Dance is an important facet of a culture, so it’s no surprise that some dances have extremely rich and unique histories. Many emerged not from the joyous celebrations where they would later be performed but from much darker times of a people’s past.

Dance was a way to escape oppression or to express oneself when society silenced you. And even when a dance is just fun and games, some people still find a way to twist it into something it was never meant to be.

10 Gumboot Dancing

During the apartheid period of South Africa’s history when racial segregation laws were instituted purely to keep whites in power, black mine workers were forced to toil in dangerous conditions. Aside from many mines forbidding their workers from even speaking to each other, the white mine owners deemed it cost-inefficient to deal with the mines’ flooding problems. Instead, they gave their workers gumboots (rubber boots) to avoid health problems that would prevent them from working.

Not being able to speak was an impediment to work, and the employees quickly devised a Morse code style system to communicate by slapping their boots with their hands to send messages. It seemed to have been catchy because the workers eventually developed this system of slapping their gumboots into a style of dance.

The miners came from diverse parts of Africa to work, so a variety of cultures added to the creation of gumboot dancing. Tribal costumes were outlawed during that dark time in South Africa’s history, but the movements of the traditional dances were incorporated into a style that flourished into a new kind of dance.^[1]

Dancing was not under the rules that mine operators controlled. As a result, songs were also incorporated into the style as it developed into the whole body dance that it is today.

9 The Dance Of Death?

The dutty wine is a dance started in Jamaica that involves wild gyrations of the neck. The dance is so intense that some Jamaican doctors are cautioning would-be dutty winers not to perform it. Physicians say that the dance, particularly the neck twirling, causes too much stress on the spine and can harm to the dancer.

Some doctors say that the dance may be performed without issue with appropriate training, but others maintain that the movements are dangerous no matter how much physical preparation the dancer has done. They warn that the dance places too much strain on the neck and spine to walk away without injury.

Nevertheless, the dance grew in popularity when Jamaican DJ Tony Matterhorn created a song of the same name. The dance spread beyond Jamaica and eventually overseas, where Beyonce also used it in one of her videos.^[2]

This happened despite rumors that the dutty wine was the cause of one 18-year-old’s death. Allegedly, she was doing the dutty wine when she died in a dance house. However, it is unclear if the dance itself was responsible for her death or if the blame lay elsewhere.

8 The Hokey Pokey
200 Years Old And Hotly Contested

It is odd that “The Hokey Pokey” (aka “The Hokey Cokey”) would be anything but a simple, fun song that everyone knows, enjoys, and does a little dance to. But it actually has a long, complicated, and contested history.

One of the earliest versions of the song was the “Hinkumbooby,” a Scottish folk song mentioned in the 1826 Popular Rhymes of Scotland. This variation was similar to the modern song, and other versions were likewise created throughout the years.

Some people even claim that “The Hokey Pokey” was not fun and games at all but a mockery of Catholic mass. They say that the name actually came from “hocus pocus.” But it was only when songwriters in the UK and the US claimed it as their own that things really got heated.

On the eastern side of the Atlantic, a legal battle erupted after two men each claimed that they had written a song called “The Hokey Cokey.” Both said that they originally called it “The Hokey Pokey” but changed the name when a Canadian soldier suggested that the word “cokey” would be better than “pokey” because it was Canadian slang for “crazy.”^[3]

The legal battle was settled out of court.

Similarly, another lawsuit ensued in the United States between two different groups claiming to have written “The Hokey Pokey.” This battle apparently ended with the royalties being shared.

7 The Hula Is A Story

While movies often depict hula in a stereotypical way, grass skirts, coconut bras, and swaying hips do not capture what hula truly is. Ancient hula was accompanied by chanted poetry, and each gesture of the dance held deep meaning.

It was the sacred text of the Hawaiian people written in movement, a traditional method of passing legends and shared histories down from generation to generation. Hula is a story.

Hula was banned by the missionaries who landed on the island in the 1800s. They considered it a pagan practice and condemned it. Soon, hula and native Hawaiian culture in general was slowly dying away until a cultural explosion in the 1970s revived the traditional dance.

There are now two types of hula. Hula kahiko hearkens back to the traditional methods, using percussion instruments and chants that tell stories of the old ways and gods. Hula ‘auana is the kind more familiar to contemporary culture, with the graceful movements performed to more modern instruments.^[4]

Regardless of which style is performed—and there are many subdivisions—hula was never intended to be a simple dance. It is a spiritual exercise of telling the story of one’s heart, which is perhaps why it now has so many practitioners around the world.

6 Dance Or Brawl?

The tinku is Bolivia’s national dance. It has its origins in a tradition where different communities would gather in a designated area to release tensions by beginning a dance that erupted into a ritualized brawl.

The tinku involved forming circles of dances separated by gender. It began at a fast pace, transitioned into a stomp, and finally transformed into ritualized combat. Any blood spilled was seen as an offering to the gods for a good harvest. And any deaths, which occasionally occurred due to the nature of the festival, were likewise seen as a sacrifice.

The modern-day tinku looks somewhat similar to the original practice except that the combat has (ideally) been toned down to ritualistic combat-like movements. However, the festival where the tinku is performed usually involves heavy drinking, and tensions between communities or neighbors can still turn from dance into a brawl.^[5]

Tourists who visit Bolivia during the festival period have said that while the tinku was indeed a spectacle, it was not one they wish to repeat. Tensions can run high during the period for anyone, and it has been advised not to make any provocative gestures lest visitors risk getting caught up in the tinku themselves.

5 The Chicken Dance Is Not A Chicken Dance

Most people know the silly, wordless (but not always) “Chicken Dance” song popular at parties. But no one actually knows who first called it the chicken dance. Originally, it was not associated with chickens in any way.

Initially called “The Duck Dance,” it was composed by Swiss accordion player Werner Thomas who performed it for patrons at his local restaurant. Spontaneous dancing erupted from those who listened, so Thomas eventually incorporated more birdlike movements and renamed it “Tchirp-Tchirp” after the sound of birds.

Even though it was a hit in his town, the song languished in obscurity until a Dutch publisher took a liking to it, added words, and spread it across Europe. Even then it was not a “chicken dance.” Instead, it was called “Little Bird Dance” or “Birdie Dance.”

Both in Europe and the US, the dance had a history of being thrown around until finally making it big and becoming famous after years of modest acclaim. Publisher Stanley Mills acquired the publishing rights in the US, but he only called it “Dance Little Bird” because that title sounded more commercial than “Little Bird Dance,” as it was known in Europe.

Mills also added English lyrics to the song, but they never really caught on. It wasn’t until a record label called up Mills about the “Chicken Dance” that it acquired its popular name, seemingly out of thin air.^[6]

4 The Sacred Dance Outlawed By The British

The female costumes of the Manipuri dance can be unique. Some are long, stiff skirts decorated with gold, silver, and mirrors that give dancers the appearance of wearing fashionable barrels. The spinning motions of the dancers can have an almost mesmerizing effect.

The dance experts of the Manipuri region were known as “Gandharvas” in ancient Vedic texts. They used their dances to celebrate Hindu values and spirituality.

This was why Christian missionaries actively discouraged the dance once the Manipuri region came under British colonial rule. The government soon outlawed all dancing in Hindu temples in the hopes of stopping spiritual and cultural dances like the Manipuri dance.

Nevertheless, the dance survived in secret. Once the Indian freedom movement took hold, it was revived alongside many others. Although many Indian dances once again became public traditions, the Manipuri dance in particular received help when the Nobel Prize–winning author Rabindranath Tagore became entranced by it.^[7]

He invited a famed Manipuri dancer to join him at an Indian cultural and study center. The Manipuri dances were dance-dramas that told ancient Hindu tales, and his work helped rekindle interest in and knowledge of the old ways.

3 Physically Integrated Dance

Physically integrated dance is not what people imagine when they think of dance. It uses people with and without disabilities who share the same stage and dance to the same piece of choreography. Whereas some might imagine the dancer with a disability playing a lesser role, physically integrated dance creates a choreography where all dancers’ unique traits are expressed.

There are many types of physically integrated dance, with styles ranging from traditional ballet to modern contemporary. The dances are like showcases of different body types (though not in a pitying or exploitative way). They are journeys into what each can do.

The dance often poses a challenge for both the critics and audience. Critics do not want to criticize performers who are disabled, and dance troupes like The GIMP Project challenge the audience with monologues detailing what viewers may be thinking when they watch the performance.^[8]

The style of dance was not built to “make up for” disabilities but to use them to create new forms of dance that are not possible under normal circumstances. For example, a dancer without legs will work with another performer to create a unique type of aerial silk act.

Despite this, directors of the dance companies often run into those who pity the disabled dancers and do not hold them to the same standards of others in their field.

2 “La Cucaracha” Has No Standard Lyrics

The origins of “La Cucaracha” (“The Cockroach”) is anything but clear. While most attribute it to Mexico, that is only where it gained popularity, especially with folk dancing. Some books have it dating back to the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella in Spain. Others record it being carried across the Atlantic Ocean to Mexico by Spanish Marines.

The song is primarily associated with Mexico because it was used by both sides of the Mexican Revolution as propaganda (and probably just to pass the time).

The lyrics of “La Cucaracha” were modified according to the values of the people who sang it. It was often heavily influenced by the events of the time period in which it was sung. This was especially true of political events.^[9]

The lyrics tend to focus on one person—the “cockroach” from which the song gets its name. Whoever the cockroach is determines the lyrics, which are metaphors for whatever nefarious dealings the singer/songwriter believes to be going on.

With such an extensive history, the song has gone through a lot of revisions. It may be better to think of “La Cucaracha” as an oral history of displeasure with political figures (and anyone else who happens to be in charge).

1 Affranchi
The Dance That Came Full Circle

When the French colonized Haiti, they enslaved the locals and put them to work on plantations. The enslaved Haitians were banned from publicly performing European dances, but their slave masters would still have them perform their native African dances for the masters’ amusement.

After the slave revolt of 1804, class barriers began to crumble and Europeans began intermarrying with women of African descent. The descendants of these common-law marriages were known as Affranchi and created a new style of Haitian dance.

The Affranchi (folk dance) was named after the new class that created it. It incorporated some movements from their enslaved ancestors, but their rhythmic movements were more reserved than the dances that were once secretly performed to drumbeats of voodoo ceremonies.

Although the final stage of the dance was freestyle, they wanted to retain what they saw as European poise. The Affranchi dance remained largely based on European dance structures that incorporated African elements.^[10]

It was a prestigious class of dancing. As it spread beyond Haiti and moved into modern times, Affranchi began to incorporate a greater range of movements. More of the original African elements were reincorporated, including voodoo drumbeats and a greater link to Haitian heritage. It became more than something emphasizing European structures. It was now a dance associated with Haiti itself.

Mike lives on the East Coast and pays too much for beach parking.

With the holidays wrapping up here in the Western world, many of us still have our Christmas lights up, our bellies full, and plenty of other cheerful things hanging around to remind us of our recent celebrations. Holidays in this day and age are a great way for us to share, laugh, love, and make memories with our friends and loved ones.

But how often do we stop and consider the roots of our holidays and the events from which they were born? Most people with an Internet connection know that many modern holidays are a hodgepodge of ancient pagan practices which have been augmented or adopted in various forms by the surviving religions.

But beyond just ancient paganism, many holidays stem from historical events. Sometimes, those events are quite dark and not exactly the nice, cheery tales we’d expect such holidays to spring from. Here are 10 holidays with unusually dark and strange histories.

10 The Death Of St. Patrick

Most of us in the Western world who celebrate the holiday, especially if we’re not particularly religious or even armchair historians, think of St. Patrick’s Day as a fun festival marked by the consumption of copious amounts of beer. St. Patrick’s Day has always been a religious holiday, but Irish immigrants who came to the United States in search of a better life greatly popularized it as a secular holiday, solidifying it as a representation of Irish culture.

But the holiday didn’t have a happy-go-lucky beginning. It’s actually the celebration of the death of St. Patrick. His life was hard from the beginning. When the Romans occupied Great Britain in the fifth century, St. Patrick was just a 16-year-old boy who was captured and taken to Ireland from Britain as a slave.

Somehow, in 432, St. Patrick managed to escape slavery and become a force for Christianity by converting the then-pagan Irish to the religion and establishing monasteries and places of worship. He was said to have died on March 17, 493, which would have made him over 100 years old. However, historians generally agree that he actually died in 461, which is a bit more realistic.

Nonetheless, the fact remains that St. Patrick’s Day is a celebration of the day of his death. Even more dark and unusual than that are the events that ensued after his death.

The Battle for the Body of Saint Patrick took place when two rival factions fought over who had the proper rights to the corpse. However, things get a little mythological in the account in Annals of the Four Masters, the work that describes the battle.^[1]

It concludes with a scene where the rival factions end up on a river to do glorious, bloody battle for the rights to the corpse of the beloved saint. Allegedly, the river rose up and flooded upon their arrival. Both sides walked away with what they believed to be the body of St. Patrick, and it was attributed to a divine miracle that the battle was stopped.

