Natascha Kampusch

Sept. 6: Natascha Kampusch, who was held prisoner in an Austrian cellar for eight years, has finally revealed the extent of her abuse at the hands of her kidnapper.

In her autobiography she tells how she was beaten up to 200 times a week, chained to her captor while they slept together in his bed and forced to shave off her hair and work half-naked as a domestic slave.

Kampusch, now 22, was kidnapped at the age of 10 by Wolfgang Priklopil and was confined to a cellar under his garage in Austria.

Her book, entitled 3,096 Days in reference to the amount of time she was held captive, will be published on Wednesday in a deal which reportedly will earn her £1 million.

“I now feel strong enough to tell the full story of my abduction,” she said. She writes that Priklopil forced her to refer to him as “My Lord” or “Maestro”, and told her “You’re no longer Natascha. Now you belong to me.”

She claims that she was beaten so badly by Priklopil that he broke her bones. “He hated it when the pain made me cry. Then he’d grab me by the throat, drag me to the sink, push my head underwater and squeeze my windpipe until I almost lost consciousness.

“I also vividly remember the snapping sound in my vertebrae when Priklopil struck my head repeatedly with his fist.”

In her autobiography, which is being serialised in the Daily Mail, Kampusch writes about the trauma of lacking human contact.

“Yet I was still a child, and I needed the consolation of touch. So, after a few months underground, I asked my kidnapper to embrace me.

“It was difficult. I went into a claustrophobic panic when he held me too tight. After several attempts, though, we managed to find a way — not too close, not too tight, and yet tight enough so that I could imagine feeling a loving, caring touch.”

She also tells how Priklopil forced her to share his bed. “When I was 14, I spent the night above ground for the first time. I lay stiff with fright on his bed as he lay down next to me and tied my wrists to his with plastic cuffs. I wasn’t allowed to make a sound.”

Kampusch escaped at the age of 18 on August 23, 2006. Tipped off that the police were about to arrest him, Priklopil, 44, committed suicide by jumping in front of a train.