Growth over 2 meters. People whose height exceeds two meters carry in their genes evidence of the existence of titans on earth

Official science is still distrustful of hypotheses about the existence of gigantic people in the past. However, numerous studies by enthusiasts may well change the usual picture of the history of mankind.

Mysterious remains

Traces of the existence of giant people have been discovered repeatedly over the centuries. Messages about found skulls or bones of abnormally large sizes came from different parts of the planet - the USA, Egypt, Armenia, China, India, Mongolia, Australia and even the Pacific Islands. True, now you will not surprise anyone with a human height of over two meters. As photographs show, in the 19th century there were people whose height significantly exceeded two meters.

However, we are talking about finds by which one can judge the much more impressive dimensions of humanoid individuals. In 1911, near Lovelock in the US state of Nevada, guano mining was suspended, as scientists were interested in the found human skeletons with a height of 3.5 meters.

Archaeologists were especially struck by the jaw discovered away from the full skeletons: its size was at least three times the jaw of an average person.
During the extraction of jasper in Australia, the remains of giant people were also found, significantly exceeding three meters in height. But the real sensation was a human tooth 67 millimeters high and 42 millimeters wide. Its owner had to be at least 6 meters tall.

Perhaps the most striking find was discovered by the Indian military. Found in a remote area of ​​​​India "Empty Quarter" well-preserved skeletons reached a height of 12 meters! However, the place was immediately closed from prying eyes, allowing only a team of archaeologists to visit the ancient burial grounds.

Written sources

Information about giant people is contained in almost all known ancient texts - the Torah, the Bible, the Koran, the Vedas, as well as Chinese and Tibetan chronicles, Assyrian cuneiform tablets and Mayan writings.

In the book of the prophet Isaiah, there is a mention of how the Jews were sent by sea "to a strong and vigorous people, to a terrible people from the beginning to the present, to a tall and trampling people, whose land is cut by rivers."

But similar information is also found in later sources claiming historical authenticity. The Arab diplomat Ahmed ibn Fodlan in 922 described the remains of the murdered giant during his embassy to Volga Bulgaria: “And here I am near this man, and I see growth in him, measuring twelve cubits with my elbow. And now he has a head - the biggest cauldron that ever happens. And the nose is more than a quarter, both eyes are huge, and the fingers are each more than a quarter.

If we assume that the elbow of the Arab traveler was modest in size, then the growth of the giant was in no way lower than 4 meters.
Interestingly, Fodlan's story is indirectly confirmed by local legends about a whole tribe of giants, recorded at the end of the 18th century by Russian explorers of the Volga basin.

stone artifacts

Silent witnesses of the existence of giant people can be traces of their material culture. During excavations in Australia near the gigantic remains, impressive stone tools were found - plows, chisels, knives, clubs and axes, whose weight ranged from 4 to 9 kilograms.

Similar finds were made during excavations of ancient settlements in the Okavango Delta. In the collection of the US Historical Society, a bronze ax is exhibited, the height of which exceeds 1 meter, and the length of the blade is half a meter. The weight of the find is 150 kilograms. A modern athlete would hardly have mastered such a tool.
Even more revealing artifacts indicating the possible presence of giants on our planet can serve as megalithic structures - we can find them on various continents. Of particular interest to scientists is the Lebanese Baalbek, which can only be called a city of giants. At least, researchers still cannot scientifically explain the appearance of stone slabs perfectly fitted to each other, weighing up to 800 tons each.

Fake!

A serious controversy has recently unfolded between supporters and opponents of the existence of meganthropes, which does not accept compromises. So the anthropologist Maria Mednikova calls the information about the discovery of the bones of four-meter people an ordinary fake.

“From a formal point of view,” the scientist says, “it is not confirmed by documented archaeological excavations, there are no conclusions of specialists – anthropologists or forensic doctors – that could reasonably state what these bones are.”

Cases of outright falsification also cause a negative reaction from the scientific community. Thus, the "skeleton of the giant Teutoboch" - the king of the Cimbri, which stood for several centuries in the French Museum of Natural History, turned out to be a fake skillfully composed of the bones of a mastodon. Revelations of modern finds are not uncommon when carefully examined, they turn out to be the remains of large mammals. Also, the “defenders of the giants” are discredited by the cases of photoshop that have become noticeably more frequent recently.

