Work is getting harder and harder to find these days. No matter what your area of expertise, the recession is sucking us all dry. With the abundance of jobs and skilled workers for those jobs, the situation is exacerbated. This was not the case in ancient times where some jobs were so repulsive that no one would want them – except the scum of society or those who had nothing to lose. This list looks at ten of them.

The nomenclator held a vitally important job. He was, effectively, a living-human-calendar cum address book. Now these days we have our iPhones, our Blackberrys, and all manner of digital devices to remember the people we are introduced to at meetings or (more embarrassingly) those we meet when we drink a little too much at a work party. We have all, no doubt, had that experience where we meet a person, take down their number and name, promise to contact them soon, and, in the sober light of day, wonder who the hell they are. The ancients had a much better way of dealing with this. They dragged a slave to their parties and forced him to remember the names and numbers. Now the most important difference between the iPhone and the nomenclator is that the nomenclator could tell you who the guy was, what you talked about, and whether he is worth contacting. He can also clarify whether that gorgeous lady you met was made gorgeous by beer googles or not. Frankly, if it weren’t for an exorbitantly high minimum wage, we would all be better off tossing the iPhone and taking on a modern nomenclator. But alas, who would want the job? Who would want to be paid two bucks an hour to remain sober while everyone else was partying on down? Not me that’s for sure! Having said that, just in case I am wrong and this job does appeal to some, if there is anyone living in the Wellington region who is looking for low-paid under-the-table work and wants to go to some great parties (whilst remaining sober), check out the Listverse About page and contact me.

Okay – be prepared for a sensitive topic. Recently we have had a rather unfortunate event wherein abortion was discussed on a list that caused quite the kerfuffle (it’s an English word – find the definition here). You may wonder why I mention it but if you read on you will understand. A slaver was a gentleman (used in the most liberal sense of the word possible) who sold slaves – for work or pleasure. He would either travel behind armies (who were off fighting in battle) so he could capture the losers and sell them to rich Greeks as slaves, or (and this is where we connect up with the awkward list of the last few days), he would buy “unwanted” boys (but only the handsome ones) from parents so he could castrate them and sell them as lovers to wealthy Greek men who had a taste for young flesh. They provided (in rather a repulsive way) an alternative to adoption to those parents who didn’t want their children. The downside to this (somewhat repellant) career choice, was that despite the demand for handsome young boys, the slavers were often murdered by those who didn’t approve of their trade.

The job of a hairdresser (ornatrix) is so often looked down upon these days. And it was no less so in the ancient times. But honestly, a modern hairdresser really ought to appreciate her job – because she has it so much better now than ever in the past. Picture this: your imperial queen is balding and blonde, but the fashion this week is dark lustrous locks. If it were today, you would either shove a wig on the lady or glue in some extensions. This was, sadly, not an option for the work-weary ornatrix of days gone by. In order to provide your mistress with her coal-colored mane, you had to work with a mixture of bile, rotten leeches, and squid ink (the rotten leeches made for an especially rich black). But it gets worse. Occasionally fashion would demand blonde hair and your mistress is a natural brunette. There was no peroxide in those days. To give her a lovely golden hue you had to mix pigeon poop, and ashes together in the hopes that the chemical combination would strip out the healthy color of her hair. Oh – and to set the color – you had to pee on her hair. Worse still was being a slave with beautiful hair – this would often be cut from your head and fashioned into a wig for a rich harridan.

Let us start with the job description: “Teen female virgin wanted for thirty year service. Must be Roman, having all limbs, and not the child of a slave”. This was the job description of the vestal virgin. These attractive and fully-limbed girls were to spend thirty years giving service to Vesta – goddess of the family. They had to keep the vestal flame burning and were in a position of great honor – the only female priests in Ancient Rome. Now if one of these pretty young girls absent-mindedly forget to keep the fire going, she would be flogged till she bled. If, the heavens forbid, she slipped up in the area of virginity, she was buried alive. Oh – and to make matters worse, the lazy vestal virgin who slept in and let the fire go out was not just likely to get a flogging: letting the fire go out was a sign of loss of virginity. In other words, she got flogged, then buried alive – just for sleeping in!

We have all seen the ridiculous Book of British Smiles (see item 8) on the Simpson’s and while that may be something of a myth, socialized dental care doesn’t seem to be particularly efficient. But imagine the mouths of the Romans who didn’t brush their teeth, ate craploads of rotten fish sauce (see item 2), and spent a huge amount of time feasting and vomiting. Now imagine one with an abscess or a toothache and being the dentist who had to deal with that. Now those of us who are very fond of wine are okay – as it was commonly used as an anesthetic, but when things got really bad, the poor dentist had to take drastic measures. This (sadly) involved taking a red hot poker to the gums after the tooth was ripped out, and stuffing more rotten fish into the resulting charred hole. One can’t help but wonder who had it worse – the dentist or the patient!

Speaking of my favorite subject wine, What job could be better than that of the wine maker – harvesting the grapes in the early hours while the dew still drips from the vines, pressing the fat grapes with one’s feet whilst singing bawdy epic songs, and finally, after fermentation, drinking the delicious nepenthe on the terrace of an evening? Hmm – perhaps drinking wine that wasn’t laced with lead! That’s right, unfortunately the Romans didn’t understand the dangers of lead and they regularly sweetened their wine with sugar of lead (much in the same way as we fill our drinks with a variety of cancer-causing sugar replacements these days). To make matters worse, they often served their “lead-wine” in lead cups! The average Roman who enjoyed a quaff or two, consumed up to one gram of lead per day!

Praegustator: in other words, a taster. Following on from wine we have food. Now who wouldn’t want to be paid a handsome sum every day for doing nothing but chowing down on the emperor’s dinner? Daily tastes of peacock, swamp hen, wild boar, the list is virtually endless. But, as is to be expected on this list, there is a caveat. Most of the emperors were dicks and a lot of people wanted them dead. And in those days before guns (or the possibility of getting close enough to fire a bow and arrow) the easiest way to kill someone was to poison them. So, forgetting the lead-laced wine which would have eventually taken its toll anyway, the emperors were certain to be dished up a plate of some rancid poisonous delicacies at least once or twice in their career. Herein steps the praegustator (the pre-taster). This poor schmuck was the guy who had to have a mouthful of everything the Emperor planned to eat. Needless to say, history has shown us that more pre-tasters died than emperors.

Most of us are aware of the experience of going to the gym to lose a few pounds. The burning ache in the shoulders and arms when our personal trainer forces us onto the satanic rowing machine with no desire other than to make us feel bad because we dragged them out of bed at 6am. Now fortunately for us we are paying the bills so we can tell the trainer to shove off and stop after three minutes. And that brings us to the poor unfortunate souls who had to row the Greek war boats during the good old ancient days. First of all, most were slaves and were paid nothing more than a daily meal. Secondly, when that nasty burn set in they couldn’t just stop and demand a latte break. They would get flogged. Imagine your innocuous personal trainer pulling out a cat’o'nine-tails when your arms started to ache. Imagine being flayed because the chubby guy on the machine next to you is going half a mile faster than you. That was the life of the rower.

I was tempted to say nothing about this item as the title is disgusting enough! But, alas, I would feel like I were cheating were I to stop there. Some years ago I was a student of pugilism. We were a small class of teenaged boys being taught by an ex-Soviet Nuclear submarine commander who had emigrated to New Zealand (he had some amazing stories to tell which I may one day share here). He worked us hard. Now I was a teen who was very concerned about personal hygiene. Sadly the same was not true for the majority of my class. The gym smelt like someone had sprayed body odor especially to “man” us up. This is not a new thing. The ancients were incredibly fond of their sports (often naked or with nothing on but the foreskin gripper – the kynodesme – see item 9). Because these athletes were working out all day in the hot sun and were aware of the natural ability of hair to retain unpleasant odors, the men (young and old) went through a daily routine of having their underarm hairs plucked out by the armpit plucker – after all, they were most likely to spend the evening in very close company with others at the public baths. Now the armpit plucker was not the same as a modern beautician who plucks eyebrows – these were professionals who were dealing with incredibly hairy armpits full of smells that one doesn’t want to think about at all. No amount of grappa could prepare you for this job.

Latin is an amazing language – it manages to make everything sound lovely. For example: pedacabo – pronounced “ped-a-cah-bo” – it just rolls right off the tongue. Unfortunately it means “one who is anally penetrated.” Delator is similar. In modern English, the delator might be called a snitch, a rat, a fink, an informant, a stoolie, and a huge variety of other unpleasant names for a person who is, basically, a nark. These were men whose sole job in life was to tell on their neighbors. For every little misdemeanor. They make the Nazi Youth look good! These bastards even reported people for failure to pay their taxes! Unfortunately power often goes to our heads and these sneaky scumbags started making stuff up because they were paid regardless of the truth behind their accusations. If there was ever going to be a social pariah, these were the guys who were it. The most famous delator (though not Roman) was, of course, Judas.

‘It was night and low visibility, but I saw a guy with an AK-47 lit up by the porch light in a doorway about 400 meters away. I watched him through the sights. He looked like just another Iraqi. I hit him low in the stomach and dropped him.’ – Specialist James Wilks, 25, from Fort Worth, Texas. Concealment is key to becoming a great sniper. Highly trained marksmen who can shoot accurately from incredible distances with specialized training in high-precision rifles. In addition, they are trained in camouflage, field craft, infiltration, reconnaissance and observation, making them perhaps the most feared military presence in a war. Below is my list of top ten snipers in history and some of the greatest shots ever fired.

Was an Irish soldier in the British 95th Rifles. What makes him on of the greats is that he shot a very impressive French general, Auguste-Marie-François Colbert.

During the battle at Cacabelos during Monroes retreat in 1809, Plunkett, using a Baker Rifle, shot the French general at a range of about 600 meters. Giving the incredible inaccuracy of rifles in the early 19th century, this was either a very impressive feat, or one hell of a fluke. Well Plunkett not wanting his army buddies to think he was a bit lucky decided to take the shot again before returning to his line. So he reloaded his gun and took aim once again this time at the trumpet major who had come to the generals aid. When this shot also hit its intended target, proving that Plunkett is just one badass marksman, he looked back to his line to see the impressed faces of the others in the 95th Rifles.

Just for comparison the British soldiers were all armed with ‘Brown Bess muskets’ and trained to shoot into a body of men at 50 meters. Plunkett did 12 times that distance. Twice.

The date was May 9th 1864, when Sgt Grace, a Confederate sniper, achieved what was considered to be an incredible shot at the time, and what is definitely the most ironic demise of a target in history. It was during the battle of Spotsylvania when Grace took aim with his British Whitworth Rifle. His target was General John Sedgwick (pictured above) and the distance was 1,000 yards. An extremely long distance for the time. During the beginning of the skirmish, the confederate sharpshooters were causing Sedgwick’s men to duck for cover. Sedgwick refused to duck and was quoted saying “What? Men dodging this way for single bullets? What will you do when they open fire along the whole line? I am ashamed of you. They couldn’t hit Elephants at this distance.” His men persisted in taking cover. He Repeated “They couldn’t hit elephants at this distance” Seconds Later Grace’s shot hits Sedgwick just under his left eye.

I swear you couldn’t write it. Sedgwick was the highest ranking Union casualty in the civil war and upon hearing his death Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant repeatedly asked “Is he really dead”.

