Wild Children is the latest project by photographer Julia Fullerton-Batten, in which she offers a look at children growing up under unusual circumstances.

The photographer rose to fame after a series of photographs "Stories of Adolescents" in 2005, when she explored the transition of a girl into adulthood.

Fullerton-Batten said The Girl Without a Name inspired her to look for other cases of feral children. So she collected several stories at once. Some were lost, others were abducted by wild animals, and many of these children were neglected.

Mowgli children

Lobo, the wolf girl from Mexico, 1845-1852

In 1845, a girl ran on all fours with a pack of wolves in pursuit of a herd of goats. A year later, people saw her again when she ate a goat with the wolves. The girl was caught, but she ran away. In 1852, she was again spotted feeding two wolf cubs. However, she ran away again, and since then the girl has not been seen again.

Oksana Malaya, Ukraine, 1991

Oksana was found in a kennel with dogs in 1991. She was 8 years old and she lived with dogs for 6 years. Her parents were alcoholics, and one day they just left her on the street. In search of warmth, a 3-year-old girl climbed into a kennel, hiding with a mongrel.

When found, she looked more like a dog than a child. Oksana ran on all fours, breathed, sticking out her tongue, bared her teeth and barked. Due to her lack of human communication, she only knew the words "yes" and "no."

With the help of intensive therapy, the girl was taught basic social speaking skills, but only at the 5-year-old level. Now Oksana Malaya is 30 years old, she lives in a clinic in Odessa and works with the pets of the hospital under the guidance of her guardians.

Incredible facts

Legend has it that Romulus and Rema, the twins of the founders of Rome, were abandoned as children, and the children were nursed by a she-wolf until they were found by a wandering shepherd. In the end, they founded the city on Palantine Hill, the very place where the she-wolf took care of them. Perhaps this is all just a myth, but in history there are many real cases associated with children raised by animals.

And although in real life the stories of these wild children are not as romantic as in the case of Romulus and Rem Because these children were often experiencing cognitive and behavioral impairments, their stories testify to the remarkable human will to survive and the strong maternal instinct of other animals.

Ukrainian dog girl

Left in the kennel by her careless parents at the age of 3 to 8, Oksana Malaya grew up surrounded by other dogs. When she was found in 1991, she could not speak, choosing barking instead of speaking and running on all fours. Now in my twenties Oksana taught to speak, but she still has mental retardation. Now she is caring for the cows that are on the farm near the boarding school where she lives.

Cambodian Jungle Girl

Rochom Piengeng(Rochom P "ngieng) got lost and mysteriously disappeared at the age of 8 while she was tending a buffalo in the Cambodian jungle. 18 years later, in 2007, a villager saw a naked woman sneaking to his house in an attempt to steal rice. How did they recognize the lost girl in a woman? Rochom Piengeng from the distinctive scar on her back, it turned out that the girl somehow miraculously survived in the dense jungle.

The girl was unable to learn the language and adapt to the local culture and disappeared again in May 2010. Since then, much conflicting information has emerged about her whereabouts, including reports that in June 2010 she was seen in a pit in a dug toilet near her home.

Monkey baby from Uganda

After his father killed his mother in front of him, 4-year-old John Ssebunya(John Ssebunya) fled into the jungle where he was supposedly raised as green monkeys until he was found in 1991. As in other cases with the Mowgli children, he resisted the villagers who tried to grab him, and received help from his fellow monkeys, who threw sticks at people. After being caught, John was taught to talk and sing. The last thing that became known about him was that he was on tour with a children's choir. Pearls of Africa.

Victor of Aveiron

He was perhaps one of the most famous Mowgli children. Story Victor of Aveiron became widely known for the film " Wild child". Despite the fact that his origin is a mystery, it is believed that Victor lived all his childhood alone in the forest before he was discovered in 1797. After several more disappearances, he appeared in the vicinity of France in 1800. Victor became the subject of study many philosophers and scientists who thought about the origin of language and human behavior, although little has been achieved in its development due to mental retardation.

Madina

Tragic story Madina similar to history Oksana Malaya. Madina lived with the dogs, on her own until she was discovered at the age of 3. When they found her, she knew only two words - yes and no, although she preferred to bark like a dog. Fortunately, Madina declared mentally and physically healthy immediately upon discovery. Although her development has been delayed, she is at an age where hope is not completely lost and those who care for her believe that she will be able to lead a normal life when she grows up.

