10 Amazing Women Who Led Rebellions
“Male revolutionaries such as Che Guevara have gone down as heroes for leading rebellions against “the Man.” But forgotten by history are the women who took on far greater powers than Fulgencio Batista. Throughout the ages, women have led rebellions and revolutions which took on the might of the Roman Empire and the vast wealth of the British East India Company.”
“…Qin Shi Huang Di made life a little easier for the rest of China. He standardized all the measurments, roads, writing and other stuff so that it wouldn’t be so fucking confusing to travel around the country there. He built some wooden walls which would become the basis for the Great Wall of China, one of the greatest and most balls-out construction projects in human history. Sure, he was oppressive, tyrannical and brutal, but he was also pretty damn efficient and he laid the groundwork for a Chinese national identity that has lasted upwards of two thousand years.
He was also totally paranoid. Early in his reign, some jerk assassin named Jing Ke tried to stab Qin Shi Huang with a fan and even though Qin managed to whip out his sword and kill the shit out of Jing, he was pretty much untrusting of anyone from that point on. His paranoia led him to relocate the leaders of each of the states he conquered to live in the capital of Qin so that he and his men could keep an eye on them. He had royal food tasters try everything before he ate it. He rarely came out in public. He burned scholarly works that disagreed with his philosophy of Legalism and buried Confucian scholars alive so that they wouldn’t fuck with him. While there’s really nothing cool about burning books and executing scholars, you sort of have to respect the fact that Qin Shi Huang was willing to go that extra mile to ensure the longevity of his reign.”
Qin Shi Huang Di
The Association of Religion Data Archives.
“
The Association of Religion Data Archives (ARDA) strives to democratize access to the best data on religion. Founded as the American Religion Data Archive in 1997 and going online in 1998, the initial archive was targeted at researchers interested in American religion. The targeted audience and the data collection have both greatly expanded since 1998, now including American and international collections and developing features for educators, journalists, religious congregations, and researchers. Data included in the ARDA are submitted by the foremost religion scholars and research centers in the world. Currently housed in the Social Science Research Institute, the College of Liberal Arts, and the Department of Sociology at the Pennsylvania State University, the ARDA is funded by the Lilly Endowment, the John Templeton Foundation, Chapman University and the Pennsylvania State University.”
“
In the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq archaeologists have discovered an ancient city called Idu, hidden beneath a mound.
Cuneiform inscriptions and works of art reveal the palaces that flourished in the city throughout its history thousands of years ago.
Located in a valley on the northern bank of the lower Zab River, the city’s remains are now part of a mound created by human occupation called a tell, which rises about 32 feet (10 meters) above the surrounding plain. The earliest remains date back to Neolithic times, when farming first appeared in the Middle East, and a modern-day village called Satu Qala now lies on top of the tell.”
Scientists in Austria have found 19 living descendants of a prehistoric iceman whose 5,300-year-old body was found frozen in the Alps.
Researchers from the Institute of Legal Medicine at Innsbruck Medical University took DNA samples from blood donors in Tyrol in the west of the country.
They managed to match a particular genetic mutation with that of Ötzi, whose body was discovered back in 1991.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2453857/Scientists-trace-19-living-relatives-tzi-Iceman-5-300-year-old-body-frozen-Alps.html#ixzz2hXrcxx00 Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
“Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia (1431–1476), was a member of the House of Drăculești, a branch of the House of Basarab, also known by his patronymic name: Dracula. He was posthumously dubbed Vlad the Impaler (Romanian: Vlad Țepeș pronounced [ˈvlad ˈt͡sepeʃ]), and was a three-time Voivode of Wallachia, ruling mainly from 1456 to 1462, the period of the incipient Ottoman conquest of the Balkans. His father, Vlad II Dracul, was a member of the Order of the Dragon, which was founded to protect Christianity in Eastern Europe. Vlad III is revered as a hero in Bulgaria as well for his protection of the Bulgarian population both south and north of the Danube. A significant number of Bulgarian common folk and remaining boyars (nobles) moved north of the Danube, recognized his leadership and became part of Wallachia, following his raids on the Ottomans.”
