Do you know who Anne Boleyn was? Never fear, I am about to tell you. Anne was the Queen of England back in the day. Way back in the day in fact, from 1533 to 1536, as the second wife of King Henry VIII and Marquess of Pembroke in her own right. I kind of feel the need at this stage, to point out for those who might be unaware, that being the King of England’s wife probably wasn’t everything it’s cracked up to be. In fact, it isn’t even cracked up to be anything special. The following is a popular song for school children to help them remember their facts comes history class at school. It starts with;
Divorced, beheaded and died
Divorced, beheaded, survived
I'm Henry the Eighth, I had six sorry wives
Some might say I ruined their lives
Then we skip the next stanza to Henry VIII’s second wife, the one which we are concerned with, Anne Boleyn;
Young Anne Boleyn, she was two
Had a daughter, the best she could do
I said she flirted with some other man
And off for the chop went dear Anne
I think you see my point, right? In case you have so far not managed to pick up what I’m putting down, her husband ordered for his second wife to be executed by having her head chopped off. Then he got busy with another four – some men are just never satisfied… At least he recognised that a common axe was far too good for the beheading of a Queen, and so he called in an expert swordsman from France to do the job – same result presumably, only probably a far cleaner cut.
There was all sorts of political jostling behind the reasons for her execution but it was said that all her issues began to compound when she miscarried with the King’s child. She was eventually brought up on all sorts of charges from adultery to treason – whether they were legitimate or not; well, that’s not for us to say, but what the Hell does this have to do with extra body parts?
Well, Anne Boleyn was thought to have had eleven fingers and quite possibly an extra breast. Historians all seem to agree about the finger. Or at least, that she had some sort of growth that could have resembled a finger. But the third breast is a bit more interesting, and perhaps a total fabrication.
During the times of the Tudor Dynasty, having a third breast was a pretty good sign that you were a witch. Naturally, with all of the political issues surrounding Boleyn, it might be a good idea for her enemies to start a smear campaign – and what better way to ruin her reputation than to tell everyone she had an extra boob?!
What extra body part do you reckon Marky Mark has? I am guessing that anyone who saw Boogie Nights might expect to see him on the list of people who got extra-large body parts… And well might he make that list if there was one (could be an idea…) but here we are referring to superfluous body parts only.
Now, I have not seen it with my own eyes, but those in the know reckon that Mark Wahlberg has an extra nipple on the left side of his chest. Apparently, during his early career, he actually thought about having it removed. It is funny because half of the world’s population (possibly more than half these days when one considers how many women are choosing a career over motherhood) have no need for the first two of their nipples, let alone a third. So it has got me thinking that, as a man, I might go and get my two nipples surgically removed and see how I look with a bare chest.
Studies suggest that the likelihood of a third nipple occurring is in about two percent of the planet’s women (that’s quite a bit of extra titty when you think about it) and a slightly smaller percentage of men. Sometimes, they are so insignificant they might just look like a mole. There’s another thing; just because you have begun to date someone, man or woman, you have seen their chest and there are just the regulation two nipples, doesn’t mean they don’t have an extra one hiding somewhere. Some supernumerary nipples are not on the chest. In fact, a third nipple may be found anywhere between the armpit and the groin.
They can range in size too. They could appear as a tiny lump (just like Mr Wahlberg’s is said to) to an extra breast. In the case of it appearing as an extra breast, sometimes they are even capable of lactation.
We are going to refer to this guy as simply “Indian Man” for two reasons; the first is that his condition is probably not something he wants perpetually associated with is name, and secondly, we don’t know his name. Indian man has, or had, an affliction which affects only one in about five and a half million men (at least according to studies restricted to the United States), known as diphallia.
In case you didn’t decipher the code there, diphallia describes a condition by which a dude is born with two penises. It really is usually quite tragic and sufferers born with diphallia will typically also suffer from renal, vertebral, hindgut, anorectal or other congenital anomalies, to go with it. There is also a higher risk of spina bifida and a higher risk of various types of infections.
So it doesn’t happen too often but one in 5.5 million guys isn’t totally unheard of, right? No it isn’t, but what is, is the situation which specifically faced Indian Man. In diphallia, only one works. The other is just “there”.
A 2006 article in the Sydney Morning Herald quoted a surgeon involved in Indian Man’s case, as he was explaining just how unique this particular man’s situation was. "Two fully functional penises is unheard of even in medical literature. In the more common form of diphallus, one organ is rudimentary," the surgeon said.
