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Berberov family- family from Baku, famous for that kept a lion named King. As an actor, he took part in the filming of various feature films. The cohabitation of a lion and people was widely covered in the press of those years. During his stay in the capital, due to a combination of circumstances, King died. To replace him, the family got a new lion cub, whom they named King II, who, having matured, began to show aggression, which ultimately led to an attack on family members and the death of the eldest son. King II repeated the fate of his predecessor and was shot dead by the police.

Lev Lvovich Berberov left his job as an architect and became a “producer” of his tame animal. A lion named King (the first) took part in the filming of the film " Incredible adventures of Italians in Russia"(1973). Immediately after their completion in the summer of 1973, due to a combination of circumstances, the lion dies from the shots of a police lieutenant Alexandra Gurova. The available information about the circumstances of the death of the animal is quite contradictory and varies depending on the side taken by the source in this conflict. Thus, the policeman claims that the lion intended to kill his victim - a random passer-by who happened to be within his reach; King’s owners claim that he just wanted to play and there is no talk of aggression; according to other sources, the man teased the lion and provoked him himself.

The death of the lion caused serious psychological trauma family members, and in an attempt to alleviate it, they got a lion cub, who was named King II. The Berberov family was friendly with the writer Yuri Yakovlev, with whom they were visiting at the dacha. The dead lion was eventually buried there. Yakovlev wrote a book for children about the domestic lion, which was filmed in 1977 under the same title - Leo left home. But King II already starred in the film. Also according to the script Yakovleva, two years earlier, the film story “ I have a lion", where all family members took part and played themselves. King II also took part in it.

There are mentions that Nina Berberova and her husband worked on a book of memories about their pets.

Tragedy

In 1978, the head of the family, Lev Berberov, died of a heart attack. Without his help, it became difficult for his wife and children to handle an adult lion, and they planned to hand him over to Berlin Zoo, but these plans failed to come true. On November 24, 1980, in a fit of aggression, the lion inflicted serious injuries on Nina Berberova and killed her son Roman. Arriving police shot the lion and puma. The reliable reasons why the lion attacked people have not yet been established and there are only a number of versions.

The version that deserves the most attention is the one that was expressed immediately after the incident. In accordance with it, a conflict arose between the lion and the puma, at the latter’s suggestion. The lion chased the puma, and people just got in the way. First of all, Roma Berberov died tragically, trying to stop the fight between a puma and a lion, which, at the time of his intervention, was a lion chasing a puma. Nina Berberova, in turn, believing that after the lion’s attack Roma was only wounded but still alive, she tried to distract the lion with shouts and commands, but only provoked the attack. Finally, the puma itself was shot by the police, after the tragedy had occurred. Fleeing from the lion, she ran into one of the rooms and climbed onto a high cabinet, where she remained the entire time. After it was discovered by one of the policemen, the leadership of the task force decided not to risk it, after which the puma was killed.

The rehabilitation of Nina, who received serious injuries, was helped by actor Kazim Abdullayev, who later became her husband and father of two children - son Farhad and daughter Rachel.

Criticism

A well-known journalist was sharply critical of keeping large pets in an apartment V. M. Peskov. He claimed that scientists had repeatedly warned the Berberovs against keeping a lion in a small city apartment.

Communication with lions

In the 30s of the last century, a lioness named Threw was kept in one of the rooms of a communal apartment by the head of the Moscow Zoo’s young animals’ area - Vera Chaplina. The tiny lion cub, which was abandoned by its mother, had to be taken in to be raised by a human family and a dog had to be found, which, although it did not feed it, warmed and licked the lion cub. Kinuli's nursing was forced to last for whole year: A 6-month-old lioness contracted nervous distemper, and Chaplina and her family (with the support of zoo veterinarians) battled the serious illness throughout the winter. But in May, when Kinuli recovered and was strong enough, Chaplina moved her to the zoo - no matter how difficult this separation from her human family was for the completely tame lioness. The writer spoke about her life with the lioness in the story “ Threw ».

Writer and activist Joy Adamson in the trilogy " Born free" (1960), "Living Free" (1962) and "Forever Free" (1964) recounts his experiences raising the lioness Elsa, who, after growing up, was released into the wild. The publication of this book served as an impetus for the emergence of Adamson's followers.

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Notes

Excerpt characterizing the Berberovs (family)

- Why not? - said the princess.
No one answered, and Princess Marya, looking around the crowd, noticed that now all the eyes she met immediately dropped.
- Why don’t you want to? – she asked again.
Nobody answered.
Princess Marya felt heavy from this silence; she tried to catch someone's gaze.
- Why don’t you talk? - the princess turned to the old man, who, leaning on a stick, stood in front of her. - Tell me if you think anything else is needed. “I’ll do everything,” she said, catching his gaze. But he, as if angry at this, lowered his head completely and said:
- Why agree, we don’t need bread.
- Well, should we give it all up? Do not agree. We don’t agree... We don’t agree. We feel sorry for you, but we do not agree. Go on your own, alone...” was heard in the crowd from different directions. And again the same expression appeared on all the faces of this crowd, and now it was probably no longer an expression of curiosity and gratitude, but an expression of embittered determination.
“You didn’t understand, right,” said Princess Marya with a sad smile. - Why don’t you want to go? I promise to house you and feed you. And here the enemy will ruin you...
But her voice was drowned out by the voices of the crowd.
“We don’t have our consent, let him ruin it!” We don’t take your bread, we don’t have our consent!
Princess Marya again tried to catch someone's gaze from the crowd, but not a single glance was directed at her; the eyes obviously avoided her. She felt strange and awkward.
- See, she taught me cleverly, follow her to the fortress! Destroy your home and go into bondage and go. Why! I'll give you the bread, they say! – voices were heard in the crowd.
Princess Marya, lowering her head, left the circle and went into the house. Having repeated the order to Drona that there should be horses for departure tomorrow, she went to her room and was left alone with her thoughts.

