Otzi's last meal was "bacon"-Stone Age style

Angela

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The findings from the Zink team are coming out at a truly glacial pace, pun intended. :)

See:
https://phys.org/news/2017-01-iceman-oetzi-meal-stone-age.html

"His last meal was most likely dried goat meat, according to scientists who recently managed to dissect the contents of Oetzi's stomach."We've analysed the meat's nanostructure and it looks like he ate very fatty, dried meat, most likely bacon," German mummy expert Albert Zink said at a talk in Vienna late Wednesday."
Maybe this is the equivalent of carrying meat jerky? It makes more sense than stopping to hunt if he was being pursued.
 
Preserved dry meat is an indication that he went on a long trip. This is best food to take with.
 
Does this mean his people had domesticated animals?
 
Sorry, I should have said. This particular "bacon" was from wild goat or ibex, which means his group hunted. (It's apparently very fatty, which couldn't have been good for his arteriosclerosis.) However, as LeBrok said, they did keep domesticated animals. We know that because of his clothing among other things.

"Otzi’s “trousers” consisted of two separate leggings approx. 65 cm in length. They were made from strips of domestic goat and sheep hide."

The same was true of his coat and "underwear".

Also, "
The belt consisted of a calfskin strip 4 to 5 cm wide."

http://www.iceman.it/en/clothing/

In terms of food, he also ate bread, so they managed to grow grains as well. He seems to come from a typical Neolithic/Copper Age community, growing cereals, using domesticated animals, but also supplementing with wild plants and animals. (There are indications of wild berries and herbs in his diet as well.)

"
The samples that were pulled showed einkorn wheat finely ground, that would have come from einkorn grain ground down to flour and baked into bread."
http://www.einkorn.com/otzi-the-icemans-last-meal-included-einkorn-wheat-bread/

He also carried a copper ax, of course, with copper sourced not to the Alpine region as some expected, but to Central Italy.
http://www.natureworldnews.com/arti...r-unlocked-mummy-copper-axe-central-italy.htm

Were people importing copper from Central Italy to make the axe, or did Otzi himself originally come from Central Italy? We'll probably never know.
 
The findings from the Zink team are coming out at a truly glacial pace, pun intended. :)

See:
https://phys.org/news/2017-01-iceman-oetzi-meal-stone-age.html

His last meal was most likely dried goat meat, according to scientists who recently managed to dissect the contents of Oetzi's stomach.

"We've analysed the meat's nanostructure and it looks like he ate very fatty, dried meat, most likely bacon," German mummy expert Albert Zink said at a talk in Vienna late Wednesday." Maybe this is the equivalent of carrying meat jerky? It makes more sense than stopping to hunt if he was being pursued.


Bacon? Awesome. :) Even today, Speck, a dry-cured and lightly smoked ham, is a typical South Tyrol product, the same area in northern Italy where Otzi has been found. The German word Speck "has its roots in the Middle High German word “spec” and the Ancient High German word “spek” and actually translates into “something thick, fat." But the German Speck is different from the South Tyrolean Speck.

According to the Speck Alto Adige/South Tyrol Consortium:

"Speck Alto Adige/South Tyrol is in no way related to the standard fatty pork belly speck described by the common German term. Speck is the result of a combination of two methods used to preserve meat: the standard Mediterranean style curing process for raw ham and smoking, which is a process typically used in Northern Europe."

South Tyrolean speck is like an Italian ham (the Italian "spalla" not the "coscia") plus the northern European smoking. Just like Otzi who lived probably at the intersection of the two worlds (the Mediterranean and the Alpine one). According to some source the salting/curing of pig's or a wild boar's hind leg or thigh is attested at least since the Etruscans, but it's clearly older.

3eea371342.jpg




He also carried a copper ax, of course, with copper sourced not to the Alpine region as some expected, but to Central Italy.

http://www.natureworldnews.com/arti...r-unlocked-mummy-copper-axe-central-italy.htm

Were people importing copper from Central Italy to make the axe, or did Otzi himself originally come from Central Italy? We'll probably never know.


Yes Central Italy, strictly speaking Southern Tuscany, most likely Colline Metallifere (from where the HGDP sample comes from). Italian Colline Metallifere = Metal-bearing Hills. The metal deposits of southern Tuscany are considered crucial for the development of the Etruscan civilization, which is much later time when Otzi lived.

Otzi was likely part of the Remedello culture, and Remedello culture, according to an old Treccani article (1965) written by Italian archaeologist Alba Palmieri, had extensions in Emilia and Toscana. Also Rinaldone culture in northern Lazio (one of the two or three proto-Etruscan cultures) and Gaudo culture in Campania (in Salerno area, exactly in the Etruria Campana) were both considered "remedelliane" by Palmieri. The main difference, according to Palmieri, is that Remedello had more western relations ("elementi ibero-mediterranei"), on the other hand both Rinaldone and Gaudo had more Balkans relations.


