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Fanari_Lloyd

Abominable Snowman
Joined
May 7, 2012
Messages
582
Hello there. I do apologise if this has been posted before, but I just thought it was interesting; I had not come across the story until very recently. (I am also not certain if it should go on this thread).

This text is taken from the Above Top Secret Website. (Link at the bottom)

'The Nahanni Valley of Canada's Northwest Territories has been called one of the last truly unexplored places in the world. Lying above the 60th Parallel, it is accessible only by air, water or a long overland journey from the village of Tungsten. As a result, much of the area remains unexplored, despite being declared a national park in 1976, and a World Heritage Site in 1978.

Native tales tell of an unknown evil lurking within 200 Mile Gorge, and most avoid the area. Local oral history also tells of a mountain-dwelling tribe known as the Naha. The Naha were feared by the region's Dene people, as they often descended to raid nearby villages. These tales end with the rapid, mysterious disappearance of the Naha. No trace of this tribe has ever been found.

The eerie nickname attached to 200 Mile Gorge is the Valley Of The Headless Men. This name comes from a series of unexplained incidents in the Gorge during the Gold Rush of the early 20th century. Two brothers, Willie and Frank McLeod left in 1906 in an attempt to reach the Klondike through Nahanni. Nothing was heard from them for the next two years. Rumours spoke of the two finding the "mother lode" of gold. Despite this, no efforts were made to find them.

In 1908, another prospecting expedition discovered two bodies, later identified as the McLeod brothers. Both had been decapitated. This incident would likely have been marked up as just another macabre tale of North had they been the only headless bodies. In 1917, the body of a Swiss prospector by the name of Martin Jorgenson was found next to his burned cabin. Decapitated. In 1945, the body of a miner from Ontario, whose name seems to be lost to history, was found in his sleeping bag, without a head. A trapper named John O'Brien was found frozen next to his campfire, matches still clutched in his hand. I cannot find any reference to the state of his head.

Yes, to describe it as cold up above the sixtieth parallel would be an understatement. It was damn near inhospitable – the wolves, the snow and the biting chill, the miles and miles of tree-shrouded mountain ranges. But the Valley was something special. All year round it was an oasis for those of the likes of us. It was warm. It was lush. It was said you could bathe naked in the zigzag streams and pools beneath ice-free cavalcades of rock. The hot sulfur springs did it.

They also gave the place an evil smell, Old Jeff swore. That, and the mists.

The Valley, with its hot spring engines beneath it, created some sort of anomalous weather vortex. The hot sulfur-tinged air rose hundreds and hundreds of feet, sparred with the cooler Arctic air blown down south from the pole, curled and curved back down. The process somehow spawned the mysterious mists that kept the Valley out of reach of more common men.

(The hot springs associated with this valley could very well small bad, we have all smelled sulfur at one point or another and it is not the most pleasant smell.

Interesting to read that there could be a tropical oasis in Canada. It's an interesting thought that the hot springs could heat up the valley enough to provide lush greenery. We have plenty of hot springs here, a couple of the more noted are Radium, and Banff Springs, so the concept is one that could easily be true.

The idea of the mist is also intriguing, creating humidity high enough for it to resemble a topical place is another interesting tidbit in the story. )

The region in the 1920's was one of the few areas in Canada with blank spots. The maps of the area showed two straight lines to indicate the Nahanni and Flat Rivers, in fact one of which was in the wrong place, along with the lone word Falls.

There were persistent rumours of prehistoric animals that ravaged the region. Bones and tusks of mastodons were found. In addition, the native people of the region were able to accurately draw pictures of mastodons on their raw hide. Combined with rumours of cliff dwelling mountain cannibals and weird uncontrolled noises in the Valley it was only the brave who would venture forth.

(The fact that they were drawing mastodons accurately is quite interesting. There is nothing saying if these are older pictures or somewhat new but either way it was interesting. If these are recent drawings then maybe the idea of cloning a Mastodon is useless if we have the living in northern Canada, and if this place can get as tropical as they say well there would be more than enough food for creatures like that to survive. )

This remote section of the Northwest Territories of Canada is a magnificent wilderness with a dark past. Prospectors for gold were found decapitated, and some were never seen again. The fierce Naha tribe had also vanished without trace years before. Rumours of evil forces gained strength, but when one visits this unforgiving environment, as R. M. Patterson did in the 1920s, one might understand the dangers that one might face, notably the perilous ice caves, sinkholes, thundering waterfalls, such as the Virginia Falls and the cold.'

