Kaspar Hauser (* allegedly April 30, 1812; † December 17, 1833 in Ansbach) became known as the "mysterious foundling".
Hauser appeared in Nuremberg on May 26, 1828 as a 16-year-old, apparently mentally retarded and seldom-speaking youth. His later statements that he had been kept alone in a dark room on bread and water for as long as he could remember caused an international stir. If taken literally, Hauser's statements are incompatible with the knowledge of modern medicine.
A contemporary rumor circulated that Hauser was the Hereditary Prince of Baden, born in 1812, who had been swapped for a dying infant and disposed of to enable a branch of the Baden royal family to succeed to the throne. In historical literature, this "prince legend" is considered to be refuted due to later published documents and eyewitness accounts of the prince's death. A scientifically published genetic analysis from 1996 showed that a blood sample attributed to Hauser could not have come from the Baden Crown Prince. Another genetic analysis from 2002 could not provide any evidence to the contrary due to numerous contradictions. In 2024 it was confirmed again that Kaspar Hauser was not the kidnapped Prince of Baden.
On October 17, 1829, Hauser was found with a harmless cut and on December 14, 1833, he returned home with a stab wound that ultimately proved fatal. In both cases he claimed to have been the victim of an assassin. His supporters suspected a politically motivated crime. According to forensic investigations, however, these were self-harms that he had inflicted on himself out of disappointment at the declining public interest in him.