Bigfoot - myths and facts.

Bigfoot (yeti, sasquatch, bigfoot, enzhey, avdoshka, almast English bigfoot) is a legendary humanoid creature supposedly found in various highland or forest regions of the Earth. Its existence is claimed by many enthusiasts, but has not been confirmed at the moment. It is believed that this is a relict hominid, that is, a mammal belonging to the order of primates and the human genus, which has survived to this day from prehistoric times.

Still from video by Roger Patterson.

Currently, there is not a single member of the species living in captivity, not a single skeleton or skin. Nevertheless, there are allegedly hair, prints of footprints and dozens of photographs, videos (of poor quality) and audio recordings. The veracity of this evidence is questionable. For a long time, one of the most compelling pieces of evidence was a short 1967 film directed by Roger Patterson and Bob Gimlin in Northern California. The film allegedly captured a female Bigfoot. However, in 2002, after the death of Ray Wallace, for whom this shooting was made, testimonies of his relatives and acquaintances appeared, who told (however, without presenting any material evidence) that the whole story with the "American Yeti" was from the beginning to end rigged; forty centimeter "footprints of the yeti" were made by artificial forms, and the filming was a staged episode with a man in a specially tailored monkey costume .

The Bigfoot was named after a group of climbers who conquered Everest. They discovered the loss of food supplies, then heard a heartbreaking scream, and on one of the snow-covered slopes appeared a chain of footprints similar to human ones. The residents explained that this is Yeti, a terrible Bigfoot, and categorically refused to set up camp in this place. Since then, Europeans have called this creature Bigfoot.

In the testimony of meetings with the "snowmen", creatures most often appear that differ from modern humans in a more dense physique, a pointed skull shape, longer arms, a short neck length and a massive lower jaw, relatively short hips, with thick hair all over. body - black, red, white or gray. Dark-colored faces. The hair on the head is longer than on the body. The mustache and beard are very sparse and short. They climb trees well. It has been suggested that mountain populations of snow people live in caves, forest ones build nests on tree branches. Karl Linnaeus designated him as Homo troglodytes (caveman). Very fast. He can overtake a horse, and on two legs, and in the water - a motor boat. Omnivorous, but prefers plant foods, very fond of apples. Eyewitnesses described encounters with specimens of various heights, from an average human to 3 m or more.

Most modern scientists are skeptical about the possibility of Bigfoot's existence.

... about Bigfoot, he said: "I really want to believe, but there is no reason." The words "no basis" means that the matter has been studied, and as a result of the examination it has been found that there is no reason to trust the original statements. This is the formula of the scientific approach: “I want to believe”, but since “there are no grounds”, then this belief must be abandoned.

Academician A. B. Migdal From Guess to Truth.

The image of a huge scary person can reflect innate fears of darkness, the unknown, relations with mystical forces in different nations. It is possible that in some cases people with unnatural hair or feral people were mistaken for Bigfoot.

The USSR was the only country in the world where the problem of finding the Yeti was considered at the highest state level. The USSR Academy of Sciences also showed interest in Bigfoot. On January 31, 1957, a meeting of the Presidium of the Academy of Sciences was held in Moscow. There was only one item on the agenda: “On the“ Bigfoot. ”In 1958, the Academy of Sciences Commission was established to study the question of the“ Bigfoot. ”It included famous scientists - a geologist, Corresponding Member S.V. Obruchev, a primatologist and anthropologist M. F. Nesturkh, botanist K. V. Stanyukovich, physicist and mountaineer, Nobel laureate, academician I. E. Tamm.The most active members of the commission were doctor J.- M. I. Kofman and professor B. F. Porshnev The working hypothesis, which guided the commission, boiled down to the fact that Bigfoot is a primate from a degraded branch of Neanderthals that has survived to this day.The work of the commission was soon curtailed, but the results of its work were not canceled by subsequent studies of the USSR Academy of Sciences and the Russian Academy of Sciences. which the commission proceeded, was further stated in the official reference manuals of the Academy by NF Reimers and other authors.

Commission members J.-M. I. Kofman and Professor B. F. Porshnev and other enthusiasts continued to actively search for Bigfoot or his tracks.

In 1987, through the efforts of J.-M. I. Kofman and other enthusiasts of the search for Bigfoot, the Russian Association of Cryptozoologists, or the Society of Cryptozoologists, was established. The Society had an official status under the USSR Ministry of Culture and received great help from the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda, which financed the purchase of night vision devices, communications equipment, photographic equipment, immobilization medicines and provided support to local authorities. The Society continues its work, publications of its members are published.

There are numerous images of creatures similar to Bigfoot (on the objects of art of Ancient Greece, Rome, Ancient Armenia, Carthage and the Etruscans and medieval Europe) and mentions, folklore of different peoples (faun, satiri is strong in Ancient Greece, Yeti in Tibet, Nepal and Bhutan , gulei-bani in Azerbaijan, chuchunny, chuchunaa in Yakutia, almas in Mongolia, ezhen, maozen and renxiong in China, kiik-adam and albasty in Kazakhstan, goblin, shish and shishiga among Russians, divas in Persia (and Ancient Rus), Chugaister in Ukraine, virgins and albastas in the Pamirs, Shurale and Yarymyk among Kazan Tatars and Bashkirs, Arsuri among Chuvashes, Pitsen among Siberian Tatars, Abnauyu in Abkhazia, Sasquatch in Canada, Terryk, Girkychavylyin, Mirigdy, Kiltany, Arsaynk, Rynk Julia in Chukotka, trampoline, sedapa and orangpendek in Sumatra and Kalimantan, agogwe, kakundakari and ki-lomba in Africa, etc.).

In folklore, they appear in the form of satyrs, demons, devils, goblin, water, mermaids, etc.

