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TIL of “The Custom of the Sea,” an old tradition among sailors where in dire circumstances, such as being stranded at sea and on the verge of starvation, the remaining sailors would all draw straws and whoever drew the shortest would then be killed and eaten to ensure the survival of the others.

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9vB TIL as a promise to a friend dying of bone cancer, a man ran across the U.S. at 16, becoming the fastest and youngest person to accomplish the feat.
G6kj TIL Wounded Viking warriors were given strong onion soup. After a few minutes someone would smell the wounds and if onions could be detected it meant that there were serious abdominal injuries and that death was inevitable.
woG06 TIL that during the battle for the village of Raseiniai, which took place 23–27 June 1941, a lone KV tank held off the advance of the 6th Panzer Division for a single day, before being overrun and knocked out on the morning of June 25.
nWp5r TIL that "Your brain isn’t fully formed until you’re 25" is a myth that is not based in science, only misunderstandings. Our brains continue to mature with time, and our brains never stop changing. Individual differences mean some of are more mature than others, at an earlier age.
8nrL TIL in 1963, a man in the Nevşehir Province of Turkey knocked down a wall of his home. Behind it, he discovered a mysterious room. The man continued digging … what he had discovered was the ancient Derinkuyu underground city, part of the Cappadocia region in central Anatolia, Turkey.