Odd beginnings for a holiday of green beer, fun, and leprechauns.

9 Good Friday

For a holiday with such a nice name as Good Friday, its historical origins are rather dark in nature. However, Good Friday came from the ancient Germanic culture and language and was long ago Karfreitag (“Sorrowful Friday”). Before the contemporary world got hold of it, the holiday was celebrated by fasting, by asking for forgiveness from sin, and by general sorrow-filled reflection on behalf of the practitioners.

If you think about it, this makes sense. Good Friday is a holiday that was born out of betrayal, greed, and execution. For most of its history, it wasn’t the wonderful holiday that we make it out to be, but rather the celebration of the death of Jesus Christ.

Traditionally, monks and devout religious people saw this as a day of observance and remembrance and of somber reflection—not just the prequel to Easter Sunday. Some people even hold services that last three hours in remembrance of the amount of time that Jesus was said to have suffered upon the cross.^[2]

8 The Friday Of Sorrows

The lesser-known holiday of the Friday of Sorrows takes place on the Friday before Good Friday and dates back to the medieval times of Europe. It’s like Good Friday, only for the Virgin Mary, where worshipers and the devoutly religious celebrate the suffering of the Virgin Mary as she witnessed her son dying on the cross. This remembrance takes place mainly in predominantly Catholic countries rather than Protestant Christian ones.

Also known as the Feast of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary, this holiday was not only meant to remember the suffering that Mary experienced while Jesus was on the cross but also seven of the sorrows that took place over the course of Mary’s life.

From Mary receiving the prophecy of Simeon to desperately fleeing into Egypt after Jesus’s assumed birth, losing Jesus in Jerusalem as mentioned in Luke 2:43–49, and watching Jesus be executed, taken off the cross, and buried, the Feast of the Seven Sorrows is perfectly dark in the way that only a medieval holiday could be.^[3]

7 The Night Of Broken Glass

This is a dark holiday observed in Germany in remembrance of one of the most atrocious events of all time: the Holocaust. Kristallnacht, or Night of Broken Glass, refers to the acts that led to the events that would eventually transpire at Auschwitz concentration camp.

On the night of November 9, 1938, German Nazis committed a grievous massacre in the streets, killing Jewish people and destroying their property. In response to these events, the Nazi government said that their actions and senseless violence against the Jewish people were “perfectly understandable.”

The name of the holiday refers to the broken glass left in the streets in several countries after the events unfolded. The violence wasn’t limited to just Germany. It also took place in Austria and Czechoslovakia.

It all began on November 7, 1938, when a Nazi German official named Ernst vom Rath was shot in Paris by a Polish Jew who was 17 years old at the time. Ernst vom Rath died two days later after an extremely drummed-up propaganda assault by none other than the Nazi minister of propaganda himself, Joseph Goebbels. He had said that there was a massive conspiracy of Jews behind the assassination.^[4]

Of course, the die-hard Nazi supporters ran with it, committing widespread violence against Jewish people on the night of Ernst vom Rath’s death, which was November 9, 1938. Germany now tries to keep this night burned into their memory with a holiday of remembrance for those who lost their lives on the Night of Broken Glass and all who subsequently died in the tragic events that followed.

That night marked the beginning of much of the anti-Jewish legislation that was railroaded through by the powerful Nazi Party, which legalized the Holocaust and the acts which led to it.

6 Samhain

Samhain is a holiday celebrated by the ancient Celts as a part of their religion before they were subjugated by Roman rule and eventually turned to Christianity (with the help of St. Patrick, no doubt). The Celts were loose-knit tribes known by the Romans as the Gauls. They shared a similar language and culture.

Samhain was the ancient Celtic festival of the dead. Celtic religion held that the spirits of the dead would have to wander the Earth and wait until the day of Samhain, which was November 1, to pass into the afterlife. It didn’t matter what time of year that the person died.

The Celts also believed that their gods were not only mischievous and caused trouble, but that they were also invisible—except on Samhain. During the celebration on October 31, the Celts would leave out burning candles to light the way for their dead so that they could see where they were going.

It should be noted that Samhain isn’t Halloween, though Halloween borrows a lot of Samhain’s traditions. Samhain is actually still practiced by pagans around the world, albeit in smaller numbers.^[5]

In ancient times, it was believed that this period was a time when people could communicate with not only their dead friends and relatives but also the Dark Mother and the Dark Father, entities of supernatural power that the ancient Celts believed in.

Their religion was quite intricate, and this holiday is a time when people would communicate with their darker natures, the darker supernatural, and the dead.

5 Valentine’s Day

Today, the watered-down tradition of St. Valentine’s Day is represented most often by thoughtful cards, chocolates, and romantic love, even courtly love not unlike that of the Middle Ages. And long before the famed St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, the brutal Mafia execution of seven men conducted by Al Capone and his gang on February 14, 1929, there was another bloody day that actually spawned Valentine’s Day.

This was the martyrdom of St. Valentine. Yes, Valentine’s Day is the celebration of an execution.

The year was 269, and Claudius II was the emperor of mighty Rome. The growth of marriage and family life had caused a shortage of men willing to leave home and fight in foreign lands. Therefore, Claudius outlawed marriage entirely and anyone caught getting married or performing marriage rites would be condemned.^[6]

But St. Valentine refused to stop performing marriages. He was punished severely for his “crimes” and was eventually tortured, beaten with clubs, and beheaded. Yes, you read that right—St. Valentine’s Day is the celebration of a saint from ancient Rome who was tortured, beheaded, and died on February 14, 269.

4 The Feast Of Corpus Christi

Corpus Christi could be regarded as a particularly strange holiday to those who aren’t Catholic and don’t believe in transubstantiation, the idea that food and wine can turn into the body and blood of Christ for the believer consuming them. The Feast of Corpus Christi is a whole day to drink blood and eat flesh for devout believers.

“Corpus Christi” translates to “the body of Christ” in Latin, so there’s no ambiguity that the idea of eating the flesh of Christ is involved.

Heavy symbolism characterizes this holiday, which began in 1246. With chalices and bread wafers everywhere, it’s an aesthetic experience as much as a spiritual one. For most non-Catholics, a holiday where one places bread into his mouth that actually turns into flesh might raise some eyebrows. But many Catholics all over the world celebrate this holiday annually and have done so for hundreds of years.^[7]

3 Dia De Los Muertos

The reason we can’t appropriately say that Samhain was the forerunner of Halloween is that Samhain became what Catholics celebrate as All Saints’ Day on November 1. All Saints’ Day is basically the Catholic version of Samhain, complete with celebrating those who’ve gone to Heaven and the saints taking the place of the Celtic gods of old.

Dia de los Muertos is a Mexican holiday which celebrates the personification of death itself and has long roots in both European and Aztec cultures. With Spanish conquests of the Aztecs, Dia de los Muertos was moved to line up with the Catholic All Saints’ Day. The two fused into one holiday when practitioners would pay respects to their dead, which was in the origins of both holidays.

Dia de los Muertos makes no claims to be anything other than a dark holiday that’s all about death, with the name itself translating to “Day of the Dead” in Spanish. However, there are some notable differences between All Saints’ Day and Dia de los Muertos.

Santa Muerte (aka Our Lady of Holy Death), the major figure celebrated on Dia de los Muertos, is the saint of death. Dia de los Muertos takes Samhain and All Saints’ Day one step further by actually making death itself a saint. The Catholic Church rejects this saint and warns against the holiday as being dark and even satanic.^[8]

2 Passover

Passover is a Jewish holiday in which practitioners remove all leavened bread from their homes and reenact what life must have been like when the Jews fled Egypt in the Bible. For many, it’s a celebration of the liberation of the Jews from an oppressive Egypt and the foundation of the homeland for the Israelites. The holiday begins on the 15th and runs through the 21st in March or April.

But what’s the real story behind what they were fleeing? Well, it all starts with the slaughter of the firstborn. Exodus 11:5 says:

“Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the female slave, who is at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle as well.”^[9]

According to the Bible, Jehovah killed every firstborn Egyptian child in the country to prove his point. And it gets worse. This was actually a reprisal because the pharaoh of Egypt had killed all the newborns and infants of the ancient Hebrews to prove his point. Then the 10 plagues of Egypt happened, with everything from raining frogs to bubonic plagues hitting Egypt hard according to the Bible.

This is what the holiday actually celebrates—a religious and military victory over another nation that, if you take it as gospel, is quite barbaric in nature.

1 Christmas

Christmas is both unusual and dark in its history for a few reasons. First, Christmas is an extremely modern holiday. Historically, Christians don’t celebrate birthdays as it has long been viewed as pagan to celebrate an individual’s birth on Earth rather than his dying to go to Heaven in accordance with Christian beliefs.

This is why saints are remembered for their (often macabre) deaths instead of their births because the moment of eternal judgment in Christianity is more important than life. This made Christmas a mockery for a long time, with writers advocating strongly against it. Traditionally, in Christianity, the moment of death was your actual and true “birthday” in the kingdom of God.

The second and more macabre part of the story comes with a jolly old fat guy, Saint Nicholas or Santa Claus. Thanks to Coca-Cola ads stemming from the 1930s, we now see him plastered everywhere as a fat guy with a wispy white beard, a red onesie with white fur trim, and a big grin on his face at all times.

But this isn’t the real Saint Nick, so who was he? Well, the answer is that we don’t really know because we have no surviving historical documentation. He was the bishop of Myra in the fourth century. But aside from that, we know next to nothing about the man.

However, we do have one major artifact: his dead body. Yes, the only thing we know for sure about Saint Nicholas is that we have his actual dead corpse.

Allegedly, the real Saint Nicholas wasn’t very jolly. He was present for the very first Council of Nicaea in 325. There, he punched a guy in the face whom he thought was heretical.^[10]

After he died in 343, his remains lay buried until Italian sailors stole his corpse and moved it in 1087 from Myra to a city in Italy called Bari. Before this, the original Santa Claus was a nobody. But the theft of his remains made his popularity surge in Europe, which is how he became a figure that’s still present in our cultures today.

To put this little piece of history to the test, researchers analyzed a fragment of Santa’s hip bone. Sure enough, it dated all the way back to the fourth century, confirming that it probably belonged to the original Santa Claus.

I love to write about dark stuff, horror-themed material, the unusual, murder, and death. Here’s a twisted little piece about the dark histories of holidays. This isn’t your usual holiday list, and Christmas is definitely the bizarre kicker. I haven’t seen it discussed like this anywhere.

Amusement parks are built to be place of thrills and entertainment, wonder and awe. They should give fond memories and bring smiles to faces. But, some parks are shrouded in mystery and misfortune, causing fear and shivers instead. In this list, we will discuss ten parks that have a past dark enough to ruin any fun.

10 Lake Shawnee Amusement Park

The rusted and overgrown rides of Lake Shawnee Amusement Park serve as a reminder of the failed West Virginia attraction, but its eerie past lives on in folklore for the area.

To start, the park was built over a Native American burial ground, with an archeological dig uncovering thirteen bodies, mostly children.^[1]

But that’s not the darkest history of the land.

In 1783, Mitchell Clay was the first European settler to make a home in the area, which was heavily inhabited by the Shawnee Native American tribe.

While Clay was gone to town one day, the Shawnees surrounded three of the Clay children, who were working in the fields. Bartley was shot first. Tabitha, hearing the gunshot, ran to her brother, where she was attacked and cut by a knife, her body dismembered. Both of their scalps were taken by the Shawnee group. Their brother Ezekiel was captured and burnt at the stake.

A historical marker on the road leading to the park commemorates their memories.

One could wonder if the tragic history of the grounds is the reason for the six deaths that occurred at the park, eventually leading to it being closed down in 1966, and many locals, including the park’s new owner Gaylord White, claim the park to still be haunted.

9 Holy Land, USA

With a Hollywood-style sign and a cross marking its entrance, Holy Land in Waterbury, Connecticut is hard to miss as you drive along Interstate 84.

Originally opened in 1960, the theme park contained replicas of famous biblical scenes, including the Last Supper, Garden of Eden, and an inn featuring a “no vacancy” sign. The park saw more than 50,000 visitors each year while it was open until owner John Baptist Greco closed the park in 1984 in order to expand it. Before he could reopen the park, however, Greco died, and the park was bequeathed to a group of nuns who maintained the grounds but never reopened it.

People still found a way in, though, and vandalism and trespassing occurred, destroying many of the parks statues and attractions.

In 2010, Chloe Ottman and her friend Francisco Cruz decided to explore the park. The two had been friends for a couple years, and Chloe clearly thought they were just in for a night of creepy fun and underage drinking at the old park. Cruz, however, had different motives, and after Chloe refused to have sex with him, he raped and killed her, stabbing her in the neck, under the giant cross before throwing her body and belongings in the woods.^[2]

Though he initially helped with the search to find Chloe, Cruz confessed to her death and led police to her body.