Russian zoologist K. A. Satunin claimed that in 1899 he saw a female byaban-guli in the Talysh mountains. In 1921, the existence of the Yeti was announced by Howard-Bury, the famous mountaineer who led the expedition to Mount Everest. In the 1920s, several Yeti were allegedly caught in Central Asia, imprisoned in zindan and, after unsuccessful interrogations and torture, were shot as Basmachis. Soviet Army Medical Lieutenant Colonel BC Karapetyan in 1941 allegedly made a direct examination of a living wild man caught in Dagestan , the animal was soon shot and eaten. There is no evidence of this incident, since soon Karapetyan and his accomplices were shot as spies. In total, in the 20th century, several hundred reports of the observation of Bigfoot were recorded.

Governor of the Kemerovo Region Aman Tuleyev promises 1,000,000 rubles for the capture of the Bigfoot.

Among those who believe in the existence of Bigfoot, the most popular versions are that he is a descendant of certain hominids with a large stature or stocky build. Among the candidates:

gigantopithecus- a probable relative of orangutans;

meganthrope- large anthropoid monkey of the Pleistocene;
Neanderthal- a species of Homo, which had a stocky constitution and lingered the longest in the mountainous regions of Europe.

A fragment from the Soviet comedy feature film "Man from Nowhere" filmed by director Eldar Ryazanov in 1961 at the Mosfilm film studio.

Cand. biol. Sci., Researcher, Department of Vertebrate Zoology, Faculty of Biology, Moscow State University Pavel Kvartalnov unearthed in the archives the evidence of scientists about the fruitless search for "Bigfoot" in Tajikistan.

In a high tin cylinder, under a pile of giant cobra skin folded several times, Said-Aliyev's field diaries with a detailed description of his collection, as well as the conditions and results of counts of desert lizards lay in a heap. In the hope of finding unpublished information about the places we were able to visit ourselves, we began to revise the diaries. Turning over the next page, I stopped with a glance at the words: "During the research on the problem of" Bigfoot "I was on the expedition as well."

It was strange to see such a phrase in the diary of a Soviet zoologist. Only later did I learn about the search for the Yeti in the mountains of Central Asia, which in the middle of the 20th century was organized by Professor Boris Fedorovich Porshnev (1905-1972), who piously believed not only in the reality of this brutal creature, but also in the fact that it must certainly hide somewhere- then on the southern outskirts of the Soviet Union.

The first expedition, which took place in 1958, is described in detail in the book by V.N.Tanasiychuk. Having received generous government funding, the capital's zoologists and botanists, together with their Tajik colleagues, surveyed the hard-to-reach areas of the Pamirs, in particular, the vicinity of Lake Sarez.

Ornithologist Roald Leonidovich Potapov, to whom I was lucky enough to talk about my findings in Tajikistan, considers the search for the Yeti, in which he took part, far from the most worthy page in the history of Soviet science. However, botanist Sergei Sergeevich Ikonnikov rightly notes that thanks to this adventure it was possible to bring "especially interesting collections of plants" from previously unexplored areas. Not without unique zoological observations. Be that as it may, no convincing signs of the presence of Bigfoot in Tajikistan were found then, and funding stopped.

Despite the lack of recognition, BF Porshnev in July 1961 nevertheless organized another trip to Tajikistan, to the places where, in his opinion, the Yeti could be hiding - to the Gissar ridge. Some observations made during this trip were included in the book prepared by B. F. Porshnev, but detailed information about it is difficult to find in the literature.

The story of SA Said-Aliev, who accompanied BF Porshnev, partly fills this gap. The essay was written concisely, in draft, but not without humor and, judging by the form, could have been intended by the author for prying eyes. It shows well how BF Porshnev collected and "verified" survey information. I am sure that there is no sedition in the publication of these records made more than half a century ago. I hope that readers will be interested in the living story left for posterity by an outstanding Soviet herpetologist.

S. A. Said-Aliev's story

During the research on the Bigfoot problem, I was also on the expedition. The main leader of the expedition was B.F. Pisthnev. He had some information about the "Bigfoot" in the Gissar valley. On July 2, 1961, we set out on a route to the village. Shurkhok on the lake. Temur-kul, on the way we followed 2–3 m from Kara-Tag-darya along a narrow and difficult-to-pass path.<...>

In the vicinity of the lake. Temur-kul we saw traces of various predatory animals (wolf, fox, bear and wild pigs). The next day at 7-8 o'clock in the morning at the shore of the lake. Temur-Kul measured the footprint of a bear. It had a length of 34.5 cm to 35 cm. When this was told by prof. B.F. Porshnev, he said that this is the footprint of this animal ["Bigfoot"]. Then I asked B.F. what kind of claws he had - long or anthropoid. He answered: almost like a man. Then we went [to where,] according to the tourist, these animals [("snow people")] hatch cubs. This place was behind a rocky ridge where [shepherds] used to stay overnight for cows and goats. There were also small pits, about 1.5–2 m deep, for baby sheep and goats. Young animals were kept in these pits until their mothers returned from pastures. But [they were] not holes for Bigfoot cubs.

Then one evening we went up to Lake Parkhon, where you can expect an angel stallion. According to legend, he lives at the bottom of the lake and sometimes goes ashore on moonlit nights. Once a man was riding down from the Upper Mazar (above Lake Parkhon). By the time he reached the lake, it was already dark, and he spent the night right on the shore. His mare was tied a hundred meters away among juniper trees. Suddenly, at 3-4 o'clock in the morning, a beautiful stallion emerged from the lake in the light of the moon. He went to the side where the mare was tied, covered her and immediately went into the water. A few months later, the mare brought a beautiful "like an angel" foal. The same person in 2-3 years again climbed this road to Lake Parkhon-kul on his stallion. When he reached Parkhon-kul, he made a lodging there. At night, the stallion went to the bottom of the lake, and was not seen again.