Link to article Here:

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread787656/pg1

Link to a picture of the Nahanni Valley here:

http://raven-talesoftheweird.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/valley-of-headless-men.html[/url]
 
Hello Fanari_Lioyd and welcome to the forum. I've come across this story before, I think it was in one of Shuker's books. Anyway when I first read about it it centered speculation that it was a result of the rampages of a cryptid/Indian legend called the Waheela(?). Apparently this was a giant wolf like animal, speculated to be a possible surviving bear dog or Amphicyonidae.
Which links in nicely with your mention of prehistoric animals.
 
Thank-you, OldRover. I have been reading for ages, but couldn't think of anything interesting to contribute. :?
I just googled waheela, so thank-you for that!
 
I've heard this story before as well, thanks for making a thread. I've got a fascination with 'far north' weirdness - I suppose it comes from reading a lot of Arctic survival/exploration-type stories as a child. The unimaginably vast and desolate nature of the places described really left an impression on me, as did the ...well, almost malevolence of the climate and geography.

The Nahanni Valley hotspot reminds me of Thomas Bay, Alaska in some ways: both are in very remote and inhospitable subarctic locations, both feature strange and possibly hostile unknown animals, and both are marked by bizarre and unexplained deaths and disappearances.

('The Strangest Story Ever Told' by a man named Harry D. Colp took place there; it's in essence a kind of Yeti story, but very unlike most, since he claims several people were killed or driven mad in encounters with a small army of the creatures, who do not conform to more typical descriptions in terms of size or behavior, and whose appearance in the area coincided with a lot of other Fortean phenomena such as missing time. The story is available in a kind of modern-day chapbook, and while the first part of it is available online, there's a lot more to the story, so I highly recommend tracking down a copy if you're interested in this sort of thing.)

I'm got the day off, so I'll spend at least a few rainy hours of it trying to search out some old newspaper stories or something regarding the murders (presumably, considering decapitation is such a recurring feature, so accident or suicide seems unlikely) in the Nahanni Valley, I'll post up anything I come across.

EDIT: Found a few things already!

Here's a link to a newspaper article from 1947 which seems to be debunking a few of the myths about the Headless Valley specifically. Although the Deseret News appears to be based out of Utah, so I'm not entirely sure why they'd be running a feature on a somewhat obscure Northwestern Canadian location.

Two names keep cropping up in conjunction with stories about this region. The first of which is a man named Phillip H. Godsell. He worked for the Hudson's Bay Company in the early part of the 20th century, and seems to have spent his retirement writing pulpy adventure memoirs. Here are some of his books on amazon.ca. I've never read any of them, but it seems like just the sort of stuff I would've loved as a kid. Somewhere in one of those books is a lot of information about the Nahanni Valley/Headless Valley legends, which it seems like he did a fair bit to popularize.

The second is someone named Poole Field, who was a former member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and a prospector who operated out of the general area during roughly the same time period. Canadian National Archives seem to have some of his letters preserved, and he is actually named in several versions of the legend as the person who found Martin Jorgenson's skeletal remains outside of his burned cabin in 1917.

(It is said that the skull was never found (headlessness again), but in truth, if you find a body in a wilderness location like that, which has been exposed long enough to skeletonize, it should not be suprising at all if some parts are missing - scavengers almost certainly scattered or carried off various bits. So I don't know if this really 'counts' as another truly headless body in this region, since it doesn't seem as though he were deliberately decapitated. In fact he might not even have been murdered according to the linked source, since the possibility of a bear attack is brought up more than once. And a lightning strike sometime afterward would certainly explain the burned cabin, but then again, it could all be down to murder as well, since setting fires is a very common way of trying (and often failing) to conceal a crime.)