REMEDELLO, Civiltà di. - Questo nome è dato ad una facies culturale della preistoria italiana, avente l'area di maggior diffusione nella Valle Padana ed estendentesi in Emilia e in Toscana. Essa è conosciuta attraverso materiali provenienti da vasti sepolcreti, il più importante dei quali, Remedello di Sotto, nel Bresciano, ha dato il nome alla cultura. I gruppi di R. presentano una fisionomia culturale per cui ben si inseriscono nel numero delle comunità mobili di trafficantiguerrieri che, nella prima metà del II millennio, si diffondono in Europa e nel bacino del Mediterraneo contrapponendosi alle popolazioni agricole stabilmente insediate. In Italia tali sono, oltre i Remedelliani, i portatori delle culture di Rinaldone (v.) e del Gaudo (v.), da cui però la civiltà di R., in cui si fondono elementi ibero-mediterranei, si differenzia per il suo contenuto essenzialmente occidentale.

Italian archaeologists have always believed that the copper for Remedello axes came precisely from Tuscany, as written by Alba Palmieri on 1965.

L'industria litica produceva asce levigate e numerose, grandi armi silicee quali cuspidi di freccia o giavellotto e pugnali. La lavorazione del rame, forse estratto in Toscana, forniva pugnali triangolari costolati, alabarde ed asce piatte.

Source: http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/civilta-di-remedello_(Enciclopedia-dell'-Arte-Antica)/

Studio Unipd: il metallo dell’ascia dell’uomo del Similaun proviene dalla Toscana

http://www.unipd.it/ilbo/studio-unipd-metallo-dell’ascia-dell’uomo-similaun-proviene-dalla-toscana




There is a Special Exhibition from 02 February 2016 to 14 January 2018 at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano.

The first metal was discovered over 10,000 years ago. It was a revolutionary step for mankind. Someone must have found a relatively pure copper nugget by accident and realized that this unknown material could be shaped by beating. At some point our ancestors succeeded in smelting copper ore at 1000º C and fashioning it into desired forms. The triumphal march of copper began! Soon craftsmen in the Middle East were learning how to make useful and beautiful things out of copper – whether jewellery, weapons or tools. Trade and mining gathered pace, and the knowledge of how to exploit the unlimited possibilities of this metal was passed around the world.

The special exhibition HEAVY METAL traces the history of copper. What were the consequences of its discovery for Stone Age man? And why is the shiny red metal found in smartphones, coins and electrical cables today? The most famous individual from the Copper Age is Ötzi, the glacier mummy from the Schnalstal Valley. He has been on display in the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology since 1998. He carried a valuable copper axe, which marks him out as a person of high standing.

HEAVY METAL is linked to the permanent Ötzi exhibition and presents the Copper Age as an exciting period of historic global change. On display are new archaeological finds from the Alpine region and important authentic artefacts from the surrounding area.

 
Bacon? Awesome. :) Even today, Speck, a dry-cured and lightly smoked ham, is a typical South Tyrol product, the same area in northern Italy where Otzi has been found. The German word Speck "has its roots in the Middle High German word “spec” and the Ancient High German word “spek” and actually translates into “something thick, fat." But the German Speck is different from the South Tyrolean Speck.

According to the Speck Alto Adige/South Tyrol Consortium:

"Speck Alto Adige/South Tyrol is in no way related to the standard fatty pork belly speck described by the common German term. Speck is the result of a combination of two methods used to preserve meat: the standard Mediterranean style curing process for raw ham and smoking, which is a process typically used in Northern Europe."

South Tyrolean speck is like an Italian ham (the Italian "spalla" not the "coscia") plus the northern European smoking. Just like Otzi who lived probably at the intersection of the two worlds (the Mediterranean and the Alpine one). According to some source the salting/curing of pig's or a wild boar's hind leg or thigh is attested at least since the Etruscans, but it's clearly older.

3eea371342.jpg







Yes Central Italy, strictly speaking Southern Tuscany, most likely Colline Metallifere (from where the HGDP sample comes from). Italian Colline Metallifere = Metal-bearing Hills. The metal deposits of southern Tuscany are considered crucial for the development of the Etruscan civilization, which is much later time when Otzi lived.