B.F. there was evidence that in the old days [there was a trail to] the Sarvin pass (from the opposite, western shore of lakes Parkhon and Temur-kul). We searched for this pass for two days, [finally] climbed [to it]. This is a very narrow and dangerous trail at an altitude of 3500-4000 m above sea level (southern slopes of the Gissar ridge). When we reached this height, we saw there flocks of sheep and goats from the collective farm named after I. IN AND. Lenin of the Regar region. We asked the shepherds if they had heard from their grandfathers and great-grandfathers about "humanoid people" who would [come] from the mountain ranges and throw stones at the village. They replied that they had never heard [although one of the shepherds], for example, was 75 years old and climbed mountains all the time. Me and B.F. Pisthnev climbed the ridge, saw the plain and valley of the Tupalang Darya.

More about mythical animals

BF Porshnev's conviction in the existence of the Yeti may seem like a kind of insanity. However, we must admit that even experienced zoologists do not always say with confidence whether some animal lives in the world or is pure fiction. In the afterword to his book, V.N.Tanasiychuk (2009) lists sensational faunistic discoveries at the end of the 20th century and mentions the spiral-horned buffalo ( Pseudonovibos spiralis) from the tropics of Indochina described in 1994.

I remember how the newspapers then told about the discovery of a large ungulate. When I was in Vietnam for the first time, I asked German Vasilyevich Kuznetsov about this beast, who had devoted more than 20 years to the study of the animal world of a distant country. Over a bowl of tart green tea, when the sultry heat gave way to evening coolness, to the cries of the necklace parrots flying to spend the night, G. V. Kuznetsov told how he found the horns of the lin-zyong in a hospitable house in Hanoi, where they were kept as a family heirloom.

Strange horns covered with transverse ridges, sharp and twisted at the ends, like a corkscrew, is the only part of the body of a mysterious beast that has turned out to be at the disposal of zoologists (not counting small fragments of the frontal bone). The rest is known from the ancient Chinese manuscript and from the stories of hunters. This animal looks like a lean buffalo or a goat with thick dark gray fur. It is fast and dexterous, prefers to live on steep rocks, uses twisted horns to cling to them during sleep, hanging from tree branches. The favorite food of the lin-zyong is poisonous snakes, because the powder from its horns helps to heal snake bites. Scientists' attempts to restore the real appearance of the animal and its habitat were summarized by G.V. Kuznetsov in his monograph on mammals in Vietnam (2006).

And yet, in recent years, it has become obvious that the spiral buffalo is nothing more than a myth, an invention, like the "Bigfoot". How did the scientists believe in him?

German zoologists I.P. Peter and A. Feiler were the first to discover unique horns in the Dresden Zoological Museum and to publish a scientific description of the new species. The horns were purchased from markets and hunters in villages on the border of Vietnam and Cambodia, where the animal was supposed to be found. After the appearance of the message about the new species, about 70 pairs of similar horns were found in the collections of different countries and no other evidence of the existence of the animal, which was supposed to reach a weight of 200-300 kg! All horns were collected before 1930, so many scientists decided that the spiral buffalo was most likely extinct.

The results of the analysis of DNA isolated from the horns turned out to be contradictory: if the scientists of the IPEE RAS showed that "lin-duong" is a distant relative of bulls and buffaloes, then zoologists from Germany concluded that it is closer to the chamois. In 2001, there was a wide discussion in the press about the reality of the existence of the spiral buffalo. Skeptics drew attention to the fact that all the known horns of the "lin-zyong" bear traces of artificial processing, which is usually not subjected to hunting trophies. They have a carefully polished surface, and the keratin covers were necessarily removed from the bones, and then (in some of the specimens) they were put back on.

The Frenchman Arnu Seveau finally "buried" the spiral-horned buffalo, personally inspecting all available horns and wandering for several years in remote Cambodian villages, where hunters could know something about the "lin-zyong". He and his colleagues managed to convince scientists that the strange horns were just a fake, designed for local people who believed in the miraculous help of this artifact against snake bites. The previous results of morphological and genetic analysis were explained by methodological errors. In 2003, an article was published with the eloquent heading “ Pseudonovibos spiralis: epitaph ", and the scientific name of the spiral-horned buffalo deservedly took the place of the junior synonym ... the domestic cow ( Bos taurus).

Literature:
1. Tanasiychuk V.N. 2009. Incredible Zoology: Zoological Myths and Hoaxes. - M .: KMK. 372 s.
2. Ikonnikov S.S. 1979. Keys to higher plants of Badakhshan. - L .: "Science" LO. 400 s.
3. Porshnev B.F. 1963. The current state of the question of relict hominoids. - M .: VINITI. 416 s.

A humanoid creature, presumably found in the highlands or forest regions of the Earth.

There is an opinion that this is a relict hominid, that is, a mammal belonging to the order of primates and the genus of man, which has survived to this day from the time of human ancestors. The Swedish naturalist Karl Linnaeus designated him as Homo troglodytes (caveman).
According to hypotheses, "Bigfoot" differs from humans in a more dense build, a pointed skull, longer arms, a short neck and a massive lower jaw, relatively short hips. They have black, red or gray hairs all over their body. The faces are dark, and the hair on the head is longer than on the body. The mustache and beard are very sparse and short. They have a strong unpleasant odor. They move on their feet, climb trees well.

It is assumed that mountain populations of "snowmen" live in caves, and forest ones build nests on tree branches.
Height ranges from 1 to 2.5 meters; in most cases, 1.5-2 meters; the largest individuals were reported in the mountains of Central Asia (Yeti) and North America (Sasquatch). In Sumatra, Kalimantan and Africa, in most cases, growth did not exceed 1.5 meters.

