Kasper Hauser was a boy who was trapped in a cramped dungeon all his life, living on bread and water and sleeping on a bed of straw. At the age of 16, a mysterious person handed Hauser two letters and dropped him off in Nuremberg, Germany. Well…maybe. For two hundred years, historians, scientists and armchair detectives have been trying to solve the baffling mystery of Kasper Hauser.
In the April 1887 issue of Popular scienceMG Valbert wrote ‘The History of a Delusion’, a comprehensive overview of everything humanity knew (and did not know) about Hauser more than fifty years after his death. Valbert described Hauser as “the object of a lively curiosity,” and the people loved him so much that he was formally adopted by the city of Nuremberg, with citizens volunteering to pay for his expenses and education.
But who was Hauser really? Was he a survivor of the ‘forbidden experiment’? Undercover royalty? Or a child genius who craved attention? The simple answer is that for 200 years no one knew. But developments can take place genetic testing science finally solve this fascinating mystery? In our latest video, Popular science delves into the enduring mystery and recent scientific breakthroughs in the case of Kasper Hauser.
It is a story about behavioral development in childhood, bloody underwear and a 1974 film by German filmmaker Werner Herzog. Trust us, it will all make sense once you hit play.