Habitat

The weak point of the theory of meganthropes is the current terrestrial conditions. Official science assures that with the current atmospheric pressure, oxygen level, gravity and other nuances, people with a height of over 3 meters simply would not have survived for purely biological reasons.

As confirmation of this, they cite as an example people suffering from gigantism - such people, as a rule, do not live for more than 40 years. However, their opponents have counterarguments. They believe that in the distant past, conditions on Earth were different, including gravity was lower and oxygen levels were about 50% higher.

The last figure is confirmed by the analysis of air bubbles "locked" in amber. Moreover, modern physicists have simulated conditions in which the force of gravity has become an order of magnitude lower than it is now. The conclusions are as follows: weak gravity, low atmospheric pressure and high oxygen content in the air contribute to the gigantization of biological species.

Here, official science does not particularly object - dinosaurs up to 30 meters high are a generally accepted fact. True, there is one more "but". The age of most of the machines of giant people is dated to millions of years, and during this time even the bones turn to dust, unless, of course, they are petrified.

"Borjomi Giants"

However, perhaps the giants lived not so long ago. The representative of the same official science, Georgian academician Abesalom Vekua, suggested that 3-meter people inhabited the Borjomi Gorge about 25 thousand years ago. The results of recent findings, in his opinion, could be sensational. “Pay attention to the femur,” the scientist says, “it differs from the bone of a modern person in its size and thickness. The skull is also much larger. These people lived and developed separately from the rest of civilization, and therefore differed in growth. In the scientific literature, they are referred to as giants, but there was no documentary evidence of this hypothesis. Thus, we stand on the threshold of a sensation. But this will be preceded by painstaking work.

If some people only dream of extra centimeters in height, then others, on the contrary, experience great discomfort and a desire to be in the role of a dwarf, especially when your height is more than 2 meters and you can hardly find clothes and shoes in size, you can’t get on public transport and lie down freely on a standard-sized bed. This is exactly how the tallest people in the world live sadly and not quite cheerfully.

The first on this list is Bao Xishun, whose height reaches 2 m 36 cm. The giant lives in China, in a country where people are mostly short.

Before him, the title of the tallest man was held by the Ukrainian Leonid Stadnik, who had a height of 2 m 53 cm, weighed more than 200 kg, and his palm size was 32 cm, which is also an absolute record. Leonid began to grow at a tremendous speed at the age of 12, due to a violation during a pituitary gland surgery, and by his 40 years he had a shoe size of 62. Note that a native of Pakistan who wears shoes has the largest foot in the world, just think , size 72. However, in 2014, Leonid died at the age of 44 from a brain hemorrhage.

If you study history and turn time back several centuries, then the tallest man in the Russian Empire was the peasant Fedor Andreevich Makhnov. It is believed that at that time (XIX) he was the tallest man on the planet, since his height was 2 m 85 cm, foot length - 51 cm and palm - 32 cm. Fedor weighed about 180 kg and earned his living by who performed in the circus. It is surprising that Fedor took a not low girl for his wife. The wife's height is 2 m 15 cm, and their five children also reached the 2 m bar.

The title of the tallest man on earth, now living, goes to Sultan Kesen from Turkey. His height is 2 m 51 cm. Such a large growth is due to a pituitary tumor. In addition, being a giant is not entirely pleasant for Sultan Kesen, since a man has to move only on crutches, and it is extremely difficult and expensive to find suitable clothes and shoes for himself.

The branch of the championship "The tallest man in the world", according to the official data of the Guinness Book of Records, belongs to Robert Pershing Wadlow, who was born in 1918 in Michigan, USA. Robert, like our previous hero, suffered from a pituitary tumor and acromegaly. Unfortunately, the man lived only 22 years, and grew throughout his short life. At the age of 8, his height reached 1 m 88 cm, at 18 years old - 2 m 54 cm, and at the time of death - 2 m 72 cm, and weight - 199 kg. As he grew, Wadlow's health only worsened, and later, against the background of an infection, he developed sepsis, and despite all the efforts of doctors, the good giant died in 1940. The coffin of the tallest man in the world weighed almost half a ton, and was carried by 12 people. Tens of thousands of people came to the funeral of the famous American. That's how famous Robert Wadlow was among his countrymen.

At one time he was known all over the world, but now he is almost forgotten. He would have turned 135 this year. With a weight of 182 kilograms, his height was ... 285 centimeters!

