A monk had once written over a book that contained information about calculus that was written by Archimedes in ancient Greece that could have made us 100 or even 1000 years more mathematically and technologically advanced.
13
Romans used a plant called Silphium as contraception. They had so much sex that they drove it into extinction.
24
The exact cause of death and burial site of Genghis Khan is unknown, because all of the 2000 funeral guests and 800 soldiers were killed in order to preserve the secret.
16
In 1956, the IBM 350 hard disk drive had 3.75 MB of storage, weighed over 2000 lbs, had to be moved around with forklifts, and was delivered via large cargo airplanes.
11
Alligator snapping turtles can live for over 150 years. Scientists know this because some of the turtles had musket balls in their stomachs.
271
Modern humans first appeared about 200,000 years ago, but record keeping didn't begin until about 6,000 years ago. That means about 97% of human history is lost.
21