› added 2 months ago

15

TIL about the battle of athens, when a group of ww2 vets banded together and overthrew their local government.

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ay9b TIL that the word “Barbarian” was invented by the ancient Greeks as an insulting term for anyone who didn’t speak the Greek language - to their ears, everyone else sounded like they were just saying “bar bar bar” all the time
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BZQy TIL the largest Japanese character is called Taito, consists of 84 strokes and means “the appearance of a dragon in flight”.
nermY TIL that the world's sperm whale population consumes almost as much seafood, by weight, as humanity.
e0A0E TIL that the English chess term "checkmate" is derived from the Persian phrase "shah mat", which means "the king is dead".