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He and Queen Mary were already quite on the outs by the time of the assassination (even though she did drop by to play the lute right to cheer him up from smallpox right before his sick house got blown up). Since he DID survive being blown up, WI he had somehow outrun those in Bothwell's service...

Until the Prussians created the German Empire, Berlin was a rather small and even sleepy city compared to Hamburg, Frankfort, Munich, Bremen or even Hanover. It seems to have only become the capital of a united German state solely due to it having been Prussia's capital. It has NOT had the...

While it may have slightly hampered trade with others in the peninsula, slightly, I'm wondering had Venice had its own distinct language (as opposed to 'Northern Italian dialect') could it somehow have maintained independence or at least autonomy with no push to 'unite' it with the rest of Italy?

Since Rome was starting to emerge as a regional power by the 330's BC, I have to wonder if there were any records on their rulers' parts re Alexander? I know Alexander seemed to want Rome for himself but died before any attempt was made. Surely the Romans had had to have heard of him so I'm...

One of the most underrated migrations in human history was that of Malays who first island hopped to colonize virtually all possible habitable islands in the Indonesian and Phillipine archipelagos, then island hopped all over the South Pacific as far away as Hawaii and Easter Island as well as...

Could the Opium Wars have been prevented had either William IV or Victoria become appalled with the East India Company's factories and put pressure to shut them down or, failing that, opposing Parliamentary support for the above-named wars? I realize that the later Hanoverians were by no means...

I've always thought it intriguing that in kosher tables, it's forbidden to serve meat and milk (or any kind of cheese,curd, yogurt,etc) at the very same time on the grounds of 'serving meat with its mother'. Yet, would it have been that big a leap to ALSO forbid having chicken (or any kind of...

Somewhat less known re the Texans' MO to throw off what it perceived as the Mexican yoke was the fact that Mexico outlawed slavery as Spain had done centuries earlier. This not only motivated quite a few slaves to flee their Texan slaveholders for freedom within established Mexican settlements...

Two moments that I believe WOULD have changed late 20th Century and early 21st Century history. 1. Instead of Vice-President Gore saying that President Bill Clinton was 'the greatest President in the 20th Century' had he addressed how the latter had humiliated the nation and infuriated many...

It would not be until May 9th,1945 that the Channel Islands were FINALLY liberated from NAZI occupation- yes two days AFTER the Unconditional German Surrender. In the meantime, they had been so horribly starved that a RAT cost a week's wages on 'black market'. That these British subjects were...

At age 88, the monarch known as Rama IX, died today from age-related ailments October 13,2016 after a 70-year reign. He came to the throne of Thailand at age 18 following the death of his 20-year-old brother from a still-controversial gunshot wound four days before he was due to return to...

I'm quite sure he'd have valued being his son's father a great deal - especially being the male heir to the Beaufort legacy but as time passed and his much-younger wife's barrenness became evident would he have separated from her and perhaps openly taken mistresses? Would Edmund have had no more...

She nearly lost her own life as a new widow at 13 when she bore her only child Henry Tudor and would never grow an inch taller as well as being rendered barren despite marrying twice more. She would spend the next 28 years channeling her energies by hook or crook to transform her son from being...

His divorced and imprisoned wife Sophia of Celle died in 1726 and he himself died in 1727 but rather estranged from their only son George II. Had George I died before Sophia, would the son have freed his mother, kept her imprisoned or just quietly transferred to another restricted but more...

Apart from two Kentucky communes near which somehow lasted to 1922, this was strictly a Northern US phenom. Among other obstacles were their strict antislavery and pacifism stances and, even in those chaotic times between the War of 1812 and the US Civil War, I seriously doubt many folks...

From the moment of her own accession in 1558 to her literal deathbed in 1603, there was a great deal of uncertainty as to who would be HER successor (and from a purely logical point of view, it's rather astonishing that James VI was able to succeed smoothly at all). However; before the Queen of...

It's not entirely impossible a scenario as San Marino managed to stay an independent republic via playing its larger neighbors against each other (and would emerge the ONLY player not absorbed by Italian Unification). Also Luxembourg and Andorra more or less did the same . So could Vermont have...

We all know that, in spite of primogeniture, he was passed over as Richard I's heir in favor of his late father's younger brother John in large part due to Eleanor of Aquitaine despising his mother Constance, the Duchess of Brittany. But what if the Queen Mother of England had either learned to...

We all know the sad fate re the Nine-Day Queen but what if she somehow defied her husband, parents and in-laws using her for a pawn? Could she have somehow held out and NOT been proclaimed Edward VI's successor? And would the physical abuse the group of them might have meted upon her wound up...

Could a duo rule manage to establish the Eternal City and would it be called Geminiopolis instead of Rome? Just asking.