The Remarkably Well-Preserved Body of the Tollund Man and His Last Supper
Did the rope around his neck indicate that he was murdered or was he executed?
Viggo and Emil Hojgaard, two peat cutters from Denmark, discovered a body near the town of Silkeborg on May 8, 1950. The body appeared to be that of a recent murder victim. They promptly notified authorities about the corpse. The police were intrigued by the discovery, but they were convinced it was not a recent homicide.
Rather than police, it needed archaeologists to solve the crime.
The body was that of a man, and it was buried 2.5 meters beneath the ground. He was curled up in the fetal position. He was wearing a sheepskin cap on his head and a noose around his neck. His hair was reddish.
The Silkeborg Museum’s officials began an investigation into the body. Was it the story of a long-dead murder victim? Or was it a public execution?
As the investigators dug deeper and began studying the corpse, questions rushed through their heads. They concluded that the body was at least 2400 years old.
They nicknamed him as the Tollund Man.
