Human evolution: What did man eat 5,300 years ago? | PICTURES Trade | Technology and science | Science



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Scientists have deciphered the last food of a 5,300-year-old hunter whose frozen body was found in the Alps.

The content of the hunter's stomach called Oetzi the Iceman allows a look at what the ancient Europeans ate five millennia ago, the researchers said.

The menu, described in the journal Current Biology, included wild goat meat and fat, red deer meat and integral wheat seeds that Oetzi ate shortly before his death.

Traces of ferns and spores have also been discovered. Scientists believe that he has swallowed the plant involuntarily or perhaps as a cure for parasites found in his gut.

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— Details of research —

Although the researchers examined the intestines of Oetzi, they could only study his stomach.

The reason is that after the death of the man, the organ has moved up. It was only in 2009, 18 years after the discovery remains near the border between Italy and Austria that a radiologist l & # 39; 39, detected behind the ribcage. After slowly thawing the body, the team took samples and rehydrated them.

Nearly half of the contents of the stomach were ibex fat, a wild alpine goat. It's a lot of fat, but scientists think that discovery makes sense.

"It was a harsh environment," said microbiologist Frank Maixner, lead author of the study. "They should be prepared, they had to eat food that gave them the necessary energy" to survive.

Source: AP

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