The Story of Peter the Wild Boy

Join Kelli as she goes over the story of a feral boy found in the woods outside of Hamelin, Germany. He was brought to King George I's court in England and named Peter, and he entertained curious onlookers for months. He had strange mannerisms and was an oddity, until he fell out of favor and "retired" to a farm, where he lived peacefully until his 70s.

But what was really going on with Peter? Was he really feral as people thought? Did he clamber around on all fours like a beast? Or was he just tragically misunderstood in a time before medical science could diagnosis him with an intellectual disability?

Sources:

• Daniel Dafoe, “Mere Nature Delineated: or, A body without a soul. Being observations upon the young forester lately brought to town from Germany. With suitable applications. Also, a brief dissertation upon the usefulness and necessity of fools, whether political or natural.” 1726. https://archive.org/details/merenaturedeline00defo/page/n12/mode/1up
• Jonathan Swift, “It Cannot Rain But It Pours, Or, London Strewed With Rarities.” 1726. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Works_of_the_Rev._Jonathan_Swift/Volume_17/It_Cannot_Rain_But_It_Pours
• Michael Newton, Savage Girls and Wild Boys: A History of Feral Children. 2002. https://www.amazon.com/Savage-Girls-Wild-Boys-Children/dp/0312423357
• “Peter 'the Wild Boy' from Hanover: The Boy on the Staircase” Historic Royal Palaces. https://www.hrp.org.uk/blog/peter-the-wild-boy-from-hanover/
• “Peter the Wild Boy” History Today. https://www.historytoday.com/archive/peter-wild-boy
• “The Tragic Origins of Peter the Wild Boy” Ripley’s. https://www.ripleys.com/stories/peter-the-wild-boy
• Lucy Worsley, “Peter The Wild Boy” Public Domain Review, 2011. https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/peter-the-wild-boy/

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