Anthropologist Chernitsky, having collected numerous drawings, photographs and descriptions of the "Bigfoot", compiled his approximate description: "Yeti is a large, upright animal, overgrown with thick wool, growing from 140 centimeters to 2 meters, weighing from 35-40 to 80-100 kilograms He has long, knee-length arms, and legs are shorter than that of a man. Outwardly he resembles the gigantopithecus ape, widespread on Earth 500 thousand years ago. "

There are suggestions that the observed relict hominids belong to several different species, at least three.

For the first time they started talking about the "Bigfoot" in the early 1950s. Then, articles appeared in many magazines about the numerous meetings of climbers with a mysterious creature - the Yeti in the distant Himalayan mountains. Then they began to meet him in the mountains of the former Soviet Union.
In 1954, the British newspaper Daily Mail organized the first expedition to find the "Bigfoot". Searches were conducted in the Himalayas.

The expedition did not reach its goal - the participants did not manage to see the "Bigfoot". But as a result of the work, materials were collected to resolve the issue of its existence. In particular, in the monasteries of Pangboche and Khimjung, scalps and mummified hands of a creature resembling a person were found. Major anatomical scientists - Teizo Ogawa in Japan, J. Agogino in the USA, E. Danilova and L. Astanin in the USSR, who studied photographs of the remains, came to the unanimous conclusion: they belong to a creature that most resembles a Neanderthal, one of the ancestors of modern humans.

In the late 1950s, at the USSR Academy of Sciences, a Commission was created to study the question of the "Bigfoot". It included famous scientists - geologist, corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences Sergei Obruchev, primatologist and anthropologist Mikhail Nesturkh, botanist Konstantin Stanyukovich, physicist and climber, Nobel laureate Academician Igor Tamm. The most active members of the commission were Doctor Zhanna Kofman and Professor Boris Porshnev. The working hypothesis, which guided the commission: "Bigfoot" is a representative of the extinct branch of Neanderthals who have survived to this day.

In 1958, an expedition of the USSR Academy of Sciences went to the Pamir Mountains to find the Yeti. She recorded many colorful stories and legends on this topic from local residents and did not find a single real fact of the existence of a relict hominoid. The work of the commission was soon curtailed, since no real evidence of the existence of the Yeti was found.

According to today's researchers of the topic, the expedition was doomed to failure, since it included only botanical scientists who did not really know what and where to look.

In 1970-1980, the newspaper "Komsomolskaya Pravda" published on its pages a number of materials dedicated to the "Bigfoot", of which the story of an expedition organized by Kiev enthusiasts to the Gissar Pamir-Alai Mountains in Tajikistan in late summer 1979 stands out. Then its participants were lucky to find and fix with the help of a plaster cast the trace of a bare foot of a hominoid. The length of his foot was 34 centimeters, the width in the toes was 16 centimeters, the toes were slightly spread out, the big one was much larger than the rest, the foot was flat. The expedition also collected a lot of oral stories from local residents about their encounters with the Bigfoot.

One of the most compelling evidence for the existence of Bigfoot has long been considered a short film directed by Roger Patterson and Bob Gimlin in 1967 in Northern California. The film shows a female relict hominoid. However, in 2002, after the death of Ray Wallace, for whom this filming was made, his relatives allegedly told (without presenting any physical evidence) that the whole story with the "American Yeti" was falsified; the forty-centimeter "footprints of the yeti" were made by artificial forms, and the filming was a staged episode with a man in a specially tailored monkey costume.

Reports of the discovery of traces and other signs of the existence of the Yeti appear in the media regularly, as enthusiasts from all over the world do not stop searching for the "Bigfoot" and often wishful thinking.

In October 2008, a group of Japanese travelers, who have been looking for Bigfoot for many years, announced the discovery of footprints of a Yeti in the Himalayas - between Nepal and Tibet.

On August 15, 2008, two residents of Georgia - Police Officer Matt Whitton and former Correctional Officer Rick Dyer - announced that they had found the body of a Bigfoot in the mountains in the north of the state, whose height was about 2.5 meters, and weighed 225 kilograms. ...

The press conference dedicated to the sensational find was attended by representatives of the largest world and American media, including CNN, Fox News and MSNBC. As evidence, several hairs were presented, allegedly belonging to Bigfoot, and later turned out to be opossum hair. Whitton and Dyer attracted investors to transport Bigfoot's body. The "body" in the block of ice was bought by one of the research institutes for an unnamed amount, and turned out to be a rubber dummy.

Also in August 2008, British scientists announced that they intend to conduct a DNA examination of hair that supposedly belongs to Bigfoot. Two hairs, about 3 cm long, were brought from India in early 2008 by BBC reporter Alistair Lawson, who visited the Garo Hills, in eastern Meghalaya, after the appearance of a yeti there several times. He got the hairs from a local forester.

Scientists at Brooks University in Oxford examined the samples using powerful microscopes, but were unable to classify them as any known species.

In Russia, reports of contacts with the "Bigfoot" are regularly received from the Kirov region. "Bigfoot" is also observed in the Perm and Leningrad regions, on the shores of Lom Lake in the Murmansk region, in the forests of the Novosibirsk region.
A few years ago, enthusiasts noticed that in the places where the "snowmen" were supposed to live, someone was building structures from branches, sticks, poles like huts. Russian researchers decided that these were the dwellings of relict hominoids. And their American colleagues saw in the forest buildings a kind of markers with which the yeti mark their habitat. More than a dozen of such designs have been found in Russia.

In early 2009, Igor Burtsev, one of the leading Russian professional researchers of the "Bigfoot", visited a similar timber structure in the Moscow region, but he found no traces of the yeti there. According to him, it is possible that "snow people" occasionally visit, or pass by these places. He did not specify where this place is, clarifying that he is afraid that simple curious people will be drawn there, which may interfere with the study.

