Why The Food From The Middle Ages Was Dangerous
One of the everyday dangers of life in the Middle Ages was something that should have helped prolong life but often didn't. Their food could kill them.
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The Disturbing Thing That People Ate During The Stone Age
To add insult to injury, it's pretty likely that once a Stone Age man, woman, or child died, their surviving friends and family would mourn their loss while simultaneously celebrating a sudden bounty of food by eating the deceased.
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The Truth About The Absolute Silence In Alcatraz
Perhaps the harshest rule Warden Johnston implemented was the mandate of almost total silence throughout the prison.
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Who Are The Men Who Have Walked On The Moon?
We walked on the moon for the first time in 1969, and since then there's been a rarefied group of people who've set foot on our planetary satellite. The United States no longer sends people to the moon on missions, so the group remains small. (And no, there's no evidence we faked it.)
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Here's Why There Were Often Kids Around Alcatraz
A prison can't operate without staff, including Alcatraz. Many of the police officers, prison guards, and other staff who worked in the prison lived on the island with their families, including young children. There was another side to the island, where staff kept their homes and raised kids.
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The Truth About The Serpent In The Garden Of Eden
The Biblical story of the Garden of Eden centers around four key characters: God, Adam, Eve, and the serpent. To many, the serpent is a particularly interesting character, representing cunning and evil, standing in opposition to God's goodness and grace.
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The Time Harriet Tubman Fell Victim To A Conman
One of Tubman's encounters with danger stands out from the rest, but not because of a slave owner or someone on the hunt for her reward money. It came from a hustler who was uncommonly good at his job, who left Tubman beaten and bound in the woods of Auburn, New York.
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How Many Men Did Billy The Kid Kill?
In August 1877, during a poker game, McCarty trades insults with a local blacksmith, Francis Cahill. The game turns violent. Cahill pins McCarty to the ground, and McCarty shoots. Cahill dies two days later.
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What's Actually In The Ark Of The Covenant?
It's been connected to the Knights Templar, and some believe it wound up in Ethiopia. But what exactly is really supposed to be inside the Ark, anyway?
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The Untold Truth Of Civil War Photographer Mathew Brady
The 19th-century photographer Mathew Brady, who went from taking portraits of the rich and famous to taking death portraits on Civil War battlefields, is known for depicting the cost of war. The truth of Civil War photographer Mathew Brady is he funded the photojournalism himself and went into debt.
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The Truth About The Brutal Punishments In Alcatraz
With voguish gangsters and bootleggers like Al "Scarface" Capone and George "Machine Gun Kelly" Barnes capturing the public's attention, the government knew it needed an equally dramatic response to their sensational criminality, one that would strike fear in the hearts of potential lawbreakers.
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There Are Actually Two Gardens Of Eden. Here's How
Religious texts explain more about the Garden -- for instance, that the Garden of Eden consisted of two gardens. According to the Jewish Encyclopedia, there were both a "higher" and a "lower" Garden.
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The Jobs Prisoners Had In Alcatraz
Even Alcatraz prisoners who didn't have access to jobs had to get to work first thing in the morning.
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The Greatest Mathematician Of Ancient Alexandria Was A Woman
Hypatia was born in Alexandria, Egypt. She was a scientist, educator, and intellectual, though many details of her life remain obscured. She was a brilliant woman who was deeply tied to Alexandra's reputation as a center of learning and progress.
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The Fascinating Story Of 19th Century Paleontologist Mary Anning
Mary Anning, who devoted most of her life to uncovering and preparing fossils, found some of the most astounding ancient creatures ever revealed in Britain.
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Charity Events That Turned Into Total Disasters
A charity event puts everyone to work toward a common goal and is usually for something that no one can argue about. Every once in a while a charity event occurs that is a disaster unto itself. Here are some of the biggest, grandest, charity disasters.
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The Strange Way People In Ancient Rome And Greece Tried To Get Back At Their Enemies
From curses to enslavement to the downright weird, the Ancient Greco-Romans had it all. And, one of these revenge methods was certainly as strange as they come: using the enemies' names as toilet paper.
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A Look Into The Royal Curse Queen Victoria Carried
Queen Victoria carried with her a royal curse, one that she passed on to other royals. Unlike that episode of Doctor Who, where Queen Victoria passed on lycanthropy to her heirs, her royal curse is more of a medical nature: She was a carrier for hemophilia.
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How JFK's Bad Back May Have Contributed To His Death
In the 2017 report, researchers speculated on whether the brace kept Kennedy sitting upright after he'd been shot in the neck by Lee Harvey Oswald. Had the president not been wearing it, he may have crumpled forward, making it more difficult for Oswald to fire the fatal second shot.
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Where Is The Garden Of Eden Located?
When trying to locate the physical, actual inspiration for the Garden of Eden, you might assume that we'd be looking for a pretty lush, verdant expanse stuffed full of bountiful fruits. But there have been a lot of climate changes in the Middle East going back to, oh, 10,000 BCE or so.
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Why Medicine Was Deadly During The Crusades
It was the Middle Ages; things were bound to be terrible compared to now. The sad thing is, even if people lived through the hunger and the wars, a doctor might end up killing them instead. Medicine, especially military medicine during the Crusades, was crude and often very dangerous.
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The Crazy True Story Of The New England Vampire Panic
Before Robert Koch discovered the tubercular bacillus in 1882, the lack of understanding of the bacteria and the disease it caused led to some wild theories and attempts to curb the spread of tuberculosis. Surprisingly, this intersected with vampire legends in an especially curious manner.
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Islands That The United States Has Stolen
The United States has made some decidedly imperialistic moves in its history. Here are some islands that the United States has stolen.
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The Most Mysterious Geoglyphs On The Planet
Geoglyphs are basically designs that someone's made on the surface of the earth, through etchings or piling up elements to create a picture. Geoglyphs can be found throughout the world. These are the most mysterious geoglyphs on the planet, from Peru to Ohio.
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How The First Televised Presidential Debate Changed History Forever
In today's cutthroat political era, Americans are used to hearing a lot about presidential elections, but it wasn't always like that.
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The Odd Reason People In Ancient Sudan Had Excellent Teeth
Once humans started eating more grain, "bacteria in the human mouth flourished, pouring out acids that eat away at the teeth." The Sudanese skeletons belonged to farmers, so why were their teeth in such great shape?
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The True Story Of How Britain Destroyed Their Files On Colonialism
Britain destroyed and withheld evidence of crimes in Africa with the explicit purpose of being kept out of the hands of post-independence governments.
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