[H]e was kept from his rest at night by the hateful whispers of his “devil twin,” as he called it, “which never sleeps, but talks to me forever of such things as they only speak of in hell”. Charles Lotin Hildreth, Boston Sunday Post.

Edward Mordake is a name that has been viral on social media for quite some time now. His story often pops up on Facebook newsfeeds with the image of a man who has a creepy face at the back of his head. I actually read his tragic story this morning which prompted me to search about him and finally write this blog post to uncover the truth behind this viral legend.

As the story goes, Edward Mordake was born in the 19th century. He was a handsome noble heir to a prestigious English family but never kept his title. He suffered from the most astonishing and horrific abnormality that resulted in an additional face at the back of his head. The disease is known as craniofacial duplication or diprosopus. Mordake called his duplicate head “the devil twin” who used to whisper unimaginable and devilish things to him. The head lacked complete functionality but it could talk and control its muscles. It would often smile or sneer, mostly when Mordake would weep or suffer. None of these movements were connected to Mordake’s primary brain.

Some of the stories claim that Mordake isolated himself from everyone. No visitors were allowed. He loved to read and had amazing musical skills. The devil twin never rested and made his life miserable. He asked different surgeons to remove the head but the surgery was very risky. Unable to handle the mental agony, Mordake committed suicide when he was 23 years old. He requested to destroy his evil twin or he would be haunted even after his death.

The tragic fate of Mordake made him a sort of mythical legend whose tale was told over and over again. The tale influenced pop culture as well. James Wan’s 2021 horror-crime film Malignant is inspired by the tale. The co-writer of the film Ingrid Bisu was fascinated by body anomalies and learnt about Edward Mordake. Mordake’s character inspired the character of Gabriel in the film who is the evil twin of protagonist Madison, at the back of her head.

Although Edward Mordake’s story is fascinating, it is not true. There is no solid evidence to prove that such a man existed in the 19th century or ever. The case was first mentioned in Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine by George M. Gould and Walter L. Pyle in 1996. The book mentioned an entire excerpt that dictated Mordake’s miserable life:

But upon the back of his head was another face, that of a beautiful girl, ‘lovely as a dream, hideous as a devil.’ The female face was a mere mask, ‘occupying only a small portion of the posterior part of the skull, yet exhibiting every sign of intelligence, of a malignant sort, however.’ It would be seen to smile and sneer while Mordake was weeping. The eyes would follow the movements of the spectator, and the lips would ‘gibber without ceasing.’ No voice was audible, but Mordake avers that he was kept from his rest at night by the hateful whispers of his ‘devil twin,’ (Gould and Pyle)

However, the book also mentioned that the story was taken from lay sources. There are no reported cases of a man having craniofacial duplication or diprosopus from the said time period. Also, these abnormalities occur in the case of identical twins that have the same gender. According to Mordake’s story, his twin was a female which is biologically impossible. There are no cases of such anomalies in which the victim has lived past early childhood years while Mordake was 23 years old when he committed suicide.

There are surely pictures circulating on the internet but if you dig a bit, you will realize that all the pictures are fake. The most widely shared image is actually of a wax statue in the Panoptikum Wax Museum in Hamburg. The image of the skull was actually a sculpture made by Tom Kuebler who uploaded the image on his Instagram account and it is also on his official website.

So there are things that just don’t add up – Edward Mordake is not real, he is just a myth that gained popularity over time. But what about Gould and Pyle’s book that lists Mordake’s case?

Even a basic Google search will lead you to a newspaper article “The Wonders of Modern Science” by Charles Lotin Hildreth published in the 1895 issue of Boston Sunday Post. This article mentioned the case of Edward Mordake for the first time. Hildreth said:

“One of the most weirdest as well as most melancholy stories of human deformity is that of Edward Mordake.” (Charles Lotin Hildreth, Boston Sunday Post)

Interestingly, the entire excerpt written by Gould and Pyle in Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine is taken from the article.

Charles Lotin Hildreth was a poet. I don’t know what inspired him to create Edward Mordake but the character was purely fictional. He referred to the Royal Scientific Society at the beginning of the article which was neither reliable nor accessible. If you read his article, he mentioned a man who was half human half crab, a woman with the lower body of a fish, a spider with a human head, and so on. The article had all the fantastical creations and ironically no solid evidence. The article did not mention any reliable sources. It was all mythical and was reprinted in several other newspapers, eventually mistaken for historical fact.

So, the haunting tragedy of the man with two faces is fictional. It never happened and there was no Edward Mordake.

But this case shows how fabricated stories can have a life of their own. They become a part of our reality. Most of us believe in these stories without ever bothering to do the research. I don’t know why people still continue to believe in Edward Mordake’s existence. Maybe we are all afraid of some evil lurking inside us, most probably in the deep pits of our heads. The human mind is a terrifying thing and when we listen to a story that personified this terror in the form of an evil twin head, we choose to believe it! This is simply my opinion, a psychologist might be able to tell better.

Anyway, the tale is surely interesting and makes you think how suffering and agony can be caused by something as insignificant and powerless as Mordake’s evil tiny head. The thing could not move, could not hit him, simply whispered and made Mordake’s life hell! It is quite possible, yes, the story is fictional and Mordake never existed, but going crazy over whispers? Quite possible!

References:

Gould, George, and Walter Pyle. Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine. Project Gutenberg, 1996, www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/747/pg747-images.html. [originally published in 1896].

“‘the Wonders of Modern Science’ by Charles Lotin Hildreth.” Newspapers.com, 8 Dec. 1895, www.newspapers.com/article/boston-post-the-wonders-of-modern-scien/81960531.

“Tom Kuebler, Sculptor of the Bizarre.” Tom Kuebler, Sculptor of the Bizarre, www.thomaskuebler.com.