In America , bogs have a pleasant connexion with New England’scranberry harvestand traditionalThanksgiving dishes . In Northern Europe , bogs offer more threatening green goods , from wads of ancient butter to leathery chunks of human eubstance — which givearchaeologistsa view of life anddeathas it was centuries ago .
For the Love of Peat
Mostbog objectshave been chance on during the cognitive operation of harvesting peat , anorganic soilcomposed of vegetation like sphagnum moss that has decayed over time . When dried , it can be burned and used as a fuel . But peat in a cold wetlandenvironmentalso creates anoxic ( atomic number 8 - gratis ) condition that decelerate the decay of organic stiff in the peat bog . The compounding of cool mood and anoxic water in these northern bogs get conditions just right for long - term saving .
Numerous examples of “ peat bog butter ” have emerged in Scotland and Ireland . These stinking , yellowish globs can weigh up to 50 kilograms ( 110 pounds ) and are broadly speaking found in wooden containers or animal hide for protection . date to 3000 BCE , some of the butter is made out of dairy fatty tissue , and some of it is made from lard or tallow , according toisotope examination . Butter was ubiquitous in many preceding eras , acting not only as a food but as a balm for wounds and a relief for cash in paying taxis , so it ’s also possible it was swallow to protect a household ’s wealth from stealer .
As weird as it must be to find a cask of rancid butter the size of it of a small nipper in a bog , imagine find ropy hunks of a human torso rather .
The peat bog - preserve people are technically naturalmummies , but their bodies are n’t like the desiccatedmummies from Egyptor freezing - dry out mummy from the high Andes . Many peat bog have highly acidic pee , which in reality dethaw skeletons by leaching out the Ca orthophosphate in the clappers . But the peel and organs are preserved thanks to the lack of O . Tannins , a chemical chemical compound in the peat , turn the hide brown and leather - like , and the result is a human - influence skin bagful that retains staggering detail — fingerprints , whiskers , wrinkles .
Some of these momma date back to 8000 BCE , and others have been transformed as recently as World War I , in the case of Russian and German soldiers who snuff it fighting in a lake district in Poland . Today , researcher count only about four dozen peat bog bodies that are integral and have appropriate archaeological linguistic context , with the majority from Europe ’s Iron Age , a time period from around 900 BCE to Roman contact in the first C CE . This time period coincided with an increment inweaponry and violencethroughout the region . Interestingly enough , bog can also contain iron , and many objects from this period were smelted frombog iron .
Violent Ends
Many bog bodies share similarities in the style of death and circumstance of sepulture . Take three of the most famous specimen : Tollund Man ( 4th century BCE ) , Grauballe Man ( tertiary century BCE ) , and Lindow Man ( 1st century CE ) . All were found mostly or altogether nude with evidence of having met vehement end .
The best study of all the bog body , Tollund Man(named for the townin Denmark near where he was discovered ) was initially thought to have been a modern execution victim when he was found in 1950 . His lack of habiliment ( save for a felt hat and a belt ) was curious — but not as strange as the remains of a noose around his neck . Forensic scientist who examined the torso in 2002 find oneself that Tollund Man ’s natural language was distended — an indication he had beenhanged . The stubble on his face suggests Tollund Man did n’t shave for at least a day prior , and analysis of his gut contents let out a meal of barleycorn and flax porridge eaten 12 to 24 hours before death .
A couple yr afterward , a peat pinnace discoveredGrauballe Manin a bog about 18 kilometers ( 11 miles ) from Tollund . Unlike Tollund Man , Grauballe Man was completely naked . His shock of red hair appear almost like a wig , the resultant of discoloration from the bog . No running noose was found with this body ; rather , his neck opening had been slit capable so violently that his trachea and esophagus were severed . Grauballe Man ’s corpse actually include castanets . He was likely an older grownup , based on the devolution of his spine , and his dentition suggested his puerility need period of poor health .