For a long time that night, Princess Marya sat at the open window in her room, listening to the sounds of men talking coming from the village, but she did not think about them. She felt that no matter how much she thought about them, she could not understand them. She kept thinking about one thing - about her grief, which now, after the break caused by worries about the present, had already become past for her. She could now remember, she could cry and she could pray. As the sun set, the wind died down. The night was quiet and fresh. At twelve o'clock the voices began to fade, the rooster crowed, the full moon began to emerge from behind the linden trees, a fresh, white mist of dew rose, and silence reigned over the village and over the house.
One after another, pictures of the near past appeared to her - illness and last minutes father. And with sad joy she now dwelled on these images, driving away from herself with horror only one last image of his death, which - she felt - she was unable to contemplate even in her imagination at this quiet and mysterious hour of the night. And these pictures appeared to her with such clarity and with such detail that they seemed to her now like reality, now the past, now the future.
Then she vividly imagined that moment when he had a stroke and was dragged out of the garden in the Bald Mountains by the arms and he muttered something with an impotent tongue, twitched his gray eyebrows and looked at her restlessly and timidly.
“Even then he wanted to tell me what he told me on the day of his death,” she thought. “He always meant what he told me.” And so she remembered in all its details that night in Bald Mountains on the eve of the blow that happened to him, when Princess Marya, sensing trouble, remained with him against his will. She did not sleep and at night she tiptoed downstairs and, going up to the door to the flower shop where her father spent the night that night, listened to his voice. He said something to Tikhon in an exhausted, tired voice. He obviously wanted to talk. “And why didn’t he call me? Why didn’t he allow me to be here in Tikhon’s place? - Princess Marya thought then and now. “He will never tell anyone now everything that was in his soul.” This moment will never return for him and for me, when he would say everything he wanted to say, and I, and not Tikhon, would listen and understand him. Why didn’t I enter the room then? - she thought. “Maybe he would have told me then what he said on the day of his death.” Even then, in a conversation with Tikhon, he asked about me twice. He wanted to see me, but I stood here, outside the door. He was sad, it was hard to talk with Tikhon, who did not understand him. I remember how he spoke to him about Lisa, as if she were alive - he forgot that she died, and Tikhon reminded him that she was no longer there, and he shouted: “Fool.” It was hard for him. I heard from behind the door how he lay down on the bed, groaning, and shouted loudly: “My God! Why didn’t I get up then?” What would he do to me? What would I have to lose? And maybe then he would have been consoled, he would have said this word to me.” And Princess Marya said out loud sweet Nothing, which he told her on the day of his death. “Darling! - Princess Marya repeated this word and began to sob with tears that relieved her soul. She now saw his face in front of her. And not the face that she had known since she could remember, and which she had always seen from afar; and that face is timid and weak, which on the last day, bending down to his mouth to hear what he said, she examined up close for the first time with all its wrinkles and details.
“Darling,” she repeated.
“What was he thinking when he said that word? What is he thinking now? - suddenly a question came to her, and in response to this she saw him in front of her with the same expression on his face that he had in the coffin, on his face tied with a white scarf. And the horror that gripped her when she touched him and became convinced that it was not only not him, but something mysterious and repulsive, gripped her now. She wanted to think about other things, wanted to pray, but could do nothing. She looked with large open eyes at the moonlight and shadows, every second she expected to see his dead face and felt that the silence that stood over the house and in the house shackled her.
- Dunyasha! – she whispered. - Dunyasha! – she screamed in a wild voice and, breaking out of the silence, ran to the girls’ room, towards the nanny and girls running towards her.

On August 17, Rostov and Ilyin, accompanied by Lavrushka, who had just returned from captivity, and the leading hussar, from their Yankovo camp, fifteen versts from Bogucharovo, went horseback riding - to try a new horse bought by Ilyin and to find out if there was any hay in the villages.
Bogucharovo had been located for the last three days between two enemy armies, so that the Russian rearguard could have entered there just as easily as the French vanguard, and therefore Rostov, as a caring squadron commander, wanted to take advantage of the provisions that remained in Bogucharovo before the French.
Rostov and Ilyin were in the most cheerful mood. On the way to Bogucharovo, to the princely estate with an estate, where they hoped to find large servants and pretty girls, they either asked Lavrushka about Napoleon and laughed at his stories, or drove around, trying Ilyin’s horse.

