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30 Of The Weirdest And The Most Disturbing Facts From Known History, Shared By People In This Online Group
History lessons in school may have seemed boring to some, but it is useful to know how far we’ve come and where we came from. It may seem boring because the events took place a very long time ago or they just don’t seem relevant to us personally. But the history that is taught at school isn’t the only truth and doesn’t encompass all the things that happened in the past.
There are so many events and people that we don’t get to hear about and maybe they didn’t have a big impact on the world, but those stories are so interesting to listen to or read about. Today you will find out some history facts that you may not have heard of before, and they come with a twist, as Redditor Doyouareisstupid asked, “What is the weirdest/most disturbing fact about our world’s history that you know?” It’s a perfect read for the spooky season we are now in because people have knowledge about some unbelievable things that occurred years ago. So enjoy and upvote the answers that surprised you the most.
More info: Reddit
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#1
Most people have 16 great great parents, Cleopatra had 2. She's lucky to have developed working lungs, let alone be competent enough to accomplish anything. That was a family tree was a wreath
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#3
That literally ever race of people that have ever existed on this planet have been slaves to another at some point in history and most of them have overlapping time frames with other races.
And this is never talked about.
#5
Adolph hitler was an animal rights advocate who banned the live boiling of lobsters.
#7
There are books in the Harvard University library which are bound in human flesh
Nicolas Schirvel 4 years ago
One is titled : "How to cover a book in human skin and get away with it"
#8
The US Government has a literal gigantic dossier of classified operations hidden from the public, no brainer. What's shocking are things they've actually declassified.
Among these documents is the detailing of one of the largest human experiments in history, when the US dropped a bacteria-infused fog on the city of San Francisco to test how well "germ-based" biological warfare could prove by masking it with natural fog, which occurred back in the 1950s.
It was widely successful. A specific case is that of Edward Nevin, who passed away from Serratia marcescens, a bacteria that makes bread turn red. It had spread to his heart from a UTI and he passed away
In 1977, the government released a thoroughly detailed report at the testament of Nevin's grandson. Nevin's grandson tried to sue the government for wrongful death, but the court held that the government was immune to a lawsuit for negligence and that they were justified in conducting tests without subjects' knowledge. According to The Wall Street Journal, the Army stated that infections must have occurred inside the hospital and the US Attorney argued that they had to conduct tests in a populated area to see how a biological agent would affect that area.
Imagine what they're hiding.
Leo Domitrix 4 years ago
Gee, you mean nations commit horrible atrocities even on their own citizens? Gasp, shock, faint ----- and, yes, that was sarcasm.
#9
Some ancient cultures knew that they could control population growth by denying fertile females both fats and carbohydrates. This process guaranteed that embryos would not mature in the womb due to the lack of food energy derived from carrying mothers. The embryos would self-abort. A certain ratio of body fat is required for successful pregnancies.
#10
There are more people in slavery today than at any other time in history.
Barbara L Bristow 4 years ago
here's a list: As of 2018, the countries with the most slaves were: India (18.4 million), China (3.86 million), Pakistan (3.19 million), North Korea (2.64 million), Nigeria (1.39 million), Indonesia (1.22 million), Democratic Republic of the Congo (1 million), Russia (794,000) and the Philippines (784,000).
#11
That we've been on the brink of a global nuclear exchange several times. And that in one case (Cuban blockade), it was only because a single man (Vasily Arkhipov), disagreed with standing orders, that a nuclear exchange was likely averted.
#12
Due to Fresh drinking water being so scarce on the Galápagos Islands, some bird species, such as the Galapagos Hawk, have adapted by drinking the blood of other animals.
#13
Cleopatra lived closer to the moon landing than to the building of the pyramids.
Mary Rose Kent 4 years ago
That’s insane. I remember watching Neil Armstrong stepping onto the moon.
#14
From the fall of the Roman empire up until the mid 19th century, not a single city in Europe had a sewer system to dispose of human feces.
