Back one day millions of years ago, insects chitter and chirp across a barren, rocky desert scape under an electric haze of early morning light. While sheltering in some nearby caves, a community of hominids huddled together for warmth as their weight to the first golden rays of dawn. When finally they come, the hominids emerge into the light to find something bizarre and alien standing before them at all obsidian monolith,
unlike anything they have ever seen before. As the hominids grunt and squawk with a mix of fear and confusion, some are brave enough to touch it as they make futile attempts to fathom its meaning. Hours later, in the shadow of the monolith, as the sun reaches its zenith in the sky above it, one hominid is scraping about in the sand when they grab a thick bone from the skeleton of a dead taper nearby and begin to
flap it about in the dust. Then, gripping it a little harder, they start to smash it against the other bones, pounding and pounding more with ever increasing intensity, before finally they unleash the full force of their strength and bring the bone crashing through the center of the tapier's skull,
smashing it to smithereens. Having finally calmed, the hominid tosses the bone high into the air, but as it falls back to Earth, the bone and desert landscape are suddenly replaced by a bone shaped spaceship drifting above a planet through the vast emptiness of space. Many may recognize this as one of the most profound and iconic scenes of
twentieth century cinema. Taken from Stanley Kubrick's nineteen sixty eight masterpiece two thousand and one, A Space Odyssey, it is a singular moment of cinematic genius, creating, in one expert transition, a direct line from the discovery of want and violence
to the greatest technological achievements humanity can presently comprehend. It is a scene that suggests provocatively that not only is humanity indelibly characterized by both these things, but that the existence of one may be predicated on the existence of
the other. Taken more broadly, it can also be read as a statement on the concept of original sin, or, more precisely, to strip away its theological connotations, aposting of the age old question of whether our potential to be good or bad, as we might describe it, is something already inherent within us from the day we are born, or whether it is something imprinted upon us by the attitudes, morais,
and conventions of the world into which we emerge. It is a complicated and fraught argument that, barring the most extreme type of human experiment, is unlikely to ever be satisfactorily answered anytime soon. From time to time, however, a unique opportunity presents itself from which we might draw an insight into the truth of the matter. You're listening to Unexplained,
and I'm Richard McClain smith. The pristine and bustling city of Nuanberg, as famed priest Martin Luther had, it, shines throughout Germany like a sun among the moon and stars. Even today, certainly within the walled parts of the old city, it remains as mesmerizing as ever, an entire town of gingerbread homes, tottering fairy tale towers, and grand, crooked timber framed buildings, resplendent under their vibrant terra cotta tiles, all in the shadow of its towering medieval castle perched high
on a hill to the north of the city. It was one warm afternoon in late May of eighteen twenty eight in the unschlit Plats, a quiet square on the western edge of Nuremberg. Sometime around four thirty pm, the shoemaker George Fikman was sweeping the cobbles outside its store when he was distracted by the sight of a man
clumsily making his way across the square. It was bizarre the way he moved, caught between simply trying to stay upright while moving forward at the same time flinging out his legs in front of him, one after the other,
as if they didn't quite belong to him. From afar, he looked like any other regular citizen of the city, a little short, perhaps, had just under five foot, but dressed in a common graycloth jacket, black silk scarf and dark felt hat trimmed with yellow ribbon, from under which a head of light brown curls could just about be seen cascading out. Fikman first assumed the man was drunk, but as he looked harder, he soon realized he wasn't a man at all, but a boy who appeared to
be in great discomfort. Rushing quickly over to help, Fikman offered his arm for the boy to hold on to, causing him to stumble suddenly, then simply stare back at him through a pair of vacant, pale blue eyes. The boy's toes, he could see now, was sticking out the ends of his boots. Fikman asked the boy for his name, as if then only seeing the shoemaker for the first time. The boy ignored the question and gestured to his feet,