Fedor Andreevich Makhnov was born on June 6 (18 according to the new style) June 1878 in the village of Kostyuki, Staroselsky volost, Vitebsk district. He came from an ancient family, whose ancestors moved to Russia from the south, from Syria. Makhnov's parents, as well as his two sisters, were of quite normal growth; his grandfather was very tall, but in any case not a giant.

The boy was born very large, and his mother died in childbirth. Fedya was brought up by his grandfather, who loved him very much. The gifts of an amazing child appeared early. At the age of 8, the kid could lift an adult, his father taught him to play the harmonica.

At the age of 12, he took the “bar” of 2 meters. I could sleep more than 24 hours in a row.

Other children laughed at him because of his height. For this, he took off their hats and hung them on the ridge of the roof of a bathhouse or a barn. Due to the growth of his son, Fyodor's father had to rebuild the hut, raising the ceilings. With the increase in growth, the strength of the boy also grew. He could lift an adult man, pull a hay cart on his own, help in the construction of houses, lifting heavy logs.

The local landowner Korzhenevsky, having learned about the abilities of the young strong man, hired him to clean the nearby Zaronovka River from boulders that interfered with the operation of the water mill. Prolonged work in very cold water played a very unfavorable role in Fedor's life. He caught a cold, and the illnesses that followed later made themselves felt for the rest of Makhnov's life.

By the age of 14, a 2-meter young man ceased to fit in the house. Because of this, my father had to build up walls on several crowns. The local blacksmith was ordered to make an individual bed, but he, overloaded with work, made it all summer. In the end, it turned out that Fedya had outgrown this bed as well.

It was problematic to dress and shoe a tall guy. Everything was made to order. Money for clothes had to be earned in Vitebsk at the Polotsk Bazaar. It was there that the German Otto Bilinder, who owned a traveling circus, noticed an unusual teenager.

The enterprising German quickly realized what benefits could be derived from the growth of the boy and suggested that Fedya's father let his son go to Germany to perform in the circus.

Speeches poster

It didn’t take long to persuade his father, and the 14-year-old boy went to conquer Europe with his abilities. Otto Bilinder took custody of Fedor. First, for an illiterate guy, he hired teachers who taught him German. Otto took over the teaching of circus art. Fedor's training lasted almost two years. When he was 16 years old, a contract was signed with him for performances. So Fedor Makhnov became a circus artist.

In Berlin, Otto Bilinder settled the guest at his home, taught him circus tricks. Fyodor broke bricks with the edge of his hand; unbent and bent horseshoes and thick nails; lying on his back, he raised the platform with three musicians along with the instruments. But people came to the circus to look first of all at the artist himself - the real Gulliver. And he grew by leaps and bounds. By the age of 25, he reached 2 m 85 cm.

The bet in his speeches was made on power numbers. More than two and a half meters tall, the giant bent iron horseshoes with one hand, smashed bricks with a blow of his hand, twisted metal rods into a spiral, and then straightened them again. Particularly successful were the numbers when he, lying on his back, raised a wooden platform with an orchestra of three musicians. In those days, Greco-Roman (classical) wrestling tournaments were very popular in circuses. Famous strongmen and world-class wrestlers, including Russian titans Zaikin and Poddubny, took part in them.

Fedor Makhnov also participated in similar tournaments. True, he did not become a great athlete due to the fact that the world's best wrestlers always came out against him, and a chronic back disease did not allow him to fully show his talents. However, his appearance in the arena alone caused a storm of delight from the public.

Makhnov devoted nine years to work in the circus, after which he became a completely wealthy person. However, great growth also brought a lot of trouble to Fedor. It was hard for him to move, since all transport, hotels, catering establishments were calculated only for people of standard sizes. Because of this, Fedor returned home to his native Kostyuki at the very beginning of the 20th century. For the money earned in circus performances, he bought from the landowner Korzhenevsky, who left for France, his land and house. Makhnov rebuilt the estate to fit his height, furnished it with suitable furniture and renamed it Velikanovo. All the necessary building materials and furniture were sent to him from Germany by Otto Bidinder, with whom Fedor maintained close friendly contacts until the end of his life.

Having settled in a new place, Makhnov decided to get married. And although by nature he was very kind, and he was not deprived of finances, he found a bride with great difficulty. She became Efrosinya Lebedeva, who worked as a rural teacher. As a girl, she was tall, but still inferior to her fiancé by almost a meter. In 1903, the first daughter Maria appeared in the family, and the next year the son Nikolai was born.

