There was a long held belief that most peasants were illiterate in the 1500s until literally schoolbooks from the 1500s were excavated in Russia of a 7 year old boy’s learning to read and write.

The the point where we actually have pieces of his writing where he GOT BORED and started drawing pictures about how big and brave he was and drew a picture of himself as a warrior AND wrote his friend (presumably also a 7 year old boy)’s name on it to show him “Hey look at this cool thing I wrote about me fighting a bear”

hold on. *gets up to pull my book from my shelf*

OK! The boy’s name was Onfim because he had to write his name on his spelling exercises. The city was called Novgorod and is the most ancient recorded Slavic city in Russian history. The message to his friend was “Greetings from Onfim to Danilo” and just because he was unsure if the pictures he drew on his spelling homework made sense, he labeled the creature he was fighting with “I am a wild beast!”

Before these types of writing were discovered it was thought that the peasant class was illiterate and that writing was ONLY for the church and the ruling class. But after finding these as well as THOUSANDS of other letters, it became clear even the lowest peasant class in this time period were not only litirate but taught writing and spelling as serious subjects to the point where 7 year old peasant children could read and write.

Oh and in a completely different time period in a completely different country there’s also this fucker.

It’s rusted and its box has rotted away because it was made around 86 BC. So here’s a replica that’s been made of what it use to look like

And here’s a cross section

It’s from Greece and like I said, it’s from roughly 86BC.

It’s a computer.

On the front it calculates with extraordinary accuracy the movement of planets, constellations, moons etc etc and can be used for everything from religious holidays and rites to navigation by ship. The back is used for keeping score in the Olympic games of the various competitors, their athletes and nations etc etc.

Another fun one is the fact that the Steam Engine was first invented in the first century AD, however since it was fueled by wood because it had not been discovered that coal could be used as fuel, it was more a parlor trick to show people because it would cost more to employ a slave to fuel the machine with wood than what power the machine gave.

But that doesn’t change the fact that the steam engine is over 2000 years old.

Oh and the 13th century Syrians had swords made of Damascus Steel and we have no idea how the steel was forged. There have been numerous attempts to replicate it and some have gotten close but still fail to match the durability and ability to stay sharp of the originals. Some individuals have claimed to have replicated the steel perfectly but none of them have been recognised by officials. So we still don’t know how to make these even with all our modern technology.