Ice Mummies

Describes ice mummies, how they are formed, and includes some of the most famous ice mummies and where they were found, how scientists study them, and what they can teach us about the past.

Rising high above the South American Continent, the Andes seem untouched by earthly struggles. But their pristine, ice-capped peaks are haunted by a dark secret: a deadly mountaintop ritual. These frozen bodies all children date to the time of the Inca, the great civilization that ruled the Andes 500 years ago.

This book takes armchair adventurers and archaeological enthusiasts not only to the excavation, but back through Peruvian history as it revisits the 1995 discovery of the mummy of a 14-year-old who died or was sacrificed some 530 years ago.

Seminar paper from the year 2009 in the subject Archaeology, grade: A (1), The University of Southern Mississippi , language: English, abstract: Ice mummies like Kwäday Dan Ts’inchì and Ötzi are rare treasures which can tell us as much about the past as a history book can. The mummies could form, because of the combination of cold temperatures, ice and dehydration. With the help of methods like isotope analysis and carbon dating, researchers were able to make the mummies talk. Especially Ötzi has completely changed the way archaeologists see the stone ages.

Reading paragraphs In 1991, two tourists hiking in the Alps saw something very odd sticking out of the snow. At first it looked like a doll’s head. But it wasn’t. It was a man, frozen in the ice for 5,000 years. Ice Mummy—first published by Random House in 1998—tells the story of this amazing discovery, from the struggle to remove the mummy from his icy grave to the creation of his final resting place: a specially designed refrigeration chamber in his own museum in Bolzano, Italy. Now updated to include shocking new evidence that the Iceman was murdered—shot with an arrow after hand-to-hand combat with an assailant—Ice Mummy will provide young readers with more chills than ever!

On 15-17 September, 1993, Innsbruck, Austria, search. Another remarkable case, that of the pre-Colum hosted the International Mummy Symposium. This bian miner from Restauradora Mine near Chuqincamata does not mean that beautiful North Tyrol was the setting in northern Chile, is the result of impregnation with for a gathering of the world's most prominent mummies copper salts, and the mummy became an attraction as themselves, but rather the exciting discovery of a Late "Copper Man" at various fairs around the country. As he Neolithic glacial mummy released from the ice of the was found with a complete set of miner's tools, the Otztal Alps provided the focus of attention for numerous mummy offers a unique insight into the life and working scholars from many different parts of the world to come conditions of an Indio miner of the first millennium AD. together to address various questions relating to mum Even so, the mummified remains comprise only the skel mified human remains. eton with a completely rigid covering of skin, whereas Normally researchers studying the remains of histori the other soft parts have not survived. calor prehistoric human bodies will at best have bony In contrast, mummification in ice, and especially in substance to work on. It is rarely the case that soft parts the permafrost, can produce much better results.

The world's oldest, coldest archaeological detective stories

Perfect for school and public libraries, this is the only reference book to combine pop culture with science to uncover the mystery behind mummies and the mummification phenomena. Mortality and death have always fascinated humankind. Civilizations from all over the world have practiced mummification as a means of preserving life after death—a ritual which captures the imagination of scientists, artists, and laypeople alike. This comprehensive encyclopedia focuses on all aspects of mummies: their ancient and modern history; their scientific study; their occurrence around the world; the religious and cultural beliefs surrounding them; and their roles in literary and cinematic entertainment. Author and horror guru Matt Cardin brings together 130 original articles written by an international roster of leading scientists and scholars to examine the art, science, and religious rituals of mummification throughout history. Through a combination of factual articles and topical essays, this book reviews cultural beliefs about death; the afterlife; and the interment, entombment, and cremation of human corpses in places like Egypt, Europe, Asia, and Central and South America. Additionally, the book covers the phenomenon of natural mummification where environmental conditions result in the spontaneous preservation of human and animal remains.