I guess we gave something away there. If we are quoting surgeons then you have probably figured out by now that Indian Man chosen to have the chop. The twenty-four-year old from Uttar Pradesh admitted himself to a New Delhi hospital in 2006 in the hope that he might be able to have a normal life. The businessman was looking forward to getting married and was hoping to enjoy a sex-life with his future wife. I like to imagine him now with a smile on his face and his extra penis preserved in a jar of vinegar sitting on the fridge.
There have been some other cases of course, with one man claiming to have bedded many women who were intrigued with the novelty factor of his genitals. I’ll leave Googling that stuff up to the reader. Start with “DoubleDickDude”….
Now before we go about detailing the plight of Rebecca Martinez, we must first get something out of our systems. It is a cliché which becomes a horrible pun when talking about a condition known as craniopagus parasiticus. Okay, so let’s get it over and one with. Actually, how about we totally refute it by saying that no, two heads are not better than one. Not when we are talking about those two heads having to share a body.
Those two long words above basically describe a condition where a baby is born with two heads although, what differentiates these cases from that of conjoined twins, is that with craniopagus parasiticus, one of the heads does not have a functioning brain in it. It is basically just “there” not serving any real function other than to look really weird.
We can sum it up quite easily by explaining that a baby is born with the head of its dead twin attached to its body. Throughout recorded medical history, there have only ever been nine cases of craniopagus parasiticus occurring.
Born in the Dominican Republic in 2003, Rebecca Martinez was one of those nine. Of those cases, seven died before they were even born. In Rebecca’s case, the second head was only partially developed, including only slightly developed brain, ears, eyes and lips. Tests indicated that there was some brain activity in the second head. Interestingly (and somewhat creepily), the mouth of the second head would move when Rebecca was breastfeeding.
On the 6th of February 2004, when she was just shy of two months old, Rebecca went in to surgery in Santo Domingo in an attempt by the surgical team to save her life by removing the extra head. To say that the operation was risky would be the mother of all understatements – it was the very first of its kind ever attempted in human history – but ultimately, what other choices were present? None…
The surgery lasted eleven hours and was led by Doctor Jorge Lazareff, who had been successful previously in an attempt to separate Guatemalan conjoined twins. Unfortunately for all concerned though, the attempt to free Rebecca Martinez from her parasitic twin was not enough to save her life. She died on the 7th of February, 2004, from complications which stemmed from her first-of-its-kind operation.
Betty Lou Williams – Twins
A gentleman by the name of Robert Ripley was well-known back in the day, for his comic strip “Believe It Or Not” which appeared in newspapers in the United States. Then at the 1934 World Fair, Ripley presented his first Odditorium, which featured real-life anatomical anomalies. The star of this show was a girl by the name of Betty Lou Williams.
Williams was born in Georgia in 1932 in to a poor farming family, the youngest of twelve children. At this time, her parents couldn’t help but notice that she wasn’t exactly what you might call “normal”. Betty was born with a parasitic twin attached to her side with its own two legs, an arm with a three-fingered hand, and an underdeveloped arm-like appendage. So where was this twin’s head? It was buried in Betty’s abdomen.
It is for this reason that it was amazing she was alive. In fact, despite all of the supposed anatomical problems, doctors insisted that there was no reason Betty could not enjoy a healthy life. Of course, it was never going to be a normal healthy life – but her condition would not cause her too many complications, the doctors said.
It may seem pretty awful to us in this day and age, but in those days, there really weren’t too many option open for a poor farm girl with this condition, and so she was displayed by Ripley as part of one of those travelling freak shows. By the age of two-years old, Betty was earning $250 dollars a week; and astonishing amount for that time. In adulthood, she was taking home a massive $1000 dollars a week. With her earning, she purchased a big old ranch for her parents and sent all of her siblings to college.
Many reports suggest that the reason for her earnings spike in adulthood is that despite her condition, she actually grew to be quite an attractive woman, who attracted a lot of attention from men. She became engaged to one of these men at the age of twenty-three. Unfortunately, the man she chose was a bad egg who was really only after her cash – much of which he took when he fled leaving her ashamed and heartbroken.
Even more disappointingly, this story does not have a redeeming happy ending. Betty Lou Williams died soon after, still aged twenty-three, after suffering a severe asthma attack exacerbated by the head hiding in her abdomen.
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