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This article is about generic categories of incompletely validated longevity claims. For fully validated specific claims over 113, see list of supercentenarians. For incompletely validated specific claims over 113, see longevity claims.

Longevity myths, longevity stories, or longevity narratives are cultural traditions and lore about exceptional, improbable, or impossible human longevity, with or without eternal youth. These stories include sincere beliefs of claims of extreme age as well as sincerely and insincerely exaggerated claims of extreme age. Each category of belief is based on a different motivation for claiming exceptional age.

Patriarchs

Stories of exaggerated longevity have been around since the earliest civilizations. The first longevity narratives were probably the patriarchal/matriarchal claims, which are often an attempt to link humans to the gods or to God due to fuller life. In many cases, the ages of ancestors were exaggerated, in order to extend a genealogy further back into the past and bring it closer to the creation of the world, or the dawn of time.

Sumerian

Extreme ages were typical in Sumerian genealogies; age claims were often rounded to the nearest 3,600 years. Documenting groups of people who had lived for hundreds of years was common in Sumer as well as the Indus Valley.

Template:Biblical longevity

Biblical

The early Biblical patriarchs and many other Biblical personalities are given extreme ages that exhibit a decrease over time. The Biblical upper limit of longevity has been categorized by Witness Lee as having four successive plateaus of 1,000, 500, 200, and finally 120 years. These upper limits are not absolute, as some Biblical individuals may have exceeded them; in the modern day, so did Jeanne Calment of France, who was 122 in 1997 and was the only modern verified person to have exceeded 120 years.

In the narrative of Noah's flood, God states that humans would not be permitted to live more than 120 years (Genesis 6:3); this was originally taken as designating the fourth upper limit. Reformers John Calvin and Martin Luther first promoted the alternative explanation that 120 years referred to the amount of time left before the flood.

With the advent of modern accountable record-keeping,[citation needed] age claims fell to realistic levels. In the tenth century B.C., King David died at 70 years; other kings of Israel died in their 30s, 40s, and 50s.

The Sacrifice of Noah, Jacopo Bassano (c. 1515-1592), Staatliche Schlösser und Gärten, Potsdam-Sanssouci, c. 1574. Noah was traditionally aged 601 at the time.
  • Methuselah, the oldest patriarch, had the age of 969 (Genesis 5:27), or 720 in the Samaritan Pentateuch. His name having been interpreted as "when he dies, it will be sent", with his year of death being the year of the flood, is taken as having prophetic character.
  • Noah, with the age of 950, is the oldest patriarch in the Samaritan Pentateuch.
  • Adam, the first man, was assigned the age of 930. Allegorists take this as representing a perfected life of 1,000 years, but cut short by 70 years, which is then given as the average longevity of man.
  • Enoch had the age of 365 and was then reportedly taken bodily into heaven. This being the number of days in a year is interpreted by allegorists as indicating his having lived "a full life".
Interpretations

Biblical apologists that assert literal translation give explanations for the advanced ages of the early patriarchs. In this view, first, man was originally to have everlasting life, but as sin was introduced into the world by Adam and Eve, its influence became greater with each generation and God progressively shortened man's life in "four falls of mankind" (according to Witness Lee), corresponding to four observable plateaus in longevity upper limits.[1] Second, before Noah's flood, a "firmament" over the earth (Genesis 1:6–8) could have greatly contributed to man's advanced age.[2] Third, biological DNA damage may cause genetically accelerated aging; experimentation with lengthening telomeres on worms has yielded increased worm life spans by about 20%[3] and this may slow aging at the cost of increasing cancer vulnerability.[4]

Some literary critics explain these extreme ages as ancient mistranslations that converted the word "month" to "year", mistaking lunar cycles for solar ones. This would turn an age of 969 "years" into a more reasonable 969 lunar months,[5] or 78½ years of the Metonic cycle; but for consistency, the ages of the first nine patriarchs at fatherhood, ranging from 62 to 230 years in the manuscripts, would then be transformed doubtfully into the range of 5 to 18½ years.

Other literary critics suggested that "years" was translated correctly but the numbers were mistranslated.[6]

Others believe that some of the numbers have a symbolic meaning, such as 930 (1,000 less 70), and 365 (the days in a year).

