The famous man-eating lions of Tsavo, which killed more than 130 railway workers in Kenya in the early 20th century, did not kill people for lack of food, but for pleasure or because of the ease of hunting humans, paleontologists say in a paper published in the journal Scientific Reports.
"It appears that hunting humans was not a last resort measure for the lions; it simply made their lives easier. Our data shows that these man-eating lions did not completely consume the carcasses of the animals and people they caught. It seems that the humans simply served as a pleasant addition to their already varied diet. In turn, anthropological data indicate that in Tsavo people were eaten not only by lions, but also by leopards and others. big cats", says Larisa DeSantis from Vanderbilt University in Nashville (USA).
This story dates back to 1898, when the British colonial authorities decided to connect their colonies in eastern Africa with a giant railway stretching along the shores of the Indian Ocean. In March, its builders, Hindu workers brought to Africa and their white “sahibs,” faced another natural obstacle - the Tsavo River, a bridge over which they spent the next nine months building.
Throughout this time, the railway workers were terrorized by a pair of local lions, whose courage and insolence often reached the point that they literally they dragged the workers out of their tents and ate them alive at the edge of the camp. The first attempts to scare off the predators using fire and barriers of thorny bushes failed, and they continued to attack the expedition members.
As a result of this, workers began to desert the camp en masse, which forced the British to organize a hunt for the “Tsavo killers.” Man-eating lions turned out to be unexpectedly cunning and elusive prey for John Patterson, an imperial army colonel and leader of the expedition, and only in early December 1898 did he manage to waylay and shoot one of the two lions, and 20 days later kill the second predator.
Ghost and Darkness. Man-eating lions from Tsavo, reproduction in the Field Museum natural history in Chicago
During this time, lions managed to end the lives of 137 workers and British military personnel, which forced many naturalists of the time and modern scientists to discuss the reasons for this behavior. Lions, and especially males, at that time were considered rather cowardly predators who did not attack people and large cats if there were escape routes and other food sources.
According to DeSantis, such ideas led most researchers to assume that the lions attacked the workers due to hunger - this was supported by the fact that the local population of herbivores was greatly reduced due to the plague epidemic and a series of fires. DeSantis and her colleague Bruce Patterson, the namesake of the colonel at the Chicago Field Museum of History, where the remains of the lions are kept, have been trying for 10 years to prove that this was not so.
Safari for the "king of beasts"
Initially, Patterson believed that the lions hunted people not because of a lack of food, but because their fangs were broken. This idea was met with a barrage of criticism from the scientific community, as Colonel Patterson himself noted that the tusk of one lion broke on the barrel of his rifle at the moment the animal lay in wait and jumped on him. However, Patterson and DeSantis continued to study the teeth of the Tsavo Killers, this time using modern paleontological methods.
The enamel of the teeth of all animals, as scientists explain, is covered with a peculiar “pattern” of microscopic scratches and cracks. The shape and size of these scratches, and how they are distributed, directly depends on the type of food that their owner ate. Accordingly, if the lions were starving, then their teeth should contain traces of chewed bones, which predators were forced to eat when there was a lack of food.
Guided by this idea, paleontologists compared the scratch patterns on the enamel of the Tsavo lions with the teeth of ordinary zoo lions that are fed soft food, hyenas that eat carrion and bones, and the man-eating lion from Mfuwe in Zambia, which killed at least six local residents in 1991 .
"Although eyewitnesses often reported 'crunching bones' on the outskirts of the camp, we found no signs of damage to the enamel on the teeth of the Tsavo lions, characteristic of bone eating. Moreover, the pattern of scratches on their teeth is most similar to that , which is found on the teeth of lions in zoos that are fed beef tenderloin or pieces of horse meat," DeSantis said.
Accordingly, we can say that these lions did not suffer from hunger and did not hunt people for gastronomic reasons. Scientists speculate that lions simply liked relatively abundant and easy prey, which required much less effort to catch than hunting zebras or cattle.
According to Patterson, such findings partially speak in favor of his old theory about dental problems in lions - in order to kill a person, a lion did not have to bite through his neck arteries, which was problematic to do without fangs or with bad teeth when hunting large herbivores animals. According to him, the lion from Mfuwe also had similar problems with teeth and jaws. Therefore, we can expect that the controversy surrounding the Tsave cannibals will flare up with renewed vigor.