7 April 2010, 17:13

Ladies and Gentlemen, Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the world of Kuuuzikaaa))))))))!!! I haven’t written a post for a long time, a very long time, and now I decided to tell you interesting story Berberov family. Surely, you all watched the famous Soviet comedy “The Incredible Adventures of Italians in Russia.” As a child, I was often told King's story from this wonderful film. And so..... let's go April 6 marked 30 years since the terrible tragedy that occurred in the Berberov family. IN THE EARLY 70s, in sunny Baku, a simple Soviet family, the Berberovs, conducted an experiment on domesticating wild animals. They tried to “domesticate” everyone: snakes, hedgehogs, eagles, storks. One day the opportunity presented itself to bring home the kings of beasts themselves - lions. All newspapers of the Soviet Union wrote about amateur trainers, and documentaries were made about their “life and customs.” The result of the experiment shocked everyone - a terrible death little boy, the son of the owner of the house Nina Berberova, two killed lions and a puma. “MY HUSBAND Lev Lvovich loved all living creatures,” says Nina BERBEROVA. “That’s why in our hundred-meter apartment, in addition to me, my daughter Eva and my son Roma, there lived cats, dogs, parrots, hedgehogs, raccoons, and snakes. Besides, they were always throwing someone at our door. One day they brought a she-wolf. We named her Tomka. When she grew up, she began to behave inappropriately: she let everyone into the apartment, but did not let anyone out. My husband and I decided, before anything happened, to place her in the zoo. We visited our pet every Sunday: we climbed into the cage with the children and fed Tomka her favorite apricot pies. One day my daughter and I decided to take a little walk around the zoo. In one of the cages, Eva saw a small, pitiful gray lump and told me: “Mommy, look, the dog is dying there.” I answered: “Daughter, this is not a dog, this is little lion cub, king of beasts. He must have gotten sick." I begged the director of the zoo to give us this unfortunate baby. We had a veterinarian friend, Mikhail Smirnov, who helped us deliver the lion cub. We named our king of animals, naturally, King (that is, King). When the lion cub got a little stronger, grew up and turned into a beautiful lion, we wanted to return him to the zoo. But when they tried to take him there, he caused a real scandal and almost overturned the car. We were told that he would no longer be able to live either in the zoo or in the wild. We had to leave our pet. Lion and pug The BALCONY of our apartment overlooked the roof, we put a net on it so that King could not climb out into the street, and we calmly let him walk throughout the living space. Sometimes, when he got bored alone, he would come into my husband’s and my bedroom, climb onto the bed, push me or Leva off it, lie down on his back with his stomach up and fall asleep soundly. In the morning I woke up with everyone else, had breakfast, and played with the children. They dragged him by the mustache, rode him like a horse: they could do anything with him, he was not offended by anything and never snapped. King was friendly not only to all two-legged animals, but also to four-legged ones: he respected all the animals that were in our house. I especially became friends with Chap, a small black dog that weighed less than four kilograms. Chap was already six years old when King appeared, so he considered himself a kind of “grandfather”, and King as a youth. King shared the same opinion. If the “youth” tried to play pranks, tiny Chap would run after him around the apartment and bark. The huge King crawled under the table (the table was placed on top of him like a shell) and tucked his tail between his legs. They also slept together: first King lay down, and then Chap settled on his huge “plush” paws. They ate from the same bowl: Chap tried the “dish” first, then King came up. Chap was tiny and ate very little, while King needed a whole refrigerator of food for lunch: several kilograms of meat, eggs, fish oil. Our salary was small, and it was very difficult to feed a huge adult lion. So we had to do a side hustle: accept filming offers. Working in “The Incredible Adventures of Italians in Russia” became our King’s finest and last hour. Deadly game We were given an entire school as temporary living space during filming. Every day a car drove around Leningrad with a loudspeaker, through which it was announced that such and such a lion lived at school, so don’t even go near there. But this public ban did not affect everyone. That day, our assistant Sasha played football with King in the school gym. The huge windows of this room overlooked the apple orchard. Sasha left King alone for a few minutes: he went to pour himself some tea. And, apparently, at that moment Markov appeared (I will never forget his name). King saw a new man and went to the window. According to eyewitnesses, Markov began to make faces and jump, turning first his face and then his back to the lion. For King, this was a call to play: our assistant rehearsed with him the episode for “The Italians”, when a lion runs after a man and knocks him to the ground. He stood on his hind legs, squeezed out the glass in the window, ran to this Markov, threw him to the ground. The girl waiting for him at the fence shouted: “Help, a lion is tearing a man!” And then we heard shots. Then we learned that police lieutenant Gurov was returning from his lunch break. He heard screams, ran up to the fence, not understanding what was happening, and shot at King. The lion immediately moved away from the guy broken window. But Gurov, apparently, got excited, and he unloaded the entire clip at King. So filming came to an end for both us and King. We were all very worried and cried. But Chap suffered the most. When we returned to Baku, boxes with King’s things were left in the corridor: collars, leashes, bowls. Chap first ran around, wagging his tail, looking for King, and then disappeared. I started calling him and suddenly I heard heavy sighs: Chap climbed into one of the boxes, lay there and sighed. The veterinarian said that he would not live long because he was in a pre-heart attack condition. And indeed, the next day Chap was gone too. I was against getting a second lion; I foresaw trouble. But the Moscow intelligentsia was very excited about this idea. Sergei Obraztsov, Yuri Yakovlev, Vladimir Vysotsky, Marina Vladi collected money and began to look all over for a new lion cub Soviet Union. Found in the Kazan Zoo. He spent a month in quarantine in Moscow, then he was solemnly presented to us. The second King was not at all like our first favorite: we saved him from death, and he thanked us for this with respect and good attitude, this one demanded that they respect him. The Second King still considered Lev Lvovich to be the “leader of the pack” and obeyed him, but in 1978 my husband died of a heart attack, and I was left alone with two children, a lion and a house full of animals. At first, the Second King looked for his owner, called him when he found Leva’s things, lay down on them and hugged them with his paws. He also obeyed me and never showed aggressiveness, so no one even thought about the danger. No matter how much you feed... THAT DAY, November 24, 1980, became a nightmare for me. In the morning I went to the publishing house: a book was being prepared for printing that my husband and I wrote about all our pets. Then she hurried home to feed the children and animals. When I entered the apartment, I smelled the acrid smell of smoke. The second King behaved very strangely, growled and rushed towards the balcony net. Puma Lyalya jumped onto the sofa and hid in the corner. I went up to the balcony and saw that our neighbor, a complete alcoholic, was setting fire and throwing pieces of a plastic comb at the lion. I exploded: “What are you doing?!” I’ll call the police now!” At this time, Roma’s son returned from school. First I sat him down to eat, then I started working on Second King. She chopped the meat and took the bowl to him. At that time, the lion climbed onto the mezzanine, hung from it, fell off and fell with all his strength on his back, jumped up and rushed at me. He tore my head with his paw (and his paw is such that it could squeeze my entire skull), and threw me onto my back. Roma jumped up and tried to run away, but the Second King caught up with him in one jump and killed him on the spot: he tore off his scalp and broke the cervical vertebrae. I lost consciousness. I woke up only when the shots started. The police, who were called by the neighbors, climbed onto the roof from all sides and began shooting. They finished off the Second King when the door had already been broken down. At that time, the frightened puma jumped out into the street and immediately received a bullet in the heart. Although she did not intend to attack anyone, she was also frightened by everything that was happening. The doctors saved my life, but after what happened I didn’t want to live at all, I thought about suicide. My daughter and friend Kazim came out to see me. I married him and gave birth to two more children, Farhad and Rachel. We no longer keep wild animals at home; now we only have dogs, cats and a parrot. I don’t hold a grudge against the Second King, he’s an animal, not a man, and he didn’t understand what he was doing. The only thing I can’t forgive myself is that I didn’t protect my first-born son Roma.
Article taken from here

