Christina Larsdotter
Christina Larsdotter was born to a Sami family in the village of Brännäs outside Malå in 1819, where she died in 1854. She was extremely tall on account of a still unidentified growth disorder, which earned her considerable fame at the time. Larsdotter was examined by Karolinska Institutet’s teaching faculty and Professor Anders Retzius in 1837 and appeared at the Crystal Palace Exhibition in London in 1851.
Christina Larsdotter, who came to be known as Stor-Stina (Big Stina), was in many ways a remarkable person. While the medical elites of the time took interest in her as an object of study, historical sources also depict her as self-willed and independent. During tours of southern Sweden and Europe, she made money by exhibiting herself, eventually earning enough to buy a plot of land in Brännäs. Here she built a house for herself and her sister, making her the district’s only female houseowner. As a landowner, she had a seat on Malå’s general assembly and took part in the decision to build Malå Church, which was completed in 1852.
In the late winter of 1854, she fell ill on a trip to England. Exactly what she suffered from is unknown, but because of her condition she never stopped growing, which gave rise to multiple complications. Christina Larsdotter died on 27 May 1854 in Brännäs. The registered cause of death was gangrene.
In the following year, Larsdotter’s skeleton was exhumed and transported to Karolinska Institutet, where it was put on display in the anatomical museum. Anders Retzius also had plaster casts made of her pelvis. In 1892, the museum caught fire and it was assumed that her remains had been destroyed. However, during an inventory in 2022 a wrongly labelled box was found that turned out to contain her bones. Karolinska Institutet returned Christina Larsdotter’s remains to Malå Sami village and Malå’s Sami Association in 2024.
The name of the lecture hall: Christina Larsdotter’s life and the events following her death are part of the history of Karolinska Institutet and of medical science. What befell her remains is an example of how ethical lines were crossed in the name of science and how ethical attitudes have changed since. Her story is also a reminder that such transgressions have lasting consequences for communities, families and individuals. The Christina Larsdotter Hall was previously dedicated to Gustaf Retzius, who like his father, Anders Retzius, collected human remains to study and document human racial, pathological, and evolutionary development.