He was charged with capital felony, murder, and sexual assault and sentenced to fifty-five years in prison for his brutal act, leaving the park with a more sinister reputation.

8 Gulliver’s Kingdom

Japan is known for having some interesting ideas when it comes to parks and architecture, and one of their most interesting, and largest failures, was Gulliver’s Kingdom, located at the base of Mount Fuji.

The theme park, based on the Jonathan Swift book, cost $350 million to build and featured a forty-five meter long statue of Gulliver himself, with the main attraction being a bobsled ride, making it not exactly your typical amusement park.

The location of the park, however, makes it even stranger.

Right next to the park is Aokigahara Forest, better known as “suicide forest,” which is considered the second most popular suicide location after the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco.

The doomsday cult Aum Shinrikyo, the group behind the Sarin gas attacks^[3] on the Tokyo subway, also had their headquarters and nerve gas production facility in the nearby village of Kamikuishiki. Residents and park goers claimed they could smell the chemicals when they were on the park grounds.

The park was thoroughly demolished in 2007, leaving nothing behind except for the strange memories and photographs and the questions as to why anyone thought it would be a popular attraction.

7 Rocky Point Amusement Park

Rocky Point Amusement Park in Warwick, Rhode Island was one of the most popular attractions in the state, drawing crowds to its over twenty-five attractions and the famous Shore Dinner Hall and Palladium Ballroom. Most Rhode Islanders have a fond memory of visiting the park while it was open.

Through all the happiness and memories, there is a dark mark on the park’s past.

In August of 1893, Maggie Sheffield, a five-year-old girl, was killed by her father Frank while they attended the park. Frank had suffered a head injury shortly before Maggie was born, making him incredibly mentally unstable. Though it is not known exactly what made him flip on that late-summer day, after a meal at the Shore Dinner Hall, he took his daughter to the shoreline, where he smashed her head in with a rock, killing her.

Frank was found not guilty of his daughter’s murder due to reason of insanity.^[4] Maggie’s death is the only murder in the park’s long history.

The thrills of the park left Maggie’s murder quickly forgotten, and Rocky Point carried on for over one hundred years.

Unfortunately, due to financial issues, the park was forced into foreclosure and closed in 1995, ending over 150 years of family fun in Rhode Island.

6 Joyland Amusement Park

When it opened in 1942, Joyland was considered the biggest amusement park in the southwest, featuring a train, Ferris wheel, merry-go-round, Tilt-a-Whirl, and a roller coaster, it’s main and most infamous attraction.

The park would eventually grow to include a log flume ride, a haunted attraction ride, swings, bumper cars, and many other carnival-type attractions, as well as host concerts and outdoor festivals.

Though the park experienced a handful of ride-related deaths, the murder of a park employee would throw some shadows over the park in 1982. Michael King, an employee, would get into an altercation with four men, aged 17 to 21, after the men snuck into the park after hours. King was stabbed to death, and police arrested the men responsible, letting the two underage boys go, and brought charges up against Dwight Sayles and Victor C. Walker.

Sayles would plead guilty to voluntary manslaughter and given five to twenty years in prison, with the eligibility of parole in eight years.^[5]

After the murder, the park would continue to operate and grow in size, adding another rollercoaster, but tragedy would continue to plague it. A park maintenance employee would be killed after getting hit by a rollercoaster and, in 2004, a thirteen-year-old girl would be injured after a thirty-foot fall from the Ferris wheel, which would lead to a series of financial issues and disputes that would eventually bring the park to close.

The 57-acres of Joyland were purchased in 2018 by Gregory and Tina Dunnegan, tent company owners who plan to bring new joy to the abandoned park by making it into an outdoor event venue for weddings, concerts, and traveling carnivals.

5 Kejonuma Leisure Land

Kejonuma Leisure Land was once a thriving amusement park in Tohoku, Japan, boasting the typical park rides such as a train, Ferris wheel, and carousel, as well as a driving range, and a campsite. Today, however, nature has taken over the structures, leaving the park to look like a ghost town, and ghosts are what it is more infamously known for.

The legend of the park begins with a beautiful woman who lived near the lake that sits on the site of Kejonuma Leisure Land, which was well-known for housing an abundance of snakes. The woman became pregnant, and when she gave birth, the baby was a serpent who escaped into the water. Every night, the woman could hear her serpent-baby cry, driving her mad, and she eventually committed suicide by drowning herself in the lake. It is said her and the baby’s cries can be heard at night.

The translation for “Kejonuma” is literally “ghost woman,”

With how superstitious the Asian culture can be at times, it is no surprise the story of Kejonuma Leisure Land is mentioned in every article about the park, but it did not stop nearly 200,000 people visiting the site each year while it was open, leaving many to question the validity of the curse.

The park officially closed in 2000, citing a drop-off in visitors due to Japan’s declining birthrate and economic crisis, but the notoriety of the curse keeps the legend of the park alive, and those interested can buy the park,^[6] as it is currently up for sale.

4 Dreamland Park

Dreamland Park began with a dark past that would continue to get darker. Built in the 1930s, the park would be open for less than two decades before it was shut down for rampant gambling and ties to the mafia.

Then, in 1969, Dreamland Park would make headlines again when two decomposing bodies would be found in the woods on the grounds of the park.

Due to the wooded and secluded area surrounding it, the park was a popular destination for couples to have a romantic drive and a little private time. On the night of August 12, 1969, Marilyn Sheckler, 18, and Glenn Eckert, 20, would set out for a drive to the park and never be seen alive again.

Their decomposing remains would be discovered feet from each other, in shallow graves, nearly two months later by state police. Autopsies would conclude that Marilyn had been raped repeatedly, and beaten, her head severely fractured, while Glenn had been shot in the forehead and side of the head and had also been beaten.

Investigators immediately suspected members of the Pagan motorcycle gang, as they had arrested ten members of the gang for beating and stabbing three men in the parking lot of Dreamland Park on the same night Marilyn and Glenn were last seen. Robert Martinolich, 22, and Leroy Stoltzfus, 24, would ultimately be arrested for the murders of the couple.

Martinolich and Stoltzfus would both be found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole. Each wold maintain their innocence and appeal their cases until they each died while incarcerated.^[7]

3 Magic Harbor

Just four miles south of Myrtle Beach, Magic Harbor Amusement Park had all the makings of a fun attraction — a roller coaster, bumper cars, Tilt-a-Whirl, arcade, hedge maze, Ferris wheel, and other all-ages rides, but it never really succeeded. Financial issues, changes in ownership, and deaths attributed to the park’s failure.

After the park closed on Labor Day, 1976, Franklin Loftis shot and killed the park’s owner Harry Koch and his sixteen-year-old stepson Carl Derk outside their trailer on the grounds of the park. Koch’s wife Carol survived the attack by hiding under the trailer. For years, the case went unsolved, making it the oldest cold case in Horry’s County history, until Loftis was charged. It was determined Loftis shot Koch over a wage and workman’s compensation dispute after Loftis, a carpenter for the park, was injured on the job.

Loftis was given two life sentences for the murders and was denied parole multiple times. Koch’s surviving wife had no desire to keep up Koch’s plan of expanding Magic Harbor, and the park went into foreclosure, was bought back by the bank, and then changed hands multiple times until it was sold to Geoffrey Thompson, president of the largest amusement park operation in Europe.

It seemed like the park’s luck was about to turn around with Thompson managing, but in 1984, tragedy would strike the park again.

Thirteen-year-old Sherri Lynn Depew was launched out of the park’s Black Witch rollercoaster. She died from her injuries, and her father sued Magic Harbor for $12 million, claiming negligence by the park for failing to supervise the ride properly.^[8]. Thompson tried to claim the girl had failed to stay seated and follow safety guidelines for the ride, but the bad publicity alone was enough to hurt the park’s reputation once again.

In the mid-1990s, the park was closed and the land was bought by the neighboring campground, resulting in all of the buildings and rides to be completely demolished.

2 Brandywine Springs

Brandywine Springs Amusement Parks was a Wilmington, Delaware attraction from 1886 to 1923, and a solid example of early twentieth century fun.

There was a castle house, train, wooden rollercoaster, restaurants, pavilion, and a magnificent archway leading into the park.

In 1916, tragedy would strike the park when Catherine Bouidecki was shot and killed and Areti Nichols was shot by Samuel Gongas, who then set fire to the park’s restaurant, railway, and photography gallery, as well as some concession stands. Gongas was infatuated with Bouidecki, who was a waitress at the restaurant, and was apparently upset she turned down his advances, prompting him to snap and kill her.^[9]

The park would close in 1923 when automobiles made it easier for people to travel and the park admission declined. Concrete slabs and muddy pools are all that remains of the amusement park today, but local historians are working on excavating and marking sites of where the major attractions stood, putting up signs and photographs to educate those who walk through the site.

1 Pripyat Amusement Park

Maybe the most horrific history behind an amusement park is one that never came to be.

Pripyat Amusement Park in Pripyat, Ukraine was supposed to open on May 1, 1986, but five days before its scheduled opening, the Chernobyl disaster occurred nearby, resulting in thirty deaths in the months following the explosion.

The park consisted of attractions, bumper cars, swing boats, a swing-carousel, and a Ferris wheel. The Ferris wheel still stands today, unfinished and towering over the scene of destruction and the bumper cars are the strongest area of radiation in the park due to the overgrown vegetation.

It is believed the park was opened early for one day, April 27, to calm people from the disaster before they were forced to pack up their belongings and be bussed out of the city, never to return.

Today, the whole city of Pripyat, including the unfinished amusement park, is a destination for “dark tourism,”^[10] guided tours through the Chernobyl ruins and abandoned towns.

Tracy spends her days writing and designing in a tourist town where she lives with her dog.

We’ve all heard of the American Civil War and the French Revolution. The Cold War and Cuba are old hat by now, and we’ve seen so much on Iraq and Afghanistan we know them inside out. These parts of history may indeed be pretty crazy, but they’re so well-known they just don’t have the same impact anymore. But do you know about the world’s craziest Central Asian dictators, who spend millions building marble palaces^[1] or boil their political opponents to death, depending on which country you look at? Do you even know which countries are in Central Asia? Many of you may not—and that’s what makes finding out about this stuff so interesting, horrific as some of it undoubtedly is.

10 The Gambia

The fact that the first Gambian president was reelected five times and the second ruled for over two decades, for a total of 53 years between them, should tell us volumes about the politics and history of this country.

Dawda Jawara, the country’s first leader, took up his post (initially as prime minister) in 1962, just before Gambian independence from the UK. Jawara was, by all accounts, somewhat better than other African leaders of the era. Corruption in The Gambia was less prevalent than in other neighboring countries; the majority of senior governmental figures led relatively modest lives (at least compared to, say, Gadhafi), and he ostensibly adhered to democratic values. The original Gambian state was not single-party, nor was it authoritarian, and the media was even (quite) free. This was, in fact, all too good to be true—which is why Jawara was the victim of several coup attempts, including one in which foreign armies had to intervene to save him, and was eventually deposed by a military coup in 1994.

Jawara’s replacement, Lieutenant Yahya Jammeh, wasn’t as nice as his predecessor. On taking power, Jammeh’s first acts were to abolish the constitution and ban all political opposition, setting the stage for what was to come. During his rule, Jammeh was involved in a number of admittedly predictable scandals, many of which involved (who would have guessed) human rights breaches. He had a somewhat different solution to many of the problems faced in Europe. Things like student protests, unflattering reporters, and illegal immigration were dealt with by brutally gunning down all those responsible. President Jammeh’s solutions also included his own “herbal cure for AIDS,” the curing of witches by abducting them and making them drink poisonous broth, and, of course, his solution to the “problem” of homosexuality: to declare gay people “vermin” and implement the death penalty for them.^[2]

It would be safe to say, then, that for such a small country, The Gambia does, in fact, have remarkably large problems—although the recent replacement of Jammeh (after two decades of dictatorship) by a fairly elected president is a good omen for the future.

9 The Comoros

The Comoros may be an island nation that almost nobody’s ever heard of, but so far, that hasn’t stopped it from breaking a number of rather impressive records. The archipelago is one of the most revolution-prone countries in Africa—and indeed the world—with a grand total of 21 throughout its history, a fact that’s even more impressive when you consider that it’s only actually existed for 42 years.^[3]

Problems started from the very outset of independence, when it turned out that one of the islands claimed by the Comoros didn’t actually want to join up with them and preferred being ruled by France instead. Since then, the Comoros has experienced a number of rather unique events, such as a Maoist revolution, a president shot dead in his bed by an anti-tank missile, and dictatorships backed by foreign mercenaries.

