years.
Vlad also enjoyed burning or boiling people, hammering nails into heads, and cutting off limbs; however, his preferred method of torture was impalement. Vlad the Impaler would attach each of his victim’s legs to a horse, place the tip of a sharpened stake where the sun don’t shine, and say, “Giddyap!” He would impale thousands of people at a time and arrange the stakes in geometric patterns around one of his cities. One of the most famous woodcuts of Vlad shows him feasting with dozens of impaled victims in the background.
Vlad also thought it important that everyone contribute to the welfare of the kingdom. So one day he invited all the vagrants, beggars, and cripples of the land to a great feast. After the meal and a short speech from Vlad, he had the hall boarded up and set on fire. That’s one way to eradicate poverty …
SIDE NOTE: In Romania, he is considered one of its greatest leaders, and in 2006, Vlad the Impaler was voted one of the “100 Greatest Romanians.”
Inferiority Complex?
In the late 1600s, Peter the Great of Russia wanted his traditional, long-bearded countrymen to look more like smooth-faced Europeans. When banning beards proved difficult (some believed you couldn’t get into heaven without an untrimmed beard), he instead imposed a beard tax. Nobles were required to pay one hundred rubles per year. Commoners paid less. He also taxed long Russian coats, trying to encourage the shorter French style, and changed the Russian calendar to follow the Julian one. (Imagine thinking the year was 7207, only to have your king change it to 1700.)
Bad Fad
On February 12, 1933, a twenty-one-year-old Japanese student (some sources place her age at nineteen) killed herself by jumping into the crater of Mount Mihara, an active volcano on the island of Izu Oshima. This started a trend in Japan, and suddenly tourists were flooding the island not to see the crater, but to witness the suicides. Hundreds killed themselves before authorities thought to put up a fence around the crater.
Rotten Religion
“How many evils have flowed from religion!”—Lucretius
The ancient Aztecs believed that the sun would disappear without food. What did the sun eat? Human hearts. Lots of them. Meanwhile, priests sacrificed crying children so their tears would appease the rain god. And not to be outdone, their maize goddess required a virgin be killed and skinned. A priest would then dance wearing her skin.
In the thirteenth century, a young shepherd claimed to have been visited by Jesus, who told him to go on a Crusade to liberate the Holy Land. Thousands of French children followed him to the docks, where French merchants agreed to take them all to Jerusalem. The merchants then sold all the children into slavery.
In 1096, thousands of Christians marched to free the Holy Land from infidels. They weren’t led by a child, however; they were, instead, following a goose. There’s no word on whether or not the goose of God approved of the army killing all the Jews they met on the way. Thousands were brutally murdered.
Back in the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church decided it was immoral for women to sing or act on stage. So who would sing the girl parts? No problem! The Church castrated young boys so their voices wouldn’t change as they grew older.
What did William Tyndale do to deserve both strangulation
and
being burned at the stake? He was arrested by church authorities in 1535 for translating the Bible into English, which was against the law. Only Latin translations were legal, meaning only educated people could read it. A lot of Tyndale’s translation was eventually used to create the 1611 King James version of the Bible, which is still in use today.
“HISTORY” AND OTHER LIES
“Clio, the muse of history, is as thoroughly infected with lies as a street whore with syphilis.”—Arthur Schopenhauer,
Parerga und Paralipomena
“To look back upon history is inevitably to distort it.” —Norman Pearson
W e
Vlad also enjoyed burning or boiling people, hammering nails into heads, and cutting off limbs; however, his preferred method of torture was impalement. Vlad the Impaler would attach each of his victim’s legs to a horse, place the tip of a sharpened stake where the sun don’t shine, and say, “Giddyap!” He would impale thousands of people at a time and arrange the stakes in geometric patterns around one of his cities. One of the most famous woodcuts of Vlad shows him feasting with dozens of impaled victims in the background.
Vlad also thought it important that everyone contribute to the welfare of the kingdom. So one day he invited all the vagrants, beggars, and cripples of the land to a great feast. After the meal and a short speech from Vlad, he had the hall boarded up and set on fire. That’s one way to eradicate poverty …
SIDE NOTE: In Romania, he is considered one of its greatest leaders, and in 2006, Vlad the Impaler was voted one of the “100 Greatest Romanians.”
Inferiority Complex?
In the late 1600s, Peter the Great of Russia wanted his traditional, long-bearded countrymen to look more like smooth-faced Europeans. When banning beards proved difficult (some believed you couldn’t get into heaven without an untrimmed beard), he instead imposed a beard tax. Nobles were required to pay one hundred rubles per year. Commoners paid less. He also taxed long Russian coats, trying to encourage the shorter French style, and changed the Russian calendar to follow the Julian one. (Imagine thinking the year was 7207, only to have your king change it to 1700.)
Bad Fad
On February 12, 1933, a twenty-one-year-old Japanese student (some sources place her age at nineteen) killed herself by jumping into the crater of Mount Mihara, an active volcano on the island of Izu Oshima. This started a trend in Japan, and suddenly tourists were flooding the island not to see the crater, but to witness the suicides. Hundreds killed themselves before authorities thought to put up a fence around the crater.
Rotten Religion
“How many evils have flowed from religion!”—Lucretius
The ancient Aztecs believed that the sun would disappear without food. What did the sun eat? Human hearts. Lots of them. Meanwhile, priests sacrificed crying children so their tears would appease the rain god. And not to be outdone, their maize goddess required a virgin be killed and skinned. A priest would then dance wearing her skin.
In the thirteenth century, a young shepherd claimed to have been visited by Jesus, who told him to go on a Crusade to liberate the Holy Land. Thousands of French children followed him to the docks, where French merchants agreed to take them all to Jerusalem. The merchants then sold all the children into slavery.
In 1096, thousands of Christians marched to free the Holy Land from infidels. They weren’t led by a child, however; they were, instead, following a goose. There’s no word on whether or not the goose of God approved of the army killing all the Jews they met on the way. Thousands were brutally murdered.
Back in the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church decided it was immoral for women to sing or act on stage. So who would sing the girl parts? No problem! The Church castrated young boys so their voices wouldn’t change as they grew older.
What did William Tyndale do to deserve both strangulation
and
being burned at the stake? He was arrested by church authorities in 1535 for translating the Bible into English, which was against the law. Only Latin translations were legal, meaning only educated people could read it. A lot of Tyndale’s translation was eventually used to create the 1611 King James version of the Bible, which is still in use today.
“HISTORY” AND OTHER LIES
“Clio, the muse of history, is as thoroughly infected with lies as a street whore with syphilis.”—Arthur Schopenhauer,
Parerga und Paralipomena
“To look back upon history is inevitably to distort it.” —Norman Pearson
W e
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