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TIL the Mediterranean Sea went into a cycle of partial or near complete drying-up from 5.96 to 5.33 million years ago, when the precursor of the Strait of Gibraltar closed off sealing the Sea off from the Atlantic Ocean. The period ended with a flood when the Atlantic reclaimed the basin.

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6mKm TIL that the color purple is the royal color because the dye was so expensive to make: “dye-makers had to crack open the snail’s shell, extract a purple-producing mucus and expose it to sunlight for a precise amount of time. It took as many as 250,000 mollusks to yield just one ounce of usable dye”
awOXA TIL Georgy Zhukov, "hero of the Soviet Union", and victorious general of the Battle of Berlin in 1945, always kept a small bag of clothes and belongings in case he was arrested by his own country's KGB. He did this until 1957.
Oo8m6 TIL humans are 99.9% genetically similar to other humans; 96% genetically similar to chimpanzees; 90% genetically similar to cats; 85% genetically similar to mice; 80% genetically similar to cows; 61% genetically similar to chickens; and 60% genetically similar to bananas.
5YXNR TIL that in 1908 Germany issued "transvestite certificates" with the support of scientists and psychologists. The certificates allowed people to legally wear clothing that contradicted their assigned biological sex.
rRZk0 TIL Astronomers from Johns Hopkins University, studying spectral analysis of over 200,000 galaxies, initially determined the average color of the universe to be a greenish white. Later study corrected this to a slight beige. A vote followed by press coverage christened the final color "Cosmic Latte"