The most incredible historical facts. Interesting historical facts. Historical facts about Russia. Ancient archaeological finds
Prospects for making a profit - it was believed that at a speed of 60 km / h, passengers would suffocate.
Interesting historical facts beckon with their diversity. Thanks to them, humanity has a unique opportunity to understand what happened in a particular period of development of a nation, society and states. Facts from history are not only what we were told in school. There are many secrets from this area of knowledge.
1. Peter the Great had his own method to fight alcoholism in the country. Drunkards were awarded medals, which weighed about 7 kilograms, and they could not be removed from oneself.
2. In the days of Ancient Rus', grasshoppers were called dragonflies.
3.The national anthem of Thailand was written by a Russian composer.
5. Those who urinated in the pond were executed during the time of Genghis Khan.
7. Braids were a sign of feudalism in China.
8. The virginity of English women in Tudor times was symbolized by bracelets on their hands and a tightly tightened corset.
9. Nero, who was an emperor in ancient Rome, married his male slave.
10. In ancient times in India, mutilation of the ears was used as a punishment.
11. Arabic numerals were not invented by Arabs, but by mathematicians from India.
13. Foot binding was considered an ancient tradition of the Chinese people. The essence of this was to make the foot smaller, and therefore more feminine and beautiful.
14. Morphine was once used to reduce coughs.
15. The ancient Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun's parents were a sister and a brother.
16. Gaius Julius Caesar had the nickname "boots".
17. Elizabeth the First covered her own face with white lead and vinegar. So she hid traces of smallpox.
18. The hat of Monomakh was the symbol of the Russian tsars.
19. Pre-revolutionary Russia was considered the most non-drinking country.
20. Until the 18th century, Russia did not have a flag.
21.Since November 1941, there was a tax on childlessness in the Soviet Union. It was 6% of the total salary.
22. Help in clearing objects during the Second World War was provided by trained dogs.
23. Virtually no earthquake was recorded during large-scale nuclear tests in 1960-1990.
24. For Hitler, the main enemy was not Stalin, but Yuri Levitan. He even announced a reward of 250,000 marks for his head.
25. In the Icelandic "Saga of Hakon Hakonarson" it was said about Alexander Nevsky.
26. Fist fights have long been famous in Rus'.
27. Catherine II abolished flogging for the military for same-sex contacts.
28. Only Joan of Dark managed to expel the invaders from France, who called herself the messenger of God.
29. The length of the Cossack gull, which we remember from the history of the Zaporizhzhya Sich, reached about 18 meters.
30. Genghis Khan defeated the Keraites, Merkits and Naimans.
31. By order of Emperor Augustus, in ancient Rome they did not build houses that were higher than 21 meters. This minimized the risk of being buried alive.
32. The Colosseum is considered the bloodiest place in history.
33. Alexander Nevsky had the military rank of "Khan".
34. In the days of the Russian Empire, it was allowed to carry edged weapons.
35. Soldiers in Napoleon's army addressed the generals as "you".
36. During the Roman war, soldiers lived in tents of 10 people.
37. Any touching of the emperor in Japan before World War II was blasphemy.
38. Boris and Gleb are the first Russian saints who were canonized in 1072.
39. A Red Army machine gunner with the name Semyon Konstantinovich Hitler, who was Jewish by nationality, participated in the Great Patriotic War.
40. In the old days in Rus', to clean pearls, they gave it to peck at a chicken. After that, the chicken was slaughtered, and the pearls were pulled out of her stomach.
41. From the very beginning, people who do not know how to speak Greek were called barbarians.
42. In pre-revolutionary Russia, name days for Orthodox people were a more important holiday than birthdays.
43. When England and Scotland came to an alliance, Great Britain was created.
44. After Alexander the Great brought cane sugar from one of his Indian campaigns to Greece, he immediately began to be called “Indian salt”.
45. In the 17th century, thermometers were filled not with mercury, but with cognac.
46. The Aztecs invented the first condom in the world. It was made from a fish bladder.
47. In 1983, not a single human birth was registered in the Vatican.
48. From the 9th to the 16th century in England there was a law that every man should practice archery every day.
49. When the Winter Palace was stormed, only 6 people died.
50. About 13,500 houses were destroyed in the great and famous fire of London in 1666.
1. in Napoleon's army, soldiers could address generals as "you".
2. In Rus', grasshoppers were called dragonflies.
3. punishment with rods was abolished in Russia only in 1903.
4. The "Hundred Years War" lasted 116 years.
5. What we call the Caribbean crisis, the Americans call the Cuban crisis, and the Cubans themselves - the October crisis.
