Home » People & Society » Valentina Vassilyev Gave Birth to a Total of 69 Children Between 1752 and 1765, with a total of 27 Births, Including Sixteen Pairs of Twins, Seven Sets of Triplets, and Four Sets of Quadruplets.
Valentina Vassilyev

Valentina Vassilyev Gave Birth to a Total of 69 Children Between 1752 and 1765, with a total of 27 Births, Including Sixteen Pairs of Twins, Seven Sets of Triplets, and Four Sets of Quadruplets.

Valentina Vassilyeva holds the Guinness World Record for the most significant number of children born to single mothers. Valentina Vassilyeva was Feodor Vassilyev’s first wife; the Russian couple lived in Shuya, Russia, in the first half of the 1700s. Valentina lived to be 75 years old, according to records, and during her life. But how many children did Vassilyev have in total?

Valentina Vassilyev had 69 children between 1725 and 1765, with 27 births totaling sixteen pairs of twins, seven sets of triplets, and four quadruplets.

Biggest Primary Family in the World

Valentina was 75 years old, and during her lifetime, she gave birth to 69 children due to 27 pregnancies, 16 sets of twins, seven sets of triplets, and four sets of quadruplets. Her twins died as infants, leaving her with 67 living children. Valentina holds the Guinness World Record for the most significant number of children born to single mothers.

Aside from giving birth to 69 children, little is known about Valentina’s life; she lived during the Russian Empire, a feudalist society that made her a serf. Peasant life in Russia was highly harsh at the time, so families aimed to be as large as possible; however, even by those standards, the Vassilyev family was quite large.

Valentina was pregnant for an incredible 18 years of her life. Because the family’s record-keeping needed to be more efficient and accurate, the names of her surviving children vanished from history. There are still some disagreements about the exact number of children Valentina had, but her prolific uterus is well-known for producing an astonishing number of babies.

Feodor Vassilyev, the husband, had another round of children with his second wife; she gave him six sets of twins and two sets of triplets, bringing his total biological children to 87. (Source: Medium

The Authenticity of Claims

The first account of the Vassilyev children was published in 1783 in an issue of The Gentleman’s Magazine. According to the reports.

However astonishing may be depended upon, as it came directly from an English merchant in St. Petersburg to his relatives in England, who added that the peasant was to be introduced to the Empress.

Gentleman’s Magazine

The reports were confirmed in Ivan Nikitch Boltin’s 1788 commentary and in Alexander Pavlovich Bashutskiy’s 1834 book.

Other sources remained skeptical of these claims’ veracity. For example, in a 1933 article by Julia Bell, she referred to a 1970 book that contained claims about the Vassilyev children, but she carefully investigated these claims. She wrote that The Lancet had reported the case in 1878 as part of an article on the study of twins; this article stated that the French Academy of Sciences had attempted to verify the claims about the Vassilyev children but had been informed that,

All investigation was superfluous, that members of the family still lived in Moscow and that they have been the object of favors from the Government.

Julia Bell

Many critics have questioned the claims, citing the 17th century’s lack of modern science, which would have made it extremely difficult for any woman to bear that many children. On the other hand, the Guinness Book of World Records continues to defend the record, claiming that the woman may have either hyper-ovulated in a single cycle or had the rare ability to release multiple eggs. (Source: Medium)

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