We have all heard a lot about ancient Egyptian mummies, because they tell us about them at school. Much has been written about Otzi - the "ice man", a mummy frozen into the ice high in the Alpine mountains, or about the mummified princess Ukok.
Meanwhile, nature itself took care to preserve for us not single bodies of ancient people, but many, and they are found almost in the very center of Europe.
These are marsh people, or marsh bodies, often very well-preserved mummified remains of people found in the peat bogs of Northern Europe: in England, Denmark, Germany, as well as the Netherlands, Ireland and Sweden. It is interesting that the skin and internal organs of the swamp mummies have been preserved, which makes them very interesting objects for scientific research.
A mummy called "The Woman of Huldremos". Discovered in 1879 near the Ramten settlement in Denmark. Radiocarbon analysis showed that the woman lived in the Iron Age, around 160 BC. e. - 340 A. D. e.
Age of mummies
In total, more than a thousand ancient mummies were found in the peat bogs of Europe, which are quite well preserved due to the preserving properties of peat. Suffice it to say that some of the bodies are practically untouched by decay, although most of them are incomparably worse preserved.
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As a rule, they were found by local workers who mined peat in the swamps. That is why many of the finds were lost to science - ignorant people simply did not report them anywhere.
Thanks to modern methods of radiocarbon analysis, it was possible to find out that they all lived about 2000-2500 years ago, but more ancient finds are also known, for example, a woman from Kölbjerg, who died around 8000 BC.
It is possible that the bodies of criminals were "buried" in the swamps
What was on the menu?
In fact, the scientists who fall into the hands of the swamp mummies have to act as detectives. That is, they need to establish the cause of death, the motive for the "crime", and also collect "evidence" - a variety of artifacts accompanying the mummified corpse. An autopsy of ancient bodies is mandatory, after which a "history" of each such mummy is created based on the totality of the collected facts.
For example, the study of the contents of the digestive tracts made it possible to find out what these ancient people ate, at least shortly before their death. Thus, a famous man from Tollund ate porridge of 40 types of grain and seeds. And judging by the small bones in the stomach of the man from Groboll, he ate meat shortly before his death.
The analysis of the composition of the preserved hair also helped in this. According to him, for example, they found out that a man from Klonikavan ate a lot of vegetables, which means that he died, most likely in the summer. It should be noted that although the people of the swamp have black skin and red hair, they were not blacks. The reason for such dramatic color changes is the specific effect of peat.
Swamp fashion styles
The specific features of peat, which is an excellent natural preservative, led to the fact that fragments of clothing were preserved on some mummified bodies. For example, a leather hat with fur inside a man from Tollund; a woolen dress found near the burial place of a woman from Huldremos, etc.
It also turned out that the man from Klonikawan was a big mod, as he styled his hair with a mixture of resin and vegetable oil.
But the hair on the head of the man from Osterby was tied in a knot over the right temple, which corresponds to the hairstyles of the Suevi people described in Tacitus. The woman from Elling had hair about 90 centimeters long, braided and, moreover, styled into a complex hairstyle.
The Elling woman and the hairstyle she had
Victims of religion or criminals?
What are the reasons why all these people have found their last refuge in the swamp? Scientists believe that those without traces of external influences have simply drowned. But others could well be sacrifices to the gods or criminals punished for some deeds.
The fact is that very often traces of suffocation are found on marsh bodies or their throats were cut. Well, the swamp itself was very close. The bodies of executed criminals and people sacrificed to the gods were thrown into it.
Tollund Man
Now let's get to know at least some of the swamp mummies. The best place to start would be with a man from Tollund, who was found on May 6, 1950 by the inhabitants of the village of Tollund in Denmark during peat works. In 1927 and 1938, bodies of ancient people were already found here, in particular, the body of a woman from Elling (located in the Silkeborg Museum), but this mummy is perhaps the best preserved.
