Psychology Today | 19.06.2026 21:31
On a rocky slope in the White Mountains of California lives the oldest non-clonal tree in the world—a Great Basin Bristlecone Pine that (as of 2026) has been alive for 5,076 years. Ask most people to name the oldest animal ever recorded, and they might suggest a tortoise (194 years old) or a bowhead whale (~200 years old). Remarkably, the oldest recorded animal is a Quahog clam (nicknamed “Ming”) harvested off the coast of Iceland in 2007. A count of its growth rings revealed that this individual lived for 507 years. And, on August 4, 1997, Jeanne Calment of Arles, France, passed away, having lived for a total of 122 years, 164 days—the oldest authenticated human being on record.