Now then, from this small amount of looking around, it seems like the body of the legend, as posted on various 'spooky stories' type sites, isn't quite so cut-and-dry as it appears. Fair enough, legends so seldom pan out exactly the way they're told, but at least something out of the ordinary might still be going on with this general area nonetheless. It is undeniable that the MacLeod Brothers were murdered in the area after rumors began to spread that they'd found gold, and the actual description of the crime scene I came across mentions the bodies as having been decapitated and tied to trees with notes pinned to them. What was in those notes is not mentioned aside from a vague 'they found gold' rumor, and whoever was responsible for the crime was never caught. Yet another rumor, however, mentions an unidentified third person prospecting with them, who conveniently seemed to vanish prior to the bodies being found, so perhaps there's your murder suspect?

I'll keep digging, but I wanted to share what I'd run across so far and see if anyone else has come across more information. There's a surprising amount of stuff free for the googling in this case, although a lot of it is just rehashes of the headlessness legends.
 
Thank-you for your response Atomic Badger, and wow, a lot to delve into!

The unimaginably vast and desolate nature of the places described really left an impression on me, as did the ...well, almost malevolence of the climate and geography.

This is where much of my fascination has its root. (And reading Silver Chief when I was a child, thinking how vast, cold and unfriendly the 'great white north' could be from a fireside in rural Oxfordshire)

Living in the temperate and relatively tame south of England, it's very hard for me to properly envisage such huge and inimical landscapes, or to remind myself that parts of the world remain almost unpopulated. I think it struck me when I recently saw a wonderful ISS image of Earth's city lights at night (Second from last here: http://www.lovethesepics.com/2011/10/iss-envy-breathtaking-views-of-earth/ ) and saw those places which are not ablaze with artificial light. Somehow that lead me to the Nahanni Valley story.

I'd never heard of Thomas Bay, thank-you so much for that.

I wouldn't find gold prospectors being murdered such a strange thing, (and I agree that if a body is left long enough scavengers would scatter the bones) but I wished more had been written on this: Native tales tell of an unknown evil lurking within 200 Mile Gorge, and most avoid the area. Local oral history also tells of a mountain-dwelling tribe known as the Naha. The Naha were feared by the region's Dene people, as they often descended to raid nearby villages. These tales end with the rapid, mysterious disappearance of the Naha. No trace of this tribe has ever been found.

But I suppose the idea of 'strangeness' in a place that is so remote, even these days, (and it certainly looks it, from the images) that really intrigued me.

Thank-you for your Googling skills that brought more to light!
 
Knew I'd forgotten something, here's what I found about the Naha - this is taken from the Canadian Parks website:

(From Herb Norwegian - Fort Simpson Band Chief)
"Legend tells us that Ndambadezha (Yamonja) was a spiritual person who travelled this great land. Umoria means ‘the man who walked the great shore’ because this was all water a long time ago. During the Ice Age, it was never touched by ice. It was a gorge, where it was almost like a Garden of Eden. And the Naha, they lived there for hundreds of years, and from there, they became a great tribe.

They were raiders. They came down the great rivers and they took advantage of whoever was living there. It came to a point where the people in the flats and lowlands couldn't put up with the continuous raiding every year, so finally the elders got together and said ‘we got to put a stop to this’. They were on top of the mountain and they knew the Nahande people were down there and they attacked. To their great surprise, they found out that in these teepees, around the campfire, that there wasn't anybody around."

Not 100% sure I'm parsing that story correctly, but apparently it may be more than just legend, since anthropologists seem to feel there may be a link between the Naha and the Navajo. Oddly enough, reading what you'd posted about the Naha, I immediately thought of the Navajo, since another name for them is Diné, and the Navajo as well have legends about a disappearing hostile tribe, namely, the Anasazi. So I wondered if maybe there wasn't just some confusion in the legends, or even an outright connection, and obviously, I'm not the first to wonder that either:

In some versions of the story, the Naha were tracked down and killed, in others the warriors simply disappeared. Anthropologists have recently discovered surprising similarities in legend between the lost tribe of the Naha and the Navajo of the American southwest. In fact, Slavey Dene visiting Arizona have found they can converse quite comfortably with the Navajo, perhaps the descendants of their enemies from long ago.

As to an evil presence in the gorge and native peoples avoiding the area, I'm a bit torn. It's somewhat common for any warning from a native populace about a place to be interpreted as 'evil spirits live there', when in actual point of fact, all that may have been warned about were completely non-supernatural dangers like flash floods or sink holes - even 'we don't hang around there for perfectly normal if decidedly non-Western monotheistic religious reasons' is often interpreted as 'here be monsters'. Then again, if an area's legitimately weird that way, who'd know it better than the people who've been living near it for ages?