If one thing is for sure, though, it’s that Comorians have had a hard time deciding who they want to lead them. The islands’ population has supported a wide variety of figures, from Islamists to teenage Marxist militias. Another strange figure in Comorian history is that of Bob Denard, a mercenary who managed to single-handledly topple four of the country’s governments, allegedly on the behalf of France. Denard was de facto head of the Comoros for years, with the leader effectively being whoever he and his mercenaries would back—until 1995, when one coup too many led him to finally be arrested by French authorities.

The country’s problems didn’t end there, though, with things eventually getting so bad that two of its three islands would attempt to secede and rejoin France in 1997, a demand that was refused. Although in 2006, the Comoros did finally manage the first peaceful transfer of power in the 31 years since the country’s independence, an invasion was required only a year later to remove the president of one of the islands who had overstayed his welcome, showing that problems in this chain of islands are sadly not over yet.

8 Mali

Mali is a beautiful and idyllic African country, filled to the brim with natural resources and fragmented along religious and ethnic lines. If there ever was a prime candidate to become a failed state, it would be Mali. It is no surprise then, perhaps, that half a century on from independence, this nation has not been as successful as some had hoped.

Mali’s first post-independence leader, Modibo Keita, was a socialist who wanted to nationalize the country’s resources—the majority of which were still owned by the French colonial masters—and reduce rampant inequality. However, this dream was too good to be true, and he was deposed and imprisoned in 1968 in a military coup. Keita’s replacement, a general named Moussa Traore, initially had the support of quite a few people in Mali, but his regime soon proved to be far worse than that of his predecessor. Mali became an authoritarian police state, and the sad combination of famines, corruption, and mismanagement of aid money led to the death of tens of thousands. Reform eventually prevailed, however, and a democratic system was implemented—which resulted in Traore winning 99 percent of the vote.

Although Traore was eventually overthrown in another military coup and democracy somewhat restored, the problems in Mali have not by any means stopped. The last three years have seen a coup (yes, another one), a nomad rebellion, Al-Qaeda taking over the majority of the country, and a foreign intervention to try and solve all of that.^[4] As the cherry on the cake, Mali is also one of the world’s poorest countries as well as one of the few nations where slaves are still prevalent—200,000 of them, in fact—signifying that there may be problems here for some time.

7 Brunei

Brunei is known by some as the “Shellfare State,” and with good reason. This small, petroleum-rich Asian nation has been effectively bankrolled by the oil companies that operate within it. Brunei’s authoritarian leader, Sultan Bolkiah, was once one of the world’s richest men, but this wealth hasn’t come at the expense of his people—or at least, not too much. Bruneian citizens receive subsidies on everything from petrol to oil, and despite the fact that the Sultan spends millions of the public budget on his collection of luxury cars, Brunei has one of the highest GDPs per capita in the world.

One might assume then, that Brunei is about as close to a perfect country to live in as you can get. With riches galore, palm-fringed beaches, and beautiful jungles covering the entire country, it would be fair at first glance to make that guess. However, Brunei’s unique situation also brings with it some rather unique problems. For example, the country is both one of the most obese in the region and one of the most repressive, as the vast network of generous subsidies and grants has effectively allowed the sultan to buy out the Bruneians’ right to freedom.^[5] Uncensored media in the country is nonexistent, dissenters are arrested, and legislation is implemented with little regard for citizens. For example, a 2014 law promises jail time for such heinous crimes as celebrating Christmas.

While it is true that some Bruneians enjoy a high quality of life, more might if the country’s non-Muslim citizens, who make up a third of the population, were allowed to practice their religion freely. And while it is also true that the citizens are quite rich, they would undoubtedly be even more so were it not for the sultan’s notorious greed and nepotism—such as his siphoning of a grand $40 billion from state funds to pay off family debts.

6 Central African Republic

The Central African Republic’s name is a bit of a misnomer. It is central, and it is indeed African, but the CAR at the moment is less of a republic and more of a failed state. As with Somalia, the government controls little of the country outside of the capital, and much of the nation is run by various rebel groups. The CAR has also, much like Somalia, been in a state of quasi-perpetual civil war for over a decade.

The country’s problems, though, date back quite a bit further than the start of civil war. The first democratic leader of the CAR only lasted a few years before dying in a suspicious plane crash. From then on, the country spiraled into madness, first with the establishment of a one-party state and then with the overthrow of President David Dacko and the establishment of a Central African “Empire.” If anything could be worse than the old single-party state, it was this—a belief proven correct when the new “Emperor” Bokassa spent a third of the government budget on his coronation ceremony, completely bankrupting the country. Bokassa’s bizarre and violent reign—which included the criminalization of unemployment, the murder of hundreds of protesting schoolchildren, and alleged cannibalism—led to the deterioration of once-strong relations between the CAR and France, and Bokassa’s predecessor was restored to power following a French coup. Dacko was then re-overthrown, and the new ruler built an authoritarian state backed by a military junta.

Although democracy was eventually achieved in the 1990s, this did not signal the end of the CAR’s struggles. The first democratically elected president, Ange-Felix Patasse, deepened the conflicts between the country’s ethnic groups, allegedly carrying out “witch hunts” against the Yakoma people.^[6] Three military mutinies occurred during only his first term, forcing foreign troops to be used to keep control and subdue the already angry population—showing exactly how the country was ripe for the civil war that broke out in 2003 and continues to ravage the country to this day.

5 East Timor

East Timor is one of the world’s most decidedly unlucky countries. First exploited and colonized by Portugal, the islanders fought valiantly for their independence and were finally granted it in 1975 after the Portuguese Revolution. It was very much a case of jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire, though, for as soon as independence was declared, neighboring Indonesia took advantage of the internal strife and disorder within the new country to invade it and declare it part of their own territory.^[7]

One might assume that the invasion of a former colony might not be taken particularly kindly by the West, especially when said colony was right off the coast of Australia, one of the region’s most important powers. And said occupation led to massive human rights abuses and the killing of what some estimate to be up to a third of the East Timorese population. But many countries actually supported this occupation, at least at the start: Australia for the oil contracts they were offered by Indonesia and the US due to the communist nature of the FRETILIN independence movement, which would have inevitably formed a government in an independent East Timor.

It took until 1999 for enough pressure to be applied to Indonesia to agree to a referendum—in which, somewhat unsurprisingly, the vast majority of the population voted for independence. Before leaving the country, though, the Indonesian military made sure to kill a significant number of civilians and burn down all of the government buildings to guarantee the failure of any successor state. Although they may have tried, this goal was not particularly successful. While there has since been some strife within East Timor, including an assassination attempt on its leader, the situation within the country has improved drastically since the end of Indonesian occupation, particularly within the last few years, with quality of life for its citizens improving by almost every available measure. A success story at last!

4 Equatorial Guinea

Equatorial Guinea is a unique country in many ways. It is, for example, the only Spanish-speaking nation in Africa, as a former colony of Spain. It is also the only state on the continent to have a capital not on its mainland but rather on a tiny island several hundred miles offshore. (No, really!) Somewhat less adorably, it also has the longest-serving leader in Africa: Teodoro Obiang, the epitome of a despotic strongman, whose rule has lasted almost 40 years.^[8]

The country’s crazy history started as soon as it gained independence. After its break with Spain, the new leader, Macias Nguema, turned the country into a single-party state and made himself “President for Life”—perhaps foreshadowing what was to come. Nguema was quick to establish relationships with the world’s communist countries despite denouncing Marxism as “neo-colonialism” in Africa. Regardless of his self-declared “moral high ground,” he had no issue with murdering or sending into exile a third of the country’s population in one of the most horrific genocides in modern history. His political opponents were all executed, and the Equatoguinean economy collapsed thanks to the exodus or death of its skilled citizens. It speaks volumes that the country’s current dictator, who has been in charge since a 1979 coup, is still several orders of magnitude milder than the previous one.

Things after the coup started off well. Amnesty was granted to all political prisoners, the country’s gulag-style forced labor system was shut down, and Nguema was sentenced to death for crimes against humanity. However, the new leader, Obiang, who was also Nguema’s nephew, forgot to apologize for the fact that he had supervised many of the atrocities committed during his uncle’s regime. Furthermore, Equatorial Guinea’s new dictator wasn’t content with what had been a political stranglehold of the country and decided to implement an economic one, too. The policy of state kidnappings and murder of opposition continued unchecked, and the country also sold its oil, with the money going straight into presidential bank accounts—making Obiang one of the world’s wealthiest leaders to the tune of $600 million.

Despite the fact that the country has the highest GDP per capita in Africa, the vast majority of the population lives in abject poverty, and the nation made a name for itself by selecting its Olympic athletes almost entirely at random, including a swimmer who had “never seen a 50m pool before” and recorded the slowest time in Olympic history. There is little chance of change for the foreseeable future, though, as Obiang has bankrolled US support of his regime in return for cheap oil contracts and has more control over his tiny country than almost any other dictator in Africa.

3 Guinea-Bissau

If one thing can be said about former Portuguese colonies, it’s that they have a rather worrying tendency to fall into the clutches of civil war. Guinea-Bissau is no exception to this rule. Following in the footsteps of Angola, Mozambique, and East Timor, this lusophone nation has also been ravaged by conflict. There is one difference, though, between Guinea-Bissau and the others: The country’s most stable years were paradoxically those immediately after independence.^[9] It was also unique in that it managed to obtain independence before being given it peacefully by Portugal.

Helped by large quantities of arms from communist countries, the Marxist nationalist movement gained control of the country through a guerrilla war and broke away from Lisbon in 1973, a year before being recognized by the new Portuguese government. They ruled as a single-party state for a decade before finally making the transition to democracy and allowing multipartisan elections—which is, ironically, when the country started to collapse.

Only a few years after the first elections, a coup attempt triggered a civil war, which ravaged the country for a year and displaced hundreds of thousands of people. The war ended after the overthrow of President Vieira, and a new leader was elected a year later—but Vieira’s successor only lasted for three years himself before being overthrown in another military coup. Following the next election in 2005, Vieira was reelected as leader, but after several attempts on his life, he was finally assassinated in 2009 before the completion of his term. One might assume that the death of the last prewar leader in Guinea-Bissau would mark the end of the country’s political strife, but another coup occurred in 2012—meaning that in the 43 years since independence, no leader has managed to successfully complete their five-year term.

2 Turkmenistan

For a country whose closest living relative is probably North Korea, it is surprising how few people have heard of Turkmenistan. While it may be a crazy nation, it hasn’t always been this way. Unlike some of the countries on this list, Turkmenistan’s history is ancient and goes back over 1,000 years, yet the 20-odd years since independence from the Soviet Union have probably been more eventful than all of the rest put together.

Under Soviet rule, Turkmenistan was very much the quintessential Central Asian republic—underfunded, exploited, and oppressed by the government in Moscow and mainly left out from the liberalization and development that happened during the USSR’s later years. After the great split in 1991, though, Turkmenistan chose to follow quite a different path from its brethren. While it may today bear the hallmarks of an ex-Soviet state—namely corruption, nepotism at its finest, and inefficient government—none of the other Central Asian states have achieved this in quite the same way Turkmenistan has.

After independence, the then-leader of the country, Saparmurat Niyazov, figured that the best way to fill the leadership void would be to become a Stalin-style cult figure. Millions were spent on gold statues of him, and knowledge of his books even became compulsory for those trying to get a driver’s license. Niyazov also banned a lot of things on his own whims, such as chewing tobacco, lip-syncing, dogs, facial hair, video games, and even ballet, which was deemed “not Turkmen enough.” While this may seem comical, thousands in Turkmenistan have died due to Niyazov’s various failed policies, and the self-styled “President for Life” is estimated to have funneled billions of dollars of state revenue into private bank accounts.

Is there hope, then, for Turkmenistan? As the country’s citizens have essentially traded their rights for the electricity, water, and natural gas they receive for free—and that their government is one of the world’s most authoritarian, second only to a few such as North Korea—one would have to assume that protests would be unlikely. There may have been a spark of hope after the death of Niyazov in 2006, after which his former dentist became president, and this spark may even have ignited something after all the golden statues of the former president for life were taken down. This was quickly dashed, though, when it turned out they were just being replaced by even larger and more expensive statues of the new leader—showing that it’s very much the same story, different pen, for Turkmenistan.^[10]

1 Paraguay

If there was ever to be an all-important rule for leading a country, it would be to not declare war on countries 20 times the size of yours. Leaders who fall foul of this generally end up in a pretty bad state, and one of these was Paraguay’s dictator, Francisco Solano Lopez. At the time, Paraguay hadn’t been a country for very long, but Lopez seemed determined to end its existence before it even started by declaring war on Uruguay, Argentina, and, incredibly, Brazil in 1864. As one might expect, this didn’t go too well—and only half a century after independence, two-thirds of the population (by some estimates) had already been wiped out.

The country, perhaps predictably, continued to be somewhat unstable, chewing up and spitting out a grand total of 31 leaders throughout the first half of the 20th century, most removed by a coup. It also started another war to reclaim the territory it had lost during the first one, only this time, it picked on a slightly easier opponent in the form of Bolivia, so Paraguay actually won. The country’s political instability ended, however, after a coup following the country’s civil war, from which strongman Alfredo Stroessner emerged as leader.

