this post was submitted on 19 Nov 2025
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History Memes

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[–] glorkon@lemmy.world 190 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (7 children)

I like this one (not mine):

  • The samurai were abolished as a caste in Japanese society during the Meiji restoration in 1867
  • The first ever fax machine, the "printing telegraph", was invented in 1843
  • Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in 1865

=> There was a 22 year window in which samurais could have sent a fax to Abraham Lincoln.

[–] LadyButterfly@piefed.blahaj.zone 17 points 23 hours ago

Ooooh that's a good one

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[–] niktemadur@lemmy.world 90 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

Have you heard of the truly ancient - Stone Age, in fact - ruins of what is now called Gobekli Tepe (Potbelly Hill) in Anatolia, Turkey, near the Taurus Mountains, between rivers that converge further downstream to create the Euphrates River.

These long-gone people, hunter/gatherers and slightly later hunter/harvesters (a primitive phase of agriculture), now called Tash Tepeler (in modern Turkic), build stone urban centers on a large scale, were completely unknown before 1992, and let me put it this way, how long ago they were:
Ancient Sumeria, cradle of civilization, where writing was invented, is closer to us than it is to the time when Gobekli Tele was thriving.

Gobekli Tepe is near halfway between the Lascaux and Chauvet cave paintings and us.

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[–] OldSageRick@lemmy.zip 163 points 1 day ago (4 children)

A few months ago my mother was cleaning the home of grannie who died, and there it was found. An old cookbook, handwritten by grannie, the book it self had a stamp on it (as in caved in leather) that it was made in 1910. from the words of my grandfather this book was given to grandmama by grand grandma.

The mindblowing thing is that this handwriting book which survived both world wars, the fall of communism and the turmoil afterwards, still has easier to follow instructions than most recipes today I see, also no about me and my life section

[–] stoy@lemmy.zip 166 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Ironic that you didn't post a recipe and only an about me and my life section.

[–] yakko@feddit.uk 31 points 1 day ago

The one time you might have wanted a touch of personal trivia with your goulash recipe... Good grief!

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[–] AnarchoEngineer@lemmy.dbzer0.com 138 points 1 day ago (4 children)

Sharks are older than the North Star. (450mya vs. 70mya)

Sharks are older than trees. (450mya vs 390mya)

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[–] frank@sopuli.xyz 111 points 1 day ago (3 children)

There was a day, 18th April 1930, where the BBC reported no news. It really shocks me because of how different the times are now. I can't imagine there's any minute that doesn't have dozens news stories running

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p010szlg

[–] jupyter_rain@discuss.tchncs.de 40 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This would be so nice I swear.

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[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 14 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

I can't imagine there's any minute that doesn't have dozens news stories running

Honestly, that's your choice. My advice; limit your news to 2 - 3 "channels" (like RSS app, Lemmy), set them up that you have to "open them" (no by-the-side stream) and have days where you just don't do that.

Yes, i'm easily stressed.

[–] frank@sopuli.xyz 13 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Oh I don't read much for news. A local paper (which is in a language I barely know), a little on here but most in blocked, and The Onion type publications sometimes.

I still can't imagine that a news source says "there's not news now, have some piano" in 2025

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[–] guy@piefed.social 16 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

The last mammoths died out at roughly the same time as the Giza pyramids were built. Albeit they being in the Arctic and being shrunk by insular dwarfism, had the Egyptians traveled to Wrangels island and captured some they could have had them as work animals while building the pyramids.

This mean that the movie 10,000 BC accurately portraited at least one thing correctly.

[–] finitebanjo@piefed.world 60 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

During the Sand Creek Massacre of 1864, friendly Native American tribes gathered upon request, hoisted american flags, and waved white flags as volunteer cavalry gunned them down leaving not even women or children alive. Chief Black Kettle, a prominent "Peace Chief" had managed to secure multiple treaties before this point and worked towards coexistence, and his efforts were repaid with blood as his people were killed in front of him after almost 20 years of dedicating himself to diplomacy. He survived only to die at yet another massacre in 1868.

During the same time period was the US Civil War from 1861 to 1865, except that's wrong! The US Civil War dated back to the Bleeding Kansas period of the 1850s, with the Kansas Nebraska Act establising two new territories and invalidating the Missouri Compromise that didn't allow slavery below a line of latitude, as well as the creation of "popular sovereignty" to allow the residents to vote on whether or not to allow Slavery, which led to antiracist freestaters and "Jayhawkers" being brought in by the Emigrant Aid Co. to fight slavery, followed by racist "Bushwackers" being brought in by former Senator Atchinson to shift the political landscape, as well as siege towns, kill abolitionists, and cause general chaos. While neither side was officially a state with an army, you can see how these battles that destroyed towns easily continued into the civil war period.

