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Posted: 2021-05-19 02:39:05

If there is one thing that is certain about the Somerton Man mystery, it is that very little is certain.

The case abounds in clues, threads, theories, rumours and artefacts.

In the 73 years since the man's body was found on Adelaide's Somerton beach, that mystery has only deepened.

As work is underway to exhume the man's remains, here is a look at some of the key clues.

A black and white image of a deceased man
The Somerton Man case has been an enigma since his body was discovered in 1948. (

Supplied

)

The suitcase

When passers-by discovered the body on December 1, 1948, he was wearing a brown suit and had a half-smoked cigarette on his lapel.

He had a clean-shaven face and appeared to be about 40 years old. There was no wallet to identify him, and his clothes had their labels removed.

A month later, a suitcase was uncovered in the cloakroom of the Adelaide Railway Station.

The suitcase and some of its contents believed to belong to the Somerton Man.
The Somerton Man's suitcase found at the Adelaide Railway Station.(

Supplied: Professor Derek Abbott

)

It had been checked in the day before the Somerton Man's body was discovered, and police suspected it belonged to him.

Inside was an odd assortment of items, including clothes that also had their labels removed, and a waxed thread not sold in Australia — the same kind used to repair the unidentified man's trousers.

The names "Keane" and "Kean" were written on several items.

Clothes believed to have belong to the Somerton Man.
Clothes believed to have belong to the Somerton Man.(

Supplied: Professor Derek Abbott

)

The poem

The Somerton Man mystery is also known as the "Tamam Shud" case.

Those Persian words, meaning "it is finished", are from the poetry book the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, loosely translated from Persian and published in 1859.

Months after the Somerton Man died, a pathologist re-examining his body found a scrap of paper in the man's pocket bearing the words "Tamam Shud".

Shortly after the first inquest concluded, police appealed to the public to help find the book from which the scrap had been torn, and a businessman came forward with a matching copy.

The book had been found apparently discarded in the back of his car around the same time as, and close to where, the Somerton Man's body was found.

The copy of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam linked to the Somerton Man.
The copy of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam linked to the Somerton Man, missing the final words: "Tamam Shud".(

Supplied: Professor Derek Abbott

)

The 'code'

Once the book was handed in, it revealed further clues.

In the back of the book there was a telephone number and a sequence of letters, faintly indented.

The letters are perhaps the most intriguing part of the whole mystery.

Police scan of the handwritten code found in the back of the book of poems linked to the Somerton Man.
Police scan of the handwritten code found in the back of the book of poems linked to the Somerton Man.(

Supplied: Australian Police

)

They have been interpreted by some as a code, and have led to speculation the Somerton Man was a Cold War spy.

But efforts to decipher their meaning — or determine whether they have one — have proved fruitless.

Jestyn

The phone number in the back of the book was revealed to belong to a woman called Jessica Thomson, who also went by the names Jo and Jestyn.

She lived just hundreds of metres from where the Somerton Man's body was found but, when she spoke to police in July 1949, she denied knowing him.

Jessie 'Jo' Thomson is a key player in the Somerton Man mystery.
Jessie "Jo" Thomson may have had a relationship with the Somerton Man.(

Supplied: Professor Derek Abbott

)

Police took her to see a plaster bust of the man's head and shoulders, in the hope it would jog her memory.

According to reports, she behaved strangely when she saw it, but never revealed why.

It has been suggested that her son Robin was the biological son of the unidentified man, with some pointing to shared physical characteristics, including their teeth and ears.

The DNA

Somerton Man researcher Derek Abbott used the plaster cast of the Somerton Man to pursue another line of the inquiry.

He found hairs that belonged to the Somerton Man that had become embedded in the bust when it was being made.

Plaster bust of the Somerton Man.
A plaster bust of the Somerton Man on display in the SA Police Museum that was made in 1949.(

ABC News: Tony Hill

)

They were then submitted for genetic testing.

The results revealed the man's mother had European ancestry, but offered no further clues.

The video

The only known images of the Somerton Man are unflattering black-and-white post-mortem photographs.

A death mask of his face and upper torso was also created using plaster, and was later put on display at the SA Police Museum.

Last year, Canadian virtual reality specialist Daniel Voshart was commissioned to come up with an animation showing what the Somerton Man could have looked like when he was alive.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume.
Canadian special effects artist Daniel Voshart devised the animation of the mystery man's face.

Using artificial intelligence software, Voshart combined physical descriptions of the Somerton Man with the autopsy photos and images of the plaster bust.

He said he hoped his work could jog someone's memory, or trigger new discoveries in unexpected places.

"If the Cold War [theory] is true that means there's a file somewhere, maybe in Russia, with an image of the actual guy."

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