British Mummies: The Lindow Man
Dear friends of Training Centre Raya London, when you hear mummy, your mind probably takes you to the hot sands of Egypt and opens up the depths of the pyramids. But mummies are also found right here on the Isles. These are real, local mummies. Let us tell you about one of them!
The Lindow Man was found in the Lindow Moss peat bog, near Wilmslow, Cheshire, North West England. Initially, in 1983, workers cutting peat in the bog found a large, round object, which they joked was a dinosaur egg. However, it soon became clear that it was a human skull. The work was interrupted, and police investigators were called in because it was suspected that the remains belonged to a missing woman from the 1960s. It turned out the skull didn’t belong to a modern woman, but to a woman from the Iron Age, and a search began for more of the so-called “peat mummies”. Why mummies? Because as it turned out, the bog created a perfect environment for preserving human remains. The combination of acidity, pressure, dissolved salts, and an anaerobic environment preserves human skin, hair, and tissue for hundreds of years.
On August 1, 1984, worker Andy Mould spotted an object in the shovel of a peat cutting machine that he thought was a thick branch. He tossed it to his colleague; as it hit the ground, the peat slid off, and it became clear that it was a human leg covered in skin. The police first took care of the find, and archaeologist Rick Turner then managed to locate the rest of the body. Due to the effect of exposure to air, the find had to be preserved quickly. The owners of the land where the bog is located donated the Lindow Man to the British Museum. This is the best-preserved bog body ever found in the UK. It is comparable to the Danish peat mummies the Graubal Man and the Tollund Man.
Scientists began to study the Lindow Man. They determined that he was about 168 cm tall and weighed about 60 kg. He was in his mid-20s. His hair, mustache, and sideburns were brown. The only fabric found on his body was a fox skin armband. The dating of the body indicates a period from 200 BC to 119 AD. Traces of copper were found on the man’s skin, which theoretically results from smearing the body with a mixture containing copper flakes, giving it a shine. It is assumed that he was a nobleman, since his hands did not show any signs of hard work, typical of ordinary inhabitants of Iron Age societies. His death occurred as a result of several fatal injuries to the head and chest, and there was a tight rope around his neck. And here the questions begin: was it a ritual sacrifice? Mistletoe powder, likely used as a sedative, was found in the stomach. Was the would-be victim sedated before his terrible end? Were the different injuries honoring different gods, each of whom accepted human sacrifice? Or was it just a robbery of all possessions, including clothes, after which the victim was thrown into the swamp?
The peat mummy of Lindow Man is owned by the British Museum and has undergone a complex conservation process to protect the tissues from alteration. It has been the subject of intense debate: Residents of Manchester demand it is displayed in their local museum. Meanwhile, another group is outraged that human remains are being publicly displayed instead of receiving a proper burial.
Lindow Man entered British culture through the works of historians, chemists, and archaeologists, and in some of the assumptions he was even described as a Druid prince. It has been called “the most significant archaeological find of the 1980s”, recognizing the great role of its discovery in understanding and studying life on the Isles some two millennia ago.
Author: Iveta Radeva