“This is the glorious story of the Hittites – the most powerful people in the Near East of their time. Narrated by Academy Award winner Jeremy Irons, “The Hittites” brings the fascinating history of this mighty empire to life with expert interviews, stunning cinematography, dramatic reenactments, and visual effects. Highlights include a breathtaking recreation of the controversial battle of Kadesh that decimated the armies of Egypt’s Pharaoh Ramesses II. Based on the actual words of the Hittites, deciphered from ancient clay tablets excavated in the 20th century, their story unfolds as beautifully as it written almost 3500 years earlier. “
“Mankind embraces a groundbreaking way of telling this epic human story. Drawing on a growing global interest in a revelatory field of history, now adopted by universities across the globe. ‘Big history’ focuses on the forces of nature to show how mankind’s path is guided by events that stretch back, not hundreds, but thousands, even millions of years. How the power of science, from geology and astronomy, to physics and biology, combined to shape our shared human journey. Revealing astounding global connections, and an astonishing interconnected story. This is history without limits. Free from boundaries and politics. Our story, like it’s never been told before. Written by History Channel “
“In which John Green teaches you how Russia evolved from a loose amalgamation of medieval principalities known as the Kievan Rus into the thriving democracy we know today. As you can imagine, there were a few bumps along the road. It turns out, our old friends the Mongols had quite a lot to do with unifying Russia. In yet another example of how surprisingly organized nomadic raiders can be, the Mongols brought the Kievan Rus together under a single leadership, and concentrated power in Moscow. This set the stage for the various Ivans (the Great and the Terrible) to throw off the yoke and form a pan-Russian nation ruled by an autocratic leader. More than 500 years later, we still have autocratic leadership in Russia. All this, plus a rundown of some of our favorite atrocities of Ivan the Terrible, and a visit from Putin!”
“Perhaps no other century in human existence experienced the terrible and remarkable contrasts of the 20th Century. The century was heroic and tragic, progressive and reactionary, forward-looking, and frighteningly regressive – a century of contradiction, confusion, and massive change. Faith and Fate focuses on how all these events and occurrences impacted on one specific group of people – a people whose survival has defied the ravages and challenges not only of this century, but of the over 40 centuries that have led up to it. Rabbi Berel Wein will take you on a remarkable journey into Jewish history. Faith and Fate powerfully and emotionally tells the story of how the events of the century impacted on the Jews – and the impact the Jews had on the century.”
HISTORY OF PROSTITUTION: PROCON.ORG
Prostitution has been around almost since the dawn of time. It has been called the world’s oldest profession…other would debate that. However it existed and that’s why it earns a spot on this history blog.
History of Divorce Around The World By Molly Kalafut
“Just as marriage creates a family relationship, divorce ends that marriage. Most of the Western Hemisphere and some countries in the Eastern Hemisphere allow divorce under certain circumstances. The legal issues surrounding eligibility for divorce are often very complicated and include everything from alimony and child support to whether the divorced wife must return to her maiden name. Remarriage is is a surprisingly sticky issue, and throughout history many regions regulated if or when a divorced husband or wife could remarry.”
LISTVERSE: 10 Historical Oddities You Don’t Know
The Lewis and Clark expedition was sent out by President Jefferson to cross the continent of America. They were to make scientific discoveries and contact the native Americans. Because they were to be gone for so long it was necessary to train them in medicine so that they could treat illness and injury. Benjamin Rush, famous doctor and founding father, was a key advisor. He was a keen advocate of purgatives and laxatives. To clear out the bowels of the expedition he provided them with his own invention, Bilious Pills. These contained a large amount of mercury. They were so effective as laxative that the expedition termed them Thunder Clappers. The problem with mercury is that it remains in the environment for a very long time. When the expedition used the pills they left such large amounts of mercury in the ground that later archaeologists have been able to identify the path of the expedition by the levels of the metal still remaining from the Thunder Clapper purges.
