The house of zombie dolls: Inside house where bodysnatcher who dug up dead ... trends now
Just over a decade ago, a well-educated Russian historian was captured by authorities when they stumbled upon his grisly collection of hand-made human dolls scattered throughout his apartment.
Once a respected figure in his field, horrific truths began surfacing in 2011 about Anatoly Moskvin, 57, that revealed he was digging up dead females and turning them into dolls. It was believed that by the end of his two-decade-long span of graverobbing, he had desecrated around 150 in total.
Dumped among the mounds of clutter within the home of Moskvin, from Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, were 26 mummified bodies of girls and women aged between three and 29.
The scholar-turned-bodysnatcher had unearthed the dead girls and lived with their corpses in his house of horrors after turning them into ghoulish playthings and adorning them with lipstick, makeup, and knee-length boots.
He dug up the bodies of the girls before dragging them back to his home, where he would turn them into showpieces that resembled antique dolls with red lips, blushed cheeks, and brightly coloured, frilly dresses.
Chilling images of his sickening collection show bodies and skeletons in stockings and costumes, with one even dressed to resemble a child's teddy bear.
Footage later released by cops showed the dead children placed around his house in bizarre outfits, poking out from behind curtains and shoved into gaps in his walls.
They were also seen seated on shelves and sofas, surrounded by clutter.
Anatoly Moskvin, 57, from Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, was arrested in 2011 after 26 mummified bodies of girls and women aged between three and 29 were found in his apartment
The depraved historian would dig up graves and bring the bodies home, before dressing them up, naming them, and placing them around his apartment
One body was found dressed up as a teddy bear. He would also insert buttons or toy eyes into the girls' eye sockets so that they could 'watch cartoons' with him
Moskvin left his dolls scattered around his home, before cops found them peering out from behind clutter and hidden in walls
Moskvin attributed his macabre obsession to a 1979 incident, that took place when the sick historian was just 13. He claimed he was forced to kiss a corpse, which sparked his obsession with the dead
Dressed up skeletons and bodies were uncovered in Moskvin's apartment. Pictured: The body contained in one of his dolls
Some were found with their faces wrapped in fabric which Moskvin had applied makeup over, and others had their hands concealed in sheets of fabric.
A terrifying image of one of Moskvin's victims showed a skull covered in a thick layer of wax as the teeth protruded from the dead girls mouth.
He admitted he would stuff the decayed corpses with rags before wrapping their faces with nylon tights, or attach fashion doll's faces on top of the human ones.
Moskvin would also insert buttons or toy eyes into the girls' eye sockets so that they could 'watch cartoons' with him.
The self-proclaimed 'necropolyst' - an expert on cemeteries- had collected photographs and plaques taken off the gravestones, doll-making manuals, and maps of local cemeteries, as well as the original clothes worn by the dead girls from when they were buried.
When police eventually caught Moskvin, they found music boxes and toys wedged into the bodies, so that the dolls could produce sounds for the perverted man when he touched them.
There were also personal belongings and clothing buried inside some of the mummies, and one even had part of her tombstone with her name scrawled on it stuffed inside her body.
It was revealed that the highly-trained bodysnatcher marked the birthday of each of his dead victims in his bedroom in chilling rituals, as well as named them and organised parties for his 'toys'.
Dubbed 'Lord of the Mummy' by local Russian media, he had preserved the girls using salt and baking soda as they had all died many years earlier.
It was unclear if each doll contained a full set of human remains.
Moskvin's parents had reportedly seen the haunting dolls scattered around their home which Moskvin lived in - but alleged they had no idea that they contained the bodies of several deceased girls.
His mother Elvira, 84, said: 'We saw these dolls but we did not suspect there were dead bodies inside.
'We thought it was his hobby to make such big dolls and did not see anything wrong with it.'
She claimed after a 2020 decision against releasing him that the court was biased against her son who was 'not able to be in society, work, or get married'.
Though 26 bodies were found in his home at the time of his arrest, it is believed Moskvin had dug up an astonishing 150 graves before he was finally apprehended
The dolls were found wearing bright colours, while some wore knee-high boots and makeup. Others were found with their faces wrapped in fabric
Background
During the Soviet years, Moskvin worked as a translator in the Red Army, but his warped love for the dead had been brewing deep inside him for many years prior.
Moskvin attributed his macabre obsession to a 1979 incident, that took place when the sick historian was just 13.
The 'cemetery expert' shared the story in Necrologies, a weekly Russian publication dedicated to cemeteries and obituaries, to which he was a committed contributor.
In Moskvin's final article for the publication, dated October 26, 2011, he told how a group of men donning black suits had allegedly stopped him on his way home from school.
They had been en-route to the funeral of 11-year-old Natasha Petrova before dragging Moskvin to her coffin where they forced him to kiss her corpse.
Moskvin wrote: 'An adult pushed my face down to the waxy forehead of the girl in an embroidered cap, and there was nothing I could do but kiss her as ordered.
'I kissed her once, then again, then again.'
The girl's grieving mother then allegedly put a wedding ring on young Moskvin's finger and a wedding ring on her dead daughter's finger.
'My strange marriage with Natasha Petrova was useful,' Moskvin said in the article.
He claimed it was this experience that led him down the path to a wild belief in magic, and a grisly fascination with the dead.
The schoolboy then began to wander through cemeteries, with his morbid interests leading him down a path to eventually earn a degree in Celtic studies - a culture whose mythology often blurs the lines between life and death.
He began exploring burial rituals, death, and the occult, and kept a large personal library of over 60,000 books and documents on the topics.
Moskvin admitted he would stuff the decayed corpses with rags before wrapping their faces with nylon tights, or attach fashion doll's faces on top of the human ones
Pictured: A head of one of the corpses covered in wax
