Abolitionist John Brown killed slavers with broadswords. King Roger II had a multi-ethnic court.

"A fun aspect of this period that's still evident today is the Jayhawk (the mascot of the University of Kansas). Jayhawkers was the name applied to the Free-State sect of the Border War that crossed over into Missouri, pillaging, burning, and killing numerous people.

Though the origin of the term Jayhawk isn't known, it's been retconned to mean a combination of the blue jay and the hawk. In case you didn't know, the blue jay is known for robbing the nests of other birds, and hawks are obviously birds of prey that swoop in for quick, devastating attacks. These two aspects reflected the actions of the Jayhawkers during the Border War."

"I'm a bit surprised to see my miniscule hometown mentioned on Reddit. I'm always saddened that the only fame we have is for being burnt to the ground. You make it sound a lot more interesting than the people at the fire museum."

"During this period, Sicily was an important place for the transmission of ancient Greek knowledge back into Europe from the Byzantines and the Arabs.

But it wasn't just simple copying of the ancients. Roger II commissioned and championed new work, for example, commissioning the top geographical work of the time, the tabula Rogeriana by Muhammad al-Idrisi. Sicily was also the home of the Salerno Medical School, possibly the top medical school in Europe at that time."

"Agreed! The Banana Wars are rarely taught due to the fact that they did not advance American foreign policy. Instead, they advanced the commercial interests of the United Fruit Company."

"What makes it even more interesting is that there is no consensus (that I know of) today in the Ukrainian government on whether it was a genocide or not. I traveled there a while back with my school and wrote a paper about Russia-Ukraine relations. During history classes, a teacher from the Eastern areas of the country is more likely to deny the genocide, while a teacher in Western Ukraine will probably agree that it was a genocide. Or at least, so was my impression.

Ukrainians, Russians, please correct me if I am wrong!"

"When the first few crew members died, there were enough men remaining to dig graves. The bodies were so well-preserved after 150 years encased in ice at sub-zero temperatures that it's like looking back in time.

For six years, they all died off, one by one, trying desperately to move south to find civilization...frost-bitten, starving to death, and delirious from the elements."

Please note: some comments have been edited for length and/or clarity.