Still others say that the first list, of only 10 names for 1,656 years, may contain generational gaps, which would have been represented by the lengthy lifetimes attributed to the patriarchs.[7] Cainan appears in the Septuagint version of the second list but not in other versions.

Japanese

Emperor Jimmu.

Age exaggeration tends to be greater in the earliest, least documented periods in many cultures. The early emperors of Japan often ruled for more than a century, according to tradition.

This form of reduced patriarchal or nationalist longevity narrative inflated the ages of emperors, resulting in the traditional dating of Japanese history to 660 BC.

  • Emperor Jimmu (traditionally, 13 February 711 BCE – 11 March 585 BCE) lived 126 years, 27 days, on the proleptic Julian and Gregorian calendars, but the form of his name dates from some centuries later than his traditional lifespan.
Lucian, the probable source of a very early investigation of longevity.

Roman

The ancient Roman author Lucian is the presumed author of Macrobii (long-livers), a work devoted to longevity. Most of the examples Lucien gives are what would be regarded as normal long lifespans (80-100 years).

In Roman times, Pliny wrote about longevity records from the census carried out in 74 AD under Vespasian. In one region of Italy many people allegedly lived past 100; four were said to be 130, others even older.

Even in times when written records came into existence for the upper class in Ancient Rome, reports from the countryside continued the same pattern of overestimation of age.

  • Lucian stated that Nestor lived three centuries.
  • Lucian stated that Tiresias, the blind seer of Thebes, was alive for 600 years.

Chinese

The early emperors of China often ruled for more than a century, according to tradition. Lucian also wrote about the "Seres" (a Chinese people), claiming they lived for 300 years.

Religious

In some religious traditions there are claims that, if one follows a certain philosophy or practice, one can become immortal or at least live to an extreme age. Some Taoists claimed to have lived to over 200 years; these claims were related to Taoist practice. Swami Bua claims to be a different age each time he is interviewed, but generally claims to have been born around 1889 (age approximately 120).

Lacking actual evidence, such claims seem intended merely to imply meditation leads to extreme longevity. Scientific evidence shows some life expectancy benefit from meditation, spiritualism, and faith, but measurable longevity tends to fall within the normal span; science also shows that human life expectancy has increased lately, but there are no studies proving this general increase is linked to religion, philosophy, practice, meditation, etc.

Alchemists

Main article: Fountain of Youth

Fountain of Youth narratives describe some natural source, potion, or other secret that provides healing and particularly longevity and youthful health (eternal youth). The Fountain of Youth reputedly restores the youth of anyone who drinks of its waters. Unlike stories rooted in patriarchal, ancient, and communal beliefs, Fountain of Youth narratives are anchored in individual wishes for longer and healthier lives.

The New Testament, following older Jewish tradition, attributes healing to the Pool of Bethesda when the waters are "stirred" by an angel. Herodotus attributes exceptional longevity to a fountain in the land of the Ethiopians. The lore of the Alexander Romance and of Al-Khidr describes such a fountain, and stories about the philosopher's stone, universal panaceas, and the elixir of life are widespread.

The more recent Fountain of Youth tradition traces from medieval and Renaissance times, and seems to follow popular fears after the Black Death, which began in the 1340s. The idea that humans could transform their own substance using techniques such as alchemy became popular during the 15th and 16th centuries. Consequently, Spanish conquistadors, already searching for storied cities of gold, added the idea of finding a "Fountain of Youth". Juan Ponce de León explored Florida in 1513 in hopes of finding such a supernatural source.

The desire to avoid death was exploited by charlatans and snake oil salesmen who sold potions that promised longevity. It was common to locate a very old person and then to claim that person as an example of successful use of the potion.

In August 2006, popular American magician David Copperfield promoted waters he had discovered at what he called a true Fountain of Youth, amid a cluster of four small islands in the Exuma chain of the Bahamas, which he had purchased for roughly $50 million.

Village elders

The village elder narrative reflects a preliterate societal respect for aging, patriarchy, etc., that leads to exceptional age claims intended to venerate the oldest person in the village.

