Clairvius Narcisse: Difference between revisions

{{refimprovemore citations needed|date=July 2015}}

|birth_place = [[L'Estère]], [[Republic of Haiti (1859–1957)|Haiti]]

|death_place = Haiti

|residence nationality = Haitian

OneThe hypothesis for Narcisse's account was that he had been administered a combination of psychoactive substances (oftentimesoften the paralyzing [[pufferfish]] venom [[tetrodotoxin]] and the strong deliriant ''[[Datura]]''), which rendered him helpless and seemingly dead.

The single greatest proponent of this possibility was [[Wade Davis (anthropologist)|Wade Davis]], a graduate student in [[ethnobotany]] at [[Harvard University]], who published two popular books based on his travels and ideas during and immediately following his graduate training.

However, subsequent scientific examinations (using tools of [[analytical chemistry]] alongside critical review of earlier reports) have failed to support the presence of the claimed key pharmacologically active compounds in the supposed zombie preparation, which was central to the phenomenaphenomenon and mechanism reported by Davis. No further supporting evidence has appeared.

Narcisse admitted himself to the Schweitzer Hospital (operated by American medical staff) in [[Deschapelles]], Haiti, on April 30, 1962.<ref name=Guercio1986>{{cite magazine|author=Gino Del Guercio|year=1986|url=https://harvardmagazine.com/sites/default/files/Zombie_1986_small.pdf|title=The Secrets of Haiti's Living Dead|workmagazine=Harvard Magazine|issue=Jan-Feb 1986}}</ref> He had a [[fever]] and [[fatigue]], and was spitting up blood.<ref name=Guercio1986/> Doctors could find no explanation for his symptoms, which gradually grew worse until he appeared to die three days later. He was pronounced dead, and held in cold storage for about a day before burial.<ref name=Guercio1986/>

In 1980, a man identifying himself as Clairvius Narcisse approached Angelina Narcisse in the city of [[L'Estère]], convincing her and several other villagers of his identity by using a childhood nickname and sharing intimate family information.<ref name="autogenerated1987"/><ref name=Guercio1986/> He claimed that he'd had been conscious but paralyzed during his supposed death and burial, and had subsequently been removed from his grave and forced to work at a [[sugar]] [[plantation]].<ref name=Guercio1986/>

Per his account, after his apparent death and subsequent burial on May 2, 1962, his coffin was exhumed and he was given a paste possibly made from [[daturaDatura]],<ref name=Guercio1986/> which at certain doses has a [[Psychedelicspsychedelics, dissociatives and deliriants|hallucinogen]]ic effect and can cause [[memory loss]]. The ''[[bokor'']] who recovered him then, as stated, reportedly forced him, alongside others, to work on a [[sugar plantation]] until the master's death two years later. When the bokor died, and regular doses of the hallucinogen ceased, he eventually regained sanity and returned to his family after another 16 years.<ref name="Zo"/> Narcisse was immediately recognized by the villagers and his family. When he told them the story of how he was dug up from his grave and enslaved, the villagers were surprised, but they accepted his story because they believed his experience resulted from the power of voodoo magic. He was seen as the man who was once a zombie.<ref name=Wood00>{{cite web|last=Wood|first=Clair|title=Clairvius Narcisse|url=http://zombieprimer.blogspot.com/2000/04/clairvius-narcisse.html|work=Website|publisher=The Official Zombie Primer|accessdate=6 December 2012|date=2000-04-04}}{{dubious|date=July 2015}}{{better source needed|date=July 2015}}</ref>

It has been further argued that Narcisse had broken one of the traditional behavioral codes by abandoning his children<ref name=Guercio1986/> and was made into a "zombie" as a punishment. When questioned, Narcisse told investigators that the sorcerer involved had "taken his soul".<ref name=Hahn07>{{cite web|author=Patrick D. Hahn |url=http://www.biology-online.org/articles/dead_man_walking.html |title=Dead Man Walking: Wade Davis and the Secret of the Zombie Poison |publisher=Biology Online |date=September 4, 2007 |accessdate=2014-05-31}}{{dubious|date=July 2015}}{{better source needed|date=July 2015}}</ref> The instigator of the poisoning was alleged to be Clairvius's brother, with whom Clairvius had quarreled over land and inheritance. He only returned home once he heard of his brother's death.<ref name=Guercio1986/><ref name="Zo">{{cite book|title=The UneXplained|url=https://archive.org/details/unexplainedillus0000shuk|url-access=registration|chapter=Mesoamerica And South America: Zombies|author=Shuker, P.N.|publisher=Carlton Books Limited|year=1996|isbn=9781858681863}}{{page needed|date=July 2015}}{{dubious|date=July 2015}}</ref>

