› added 1 month ago

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TIL that the Sistine Chapel originally depicted nude figures, but the genitals got painted over after the Council of Trent banned nudity in religious art.

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via reddit.com

JYvKm TIL about the Gordian Knot, a supposedly impossible knot to untie. An oracle declared that whomever opened the knot would become ruler of all Asia. Alexander the Great, unsuccessful at loosening the knot, simply sliced it in half with his sword, fulfilling the prophecy.
GYN9g TIL that the nation of Barbados has a Rihanna Day on February the 22th to celebrate their most famous celebrity.
GAw4J TIL in two boys from Ireland (10 & 13) went on a Transatlantic Flight to New York City as stowaways over Christmas break 1985.
pYAeQ TIL that in 1901, Elisa Sánchez Loriga and Marcela Gracia Ibeas were wed by a priest. Elisa, wearing a suit and donning short hair, presented as a man. She told the priest that she was called ‘Mario’ and concocted a fake backstory. The priest married them believing they were a heterosexual couple.
e0Dv6 TIL: After the conclusion of the First World War, the French government declared a "Zone Rouge" deemed unfit for human habitation.