© Andrea Solero/AFP/Getty ImagesÖtzi, the Iceman, tattooed and full of goat fat.
Imagine you're out for an evening of pizza and beer and on the way home you're flash-frozen into a block of ice, only to have hordes of scientists thaw you out a few thousand years later and systematically
delve into every conceivable aspect of your long-lost life.
Such has been the fate Ötzi, also known as the Iceman, whose frozen body was
discovered in 1991 by a pair of German tourists hiking in the southern Tyrol on the border between Austria and Italy. Ötzi's corpse was found at an elevation of 3210 metres above sea level, where it had rested undisturbed for more than 5300 years.
In the latest examination, researchers
reporting in the journal Current Biology say their in-depth analysis of his stomach contents reveals much about his dietary habits. Among other things, they say,
his last meal was heavy on fat.When Ötzi was discovered, what was at first thought to be the corpse of some unfortunate modern-day climber was eventually revealed to be that of oldest naturally preserved ice mummy.
Since then, study of Ötzi, his clothing and the tools and weapons he carried have revealed much about life in the Copper Age, or Eneolithic Period.
Much has been
written, for example, about his more than 50 tattoos.
Researchers led by Frank Maixner, of the Eurac Research Institute for Mummy Studies, in Bolzano, Italy, used highly detailed biological analysis to reconstruct the Iceman's last meal.
They found that he had a "remarkably high proportion of fat in his diet".
© Paul HANNY/Gamma-Rapho via Getty ImagesÖtzi, freshly discovered, in situ, in 1991.
The fat would have come from eating wild game such as red deer and
ibex, a type of goat found in the mountainous regions of Europe, north central Asia and northern Africa.
The Iceman's diet also included
einkorn, one of the earliest known forms of cultivated wheat, and Maixner says they also found traces of a type of toxic bracken, or fern, in his stomach.
© Xavier ROSSI / Gamma-Rapho via Getty ImagesA reconstruction of Ötzi, bundled in fur and leather, which greets visitors to the prehistorical museum in Quinson, France.
Despite previous in-depth studies into the Iceman's physiology, Maixner says his team's analysis hadn't been done previously because scientists had been unable to find the corpse's stomach, which had moved up into the body cavity during the mummification process.
It was finally spotted in 2009, during a re-investigation of CT scans, and an effort to analyse its contents was launched.
"The stomach material was, compared to previously analysed lower intestine samples, extraordinarily well preserved, and it also contained large amounts of unique biomolecules such as lipids, which opened new methodological opportunities to address our questions about Ötzi's diet," Maixner says.
The researchers combined standard microscopic and advanced molecular approaches to determine the exact composition of the Iceman's diet. This allowed them to make inferences based on ancient DNA, proteins, metabolites, and lipids.
The analysis identified ibex tissue as the most likely fat source. In fact,
about half of the stomach contents comprised animal fat.The researchers say the high-fat diet "totally makes sense", given the extreme alpine environment in which Ötzi lived and where he was found.
"The high and cold environment is particularly challenging for the human physiology and requires optimal nutrient supply to avoid rapid starvation and energy loss," says Albert Zink, also from the Eurac Research Institute.
"The Iceman seemed to have been
fully aware that fat represents an excellent energy source."
Although the presence of toxic bracken particles is more difficult to explain, the researchers say it's possible the Iceman suffered from intestinal problems related to parasites and ate the bracken as a medicine. Another possibility is that he may have used the fern leaves to wrap food and ingested toxic spores unintentionally.
The researchers say they plan to conduct further studies aimed to reconstruct the ancient gut microbiomes of the Iceman and other mummified human remains.
Reader Comments
I wonder how he managed to kill an animal with a high fat content so high up in the Alpine regions.
It is my opinion that our ancestors lived on a much more varied diet than we imagine, or are lead to believe, yes, animal products were very much a heavy part of the diet also fish and selfish in coastal areas, they also foraged from the land to provide much needed nutrients to sustain health and vitality.
I recommend watching Ray Mears Wild foods and how our ancestors in the paleolithic lived existing on wild foods, along with him on this journey is a a paleobotanist, seems to me that the diet of our ancestors may have been much varied than we are lead to believe.
He starts with comparisons between the indigenous Aboriginal population of Australia and how they foraged for food, then goes back to the UK to make comparisons, remember at one time the UK and Europe were one contiguous landmass.
Wild foods Part one Starts in Australia
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There are more episodes if one is interested enough to search
well Ibex live above the tree line and he did carry arrow heads, so at one stage he still had his bow and arrows
Also at the meeting, researchers led by geneticist Angela Graefen of the Institute for Mummies and the Iceman reported that they have succeeded in sequencing the Iceman's whole genome, despite the highly fragmented nuclear DNA. The genome has already revealed some surprises. One preliminary finding shows that the Iceman probably had brown eyes rather than the blue eyes found in many facial reconstructions done by artists. Graefen and her colleagues are also examining the DNA to see if Ötzi possessed genetic predispositions to diseases such as arthritis, which other researchers have diagnosed based on radiological and other evidence
But a team led by microbiologist Frank Maixner of the Institute for Mummies and the Iceman in Bolzano, Italy, recently reexamined computed tomography scans taken in 2005 and spotted, for the first time, the Iceman's stomach. As the researchers reported at the meeting, the organ had moved upward to an unusual position, and it looked full. When they took a sample of the stomach contents and sequenced the DNA of the animal fibers they found, they discovered that Ötzi, just 30 to 120 minutes before his death, had dined on the meat of an Alpine ibex, an animal that frequents high elevations and whose body parts were once thought to possess medicinal qualities.
What is the Institute of Mummies and Iceman? Are the scientists are known and recognized in paleo anthropology, paleo genetics, and paleo archeology
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