This is probably a reduced version of the patriarchal narrative, which attributes longevity to a former era. Village elder stories suggest an understanding that persons in the immediate era do not generally attain the ages of the ancients, but that an exceptional claim on behalf of one village elder is culturally appropriate.

The stories originally centered on the tribal chieftain, but in locations of distributed societal power, an elderly woman began to be substituted as the central figure. The village elder represented a source of pride and of oral tradition, and a person to commemorate. Often the elder claims a link to a famous historical figure or era, to give an authority to oral tradition that is entirely similar to that of pseudepigraphy.

The ages claimed tend to be limited by credibility. Most such claims are for ages of less than 200 years old, with the majority in the range of 140 to 160. These popular tales continue to exist even today in places such as Bangladesh.

Nationalists

An extension and adaptation of the fountain of youth concept is the idea that a particular place, rather than a substance, carries what is needed to attain extreme age, and that a person seeking extreme longevity needs to move to a special district (one example is Goust). This story differs from the Fountain of Youth in that it focuses on an entire village, a mountain region, or a particular nation or national treasure. Such a location can also be called a Shangri-La, named after a mountain area in 20th-century fiction that contained an entire village of long-lived (or eternally lived) people.

Ascribing unique longevity to a particular "village of centenarians" is common across many cultures. Nationalist pride often contributes to motivate such tradition. The nationalist outgrowth idea became widespread in the rise of nationalism in the 20th century. As popular ideas became focused on one nation versus another, extreme age claims became a source of national pride.

Other longevity narratives are race-based or family-based, proposing unproven beliefs that a certain race or tribe tends to live longer than others. Many people tend naturally to believe that their own family members live a very long time.

America

Many people in the 1950s falsely claimed to be Confederate veterans, in a narrative of Southern longevity; in 1973 a woman claimed to be a Confederate widow at 117.

In another wave of American longevity claims, Americans were faced with 1960s Soviet claims that the Soviet communist "lifestyle" resulted in extreme longevity, and that Shirali Muslimov was in his 160s. The 1970 U.S. census listed 106,000 people claiming to be 100 years old or older, some over 130. Longevity narratives fell somewhat out of vogue in the later 1970s, when both American and Soviet experts came forward to debunk both sides.

  • Walter Williams claimed to be a Confederate soldier aged 117 in 1959; research that year indicated that Williams was then really 105.
  • Sylvester Magee, allegedly 126, and Charlie Smith, allegedly 125, were featured by Time Magazine in 1967. Both claims may have been put forth by publicity-seeking individuals, while the national media chose to elevate these unsubstantiated claims in the context of Cold War ideology. Smith claimed an 1842 birth and died in 1979, but his marriage certificate indicated he lived only to 105, and the 1900 census indicated he lived only to 100.
Brazil

RankBrasil, a Brazilian competitor of Guinness, has made several unsubstantiated claims.

  • Maria do Carmo Geronimo (5 March 1871? - 14 July 2000), 129 years, 101 days.
  • Maria Olivia da Silva (28 February 1880? - ), 144 years, 156 days.
  • Ana Martinha da Silva (27 August 1880? - 27 July 2004), 123 years, 337 days.
  • Rosalina Francisca da Silva (6 August 1886? - ), 137 years, 362 days.
  • Joana Ribeiro da Silva (25 May 1888? - ), 136 years, 69 days.
China
File:Li chingYuen.jpg
Li Ching-Yuen, photographed in 1927 at the residence of General Yang Sen.
  • Chen Jun (陈俊) was said to have lived for 443 years in Yongtai county, Fujian province.
  • A wire story erroneously announced in 1933 that China's Li Ching-Yuen (李青云, Li Qing Yun), born in 1680, had died at age 256, attributing longevity to his genealogy. (If the dates were correct, Li would have been 252 or 253; Li himself claimed to be born in 1734, age 199.)
  • Still within the context of Marxist ideology but perhaps motivated more by nationalism, Du Pinhua of the People's Republic of China (22 April 1886? – 11 December 2006) was attributed a lifespan of 120 years, 233 days, perhaps to counter the relatively verified supercentenary claims of Japan's Kamato Hongo.
Cuba

In Cuba, local nationalism fueled unverified claims quite recently, such that the world's oldest man was claimed to be Benito Martínez. Recently, the fountain of youth narrative was also invoked to explain Cuba's longevity.[8]

Ecuador

A National Geographic article in 1973 treated with respect some claims that have subsequently been disproven, including the notorious Vilcabamba valley in Ecuador, where locals had claimed ancestors' baptismal records as their own.[9]

Nathaniel Grogan's 1806 engraving of Lord Kerry's portrait of Katherine FitzGerald, Countess of Desmond.
England
Old Tom Parr.

