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TIL the third wife of emperor Claudius, Messalina, was so bold that she publicly married another man while Claudius was out of Rome, apparently in a coup attempt against the emperor. Claudius was informed and found his family's heirlooms in the new husband's home. The pair were predictably executed

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E1oxo TIL that in 1825 Haiti agreed to pay $21bn to France to preserve its independence and be able to participate in the global economy. As a poor country who just uprised and freed itself from slavery, the Haitian government even had to ask citizens for donations. They ended up paying it off in 1947.
J1Pp8 TIL ‘Linguistics and Comparative Language’ degree holders have the highest unemployment rate (10.5%) for bachelors degree holders ages 30-54.
4RA6 TIL that on one occasion, J.S. Bach was in Dresden at the same time as a French organist named Louis Marchand. There was to be a competition between the two men to see who was better at improvisation. Marchand heard Bach practicing the day before the competition and left town.
NoxN TIL that Stanley Kubrick forced Shelley Duvall to film the scene of her on the stairs during “The Shining” 127 times. Her misery wasn’t even her acting at that point.
gr6QD TIL that James Earl Ray's brother once tried to sell a videotape of his brother's autopsy for $400K.