103 Confirmed Kills

Was an avid hunter as a kid and joined the Marines in 1967. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps during Vietnam and holds the record for number of confirmed kills for Marine snipers, exceeding that of legendary Marine sniper Carlos Hathcock. In just 16 months he killed 103 enemies and another 216 kills were listed as probable’s by the military, only because it was too risky at the time to search the bodies for documents. When he left the Marines he told no-one of his of his role during the conflict and only a few fellow Marines knew of his assignments. It was nearly 20 years before somebody wrote a book detailing his amazing skills as a sniper. Mawhinney came out of anonymity because of this and became a lecturer in sniper schools. He was once quoted saying “it was the ultimate hunting trip: a man hunting another man who was hunting me. Don’t talk to me about hunting lions or elephants; they don’t fight back with rifles and scopes. I just loved it. I ate it up.”

A routinely deadly shot from distances between 300 – 800 yards, Mawhinney had confirmed kills of over 1000 yards, making him one of the greatest snipers of the Vietnam war.

A former corporal of the Canadian Forces, he holds the record for the longest confirmed sniper kill in history at 1.51 miles or 2,430 metres. That’s the length of about 26 football pitches.

This amazing feat occurred in 2002, when he was involved in Operation Anaconda. His Sniper Team consisted of 2 Corporals and 3 Master Corporals. When a three man Al-Qaeda weapons team moved into a mountainside position he took aim. Furlong was armed with a .50-caliber McMillan Brothers Tac-50 Rifle and loaded with A-MAX very low drag bullets. He fired and missed. His second shot hit the enemies knapsack on his back. He had already fired his third shot by the time the second hit, but now the enemy knew he was under attack. The airtime for each bullet was about 3 seconds due to the immense distance, enough time for an enemy to take cover. However the dumbfounded militant realised what was happening just in time to take the third shot in the chest.

242 Confirmed Kills

Zaytsev is probably the best known Sniper in history thanks to the movie ‘Enemy At The Gates’. It is a great film and I wish I could say it was all true. However the truth only goes as far as the battle of Stalingrad. There was no Nazi Counter-Sniper Specialist in real life. Well not to the extent of the film. Here’s the truth. Zaytsev was born in Yeleninskoye and grew up in the Ural Mountains. His surname means ‘hare‘. Before Stalingrad, he served as a clerk in the Soviet Navy But after reading about the conflict in the city he volunteered for the front line. he served in the 1047th Rifle Regiment. Zaytsev ran a sniper school in the Metiz factory. The cadets he trained were called Zaichata, meaning ‘Leverets’ (Baby Hares). This was the start of the sniper movement in the 62nd army. It is estimated that the snipers he trained killed more than 3,000 enemy soldiers

Zaytsev himself made 242 confirmed kills between October 1942 and January 1943, but the real number is probably closer to 500. I know I said there was no counter-sniper, but there was Erwin Kónig. Was alleged to be a highly skilled Wehrmacht sniper. Zaytsev claimed in his memoirs that the duel took place over a period of three days in the ruins of Stalingrad. Details of what actually happened are sketchy, but by the end of the three day period Zaytsev had killed the sniper and claimed his scope to be his most prized trophy. For him to make this his most prized trophy means that this person he killed must have been almost as good as Zaytsev himself.

309 Confirmed Kills

In June 1941, Pavlichenko was 24 and Nazi Germany were invading the Soviet Union. She was among the first volunteers and asked to join the infantry. she was assigned to the Red Armies 25th infantry Division. From there she became one of 2000 female snipers of the soviet.

Her first 2 kills were made near Belyayevka using a Mosin-Nagant bolt action rifle with a P.E. 4-power scope. The first action she saw was during the conflict in Odessa. She was there for 2 and a half months and notched 187 kills. When they were forced to relocate, she spent the next 8 months fighting in Sevastopol on the Crimean Peninsula. There she recorded 257 kills and for this feat she was cited by the Southern Army Council. Pavlichenkos’ total confirmed kills during WW2 was 309. 36 of those were enemy snipers.

378 Confirmed kills
300+ Captures

Three times awarded the military medal and twice seriously wounded, he was an expert marksman and scout, credited with 378 German kills and capturing 300+ more. He was an Ojibwa warrior with the Canadians in battles like those at mount sorrel. As if killing nearly 400 Germans wasn’t enough, he was also awarded medals for running messages through very heavy enemy fire, for directing a crucial relief effort when his commanding officer was incapacitated and for running through enemy fire to get more ammo when his unit was running low.

Though a hero among his fellow soldier, he was virtually forgotten once he returned home to Canada. Regardless he was one of the most affective snipers of world war 1.

109 confirmed kills

He holds the record for the highest number of confirmed kills for any American sniper in history. However it is not just his impressive kill record that makes him one of the best, but also his incredible accuracy.

This excerpt from ‘Inside the Crosshairs: Snipers in Vietnam’ by Col. Michael Lee Lanning, describes just what I’m talking about:

“One afternoon he was riding along the Mekong River on a Tango boat when an enemy sniper on shore pecked away at the boat. While everyone else on board strained to find the antagonist, who was firing from the shoreline over 900 meters away, Sergeant Waldron took up his sniper rifle and picked off the Vietcong out of the top of a coconut tree with one shot (this from a moving platform). Such was the capability of our best sniper.” Nuff Said.

If there was a scale of difficulty for shots like these, it would be next to impossible to beat. well lets try to do that anyway.

Here’s ‘white feather’….

Nicknamed ‘Lông Trung du Kich’ (‘White Feather Sniper’)

93 Confirmed kills

Hathcock has one of the most impressive mission records of any sniper in the Marine corps. Lets forget about the dozens of shooting championships he won, during the Vietnam war he amassed 93 confirmed kills. The Vietnam army put a $30,000 bounty on his life for killing so many of their men. Rewards put on U.S. snipers by the NVA (North Vietnamese Army) typically amounted to….say $8.

It was Hathcock who fired the most famous shot in sniper history. He fired a round, over a very long distance, which went through the scope of an enemy sniper, hit him in the eye, and killed him. Hathcock and Roland Burke his spotter were stalking the enemy sniper, (which had already killed several Marines) which they believed was sent to kill him specifically. When Hathcock saw a flash of light reflecting off the enemies scope he fired at it in a split second pulling off one of the most precise shots in history. Hathcock reasoned that the only way that this was possible, would have been if both snipers were aiming at each others scopes at the same time, and he fired first. However, although the distance was never confirmed, Hathcock knew that because of the flight time, it would have been easy for both snipers to kill each other. The white feather was synonymous with Hathcock (He kept one in his hat) and he removed it only once for a mission. Keep in mind that he volunteered for this mission, but he had to crawl over 1500 yards of enemy territory to shoot an NVA commanding general. Information wasn’t sent until he was on-route. (He volunteered for a mission he knew nothing about) It took 4 days and 3 nights without sleep of inch-by-inch crawling. One enemy soldier almost stepped on him as he laid camouflaged in a meadow. At another point he was nearly bitten by a viper, he didn’t flinch. He finally got into position and waited for the general. When he arrived Hathcock was ready. He fired one round and hit the general through the chest killing him. The soldiers started a search for the sniper and Hathcock had to crawl back to avoid detection. They never caught him. Nerves of steel.

Nicknamed ‘The White Death’

705 confirmed kills (505 with rifle, 200 with submachine gun)

Was a Finnish soldier who, using an iron sighted bolt action rifle, amassed the highest recorded confirmed kills as a sniper in any war…ever!!

Häyhä was born in the municipality of Rautjärvi near the present-day border of Finland and Russia, and started his military service in 1925. His duties as a sniper began during the ‘winter war’ (1939-1940) between Russia and Finland. During the conflict Häyhä endured freezing temperatures up to -40 degrees Celsius. In less than 100 days he was credited with 505 confirmed kills, 542 if including unconfirmed kills, however the unofficial frontline figures from the battlefield places the number of sniper kills at over 800. Besides his sniper kills he was also credited with 200 from a Suomi KP/31 Submachine gun, topping off his total confirmed kills at 705.

How Häyhä did all this was amazing. He was basically on his own all day, in the snow, shooting Russians, for 3 months straight. Of course when the Russians caught wind that a shit load of soldiers were being killed, they thought ‘well this is war, there’s bound to be casualties’. But when the generals were told that it was one man with a rifle they decided to take a bit of action. first they sent in a counter-sniper. When his body was returned they decided to send in a team of counter-snipers. When they didn’t come back at all they sent in a whole goddamn battalion. They took casualties and couldn’t find him. Eventually they ordered an artillery strike, but to no avail. You see Häyhä was clever, and this was his neck of the woods. He dressed completely in white camouflage. He used a smaller rifle to suit his smaller frame (being 5ft3) increasing his accuracy. he used an iron sight to present the smallest possible target (a scoped sight would require the sniper to raise his head for sighting). He compacted the snow in front of the barrel, so as not to disturb it when he shot thus revealing his position. He also kept snow in his mouth so his breath did not condense and reveal where his was. Eventually however his was shot in the jaw by a stray bullet during combat on March 6 1940. He was picked up by his own soldiers who said half his head was missing. He didn’t die however and regained consciousness on the 13th, the day peace was declared.

Once again total kills…. 505 sniper + 200 submachine = 705 total Confirmed Kills…all in less that 100 days.

In the past we gave you a list of ten myths about the Romans. Today, to complement that list we are giving you ten facts. Roman society existed in one of the most fascinating periods of history. Many of the aspects of Roman life continue on to the present day and we certainly have a lot to thank them for in terms of culture and law and, of course, our calendar. This list looks at ten aspects of Roman life that are particularly interesting and (hopefully) not especially well known.

While it is well known that the Romans worshipped many gods, there was, in fact, an official state god. This god was named Sol Invictus (the unconquered sun) and was created by the emperor Aurelian in 274 AD and continued, overshadowing other cults in importance, until the abolition of paganism under Theodosius I (on February 27, 390). The Romans held a festival on December 25 of Dies Natalis Solis Invicti, “the birthday of the unconquered sun.” December 25 was the date after the winter solstice, with the first detectable lengthening of daylight hours. There was also a festival on December 19. Though many Oriental cults were practiced informally among the Roman legions from the mid-second century, only that of Sol Invictus was officially accepted and prescribed for the army. Emperors up to Constantine I portrayed Sol Invictus on their official coinage and Constantine decreed (March 7, 321) dies Solis — day of the sun, “Sunday” — as the Roman day of rest.

Just like today, Romans lived in a variety of different dwellings depending on class. The rich had villas (our rich have McMansions), and the poor lived in small apartments over shops – just as many city-dwellers do today. Roofs were not allowed to be higher than 17 meters (during the reign of Hadrian) due to the danger of collapse, and most apartments had windows. Water would be brought in from outside and residents would have to go out to public latrines to use the toilet. Because of the danger of fire, the Romans living in these apartments were not allowed to cook – so they would eat out or buy food in from takeaway shops (called thermopolium). It is amazing to see how these aspects of life have barely changed – our homes may look different, but in many ways we are the same as the Romans.

The closest thing Romans had to underwear was a subligaculumIt could come either in the form of a pair of shorts, or in the form of a simple loincloth wrapped around the lower body. It could be worn both by men and women. In particular, it was part of the dress of gladiators, athletes, and of actors on the stage. The subligaculum could be worn under a tunic but men who were standing for public office would sometimes just wear the subligaculum and nothing else. Roman Women also sometimes wore a band of cloth or leather around their upper body. (strophium or mamillare) as can be seen in the picture above.

