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Coventry University project aims to reveal secrets of the ‘bog bodies’
Recent preliminary work on the project
University news
Tuesday 23 September 2025
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Iron Age ‘bog bodies’ have long captivated the imagination, but a Coventry University-led study is aiming to shed new light on why these individuals were deposited in the bogs.
For more than 200 years ancient bodies found in bogs have been a source of study due to their exceptional preservation, though the explanation for their final resting place has largely divided scholars into two themes – punishment or ritual sacrifice.
Though there has been extensive examination of the bodies themselves, Coventry University’s project will focus on the landscape and environmental context of bog bodies, something few other investigations have considered.
I’ve always had a fascination with bogs and their ability to preserve organic remains such as pollen grains, which gives us the chance to analyse how the vegetation and environment has changed over time.
Because the peat is so waterlogged and there’s so little oxygen, bodies found in bogs are remarkably well preserved. Most of the time we only get bones from Iron Age bodies, but with bog bodies you can get hair, stomach contents, nails, all sorts so they are very exciting for archaeologists.
There was an increase in such discoveries in the early to mid-20th Century with more industrial scale peat extraction taking place, but despite the interest in the bodies, there’s been relatively few studies of the actual bogs themselves, and they really are amazing archives of environmental change.
Project lead Dr Michelle Farrell, from Coventry University’s Research Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience
The study will involve reconstructing contemporaneous vegetation and considering episodes of environmental change such as climatic deterioration and its impacts on agriculture.
The team will also aim to address questions about the accessibility and visibility of the sites and whether there was the potential for an audience to view the events taking place.
Such considerations could explain possible motivations for human sacrifice.
The two-year project will see the team visit Bjældskovdal, in Denmark, where the famed Tollund Man was discovered in 1950, along with two other Danish sites and Lindow, in Cheshire, where Lindow Man was unearthed in 1984.
They will take core samples from across the bogs, reaching depths which should provide details about the terrain during the Iron Age.
We hope this study will add more detail to the debate around the deliberate killing of people and placing them in bogs. This was a widespread phenomenon across Northwestern Europe in the Iron Age and the debates around why have stagnated in recent times.
Project lead Dr Michelle Farrell, from Coventry University’s Research Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience
The project, entitled ‘Bog Biographies’ has been funded by an APEX Award of almost £200,000, supported by the Leverhulme Trust and delivered in partnership with the British Academy, The Royal Academy of Engineering and the Royal Society.
Dr Farrell’s collaborators on the project are Prof Henry Chapman and Dr David Smith at the University of Birmingham, and Prof Maarten Blaauw at Queen's University Belfast.
Find out more about the work of Coventry University’s Research Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience.
