France’s King Louis XIV was offered biological weapons by an Italian chemist. He not only refused, but also paid the chemist an annual salary to never reveal the technology to anyone else.
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Recently, archaeologists excavating in the old medieval town of Odense in Denmark uncovered 700-year-old barrels of poop - and, to their surprise, they still smelt.
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Rio de Janeiro was once capital of Portugal, making it the only European capital outside of Europe.
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The world's first Buddhist ruler, Emperor Ashoka, who ruled India from 274-232 BCE, was the first ruler in human history to ban slavery, the death penalty, animal cruelty, and deforestation. He even advocated gender equality in education and religious institutions.
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In ancient Athens, the worlds first democracy, they had a process called ostracism, where once a year the people could vote on the politician they thought was most destructive to the democratic process. The “winner” was banished from Athens for 10 years.
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In 1518, a "dancing plague" struck Strasbourg, Alsace, whereby hundreds of people danced fervently in the streets over the period of a month. Some suffered heart attacks or strokes, and many others died from sheer exhaustion. It remains unexplained.
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