Lobo, wolf girl from the Devil's River

In 1845, a mysterious girl was seen running on all fours among wolves, attacking a herd of goats near San Felipe in Mexico. The story was confirmed a year later, when the girl was seen again, this time greedily eating a dead goat. The alarmed villagers began searching for the girl, and soon the wild girl was caught. It is believed that she constantly howled like a wolf at night, attracting packs of wolves that rushed into the village to rescue her. In the end, she broke free and fled from her captivity.

The girl was not seen until 1854, when she was accidentally spotted with two wolf cubs by the river. She grabbed the cubs and fled into the forest and since then no one has seen her again.

Bird boy

A Russian boy abandoned by his mother who chirps was discovered by social workers in Volgograd. When found, the 6-year-old boy was unable to speak and instead tweeted like his parrot friends. Despite the fact that he was not physically injured in any way, he is unable to enter into normal human contact. He expresses his emotions by flapping his arms like a bird's wings. He was transferred to a psychological aid center, where specialists are trying to rehabilitate him.

Amala and Kamala

These two girls at the age of 8 ( Kamala) and 18 months ( Amala) were found in a lair of wolves in 1920 in Midnapore in India. Their story is controversial. Since the girls had a big age difference, experts believe that they were not sisters. It is possible that they got to the wolves at different times. Both girls had all the habits of animals: they walked on all fours, howled at night, opened their mouths and stuck out their tongues like wolves. Like other Mowgli children, they wanted to return to their old life and felt unhappy trying to settle in the civilized world. After the youngest girl died, Kamala cried for the first time. The older girl managed to partially socialize.

Wild Boy Peter

In 1724, a naked, hairy boy who walked on all fours was found in a forest near the city. Hameln in Germany. When tricked into tricking him, he behaved like a wild animal, preferring to eat raw birds and vegetables and unable to speak. After being transported to England, he was given a name wild boy peter... And even though he never learned to speak, he supposedly loved music, was taught to do simple jobs, and lived to a ripe old age.

Children - Mowgli - human children who lived out of contact with people from an early age and practically did not feel care and love from another person, had no experience of social behavior and communication. Such children, abandoned by their parents, are raised by animals or live in isolation. Children raised by animals exhibit (within the limits of human physical capabilities) behaviors characteristic of their adoptive parents, for example, fear of humans.

Most often, wolves, dogs, monkeys, sometimes bears, goats become the "adoptive parents" of Mowgli children, and there have also been recorded cases of raising lions, gazelles, and pigs.

There are a number of factors that scientists need to identify Homo ferus (that is, Mowgli children). Its typical representative is devoid of many inherent human traits: love, ordinary emotions and especially laughter; he is silent, except for those moments when he growls, snorts or howls; he walks on all fours like a real four-legged; he is not able to live among people and must lead an existence characteristic of animals, and most importantly, he can live without any human help.

Over many millennia of human history, the "Mowgli phenomenon" has been repeated a huge number of times on all continents of the Earth.

Some examples of parenting with animals include:

1. Everyone knows the legend of the creation of Rome. Legend has it that Romulus and Remus, the twins of the founders of Rome, were abandoned as children, and the children were nursed by a she-wolf until they were found by a wandering shepherd. In the end, they founded a city on Palantine Hill, the very place where the she-wolf took care of them. Perhaps this is all just a myth, but in history there are many real cases associated with children who were raised by animals.

2. Ukrainian girl-dog

Left in the kennel by her careless parents at the age of 3 to 8, Oksana Malaya grew up surrounded by other dogs. When she was found in 1991, she could not speak, choosing barking instead of speaking and running on all fours. Now in her twenties, Oksana was taught to speak, but she still has a mental retardation. Now she is caring for the cows that are on the farm near the boarding school where she lives.

3. Monkey baby from Uganda

After his father killed his mother in front of his eyes, 4-year-old John Ssebunya fled into the jungle, where he was supposedly raised as green monkeys, until he was found in 1991. As in other cases with the Mowgli children, he resisted the villagers who tried to grab him, and received help from his fellow monkeys, who threw sticks at people. After being caught, John was taught to talk and sing. The last thing that became known about him was that he was on tour with the Pearl of Africa children's choir.

4. Bird Boy

A Russian boy abandoned by his mother who chirps was discovered by social workers in Volgograd. When found, the 6-year-old boy was unable to speak and instead tweeted like his parrot friends. Despite the fact that he was not physically injured in any way, he is unable to enter into normal human contact. He expresses his emotions by flapping his arms like a bird's wings. He was transferred to a psychological aid center, where specialists are trying to rehabilitate him.

