Trijntje Keever, circa 1630.
Only 12 people are officially credited with having been over 8 feet tall, and Machnov is not one of them. The second tallest person in modern history, nearly as tall as Wadlow, was John “Bud” Rogan. Rogan was born in 1868 and he grew normally until the age of 13. He began to grow very rapidly at that age, and developed Ankylosis, a condition in which the joints stiffen and become immoble. Eventually Rogan could not stand or walk. His height was measured while he was in a sitting position. His exact height was not officially recorded until his death, at which point he was 8’9” tall. Due to illness he weighed only 175 pounds. He is the tallest African American ever recorded. He died in 1905 due to complications from his illness.
The tallest woman on record was Trijntje Cornelisdochter Keever, born in 1616 in Edam, Holland. Nicknamed De Groote Meid (in English, The Big Girl), Keever stood nine Amsterdam feet or 2.54 meters (8 ft 4 in) tall at the time of her death at age seventeen.
Trijntje first received public attention when she was nine years old and had reached the height of two meters (6 ft 7 in). Her parents took her to carnivals to earn some money by letting people view her. She died of cancer and was buried on July 7, 1633 in Edam, her town of birth.
“Big Gust” the gaint.
The tallest person currently alive is Zhao Liang, a circus performer from Henan in China. In April 2009, doctors in Tianjin measured his height at 2.46 meters (8 ft 1 in). Zhao played basketball until ligament damage to his left foot in 2001. In 2009 he visited a hospital because of this injury; he said he was too poor to have it treated sooner. Despite advising Zhao against any intense physical exercise, Zhao’s surgeon has declared that he has no health issues related to his height. His parents and siblings are average height, though his grandfather was 2 meters tall (6 ft 61/2 in). Zhao grew 10 centimeters (about 4 inches) a year till age 23.
An old photo of a Mongol giant who was sent to Moscow as a tribute.
Zhao Liang.
According to Wikipedia, Zhoa joined a circus in Jilin province in 2006. Though he was recruited for his height, he now also does magic tricks and plays the saxophone and cucurbit flute. Until someone bigger comes along, he is officially the tallest person in the world.
Wikipedia gives us this list of the tallest men and women officially known to history:
Tallest male
Robert Wadlow — Confirmed tallest male and person by Guinness World Records at 8’11.” (272 cm), (b. 1918, d. 1940)
John Rogan — Second tallest male in recorded history at 8’9 ½ (268 cm). Tallest African American. (b.l868,d. 1905)
Don Koehler ” 8’ 2” (2.49 m), Tallest in World for most of 1970s. Had 5’ 10” twin sister. (September 1, 1925 ” February 26, 1981)
Zhao Liang ” 8’ 1.1” (2.48 m)
Väinö Myllyrinne — Tallest Finn, standing 8’1” (247 cm). Myllyrinne was born in 1909 and died April 13, 1963.
Gabriel Estêvão Monjane — Guinness World Records listed him as tallest man from 1988 to 1990 at 8’1” (246 cm), (b.1944, d.1990)
Suleiman Ali Nashnush — Libyan who may be the tallest basketball player at 8’½” (245 cm), (b. 1943 d.1991)
Rigardus Rijnhout — Tallest Dutchman at 7’9” (2.37 m), nicknamed ‘Reus van Rotterdam’ (Giant from Rotterdam), (b. Rotterdam, 21 April 1922 — d. Leiden, 13 April 1959)
Gogea Mitu (b. Gogu Stefanescu) — Romanian boxer at 7’9” (2.36 m). (b. 14 July 1914-d.22 June 1936).
Bao Xishun — Former Guinness World Record holder for tallest living person at 7’9” (236 cm). (b.1951)
Sun Ming-Ming — Chinese basketball player. Formerly second tallest living person at 7’9", currently third tallest living person.
Radhouane Charbib — Listed by Guinness World Records as tallest man before Bao Xishun and Sun Ming Ming at 7’8¾” (235 cm).
Hussein Bisad in London.
Romanian boxer Gogea Mitu.
Ri Myung Hun — Former basketball player with the North Korean national team. 7’8½” tall.