City planners didn't build sewers until it was proven in 1855 that the cause for all the cholera epidemics was drinking water contaminated by human feces.
#15
The Mayans partied hard. They would take alcohol and hallucinogenic enemas.
In Social Studies they had us watch a special on them and I vividly remember an artists rendering of a Mayan doing a handstand while getting an enema.
The original keg-stand.
#16
Russia still has not recovered its population prior to WWII
Tim Pillinger 4 years ago
Ireland hasn't recovered from the potatoes famine. There were 8 million in Ireland in 1841, now there are about 6.
#17
Up until the early 1980s doctors did not think newborn babies could feel pain. They didn't use anesthetic only used muscle relaxers on newborns.
#18
Rainbow Valley of Mount Everest is named for the rainbow colors of clothing of passed away people there
#19
Spartans bathed their newborn babies in red wine instead of warm water
Otter 4 years ago
And the babies slept very quietly after their baths! But seriously, water was often contaminated in the ancient world, and alcohol killed bacteria so it might actually have been a good idea. Did you know that Roman army was able to conquer much of the known world because they carried huge vats of low-quality wine and mixed it with whatever drinking water they found? It killed enough pathenogenic microbia that the armies didn't get sick en masse in dubious areas.
#20
The United States injected unknowing Puerto Rican’s with cancer cells to see how the illness worked
Mary Rose Kent 4 years ago
In the Tuskegee Study, the U.S. government injected African Americans with syphilis so that they could find how it spreads and works its way through the body. And they just left them infected rather than giving them penicillin afterwards.
#22
The founding fathers of the USA didn't know dinosaurs existed.
Mary Rose Kent 4 years ago
And it took even longer from that point to now to work out that we still have dinosaurs in the form of birds and reptiles.
#23
The ability to tell time (circadian rythm) is an evolutionary reaponse.
Cells that learned to replicate at night and rest during the day ultimately survived.
I'm bastardizing it but I find that amazing.
Eli Rockwell 4 years ago
One way that chronobiologists and sleep researchers have used to identify and study circadian rhythms is to spend extended periods isolated from natural light, temperature fluctuations, or other stimuli that could signal the time of day. Today, some laboratories have special facilities to achieve this isolation, but early researchers used caves. Nathaniel Kleitman conducted the first cave experiment in 1938 when he and a graduate student spent 32 days isolated from the outside world in Mammoth Cave, Kentucky. The researchers imposed a 28-hour cycle on themselves consisting of ten hours of work, nine of leisure, and another nine hours of sleep. Bedtime shifted four hours later each day during the Mammoth Cave study. Despite the alternative schedule and the absence of external cues, Kleitman found that body temperature continued to fluctuate in an approximately 24-hour cycle, suggesting the existence of an endogenous clock.
#24
If you lined up this history of earth on a 12 hour clock, modern humans making an impact on the planet would be about 1/10 of a second ago.
#25
Adolf Hitler was saved from drowning at age nine in a fountain by a priest
#26
Not so much disturbing as it is funny (at least to me).
The Kettle War. Long story short, Spain (The Holy Roman Empire) and the Netherlands (The Seven Republics of the Netherlands) were beefing. One boat from Spain engaged in a fight with a Dutch naval ship. One shot was fired. The only victim of that cannonball was a pot of soup that was cooking. The Spanish ship then surrendered.
#27
Ireland exported potato’s during the great potato famine.
Otter 4 years ago
Someone won a Nobel Prize by doing large-scale research on large historical and current famines, and found the same pattern in every one: There was always enough food to feed everyone, but in a famine, large numbers of people just had no access to the food. They were either deprived of food, or weren't given enough resources to afford food.
#28
That in UK, some time in the 12th century, two children of unusual GREEN skin colour appeared in the village of Woolpit in Suffolk, England.
The girl later communicated she and her brother had come from Saint Martin's Land, a subterranean world inhabited by green people. This actually happened!
NeonDisco 4 years ago
It's a folklore story passed down generations, like the Bible but believable.
