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152

TIL that inoculation against smallpox was already practised in Africa, China and Turkey long before it reached Western Europe and North America

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PYdOG TIL the word āss in Old Norse means god.
kAMW TIL the film ‘Back to the Future’ provides the OED’s earliest recorded example of a colloquial sense of ‘hello’, used to imply (sometimes disbelievingly or sarcastically) that the person addressed is not paying attention, has not understood something, or has said something nonsensical or foolish.
epRO5 TIL about Gemistos Plethon, a 14th/15th century Greek scholar who rejected Christianity and favoured a return of Hellenic paganism in the Byzantine Empire.
9wQLD TIL Richard Nixon wanted to be a rapper: “I have often thought that if there had been a good rap group around in those days, I might have chosen a career in music instead of politics.”
ZBVY TIL that in 19th-century America, the belief that sausages were usually made out of dog meat was so widespread that they started to be called “hot dogs”