As much as 10,000 years old yet shockingly well-preserved, bog bodies like the Tollund Man are more incredible than any manmade mummy.
He died in the 7th century B.C.E. after being bludgeoned to death and was found with a rope around his neck. It is believed that he was a human sacrifice. Danish National Museum/Wikimedia Commons
He lived sometime between 362 B.C.E. and 175 B.C.E. and was around 20 years old when he died. From his arm-span, it is believed he would have been 6'6. Mark Healey/Wikimedia Commons
He was an approximately 40 years old when he was killed sometime between 375 and 210 B.C.E. He was found with a noose around his neck, indicating he was hanged to death, as well as a sheepskin cap on his head. Wikimedia Commons
Windey I was once a 16-year-old boy who lived between 41 B.C.E. and 118 C.E. Bullenwächter/Wikimedia Commons
She died sometime between 54 B.C.E. and 128 C.E. at around the age of 16 years old. She suffered from scoliosis and had long reddish blonde hair that was preserved by the swamp and was buried with a ritually tied woolen braid around her neck suggesting she was killed as a human sacrifice.
However, due to damage to the body at the time of discovery, the cause of her death is unknown. Drents Museum/Wikimedia Commons
He died around the first or second century C.E.Bullenwächter/Wikimedia Commons
Her hair was tied in knots and she was decapitated. The rest of her remains have never been found.National Museum of Denmark, Copenhagen
He died around the late third century B.C., apparently by having his throat cut.MOESGAARD MUSEUM
Though she died in the second century B.C.E., her skin, hair, clothes, and stomach contents (her last meal was rye bread) are well preserved. Public Domain
She died between 350 and 150 B.C.E. and was probably a human sacrifice. National Museum of Denmark
She died around 1400 B.C.E. and was around 20 to 25 years old at the time of her death. Police said the corpse was found in a 'question mark' shape. Her well-preserved hair was dark blond, drawn into two pigtails, and coiled around the top of her head. Unlike some bog bodies, she was found with garments and with no evidence of a violent death. P.V. Glob/Wikimedia Commons
Radiocarbon dating suggests she died around 770 B.C.E. Public Domain
He likely lived sometime between 1290 and 1430. He was a tall, slender man, most likely in his 40s at the time of his death. He was killed and impaled with two wooden poles, one that went directly through his heart, to the bed of a lake that would later become a bog. This impaling likely happened after his death as he also has a large wound on his head.
His hair well preserved, and he was also discovered with a hooded garment and an engraved leather sheath. Peter Lindberg/Wikimedia Commons
He died around 2 B.C.E. and 119 C.E.The Trustees of the British Museum
He died around 300 B.C.E. and had his body squashed flat by the weight of the peat that accumulated on top of him. Bullenwächter/Wikimedia Commons
He died sometime between 392 B.C.E. and 201 B.C.E. He was 5'2, with a squashed nose, crooked teeth, and gelled-up hair. He was killed by an ax blow to the back of his head.
His rich diet, imported hair gel, and death near a hill used for kingly initiation led historians to theorize that he was a king who was ritually sacrificed after a bad harvest.Mark Healey/Wikimedia Commons
After its discovery, the body was sold to The Museum of European Cultures in Berlin. However, it was destroyed when the city was bombed during WWII. Hair found at the site — believed to belong to the Kreepen Man — dates to between 1440 and 1520 more exact dating is impossible.Andreas Franzkowiak/Wikimedia Commons
They would have lived sometime between 60 BCE and 220 C.E. One of the men had a large cut in his abdomen, through which his intestines spilled out, which some historians believe indicates that he was cut open so an ancient druid could divine the future from his entrails.Wikimedia Commons
She is thought have died sometime between 200 BCE and 80 C.E. but the cause of her death is unknown because her body was destroyed during WWII.Wikimedia Commons
He died sometime between 220 and 430 C.E. His throat was killed and his shoulder was pierced by an arrow.
His nickname is derived from the red hair and beard discovered on the body. Axel Hindemith/Wikimedia Commons
He lived sometime between 75 and 130 C.E. and was 50 to 60 years of age when he died. Evidence shows that he was struck in the head fatally and then beheaded.
His hair was tied in a Suebian knot, indicating he was likely a free man of the Germanic Suebi tribe.Andreas Franzkowiak/Wikimedia Commons
He is believed to have been male, but there is little documentation, and the body has been lost. The Kraglund Man was the first bog body to be photographed before being moved from where it was discovered.Georg Sarauw /Wikimedia Commons
He was 40 to 50 years when he died in the 1st century C.E. He is believed to have been beaten to death and was buried with his clothing: a rectangular wool cloak and a fur cape. Andreas Franzkowiak/Wikimedia Commons
It once belonged to a man in his 20s who died during the Iron Age. The find was originally titled as "The Roum Woman" until traces of beard stubble were found on the face.Wikimedia Commons
In 1977, radiocarbon dating proved that the woman actually lived nearly 1,500 years before the revered queen, and likely died in the 5th century B.C.E. She was around 40 years old at the time of her death.McLeod/Wikimedia Commons
He was a child between the ages of seven and 10 who was killed between 300 and 400 B.C.E. The boy had an infected socket at the top of his femur that would likely have made him unable to walk. His killers bound his hands and feet with cloth torn from a fur cape and stabbed him four times. Department of Legal Medicine, Universitatsklinikum Hamburg-Eppendorf
In 1950, two Danish brothers stumbled across a human body while collecting peat from a bog outside of Silkeborg. Terrified, they immediately notified the police. The body appeared to be just days old, and they assumed it was a murder victim. But radiocarbon dating told quite a different story. It was actually a 2,000-year-old bog body.