Rebekah Tracy 4 years ago
*WARNING* there’s is not a single ounce of hate in this comment!!! But I do realize that some Christians could be very offended that you think that a folklore story is true but something they’ve based their lives on is false. It’s totally okay for you not to believe in the Bible. That’s fine, you do you. However it’s not something that’s beneficial to anyone when you bash other peoples religion.
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olx 4 years ago
this explanation is not true. they were the children of foreign cloth dyers, didn't speak English, and mostly preferred vegetables out of the food they were offered, which, for whatever reason, confused the townspeople. the boy died of malnutrition and they eventually worked out what happened when the girl learned English then worked as, I believe, a maid.
Firefoxy3121 4 years ago
It was eventually found that they were a dyers children, I think, and were coated in vegetable based green dye
Agnes Jekyll 4 years ago
They were green because their father was a wool merchant. The green came from dye. Their parents died, and the children eventually made it to a town. They didn't speak English. The little boy died from starvation, and the little girl survived. I wonder if this was the inspiration for Hansel and Gretel?
Penelope 2 3 years ago
Actually. And I don't quite remember all the details. But for some reason parents would leave their children in the woods. Said children would be eaten by cannibals. Which. I don't know much about the history of cannibalism in Germany. That's just what I've read regarding that story I may be incorrect.
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sunflower bunny 4 years ago
that's so cool! in primary school, we had a drama prompt that to green children had come to our town!
MikeWheelerFan 4 years ago (edited)
I don’t believe this. It’s possible to have blue skin due to genetics, but not green (I think). There’s actually an infamous family called the Fugate family that had this condition.
Kim Lorton 4 years ago
You can also get blue skin from ingesting silver home remedies. Or silver in medications, or use silver based products on a regular basis.
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Hugh Cookson 3 years ago
I lived near Woolpit many years ago - this is probably correct.......
Thomas MacLean 4 years ago
Sure it did ... can I sell you some oceanside real estate in Florida??
Mazer 4 years ago
Greenish staining of human skin may result from a gamut of causes, such as chlorosis, exogenous copper, resolving ecchymosis, drugs, green textile dyes, green tattoos, apocrine and eccrine chromhidrosis, hyper biliverdinemia, chloromas, use of green dyes during tube feeding in patient with multiorgan failure, Pseudomonas infections, and Wells’ syndrome in its second stage. Physicians may rarely encounter patients with green skin, hair, nails, or mucosae.
buttonpusher 4 years ago (edited)
Reminds me of that Papa Smurf guy who's skin turned blue from that silver stuff he was drinking. He had argyria or something.
~oatmeal.rat~ 4 years ago
to all the people who are being rude to people who believe in the bible- stop? It is their choice to believe what they want to and not be shamed because of it.
Betty Vanderhooven-SchmaaSchmaa 4 years ago
Except when they believe that ppl who don't believe couldn't possibly live without breaking commandments. Or sit around thinking everything is God's will. Being ignorant wont get you out of a speeding ticket.
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AzKhaleesi 4 years ago
All you bashers are sad. Really speaks volumes to where this world is headed. You guys take things WAY to literal. No one actually thinks that a wall was brought down by a trumpet, unless you are literally believing in the miracle. Open up your minds. Back then, they didn't know how to tell stories other than what they KNEW for the time. So maybe there was some kind of weapon that was invented, but it made a "trumpet" noise. Therefore, much like the game of telephone, eventually as passed down it was a trumpet. (even though it wasn't) The one loaf feeding many, wasn't actually one loaf, it was a "pay it forward" thing. One person shared, the rest shared too. The great flood has been proven by science. I can keep going but you get the idea. They told the events as they could describe in the times. And how it was passed down. It's that simple.
Kaseylulu 4 years ago
So what parts do you take literally and what parts are open for interpretation?
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Effin Fred 4 years ago
There is nothing to claim that this even remotely occurred. This is fiction, much like the bible, jesus, ghosts, and moral politicians.
#29
The baltic states conquest was buried in history (not many people know it) because ww2 and the holocaust happened at about the same time.
