Tarrare, widely known as the hungriest man in history, is a real medical anomaly who still perplexes experts to this day.
The Frenchman, born near Lyon in 1772, had an insatiable appetite. He also consistently defied social and ethical norms by devouring live animals and even human flesh – seemingly without hesitation.
While Tarrare's appetite has often been described as grotesque, it's important to note that he is believed to have had a very specific form of hyperthyroidism.
Hyperthyroidism is a medical condition of which a symptom can be extreme hunger. What sets apart this condition and normal hunger is that eating will quench hunger, whereas it will not satisfy the hunger in those who have the condition.
At the height of his bingeing, Tarrare ate live eels, lizards, snakes – sometimes, engulfing the animals' bones as well as flesh. He would also root through piles of trash and eat rats and squirrels.
What most concerned people, though, was when Tarrare turned his attention to people rather than animals.
He had a tendency to drink the blood of patients undergoing bloodletting therapy in hospital, he was believed to have eaten dead bodies in a morgue and was even accused of eating a 14-month-old child who had gone missing at the same hospital.
Tarrare was born to a poor family less than two decades before the start of the French Revolution.
What's interesting about Tarrare's appearance as a boy, considering he'd always been a voracious eater, is that he wasn't large by any stretch of the imagination.
In fact, by the age of 17, he weighed only about 100 pounds and yet was able to eat his entire body weight in food on a daily basis, according to historical accounts.
Tarrare seemed to have a very large mouth and after he consumed colossal portions of food, his stomach would stretch to an almost unthinkable degree. His condition also severely impacted his skin, which continually stretched to accommodate his consistent eating.
He was also known to have an indescribably foul odor, with medical records stating that his stench was "to such a degree that he could not be endured within the distance of 20 paces."
The young man's appetite had started to become a real problem for his impoverished parents who couldn't afford to have him stay at home anymore.
Forcing their son to leave home, he now had to learn to support himself, and more importantly, his addiction to eating.
After leaving home, a penniless Tarrare was forced to beg, steal, and eat stray animals or whatever else he could find in the trash.
Soon enough, he had garnered a reputation for his bizarre eating habits and eventually took advantage of his condition by becoming a street performer.
The showman would wow crowds with his ability to wolf down buckets of eggs, apples, stones, and wine corks.
Based on historical accounts of those who witnessed his act, he also devoured cats and dogs whole:
"He seized a live cat with his teeth, eventrated [disemboweled] it, sucked its blood, and ate it, leaving the bare skeleton only. He also ate dogs in the same manner.
"On one occasion it was said that he swallowed a living eel without chewing it."
Although Tarrare made some money from his performances, his extreme overindulgence did lead to his being hospitalized with severe indigestion.
Moving on from his life as a showman, Tarrare decided to enlist in the French Revolutionary Army amid the War of the First Coalition.
The former street performer didn't exactly have the easiest time while in the army. He was in a constant state of hunger despite officers allowing him four times the rations that other soldiers received.
So, Tarrare, as insatiably hungry as ever, reverted back to his former habits of rooting through trash for food.
So stricken was the soldier that he was eventually admitted to a military hospital in Soutz-Haut-Rhin with a severe case of exhaustion.
Medics were at a loss as to the intricacies of Tarrare's baffling health condition. So, they decided to set up a range of experiments to test how much he was willing to eat – and what exactly he was willing to eat.
The doctors arranged a meal fit for the consumption of 15 people, which Tarrare was easily able to eat in one sitting. He was fed live lizards, eels, and snakes – some of which he ate with the bones.
Tarrare continued to eat everything laid before with total ease. So, it was decided that his extraordinary anatomy would be used for the benefit of the army.
Essentially the plan was that Tarrare would be their spy. Tarrare was ordered to eat a wooden box that contained a secret message, which he was expected to deliver to a French Colonel imprisoned in Prussia (modern-day Germany).
However, in the middle of his mission, Tarrare was taken captive by the enemy and soon confessed the entire plan.
He was then chained to a toilet while the Prussians waited for him to relieve himself so that they could obtain the secret message.
As the message had only been intended as a test of Tarrare's espionage abilities, it didn't contain anything particularly damning, merely the words: "Let me know if you got this message."
In an act of supposed goodwill, Tarrare's captors eventually allowed him to return home, before not before he received a beating from the enemy.
Deciding he'd had enough of his ravenous appetite, Tarrare, who was now back at the hospital, pleaded with medics to help him overcome his condition.
Unfortunately, none of the treatments he underwent worked for Tarrare.
In fact, based on witness accounts by medical staff, his eating behavior appeared to be more extreme than ever.
Nurses had witnessed Tarrare fighting with stray dogs for scraps of garbage. And as noted earlier, he sought out patients undergoing bloodletting in order to take their blood for himself. It was also claimed that he ate dead bodies he found in a nearby morgue.
The last straw was the disappearance of a one-year-old toddler at the hospital. Given his behavior, staff had no qualms believing that he would go to the extent of eating a defenseless infant.
Tarrare's treatment was ended immediately and he was forced to leave the hospital. He died years later from tuberculosis.
However, the fascinating story of the hungriest man in history didn't end with his death. In fact, when the autopsy was conducted, doctors found that when they opened his mouth, they could see all the way down his throat and into his stomach cavity.
His stomach was so huge that it almost took up his whole abdominal cavity. His gullet was also abnormally large and his jaw was able to stretch so wide open that, as stated in the medical report: "A cylinder of a foot in circumference could be introduced without touching the palate."
All in all, while many of the things Tarrare did as a result of his disorder were, at best, unpleasant - he certainly did not lead the most fortunate life.