To replenish the family budget, from time to time Fedor went to various wrestling tournaments, performed in circuses, demonstrating his abilities in various cities of the Russian Empire.

Fedor in Europe

Archival information about the stay of the giant Makhnov in the German capital in 1904 has been preserved. The Germans were ready to fulfill any whims of the Belarusian Gulliver. In the middle of winter, Fyodor wanted strawberries - they delivered them to him. In Holland, in Paris, he repeatedly violated the contract, once they wanted to imprison him for hooliganism, but the cells of the Paris police could not accommodate people of such height.

Fedor with his wife Efrosinya

In 1905, the Makhnov family went on a tour abroad. Traveling in Western Europe, they visited France, Great Britain, Belgium, Holland, Italy. The Pope himself honored them with an audience. According to family tradition, he took off his golden cross and gave it to the giant's daughter. The Makhnovs also visited the USA. To do this, however, had to redo the cabin of the steamer.

These trips were not without incidents. At receptions in palaces, Fedor lit cigarettes from candles from the upper tiers of chandeliers, which extinguished them.

In Paris, he had a skirmish with several citizens. The police officers who arrived wanted to send the giant to jail, but not finding a suitable cell, they limited themselves to a conversation.

During dinner at the German Chancellor, a huge tea set was placed in front of Makhnov, but Fyodor did not appreciate such a “joke”, demanding to replace it with an ordinary mug.

Fedor on a trip abroad

While in Germany, Fedor always wanted to return home. When he saved up enough money, he left for his native Kostyuki, despite the fact that the owner persuaded him to stay. Height did not allow living in his father's house. At this time, the landowner Krzhizhanovsky was just selling his estate. Makhnov bought it along with the land, rebuilt the house according to his own parameters. From Germany, Otto Bilinder sent him furniture. Thought about getting married. It turned out to be the hardest question! Girls of ordinary height did not dare to marry such a thug. And where to find him to match? Finally, the whole world found a bride - teacher Efrosinya Lebedeva. For a girl, she was tall - 1 m 85 cm. She was two years younger than Fedor, but outlived her husband by 35 years, she died in 1947. Played a wedding. In 1903, their daughter Maria was born, in 1904 their son Nikolai was born. In 1911-12, the Makhnovs had three more children. Thus, the Makhnovs had five children in total. None of them grew above two meters. They lived together, in love and harmony. Fedor was a kind man, loved his children, helped the peasants. And from Germany there were invitations to return to the circus again ...

Together they traveled the world. Fedor attended a reception at the German Chancellor, at an audience with the Pope, who liked Fedor's little daughter Maria so much that he took off his gold cross on a chain and presented it to the girl, at a reception at US President Theodore Roosevelt. So that Makhnov could cross the ocean, the cabin of the ship was remade for him. Efrosinya liked this life, she even wanted to stay in Germany.

But when the German doctors began to persuade them to sign a contract, according to which, after death, the giant’s corpse would be left to them for scientific research, she was afraid that something could suddenly happen to Fedor, and they left home.

In Paris, almost all members of the Anthropological Association showed great interest in the extraordinary physical data of the giant. They wanted to examine it more thoroughly, but Makhnov refused to undress in front of doctors all his life, allowing them to measure only the length of his feet and palms - 51 cm and almost 35, respectively.

His ears were 15 cm long and his lips were 10 cm wide, which must have made a certain impression on his wife, a woman of normal size, when they kissed. After a few days of rest, he always got taller. This was due to the extraordinary ability of his spine to decrease and contract under the influence of large loads.
He ate, like everyone else, four times a day, but his breakfast could feed the average family for two days. According to the materials of the press, it is known how our giant ate. In the morning he ate 20 eggs, 8 round loaves of white bread with butter, drank 2 liters of tea. For lunch - 2.5 kg of meat, 1 kg of potatoes, 3 liters of beer. In the evening - a bowl of fruit, 2.5 kg of meat, 3 loaves of bread and 2 liters of tea. And before going to bed, he could still swallow 15 eggs and a liter of milk.