Lindow Man , discovered in 1984 in a peat bog near Manchester , is the most complete bog body found in the UK . He wore a fox - fur armband , but otherwise was completely naked . And his destruction was perhaps the most violent of all have sex bog bodies . First , he was clocked on the top dog with a blunt object ; he may have fallen unconscious but did n’t die from the injury ; there is evidence of tenuous healing in the wounding . He was stabbed in the breast but also strangled with a sinew corduroy that was recovered with his consistence . Other wounds include a unkept costa and broken neck vertebra , but with archaeo - forensic cases , it is not always possible to assure which injuries happened when . For his last repast , Lindow Man appears to have had goner .
Other examples of dispatch men thrown into ancient peat bog include Dätgen Man from Germany , who had been tick , prod , and decapitated ; the Nieuw - Weerdingen Men from the Netherlands , one of whom had been disemboweled ; and Old Croghan Man from Ireland , whose nipples had been cut out , perhaps as a way of rack him before demise .
They were n’t all military personnel , either . One of the Borremose Women from Denmark was get a line with a belt around her neck and an infant in her blazon . “ Moora ” from Germany is mostly skeletonized , but she was malnourished and had lose two skull faulting before her death . And Kayhausen Boy from Germany was around 7 to 10 years former when he was knife repeatedly in the throat and build up . Especially poignant was his infected articulatio coxae socket , which would have incapacitate him and cause him infliction at the destruction of his short sprightliness .
The substantial question that ’s been haunt archaeologists since the peat bog bodies bulge to be reveal in the 19th hundred is , why were all these people bump off ? There are n’t yet any definitive answers , in particular because bog bodies traverse nearly 10 millennium and much of a continent . Any account for violence and entombment in the past tense has to be based in large part on cultivation , and culture change dramatically over time and place .
For the most part , archaeologists have advanced two general theories for the murders of the peat bog bodies . The much to begin with Bronze Age bodies are believe to have been human ritual killing , peculiarly because many of the people were adolescents and young adult when they were killed .
The second possibility relate the Iron Age organic structure , which may have been those of criminals or other hoi polloi think socially deviant . Artifact evidence suggest that bog may have hold ritual meaning since they are an interesting geographical feature article : neither upstanding farming nor open water . During a riotous time just prior to extend impinging with the Romans , where northern European groups begin to see the start of power structure and societal grade differentiation , perhaps ignominious sepulture in a bog was Iron Age the great unwashed ’s direction of separate “ us ” from “ them . ”
Digging for DNA
Since 2000 , about half - a - 12 bog bodies have been discovered in Ireland , and young studies of bog body found X ago are give us newfangled insight into living in northern Europe in the first millenary BCE .
contemporaneous proficiency to analyze the bodies include 3D CT scanning , which does n’t destroy the tegument the way that traditional autopsy would . The diet of the bog people is being reconstructed through carefully extracted gut mental object and chemical analysis , let on varied diet with a lot of grain and local seeds . The dead body are also revealing their parasite . Every single bog consistence that has been straight off examined with modern techniques hashad a parasitic infection , commonly roundworm or whipworm .
One thing that archeologist are still miss , however , is high - quality deoxyribonucleic acid from the remains . Though Grauballe Man wastested for ancient DNA , his body did not produce any , probably because the acidic condition in the peat bog damaged the proteins on which ancient DNA examination is typically done . As this technology come on , bog bodies ’ deoxyribonucleic acid may shortly give us deeper insights into their life history .
But all of this information is still make out from item-by-item remains . Unlike with bioarchaeological research , which uses hundreds of frame from one cemetery to understand whole populations of past the great unwashed , bog body are still found in isolated context of use , strictly by chance . The late finds in Ireland , however , suggest that more bog body will amount to the surface . When they do , archaeologists and forensic specialist arm with the latest techniques will be on hand to palaver novel clues from the depths of the peat bog .
let on More Fascinating Stories About archeology :
A version of this report was published in 2016 ; it has been update for 2024 .
