Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi (), or Canadian Ice Man, is a naturally

mummified A mummy is a dead human or an animal whose soft tissues and organs have been preserved by either intentional or accidental exposure to chemicals, extreme cold, very low humidity, or lack of air, so that the recovered body does not decay furt ...

body found in

Tatshenshini-Alsek Provincial Park Tatshenshini-Alsek Park or Tatshenshini-Alsek Provincial Wilderness Park is a provincial park in British Columbia, Canada . It was established in 1993 after an intensive campaign by Canadian and American conservation organizations to halt mining e ...

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

, Canada, by a group of hunters in 1999. Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi means "Long Ago Person Found" in

Southern Tutchone The Southern Tutchone are a First Nations people of the Athabaskan-speaking ethnolinguistic group living mainly in the southern Yukon in Canada. The Southern Tutchone language, traditionally spoken by the Southern Tutchone people, is a variet ...

, and is pronounced in that language. Radiocarbon dating of artifacts found with the body placed the age of the body at between 300 and 550 years. The find was comparable in condition and scientific value to

Ötzi the Iceman Ötzi, also called the Iceman, is the natural mummy of a man who lived some time between 3350 and 3105 BC, discovered in September 1991 in the Ötztal Alps (hence the nickname "Ötzi") on the border between Austria and Italy. Ötzi is believed to ...

, remains dating to 3300 BC that were found in the

Ötztal Alps The Ötztal Alps ( it, Alpi Venoste, german: Ötztaler Alpen) are a mountain range in the Central Eastern Alps, in the State of Tyrol in western Austria and the Province of South Tyrol in northern Italy. Geography The Ötztal Alps are arrayed ...

in 1991.

DNA testing Genetic testing, also known as DNA testing, is used to identify changes in DNA sequence or chromosome structure. Genetic testing can also include measuring the results of genetic changes, such as RNA analysis as an output of gene expression, o ...

of more than 240 volunteers from the local Champagne and Aishihik First Nations revealed 17 persons who are related to the ice man through their direct maternal line. They were excited to have their deep connections to the area affirmed.

Discovery

Three sheep hunters, Bill Hanlon, Warren Ward and Mike Roche, discovered a number of artifacts and a human body in a melting

glacier A glacier (; ) is a persistent body of dense ice that is constantly moving under its own weight. A glacier forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its ablation over many years, often centuries. It acquires distinguishing features, such as ...

while hunting near the

Yukon Yukon (; ; formerly called Yukon Territory and also referred to as the Yukon) is the smallest and westernmost of Canada's three territories. It also is the second-least populated province or territory in Canada, with a population of 43,964 as ...

border on July 22, 1999 (). The hunters were walking along a glacier, above the treeline, and noticed some bits of wood, which they thought unusual given their location. They examined the wood, and noticed carvings and notches, possibly indicating the wood formed the frame of a

backpack A backpack—also called knapsack, schoolbag, rucksack, rucksac, pack, sackpack, booksack, bookbag or backsack—is, in its simplest frameless form, a fabric sack carried on one's back and secured with two straps that go over the shoulders ...

. Searching with binoculars, Ward discovered the body in the ice. On August 16, the party reported their find to Yukon archaeology department staff, and turned in a number of artifacts they collected from the site. Before making a public announcement, the archaeologists notified representatives of the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations, whose historical territory is here. They visited the site and decided to name the person Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi, which means ''Long Ago Person Found.'' A team of archeologists was assembled to assess the find, and the First Nations were further consulted about the project. They supported having scientific studies done, including DNA analysis.

Description

The remains had been dismembered after death, probably by shifting ice due to thermal cracking and slumping along the edge of the glacier. The first part found was the torso, with left arm and mummified hand still attached. The lower body was found a few meters away, with the thighs and muscle still attached. The head was missing, as were the right arm and lower right leg, though his hair, attached to some remnants of the scalp, and some small bones from the right hand and foot were recovered. Soft tissue was present primarily in the torso and thighs. The torso was of particular interest, as gastric contents could be analyzed to yield clues to the days leading up to the man's death. The skull was located in 2003, but was not removed from the site for study. The young man was estimated to be approximately 18–19 years old at his time of death. The cause of death is unknown, but there appears to be no sign of serious injury, and

hypothermia Hypothermia is defined as a body core temperature below in humans. Symptoms depend on the temperature. In mild hypothermia, there is shivering and mental confusion. In moderate hypothermia, shivering stops and confusion increases. In severe ...

