Lindow Man

Remains of an Iron Age man discovered in a peat bog at Lindow Marsh, Cheshire, UK, in 1984. The chemicals in the bog had kept the body in an excellent state of preservation.

‘Pete Marsh’, as the archaeologists nicknamed him, had been knocked unconscious, strangled, and then had his throat cut before being thrown into the bog. He may have been a sacrificial victim, as Celtic peoples often threw offerings to the gods into rivers and marshes. His stomach contained part of an unleavened barley ‘bannock’ that might have been given as a sacrificial offering. His well-cared-for nails indicate that he might have been a Druid prince who became a willing sacrifice.