How many calories in an average human - cannibalism

By Matt Cantor, Newser Staff

Cannibals would get about 81,500 calories from eating a person. (Shutterstock)

(NEWSER) – Popular Science has some nutritional information for Hannibal Lecter: It's probably best not to eat an entire human at once. Scientist James Cole finds that a whole person probably contains about 81,500 calories—about 40 times more than your recommended daily value. But individual pieces of person are more manageable. An arm contains about 1,800 calories, a leg 7,150. Snacking on a brain, spinal cord, and nerve trunks? That's 2,700 calories.

That data comes from four adult male bodies from the 1940s and 50s. Cole helpfully created an entire chart showing different cuts of human meat. Why, you ask, did he do this? Well, he's an expert on human origins, and he's interested in whether certain hominins ate each other for ritual purposes or health purposes. Researchers recently found hominin bones in Spain with cutting marks that look like those left on eaten animals. Cole's chart could perhaps help researchers figure out whether hominins were seeking to eat the healthy parts of their victims.

Illustration by Jason Schneider

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