6. The shortest war in history was the war between Great Britain and Zanzibar on August 27, 1896. It lasted exactly 38 minutes.
7. The first atomic bomb dropped on Japan was on a plane called the Enola Gay. The second is on the Bock's Car plane.
8. Under Peter I, a special department was created in Russia to receive petitions and complaints, which was called ... racketmaking.
9. On June 4, 1888, the New York State Congress passed a bill abolishing the hanging. The reason for this "humane" act was the introduction of a new method of the death penalty - the electric chair. 10. According to an agreement between the engineer Gustave Eiffel and the city authorities of Paris, in 1909 the Eiffel Tower was to be dismantled) and sold for scrap.
11. The Spanish Inquisition persecuted many groups of the population, but more than other Cathars, Marranos and Moriscos. The Cathars are followers of the Albigensian heresy, the Marranos are baptized Jews, and the Moriscos are baptized Muslims.
12. The first Japanese who came to Russia was Denbei, the son of a merchant from Osaka. His ship was nailed to the shores of Kamchatka in 1695. In 1701 he reached Moscow. Peter I appointed him to teach Japanese to several teenagers. 13. Only in 1947 in England was the position of a person who was supposed to fire a cannon fired when Napoleon Bonaparte entered England was abolished. 14. Guy de Maupassant, Alexandre Dumas, Charles Gounod, Leconte de Lisle and many other cultural figures signed the famous protest against ... "Disfiguring Paris with the Eiffel Tower."
15. When the famous German physicist Albert Einstein died, his last words went with him. The nurse next to him did not understand a word of German. 16. In the Middle Ages, students were forbidden to carry knives, swords and pistols and appear on the street after 21:00, because ... this posed a great danger to the townspeople.
17. On the tombstone of the monument to Suvorov, it is written simply: "Here Lies Suvorov." 18. Between the two world wars, more than 40 different governments changed in France. 19. For the last 13 centuries, the imperial throne in Japan has been occupied by the same dynasty.
20. One of the American aircraft in Vietnam hit itself with a missile. 21. The mad Roman emperor Caligula once decided to declare war on the god of the seas - Poseidon, after which he ordered his soldiers to randomly throw their spears into the water. By the way, from the Roman "Caligula" means "little shoe". 22. Abdul Kassim Ismail - the Grand Vizier of Persia (10th century) was always near his library. Only if he went somewhere, the library "followed" him. 117 thousand book volumes were transported by four hundred camels. Moreover, books (i.e. camels) were arranged in alphabetical order.
23. Nothing is impossible now. If you want to buy a car in Guryevsk - please, if you want - in another city. But the fact remains, it needs to be registered and get license plates. So, the Berlin businessman Rudolf Duke attached the very first car number to his car. It happened in 1901. There were only three characters on his number - IA1 (IA are the initials of his young wife Johanna Anker, and the unit means that she is his first and only.
24. At the end of the evening prayer on the ships of the Russian Imperial Navy, the officer in charge of the watch commanded "cover yourself!", which meant putting on headgear, and at the same time the prayer all-clear signal was given. Such a prayer usually lasted 15 minutes. 25. In 1914, the German colonies had a population of 12 million people, and the British - almost 400 million. 26. In the entire history of temperature registration in Russia, the coldest winter was the winter of 1740
27. In the modern army, the rank of cornet corresponds to an ensign, and the rank of lieutenant corresponds to a lieutenant.
28. The Thai national anthem was written in 1902 by the Russian composer Pyotr Shchurovsky.
29. Until 1703, clean ponds in Moscow were called ... filthy ponds.
30. The first book printed in England was devoted to ... chess. 31. The population of the world in 5000 BC. e. was 5 million people.
32. In ancient China, people committed suicide by eating a pound of salt. 33. A list of gifts to Stalin in honor of his seventieth birthday was published in Soviet newspapers from December 1949 to March 1953.
34. Nicholas I gave his officers the choice between a guardhouse and listening to Glinka's operas as punishment. 35. Above the entrance to the Lyceum of Aristotle was the inscription: "The entrance here is open to anyone who wishes to dispel the errors of Plato."
36. The third decree after the "Decree on Peace" and the "Decree on Land" issued by the Bolsheviks was the "Decree on Spelling". 37. During the eruption of Mount Vesuvius on August 24, 79, in addition to the well-known city of Pompeii, the cities of Herculaneum and Stabiae also perished.
38. Fascist Germany - the "Third Reich", the Hohenzoller Empire (1870-1918) - the "Second Reich", the Holy Roman Empire - the "First Reich".