One might assume that some stability, the first since its independence, would do Paraguay some good, but Stroessner’s regime was among the worst in South America for its human rights and liberties—which, considering some of the other governments in the region at the time, is quite something. Thousands died for opposing Stroessner’s regime, and extrajudicial kidnappings became the norm.^[11] Stroessner’s staunch anti-communism meant that he had the support of other Latin American dictators and, most importantly, the US, which allowed him to hold power until 1989, when he was finally overthrown in a military coup. Besides the impeachment of two presidents since, most recently in 2012, the country has shown a bunch of positive changes, so while it still may not be perfect, there is hope for stability in Paraguay after all!

Fruits are wonders of sweetness and seed that we have grown over millennia to feed ourselves. We tend to think that the various fruits we enjoy have been only slightly altered on the orchards of domestication. The truth is that there are more interesting histories of fruit than you can chew.

10 The Kiwifruit’s Nationality

Kiwifruit, shortened as kiwi, was named after the bird of the same name due to its fuzzy brown resemblance. The curiously shaped avians are endemic to New Zealand, and you’d expect the fruits to be, too. After all, they produced over a billion dollars for the country in 2015.

However, kiwifruit actually originated in China under a name that translates to “macaque peach” due to its popularity with the local monkeys. Later on, the English named it the Chinese gooseberry for reasons completely unknown.

At the turn of the 20th century, the principal of a New Zealand college had brought back some seeds from China. After a few decades, New Zealand began exporting Chinese gooseberries to the US. But it soon became apparent that nothing associated with Red China was profitable during the Cold War.

First, New Zealand changed the name to “melonettes,” but that also failed since unattractive tariffs were placed on melons and berries. Finally, in a hilarious marketing move, the goose was reasonably replaced with New Zealand’s national bird and the berry broadened into fruit.^[1]

9 The Pineapple’s Adoration

For centuries, everyone involved in the pineapple’s colonial trade absolutely adored it. The earliest records involve Carib Indians, expert navigators who traded and raided across the islands to collect all manner of bounty.

The intense sweetness of the pineapple elevated it as a staple in important feasts and cultural rites. During Columbus’s second voyage to the Caribbean, his crew hauntingly found pineapples beside pots of body parts, evidence of cannibalism at their first inspection of an abandoned Carib village.

When it was brought back to Europe, the pineapple was regarded as nature’s culinary masterpiece, a tropical delight reserved for English royalty and literally held on a pedestal during extravagant feasts because there were no common sweets back then.

The women of colonial America competed with each other in arranging creative displays of food on their tabletops, with the sharp pineapple being king of the decorations and undeniable proof of wealth. Due to its extreme rarity, producers actually rented the fruit for hostesses to proudly exhibit. Then the pineapples were given back to be sold as food.^[2]

8 The Tomato’s Toxicity

By now, it is common knowledge that the tomato has a tainted past. Being a member of the notoriously poisonous nightshade family, the bright red tomato was thought by wary Europeans to be toxic for over two centuries.

But this was no simple assumption on appearance. Affluent Europeans did die of poisoning after eating tomatoes on their pewter plates. The acidity from the fruit released lead, a component metal of pewter alloy at the time, producing a deadly combination of tableware and tomato.

Furthermore, 10-centimeter (4 in) tomato hornworm caterpillars were thought to poison the tomatoes they infested. Though we now know they are harmless, the caterpillars had a menacing red protrusion on their tails.

Established American colonists had no issue with the enjoyable tomato, but newer rural settlers still avoided it due to the lack of cross-country information sharing. Interestingly, the Civil War brought tomatoes into the spotlight in America.

As a fast-growing, easily canned food, tomatoes dominated the canning market to support soldiers on both sides. In 1880, Italian peasants popularized tomatoes in Europe as an edible ingredient in the birth of pizza, finally eliminating all fear of the fruit.^[3]

7 The Avocado’s Salvation

Before agriculture, avocado seeds enjoyed widespread travel in the bodies of various megafauna before being defecated in fertile feces. Birds and other small animals did not provide any benefit in helping plant the large seed and so were all lethally deterred from eating avocados through development of the toxin persin.

After the Ice Age extinction event, three-fourths of all megafauna were wiped out. With the avocado’s distributors all gone, it required a savior from extinction: us.^[4]

Central Americans successfully cultivated avocados during and after the time of the megafauna and named the fruit after its similar appearance to testicles, evoking a sexual mysticism. Indeed, the avocado was thought to be such a potent aphrodisiac that virgin daughters were kept indoors when Aztec farmers harvested avocados!

6 The Pumpkin’s Tradition

Our favorite squash, the pumpkin wasn’t always able to be carved into sturdy, smiling Halloween decorations. However, even Pilgrims praised the pumpkin’s long storage time and sweetly nutritious flesh in this verse circa 1633:

For pottage and puddings and custards and pies
Our pumpkins and parsnips are common supplies,
We have pumpkins at morning and pumpkins at noon,
If it were not for pumpkins, we should be undoon.

Europeans were incremental to the creation of the modern pumpkin. The earliest jack–o’–lanterns were made from lit coals placed in hollow root vegetables such as turnips and potatoes. The lanterns were held during festivals to brighten the night.

As Celtic tradition arrived in America, the pumpkin was grown through artificial selection to become the greatest carrier of fire and light. Decades later, the pumpkin was immortalized as the joyous fruit of the harvest—a massive, creative, and delicious entity of Halloween.^[5]

5 The Chili Pepper’s Ubiquity

Chilies are intensely spicy to prevent animals from eating their seeds, which aren’t suited for survival past digestion. In an evolutionary insult, humans raised and ate chili peppers specifically for their natural flame, producing varieties so intense that they blister skin and blind if exposed to the eye.

Latin Americans are stereotypically known to enjoy an apparent immunity to the blazing effects, a not entirely false notion given the cultural origin of the chili.^[6]

In the records of conquistadors, the Aztecs and Maya ate chilies with anything and everything. Chilies were believed to have medicinal properties to cure various sicknesses. The smoke was used as both a highly effective pest deterrent and a highly effective children’s punishment.

Chilies also achieved a legendary commonplace status. If not practicing abstinence from chilies for religious or health reasons, a person who didn’t eat chili peppers would straightaway be presumed a witch!

4 The Strawberry’s Union

Uniquely, ancestral strawberries originated in both Europe and North America. The French selected wild strawberries for sweetness, but the fruit was still small. Only the Sun King’s plans for royal domination romantically brought the parents of the modern strawberry together from across the continents.

King Louis XIV of France desired the Spanish throne, so he assigned a spy, Frezier, to study Chilean and Peruvian fortifications. But Frezier’s duty was not only to discover the military strength of the colonial Spanish.

Previously, another dispatch had found unexpectedly large Chilean strawberries. A military engineer posing as a merchant, Frezier purchased the strawberries and brought them back to France.

For years, French gardeners couldn’t reproduce the Chilean strawberry since they grew native strawberries through asexual planting. The Chilean variety had both male and female plants. But the males were culled as weeds due to their different appearance because the Europeans didn’t know any better.

None of the European strawberries were large enough to hybridize with the Chilean, but the Virginian variety, brought over during the French colonization of North America, was. While placed in the same garden, the two plants from the New World coincidentally came together in the Old World to create the globally distributed garden strawberry we savor today.^[7]

3 The Apple’s Alcohol

Apples have been eaten since before Jericho’s walls were built. They were revered in Western cultures as a mythical symbol and still are respected as a daily health remedy.

On the great American frontier, Johnny Appleseed planted plenty of apple trees for welcome settlers, but they didn’t munch on them. The notion of eating apples was actually rare since most varieties were bitter and unpleasant. Over time, apples were selected to become larger and tastier, but until then, their main purpose was to create another product.^[8]

Apple cider was championed as the most valuable, most available beverage of early America. Compared to the water and whiskey of the colonies, homegrown apple cider could be counted on as a personally confirmed sanitary and healthy drink.

Originally only made as hard cider, which was alcoholic, demand greatly fell during Prohibition. To continue to use their apple stock, producers rightly marketed apples as being directly edible after breeding sweet, nutritious varieties.

2 The Rhubarb’s Warning

The plight of China during the Opium Wars was tragic. Technologically superior militaries allowed Western nations to bully China and steal its wealth. The worst offense was the introduction of opium, which ruined many lives due to uncontrollable addiction and poverty.

After failing to prevent the blockade of Canton, a major trade province, Chinese officials were desperate to retaliate. It would have taken too long to modernize their military, so they looked to other solutions.

To regain respect in trade agreements for their country, officials researched the English to determine if an embargo of a few vital products would help. The studies of Lin Tse-Hsu, the Chinese commissioner in Canton, had exaggeratedly shown him that without rhubarb, tea, silk, and other goods, the people of foreign nations would be devastated.

In a famously ignored plea, Lin sent a letter to Queen Victoria stating that since opium was clearly understood as an illegal, destructive drug in the United Kingdom, it should not be immorally exploited in China.

He proposed that if China were to embargo its rhubarb, widely used as an effective laxative, entire populations of Westerners would start to die of constipation. Unfortunately, he did not realize that these goods were luxuries rather than requirements.

The misunderstanding was recorded in the letter for history to demonstrate the confusion and hope of the vulnerable East.^[9]

1 The Breadfruit’s Mutiny

Breadfruit was discovered by a scientific crew in Tahiti, an island located in the center of the South Pacific. Eighteenth-century Europeans had gathered to witness the transit of Venus, an extremely rare astronomical event which is similar in nature to a solar eclipse by the Moon.

With them was botanist Joseph Banks, who correctly and impressively identified the breadfruit as a cheap and nutritious fruit, albeit for the mistreated slaves of the sugar plantations. King George III directed Lieutenant William Bligh to gather this potentially valuable fruit.

Bligh’s crew on the HMS Bounty enjoyed the shores of Tahiti and eventually departed with 1,000 breadfruit plants. However, master’s mate Fletcher Christian led a revolt, discarding Bligh and his followers in an open boat.

Since both Bligh and Christian survived, the history on the reasons behind the mutiny is impossible to truly know. Bligh may have been abusive, Christian may have gone insane, or the crew may have simply wanted to return to the Tahitian women and beaches.

It is confirmed, though, that Bligh had been saving water for the fruit instead of his men. Though dutiful, this would definitely have raised issues.

As an excellent navigator, Bligh managed to safely sail thousands of miles to a hospitable Dutch island, returned to the UK as a hero, and went on to finish the job by bringing back 2,126 breadfruits on his second voyage. Unfortunately, his work was all in vain as the slaves absolutely refused to eat them due to their bland taste!^[10]

Damian Black is a lone archivist interested in the corruption of pure science.

The English language is notoriously difficult to learn. First, it is full of strange idioms, like the sayings about not crying over spilt milk, looking a gift horse in the mouth, or having egg on your face. Second, it is shocking, stupefying, formidable, and distressing that we have so many synonyms.

Many of these difficulties arise from the fact that English is based on a combination of different languages. Sometimes, we can easily see the similarities between English words and the languages from which they are borrowed. Other times, this can be a little harder.

The following 10 English words have rather strange origins that may surprise you.

Top 10 Silliest English Words And Their Origins

10 Lesbian

The word “lesbian,” which is used to describe women who love other women, is derived from the Greek island of Lesbos. Around 600 BC, a poet named Sappho lived on this island. Most of her poetry has been lost to time, but we have collected fragments of her works from other writers who quoted her in their works.

Much of her writing was about women, and many of her poems are quite passionate about love. This has led to speculation that she may have been homosexual. By some accounts, she may have been married and had a daughter. But it is difficult to piece together the snippets that exist about Sappho.

Her daughter was named Cleis, but some scholars argue that this was really the name of Sappho’s lover. Her husband was said to be Kerkylas from the island of Andros.

However, the name “Kerkylas” is close to the word for “penis” and “Andros” is like the word for “man.” So the fact that her husband was named “Penis from the Island of Man” implies that this was probably a joke.^[1]

9 Assassin

An “assassin” is a person who commits murder for money or a fanatical reason, such as political ideology. The history of this word stretches back to the Crusades. At that time, a sect called the Nizari Ismaili operated out of Lebanon. They were fanatical Muslims answering to a leader known as the “Old Man of the Mountains.”

This sect was responsible for murdering many leaders of opposing forces. It was believed by Western Europeans that the members of Nizari Ismaili did so after consuming large quantities of hashish, which would make them high. Although this is debatable, it earned them the nickname hashishin (“hashish user”).

By the time this word became part of the English language, it had already made its way through the Italian and French languages and mutated into the word “assassin.”^[2]

8 Walrus

Before writing The Lord of the Rings, author J.R.R. Tolkien worked for the Oxford English Dictionary. As part of his duties, he had to uncover the histories of words beginning with the letter W, including “walrus.” Tolkien found varying histories behind this seemingly simple word.