TRAGEDY IN THE BERBEROV FAMILY

At one time, much was written about this drama. There was even a discussion about whether a person has the right to keep wild animals in their home. The Berberov family from Baku became a victim of their hobby. In 1980, their domesticated lion suddenly remembered his natural instincts and killed the child...

A tragedy occurred at the Baku Zoo. The lioness died during childbirth. The tiny helpless creature that was born without maternal care was doomed to death. By some miracle, the news of the dying lion cub reached the Baku resident Berberov. And he persuaded the director of the zoo to give the lion cub to him.

They gave the lion cub sonorous name- King, which means King. Indeed, from a little runt, King was turning into a real king of beasts before our eyes. A year later he was already a mighty handsome man with a proud posture and a luxurious mane. And his noble character fully corresponded to his royal origin.

There was a lot of controversy surrounding the King story. Professionals, biologists and trainers were indignant and considered it unacceptable to keep such an animal in a city apartment. People who are far from communicating with animals admired that you can get along with a lion...

The fame of the Berberovs, with whom a real lion lived and was raised, grew day by day. As one would expect, filmmakers soon appeared in their apartment

In 1974, King-1 starred in the film “The Incredible Adventures of Italians in Russia.” The lion and his owners were accommodated in the school, which was empty at that time, surrounded by a park and a high fence. The guy climbed over the fence behind his dog. As a result, King knocked the guy to the ground, and a passing policeman, seeing such a picture, shot the animal.

The owners, of course, loved their lion. Of course, they felt sorry for him. But he was also a breadwinner! And the head of the family takes another lion cub. He is also called King, King-2. We all have different tempers, it’s the same in animals. King-1 was a meek, obedient, good-natured creature. King-2 turned out to be the complete opposite of him in character. This did not stop Lev Lvovich from taking home a puma as well.

In 1978, Berberov died of a heart attack. His wife keeps the animals. And then comes the tragic and natural ending - King 2 kills his son and cripples his mother. Under what circumstances this happened, there is also disagreement. The first option - the mother was doing laundry in the bathroom, the lion roared, she slapped him with a wet towel, after which the beast attacked her, and with a blow of its paw scalped and broke the neck of the boy who came to the rescue. Another is that a drunk neighbor from above threw pieces of a burning comb at the lion, which provoked the animal to attack people. Another version is that the lion fell from the mezzanine, on which he loved to lie, and, irritated, rushed at the owners. And biologists believe that the cougar could be in heat... Personally, I think this is the most logical.

Nina Berberova:“The Second King still considered Lev Lvovich to be the “leader of the pack” and obeyed him, but in 1978 my husband died of a heart attack, and I was left alone with two children, a lion and a house full of animals. First, the Second King was looking for his owner, he called him when he found Leva’s things, lay down on them and hugged me with his paws, he also obeyed me and never showed aggressiveness, so no one even thought about the danger.”

On November 24, 1980, in a fit of aggression, the lion seriously injured Nina Berberova and killed her 14-year-old son Roman. The police arrived and killed the lion and puma.

“That day became a nightmare for me,”recalls Nina Berberova.- In the morning I went to the publishing house: a book was being prepared for printing that my husband and I wrote about all our pets. Then she hurried home to feed the children and animals. When I entered the apartment, I smelled the acrid smell of smoke. The second King behaved very strangely, growled and rushed towards the balcony net. Puma Lyalya jumped onto the sofa and hid in the corner. I went up to the balcony and saw that our neighbor, a complete alcoholic, was setting fire and throwing pieces of a plastic comb at the lion. I exploded: “What are you doing?! I’ll call the police now!” At this time, Roma’s son returned from school. First I sat him down to eat, then I started working on Second King. She chopped the meat and took the bowl to him. At that time, the lion climbed onto the mezzanine, hung from it, fell off and fell with all his strength on his back, jumped up and rushed at me. He tore my head with his paw and threw me on my back."