is a possibility. He died near the onset of the Little Ice Age. An examination of the food in Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi's digestive tract reveals that he had traveled a distance of around in the three days prior to his death, from the coastal region up into higher elevations where he was found. Based on pollen found in the contents of his colon, he was traveling in the summer. Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi was found with a number of artifacts, including a robe made from 95 pelts of the local arctic ground squirrel (commonly called "gophers") subspecies ''Spermophilus parryii plesius'' sewn together with sinew, a woven Tlingit (root hat) of split spruce root (probably Sitka spruce), a pouch or small bag of beaver fur containing a mass of lichen, mosses and leaves, gaff poles/walking sticks, sticks for carrying salmon, a curved, hooked stick possibly used for setting snares to catch marmots, a "Carved and Painted stick" of unknown purpose, an iron-bladed knife with matching gopher skin sheath, and an

atlatl A spear-thrower, spear-throwing lever or ''atlatl'' (pronounced or ; Nahuatl ''ahtlatl'' ) is a tool that uses leverage to achieve greater velocity in dart or javelin-throwing, and includes a bearing surface which allows the user to store ene ...

and dart. The use of gopher skins for common household items, robes, and blankets had been important in the past, but the discovery of Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi helped revive interest among the Champagne and Aishihik people in teaching and passing on the skills involved, from harvesting the animals to the preparation and the sewing of pelts together.''Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi Newsletter''
Champagne and Aishihik First Nations, Winter 2009. The find also inspired weaving workshops in the Klukwan and Yukon communities for teaching spruce root weaving. Tissue studies revealed that his long-term diet consisted principally of shellfish and salmon, indicating that he was originally from one of the communities near the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contin ...

coast; however, hair samples indicated that his diet over the couple of months before his death had been more strongly meat-based than usual, suggesting that he had spent some time inland. His stomach contents included beach asparagus and he was carrying salmon and shellfish with him, suggesting that he had been back at the coast again and was traveling back inland to the Tatshenshini River at the time of his death. The tribes allowed samples, including DNA, to be taken for study. They decided to have his remains cremated and scattered over the area where he was discovered. Local clans are considering a memorial potlatch to honour the ancient man.

DNA tests

In 2000, mitochondrial DNA tests of 241 area volunteers of the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations revealed 17 living persons who are related to Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi through their direct maternal line. Among them were Sheila Clark and Pearl Callaghan, two of seven sisters. Clark said of finding they were related to Long Ago Man, "It was extremely moving. I couldn't believe it." Fifteen of the 17 individuals identify as Wolf clan, suggesting the man may also have belonged to the Wolf clan. In their

matrilineal Matrilineality is the tracing of kinship through the female line. It may also correlate with a social system in which each person is identified with their matriline – their mother's lineage – and which can involve the inheritance ...

kinship system, children are considered born into their mother's clan. The individuals were split roughly in half between those who lived in coastal areas and those who lived inland, reflecting historical territories of bands.Judith Lavoie, Canwest News Service, "Iceman's DNA Linked To Coastal Aboriginals (Canada)"
''Leader Post'', 26 April 2008, accessed 5 October 2014 A partial mitochondrial DNA sequence of Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi, containing information on the

hypervariable region A hypervariable region (HVR) is a location within nuclear DNA or the D-loop of mitochondrial DNA in which base pairs of nucleotides repeat (in the case of nuclear DNA) or have substitutions (in the case of mitochondrial DNA). Changes or repeat ...

HVR2, bases 1 to 360, is available in the

National Center for Biotechnology Information The National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) is part of the United States National Library of Medicine (NLM), a branch of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). It is approved and funded by the government of the United States. The ...

genome sequencing Whole genome sequencing (WGS), also known as full genome sequencing, complete genome sequencing, or entire genome sequencing, is the process of determining the entirety, or nearly the entirety, of the DNA sequence of an organism's genome at a ...

database,

GenBank The GenBank sequence database is an open access, annotated collection of all publicly available nucleotide sequences and their protein translations. It is produced and maintained by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI; a part ...

, as accession number AF502945.

Conference

The find and studies generated great interest in Kwäday Dän Tsʼìnchi. In June 2005, the findings were discussed at a science conference on ''Rapid Landscape Change'' at Yukon College.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tsinchi, Kwaday Dan 1999 archaeological discoveries Archaeological artifacts Archaeology of Canada First Nations history in British Columbia Mummies Pre-Columbian archaeology Pre-Confederation British Columbia people Southern Tutchone Tutchone people Unsolved deaths

Discovery

Description

DNA tests

Conference

See also

References