• glorkon@lemmy.world
    2141·
    18 days ago

    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.

  • OldSageRick@lemmy.zip
    176·
    19 days ago

    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

      • PhilipTheBucket@quokk.auEnglish
        12·
        18 days ago

        IDK if the BBC still does this, but back when I watched, they had a habit of just cutting to some B-roll footage of whatever situation, and just shutting up for a while to let it play out and let the audience breathe a little bit, as a segueway and palate cleanser before whatever the next segment was. Absolute perfection. I cannot imagine the American news doing that (and indeed they do not) without someone losing their job.

    • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip
      14·
      18 days ago

      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·
        18 days ago

        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

        • caseyweederman@lemmy.ca
          5·
          18 days ago

          I mean, there was still a tremendous amount of things happening in 1930, they just didn’t report on any of it.

  • masterspace@lemmy.caEnglish
    103·
    18 days ago

    Here’s some wild river history for you:

    The great lakes are super big, have huge flow rates, Superior is famously super deep since it’s a continental-rift lake that was widened by glacial retreat … But they only formed like 14,000 years ago when the glaciers retreated…

    The river Tyne in England is 30 million years old, just when Antarctica was separating from Australia and South America.

    The river Thames is 58 million years old, that’s just after the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs.

    The Rhine is at least 240 million years old … From the Triassic era if not earlier.

    And then there’s 3 rivers in Appalachia that are ~ 320 million years old… The French Broad river, the Susquehanna river, and (ironically) the New river. They’ve been continuously flowing since the carboniferous period, literally when Pangea first started forming and before any bacteria or enzymes could break down trees (which eventually compacted and became all the coal in the mountains that formed alongside them).

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rivers_by_age

  • niktemadur@lemmy.world
    95·
    18 days ago

    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.

  • GraniteM@lemmy.world
    72·
    18 days ago

    • Coca-Cola: Founded 1888

    • Nintendo: Founded 1889

    • Dracula, by Bram Stoker: Published 1897

    It would have been historically accurate for the vampire hunters who killed Dracula to celebrate by having a Coke and playing Nintendo.

  • finitebanjo@piefed.worldEnglish
    64·
    18 days ago

    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.

  • abbiistabbii@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    60·
    18 days ago

    • Scotland’s first railway, the Cockenzie and Tranent waggonway, played a role in the Battle of Prestonpans (1745). The final piece of the line went out of use in the 1960s.

    • The Last Stand by Sabaton was describing an event that happened in 1527, the year Henry VIII was trying to get an annulment. The events of The last stand played a role in the founding of the church of England.

    • San Marino is so old it was founded before The Council of Nicea.

    • The oldest Evidence in the archeological record we have of transgender individuals is older than the oldest archaeological evidence for gay couples.

    • The first use of “OMG” was on a memo sent to Winston Churchill in 1917.

    • India and Sri Lanka were connected by a land bridge until the 1500s. The remains of which are still a tourist attraction.

    • The first scientific study into transgender people was published in 1896 and studies about transgender people were burnt by the Nazis. Don’t ever let people say transgender people are a recent thing.

    • The Romance languages have been written down for so long that we can basically watch the evolution of multiple languages in real time through texts.

    • Oxford university was founded before what would become the Maori settled in New Zealand.

    • One of the last people born into (legal) Slavery in the USA died after being hit by a car in the 1970s.

    • It’s possible that former Samurai lived to see the 20th century.

  • hactar42@lemmy.ml
    52·
    18 days ago

    The Appalachian Mountains are older than trees, dinosaurs, the Atlantic Ocean, and Pangea

  • marzhall@lemmy.world
    471·
    18 days ago

    Columbus’ contact resulted in a 92% loss of population in North, Central, and South America. Mexico City area only just re-reached its pre-contact population estimate in the 1960s.

    “1491” is a good read.

      • I_Has_A_Hat@lemmy.world
        18·
        18 days ago

        It is the greatest loss of human knowledge that we know of. Certainly the largest in the last 4000 years. It puts the burning of the Library of Alexandria to shame. Entire civilizations, and the sum of all their knowledge, gone. Wiped out. Practically erased from history. The Aztecs had a full writing system and a long recorded history, all burned to ash by the Spaniards just for the hell of it; only scraps remain.

        • IlovePizza@lemmy.world
          45·
          17 days ago

          From ChatGPT:

          Several Indigenous civilizations in the Americas had their written records deliberately destroyed, while others relied heavily on oral knowledge that disappeared when communities were decimated. Here’s a clear breakdown of both types:

          Civilizations Whose Records Were Intentionally Destroyed

          Aztec (Mexica) Empire

          • Type of records: Pictorial and glyphic codices on history, astronomy, tribute, law, and religion.
          • Destruction: After the conquest, Spanish authorities, most famously Bishop Juan de Zumárraga and later Diego de Landa, burned almost all Aztec codices as “idolatrous.”
          • Survival: Fewer than 20 pre-conquest or early-contact codices survive.

          Maya Civilization

          • Type of records: Highly developed writing system; texts on astronomy, mathematics, calendars, history, and ritual.
          • Destruction: Inquisition-era clerics burned “thousands” of books and idols; Diego de Landa’s auto-da-fé in 1562 is the most notorious.
          • Survival: Only four confirmed pre-conquest Maya codices remain (Dresden, Madrid, Paris, Grolier).