It's a great story in any case though, with plenty of mysterious elements to it to fascinate - whether you take the tack of paranormal events, or unsolved anthrolopological mysteries, or simply the compelling image of the trackless wilderness, so thanks again for making this thread. Tons of entertainment on a rainy day!
 
This pilot's extensive report of a day trip surveying the Nahanni area:

http://www.btinternet.com/~miscellaneou ... hanni4.htm

... contains a number of points interrelating various legends (as the pilot heard / relates them ...) and specific locales within the watershed.

This is the only account I've found which (a) specifies the Naha 'base camp' location and (b) claims the retreat / disappearance of the Naha occurred within historical times (according to this report - the 1880's).

The South Nahanni was once the home to the Naha Indians who ranged the whole river from their base camp at Prairie Creek in Deadmen Valley. The Naha themselves believed in a protector, Ndambadezha, The Good Giant Spirit who was supposed to dwell in the Rabbitkettle Hotsprings. They were a ferocious tribe who raided and fought widely. It was this reputation that brought about the legend, still commonly held at the turn of the century, that told of a people, hostile to strangers, who were apparently dominated by a woman of partly European origin. Reputation also had it that they had killed a number of white pioneers. However, they were eventually chased out of the area by the peaceful Dene Indians in the 1880's who still inhabit Nahanni Butte Village and Fort Liard.
 
Thank-you Atomic Badger and Enola Gaia, because you made this topic even more interesting than the original.

It's a great story in any case though, with plenty of mysterious elements to it to fascinate - whether you take the tack of paranormal events, or unsolved anthrolopological mysteries, or simply the compelling image of the trackless wilderness, so thanks again for making this thread. Tons of entertainment on a rainy day!

Yes, it has been, and I find your musings about the Naha and the Navajo fascinating:
Oddly enough, reading what you'd posted about the Naha, I immediately thought of the Navajo, since another name for them is Diné, and the Navajo as well have legends about a disappearing hostile tribe, namely, the Anasazi. So I wondered if maybe there wasn't just some confusion in the legends, or even an outright connection, and obviously, I'm not the first to wonder that either:

and also this:

It was this reputation that brought about the legend, still commonly held at the turn of the century, that told of a people, hostile to strangers, who were apparently dominated by a woman of partly European origin.

Places being 'legitimately weird' is probably a whole different, but related topic. I am sure a lot of people have been to places that don't feel 'right' to them (this reminds me a little of the 'Panic' thread, which I ought to post something on because my sister had a rather odd experience last year, with her eldest daughter) but probably many are human responses to danger of some sort or another. Still, it is interesting to think about. Again thank-you very much for such intriguing replies!
 
Interesting to read that there could be a tropical oasis in Canada. It's an interesting thought that the hot springs could heat up the valley enough to provide lush greenery. We have plenty of hot springs here, a couple of the more noted are Radium, and Banff Springs, so the concept is one that could easily be true.

I actually wrote a report on the Nahanni Valley which focused on how simple suggestions got blown out of proportion when passed by word of mouth; this, sadly, is one of them.

There was a (nunnery? Something like that) and they had a greenhouse. The greenhouse was kept at tropical temperatures via the hot springs, so they were able to grow (specifically) bananas. Once word got out, it was a short leap from "Some nuns are growing bananas in a greenhouse in the middle of a frigid wasteland" to "Hey, guys, there's this tropical area up north in some valley! Bananas even grow there, it's so warm!"

I do suppose there could be something very strange about the area, but I just had to clear that one up.

Sorry to be a Fortean spoilsport (again).
 
You're not being a Fortean spoilsport at all. We question everything, I think?

Once word got out, it was a short leap from "Some nuns are growing bananas in a greenhouse in the middle of a frigid wasteland" to "Hey, guys, there's this tropical area up north in some valley! Bananas even grow there, it's so warm!"

I don't know why this made me giggle, but it did.

