askhistorians

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You're a foodie with access to a time machine that will send you to whatever time you want for one week before returning you to the present. You've chosen the city of Rome in 168 AD. You bring enough cinnamon to buy whatever you want. What meals are you anxious to try this week?	498
When did the U.S. become an outlier in mass incarceration and why?	346
In honour of Roger Moore, did any MI6 agents really have a licence to kill? If so, are any targets from before 1985 declassified?	286
In "Alice's Restaurant", Guthrie says that if drafted, he will be forced to commit atrocities. But the song came out in 1967, a year before the My Lai Massacre. What war crimes by US soldiers in Vietnam were known to the American public in 1967?	283
The Rubik's cube was invented in Hungary in 1974. Tetris was created in 1984 in Moscow. Was there something about Eastern bloc culture in that era that made spatial puzzles particularly appealing? Also how were they marketed in Communist countries and how were they popularized in the West?	282
In 101 Dalmatians, would Cruella de Vil have a good defamation case against Roger for his song about her based on the UK laws in 1961?	271
Why is Jesus so overwhelmingly depicted with brown hair (or occasionally blond) but almost never black hair? I get European bias, but plenty of European people have black hair.	260
Ann Putnam was an accuser in the Salem Witch Trials who later apologized. But she didn’t say “We made it up.” She said at the time she believed the accused were guilty but now thought she had been deceived by the devil. Does that mean the accusers were suffering from delusions? Did others apologize?	241
Brazil is widely known to be the last country in the Americas to abolish slavery. Why did it last so long in Brazil and what pressures caused it to finally end?	224
How did citizenship work at the breakup of the Soviet Union? Could you move where you want and get citizenship there? Were you stuck with your birthplace? Or most recent residence?	223

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