# Early centenarians **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 2, 2012, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696 "2012-05-02T23:50:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b19c9b/32.png) [@A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Sniveling_Mess)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2012, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/1 "2012-05-02T23:50:26Z")
I’ve been interested in centenarians for quite some time.During this time I’ve found that you can find a lot of centenarians born in the 1800s or 1900s,and a few born in the 1700s,but after then you hit a brick wall.From the 1600s backward,it’s all but impossible to find one.Of course,this is understandable,since they didn’t keep birth records and death records then as diligently as they do now,but still you’d think there would be some.Do any of you know of such a person,born in 1699 or earlier? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/2 "2012-05-03T00:27:08Z")
[Dr. Laurence Chaderton](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurence_Chaderton), one of the translators of the King James Version, was allegedly 103 years old when he died in 1640. [St. Godric](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godric_of_Finchale) was supposed to have been 104 when he died in 1170. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/3 "2012-05-03T00:35:58Z")
If you go to [familysearch.org](http://familysearch.org) you can look at searchable databases in the British Isles. They go back that far. ---
**Author:** ![A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b19c9b/32.png) [@A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Sniveling_Mess)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/4 "2012-05-03T00:56:28Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > [Dr. Laurence Chaderton](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurence_Chaderton), one of the translators of the King James Version, was allegedly 103 years old when he died in 1640. > > [St. Godric](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godric_of_Finchale) was supposed to have been 104 when he died in 1170. Thanks for the reply.Those stories really were very interesting.It seems that maybe the Chaderton claim is better documented than the St.Godric one? ---
**Author:** ![Washoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ecae2f/32.png) [@Washoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Washoe)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/5 "2012-05-03T01:14:42Z")
[Luigi Cornaro](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luigi_Cornaro). There is some dispute as to his age at death. I have seen sources quote figures as high as 106 (Wolford, 1983). ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/6 "2012-05-03T01:39:38Z")
> [@JRyan35](#): > > Thanks for the reply.Those stories really were very interesting.It seems that maybe the Chaderton claim is better documented than the St.Godric one? I’d imagine, just from the ages of the accounts. The more recent, the better-documented (which is why there are so few pre-1700). Any medieval saint’s life is going to be largely legend, really, even outside the miraculous stuff. Hell, half the saints in the Catholic hagiography can’t even be proven to have existed… ---
**Author:** ![A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b19c9b/32.png) [@A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Sniveling_Mess)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/7 "2012-05-03T01:54:52Z")
I wonder if there were any centenarians born in the 1600s who died in the 1800s?That would be pretty interesting,because a few people are still alive who were born in the 1800s,so that would mean a person born in a century when Galileo was still alive died in a century when people were living who are still alive today.Of course,for that matter,there probably was at least one person alive in the 1600s who was born in the 1400s. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/8 "2012-05-03T02:00:30Z")
What about the famous [Old Parr](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Parr) ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/9 "2012-05-03T02:14:20Z")
I have the opposite problem from the OP – for some reason, I can’t find any centenarians born more recently than 1912! ---
**Author:** ![A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b19c9b/32.png) [@A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Sniveling_Mess)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/10 "2012-05-03T02:35:53Z")
> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#): > > I have the opposite problem from the OP – for some reason, I can’t find any centenarians born more recently than 1912! Good one!😃 ---
**Author:** ![Keeve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/11 "2012-05-03T11:17:38Z")
> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#): > > I have the opposite problem from the OP – for some reason, I can’t find any centenarians born more recently than 1912! They’re still compiling the research on that. Give them another 7 months. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/12 "2012-05-03T13:10:33Z")
See this table on [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oldest_people_by_year_of_birth). Ferdinand Ashmall just missed out on spanning three centuries, being born in 1695 and dying in 1798. Margaret Ann Neve was born in 1792 and died in 1903. Sophia Wijnberg (1799-1905) and Johann Roeder (1800-1909) both also spanned the 18th to 20th centuries. The oldest living person right now was born in [1896](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Besse_Cooper), it seems. I wonder how long it will be before there are no 19th-century dudes left. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b19c9b/32.png) [@A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Sniveling_Mess)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/13 "2012-05-03T13:48:07Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > I wonder how long it will be before there are no 19th-century dudes left. ☹ Not very long.Our connection to the 19th century is hanging on by a thin thread,and that thread could snap at any time;for all we know,we may lose an entire century by the end of today.It’s very depressing. ---
**Author:** ![A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b19c9b/32.png) [@A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Sniveling_Mess)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/14 "2012-05-03T13:53:51Z")
That table was interesting,by the way;it’s amazing to see that people who were born early enough to remember the Civil War lived all the way into the 1960s and 1970s.Believe it or not,it’s not impossible that one or two of those people had memory of all four Presidential assassinations. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/15 "2012-05-03T14:54:07Z")
So, I went to Wikipedia to look up [Saint Bede](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bede), also known as “the Venerable Bede”…I was thinking that a guy with the moniker “Venerable” would have to have gotten up there in age. Well, for the 8th Century, I guess he was pretty old, but he died at around age 62. I guess “venerable” is relative. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/16 "2012-05-03T15:07:05Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > So, I went to Wikipedia to look up [Saint Bede](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bede), also known as “the Venerable Bede”…I was thinking that a guy with the moniker “Venerable” would have to have gotten up there in age. > > Well, for the 8th Century, I guess he was pretty old, but he died at around age 62. I guess “venerable” is relative. 😉 According to Wikipedia, > [@](#): > > Bede became known as Venerable Bede (Lat.: Beda Venerabilis) by the 9th century,[128] but this was not linked to consideration for sainthood by the Roman Catholic Church. According to a legend the epithet was miraculously supplied by angels, thus completing his unfinished epitaph.[129] It is first utilised in connection with Bede in the 9th century, where Bede was grouped with others who were called “venerable” at two ecclesiastical councils held at Aix in 816 and 836. Paul the Deacon then referred to him as venerable consistently. By the 11th and 12th century, it had become commonplace. However, there are no descriptions of Bede by that term right after his death.[8] ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/17 "2012-05-03T15:13:37Z")
Ramesses II - c. 1303 BC – July or August 1213 BC - about 90 when he died, but not bad for 3300 years ago. Some rumours put him at 99 when he died. He was pharaoh for 66 years, and allegedly produced more cubic yardage of statues of himself than any else ever before or since. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/18 "2012-05-03T15:21:27Z")
> [@JRyan35](#): > > From the 1600s backward,it’s all but impossible to find one.Of course,this is understandable,since they didn’t keep birth records and death records then as diligently as they do now,but still you’d think there would be some. Don’t forget the much smaller population also. ---
**Author:** ![A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b19c9b/32.png) [@A\_Sniveling\_Mess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Sniveling_Mess)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/19 "2012-05-03T15:39:08Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > Don’t forget the much smaller population also. Yes,there’s another reason.And then,of course,the life expectancy was also _much_ lower. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2012, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696/20 "2012-05-03T16:22:20Z")
> [@JRyan35](#): > > Not very long.Our connection to the 19th century is hanging on by a thin thread,and that thread could snap at any time;for all we know,we may lose an entire century by the end of today.It’s very depressing. That’s pretty unlikely unless there’s a mass killing spree at the world’s care homes. Looks like there are currently 44 people still alive who were born in the 19th century, according to [this list](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_living_supercentenarians) - plus another six “unverified”. I must admit I thought it would be rather more than that. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/early-centenarians/620696.md?page=2)