Education was very important to the Ancient Romans. The rich people in Ancient Rome put a great deal of faith in education. While the poor in Ancient Rome did not receive a formal education, many still learned to read and write. Children from rich families, however, were well schooled and were taught by a private tutor at home or went to what we would recognise as schools. In general, schools as we would recognise them, were for boys only. Also, Roman schools were rarely an individual building but an extension of a shop – separated from the crowd by a mere curtain! Learning in Roman schools was based on fear. Boys were beaten for the slightest offence as a belief existed that a boy would learn correctly and accurately if he feared being caned if he got something wrong. For boys who continued to get things wrong, some schools had a policy of having pupils held down by two slaves while his tutor beat him with a leather whip. [Source]

At the time of the first Christians, St Peter, the first Bishop of Rome (and thus first Pope) was put to death by being crucified upside-down in the Circus of Nero – a large open-air venue used for public events. His body was buried there. A mere 200 years later, the Roman Emperor Constantine I legalized Christianity and donated the Circus of Nero to the Church for what is now known as Old St Peter’s Basilica. It took only 30 years to build and survived until 1506 when it was demolished by Pope Julius II in order to make way for the Basilica which stands in its place today and remains the seat of the Papacy. The irony of the fact that the seat of the oldest and largest Christian population in the world stands on the spot where the first attempts were made to destroy the new religion is obvious. Given the temporal power the Church wielded (and still does to a certain degree, though more through influence now), one could say that the Roman Empire is still at the heart of Western society.

A different lifestyle also meant that the eating habits of the Ancient Romans were different to ours today. Breakfast (the Romans called this jentaculum) was taken in the master’s bedroom and usually consisted of a slice of bread or a wheat pancake eaten with dates and honey. Wine was also drunk. Lunch (the Romans called this prandium) was eaten at about 11.00 a.m. and consisted of a light meal of bread, cheese and possibly some meat. In many senses, everything was geared up towards the main meal of the day – cena. This was eaten in the late afternoon or early evening. If the master of the house had no guests, cena might take about one hour. If he did have guests, then this meal might take as long as four hours. A light supper was usually eaten just before the Romans went to bed, consisting of bread and fruit. The Romans were usually not big meat eaters and a lot of their normal meals involved vegetables, herbs and spices together with a wheat meal that looked like porridge. Petronius described a luxurious dinner thus:

“We were invited to take our seats. Immediately, Egyptian slaves came in and poured ice water over our hands. The starters were served. On a large tray stood a donkey made of bronze. On its back were two baskets, one holding green olives, and the other black. On either side were dormice, dipped in honey and rolled in poppy seed. nearby, on a silver grill, piping hot, lay small sausages. As for wine, we were fairly swimming in it.”

For those keen to try some home-cooked Roman food, here is a recipe for dormice: Stuff the dormice with minced pork or the meat of other dormice chopped up with herbs, pepper and pine nuts. Sew up the dormice and cook in a small oven. [Source] Before you jump up and down about the idea of eating mouse-like rodents, you should know that they are still a popular food in Slovenia. Pictured above is an edible dormouse and a Slovenian stew made from them.

Not only did the Romans use guard dogs to guard their houses, they also used “beware of the dog” signs. Petronius in his Satyricon mentions them: “There on the left as one entered…was a huge dog with a chain round its neck. It was painted on the wall and over it, in big capitals, was written: Beware of the Dog.” One wonders whether we will one day discover a sign for chariots which says “infantia in carrus” (my appalling translation of “baby on board”.) Pictured above is an authentic “beware of dog” (cave canem) mosaic from Pompeii.

The Romans were a very clean people, taking regular communal baths. They had two main supplies of water – high quality water for drinking and lower quality water for bathing. In 600 BC, the King of Rome, Tarquinius Priscus, decided to have a sewer system built under the city. It was created mainly by semi-forced laborers. The system, which outflowed into the Tiber river, was so effective that it remains in use today (though it is now connected to the modern sewerage system). It continues to be the main sewer for the famous amphitheater. It was so successful in fact, that it was imitated throughout the Roman Empire.

Pecunia non olet means “money does not smell”. This phrase was coined as a result of the urine tax levied by the Roman emperors Nero and Vespasian in the 1st century upon the collection of urine. The lower classes of Roman society urinated into pots which were emptied into cesspools. The liquid was then collected from public latrines, where it served as the valuable raw material for a number of chemical processes: it was used in tanning, and also by launderers as a source of ammonia to clean and whiten woollen togas. There are even isolated reports of it being used as a teeth whitener (supposedly originating in what is now Spain). When Vespasian’s son, Titus, complained about the disgusting nature of the tax, his father showed him a gold coin and uttered the famous quote. This phrase is still used today to show that the value of money is not tainted by its origins. Vespasian’s name still attaches to public urinals in France (vespasiennes), Italy (vespasiani), and Romania (vespasiene).

Gaius Valerius Catullus (ca. 84 BC – ca. 54 BC) was a Roman poet of the 1st century BC. His surviving works are still read widely, and continue to influence poetry and other forms of art. Now the Romans were extremely fond of poetry, humor, and obscenity. In fact, so obsessed were they with obscenity that the Latin language contains many very specific sexual terms. For example, cinaede is the term used to describe a person who is being anally penetrated and pedacabo is the the term for the person doing the penetrating. The verb irrumare means “to insert one’s penis into another person’s mouth for suckling”. So how does this relate to Catullus? It turns out that he wrote one of the most obscene pieces of poetry ever. It was considered so bad that a full English translation did not exist until the 20th century. Here is the translation:

I’m gonna fuck you guys up the ass and shove my cock down your throats,
yes, you, Aurelius–you fucking cocksucker–and you too, Furius, you faggot!
Just because my verses are tender doesn’t mean
that I’ve gone all soft. Sure, a poet should focus
on writing poetry and not on sex; but does that
mean they can’t write about sex? If a poem is
in good taste, well-written and erotic,
it can give massive boners to hairy old men,
not just to horny teenagers. You think I’m a sissy
just because I write about thousands of kisses?
I’m gonna fuck you guys up the ass and shove my cock down your throats!

It definitely sounds nicer in the Latin!

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History is a funny sort of thing. As humans, we often take an extremely complex event and filter the information from that event that best captures the story in our minds. As a result of the limited nature of the human brain, often fascinating and/or critical information is lost. In this list, I wanted to capture some of the often overlooked and under-reported information surrounding major historical events. This list is in no way definitive and somewhat U.S.-centric. It would be great to see future lists that cover the topic in respect to other countries.

While the moon landing may be the single most remembered event in the history of mankind and President John Kennedy, as the man who championed and led this accomplishment, often forgotten is Kennedy’s true motive for the daunting task. In a conversation with James Webb, the director of NASA at the time, Kennedy was quoted as saying, “Everything we do ought to really be tied into getting on to the Moon ahead of the Russians [...] otherwise we shouldn’t be spending that kind of money, because I’m not interested in space [...] The only justification for [the cost] is because we hope to beat [the USSR] to demonstrate that instead of being behind by a couple of years, by God, we passed them.” Due to this passion to push the U.S. past the Soviets, Kennedy essentially diverted all of NASA’s funds to the moon landing, much to the dismay of Webb, who favored a broader approach of discovery and programs.

Due to the powerful images conjured up while recalling the horrific incident in Jonestown that saw 900+ men, women and children die through suicide or murder, the world often only remembers the victims that were actually in the compound itself and forgets the victims that tried to flee with Congressman Leo Ryan, who was there to determine whether or not U.S. citizens were being held against their will. The day before the mass suicide, Ryan and other U.S. government officials landed in Guyana. During their visit, many of the cult members asked to leave with Ryan’s delegations. Arriving at the airport, the delegation was ambushed by the cult, one of who had embedded himself into the group asking to leave. The embedded cult member drew a gun on the plane and summarily shot the passengers. Additionally, the cult disbanded a small force and attacked the delegation from a tractor with a trailer. Congressman Ryan was one of those murdered, becoming the first and only U.S. Congressman killed in the line of duty in the history of the U.S.

When U.S. history recalls Japan in WWII, it often only remembers the mushroom clouds that scarred Japan’s physical geography and overlooks the strong psychological moorings that were devastated after the surrender. Following the surrender of Japan, U.S. General MacCarthur forced Hirohito to issue the, “Humanity Declaration,” or the Ningen-sengen. In the declaration, the Emperor proclaimed that in fact and contrary to the Shinto religion, which the culture at the time was largely built upon, he was not a god. Interestingly however, the confession was given in an archaic, court form of Japanese allowing the Emperor to be deliberately vague. It is theorized that he substituted the much more common word, “arahitogami” or “living god”, with the much more unique word “akitsumikami,” meaning an, “incarnation of god.” Many scholars have noted that one could be a living god, without being an incarnation of god.

Again, because of the sensational images of the two, 110-story Twin Towers of the World Trade Center falling, many people forget the overall tremendous devastation that the acts truly resulted in. On 9/11, in addition to the Twin Towers- 7 World Trade Center (47-stories tall), 6 World Trade Center (8-stories tall), 3 World Trade Center and the St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church were all completely destroyed, the latter entirely buried by debris of Tower 2. Also, 5 World Trade Center (9-stories tall), 4 World Trade Center (9-stories tall), the Deutsche Bank Building (40-stories tall), and Manhattan Community College’s Filterman Hall (15-stories tall) were all damaged beyond repair and have been or are slated for demolition.

Immediately following the 2004 Tsunami, the world was so rocked with the staggering death toll of nearly 240,000 individuals that it is often forgotten that many of the more rural and traditional citizens were able to survive through an indigenous understanding of the signs of an incoming tsunami. For example, scientists in the area initially were convinced that the aboriginal population of the Andaman Islands would be significantly ravaged by the tsunami, however, all but one of the tribes in the islands (oddly enough, the one that had largely converted to Christianity and thus, a change of lifestyle,) suffered only minor casualties. When questioned, the tribesmen explained to the scientists that the land and ocean often fought over boundaries and when the earth shook they knew that the sea would soon enter the land until the two could realign their borders. Because of this, the villagers fled to the hills and suffered little or no casualties. Additionally of note is the story of Tilly Smith, a 10-year-old British student vacationing on Mikakhao Beach in Thailand. Tilly, had recently studied tsunamis in school and immediately recognized the frothing bubbles and receding ocean as a harbinger of a tsunami. Along with her parents, they warned the beach and it was entirely evacuated safely.

While nearly everyone can name the place (The Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles) and perpetrator of the assassination (Sirhan Sirhan), few people recall the man who captured and disarmed the gunman. That man was Rosie Grier, an American Football sensation (Super Bowl Champion, 2 time pro-bowler, member of the Ram’s “Fearsome Foursome,” and 5 time All Pro defensive tackle.) On the night of the assassination, Grier was the bodyguard for Kennedy’s pregnant wife. Along with Rafer Johnson, an Olympic gold medal decathlete, Grier heard the shots and tackled Sirhan. Grier, then jammed his finger behind the trigger of the gun and broke Sirhan’s arm. Grier then fought off those that were literally ready to rip Sirhan apart. Later Grier, would explain that, “I would not allow more violence.” Additionally, Grier would later testify to Judge Lance Ito during the O.J. Simpson trial that he had been present when O.J. confessed to the crimes in prison. Judge Ito however, ruled that the testimony was inadmissible.

When the news broke that the Russian military had ended the standoff where 850 people were held hostage by a Chechen separatist group in Moscow, the focus of the news quickly turned to the dramatic rescue. Due to this, the heroism and sacrifice of Olga Romanova, is often overlooked. When Romanova, a 26 year-old perfume-shop clerk, heard of the crisis, she left the safety of her parent’s house and walked to the Theatre alone. Convinced that she could reason with the terrorists and at the very least convince them to free the women and children, Romanova somehow managed to bypass the intense security in the area and enter the theatre. She then confronted the rebels and pleaded for the immediate release of the hostages. The terrorists, suspecting that she was FSB, marched her into an adjoining room and executed her with a shot to the head.