He believed it to be most likely that “walrus” was derived from hrossvalir, an Old Norse word that translates to “horse-whale.” The whale part makes sense because walruses are also massive and have flippers. But the horse part is confusing. All we really know is that someone long ago probably looked at a massive mustachioed creature with giant tusks and thought the best comparison to a land animal was a horse.

Although Tolkien decided on the horse-whale etymology of “walrus” as the most reasonable, he labored over this decision for quite some time. Reportedly, he had more than six versions of this word’s history, some of which still exist in the Oxford English Dictionary archives.^[3]

7 Quarantine

Undoubtedly, we have all encountered the word “quarantine” on television or in the newspaper. Some may have even experienced it firsthand since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic as this term has long been associated with disease outbreaks.

“Quarantine” is derived from the Italian word quarantino (“40-day period”). Back when the plague was spreading across Europe, Venetian policies dictated that incoming ships from affected countries could not enter the ports until 40 days had passed. This was meant to ensure that no cases of plague were brought into the country.

In a similar manner, people traveling during the coronavirus pandemic have been ordered to isolate for two weeks to prevent disease transmission. We should probably be thankful that we no longer use the 40-day period from the time of the plague.

However, you may be wondering how 40 days was chosen as the correct length of time to isolate someone. It is likely because 40 is an important religious number in Christianity. Medieval Christians believed that Jesus fasted for 40 days in the desert and that it rained for 40 days and 40 nights in the story of Noah’s Ark.

The idea that people needed 40 days to become purified fit well within existing religious beliefs of the time.^[4]

6 Nimrod

“Nimrod” is often used as an insult for someone who is clumsy or foolish, but this word originally had a very different meaning. Nimrod is the name of the great-grandson of Noah in the Bible, and he was said to be a mighty hunter. This word only came to be associated with clumsiness and foolishness in the 1980s, and the reasons for this are debatable.

According to one theory, the alternative meaning of the word arises from its use in Bugs Bunny cartoons. Bugs was pursued relentlessly by inept hunter Elmer Fudd. That rascally rabbit sometimes referred to Fudd as a “Nimrod” to sarcastically compare his lack of hunting skills to those of the mighty Nimrod from the Bible.

However, due to the young audience misunderstanding the insult and the sarcasm, “nimrod” became a widely used term to describe someone who was klutzy or foolish.^[5]

10 Offensive English Words With Hazy Origins

5 Muscle

When you look at a large, muscular person, the first image to pop into your head is unlikely to be a teeny-tiny mouse. Thus, it may surprise you to know that the word “muscle” is derived from the Latin word musculus (“little mouse”).

The reason for this odd connection between muscles and mice is all about appearances. Our ancient ancestors simply thought that a flexed bicep looked a lot like a tiny mouse was moving under a person’s skin.

The Middle English language had another word for someone muscular—lacertous. You may be happy to note that this word does not have anything to do with mice. Instead, it means lizard-like. Perhaps the lizards back in the day were quite jacked.^[6]

4 Cancer

The connection between the astrology sign Cancer and the disease of the same name is based on crabs. The word “cancer” is derived from the Latin word meaning “crab.” The Cancer astrology sign is based on a constellation that is supposed to look like a crab, though it really looks more like an upside-down Y in the sky.

In Greek mythology, Heracles crushed a giant enemy crab under his foot during a battle with Hydra. Afterward, Hera rewarded the crab for its service by placing its remains in the sky among the stars. That became the Cancer constellation.

Returning to reality, a cancerous growth, usually surrounded by swollen veins and connections, was named after its similar appearance to a rounded crab body with legs extending from it. The likeness between crabs and cancerous tumors was noted by multiple prominent ancient Greek physicians, including Hippocrates.^[7]

3 Malaria

Malaria is a disease spread by mosquitoes and characterized by recurring fevers, anemia, and jaundice. However, the history behind the name of this disease comes from a misunderstanding about its cause.

Before we knew that mosquitoes were responsible for infecting humans with malaria, there was something called the miasma theory. According to this theory, decaying materials gave off a toxic vapor that caused illnesses like malaria and cholera.

The word “malaria” is derived from the Italian mala aria (“bad air”). The vapors involved in miasma theory were often linked to marshes. A lot of decay was found in these wet regions, and people living near marshes often got sick.

The real cause? Mosquitoes like to lay their eggs near the standing water found in marshes.^[8]

2 Tragedy

When you think of a tragic event, you probably do not automatically think about goats. Then again, maybe you do. The ancient Greeks certainly did, and this is why “tragedy” is derived from the Greek words tragos and oidos, meaning “goat song.”

Some confusion surrounds the exact origins of this word. But the connection to goats seems to arise from plays involving satyrs, nature spirits that combine human and goat or horse features. They were commonly seen in satyr plays. These plays often accompanied the performances of tragic plays, and they tended to be dramatic but funny.^[9]

1 Candidate

Candidates running for political offices nowadays tend to be shrouded in scandal. Back in ancient Rome, they were shrouded in white togas instead. These garments were specially made to be very white, leading to the men who wore them being called candidati (“whitened men”).

This term originates from the Latin word candidus (“pure white”). Funnily enough, this word is also the basis for the English word Candida, which is a persistent type of fungus that can be difficult to eliminate.

This is likely because the fungus itself is white and can overgrow on the tongue, forming white patches called thrush. However, the connection between an annoying fungus and politicians is certainly interesting enough to be mentioned.^[10]

Top 10 English Words Derived From Arabic

The old saying goes that comedy is tragedy plus time. Simple math, then, holds that more tragedy equals more comedy. Many of our funniest comedians have lived the types of bleak, sorrowful lives that prove the equation true.

So many of the people who make us laugh struggle to find their own laughter that the phenomenon has its own psychological label: the sad clown paradox. They really give Pagliacci a run for his money.

For whatever reason, the correlation between misfortune and mirth is especially strong in the true comedic greats, the human factories that refine raw pain into concentrated wit. Here are ten such comedians, those who were given the worst of tragedies and gave us back the best of comedy.

10 Jim Carrey

Nowadays, Jim Carrey is a multimillionaire who could retire this second and coast off of royalties as long as he needed. But before the lucrative television and movie roles, Carrey grew up poor. As in homeless, traveling vagrant poor.

Carrey spent a large part of his teenage years in serious poverty. His family’s fortunes varied year to year, but never rose to the level of dependable comfort. The Carrey clan spent years with no house nor even apartment, living instead all together in a van and later a tent. Even the uptick in the family’s situation, when his father gained lucrative employment, still saw teenage Carrey and his brother working as night crew janitors for his father’s employer, just to make ends meet. Even when he ‘got out,’ Carrey spent years living the life of a struggling comedian, which many can attest is not much of an upgrade.

9 Patton Oswalt

Patton Oswalt has been the king of the alt-comics for decades now, and for a while, everything in his life was picturesque. He had made it as a comedian and writer, was raising a daughter, and had found his soulmate: a writer named Michelle McNamara. That is, until she died suddenly in her sleep, leaving Oswalt a heartbroken widower and single father.

McNamara died without warning on April 21, 2016, from an unknown heart condition combined with a mix of prescription drugs—an unpredictable and surprising death. Oswalt, whose work is by nature self-reflective and confessional, has gone into great detail about how the death affected him and his daughter, including “the worst day of (his) life”: the first time he told his daughter that her mother was dead. It’s a sorrowful—but enlightening—story.

8 Maria Bamford

If there’s a poster child for mental illness (outside of vicious murderer-cannibals and the like), it’s Maria Bamford. Bamford’s comedy has repeatedly delved into her various mental issues, such as depression, anxiety, OCD, suicidal thoughts, and bipolar disorder. Dealing with several issues at once for so long has made Bamford’s life a constant struggle.

Though she always makes it hilarious, Bamford nonetheless delves deep into her struggles on stage, including the time she checked herself into a psych ward because she was close to killing herself. Luckily, she was able to avert the disaster, but Bamford’s internal fight for cognitive control is still ongoing.

7 Pete Davidson

Pete Davidson is another comedian who has worked his personal tragedy into his work. Davidson’s father was a New York City firefighter who died while responding to the September 11 attacks on the Twin Towers. Davidson was only seven at the time.

Whether directly stemming from the trauma or not, Davidson has suffered from mental health problems for most of his life. As a child at school, he once suffered a breakdown and pulled all the hair out from his scalp. He also famously posted suicidal thoughts on Instagram before quickly deleting his account altogether, prompting police to locate him and perform a wellness check. Luckily, he is still around and still seeking help.

6 Andy Dick

Many of those closest to Andy Dick have described him as being two separate people: sober Andy and drunk Andy. Dick has become notorious for his drug and alcohol use and the erratic, destructive behaviors it has caused. In an effort to treat himself, Dick has been in rehab programs more than two dozen times.

Dick is now so notorious for his constantly inappropriate behavior that new allegations and charges now blend in with the rest; his conduct is becoming normalized. Despite many high-profile public figures facing overdue consequences in the wake of the #metoo movement, Dick has never received the same public flogging- even though he has allegedly committed an unbelievable amount of offensives such as indecent exposures, sexual assaults, sexual batteries, sexual abuse, and more. It remains to be seen if any treatment will stick for Dick and beat his addiction once and for all.

5 Mitch Hedberg

Mitch Hedberg was one of the all-time great short-form joke writers. An average stand-up set from Hedberg would contain dozens of pithy, witty jokes and his impressive facility for wordplay and observation made him a huge cult hit. Hedberg was also heavily addicted to drugs and never fully committed to getting clean.

Hedberg was outspoken about his drug use; he often discussed it on stage and in interviews. Perhaps his most famous joke is, “I used to do drugs. I still do, but I used to, too.” Sadly, he was equally outspoken about not wanting to quit. Friend and fellow comedian Artie Lange, best known for his tenure on MadTV, once quoted Hedberg as saying, “Guys, don’t try to help me. I want to do heroin until I die.” In 2005, at age 37, his wish—whether joking or not—came true.

4 John Belushi

The theme of these accounts should be apparent by now, and John Belushi was no exception. Belushi was a member of the Not Ready for Primetime Players, the original SNL lineup. He consistently stole scenes with his physical humor and energy. As he became more famous and began working on more projects at once, Belushi started finding that energy elsewhere: most notably cocaine.

As Belushi began using more and more, with increasingly obvious effects, his friends and coworkers, including Carrie Fischer and “Animal House” director John Landis, attempted to coax Belushi into rehab. They failed. As he fell deeper into his addiction, Belushi began using heroin. It was an overdose of cocaine and heroin—also called a speedball—that ultimately ended his life at age 33.

3 Chris Farley

It’s hard to mention the tragic rise and fall of John Belushi without then mentioning Chris Farley. Farley’s career and personal trajectory mirrored Belushi’s uncannily closely. Farley, like Belushi, became famous as a cast member on SNL, and again like Belushi, was known for his high energy, physical humor despite his large size. Some of his most memorable skits include “Chip n’ Dales” and “Van Down by the Mirror.” Seriously—they’re hilarious, and you should go watch them right after you read this article.

The comparison continues as Farley also began taking on more and more projects, all the while falling deeper into a life of drugs. Farley’s obesity caused its own problems, as well. All told, the actor sought help for obesity and drug addiction 17 times by his death, though none were successful. He died of an overdose of cocaine and morphine at age 33.

2 Robin Williams

Robin Williams might just be the most beloved comedian ever. In addition to his extraordinary stand-up work, he starred in a range of fan-favorite films and stole almost every scene he was in. His relentless energy and manic delivery made him both completely unique and legendary. But behind that endless brightness were dark battles with disease and addiction.

Williams spent much of the 70s and 80s addicted to cocaine and though he eventually quit the drug, he then had another battle with alcoholism. Underpinning all of this was William’s well-known struggles with depression. Eventually, and only because of the autopsy after his death by suicide, it was discovered that Williams had Dementia with Lewy Bodies, which was causing his mind to unravel at the seams. His final days were plagued with anxiety, paranoia, and lost memories.

1 Richard Pryor

Richard Pryor is one of the greatest comedians of all time and, over the course of his life, brought happiness to millions. You’d be hard-pressed, however, to find a single period of that life in which Pryor found any lasting happiness himself.

Pryor grew up in a brothel where his mother was a prostitute, even turning tricks for his town mayor at one point. His mother eventually abandoned him and left him to his grandmother, the brothel’s owner, who frequently beat him. He was molested multiple times, first by an older kid, and later by a Catholic priest. His adult life was scarcely much better. Pryor was divorced seven times, had recurring problems with drugs and alcohol, and even infamously set himself on fire while high on cocaine. It was his constant smoking that eventually killed him, as it partially brought on the coronary artery disease that caused his fatal heart attack.

Question: Did you eat today? The answer is probably yes. Now, do you know where your food came from? We don’t think much about the food we eat every day, but many of the delicious treats we shove down our throats have fascinating histories.

