When Julius Caesar visited Egypt and was shown around by Cleopatra the Sphinx was still completely covered in sand and the great Pyramid was 31 feet taller than it is today.
(Book – Cleopatra: A Life – Stacy Schiff)
When Julius Caesar visited Egypt and was shown around by Cleopatra the Sphinx was still completely covered in sand and the great Pyramid was 31 feet taller than it is today.
(Book – Cleopatra: A Life – Stacy Schiff)
The ‘Holy Koran’ is supposed to be recited in Arabic which is why so many Muslims memorize it. It tells the story of Moses, Noah and the flood, and it tells the story of the prophet Jesus who was born to the Virgin Mary but he is considered completely human.
(The Great Courses – Sacred Texts of the World)
It is estimated that humans can distinguish about 500 different variations in brightness and 6 Million hues of color. Humans can also be taught to distinguish hues but women appear to be naturally better at color vision.
(The Great Courses – Understanding the Brain)
Only 18% of the worlds Muslims are Arabs. Two of the largest non-Arab Muslim countries are Indonesia and Pakistan.
(The Great Courses – Sacred Texts of the World)
Magellan left Spain with five ships to try and get to the Spice Islands in the Pacific Ocean by sailing West. The Spice Islands which are called the Moluccas actually comprise about one thousand small islands but the Europeans only considered the five largest to be the Spice Islands. They are named Ternate, Tidore, Motir, Makian and Bacan and the main spice which was loaded onto the ships were cloves which were considered more valuable than gold. Only two ships with sixty crew made it to the Spice Islands and only one ship made it back to Spain with only eighteen members of the original crew of over two hundred thirty. Several other members of the crew which were marooned in several places also eventually made it back to Spain. One of the ships had mutinied in South America and made it back to Spain before they even got to the tip of South America. The one ship that made it back was full of cloves which were so valuable that the entire venture was a commercial success for the original investors.
(Book – Over the Edge of the World:Magellan’s Terrifying Circumnavigation of the World – Laurence Bergreen)
The Buddhists have a story which ends with a rabbit giving himself up to be food for others. The Gods were so impressed they put him on the moon. When Buddhists look at the moon they see a rabbit in the moon.
(The Great Courses – Sacred texts of the World)
The original ‘Book of Ruth’ in the Jewish tradition had no references to God which concerned early priests. Later versions added many lines which added references to God which are in today’s version.
(The Great Courses – Sacred Texts of the World)
The world’s earliest printed book was printed in 868 CE in Dunhuang, China. It is a copy of the Buddhist Diamond Sutra and was discovered in 1900. It is a 16 foot long scroll and was printed almost 600 years before the Gutenberg Bible.
(The Great Courses – Sacred texts of the World)
At birth the brain has more neurons than it will ever have again. About 70% of neurons die shortly after birth because they are no longer needed since they were used in the initial growth of the brain and the pathways.
(The Great Courses – Understanding the Brain)
During the Greek Golden Age many Greek settlements were founded in Sicily and the southern areas of The Italian peninsula. The Carthaginians were really just the Phoneticians from the area around Lebenon/Israel who settled in Northern Africa and then became their own empire after Alexander the Great took over the areas of the Middle East. The Carthaginians then expanded in the western Mediterranean and fought the Greeks for control of Sicily. By the time the Carthaginians won the Romans were expanding and eventually made Sicily one of their provinces by defeating the Carthaginians in the first Punic War.
(Book – The Rise of Rome – Anthony Everitt)