5. Chinese woman Wang Xianfeng raised pigs. At the age of 9, when she was found, she did not have the intelligence of even a 3-year-old child. The poor thing was taken to an orphanage. After two years, she stopped grunting and learned to eat with chopsticks. After the orphanage, she even got a job, became a cleaner in the Shanghai menagerie.

6. Even physical changes take place with such children. So, in the 60s in Uganda, a 4-year-old baby was found in the jungle, almost from birth with monkeys. The baby's body was covered with thick hair. Two years later, she fell out, but the child did not get rid of the monkey habits. Several times he tried to escape from the orphanage into the jungle. At the age of 8, he succeeded. What happened to him in the future is unknown to anyone.

7. In 1887, a nine-year-old Arab girl Kama, who lived in a family of lions, came to the people. She ate raw meat, did not understand human language, saw in the dark and had incredibly strong hands with sharp long nails. Unfortunately, Kama could not adapt to people, she soon fell ill and died.

8. In October 2001, a baby aged 1 year and 4 months was lost in northern Iran. A week later he was found in a bear den. He played with three cubs. The bear licked the boy's face and fed him with her milk. Fortunately, the boy did not have time to run wild and, returning to his father's house, quickly forgot his experience of life with animals.

9. There have been cases when lost children were raised by such exotic animals as gazelles. In 1960, French anthropologist Jean-Claude Auger saw a herd of white gazelles in the Spanish Sahara, among which a naked child was jumping merrily. Physically he was excellently developed, his calf muscles were especially strong. The Spaniards decided to find out how fast the boy was running and chased him in a jeep. Then they claimed that at times he reached a speed of 54 km per hour and easily jumped four meters in length.

The fate of animal pupils among people, as a rule, is sad. In isolation from the wild, Mowgli children die very quickly. The fate of those who survive is unenviable. The wards of psychiatric hospitals are becoming the home for the matured Tarzan.

Rehabilitation process:

If, before isolation from society, children had some skills of social behavior, the process of their rehabilitation is much easier. Those who lived in animal society for the first 5-6 years of life practically cannot master the human language, walk upright, communicate meaningfully with other people, even despite the years later spent in human society, where they received enough care. This once again shows how important the first years of life are for the development of a child.

Psychologists have often noted that a person who has spent a long time among animals begins to identify himself with his “fellows”; so an eighteen-year-old girl who was raised by dogs, having learned to speak, still insisted that she was a dog. However, in this case there are already mental deviations, which are also inevitable.

Mowgli's chances of becoming a normal person depend both on genetically inherent qualities and on the period and length of stay outside of society. In the process of human development, there is a certain age limit, a threshold into which this or that function is laid: for example, the ability to speak, the skills of bipedal locomotion. In addition, there is a transitional period, on average, 12-13 years: before this age, the child's brain is sufficiently plastic, and by the age of 12-13, the human brain is gaining intellectual potential. In the event that a person has not formed any of the functions, then it is almost impossible to replenish them later.

As the specialist notes, after the 12-13-year-old threshold of an undeveloped person, it is only possible to “train.” True, if a child was returned to people before the “teenage threshold” of 12-13 years old, he can still be adapted to society, but mental disorders will remain with him until the end of life.

Many experts have a question: what makes animals take on human children for raising? There is no single answer to this question. Many believe that this is the instinct of motherhood, which is triggered when a "mother-wolf" or another animal (having its own cubs) meets a human child.

Others believe that the insecurity of the child is perceived by the beasts as the absence of any threat from him and in response to this they show "loyalty" (tolerance) to him.

Often, Mowgli children have excellent health and much more stable immunity than people living in society. It happens that absolutely healthy “Mowgli” in the familiar animal environment die, falling into human society - for them it is not only physiological, but also a deep cultural shock.

A person - a real person, and not a being with human physiology - can be brought up only in society, in society, in a group of people. Nature, genes in a person have some signs that must be expressed in development, and outside of society, a person cannot develop. It is society, society, the community of people that makes a person not just a bipedal erect mammal, but a true homo sapiens - a reasonable person.

From childhood, a person is formed under the influence of the conditions in which he grows up. And if up to five years old a child is surrounded by animals, and not people, he adopts their habits and gradually loses his human appearance. “Mowgli's Syndrome” is the name given to cases of the formation of children in the wild. After returning to people, socialization became impossible for many of them. How the fate of the most famous Mowgli children developed is further in the review.

