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Siberian Graveyard's Secrets YEKATERINBURG, Russia In a medieval Siberian graveyard a few miles south of the Arctic Circle, Russian scientists have unearthed mummies roughly 1,000 years old, clad in copper masks, hoops and plates - burial rites that archaeologists say they have never seen before. . Among 34 shallow graves were five mummies shrouded in copper and blankets of reindeer, beaver, wolverine or bear fur. Unlike the remains of Egyptian pharaohs, the scientists say, the Siberian bodies were mummified by accident. The cold, dry permafrost preserved the remains, and the copper may have helped prevent oxidation. . The discovery adds...

Academics restart work to unlock secrets of mystery medieval civilization with links to Persia on edge of the Siberian Arctic. A red-haired man was found, protected from chest to foot by copper plating [Credit: Kate Baklitskaya/Go East] The 34 shallow graves excavated by archaeologists at Zeleniy Yar throw up many more questions than answers. But one thing seems clear: this remote spot, 29 km shy of the Arctic Circle, was a trading crossroads of some importance around one millennium ago. The medieval necropolis include 11 bodies with shattered or missing skulls, and smashed skeletons. Five mummies were found to be shrouded...

New tomb for 'Altai Princess' to be built in Siberia 21:34 | 20/ 03/ 2008 NOVOSIBIRSK, March 20 (RIA Novosti) - A tomb to house the remains of a woman found after being preserved in ice for 2,500 years will be built in Siberia's Altai Republic, the director of a local museum said on Thursday. The well-preserved remains of the woman dubbed the Altai Princess were discovered in the region by a team led by a Novosibirsk archeologist in 1993 near the Mongolian border, and have been studied at the Archaeology and Ethnography Institute in Novosibirsk. Residents of Altai, where...

The ancient mummy of a mysterious young woman, known as the Ukok Princess, is finally returning home to the Altai Republic this month. She is to be kept in a special mausoleum at the Republican National Museum in capital Gorno-Altaisk, where eventually she will be displayed in a glass sarcophagus to tourists. For the past 19 years, since her discovery, she was kept mainly at a scientific institute in Novosibirsk, apart from a period in Moscow when her remains were treated by the same scientists who preserve the body of Soviet founder Vladimir Lenin. To mark the move 'home', The...