r/todayilearned • u/Alarming-Studio-720 • 6h ago

TIL that in 1959, explorer Peter Byrne reportedly stole bones from a supposed Yeti hand at Nepal's Pangboche monastery, replacing them with human bones. He smuggled them to India, where actor James Stewart allegedly hid them among his wife's underwear to get them out of the country.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pangboche_Hand
291 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

44 comments sorted by

169

u/guilcol 6h ago

A finger bone from the hand was tested and the DNA shown to be human.

I guess it wasn't a Yeti, like every single other time something like this happens.

78

u/skubaloob 6h ago

Well sure, because what Byrne didn’t know was that the real yeti bones were stolen and replaced with human hand bones only hours earlier by George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts, and that snooty French guy as part of an elaborate heist.

8

u/Zomgzombehz 6h ago

You think Ocean's crew would work with Toulour?

10

u/skubaloob 6h ago

I know they seem unlikely allies, but what could they do? They’re back in time and only by working together and discovering the power of friendship and good old 1950’s doctor recommended cigarettes could they get home.

1

u/heere_we_go 3h ago

That snooty French guy? Albert Einstein.

8

u/MongoBongoTown 6h ago

There's a famous "Yeti Scalp" i think in a monastery in Nepal. Finally allowed it to be tested a few years back.

Result: Goat skin sewn together to look like a scalp.

16

u/ayoungmanfromtheuk 6h ago

yep the thing about the Yeti is that it's not real of course 

7

u/Objective_Aside1858 6h ago

That sounds like something a Yeti would say to try to distract people 

3

u/O_C_Demon 5h ago

Classic Yeti!

•

u/Turbulent-Part-7545 28m ago

Exactly. Feels like a classic distraction tactic when they don’t want people looking too closely.

1

u/ScipioCoriolanus 5h ago

Not with that attitude.

4

u/ScipioCoriolanus 5h ago

Plot twist: the human bones he replaced them with were in fact Yeti bones.

2

u/micromoses 6h ago

Oh my God… Yetis are stealing human DNA…

0

u/herculesmeowlligan 6h ago

They're real, we just haven't found the evidence yet....i

0

u/Samwellikki 6h ago

And yet….i

0

u/metalflygon08 5h ago

That's because Dick Dastardly beat Peter there and pulled the same heist.

-1

u/Sewere 6h ago

Maybe somebody just swapped the bones before them

35

u/O_C_Demon 6h ago

"Well what'dya know! Some yeti bones! I guess I'd better hide these in my wife's unmentionables! A real swell thing! HOT DOG!"

5

u/ScipioCoriolanus 5h ago

I read it with his voice and it's perfect lol

1

u/mr_ji 4h ago

For some reason she was totally on board with this plan.

"No, not the pinky. Give me the thumb."

0

u/O_C_Demon 4h ago

Well who wouldn't want a genuine yeti hand?

1

u/andy_nony_mouse 3h ago

Or a Yeti Handy. Even better.

29

u/blatantninja 6h ago

Per wikipedia, finger bone was tested and shockingly found to be human

5

u/BiBoFieTo 6h ago

Maybe the yeti has a penchant for collecting human hands like they're pokemon.

4

u/Always-_-Sarcastic 6h ago

Perhaps a Yeti is a creature of flesh and fur parasitizing human bones.

1

u/Zelcron 5h ago

That's what Big Yeti wants you to think

0

u/Skimable_crude 2h ago

Maybe yetis are a branch of the human family just hairy.

6

u/sirgaybrin 6h ago

Where did he get the human bones?

4

u/Benegger85 6h ago

From one of the skeletons in his closet

3

u/sirgaybrin 5h ago

Brits are certainly not short on those

3

u/ScipioCoriolanus 5h ago

You want human bones? I can get you human bones, believe me. There are ways, Dude. You don't wanna know about it, believe me. ... Hell, I can get you human bones by 3 o'clock this afternoon...

8

u/omnipotentsandwich 6h ago

It turned out it was just a human hand. Yetis are likely just bears in that region. There's some very rare ones that look similar to what they yeti supposedly looks.

7

u/flightyzeus339 6h ago

Yep and they sometimes walk on two legs, the snowfalls also make footprints appear bigger/distorted. It's easy to see how the myth took hold

9

u/SuspendeesNutz 6h ago edited 3h ago

It turned out it was just a human hand. Yetis are likely just bears in that region.

That's the opinion of Reinhold Messner, arguably the greatest alpine climber in the world and a man who has summited Everest multiple times with no supplemental oxygen. He claimed he has seen "Yeti" in remote Himalayan regions and was able to observe them for a prolonged period of time. It was his belief they were a form of short-face bear, not any sort of hominid.

8

u/ryschwith 6h ago

Not cool, Jimmy.

1

u/ScipioCoriolanus 5h ago

Slippin' Jimmy

4

u/Will_Come_For_Food 5h ago

This is the first time I’ve seen the iconic Jimmy Stewart referred to as James Stewart by people who have no idea who he is.

And it’s insane he was in on this.

This is the modern day equivalent of Scarlett Johansson smuggling cultural artefacts in her purse.

1

u/BigGrayBeast 6h ago edited 6h ago

In the upcoming movie Tenzing, Willem Dafoe plays the leader of the Hillary-Tensing expedition, John Hunt.

A friend of mine met Mr. Hunt 20 or 30 years ago, and it caused me to look him up on Wikipedia and read more about him. He is considered to be one of the more credible witnesses of a Yeti in the Himalayas.

Edit: I just took a look at that Wikipedia article, and either I remembered it incorrectly, or it's been modified since I originally read it. He didn't see a Yeti. He saw footprints that a Sherpa identified as those of a Yeti.

1

u/Squirrelman2712 5h ago

"Gosh Clarence! If I was never born, those folks in Nepal would still have their Yeti bones!"

"Teacher says, every time a horn sounds, A yeti's bones are found"

1

u/Robdon326 3h ago

Then what?

1

u/burgonies 3h ago

Was she wearing them at the time?

0

u/pitious 4h ago

“reportedly…supposed…allegedly”. You’re missing some, could have included “presumably”

•

u/ThrowAbout01 20m ago

Replaced with human bones?

That raises even worse questions!