In February 2009, the administration of the Kemerovo region disseminated information that in Gornaya Shoria, in the Azasskaya cave in the deep taiga, 500 kilometers from Kemerovo, local hunters saw some humanoid creatures covered with hair, 1.5-2 meters in height. Attached to the message was a photograph from the cave, possibly showing the trail of an unknown creature. However, Igor Burtsev could not find their tracks during an expedition to the region. Burtsev noted that after reports of the discovery of the "Bigfoot", ordinary curious people flocked to the Azasskaya cave. "People poured in there. If there were any traces, they were simply erased," he said. Burtsev announced the need to conduct another expedition in the summer, when it will be easier to study the area.

The Russian Academy of Sciences does not officially recognize the existence of Bigfoot and is skeptical about the work of private researchers.

According to the head of the anthropology department of the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Historical Sciences Sergei Vasiliev, anthropologists have never met or examined the bodies of the "Bigfoot", although information about meetings with him constantly comes from different places.

At the same time, the Yeti always see one individual, which is biological nonsense, the scientist noted. After all, there must be a large population of Yeti, so that it persists from generation to generation. And the Earth is not such an unexplored object, and if there was such a population, they would know about it, he believes.

According to Vasiliev, the information about the discovery of "snowmen" is just people's imaginations. According to him, in reality they do not exist, just as there is no scientific side of this issue.

The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources

The time of the first evidence of existence Bigfoot has more than one millennium. However, real interest in this phenomenon appeared only in the 19th century. I was surprised by the vastness of the distribution area of ​​this either animal or man. It will probably be easier to say where he was not met. In each region, Bigfoot is called differently: in the Himalayas it is a yeti, in China it is a yeren, in North America it is a sasquach or bigfoot, in India and Nepal it is a forest man, in Australia it is a yovi or yahu, and also just a hairy Human.
One would assume that since people learned about it, it should have been studied up and down. But, despite many versions and participation in the discussions of authoritative scientists, its existence has not been officially confirmed. The earliest historical mention of the Yeti is inextricably linked with the ancient Greek philosopher Plutarch. He told how the soldiers of the commander Sulla caught a satyr, the description of which strongly resembles the supposed appearance of Bigfoot.

The Qur'an says that one should be merciful to a subhuman. Historian of ancient Greece named Ctesias in the 5th century. BC NS. in the description of India, he testified that humanoid wild animals also live in the Himalayas. The Roman writer Pliny the Elder and the 1st century AD also knew about the "creatures" in the mountains of Asia. NS. The Indian poem "Ramayana", dating from the 3rd-4th centuries, contains a mention of demons called "rakshasas", whose appearance, according to descriptions, also coincides with the alleged portrait of a forest man. Among the ancient Sumerians in the epic "On Gilgamesh" (III century BC) there is a mention of the humanoid creature Enkidu. Among 10,000 petroglyphs and 12 rock paintings in the mountains of Central Asia, about 7,000 years old, scientists have discovered many drawings of Bigfoot. Such famous people as Karl Linnaeus, Herodotus, Yuri Roerich, Nikolai Przhevalsky were direct eyewitnesses to the phenomenon of strange creatures. In 1661, a wild man caught in the Lithuanian-Grodno forests was presented to the Polish king Jan II Casimir. In appearance, he was about 14 years old, his body was overgrown with hair, he could not speak. Subsequently, the monarch's wife tamed the "unusual bear", who even learned how to do some work in the kitchen. In the XVII century. one of the researchers of the Bigfoot phenomenon named Jan Redwich published in 1674 a special essay dedicated to the unknown animal, in which he collected many assessments and observations of eyewitnesses. Cryptozoology is engaged in the search and study of Bigfoot, the science of secretive animals, the existence of which there is no direct evidence, but only witness testimony and circumstantial evidence. Zoologist Bernard Evelmans appears as the founder of cryptozoology. The headquarters of the International Society of Cryptozoology is based in Tucson, the American state of Arizona.
The Soviet Union also created a special science dedicated to the study of Bigfoot - hominology. Such issues were discussed at the highest level. At the Academy of Sciences there was a corresponding commission headed by Professor of Philosophy B. F. Porshnev, the author of several volumes with evidence of encounters with unknown hominids. However, the fate of the commission was similar to many others - it was simply dispersed, considering hominology a pseudoscience. Soon Porshnev died of a heart attack, but his work did not die, but was continued by his students. So, Dmitry Yu. Bayanov gathered a group of followers. For 40 years he studied Bigfoot and quite naturally became one of the largest yeti specialists in the world. Doctor of Biological Sciences Professor P.I.Marikovsky made a significant contribution to solving its mystery.
It is curious that in the "Atlas of Bigfoot" Vadim Yu. Makarov, based on the results of observations, concludes that recently Bigfoot is gradually moving to Russia. For example, recently it began to be observed in the central regions: Leningrad, Moscow, Saratov, Kirov regions.
For several decades, the problem of bigfoot was dealt with by a candidate of biological sciences, a member of the All-Russian Geographical Society, a participant in many expeditions in Central Asia dedicated to
search for humanoid creatures, V. Yu. Makarov.
() he wrote a large work called "The Atlas of Bigfoot", which summarizes the information accumulated by mankind over many centuries of observations in him. According to the German scientist V. Siebert, who left a map of the territories where Yeti is more common, these include the Caucasus, Transbaikalia, Canada, California, Himalayas, Pamir, Chukotka. The Austrian jurist F. Zak collated numerous evidences and found out that the average height of a Bigfoot is 2 m, the mass of adults varies from 150 to 250 kg, and the head circumference is about 700 mm. Climbers and tourists often meet with Bigfoot, so he is sometimes called the "black climber". It is believed that the first European encountered the Yeti when he conquered the highest mountain on Earth. British military C.C. Howard-Bury with a group of companions climbed Everest in 1921. At an altitude of 7 km, they saw several strange creatures, and coming closer, they could see large footprints in the snow, each of which was 3 times the size of a human ... In the manuscripts of the 17th century. there is evidence from the Spanish conquerors of America about a humanoid animal with a hard coat. The Indians called him sasquatch. At the beginning of the XIX century. researcher David Thompson in the Rocky Mountains saw footprints of Bigfoot, the length of which was 35.5 cm, and the width was 20 cm.When David began to question the local Indians about this, he was amazed at how dismissive they were of the sasquatch, seeing in him everything only a cumbersome, clumsy and disgusting kind of man, his lowest form. In 1905, in Northern California, local Indian Johnny Tester watched for a long time as Bigfoot Dad taught the cubs to swim and fish using sharp sticks. And in 1924, in the town of Kelso, Washington, woodcutters unexpectedly refused to go to work. As it turned out, they were cutting down the forest in the distant part of the Cascade Mountains. There they were attacked by large, hairy, wild men who threw stones. Armed, the inspectors went to the scene. The workers' hut was indeed destroyed, and huge footprints were visible on the ground. In 2003, a forester named Deep Marak watched the Yeti for three days in the dense jungle of India. He managed to get the scraps of hair from the creature's body. Subsequently, he handed over their samples to the British BBC television company, reporting that the monster's height reached 3 m, its color was black and gray, its weight was about 300 kg, and the treatment included the fruits of plants, tree bark, and roots. Scientists who studied hair could not draw unambiguous conclusions. But an expert on great apes Ian Redmond noticed that the presented hair was incredibly similar to other similar hair, presumably a bigfoot, collected by Sir E Hillary, who visited Everest. As the scientist stated, “we now know for sure that this hair does not belong to the Asian black bear, it does not belong to the wild boar and does not look like the wool of various types of macaques. This hair remains a mystery. I can also confirm that if this hair really belongs to the yeti, then their hair is split like humans! " The researchers agreed that the specimens belonged to a well-known primate species. Based on the available information, we can say that eyewitness accounts about the appearance of the Yeti are not always unambiguous. If some talk about large, fast animals up to 4 m in height, then the second, on the contrary, emphasize small growth (up to 1.5 m), passivity and sweeping arm movements when walking. However, everyone agrees that the Bigfoot's physique is denser than that of a human, the skull is pointed, the arms are long, the neck is short, and the jaw is massive. The whole body of the Bigfoot and stripes, the color is gray, black or red, the face and mius. Most likely, they live in areas of the snow edge, which serves as a kind of border between mountain glaciers and forests. They can live in caves or tree nests. Rodents and lichens also eat food, and they skin and gut the animals, which indicates their closeness to humans. They are wary of people. If they are hungry, they can come closer. In potential danger, the animal makes a loud barking sound. According to Chinese researchers, snowmen can even make primitive tools and weave baskets. Based on this, we can assume that we are talking about a relict hominid. And this point of view is at least to some extent scientifically substantiated. Scientists from the USSR Academy of Sciences considered Bigfoot to be a primate from a degraded branch of Neanderthals, who managed to survive to this day. However, the theory about the alien origin of the Yeti also has a right to exist, as well as the assumption that this is a guest from a parallel universe. Some even consider it to be the result of an experiment in crossing humans with apes. In any case, these creatures live next to us. And no one is safe from meeting with them. There is too much evidence and serious scientific research on this topic to dismiss this mystery.

