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Keith Burnside - Lists at Ranker

Lists about the fascinating culture and practices of the civilization that occupied Northeastern Africa from 3000 to 300 BC. 

Walk Like an Egyptian

Egypt

Despite popular internet theories, ancient Egyptians weren&#39;t truly&nbsp;obsessed with death. Rather, <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ancient/afterlife-ancient-egypt.html">they were obsessed with life</a>&nbsp;-&nbsp;specifically, the afterlife. Preservation of the body and preparation for the next world were massively important concepts to most ancient Egyptians. So, how did people die&nbsp;in ancient Egypt? Frequently, they passed much like many do today -&nbsp;awaiting something better on the other side.

This hope for improvement in the next life - and this hope&#39;s&nbsp;adjacent anxiety - was not unfounded given the standards of the culture; as the <a href="http://escholarship.org/uc/item/9661n6rn#page-1">&quot;Violence&quot; entry</a> in the UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology states, &quot;However violent reality was, it pales in comparison to the violence potentially experienced as part of the afterlife.&quot;

Here are some of the craziest and most gruesome ways people died in ancient Egypt. Hopefully, those who suffered the fates below were able to avoid a second, more painful&nbsp;destiny in the afterlife.&nbsp;

10 Gruesome Ways People Died In Ancient Egypt

General

The 10 Most Gruesome Ways People Died in Ancient Egypt

Keith Burnside

Hey, Looky-Lous! Get your rubbernecks ready.

Cool Things You've Gotta See

Lists and galleries of some of the most famous, interesting, and beautiful buildings around the world and throughout history.

Architectural Marvels

Architecture

When you think of buildings made of trash, what do you imagine? A steaming pile of garbage with a leaky roof? Something so dirty a vulture wouldn't land on it? Or perhaps you're thinking of something more foundational, like the&nbsp;house built on sand by <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%207:24-27">that foolish man in&nbsp;the Gospels</a>.As it turns out, a lot of trash buildings look&nbsp;slick and standing firm once their enterprising owners finish putting all the bits and pieces in place. Sure, some of the final results are undeniably weird cases of what-in-the-world – but at the same time, many more are carefully planned, well-designed recycled structures that tower above a crumbling monotony of cookie-cutter neighborhoods and subdivisions.Some of those who build with trash are driven by environmental concerns,&nbsp;others just want to create something colossally unique.&nbsp;Often enough, it's a little bit of both.&nbsp;And then there's the people who are just plain crazy. But somehow, regardless of the architect's state of mind, these projects always seem to turn into works of art that attract the masses.&nbsp;

11 Absurdly Crazy Buildings Made from Trash and Recycled Materials

It's always made the world go-round, but how did people of the past let others know how much they had before the days of fast, shiny cars and cheesy name brand apparel? And why do economies keep collapsing? Study up to see why history repeats itself.

Money Matter$

Money

Some of the worst inflation in history has coincided with war, as several of the worthless (or nearly worthless) currencies on this list&nbsp;illustrate. Wars are massively expensive, and one of the fastest ways for a cash-strapped government to pay for one is to fire up the presses and churn out a pile of paper money. However, history's pretty clear that this tactic will get you stabbed in the back with the dull, rusty blade of inflation, and if that stab wound gets infected and turns into hyperinflation – which usually happens –&nbsp;your economy is toast. Which is doubly&nbsp;bad if you end up on the war's losing side.But there are other times currency became worthless, simply because of ill-advised financial policy, or because people are crazy and will do crazy things, which is why one of the currencies below is literally a living thing. So, ready to burn through some cash? Great, because here are examples of worthless currency in history –&nbsp;some old, some new, all ultimately useless.

12 Times Currency Was Rendered Almost Worthless (and Why)

Graveyard Shift

If you grew up going to a Christian church of some kind, you're probably aware that there are more than a few Christian hymns with scary lyrics out there. This really isn't too surprising given the often-scary content of the Holy Bible, and the different cultural and historical contexts from which these hymns hail. You don't need to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/mar/11/return-of-religious-films-legion">go to a theater to be horrified by Christian religious themes</a>; you can simply go to church and let your mind run wild with the lyrics.Or, you can turn off the lights in your room, fire up a few candles, and pretend to be in church while following along with this list of 18 scary traditional Christian hymns. They're all kind of terrifying, thanks to the violent, disturbing, or severely depressing themes hiding behind well-intentioned worship music, ranging from innocently weird to epically wreckful.

18 Traditional Christian Hymns That Are Totally Terrifying

Traditional Christian Hymns That Are Totally Terrifying

Lists that examine the unique, bizarre, and sometimes shocking ways that different worldwide cultures view and celebrate life and what comes next. 

Post-Mortem Rituals

Resting Places

Zoroastrian funerals are pretty different from what&#39;s usually found in Western tradition. That&#39;s because in <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/zoroastrian/" target="_blank">Zoroastrianism</a>, the age-old Parsi religion, dead bodies don&#39;t go underground; instead,&nbsp;they go sunbathing on what&#39;s called a &quot;Tower of Silence.&quot; That&#39;s weird, you might say. Why would anyone get rid of their dead like that?

The answer makes sense once you&#39;re aware that in&nbsp;Zoroastrianism, physical purity and spiritual purity are closely connected. Death is impure&nbsp;by default,&nbsp;as is anything that a dead body touches. In short, Zoroastrians need to dispose of their departed&nbsp;quickly and in a way that defiles as little of the material world as possible. The Towers of Silence work because of the exposure to the sun (but mostly because of the vultures - just like the Buddhist practice of <a href="http://www.ranker.com/list/sky-burial-facts/jeffrichard" target="_blank">Sky Burial</a>.)&nbsp;Zoroastrians are pretty serious about this ritual, to the point that <a href="http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/burial-iii" target="_blank">in the past they&#39;ve considered it a meritorious action</a> to dig up bodies and properly dispose of them. In locations where burial by exposure is illegal or too difficult, however, Zoroastrians turn to more traditional methods like cremation.

