Jane, you may have seen it but if not there was a double page spread about this in Saturday's <b>Independent</b>.
Dr Tom Loy was 63 and a Californian-born molecular biologist, he headed a team that studied Oetzi and the tools, weapons etc that Oetzi had with him when he died some 5,300 years ago. Loy and his research team identified four different types of blood (which all belonged to other people) on Oetzi's clothes and tools and "...surmised that the Iceman had been with a comrade, and had died after a terrible battle with his rivals. Possibly he had carried a wounded companion some distance before depositing his tools and lying down to die."
Perhaps knowing so much about Oetzi (his clothes, tools, what killed him and even what his last meal was) leads us to recreate his last hours and even invent a curse around him (a little like Tutankhamen). That degree of association is something you don't really see when it's just an unidentified skeleton in some obscure grave - perhaps it's this detail that gives credence to the curse; perhaps in some way, that I can't quite articulate, it's part of a need within us to keep alive that which has passed away.
