Random Knowledge

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This is inspired by a talk that apparently took place in the FAI where a bunch of people educated Nakia on several different topics. It got me thinking. We have a lot of knowledgable people (read: geeks) on the boards, and each of us probably have our specialties. If everyone post a snippit of their knowledge - no matter how obsecure it is - then we could learn a lot and possibly have something interesting to say to people at the next party we go to (ha ha - like we go to parties ).

So, go on. Teach your fellow forumers something interesting/informative, no matter how bizarre or obsecure it is. I only ask it to be actual information/knowledge, instead of random trivia typed stuff. Make it as basic or as complicated as you like. For some idea, apparently Nakia was taught virology by Ziad and scripting by Kenneth.

Why don't I simply check Random Pages on Wikipedia? Well, because it's not nearly as interesting as being taught stuff by your fellow forumers, now, is it?

I'm going to be primarily talking about history, because that's the only thing I know about. But feel free to teach anything. Hell, teach fictional lore if you want. You don't have to be as longwinded as I'm going to be (below) - I'm just longwinded by nature. Skip it if you like...

I shall start by offering a hugely-condensed version of Japanese history from c.1550 ~ 1615.

In 1560, Oda Nobunaga (head of the Oda Clan) first came to prominence by ambushing and killing Imagawa Yoshimoto (Battle of Okehazama), whose clan at that time was one of the strongest in the country. This battle came as an utter surprise because the Oda Clan was one of the weakest, and Oda Nobunaga was commonly regarded as an idiot for his whimsical actions. Following the Imagawa's defeat, Matsudaira Motoyasu, former vassal of the Imagawa, broke from them and declared independence. This man would later be known as Tokugawa Ieyasu. He and Nobunaga formed an alliance that allowed Nobunaga to safely expand west.

This is in central Japan. Map.

Over the next few years, the Oda clan slowly consolidate power by destroying smaller clans to the west. In 1572, the Oda were surrounded by an alliance that formed to destroy him - including the Takeda (exceptionally strong), the Azai, the Asakura, and the Ikko(a group of monks). Oda defeated the Azai and Asakura first (incidentally, Azai Nagamasa was Nobunaga's brother-in-law - a political marriage. Nagamasa betrayed the marriage alliance in favour of the century-old alliance with the Asakura), then narrowly smashed the Takeda in the Battle of Nagashino (see also Akira Kurosawa's Kagamusha). Don't believe what you read on Wikipedia - evidence suggests that the battle was a closer shave than what many believe them to be. The Oda thus became the most dominant power in Japan, holding roughly 1/6 of it. They began to expand westward towards the Chugoku and Shikoku regions (the East was held by Ieyasu, remember?).

In 1582, while his generals were out fighting with the armies, Nobunaga was betrayed by vassal Akechi Mitsuhide and murdered in the temple of Honnouji (in Kyoto). Hashiba Hideyoshi, Nobunaga's general who was at this time fighting in Chugoku, heard about this news and managed to return with his army to central Japan in three days to battle Mitsuhide. He won (Battle of Yamazaki), and thus Hideyoshi became Nobunaga's successor.
This is the situation he faced after Yamazaki.

Under Hideyoshi, Japan became unified. Hideyoshi launched a few econimically draining and unsuccessful campaigns to Korea, then died in 1598, leaving behind a very young successor (6 years old, IIRC). He was to be aided by 5 men, one of which included Ieyasu.

Ieyasu, however, steadily expanded his power. Within months the samurai clans in Japan are divided into two camps: those following Ieyasu (mostly Northern/Eastern lords) and those following Mitsunari (mostly Southern/Western lords). Mitsunari was a vassal of Hideyoshi, and fought on behalf of his son.

In 1600 the Battle of Sekigahara erupted - the ultimate showdown in Japan that decided its fate. As you can see from the map, virtually all of the clans threw in their lot and made a bet (the Sanada, however, had a son on each side - which is why they weren't wiped out after the Eastern victory). The armies were about evenly matched. It was mainly fought in Sekigahara (duh?), which was in central Japan, but a number of other campaigns took place in relation of this as well (eg: Battle of Hasedo, Second Battle of Ueda). The battle was a close shave, but the betrayal of western-army Kobayakawa Hideaki sealed the Western army's fate. Mitsunari was defeated, captured, and executed. Thus, Ieyasu established his bakufu - his shogunate.

In 1615, in the Battle of Osaka, he stamped out the aforementioned son of Hideyoshi, who was stubbornly fighting to his last (his general here was Sanda Nobuyuki, aka Yukimura). Thus Japan was unified under the Tokugawa Shogunate for some 200 years (until the Westerners started rocking in, and the Meiji Restoration happened).
Map.

