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A Brief History of Tobacco in the Americas
The history of tobacco use in the Americas goes back over 1,000 years when natives of the region chewed or smoked the leaves of the plant now known as Nicotiana rustica (primarily in the north) and Nicotiana tabacum (mostly in the south...
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Zheng Yi Sao
Zheng Yi Sao (aka Ching Shih, Cheng I Sao, Ching Yih Saou or Mrs Cheng, d. 1844) was the chief of a massive pirate confederation which plundered the South China Sea in the early 19th century. She inherited the role from her late husband...
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Portuguese Malacca
The Portuguese colonised Malacca (modern Melaka) on the southwest coast of the Malay peninsula from 1511 and kept it until 1641 when the Dutch took over. The port controlled the Malay Straits which lead from the Indian Ocean (the Andaman...
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Menehune
Menehune is the term applied to short-statured, forest-dwelling creatures of Hawaiian mythology and is part of a common mythology throughout Polynesia that describes secretive, supernatural beings with human-like attributes. Mysterious supernatural...
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The Description of Africa
The Description of Africa is the first comprehensive book about Africa, written by Leo Africanus, an African scholar trained in the Islamic intellectual tradition, in 1526, during the Italian Renaissance. A skillful mixture of anthropology...
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Pawnee
The Pawnee are a Native American nation of the Plains Indians culture originally from the region of modern Nebraska. Prior to the European colonization of the Americas, they were among the most powerful of the Plains Indian tribes numbering...
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Samoset
Samoset (l. c. 1590-1653, also given as Somerset) was the Abenaki Native American who first approached the English settlers of Plymouth Colony (later known as pilgrims) in friendship, introducing them to natives Squanto (l. c. 1585-1622...
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Zheng Yi
Zheng Yi (also Cheng I, Ching Yih, Cheng Yao-I, Cheng Wen-Hsien, or Cheng Yud) was a Chinese pirate who lived from 1765 to 1807. Operating in the South China Sea, Zheng Yi famously led a 600-ship pirate confederation. This force of more than...
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Etowah Mounds
Etowah Mounds (also known as Etowah Indian Mounds) is a National Historic Landmark and archaeological site near Cartersville, Georgia, USA, enclosing the ruins of a prehistoric Native American city whose original name is unknown. The present...
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Indigo Revolt
The Indigo Revolt (aka Indigo Riots or Blue Mutiny) of 1859-60 in Bengal, India, involved indigo growers going on strike in protest at working conditions and pay. The subsequent violence was aimed at exploitative European plantation owners...