Overview
The almas, or almasty, is a wild man of Central Asian folklore. Reports and stories come from the Altai Mountains and Gobi in Mongolia, the Tian Shan and Pamir ranges, and the Caucasus. Accounts describe something closer to a human than to an ape: about human height, covered in reddish-black hair, with a hairless face, a sloping forehead, heavy brow and cheekbones, and long arms. It is said to walk with bent knees and to be timid and active at night.
Travelers recorded such stories for centuries. In the 1870s the explorer Nikolay Przhevalsky described a Mongolian 'man-beast' with a flat, human-like face and thick black fur. Mongolian scholar Byambyn Rinchen noted in 1964 that the word 'almas' has no known origin, and that place names in southwestern Mongolia include it. In some provinces people avoided saying the name at all.
In the Soviet era the subject drew real scientists. Boris Porshnev of the Soviet Academy of Sciences took part in a 1958 Pamir expedition and later argued the almas might be surviving Neanderthals. Surgeon Marie-Jeanne Koffmann spent decades collecting reports in the Caucasus.
Genetics has since tested some claims. Hair said to come from almasty matched bears, horses and cattle. The famous case of Zana, a 19th-century woman in Abkhazia said to be a captured almas, turned out on DNA testing to be a human of African descent.
Timeline
- 1420sBavarian captive Johann Schiltberger is said to describe wild hairy people in the mountains (secondary source).
- 1870sNikolay Przhevalsky records reports of a Mongolian 'man-beast'.
- 1890s-1928Tsyben Zhamtsarano collects witness reports; his notes are later lost (secondary source).
- 1913V.A. Khakhlov sends a report to the Russian Imperial Academy (secondary source).
- 1958Soviet 'snowman commission' sends a Pamir expedition led by hydrologist Alexander Pronin.
- 1962Porshnev and Alexander Mashkovtsev collect stories about Zana in Tkhina, Abkhazia.
- 1963-1964Porshnev proposes a relict Neanderthal; Rinchen publishes on the almas.
- 1981Damdinzhavyn Maidar publishes a detailed description.
- 2014Bryan Sykes's team matches 'almasty' hairs to known animals.
- 2021Zana's genome shows African ancestry; hypertrichosis proposed.
Reported sightings
Tian Shan mountains, Central Asia
1420s Told story
Johann Schiltberger, a Bavarian held captive in Mongol lands, is said to have written about wild people in the mountains who were hairy except for their hands and faces and lived on grass and wild plants. He reportedly saw a male and female given as gifts to his captors. This comes from a secondary source and was not found in the Wikipedia summary of his travels.
Source: occult-world.comMongolia
1870s On the record
Russian explorer Nikolay Przhevalsky recorded local reports of a 'man-beast' he called kung-guressu. He was told it had a flat, human-like face, often walked on two legs, had thick black fur and large claws, and was very strong. He did not see it himself.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgMongolia
1890s-1928 Told story
Scholar Tsyben Zhamtsarano is said to have interviewed many witnesses and had artists sketch the creature from their descriptions. His notes were reportedly lost, so only secondhand summaries remain.
Source: occult-world.comNear Buynaksk, Dagestan
1941 Told story
Lt. Col. V.S. Karapetyan, a Soviet army medical officer, is said to have been told by a local police officer about a wild man held near his camp. The source reviewed gave only the start of the story, not what he found.
Source: cryptomundo.comPamir Mountains
1958 Investigated report
After scientists reported sightings, the Soviet Academy's 'snowman commission' sent an expedition to the Pamirs led by hydrologist Alexander Pronin, with Boris Porshnev and Marie-Jeanne Koffmann. It searched for evidence of the yeti and almas and came back without proof.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgTkhina, Abkhazia (Caucasus)
Mid-19th century On the record
Zana was a woman held as a slave on the estate of nobleman Edgi Genaba. Local stories called her wild and hairy, and some researchers later called her a captured almasty. She had at least four children, including a son, Khwit, and died around the 1880s. Porshnev collected stories about her in 1962.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgCaucasus mountains, Russia
1960s onward Investigated report
French-born surgeon Marie-Jeanne Koffmann collected reports in the Caucasus for decades. A secondary source says she documented so-called nests with stored food bearing tooth marks. Her work is the main modern collection of almasty testimony.
Source: occult-world.comGobi, Mongolia
1981 (publication) Told story
Mongolian writer Damdinzhavyn Maidar gave a detailed description based on local accounts: half animal and half human, with reddish-black hair, a hairless face, flat forehead, prominent cheekbones, bent-knee walk, long arms and shy, nocturnal habits.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgEvidence
Zana's remains Explained
A skeleton exhumed in 1975 was confirmed as Zana in 2021. Her genome showed mostly East African ancestry; she may have had congenital hypertrichosis.
Almasty hair samples Explained
Eight Russian samples tested by Bryan Sykes's team in 2014 matched brown bear, horse and cattle.
Folk testimony Disputed
Long tradition across several mountain regions; recorded by explorers and scholars.
What each side says
What witnesses and researchers report
Supporters note the depth of the tradition: centuries of stories across Mongolia, Central Asia and the Caucasus, specific place names, and taboos about speaking the name. Serious scholars like Rinchen and scientists like Porshnev treated it as worth study.
Porshnev argued the reports describe a relict population of Neanderthals, which would explain why the almas is described as so human-like.
What skeptics and scientists suggest
Genetic tests have explained the strongest physical cases. The hairs were ordinary animals, and Zana was a human woman of African descent, perhaps with a condition causing heavy hair growth, whose treatment as 'wild' reflected the prejudice of her time.
Skeptics see the almas as folklore of the wild man, a figure found in many cultures, kept alive by remote landscapes and occasional encounters with hermits, outcasts or animals.
Open questions
- Why are almas descriptions so much more human than those of the yeti?
- What did the 1958 expedition actually find?
Visiting
Where: The Altai and Gobi regions of Mongolia; the Caucasus mountains of southern Russia and Abkhazia.
Access: Remote mountain and desert areas; travel with local guides. Political conditions in parts of the Caucasus may limit travel.
Events: None.
Did you know?
- In parts of Mongolia people avoided saying the word almas at all.
- Porshnev's work was translated into English as The Soviet Sasquatch.