39. in the Roman army, soldiers lived in tents of 10 people. At the head of each tent was an elder, who was called ... dean. 40. A tightly tightened corset and a large number of bracelets on the hands in England during the reign of the Tudors were considered a sign of virginity.
41. FBI agents did not acquire the right to bear arms until 1934, 26 years after the founding of the FBI.
42. Until the Second World War in Japan, any touch to the emperor was considered blasphemy.
43. On February 16, 1568, the Spanish Inquisition pronounced a death sentence on all the inhabitants of the Netherlands. 44. In 1911, in China, braids were recognized as a sign of feudalism and therefore their wearing was prohibited.
45. The first party card of the CPSU belonged to Lenin, the second to Brezhnev (the third to Suslov, and the fourth to Kosygin.
46. The American Physical Education League, the first naturist organization in the United States, was founded on December 4, 1929. 47. In 213 BC. e. Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huangdi ordered to burn all the books available in the country.
48. In Madagascar in 1610, King Ralambo created the state of Imerin, which means "As far as the eye sees."
49. The first Russian saints were Boris and Gleb, canonized in 1072.
50. one of the punishments for criminals in ancient India was ... mutilation of the ears.
51. Of the 266 people who occupied the papal throne, 33 died a violent death.
52. In Rus', the original was a stick used to beat a witness, seeking the truth. 53. In normal weather, the Romans wore a tunic, and when the cold came, several tunics.
54. in ancient Rome, a group of slaves belonging to one person was called ... a surname. 55. The Roman emperor Nero married a man - one of his slaves named skorus.
56. Until 1361, in England, legal proceedings were conducted exclusively in French. 57. Having accepted the surrender, the Soviet Union did not sign peace with Germany, that is, it remained at war with Germany. The war with Germany was ended on January 21, 1955 by the adoption of a corresponding decision by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. Nevertheless, May 9 is considered the day of victory - the day the act of unconditional surrender of Germany was signed.
58. The eruption of the Mexican volcano Paricutin lasted 9 years (from 1943 to 1952. During this time, the cone of the volcano rose to 2774 meters. 59. To date, archaeologists have discovered on the territory associated with ancient Troy, traces of nine fortresses - settlements that existed in different era.
1. Albert Einstein could have been president. In 1952 he was offered the post of the second President of Israel, but he refused.
2. Kim Jong Il was a good composer and throughout his life the Korean leader composed 6 operas.
3. The Leaning Tower of Pisa has always been leaning. In 1173, a team building the Leaning Tower of Pisa noticed that the base was warped. Construction was halted for almost 100 years, but the structure was never straight.
4. Arabic numerals were not invented by Arabs, but by Indian mathematicians.
5. Before the invention of alarm clocks, there was a profession that consisted of waking other people up in the morning. So, for example, a person had to shoot dried peas at other people's windows to wake them up for work.
See also: The biggest mistakes in history
6. Grigory Rasputin survived many assassination attempts in one day. They tried to poison him, shoot him and stab him, but he managed to survive. In the end, Rasputin died in a cold river.
7. The shortest war in history lasted less than an hour. The Anglo-Zanzibar War lasted 38 minutes.
8. The longest war in history took place between the Netherlands and the Scilly archipelago. The war lasted 335 years from 1651 to 1989 with no casualties on either side.
By the 20th century, humanity had reached unprecedented heights: we had discovered electricity, conquered the heavens and the depths of the sea, learned how to heal many diseases, quickly transmit messages over great distances, even space and nuclear energy had conquered us. However, along with these achievements, the 20th century can be called the peak of the madness of the human race, when, with their reckless behavior, people practically brought themselves to the brink of annihilation in two world wars ...
Almost 80% of Soviet men born in 1923 died in the Great Patriotic War. 
Ivan Burylov, who wrote the word "comedy" on the ballot paper, received 8 years in the camps, 1949. 
Husband is Protestant, wife is Catholic. The community did not allow them to be buried in the same cemetery. Holland, 1888 
The creator of the popular cartoon "Shrek" William Steig copied his character from the professional wrestler Maurice Tiye 
In 1859, 24 rabbits were released into the wild in Australia. For 6 years, their number has increased to 6,000,000 individuals ... 
Note by Yuri Gagarin, written after the flight around the Earth. 
King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland George V and his brother - Emperor of All Russia Nicholas II. 
The first photograph on Earth. 
The diameter of Soviet cigarettes is 7.62 mm, like the cartridge caliber. There is a widespread myth that all production was set up so that after 2 hours it was ready for the release of cartridges. 
Afghanistan 1973 and 2016. 
"Give me 5 years and you won't recognize Germany." - A. Hitler 
John Rockefeller dreamed of earning $100,000 and living to be 100 years old. And he earned $192 billion and died at 97. Not all dreams come true. 