grimacing with palpable pain. Then, after steadying himself against a nearby wall, he reached into his pocket, took out a letter and handed it to Vikman. The man studied the address on the front of it, with some surprise to the well borne captain of the fourth Squadron of the sixth Regiment of Light Horses. It read Fikman again at the strange, disheveled youth, and asked once more for his name. After taking a moment to think about it, he replied instead, I want to be the rider my father was yes,
But what is your name? Said Vikman again, But the boy seemed not to understand, his face crumbling as though he were about to cry. Please, he said pitifully, I want to be the rider my father was. Fikman shook his head and looked about the deserted square, then motioned for the boy to follow him. After a short but arduous walk, Fikman led the mysterious boy to the home of Captain Friedrich von Vessenig, the current captain of the
fourth Squadron. The door was answered an extremely confused looking servant, who, like Vikman, also asked first for the boy's name, but just as before, the boy replied with his own intense look of confusion, before stating once more that I want to be the rider my father was. Fikman chuckled to himself, then handed the boy's letter to the servant with a
quick glance at the address. The servant informed the pair that the captain was not currently at home and suggested they try again later, But as he closed the door, the boy began to cry and pointed to his feet. Seeing the blisters now clearly visible under the boy's toes, the servant softened and agreed to let him wait in
the barn until the captain returned. While there, the boy was given some meat to eat, but no sooner had he placed it in his mouth, He immediately spat it out with disgust, as his entire body shook from the revulsion of it. It was the same when he tried the beer they brought him too. When simple bread and
water was offered, however, the boy gobbled it down with glee. Then, with obvious relief at finally being off his feet, the boy sat down on a pile of straw with his back against the wall and his legs stretched out in front of him, then promptly fell into a deep sleep.
A few hours later, the captain arrived home to much excitement from his children, who by then had become well acquainted with the peculiar creature now lying asleep in their barn, having spent much of the afternoon secretly spying on him. Completely bemused as to what they were talking about, the captain was then handed the boy's letter from his servant and eckleet or it open. Though the writing was legible, it was littered with strange grammar and numerous spelling mistakes.
It read as follows from the Bavarian border, the place is unnamed, eighteen twenty eight. I'm sending you a boy who would like to faithfully serve his king. This boy was laid on me on the seventh of October eighteen twelve. I myself have ten children. I have enough to do to get by, and his mother only laid the boy for being raised, and I was not able to find her.
I raised him as a Christian, and I have since eighteen twelve not allowed him to take a single step out of the house, so that nobody knows the place where he was brought up, and he himself doesn't know. So you can ask him as much as you like, but he can't tell you. Read and writing. I have already taught him, And when we ask him what he wants to become, he said he wants to be a cavalryman like his father was. If he had parents, which he has none, he would have become a learned boy.
You only have to show him something once and he can do it best. Captain. You shouldn't torture him with questions. He doesn't know where I am. I took him away in the middle of the night, and he doesn't know anymore how to go home. If you can't keep him, you will have to butcher him or hang him up in the chimney. Within the letter to the captain was a second letter, which the captain presumed was given to the writer of the first when the boy was apparently
left with him. The child is called Casper. He was born on the third yet of April in the year eighteen twelve. I ask you to raise him until his seventeenth year. Then sent him to Nuremberg, to the sixth Regiment. That is where his father was too. I am a poor little girl. I cannot feed the boy, and his father is dead. Since the captain had no idea who the boy was and had no use for him, he ordered his servants to have him delivered immediately to the
nearest police station. It had just gone eight pm when the boy was handed over to the police, wailing in pain at each step as he shuffled into the station building, drawing the attention of all who were inside. Once again, the boy was asked for his name, but once again he could only stare back vacantly and offer the same old refrain in response, I want to be the rider.