The bog body, nicknamed the "Tollund Man" after the village where the boys came from, belonged to someone who had died between 375 and 210 B.C.E. He was found naked with noose hanging around his neck and a sheepskin hat on his head. Researchers believe that he was likely a human sacrifice.
And he's just one of many bog bodies that have been uncovered in Europe.
What Are Bog Bodies?
Silkeborg Museum
The Tollund Man was discovered by two boys in 1950. His body is so well-preserved that they thought he was a recent murder victim.
Bog bodies — corpses mummified and preserved by the highly acidic water, low temperature, and a lack of oxygen found in peat bogs — have been turning up for hundreds of years. The first recorded discoveries of bog bodies began in the 17th century, and dozens have been found since.
Though the oldest bog body ever found dated back to 8000 B.C.E., not all of them are ancient. In the 1990s, the well-preserved bodies of Russian soldiers killed during World War II were discovered in bogs in Poland. And though most bog bodies have been found in Europe, they've appeared elsewhere too. In the U.S., Native American remains have been found in Florida bogs.
This unique environment of bogs can perfectly preserve the skin and internal organs of a human — as well as their hair, fingernails, and stomach contents.
The Famous Bog Bodies Of Western Europe
The Tollund Man is one of the most famous bog bodies ever discovered. But he's just one of many bog bodies to emerge from Europe's peat bogs.
Like the Tollund Man, the Grauballe Man was discovered in the 1950s. And like the Tollund Man, he was so well-preserved that he appeared to be a recent corpse. After all, he still had a full head of flaming red hair.
Moesgaard MuseumThe Grauballe Man is so well-preserved that he still has a healthy head of hair — though the chemical composition of the peat bog likely changed the color over time.
"I stood on the shovel and it wobbled like a rubber ball," Tage Busk Sørensen, the peat-cutter who discovered the body in 1952, recalled of his eerie discovery according to the Moesgaard Museum. "I hit him right on the shoulder. There was the head so fine. I had to get down on my knees to see if it really was a human head. Then I realized it really was."
An examination of the body revealed it to be some 2,300 years old. The Grauballe Man was around the age of 30 years old when he died, stood about five feet and seven inches tall, and retained his full head of hair. Though it appeared bright red, it's unlikely that it was this color during his life — the chemical composition of the bog changed its hue over time.
Half a century earlier, another well-preserved bog body was discovered in the Stijfveen bog near the Dutch village of Yde. Two laborers were dredging peat on a spring day in 1897 when a dark human form suddenly surfaced from beneath the water. Believing it to be the devil, they fled.
But the human form they'd seen was actually a 2,000-year-old bog body.
Since nicknamed the "Yde Girl.", this bog body was once a 16-year-old girl who died between 54 B.C. and 128 A.D. She stood at about four and a half feet tall and appeared to suffer from a severe case of scoliosis.
The Hondsrug UNESCO Global Geopark Foundation/Drents Museum
The Yde Girl was not as well preserved as some other bog bodies, but likely suffered a similar fate.
The Yde Girl was not in as good condition as the Tollund Man or the Grauballe Man, but these three bog bodies had one gruesome thing in common. Like many of the other human remains dredged from peat bogs, they were likely the victims of ritual sacrifice.
How Did These People Die?
Each of the three bog bodies mentioned so far appeared to have died violent deaths. The Tollund Man was discovered with a rope around his neck, which is why researchers believe that he was hanged.
Silkeborg MuseumThe rope around the Tollund Man's neck was still visible when he was pulled out of a bog in the 1950s.
Though it's possible he was a criminal, that he died by suicide, or that he was murdered, researchers have reason to believe that he was a sacrifice victim. The Tollund Man was laid to rest by someone who closed his eyes and his mouth and, significantly, he was buried in a bog and not in the earth.
Likewise, the Grauballe Man and the Yde girl both appear to have been sacrificed. Researchers found that the Grauballe Man had a broken shin bone and a slit throat. The Moesgaard Museum speculates that a priest broke his leg with a club, forcing him onto his knees. Then the priest may have grabbed his hair, yanked his head back, and slit his throat.
The Yde Girl also died a violent death. The Drents Museum reports that she was strangled by a "woolen band" that was wrapped around her neck three times and possibly stabbed in the neck.
That said, not all bog bodies were necessarily human sacrifice victims. Though many other bog bodies bear marks of violence — including the Clonycavan Man, Old Croghan Man, and the Lindow Man — others do not. Some may have merely drowned while attempting to cross the treacherous landscape. Others may have indeed died violent deaths, but were perhaps victims of murder and not ritual sacrifice.
In all, each bog body tells a slightly different story. Found in different places and hailing from different times, these people lived unique lives — and died unique deaths. Their facial features, gruesome injuries, and even the curious contents of their stomachs tell a fascinating story about how ancient humans lived and died hundreds or even thousands of years ago.
In the gallery above, get to know some of the most well-known bog bodies that have been found so far. And next time you're around a peat bog, keep an eye out for a human figure in the depths.
After this look at bog bodies and the Tollund Man, see the screaming Guanajuato Mummies whose faces remain frozen in terror. Then, check out this 2,000-year-old Chinese woman who is one of the most well-preserved mummies in the world.
