Autism Was Being Documented 100 Years Ago — Why Were We Never Told?

People often talk about autism as though it suddenly appeared in modern society.

As though it is something “new.”

Something caused by screens, parenting, processed food, or the modern world.

But autism did not suddenly emerge.

People have always been autistic.

What changed was our understanding.

Long before autism had a name, those that were autistic were already living in a world that did not understand them. Many were labelled as difficult, shy, eccentric, sensitive, gifted, strange, troublesome, lazy, obsessive, or emotionally detached.

Some were isolated.

Some were misunderstood.

Some spent their entire lives trying to fit into a world that expected them to think, communicate, and experience life differently.

In 1925, a Soviet psychiatrist called Grunya Sukhareva published detailed descriptions of children whose traits are now clearly recognisable as autism.

This was nearly twenty years before autism became widely known in Western medicine.

What is remarkable is not just how early her work was, but how accurate it was.

When modern researchers compared her descriptions to today’s diagnostic criteria, the similarities were striking.

She described children who:

• struggled socially but were often highly intelligent

• had intense interests and deep knowledge in specific subjects

• preferred routine and predictability

• experienced sensory differences

• communicated differently from their peers

• found social interaction exhausting or confusing

• displayed strong attention to detail

Reading her work today feels surprisingly modern.

And that raises an important question.

If autism was being described so clearly over 100 years ago… how long had those that were autistic existed before that?

The answer is almost certainly: throughout human history.

The difference is that society did not yet have the language to explain what it was seeing.

Before neurodevelopmental research existed, those that were autistic may have been viewed through completely different lenses depending on the time period.

Some may have been described as eccentric scholars or inventors.

Some as socially withdrawn.

Some as rebellious children.

Some as mentally ill.

Others may simply have learned to mask their differences to survive.

History is full of people whose behaviours, thinking styles, sensitivities, routines, or intense interests would likely be recognised very differently today.

That does not mean we can diagnose historical figures from a distance.

But it does remind us that autism is not a “modern epidemic.”

Recognition has changed.

Awareness has changed.

Language has changed.

Society has changed.

But those that are autistic have always existed.

For generations, many who were autistic lived without explanation, support, understanding, or acceptance. Some spent their entire lives believing they were simply “wrong” somehow because nobody understood the way their brain worked.

That is why recognition matters.

Not because autism is suddenly appearing.

But because people finally have words for experiences that have existed for a very long time.

And perhaps one of the most important parts of this history is remembering the people whose work helped us begin to understand autism in the first place.

For many years, Grunya Sukhareva’s contribution was largely forgotten.

Now, more people are finally beginning to recognise the importance of her work and the role she played in the early understanding of autism.

History did not begin when autism was named.

People had always been autistic.

Society just did not yet understand what it was seeing.