Due to the iconic photo of a student lying dead and another leaning over his body and weeping, the Kent State Massacre has largely been accepted as a single event that took place in Ohio and resulted in 4 students being killed by the U.S. National Guard. What is often forgotten about the event is the sheer size and scale of the overall national unrest at the time of the shootings. Immediately following the shooting and centered on the common sentiment of, “they can’t kill us all,” 900 college campuses were closed because of violent and non-violent protests. Also, 100,000 people descended on Washington D.C., smashing car windows, lighting fires, looting and barricading streets and freeways. The President of the United States was evacuated to Camp David and the 82nd Airborne was brought in to defend the white house. Additionally, Nixon organized a special commission to focus solely on campus unrest. Ray Price, Nixon’s chief speechwriter was quoted as saying, “that’s not student protest, that’s civil war.” Overall, 4,000,000 people took place in the protests. It was at the time, the only nation wide protest on college campuses.

When the Altamont Concert is remembered, it is often solely for the Hell’s Angels providing “security,” and the ensuing riot that left an 18-year old man dead. According to sources, the Rolling Stones had hired the Hell’s Angels to keep people off the stage and to escort the Stones through the site. According to some witnesses, the Angels were hired for $500.00 worth of beer. As the evening went on, the crowd and the Angels got increasingly agitated with one another. The crowd pressed to the stage and the Angels fought them back. In the ensuing melee, Meredith Hunter was killed and the death has ever since been remembered as an example of the Angel’s inherent lawlessness and violence. However, what is not often remembered is the actual event that spawned the killing. Meredith Hunter, high on methamphetamine was captured on camera approaching the stage and brandishing a pistol. In response to the imminent danger, an angel drew a knife and stabbed him. The act of violence was determined by a judge to be an act of justifiable homicide as the Angel had every reason to believe his life was in jeopardy.

The Boston massacre was one of the most critical events that led the colonies of America to revolt against King George III. While it is well remembered in this fashion, the fates of the British soldiers that fired on the civilians are often forgotten. In fact, the Captain that was present and 8 of the soldiers were arrested and tried. What is interesting is that the defender of the soldiers was none other than, John Adams, founding father and future President of the United States. No lawyer in Boston would take the case and so the court pled with Adams to represent the men. Although, he was hesitant, he so believed that everyone deserved a fair trial that he finally relented. Adams successfully convinced the jury that 6 of the men were afraid for their life and therefore, had the right to defend themselves. Interestingly, two of the men were convicted of murder, however, Adams presented a loophole to the court whereby according to English law, if the men could read then they could claim to be clergy and thereby were not bound by secular law. Adams had the men read out-loud from the Bible and the charges were reduced to manslaughter for which they were punished by a branding on the thumb.

The Maya is a Mesoamerican civilization, noted for the only known fully developed written language of the pre-Columbian Americas, as well as its art, architecture, and mathematical and astronomical systems. Many misconceptions about the mayans exist, and this list should put an end to at least one or two of them. In addition, it will introduce you to facts that you never knew about this great ancient civilization.

The Fact: There are numerous Mayans still living in their home regions

In fact, there are over seven million Mayans living in their home regions, many of whom have managed to maintain substantial remnants of their ancient cultural heritage. Some are quite integrated into the modern cultures of the nations in which they reside, while others continue a more traditional culturally distinct life, often speaking one of the Mayan languages as a primary language. The largest populations of contemporary Maya inhabit the Mexican states of Yucatán, Campeche, Quintana Roo, Tabasco, and Chiapas, and in the Central American countries of Belize, Guatemala, and the western portions of Honduras and El Salvador. Just as a point of interest, it is very possible that the word “shark” comes to us from the Mayan languages, as does the word “cocoa”. To say “thank you” in Yucatec Maya, you say “Jach Dyos b’o'otik.”

The Fact: The Mayans “enhanced” the beauty of their children

The Maya desired some unnatural physical characteristics for their children. For instance, at a very young age boards were pressed on babies’ foreheads to create a flattened surface. This process was widespread among the upper class. Another practice was to cross babies’ eyes. To do this, objects were dangled in front of a newborn’s eyes, until the newborn’s eyes were completely and permanently crossed. Another interesting fact about Mayan children is that most were named according to the day they were born. Every day of the year had a specific name for both boys and girls and parents were expected to follow that practice.

The Fact: The Mayans had many excellent medical practices

Health and medicine among the ancient Maya was a complex blend of mind, body, religion, ritual, and science. Important to all, medicine was practiced only by a select few who were given an excellent education. These men, called shamans, act as a medium between the physical world and spirit world. They practice sorcery for the purpose of healing, foresight, and control over natural events. Since medicine was so closely related to religion and sorcery, it was essential that Maya shamans had vast medical knowledge and skill. It is known that the Maya sutured wounds with human hair, reduced fractures, and were even skilled dental surgeons, making prostheses from jade and turquoise and filling teeth with iron pyrite.

The Fact: Some Mayans still practice blood sacrifice

It is a rather well known fact that the Mayans practiced human sacrifice for religious and medical reasons – but what most people don’t know is that many Mayans still practice blood sacrifice. But don’t get too excited – chicken blood has now replaced human blood. Today the Maya keep many of the ritualistic traditions of their ancestors. Elements of prayer, offerings, blood sacrifice (replacing human blood with that of sacrificed chickens), burning of copal incense, dancing, feasting, and ritual drinking continue in traditional ceremonies.

The Fact: The Mayans used painkillers

The Mayan peoples regularly used hallucinogenic drugs (taken from the natural world) in their religious rituals, but they also used them in day to day life as painkillers. Flora such as peyote, the morning glory, certain mushrooms, tobacco, and plants used to make alcoholic substances, were commonly used. In addition, as depicted in Maya pottery and carvings, ritual enemas were used for a more rapid absorption and effect of the substance. Above is a statue of a Mayan enjoying their enema.

The Fact: The Mayans built ball courts so they could play games

The Mesoamerican ballgame was a sport with ritual associations played for over 3000 years by the pre-Columbian peoples of Mesoamerica. The sport had different versions in different places during the millennia, and a modern version of the game, ulama, is still played in a few places by the local indigenous population. Ballcourts were public spaces used for a variety of elite cultural events and ritual activities like musical performances and festivals, and of course, the ballgame. Enclosed on two sides by stepped ramps that led to ceremonial platforms or small temples, the ball court itself was of a capital “I” shape and could be found in all but the smallest of Maya cities. In Classic Maya, the ballgame was called pitz, and the action of play was ti pitziil. The game was played with a ball roughly the size of a volleyball but made from rubber and heavier. Decapitation is particularly associated with the ballgame – severed heads are featured in much Late Classic ballgame art. There has even been speculation that the heads and skulls were used as balls.

The Fact: The Mayans used saunas

An important purification element to the ancient Maya was the sweat bath, or zumpul-ché. Similar to a modern day sauna, sweat baths were constructed of stone walls and ceilings, with a small opening in the top of the ceiling. Water poured onto the hot rocks in the room created steam, offering a setting in which to sweat out impurities. Sweat baths were used for a range of conditions and situations. New mothers who had recently conceived a child would seek revitalization in them, while individuals who were sick could find healing power in sweating. Maya kings made a habit out of visiting the sweat baths as well because it left them feeling refreshed and, as they believed, cleaner.

The Fact: The last Maya state existed until 1697

The island city of Tayasal was the last independent Mayan kingdom and some Spanish priests peacefully visited and preached to the last Itza king, Canek, as late as 1696. The Itza kingdom finally submitted to Spanish rule on March 13, 1697, to a force led by Martín de Ursua, governor of Yucatán. The famous archeological site and home to the beautiful monuments we are all familiar with was in Chichen Itza, located in this last independent region. Interestingly, much of the land under the monuments is privately owned by one family, whilst the government owns and administers the monuments themselves.

The Fact: The Mayan Calendar does not predict the end of the world in 2012

First of all, the Mayans don’t have a calender they have calendars which often interlocked. The calender that has given rise to the myth of the end of the world is the Mayan long count calendar. According to Mayan Mythology, we are living in the fourth world or “creation” so to speak. The last creation ended on 12.19.19.17.19 of the long count calendar. That sequence will occur again on December 20, 2012. According to the Mayans this is a time of great celebration for having reached the end of a creation cycle. It does not mean the end of the world but the beginning of a new “age”. Does the world end every December 31st? No – we go on to a new year. This is the same as the Mayan creation periods. In fact, the Mayans make many references to dates that fall beyond 2012. The idea of 2012 being the end of the world was actually first suggested by New Age religionist José Argüelles in his 1987 book The Mayan Factor: Path Beyond Technology.

The Fact: No one really knows what caused the collapse of the Mayan culture

For reasons that are still debated, the Maya centers of the southern lowlands went into decline during the 8th and 9th centuries and were abandoned shortly thereafter. This decline was coupled with a cessation of monumental inscriptions and large-scale architectural construction. Non-ecological theories of Maya decline are divided into several subcategories, such as overpopulation, foreign invasion, peasant revolt, and the collapse of key trade routes. Ecological hypotheses include environmental disaster, epidemic disease, and climate change. There is evidence that the Maya population exceeded carrying capacity of the environment including exhaustion of agricultural potential and over-hunting of megafauna. Some scholars have recently theorized that an intense 200 year drought led to the collapse of Maya civilization.

The effective prosecution of any war requires a load of decisions at all junctures. Many times, commanders will blunder through misinformation, faulty intelligence, or a misreading of the tactical or strategic situation. We, safely ensconced here in the future can play Monday morning quarterback with the decision of the past often without acknowledging the fact that the commanders in question lack our brilliant hindsight; however, some decisions are simple unconscionable. One has to think that someone, somewhere had to look at this choice and say “God, this is stupid!” This list represents, in chronological order, ten of what I consider to be the dumbest decisions anyone ever made. Each of these decisions either resulted in tremendously unnecessary loss of men and materiel or it resulted in the ultimate loss or needless prolonging of the war in which it took place.

The only motivation I can fathom behind this idiotic blunder by a military genius is sheer boredom. To this point in his military career, Napoleon has known nothing but victory after victory. He’s conquered pretty much all of Europe that refused to ally with him and suddenly he was sitting around with the largest army ever gathered in Europe up until then with nothing to do. So Napoleon looks west, to Mother Russia.

We all know how it turned out but you have to think someone in that huge army knew it was a bad idea. In any event, he didn’t say anything and the rest is history. Napoleon invaded Russia with three quarters of a million men and didn’t fight much of a battle. The Russian retreated into the vastness of their country and burned everything in their wake. Result? Napoleon gets to Moscow only to find smoking ruins. Dejected at not getting to move his toy soldiers around on his big map, he turns the Grand Armee around and begins for home.

But then the real trouble began. Constant harassment by tiny, mobile Russian units. Constant hunger because the supply lines are cut in more places than Danish lace and, worst of all, winter sets in and the soldiers start freezing to death in droves. Three quarters of a million went in, but less than one in three would made it out.

Someone has remarked that the Alamo seems to show up on nearly every military list. Well, it’s a great story. Not the least great part about it was it was so totally unnecessary. All the Alamo consisted of was a tiny adobe walled mission in the middle of a prairie. Basically, Santa Anna, aka Napoleon of the West, decided the tiny garrison in the tiny fort had to be taught a lesson about Mexican politics by his great big army.