It is a common complaint, especially in election years, that politics has become too divided. Today even slight criticisms are thought to be devastating. In the past politics was a lot less dainty. When Senator Sumner made a speech attacking “the harlot Slavery” Senator Preston Brooks, representing the pro-slavery South Carolina, took offense. Two days later, on the floor of the senate chamber, Brooks approached Sumner and began to thrash him with a heavy walking stick. When other senators attempted to stop the beating, an accomplice of Brooks held them off with a pistol. Sumner was beaten unconscious, the injuries he suffered affecting him for the rest of his life. It was three years before Sumner was able to return to his duties. Brooks was re-elected and hailed as a hero in the pro-slavery south.
Because Brooks had broken his cane in the attack he was inundated with gifts of replacement walking sticks by admirers.
In many cultures certain people are held to be taboo; that is, they are not to be touched. In 19th century Siam, it was absolutely forbidden for a commoner to touch the queen. To break this rule carried the death penalty. One day Queen Sunandha Kumariratana was in a boat which capsized, plunging her into a river. Though there were many people who might have come to her aid it would have meant their own death to touch the royal body. She died at the age of 19 along with her daughter.
In the ancient world the color purple was a rarity. The word purple derives from the Latin Purpura, and that from the Greek Porphrya. The Greeks knew only one source of a purple dye, a secretion of a certain type of sea snail. To make up any significant amount of dye it was necessary to harvest vast quantities of snails. This made the resulting dye hugely expensive. For centuries only the very rich could afford purple. In many cultures the color became so associated with royalty that commoners were banned from wearing it.
Only one person can claim to be the first person to have been born on a continent. Emilio Palma was born at the Esperanza Base in the Antarctic in 1978. His birth was planned by the Argentine government to bolster their claim to a region of Antarctica. When heavily pregnant, his mother was flown to the base for the birth. Unfortunately it failed to have much effect on the international scene, though made for an interesting anecdote.
On a side note of continental births: the first European to be born in the Americas was born around 1005 in the Norse settlement of Vinland. He went by the great name of Snorri Thorfinnsson.
It is well known now that the people of the ancient world were well aware that the Earth was not flat. Even looking at the horizon of the sea it was possible to see the curvature of the Earth as ships fell below the horizon. What is less well known is how accurately they knew the circumference of the planet. Eratosthenes, a Greek mathematician who lived in the 3rd century BC, using only sticks and the shadows they cast, was able to calculate the circumference of the Earth to a size of 25,000 miles. This compares to the actual (polar) circumference of 24,860 miles.
We all know what the terms clockwise and anti-clockwise mean. But why do clocks move in the direction they do? The answer is based on tradition. Long before mechanical clocks were invented, sundials were the best way of estimating the time of day. In the Northern Hemisphere, the direction of a shadow on a sundial will move clockwise due to the Earth moving in an anti-clockwise direction when viewed from the North Pole. When mechanical clocks were invented they were modeled to be similar to sundials and so we still use the movement of the sun in the way we read the time.
The Anglo-Zanzibar war of 1896 is the shortest war on record lasting an exhausting 38 minutes. After the death of the pro-British sultan Hamad he was succeeded by his nephew Bargash. The British favored another candidate. With Bargash in the sultan’s palace refusing to abdicate the British gathered a fleet in the harbor beside it. An ultimatum was delivered requiring Bargash to step aside by 9am on the 27th of August. When no reply was received the British opened fire at 9:02. The entire fleet of Zanzibar, a single royal yacht, was sunk and the palace caught fire. The sultan’s flag was removed and the firing stopped at 9:40. By the afternoon the pro-British Hamud bin Muhammed was in place as the new sultan. The supporters of Bargash’s short sultanate were forced to pay for the cost of the shells shot by the British.