          Mixtec Civilization

          • Type of records: Rich pictographic histories of dynasties, genealogies, wars, religious rituals.
          • Destruction: Many codices lost to Spanish burnings and suppression of Mixtec priest-scribes.
          • Survival: A few extraordinary codices remain (Codex Zouche-Nuttall, Codex Vindobonensis).

          Inca Empire (Tawantinsuyu)

          • Type of records: Not written in books, but quipus—complex knotted-string recording systems for census, tribute, calendrics, and possibly narrative information.
          • Destruction: Colonial authorities destroyed many quipus, and forced conversion efforts suppressed quipu-keepers (khipukamayuqs).
          • Survival: ~1,000 quipus remain, but most without context.

          Taíno (Caribbean)

          • Type of records: Primarily oral, but also ceremonial carvings (zemis), sacred objects, and chronicled songs.
          • Destruction: Spanish campaigns wiped out most of the population within decades; much material culture was destroyed or lost.

          Muisca (Colombia)

          • Type of records: Mostly oral histories and sacred textiles and objects.
          • Destruction: Spanish suppression of temples and ceremonial items erased much of their intellectual heritage.

          Civilizations Whose Knowledge Faded With Their Communities

          These relied heavily on oral traditions or fragile local materials. When communities were devastated by disease, enslavement, and forced assimilation, their knowledge systems could not survive intact.

          Mississippian Cultures (e.g., Cahokia)

          • No writing system; history was preserved orally.
          • Collapse accelerated by population loss after contact, long before written ethnography could record their traditions.

          Ancestral Puebloans, Hohokam, Mogollon

          • Sophisticated sciences (astronomy, hydrology, architecture) maintained through oral knowledge.
          • Much was lost after displacement, missionization, and cultural fragmentation.

          Wari, Tiwanaku (pre-Inca Andes)

          • No writing system; relied on knot-based or symbolic systems.
          • Knowledge of state organization and ritual life vanished after the societies collapsed long before Spanish arrival, and then post-contact disruptions erased remaining memories.

          Nahua, Zapotec, Purepecha, and many others

          • These groups had writing or semi-writing systems, but much of what we know today survives only in fragments because:

            • manuscripts were burned,
            • priestly classes were suppressed,
            • or oral lineages were broken.

          The Scale of Loss

          Across the Americas, scholars estimate:

          • hundreds of languages vanished, each carrying unique worldviews and knowledge systems;
          • countless scientific, agricultural, ecological, and medical traditions were lost or fragmented;
          • many civilizations’ histories and lineages were erased or only partially reconstructed through archaeology.

          It truly was a civilizational-scale knowledge collapse—yet also a story of survival, because many Indigenous peoples continue to preserve, revive, and rebuild these traditions today.

    • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
      6·
      18 days ago

      The weird part about that is that Columbus was the third expedition to the American continent from the European continent.

      First was a single Irish/Celtic(?) monk in the 800s. Second was Leif Erikson and his crew of “Vikings” in the 1100-1200s. Neither one of those caused widespread disease in the Americas, despite the fact that the monk made it as far as The Great Lakes, and Leif Erickson’s expedition was cut quite short with them engaging in battle with the first natives they saw, resulting in the death of Leif Erikson as well as a few of his companions.

        • Uruanna@lemmy.world
          7·
          17 days ago

          Brendan the navigator, 6th c., but the story about “Saint Brendan’s island” is not proven to be about America AFAIK. Or true. It’s a legend about a blessed island that may be a religious myth.

          There’s a ton of legends of sailors finding a vanishing island, an island of plenty, the island of apples, that various theories have attached to the Canaries or Azores and such IINM. Saint Brendan is just one among those, so it’s hard to assume it’s fact.

          Also, Leif Erikson was in year 1000. And there is a strong suspicion that diseases did play a big role and made it a shitshow.

    • sexual_tomato@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      5·
      17 days ago

      Then Cortez finished the job when he explored from Florida to Texas. He also introduced wild hogs to the continent, which introduced trichinella parasites to native fauna. Truly one of the most ecologically destructive events in the past thousand years.

  • Geobloke@aussie.zone
    44·
    18 days ago

    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·
      18 days ago

      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·
        18 days ago

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

        • Zombie@feddit.uk
          8·
          18 days ago

          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·
            18 days ago

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

            • Trainguyrom@reddthat.comEnglish
              1·
              18 days ago

              We get about 3 months a year of snow where I live (and 5 months of below freezing. Used to be a proper 5 months of snow not 25 short years ago but climate change has shifted that noticeably) the snow is absolutely magical and I can’t imagine living somewhere that doesn’t get it. Yes it makes a mess of commutes and drivers who don’t know how to drive in snow (literally just drive like a grandma, and of course make sure you have “all season” tires not those touring tires that are the default) and yeah whatever snow accumulates on the sidewalk and driveways you need to clear off, but you just do what you gotta do and appreciate the wonderland the snow turns the world into

    • ronl2k@lemmy.worldEnglish
      10·
      18 days ago

      Humans got to Tasmania, Australia 20 000 years before they got to Scotland despite it being 3x the distance

      Early humans out of Africa walked along the south Asian coasts, so Tasmania makes sense it its path was warmer than Scotland. Also, there were land bridges available near Australia that aren’t present today.

      and featured the first time humans journeyed over the ocean.

      We can’t possibly know that since Homo Erectus bones have been found on Crete. They could have island-hopped there from Greece, or they could have built a boat/raft.

  • mech@feddit.org
    451·
    19 days ago

    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.

    • finitebanjo@piefed.worldEnglish
      251·
      18 days 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.

    • shawn1122@sh.itjust.works
      13·
      18 days 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.