14-year-old Roman came running to his mother’s cry, grabbed King by the collar, but intoxicated with blood, an angry lion killed his son in front of his mother’s eyes - the lion’s paw tore off the guy’s scalp and broke the cervical vertebrae...

Nina Berberova:"I lost consciousness. I woke up only when the shots started. The policemen, who were called by the neighbors, climbed onto the roof from all sides and began shooting. They finished off Second King when they had already broken down the door. At that time, the frightened puma jumped out into the street and immediately received a bullet in her heart. Although she did not intend to attack anyone, she was also frightened by everything that was happening.”

This happened thirty years ago... The death of her son was hidden from Nina Petrovna for a long time. She found out about this only after leaving the hospital, after which she fell ill again for three months. She didn’t want to live, but a friend saved her and came out, he made her believe in herself and in the future. She and Kazim got married. Children were born.

“The doctors miraculously saved my life, but I lost my son, whom I loved madly,” Nina Petrovna indulges in difficult memories. “After what happened, I didn’t want to live at all, I thought about suicide. My daughter and friend Kazim (Kazim Abdullaev - Azdrama actor, honored artist). I married him, gave birth to two more children, Farhad and Rachel. We no longer keep wild animals at home, now we only have dogs, cats and a parrot. I don’t hold a grudge against the Second King. “I’m a beast, not a man, and I didn’t understand what I was doing. The only thing I can’t forgive myself is that I didn’t save my first-born son Roma.”

Many birds and animals still live in Nina Petrovna Berberova’s Baku apartment, but there are no longer lions among them. Only in the most prominent place are photographs of King Sr. and King Jr. displayed. One of them shows Roma tightly hugging King Jr. Double tragedy - the boy died and the lion died. But man and animal loved each other so much...

There was a lot of noise, controversy... It seems that they finally came to the conclusion that such animals have no place in a city apartment. The scary thing is that this doesn’t stop many. Now we are not in the USSR, now you can buy everything here... And all the time in the press and on TV there are messages about tied leopards, bears in the barn, crocodiles in the bathroom...

And here we go again...

The huge “pet” lion has become a full-fledged member of the family of actress Tilly Hedren. A very risky lady! Let's take a look at the photo from the family archive... Oh... Oh... Ohhhhh!!!

Continued under the cut.

IN THE EARLY 70s, in sunny Baku, a simple Soviet family, the Berberovs, conducted an experiment on domesticating wild animals. They tried to “domesticate” everyone: snakes, hedgehogs, eagles, storks. One day the opportunity presented itself to bring home the kings of beasts themselves - lions. All newspapers of the Soviet Union wrote about amateur trainers, and documentaries were made about their “life and customs.” The result of the experiment shocked everyone - the terrible death of a little boy, the son of the mistress of the house Nina Berberova, two killed lions and a puma.

A tragedy occurred at the Baku Zoo. The lioness died during childbirth. The tiny helpless creature that was born without maternal care was doomed to death. By some miracle, the news of the dying lion cub reached the Baku resident Berberov. And he persuaded the director of the zoo to give the lion cub to him.

Berberov's family - a wife and two children - began to nurse the unfortunate baby with great enthusiasm. Twenty-four hours a day the lion cub was under their constant attention. At first he was fed milk from a pacifier. Then, when the lion cub grew up, they switched to meat...

The lion cub was given a sonorous name - King, which means - King. Indeed, from a little runt, King was turning into a real king of beasts before our eyes.
A year later he was already a mighty handsome man with a proud posture and a luxurious mane. And his noble character fully corresponded to his royal origin.

The Berbers doted on their pupil. Although it was a bit cramped in the city apartment, they did not complain. By special order of the Baku authorities, King was provided with the necessary maintenance. They offered to move him to a zoo, but the Berberovs did not want to part with their pet. After all, King during this time became a full member of the family...

“My husband Lev Lvovich adored all living creatures,” recalls Nina Berberova. “Therefore, in our hundred-meter apartment, in addition to me, my daughter Eva and my son Roma, there were many animals and birds. And the lion cub did not appear by chance. One day, my daughter and I decided to take a little walk at the Baku zoo. In one of the cages, Eva saw a small pitiful gray lump and said to me: “Mommy, look, the dog is dying there.” I answered: “Daughter, this is not a dog, this is a little lion cub, the king of animals.” He probably got sick." I begged the director of the zoo to give us this unfortunate baby.

We had a veterinarian friend, Mikhail Smirnov, who helped us deliver the lion cub. We named our king of beasts, naturally, King. When the lion cub got a little stronger, grew up and turned into a beautiful lion, we wanted to return him to the zoo. But when they tried to take him there, he caused a real scandal and almost overturned the car. We were told that he would no longer be able to live either in the zoo or in the wild. We had to leave our pet."

The story of keeping a lion in a city apartment became very famous in the USSR; several films were made about the family and the tame lion. documentaries. Scientists followed the experiment with interest. King became a silver screen star after starring in several films - "The Lion Left Home", "A Girl, a Boy and a Lion" and especially "The Incredible Adventures of Italians in Russia." Lev Lvovich Berberov quit his job as an architect and became the “producer” of the King of Beasts.