Poor William Bligh has gone down in history as a tyrannical captain, mainly due to various film depictions of him. The mutiny on the Bounty in 1789 is the one fact that has become associated with him. Most people at the time blamed the mutiny not on Bligh being too strict with his men but rather being too lax. Unfortunately Bligh seems to have been a magnet for rebelliousness. In 1797 his crew again rebelled, as part of a larger mutiny. After this was settled there was a second mutiny in 1797 which involved Bligh’s ship. While neither of these mutinies focused on anything Bligh was responsible for, it set up a pattern which was to shape his memory. Perhaps because of his now extensive experience with rowdy crews he had hardened his style of command. The now harsh Bligh was made governor of New South Wales in 1806. He antagonized several important people in the colony and in 1808, in a mutiny known as the Rum Rebellion, Bligh was arrested and held captive for two years.
Had these mutinies not occurred Bligh would be best known today for the transplantation of the bread fruit to the West Indies.
I recently wrote a list with unusual facts about the US presidents. While the human occupants of the White House have been occasionally bizarre there have been an equal number of strange animal residents. John Quincy Adams used to keep an alligator, a gift from the Marquis de Lafayette, in a bathtub. Calvin Coolidge kept a pygmy hippo called Billy, an ancestor of many of the pygmy hippos to be found in US zoos today. It should perhaps be no surprise that the legendarily pugnacious Andrew Jackson kept fighting cocks. The hungry President Taft was the last president to keep cows, called Mooly Wooly and Pauline Wayne, at the White House and enjoyed drinking their milk. It would probably liven up press conferences today if the sitting president would keep bears as his predecessors Jefferson and Coolidge did.
http://listverse.com/2012/11/06/10-historical-oddities-you-dont-know/
From the BBC: Skeleton at Llanbedrgoch, Anglesey, sheds light on Viking Age
The skeleton was found in a shallow graveThe skeleton, found at Llanbedrgoch, Anglesey, has forced experts to revise the theory that five earlier skeletons were the victims of a Viking raid.
Evidence now suggests the men may have spent the first part of their lives in Scandinavia.
Experts say artefacts discovered confirm Llanbedrgoch as a 10th Century manufacture and trade centre.
The site was discovered in 1994, and in the late 1990s, five bodies – two adolescents, two adult males and one woman – were found.
The bodies were thought to be victims of Viking raiding, which occurred throughout the Viking period (850 to 1,000).
However, the new skeleton discovered this summer was buried in a shallow grave, which National Museum Wales archaeologists say was unusual for the period.
They say the “non-Christian orientation of the body” and its treatment “point to distinctions being made in the burial practices for Christians and other communities during the 10th Century”.
Analysis indicates the males were not local to Anglesey, but may have spent their early years – at least up to the age of seven – in north west Scotland or Scandinavia.
Excavations this year also produced 7th Century silver and bronze sword and scabbard fittings.
Archaeologists believe it suggests the presence of a “warrior elite and the recycling of military equipment” during a period of rivalry and campaigning between kingdoms Northumbria and Mercia.
Excavation director, Dr Mark Redknap, said: “Other finds from the excavation, which include semi-worked silver, silver-casting waste and a fragment of an Islamic silver coin – exchanged via trade routes out of central Asia to Scandinavia and beyond – confirm Llanbedrgoch’s importance during the 10th Century as a place for the manufacture and trade of commodities.”
41 Maps Covering 5,000 Years of History Introduction – 5,000 Years of Dynamic Maps
”TIME PERIOD: Introduction
“For about two thousand years the name Palestine has been used internationally for the lands on both sides of the Jordan River… The name Palestine will here be used…to refer to the area from southern Syria (the Beqa Valley) to Egypt and the Sinai, and from the Mediterranean to the Arabian desert.
The Greek historian Herodotus called Cisjordan [the land west of the Jordan River] the Palestinian Syria or sometimes only Palaestina. Thus, there is a tradition from at least the fifth century B.C. for the use of this name…
Another well-known name for Palestine, which is the most common one in the Bible, is Canaan. The earliest known reference to this name, read as ‘Canaanites‘, is in a letter from [the kingdom of] Mari (on the Euphrates) [see 700 mile radius map] to Iasmah-Adad from the eighteenth century B.C… The letter does not give any information about the territory of these Canaanites… In many Egyptian texts Canaan refers to southern Syria and Palestine…
The Sinai peninsula is not part of Palestine, but because of its geographical location between Egypt proper and Palestine it has a place in a history of Palestine.”
