10 creepy historical facts

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

A human corpse soaked in honey, parts of which were eaten for medicinal purposes. Treatment of human flesh, waste of wives, lobotomy in the Kennedy family and some other facts, from which frost on the skin …

Honey corpses

The honey man is a commodity that could be purchased in the 12th century in large Arabian bazaars. It is a human corpse soaked in honey, parts of which have been taken orally for medicinal purposes.

In the reference book “Medicinal Substances in Chinese Medicine” (1597), a description of how this honey corpse was created is preserved: “In Arabia, there are men aged 70 to 80 years who want to give their bodies in order to save others. Such a person does not eat food, he only drinks honey and bathes in honey. After a month, he excretes only honey (urine and excrement are composed of honey) and soon dies. His assistant places him in a stone coffin filled with honey, in which he soaks. The month and year of death are recorded on the coffin. After a hundred years, the coffin is opened. The candied body is used to heal broken and injured limbs. When a small amount is taken internally, the pain stops immediately.

Human flesh treatment

By the way, until the end of the 18th century, human flesh was traditionally present in the arsenal of European medicine. At the beginning of the 17th century, doctors used the remains of those executed, as well as the corpses of beggars and lepers.

Pharmacologists and healers of that time gave recommendations on eating human flesh, allegedly curing many diseases - the blood of gladiators was considered a cure for epilepsy, powder from Egyptian mummies was considered the "elixir of life", human skulls served to stop bleeding, fat - for the treatment of rheumatism and arthritis. And it was possible to get the remaining years of life from the flesh of a person who died an unnatural death.

So the German pharmacologist of the 17th century Johann Schroeder recommended cutting human meat into small pieces, adding a little myrrh and aloe, soaking in wine alcohol for several days, and then drying it in a dry room.

And the famous Paracelsus argued that parts of the corpse and blood were essential items that were in every pharmacy.

Even the ancient Romans, the author of the publication in the journal points out, considered the blood of gladiators as a cure for epilepsy. During the Renaissance, powder from Egyptian mummies, considered the "elixir of life", gained popularity. Human skulls were used to stop bleeding. Fat - for treating rheumatism, gout and arthritis. For dizziness, a crushed human heart is recommended - "a pinch in the morning on an empty stomach." For the treatment of teeth, powder from the teeth of the dead was used, mixed with the milk of a dog. There were many prescriptions for the treatment of epilepsy. For example one was based on baby dust powder.

In addition, if a person did not die a natural death, it was believed that by eating his flesh, one could get the remaining years of his life.

When Pope Innocent VIII was dying in 1492, his doctors pumped out the blood of three boys and gave him to drink. The boys are dead. Daddy too. Was it cannibalism? Sugg's answer to this question is in the affirmative.

Sale of wives

Until the beginning of the 20th century, there was a tradition of selling wives in Europe. a woman who got married was the property of her husband and was, in fact, an absolutely powerless being. The sale was announced in advance and an auction was held - a noose of rope was put on a woman's neck or waist, her hands were tied. The wife was given away at the highest price charged. This was one way for a man to end an unsatisfactory marriage. Similar auctions were regularly held in the 18th and even 19th centuries.

There have been cases when a woman sold herself in an attempt to get rid of a terrible marriage. The sale of the wife survived in some form until the beginning of the 20th century. The last known case was in 1913, when a woman claimed in Leeds Police Court that she had been sold to one of her husband's comrades.

Lobotomy in the Kennedy family

The Kennedy clan was essentially an American royal family with tremendous political power and racy rumors about their personal lives. Their family pictures, full of happiness, fun and wealth, inspired people to seek their "American happiness".

However, this story was hidden from the public for a long time. In the photo, in the bottom row on the right, sits Rosemary Kennedy, whom the head of the family Joseph P. Kennedy Sr., an ambitious and demanding person with respect to his children, considered a big problem for his family. He considered the girl to be frankly stupid, having a rebellious character, and, according to unverified data, she had a mental disorder. And in order not to spoil the happy picture of his family, his father put Rosemary in a psychiatric clinic, where, on his instructions, she underwent a lobotomy. Profitable. Rosemary, who, according to historians, may have suffered from some kind of mental disorder, was conscious throughout the operation, which naturally ended in failure. The girl essentially turned into a vegetable, unable to speak and control her intestines, with the intelligence of a 2-year-old child. She spent the rest of her life in a medical facility, away from the public, and her brother John at this time became a presidential candidate.

