Rich Travs
Thu, Jul-18-02, 01:04
Shades of Tarzan.
http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,4136216%255E17-
02,00.html
KANO, Nigeria: A disabled Nigerian boy believed to have been
adopted and raised by chimpanzees for 18 months is in care in
a specialist children's home in this northern city.
Named Bello by nursing staff at the Tudun Maliki Torrey home
in Kano, he was brought to them six years ago by hunters
after being found with a chimpanzee family in the Falgore
forest, 150km south of Kano, staff told AFP.
Believed to have been aged about two when he was taken in,
Bello is probably the son of nomadic ethnic Fulani people who
travel through the region, Abba Isa Muhammad, the home's
child welfare officer, said.
Mentally and physically disabled, with a misshapen forehead,
sloping right shoulder and protruding chest, he was probably
abandoned by his parents because of his disabilities, Isa
Muhammad said.
Such abandonments of disabled children are common among the
nomadic Fulani, a pastoralist people who travel great
distances across the west African Sahel region, and in most
instances the children die, specialists told AFP.
But in Bello's case, he was apparently adopted by a family of
chimpanzees, Isa Muhammad said.
"We do not know exactly how long he would have been with the
chimps. Based on the traits he exhibits, we estimate that he
would have been adopted when he was no more than six months
old and nursed by a nursing chimp," the welfare officer said.
When he was first brought in, Bello, who is about the size
and weight of a four-year-old, walked in a chimpanzee-like
fashion, moving on his hind legs but dragging his arms on the
ground, the home's matron, A'isha Ibrahim, told AFP.
Still today he leaps, chimpanzee-like, and claps his hands
over his head repeatedly, cupping his hands, as monkeys do,
and does not speak but makes chimpanzee-like noises.
Assuming this is true, it's an interesting addition to feral
children lore.
Just out of curiousity, what was Burrough's inspiration
for Tarzan?
http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,4136216%255E17-
02,00.html
KANO, Nigeria: A disabled Nigerian boy believed to have been
adopted and raised by chimpanzees for 18 months is in care in
a specialist children's home in this northern city.
Named Bello by nursing staff at the Tudun Maliki Torrey home
in Kano, he was brought to them six years ago by hunters
after being found with a chimpanzee family in the Falgore
forest, 150km south of Kano, staff told AFP.
Believed to have been aged about two when he was taken in,
Bello is probably the son of nomadic ethnic Fulani people who
travel through the region, Abba Isa Muhammad, the home's
child welfare officer, said.
Mentally and physically disabled, with a misshapen forehead,
sloping right shoulder and protruding chest, he was probably
abandoned by his parents because of his disabilities, Isa
Muhammad said.
Such abandonments of disabled children are common among the
nomadic Fulani, a pastoralist people who travel great
distances across the west African Sahel region, and in most
instances the children die, specialists told AFP.
But in Bello's case, he was apparently adopted by a family of
chimpanzees, Isa Muhammad said.
"We do not know exactly how long he would have been with the
chimps. Based on the traits he exhibits, we estimate that he
would have been adopted when he was no more than six months
old and nursed by a nursing chimp," the welfare officer said.
When he was first brought in, Bello, who is about the size
and weight of a four-year-old, walked in a chimpanzee-like
fashion, moving on his hind legs but dragging his arms on the
ground, the home's matron, A'isha Ibrahim, told AFP.
Still today he leaps, chimpanzee-like, and claps his hands
over his head repeatedly, cupping his hands, as monkeys do,
and does not speak but makes chimpanzee-like noises.
Assuming this is true, it's an interesting addition to feral
children lore.
Just out of curiousity, what was Burrough's inspiration
for Tarzan?