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On Thursday, September 19, 1991, at about 1.30 p.m. on a sunny afternoon Erika and Helmut Simon, from Nuremberg in Germany, were enjoying a vacation walking through icy and rock-strewn terrain high up on a mountain overlooking the Ötz valley in the Alpine borderlands between Austria and Italy.
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On Thursday, September 19, 1991, at about 1.30 p.m. on a sunny afternoon Erika and Helmut Simon, from Nuremberg in Germany, were enjoying a vacation walking through icy and rock-strewn terrain high up on a mountain overlooking the Ötz valley in the Alpine borderlands between Austria and Italy. The ice man
On their descent from a peak near Tisenjoch they strayed a little from the recommended route in the hope of finding a short cut and, as they traversed an elevated plateau near a retreating mountain glacier at some 10,531 feet above sea level, they passed a gully filled with thawing ice and melt-water within which they noticed something unusual. Further investigation showed this object to be an actual human corpse. The ice man
Much of these human remains lay under the ice and melt-water but the back of the head and upper back and shoulders were exposed - the Simons also noticed several pieces of rolled-up tree bark near the body and took a picture of what they now presumed to be the unfortunate victim of some sort of, quite recent, accident on the mountain before leaving to report their find. The ice man
The following day two "officiating" Austrians, a policeman and a mountain rescue officer, showed up to try to recover the remains - with the aid of a pneumatic drill! Unfortunately the weather was markedly less kind than when the body was discovered and the pair worked semi-immersed in freezing waters and some damage was done to the left of the frozen ice mummy as it lay under the ice and the freezing cold water. The ice man
On Sunday 21st many objects strewn at a various distances around the gully were recovered. The next day the ice mummy itself was removed under the supervision of a forensic expert with the process being recorded on film. Numerous pieces of leather and hide, string, straps and clumps of hay were also recovered and preserved for further study. The remains were then taken to the Institute of Forensic Medicine in Innsbruck, Austria. The ice man
The gully in which the body was found had helped to preserve it, in its frozen state, from the immense weight of snow which seems to have covered the site for most of the several millennia since Ötzi, ( pronounced Oot-zee, and often actually spelled Oetzi ), lost his life. Ötzi's remains must have been claimed by icy cold quite soon after his demise as even his internal organs were found to be intact - they were able for instance to actually analyze his stomach contents which included ibex meat and primitively cultivated "einkorn" grains. The ice man
Over several years of subsequent investigation forensic findings relating to this frozen body in the Alps included the time of death as being some 5,300 years ago - in the stone age! The deceased being a male of some 45 years of age with tattoos on his body and worn, but otherwise perfect, teeth and a probably quite troublesome infestation of intestinal whipworms. The deceased had come to a violent end - an arrowhead was found buried in the body and there was evidence of Ötzi having been struck with a blunt instrument. The ice man
As to the tattoos - one of several groups of vertical lines are located to the left and right of the spinal column. Others are on the left calf, on the right instep and on the inner and outer ankle joint, two further lines cross the left wrist. A cross-shaped mark appears on the back of the right knee and beside the left Achilles tendon. The ice man
. Later researchers considered that the tattoos may have been intended as therapeutic measures to hopefully combat arthritis rather than as decorative or religious symbols as, astonishingly, these tattooed areas seem to correspond to accepted skin acupuncture lines. Before Ötzi it was thought that this treatment had only originated two thousand years later in Asia. The ice man
The remains of Ötzi the Iceman now lie in the Südtiroler Archeologiemuseum in Bozen / Bolzano in Italy's South Tyrol where they are stored in a nitrogen rich atmosphere under conditions of controlled temperature and humidity for their preservation but can be seen through a 16 X 12 viewing window by interested visitors. The ice man
Here is what you must solve: How was he killed? Who killed him? What was the motive? Was the ice man alone? Was the ice man a warrior or just a traveler? How long did he live after he was shot by the arrow? The ice man
Form into groups and come up with solutions to these questions. Good Luck. The ice man