It's true that things can get blown up out of all proportion.
[/quote]
 
Fanari_Lloyd said:
Once word got out, it was a short leap from "Some nuns are growing bananas in a greenhouse in the middle of a frigid wasteland" to "Hey, guys, there's this tropical area up north in some valley! Bananas even grow there, it's so warm!"
I don't know why this made me giggle, but it did.
Out of all the fruit they could have grown, why did the nuns choose bananas?
I have absolutely no idea... ;)
 
Why does everyone who has a decent greenhouse grow bananas (like the Icelanders do)

why not pineapples?
 
Thanks AtomicBadger for the reference to "The Strangest Story Ever Told".

I tracked down a copy on Amazon, it's one of those sort of local lore pamphlets you see in gift shops, six accounts from the original source, Harry Colp, and another related story he heard second hand. In all total, this isn't much more than a long article's worth, so you probably don't want to go crazy with the $$$$ to get your hands on a copy.

One aspect of the stories I wasn't expecting was the lost time / people going batty in the wilderness. If it weren't for the last, second-hand, story, one could almost take these to be purely psychological occurrences.
 
"I wouldn't find gold prospectors being murdered such a strange thing ".
When the infamous Mad Trapper of Rat River was finally killed in the Yukon, he has a jar of alluvial gold in his pocket, taken from some poor miner no doubt. Also numerous gold teeth. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Johnson_(criminal)

I remember being told this story at school when I was a kid in Ottawa. Our history teacher was the coolest.

(oh and BTW - I have to eat a banana a day to replace the potassium from my blood pressure pills!)
 
Hello there. I do apologise if this has been posted before, but I just thought it was interesting; I had not come across the story until very recently. (I am also not certain if it should go on this thread).

This text is taken from the Above Top Secret Website. (Link at the bottom)

'The Nahanni Valley of Canada's Northwest Territories has been called one of the last truly unexplored places in the world. Lying above the 60th Parallel, it is accessible only by air, water or a long overland journey from the village of Tungsten. As a result, much of the area remains unexplored, despite being declared a national park in 1976, and a World Heritage Site in 1978.

Native tales tell of an unknown evil lurking within 200 Mile Gorge, and most avoid the area. Local oral history also tells of a mountain-dwelling tribe known as the Naha. The Naha were feared by the region's Dene people, as they often descended to raid nearby villages. These tales end with the rapid, mysterious disappearance of the Naha. No trace of this tribe has ever been found.

The eerie nickname attached to 200 Mile Gorge is the Valley Of The Headless Men. This name comes from a series of unexplained incidents in the Gorge during the Gold Rush of the early 20th century. Two brothers, Willie and Frank McLeod left in 1906 in an attempt to reach the Klondike through Nahanni. Nothing was heard from them for the next two years. Rumours spoke of the two finding the "mother lode" of gold. Despite this, no efforts were made to find them.

In 1908, another prospecting expedition discovered two bodies, later identified as the McLeod brothers. Both had been decapitated. This incident would likely have been marked up as just another macabre tale of North had they been the only headless bodies. In 1917, the body of a Swiss prospector by the name of Martin Jorgenson was found next to his burned cabin. Decapitated. In 1945, the body of a miner from Ontario, whose name seems to be lost to history, was found in his sleeping bag, without a head. A trapper named John O'Brien was found frozen next to his campfire, matches still clutched in his hand. I cannot find any reference to the state of his head.

Yes, to describe it as cold up above the sixtieth parallel would be an understatement. It was damn near inhospitable – the wolves, the snow and the biting chill, the miles and miles of tree-shrouded mountain ranges. But the Valley was something special. All year round it was an oasis for those of the likes of us. It was warm. It was lush. It was said you could bathe naked in the zigzag streams and pools beneath ice-free cavalcades of rock. The hot sulfur springs did it.

They also gave the place an evil smell, Old Jeff swore. That, and the mists.

The Valley, with its hot spring engines beneath it, created some sort of anomalous weather vortex. The hot sulfur-tinged air rose hundreds and hundreds of feet, sparred with the cooler Arctic air blown down south from the pole, curled and curved back down. The process somehow spawned the mysterious mists that kept the Valley out of reach of more common men.

(The hot springs associated with this valley could very well small bad, we have all smelled sulfur at one point or another and it is not the most pleasant smell.

