Prior to the widespread use of technology, biological anomalies slipped into the status of urban legend, but as medical science has proven, some people are born with deformities that really have to be seen to be believed, which brings us to the case of Edward Mordake.

Regarded as one of the “human freaks” of the 19th century, his story has been a continual source of fascination. Mordake reportedly was born with two faces, a phenomenon which is known as diprosopus, and there was something very sinister about his second face.

In most recorded cases of diprosopus, the person affected has an extra facial feature like a nose or ear, but in rare cases, entire faces can be duplicated. This duplication is what Mordake was said to suffer from when he was first described in the Boston Post in 1895.

Featured below is the only picture which has been said to be of Mordake:

Alongside a number of other people born with extreme deformities, the information reported about Mordake’s condition was obtained from the reports of the “Royal Scientific Society” by writer Charles Lotin Hildreth, although it’s unknown if this society ever existed or not.

Mordake’s story then managed to make its way into the 1896 medical encyclopedia Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine, co-authored by Dr. George M. Gould and Dr. Walter L. Pyle, although it was not specifically defined as a case of diprosopus at the time.

As told in Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine, this is Mordake’s story:

“One of the weirdest as well as the most melancholy stories of human deformity is that of Edward Mordake, said to have been heir to one of the noblest peerages in England. He never claimed the title, however, and committed suicide in his twenty-third year. He lived in complete seclusion, refusing the visits even of the members of his own family.”

...[ Continue to next page ]

Share This Post