Every ecosystem has its own mythology, but bogs are especially intriguing. Beyond their unique ecology, these peaty wetlands hold secrets about the past that humans have been digging through for centuries. Sometimes, that digging yields secrets in the form of human remains.
Understanding how bogs can so effectively preserve human remains—down to the undigested contents of a stomach—first requires an understanding of bob systems. Bogs are just one type of wetland, according to Roy van Beek, an associate professor of landscape archaeology at Wageningen University in the Netherlands. The most famous sort are raised bogs, which sit higher than the surrounding ground and are fed by rainwater. This composition renders them extremely acidic and nutrient-poor, or oligotrophic. Constantly saturated with water, little can survive here.
Vegetation called sphagnum moss decays and compresses into a fibrous brown material called peat, which creates a cold, anoxic substrate. Without oxygen, a bog “prohibits bacteria to do their work,” van Beek says, which results in a preserved body called a bog mummy.
“Raised bogs are places where we see the survival of material that doesn't normally survive in dry land context,” says Melanie Giles, a professor of European prehistory at the University of Manchester and author of Bog Bodies: Face to Face With the Past. “That includes things like skin and hair [and] nails.”
There are about 2,000 known bog mummies and skeletons throughout Europe, according to a 2003 paper published in the journal Antiquity by van Beek and co-authors. Though, van Beek adds, he believes “the actual number is a lot higher.” Most of the recovered bodies belonged to people who apparently met violent ends, from hanging to bludgeoning to beheading.
Below are some notable bog bodies found over decades—and what they revealed.
