A jealous husband 'cut off both his wife's hands' in a fit of rage after he accused her of having an affair.

Doctors have managed to save one of the woman's hands during emergency surgery but have not been able to re-attach the other.

Dmitry Grachyov, 26, launched the medieval-style attack at his wife Margarita after he accused her of being unfaithful, reports the Mirror.

He took the mother of his two children to a forest, say reports in Moscow, and used an axe to hit her fingers as he tried to torture her in for confessing.

The woman denied the accusations, according to police reports, so Grachyov is said to have one hand then the other.

Blood gushing from both arms, Grachyov is then reported to have driven his wife to hospital and gave himself up to police.

Margarita needed a ‘highly complex’ nine-hour operation to reconnect one hand after the attack by her husband who has been called ‘Othello with an axe’.

The right hand and arm was ‘too damaged’ in the gruesome attack to be saved, say doctors.

A video showed Grachyov in a court cage after he was detained.

He has been remanded in custody pending investigations into the incident.

The couple have been married five years and have two children, sons aged three and four.

Before attacking her, he demanded she be tested on a lie detected. She agreed but he mutilated her anyway, said police.

Friends saw the couple as ‘close and loving’.

A colleague of Margarita, who worked in marketing and was organising a beauty contest in Moscow region, said: ‘She's really open. But she didn't tell me anything was wrong’.

Other friends said she was preparing to divorce her husband.

She had previously called the police over her husband's behaviour, but they only ‘talked to him’, according to one report.

A family friend called Dmitry said he had once told her: ‘I'll kill you. If need be, I'll go to jail.’

The unnamed micro surgeon, who believes his team saved one hand, said: 'We started at 6.50pm, finished at 3.50am.

'Let's hope that it is not in vain because so many people participated in seeking to (mend the severed hand.’

He said: ‘The case shocked even us. A normal person cannot do this.’

The chief physician of City Hospital No 7 in Serpukhov, Alexander Myasnikov, said: ‘I am immensely proud of my doctors. This was an outrageous case - a young woman had both hands cut off.

‘I just cannot show the original pictures. It is just a bloody mess, even I have to strain and prepare myself to look at them.

‘The surgical team did an incredible job - sewing her up even though this seemed impossible at first.’

The macabre attack was near Panikovo village on December 11.