An old servents buried him under a pile of stones at Luci Ridge, western suburb of Hangzhou. Not until a whole century later did some passerby found his body.
It wasn't until 1906 that a scholar came across the prayer book in a library and realized it was a palimpsest, and that the underlying layer of texts could only have come from Archimedes.
A beautifully preserved boat, made around 3,000 years ago and discovered by chance in a muddy hole, has had a profound impact on archaeological research.