One just has to think that someone, some hard campaigning Sergeant in the Mexican force had to look around at the wide open prairie on both sides of the Alamo and think to himself, “Why don’t we just go around? We can even shoot at them as we go by, but let’s get to the rebel capital and put down the rebellion.”
Instead, mainly as a result of Santa Anna’s pride, the main Mexican army spends days and days held up attacking this insignificant little outpost. This needless delay gives the Texas government time to get organized, gives people time to flee, and gives the main Texan army time to get reinforced and into better position. The end result was the Battle of San Jacinto where old Santa Anna got caught napping – literally – and the Republic of Texas was born.

This one will be a little obscure to some, but in the grand scheme of things, it was a world-changing event. The cartridge in question was for the new Pattern 3 Enfield rifle that was to be issued to all the Empire’s troops and replace the older, less efficient models. On the surface this doesn’t seem like a big deal and to us, it probably wouldn’t be. However, in 1857, cartridges weren’t brass, they were paper, and to load them, one had to first BITE the end off the cartridge and pour the contained powder down the barrel of the muzzle loaded weapon. Again, no big deal, until one realizes one singularly important fact. The lubricating lard smeared on the cartridges was made from animal fat. This fat could be obtained from either pigs or cows. In and of itself, that doesn’t present a problem until one realizes that the vast majority of foreign troops in the British Empire were either Muslim or Hindu, especially in India. Now, pigs are unclean to Muslims and cows are sacred to the Hindus so the thought of putting a cartridge with lard into their mouths was anathema to both parties. It didn’t help matters much that the political climate in India was becoming a powder keg, but the lard cartridges proved the final straw – the match that blew the keg, so to speak.

What resulted is known to history as the Sepoy Rebellion or the Sepoy Mutiny. Basically, without going into the very involved, tense and delicate political situation, the Sepoys or Indian soldiers, refused to touch the cartridges which constitutes mutiny. When the first few were seen being punished by the British colonial overlords, the rest rose up and began a bloody rebellion that lasted 13 months and saw tremendous bloodshed and cruelty on both sides. The British severity in putting down the revolt – many leaders were tied to the mouths of cannon and blasted to bloody vapor — remained in the minds of the Indian people through the rest of the 19th century and through two world wars in the 20th. In many ways, the Indian Independence Movement lead by Gandhi can trace its roots to this one monumentally boneheaded decision.

During the American Civil War, one of the qualities that made General Robert E. Lee of the Confederacy so effective was the mysteriousness with which he moved and operated. His troops seemed to appear, fight, and melt away with uncanny speed. Now in reality, this was nothing more supernatural than very detailed and well-executed battle plans. Imagine what the Union generals could have done if they had only possessed a copy of one of Lee’s battle plans. In a wildly providential moment, that is exactly what happened on the eve of the Battle of Sharpsburg in September of 1862.

Union General George McClellan’s 90,000-man Army of the Potomac was moving to intercept Lee, and occupied a campsite the Confederates had vacated just a few days before. While setting up their tent, two Union soldiers discovered a copy of Lee’s detailed battle plans wrapped around three cigars. The order indicated that Lee had divided his army and dispersed portions, intending to bring battle near Antietam Creek. Everything was there in writing. It was a colossal blunder by some Confederate officer.

The outcome would have been even more disastrous for the Confederates had not McClellan waited about 18 hours before deciding to take advantage of this intelligence and reposition his forces. As it was, the Battle of Sharpsburg (or Antietam) would be the single bloodiest day of combat in American history with 23,000 killed and countless wounded before the sun set.

All that saved Lee was McClellan’s indecision. Still, the battle sapped numbers of soldiers that the Confederacy could ill afford to lose. More importantly, though, was the fact that England had been teetering on the fence of coming into the war to aid their cotton supplying Confederates, but with the outcome of Antietam, they decided to sit back for a little while longer, thus robbing the Confederacy of help it desperately needed. A different choice of wrapping paper could have made all the difference in the world to the history of North America.

It sometimes looks like Lee did have some sort of guardian angel; either that or the Northern generals before Grant were all monumentally stupid. The former is more romantic, but the latter is easier to prove. In any event, Meade’s decision to let Lee slip back to Virginia is another example of Lee’s luck and an opposing general’s horrendous decision making ability.

The Army of Northern Virginia was done. Three days at Gettysburg had reduced the proud rebels to a shell of their former strength. Devil’s Den, Little Round Top, the Peach Orchard, and, at the last, Pickett’s Charge up Cemetery Ridge had produced the High Water Mark of the Confederacy. With all his reserves spent, Lee was gathering his badly mauled forces and trying mightily to make it back to the relative safety of Ol’ Virginy.

In his way was the rain swollen Potomac River. On his flanks were the persistent if largely ineffectual Union cavalry pickets. The roads were a quagmire of mud. In all, the stage was set for the final crushing blow to be delivered by the Army of the Potomac, which had several reserves that had seen little if any fighting. They would sweep down on the defeated boys in grey like an avenging blue tide. The Army of Northern Virginia would be crushed and the Civil War would be all but over. All that remained was for General Meade to give the order to attack.

Well, the order never came. For reasons that, to this day, are unclear Meade was reluctant to follow Lee. Instead, he gathered his forces in strength and waited. No one is quite sure what he was waiting for, but when President Lincoln found out that Meade had literally allowed the end of the war to slip through his hands, Honest Abe was incensed. It was largely Meade’s indecision that resulted in General Grant being called east from Vicksburg and placed in command of the Army of the Potomac. Had Meade attacked the defeated rebels at that opportune moment, the Civil War probably would not have drug on in a morass of attrition for nearly two more years. Countless lives, Union and Confederate alike, could have been spared and the Reconstruction Period would likely have looked much different.

It is generally held to be a good idea among most military men that, when the latest and greatest weapons are available, they should be used. The newly patented Gatling Gun was the earliest machine gun and had completed its trials. Custer had two to four of the guns and abundant ammunition available when he set out to uproot a “small Indian village” on the bank of the Little Bighorn River. Custer’s reasoning behind not using them was that the Gatling guns would impede his march and hamper his mobility. More importantly, he also is said to have believed that the use of so devastating a weapon would “cause him to lose face with the Indians.” Considering reports of Custer’s vanity, this is not hard to believe.

These problems do not change the fact that the Gatling guns would have been a decided equalizer in the face of what turned out to be overwhelming Indian superiority, and that elsewhere in the Indian wars, the Indians often reacted to new army weapons by breaking off the fight. Instead, Custer led more than 250 doomed men of the famous 7th Cavalry into the Montana hill country. If he had taken the then greatly improved machine guns with him the outcome of the much-discussed Last Stand would surely have been very different.

What could have been going through Custer’s mind as he stood, the breeze whipping his famous golden hair behind him, his loyal men dead all about him, and several hundred Sioux warriors galloping towards him intent on making him a human pincushion? Could it possibly have been, “I really could use those Gatling guns right about now.”

By the start of 1915, the Great War had ground to a halt. The trench lines stretched from Belgium through Italy and neither side was making progress. The war had devolved into mad suicide rushes across no man’s land into the teeth of the new Maxim guns. Predictably, casualties were mounting daily and the war that “will be over by Christmas” seemed to have no end in sight. To make matters worse, Russia was getting their mess kits handed to them all up and down the Eastern Front and the tsardom was beginning to look shaky. The German navy had cut all the usual supply lines to accessible ports and any port safe from the German fleet was either icebound or entirely too far away to be of any practical use. Something had to be done and quickly.

Enter Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill. Now Churchill is well know for his personal bravery as well as his usually keen mind. He is also known for being a fan of a good stiff drink and apparently, he’d had several when he thought of this plan. Churchill proposed that a third front be opened up in the western Mediterranean. Specifically, he planned an attack on the Ottoman Empire held Dardanelles. The attack on what he termed the “soft underbelly of the Central Powers” would open up a warm water resupply depot for Russia and effectively turn the flank of the vast trench network. It was a great idea in theory and on paper.

The Gallipoli Campaign took place at Gallipoli peninsula in Turkey from 25 April 1915 to 9 January 1916. The intent was for a joint amphibian attack by British Empire and French forces up the peninsula to capture the Ottoman capital of Istanbul. To put it mildly, the attempt failed miserably with heavy casualties on both sides. The whole operation was botched from the beginning. The planned invasion was tipped off to the Turks who reinforced the peninsula with heavy guns and additional troops. Once the invasion began, it quickly stalled on the beachhead, thwarted by the Turkish occupation of the high ground.

To make a very detailed and long story short, the allied forces, the bulk of which were Australians and New Zealanders (who ultimately had the highest number of dead per capita of all nations in the war), were essentially trapped on the beaches in the open for months. No real progress was ever made inland despite several dogged attempts all around the peninsula. Promised naval artillery support was cut short as soon as the Admiralty found out – by the sinking of two battleships – that German U-boats were in the waters. The whole event was an unmitigated disaster. Conditions were unreal. In the summer, the heat was atrocious, which in conjunction with bad sanitation, led to so many flies that eating became extremely difficult. Corpses, left in the open, became bloated and stank. The precarious Allied bases were poorly situated and caused supply and shelter problems. A dysentery epidemic spread through the Allied trenches. Autumn and winter brought relief from the heat, but also led to gales, flooding and frostbite.

In the end, Churchill was sacked as Lord of the Admiralty, several generals saw their careers ended but most of all; tens of thousands of men on both sides were killed for absolutely no gain whatsoever. To this day, Gallipoli is remembered as ANZAC Day in Australia and New Zealand in honor of all the brave ANZACs who gave their lives for a stupid decision.

Honestly? See item 10. Replace “Napoleon” with “Hitler”, “Russia” with “Soviet Union”, and “Le Grand Armee” with “Wermacht” and you have the gist of the story. Operation Barbarossa was, without a doubt, the worst case of someone who failed to learn from history being doomed to repeat it. Adolf Hitler proved that it’s not only teenagers who think, “It can’t happen to me.”

Wars are best run by the professionals. Lyndon B. Johnson was President, but he was not a professional soldier by any means during the Vietnam War. That did not stop him from blowing what was a small insurgency with American “advisors” into an all out “police action” that would claim the lives of nearly 60,000 American soldiers, sailors, and airmen before it ended two Presidents later.

Johnson expanded American involvement on the ground in Vietnam as soon as he took office after JFK’s assassination. Unfortunately for the troops, LBJ watched opinion polls and it is hard to fight a war if you watch opinion polls. Basically, field commanders couldn’t attack certain high value targets without Johnson’s say-so and, given the distances and the time it would take to brief the President on each given situation, the men were fighting one step behind at all times. He also took fire from the press who said he was too cozy with the defense businessmen and the war was justification for increased defense spending to make these businesses rich. That speculation, like Johnson’s supposed involvement in JFK’s assassination, is better left to the conspiracy theorists.

What is a fact, however, is LBJ’s insistence on being a hands-on Commander-in-Chief seriously handicapped American efforts in the jungles of Vietnam. Ultimately, his decision to try running a war based on opinion polls proved his undoing and he dropped out of the 1968 Presidential elections.

For centuries, countries outside of Afghanistan – from the Indian Mughals, to the British Empire, to the Islamic fundamentalists – have tried to impose their will upon the Afghan people. As a result, the Afghans are a hardy bunch and they can fight like devils. The are experts at guerilla warfare and it is always a safe bet to assume that whoever is invading them has enemies all to willing to supply the natives with effective weaponry. That is over 1200 years of history totally lost on the Soviets in 1979 when they sent in a massive number of troops to prop up the unpopular communist government in Kabul.

