For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact

  • Hey Guest, We're having our annual Winter Moot and we'd love you to come. PLEASE LOOK HERE to secure your place and get more information.
    For forum threads CLICK HERE
  • Merry Christmas Guest, we hope that you have a great day wherever you are, and we're looking forward to hearing of your adventures in the New Year!
Shame the video documentary is in russian, link at the bottom of the article. Only watched the first part so far.

But does show the interior of their cabin, and some of their tools.
 
People aren't meant to live alone. I know there have always been the ascetics, eremitics and anchorites, but this was simple fear and oppression.
Such a shame; wonderful the human endurance, but still, it would make you weep.

M
 
Yes it is well-known story Отшельники Лыковы "Таёжный Тупик"
You can read in English "Lost in the Taiga"
1166194.jpg


Or in German Wassili Peskow: Die Vergessenen der Taiga : die unglaubliche Geschichte einer sibirischen Familie jenseits der Zivilisation. Goldmann, München 1996, ISBN 3-442-12637-1.
 
They were not lost ! They just did not want to be found !! ??

Indeed one of them is still there - by choice

The Lord would provide, and she would stay, she said—as indeed she has. A quarter of a century later, now in her seventies herself, this child of the taiga lives on alone, high above the Abakan

...and why not? I'm not at all convinced that humans are "meant" to live in large colonies.I think different people like different types of lives - I don't think that one answer suits everyone - or that people who choose to live in isolation (relative or absolute) are "wrong".

These were perhaps more isolated than many, but, even when they knew they could return to a more populated area, they chose not to. I'm glad they have the choice, and the freedom, to live as they chose.
 
I didn't say large colonies, but human genetics alone clearly indicate huge problems when there is a limited and inbreeding population.
Social animals means different things to different people. You can have society with just your family and those people you see or contact through the seasonal round; that's very different from one family or one individual effectively stranded with no contact with anyone else.
As I said, those in the grip of religious fervour might choose that route, and the occasional aesthetic, but it's by and large not really a good thing.
Pratchett has a quote on it, doesn't he ? :D

M
 
Look up the Hmong in Laos many if not most are still on the run, hiding in the jungles of Laos, persecuted and killed because they supported the Americans and where promised a passage out if it went wrong, it went big time wrong and they still suffer. Those that get into Thailand are exploited by the Thais, a year or two back a large group were thrown back into Laos were their fate is unknown, the sick part was they had UN refugee I'd cards meaning they were protected. 35 years now so at least 2 generations still hiding
 
Yes and it was a lot of discussion about this story.
This family was not like Robinzon, they retained language, culture, but do not make any progress. (may be some close situation to Amish community.)
Perhaps problem in this story that old man was like "captain Ahab" his family do not have really choice. No children, no future, religious fanaticism.
 
<shrug>

These people didn't interbreed - they just chose to live apart as a family

Even when presented with options, they chose to carry on that way - presumably because they preferred it.

Of course people need genetic diversity - but that can happen even if families live far apart almost all the time. Total isolation wouldn't suit me - but neither would living in a town. I respect both as equally valid options for those that prefer them though.
 
I made no comment about them interbreeding. I said that for 'people' to live alone is not a good idea.
There's no issue about having an extended family or tribal or clan network, or village mentality come to that. Just that individuals do not do so well alone.
This family was persecuted and the patriarch took them into the back of beyond to keep them safe and faithful, and in the end it was a Darwin award with a great deal of pathos attached.
What a waste :sigh:

M
 
Not sure they felt they had a choice in the beginning.

And the younger children that were born in Tagia never knew anything different, so going to have be resistant to change when in their later years.

A bit of googling on Agafya Lykova seems to reveal she wrote a letter in 2011 asking for help.

"I bow to you before the damp earth, and I wish you from God good health, salvation and well-being, especially for those who [offer] rescue and welfare, and so be saved by the LORD God in the Holy, Catholic, Apostolic and paternal church [protected] until the end of this age from all divisions, heresies and foes ... "

"With a great big bow to request of all: I need a man as an assistant, one whom I will not survive, [who] lives so not good, with weeks of being alone. Do not leave me for Christ's sake. Have mercy upon a wretched orphan, who is in trouble [and] suffering."

"... People here [you] have a true Believer, the faith of Christ Believer, and people here I need firewood to cook, to mow the hay <...> I have weakened health and forces."

http://www.byzcath.org/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/363063/Appeal%20from%20Agafia%20Lykova%20of%20L
 
Last edited:
Thanks for the link. Have read the article and watched all three utube videos. That's some survival story - escape from death and persecution, then living on as little as they did for forty years is just astounding.

Not sure about the arguments above re choices to live away from society, except to say that running away from their persecutors was evidently the right survival choice in the first place. You can't face down (a society of) gun toting fascists, or whatever, and in my view you'd have to be crazy or a fanatic to do so.

Its not surprising that they craved salt so much; but I wonder if it caused the kidney failure of the two who died a few days apart, given that they may never have had added salt in their diet. Just an idea.
 
The original group who found them reported back to the regional govt. It turns out that there were still living relatives in the villages that the family had fled from.
They could have gone home, or at least had contact with family, had they chosen to keep in touch.

The comment that the father was a dominant patriarch seems to be at the root of the family staying away. Then again, apparantly his brother was shot right beside him, so trauma would play on his mind too.

M
 

BCUK Shop

We have a a number of knives, T-Shirts and other items for sale.

SHOP HERE