Required fields are marked *. Julia Pastrana - Wikipedia An indigenous woman exhibited in 19th-Century Europe as the "world's ugliest woman" has been buried in her native Mexico some 150 years after her death. Lent soon began exhibiting the embalmed bodies of his wife and son. Similar stories are found elsewhere around the world, namely the well documented case of Zana, captured in Abkhazia. Bodily autonomy in life and death was taken from Julia without her say in the matter. Welcome to Pastranaland. Her appearance was caused by two rare conditions: hypertrichosis, a genetic mutation causing her hair growth; and gingival hyperplasia, an abnormal thickening of her gums. Seriously, the young woman is a remarkable curiosity not so horridly repulsive as the imaginative artists of the posting-bill school have made her but yet sufficiently abnormal to create a feeling of sorrow and sadness, which would be more intense but that the young woman herself seems perfectly happy. In 1994, the Norway Senate recommended burying her remains, but the Minister of Sciences decided to keep them, so scientists could perform research. Julia Pastrana's last words on her deathbed were "I am dying happy". After the bodies were preserved by Sukolov, Lent re-purchased them from him and began exhibiting them throughout Europe. The bodies were touring up until as recently as the 1970s until Sweden banned the exhibition in 1973 putting a stop to the display of the corpses. Pastrana became a sideshow oddity, billed as the missing link between humans and apes. This questions his motive behind the marriage in the first instance, with the union likely more of a business plan than a loving partnership to the scrupulous businessman. Julia Pastrana (Bear woman, Ape woman, The Ugliest Woman in the World) was born on 1834 in Sinaloa, Mexico, is an Actor. At first, Pastrana performed under the management of J.W. In both stories, she came out of the womb dark and hairy, with thick lips and wide ears. Bartra, Roger. Julia Pastrana, a woman from Mexico born with hypertrichosis, became one of the most famous human curiosities of the 19th century, exhibited the world over as a "bearded lady" while both alive and dead. She was 59. These speculations also arose because her face had a gorilla-like appearance, among other body features. Then, Pastrana got pregnant. And when she died after six years of displaying her face and bodys thick, coarse black hair, Lent had her and their infant son stuffed, mounted and displayed like trophies. Other official version: Her peculiar looks were a result of a rare congenital condition known as acromegaloid hypertrichosis syndrome, which covered her body with thick hair and caused unusual facial features, including abnormally thick lips and a large jaw. Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. But Ms. Barbata, who is 54, continued to apply pressure. Patrick McMullan/Getty Images. She grew only to 4 feet 5 inches tall and 112 pounds in weight, but what was fascinating about her to most people was that her entire body was covered with hair except the palms of her hands and the soles of her feet. That play, by Shaun Prendergast, had its debut in London in 1998 and is performed almost entirely in the dark. The newborn would only survive a little over a day after his birth and he had inherited the condition that made his mother famous he too was covered in dark hair. Julia Pastrana entered history as one of the most extreme and earliest reported cases of this condition and, unfortunately after her death in 1860 her body was regularly exhibited in a When the German audience saw Pastrana, they considered her show in bad taste and rejected it. Mexican 'ape woman' buried 150 years after her death. Her return home from a locked storage room in an Oslo research .