AskHistorians

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I read an alt-history story about the Chinese discovering America in the 1500s. The Chinese start a smallpox epidemic, they say that they've had this happen before with natives on Tiwan, the Philippines and the spice islands. Did the Chinese really trigger virgin outbreaks in any of those places?	346
in HBO Rome Lucius Vorenus carries around the desiccated penis of someone he killed in Gaul. was taking body parts as trophies a thing Roman soldiers actually did?	345
Did the Mayans look down on native Americas who didn't live in cities like them, in the same way the greeks/Romans thought northern Europeans were "barbarians"?	339
There's several episodes of Downton Abbey where the family do the servants fairly substantial favours (like paying for medical care and such like). Are there many/any cases of aristocrats doing that sort of thing reality, a century or more ago?	337
just now I watched a YouTube video about how people need to continually add new chalk to the Uffington White Horse to keep it from disappearing. If that's true how did it survive the middle ages? why would medieval Christians care about preserving pre-roman pagan art?	332
During the cold war were there ever serious worries that even if the president gave the order, some of the guys manning the silos would just refuse the launch the missiles?	322
Suppose I'm a 20 year old upper class roman pagan in 313. How long will it be before my beliefs start making it difficult for me to get along politically?	320
Were the Spanish at all amazed by the alieness of the Aztecs and the Mayans (like modern westerners would be upon first contact with an alien people)?	305
suppose you're the son of a pharaoh sometime between 2000 BC and 1000 BC. What would your education consist of?	304
I've been listening to the history of Rome podcast. In it Mike Duncan says that when the vandals sacked Rome 455, they took all the gold the goths hadn't. Why would the goths have left any gold behind?	296

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