Terry Savchuk - the face of a hockey goaltender, when the mask was not yet a mandatory attribute, 1966. 
Mortgage - definition in the Soviet dictionary. 
Women's Minister Angela Merkel and Chancellor Kohl. 1991 And then 10 years later she fired him. 
Stalin's son Yakov Dzhugashvili in German captivity, 1941. Later he was killed in a prison camp - his father refused to exchange him for captured German generals. 
Public execution on the guillotine, France, 1939. 
Australia in the middle of the 20th century. Very soon the USSR will send Gagarin into space. 
A hotel manager pours acid into a pool filled with blacks, 1964. USA. 
The Auschwitz concentration camp is the same furnace in which people were burned. 
In 1938, Stalin offered the pilot Valery Chkalov to head the NKVD. However, Chkalov refused.
In the 5th century BC. The Spartan commander Pausanias betrayed his homeland to the Persians. The betrayal was discovered, and the court decided to execute the traitor. Pausanias hid in the temple of the goddess Athena, knowing that killing on the temple grounds was considered sacrilege. However, the Spartans still found a way out: they immured Pausanias in the temple.
All theater in pre-Aeschylean ancient Greece was a "one-man theatre": one person played all the roles. Aeschylus introduced a second actor, and Sophocles a third.
Alexander the Great was very handsome, but two things spoiled the matter: short stature - only one and a half meters and the habit of tilting his head to the right and looking, as it were, into the distance.
Modern ophthalmologists tend to believe that the king suffered from a rare pathology of vision called "Brown's syndrome." In Pompeii, where there were barely 20 thousand inhabitants, seven brothels were discovered during excavations, some of them simultaneously served as taverns, others as barbers.
In the Middle Ages, beds in noble houses were necessarily supplied with a canopy on four columns. The fact is that there were no glasses in the windows of that time, and therefore cruel drafts were walking in the bedrooms.
Railroad tracks in Europe were laid on cart tracks left over from the time of the ancient Romans. The distance between the wheels of Roman carts was standard: two horse backs.
The Danish king Niels, who ruled in the 12th century (1104-1134), had the smallest army ever in the world. It consisted of ... 7 people - his personal assistants. With this army, Nils ruled Denmark for 30 years, and at that time Denmark also included part of Sweden and Norway, as well as some parts of Northern Germany.
Nicholas II had only the military rank of colonel. Napoleon overslept the battle of Waterloo. He was tormented by hemorrhoids, which were treated with enemas with painkillers that caused severe drowsiness. Bonaparte fell asleep before the fight, and no one dared to wake him up until the most critical moment.
The place and role of historical facts in the process of cognition is determined by the fact that only on the basis of these "bricks" can one put forward hypotheses and build theories. There is no single definition of historical fact. The following interpretations of the term "historical fact" are most common:
- it is an objective event or phenomenon of the past;
- these are traces of the past, i.e. images that are captured in historical documents.
Many scientists (A.P. Pronshtein, I.N. Danilevsky, M.A. Varshavchik) singled out three categories of historical facts: objectively existing facts of reality, located in certain spatio-temporal limits and having materiality (historical events, phenomena and processes as such). facts reflected in the sources, information about the event; "scientific facts" obtained and described by the historian.
In the interpretation of M.A. Barga the concept of "historical fact" has several meanings. First, a historical fact, as a fragment of historical reality, having "chronological completeness and ontological inexhaustibility". Second, "source message"; thirdly, the "scientific-historical fact" - in its "cognitive incompleteness, in content variability, cumulativeness, the ability to endless enrichment and development" along with the development of "historical science" itself.
A scientific historical fact is a historical fact that has become the object of activity of a scientist historian; the result of an inference based on traces left by the past. These facts are always subjective, they reflect the position of the scientist, the level of his qualifications and education. The academic subject most often presents scientific and historical facts that are described, systematized and explained. Any historical fact can contain the general, universal, individual. Taking into account this specificity, three groups of facts are conditionally distinguished in the methodology of teaching history: a fact - an event - characterizing the unique, inimitable; fact - phenomenon - reflecting the typical, general; fact - processes - defining the universal. These facts have undergone logical processing and are presented in logical forms: representations (images) contain a characteristic of the external side in the form of a description; concepts, ideas, theories that characterize the essence and provide an explanation of the historical past. Facts-processes are presented by description, explanation, evaluation.