As anthropologists rightly noted, this inhabitant of Belarus “is only legs.” His boot, barely reaching the giant’s knee, reached the chest of a normal person, and a 12-year-old boy could fit in it with his head. If Fedor had been born without legs, he would hardly have reached average height. His head, which was unusually small with such a huge body, gave him an unusually ridiculous appearance, which he tried to hide by wearing a richly decorated Cossack uniform.

A long nomadic life undermined Makhnov's already not very good health. The chronic disease of the joints, earned in childhood in the cold water of Zaronovka, aggravated. It became more and more difficult to walk. Otto Bilinder tried to help Fedor by sending a heavyweight horse from Germany. Unfortunately, the sent animal did not solve the problem, because with its nearly three-meter height, the giant's legs still dragged along the ground when he mounted it. And although Fedor became very attached to the horse, he preferred to take the troika as the main means of transportation on trips.

Traveling abroad brought a lot of new things to the economic life of Fyodor Makhnov. Almost the first in the district, he began to use agricultural machines, purchased by him in Germany and kindly sent by Bilinder. For a while, he even bred horses.

Unfortunately, Fyodor Makhnov did not live long. In 1912, chronic illnesses finally crippled the giant's health, and he died at the age of 34, having, however, managed to rejoice before that at the birth of three more of his children: daughter Masha (1911) and twin sons Rodion (Radimir) and Gabriel (Galyun) born just six months before his death. The exact reason for such an early departure of Makhnov's life was never determined. German doctors believed that Makhnov died from bone tuberculosis, which many giants suffered from. According to other sources, he caught a cold and got pneumonia. The version of poisoning by rivals on the wrestling mat is also not ruled out. According to the grandson, there is a version that Fedor, having moved to the farm, did not leave the performance in the circus. He often traveled to Germany with his family.

The Vitebsk giant was buried at the local cemetery near the village of Kostyuki. Russian Sport magazine published an obituary announcing his death.

The growth of Fyodor Makhnov, even after his death, continued to amaze everyone. The undertaker, thinking that there had been a mistake in the order for the coffin and the fence, did the job for the average person. When it turned out that he was mistaken, he had to urgently remake the coffin, and there was no time left to remake the fence, and he had to leave it.

On the surviving tombstone, one can still read the inscription: “Fedor Andreevich Makhnov, born on June 6, 1878, died. On August 28, 1912, at the age of 36, the Biggest Man in the World Rostom was 3 arshins 9 vershoks.

The story about Fyodor Makhnov can be supplemented by the fact that his height on the tombstone is indicated incorrectly. He was taken from a contract with Bilinder, signed by the giant at the age of 16. Since that moment, Fedor has grown another 30 cm.

The giant's wife subsequently wanted to correct the mistakes on the tombstone and remake the fence, but the outbreak of the First World War and the revolutionary events that followed prevented her from doing this.

In 1934, the remains of Makhnov were exhumed for scientific purposes and sent to the Minsk Medical Institute for study. During the war, the giant's skeleton was lost, like many other things. Only a photograph and a description made by Professor D.M. have survived. Dove.

There is also such a version of how this happened: in 1935, the son Rodion studied at the Minsk Medical Institute, and at one of the lectures on giantism, the professor cited the example of Fyodor Makhnov. What was the amazement of everyone when Rodion got up and said that this was his father. It was then that he was asked to talk to the family about the sale of his father's skeleton. The mother agreed to sell for 5 thousand rubles. After the death of her husband, she married a second time, gave birth to three more children. Money was needed... Many people were present during the exhumation, including a widow and children. In 1936, Minsk professor D.M. Golub published an article on the skeleton of acromegalic in the collection of works of the Psychoneurological Institute of the Belarusian Academy of Sciences. Acromegaly is characterized by hyperplastic changes in the skeletal system, soft parts, and most internal organs. Simply put, all giants suffer from gigantism.

However, according to descendants no one opened the grave, much less sold anything! The remains disappeared after the Second World War, they were supposedly taken to Germany, because. even before the revolution, the German Academy of Natural Sciences wanted to get them

Today, the children of Fedor and Efrosinya Makhnov are no longer alive. All lived a difficult but worthy life. During the years of collectivization, the Makhnov family wanted to be dispossessed and deported, but the peasants interceded and were left in peace. Nikolai and Gavrila were officers, they went through repressions. Rehabilitated. Rodion became a doctor and during the Great Patriotic War he was shot by the Nazis for his connection with the partisans. The elder Maria worked all her life as a livestock specialist, and the younger Masha worked as an accountant. All children were more likely to grow to their mother - 180 - 190 cm. Makhnov's descendants were scattered around the cities and villages of Belarus and Russia. On the site of the former estate, only a birch remained, perhaps planted by Fyodor Makhnov himself. And the names of the Giants' Farm, the Giants' Forest remind the locals of the tallest man in the world who once lived in these places.

