ÖTZI didn't die of cold or after a fall—he was shot in the back with an arrow, Italian researchers think. But only an autopsy will show if they're right.

The iceman's frozen body was found high in the Alps a decade ago. The latest X-rays and CT scans show what looks like a flint arrowhead in the left shoulder of the 5300-year-old corpse, says Paul Gostner, head of radiology at Bolzano General Hospital. The arrow stopped just short of the lung but would have hit several major blood vessels, says Gostner. "He probably bled to death."

Earlier X-rays revealed the same mark, says Peter Vanezis, a forensic pathologist at the University of Glasgow, part of a team investigating Ötzi. "We've always been aware of it," he says. "But it didn't look like a missile. It seemed to have the same density as bone."

If the object is an arrowhead, it ...