Inoculation

Mary Wortley Montagu, by Charles Jervas , after 1716

A column of Bulgarian Comitadjis captured during WWI in Thessaloniki .

Zimbabwean banknotes ranging from 10 dollars to 100 billion dollars printed within a one-year period. The magnitude of the currency scalars signifies the extent of the hyperinflation.

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu watched Ottoman doctors scratch pus into children's arms in 1717 and brought the technique to England the following year — inoculating her own son, then daughter, as living proof of concept.

Murder of the Notorious B.I.G.

Biggie Smalls was killed in Los Angeles on March 9, 1997 — six months after Tupac. The LAPD's own investigator identified a department officer as the prime suspect. The case was never prosecuted.

Ortolan bunting

French presidents draped napkins over their heads to eat ortolan buntings whole — bones, organs, beak — hiding the act from God's sight. Mitterrand ate two at his final meal, eight days before he died.

Komitadji

Komitadji fighters waged war on two fronts at once — killing Ottomans by day, settling scores with rival Bulgarian or Macedonian bands by night. A single mountain pass could change hands three times in one season.

Xuanzang

Xuanzang slipped out of Tang China illegally in 629 CE, walked to India alone through deserts that killed his guide, and returned 16 years later with 657 Sanskrit texts on 22 horses.

Decebalus

The last Dacian king slit his own throat on horseback as Roman cavalry reached him — the moment was carved in stone on Trajan's Column, his severed head then paraded to Rome.

Ten-Cent Beer Night

On June 4, 1974, Cleveland's Municipal Stadium sold beer for 10 cents a cup; by the ninth inning, fans swarmed the field armed with chains and knives, and the umpires forfeited the game to Texas.

Hyperinflation in Zimbabwe

At its worst, Zimbabwe's inflation hit 89.7 sextillion percent annually. Workers were paid twice a day so they could spend wages before lunch erased the value.

Thomson's lamp

Switch a lamp on and off — once per second, then half a second, then a quarter — completing infinite switches in two minutes flat. Mathematics gives no answer to whether it's on or off at minute two.