Born In 1885, World’s Oldest Woman Dies In China
was 127 years old – although
international authorities never
recognised the claim – has died,
relatives said on Tuesday.
Official documents said that Luo
Meizhen was born in 1885, which
would make her the oldest person
ever to have lived, but she died at
the weekend after months of illness,
her son Huang Youhe said. “She was 127 when she died, it
wasn’t unexpected,” her grandson
Huang Heyuan said.
Luo’s declared birth date means she
may have been the oldest person in
the world when she died, ahead of
Japan’s Jiroemon Kimura, who
records say is 116.
But Luo’s claim met with little
recognition internationally because
China did not have a reliable birth
certification system until decades
after she was born.
Scepticism was further fuelled by
reports of the youthfulness of her
sons, one of whom she was said to
have given birth to at the age of 61.
According to Guinness World
Records, the oldest person ever to
have lived was Jeanne Calment of
France, who was 122 years and 164
days when she died in 1997.
Luo’s 1885 birth date was quoted on
her official residency permit and
identity card, both issued in recent
decades, and was confirmed by a
state-sponsored research institute in
2010.
China’s official Xinhua news agency
ran reports of her 127th birthday
celebrations on its website in
October, describing her as China’s
oldest person.
“She was a kind person but at times
had a very bad temper, she had a
strong character,” Huang Heyuan
said.
Luo, who worked as a farmer all her
life, and gave birth to five children,
is survived by several great-great
grandchildren in the remote village
of Longhong, in China’s southern
province of Guangxi.
The village is part of Bama county, a
poor region that officials say is
home to more than 80 centenarians.
Her relatives gathered in her simply
furnished brick house Tuesday to
light red incense sticks in
remembrance. Relatives said they had stored her
body on a mountain close to their
home and were waiting for an
auspicious date later this month to
bury her. [AFP]
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