Gosta W. Ahlst”http://israelipalestinian.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=000642…
(CBS News 60 MINUTES) The exodus from the Holy Land of Palestinian Christians could eventually leave holy cities like Jerusalem and Bethlehem without a local Christian population, Bob Simon reports. Why are they leaving? For some, life in the middle of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has become too difficult.
“From 6o Minutes:
For Israel, there could be serious economic consequences. According to Israeli government figures, tourism is a multi billion dollar business there. Most tourists are Christian. Many of them are American. That’s one reason why Israelis are very sensitive about their image in the United States. And that could be why Ambassador Oren phoned Jeff Fager, the head of CBS News and executive producer of 60 Minutes, while we were still reporting the story, long before tonight’s broadcast. He said he had information our story was quote: “a hatchet job.”
Michael Oren: It seemed to me outrageous. Completely incomprehensible that at a time when these communities, Christian communities throughout the Middle East are being oppressed and massacred, when churches are being burnt, when one of the great stories in history is unfolding? I think it’s– I think it’s– I think you got me a little bit mystified.
Bob Simon: And it was a reason to call the president of– chairman of CBS News?
Michael Oren: Bob, I’m the ambassador of the State of Israel. I do that very, very infrequently as ambassador. It’s just– that’s an extraordinary move for me to complain about something. When I heard that you were going to do a story about Christians in the Holy Land and my assum– and– and had, I believe, information about the nature of it, and it’s been confirmed by this interview today.
Bob Simon: Nothing’s been confirmed by the interview, Mr. Ambassador, because you don’t know what’s going to be put on air.
Michael Oren: Okay. I don’t. True.
Bob Simon: Mr. Ambassador, I’ve been doing this a long time. And I’ve received lots of reactions from just about everyone I’ve done stories about. But I’ve never gotten a reaction before from a story that hasn’t been broadcast yet.
Michael Oren: Well, there’s a first time for everything, Bob.”
FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY.: VIEWER DISCRETION ADVISED!!!
Sex in the Ancient World Pompeii: This intriguing look at the sexual practices of ages past focuses on the infamous location of Pompeii, home to the oldest known brothel in the historical world. With commentary from historians and archaeologists, the film explains how issues like prostitution and sexual slavery affected the world of ancient Rome.
English: Walter Yeo, the first person to receive plastic surgery, before (left) and after(right) skin flap surgery performed by Sir Harold Delf Gillies in 1917. The pictures of Walter’s face before the surgery are blurry and hard to come by. In the tragic accident he was recorded as having lost both his upper and lower eyelids. The surgery was some of the first to use a skin flap from an unaffected area of the body and paved the way for a sudden rash of improvements in this field. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
| Plastic surgery, the practice of reshaping body tissues for reconstructive or aesthetic purposes dates back to antiquity. Derived from the Greek plastikos, meaning “to mold,” plastic surgery holds a critical place in cultures all over the world. For centuries, tribes would disc their lips, stretch their earlobes, bind their feet, file their teeth, and tattoo and scar their skin. If contemporary popular series such as Extreme Makeover andNip/Tuck are any indication, plastic surgery has not lost any of its cultural power. While filed teeth may not appeal to everyone, men and women of today still have a wide range of surgical procedures from which to choose, including liposuction, nose jobs, eyelid surgery, tummy tucks, and breast augmentation and reduction. The term “plastic surgery” also includes nonsurgical options such as Botox, microdermabrasion, collagen injections, laser hair removal, and chemical peels. Plastic surgery, however, was not always so readily available or varied and was even shrouded in mystery, magic, and eroticism.
Click link to view>>>>>>>http://www.randomhistory.com/2008/08/31_plastic.html |
I Love History...and Research 