My father was unsure what to do with him. The police first made a search of his pockets to see if they might find any evidence as to who he was or where he came from. Little was found, however, save for some rags patterned with blue and white flowers, a small envelope with some gold dust in it, and a collection of religious texts, including one titled the Art
of Replacing Lost Time and Years Badly Spent. A red and white handkerchief was also found, with the initials K h embroidered onto it, suggesting at least a second name beginning with H to go with the first one, Casper. As the police discussed what they should do next, the boy could only watch on through tears as he sat in the corner, seemingly unsure where he was exactly or what he wanted. Eventually, one officer approached him quietly and showed him a coin. The boy's face lit up into
a huge, beaming smile. Oors oors, he said, strangely, with wondrous joy, now suddenly indifferent to the tears of anguish still wet on his cheeks. It was, they thought, as if he were only a little child encased within a teenager's body. Then another officer grabbed a pen and paper and showed them to the boy, who seemed to recognize what they were taking the pen confidently between his thumb
and fingers. The officers watched on with excitement as the boy dipped it into the ink and began to write in careful flowing letters K A S P A R H A U S E R. Casper Hauser said the officer, is that your name? But the boy could only stare back blankly in reply. With nothing else to be done. So late in the evening, Casper, as he would from then on be known, was taken by horse and cart to the prison at Vestner Gate in the north of the city, a place for vagrants and minor offenders in
the shadow of the Imperial Castle. The following morning, a private room was prepared for him, where he could be watched over by resident jailer Andreas Hiltell, who lived on site with his wife and their eight children. As a father himself, it was hard not to take pity on Casper and his unusual predicament, or to be struck by just how childlike he was, even down to the way he would pour at things with his hands, as if he hadn't yet become accustomed to the dexterity of his
fingers like everyone else. Hiltol's attempts to communicate with him were met only with confused grunts and vacant stairs. After hearing the boy could write, however, he procured him some paper and ink, and then watched with interest as he quickly began to write something down. When the jailer returned to Casper's room soon after, he was amazed to find
he'd covered four sides of paper in writing. Hiltol's amazement soon turned to disappointment, however, when the writing was found only to comprise the letters of the alphabet and Casper's name written over and over again. Over the next few days, Casper's time was spent mostly at the police station, sat quietly crying to himself in the corner as the police
waited in vain for someone to claim him. He was quick to be cheered up, however, whenever the officers occasioned to give him a gift of coins or ribbons, which he delighted in playing with as he shouted the word horse again, much to everyone's confusion. That was until one morning when one officer brought him a large wooden horse to play with. On seeing it, Casper burst into tears of unbridled joy as he wrapped his arms around it,
greeting it like a long lost friend. Then, taking the various coins and ribbons he had amassed, he proceeded to drape them around the horse's neck. Is there something interfering with your happiness or preventing you from achieving your goals? Better help will assess your needs and match you with your own licensed professional therapist. Sign up today and start communicating, and less than forty eight hours you'll get timely and
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Forward slash Unexplained, that's better help dot com. Forward slash Unexplained. Join the over one million people taking charge of their mental health with the help of an experienced professional. Better Help wants you to start living a happier life today. A few days after his mysterious appearance in Nuremberg, police took Casper for a walk around the city in the hope that he might be able to at least identify
what direction he'd come from. Though he failed to recognize anything, it was fascinating to watch the way he moved about, or how mesmerized he became by the sudden toll of a nearby bell as he pointed to his ear and scanned the air above, as if he might somehow see the sound of it. Back at the jail, Casper divided most of his time between drawing and writing and playing with the numerous wooden horses he had now been given. As he sat quietly, delicately moving them about the room,
it was as though he believed they were alive. Whenever he was given bread and water, he took pains to make sure the horses at their share, first pressing the bread against their mouths before dipping their noses in the water so they could drink. At one point, he even spent two days trying to convince one of the horses to take a bridle piece in its mouth, only for Hiltel to have to try and explain that the horse
couldn't open its mouth. Over time, Hiltell allowed Casper to sit for dinner with his family, and though he didn't eat himself, he seemed to delight in observing their various behaviors. Hiltel also allowed two of his children to play with Casper,
hoping it might help his development. Despite first being scared that the jailer's two year old daughter, Margaret, might hurt him, Casper soon learned to enjoy their company, and so things continued for the next week as all the while, the news began to spread of the strange child in the tower who'd appeared one afternoon out of thin air, transported from another world like something out of a bizarre fairy tale.