Every year in May, Mother's Day is celebrated all over the world. On this day, congratulations and gifts are given to mothers and pregnant women. Motherhood is an amazing state, but even women themselves do not know some facts about it:
- The word "mama" in all languages sounds about the same: Russian, Chinese and Spanish children call their mother "mama", English and German - "mum". And the secret is simple: the children themselves came up with this word. One of the first syllables that a child pronounces is “ma”, and he determined the name of the most important person in the life of each of us.
- A woman carries a child for nine months, he is born, the umbilical cord is cut, but his connection with his mother does not end there. During pregnancy, mother and baby exchange cells through the placenta, and these cells in a woman's body sometimes remain for a very long time.
- Pregnancy causes changes in a woman's brain.
- A child's successful personal life depends on how close his relationship with his mother was. Scientists believe that it is the mother who instills in the child the ability to love and feel, which helps him build a happy relationship with the opposite sex.
- Mothers feel if something happened to the child, even if the latter is already an adult, accomplished person.
- Children know the voice of their mother, not yet born into the world. Scientists have conducted a number of studies, as a result of which it was revealed that the child in the womb responds to the voice of the mother and does not react at all to extraneous voices.
We offer a fascinating selection of historical facts about Russia and Russian people. Informative and interesting:
The origin of the name of our country is unknown
Since ancient times, our country has been called Rus, but it is not known for certain where this name came from. But it is known how "Rus" turned into "Russia" - this happened thanks to the Byzantines, who pronounced the word "Rus" in their own way.
After the collapse of Rus', its individual regions began to be called Little Rus', White Rus' and Great Rus', or Little Russia, Belarus and Great Russia. It was believed that only all these parts together make up Russia. But after the revolution of 1917 and the coming to power of the Bolsheviks, Little Russia began to be called Ukraine, and Great Russia - Russia.
In Rus', grasshoppers were called dragonflies.
A long time ago, in the time of Rus', grasshoppers were indeed called dragonflies, but this name does not in any way directly refer to the flying insect dragonfly, the grasshopper got the name "dragonfly" because of the sounds it made, which sounded like a chirp or click.
Foreign invaders only once managed to conquer Russia
Many tried to conquer Russia, and these attempts repeatedly failed. Only the Mongols were able to conquer Rus', and this happened in the 13th century. The reason for this was that Rus' at that time was divided into many principalities, and the Russian princes could not unite and jointly repel the conquerors. Since then and to this day, it is the stupidity and greed of the rulers, internal conflicts that have been and remain the main source of problems for our country.
Corporal punishment in Russia
On August 11, according to the old style (24 according to the new one), 1904, corporal punishment for peasants and underage artisans was abolished in the Russian Empire. This was the last social group for which various types of physical influence were still used. A little earlier, in June of the same year, corporal punishment was abolished in the navy and army.
Corporal punishment fell into three broad categories:
1) mutilating (mutilating) - depriving a person of any part of the body or damaging it (blindness, cutting out the tongue, cutting off an arm, leg or fingers, cutting off ears, nose or lips, castration);
2) painful - causing physical suffering by beating with various tools (whips, whips, batogs (sticks), gauntlets, rods, cats, molts);
3) shameful (disgraceful) - the most important is the disgrace of the punished (for example, putting up at the pillory, branding, imposing shackles, shaving the head).
The upper strata of the population were anxious about the prohibition of corporal punishment. In July 1877, the St. Petersburg mayor Trepov, in violation of the law of 1863, ordered the political prisoner Bogolyubov to be whipped with rods. The educated Bogolyubov went mad and died from such an insult, and the famous Vera Zasulich avenged him by seriously injuring Trepov. The court acquitted Zasulich.
Official Soviet pedagogy since 1917 considered corporal punishment of children unacceptable. They were banned in all types of educational institutions, but in the family they remained a common occurrence. In 1988, the journalist Filippov conducted an anonymous survey of 7,500 children from 9 to 15 years old in 15 cities of the USSR, 60% admitted that their parents used corporal punishment against them.
Cuban Missile Crisis and Black Saturday
What we call the Caribbean Crisis, the Americans call the Cuban Crisis, and the Cubans themselves call the October Crisis. But the whole world calls the most important day in the Caribbean crisis one name - "Black Saturday" (October 27, 1962) - the day when the world was closest to a global nuclear war.
Russia has repeatedly helped the United States in its formation and strengthening
If not for Russia, the United States would not have arisen at all, let alone become a superpower. During the war of independence with England, the English king repeatedly turned to Russia for help in suppressing the uprising. Russia, however, not only did not help, but also founded a league of armed neutrality, which was soon joined by other countries that traded with the United States despite the protests of England. During the American Civil War, Russia actively supported the northerners by sending squadrons to New York and San Francisco, while England and France wanted the US to disintegrate and took the side of the southerners. Finally, Russia ceded to the United States California and the Hawaiian Islands, where it had colonies, and then sold the United States and Alaska for a ridiculous price. However, in the 20th century, the United States, having become a world power, responded to Russia with black ingratitude.