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10 Facts About Zoroastrian Funerals, Where They Feed The Dead To Vultures On Towers

10 Facts on Zoroastrian Funerals, Where They Feed the Dead to Vultur

Interesting

The Haida people, who have inhabited the Haida Gwaii archipelago off British Columbia, Canada, <a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/when-did-the-first-people-arrive-in-the-americas/article4431946/">for tens of thousands of years</a>, were some of the finest wood carvers in the Pacific Northwest during the totem pole boom that began in the late 18th century and carried itself to about 1900. In <a href="https://goo.gl/6LGpaF">Native Americans: An Encyclopedia of History, Culture, and Peoples</a> (1998), Barry Pritzker calls the Haida &quot;outstanding wood-carvers&quot; and speaks of their totem poles as some of the best in world history.This high praise extends of course to Haida mortuary poles, which are simply totem poles specially modified to hold human remains in a box at the top. <a href="http://www.royalbcmuseum.bc.ca/exhibits/tbird-park/html/early/ex12/ex12.htm">Here's an example from the 19th century</a>, showing the pole and the frontal board behind which the boxed body rested. &nbsp;The Haida were not the only people to carve these mortuary poles; they just did it better than anyone else. Their totem pole death legacy is actually quite fascinating, but in a way that's more admirable than macabre. To imply that there is anything spooky or crude about these poles would be to totally miss the point &shy;–&nbsp;the Haida had, and still have, great respect for those among them who ended up atop poles.

Fascinating Facts About Haida Mortuary Poles

A deep look at the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.

Alcohol Through the Ages

Alcohol

The 18th Amendment didn&#39;t do a whole lot in the way of making America sober up. It did, however, do a lot of damage to businesses across the country, mainly&nbsp;breweries and distilleries that were unable to keep going after their main products were made illegal. From 1920 to 1933, the federal government&nbsp;spent outrageous sums of money failing miserably at enforcing a law most people hated, and fighting a war with the criminals and gangsters who stepped up to fill the shoes of thousands of shuttered saloons and breweries nationwide.

<a href="https://www.brewersassociation.org/statistics/number-of-breweries/">Brewers Association has a nifty chart</a> showing the approximate number of breweries in the US&nbsp;from 1873 to 2015. You see a sharp decrease as the Temperance Movement&nbsp;picked up steam in the second half of the&nbsp;19th century. In 1873, there were more than&nbsp;4,000 breweries in the US. In 1888, only 15 years later, there were fewer than 2,000. By 1910, there were about 1,500.&nbsp;The number plunges to zero from 1920 to 1933.

Despite this catastrophic decline,&nbsp;there actually were some brewing companies that made it through Prohibition.&nbsp;Not many survived, but a few had the foresight, finances, and good old-fashioned luck to keep the doors open. Here&#39;s a list of 11 breweries that worked during Prohibition &ndash; plus one distillery, because <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/american-history-of-alcohol-choices/genevieve-carlton" target="_blank">America needed its bourbon</a>, too. Read on to find out&nbsp;how&nbsp;companies&nbsp;stayed&nbsp;in&nbsp;business&nbsp;during&nbsp;prohibition.

12 Brewing Companies That Couldn’t Be Stopped by Prohibition

Company

Fun and horrifying facts many weird, gross, and excruciatingly painful things that can happen to you & your body in your final moments.

Terrible Ways to Go

Biology

Not too long ago, spontaneous human combustion (SHC) was accepted by the general public&nbsp;as something to really crap your pants about. <a href="http://www.ranker.com/list/people-who-died-from-spontaneous-human-combustion/alby-thompson">People were catching fire</a>&nbsp;and scientists couldn't figure out what was going on. So what is spontaneous human combustion? It's basically exactly what it sounds like - suddenly, you just explode.&nbsp;In fact, people are still spontaneously combusting every once in a while, and there's still no definitive answer why.&nbsp;A lot of what's been written about SHC focuses mostly on mysterious, fiery deaths and the gruesome remains left behind. And for obvious reasons&nbsp;- everyone knows SHC sells. But there is a slew of weird points in its lively history, interesting tidbits that are often forgotten or ignored in favor of the crazy fact that someone just went up in flames for no good reason. So, for the record, here are a bunch of weird and often overlooked spontaneous human combustion facts to give you some insight into what happens to your body if you spontaneously combust.

Weird Things You Didn’t Know About Spontaneous Human Combustion

Mysteries

There are dozens of examples of unsolved codes and scripts spanning from earliest history to modern times. Linear A, Etruscan, the Pigeon Cipher, the fourth and final section of the Kryptos sculpture –&nbsp;the list of mysterious unsolved ciphers goes on and on. Many of these ciphers may never be cracked, if for no other reason than the limited sample size. For example, the ancient Greek writing system Linear A has&nbsp;over 1,400 existing specimens, but it all boils down to barely a couple pages' worth of content. That's not much for codebreakers to go on.But what about unsolved codes that might mean nothing? There are cases out there that have raised more than a few eyebrows and, for various reasons, seem a bit off. Might some of them actually be tricks, hoaxes, or jokes that long-forgotten pranksters played on humanity?The answer is most definitely yes, some of them might be exactly that. For all the effort people love to put into solving mysteries, there are always going to be those that simply&nbsp;don't have solutions. So, for anyone planning to head off into the hills to&nbsp;score some treasure or hunker&nbsp;down in a basement to&nbsp;unravel&nbsp;a baffling murder, here are some&nbsp;unsolved ciphers that might actually just be jokes on us all.

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