24 April 2023 , 21:39
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As far as legends go, this woman's quite literally defied science and elevated her to celebrity status.
Bed-ridden Mary Thomas is said to have forgone food for four decades as she wasted away in bed weighing little more than a six-month-old baby.
Likened to a "breathing skeleton", poor Mary was taken ill as a teenager with a mystery illness which confined her to a bed for 70 years throughout the 18th and 19th centuries in the Welsh village of Llangelynnin.
Mary's story has continued to baffle historians throughout the years, and was even adapted by Netflix for The Wonder - a psychological drama starring Florence Pugh based during the Irish Potato Famine.
The dumbfounding story began in the late 18th-century, North Wales Live reports, when a teenage Mary Thomas fell ill as her mother prayed to God she would be cured.
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The Wonder was based on the haunting story of Mary Thompson (Press Association Images)Mary's mother's wish was granted - but at a horrifying price.
Despite surviving her illness, the teenager spent almost her entire life in bed in a "pitiable condition", not eating for a "supernatural amount of time".
Accounts from the time claimed Mary didn't eat a morsel for 40 years, although others state her death-defying fast lasted for 10.
And with curiosity over the so-called "fasting woman" growing as it reached surrounding towns and villages, Mary would go on to be visited by the likes of English nobles and even royalty who heralded her a living miracle.
Among her famous bedside visitors were Prince William Henry, who was a younger brother of King George III - Queen Victoria's predecessor.
Mary's skin was reported to have become pallid and leathery due to her malnourishment, meaning that for decades she couldn't walk.
Anna O'Donnell in The Wonder was inspired by a real story (Brentwood Gazette)Instead of leaving her bed, Mary was simply hoisted to one side when her family changed her sheets.
But despite her “frightful appearance”, some doubted Mary's story and many began to suspect she was instead eating in secret with her family cashing in on the attention.
Locals noted suspiciously that she "received a good deal from her curious visitors, particularly in the summer seasons" - one noble was said to have given the family £50, an enormous sum for the time.
One man who visited the family wrote: "I remarked that she has a strong desire to represent herself as a wonder."
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Mary's story is mirrored in last year's Netflix hit, directed by Sebastián Lelio, depicting a British nurse sent to a remote Irish village where 11-year-old Anna O'Donnell claims to have not eaten for months.
In 1770 when Mary Thompson was 47, she was visited by travel writer Thomas Pennant as part of his travels around Snowdonia and North Wales.
Thomas Pennant's musings are thought to have inspired the Netflix hit (AIDAN MONAGHAN/NETFLIX)Curious Pennant wrote: "During two years and a half, (she) remained insensible, and took no manner of nourishment, notwithstanding her friends forced open her mouth with a spoon, to get something down.
"But the moment the spoon was taken away, her teeth met, and closed with vast snapping and violence: during that time, she flung up vast quantities of blood."
Pennant claimed she fasted for seven-and-a-half years, taking neither food or liquid with the exception of "a spoonful of wine" to "moisten her lips". Another said she starved for a decade.
Two writers from Oxford's Ashmolean museum meanwhile reported that Mary went without food for "40 years".
But the bizarre case of Mary Thompson was not an isolated one - many reports exist of "fasting girls" between the 15th and 19th centuries, which historians have since attributed to anorexia or bulimia.
Florence Pugh plays an English nurse sent to observe a 'fasting girl' in 1800s Ireland in the film inspired by Mary Thompson's story (AIDAN MONAGHAN/NETFLIX)Welsh teenager Sarah Jacob was also heralded by her parents who claimed she had not eaten or drunk for nearly two years.
The tragic teen's story was later proven to be false when she was taken under doctor's supervision, and sadly died of starvation two weeks later.
Evil parents Evan and Hannah Jacobs, it transpired, had been feeding her tiny morsels to keep her on the brink of life, while exploiting her for attention of the public curious at the alleged medical miracle.
Mary Thompson meanwhile lived to the impressive age of 89, which may suggest her fasting may not have been an eating disorder.