Publications about Bigfoot long ago moved from the category of world sensations to the category of entertaining reading material. Back in the 1970s, the well-known journalist Yaroslav Golovanov noted that at yeti there is "the brand of a smile." And in recent years, almost no journalistic investigation on this topic is complete without a certain amount of scoffing.

Representatives of the "big" science call the researchers of the problem dilettantes, arrogantly rejecting their discoveries. Nevertheless, research in this area continues and is replenished with more and more new evidence. DISCOVERY Magazine begins a series of publications about Bigfoot and other unexplored, controversial and extinct creatures.

It is believed that in Russia the study of Bigfoot began a century ago. Back in 1914, the zoologist Vitaly Khakhlov, who had been searching for a “wild man” and polling the local population on the territory of Kazakhstan since 1907, sent a letter to the leadership of the Academy of Sciences in which he substantiated the existence of humanoid creatures.

Khakhlov gave them the specific name Primihomo asiaticus (the first Asian man) and insisted on organizing an expedition to find viable individuals. But the letter fell into the category of "not having scientific significance", and the subsequent events, including the First World War, completely postponed the solution of this problem for many decades.

Bigfoot (aka Bigfoot, Yeti and Sasquatch) first attracted the attention of the general public in the 1950s, when climbers from many countries began to "explore" the highest peaks of the planet. A little more than half a century ago, in 1954, the first special expedition to find the Yeti in the Himalayas took place.

It was organized by the British tabloid Daily Mail on the initiative and under the direction of the newspaper's employee, journalist Ralph Izzard. The impetus for the preparation of the expedition was the photographs of the footprints of a mysterious two-legged creature in the snow, taken by the Englishman Eric Shipton during the ascent of Everest in 1951.

Evidence has been found in high-altitude monasteries that the Himalayas are inhabited (or at least inhabited) by huge, humanoid, fur-covered creatures.

Izzard very thoughtfully approached the collection of the expedition, which took almost three years. During this time, he got acquainted with all the publications on the topic in libraries of different countries, carefully selected specialists for the main team of the expedition, and agreed on the assistance of the Sherpas - the indigenous inhabitants of the high Himalayas.

And although Izzard did not catch Bigfoot (and such a task was also set), many reports of meetings with him were recorded, and evidence was found in the high-mountain monasteries proving that huge humanoid creatures live (or at least lived) in the Himalayas covered with wool. According to the descriptions of local residents, an English anthropologist, the son of first-wave emigrants, Vladimir Chernetsky recreated the appearance of a Yeti.

A unique photograph taken during an expedition in the forest near Vyatka (Orichevsky district) in 200V year: a shaggy creature moving on two legs was photographed from a distance of about 200 meters, after which it fled, leaving gigantic footprints.

