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Why did so many Italians emigrate to Argentina?
On 13th of March, 2013, archbishop of Buenos Aires, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, became new pope of Catholic Church. He was born and raised in Argentina with Italian origins.
There are more than 24 millions of Argentinian citizens who have Italian roots,…
Darek Wędrychowski
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Did the U.S. and Soviet Union have a submarine battle in 1968?
There are books and articles about the Soviet submarine K-129 and the USS Scorpion in 1968, with various stories of attempted nuclear attacks and reprisals. Is there a factual narrative about these events (or non-events, if that's the case)?
xpda
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What is the origin of the "No Symbol"?
I have been able to trace the " No symbol" (red circle with single diagonal line through it, U+20E0 ⃠ COMBINING ENCLOSING CIRCLE BACKSLASH) as far back as the "Geneva Convention concerning the Unification of Road Signals" in 1931 where several signs…
SPavel
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How did off-grid UK homes in the 1800s generate gas?
Some relatives of mine live in (part of) what used to be a remote country manor house in the north of England. Even now it's remote enough not to have mains water, sewage or gas.
However, there's evidence that the house used to have gas. There's a…
ConanTheGerbil
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Did the Finns have aluminum screw caps in 1939?
I was looking at images from the 1939 Winter War
https://www.rferl.org/a/finlands-winter-war-with-the-soviet-union/30280490.html
and found this interesting one.
source
The Molotov cocktail has an aluminum screw cap. I did not think that such caps…
Willk
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Why didn't the silk road run north of the Black Sea?
I have read many times that the only way for Europeans to get to China, or vice versa, was through Anatolia and Persia. This gave Istanbul an advantage in throttling trade, as well as Mesopotamia and locations in Persia.
I am sure that due to…
social-biz
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Please help identify these old coins found in Germany?
We found these two identical coins in our garden (near Wuerzburg, lower Franconia / northern Bavaria):
Coin side A: coat-of-arms of sorts:
(the scale units are centimetres / millimetres)
Coin Side B - "templar-type cross":
Unfortunately rather…
FrankH.
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Could a German insult Hitler without being arrested?
According to Wikipedia, in its article about general Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck,
Later, when Hitler offered him the ambassadorship to the Court of St James's in 1935, he “declined with frigid hauteur”; the suggestion for the nomination as ambassador…
José Carlos Santos
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How did medieval manors handle population growth? Was there room for more fields to be ploughed?
Most villeins were bound to the manor and not allowed to move elsewhere. But what happened when the population grew? The size of the manor remained the same didn't it, so how did they keep up with the increased food requirement for all the people?…
Kristoffer Helander
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Who were the Huns and/or Xiongnu?
Who were the Hun people who made several appearances in Eurasian history?
Were they Finno-Ugric, Paleo-Siberean, Mongolic or Turkic?
Were the Hun who attacked Roman Empire extensions of the Xiongu, the first nomadic sovereign state in Central…
Dagvadorj
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When was this photo of Mission Dolores *actually* taken?
While researching another question concerning the cemetery at Mission Dolores, I came across an image which gives a date of 1856, in Wikipedia.
The image shows the mission in a state of disrepair, with plaster coming off the sides. I thought this…
justCal
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What's the meaning of a knight fighting a snail in medieval book illustrations?
Someone sent me this really weird picture of a medieval illustration.
It depicted a knight fighting a snail, and was basically a viral snarky commentary about how weird medieval ideas were.
I tried to figure out what it was about, and seemed to be…
DVK
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Where (if anywhere) were X-ray machines put on trains or trolleys to image "Everybody over 14 years old"?
The background image in this X-ray analysis sotfware page shows what looks like a trolley or train car on tracks with a sign that says "X-ray Now: Everybody over 14 years old".
Where might this have been and when? Was this practice widespread…
uhoh
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Who was the first female ruler to be given the suffix, "the great"?
Down through the ages exceptional elite leaders have been referred to with the suffix, the great. Cyrus the Great of Persia, Alexander the Great of Macedonia, and perhaps Alaric the Great of the Visigoths who sacked Rome or Peter the Great of…
user27618
31
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What were sandbags used for in medieval duels?
I was hesitant whether to ask this question in history or Shakespeare stack exchange, but I eventually decided it is more of a historical question. In the play "King Henry The Sixth" there is a fragment concerning a duel between an apprentice and…
Jakub
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