What followed was a ten year blood bath of death among the rocks. For years, Soviet Hind helicopters would hunt in the valleys for any of the Afghan fighters. Upon finding them, the guerillas would be mown down by cannon fire from the craft they called “The Crocodile”. Then the CIA saw a chance to return the favor the Soviets had played on the United States during its involvement in Vietnam and began supplying the Afghan fighters with Stinger surface to air missiles. So much for Soviet air superiority. Stingers shot down 333 Soviet helicopters in the course of the ten year war.

The saddest part is the Soviets had just witnessed the USA’s horrific ten year quagmire in Vietnam, but, like other groups in history, they figured it couldn’t happen to them. They were wrong. The Soviets lost 15,000 men and billions of rubles worth of equipment to Afghanistan and they got nothing in return. For the Afghans, the country was left devastated and ripe for a group called the Taliban to take over.

To me, the “heroic last stand” is one of the most awesome of all the awesome footnotes of history. Sure, not all of them work out this way, but I can almost see the noble bunch of heroes looking at one another and saying, “This is it, gentlemen, we are royally screwed, surrounded, and the cavalry apparently ain’t coming so lets make this bunch pay dearly for our blood.” They are the brawniest bunch you can imagine and the ones the people back home are counting on to keep them safe.

Now, in my admittedly biased and prejudiced mind, not all Last Stands are created equal. So, for the purpose of this list, I’ve got five criteria in mind. Not every last stand here meets all five, but they must meet at least three.

1. If you are the aggressor, you can’t have a Last Stand because you are getting your just desserts. Simply put, you started it and if you hadn’t started it, you wouldn’t be getting wiped out to the last man, now would you? (Think Custer)
2. The odds are laughably against your team. We’re talking AT LEAST 3:1 against and the worse the odds, the burlier the last stand glory.
3. Everybody, or at least just about everybody, dies. It’s not a Last Stand if enough of you are left to make another last stand at some point.
4. Everyone EXPECTS to die. No surrender even if asked to. As one burly sergeant in a furball of a fight put it, “Surrender? Not bloody likely!” (Exception: You surrender on YOUR terms and it’s honored.)
5. The sacrifice has to mean something in the larger scheme of things. Otherwise, you should have bloody well retreated or something to try staying alive since what you did was get everyone killed for nothing.

So, with no further ado, and in no particular order, here are my suggestions for the burliest of the burly Last Stands.

This was the stuff legends are made of and since Frank Miller’s film 300 came out, a whole new generation of people have been acquainted with the heroic sacrifice of Leonidas and his handpicked guard of 300 warriors, all of whom had mature sons who could carry on the family name. What a lot of people don’t seem to remember is that as awesome as Leo and his wild bunch were, they didn’t stand completely alone. Other city-states, notably Arcadia and Thespia, sent troops as well, so the force opposing the massive Persian army was closer to 6,000 than just 300. Still, that this group stopped those thousands cold in their tracks at the Hot Gates for three days and in the end were only dislodged by treachery is nothing short of amazing. The action scored a perfect 5 out of 5 on the criteria. The best legend, probably apocryphal – but maybe not, was one Spartan hoplite’s reply to a Persian envoy’s boast that, “Our arrows will blot out the Sun.” The hoplite replied, “So much the better, for then we shall fight in the shade!”

Rome was sacked by the troops of the Holy Roman Empire under Emperor Charles V in 1527. When the troops, mostly rabble and mercenaries, of the empire breached the city, they immediately ignored the orders of Charles and pretty much everyone else in command and made straight for Vatican Hill intent on pillaging the richest treasures in Christendom. They also had murder on their mind and Pope Clement VII was high on the list of targets. The famous Swiss Guards, who used to do more than just stand around looking pretty for tourists, formed a fighting square on the steps of St. Peter’s Basilica to face upwards of 20,000 bloodthirsty troops who were storming the city. Only 189 Guardsmen remained after the fighting to take the city, but these troops chose to make their stand in hopes of buying Clement time to escape the city through one of the warrens of tunnels under Rome. Clement made good his escape as the Guard managed to hold the porch of the church and prevent the doors from falling, but only 42 Swiss Guards survived and none of them were uninjured. Again, this one scores a 5 out of 5 and proves that when the Swiss decide not to be neutral, they aren’t a bunch to take lightly.

This one siege and especially its climactic pre-dawn final battle is the reason natives of Texas poke their chests out a little farther than most other Americans. It is a singular event in Texan history and it’s what lead directly to Texas becoming first a nation and later a state in the United States of America. Not only that, but “Remember the Alamo!” has rung down the years as a major battlecry for people who’ve never crossed the Texan border, but who feel a giddy sense of bravado in the face of utter annihilation.

At the old Spanish mission, 182 poorly armed Texas rebels faced upwards of 2000 crack Mexican troops under the command of the finest Mexican general, Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. The Mexicans had cavalry and a battery of cannon. The Texans had grit, determination, and cannons with very little ammunition. For 12 days, the Texans stood down Santa Anna, enduring bombardments daily. Finally, Santa Anna had enough and ordered a full assault on the mission in a surprise pre-dawn attack. Every defender of the mission was killed but Santa Anna did spare the women and children as well as sparing and freeing two African American slaves found in the fort. This last stand garners a 4.5 out of 5 because technically, the Mexicans were the “good guys” since the Texans were rebels against the lawful authority in Mexico City.

This small engagement in Mexico while much of the world was focused on the American Civil War to the north, put the French Foreign Legion on the map and began a legend that persists today in the unofficial motto, “The Legion dies, it does not surrender.” Everything fell out because a group of 65 Foreign Legion troops, led by Capt. Jean Danjou were carrying supplies to Veracruz in support of the French campaign in Mexico under Napoleon III. Caught out in the open, the French troops managed to make a fighting retreat to the small hacienda of Cameron. There, surrounded and backs to the wall, the handful of Legionnaires fought like they were possessed. They repulsed attack after attack, cavalry charge after cavalry charge, until their ammunition began to run low.

Even after Capt. Danjou was felled by a bullet to the chest, his men fought on. Finally, only six of the men remained and they were out of bullets and powder. At this point, they have killed enough Mexicans to surrender honorably. After all, only six are left ALIVE, much less standing. But no, led by the highest remaining NCO, a corporal, the six men fixed bayonets and, with the cry of “Vive l’France”, charged the Mexican forces. Three were struck by rifle fire and killed outright. The remaining three were surrounded, wrestled to the ground and asked to surrender. Most men would have said fine and thanked their luck they were alive.

Not this bunch. One of the men looked up and said they would surrender only if they were allowed to keep their regimental Colors, keep their weapons, carry their dead with them, AND be given a safe conduct escort to their own lines. According to the accounts of eyewitnesses, the Mexican commander shook his head, laughed and ordered his men to comply with the Legionnaires’ demands. “After all,” he is supposed to have said, “What is one to do with devils like these?” To this day, April 30 is called Cameron Day in France and is celebrated by the Legion much as the Marine Corps Birthday is celebrated every November in America.

This battle would again only garner a 4 out of 5 on the criteria because Saigo’s samurai were technically rebels. BUT, they were rebels because the Emperor was destroying their way of life. Bushido and the sword had ruled samurai behavior for over a thousand years and now the nobility of the samurai and his training were being swept aside in favor of conscript troops with rapid firing weapons.

So, the samurai under their commander Saigo were retreating to their base of operations when they were caught and surrounded on the hill of Shiroyama. The 300 of them had their traditional bows and, of course, their matchless katanas. The 30,000 Imperial troops had rifled muskets and gatling guns.

The Imperial commander asked Saigo to surrender peacefully and be spared, but, being a samurai, Saigo couldn’t really do that. Instead, he spent the night of September 23 getting buzzed on sake and ready to die. At 3:00 AM, the Imperial troops began an artillery bombardment followed by a full frontal attack. Saigo was twice wounded before committing ritual suicide to avoid the dishonor of capture. The thirty men who survived the artillery barrage charged the Imperial lines and began laying about them with their katanas. They acquitted themselves well, but in the end, every one of them was killed and the way of the samurai was dead . . . at least until the start of World War II.

Okay, this is another slightly technical violation of my criteria. After all, if the Brits hadn’t been trying to take the Zulu’s land, Rorke’s Drift never would have happened. BUT, in my defense, these particular 139 soldiers weren’t invading anything. They were left behind while the “big boys” went off to get massacred at the Battle of Islawandha.

No, this was a group of cooks, supply clerks, Royal Engineers, and other guys who could fight if they had to, but hadn’t really been called upon very much. They were the prime example of the “in the rear with the gear” soldiers. Unfortunately, all their buddies were wiped out at the aforementioned Battle of Islawandha. To make matters worse, a whole crap load of Zulus didn’t get to take part in the battle because everyone was dead before they got there. So, those bored Zulus decided to take out their frustrations on the supply depot at Rorke’s Drift.

The Zulus had numbers, surprise, the high ground, and knowledge of the terrain. The defenders had bags of grain, Martini-Henry rifles, and bayonets “with some guts behind them”. The Zulus attacked in massive waves all through the afternoon of January 22 and through the night and early morning of January 23. They were gathering for another assault when their scouts spotted the British relief column complete with cannon and decided to retire.

The defenders gained a new respect for the Zulus and in the process garnered 11 Victoria Crosses, the most ever awarded for a single engagement. True, they weren’t wiped out, but when they looked up and saw every surrounding hill bristling with Zulu warriors, no one thought he was getting out alive.

1,400 Malay, British, Indian and Australian soldiers faced off against 13,000 Japanese troops in an attempt to save Singapore or at least give the civilians time to evacuate. Soldiers from the Royal Malay Regiment, The Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment, the British 2nd Loyals Regiment, the 44th Indian Brigade and the 22nd Australian Brigade made a futile attempt to stop the advancing Japanese towards the centre of Singapore. The majority of the defenders fell in the battle. Those that did not became prisoners who would later be pressed into service on the Thai-Burma Railroad where they would be forced to built a famous bridge over a famous river.

In the final hours of battle, a Malay soldier, 2nd Lieutenant Adnan Bin Saidi, led a 42-man platoon against thousands of invaders, leaving himself as a sole survivor. The Japanese suffered a disproportionately high number of casualties because of these men’s bravery so as punishment for being burly and courageous they tortured Adnan before executing him.

Early in the Battle of the Bulge about 12,000 under-equipped and exhausted US Paratroopers of the 101st Airborne Division seized the town of Bastogne to defend this strategic crossroads from the German Advance. They were promptly and completely surrounded by roughly 15 Divisions of Germans. The 101st could only be sustained by airdrops from C-47s and things looked suitably grim. Seeing the hopelessness of the American position, German commander, General Heinrich Freiherr von Lüttwitz asked the 101st’s acting commander, Captain Anthony McAuliffe to surrender, McAuliffe’s famously terse reply was “Nuts!”.

Under their impetuous commander, the unit held off multiple German Panzer attacks, until eventually relieved by George S. Patton’s US Third Army on December 26. One of the units of the 101st to take part in the battle was the legendary Easy Company immortalized in the TV series “Band of Brothers.”

On January 6, 1066, Harold Godwinson became King Harold II following the death of his brother-in-law, Edward the Confessor. By late summer, he was faced with two imminent attempts to invade England. The first came in the northeast from his traitorous brother, Tostig, and King Harald Hardraada of Norway. While celebrating his defeat of Hardraada at a victory feast, Harold received word that Duke William the Bastard had landed at Pevensey in the south with 7,000 men. Harold gathered his forces, marched south to London, and by the evening of October 13, deployed his forces along Battle, or Senlac, Ridge near Hastings.