English claims in prior centuries include:

  • Thomas Carn (1381?-1588?), allegedly 207.
  • Henry Jenkins, allegedly 169, apparently concocted to support testimony in a court case about events a century before.
  • Thomas Parr (1483?-1635), allegedly 152. According to P. Lüth, the results of Parr's autopsy by William Harvey suggest that Parr was probably under 70 years of age.[10] It is possible that Parr's records were confused with those of his grandfather.[11]
  • Katherine Fitzgerald (1464?-1604), allegedly 140, with significant evidence of being at least centenarian.
Pakistan

The 1973 National Geographic article on longevity also reported, as a very aged people, the Hunza in a mountain region of Pakistan, without any documentary evidence being cited.[9] Apparent age "heaping" suggested unreliability, because significantly often, the oldest ages ended in 0 or 5,[citation needed] indicating the ages were guesses, not real measurements.

Soviet

The Caucasus mountain region of Azerbaijan did not merely claim to have a 168-year-old; it also claimed hundreds of people aged over 120. Instead of one village elder, the entire village had become a "village of centenarians." Abkhazia is also an example.

The Caucasus was the subject of extreme claims for decades, inspired by Stalin's desire to believe that he would live a very long time. The fountain of youth concept was invoked by Dannon, which featured elderly yoghurt eaters of the Caucasus in its advertising. Longevity narratives fell somewhat out of vogue in the later 1970s, when both American and Soviet experts came forward to debunk both sides.

  • Shirali Muslimov (26 March 1805? – 4 September 1973) was allegedly aged 168 years, 162 days, based solely on a passport. National Geographic carried but recanted the claim.[9]
  • In 2003, health officials in Chechnya declared that Zabani Khakimova was at least 124 years old; she died later in 2003.
  • In 2004, The Moscow (Russia) Times reported that 122-year-old Pasikhat Dzhukalayeva, also of Chechnya, claimed to have been born in 1881, without a birthdate.

Exhibitors

In the "P. T. Barnum" longevity stories, one claims to be a great age to attract attention to oneself and/or to obtain money.

Despite the evidence of the extremes of verified modern longevity, as established by Guinness and the Gerontology Research Group, stories in reliable sources still surface regularly, repeating longevity narratives stating that these limits have been exceeded, even at extremely unlikely odds.

The odd wire correspondent looking for a captivating filler reports extreme undocumented claims to this day: in early 2000, a Nepalese man claimed to have been born in 1832, citing as evidence a card issued in 1988. In December 2003, a Chinese news service claimed incorrectly that Guinness had recognized a woman in Saudi Arabia as being 131. A claim from South America was for Javier Pereira (said to have been determined to be 167 years old by a dentist looking at his teeth).

See also

References

  1. ^ "The Cultural Dictionary of the Bible", John J. Pilch, Liturgical Press, 1999, p. 144-146
  2. ^ "The Waters Above the Firmament: Or The Earth's Annular System", Isaac Newton Vail, Ferris and Leach, 1902, p. 97.
  3. ^ Joeng et al., 2004.
  4. ^ Weinstein and Ciszek, 2002.
  5. ^ "Making Sense of the Numbers of Genesis", Carol A. Hill, Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith, volume 55, 4 December 2003, p. 239.
  6. ^ Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic, chapter 7, R. M. Best, 1999.
  7. ^ Zondervan NIV Study Bible notes on Genesis 5:5. 2002.
  8. ^ [1]
  9. ^ a b c Alexander Leaf, (Jan. 1973). "Search for the Oldest People". National Geographic, pp. 93-118.
  10. ^ P. Lüth “Geschichte der Geriatrie” (1965), S. 153 + 154
  11. ^ Thomas Parr NNDb.com Retrieved on: 10 January 2008
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