As we approach the 100 year anniversary of the start of World War I, melting glaciers in Italy are revealing the frozen corpses of the men who fought - and died - in The Great War.
The small ski resort town of Peio, in the Italian Alps, has become the center of an archeological wonderland. A few years ago, the well-preserved bodies of fallen soldiers began to emerge from the melting ice, according to The Telegraph.
Among the most haunting of the discoveries was the mummified remains of two young Austrian soldiers. They were teenagers with blond hair, blue eyes, and bullet holes in the skulls.
Franco Nicolis of Trento's Archaeological Heritage Office told The Telegraph how he felt upon seeing the bodies:
"They feel contemporary. They come out of the ice just as they went in," he says. In all likelihood the soldiers’ mothers never discovered their sons’ fate.
The soldiers discovered in Peio fought in what's known as the White War. Italy entered WWI on the side of the Allies in 1915, and one of the most dangerous fronts became the area surrounding Peio, where Italian and Austrian soldiers fought not only each other, but bitterly cold temperatures and the danger of avalanche.
This report from The Weather Channel gives a little historical perspective on The White War, and the surprising consequences of climate change:
