During the Black Plague, it was thought that bad smells were the cause of the plague. "Plague Doctors" therefore wore masks with long beak-like noses stuffed with flowers or smoke to hide the smells.
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Genghis Khan exempted the poor and clergy from taxes, encouraged literacy, and established free religion, leading many peoples to join his empire before they were even conquered.
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Scientists are excavating the ruins of a major civilization which pre-dates both the pyramids and Stonehenge by over 7,000 years. In 15 years, they have uncovered only about 5% of the site.
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The Aztecs were the first to serve chocolate as a drink. They also mixed it with hot chili pepper to make it really 'hot'.
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A man named Heraclitus had an illness that made his body swell up with water. To try to sweat it off, he buried himself in a steaming pile of animal poo, but then overheated and died of dehydration.
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