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(#1) How Quickly Meat Rots When Left Out Indicates How Clean The Air Is
From Redditor u/LilSmore:
TIL when the medieval scholar Rhazes was tasked with choosing the location of a new hospital in Baghdad, he hung meat at points around the city, and chose the location where it rotted the slowest.
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(#2) Medieval Miners Thought The Element Cobalt Was The Work Of Goblins
From Redditor u/Yorkshire_Bjorn:
TIL that the element Cobalt gets its name from a trickster goblin of German folklore, the kobold, because when medieval miners discovered it and tried to smelt it thinking it was silver, it released toxic gasses they believed to be the goblin playing a trick on them.
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(#3) A Moment Is Actually A Set Amount Of Time
From Redditor u/AReallyBadChemist:
TIL A moment was a medieval measurement of time and corresponded to 90 seconds.
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(#4) The Medieval Era Had Its Own Version Of 'The Purge'
From Redditor u/bort-thrillho:
TIL of the 'Ill Week' - a kind of late medieval version of the Purge. When Elizabeth I died there was a popular belief that the laws of a kingdom were suspended between the death of a sovereign and the proclamation of the successor.
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(#5) Medieval People Entertained Themselves With 'Cat Burning'
From Redditor u/el_muerte28:
TIL about Cat Burning, a form of entertainment in medieval Europe. It involved such "amusement" ranging from putting cats in a bag and throwing them into a bonfire to setting them ablaze and chasing them through the streets.
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(#6) The Nuremberg Celestial Phenomenon Baffled Medieval Germans
From Redditor u/WillpowerExertion:
TIL about the 1561 Nuremberg celestial phenomenon: a mass sighting of unidentified flying objects in medieval Germany.
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(#7) Medieval Dentistry Was Surprisingly Advanced
From Redditor u/Tokyono:
TIL that medieval dentists knew how to fill cavities, treat facial fractures, could spot oral cancer, and even knew the basics of whitening teeth. Evidence also suggests they knew how to create dentures out of cow bone and human teeth.
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(#8) The North Pole Was A Complete Mystery To Medieval Cartographers
From Redditor u/I_Do_Not_Abbreviate:
TIL late medieval and early modern European cartographers believed that compasses consistently pointed North because there was a massive, perfectly circular island made of naturally-magnetic black rock at the North Pole.
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(#9) The Reason British Pubs Have Such Weird Names
From Redditor u/Long-Afternoon:
TIL that the reason that pubs in England have such weird names goes back to medieval times, when most people were illiterate, but could recognize symbols. This is why they have names like Boot and Castle, or Fox and Hound.
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(#10) An Alternate Use For Mummies
From Redditor u/secure_caramel:
TIL from the 12th to the 17th century in medieval Europe, mummies were eaten as a drug
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(#11) Medieval Scribes Were Creative In The Margins
From Redditor u/Tokyono:
TIL: Medieval scribes would frequently scribble complaints in the margins of books as they copied them, as their work was so tedious. Recorded complaints range from “As the harbor is welcome to the sailor, so is the last line to the scribe,” to “Oh, my hand,” and, "A curse on thee, O pen!"
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(#12) Why A Baker's Dozen Is 13
From Redditor u/froyoboyz:
TIL that a bakers dozen is comprised of 13 because in medieval England there were laws that related the price of bread to the price of the wheat used to make it. Bakers caught cheating customers by overpricing undersized loaves were punished. For fear of coming up short, they would throw in extra.
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(#13) The Shroud Of Turin Could Have Been Made Using Lost Medieval Technology
From Redditor u/turkmenitron:
TIL that the Shroud of Turin (allegedly Jesus Christ’s burial shroud) may have been created using a lost form of medieval photography
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(#14) Medieval Armor Wasn't Stiff - Knights Could Actually Move Around With Ease
From Redditor u/SleepyPeruser:
TIL that despite being 23 kg (50 lbs), medieval knight armor is actually not as stiff as often portrayed and quite flexible. A knight would be able to run full speed in it, fight with the dexterity of a common soldier and even perform acrobatics.
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(#15) Medieval Armies Used Plague-Infected Cadavers As Ammo
From Redditor u/WeirdBoy_123:
TIL that in medieval times, corpses of sick people were used as catapult ammunition, as a form of biological weapon.
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About This Tool
The Middle Ages is considered to be one of the darkest periods in European history. Frequent wars, the imprisonment of the Catholic Church, the stagnant development of technology and productivity, and diseases are all causes of many problems. But the Middle Ages is also a very interesting historical period, and most people don't know enough about it.
This is a period of relatively slow development in the history of European civilization, and society and minds were accelerating the transformation. In fact, there are many disputes about the Middle Ages. The random tool explains 15 interesting facts about the Middle Ages that most people did not know.
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