Picture Austria, circa 800–450 BC. An Iron Age miner culls salt in the ancient mine shafts of Hallstatt in the Eastern Austrian Alps. He nears the end of his lunch break, satiated by a hearty meal of grains and legumes, with a side of nuts and a few bites of salt-cured beef. His work buddy offers him a swig of his latest batch of beer. The miner chases it down with a bite of his co-worker’s homemade blue cheese and a handful of berries. He gets up, stretches, grabs his pickaxe, and returns to labor in the chilly mine, unaware that this was his last meal. Just as his pickaxe hits salt with a clink, an unearthly rumble passes through him and the tunnel collapses.
Two millennia later, in 1734, miners discovered a mummified body embedded in a saline tomb, almost perfectly preserved by the salt, with bits of clothing ...
