Knowing that he had Lyme disease, that he had arthritic pain, that he had dental abscesses, that he was going bald — these details are meaningful not primarily because of what they tell us about Copper Age health (though they do tell us something about that), but because they make Ötzi recognizably human.

He had the kind of conditions that middle-aged men have.

His body was keeping the same kinds of records that middle-aged bodies keep today.

He was, in the most fundamental physical sense, a person like us.

The Discovery That Keeps Giving

The 2023 genome reanalysis is, as of this writing, the most complete and accurate genomic picture of Ötzi that science has produced.

But it is almost certainly not the last word.