Introducing the Iceman
One of the most interesting people in history is probably someone you have never heard of.
We will call him Iceman because his body was frozen in ice for several thousand years.
His body was discovered in 1991 by two hikers in the mountains near the boder of Austria and Italy.
The lower part of his body was still forzen in ice,but the upper part was uncovered and visible.
Once the body was extracted from the ice it was taken in for examination.
Upon examination,scientists determined that the Iceman lived around 5300 years ago.
This was at the end of the Stone Age,nearly 1000 years before the great pyramids were built.
This made him the oldest mummy ever found.
Iceman's body was in good condition when it was found.
People believed that the body was one of many hikers who had been lost in recent years.
Nobody suspected that the body was as old as it was.
It had been preserved by the ice for thousands of years.
Given it's good condition,studying it was like opening a window in time.
Scientists could learn a lot about how people lived 5000 years ago.
The Iceman lived at the end of the Stone Age,a time of great change in human history.
Hunting was still a major source of food,but people were begining to farm.
People were settling down and forming communities.
These communities were claiming territory and setting up boundaries.
As a result,sometimes they had to fight to defend their territory from outsiders.
The village where the Iceman lived was probably not far from where he died.
Perhaps he was killed in a battle with outsiders.
(Communities were claiming territory and fighting to defend it from outsiders.)
(It was in good condition because it has been preserved by the ice.)
Death of the Iceman
Ice man was about 45 years old when he died.
He was 1.6 meters tall and weight about 50 kilograms when he was alive.
Along with the body were some other objects.
These included some weapons,including a bow and arrow,a knife and an ax.
He was still wearing one of his shoes and had a backpack with a wooden frame.
He also had some plants that may have been used for medical purposes.
Further examination of the body showed that he was well fed with a diet of meat,bread and fruit.
In fact ,he had eaten several meals within a few hours of his death.
From all the evindence,he probably had a good life.
Perhaps he was hunting for food when he was caught in a sudden storm.
For several years after the discovery the body scientists believed that he died from the cold.
Weather is unpredicatable in the area where he was found,so perhaps he was caught in an unexpected storm.
However,10 years after his body was found,new evidence point to a new cause of death.
In 2001,examiners X-rayed the body and found an arrowhead deep in the Iceman's chest.
Further analysis revealed that the Iceman had been shot from behind.
The arrow had cut through an artery and had caused severe bleeding.
Clearly,it was a case of murder,the oldest case of murder ever discovered.
(He ate several meals with in a few hours of his death.)
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