From a Michelin Star-worthy Mesolithic caviar, to Caucasian wine that warmed Neolithic people after the Ice Age, to an acquired taste that shaped evolution, these global favorites share amazing origins.

10 Mesolithic People Ate Fancy Steamed Caviar

Ancient dishes could be sophisticated, too, like a 6,000-year-old caviar soup from a site near Berlin. The soup, found in a ceramic bowl dating to 4300 BC, was like an ancient version of Korean or Thai and could probably be served up at tablecloth restaurants today.

The freshwater carp roe was cooked in a fish broth that was covered with leaves to hold in all the fishy goodness while also imparting some fresh green flavors from the plants. Pork rib remains uncovered in another bowl suggest that Mesolithic people were eating fancier, daintier portions instead of Flintstones-like chunks of charred meat.^[1]

9 Vanilla Was An Offering For Dead Royal Canaanites

Vanilla use supposedly started in South America. But newer (as in, older) evidence recovered from a 3,600-year-old tomb in Israel fixes vanilla’s origin several thousand years prior and 21,000 kilometers (13,000 mi) away. Vanillin compounds were found in three small jugs at a Bronze Age burial chamber at Megiddo, an afterlife offering for the three gold-and-silver-adorned skeletons interred in the tomb.

Researchers say the vanilla orchid reached the Levant via trade routes with Southeast Asia. Vanilla, now the second-most-expensive spice behind saffron, was even more prized and valued during the Bronze Age. So the tomb belonged to a big shot, like a royal Canaanite.^[2]

8 A Yellow River Artifact Ends The Noodle Debate

The origin of noodles has been highly debated. Some say they’re a Chinese invention, but others contend Italian or even Arabic roots. Before 2005, the earliest known noodles belonged to the East Han Dynasty circa AD 25–220, but a much older find suggested that the noodle’s birthplace does indeed lie in China.

Archaeologists at the Lajia site on the Yellow River recovered a 4,000-year-old bowl of noodles, fortuitously (for science and noodle history purposes) preserved by a catastrophic flood. The pot contained a bunch of 50-centimeter-long (20 in) yellow strands which, unlike modern variants made of flour, were made of grains from millet grass.^[3]

7 Wine Is From Europe, But Not Italy

The world of 8,000 years ago was in the process of awakening from an ice age. And as temperatures warmed, the Neolithic people of Georgia figured out how to make wine. It might be the oldest wine-wine in the world, because while the Chinese did brew alcoholic grape-based drinks 1,000 years prior, it wasn’t a pure grape wine. But the Georgian stock, dated between 6000 and 5800 BC, is like the stuff enjoyed today.

And it was an excellent new invention to store in another great recent(ish) invention, jars from the pottery-making trade that began around 9,000 years ago. Unfortunately, the ancient vintners didn’t include tree resin, a known preservative that started showing up in wines several hundred years later.^[4]

6 People Made Bread Way Before Agriculture

A bunch of unassuming black specks, just a few millimeters across, from a Natufian hunter-gatherer camp in Jordan have revealed themselves as the world’s oldest bread.

They predate the second-oldest bread, as well as the Agricultural Revolution itself, by several millennia. The tiny, charred remains are the equivalent of the crisped bread residue on the bottom of your toaster. Only they’re 14,000 years old. Or about 4,000 years older than Levantine agriculture.

The Black Desert-roaming Natufians foraged for wild grains, tubers, and cereals like barley, wheat, oats, and einkorn. They turned these ingredients into unleavened flatbreads, cooked on stones or ashes.^[5] But it was a long, tedious process, so bread was probably reserved for feasts and events.

5 Thank Sicilians For Creating Italy’s Culinary Symbol

Italian wine was thought to have come about around 1200 BC, possibly as a tasty result of Greek colonization. But some late-Copper Age terra-cotta jars from a Sicilian limestone cave on Monte Kronio push that date all the way back to the fourth millennium BC.

Inside the storage jars, archaeologists found 6,000-year-old tartaric acid, the grapes’ main acid component, as well as its salt, also known as cream of tartar. It’s a result of fermentation and a sign of winemaking. This direct evidence trumps many previous ancient, potentially vinous discoveries, which involved only the circumstantial evidence that lots of grapes were being grown.^[6]

4 The First People To Use Chocolate (Were Not Central American)

The Central American Olmec and Aztec civilizations “invented chocolate” when they made spicy, bitter cacao-based beverages as early as 1900 BC.

Or so scientists thought, but some newly publicized 5,300-year-old pottery moves cocoa’s birthplace to Ecuador. It’s here that the first Theobroma cacao trees graced planet Earth and here that humans exploited their seeds for culinary and ceremonial purposes.

The discovery was chanced upon when researchers noted that vessels from the Amazon-dwelling Mayo-Chinchipe people looked suspiciously like Maya cocoa pots and then looked inside and realized that they were also used to store cocoa.^[7] These vessels were found both in homes and in tombs, so cocoa was utilized as a ritualistic offering for the dead as well as a powdered foodstuff, possibly to make a hot cacao drink.

3 Bone Marrow Made Us Who We Are

Most people regard bone marrow as garbage food, like offal. But this unjustly vilified food source helped humanity to the top of the food chain.

Our early Homo ancestors pried it from the bones of animals at least two million years ago. Homo habilis et al. used “Oldowan tools,” made by bashing rocks together to produce a sharp edge, to get at the prized marrow.^[8] The brain-boosting fats and protein therein helped early humans grow larger brains, with the capacity to craft better tools and eventually the Large Hadron Collider.

It’s also possible that the practice of extracting marrow helped human hands differentiate from ape hands because the forces and dexterity required to crack bones added an extra evolutionary variable.

2 Native Americans Had Huge Jerky-Making Camps

Native Americans ate a type of beef jerky-like thing called pemmican and devoted camps to its production, like a pemmican factory discovered at a bison-hunting site in Montana that was inhabited in the pre-European days circa 1410–1650. The site, Kutoyis, is composed of more than 3,500 stone features and served as a bison-processing center in the pre-European conquest centuries.

Making pemmican was a labor-intensive process that first involved cutting the meat into strips, drying it, and then smashing it into tiny pieces with stones.^[9] For consistency and a caloric boost, it was mixed with fat, acquired by breaking the bones into fragments, boiling them, then skimming off the bone grease floating to the top. The result was a calorically dense, portable foodstuff that didn’t quickly spoil.

1 Dogs Became Cuisine Thousands Of Years Ago

Dog has been on the menu for thousands of years in some cultures. And in an ancient Chinese tomb discovered in 2010, dog meat accompanied the departed to the underworld.

The tomb in Xian in Shaanxi province held a 20-centimeter-tall (8 in), 2,400-year-old sealed cooking vessel made of bronze. Inside, researchers found remnants of ancient bone soup, though oxidation had turned the contents and the container green and mysterious.

Analysis revealed 37 bones belonging to a male dog, younger than one year in age. Along with the puppy soup, an airtight bronze container held wine. It’s pretty luxurious for a death offering, suggesting that the deceased was a landowner or important military officer.^[10]

Ivan writes about things for the internet. You can contact him at [email protected].

The following locales are globally renowned, and it’s easy to see why. Rich with history, mystery, and natural beauty, they’ve captivated humanity for hundreds (or thousands) of years. In addition to lore and magnificence, they tantalize us with hidden stories that illuminate the murky past.

10 Belize’s Blue Hole holds a clue to the Maya’s demise

Scientific storm records only go back about a century. But nature keeps its own, longer-lasting records, locked in rocks and dirt.

Some of these are stored at the bottom of Belize’s famous Blue Hole. It, and similar aquatic sinkholes, trap sediment which floats down and settles in layers. And when storms hit, the sediments become more coarsely strewn.

Scientists stabbed into the Blue Hole’s heart and removed a 28-foot-long core that displays nearly 2,000 years of geo-history. It reveals that storm activity intensified around 900 AD, around the time of the Maya demise.

Five especially eye-catching layers formed circa 700-1150 AD. They’re 6-to-12-inches in thickness and constitute monstrous events, considering that the Category 5 Hurricane Hattie laid down just 1.5 inches in 1961.

With the Maya already burdened by drought in the late 800s, these ferocious cyclones may have forced another nail in their collective, cultural coffin.

9 The Alhambra is full of secret messages

The Alhambra, in Granada, is the quintessential Spanish monument: it was built on top of Roman ruins in 889, rebuilt by the conquering Moors, then reclaimed by Spain in 1492.

Its many columns, geometric ornaments, and fountains are supreme works of art. But hidden throughout the fortress are 10,000 Arabic inscriptions. About 10 percent of these are verses from the Quran. The others are slogans, attributions, poems, and bits of life advice, like “Be sparing with words and you will go in peace.”

The most common motif is praise for the Nasrid dynasty. The final Muslim dynasty to rule the Iberian, the Nasrids enjoyed more than 260 years in power. And their motto, “There is no victor but Allah,” is the most common inscription in the palace.

After the Christian reconquest of Granada, power-couple rulers Ferdinand and Isabella realized the Alhambra’s beauty and chose to preserve the inscriptions. How refreshing to hear of monarchs that appreciated, rather than obliterated, a rival culture’s art.

8 The Nazca Lines evolved from an older, more psychedelic art form

Peru’s Nazca Lines succeeded an art form that began more than 1,000 years earlier. Recent drone surveys revealed hundreds of ancient geoglyphs in the hills of Palpa, about 30 miles north of the Nazca site.

Made between 500 BC and 200 AD, they highlight the evolving art and ideology of the Topará and Paracas people. Unlike the more famous Nazca Lines etched on the 150-square-mile Nazca plateau, these older glyphs are set into the slope of a hill and would have been visible from the populated valley below.

So while the Nazca Lines may have been aimed at the gods, their predecessors were designed for human eyes, possibly to mark territories.

The images are psychedelic. Among them is an 80-by-210-foot depiction of a sacred deity with the body of a killer whale and a human arm, which holds a trophy head. Another glyph depicts a warrior with a headdress and staff-like implement, standing beside a woman. Between them is a Medusa-like being made of tangled tentacles or snakes. The scene supposedly symbolizes fertility. Go figure.

7 Pompeii’s gladiator pub (had prostitutes)

Two thousand years after its heyday, Pompeii continues to amaze the world with a flood of discoveries. Among the latest, courtesy of the Great Pompeii Project, is a fresco that combines all the beauty and brutality expected from the Romans.

The fresco is 3-by-4.5-feet and located near a gladiators’ barrack. It once adorned a basement wall in a tavern or public house, where gladiators gathered to knock back brews and perhaps sling smack-talk. In the rooms above, prostitutes practiced the world’s oldest trade and helped keep the gladiators, uh, fighting fit.

The fresco is renowned for its goriness. It depicts a murmillo gladiator (wielding a gladius and large rectangular shield) defeating a Thracian gladiator. The beaten “Thraex” gushes blood from multiple, well-detailed wounds as he holds up his finger, pleading for mercy.

6 The Serengeti is seeded with poo

The Serengeti isn’t as untouched as it appears: nomadic Stone Age herders altered the savannah with their poo. Not their personal poo, but that of their grazing animals.

This inadvertent fertilization led to widespread greening and improved biodiversity. And it’s still visible today in oases called grassy glades. These verdant patches were thought to be around 1,000-years-old, but analysis of the dung-rich earth revealed they’d been laid down between 1550 and 3700 years ago.

Compared to the more barren patches surrounding the grassy glades, the oases were 10 to 10,000 times more fertile, thanks to the fecal enrichment that provided nutrients like magnesium, calcium, and phosphorus.

But the au naturel fertilization process is a double-edged sword. Only herders that are constantly on the move benefit the ecosystem. If they stay in one spot for too long, their animals overfeed and deplete the soil.

5 The Parthenon may have the wrong name

Built around 430 BC and dedicated to Athen’s patron goddess, Athena, the Parthenon is one of the world’s most famous buildings. But we might be calling it by the wrong name.

Parthenon means “house of virgins,” but there’s no real consensus as to why this particular structure earned this particular moniker. According to ancient texts and historical sources, the Greeks may have called their monument Hekatompedon, or “hundred-foot temple.”

This term appears in 2,500-year-old inventories. It’s described as the storehouse or treasury for all the golden objects made for Athena, including a 33-foot-tall gold statue. The name Parthenon is also mentioned, but it seems to refer to a separate, smaller treasury sitting within the Acropolis complex.

It’s argued that this smaller treasury, which held spoils of war, furniture, and other non-golden goods, could be the true Parthenon. Especially since it’s held up by caryatids, pillars in the form of women (virgins), fittingly supplying the name “house of virgins.”

4 Easter Island’s obsidian tools could explain the culture’s demise

Rapa Nui seemingly holds the remnants of mass warfare. The island is littered with thousands of (what seem to be) obsidian spearpoints, called mata’a.

But even though the mata’a are sharp and pokey, their creators may not have used them to erase each other from history. So says the scientific art of morphometry, which compares the size and shape of the obsidian tools.

