There are various possibilities, including the warmer position. While generally smaller glaciers equilibrate in times measured in decades, larger ones take much longer. I don’t know the details on the glacier Oetzi was found in, so I don’t know how much cover he might have had which had melted or evaporated off. Generally speaking the glaciated regions of the earth have been warming (on average) since the end of the last ice age, and as reserviors of coldness have decreased the excursions to warmer local temperatures are more likely. IOW, whether whatever warming has occured recently has a man-made component or not, it’s capable of warming things more for a given forcing than in the past when there was more ice present to buffer the warming.

Of course the ocean is the largest heat buffering system by far, so I suppose checking to see what the deep oceans have done temperaturewise over the past few thousand years would be a good thing to check.

But getting to your initial question, It’s quite possible for something to be exposed or melted out of a frozen area whether the temperature has warmed or not. Ice flows and frozen water can still sublimate at quite cold temperatures and will eventually leave barren ground if there’s no precipitation. As I said earlier Oetzi was near a saddle or pass, but I’m not sure if it was shown he was where he’d been buried or not when he was found. He might have slowly moved until he was in a location where he could melt out. Also, in open areas near a pass, snow might not accumulate much because of wind blowing it downhill.

I just went and read some background on his finding (see: http://www.mummytombs.com/mummylocator/featured/otzi.discovery.htm )
and here’s an interesting pull-quote “When the authorities arrived, they were well aware that the glacier had been melting. Three weeks earlier, the bodies of a man and woman who had gone hiking in 1934 and never returned had been discovered. For this reason, they, like the Simons, assumed that the person had died in a climbing accident.

So while we might conclude it’s the warmest it’s been since 1934, I’m not sure we can say it’s the warmest in 5300 years.

What really interest me though is why it is warm now (good to see everyone accept that btw). There is probably nothing, amazingly, unusual about the present day warmth (yet…) but part of the reason for the warmth (and the rate of warming) undoubtedly is. That no one mentions that that part is us is hardly surprising to me anymore.

Re #2. So, Dave, it’s warmer now that at any time for the last 5300 years? Or just in that area? If that then is it possible that just Europe was warm 7000 years ago too?

OK, unleash the dogs….

Note that this differs somewhat from the situation with the trees from thousands of years ago when they had to be gradually dug up from hillsides before being incorporated into moving glacial ice.

OT – Might the fact that it was published in Der Spiegel indicatate a climate change in groàƒŸer Deutschland. Not that Der Spiegel was ever green.