Otzi was likely part of the Remedello culture, and Remedello culture, according to an old Treccani article (1965) written by Italian archaeologist Alba Palmieri, had extensions in Emilia and Toscana. Also Rinaldone culture in northern Lazio (one of the two or three proto-Etruscan cultures) and Gaudo culture in Campania (in Salerno area, exactly in the Etruria Campana) were both considered "remedelliane" by Palmieri. The main difference, according to Palmieri, is that Remedello had more western relations ("elementi ibero-mediterranei"), on the other hand both Rinaldone and Gaudo had more Balkans relations.




Italian archaeologists have always believed that the copper for Remedello axes came precisely from Tuscany, as written by Alba Palmieri on 1965.



Source: http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/civilta-di-remedello_(Enciclopedia-dell'-Arte-Antica)/

Studio Unipd: il metallo dell’ascia dell’uomo del Similaun proviene dalla Toscana

http://www.unipd.it/ilbo/studio-unipd-metallo-dell’ascia-dell’uomo-similaun-proviene-dalla-toscana




There is a Special Exhibition from 02 February 2016 to 14 January 2018 at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano.




More likely the copper came from
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/265409510_Mid_fourth-millennium_copper_mining_in_Liguria_north-west_Italy_The_earliest_known_copper_mines_in_Western_Europe


The geographic area where Rhaetic epigraphy has been found includes Trentino, Northern and Southern Tirol, the Engadin Valley and part of northwestern Veneto. The most important epigraphic sites are Sanzeno and Cles in the Non Valley (Trentino), Magrè near Vicenza, San Giorgio in Valpolicella near Verona (Veneto), Sluderno, Settequerce and S. Lorenzo di Sebato (South Tirol). In Austria, some inscriptions come from the district of Innsbruck (Demlfeld, Steinberg am Rofan). The areas of Rhaetic writing fit the archaeological definition both of the Fritzens-Sanzeno culture on one hand and the Magrè culture on the other.

I see Otzi being part of these 2 cultures ...........
 
More likely the copper came from

Mid fourth-millennium copper mining in Liguria, north-west Italy: The earliest known copper mines in Western Europe

https://www.researchgate.net/public...earliest_known_copper_mines_in_Western_Europe


That's a 2005 study.


Sile, I'm aware that you don't like any possible connection between Raethians and Etruscans, who don't even exist at the time of Otzi. But the fact that the copper used for Otzi's axe came from Central Italy (specifically southern Tuscany) has been discovered by a group of archeologists of the University of Padua. As I know Padua is in Veneto, your homeland.

Unfortunately it's written in Italian and not in Venetian.

Il gruppo di archeometallurgia dell’università di Padova costituito da Gilberto Artioli, Ivana Angelini e Caterina Canovaro, dei dipartimenti di Geoscienze e di Beni Culturali, in collaborazione con lo staff del Südtiroler Archäologiemuseum, ha ultimato ora con successo le analisi di provenienza del rame che costituisce l’ascia ed i risultati sono stati presentati in anteprima al congresso appena conclusosi. I dati mostrano chiaramente come il metallo fu estratto da minerali della Toscana meridionale. I depositi minerari della Toscana meridionale presentano un segnale inconfondibile dei rapporti isotopici del piombo, un segnale che può discriminare l’origine del rame da tutti gli altri depositi minerari cupriferi noti in Europa e nell’area mediterranea, ed è trasmesso inalterato al manufatto prodotto.

http://www.unipd.it/ilbo/studio-unipd-metallo-dell’ascia-dell’uomo-similaun-proviene-dalla-toscana

Links to Central Italy

One surprising new fact has been unearthed which concerns the most extraordinary item amongst Ötzi's equipment -- the valuable copper axe. In contrast to what had previously been presumed, the copper used in the blade does not derive from the Alpine region (researchers had suggested East or North Tyrol as the most likely provenance) but from Central Italy. Professor Gilberto Artioli's archaeometallurgy research group at the University of Padua has discovered that the metal had been obtained from ore mined in South Tuscany. In order to determine its origin, Italian scientists took a tiny sample from the blade and compared the proportion of lead isotope -- a kind of "finger print" of the ore deposits which remains unchanged in any objects subsequently made from the ore -- with the corresponding data from numerous mineral deposits in Europe and the entire Mediterranean region.

The result pointed unequivocally to South Tuscany.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/09/160923140105.htm


"No one was prepared for this finding. We will commission further analyses in order to double-check these first results" stressed Angelika Fleckinger.

"No one was prepared for this finding", said Angelika Fleckinger, Otzi's museum director. Well, Fleckinger has obviously not read what the Italian archaeologists wrote more than 50 years ago. Fleckinger seems shocked at the discovery, just like you, Sile. :)
 
Last edited:
That's a 2005 study.