The scientists concluded that the mata’a don’t resemble the morphology of actual weapons found on the island. Their forms vary greatly and, more importantly, aren’t all that conducive for flesh-jabbing. Instead, they resemble multi-purpose tools, which explains their prevalence.

The Rapa Nui used them for various tasks, like tattooing or preparing plants. What they didn’t use them for, was stabbing. So maybe their decline wasn’t caused by catastrophic infighting, but (huge surprise) the European visitors who began arriving in the 18th century.

3 Tintagel Castle was poppin’

Tintagel Castle, famously featured in Arthurian legend, was a happenin’, cosmopolitan hot-spot.

The unlikely evidence is a 2-foot-long slab of Cornish slate, which served as a window ledge in some now-ruined building, more than a thousand years ago. It’s like a miniature medieval Rosetta Stone, featuring Christian symbols and Greek and Latin writing. And its multilingual nature implies a learned, metropolitan population.

Researchers say the stone immortalizes an old scribe’s writing practice. And this 7th-century man-of-words was no scrub; he knew how to write official documents and also those flashy, illustrated gospels with the fancy letters.

This discovery (along with previously found foreign goods) suggests a vibrant heritage. The site hosted a literate people, boasted Mediterranean trading connections, and may have even seated Cornish kings.

2 Stonehenge may have been built with pig fat

Stonehenge England, United Kingdom

Stonehenge’s megaliths weigh 30 tons and came from 18 miles away. The smaller bluestones weigh between 2 and 5 tons and traveled nearly 90 miles from the Preseli Hills in Wales. Possibly with help from an unexpected ally: pigs.

Pigs’ fat, actually, according to ceramic pots found two miles away at Durrington Walls, the millennia-old village that may have housed Stonehenge’s builders.

The aged pots were smeared with pork fat, and it probably wasn’t for culinary reasons. If the pigs were indeed cooked in these bucket-sized vessels, they would have been chopped up. But archaeologists discovered the ancient carcasses mostly intact and displaying the type of burn marks that suggest a spit-roasting method.

So the monument-builders may have collected the lard to grease logs, upon which they rolled the sleds that conveyed Stonehenge’s enormous megaliths.

1 The Great Wall of China had multiple purposes

The Great Wall’s creators didn’t always build defensively. Researchers argue that the Northern Line, a nearly 500-mile-long section called Genghis Khan’s Wall, wasn’t built to halt the ruthless Khan’s advance.

First, the wall is too low. At only 6-feet-tall, with a 6-foot-deep ditch, it’s not unscalable enough to impede a marching, blood-thirsty army. Second, it isn’t built of sturdy bricks, like other portions of the wall, but of packed earth.

Plus, it’s built around footpaths. And accompanied by 72 clusters that probably housed administrative buildings. These unfortified structures are placed next to entrances and exits at the head of well-traveled paths.

Why? To manage mass movements of people and livestock. The wall allowed the Khitan-Liao Empire to control migration, impose taxes, and grow fat.

Looking at old photographs, it is easy to imagine that the past was a drab place. Even old paintings can make us think that no one in history enjoyed colorful things. But photos and brown-varnished paintings do not tell the whole story.

To make those paintings in the first place, people had to search out pigments to make paints. To dye cloth, people experimented for years to get just the right color. Some of those experiments went in very odd directions. Here are ten pigments with strange histories.

10 Tyrian Purple

Tyrian purple was once the most highly sought-after pigment in the world. Known as imperial purple, only those of a high status were allowed to wear it. Being porphyrogennetos—born to the purple—meant a person was born into a royal family.

Tyrian purple was one of the most vivid colors available to dyers of antiquity and was desired because unlike many natural dyes, it was resistant to fading. It was also fantastically hard to produce and rare, which only increased its value. According to Phoenician mythology, the dye was first discovered when a dog ate a small mollusc on the beach. When the dog went to lick its mistress, she noticed that its tongue was an intriguing shade of purple. And so Tyrian purple was born.^[1]

There is some truth in this tale. Tyrian purple was made from crushing up tiny shellfish, millions of them. The mashed-up molluscs were then left to bake in the sun in a process that caused an unholy stench. 10,000 molluscs would produce a single gram of dye.

Despite being fashionable, the dye could prove deadly. When King Ptolemy visited the Roman emperor Caligula, he wore a vast amount of purple cloth to show off. Caligula, not the most stable monarch, took this as a challenge to his own power and put the king to death.

9 Uranium

Uranium is most famous today as a source of energy in nuclear reactors and atomic bombs. First isolated and named as an element at the end of the 18th century, uranium had actually been used in pigments since at least the first century.^[2] A piece of glass from a Roman villa was found to be yellow because it was one-percent uranium oxide.

After the discovery of uranium, it was used extensively to make glass, enamel, and ceramics of a range of colors. The most famous use of uranium was in uranium glass, which has a distinct, and slightly unsettling, green tint under UV light. The fashion for uranium pigments went into overdrive after the discovery of radium.

Radium, often found as an impurity in sources of uranium, was itself used in paints, as it had the lovely effect of glowing in the dark. Since tons of uranium had to be procured to get small amounts of radium, there was a lot of uranium lying about. Artists and factories making glass and pottery soon put it to use. Although the risk from the radiation in uranium-pigmented objects is low, it is very rarely used today.

8 Han Purple

Even old-fashioned pigments can have interesting things to teach us today. Han purple and the closely related Han blue (both of which are used in the mural above) were pigments created by the ancient Chinese 2,500 years ago.^[3] Han purple was used to paint murals, decorate the famous Terracotta Warriors, and to produce glass. The use of Han purple stopped in the third century AD and was forgotten until it was rediscovered in the 1990s.

Blue and purple are hard pigments to make from natural materials. Han purple is created by mixing ground quartz, a barium mineral, copper, and lead salt together in precise proportions and heating them to around 1,000 degrees Celsius (1,800 °F). Given the heat and ingredients used in its creation, it seems likely that Han purple was a by-product of glass manufacture, but how it was invented will likely always be a mystery.

Its creation is less interesting to some than the properties it is showing today. It has been discovered that when Han purple is cooled to just above absolute zero and a magnetic field is applied to it, it becomes first a superconductor and then a Bose-Einstein condensate. It’s as if Han purple loses a dimension under these conditions, and electrons flow in only two dimensions.

7 Cochineal

Humans generally tend to dislike eating insects, unless those insects make their food a pretty color. Cochineal, or carmine, or natural red 4, is produced by a tiny insect that lives on a variety of cactus. The females of the species feed on the red berries of the cactus and produce an intense red chemical.

When Europeans reached Mexico, they found that the natives were able to produce a red cloth far more vibrant than anything they had seen before. Soon, cochineal became a highly sought-after dye, and for more than just clothing.

The process of harvesting the insects is a delicate and time-consuming one.^[4] Once harvested from the cacti, the bugs are rolled around on a wooden board to kill them without damaging the valuable pigment, and they are then left out to dry in the sun. 70,000 insects are required to make a single pound of cochineal.

While synthetic reds replaced cochineal in clothing manufacture, it is still sometimes used in the food industry to color foods and drinks, especially in brands that want to boast about only using “natural ingredients.” In 2012, Starbucks decided it would no longer use cochineal after an outcry from consumers.

6 Scheele’s Green

Some colors are just to die for, and Scheele’s green might just kill you. Made from copper and arsenic, Scheele’s green was hugely popular in the 19th century and featured in everything from wallpaper, to clothes, to food. A fondness for representing the natural world indoors meant a strong green dye was needed, and Scheele’s green was just waiting to be used.

One problem was that people who used Scheele’s green to make things tended to get sick, really sick. Workers inhaled the arsenic-laden dust or got it on their fingers. Many were lucky to escape with open sores, while others wasted away from chronic arsenic poisoning.

The use of Scheele’s green in wallpapers created deadly rooms. When the wallpaper got damp, or fungi grew on it, arsine gas was produced. It may have played a role in the death of Napoleon, who, in exile on Saint Helena, thought his British guards were trying to poison him. He did have many of the symptoms of arsenic poisoning, but it may not have been the British who killed him. He had wallpaper of a very lovely green color.^[5]

5 Vantablack

It is a common joke that carbon nanotube technology is ten years away from changing the world . . . just like it was ten years ago. There have been a number of fascinating, if limited in scope, uses of carbon nanotubes, but perhaps the most eye-catching is Vantablack. Well, perhaps it’s not eye-catching because your eyes tend to slide right off objects coated in this black pigment, which is the darkest substance made by man.^[6]

Vantablack is not a pigment in the usual sense, in that you cannot just paint it on an object. It is created by aligning nanotubes on a surface in a certain way so that almost all the light hitting the surface is absorbed. It is certainly a startling effect, and that is why it has been sought after by many artists.

Unfortunately for other artists, British artist Anish Kapoor managed to get exclusive rights to the use of Vantablack in art. This monopoly on the use of the material did not sit well with many people. So when Stuart Semple created what he called “the pinkest pink,” he offered to sell it to anyone—except Anish Kapoor, who was already hogging the “blackest black.” Buyers had to agree to a legal declaration stating, “You are not Anish Kapoor, you are in no way affiliated to Anish Kapoor, you are not purchasing this item on behalf of Anish Kapoor or an associate of Anish Kapoor.”

When Kapoor did get his hands on a sample of the pink, he dipped his middle finger in it and posted it to Instagram.

4 Dragon’s Blood

What could be cooler than painting with dragon’s blood? Fortunately for ancient artists, there was no need to go out and slay dragons to get it. Unfortunately, the only sources for the pigment were plants that often grew thousands of miles away.

Dragon’s blood comes from a range of plants and is the red-colored resin that they produce when damaged. One of the sources of dragon’s blood for the Romans was the island of Socotra off the coast of Africa in the Arabian Sea. This island is home to many bizarre-looking plants and animals. When the dragon’s blood tree is cut, it looks as if it is bleeding. Despite the intense red of the resin the trees produce, the red pigment in it, dracorubine, makes up only one percent of the fluid.^[7]

The ancient Romans found it hard to tell the difference between dragon’s blood and another red pigment called cinnabar. Since cinnabar is a compound made with mercury, it often soon became apparent which was which, as people who used cinnabar often fell ill with chronic mercury poisoning.

3 Oak Gall Ink

Making books used to be a long and expensive process. In the Middle Ages, people making a book wanted it to last, so they used animal skins, called parchment, instead of paper. Unlike paper, skin is not absorbent, so if you want to write on it, you have to create an ink that will both stick to the parchment and last a long time.

Somehow, oak gall ink (also called iron gall ink) was invented. The process of making it involves finding an oak tree that has been attacked by parasitic wasps. These wasps lay their eggs on the tree and force it to create little hard balls, called galls, where their eggs develop. These galls are then smashed to powder and left to stew in water for several days. The resulting brown liquid is mixed with an iron-containing compound that creates a black ink. To get this to stick to the page, a gum has to be added, too.

Even today, recreating oak gall ink can be tricky.^[8] Made incorrectly, it can flake off the page, leaving you with nothing but an expensively bound book of leather.

2 Indian Yellow

Indian yellow is not a simple pigment like many on this list. Instead of being a single chemical, it is composed of a range of chemicals, but this is only to be expected, given its source. When seen under sunlight, the yellow it produces is particularly luminous, as it fluoresces slightly. Some, however, thought that the pigment had an unpleasant smell, which, again, may be due to its source—cow urine.

Also known as purree, the pigment originated in India in the 15th century. It was made by feeding cows a special diet of mango leaves and letting them urinate onto a special sand. When the lumps of sand and dried urine were collected, they were ground to make the pigment. European artists loved the vivid yellow, and many famous works of art, including the stars of Van Gogh’s Starry Night, used it.

The artists themselves did not know what it was they were painting with. Indian yellow fell out of favor partly because of an investigation into its manufacture in the early 20th century.^[9] It was found that the diet of mango leaves fed to the cows left them very unhealthy. The practice was eventually banned.

1 Mummy Brown

Egyptian mummies are one of our best ways of learning about the past. As well as teaching us about the Egyptian funerary rites, they can tell us about the health of individuals, their cultural status, and much more. Even the wrappings used on the mummies can be revealing, as old texts were often used. Otherwise, lost works from the ancient world are still being recovered from mummies. Besides this, they are the physical remains of a once-living person, which makes it all the more tragic that thousands of them were unceremoniously ground up to make a pigment known as mummy brown.^[10]

Artists loved the tone of the pigment because it gave them a new color to capture the dark wood used inside homes at the time. But when it was discovered what the source was, some were deeply disturbed. Edward Burne-Jones is said to have given his tube of mummy brown a burial in the garden as soon as he found out what it was made from. Others were less squeamish. Martin Drolling supposedly used the corpses of disinterred French kings to make his own pigment.

Despite the moral issues of using mummies for paint, the practice only stopped in 1964, when the supply of mummies ran out.