The End!
Of course, I had to omit just about everything (Chousoukabe, Uesugi, Saito, Hojo, Tachibana, Date, Shimazu, Mori...for people who are curious and want to Wiki), but it's a start.

Okay, now your turn. Share something about anything.

 

O.K.

Art - I know a lot about art history, fundamentals, and art products. Winsor and Newton company has been manufacturing pigment based paints for a lot of years. Quite a few years back they made a pigment called Mummy. It was a brownish kind of colour and it was actually made of ground up Egyptian mummys. I am dead serious about this. They stopped manufacturing it when people began to realize just what they were painting with. Also, a particular kind of yellow, I think it was indian yellow, used to be made out of the urine of cows who were fed mango leaves. Since it was pretty hard on the cows, they stopped making the colour that way.

Another piece of art history that a lot of people don't realize is that the reason Vincent Van Gogh went crazy was lead poisoning from his paints.

 

How the heck did they get hold of the Mummy? Wouldn't that be blatantly illegal?

My contribution to the topic for this post:
The idea that medieval people thought the world was flat is rubbish - that's a modern myth. There are drawings and calculations that prove this knowledge (I can't remember off the top of my head). This modern myth of "haha medieval people are stupid" is invented, IIRC, by Washington Irving in a short story back in the 19th century.

So, when Columbus sailed across the world, nobody thought he was going to fall off the earth.

 

Nunna daul Isunyi

The Trail of Tears

In the case of Worcester vs Georgia the Supreme Court affirmed the sovereignty of the Cherokee Nation. President Andrew Jackson defied the decision of the Supreme Court and ordered the removal of the Cherokee Nation peoples from their land. In 1835 100 Cherokees banded together and called themselves the Treaty Party. They were not authorized by the Cherokee Nation to represent it but never the less they signed a treaty with the United States Government agreeing to their removal from their ancestral home. The Cherokee Nation had passed a law forbidding the signing of such a treaty and the penalty was death. Most of the members of the Treaty Party died.

President Jackson however used this Treaty as a basis for ordering the removal of the Cherokees from their land. Unfortunately gold had been discovered in Georgia in the early 1800's so guess who wanted to move in?

Earlier a group of Cherokees calling themselves the Old Settlers had voluntarily moved to Arkansas and this was also used as an excuse. People (white) said "See they want to move."

In 1838 most of the 17,000 Cherokees were forcibly removed from their ancient lands. A few hundred did manage to evade removal by one means or another and formed the Eastern Cherokee Nation.

It is estimated that some 4,000 Cherokees, men, woman and children died on the march to what is now Oklahoma. Nunna daul Isunyi—“the Trail Where They Cried"

Prior to this forced removal three other of the Five Civilized Nations had been removed by ones means or another. The Seminole Indians vanished into the Everglades. Even as late as the 15950;s I remember a family friend saying they weren't very friendly to whites. Wonder why?

 

Another myth is that Columbus was the first to sail to the Americas... which is still taught in schools over here (USA).

It has been documented that the Vikings explored and even established temporary settlements in Greenland and Newfoundland, and possibly farther along the coasts. Furthermore, much research is being done to prove that the Chinese managed to sail to the Americas and back, whether by accident, or intent, I can't remember what the line of thinking was. Lastly for now, the Portuguese had already been fishing off the coast of Brazil by the time Columbus had discovered America (this is from a professor so I dunno what exactly "of the coast of Brazil means").

Oh yeah, a there is also a theory floating around (though VERY unlikely) that the Olmec (early Indigenous American tribe) are descendants of the Biblical Phoenicians, or possibly early Carthaginians.

 

While the Vikings certainly sailed to Greenland and Newfoundland, I'm not sure if they did rock to America. If you're referring to that map, I'm sure it's a myth.

I've heard the Chinese theory too. Apparently they sailed to Mexico - but this is a lot of apparentlys and conjective evidece so I'm quite reluctant to judge.

Contribution: this is pretty general knowledge, but Alexander the Great's claim to fame was the sarissa - 7 metre (!) long spears. He had his army hold these and move in phalanxes of 16 people deep and 16 wide, so they were like a porcupine of death. Each man had a shield that guarded the person to his right, and when enough of these units are together it's nigh unstoppable. People simply could not get close enough to fight them - they'd just get impaled, and their spears aren't nearly long enough. If held up at 45 degrees, the sarissa could also block incoming projectiles.

Needless to say these are ridiculously heavy. One professor at my uni made a replica, and average high school students could not hold them for two minutes. 7 metre is about the size of a one-story building, btw. Alexander's men marched with these from Greek to Persia, but it was later abandoned when they started going into India - Alex wanted mobility, I guess.

This military innovation and accompanying training, btw, wasn't done by Alexander, but instead by his father Philip, who is rather a cool guy but sadly overshadowed by his cooler son.