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[–] Geobloke@aussie.zone 44 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Humans got to Tasmania, Australia 20 000 years before they got to Scotland despite it being 3x the distance and featured the first time humans journeyed over the ocean.

Bananas were domesticated in New Guinea

The Maori beat Europeans to new Zealand by roughly 500 years

[–] Zombie@feddit.uk 27 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Considering the yellow weather warning and snow this morning in Scotland, I think I'd choose walking to Tasmania as well.

[–] Geobloke@aussie.zone 5 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

I'm scared to ask what a yellow weather warning in Scotland is, must mean it's pishing down?

[–] Zombie@feddit.uk 7 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

Pishing down, with snow!

It wasn't much, but enough to make traveling stressful and idiots slide all over the place.

Yellow warning is our lowest level warning.

[–] Geobloke@aussie.zone 3 points 18 hours ago (2 children)

As someone who's seen snow up close once, it seems kind of cool. Like turning your commute into a rally stage

[–] lightnsfw@reddthat.com 4 points 16 hours ago

It's fun until you realize most people don't have the driving skills necessary for that.

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[–] CitizenKong@lemmy.world 75 points 1 day ago (2 children)

In 1913, Stalin, Hitler and Sigmund Freud all lived in the central part of Vienna.

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[–] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today 10 points 22 hours ago (6 children)

We only understand about 15% of the Universe, and we're probably wrong about much of that. For instance, we know dark matter is pervasive throughout the Universe, and we don't have the slightest idea of what it is.

Also, one of the leading theories of why we haven't met other intelligent alien cultures is because there is one major ancient, highly advanced race that is so devoted to being the only race on the Universe, that every time they find any evidence of another intelligent race, they travel there and extinguish them entirely.

It is already too late to save us. We have been beaming all sorts of electronic signals into the universe in every direction for decades, and sooner or later, it will reach THEM.

[–] lightnsfw@reddthat.com 4 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Also, one of the leading theories of why we haven’t met other intelligent alien cultures is because there is one major ancient, highly advanced race that is so devoted to being the only race on the Universe, that every time they find any evidence of another intelligent race, they travel there and extinguish them entirely.

What evidence is there to support this theory?

[–] absGeekNZ@lemmy.nz 4 points 15 hours ago (3 children)

Absolutely none.

That is a variance on the dark forest theory. It has flaws just like any of the proposed solutions to the Fermi paradox.

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[–] mech@feddit.org 43 points 1 day ago (2 children)

In the early 15th century (before the "discovery" of the Americas and the age of colonization), China had assembled a heavily militarized fleet that was likely bigger than all European powers' fleets combined. They used it to become the dominant maritime power of their time, bringing India, South Asia and Eastern Africa into their sphere of influence.
Then internal struggle and threats on their northern borders lead to a shift in policy and the fleet was recalled from further exploration to the west and dismantled - making Europe's naval expansion possible.

[–] shawn1122@sh.itjust.works 13 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago)

To provide some context and a good book to read more on this:

Historian Louise Levathes, in When China Ruled the Seas (2008), argues that “the Ming voyages were primarily a diplomatic mission to incorporate Indian coastal states into the Chinese tributary system; the Sultan of Calicut and the ruler of Cochin accepted Chinese titles and protection in exchange for regular tribute and trade privileges (tax exemptions)”.

I wouldn't take this to mean that all or even the majority of India came under China's sphere of influence. The kingdoms of the Malabar coast acted as the gateway into India for over a millennia and were plutocratic hubs where foreign influence (Arab, European, African) was not uncommon.

In fact it was common for the kingdoms of the Malabar coast to pay tribute to multiple domestic and foreign polities to secure tax exemptions.

This was also the port through which significant trade occurred between India and the Roman Empire which led a prominent Roman (Pliny the Elder, writer of Naturalis Historia) to remark

‘It is quite surprising that the use of pepper has come so much into fashion,’ Pliny wrote, 'especially when you consider that in other substances which we use, it is sometimes their sweetness, and sometimes their appearance that has attracted our notice; whereas, pepper has nothing in it that can plead as a recommendation to either fruit or berry, its only desirable quality being a certain pungency; and yet it is for this that we import it all the way from India! Who, I wonder, was the first to make trial of it as an article of food?'