In 1958, the USSR Academy of Sciences created the "Commission for the Study of the Bigfoot" and sent an expensive expedition to find the Yeti in the high Pamir mountains, but, unlike Izzard, did not bother with any serious preparation. The mission was headed by botanist Kirill Stanyukovich, and there was not a single specialist in large mammals among his colleagues.

Needless to say, the result turned out to be depressing: a lot of money was spent, as they would say today, on “non-earmarked spending”. It cannot be argued that Stanyukovich did not at all justify the hopes of high officials. On the basis of the data obtained, he created a geobotanical atlas of the Pamir highlands, but after his expedition, the Academy of Sciences officially closed the topic of studying Bigfoot. Since then, all searches for the Yeti in our country were carried out exclusively by the forces of enthusiasts.

YETI ON FILM

Nevertheless, in the short period of its existence, the commission managed to collect a large number of eyewitness reports about meetings with the "inhabitants of the mountains". Several issues of information materials have been published. All work was carried out under the guidance of Professor Boris Porsh-nev, who founded a new direction in the science of man and his origin - hominology.

In 1963, marked "For official use" in a print run of only 180 copies, his voluminous monograph "The Current State of the Question of Relict Hominids" was published, in which Porshnev outlined the available data and the theory based on them.

These ideas in subsequent years were developed by the professor in articles of popular science publications and summarized by him in the book "On the Beginning of Human History" (1974), which was published after the death of the author. Boris Porshnev died of a heart attack when at the last moment the publication of this work was canceled and the set of the book was scattered.

In his writings, Porshnev expressed the idea that the "snowmen" are Neanderthals who have survived to this day, having adapted to natural conditions without tools, clothing, fire and, most importantly, speech as a means of communication. Speech, according to the scientist, is the most important distinguishing quality of a person, distinguishing him from the rest of the animal world.

In the 1960s, expeditionary work moved mainly to the Caucasus. The main merit in this belongs to the doctor of biological sciences Alexander Mashkovtsev, who traveled along and reproached several regions of the Caucasus and collected a wealth of material.

The expeditionary work was headed and led for many years by Maria-Zhanna Kofman. The participants in the search exchanged information on the results obtained at meetings of a seminar on the problem of relict hominids, founded in 1960 at the State Darwin Museum in Moscow by the famous naturalist Pyotr Smolin. After the death of Smolin, the seminar is still headed by Dmitry Bayanov.

While in the USSR the problem of Bigfoot was discussed from a theoretical position, in America and Canada there was a major breakthrough in the field of field searches.

On October 20, 1967, the American Roger Patterson managed to film a female hominid in a forest in Northern California and made several plaster casts of her tracks. The film was coldly received by the scientific community, without any study was rejected by the Smithsonian Center and declared to be a forgery. Patterson died five years later of brain cancer, but there are still materials in print trying to accuse him of falsification.

But back in 1971, Russian hominologists, among whom was your humble servant, as a result of painstaking research, recognized the film as genuine. Our study of the film is still the most important evidence of its truth. American specialists have only recently begun to seriously study it and are already confirming the conclusions drawn in the USSR almost 40 years ago.

EXPERTISE STUDYING THE PATTERSON'S FILM, RUSSIAN (THEN STILL SOVIET) SCIENTISTS DID THE CONCLUSION THAT IT IS GENUINE. THEY JUSTIFIED THEIR CONCLUSIONS WITH THE FOLLOWING ARGUMENTS:

Exceptional flexibility of the ankle joint of the creature depicted on the film, unattainable for humans.
Greater, in comparison with humans, the flexibility of the foot itself is in the back direction. Dmitry Bayanov was the first to draw attention to this. Later this was confirmed by the American anthropologist Jeff Meldrum, which he described in his publications.

Bigfoot's heel protrudes back more than a person's. This corresponds to the typical foot structure of Neanderthals. For a creature of large weight, this is justified from the point of view of the rational application of muscle strength.

In the study of the film, Doctor of Sciences Dmitry Donskoy, who was then the head of the Department of Biomechanics at the Institute of Physical Education, came to the conclusion that the creature's gait is completely not typical for Homo sapiens and practically cannot be reproduced.

In the film, the play of muscles on the body and limbs is clearly visible, which rejects the assumption of the costume. The entire anatomy of the body and especially the low head position distinguishes this creature from modern humans.

Measurements of the frequency of vibration of the hands and comparison with the speed at which the film was filmed indicate a high growth of the creature (about 220 cm) and, given the complexion, a large weight (over 200 kg).

THE BIGFOOT CLAN IN TENNESSY

In December 1968, two world-renowned cryptozoologists, Ivan Sanderson (USA) and Bernard Eyvelmans (France), examine the frozen corpse of a hairy humanoid creature. Later they publish the report in the scientific press. Evelmans identified the deceased as a "modern Neanderthal", thus declaring that Porshnev was right.

Meanwhile, the search for Bigfoot continued in the USSR. The most significant results were provided by the work of Maria-Zhanna Kofman in the North Caucasus, the search for Alexandra Burtseva in Kamchatka and Chukotka; very large-scale and fruitful expeditions in Tajikistan and the Pamir-Alai under the leadership of Kievites Igor Tatsl and Igor Burtsev, and in Western Siberia and on Lovozero (Murmansk region), not unsuccessfully conducted searches for Maya Bykov, Vladimir Pushkarev collected a lot of information in Komi and Yakutia.

Pushkarev's expedition ended tragically: in September 1978, he single-handedly went on an expedition to the Khanty-Mansiysk District and disappeared without a trace.

In 1990, search expeditions practically ceased due to a sharp change in the socio-political situation in the territory of the former USSR. After some time, thanks to the development of the Internet, Russian researchers were able to establish strong contacts with European and overseas colleagues.

