Esta página contiene material que se conserva porque se considera humorístico . Este tipo de material no debe tomarse en serio. |
tenga en cuentaLos artículos sobre temas considerados inusuales pueden ser aceptados en Wikipedia si cumplen con los criterios de inclusión . Esta página no es un artículo y el único criterio de inclusión es el consenso sobre si un artículo encaja en esta página.Las listas de cosas inusuales en el espacio principal de Wikipedia (ver Categoría:Listas de cosas consideradas inusuales ) deberían tener una referencia externa para cada entrada que las clasifique específicamente como inusuales, para evitar que se conviertan en una derivación del punto de vista (POV) de la investigación original . Aun así, todas esas listas corren el riesgo de ser eliminadas por falta de una definición neutral de lo que se considera "inusual". |
De los más de seis millones de artículos de la Wikipedia en inglés, hay algunos que los wikipedistas han identificado como algo inusual. Estos artículos son contribuciones verificables y valiosas a la enciclopedia, pero son un poco extraños, extravagantes o algo que uno no esperaría encontrar en la Encyclopædia Britannica . Debemos tener especial cuidado de cumplir con los estándares más altos de una enciclopedia con estos artículos para que no hagan que Wikipedia parezca idiosincrásica . Si desea agregar un artículo a esta lista, el artículo en cuestión debe cumplir preferiblemente con uno o más de estos criterios:
Esta definición no es precisa ni absoluta; algunos artículos podrían considerarse inusuales incluso si no se ajustan a estas pautas.
Cada entrada de esta lista debería ser un artículo en sí mismo (no simplemente una sección de un artículo menos inusual) y de calidad decente, y en general cumplir con el manual de estilo de Wikipedia . Para contribuciones inusuales que sean de mayor ligereza, consulte Wikipedia:Cosas tontas .
En esta lista, una estrella () indica un artículo destacado . Un signo más ( ) indica un buen artículo .
Colina en forma de pecho | Se encuentra al descubierto en muchos lugares del mundo. Es posible que le haya dado su nombre a Manchester . |
Réplicas y derivados de la Torre Eiffel | No es tan único como te podrías haber imaginado. |
Locura | Edificios apreciados por su inutilidad. |
Colina de gravedad | Una colina que da la ilusión de que hay objetos rodando por ella. |
Lista de ciudades que se dice que fueron construidas sobre siete colinas | Casi 100 ciudades diferentes en todos los continentes habitados, tratando de conseguir la credibilidad de tener algo en común con Roma . |
Lista de micronaciones | ¿Alguna vez quisiste fundar tu propio país? |
Lista de nombres de lugares tautológicos | Nombres de lugares que contienen verdades obvias y dicen lo que son. |
Isla fantasma | Como islas, pero no existen. |
Granja de pizza | ¡Todos los ingredientes de la pizza, cultivados en un lugar conveniente! |
Islas y lagos recursivos | Islas en lagos en islas en lagos en islas... |
Jardín de cohetes | Paisajismo y cohetería, juntos por fin. |
Casa de despecho | Varias casas construidas únicamente por despecho hacia sus vecinos. |
Círculo de Valeriepieris | O vives dentro del círculo o vives fuera, aunque vivas dentro. |
Casa del avión en Abuja | Una villa con temática de avión en la capital de Nigeria. | |
Ciudad de Akon | Un cantante de R&B de la década de 2000 está planeando su propia ciudad en su Senegal natal , basada en su propia criptomoneda que llama "Akoin". | |
Pirámide inclinada | Aún no habían desarrollado del todo la técnica. | |
Bir Tawil | Uno de los pocos lugares de la Tierra que no está reclamado por ningún país. Un estadounidense viajó hasta allí y lo reivindicó en 2014 como el Reino de Sudán del Norte para poder convertir a su hija en princesa. | |
Desierto azul | Tras el tratado de paz entre Egipto e Israel , las Naciones Unidas donaron varias toneladas de pintura azul a un artista belga para que pudiera conmemorarlo pintando de azul una línea de rocas en el desierto del Sinaí . | |
Playa Boulders | Una playa en la costa sudafricana, cerca de una zona residencial urbana, conocida por ser el hogar de una colonia de varios miles de pingüinos. | |
Pedículo del Congo | ¿Qué sucede cuando un rey tiránico decide que quiere cazar en un pantano? | |
Dallol (sistema hidrotermal) | Una región que rodea un volcán en Etiopía, conocida por sus brillantes colores que parecen alienígenas, y poblada por vastas llanuras de sal y aguas termales extremadamente calientes que emiten azufre ácido, que según algunos estudios, carecen incluso de los microbios más pequeños. Hay una ciudad hoy abandonada del mismo nombre cerca, que antiguamente ostentaba el récord del lugar habitado más caluroso de la Tierra. | |
Estanque de Gaet'ale | Un pequeño lago en Etiopía que se formó en 2005 tras un terremoto. No es amargo, sino muy, muy salado. | |
Mansión de la Jirafa | Un hotel en los suburbios de Nairobi donde podrás comer junto a una de las subespecies de jirafas más amenazadas del mundo. | |
Meteorito Hoba | El meteorito intacto más grande del mundo. | |
La escalera de Jacob | A partir de aquí todo va cuesta abajo. | |
República de Kalakuta | Un complejo que alberga a Fela Kuti , un famoso músico nigeriano, su familia, los músicos de su banda y un estudio de grabación, que él declaró independiente y utilizó para criticar a la junta militar nigeriana de los años 70. Estos respondieron asaltándolo con más de mil soldados, prendiéndole fuego y arrojando a la madre de Fela por la ventana. | |