The USSR could have easily won the Cold War
After the end of World War II, two superpowers remained in the world that clashed in a global confrontation - the USA and the USSR. Despite the worst starting conditions, the USSR in the 60s pulled ahead in many respects, and many believed that it would win in the fight against the capitalists. In the 70s, the capitalist world was struck by a severe crisis provoked by rising oil prices, and the US economy was on the verge of collapse. However, the Soviet leadership not only did not take advantage of the situation, but, on the contrary, actually saved its enemy by signing disarmament agreements and agreeing to sell oil for dollars. The United States, on the contrary, relied on the collapse of the USSR and victory in the Cold War, which, in the end, they were able to achieve 20 years later, with the complicity of traitors among the Soviet leadership.
The first Japanese in Russia
The first Japanese who came to Russia was Denbei, the son of a merchant from Osaka. His ship was nailed to the shores of Kamchatka in 1695. In 1701 he reached Moscow.
In the winter of 1702, after an audience on January 8 with Peter I in the village of Preobrazhenskoye, Denbey received an order to become a translator and teacher of the Japanese language in the Artillery Order. Denbey personally told what he could to Peter I about Japan and thus gave impetus to Russian efforts to explore Kamchatka and the Kuriles and attempts to open trade with Japan.
Since 1707, Denbey lived at the palace of the prince and at one time the governor of the Siberian province, Matvey Gagarin. It is known that at the insistence of an associate of Peter I, Jacob Bruce, Denbey was baptized and took the name Gabriel Bogdanov (which blocked his way back to Japan, where Christianity was forbidden). The school of translators from Japanese founded by him operated in Moscow until 1739, after which it was transferred to Irkutsk, where it existed until 1816.
Prior to Denbey, only one Japanese is known in Russia. During the reign of Boris Godunov, a Japanese of the Christian faith visited Russia. He was a young Catholic from Manila, who, together with his spiritual mentor Nicholas Melo of the Order of St. Augustine, traveled to Rome along the route Manila - India - Persia - Russia. But the Time of Troubles turned out to be tragic for them: they were captured by foreign Catholics, and Tsar Boris Godunov exiled them to the Solovetsky Monastery. After six years of exile, he was executed as a supporter of False Dmitry I in 1611 in Nizhny Novgorod. In Russia, he was considered an Indian, not a Japanese.
Favorite commander of Catherine II
Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov was a favorite of Empress Catherine. She celebrated and showered awards on the Russian Macedonian, and he happened to allow himself what was unacceptable to others, knowing in advance that Catherine would always forgive any trick or eccentricities of the great commander. Here are some interesting cases:
Once, at a court ball, Catherine decided to pay attention to Suvorov and asked him:
- What to treat dear guest? - Bless, queen, vodka! “But what will my ladies-in-waiting say when they talk to you?” “They will feel that a soldier is talking to them!”
Once, in a conversation, the empress said that she planned to send Suvorov to serve in Finland in the future. Suvorov bowed to the Empress, kissed her hand and returned home. Then he got into the mail coach and left for Vyborg, from where he sent a message to Catherine: “I am waiting, mother, for your further commands.”
It is known that Suvorov dressed very lightly even in severe frosts. Catherine II gave Suvorov a fur coat and ordered him to wear it. What to do? Suvorov began to carry the donated fur coat with him everywhere, but he kept it on his knees.
After the pacification of the Poles in 1794, Suvorov sent a messenger with a message. The “message” is the following: “Hurrah! Warsaw is ours! Catherine's response: "Hurrah! Field Marshal Suvorov! And this is at the time of lengthy reports about the capture of cities. How did you send an SMS. But, nevertheless, he failed to surpass Field Marshal Saltykov in lapidarity, who, after the battle with the Prussians at Kunersdorf during the Seven Years' War, simply sent the hat of the Prussian king found on the battlefield to St. Petersburg.
Kutuzov is not a pirate, he does not need an eye patch!
In recent years, images of the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Army in 1812, Field Marshal His Serene Highness Prince M.I. Golenishchev-Kutuzov, with a bandage over his right eye, began to be massively replicated. The "one-eyed" Kutuzov can be seen on the covers of books and magazines, in the paintings of contemporary artists and on various souvenirs, as well as on busts and monuments.
Such images do not correspond to historical accuracy, since Kutuzov never wore eye patches. There is not a single memoir or epistolary evidence of Kutuzov's contemporaries describing a field marshal with a bandage over his right eye. Moreover, Kutuzov did not need to hide his eye under a bandage, since he saw with this eye, although not as well as with his left.
