"When Mehmed (II) saw the ravages, the destruction and the deserted houses and all that had perished and become ruins, then a great sadness took possession of him and he repented the pillage and all the destruction. Tears came to his eyes ..."
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Picture a rhino... with fur. That's the woolly rhino, and once upon a time, it was real.
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Out of all of history's serial killers, the Axeman of New Orleans is perhaps the most remarkable, for two reasons. First, he was never identified, and secondly, he's standing right behind you.
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Compared to some televangelists, Joel Osteen has kept himself relatively free of scandals. But he's not squeaky clean. Osteen has plenty of critics, who are quick to point out that the powerful preacher man is not without his controversies. Let's look at the troubled history of Joel Osteen.
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The UFO sighting took place at the long-since defunct Burrett College during the wee morning hours. As the sun rose over the school, a group of students noticed something peculiar. More specifically, two things: glowing orbs.
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In June of 2001, a soft-spoken old white guy hit the soft-spoken old white guy lottery when he brought his grandmother's old Navajo blanket to an Antiques Roadshow taping and discovered that it had more than just sentimental value. It was worth big time money.
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Look at the pictures from the night of Abraham Lincoln's assassination with an inquisitive eye and you'll notice that, along with the Lincolns and a failed actor, there's another couple in frame. The Lincolns had guests with them that night. Their names were Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris.
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Simon has played out the Who of "You're So Vain" since the very beginning. She auctioned off the answer to benefit a charity, under the condition that the winner was forbidden to reveal the name (or is it names?). (The name -- whichever it is -- has an "e" in it. She said.)
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It's a scene repeated ad nauseam in World War II films. "I'd hardly arrived when the SS showed up at the door and demanded, 'Come with us!'" Margo Wölk's recalls of her experiences, which she recounted to the German magazine Der Spiegel.
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Throughout history, explorers ventured into uncharted territories to source a body of water that could turn back biological clocks, but how seriously did they take their quests for curing waters? Here is the perplexing, sometimes tragic history of the search for the Fountain of Youth.
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There were at least three items that defined Aztec life. Without them, the Aztecs wouldn't have been who they were. One was endearing. Another had horrifying implications. And the third ... kind of brings everything together and helps put their culture into sharper focus.
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Feuding artists can behave like reasonable adults, but some pretty big names in art history have been involved in some incredibly petty disputes. Here are some art rivalries that took things too far.
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"He has 71 confirmed murders to his name, although this could be just the tip of the iceberg in terms of his kill count. The vast majority of these victims were criminals themselves." One more time for the cheap seats -- "the vast majority." Not all.
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Empress Cixi, known as the Shadow Queen and the Dragon Lady, is a controversial figure in Chinese history. At once revered, feared, and hated, she worked to consolidate power even as rebellions broke out across her empire.
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The Shroud of Turin is arguably the most famous Christian relic in the world. Devotees claim that it shows the authentic Holy Face of Jesus, while skeptics claim that it's nothing but an impressive and puzzling forgery. Read on for some mysteries and secrets of the Shroud of Turin.
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After managing to escape the stigma of being a bastard by conquering a country, William the Conqueror's legacy will now always include a series of slapstick jokes tied to his final misfortune.
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Viewers of Unsolved Mysteries who saw the episode on Rey Rivera might have wondered if there was an entirely different theory about how he died. Enter the helicopter theory, which wasn't included in the Netflix series but was mentioned in a recently released clip.
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Many histories of ancient Egypt only deal with the lives of pharaohs. But everyday Egyptians also had interesting lives. They weren't just farming or building stone memorials and there were certain things they couldn't live without.
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The young lady developed some medical complications as she grew older. Seizures weren't uncommon, but what really seemed to upset her parents were the developmental delays.
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In this city, there is a hatch, like a nuclear fallout shelter, and a ladder that leads down to Final Fantasy 7's final, and oddest, mystery.
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As he burned on the stake, Jacques de Molay, the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, called on Christ to prove the Templars' innocence and its enemies feel God's wrath.
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In the Bastille Prison lived a man whose identity was largely unknown. Many said the prisoner was the King's political opponent, others say he must have been a disgraced member of the Royal Family. No one knew him; no one had seen his face. He was the Man in the Iron Mask.
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When Brian Shaffer didn't show up for his planned flight to Florida, his girlfriend reported him missing.
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In the nineties, construction in Herxheim, a municipality in south-western Germany, uncovered a buried enclosure ... where the bones of more than 450 humans, which all dated to a similar fifty-year range, were buried together in a series of ditches.
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The Koh-I-Noor, is a prized gem among the British crown jewels. But it holds a secret. The Koh-I-Noor may be one of the largest diamonds in the world, but it is also one of the most cursed.
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In Japan, you'd hear the word yokai (妖怪), a catchall for all manner of unnatural beings: ghosts, phantoms, demons, monsters, or goblins; "mystical creatures that possess unexplained powers, physical characteristics or strength," according to Motivist Japan. You know -- those.
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Here's the story of the USS Samuel B. Roberts, an exceedingly brave mouse that sacrificed itself while fighting an extremely large lion to a standstill in the South Pacific.
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