Was an Englishman named Edward Mordake (or Mordrake) born with a malevolent “second sight” on the back of his head?
It is claimed that in 19th century Britain, a man named Edward Mordrake (or "Mordake") was born with a rare disease in the form of an extra face on the back of his head. A status message on Facebook even shows a photo of his skull as evidence of this claim. You can read the following in the status message:
The skull of Edward Mordrake, the man with a second face on the back of his head, circa 1890.
Although it couldn't speak full words, the second sight could laugh, cry, and make strange noises without Edward's control. He reportedly begged doctors to have his "demon face" removed, claiming it whispered to him at night, but no doctor would try. He committed suicide at the age of 23.
Creepy, right?
But the story is fake!
Snopes has already taken a closer look at this legend and writes:
One of the more interesting historical cases that has come to our attention in recent years is the claim that a 19th-century English gentleman named Edward Mordrake (or "Edward Mordake," according to older sources) was born with a bizarre medical condition that drove him to suicide.
Although popularized in the 2000s through memes, songs and television shows, the story is not of recent origin, having piqued the morbid interests of Victorian readers more than a century ago in Gould and Pyle's Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine, first published in 1896 has. […]
Despite the story's gullible reception, there are many reasons to be skeptical. For one thing, the entire passage on Mordrake was quoted from what the authors refer to as "lay sources" (more on which later), which they contrast with other entries (such as their account of the life of Joseph Merrick, the "Elephant Man") from the current one medical case history differs. On the other hand, it is hard for melodrama (e.g. "he was kept from his rest at night by the hateful whispers of his 'devil twin', as he called it"), while he gave only the slightest nod to science (apart from the application of the (now outdated medical classification “bicephalic monsters” there really is no scientific talk about it). And although it purports to quote two attending physicians, "Manvers and Treadwell," a review of the entry in the 1906 edition of Theosophical Review that the names appear nowhere in the Dict. of National Biography (a Victorian Who's Who).
The origin of the black and white photograph, or skull, that supposedly shows Mordrake and his "devil twin" in profile (which has appeared in Internet postings since 2007) is unknown. Despite its "vintage" appearance, the image exhibits higher resolution and clarity than is found in photographic reproductions of the mid to late Victorian era (e.g. the 1889 photograph by Joseph Merrick ). It ultimately appears to be photo of a wax figure
A case of asymmetrically conjoined twins?
There is a real disease, craniopagus parasiticus, whose symptoms are very similar to those described here. It is an extremely rare complication in conjoined twins in which one of the two is underdeveloped and less than fully functional (hence "parasitic") and takes the form of a vestigial head attached to the skull of the "autositic" (dominant) twin. According to a 2016 case report, there have only been ten or fewer cases of craniopagus parasiticus in history, "of which only three survived birth and documented in the literature ." Of these three, two died before the age of two, despite surgical attempts to save the life of the autositic twin. The third, known as the " two-headed boy of Bengal ", lived to be four years old and was said to have been in good health until he was bitten by a cobra and died.
As for the Mordrake case, the conjoined twins are by definition genetically identical, so they are always the same gender. The "devil twin" described in this case was female, while the autositic twin was male (although one could of course argue that the atrophied face was identified as female).
That the "mocking" face had no audible voice according to the information we have about real cases of craniopagus parasiticus now contrasts with the incongruous claims that it showed "every sign of intelligence" and the poor man mocked with “hateful whispers.” According to reports from the Two-Headed Boy of Bengal, the withered face in this case could "grimace" and his eyes were observed moving, for example, but although there may have been some kind of rudimentary consciousness, there were no signs of intelligence.
Alternatively, it has been suggested that Mordrake may have instead suffered from a congenital defect known as diprosopus (or craniofacial duplication), in which facial features are duplicated to a greater or lesser extent elsewhere on the head (in the rarest cases, the entire face is duplicated ).
The mechanisms behind this deformity are not fully understood, although many researchers believe it is another rare form of conjoined twinning. Although slightly more common than Craniopagus parasiticus (with nearly 50 documented cases since the mid-19th century), Diprosopus has a similarly poor survival rate, with most cases ending in stillbirth. In short, although science offers theoretical explanations for Mordrake's condition, they are few and only marginally plausible.
About these “lay sources”
Gould and Pyle reported in 1896 that the "well-known story of Edward Mordake" they cited came from "lay sources" - plural - even though there was actually only one. Science historian Alex Boese has traced the quoted text verbatim to a syndicated newspaper article written in 1895 by Charles Lotin Hildreth, a poet and author of speculative fiction:
The article entitled “The Wonders of Modern Science: some half human monsters once thought to be of the Devil's brood” describes a number of remarkable “human freaks” whose cases Hildreth describes in old reports from the “Royal Scientific Society” (the “musty "old pages" that he tells us about, characterized by their "long S's and their pompous phraseology") claims to be found.
Among the cases, Hildreth Details is the "Fish Woman of Lincoln" - a young girl whose legs, from the hips down, "are covered with shiny scales and terminate in the most precise tails of fishes." There is a “half-man, half-crab” whose hands and feet end in huge, hard-shelled claws. The “Melon Child of Radnor,” we learn, had a head the size and color of a melon, with no discernible sensory organs other than a vertical slit for a mouth. Mr. Pewness of Stratton had feet where his hands should be, “and vice versa.” The “four-eyed man of Cricklade” had two eyes, one above the other. "Jackass Johnny" was cursed with "a pair of enormously long, furry ears, just like those of a donkey." The "Norfolk Spider" was a monstrous thing with six hairy, jointed, clawed legs and a human head on its stomach crawled.
What all of these “miracles of science” have in common, according to Boese, is that they are not mentioned in any previous sources. No. In other words, Hildreth simply made her up. Although couched as non-fiction, the article was actually a work of speculative fiction in the spirit of other scientific hoaxes of the time, such as the infamous Life on the Moon hoax of 1835 and the Cardiff Giant hoax of 1869.
Boese concludes that Edward Mordrake was the literary work of Charles Lotin Hildreth. He never really existed.
Debunk via Snopes
Translated with Deepl Translator
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