Man's height

Man's height or human body length- the distance from the apex of the head to the plane of the feet. In anthropology, height is one of the common anthropometric features. Included in the list of indicators of human physical development.

Human growth, among other things, is influenced by environmental factors, heredity from parents, hereditary diseases, age, gender. Also, growth can be influenced by belonging to a particular race and nation. So, for example, the average height of Chinese citizens is 158 cm (for men) and 147 cm (for women), and the average height of the Dutch is 184.8 cm and 168.7 cm, respectively.

growth process

Some dwarfs became famous in military affairs. King Gustavus Adolf of Sweden, for example, kept an entire regiment of dwarf soldiers in his army.

A big increase

In itself, high growth is not yet a sign of gigantism - a serious illness caused by excessive production of somatotropic hormone. Healthy people with gigantic stature (200 cm or more) differ from people of average height only in their height. And people with gigantism also differ in proportions.

The tallest person of whom there is reliable evidence was Robert Pershing Wadlow, born in 1918 in Alton, pc. Illinois, USA. When measured on June 27, 1940, his height was 2.72 m with an arm span of 2.88 m. His maximum recorded weight was 223 kg.

The generally accepted rubrication of the length of the human body (height)

Height Man Woman
Dwarf below 150 cm below 140 cm
Very low 150-159.9 cm 140-149.9 cm
Short 160-169.9 cm 150-159.9 cm
Below the average 170-173.9 cm 158-162.9 cm
Average 174-176.9 cm 162-166.9 cm
Above average 177-179.9 cm 167-169.9 cm
High 180-189.9 cm 170-179.9 cm
Very tall 190-199.9 cm 180-186.9 cm
Giant from 200 cm and above from 187 cm and above

The average height of a man on the planet is 175 cm, and that of a woman is 162 cm.

Average age-related changes in height

At the age of 19-26, some men can gain 0.5 cm of height per year. Usually at this age those who have late sexual development grow. In women at this age, an increase in height is rare.

After the age of 26, people may also have some increase in height - usually up to 2 cm.

On average, men grow up to 18-25 years, and women - up to 16-19 years.

Sources

  • Height- article from
  • Gigantism- article from the Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Notes

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See what "Human Growth" is in other dictionaries:

    man's height- see the length of the human body. * * * HUMAN HEIGHT HUMAN HEIGHT, see Human body length (see HUMAN BODY LENGTH) … encyclopedic Dictionary

    MAN'S HEIGHT- see the length of the human body ... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

Robert Pershing Wadlow is the tallest man in world history, about whose growth there is undoubted information.

Wadlow's parents were rather average height (father was 180 cm tall and weighed 77 kg); he (the first-born) had two younger brothers and two sisters, of normal height. Until the age of 4, Robert had normal height and weight for his age, but from that moment he began to grow rapidly and attract everyone's attention. At 8 years old, he had a height of 1 m 88 cm, at the age of 9 he could carry his father in his arms up the stairs, and at 10 years old he reached 198 cm in height and 100 kg in weight. At 18, he already had a height of 254 cm, weighed 177 kg and wore shoes in size 37AA (75 European); by this point Wadlow, now an All-American celebrity, was making shoes for free.

Over time, Wadlow's health deteriorated: due to his rapid growth, he had limited sensation in his legs, he began to need crutches. On June 27, 1940, his height was measured for the last time in St. Louis - the giant's height was 2.72 m. On July 4, 1940, during a speech on the occasion of Independence Day in Manistee, Michigan, a crutch rubbed Robert's leg, which caused an infection and rapidly developing sepsis. Doctors tried to save the life of the famous American with a blood transfusion and surgery, but on July 15, the tallest man in the world died in his sleep.

Wadlow's funeral was attended by 40,000 Americans: his coffin weighed half a ton and was carried by 12 people. Wadlow's grave was carefully concreted at the request of his family, who feared that Robert's remains would be stolen. On his grave is written only: "Rest in peace" (At Rest); his monument is twice the standard in the cemetery.

Source: Guinness World Records

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