George Bell — Tallest living American at 7’8” (234 cm).
Yasutaka Okayama —Tallest basketball player drafted in National Basketball Association history at 7’8” (234 cm).
Neil Fingleton — Tallest person born in UK at 7’7½” (233 cm).
Hussein Bisad — Somali, considered to be one of the tallest living men at 232 cm.
Alam Channa — Pakistani, considered to be the tallest living man when he died in 1998 at 7’7¼ (232 cm).
Manute Bol — Tied for tallest in NBA history at 7’7“(231cm).
Gheorghe Muresan — Tied for tallest in NBA history at 7’7” (231 cm).
Kenny George — Tallest Division I basketball playerat 7’7“ (231cm).
Jorge Gonzalez — Tallest wrestler in WWE history at 7’10” (229 cm).
Yao Ming — Yao is currently the tallest player in the NBA at 7’6” (229 cm).
Matthew McGrory — tallest actor at 7’6” (229 cm) when he died.
Tallest female
Trijntje Keever — Tallest recorded woman at 8’4” (254 cm). Died in 1633 at age 17.
Zeng Jinlian — Tallest woman at 8’2.75” (249 cm). Suffered from spine curvature and could not stand at full height. Died in 1982 at age 17.
Jane Bunford — Former world’s tallest woman (until Zeng Jinlian) and possibly the world’s tallest person at the time of her death in April 1922 at 7’8” (234 cm), but due to a curved spine she could not stand up straight. However, if her spine had normal curvature, she would have stood 8’0 (244 cm).
Yao Defen — Claimant as tallest living female at 7’9” (234 cm). Not confirmed by Guinness World Records.
Sandy Allen — Listed as tallest living female by Guinness World Records at 7’7¼” (232 cm), until her death on August 13, 2008.
The famous giant of Cuzco, Peru (unknown height).
An old print of a wildman or wildwoman.
CHAPTER 3
WILDMEN AND HAIRY GIANTS
I think that only daring speculation can lead us further, and not accumulation of facts.
—Albert Einstein
Wild hairy men have been popular in literature for thousands of years. The original boogey man was essentially the wild Hairy Man. Often, they were described as giants as well, as if being hairy and wild wasn’t scary enough.
According to Wikipedia, the wildman or woodwose, in old English, is a mythological figure that appears in the artwork and literature of medieval Europe. “Images of wild men appear in the carved and painted roof bosses where intersecting ogee vaults meet in the Canterbury Cathedral, in positions where one is also likely to encounter the vegetal Green Man.” The wildman was often armed with a club, and was a link between civilized humans and the dangerous elf-like spirits of natural woodland, such as Shakespeare’s character Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The image of the wild man survived to appear as a support image on heraldic coats-of-arms, especially in Germany, well into the 16th century. Early engravers in Germany and Italy were particularly fond of wild men, wild women, and wild families, and many examples of such characters are found in the art of from Albrecht Dürer, Martin Schongauer and others.
A wildman from olden days.
Both folklorists and cryptozoologists apply the term “wildmen” to the European wild human. The term is also used in worldwide reports of hair-covered bipeds resembling bigfoot, but tends to be most often applied to beings that seem more human than ape, or to people who live on the fringe of civilization and have developed supernatural overtones, such as the ability to predict the future or mysteriously vanish.
As one would easily imagine, the key characteristic of the wildman is his wildness. Wildmen, often imagined at giants (whether they were or not) were seen as beings of the remote wilderness, and as such represented the antithesis of civilization and civilized people who were no longer “wild.”
A wildman appears on this 1629 coin.
From the earliest times wildmen were a
ssociated with hairiness and by the 12th century they were al most invariably described as having a coat of hair covering their entire bodies except for their hands, feet and faces above their long beards; the breasts and chins of the females were also hairless. With today’s abundant stories of yetis, sasquatch, yowies (in Australia), and bigfoot reported all over the world, one cannot help but think that there is a connection between the large hairy wildmen of the Middle Ages and the sasquatch-yeti.
An old print of a fight in the forest with a wildman.