The battle developed into a deadly engagement between the Saxon infantry and the Norman cavalry and archers. Initially, Norman arrows were harmlessly deflected by Saxon shields, and Saxon axes and spears shattered the first Norman charge. Overcome by confidence, the Saxon infantry unwisely followed the retreating cavalry in reckless pursuit and were cut down by the Norman reserve. Harold reformed his forces and the Saxons braced for additional charges. The battle evolved into relentless pounding on the Saxon line by the Norman cavalry. The Saxons more than held their own and inflicted heavy casualties. Just before evening, William feigned a general withdrawal and many Saxons again broke ranks to pursue. The knights wheeled round and destroyed the Saxon infantry in the open field.

Harold and his housecarl bodyguard remained intact and just as formidable on the ridge. William ordered a final charge. This time he first had his archers aim not at the Saxon shields but release their volleys into the air so the arrows would fall on the Saxons from above. The tactic worked, but the Harold and his housecarls fought on until an arrow struck the king in the eye. As Harold struggled to pull it free, four Norman knights (one of whom may have been William) attacked. One speared Harold in the chest, and a second nearly decapitated him with a sword. As he fell, the other two Normans delivered additional blows. With Harold’s fall, the Saxon forces panicked and retreated into the nearby woods except for the housecarls who fought to the death around the body of their dead king.

The Battle Off Samar (also known as “The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors) has been cited by historians as one of the greatest military mismatches in naval history. It took place in the Philippine Sea off Samar Island, in the Philippines. It all started when Admiral William Halsey, Jr. was lured into taking his powerful U.S. Third Fleet after a Japanese decoy fleet. He thought this fleet was the main Japanese battle group and if he could catch them, he could destroy what was left of the Japanese navy.

To defend his rear, he left behind only “Taffy 3,” a light screen of destroyers, destroyer escorts, and three escort “baby” carriers. A powerful Japanese surface force of battleships and cruisers thought to have been defeated and in retreat earlier had instead turned around unobserved and came upon the tiny force of tiny ships. With nothing else he could do, Admiral Spruance in command of Taffy 3 gave the order, “Small Boys (meaning destroyers and escorts) attack.”

With that order Taffy 3’s destroyers and destroyer escort desperately charged forward and attacked with 5 inch guns which could not penetrate even the thinnest armor of the Japanese armada and torpedoes, while carrier aircraft dropped bombs and depth charges, then out of bombs, strafed the bridges of the Japanese heavy ships. While the Americans suffered more losses in ships and men than were lost at the Battle of Midway, they caused so much damage and confusion to convince the Japanese commander, Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita thought he had stumbled upon the lead element of Halsey’s main fleet. Fearing for his forces, he ordered his ships to regroup and ultimately withdraw rather than advancing to sink troop and supply ships at Leyte Gulf. Taffy 3’s bold defense in the face of overwhelmingly superior firepower saved the invasion of the Phillippines.

Nearly two years ago we wrote a list of everyday inventions. The list was relatively popular for its time and debunked at least one myth about the invention of peanut butter. This list is the second installment and looks at ten more items that we all come into contact with in our daily lives. These are things we tend to take for granted and we certainly wouldn’t know the name of the inventor if asked.

The first garden gnomes were made in Gräfenroda, a town known for its ceramics in Thuringia, Germany in the mid-1800s. Philip Griebel made terracotta animals as decorations, and produced gnomes based on local myths as a way for people to enjoy the stories of the gnomes’ willingness to help in the garden at night. The garden gnome quickly spread across Germany and into France and England, and wherever gardening was a serious hobby. Griebel’s descendants still make them and are the last of the German producers. Garden gnomes were first introduced to the United Kingdom in 1847 by Sir Charles Isham, when he brought 21 terracotta figures back from a trip to Germany and placed them as ornaments in the gardens of his home, Lamport Hall in Northamptonshire. Only one of the original batch of gnomes survives: Lampy, as he is known, is on display at Lamport Hall, and is insured for one million pounds. He is pictured above.

While matches existed in China in the 6th century and Europe from the 16th century, it was not until the 1800s that friction matches as we know them today were invented. The first “friction match” was invented by English chemist John Walker in 1826. Early work had been done by Robert Boyle and his assistant, Godfrey Haukweicz in the 1680s with phosphorus and sulfur, but their efforts had not produced useful results. Walker discovered a mixture of stibnite, potassium chlorate, gum, and starch could be ignited by striking against any rough surface. Walker called the matches congreves, but the process was patented by Samuel Jones and the matches were sold as lucifer matches (as they are still known in the Netherlands). In 1862, Bryant and May, the British match manufacturers began mass producing the red tipped matches we all know today, after the patent by the Lundström brothers from Sweden,

Contact lenses are surprisingly older than most of us realize. In 1888, the German physiologist Adolf Eugen Fick constructed and fitted the first successful contact lens. While working in Zürich, he described fabricating afocal scleral contact shells, which rested on the less sensitive rim of tissue around the cornea, and experimentally fitting them: initially on rabbits, then on himself, and lastly on a small group of volunteers. These lenses were made from heavy blown glass and were 18–21mm in diameter. Fick filled the empty space between cornea/callosity and glass with a dextrose solution. Fick’s lens was large, unwieldy, and could only be worn for a few hours at a time. It was not until 1949 that the first lenses were produced that sat on the cornea only and allowed for many hours of wear.

The first patent for a non-electrical washing machine was issued in England in 1692. Nearly two hundred years later, Louis Goldenberg of New Brunswick, New Jersey invented the electric washing machine (late 1800s to early 1900s). He worked for the Ford Motor Company at that time, and all inventions that were created while working for Ford under contract, belonged to Ford. The patent would have been listed under Ford and or Louis Goldenberg. Alva J. Fisher has been incorrectly credited with the invention of the electric washer. The US patent office shows at least one patent issued before Mr. Fisher’s US patent number 966677.

The early metal beverage can was made out of steel and had no pull-tab. Instead, it was opened by a can piercer, a device resembling a bottle opener, but with a sharp point. The can was opened by punching two triangular holes in the lid — a large one for drinking, and a small one to admit air. This type of opener is sometimes referred to as a churchkey. As early as 1936, inventors were applying for patents on self-opening can designs, but the technology of the time made these inventions impractical. Later advancements saw the ends of the can made out of aluminum instead of steel. In 1962, Ermal Cleon Fraze of Dayton, Ohio, invented the integral rivet and pull-tab (also known as rimple or ring pull), which had a ring attached at the rivet for pulling, and which would come off completely to be discarded. These were eventually replaced almost exclusively by the stay tabs we still use today. Stay tabs (also called colon tabs) were invented by Daniel F. Cudzik of Reynolds Metals in Richmond, Virginia, in 1975.

The first rubber condom was produced in 1855. For many decades, rubber condoms were manufactured by wrapping strips of raw rubber around penis-shaped molds, then dipping the wrapped molds in a chemical solution to cure the rubber. In 1912, a German named Julius Fromm developed a new, improved manufacturing technique for condoms: dipping glass molds into a raw rubber solution. Called cement dipping, this method required adding gasoline or benzene to the rubber to make it liquid. These condoms were re-usable. Latex, rubber suspended in water, was invented in 1920. Latex condoms required less labor to produce than cement-dipped rubber condoms, which had to be smoothed by rubbing and trimming. The use of water to suspend the rubber instead of gasoline and benzene eliminated the fire hazard previously associated with all condom factories. Latex condoms also performed better for the consumer: they were stronger and thinner than rubber condoms, and had a shelf life of five years (compared to three months for rubber).

Foil made from a thin leaf of tin was commercially available before its aluminum counterpart. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, tin foil was in common use, and some people continue to refer to the new product by the name of the old one. Tin foil is stiffer than aluminum foil. It tends to give a slight tin taste to food wrapped in it, which is a major reason it has largely been replaced by aluminum and other materials for wrapping food.
The first audio recordings on phonograph cylinders were made on tin foil. Tin was first replaced by aluminum starting in 1910, when the first aluminum foil rolling plant, “Dr. Lauber, Neher & Cie., Emmishofen.” was opened in Kreuzlingen, Switzerland.

The first patent on a ballpoint pen was issued on 30 October 1888, to John J. Loud, a leather tanner, who was attempting to make a writing implement that would be able to write on the leather he tanned, which the then-common fountain pen couldn’t do. The pen had a rotating small steel ball, held in place by a socket. Then, fifty years later, with the help of his brother George, László Bíró, a chemist, began to work on designing new types of pens. Bíró fitted this pen with a tiny ball in its tip that was free to turn in a socket. As the pen moved along the paper, the ball rotated, picking up ink from the ink cartridge and leaving it on the paper. Bíró filed a British patent on 15 June 1938. Earlier pens leaked or clogged due to improper viscosity of the ink, and depended on gravity to deliver the ink to the ball. Depending on gravity caused difficulties with the flow and required that the pen be held nearly vertically. The Biro pen both pressurized the ink column and used capillary action for ink delivery, solving the flow problems.

Shampoo originally meant head massage in several North Indian languages. Both the word and the concept were introduced to Britain from colonial India. The term and service was introduced in Britain by a Bengali entrepreneur Sake Dean Mahomed in 1814, when Dean, together with his Irish wife, opened a shampooing bath known as ‘Mahomed’s Indian Vapour Baths’ in Brighton, England. During the early stages of shampoo, English hair stylists boiled shaved soap in water and added herbs to give the hair shine and fragrance. Kasey Hebert was the first known maker of shampoo, and the origin is currently attributed to him. Originally, soap and shampoo were very similar products; both containing surfactants, a type of detergent. Modern shampoo as it is known today was first introduced in the 1930s with Drene, the first synthetic (non-soap) shampoo.

Up to and including the 19th century, candy of all sorts was typically sold by weight, loose, in small pieces that would be bagged as bought. The introduction of chocolate as something that could be eaten as is, rather than used to make beverages or desserts, resulted in the earliest bar forms, or tablets. In 1847, the Fry’s chocolate factory, located in Union Street, Bristol, England, moulded the first ever chocolate bar suitable for widespread consumption. The firm began producing the Fry’s Chocolate Cream bar (arguably the best tasting chocolate bar in the world in my opinion) in 1866. Over 220 products were introduced in the following decades, including production of the first chocolate Easter egg in UK in 1873 and the Fry’s Turkish Delight (or Fry’s Turkish bar) in 1914. By 1919 the company merged with Cadbury’s chocolate and the joint company named British Cocoa and Chocolate Company.

This article is licensed under the GFDL because it contains quotations from Wikipedia.

History is a fascinating topic but so frequently we get things wrong and spread misinformation and myths. This list is the second in our series focussing specifically on historical errors. The first was written just under two years ago, so it is high time we saw another. Hopefully this list will help us all to help put an end to the mythologies that so many people believe today.

The Myth: An Old Religion was practiced in rural Europe until it was stamped out by the witchcraft persecutions, which killed millions of women. [Source]

The Witch-cult is the term for a hypothetical pre-Christian, pagan religion of Europe that allegedly survived into at least the early modern period. The theory was postulated by some 19th and 20th century scholars based upon the conspiracy theory that the European witchcraft which had been persecuted in the witch-hunt had been a part of a Satanic plot to overthrow Christianity, and indeed most of the evidence for the theory was compiled by studying the accounts of the persecutors in the witch trials in Early Modern Europe. The theory notably gave rise to several neopagan religions, such as Wicca and Stregheria in the 20th century. In fact, there was no “old religion” and modern day Wicca originated in the 20th century and was popularized by Gerald Gardner in 1954.