#30
The Germans smuggling Lenin into Tsarist Russia, to bring it down.
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
imagine like being putting your luggage through the scanner at the airport and inside they find trotsky
#31
Ho chi minh was an OSS intelligence asset during the Japanese occupation of Indochina. He was almost executed by nationalist Chinese in 1943 for promoting Leninist teachings in southern China; until Washington threatened to withdraw American support for Chiangs kai shek. You made the man what he was and gave him the resources to throw off the Japanese, French and Americans.
Chewie Baron 4 years ago
He was also present in Versailles in 1919 as they were drawing up the treaty to decide Germany's fate. There is a photo of a dinner being held and he is one of the waiters in the picture.
#32
I find it disturbing that there have been multiple natural disasters that have cause mass extinctions.
Mary Rose Kent 4 years ago
Why is this disturbing to you? What I find disturbing is that we’re going through another mass extinction now and we’re the ones doing it. Rhinos, elephants, whales. Most megafauna will be dead by the end of this century, and it’ll be the humans that brought it about.
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What do you think ?
Elin Stenqvist 4 years ago
I usually like this type of lists but this one is seriously lacking credible sources and some entries are downright false.
Rissie 4 years ago
I always have this thing that if I find it interesting, I look it up to find out more about it. Cleopatra and the Dutch eating their prime-minister for instance. And those seem to check out. The latter a little less click baity as it is put there, but still very gruesome. The not anesthesising babies is sadly true. Homeless people still having jobs is a fact that's easily checked (not every homeless person is carless or roofless). And the rest just didn't really resonate. I mean, someone saved Hitler from drowning? Yeah. Well. Great. Whether it's true or not, it doesn't impact history.
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Marie Adamson 4 years ago
The only thing that stood out from this article was the appalling spelling mistakes.
bonnyatlast 4 years ago
The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster was a 2011 nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Ōkuma, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. The proximate cause of the disaster was the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. Clouds of radiation were released and the Pacific water was contaminated. The US had Navy ships that went through the radiation contaminated clouds. We had a family friend whose son was on one of those ships.
Jody Whitmarsh 3 years ago
With all these very modern government experiments and deprivation of their subjects, it amazed me that people today actually trust their politicians and will argue that the government knows what's best. Their advisors know what's best. Behind every despotic action in history is a scientist Dr type with a god complex to justify atrocities and societal breakdown
More Thinking Needed 4 years ago
In fairness, it would be nice to have a post where people shared all of the accomplishments and advances from world history.
Elin Stenqvist 4 years ago
I usually like this type of lists but this one is seriously lacking credible sources and some entries are downright false.
Rissie 4 years ago
I always have this thing that if I find it interesting, I look it up to find out more about it. Cleopatra and the Dutch eating their prime-minister for instance. And those seem to check out. The latter a little less click baity as it is put there, but still very gruesome. The not anesthesising babies is sadly true. Homeless people still having jobs is a fact that's easily checked (not every homeless person is carless or roofless). And the rest just didn't really resonate. I mean, someone saved Hitler from drowning? Yeah. Well. Great. Whether it's true or not, it doesn't impact history.
Load More Replies... Marie Adamson 4 years ago
The only thing that stood out from this article was the appalling spelling mistakes.
bonnyatlast 4 years ago
The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster was a 2011 nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Ōkuma, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. The proximate cause of the disaster was the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. Clouds of radiation were released and the Pacific water was contaminated. The US had Navy ships that went through the radiation contaminated clouds. We had a family friend whose son was on one of those ships.
Jody Whitmarsh 3 years ago
With all these very modern government experiments and deprivation of their subjects, it amazed me that people today actually trust their politicians and will argue that the government knows what's best. Their advisors know what's best. Behind every despotic action in history is a scientist Dr type with a god complex to justify atrocities and societal breakdown
More Thinking Needed 4 years ago
In fairness, it would be nice to have a post where people shared all of the accomplishments and advances from world history.
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