In recent years, interest in the Yeti has increased, and new regions of hominid detection have emerged. In 2002, Janice Carter, the owner of a farm in Tennessee, said in an interview that a whole clan of Bigfoots has lived near her property for more than half a century. According to the woman, the elder of the “snow” family was about 60 years old, and “acquaintance” with him took place when Janice was only seven years old.

In the next issue, we will dwell in more detail on this amazing case and the main protagonists of the story. A story about unique finds and incredible discoveries awaits you.

Mysterious creature from Burganef really looks like a Neanderthal

Janice Carter meets Bigfoot. The drawing was made according to the woman's words and accurately shows the proportions of the creature and demonstrates how their communication took place.

Some time ago, Russian hominologists accidentally stumbled upon information that in 1997 in France, at a provincial fair in the town of Burganef, a frozen body of a "Neanderthal" was shown, allegedly found in the mountains of Tibet and smuggled from China.

There are many incomprehensible things in this story. The owner of the trailer, which transported the refrigerator with the "Neanderthal", disappeared without a trace shortly after pictures of the dead Bigfoot's body were leaked to the French press.

The trailer itself with its invaluable contents has also disappeared, all attempts to find it for 11 years are in vain. Photos of the frozen body showed Janice Carter, who most likely confirmed that this was not a falsification, but indeed the corpse of a Bigfoot.

Despite serious difficulties, mainly of a financial nature, research on the problem of Bigfoot continues. The recognition by the official science of such humanoid creatures will lead to serious changes in many branches of knowledge related to the study of man, will allow to penetrate the secret of his origin, will have a serious impact on the development of culture, religion, medicine. Using Porshnev's terminology, this will lead to a scientific revolution and to a radical revolution in the issue of defining a person as such and isolating him from the animal world.

An unusual structure made of tree trunks and branches found in Tennessee. Such structures are often found in difficult-to-pass forests. Their purpose is still unknown, but, apparently, this is how the Yeti somehow designate their territory. Igor Burtsev (pictured) is convinced that there is a huge Bigfoot family living in Tennessee.

HUMAN AND ANIMAL HYBRID

Even Michel Nostradamus warned about the emergence of a hybrid of man and animal. Experiments on vivisection, that is, surgical intervention into a living organism in order to create another creature, in particular a person (or similar), were carried out back in the 19th century, but they did not lead to anything.

There is no data of this kind on earlier "studies". At least, doctors and alchemists of the Middle Ages did not resort to such experiments (this was the road to the fire of the Inquisition), content with attempts to grow homunculi in test tubes.

Experiments on breeding humanoid creatures became widespread (in certain circles) in the early 1920s. A student of Academician Ivan Pavlov, biologist Ilya Ivanov, began to conduct experiments on crossing humans and chimpanzees by the method of artificial insemination. The experiments were carried out on volunteers and lasted more than 10 years, until Ivanov's death in 1932, which followed under very mysterious circumstances.

Why were these experiments carried out? At first glance, the reason is simple - the possibility of creating some hybrids for work in difficult and harmful conditions and, possibly, for organ donation. However, the results of the experiments are unknown. True, there is unverified evidence that somewhere in the mines, prisoners of the GULAG met hairy, ape-like people.

But is it possible to create such creatures and other humanoid monsters? Geneticists give a negative answer to this question, since humans have 46 chromosomes, while chimpanzees have 48, which means that artificial (as well as natural) fertilization is simply impossible. But Ivanov, when exposed to an egg, could well use chemicals, drugs, radiation and any other powerful methods. After all, what is sometimes impossible in nature is quite possible in the laboratory.

JAPANESE VERSION

The Japanese climber claims that he has uncovered the secret of Bigfoot, and now this problem, which has excited the minds of seekers of mysterious phenomena for decades, is over. After 12 years of research, Ma-koto Nebuka concluded that the legendary Yeti from the Himalayas was nothing more than the Himalayan bear (Ursus thibetanus).

“Reality is rarely as frightening as imagination,” says smiling Nebuka, one of the leading members of the Alpine Club of Japan, at a press conference in Tokyo for his book, which summarizes years of research into Bigfoot.

In addition to unique photographs. Nebuka was also engaged in linguistic research. In particular, an analysis of interviews with residents of Nepal, Tibet and Bhutan showed that the notorious "Yeti" is a distorted "meti", that is, "bear" in the local dialect. And the myth has almost become a reality due to the fact that the Tibetans consider the "yeti" honey to be an omnipotent and terrible creature with supernatural powers.

These concepts combined and became "Bigfoot", explains Nebuka. To prove his position, he shows a photograph of a "yeti" bear, the head and paws of which are kept by one of the Sherpas as a talisman.

DID YOU KNOW THAT ...

The name "Bigfoot" is a tracing paper from the Tibetan "metoh kangmi", as this creature is called there.
... Scientists studying Bigfoot agree that the life span of this creature is 250-300 years.
... Cryptozoologists have not only casts of footprints, hair and excrement of the Yeti, but also fragments of his dwelling, built on the ground and in trees. Scientists are convinced that it takes a lot of strength and intelligence to build a structure from branches and seal walls with grass, foliage, earth and excrement.
... Finnish scientists tried to offer the most incredible version of the appearance of Bigfoot. They claimed that the Yeti are aliens, and when they disappear, they are transported to their planet.
... In Malaysia, Yeti is considered a deity, they call him "Hantu Yarang Jiji" (literally - "a spirit with wide-set teeth"), and in Endau-Rompin National Park there is even a small chapel with a bigfoot sculpture, to which believers come to pray.
... The American Society of Cryptozoologists and in Tucson (Arizona) announced a reward of 100 thousand US dollars to those who find and deliver scientists the corpse of Bigfoot, and 1 million dollars to those who manage to catch him alive.

Igor Burtsev
Discovery Magazine No. 5 2009.