 

Actually, after Napoleon's conquest of Egypt and throughout a large part of the 19th century following it, mummies were shipped out of Egypt in huge amounts. There were so many of them (well, many were animal, but human too) that they were used in preparing all sorts of quasi cures, for paint, as D-Fly mentioned, for making those cardboard bags, even as fuel for furnaces...) And, no I'm not kidding. The mummies used to be quite present.

As for topic aditions - my main area is organic chemistry, with dabbling in various other stuff.

One of the most prominent medieval smithies for two-handed swords was located in Germany and their mark on the swords was a wolf. The other big one had the mark of a lilly.

Bookkeeper - the only word in English language that has three pairs of same letters side by side: B-oo-kk-ee-per.

 

In a lottery in which you need to choose 6 numbers from 49, the chance of getting all 6 numbers right is one in 13 983 816.

The avocado is so named because it resembles a testicle. I cant remember which language originally provided the word, look it up on wikipedia.

 

henry the 8th only had 2 wives, all human beings have 4 nostrils, the steam engine was invented in greece, over a billion people have been killed by marmots, the largest thing a blue whale can swallow is a grapefruit

 

Actually, I go to lots of parties. I'm just not invited to most of them.

Anyway, as to the topic:

1. The palindrome of Bolton is Notlob

2. The mollusc is a soft-bodied, unsegmented invertebrate animal usually protected by a large shell. One of the most numerous groups of invertebrates, it is exceeded in number of species only by the arthropods

3. Amongst the Spanish Inquisition's weaponry are such diverse elements as: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope, and nice red uniforms.

Everyting I know, I learned from Monty Python.

 

Not quite. A palindrome is a word or phrase that reads identically from the front or the back. Racecar, for example, is a palindrome because if you reverse the letters it still says racecar.

 

Only in elementary school I believe. I think highschools teach otherwise. Well, at least my highschool did.

 

You must have had a special high school! Seriously though, mine did mention it, but ask the kids and about 8 out of 10 would say he was first, another other would say the Vikings, and the last kid wouldn't say anything. A contributing factor to this is that we celebrate Columbus day, so people tend to think he discovered that there was a big hunk of land out here...

I like Silvery's contribution on Henry VIII only having two wives, since it is clever. He believed himself to be wedded to six different women (I believe), but all but two of those were annulled (not divorced), therefor he only actually had two wives... Jane Seymour and Catharine Parr.

 

Good King Henry the VIII's Wives.

Catherine of Aragon- Annulled by the newly established Anglo Catholic Church.
Anne Boleyn - Executed but the marriage was dissolved before her execution.
Jan Seymour- died from child birth complications after giving birth to Henry's long awaited male heir.
Anne of Cl eves-Annulled - The story goes that she and Henry took one look at each other and said "Let's just be friends."
Kathryn Howard- Executed. I couldn't find any mention of the marriage being disolved but since her behavior would be considered treason maybe that was automatic.
Katherine Parr - She got lucky and outlived Henry.

 

There's a rhyme - "divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived."

Here's something. Queen Elizabeth never said the famous quote about not wishing to make windows into men's souls - that was coined by Francis Bacon. However, the quote is still extremely useful to write essays with because it sums up her PoV quite well.

 

I know it was a long time ago when I studied geography but when I did I was taught there was a North America which included Canada, the United States and a lot Mexico. Then there was Central America and South America. Did Columbus ever actually land on the mainland of North America?

We could just say that Columbus discovered the New World, the Vikings discovered a bunch of grapes and the Chinese discovered something.

After all going from the Arctic to the Antarctic that is a lot of land and anyone trying to sail round the world, whether east to west or west to east would be bound to hit some land that now has America included in its name.

edit: Speaking of the Chinese, they discovered gunpowder, right? But they didn't use it for a wapon but enterainment, ceremonial, religious use. Not sure about the religious use. But they didn't go around killing each other with it. At least that is what I understand.

 

uummm, sorry nakia but according to wikipedia & quoting from Chase, Kenneth (2003), Firearms: A Global History to 1700, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0521822742 .

"The Chinese wasted little time in applying gunpowder to warfare, and they produced a variety of gunpowder weapons, including flamethrowers, rockets, bombs, and mines, before inventing firearms.There was once a great deal of confusion and controversy surrounding the invention of firearms, but it is now generally accepted that firearms originated in China"

 

It's true - the Chinese did use it for a variety of interesting weapons. It was the Westerners, however, who developed cannons and probably perfected muskets.

 

A nebula is an interstellar cloud of dust, hydrogen gas and plasma. it is the first stage of a star's cycle and it is usually formed as a result of a supernova explosion, which is when a star dies explosively. Nebulae(plural) have been dubbed the crown jewels of the universe for their magnificient formations and they are eye candy for anyone. The most famous nebula is "The Pillars of Creation" captured by NASA.