In confirmation of such grumbles, two south Indian dynasties, the Pandyas and the Cheras, went as far as sending embassies to Rome to discuss the balance-of-payments problem and the inability of the Romans to pay their various Indian debts.

Eighty per cent of the 478 recipes included in the Roman cookbook of Apicius included pepper, and it appears regularly even in the pudding section. It was still, however, an expensive treat. The Tamil and Sanskrit words for sugar, ginger, pepper, sandalwood, beryl, cotton and indigo all made their way into Latin, and hence to modern English: ‘pepper’ and ‘ginger’ are both loan words from Tamil – pipali and singabera respectively.

According to some recent calculations, customs taxes on trade with India may have generated as much as one-third of the entire income of the Roman exchequer.

(Source: The Golden Road by William Dalrymple)

The history of the Ming Treasure Fleet and Zhang He is absolutely fascinating and I will be reading more on it! If I may get on my soapbox, it is important for everyone to expose themselves to non Eurocentric historical narratives to arrive at a more complete and balanced worldview.

[–] finitebanjo@piefed.world 21 points 1 day ago

I feel like you kind of sang their praises there considering they barely accomplished anything and then outlawed fleets just in time for the age of exploration followed by a losing war and colonization by Japan, who for comparison had always maintained a strong navy until falling short of the west's canons and superior siege warfare tactics for a brief period. I kind of doubt China would have achieved much even if they had kept the boats around.

[–] krooklochurm@lemmy.ca 8 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

I did a poop once. A very big one. It was a pivotal moment in the history of my ass.

[–] kandoh@reddthat.com 6 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Did you feel lighter afterwards, like a great weight had been taken from you?

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[–] AnarchoEngineer@lemmy.dbzer0.com 33 points 1 day ago (7 children)

Recently I read a comment on here saying that French was older than English. I also randomly remembered that I learned that several countries in Europe are actually younger than the US. Italy feels like it’s older than the US but the country wasn’t unified till the 19th century.

Anyway I’m getting sidetracked. The point is that I decided to look into when the French started regulating language and discovered that English is older than French.

Now, Vulgar Latin, from which French and other romance languages originated is older than Old English. However, since it’s the source of the other Romance languages which aren’t French, I’d say it doesn’t count as French.

The oldest Old French we have is from 842AD, but old English fragments are as old as the 5th century.

Early modern french seems to date back to the 1500s (“Paris Latin” was still a thing during this time), but Early Modern English predates 1500 in the beginning of the vowel shift.

Now the end of the English vowel shift probably happened after the Académie française was first established; however, common people in France at the time did not speak this formalized French. Furthermore, the work of the Academy was ended and the academy abolished during the Revolution. It was only after 1816 that the academy was restored and the idea of having a single unified language was supported by the French government. Late modern English (current English) was established by that point.

Anyway long story short, English is older than French if only by a century or two through their histories. This might not seem like a big surprising time difference, but it was a bit of a shock to me.

[–] olafurp@lemmy.world 3 points 16 hours ago

"English is older than French" is a weird way to put it. "English spelling was standardised a century before French spelling" might be a better. After all, both languages existed the whole time but are named differently by periods in history for convenience. There's no way to say "Middle English ended in 1658" for example.

[–] addie@feddit.uk 12 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Interesting. I think the real question about "is it the same language?" is whether modern readers can still understand it.

For early modern English (think Shakespeare) then most modern speakers can. You'd probably have a basic understanding from reading, although missing some nuance. A lot of the jokes in Shakespeare come out better when they're performed, so you'd probably have a better understanding of it in the theatre.

For middle English (think Chaucer) then you'd struggle a bit. Vocabulary and grammar have changed a lot. Might have a few passages in the Canterbury Tales that make sense unaided, but in general, not really.

For early English (think Beowulf) ha ha, fat chance. Even scholars of early languages don't understand everything in it, there's a few words the meaning of which are lost, but in general about one word in fifty even looks familiar and it's probably a false friend.

So I'd probably put English at 'about 500 years old'.

How far back modern French speakers can understand French would be interesting. I can understand a fair amount of Latin from my knowledge of Spanish; and unlike eg. William the Bastard invading England and introducing a whole pile of new vocabulary, the French have the advantage of never having been invaded by the French ;-)

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