This case puzzled many doctors because Narcisse's death was documented and verified by the testimonies of two American doctors. The case of Narcisse was argued to be the first verifiable example of the transformation of an individual into a zombie.<ref name="autogenerated1987"/> Narcisse's story intrigued Haitian psychiatrist Lamarque Douyon. Though dismissing supernatural explanations, Douyon believed there was some degree of truth to tales of zombies and he had been studying such accounts for decades. Suspecting zombies were somehow drugged and then revived, Douyon reached out to colleagues in America. [[Wade Davis (anthropologist)|Wade Davis]] traveled to [[Duvalier dynasty|Haiti]], where he obtained samples of powders purportedly used to create zombies.<ref name=Guercio1986/>

This idea appeared in print as early as the 1938 non-fiction book ''Tell My Horse'' by [[Zora Neale Hurston]], which reported multiple accounts of purported tetrodotoxin poisoning in Haiti, by a Bokorbokor (voodoo sorcerer).<ref>Hurston, Zora N., 2008, ''Tell My Horse,'' Modern Classics series, New York, NY: Harper Perennial, 2008.{{page needed|date=July 2015}}</ref>

The Canadian [[ethnobotany|ethnobotanist]] [[Wade Davis (anthropologist)|Wade Davis]], who did research related to the implication that tetrodotoxin was present,<ref name=DavisScienceLttr>[[Wade Davis (anthropologist)|Davis, Wade]], 1988, "Letters: Zombification" [Response to W. Booth, "Voodoo science"], ''Science,'' '''240'''(4860), 24 June 1988, pp. 1715–16, {{DOIdoi|10.1126/science.3381089}}, see [httphttps://www.sciencemagscience.org/contentdoi/240abs/486010.1126/1715science.extract3381089?sid=c49d7648-a7df-4cb1-a9ca-d23d0a8c2d2e], accessed 26 July 2105.</ref><ref name=Booth>Booth, W. 1988, "News and Comment: Voodoo science," ''Science,'' '''240'''(4850), 15 April 1988, pp. 274–77, {{DOIdoi|10.1126/science.3353722}}, see [httphttps://www.sciencemagscience.org/contentdoi/240abs/485010.1126/274science.extract3353722?sid=3d40a671-938b-4f0f-ab97-ecc4a41074a6], accessed 26 July 2105.</ref> hypothesized how this might have been done. The ''[[bokor]]'' (sorcerer) would have given Narcisse a powder containing the tetrodotoxin through abraded skin. Narcisse would then have fallen into a comatose state, closely resembling death, which resulted in his live burial.<ref name="autogenerated1987">"''American Scientist'' Interviews: [[Wade Davis (anthropologist)|Wade Davis]] on Zombies, Folk Poisons, and Haitian Culture." ''American Scientist'' 75.4 (1987): 412–14. Print.</ref> His body would then have been recovered and he would have been given doses of ''[[Datura stramonium]]'' to create a compliant zombie-like state, and set to work on a plantation. After two years, the plantation owner died and Narcisse would have simply walked away to freedom.

While in these popular accounts, and in Haiti, tetrodotoxin is thought to have been used in [[Haitian Vodou|voodoo]] preparations, in so-called [[zombie]] poisons, subsequent careful analysis has repeatedly called these accounts and early analytical studies into question on technical grounds; moreover, they have failed to identify the toxin in any such preparation,<ref name=Kao86>Kao, C.Y., and T. Yasumoto, 1986, "Tetrodotoxin and the Haitian zombie." ''Toxicon'', '''24''': 747–49.</ref><ref name=Kao90>Kao, C.Y., and T. Yasumoto, 1990, "Tetrodotoxin in 'zombie powder.'" ''Toxicon'', '''28''': 29–132.</ref><ref name="Hines">Terence Hines, 2008, "Zombies and Tetrodotoxin," ''Skeptical Inquirer'' (online), Volume 32.3, May/June 2008, pp. 60–62, see [https://www.csicop.org/si/show/zombies_and_tetrodotoxin], accessed 25 July 2015.</ref> such that discussion of the matter of tetrodotoxin use in this way has all but disappeared from the primary literature since the early 1990s. Kao and Yasumoto concluded in the first of their papers in 1986 (and remained unswerving on the matter in their later work) that "the widely circulated claim in the lay press to the effect that tetrodotoxin is ... causal agent" in a "zombification process" is, in their view, "without factual foundation."<ref name=Kao86/>{{rp|748}}

Kao, of the [[State University of New York]], onwhen interviewinterviewed on the matter in 1988, stated, "I actually feel this is an issue of fraud in science". A supporter of Wade, Bo Holmstedt of the [[Karolinska Institute]], more restrained, stated that it was "not deliberated fraud," rather that it was "withholding negative data" {{nowrap|(''i.e.'',{{tsp}}data}} which fails to support the desired conclusions) and therefore "simply bad science."<ref name=Booth/>

Narcisse's story was loosely adapted into the ''[[The Serpent and the Rainbow (film)|The Serpent and the Rainbow]]'', a 1988 American horror film directed by [[Wes Craven]].