Julia Pastrana

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Julia Pastrana (1834-1860) was a Mexican-born woman with hypertrichosis who exhibited herself in 19th-century Europe.

Julia Pastrana was born a Mexican-Indian in 1834. She had hypertrichosis terminalis; that is, her face and body were covered with straight black hair. Her ears and nose were unusually large and her teeth were irregular.

Theodor Lent discovered her and purchased her from a woman who might have been her mother. Lent taught her to dance and play music and took her on a worldwide tour with the name "Bearded and Hairy Lady". She also learned to read and write in three languages. Eventually they were married and she became pregnant.

During a tour in Moscow, Pastrana gave birth to a baby with features similar to her own. The child survived only three days, and Pastrana died of post-birth complications soon after.

Lent did not abandon the tour; he contacted a Russian professor named Sokoloff, had his wife and the child mummified and displayed them in a glass cabinet. He eventually found another woman with similar features, married her and named her Zenora Pastrana. He was eventually committed to a mental institution.

The mummies disappeared from the public view. They appeared in Norway in 1921 and were on display until the 1970s when the Norwegian government threatened confiscation if they were not withdrawn from the public. The mummies were stolen in 1979 but later recovered and stored at the Oslo Forensic Institute where they were rediscovered in 1990.

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