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Most anyone who has received a basic education in world history knows the story of how "in 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue." Most also know that Christopher Columbus made first contact with the Americas while searching for a water route to Asia. However, far fewer people remember that the search for such a route continued for centuries after Columbus' death.

Since the earliest days of civilization, people have built homes not just for shelter, but to proclaim their status in the world. There is evidence from the earliest known cultures that one way in which rulers showcased power was by building a more elaborate home than those around them had. Through the centuries, as homes grew larger and better furnished, those in charge had to make their homes even larger and furnish and decorate them even more.

The Guillotine. Its very name recalls scenes of horror during the French Revolution, as nobles lost their heads while gangs of people cheered and Madame Defarge knitted. Some of history's most famous people lost their heads at the guillotine, including Marie Antoinette, King Louis XVI of France, and Robespierre, and the apparatus is immediately recognizable across the world, not just for its appearance but for all the stories in which it featured prominently.

Modern views of animals range from hunters who pay big money to go on safaris in Africa to vegans who refuse to use even the wool or milk from a fellow creature, and as is the case with most controversies, most people fall in the middle, not wanting to kick a dog but still enjoying a good steak. However, in the early 20th century, the standards were much different, with animals seen as strictly property to be gathered and used with little to no consideration about their health or feelings.

Big Ben is one of the most recognizable symbols of Britain, and indeed one of the most famous structures in the world. A quintessential part of London, every movie set in London features an establishing shot of Big Ben, and many guidebooks of London have the clock tower as its cover photo. London and Big Ben are forever linked in the consciousness of the Western world.

Nowadays, the pope is synonymous with unparalleled piety, compassion, and benevolence. To many, the pope is the embodiment of godly love in its purest form. This is a far cry from how things were just a few centuries ago. Back in the day, the most notorious of popes were nothing more than power-hungry dictators and cutthroat political experts. Indeed, by the late 14th century, tensions within the Church reached a breaking point, resulting in the infamous split of the Catholic Church, one that saw multiple popes fighting to knock the others off their thrones.

In the 14th century, a ruthless killer stalked the streets of England, wiping out up to 60 percent of the terror-stricken nation's inhabitants. This invisible and unforgiving terminator continued to harass the population for hundreds of years, but nothing could compare to the savagery it would unleash three centuries later. This conscienceless menace was none other than the notorious bubonic plague, also known as the "Black Death".

Poseidon is one of the most easily recognizable characters in all of ancient Greek mythology. His signature trident is iconic; one sight of it invariably floods the modern mind with images of aquatic chariots and daunting typhoons. But there is so much more to the character of Poseidon than maritime denizens and disasters, which shouldn't really come as a surprise.

World War II stood apart in many ways from every earlier war, not least in the way that it reached to every corner of the planet and involved a noticeable segment of humanity's collective resources. Battles erupted not only on land and the sea's surface as they had for centuries, but also in the ocean depths and the windswept heights of the sky. One of the war's most crucial struggles happened in the realm of the unseen, inside the human mind and amid the invisible flow of radio waves.

Of all the goals the Bolshevik Revolution aimed to bring about, perhaps nowhere were Russian promises delivered on more than in the success of the Soviet Space program of the 1950s and 1960s. As a result of Russian innovation and technology, but also due to incredible drive to modernize and compete with the United States for world power, Russia was finally and triumphantly modernized in the eyes of her own people and the world.

Most commonly known as the antagonists of the pantheon of gods led by Zeus, the Titans embody "unrest" and "transience" for the modern listener, but for reasons less than the obvious. History, after all, is the story of the winners, and the world of the ancient Greeks was a world of a very real, highly querulous pantheon that it behooved ancient writers to glorify in their works.

Lying in the middle of a plain in modern-day Iran is a forgotten ancient city, Persepolis. Built two and a half thousand years ago, it was known in its day as the richest city under the sun. Persepolis was the capital of Persia, the largest empire the world had ever seen, but after its destruction, it was largely forgotten for nearly 2,000 years, and the lives and achievements of those who built it were almost entirely erased from history.

In 353 BCE, when King Mausolus of Halicarnassus passed away, his sister and queen Artemisia was inconsolable, but she found a way to honor him through finishing a project that they had started together during his life: the construction of a mausoleum that was so marvelous it would later be considered one of the Seven Wonders of the World.

Perhaps the most famous – or as many would put it, infamous – of these naval corporations was the Dutch East India Company, also known as VOC. Established around the beginning of the 17th century, this nautical behemoth of a corporation was determined to squeeze everyone else out of the market. Vested with the power to wage war and exterminate any who dared stand in their way, the rest of the world stood by as the unstoppable force took over the whole of international maritime trade.

The Ancient Greeks have long been considered the forefathers of modern Western civilization, but the Golden Age of Athens and the spread of Greek influence across much of the known world only occurred due to one of the most crucial battles of antiquity: the Battle of Marathon.

The intentional deprivation of one's most physical and carnal needs is a concept that has existed since the beginning of time, more commonly known as "mortification". The Bible makes one of the earliest references to "mortification of the flesh", as seen in Colossians 3:5, which reads, "Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry."

There are hundreds of pyramid-shaped hills distributed in and around central Bosnia and Herzegovina, yet one in particular has achieved worldwide attention over the last decade. Found in the small town of Visoko, located about 30 kilometres northwest from Sarajevo, the hill is the tallest point in a landscape of tremendous historical importance for the country. The region has been occupied from prehistoric times.

The Fourth Crusade from 1202-1204 is significant in medieval history because it was the first time a crusade was directed against another Christian group. It was also significant since it encompassed two of the four major sieges of Constantinople, and it also sparked a third in 1235 (an unsuccessful attempt to reverse the Latin gains in 1204).

Ireland has a rich folklore. Everyone knows about the fairy folk and leprechauns and many have heard of the fearsome banshee. There are also the usual ghost stories found in every old land. The stranger side of the Emerald Isle goes much deeper than that, however, with tales of phantom armies marching through the sky, sea monsters swimming in the waters around the island, and stories of strange powers and dark magic.

Although Russia has long been considered part of Europe, it has always had a culture so distinct and a history so different that it is still foreign to Western Europe in many ways. Naturally, this sense of otherness has lent an aura of intrigue and mystique to Russia as people have struggled to understand it. Over the long course of Russian history, perhaps no aspect of the giant country has generated interest quite like Siberia, the easternmost part of Russia that lies in Asia.