Fet-Mats

Who was Fet-Mats?

Fet-Mats was a "petrified man" found in 1719.

In 1719, miners in the Falun copper mine found an intact dead body in a long-unused tunnel. When they brought the body to the surface, it was identified as Fet-Mats Israelsson, who had disappeared 42 years earlier, by his former fiancée, Margaret Olsdotter.

In the open air the body dried up and turned hard as a rock. People gave it a nickname "petrified miner". Fet-Mats Israelsson was put on display on Stora Kopparberget.

When the naturalist Carolus Linnaeus visited, he noticed that Fet-Mats was not petrified but just covered with vitriol. He stated that as soon as the vitriol would evaporate, the body would begin to decay.

That proved to be correct. Fet-Mats Israelsson was buried in The Stora Kopparbergs Church December 21, 1749. During the change of the floor in early 1860, the remnants of Fet-Mats was found again and exhibited in a display case, until he was finally buried 1930 in the cemetery nearby the church.

Fet-Mats became an inspiration for the German romanticists.