Thailand's Boonreung Buachan, holder of the Guinness Book of World Records title for spending the most time penned up with snakes, was killed by a cobra which bit him during his daily show, a hospital doctor said on Monday.
Boonreung, 34 and dubbed Snake Man, was rushed unconscious to Prai Bung Hospital near his home town, 570 km (350 miles) north-east of Bangkok, Dr Wipa Praituan told Reuters.
"He was brought here with no signs of life. He wasn't breathing and his heart didn't beat," she said.
Boonreung was listed by the "Guinness Book of World Records" in 1998 after living with snakes in a glass box for seven days.
An epileptic, he went into convulsions after being bitten, but no one took him to the hospital initially because they thought he was suffering an epileptic fit.
Boonreung's father said he would give his son's 30 snakes to a zoo because nobody in the family dared deal with them.