A man was met with a nasty surprise when he began renovating his father’s attic.
Stepping into the loft, he discovered the desiccated corpse of a woman lying underneath a bed of leaves and straw, according to media reports.
On Aug. 28, local law enforcement received a call from a startled 33-year-old local man, whose name has not been disclosed. The man had found a long-dead body in his father’s attic.
No one had stepped foot inside of the attic for more than 40 years, according to The Local.
The man found the body on the floor, a skeleton garbed in several jackets, trousers and shoes. Law enforcement performed a dental analysis and determined the corpse was that of a woman who was reported missing in 1977, the German newspaper Bild reports.
A mother of three, the woman had an established history of mental illness. One year before her final disappearance, she went missing for six weeks. She was eventually found hiding in a forest.
The woman was last reported missing on November 4, 1977. The attic where she was found was roughly three miles from her home.
The deceased woman’s husband died in 2012, and he never had the opportunity to learn what had happened to his wife.
Local law enforcement does not suspect foul play in the woman’s death.
“A discovery of this type is a very unusual event,” said police spokesman Josef Schade. “We assume she lay down to sleep and froze to death in the attic.”
Nearly four decades after her mysterious disappearance, her case is now closed.
Not all attic discoveries are tragic. In 2013, a family in Brazil was stunned to find their missing pet tortoise living in their attic.
The pet had been missing for more than 30 years, according to TreeHugger.
After the tortoise disappeared during a home renovation in 1982, its owners spent decades believing their pet had escaped from the house.
To their shock, they found the resilient turtle in their upstairs storage room, having survived over the years eating termites.
Whether our storage spaces hold horrific or happy surprises, stories like these prompt the question: what’s in your attic?