A FEW WORDS ABOUT PATTERSON’S BOOK “MAN-EATERS FROM TSAVO”
The BOOK of the English engineer James Patterson gained international fame at the beginning of our century. It went through several editions and was translated into many European languages (it was not translated into Russian). The book "The Cannibals of Tsavo" tells about the construction railway V East Africa. It contains incidentally sketches of the nature and ethnography of Kenya and stories about the hunting adventures of the author. However, it was not this, albeit lively written, but still amateurish information that determined the wide popularity of the book. Its central core is the story of the fight with two man-eating lions, who interrupted the construction of an important bridge and slowed down the entire construction of the road. This is the story about great tragedy and outstanding human courage made Patterson’s book a document of a brave struggle with nature, a document that has not lost its interest for subsequent generations, including for our Soviet readers who know how to appreciate perseverance, courage and selfless work.
Therefore, from the entire book, only the chapters telling about Patterson’s struggle with man-eating lions were selected, all other parts were omitted as outdated. Perhaps lovers of the history of African exploration and ethnography will complain about this choice and feel that the book should have been translated in full. However, it seems to me that the interest of the dramatic central part of the book cannot be compared with the author's fragmentary and random observations of the ethnography and nature of Kenya at the end of the last century. That is why in our collection for the general reader we limited ourselves to only chapters on the fight against man-eating lions.
The story “The Man-Eaters of Tsavo” echoes Jim Corbett’s wonderful books about Indian man-eating tigers, written forty years later. In the books, one involuntarily draws attention to the huge number of people who died from tigers and man-eating leopards, and the complete helplessness of the population in front of the terrible predator. Entire areas were abandoned by people, fairs emptied, life on the roads came to a standstill, and logging stopped. Very similar picture Patterson draws on the construction of the railway. Just two man-eating lions appear in the construction area, and thousands of workers live in constant terror, work is disorganized and even completely interrupted. This similarity between Corbett's and Patterson's stories is no coincidence. The construction of the railway was carried out by Indian workers brought to Africa. They saved in Africa character traits everyday life Indian people and including religious aversion to the killing of any animal. Passivity and submission to the predetermination of fate are also characteristic of the main religions of India - Brahman and Buddhist.
It is safe to say that under other conditions, man-eating animals could not be so rampant. Their life would be very short and the number of victims incomparably smaller. And it's not just the lack of firearms. If the engineer, Patterson, had not been here, warriors from the Maasai tribe would have dealt with the cannibals with their spears.
So, two man-eating lions ran rampant on a small piece of India, transported to Africa, in full force of their Asian counterparts. But there is a significant difference between Jim Corbett and engineer James Patterson. Corbett was a born hunter, a native of India, and the places in which he hunted cannibals were as familiar to him as a room in his own home. This man, whose unparalleled courage there can be no doubt, set out to fight the cannibals, armed with an excellent knowledge of the jungle and the habits of animals, which more than a quarter of a century of acquaintance with them gave him.
Engineer Patterson took on the same task in a foreign country, barely familiar to him, and his hunting experience could not be compared with that of Jim Corbett. Of course, some experienced travelers will say, a tiger is more dangerous than a lion! The answer to this can be that Patterson did not have such advanced weapons, electric lights and magnesium flashes as Corbett possessed. Young self-confidence and courage, and maybe even luck, saved engineer Patterson and helped him emerge victorious. It is enough to read the fascinating pages about his duty on a hastily knocked together low platform, in impenetrable darkness, one on one with the cannibal, to understand that this struggle was not always equal and that a clear advantage was on the side of the man-eating lions.
I am convinced that our readers will receive with interest this story about the great courage of a man who managed to save the lives of many ordinary people- Indian workers, whom he treated with constant respect, as well as his hunting companions - the indigenous inhabitants of Africa.
