TALKABOUT ARCHAEOLOGY Tollund Man, Denmark ReSUrreCTioN SHUFFLE From Dublin to Denmark, Some day I will go to Aarhus museums are uncovering the To see his peat-brown head, The mild pods of his eye-lids, secrets of the Iron Age, men and His pointed skin cap. women uncannily preserved in peat bogs and glaciers for In The Tollund Man from his Wintering Out collection (1972), the late Irish poet Seamus Heaney was writing about the extraordinar- millennia. Chris Wright ily well-preserved mummified corpse of a 2350-year-old Iron Age delves into these mysteries man recovered from a Danish peat bog in May 1950. In fact, Heaney did eventually meet Tollund Man – however, it was in the Silkeborg of ancient history. Museum, 40km west of Aarhus on the Jutland peninsula. tollund man photography: corbis; photo borders: shutterstock.com APRIl 2014 QANTAS 133 Ötztal Alps, on the border between Austria and Italy THERE IS MUCH TO BE LEARNED... THEIR LAST Ötzi the MEAL... VENISON, BERRIES Iceman AND EINKORN FOR ÖTZI tztal alps: alamy Ö An entire European trip can be constructed around viewing these people who discovered them reported them to the police as recent Iron Age remains. Tollund Man is by far the best preserved, but is murder victims. They do vary in condition; all that’s readily recognis- just one of many similar corpses given up by the peat-bog belt that able of Elling Woman is her clothing and plaited hair, for example, stretches from Ireland across the middle of England into Denmark. while Lindow Man’s features have been distorted to resemble Edvard The Silkeborg Museum also houses another, Elling Woman, while Munch’s The Scream. But seeing Tollund Man is an unforgettable Grauballe Man resides at the Moesgaard Museum Aarhus (closed experience. Were it not for the fact that his skin has been dyed black pending relocation to a new building this northern autumn). Lindow over the centuries by the peat bog, it would seem he was asleep. Man, discovered in a bog in Cheshire in 1984, resides in the British Clearly apparent are the individual bristles of his beard, the lines Museum in London; Old Croghan Man, found in County Offaly, plus around his closed eyes, the contours of his lips, arranged as if in a several others, at the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin. All are pleasant dream. He’s almost smiling. Iron Age bodies, all more than 2000 years old. “When you look at him,” says Ole Nielsen, director of the Silkeborg The grandfather of them all is Ötzi the Iceman, a 5300-year-old Museum, “you say: ‘He’s like me’.” It really makes you think you’re hunter-gatherer who emerged from a glacier on the border between coming face to face with prehistory.” south tyrol museum of ochsenreiter; archaeology/a Austria and Italy in September, 1991. Today, Ötzi resides at the © South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano, in the German- TheRE IS MUch TO BE LEARned from these speaking part of Alpine Italy. finds. Their last meal, for instance – in the case of Tollund Man, a Unlike mummified Egyptian corpses, these recovered bodies are porridge made from grains and seeds; unleavened bread made with exposed, their faces clear, their overall condition remarkable. Almost wheat and barley and baked over an open fire for Cheshire’s Lindow tzi photography: all, including Ötzi and Tollund Man, were so well kept that the Man; venison, berries and einkorn (native wheat) for Ötzi. Ö 134 QANTAS APRIL 2014 Peat in a Jutland pine forest, prime bog body territory (left); Silkeborg Museum, home of Tollund Man and Elling Woman (above) Extensive examination of Ötzi suggests he died in spring or early stand on other people’s shoulders,” says Nielsen. “Who were those summer, at the age of about 46; that he had eaten within a couple of people way down in the chain upon whose shoulders I stand?” hours of his death; that he probably smelted copper. He was lactose- While Ötzi was clearly frozen in the ice, the peat-bog bodies exist intolerant, suffered arthritis, had intestinal worms – and carbon because of a curious combination of circumstances. Peat bogs are tattoos, which may have been a form of acupuncture 2000 years cold, acidic and lacking in oxygen, which prevents microorganisms before the Chinese were believed to have invented it. that would normally break down the body. It’s likely that all the bodies that survived were buried in bog water that was below 4°C, TheY ALL DIed VIOLenTLY. Ötzi was shot with an and must have been covered quickly. Elling Woman and Tollund arrow and probably bled to death (an arrowhead was found in his Man were found 80m apart, at a 12-year interval. Probably there are shoulder and he had head injuries). Grauballe Man’s throat was cut. others in Denmark and Ireland, a couple of metres into the bog, just Lindow Man was struck on the head, strangled with a cord and had waiting to be found by the farmers who dig up the peat to use as fuel. his throat cut. Old Croghan Man was apparently tortured, stabbed The bodies have a different resonance according to where they’re and decapitated; Elling Woman and Tollund Man were also both housed. Tollund Man is the centrepiece of the Silkeborg Museum; strangled with nooses. So there is one more reason to be interested Ötzi is largely the reason for the existence of the South Tyrol in these dead bodies: they present intriguing mysteries. Museum, which recreates what he might have looked like. Lindow “We know he was hanged,” says Nielsen of Tollund Man, “but we Man is in a corner on the third floor of the British Museum. Among don’t know why. Did he hang himself? Was he punished for some all the plunder in that extraordinary place, he doesn’t even make the wrongdoing? Was he a sacrifice to the gods?” top 10 “don’t miss” exhibits on the museum’s free map. The third is the most widely supported theory, as Iron Age Because of the stark evidence of a brutal past, some have found sacrifices were often made in bogs. But whatever the reason, an emotional resonance in the bodies – none more so than Heaney, someone cared about him. “Someone has taken him down after- the Nobel Prize-winning poet. Writing in conflict-torn 1970s Ireland, wards and put him to rest in the bog, in a sleep-like position. You he saw in the tribal sacrifices and executions of these old civilisations don’t look like that if you have just been hanged: somebody has an uncomfortable echo of modern Ireland and wondered how far we closed his eyes, his mouth, shown care for him and put him at rest.” had really come in all that time. The bog people gave him a metaphor Tantalisingly, however, much remains unknown about these to write about Ireland during “The Troubles”. people. “I’d very much like to take a USB and plug it into his brain to download what he saw,” says Nielsen. “What language did he talk? As The Tollund Man concludes: What did he think? What values did he have, what gods did he Out here in Jutland believe in, what were the issues of his life and time? Was he happy?” In the old man-killing parishes There is still an enormous amount, culturally, that is unknown about prehistory, as any trip to Stonehenge, with its myriad theories I will feel lost, and guesses, affirms. “We are a culture, and a culture is that you Unhappy and at home. jutland forest photography: alamy; museum: getty images 136 QANTAS APRIL 2014.