In 1493, an expedition of seventeen ships left the Spanish port town of Cádiz. After a stop in the Canary Islands, the expedition ventured out across the Atlantic. Destination: India. Maybe?
This convoy was the second Spanish voyage to America. The aim was to establish the first Spanish base in the New World, and to do so, the commander, Christopher Columbus, brought more than a thousand men with him. Among them was the young and ambitious Juan Ponce de León. When the expedition reached its destination – the tropical island of Hispaniola – Ponce de León settled down and eventually became a respected military commander and landowner.
At the time, the New World was a place of legends involving strange lands, alien peoples and, of course, massive wealth. One day, Ponce de León heard just such a story promising new land north of Hispaniola. He quickly assembled a crew and set out to investigate. Ponce de León’s expedition ventured north along the Bahamas and then glimpsed a strange new place, which they named La Florida for the many flowers in the landscape.
The Spaniards were quick to explore the new land and at one point, they encountered a tribe of native peoples. During the meeting, the natives told the Spaniards about a mythical spring, which they called the ‘Fountain of Youth’: a spring whose water was healing and which could make even the oldest person young again. They insisted, however, that no one in their community could remember where it was. And no, no, they didn’t just tell this story to make the Spaniards leave them alone. It was completely true.
In the following years, the Spanish expedition traversed the coast of Florida, searching every nook and cranny for this infamous source of immortality. The hopeful Spaniards plunged into every freshwater spring they found – pretty brave, considering Florida’s alligator population. Of course, the Spaniards never found the mythical spring, and in turn, the Grim Reaper eventually found them all.
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Alright, serious historians will probably tell you that the Fountain of Youth story is mostly a myth. Fortunately, I’m not a serious historian, so I’m allowed to start my book with a bit of a tall tale.
Truth be told, Ponce de León and his men were probably seeking the same kind of fortune as everyone else at the time: land and gold, probably slaves and undoubtedly also women. Nevertheless, tales of the quest for eternal life recur across every single civilisation we know. There are accounts of rejuvenating springs and immortalising elixirs in every historical culture, from Alexander the Great in ancient Greece, to the Crusaders, ancient India, ancient China, ancient Japan and everywhere in between.
In fact, one of the oldest pieces of literature ever is about just this very subject. The Epic of Gilgamesh, which dates back more than 4,000 years, tells the story of a king who leaves his people and travels to the end of the world in search of immortality. Contemporary civilisation is no exception. Though we’ve mostly moved on from magic springs and elixirs, we still long to uncover the secrets behind a long life. However, today, the main source of these stories is not legends and myths but scientific research. You’d think this would be unquestionable progress, but that hasn’t always been the case. Science has had a few bumps on the road towards understanding ageing.
In the early twentieth century, some scientists believed that extracts from animal glands could be used to rejuvenate humans. One of these researchers, the surgeon Serge Voronoff, was convinced that consuming the animal extracts or doing infusions was not enough; no, you needed to transplant tissue directly on to people for the desired effect. After studying castrated men in Egypt, Voronoff concluded that testicles were the number one source of rejuvenation.
Naturally, he began grafting small pieces of monkey testicles on to his patients. The treatment was bizarre enough for ordinary people to avoid it like the plague. But the rich and famous loved it; they lined up in droves to try Voronoff’s miraculous anti-ageing grafts. In fact, there was so much interest that Voronoff made a ton of money, and soon he started having difficulty obtaining enough monkey testicles. To secure his supply, he had to create an enclosure for the poor animals at the castle he’d bought, and hire a circus trainer to breed them.
Of course, Voronoff’s patients didn’t end up as anything but a historical joke. They and Voronoff grew old and frail, just like Ponce de León and his men. And just like we will – unless science can find a better solution than what’s come before.
That’s what this book is about – how to ‘die young’ as late as possible. In other words, about the nature and science of longevity and a healthy life. I promise you that you won’t have to sew testicles to your thigh, or swim with flesh-eating reptiles. But nevertheless, it will be something of a journey.