Nina Berberova: “King adored Lev Lvovich and treated me tenderly, apparently understanding that I was a woman! Either the jealousy of a male awakened in him, or there was another reason for this, but as soon as he felt his youthful age, King began to spend the night on our marital bed between me and Lev Lvovich. And very often on such nights I woke up from the noise and found my husband on the floor next to the bed. It was King who pushed his master out of bed, since he did not understand that in such a situation he was the third man. .. So the late Lev Lvovich, by the grace of his pupil, got himself more than one bump."

From the memoirs of photographer Vladimir Alekseev, who often visited the Berberovs, pulled the mane of a huge lion and, by the will of fate, was an eyewitness to the bloody denouement.

"They covered King with heating pads, fed him all sorts of mixtures from the nipple. At first, the lion cub's front paws did not work at all. So they massaged them alternately all day long. Gradually the lion began to walk, but the defect remained for the rest of his life. If you look closely, in "Extraordinary adventures..." can be seen when King runs down the street, his front paws rake like flippers. King grew up big, big, handsome, beautiful. And a kind-hearted man - the likes of which the world has never seen. King behaved exactly like an ordinary one domestic cat. The only problem: this “cat” tried to lick the guest, and the lion’s tongue was like sandpaper. But if he was really annoying, you could point at him and push him away. The lion resignedly went into a corner or climbed onto the mezzanine, where his rightful place was."
Artistic abilities manifested themselves in King as early as childhood, when he acted out various scenes with his toy friend Boniface, a stuffed lion. At the same time, he demonstrated ingenuity unusual for such a beast. Later, these qualities were noticed in him by Azerbaijani filmmakers, who cast him in two films: “The Girl, the Boy and the Lion” and “The Lion Left Home.”

True, the neighbors were not happy to be next door to the movie star. From a spacious apartment on the second floor in a prestigious area of Baku there was a smell that was like hanging up an ax and putting on a gas mask. And then a lion appeared!.. Moreover, King from time to time, often in the middle of the night, announced his royal origin with a loud roar. Dozens of people living in neighboring apartments jumped up in a cold sweat. We walked King on a leash early in the morning in the park, but when we entered the entrance, no, no, we ran into neighbors. Not everyone could bear it calmly when they were pressed against the wall by a two-hundred-kilogram lion carcass on a flight of stairs.

About the friendship of a lion and a dog
“The balcony of our apartment overlooked the roof, we put a net on it so that King could not climb out into the street, and we calmly let him walk throughout the living space,” recalls Nina Berberova. “Sometimes, when he got bored, he came to ours with my husband bedroom, climbed onto the bed, pushed me or Lyova off it, lay down on his back with his stomach up and fell asleep in an uninterrupted sleep. In the morning he woke up with everyone, had breakfast, played with the children, they pulled him by the mustache, rode him like a horse: you can handle him. he could do whatever he wanted, he was not offended by anything and never snapped.

King was friendly not only to all two-legged animals, but also to four-legged ones: he respected all the animals that were in our house. I especially became friends with Chap, a small black dog that weighed less than four kilograms. Chap was already six years old when King appeared, so he considered himself a kind of “grandfather”, and King as a youth. If the “youth” tried to play pranks, tiny Chap would run after him around the apartment and bark. The huge King crawled under the table and tucked his tail. They also slept together: first King lay down, and then Chap settled on his huge “plush” paws. They ate from the same bowl: Chap tried the “dish” first, then King came up. Chap was tiny and ate very little, while King needed a whole refrigerator of food for lunch: several kilograms of meat, eggs, fish oil. Our salary was small, and it was very difficult to feed a huge adult lion. So we had to do a side hustle: accept filming offers. Work in “The Incredible Adventures of Italians in Russia” became our King’s finest and last hour.”

Deadly game and worldwide fame - "Posthumously"

The Berberovs were given an entire school as temporary living space during the filming of “The Incredible Adventures of Italians in Russia.” Every day a car with a loudspeaker drove around Leningrad and warned that a lion lived at such and such a school and you should not approach this place. But this public ban did not affect everyone.

Nina Berberova: “That day, our assistant Sasha was playing football with King in the school gym. The huge windows of this room overlooked the apple orchard. Sasha left King alone for a few minutes: he went to pour himself some tea. And, apparently, in this moment Markov appeared (I will never forget his name). King saw a new man and approached the window. According to eyewitnesses, Markov began to make faces and jump, turning his face and then his back to the lion. For King, this was a call to play: our assistant. This is how I rehearsed an episode with him for “Italians”, when a lion runs after a man and knocks him to the ground. He stood on his hind legs, squeezed out the glass in the window, ran to this Markov, knocked him to the ground. The girl who was waiting for him at the fence screamed. : “Help, a lion is tearing a man apart!” And then we heard shots. Then we learned that police lieutenant Gurov was returning from his lunch break. He heard the screams, ran up to the fence, not understanding what was happening, and shot at King. The lion immediately walked away. guy towards the broken window. But Gurov, apparently, got excited, and he unloaded the entire clip at King. Student Valentin Markov escaped with only minor scratches."

