› added 6 years ago

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TIL about an Aptronym, which is when someone's name suits their personality (like Lonzo Ball who is a basketball player or Anthony Weiner who was involved in a sex scandal).

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via reddit.com

YP07 TIL that Charles Bronson, Britain’s most violent prisoner actually shaved his trademark mustache off so Tom Hardy could wear it during the filming of “Bronson” which based on his life in prison
b6no7 TIL As a teenager, Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping went to Europe on a work-study program designed by anarchists who hoped a Western education would create a cohort capable of reviving China
W7p6Y TIL about ether, a drug that took Ireland and most of baltic/eastern Europe by storm in the 18th and 19th century. Village addiction rates were up to 90% with entire villages reeking off the drug, commonly used as an alternative to alcohol for the poor or abstinent. Even 10yo children took it.
gr987 TIL During WW1 Sauerkraut was called liberty cabbage.
6KxW TIL early printing presses used the letter “y” for the Middle English letter thorn (þ). “Ye” (definitive article), as in “ye olde”(pronounced “the old”), became commonplace, which contributed to the transition of “ye”(noun) to “thou” to avoid confusion, which eventually lead to “thou” to “you”.