AskHistorians

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I'm a messenger in service to Genghis Khan sent to talk to the leaders of civilizations we plan on conquering. Is there anything I can do or say to prevent the leaders from killing me or am I just doomed to die if the leader has hostile intentions?	1729
You see in all sorts of fantasy media Knights who can single handedly slay scores of foot soldiers. Could one knight from the Middle Ages actually take on a dozen or so poorly trained/armored/armed soldiers and come out on top?	1334
Why did the Praetorian Guard still exist after it kept assassinating emperors? Shouldn’t it have been disbanded for its habit of killing the people they were supposed to guard?	1044
Did every early civilization decide to name their cities? Or is that something we’ve done more recently to make them easier to discuss? I.e. would someone living in Ur say “I live in Ur” or just “I live in that city over there”?	547
Is there a reason why the geographic “panhandles” exist in the USA? Why weren’t they merged more evenly with the surrounding states when they were formed?	207
JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, written in late 1980s Japan, has an arc in which a Nazi SS unit is depicted as unethical, but end up allies of the protagonists. How did the average Japanese in the 70s-80s view the Nazis/SS? Would a sizeable minority actually think they were unethical allies?	174
Movie swordfights nowadays are flashy but unrealistic. We don't know any better, but a medival citizen might. Were swordfights in medieval plays done realistically or flashily? And when/how did flashy swordfights become more popular on stage?	132
When/why did we go from “John the Elder and John the Younger” to “John Senior and John Junior?”	48
I’m an average peasant living in Central Europe around the year 900. After communion goes disastrously wrong, I find myself transported 300 years into the future. What would be the big change I see? Or could I even tell? Do I even know what year it is?	23
Nowadays everyone knows that it’s healthy to exercise. But how long has that been the case? Would you find an ancient Roman jogging? A Ming peasant doing push-ups? I don’t mean practicing with weapons, I mean plain working out.	21

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