Ötzi (German: [œtsi]; c. 3275 BC – c. 3230 BC, also called The Iceman, Similaun man, or Tyrolean Iceman, is the natural mummy of a man who lived during the 4th millennium BC. Ötzi's remains were discovered on 19 September 1991 in the Ötztal Alps (hence the nickname "Ötzi") at the Austria–Italy border. He is Europe's oldest known natural human mummy, showing an unprecedented view of Chalcolithic (Copper Age) Europeans.
Because of the presence of an arrowhead embedded in his left shoulder and various other wounds, researchers believe that Ötzi was killed by another person. The nature of his life and the circumstances of his death are the subject of much investigation and speculation. His remains and personal belongings are on exhibit at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano, South Tyrol, Italy.
Ötzi was discovered on 19 September 1991 by German tourists Helmut and Erika Simon near the Tisenjoch pass in the Ötztal Alps. At about 3,210 metres (10,530 ft) above sea level, they saw the upper part of his body protruding from the ice. Because the site was close to the Austria–Italy border, both Austrian police and the Italian Carabinieri were notified. At first, Ötzi was thought to be a mountaineer who had recently died.
Attempts to recover his body began the next day but were delayed by bad weather and continued until 23 September. During this time, mountaineers Reinhold Messner and Hans Kammerlander examined some of Ötzi's belongings, including leather clothing, birch bark containers and an axe. After seeing a drawing of the axe, Messner suggested that the remains might be much older than first thought.
Before Ötzi was recovered, several people visited the site. Fragile objects were stepped on and others were removed before their locations had been recorded, destroying some evidence about where his belongings had originally been lying. Researchers later interviewed visitors to reconstruct the locations of the finds.
Ötzi was finally removed from the ice on 23 September, four days after his discovery. No archaeologist was present. A dagger was found beside him, and a long wooden object nearby was later identified as a bow. His body was flown to Vent and then taken to the Institute of Forensic Medicine in Innsbruck for examination.
It was still unclear whether Ötzi had been found in Austria or Italy. The border established under the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye of 1919 was intended to follow the Alpine watershed, but snow and ice had made the area difficult to map accurately. On 2 October, thirteen days after Ötzi's discovery, an official survey placed the find site 92.56 metres (101.22 yd) inside Italy, in South Tyrol. South Tyrol claimed ownership of Ötzi, but agreed that his body could remain temporarily in Innsbruck while examinations continued.
When Ötzi was recovered in September 1991, he was a wet mummy that had been naturally preserved in glacier ice. Although much of the fluid in his body had been lost through dehydration, he remained preserved almost in his entirety. His tissues, bones and internal organs were well preserved, and his mummified body measured about 1.54 m (5 ft 1 in) in length.
Other parts of Ötzi's body had disappeared during decomposition. His epidermis, or outer layer of skin, had been shed, and his body hair had been lost. His fingernails and toenails had also fallen off. Clumps of his dark hair were found around the body, while one fingernail and two toenails were recovered during later excavations.
Ötzi suffered further damage during his recovery and subsequent handling. A pneumatic drill damaged his hip, his left arm was broken during handling, and elements of his clothing were destroyed. His longbow was also broken during the recovery. His clothing had already been damaged by wind and weather after the surrounding ice melted and was further damaged during the recovery.
By 24 September 1991, the day after his recovery, Ötzi's body had begun to decompose. He was placed in a refrigerated cell at the Institute of Forensic Medicine in Innsbruck that simulated glacier conditions. Fungus also began growing on his skin while he was at the mortuary, and within days scientists began more rigorous efforts to stabilize the mummy.
Ötzi wore a cloak made of woven grass and a coat, a belt, a pair of leggings, a loincloth, and shoes, all made of leather of different skins. He also wore a bearskin cap with a leather chin strap. The coat, belt, leggings and loincloth were constructed of vertical strips of leather sewn together with sinew. His belt had a pouch sewn to it that contained a cache of useful items: a scraper, a drill, a flint flake, a bone awl and a dried fungus (see § Tools and equipment below).
The shoes were waterproof and wide, seemingly designed for walking across the snow. They were constructed using bearskin for the soles, deer hide for the top panels, and a netting made of tree bark. Soft grass went around the foot and in the shoe, functioning like modern socks.
The shoes have since been reproduced by a Czech academic, who said that "because the shoes are actually quite complex, I'm convinced that even 5,300 years ago, people had the equivalent of a cobbler who made shoes for other people". The reproductions were found to constitute such excellent footwear that a Czech company reportedly offered to purchase the rights to sell them. However, a more recent hypothesis by British archaeologist Jacqui Wood posits that Ötzi's shoes were actually the upper part of snowshoes. According to this theory, the item currently interpreted as part of a backpack is actually the wood frame and netting of one snowshoe and animal hide to cover the face.
The leather loincloth and hide coat were made from sheepskin. Genetic analysis showed that the sheep species was nearer to modern domestic European sheep than to wild sheep; the items were made from the skins of at least four animals. Part of the coat was made from a domesticated goat belonging to a mitochondrial haplogroup (a common female ancestor) that inhabits central Europe today. The coat was made from several animals from two different species and was stitched together using hides. The leggings were made from domesticated goat leather. A similar set of 5,000-year-old leggings discovered in Schnidejoch, Switzerland, were made from goat leather as well.
Irish and Italian researchers were able to undertake an analysis of the mitochondrial DNA from six different items of the body's clothing and published their findings in the journal Scientific Reports. These showed that the shoelaces were made from the European genetic population of cattle. The quiver was made from wild roe deer, and the fur hat was made from a genetic lineage of brown bear which lives in the region today.
Other items found with the Iceman were a copper axe with a yew handle, a chert-bladed knife with an ash handle and a quiver of 14 arrows with viburnum and dogwood shafts. Two of the arrows, which were broken, were tipped with flint and had fletching (stabilizing fins), while the other 12 were unfinished and untipped. The arrows were found in a quiver with what is presumed to be a bow string, an unidentified tool, and an antler tool which might have been used for sharpening arrow points. There was also an unfinished yew longbow that was 1.82 m (72 in) long.
Among Ötzi's possessions were berries, two birch bark baskets, and two species of polypore mushrooms with leather strings through them. One of these, the birch fungus, is known to have anthelmintic properties, and was probably used for medicinal purposes. The other was a type of tinder fungus, included with part of what appeared to be a complex firelighting kit. The kit featured pieces of over a dozen different plants, in addition to flint and pyrite for creating sparks.