Iceman Oetzi's Last Supper

ScienceDaily ^ | Monday, December 1, 2008 | adapted from Dickson et al

[SunkenCiv]

From the analysis of the intestinal contents of the 5,200-year-old Iceman from the Eastern Alps, Professor James Dickson from the University of Glasgow in the UK and his team have shed some light on the mummy's lifestyle and some of the events leading up to his death. By identifying six different mosses in his alimentary tract, they suggest that the Iceman may have travelled, injured himself and dressed his wounds. The Iceman is the first glacier mummy to have fragments of mosses in his intestine. This is surprising as mosses are neither palatable nor nutritious and there are few reports of mosses used for internal medical treatments. Rather, mosses recovered from archaeological sites tend to have been used for stuffing, wiping and wrapping... In particular, the authors of the new article in Vegetation History and Archaeobotany suggest that one type of moss is likely to have been used to wrap food, another is likely to have been swallowed when the Iceman drank water during the last few days of his life, and yet another would have been used as a wound dressing. One type of moss in the Iceman's gut is not known in the region where the mummy was found, implying that the Iceman must have travelled.

[SunkenCiv]

and for the one which follows, thanks LucyT.

Iceman Mummy Had Moss in His Tummy
by Jeanna Bryner
LiveScience via Yahoo

The remains of the Iceman (also called Ötzi, Frozen Fritz and Similaun Man) were discovered accidentally in 1991 by German tourists in the Eastern Alps. Since then, a suite of tests has opened a window into the guy's life and death. For instance, the Iceman was about 45 years old when he died some 5,200 years ago; he was probably a hunter-gatherer while alive; he sustained a shoulder injury from an arrow and might have died from head trauma; and his last meal included unleavened bread and meat... The food-wrapping moss is called Neckera complanata. And the Iceman probably accidentally ingested a moss called Hymenostylium recurvirostrum along with some drinking water before he died. And he could have applied the bogmoss Sphagnum imbricatum as a wound dressing. That particular bogmoss does not grow, at least today, within about 30 miles (50 km) of the site where Ötzi was found, the researchers say, suggesting the Iceman must have been a traveler... Researchers in the past have found two wounds on the Iceman, one in the back from an arrow and the other a deep cut in his right palm.

[SunkenCiv]

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[Ciexyz]

Perhaps he was too weakened from his wounds to gather better food.

[SunkenCiv]

Could have been the time of the year when there wasn’t anything else, and no one climbs the Alps looking for food. He was trying to escape, or trying to get back home imho.

[piasa]

This is surprising as mosses are neither palatable nor nutritious and there are few reports of mosses used for internal medical treatments

I beg to differ with them... arctic peoples, when they killed a caribou or other grazing animal, used to and perhaps still do eat the stomach contents of those animals. The reason? Apparently because someone earlier in prehistory dared to try it and found the stuff kept him or her alive. The animals grazed on moss and lichen and when it's partially digested it it is a rich source of vitamins, particularly vitamin C, not otherwise easy to come by in cold parts of the world.

[bigheadfred]

I think the practice was more widely spread than the Arctic. Trappers (American) used the same practice. I haven’t researched whether they adopted it from the Indians. But it was (also) a source for the vitamins you can’t get by just eating beavers (in the dead of winter)

[tubebender]

My First Wife was watching a show on Oetzi the other night and came to the conclusion that he was related to her because her Mother came from Austria and First Wife still has relatives there that she corresponds with. I told her it may be but no one really knows where he was from.

No, I did not tell her that her Mother resembled Oetzi...

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks!

[SunkenCiv]

Wise move. :’)

[tubebender]

My MiL was born in Malnitz on the Austrian Italian border so she may have dated... naaahhhh

[tubebender]

Could Oetzi have eaten a snow rabbit that had dined on Moss?

[SunkenCiv]

:’) You realize of course, we could all blackmail you now... ;’)