“Fate appoints Kutuzov to something great,” Masso, the chief surgeon of the Russian army, said with amazement, who examined Kutuzov’s “mortal wound” in the head in 1788 near Ochakovo. The bullet passed right through from temple to temple behind both eyes. The verdict of the doctors was unequivocal - death, but Kutuzov not only did not die, but did not even lose his sight, although his right eye was a little skewed. The surprise of doctors and the whole world that Kutuzov remained alive and after 6 months was again in the ranks was boundless, like 14 years before, when he was first "mortally wounded." In 1774, near Alushta, as well as near Ochakov, Kutuzov was wounded in the head, and the bullet passed almost in the same place. Then doctors all over Europe considered Kutuzov's recovery a miracle, and many believed that the news of the general's injury and cure was a fairy tale, because. it was impossible to survive after such a wound.
In fact, at the beginning of the XIX century. it was not customary to wear an eye patch after the wound had healed (even if the eye was completely absent). For the first time, the "one-eyed" Kutuzov appeared in 1944 in the feature film "Kutuzov". Then the bandage on Kutuzov's right eye was put on by the directors of the musical comedy film "Hussar Ballad" (1962) and the performance of the same name (1964) and ballet (1979).
The image of Kutuzov, brilliantly played by Igor Ilyinsky, gave rise to a stable legend that Kutuzov wore a patch on his injured eye. The replication of this legend in recent years has taken on such a massive character that it has begun to lead to a distortion of historical reality.
Jesters of Empress Anna Ioannovna
The niece of Peter I ruled the Russian Empire for 10 years. The stern disposition of the Russian landowner did not prevent her from having fun.
It is known that Empress Anna Ioannovna was very fond of jesters and dwarfs. There were six of them at her court. Three of them were demoted aristocrats. So, she forced princes Mikhail Golitsyn and Nikita Volkonsky, as well as Count Alexei Apraksin, to play the role of a jester. The illustrious clowns were supposed to grimace in the presence of the empress, sit on top of each other and beat with their fists until they bleed or portray brood hens and cackle. In the last year of her reign, the Empress arranged the wedding of her jesters - the 50-year-old Prince Golitsyn and the ugly Kalmyk Anna Buzheninova, who received her surname in honor of the Empress's favorite dish. Representatives of different nationalities of both sexes were discharged from all over the country to participate in wedding celebrations: Russians, Tatars, Mordvins, Chuvashs, etc. They were supposed to dress up in their national clothes and have musical instruments. It was winter. By order of Anna Ioannovna, an ice House was built on the Neva, in which everything - walls, doors, windows, furniture, utensils - was made of ice. This is where the wedding ceremony took place. Numerous candles were burning in ice candlesticks, and even the marriage bed for the "young" was arranged on an ice bed.
Peter I and guards
In winter, slingshots were placed on the Neva, so that after dark they would not let anyone into or out of the city. Once, Emperor Peter I decided to check the guards himself. He drove up to one of the sentries, pretended to be a spree merchant and asked to be let through, offering money for the pass. The sentry refused to let him through, although Peter had already reached 10 rubles, a very significant amount at that time. The sentry, seeing such stubbornness, threatened that he would be forced to shoot him.
Peter left and went to another sentry. The same one let Peter in for 2 rubles.
The next day, an order was announced for the regiment: hang the corrupt sentry, and drill the rubles he received and hang it around his neck.
Promote a conscientious sentry to corporal and welcome him with ten rubles.
Thai national anthem
The Thai national anthem was written in 1902 by the Russian composer Pyotr Shchurovsky.
Nicholas I gave his officers the choice between a guardhouse and listening to Glinka's operas as punishment.
On November 27, 1842, the first performance of M. I. Glinka's opera "Ruslan and Lyudmila" took place, which brought a number of sensitive sorrows to the author. The public and high society did not like the opera, Emperor Nicholas I defiantly left after Act IV, without waiting for the end. He did not like the music of the opera so much that he ordered, as a punishment, the offending officers of the capital to choose between the guardhouse and listening to Glinka's music. So the emperor additionally expressed his displeasure with the composer's work. Such were the customs, alas. Thank God that Nikolai himself did not send the composer to the guardhouse.
"Thank God you are Russian"
In 1826, a “Russian contemporary” described the appearance of the sovereign, Emperor Nicholas I: “Tall, lean, had a wide chest ... a quick look, a sonorous voice, suitable for a tenor, but spoke somewhat patteringly ... Some kind of genuine severity was visible in the movements” .