Professor I. A. Efremov
ARRIVAL IN TSAVO
NOON March 1, 1898, found me on board a ship entering the narrow and rather dangerous harbor of Mombasa, a port on the east coast of Africa. The city is located on an island of the same name, separated from the mainland by a very narrow strait, which forms the harbour. As our ship slowly turned around near the quaint old Portuguese fortress, built more than three centuries ago, I was more and more amazed at the unusual beauty of the landscape that gradually unfolded before me. Contrary to expectations, everything around looked fresh and blooming. Ancient city basked in the sparkling rays of the sun, lazily reflected in the motionless sea; the flat roofs and dazzling white walls of the houses looked dreamily through the swaying trunks of slender coconut palms, huge baobabs and spreading mango trees, and the dark green, overgrown dense forest The hills and slopes of the mainland served as an expressive backdrop for this beautiful and unexpected picture for me.
Scientists appear to have uncovered the mystery of why history's most famous "man-eating lions" developed a taste for human flesh, even though 119 years have passed since they hunted humans. Researchers may have discovered the reason why lions hunt bipedal predators.
Cannibals of Tsavo
Despite their considerable capabilities, lions very rarely kill people unless provoked. However, several representatives of this species received the nickname “man-eaters” because they began to attack people. Their victims were mainly women. 
When two lions began hunting workers who were building a railway in Tsavo, Kenya, they even attracted the attention of the British Parliament, not to mention their popularity among directors who made three films about them. 
Teeth analysis
When the lions were finally killed, their bodies were sent to the Field Museum in Chicago for preservation. Now scientists are again interested in the history of these animals. It turned out that one lion from the pair suffered from an infection that developed at the root of the fang. Except bad mood caused by constant pain, this damage could make it difficult for the animal to hunt, scientists suspect. 
Lions typically use their fangs to capture prey, such as zebras or wildebeest, and strangle them. However, this lion would have a hard time dealing with a large prey that was fighting for its life. It's much easier to catch people.
The second killer lion had a broken tooth. While this probably did not stop him from hunting, he may have started chasing people "for company" with his partner. Isotope analysis of the fur of these lions shows that, while humans made up about 30 percent of the first lion's diet in its last years, in the diet of the second they occupied only 13 percent. 
Reasons for hunting people
Dr. Bruce Peterson, curator of the Field Museum and author of the new study, published the results in Scientific Reports, which provides evidence that the Zambian lion that killed six people in 1991 also had serious problems with teeth. This suggests that dental problems may be common cause lions hunting people.
Previously it was thought that lions may have hunted people due to severe drought, which reduced the number of wild prey. However, Patterson and study co-author Dr. Larissa Desantis of Vanderbilt University found that the teeth of the Tsavo lions did not show signs of wear associated with chewing animal bones, as typically occurs when food supplies are low. 
Patterson says healthy lions rarely attack humans because they are smart and understand that humans can be dangerous. Zebras can hurt lions death blow, but if a predator does manage to catch one, the rest of the herd will not kill it out of revenge. People, as a rule, begin to take revenge. When lions hunt humans, it most often occurs on a moonless night, even though unarmed humans would be easy prey in daylight.
In 1898, Britain began construction of a railway bridge over the Tsavo River in Kenya. Over the next nine months, construction workers became a constant target of attacks by two killer lions. The predators were distinguished by their large size (more than three meters in length) and, like many lions in the Tsavo region, by the absence of a mane. At first, the lions attacked the workers at night, dragging people from their tents into the thicket and devouring them there. However, soon the predators lost so much fear that they devoured their victims right next to the tents. The size, ferocity and cunning of the two killer lions were so great that many local residents the predators were seen as demons trying to drive out the British invaders, and railroad workers walked out of construction in the hundreds. As a result, the construction of the bridge was curtailed - no one wanted to become the next victim of the “devilish lions.” Often lions did not eat their victims, but simply killed for pleasure. Because of this, the lions received speaking names: Ghost and Darkness, hunters were repeatedly sent to search for and capture them, but the lions managed to escape pursuit each time. Everyone noted that there was something devilish and mystical about them.
John Henry Patterson Chief Engineer, responsible for the construction of the railway bridge, decided to kill the predators: in December 1989, he shot one of the two lions, and two weeks later he killed the second. By this time, the lions had killed about 140 people.
During their wanderings through the savannah, Patterson and Remington found a fetid cave where human remains were rotting. Some organs were simply bitten, while others were not touched at all. From this they concluded that lions hunted not only for food, but also for thrills.
