Experts from Bristol, Birmingham, Oxford and Trento (in Italy) will be discussing the intriguing question of just how Ötzi - as he is known - perished on the Tyrolean Alps.
Theories vary... some say he bled to death from a wound in his shoulder, others prefer to say the cause was cold and hunger.
Among the speakers at Thursday's event will be Professor Annaluisa Pedrotti, the archaeologist from the team working on Ötzi, and Dr Franco Nicolis, a specialist on the Copper Age in northern Italy.
Icy grave
Ötzi the Iceman was discovered by two hikers in 1991 when they found a body embedded in the melting ice of the Schnalstal glacier, high in the Italian Alps.
 | | Ötzi wore a grass cape and goatskin leggings |
He was still wearing goatskin leggings and a grass cape and his copper-headed axe and a quiver full of arrows were lying nearby.
Back in the lab, radiocarbon dating revealed the body to be more than 5,000 years old. Ötzi became an archaeological sensation, providing a unique snapshot of someone who lived in the Alps around the time when humans were switching from stone to metal tools.
His copper axe is the only one ever found with all its fixings in place and the preservation of other artifacts is unparalleled.
Speculation
Andrew Winter, President of Bristol University's
Archaeological Society, said: "There has been much speculation as to how Ötzi died.
"Years of examination and x-rays had not come up with an answer until, in June last year, an Italian radiologist at the local hospital saw what
everyone else had missed - there was a flint arrow head embedded in Ötzi's shoulder.
"But how had it got there and was it that that killed him?" Archaeologists from Bristol University are putting on an evening of talks about Ötzi the Iceman.
Along with colleagues from Oxford, Birmingham and Trento they will present an overview of this remarkable find and debate the reasons why he died.
The talks are open to the public and aimed at a non-specialist audience.
They will be held in the Tyndall Lecture Theatre, Department of Physics, Tyndall Avenue and start at 4pm on Thursday 14 November 2002.
To round off the evening there will be a wine reception at about 7.30pm.
Admission is £5 on the door, (concessions £2.50) and you don't have to be there on the dot as latecomers will be made welcome.
Programme for the evening:
4.00 pm
Professor Dr Annaluisa Pedrotti (Trento) & Professor Lawrence Barfield (Birmingham) The Iceman: Who, What, Where, When ... 4.30 pm
Dr Paul Pettitt (Bristol) & Professor Robert Hedges (Oxford) Radiocarbon Dating of the Iceman 5.00 pm
Professor Richard Harrison (Bristol) The Iceman and the Transformation of Europe COFFEE BREAK 6.00 pm
Dr Franco Nicolis (Trento) & Dr Volker Heyd (Bristol) His Journey Through the Mountains: The Copper Age North and South of the Alps 6.45 pm
Prof. Dr. Annaluisa Pedrotti (Trento) Current Research on the Iceman's Archaeology 7.30pm
Wine reception | 
