Day 8 Ötzi the Iceman

Today was Ötzi Day.  For you uninitiated in The World of Ötzi, you should find this interesting.  Others of you that have followed Ötzi since he was first discovered in 1991 will be glad to know he has found a happy home and is being well taken care of.

Briefly, and you really need to check out this and this to get a good background on Ötzi.  For the unwilling, Ötzi was discovered accidentally by Austrian trekkers.  His half exposed corpse was sticking out of a snowbank.  Initially, it was thought he died in the last few centuries.  But, after some good science, he was dated to around 3300BC! 

He was dressed in his best hunting gear (all layers came from a total of 8 animals), with his bow and arrows, a knife, a copper ax, first aid kit, and fire making kit.  He also had 61 tattoos.  Until 2001 it was assumed he had died of starvation or freezing to death until through more sophisticated imaging they discovered he had suffered an arrow wound and had bled to death.  He was MURDERED!

See Wikipedia as to what Otzi looks like now, this is a wax model of him.  Very lifelike!

It was soon discovered that two of his arrows had blood on them fr\om two different individuals, and there was blood on his outer coat with a third type of blood.  His stomach was full at death and the arrow came from behind him.  Perhaps revenge for the killing of 2 or 3 others.  He was 5'3" and around 45 years old.  Bad knees, bad teeth, he had lived a tough life.  But within hours or days, he was covered with snow and frozen in place for over 5000 years.  (What they call a 'wet mummy', he still had intact red blood cells in his veins).  A real glimpse into history.  An amazing museum.

I asked him to smile, he didn't appreciate my attitude.