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Indian Mowgli girl Kamala

Monument to Romulus, Remus and the she-wolf who nurtured them

The first known case of raising children by animals, according to legend, was the story of Romulus and Remus. According to the myth, in childhood they were raised by a she-wolf, and later found and raised by a shepherd. Romulus became the founder of Rome, and the she-wolf became the emblem of the capital of Italy. However, in real life, stories of Mowgli children rarely have such happy ends.

Shot from the cartoon "Mowgli", 1973

The story, born of Rudyard Kipling's imagination, is actually completely implausible: children who are lost before they can walk and talk will no longer be able to learn these skills in adulthood. The first reliable historical case of raising a child by wolves was recorded in 1341 in Hesse, Germany. The hunters found a child who lived in a pack of wolves, ran on all fours, jumped far, squealed, growled and bite. The 8-year-old boy spent half of his life among animals. He could not speak and ate only raw food. Soon after returning to the people, the boy died.

Savage of Aveyron in life and in movies

The most detailed case was the story of the "wild boy of Aveyron." In 1797, in France, peasants caught a 12-15 year old child in the forest, who behaved like a small animal. He could not speak, his words were replaced by growls. Several times he ran away from people to the mountains. After he was caught again, he became the object of attention of scientists. Naturalist Pierre-Joseph Bonater wrote Historical Notes on the Savage of Aveyron, where he detailed the results of his observations. The boy was insensitive to high and low temperatures, had a special sense of smell and hearing, and refused to wear clothes. Dr. Jean-Marc Itard spent six years trying to socialize Victor (as the boy was named), but he never learned to speak. He died at the age of 40. The life story of Victor of Aveyron formed the basis for the film "Wild Child".

Still from the movie "Wild Child", 1970

Dina Sanichar

Most children with Mowgli's syndrome are found in India: from 1843 to 1933, 15 such cases were recorded here. Dina Sanichar lived in a den of wolves, he was found in 1867. The boy was taught to walk on two legs, use dishes, wear clothes, but he could not speak. Sanichar died at the age of 34.

In 1920, the inhabitants of an Indian village turned to missionaries with a request to help them get rid of the creepy ghosts from the jungle. The "ghosts" were two girls, eight and two years old, who lived with wolves. They were placed in an orphanage and named Kamala and Amala. They growled and howled, ate raw meat, and moved on all fours. Amala lived for less than a year, Kamala died at the age of 17, having reached by this time the developmental level of a four-year-old child.

Indian Mowgli Amala and Kamala

In 1975, a five-year-old child was found among wolves in Italy. He was named Rono and placed at the Institute of Child Psychiatry, where doctors worked to socialize him. But the boy died eating human food.

Many believe that the story of Indian wolf boy Dean Sanichar inspired Rudyard Kipling to write his most famous and beloved by millions of readers, The Jungle Book.

Like Mowgli, Dean was a wild boy raised by wolves, although his life was very different from that of a fictional character. Book Mowgli surprised readers with his upbringing. After visiting the Indian forest, he was adopted by animals that fed, protected and protected him. Dean was also raised by wolves, but this real-life boy's life was not so fabulous.

Born in India, who lived there until he was 6 years old, and then moved to England with his parents, the young writer Rudyard returned to his small homeland a decade later. His famous "The Jungle Book" was published in 1895.

It turns out that Mowgli's story was born two decades after Dean Sanichar was caught by Indian hunters in a pack of wolves. But unlike the clever book hero, Dean was mentally handicapped despite years of reintegration into human society.

Dean was not the only boy whose unusual life was embodied in the book's story. But it was his life story that had a direct impact on one of the most famous British writers.

The hunters kidnapped him and killed the companion wolf.

The hunters stumbled upon Dean in the jungle by chance and witnessed him walking on all fours after his wolf friend. Curiosity got the better of them, and they began a whole hunt for the boy to catch him.

They made numerous attempts to lure the wild child and separate him from the wolf, but they failed to separate them. The hunters killed the wolf at the first opportunity. Everything happened right in front of the boy's eyes.

He was labeled as mentally retarded as soon as he got into the orphanage.

The hunters brought Dean to the orphanage, where the missionaries baptized him and gave him the name Sanichar, which means Saturday in Urdu, because it was on that day of the week that he entered the orphanage. At that time, Father Erhardt was in charge of the mission, and tried to get to know and understand the boy better.

Dean had a difficult time adapting to his new life, because everyone considered him mentally retarded. However, he demonstrated the ability to reason and at times strove to complete certain tasks.

He never learned to speak or write.

