According to numerous posts in social networks, this picture depicts a man who died in the 19th century under very unusual circumstances: he allegedly broke his neck because he stepped on his own beard. We checked the reliability of this story.
The viral photo captures a man sitting on a chair with a giant beard. The authors of publications, in addition to the cause of the death of this person, also indicate that the photo was taken in 1867 in the United States. In Runet, such messages were most widely dispersed inVKontakte", Where such posts in public topics sometimes received several hundredsand sometimes thousands Likes (examples here, here, here, here, here And here). IN Twitter Account "Historical photos" with more than 500,000 subscribers since 2014 Published Eight identical tweets about an unusual accident. Tens of thousands of views are collected in Telegram (examples here, here, here, here And here).
In addition, sometimes a different version of a viral photo is found on the Web-on it a man is presented in the form of Odin, the Supreme God in German-Scandinavian mythology, with attributes characteristic of him: a lining by eye and two crows sitting behind.
First we have completed the reverse search in the picture and found The original a picture on the website of the British photographic agency Alamy, and its original Store In the library of the State University of Northern Dakota. As expected, there are no poultry lining in the original. The photo base also indicates the name The captured person is Hans Langseth. There is about him article In Wikipedia, where the same viral photo is posted (according to Most sources, on it a man is 66 years old). Langeset is a resident of the United States of Norwegian descent, setting a global record for the length of the beard. This is an achievement confirms The official website of the Guinness Book of Records:
The longest natural male beard in history belonged to Hans N. Langeset (was born In 1846 in Norway). Its length at the time of the burial of the Langeste in Kensett, Iowa, in 1927 was 5.33 m (17 feet and 6 inches). In 1967, she was Given Smithsonov Institute (Washington, USA).
According to site Smithsonov Institute, Langeset began to let go of a beard at 19 to participate in local competitions in the growing beard and continued after their completion. According to some publications, the viral photo was taken in 1867, but then Langeste was slightly over 20 years and his beard could not reach the size that we see in the picture. According to site Libraries of the State University of Northern Dakota, the photograph dates from the 1910s. If we assume that the man was really photographed at the age of 66, then the picture was taken in 1912 or 1913.
Before his death, Langeset told the children about his last desire: the record holder wanted his beard to be cut off and preserved for descendants after a farewell ceremony. The son of Langeste agreed, but before getting into the museum, the beard lay in a box in the attic for several decades. At the same time, how reported On the site dedicated to the life of the record holder, the beard was about about a foot (0.3 m), since it was not completely cut off.
In November 1927, in the newspaper The Greene Recorder was published Necrologist of the Langeste. It was reported that on November 10 at the 82nd year of his life, a man died in his son’s house. The cause of death was not called, so there were no references to the broken neck.
However, the story of death due to a beard is not taken out of nowhere.
In the XVI century, one of the leaders of the Austrian city of Brownau-Am-Inn (the very one, where after several centuries was born Adolf Hitler) was Hans Steininger. Since then the photograph was not yet invented, we can only be content with paintings, engravings and sculptures with the image of this person, and some of them were created centuries after his death. So, in the collection of the Louvre There is His portrait in full height, and the description of the exhibit reads: “A counselor from Brownow named Hans Steininger wore a beard divided in two up to the very heel, he died in 1567.” Coherent The wall of the parish church of Brownow, where Steining is buried, Decorated His sculptural portrait, also depicting a man with a long bifurcated beard.
On different ones educational And entertainment resources writethat on September 28, 1567, a fire occurred in the city, which caused a panic. Steininger arrived in the place, who in the turmoil forgot to turn and remove the beard, then stepped on it and fell from the stairs, breaking his neck. Found And the version that he died in fire. The Austrian writer-traveler of the 19th century Joseph Kiselak also mentioned 1567 as the date of death, but about the death of a bearded man told So: “When, wanting to show his loyalty to the prince, he usually accelerated a measured step, he stepped on his beard and, leaning something in the fall, soon died of the consequences of the injury.” And the Austrian local historian and writer of the 19th century Benedict Pillway in his book told About several contradictions in the biography of Steiner. For example, according to legend, King Rudolf II was so impressed by his beard that he called Steinger to Prague to the royal celebration. However, by words Pillwine, this is not true, since Rudolph II Rules Since the mid-1570s, and the bearded man died on September 28, 1570, as a tombstone is about. An engraving is given on the website of the Austrian National Library (you can consider it more details here) where the same date is indicated. At the same time, Pillway brought two different descriptions of how Steining died. According to the first, he worked with documents in the town hall, when the rider joked around the city and announced the death of the king, which was why Steininger jumped sharply, stepped on his beard and broke his neck. But the more likely Pillway calls the version with a fire: Steining wanted to escape, so he was in a hurry and stepped on his beard, as a result of which he fell from the stairs, breaking his neck.
And although after several centuries the exact details of the death of Steiner remains a mystery, his beard Store In the local history Museum Cities of Brownau-Am-Inn.
Thus, a person with a viral photo did not die as a result of a fracture of the neck after he stepped on his beard. Authors of such publications, probably Confused The real documented story of the American Norwegian origin of Hans Langeste, who died in the 20th century, and the contradictory versions of the biography of the Austrian Hans Steiner, who lived in the 16th century.
Photo on the cover: Institute for Regional Studies, NDSU, Fargo (Folio 13.1) / Jorgenson, Nils C.
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