Ötzi quiz: What do you know about the Iceman mummy who was murdered 5,300 years ago in the Alps?

the mummy of a human man lies on a grey rock base with snow surrounding him

The mummified body of a man who died over 5,000 years ago was discovered in 1991 in the Alps. (Image credit: Leopold Nekula / Getty Images)

On Sept. 19, 1991, hikers were crossing a pass over the Ötztal valley in the Alps when they stumbled upon a human body that was partly exposed in the ice. The hikers alerted the authorities, who spent several days extracting the mummified corpse from the melting ice. When archaeologists finally got a look at it, they realized the mummy was not a missing 20th-century hiker but rather millennia-old human remains. The body of the middle-aged man who died around 3300 B.C. would become known as Ötzi or the Iceman who revealed what everyday life was like during the Copper Age.

Think you know a lot about Ötzi's Copper Age life and manner of death? Start the quiz below to find out if your knowledge of this famous mummy is solid or on thin ice.

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Kristina Killgrove is a staff writer at Live Science with a focus on archaeology and paleoanthropology news. Her articles have also appeared in venues such as Forbes, Smithsonian, and Mental Floss. Kristina holds a Ph.D. in biological anthropology and an M.A. in classical archaeology from the University of North Carolina, as well as a B.A. in Latin from the University of Virginia, and she was formerly a university professor and researcher. She has received awards from the Society for American Archaeology and the American Anthropological Association for her science writing.

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