On a misty day in August 1984, Andy Mould and Eddie Slack were cutting peat from a bog in Lindow Moss, England. Suddenly, the two men froze. A human foot was sticking up out of the peat!
The men called the police, but it turned out to be a job for an archaeologist instead. Lindow Man, as he came to be called, had been dead for about 2,300 years.
Lindow Man did not come as a complete surprise to scientists. All in all, about 2,000 bodies have been found in European bogs, one as early as 1450. Most have been dated to between 800 B.C. and A.D. 400.
These bodies were preserved whole in the peat. The conditions that produce peat are a lack of oxygen in the mud and a high acid content. As it happens, these are just right for preserving flesh.