Having been informed of Casper's situation and the terrible treatment meted out to him as described in the letter, the city's mayor, yak of Binder, made it his personal responsibility to help him. He began by having him brought to his home, where he was formerly assessed by the mayor's doctor. The doctor confirmed the boy's age to be in the region of fourteen to sixteen years old, in keeping with the dates given in the letter. On account of the light,
downy hairs on his chin and top lip. Though slightly small for his age but only four foot nine inches, the boy's physique was judged to be well proportioned, if a little on the stocky side, with no obvious physical defect save for one large recently healed scar on the boy's arm, and though his skin was thought to be quite pale, it wasn't considered to be a sign of
any obvious sickness. One unusual aspect, however, was just how weak his limbs were, with the doctor estimating his strength to be only that of a child half his age. As for his attempts at walking, this was more in keeping with a mere two year old. The boy also had a clear aversion to bright light, which he took great efforts to avoid, shielding his eyes from it at the slightest exposure, in keeping with the letter's proclamation that
he'd been kept inside his entire life. Focusing on distant objects was also difficult for him, as if he didn't quite understand that they were in the distance at all, as opposed to just being small things in front of him, all of which led the doctor to conclude that Casper was not crazy or an idiot, as he described it, but evidently someone who'd been raised like a half wild person, having been forcibly and in the most heinous way, removed
from all human and societal education. With the doctor's assessment appearing to confirm what was written in the letter, the public's interest in the boy only intensified. The authorities then invited people to visit him, in the hope that someone might be able to shed some light on where he'd come from. Throughout June or manner of visitors came from doctors and teachers, to other academics, as well as hundreds
of members of the general public. Though some came to laugh and tease the boy, others, having been touched by his plight, came bearing gifts or with the genuine hope that they might find a way to communicate with him. Casper observed them all with cool detachment, or in many cases, didn't observe them at all, preferring instead to play with his toys. One visitor, however, soon became a favorite of Casper's.
George Friederichdwmer had studied under the great philosopher George Wilhelm Hegel And had been destined for a solid career as
a teacher before deteriorating eyesight forced him to retire. Having first had his interest in Casper piqued by rumors of the wild, feral child being kept locked up in one of the city's towers, Dowmer was surprised to find the boy's room, by then covered in tens of crude but oddly beautiful pictures he'd drawn himself, while the toys that ranged from hundreds of tin soldiers to wooden horses and other such things common to Nuremberg, despite his apparent lack
of any civilizing influence, had seemingly unprompted been stacked and neatly arranged on the benches that boarded the room. Believing Casper to be potentially the most pure form of human he'd ever come across, a fascinating creature unblemished by human civilization, Dahmer continued to visit him over the next few weeks, each time finding small but meaningful ways to engage with
him and bring him out of his shell. Meanwhile, Mayor Binder also continued his regular meetings with the boy, as he attempted to get to the bottom of his story, and over time, through short, often confused sentences and single word grunts, Casper slowly began to reveal it, having done his best to make sense of it all. On July fourteenth, eight weeks after Casper first appeared, Mayor Binder, released a public statement revealing for the first time Casper's story in full.
It was a tale almost beyond belief. Casper remembered nothing of how he came to be in the cage, simply that it was all he had ever known. The cage was Casper's name for the room in which he was kept, which, as he conveyed to the Mayor, was a tiny dirt floor space roughly six feet long, four feet wide, and only five feet high, Though there were two small windows at one end, both were covered with wood, through which
only a few anemic rays of light ever penetrated. Having no concept of day or night, Casper had never seen the sun or the moon, and spent more or less the entirety of his time in complete darkness and silence. From as far back as he could remember, he'd always been dressed in a cloth shirt and dark leather pants, which had a hole cut out at the backside, through which he was able to relieve himself. He would do this into a bucket that was kept in a hole
in the ground in the corner of the room. Whenever Casper fell asleep, he would wake up to find the bucket had been emptied, while a pitcher of water and some pieces of bread had been left out for him. Sometimes, when he drank the water, it would taste funny and would cause him to fall asleep, after which he awoke to find his nails and hair had been trimmed and his clothes had been washed. For company, he had two white wooden horses and a wooden dog with which he
would spend most of his time playing. For the rest of the time, he slept or simply shuffled about the space on his backside, having never learned how to walk. Once, when he made too much noise with the horses, a man appeared suddenly and beat him on the arm with a stick, which, as he explained, was how he got the big scar on his arm. It was, he insisted,
the first and only time he'd ever felt pain. One day, the man entered the room again and placed a table over his feet, onto which he put a sheet of paper, some ink, and a pen to write with. The man, who he assumed had been the person keeping him captive that whole time, also brought to books with him, which he used to help teach Casper how to write. It was the most joy that Casper had ever known in
his lifetime. Throughout it all, the man kept his identity hidden by obscuring his face and telling Casper not to look in his direction. If the man caught the boy looking toward the tiny door in the far corner of the room, he told him that if he ever tried to get out, something called God would be very angry
with him and would beat him. After Casper mastered the letters of the alphabet, the man turned his attention to teaching him how to walk, which he did by hauling him off the ground and kicking his legs until he learned to put one foot in front of the other.