Usually, in this case, a lion from the circus was invited to filming, along with trainers. “Striped Flight” has already become a classic of Soviet cinema: the film may seem too sweet and naive, but one cannot help but admire the professionalism of the trainers “in the frame.” But the idea of filming not a circus lion, but a “domestic” lion, looked too tempting. Leo was specially given a month to acclimatize, a gymnasium of one of the schools was allocated for housing, and the issue of food was “resolved...

But then it turned out that the “house lion” is used to doing only what he wants, and does not accept or carry out any commands in principle. It was on the set of “The Italians” that Ryazanov made a vow to himself never to film animals in films. He himself assessed King’s abilities in a very unflattering way: “The lion wanted to sneeze on all of us! He was a lazy domestic lion, raised in an intelligent family of an architect, and he did not want to work. This lion did nothing in his life that he did not want. I didn’t care that the group had a tight deadline, that it was necessary to honor the contract with the Italians, that this was a joint production, that a cultural exchange agreement had been concluded between the countries. King turned out to be very irresponsible... Unfortunately, the lion’s abilities were greatly exaggerated! The lion was untrained, ignorant and, in my opinion, stupid. We had a lot of trouble with this sleepy, good-natured and cute animal in a way that is impossible to describe..."

Thus ended the life of the movie star - the King of Beasts. Everyone was very worried and cried. After the film was released abroad, King gained worldwide fame. Posthumously.

From the memoirs of Eva Berberova: “Dad jumped out the window and ran towards the clap. King was lying on his side, not far from the fence, with wide open surprised eyes. Not realizing what was happening, dad rushed to King, hugged him, but King was no longer breathing. At that moment, my mother ran up. A woman’s voice was heard from a small crowd near the fence: “Your lion tore a man apart.” The next morning, everyone was traveling in an open truck, King was covered with some kind of mourning blanket, the headwind moved the mane of the dead lion. dacha to the writer Yakovlev, where the lion had recently visited and where they decided to bury him. I remember a hitch when they started to remove King from the car, the huge circus performer Yura, who worked with us in the film, weeping, pulled everyone away, took King on his shoulders and carried him to him. young oak.

We realized that an irreplaceable part of the soul goes to the grave with King, that this animal, who came to us as a terminally ill cub, was seriously ill many times and was saved by us from death, responded to us with love, devotion, spiritual communication and closeness, becoming our own son, kinship with whom we will be proud all our lives..."

But Chap suffered the most. When we returned to Baku, boxes with King’s things were left in the corridor: collars, leashes, bowls. Chap first ran around, wagging his tail, looking for King, and then climbed into one of the boxes, lay there and sighed. The veterinarian said that he would not live long because he was in a pre-heart attack condition. And indeed, the next day Chap was gone too.

The death of the lion caused serious psychological trauma to family members. At night, the children Eva and Roma screamed hysterically in their sleep: “Kika! Kika! Let’s go home! Kika, don’t go!” It was necessary to save the children. So a second lion cub appeared in the Berberov family, which was also named King in memory of the first lion...

“I was against having a second lion, but my husband insisted on his own,” Nina Berberova seemed to have a premonition of trouble. “And the Moscow intelligentsia was very excited about this idea. Sergei Obraztsov, Yuri Yakovlev, Vladimir Vysotsky, Marina Vladi collected money and began to look for a new lion cub was found throughout the Soviet Union. He was quarantined in Moscow for a month, then he was solemnly presented to us. The second King was not at all like our first favorite: we saved him from death, and he thanked us for this with respect and respect. good attitude, this one demanded that he be respected."

In 1975, based on real facts From the life of the Berberov family, director Konstantin Bromberg and screenwriter Yuri Yakovlev made the film “I Have a Lion.” The main roles were played by King II, Roma and Eva Berberov. King II loved Roma most of all. He became very attached to the boy and obeyed him unquestioningly. Roma rode around King as if he were not a lion, but a racing stallion. But what was allowed to Roma was not allowed to the other members of the film group. King did not tolerate familiarity. Thus, director Bromberg's attempt to make a lion jump into a cold river ended in failure. King bit Bromberg's leg. The lion's fang left a wound eight centimeters deep in the director's thigh... Another time, the lion chopped off half the finger of the camera assistant when he abruptly brought a tape measure to his mouth - measuring the distance from the lion's nose to the film camera. In the end, not without losses, the film starring King II was made. Both children and adults watched it with pleasure... The Berberovs were already negotiating with the studio. Gorky about a new film project. Alas, fate decreed otherwise. The life of King the Second turned out to be as tragic as the life of King the First.

Tragedy - death in the clutches of the King
An idyll reigned in this family, which gave fantastic hopes for the possibility of different relationships between people and animals. All-Union fame is all-Union fame. Heydar Aliyev, who then headed the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, ordered to help the Berberovs. Moreover, the authorities provided them with all possible assistance and provided meat for the animals. They even gave me a minibus, which was an unprecedented act at that time. And suddenly everything collapsed. Tragic events followed one after another. In 1978, after the death of the head of the family, Lev Berberov, from a heart attack, his wife and children found it difficult to handle the lion, and they planned to transfer him to the Berlin Zoo, but these plans could not be realized.

Nina Berberova: “The Second King still considered Lev Lvovich to be the “leader of the pack” and obeyed him, but in 1978 my husband died of a heart attack, and I was left alone with two children, a lion and a house full of animals. At first, the Second King was looking for his owner, called him when he found Leva’s things, lay down on them and hugged me with his paws, he also obeyed me and never showed aggressiveness, so no one even thought about the danger.”

