A German man has drowned himself using his wife's chopped off head after dismembering her and dumping the remains in a lake in Austria.

According to comments made by Austrian authorities on Tuesday, a passer-by found some body parts inside a suitcase that washed up on Lake Traunsee's shore in central Austria on Sunday. The local resident then called the police and an extensive search began.

Another suitcase with more body remains inside was found the next day, but police were still unable to determine the identity of the woman as her head was missing.

After a thorough search, divers discovered the man’s body tied to two bags containing “commercially available granite stones” and “personal tools”  at the bottom of the lake. The woman’s head was found encased in a concrete block in one of the bags.

The initial forensic examinations revealed that the case was a murder-suicide, in which the woman, aged 50 to 70, had been strangled between December 25 and January 1, and the 70-year-old man, a pensioner, later drowned himself.