Mores of Siam

In the 19th century, in Siam, it was forbidden to touch royalty on pain of death. And this led to a tragedy. Queen Sunandha Kumariratana once rode a boat and the boat capsized. Many residents saw this tragedy, but not a single one moved. The queen, along with her little daughter, drowned in front of the servants and the people.

Rat King

Until now, no one can really explain why rats make this knot from intertwined tails, mixed together with blood, dirt and excrement. Rats grow with tied tails, which are often broken. Historically, finding the rat king was considered a bad omen associated with epidemics.

Waterloo teeth

After major battles, in which tens of thousands of young soldiers perished, they pulled out their teeth right on the battlefield, from which they later made prostheses. As soon as the smoke cleared, and the military left the battlefield, scavengers came out of their hiding places and began to examine the corpses in search of precious prey, not particularly caring about whether the person had died or was only seriously wounded.

This phenomenon was called "the teeth of Waterloo" - the marauders pulled out thousands of teeth from the dead English, French and Prussian soldiers who died during the last Napoleonic battle.

Of particular note is the American Civil War, which brought a "good harvest" - teeth torn from fallen soldiers from both warring sides were sent on ships to England, where they were either sold individually or made into dentures.

Police and human skin

Henri Pranzini, a late nineteenth century French criminal known by the nickname "The Fascinator" was executed by guillotine. "The charming woman" was famous for his style, for example, he wore a ring on his hand with a tooth inserted into it, personally knocked out by a bandit from a woman he had robbed. Later, his personal belongings, including this ring, were put up for auction. But it was not the ring that made a splash, but the cigarette case, which the police made of his skin.

Woman man

Eugenia Falleni, 1920, Annandale, New South Wales, dressed as a man from her teens, worked in a brick factory and a stable boy, was a cabin boy. On one of his trips to the seas, the captain of the ship suspected a woman in the cabin - Evgenia was raped by sailors, soon gave birth to a child, but left him in the care of a distant relative. And she herself, still wearing a man's outfit, decided to get married. Taking the name Harry Crawford to marry a widow with a 13-year-old son, Annie Birkett. For many years, their married life proceeded quite calmly and the wife never realized that her husband was "not quite a man."

On October 1, 1917, Harry invited his wife to a picnic in the country, from which she did not return. Harry stated that his wife ran away and soon remarried. But the stepson did not leave this business so - he found a place where his mother went with her "husband" and a charred corpse of a woman was found at the picnic site. Harry was arrested after hitting the police with a request to put him in a women's cell.

Several dildos were found in Harry's belongings. His second wife, Elizabeth Allison, said at the trial: “He was the perfect husband and we were very happy! And the fact that he performed marital duties in his underwear or a dressing gown did not bother me - he explained this by his puritanical upbringing."

Harry, or rather Eugene, was sentenced to death, but later the execution was changed to life imprisonment, but she was released 11 years later and was soon killed by a passing car.

It was believed that 38-year-old John Birkett, the son of the murdered Annie Birkett, could have been driving that car.

Deadly chess

The Spanish inquisitor Pedro de Arbuez de Epila came up with a sophisticated, bloody entertainment - live chess.

For the game, a sufficient number of imaginary or real heretics was needed - the guilt or innocence of a person in this case did not matter. The selected people were dressed in white and black clothes and placed on the board. Two old blind monks played such chess.

As soon as one "ate" the figure of the other, the executioner came to the corresponding cage and killed the unfortunate man, piercing him with a spear or chopping off his head. By the end of the game, the entire chess field was littered with the disfigured corpses of "chess pieces".

An interesting fact - the Catholic Church solemnly recognized the bloody chess player Arbues, who was killed in 1485, as a martyr. Pope Alexander VII in 1661 recognized him as a righteous man, and in 1867 Pius IX even canonized him.