‘World’s Oldest Person’ Reportedly Dead At 132
A Georgian woman named Antisa Khvichava, who claimed to have been born in 1880, has died at the purported age 132. However, she left no verifiable proof of her age, and her claim has not been identified by Guinness World Records.
Authorities from the former Soviet republic first claimed Khvichava was the oldest person in the world two years ago, on what was said to be her 130th birthday. Georgiy Meurnishvili, a spokesman for the country’s national register, said she was born on July 8, 1880 in the village of Sachino in northwest Georgia. She spoke only the local language, Mingrelian. Authorities presented two Soviet-era documents that noted in her date of birth as recorded on her birth certificate, which had been lost. Friends and relatives have vouched for her age.
Khvichava would have been 31 when the Titanic sank in 1912, 61 when the Soviet Union entered World War II in 1941, and 111 when the Soviet Union was disbanded in 1991. She said she had 12 grandchildren, 18 great-grandchildren and four great-great-grandchildren. She lived with her 42-year-old grandson and retired from her job as a tea and corn picker in 1965, when she was 85 years old.
Antisa Khvichava credited her long life to a small amount of local brandy every day.
The oldest living person in the world, who has been officially verified by Guinness, is Tennessee native Besse Brown Cooper. Cooper celebrated her 116th birthday on August 26, 2012. She was born in 1896, the same year as author F. Scott Fitzgerald and comedian George Burns.
The oldest person ever to live was a French woman named Jeanne Calment. She was born in February 1875 and died in August 1997 at 122 years and 164 days old.
