‘World’s Dirtiest Man’ Dies After First Bath in 60 Years

An Iranian man affectionately called “Uncle Haji” and described in the press as the “world’s dirtiest man” died on Sunday at the age of 94, shortly after taking his first bath in more than six decades, according to Iranian media reports.

The resident of Dezhgah, a small village in Iran’s southern Fars province, 525 miles south of Tehran, avoided eating fresh food and believed that being clean was harmful to one’s health, the head of Dehram district told the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA).

Amou Haji subsisted on roadkill and smoked animal excrement from a pipe. He lived in a “grave-like hole” and, when temperatures dropped, lived in a shack that villagers built for him. IRNA described him as having “a face similar to that of a caveman” and said that “even ordinary people thought he was nearly a century old.”

And he feared that taking a bath would make him sick. When, a few years ago, a group of local youth tried to bring him in a car to the river to bathe, he jumped out of the car and ran away.

Turns out, he may have been right.

Villagers convinced him a few months ago to finally bathe. Shortly afterward, he fell ill and finally died on Sunday.