Some humans do have a hormonal disorder called Hypertrichosis that causes an overproduction of male hormones and a subsequent acute hairiness. Hyper-trichosis is thought to occur because of tumors near glands or because of some genetic chromosome defect. Perhaps some men and women in ancient times had this disorder and became outcasts of society, ultimately becoming wild men (and women). But this disorder does not seem to be the origin of most wildmen.
Prussian coat of arms featuring two wildmen.
In many medieval stories of the wildman, he was a normal human who had gone wild, becoming something of a misfit holy man. In the 7th-century Irish tale Buile Shuibhne (translated as “Frenzy of Shuibhne” or The Madness of Sweeney) which describes how Sweeney, the pagan king of the Daln Araidi of Ulster, assaults the Christian bishop Ronan Finn and is cursed with madness as a result. Sweeney spends many years roaming naked through the woods, composing verse. A similar Welsh story is about Myrddin Wyllt (the origin of the name Merlin of later romance). In the various versions of this story, Myrddin is a warrior in the service of King Gwenddoleu ap Ceidio at the time of the Battle of Arfderydd. When his lord is killed at the battle, Myrddin takes to the Caledonian Forest in a fit of madness that also gives him the ability to compose prophetic poetry.
Another version of this story comes from Geoffrey of Monmouth in his Latin Vita Merlini of around 1150, though here the figure has been renamed “Merlin.” According to Wikipedia, Geoffrey says that after Merlin witnessed the horrors of the battle:
...a strange madness came upon him. He crept away and fled to the woods, unwilling that any should see his going. Into the forest he went, glad to lie hidden beneath the ash trees. He watched the wild creatures grazing on the pasture of the glades. Sometimes he would follow them, sometimes pass them in his course. He made use of the roots of plants and of grasses, of fruit from trees and of the blackberries in the thicket. He became a Man of the Woods, as if dedicated to the woods. So for a whole summer he stayed hidden in the woods, discovered by none, forgetful of himself and of his own, lurking like a wild thing.
So, what we see here is that the classic wildman is a crossover between the worlds of bigfoot and humans. Some wildmen were humans who had just always lived in the deep woods, shunning civilization; others were people who had “gone crazy,” and were now living off roots, berries and wild game in the woods, just like bears or sasquatch. In some ways, they were the “village idiots” who had left their village and were living in the forest.
Two views of wildmen from A. Durer, 1499.
However, it also seems clear that some wildmen, especially the giant hairy ones, might have more in common with yeti and sasquatch than with normal human beings with anti-social tendencies. For instance, Wikipedia mentions that a wildman is described in Konungs Skuggsjá (Speculum Regale or “the King’s Mirror”), a book written in Norway around 1250 AD:
It once happened in that country (and this seems indeed strange) that a living creature was caught in the forest as to which no one could say definitely whether it was a man or some other animal; for no one could get a word from it or be sure that it understood human speech. It had the human shape, however, in every detail, both as to hands and face and feet; but the entire body was covered with hair as the beasts are, and down the back it had a long coarse mane like that of a horse, which fell to both sides and trailed along the ground when the creature stooped in walking.
This wildman would seem to be of the bigfoot type, though he would appear to be a sasquatch of smaller size, or perhaps one that was not yet fully grown. There seems to be little doubt the wildman did indeed exist in Europe and other parts of the world, but is the wildman a human being, or an ape-creature? As we have seen, he could be either.
Hairy Apemen of South America
Let us look at some of the early curious reports of wildmen. Some years ago, while researching a book on pirates and the Knights Templar, I came across a curious aside in one of the books I was reading, a 1678 book entitled The Buccaneers of America26 by Alexander O. Exquemelin (the book was translated from the French by Alexis Brown). Exquemelin’s book was a bestseller in its own time, and has been reprinted by Penguin Books in 1969 and Dover Books in 2000.