Interesting to read that there could be a tropical oasis in Canada. It's an interesting thought that the hot springs could heat up the valley enough to provide lush greenery. We have plenty of hot springs here, a couple of the more noted are Radium, and Banff Springs, so the concept is one that could easily be true.

The idea of the mist is also intriguing, creating humidity high enough for it to resemble a topical place is another interesting tidbit in the story. )

The region in the 1920's was one of the few areas in Canada with blank spots. The maps of the area showed two straight lines to indicate the Nahanni and Flat Rivers, in fact one of which was in the wrong place, along with the lone word Falls.

There were persistent rumours of prehistoric animals that ravaged the region. Bones and tusks of mastodons were found. In addition, the native people of the region were able to accurately draw pictures of mastodons on their raw hide. Combined with rumours of cliff dwelling mountain cannibals and weird uncontrolled noises in the Valley it was only the brave who would venture forth.

(The fact that they were drawing mastodons accurately is quite interesting. There is nothing saying if these are older pictures or somewhat new but either way it was interesting. If these are recent drawings then maybe the idea of cloning a Mastodon is useless if we have the living in northern Canada, and if this place can get as tropical as they say well there would be more than enough food for creatures like that to survive. )

This remote section of the Northwest Territories of Canada is a magnificent wilderness with a dark past. Prospectors for gold were found decapitated, and some were never seen again. The fierce Naha tribe had also vanished without trace years before. Rumours of evil forces gained strength, but when one visits this unforgiving environment, as R. M. Patterson did in the 1920s, one might understand the dangers that one might face, notably the perilous ice caves, sinkholes, thundering waterfalls, such as the Virginia Falls and the cold.'

Link to article Here:

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread787656/pg1

Link to a picture of the Nahanni Valley here:

http://raven-talesoftheweird.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/valley-of-headless-men.html[/url]

Alaska: Mysteries Unsolved | Season 1 Episode 8 links the Naha to some mysterious disappearances in Alaska
 
The Nahanni Valley is tucked in the MacKenzie Mountain region in Northwestern Canada, a beautiful place by all accounts, but steeped in in the dusty annals of folklore and myth. First settled nine to ten thousand years ago, the area has since been dubbed “the Valley of Headless Men” due to a series of unexplained beheadings.

According to legend, most native tribes avoided the region, believing it to be haunted. Rumors spread of ghosts and devils, of strange creatures that lurked in the forests. The Naha people, an inherently violent tribe, settled there regardless. During frequent raids outside of the valley, they were known to claim the heads of their victims. Their blood-soaked legacy came to abrupt end when the entire tribe inexplicably disappeared. No trace was ever discovered what became of them.

Fast forward to the 18th Century. Prospectors and miners descended on the region, lured by rumors of gold. In 1908, like many before them, brothers Frank and Willie McLeod arrived to seek their fortune. The pair gathered their gear and headed into the wilderness, but never returned. A year later their bodies were found along a riverbank, minus the heads.

Another prospector, Martin Jorgeson, burned to death in his cabin in 1917. When his skeleton was found among the charred remains, his head was missing. In 1945, a miner from Ontario was discovered dead in his sleeping bag. Like the others, he had been decapitated. In all cases, the missing heads were never found.

Had the ghosts of Naha warriors returned to inflict retribution on those who ventured into their domain? Whoever—or whatever—the culprit, the legends of beheadings left a permanent mark on the valley. Macabre place names are common. Headless Creek, Funeral Range, Deadman Valley and Headless Range, all speak of the grisly tales from which they sprang.

But unexplained beheadings aren’t the only unsolved occurrences to plague Nahanni. Many people have simply vanished without a trace. Others fortunate enough to return speak of an unseen presence, constantly watching. Rumors of mysterious lights, Bigfoot sightings, and UFOs are common. Some whisper the Nahanni Valley is a thin spot—a rare location where dimensions are easily breached by crossing through a fragile veil. Others believe the region may harbor a secret entrance to the Hollow Earth.

Riddled with hot springs, caves and gorges, this rugged terrain is frequently shrouded in mist. Perhaps a warning to stay away. Despite the gorgeous scenery, the “Valley of Headless Men” certainly isn’t a name to encourage tourism.


Source:
https://maeclair.net/tag/naha-tribe/
 
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