Sile, I'm aware that you don't like any possible connection between Raethians and Etruscans, who don't even exist at the time of Otzi. But the fact that the copper used for Otzi's axe came from Central Italy (specifically southern Tuscany) has been discovered by group of archeologists of the University of Padua. As I know Padua is in Veneto, your homeland.

Unfortunately it's written in Italian and not in Venetian.



http://www.unipd.it/ilbo/studio-unipd-metallo-dell’ascia-dell’uomo-similaun-proviene-dalla-toscana



https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/09/160923140105.htm




"No one was prepared for this finding", said Angelika Fleckinger, Otzi's museum director. Well, Fleckinger has obviously not read what the Italian archaeologists wrote more than 50 years ago. Fleckinger seems shocked at the discovery, just like you, Sile. :)

I really do not know why you champion the etruscans, like you said the rhaetians did not , and neither did etruscans, venetics etc etc ........so let us say it came either from central or western Italian peninsula

There are other more important tribes than the etruscans or venetic or rhaetics............the umbri are far more important than those 3 put together.

The venetics are not important either, bringing their Palaic language/script from Northern Anatolia but accepting to use the Euganei language/script instead
 
Like all neolithic farmers. ;)

Somehow I doubt that but I could easily see why an individual like you would be vehemently pushing that agenda. (just like the ridiculous theory that Phoenicians created the first alphabet; despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.) But maybe it's true. Alternatively, the Iberian language had "saldu" for the name of a horse. (Basque: zaldi)
 
Does this mean his people had domesticated animals?
It's funny, one instant they are "claiming" that he ate red deer meat, and the next instant is that they are saying he ate bacon. Fishy, I often wonder if this Otzi mystery is a fabrication.

Also, I remember reading somewhere (with photos) they have already found other bodies of Neolithic people about 5,000 years ago in Italy, mostly decomposed women; not far from Otzi's area, trapped in ancient tombs. But for some odd reason they haven't studied these females, or gotten their mtdna?
 
It's funny, one instant they are "claiming" that he ate red deer meat, and the next instant is that they are saying he ate bacon. Fishy, I often wonder if this Otzi mystery is a fabrication.

Also, I remember reading somewhere (with photos) they have already found other bodies of Neolithic people about 5,000 years ago in Italy, mostly decomposed women; not far from Otzi's area, trapped in ancient tombs. But for some odd reason they haven't studied these females, or gotten their mtdna?

was it bacon or goat

http://www.sciencealert.com/oetzi-the-iceman-s-last-meal-was-stone-age-bacon
 
from a day ago

The last meal of Ötzi the Iceman, the Copper-Age mummy discovered frozen in Alpine ice along the Austrian-Italian border in 1991, was a dry-cured meat similar to speck, prosciutto, or bacon, according to Gizmodo and The Local.


Ötzi, who was probably around 45 years old when he was murdered in 3300 BCE, is housed at the European Academy of Bolzano’s EURAC-Institute for Mummies and the Iceman. Researchers have thawed his body and have been studying his stomach contents for insights into his life. The latest research from Albert Zink, who heads up the Institute for Mummies, shows that his stomach contained the remains of raw, dry-cured goat meat. The nanostructure of the meat fibers showed that the goat was not cooked or grilled at all.

The first line seems to have come via the system as the "CNN Fake News Team "...............while researcher A.Zink says it was dry-cured goat meat
 
Phys Org publishes "fake news"? This is "fake news"?
https://phys.org/news/2017-01-iceman-oetzi-meal-stone-age.html

"
His last meal was most likely dried goat meat, according to scientists who recently managed to dissect the contents of Oetzi's stomach."We've analysed the meat's nanostructure and it looks like he ate very fatty, dried meat, most likely bacon," German mummy expert Albert Zink said at a talk in Vienna late Wednesday."

(The above, in case some people missed it, is the first paragraph of this thread.)

I would suggest that accusing respected publications of publishing "fake news" by, if I understand the objection, deliberately misquoting statements from a researcher, could be construed as libel. There are consequences for that.

There is a reason that I put the word bacon in quotes. It was because most people, although apparently not Albert Zink, think of bacon as coming exclusively from pork. However, it is actually sometimes used for meat from other animals.

"Meat from other animals, such as beef, lamb, chicken, goat, or turkey, may also be cut, cured, or otherwise prepared to resemble bacon, and may even be referred to as "bacon".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacon

So, Dr. Zink was not entirely incorrect in describing the meat in that way.

I guess I also fail to understand the importance of this issue. The Phys Org article clearly states that Dr. Zink said that the meat was dried goat meat. So what if Dr. Zink also called it "bacon", or more likely perhaps meant to say "like bacon", as in cured or prepared like bacon?
 

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