On November 24, 1980, in a fit of aggression, the lion seriously injured Nina Berberova and killed her 14-year-old son Roman. The police arrived and killed the lion and puma.

“That day became a nightmare for me,” recalls Nina Berberova. “In the morning I went to the publishing house: a book was being prepared for printing that my husband and I wrote about all our pets. Then I hurried home to feed the children and animals. When I entered the apartment, I felt the acrid smell of smoke. The second King behaved very strangely, growled and rushed towards the balcony net. Puma Lyalya jumped onto the sofa and hid in the corner. I walked up to the balcony and saw that our neighbor, a complete alcoholic, was setting fire and throwing pieces of plastic at the lion. combs. I exploded: “What are you doing?!” I'll call the police now!" At this time, Roma's son returned from school. First, I sat him down to eat, then I took care of the Second King. I cut the meat and carried the bowl to him. At that time, the lion climbed onto the mezzanine, hung from them, fell off and fell from with all his strength on my back, he jumped up and rushed at me. He tore my head with his paw and threw me on my back.”

Nina Berberova: “I lost consciousness. I woke up only when the shots started. The policemen, who were called by the neighbors, climbed onto the roof from all sides and started shooting. They finished off the Second King when they had already broken the door. The frightened puma at that time jumped out into the street and then she received a bullet in the heart. Although she had no intention of attacking anyone, she was also frightened by everything that was happening.”

Zoologists who studied the habits of predators, circus workers, including the famous trainer Irina Bugrimova, were categorically against it. People's Artist of Ukraine Nikolai Kuntsevich, who worked for many years in the circus as a sprechstalmeister, that is, a “ringmaster,” recalled: “...When I worked at the zoo, I was reprimanded because of Berberova. work book“We had an animal theater at the zoo,” said Kuntsevich. - Nina Berberova came to our performance like a maestress and threw a tantrum that this was a violation of animal rights. I said: “If your first lion King had not been shot on the set of Eldar Ryazanov’s film “The Incredible Adventures of Italians in Russia,” he would still have torn you apart sooner or later.” She flared up: “You don’t understand anything, I have him like a house cat!”

According to many, at this time Vasily Peskov, who worked in the program “In the Animal World,” also met the lion. And during the filming I became convinced that the situation in the apartment resembled a ticking bomb. At first, the lion became interested in a bag with expensive equipment and began to drag it around the apartment, and no one knew how to take this “toy” away from him. Then he “chewed” the trouser leg of one of the journalists. The conclusion was clear: the lion is absolutely untrained and does not obey any commands. Peskov warned the Berberovs “outside the frame”: an “experiment” of this kind is unlikely to end well... However, Peskov himself in the article “Lesson”, published hot on the heels of the tragedy, did not in any way mention the story with the bag and his warning.

But it was not possible to break through the impressive “lobby” of the Moscow creative intelligentsia, whose representatives did not have to live next to a predator, until the tragic end of the “experiment.”

Bloody ending

The denouement came on November 24, 1980. Today it is difficult to judge what event “released the spring”. Berberova herself blames everything on her neighbors, who “didn’t have a good relationship” with the lion. Allegedly, a neighbor - a “complete alcoholic” - threw burning fragments of combs onto the mane of a lion walking on the roof. Other experts, however, claim that the lion was infuriated by the puma’s “estrus,” which categorically rejected his advances. There is a version that Rom’s son began to “train” the lion, but for some reason King II was “out of sorts.”

There is another reason, as Nina Berberova herself admits. If King I was sleepy and good-natured, then his successor turned out to have a bad character. In addition, by this time Lev Lvovich, whom the lion considered the head of the pride, that is, the pack, had died of a heart attack. And King II decided that now he was in charge. And what exactly was the impetus for the denouement, there are different versions,

But, one way or another, 14-year-old Roma was the first to fall under the heavy clutches of the predator. The first blow from the angry predator's paw hit her in the stomach. Then the lion broke his neck vertebrae. Having felt the taste and, most importantly, the smell of blood after the first and, in general, random blow, the predator fell into a frenzy.

At that moment, the mother ran into the room in response to the screams. She tried to calm King down, but the lion pounced on the owner, knocked her down with a blow of his paw, tore off her scalp... The woman managed to literally tear her son’s body out of the lion’s mouth and run to the bathroom. King II rushed with a roar at the door, which Nina Berberova managed to slam, the woman called for help, begged “Remove the lion!”

According to them, neighbors called the police: “Something happened at the Berberovs’ place, you can hear cries for help - it seems there is a fire.” The policeman on duty then said: “What the hell is the fire - it’s probably something else. Take your weapon.”

The picture was terrifying: the walls and floor were covered in blood, in the middle of the room there was a raging predator... There was no time left to think, and the policemen shot to kill,

Then experts say: killing the lion from the police officer Makarov is at least not an easy task. But King II was killed literally with the first shot. They opened the bathroom door, where screams were heard. On the floor in a pool of blood is a boy showing no signs of life. Nearby is a tormented woman.

But at that moment something “flew” over the heads of the people in the room. A puma jumped out into the street... It was managed to be “liquidated” before the animal, which was in an understandable state after the blood and shots, caused trouble...

Many birds and animals still live in Nina Petrovna Berberova’s Baku apartment, but there are no longer lions among them. Only in the most prominent place are photographs of King Sr. and King Jr. displayed. One of them shows Roma tightly hugging King Jr. A double tragedy - the boy died and the lion died. But man and animal loved each other so much...