The Sedlec Ossuary houses chalices, ornate wall ornaments, and even a chandelier that are all built from the bones of more than 40,000 skeletons. About 30,000 of those skeletons belonged to people who succumbed to the Black Death.
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King Tut. The name captures the imagination. Just ask Steve Martin, who did a famous musical number about Tutankhamen for Saturday Night Live. Like a lot of history, though, the details often get lost in the translation ... until science steps in and gives the low-down.
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The mighty Persian Empire was born in the cradle of civilization, ancient Mesopotamia. Also known as the Achaemenid Empire, it emerged as "the world's first superpower" in the 6th century B.C., and under the leadership of King Cyrus the Great, the Persians toppled Babylon, Media, and Lydia ...
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Alexander Hamilton. Brilliant, but also arrogant; witty, but also dismissive; married, and the father of seven, but also a cheater. Consensus is, it's this last part that kept him out of the White House himself.
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Up until the 18th century, Ireland had itself a wolf problem. Their solution: make bigger wolves.
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Alexander Hamilton, many enemies included some of the country's most celebrated Founding Fathers. And from the sound of things, the hate isn't wholly unfounded.
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What does the Liberty Bell sound like? Does it whisper like wind washing over amber waves of grain? Not quite. It seems that American freedom rings in E-flat. Or at least it used to.
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Witness Edward, eldest son of England's King Edward III, born in 1330 and made Prince of Wales a mere 13 years later. At least one legend has it that Edward was known as the Black Prince (though only after his death) because he favored black armor. But the truth may be much darker.
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You may have seen the famous Currier and Ives print depicting the electrifying kite experiment that Benjamin Franklin conducted with his son, William. Did Franklin really discover electricity? You may find the truth shocking.
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For the better part of the 13th century, the Mongols were a horseback riding cultural and military juggernaut of the Eastern hemisphere. Still, nothing lasts forever, and Genghis Khan's empire, while still famously genetically prevalent, has since crumbled. Here's what happened.
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In 1937, Doctor Josef Mengele began work at Frankfurt, Germany's Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene. There, he worked under the supervision of hardcore eugenicist Otmar Frieherr von Verschuer, researching the effects of nature versus nurture, specifically focusing on twins.
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While a person's integrity isn't inherently defined by their bank account, former Uruguayan head of state Jose Mujica, dubbed "the world's poorest president," governed with a heart of gold.
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Elizabeth I had the extremely mixed blessing of being born of the House of Tudor, the reigning royal family of England, which began with Henry VII in 1485. Royalty being what it is, and national elections being what they weren't, succession was always an issue.
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In 1954, the Ray Kroc met Dick and Mac McDonald at their San Bernardino, California restaurant, was impressed by their efficient operation, and became their franchise agent who polished the concept, built the McDonald's restaurant chain ... and became filthy rich.
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In 1918, children used to skip rope to a rhyme that captured the tenor of the time. Via Stanford University, it went like this: "I had a little bird. Its name was Enza. I opened the window, And in-flu-enza." Unfortunately, Enza flew in through a lot of windows.
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Joshua Tree National Park's got death, despair, stifling heat, and a dark and sinister past. Joshua Tree is in the Mojave Desert, the only place on Earth where you'll find the giant yucca plants called "Joshua Trees." The park's history is full of tragedy. This is the tragic history of Joshua Tree.
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How did we as a culture get from wearing tunics, robes, gowns, and togas to cargo shorts and mom jeans? How did pants go from being a sign of barbarism to being one of the only requirements to eat at a Waffle House? And why do we call them pants?
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"The real story of the Old West can never be told unless Wyatt Earp tells what he knows, and Wyatt will not talk," said perhaps the oldest of those friends, William Barclay "Bat" Masterson.
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Nearly forty years after his final match and four years after his death, the name Muhammad Ali is synonymous with pugilistic excellence. But he wasn't always named Muhammad Ali.
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What if you were Henry VIII's kid? Would life be all strawberries and high fashion as the child of England's most notorious ladykiller?
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With the rise of the coronavirus, what's left of the mall experience is often shuttered as part of the nation working together to stop the spread. Classic mall stores such as Sears, among others, may not survive the pandemic.
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Regardess of everything else Lennon was (and he was a lot), there's one thing he certainly was: Filthy rich.
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Six years isn't such an age gap in a relationship, married or otherwise, ahead or behind. It maybe gets a little more problematic when the groom is 21 and the bride is 15. Somehow, Loretta Webb and Oliver "Doolittle" Lynn made it work.
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An estimated 50,000 women died there between 1938 and 1945. This place was relentlessly inhumane. Yet the horrors of Ravensbrück went overlooked for decades.
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Biography says this of Edward Theodore Gein: He "wasn't actually a serial killer — he only admitted to killing two women." So there you go. That's all. Not such a bad guy. Especially if you're a Hollywood writer.
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Bonnie and Clyde are consistently credited with killing 13 people, nine of them law enforcement personnel. But there's more to the story.
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A few months ago, times were simpler -- largely because Tiger King hadn't yet premiered. But now that it has, with its puzzling cast of characters, we have names like Bhagavan 'Doc' Antle, and equally puzzling financial situations. With his money in mind -- how did the tiger earn its stripes?
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