The former pirate Exquemelin goes on about various buccaneers that he sailed under, and at one point includes several chapters about the French buccaneer named Francois 1’Olonais and his raid (with 660 men) of the Spanish port of Maracaibo in Venezuela. After describing the journey of the buccaneers from their base on Tortuga to Venezuela, he describes Maracaibo bay (which he calls a lake) and the land— and inserts a strange note about apemen in the mountains:
On Pigeon Island stands a fort guarding the strait, as any ship wishing to enter the lake must pass close to the island. For at the mouth is a bar, or sandbank, in fourteen feet of water, and about a league inwards is another sandbank called El Tablazo, where there is only ten feet of water. Thereafter, as far as Rio de las Espinas (about forty leagues along the lake) the water is six, seven and eight fathoms deep.
Some six leagues along the lake shore, on the western side, lies Maracaibo, a very handsome city with fine-looking houses along the waterfront. The population is considerable: counting the slaves, it is reckoned that three or four thousand souls live there, and among them 800 men capable of bearing arms, all Spaniards...
There are tribes of Indians living along the western shore, still unconquered, whom the Spaniards call Indios Bravos. They will have no dealings with the Spaniards. They build their houses high up in the trees which grow in the water, so as to be less plagued by the mosquitoes. On the eastern side of the lake are Spanish fishing villages, built on piles above the water. The surrounding land is so low and swampy the mosquitoes make life intolerable, and there is danger of floods. The lake is fed by seventy-five rivers and streams, and when it rains hard the land may be flooded for a distance of two or three leagues. The village of Gibraltar often lies so deep under water that the inhabitants are forced to abandon their houses and retreat inland to the plantations...
Beautiful rivers flow through all the surrounding countryside. Cacao plantations grow beside the rivers, and in time of drought they channel water into these plantations along ditches, which have sluices to check the flow when they have sufficient. Considerable quantities of tobacco are also produced, of a kind highly esteemed in Europe; this is the genuine Virginian tobacco, known as Pope’s Tobacco.
The fertile land stretches some twenty leagues, being bounded on the lake side by swamps and on the other by high mountains, always covered with snow. On the far side of the mountains is a large town called Merida, having authority over the village of Gibraltar. Merchandise from Gibraltar is taken there over the mountains—on pack-mules—and this only once a year, because the journey is so cold as to be almost unbearable. On the return journey from Merida they bring back meal, sent from Peru by way of Santa Fe.
A Spaniard told me of a sort of people who live in these mountains, of the same stature as the Indians, but with short curly hair and with long claws on their feet, like apes. Their skin resists arrows, and all sharp instruments, and they are very agile climbers, having tremendous strength. The Spaniards attempted to kill some of the tribe with their lances, but the iron could not pierce their tough skin. These wild men managed to seize some of the Spaniards, carrying them up to the tree-tops and hurling them to the ground. These people have never been heard to speak. Sometimes they come down to the plantations at the foot of
the mountains and carry off any women slaves they can capture.
I have read various descriptions of America, but never found any mention of such people, so I believe they must be a sort of Barbary ape living in those parts, for I have seen many apes in the forest. Nevertheless, several Spaniards have assured me that these creatures are human, and that they have seen them frequently: I give it here for what it’s worth. Truly, God’s works are great, and these things may well be.26
This curious tale of apemen living in the jungle-covered mountains of western Venezuela is an odd one. They sound like some sort of bigfoot or yeti. They are men, but wildmen covered with hair who kidnap women. Stories of wildmen and yetis in the Himalayas, China and Central Asia have also mentioned the occasional kidnapping of human women.
The first reports that came out of South America came from the northernmost tip of the Andes. A member of a Spanish gold-hunting expedition in the late seventeenth century wrote back to Sevilla that his group had fought with and killed fourteen giant beasts, in a section of jungle near the Colombia-Panama border. Subsequent stories of “man-apes” drifted back to Europe from time to time, as the tropical forests and mountain slopes were crossed by Spaniards, Portuguese and Englishmen intent on pulling precious minerals out of the earth and sticky resins out of the bush. The names given to the beasts they encountered were numerous—the creatures were known as the mapinguary, capelobo or pelobo in the jungle vocabularies of the south (across the Amazon delta through Brazil), or as the di-di or Mono Grande in the northern countries of Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela.
Yeti, Sasquatch & Hairy Giants Page 4