The Myth: Starvation was rife in the Great Depression

It is very common when hearing about the Great Depression to imagine hoards of families starving to death due to lack of food and money, but while money was, indeed, scarce, most people were able to survive through resourcefulness and charity. The depression meant hunger, malnutrition, overcrowding, and poor health. It gave rise to widespread poverty and suffering. While virtually no one died from starvation, many did not have enough to eat. People searched garbage dumps for food or ate weeds. It is the resourcefulness that people learnt during this time that helped to make rationing easier on the British during the Second World War. The replacement of a hands-off approach to the economy with a more regulated one by President Roosevelt has been blamed by many for the current economic crisis.

The Myth: Cleopatra was Egyptian

Though Cleopatra bore the ancient Egyptian title of pharaoh, the Ptolemaic dynasty (of which she was a part) was Hellenistic (Greek), having been founded 300 years before by Ptolemy I Soter, a Macedonian Greek general of Alexander the Great (depicted by Anthony Hopkins in the Oliver Stone film: Alexander). As such Cleopatra’s language was the Greek spoken by the Hellenic aristocracy, though she was reputed to be the first ruler of the dynasty to learn Egyptian. She also adopted common Egyptian beliefs and deities. According to tradition, saddened by the loss of her lover Mark Antony, she killed herself by means of an asp bite on August 12, 30 BC.

The Myth: Slaves built the pyramids

We have all seen the movies and heard the tales of slaves captured by Egyptian military excursions being used to build the pyramids and temples of Ancient Egypt, but, in fact, they are all completely wrong. Contrary to popular belief, excavated skeletons show that the pyramid builders were actually Egyptians who were most likely in the permanent employ of the pharaoh. Graffiti indicates that at least some of these workers took pride in their work, calling their teams “Friends of Khufu,” “Drunkards of Menkaure,” and so on—names indicating allegiances to pharaohs.

The Myth: The inquisition saw the slaughter of tens of thousands

The modern day notion of a unified and horrible “Inquisition” is an assemblage of the “body of legends and myths which, between the sixteenth and the twentieth centuries, established the perceived character of inquisitorial tribunals and influenced all ensuing efforts to recover their historical reality”. It was the relatively limited persecution of Protestants, mostly by the inquisitions in Spain and Italy, that provoked the first image of “The Inquisition” as the most violent and suppressive vehicle of the Church. Under the rule of the Protestant Queen Elizabeth I and threatened with military attacks from Spain, England found a new surge of nationalism being fueled by anti-Catholic propaganda centered on a series of books and pamphlets that detailed the horror of the “Spanish Inquisition”. But the reality? No more than 2,000 people who were tried by the Inquisition were executed. The Spanish Inquisition (which should not be confused with the Office of Inquisition which still exists in the Church as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) ceased operating on the 15th July 1834.

The Myth: Emperor Caligula made his horse a consul (a figurative head of the republican government)

Caligula’s love for his horse, Incitatus, was well known in his time and in present times, but the modern love of a good myth has promoted the horse to a far greater position than in reality. About seventy years after Caligula died, the historian Seutonius wrote of Caligula and Incitatus: “Besides a stall of marble, a manger of ivory, purple blankets and a collar of precious stones, he even gave his horse a house, a troop of slaves and furniture, for the more elegant entertainment of the guests invited in his name: and it is also said that he planned to make him consul.” The fact that this was not a first hand account (hence saying: “it is also said”) the report is dubious. There are no other records that indicate that Caligula did ever indicate that he planned to raise Incitatus to such an important place – let alone do it.

The Myth: Catherine the Great died whilst having sex with a horse

While this myth is very amusing (no doubt the reason for its popularity), Catherine died in bed of illness; there were no equines involved and a Catherine/horse nexus was never attempted. So how did the myth arise? During past centuries the easiest way for people to offend and verbally attack their female enemies was sex. Catherine the Great was always going to attract rumours about her sex life, but her voracious sexual appetite – while modest by modern standards – meant that the rumours had to be even wilder. Historians believe the horse myth originated in France, among the French upper classes, soon after Catherine’s death as a way to mar her legend. [Source]

The Myth: Spanish flu came from Spain

The Spanish flu pandemic (the same virus as Swine flu) lasted from March 1918 to June 1920, spreading even to the Arctic and remote Pacific islands. It is estimated that anywhere from 50 to 100 million people were killed worldwide, or the approximate equivalent of one third of the population of Europe. Although the first cases of the disease were registered in the continental US and the rest of Europe long before getting to Spain, the 1918 Flu received its nickname “Spanish Flu” because Spain, a neutral country in WWI, had no special censorship for news against the disease and its consequences. Hence the most reliable news came from Spain, giving the false impression that Spain was the most—if not the only—affected zone. So thanks to the honesty of Spain, they are now marred forever by the title of the worst flu epidemic in modern history.

The Myth: Amazons were women who cut off one breast so they could use a bow and arrow better

Considering how ridiculous this story is, it is hard to believe that so many people believe it. This element of the Amazon myth was invented in the 5th century B.C. The poor Amazons had to start mutilating themselves because some big boob thoughtlessly dabbled in the dark art of etymology without the proper equipment. Hellanicus of Lesbos imagined the name was derived from the Greek prefix a- (“without”) and mazos, a variant of mastos (“breast”). He was surely wrong, but his folk etymology is still firmly embedded in the collective consciousness after more than two dozen centuries. There was no hint before his time, either in writing or art, that the Amazons had anything other than usual complement of breasts, so we can safely assume that the one-breasted image we have of them flowed from the (false) etymology and not vice versa. [Source]

The Myth: Jesus spoke Hebrew

First of all, Jesus probably did have a knowledge of Hebrew, but he didn’t speak it. The language spoken by Jesus (and the apostles) was Aramaic. Aramaic is a semitic language and it was the day-to-day language of Israel from 539 BC – 70 AD. In fact, contrary to popular belief, some parts of the Bible were never written in Hebrew – but rather Aramaic – chiefly Daniel and Ezra. It is also likely that Jesus was fluent in Greek as this was the secondary language of the region and it was the language of the common version of the Bible used by the Jews at the time. Even one of the most well know sayings of Jesus upon the Cross is Aramaic: “Eloi Eloi lema sabachthani?” meaning “My God, my God, for what have you forsaken me?”

This article is licensed under the GFDL because it contains quotations from Wikipedia.

Torture: it is an ancient practice that still goes on today. In the middle ages torture was used for punishment, interrogation, and deterrence. It is easy to consider ourselves more humane these days, but while some of the devices listed here would lead to death, we have, in modern times, mastered the ability of inflicting extreme pain for indefinite periods of time – something which is, perhaps, worse.

With the head placed under the upper cap and the chin placed above the bottom bar, the top screw of this awful device was slowly turned, compressing the skull tightly. First the teeth are destroyed, shattering and splintering into the jaw. Then the eyes are squeezed from the sockets – some versions had special receptacles to catch them. Lastly, the skull fractures and the contents of the head are forced out. In earlier stages, the torturer could keep the head firmly clamped and strike the metal skull cap periodically; each blow echoing pain throughout the victim’s body.

The Cat’s Paw (or Spanish Tickler) was oftentimes attached to a handle; in size and appearance it was an extension of the torturer’s hand. In this way it was used to rip and tear flesh away from the bone, from any part of the body.

A popular torture device during the Inquisition, the knee splitter does what it says: split victims’ knees and render them useless. Built from two spiked wood blocks, the knee splitter is placed on top of and behind the knee of its victims. Two large screws connecting the blocks are then turned, causing the two blocks to close towards each other and effectively destroy a victim’s knee. This device could also be used to inflict damage on other parts of the body such as the arms.

The Scavenger’s Daughter was invented as an instrument of torture in the reign of Henry VIII by Sir William Skevington (also known as William Skeffington), Lieutenant of the Tower of London. It was an A-frame shaped metal rack to which the head was strapped to the top point of the A, the hands at the mid-point and the legs at the lower spread ends; swinging the head down and forcing the knees up in a sitting position so compressed the body as to force the blood from the nose and ears. The Scavenger’s Daughter was conceived as the perfect complement to the Duke of Exeter’s Daughter (the rack) because it worked the opposite principle to the rack by compressing the body rather than stretching it.

This procedure has remained essentially unchanged from the Middle Ages until today. The victim is hoisted up and lowered onto the point of the pyramid in such a way that his weight rests on the point positioned in the anus, in the vagina, under the scrotum or under the coccyx (the last two or three vertebrae). The executioner, according to the pleasure of the interrogators, can vary the pressure from zero to that of total body weight. The victim can be rocked, or made to fall repeatedly onto the point. The Judas cradle was thus called also in Italian (culla di Giuda) and German (Judaswiege), but in French it was known as la veille, “the wake” or “nightwatch”. Nowadays this method enjoys the favour of not a few governments in Latin America and elsewhere, with and without improvements like electrified waist rings and pyramid points. Similar to the Judas Chair – but probably worse, is the Spanish Donkey:

The Spanish Donkey was a device which consisted of a main board cut with a wedge at the top fastened to two cross-beams. The naked victim was placed astride the main board as if riding a donkey, and various numbers of weights were attached to his or her feet. The agony could be ‘fine-tuned’ by using lighter or heavier weights. Sources relate that on occasion, the wedge would slice entirely through the victim as a result of the immense weight attached to his or her feet.

These instruments were used in oral and rectal formats, and in the larger vaginal one. They are forced into the mouth, rectum or vagina of the victim and there expanded by force of the screw to the maximum aperture of the segments. The inside of the cavity in question is irremediably mutilated, nearly always fatally so. The pointed prongs at the end of the segments serve better to rip into the throat, the intestines or the cervix. The oral pear was often inflicted on heretical preachers, but also on lay persons guilty of unorthodox tendencies; the rectal pear awaited passive male homosexuals, and the vaginal one women guilty of sexual union with Satan or his familiars. Pictured above is a version of the choke pear called the “Pear of Anguish”.

The lead sprinkler was essentially a ladle on the end of a handle. The top half of the sphere could be removed and the lower half was filled with molten metal, boiling oil, boiling water, pitch or tar. The perforated top half was then re-attached. Shaking or flicking the sprinkler towards the victim showered him or her with the boiling contents of the ladle. The victim had, of course, been pinioned in advance.

This item was used both as a punitive and an interrogational device. Punitively, it was used red-hot to mark the breast of unmarried mothers. In an inquisitory nature it was used on condemned women – convicted of heresy, blasphemy, adultery, self-induced abortion, erotic white magic and any other crime that the inquisitors selected. The claws were used, either cold or heated, on a female’s exposed breasts – rendering them into bloody pulps. A variation was called the Spider. This consisted of clawed bars which protruded from the wall. A woman was pulled alongside the bars until her breasts were torn away.

The crocodile shears was an instrument of torture used in late medieval Europe and typically reserved for regicides – those who attempted (and, perhaps, succeeded) to assassinate the king. The shears were made of iron and were based upon the concept of pincers, but—instead of standard jaws or blades, crocodile shears ended in a pair of hemicylindrical blades that, when closed together, formed a long, narrow tube. The insides of the blades were generously lined with teeth or spikes. After being heated red-hot, the crocodile shears were applied to the erect penis, which—once exposed to sufficient tension—was torn from the prisoner’s body; or at the very least leading to severe arterial bleeding.