While they were looking for them, they never met the lions face to face, but they often heard their rapid breathing or dull roar. In the darkness, because of the grass, they sometimes noticed glare cat eyes, but they quickly disappeared. The lions came quite close to the hunters, but people understood this only after some time. At some moments, according to Patterson and Remington, it seemed to them that they were being hunted.
The situation became tense. A couple of men realized that this was not just a hunt, but a race for survival. The killing of the lions was intended to end the bloodshed that had begun nine months earlier. After failed attempts, the first lion was killed on December 9, 1898. Twenty days later the second one was defeated. Later, the hunter told how even 9 shots did not stop the beast. "IN last moment he tried to attack me. I'm lucky! - Patterson recalled.
This cave still exists today, and although human bones were seized, local residents claim that human remains can still be found inside. This fact seems very strange, considering that ordinary lions do not make their own den. Today, the remains of the two famous killer lions are kept in a museum in Chicago, although Kenyan authorities have already expressed their intention to build a museum entirely dedicated to the predators and their victims. The size of the lions was also notable: the first of the lions was 3 meters long (from nose to tip of tail). It was so heavy that it took 8 people to carry it to the camp.
edited news Olyana - 4-12-2015, 09:22
Perhaps these are the most famous lions cannibals who stood up to defend their “Fatherland”. They are also known as "Ghost and Darkness". Two lions worked in tandem at the end last decade 19th century. According to official figures, they killed 35 people. According to other sources, 135 people. This is probably due to the fact that at that time blacks were not considered people.
The territory of their activities covered the banks of the Tsavo River, which flows in Kenya. In 1898, a British man named John Henry Patterson started building a bridge across this river. In addition to the British, many blacks and workers from India were involved in the project.
When construction of the bridge began, two “kings” began to kidnap workers. They abducted them under the cover of darkness directly from their tents. The entire camp woke up from the screams and cries of the unfortunates, who were found after some time half eaten. The lions became very bold, they did not hesitate to attack during the day, leaving the “spectators” in silent horror.
The attacks continued for several months, and the frightened and demoralized workers took action against the "warriors of darkness." They first tried to use fires to scare away the cats, but were unsuccessful. Then fences came into play, but they did not stop the bloodshed. All efforts were unsuccessful.
Patterson, known as an experienced marksman and hunter, took it upon himself to resolve this issue personally. He set traps, but the lions miraculously escaped them. Patterson's next move looked like a platform on stilts. This trick was proposed by the Indians, and it is called “machaan”. But while the great hunter sat for the third day in a row at his observation post, the camp was attacked again, and more than once.
Rumors spread throughout the camp. Representatives different cultures and beliefs - everyone spoke with one voice about the punishment of the Lord. They called the deadly duo "Ghost and Darkness". They were afraid to continue working and left the camp.
The British eschewed pseudoscientific explanations. They assumed that the two lions were injured or alone, so they teamed up to hunt. They believed that if you kill one, the second will soon die. Then a second man named Charles Remington joined the hunt.
During their wanderings through the savannah, Patterson and Remington found a fetid cave where human remains were rotting. Some organs were simply bitten, while others were not touched at all. From this they concluded that lions hunted not only for food, but also for the thrill.
While they were looking for them, they never met the lions face to face, but they often heard their rapid breathing or dull roar. In the darkness, because of the grass, they sometimes noticed the glare of the cat's eyes, but they quickly disappeared. The lions came quite close to the hunters, but people understood this only after some time. At some moments, according to Patterson and Remington, it seemed to them that they were being hunted.
The situation became tense. A couple of men realized that this was not just a hunt, but a race for survival. The killing of the lions was intended to end the bloodshed that had begun nine months earlier. After unsuccessful attempts, the first lion was killed on December 9, 1898. Twenty days later the second one was defeated. Later, the hunter told how even 9 shots did not stop the beast. “At the last moment he tried to attack me. I'm lucky! - Patterson recalled.
The first of the lions was 3 meters long (from nose to tip of tail). It was so heavy that it took 8 people to carry it to the camp. Construction of the bridge was eventually completed in February 1899, and the remains of the animals were sold to the Chicago Museum, where they remain to this day.