It wasn't long after that that their journey began, when early one morning, Kasper was awoken suddenly by the man, who hurriedly dragged him out of the small door, then hoisted him onto his back before whisking him out of the building and straight into the cool damp air of the outside world. The next thing Casper knew he was waking up in the freezing cold, surrounded by strange tall
things that rustled in the wind above him. Then he was stripped naked and redressed in an entirely new set of clothes, before being once again hoisted onto the man's back and hauled off into the night. Eventually having been put down, Casper and the man continued on foot together as the man repeated the Lord's prayer over and over again, telling Casper to keep his eyes on the ground at all times and to never look at him in the face.
After a while, the man explained that they were heading to a place called the Big Village, where Casper would learn to be something called a cavalryman, just like his father. Over time, Casper's feet began to burn and ache, until when he could barely walk any more. They finally arrived at the outskirts of the Big Village. There, the man pulled Casper back and thrust a letter into his hand, telling him he was to deliver it to the captain
of the sixth Regiment, who lived somewhere in the Big Village. Then, after turning Casper in the direction of the city gates. He shoved him forward and told him to get walking, but Casper didn't budge. As tears filled in his eyes, he turned back to the man, whose face was obscured by a scarf, and told him, in the few words that he had, that he didn't want to be alone, and that he wanted the man to go the rest
of the way with him. Taking a moment to think about it, the man then made a deal with the boy, agreeing to meet him later if he were to go on ahead without him. And with that Casper stepped unsteadily from the shelter of the trees and made his way toward the city gate. He never saw the man again,
and so begins the tale of Caspar Houser. At the end of his statement, the mayor promised to do all that was possible to uncover the crime that, by his reckoning, had undoubtedly been committed against Casper, and to discover the
villain or helpers who committed it. It was stated also that anyone who carried within their bosoms a human heart should come forward and speak with the police, with the offer of a generous reward if they had even the smallest shred of evidence that might help them to identify and capture the culprit. With it estimated that the boy had most likely been held captive since the age of two.
The police were instructed to focus their attention on any children that had been reported missing in the last fourteen years. Thanks to the mayor's statement, Casper's story soon caught the attention of most of Europe and was even featured in papers as far away as the United States of America, as many began to speculate about his true identity. Before long, some were even speculating that the boy was actually from noble stock, but had been snatched away and denied his
rightful birthright as the result of some nefarious plot. Others wondered just how much of the mayor's version of Casper's story could truly be believed, since his language skills were still reportedly severely limited at the time. Either way, as the rumors continued to swirl, all that was left was to sit back and wait for more information to come to light while the mayor and the relevant authorities debated what to do with the young boy. In the meantime.
Little did they know then that the beguiling tale of Caspar Hauser was only about to get even more strange. You've been listening to Unexplained Season six, episode five, The Boy Who, Part one of two. The second and final part will be released next week on Friday, December third. If you enjoy Unexplained and would like to help supporters, you can now do so via Patreon. To receive access to add three episodes, just go to patron dot com
Forward Slash Unexplained Pod to sign up. Unexplained, the book and audiobook, featuring ten stories that have never before been covered on the show, is now available to by worldwide. You can purchase through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Waterstones, among other bookstores. All elements of Unexplained, including the show's music, are produced by me Richard McClain smith. Please subscribe and rate the show wherever you listen to podcasts, and feel free to get in touch with any thoughts or ideas
regarding the stories you've heard on the show. Perhaps you have an explanation of your own you'd like to share. You can reach us online at Unexplained podcast dot com or Twitter at Unexplained Pod and Facebook at Facebook dot com. Forward Slash Unexplained Podcast