It turned out that the man from Tollund was no more than 162 centimeters tall. The medical examiner, having examined the body, said that he was strangled and only then he was thrown into the swamp. Since the internal organs were very well preserved, it was found out that at the time of his death he was about 40 years old.
It is possible that he was buried either in late autumn or early spring, and the water into which the body fell was cold, and then peat had already done its job. He lived at the beginning of the Iron Age, but that's who he was: a slave, a free man, a sacrifice to the gods or a criminal, it is, alas, impossible to find out today. You can see it in the Silkeborg Museum, but only the head survived from the find. The rest of the body is an elaborate dummy.
Groboll Man
This body is also very well preserved, and it was found on April 26, 1952, in the same peat bog near Silkeborg in Denmark. The nails of the mummy's fingers are preserved, and the head is covered with hair. The unfortunate's throat was cut from ear to ear, and why he was killed in this way, we, again, can only guess.
According to radiocarbon analysis, the Groboll man lived at about the same time as the Tollund man, that is, at the beginning of the Iron Age, and he died at the age of about 30. Moreover, his height was 175 centimeters, which is not bad by today's standards. The mummy of a man from Groboll is exhibited in the museum in the Danish city of Aarhus.
Woman from Haraldsker
This bog body was found as early as 1835 in a swamp in Jutland. Death dates back to the 5th century BC. In the anaerobic conditions of the peat bogs, the body was mummified, so that both the skin and internal organs were preserved. The woman was small, about 1.5 meters tall.
The woman died at the age of 50, and scientists did not find any senile diseases in her. This is also believed to be a victim, as there is a rope mark on the neck. The find is on display in a richly decorated glazed sarcophagus in the Church of St. Nicholas in the center of the Danish city of Vejle.
Lindow Man
Swamp people have also been found in England, for example, the body of a man named by journalists Pete Marsh (ie "peat bog") was discovered in 1984. First, they found a woman's head and … turned to the police, it is so well preserved. Well, the police immediately arrested a local resident who was suspected of murdering his wife back in the 1950s.
As a result, he confessed to the murder and that he dismembered the corpse and threw it into the swamp. But radiocarbon analysis showed that the head belongs to a woman who died in the 1st or 2nd century. Then Pete Marsh himself was found here, who, as it turned out, died more than a thousand years ago.
Scientists have found that at the time of death, the man from Lindow was about 25 years old. He was 168 centimeters tall and weighed 60-65 kilograms. Interestingly, both the beard and mustache of the young man were trimmed with scissors before his death.
He was not sick with anything special, except for helminthiasis, but died from a blow with something heavy on the head - perhaps a stone ax, and they also cut his throat. You can see the man from Lindow on display at the British Museum in London.
Clonikawan man
Another marsh body was found in England in 2003 in the Klonikavan marshes in County Meath, Ireland.
The mummy has survived so well that at first police forensic experts took care of it. Then it turned out that the age of the body is about 2300 years, and the find was passed on to scientists.
The mummy is interesting primarily because the hair on her head was styled using a kind of "hair gel", which included ingredients confirming that trade between Ireland and southern Europe was already underway. For some characteristic features in appearance, the mummy was nicknamed David Beckham.
Clonikavan man. Mummy and face reconstruction (below)
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Swamp body from Windeby
A mummy called "Windeby Marsh Body" (formerly called "Windeby Girl") discovered in a peat bog in northern Germany.
The body was found in 1952 by peat workers. With the help of spore-pollen analysis, it was found that the teenager died in the Iron Age at the age of 14. In 2002, using radiocarbon analysis, the time of his death was more accurately dated - between 41 and 118 AD. e.
During the first study, the sex of the teenager was incorrectly established - the delicate structure of the skeleton suggested that the corpse belonged to a girl. However, recent studies do not exclude that it could also belong to a boy.
The cause of death has not been established. There are versions that death was from hunger (defects on the bones and impaired growth symbolize exhaustion during life). Others assume (assuming it was a girl) that she was killed for adultery.
Vyacheslav SHPAKOVSKY, magazine "Secrets of the XX century" №30 2016