"Genuine severity" ... When he commanded the troops, he never shouted. There was no need for this - the king's voice could be heard a mile away; tall grenadiers looked just like children next to him. Nikolai led an ascetic life, but if we talk about the luxury of the court, magnificent receptions, they stunned everyone, especially foreigners. This was done in order to emphasize the status of Russia, which the sovereign cared about incessantly.
General Pyotr Daragan recalled how, in the presence of Nikolai Pavlovich, he spoke French, grazing. Nikolai, suddenly making an exaggeratedly serious face, began to repeat every word after him, which brought his wife to a fit of laughter. Daragan, crimson with shame, ran out into the waiting room, where Nikolai caught up with him and, kissing him, explained: “Why are you burring? No one will take you for a Frenchman; thank God that you are Russian, and monkeying is no good.”
History is full of the most incredible facts and oddities. People in the entire history of their existence not only created, but many did to their own detriment, believing that they had found a panacea for all diseases or an ideal political solution.
This review contains historical facts that seem somewhat strange from the height of centuries.
1. Clothing made from asbestos
The Romans used asbestos in clothing and everyday items such as dish towels, napkins and tablecloths. Pliny the Elder (a Roman polymath writer) said that, unlike ordinary cloth, asbestos objects could be cleaned simply by throwing them into a fire. He also noted that slaves who wore asbestos clothes often suffered from lung diseases.2. Heart versus brain
In ancient Egypt, it was believed that people think not with the help of the brain, but with the heart. The Egyptians believed that the brain was essentially just a "stuffing" for the head. For this reason, they carefully scraped it out of the head during embalming and threw it away, and the heart was preserved with great care.
3. "Plague suit"
During the plague in the Middle Ages, some doctors wore a primitive form of biohazard suit called a "plague suit". The mask of this costume had red glass eyepieces (to "make the wearer immune to evil") as well as a beak that was often filled with fragrant herbs and spices to kill the miasma that was also believed to spread plague.
4. 3370 years of war
"The Apotheosis of War" - a painting by Russian artist Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin.
During the last 3500 years, there have been a total of only 230 years without war worldwide. It is worth considering whether there is any benefit from the "peace movement".
5. Bearded men
Among the urban population of Western Europe and America, beards fell out of fashion at the beginning of the 17th century. In 1698, Peter the Great ordered all boyars to shave off their beards, and in 1705 he even introduced a tax on beards.
6. "The Tale of Two Lovers"
The best-selling book of the 15th century was an erotic book called The Tale of Two Lovers. Its author was none other than Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini, otherwise known as Pope Pius II.
7. Sacred cats
In ancient Egypt, cats were considered sacred. When a family's beloved cat died, the entire family would shave off their eyebrows and mourn until the eyebrows grew back.
8. 20 slaves per Spartan
In 200 BC The Greek city of Sparta was at the height of its power. At this time, every citizen of Sparta had 20 slaves.
9. Prolonged war
Andorra declared war on Imperial Germany during World War I, but did not actually take part in the fighting. Interestingly, the country was officially at war until 1957, since it was not included in the Versailles Peace Treaty.
10. "Western schism"
During the so-called "Western Schism" or "Great Western Schism" (1378 - 1417), three people simultaneously claimed to be the true popes. When the cardinals refused to obey their chosen Pope Urban VI and declared him mentally ill, they elected an "alternative" Pope Clement VII. This caused great strife in the Church, which led to the election of a third Pope by the Council of Pisa.
11. From Pirates to Bankers
Sir William Paterson was the founder of the Bank of England. At the same time, few people know that before the foundation of the bank, he was suspected of piracy.12. Tea bags
In 1904, tea bags were invented quite by accident. Their inventor, Thomas Sullivan (a tea merchant), decided it would be cheaper for him to ship small samples of tea to potential customers in silk bags rather than boxes. The recipients mistakenly thought that these bags should be brewed. Sullivan was soon flooded with orders for his "tea bags."
13. First parachute
The oldest parachute design can be found in an anonymous Italian Renaissance manuscript that dates back to 1470. The design looked like a frame attached to a conical dome. The man was hung from this frame with four straps attached to his waist belt.
14. Tobacco enemas
There were tobacco enemas in the late 1700s. With their help, tobacco smoke was blown into the patient's rectum for various medical purposes, primarily for resuscitation of victims of drowning.
15. Ancient depilation
In ancient Rome, there were people who specialized in plucking armpit hair. Somewhere around 1 AD among Roman aristocrats it became fashionable to remove all body hair. The following requirements were imposed on people of this profession: the presence of tweezers, a strong arm and the ability to hold a resisting client in place.
