Wikipedia is a great site to learn stuff from and get lost for hours through the endless amount of information. It’s also a place with some very dark corners and stories, and you can find yourself reading some very creepy stuff in there.
Tarrare
A French showman and solider known for his unusual (to be gentle) eating habits. Able to eat vast amounts of meat, he was constantly hungry; his parents could not provide for him, and he was turned out of the family home as a teenager. He travelled France in the company of a band of thieves and prostitutes, before becoming the warm-up act to a travelling charlatan; he would swallow corks, stones, live animals and a whole basket full of apples. He then took this act to Paris where he worked as a street performer.
After a rough experience with the military, he agreed to submit to any procedure that would cure his appetite, and was treated with laudanum, tobacco pills, wine vinegar and soft-boiled eggs. The procedures failed, and doctors could not keep him on a controlled diet; he would sneak out of the hospital to scavenge for offal in gutters, rubbish heaps and outside butchers’ shops, and attempted to drink the blood of other patients in the hospital and to eat the corpses in the hospital morgue. After falling under suspicion of eating a toddler he was ejected from the hospital. He died at the age of 26.
Scaphism
Also known as the boats, it is an ancient Persian method of execution. The method? The intended victim was stripped naked and then firmly fastened within the interior space of two narrow rowing boats (or hollowed-out tree trunks) joined together one on top of the other with the head, hands and feet protruding. The condemned was forced to ingest milk and honey to the point of developing a severe bowel movement and diarrhea, and more honey would be poured on him to attract insects, with special attention devoted to the eyes, ears, mouth, genitals, and anus. In some cases, the executioner would mix milk and honey and pour that mixture all over the victim. He would then be left to float on a stagnant pond or be exposed to the sun. The defenseless individual’s feces accumulated within the container, attracting more insects which would eat and breed within his exposed flesh, which—pursuant to interruption of the blood supply by burrowing insects—became increasingly gangrenous. The individual would lie naked, covered from head to toe in milk, honey, and his or her own feces. The feeding would be repeated each day in some cases to prolong the torture, so that fatal dehydration or starvation did not occur. Death, when it eventually occurred, was probably due to a combination of dehydration, starvation and septic shock. Delirium would typically set in after a few days. (Image via gadgetpics)
The Flatwoods Monster
Also known as the Braxton County Monster or the Phantom of Flatwoods, is an alleged unidentified extraterrestrial or cryptid reported to have been sighted in the town of Flatwoods in Braxton County, West Virginia, United States on September 12, 1952. According to the story, the boys who met this alleged extra terrestial creature suffered from vomiting and convulsions due to the mist surrounding it. (Image via beyondthecircle.net)
Rat King
Known as Rattenkönig in German and roi de rats in French, Rat Kings nvolve a number of rats intertwined at their tails, which become stuck together with blood, dirt, ice, or feces – or simply knotted. The animals reputedly grow together while joined at the tails.
June and Jennifer Gibbons
A unique story about a pair of twins from Wales known as the silent twins who only talked to each other, shutting themselves away from the outside world and refusing to be torn apart from each other. They agreed that if ever one of them died, the other one will begin to speak and live a normal life. During their stay in the hospital, they began to believe that it was necessary for one twin to die, and after much discussion, Jennifer agreed to be the sacrifice. In March 1993, the twins were transferred from Broadmoor to the more open Caswell Clinic in Bridgend, Wales; on arrival Jennifer could not be roused. She was taken to the hospital where she died soon after of acute myocarditis, a sudden inflammation of the heart. There was no evidence of drugs or poison in her system, and her death remains a mystery. (Image via Buzzfeed)
Not everything is creepy on Wikipedia. Sometimes it’s only bizarre, such as these 10 articles you’ll find hard to believe that are real.