Children learn to speak during the first two years of their lives. Some children pronounce "mom" or "dad" as early as six months and after a couple of years they begin to communicate calmly in sentences. These milestones coincide with the child's mental, emotional and behavioral development.

However, Dean never speaks. Despite numerous attempts by those around him to teach him to speak, the wolf boy never learned the human language and did not learn to write. He communicated all his life, making the sounds of an animal.

The boy quickly learned to smoke

The kid was disgusted with clothes and refused to talk, but he liked to walk not on all fours, but on his feet, although this was not easy for him. Very soon he adopted the addiction from adults and became addicted to smoking. Perhaps this was the cause of tuberculosis, which killed him later.

He liked to eat raw meat more and sharpen his teeth on bones.

Most babies begin to grow teeth between the ages of four and seven months and have a full set of teeth by the age of three. Most likely, at first, it was very difficult for Dean to eat without teeth in a pack of wolves, because wolves are carnivores and eat mostly raw game.

But over time, he seemed to get used only to the food that the flock ate. When he first appeared at the shelter, the boy flatly refused to eat cooked food. But he eagerly pounced on the raw pieces of meat and gnawed at the bones with a snarl.

He hated walking around dressed

Immediately after the delivery of the boy from the jungle, people tried to instill in him social skills and forced him to dress. Having learned to walk like a human being, he forced himself to put on trousers and a shirt for almost twenty years.

In addition to him, a wolf boy from Krondstadt was later brought to the orphanage, who shared Dean's reluctance to dress. They both enjoyed running naked in the jungle.

He managed to make friends with only one orphan - the same wild child

Dean spent most of his childhood with animals and it was quite difficult for him to get used to people. But despite this, he immediately managed to find a common language with another wild child who lived in the same orphanage.

The father-abbot of the orphanage believed that a "connection of compassion" was instantly established between the boys and they even taught each other new skills of human behavior. For example, how to drink liquids from mugs. They both grew up in the wild, so they were much more comfortable together, because they understood each other.

During this period, several more children were found raised by animals in the Indian jungle.

As strange as it may sound, in addition to Dean, at the end of the 19th century, other wolf-cubs were found in the Indian jungle. One of the missionaries found a wild child near Jalpaigur in 1892. The next year, a boy who loved to eat frogs was found in Batsipur near Dalsingaray.

Two years later, the child was found near Sultanpur and they say that later he settled well among people and even went to work for the police. The latter was found 3 years later, a child near Shajampur, who could not adapt to life among people at all, although they tried to "tame" him for 14 years.

Dean was unable to adapt to society fully and tuberculosis killed him

After living in the orphanage for nearly a decade, Dean was unable to catch up in his mental development. The eighteen-year-old boy barely reached 152 centimeters in height. The young man was low-browed and with big teeth, he was constantly nervous and felt “out of place”.

He is believed to have died at the age of twenty-nine due to tuberculosis in 1895. However, according to other sources, he was 34 years old by that time.

Evidence for the existence of children raised by wolves first emerges in India in the 1850s.

Sir William Henry Slimane's 1851 pamphlet, Indian Statistics of Wolves Raising Children in Their Packs, is one of the first facts to explain the existence of six wolf children in India. Five of these wild children were found in what is now Sultanpur. One was caught in the area of ​​modern Bahreich.

Slimane said there were many wolves who lived near the city of Sultanpur and other areas on the banks of the Gomtri River, and they ran with "a lot of children."

Pupils of wolves, children were killed in the jungle by tigers and other predators

Why were there only children raised by wolves in the jungle, and not adult boys or girls? It is likely that many children did not manage to survive their childhood. Perhaps they starved to death or were killed by wolves themselves or other predatory animals.

In The Jungle Book, Mowgli's worst enemy was the tiger Sher Khan. In India, even at that time, there were many tigers who could easily attack a child in a wolf pack, because people are not allowed to run as fast as wolves. During the 19th century, hunters often found dead children's bodies in the jungle, gnawed by wild animals.

Wild children: truth or deception?

Over the years, there have been numerous stories of wild children caught and retrained to live in society, but many of the stories have since been debunked.

One of the most famous cases in the 1920s involved two girls, Amala and Kamala, who were almost nine years old when they were rescued from a wolf pack. The person who found them told everyone that the little ones howled at the moon, walked on all fours and ate only raw meat. He tried to teach them how to walk and talk.

The researchers were fascinated by this story and wrote many stories and books about them. But later it turned out that the girls were not at all raised by wolves, but from birth they were disabled with congenital defects of the limbs.

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