After 250 Years

Manawatu Times, Volume LVI, Issue 6519, 7 April 1931, Page 2

After 250 Years

“THE PETRIFIED MINER” FINAL BURIAL OF BODY

The body of Matts, the ‘‘petrified miner,” was recently buried in Falun, in the Swedish province of Dalecarlia, his native town, where he met his death in 1677. The ceremony was the last act in a story 250 years old.. In spite of the entreaties of his betrothed, on the first day of the calling of his banns, Matts went down a deep shaft to .explode blasting charges. He never returned, and his body was not found until about 50 years later. _ It has been preserved by the vitriolic water in which it was lying, and it looked almost lifelike. When the body was brought up, Matts’ former fiancee, now an old woman, but unmarried and true to his memory, went to the mine and recognised him at once. He retained his youthful features. The petrified body was placed in a glass case and kept for a long time in the mining museum of the Great Copper Mining Company in Falun, and later was buried beneath the floor of the church. When tho floor was repaired in 1860 the body was placed in a glass-covered coffin in the church gallery. It has now been finally buried in the churchyard. The fate of Matts lias been the theme of many literary and musical works. The German romanticists, Ruckert and Hoffman, and the poet, Archim von Arnim, have used the theme, and Wagner in 1549 worked out a preliminary plan for an opera in three acts based on it.