BREAKING NEWS: The 5,000-year-old man lying beneath the ice was discovered by passing hikers.

High in the icy silence of the Ötztal Alps, a man lay frozen in time, hidden beneath snow and glacier for over 5,000 years. When hikers discovered his body in 1991, they had no idea they had stumbled upon one of the greatest archaeological finds in modern history.

He would become known as Ötzi, the Iceman, a Copper Age traveler who died around 3400–3100 BC. But he didn’t die quietly. An arrow pierced his shoulder, shattering bones and blood vessels. He suffered a head wound. And his hand bore the mark of a fight, just days before.

Beside him were his tools: a copper axe, a flint knife, and a long wooden pole, later confirmed to be a bow. His quiver still contained arrows, some finished, others half-finished. He wore a coat, leggings, a belt, and a loincloth, all made of animal skin, and a bearskin cap to protect him from the cold. Even his shoes were stuffed with grass for warmth. Nearby lay a broken frame, probably the remains of a backpack.

Ötzi also carried birch bark containers, one of which contained charcoal and maple leaves, indicative of firemaking or medicine. His miraculously preserved stomach still contained his last meal: meat, fruit, grains, and plants—a diet as practical as it was revealing.

But perhaps the most disturbing discovery? 61 tattoos, created by cutting the skin and rubbing charcoal, likely to relieve pain, marking the oldest known form of therapeutic tattooing.

Today, Ötzi rests in the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology in Italy, still dressed in the clothes he wore when he died. Through science and time, he whispers from a world that no longer exists, reminding us how much we can learn from those who walked before us.