Our history is filled with weird tales, and the best part is that some of them are true. Interested in these crazy moments, Redditor u/day-tripper96 made a post on the platform, asking other users: "What's a bizarre historical event you can't believe actually took place?" And people instantly flooded the comment section with answers.
From the CIA training a cat to spy on the Soviets to the great Emu War, continue scrolling to check out the most memorable ones together with Bored Panda's treat — an interview with Dr. Darren R. Reid, a historian who earned his Ph.D. from the University of Dundee and is now a lecturer at Coventry University.
#21
If I had a nickel for every time there was a Defenestration of Prague, I'd have ten cents, which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.
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147points
#23
Dr. Robert Liston performing a surgery with a 300% mortality rate. Wild if you read the story
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141points
#24
Napoleon was once attacked by a horde of rabbits.
Basically, a rabbit hunt was set up to celebrate the Treaties of Tilsit and they ended up amassing somewhere between hundreds and thousands of rabbits (accounts vary). Anyway, the day of the hunt they set the rabbits in cages surrounding the area that they would be hunting in.
They released them once everyone was set, but instead of being scared the bunnies swarmed the hunting party. At first they thought it was funny, but then it got overwhelming and Napoleon and the others had to flee from the bunnies in a coach.
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140points
#25
I am a big fan of the period when there were like three different popes all excommunicating each other and the term anti-pope is valid in Christian theology.
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132points
#26
The citizens of Holland once ate their prime minister, that's a bizarre case. It was the case of Johan de Witt 1672. You know, your political career is over when your citizens start to eat you...
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132points
#27
The Battle of Pelusium the persians straight up attached cats to their shields so the egyptians couldn’t attack the shields or fire arrows at them
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131points
#28
Alexander the Great named (or renamed) 70 cities after himself. Some still have the name or derivatives of it - Alexandria in Egypt being the most obvious, but also Iskandariya in Iraq and Kandahar in Afghanistan.
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129points
#29
Battle of Tsushima in 1905.
Russian Baltic fleet sails the long way (16k miles and 7 months) started by them opening fire on British fishing boats mistaken for Japanese vessels in the North sea.... sank their own ships while conducting target practice, then were destroyed by the Japanese fleet upon arrival (they mistook the Japanese ships for Russian and signaled them instead of firing).
119points
#30
Austro-Hungarian army started shooting at itself while fighting Ottomans. The German speaking troops apparently yelled "Halt" when they encountered the Slavic troops of the same army, which then the Slavic troops who spoke s**t German (if any) mistook for "Alah" and started shooting. I believe the Slavic troop was also severely drunk at that point
Actually... I can totally see this happening
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100points