Lago Nyos | Un lago en el noroeste de Camerún que liberó gas en 1986 , matando a 1.746 personas. Uno de los dos lagos gaseosos conocidos; el otro es el lago Monoun . | |
Lago Retba | Un lago en Senegal que es naturalmente rosado y es uno de los lagos más salados del mundo. | |
Ferrocarril de Mauritania | Toda la red ferroviaria nacional de Mauritania está formada por una única línea que conecta el centro de la industria minera del hierro del país con la ciudad portuaria de Nuadibú . Por dicha línea circulan también los trenes más largos y pesados del mundo, cargados de mineral de hierro y de hasta 3 kilómetros de longitud. | |
Oklo | El antiguo emplazamiento de los únicos reactores de fisión nuclear naturales del mundo . | |
Palacio de Ferro | Un edificio de hierro de color amarillo brillante en Luanda que data de la época colonial, que se destaca por el hecho de que no hay registro de quién o por qué fue construido, aunque la leyenda dice que fue diseñado por Gustave Eiffel , arquitecto de la Torre Eiffel . | |
Peñón de Vélez de la Gomera | Una roca en la costa marroquí conectada al continente por un tómbolo de 80 metros de ancho (260 pies) ; es propiedad de España . En 2012, cuatro irredentistas marroquíes intentaron tomar por asalto el territorio y apoderarse de él . | |
República de Benín (1967) | Fue uno de los estados más efímeros de la historia: sólo fue independiente durante siete horas (de las 07:00 a las 14:00 del 19 de septiembre de 1967). | |
Socotra | Una isla yemení que geográficamente forma parte de África y es conocida como "el lugar de aspecto más extraño de la Tierra" debido a su extraña flora, que incluye el "árbol de sangre de dragón" y un árbol que produce pepinos . | |
Restaurante La Tante DC10 | Un avión de pasajeros McDonnell Douglas DC-10 en tierra en Accra que ha sido convertido en un restaurante gigante con forma de avión. | |
Isla Tromelin | Una isla cercana a Madagascar que es famosa por ser el lugar de un importante desastre humanitario en el siglo XVIII. | |
La casa del búho | No se trata de la aclamada caricatura animada de fantasía LGBT que se transmitió en Disney Channel ; este es un museo al aire libre que fue creado por una artista forastera y solitaria que decoró su casa heredada con más de 300 esculturas de vidrio y concreto de búhos, camellos, pavos reales, pirámides y otras formas. | |
Umoja, Kenia | Se establece una aldea enteramente solo para mujeres en Kenia como respuesta a la violencia contra las mujeres en la sociedad tribal Samburu . |
Cataratas de sangre | Una columna de agua salada de origen natural, de color rojo sangre gracias a su alto contenido de óxido de hierro . | |
Pico Mawson | La montaña más alta de la Mancomunidad de Australia no está en tierra firme, sino en una isla desierta y estéril a más de 3.800 kilómetros (2.400 millas) de distancia. | |
Valles secos de McMurdo | Un área de la Antártida que a) contiene un cuerpo de agua extremadamente salino , y b) no ha experimentado lluvias durante más de dos millones de años. | |
Tierra de Marie Byrd | El territorio no reclamado más grande del mundo. Destaca por ser más grande que Mongolia , por tener una de las bases humanas más grandes de la Antártida y por ser el escenario de La Cosa . | |
Nueva Suabia | El territorio nazi en la Antártida. | |
Estación de investigación del Polo de Inaccesibilidad | Una estación de investigación soviética de corta duración en la Antártida que ahora está completamente cubierta de nieve, a excepción de un pequeño busto de Vladimir Lenin que asoma desde el suelo. | |
Villa Las Estrellas | Uno de los dos únicos asentamientos civiles en la Antártida. |
Zona de Arte 798 | Cómo un complejo abandonado de edificios industriales militares se convirtió en el corazón de la escena artística moderna de Pekín. | |
Aoshima, Ehime | Una isla donde los gatos superan en número a los humanos en una proporción de 36:1. Curiosamente, no es la única isla con gatos en Japón (véase: Tashirojima ). | |
Artes Vashen | Ciudad armenia rodeada y controlada por Azerbaiyán . Una de las numerosas ciudades similares en esta frontera; otras son Yukhari Askipara , Barxudarlı y Karki . | |
Atar, Padang Ganting | Un pueblo indonesio con un monumento que se asemeja a una fotocopiadora . | |
Busto de Ferdinand Marcos | Un Monte Rushmore en Filipinas, que desplazó a sus habitantes indígenas. Fue destruido por los rebeldes en 2002. | |
Campamento Bonifas | Los bunkers de este campo de golf cuentan con ametralladoras y minas terrestres. | |
Santuario Chao Mae Tuptim | Un santuario dedicado a los penes en Bangkok , construido a principios del siglo XX por un empresario tailandés, en el borde de su propiedad. | |
Isla de Navidad | Una pequeña isla y territorio externo de Australia cerca de Indonesia que es principalmente conocida por tener hasta 100 millones de cangrejos que migran allí para desovar cada año. | |
Dahala Khagrabari | India dentro de Bangladesh dentro de India dentro de Bangladesh. Antiguamente el único enclave de tercer orden en el mundo. | |
Cráter de gas Darvaza | Un cráter en llamas, de 70 m (230 pies) de ancho y 30 m (98 pies) de profundidad, en medio del desierto de Karakum , en llamas desde 1971. | |
Central eléctrica de Dhekelia | Una central eléctrica chipriota que suministra energía a una base militar británica que la rodea. | |
Islas Diomedes | Dos islas en el estrecho de Bering separadas por 4 kilómetros (2,5 millas) y 21 horas de diferencia horaria . | |
Puensum de Gangkhar | La montaña más alta que nadie ha coronado jamás , ya que el gobierno de Bután prohíbe el montañismo desde 2003. | |
Edificio de la Torre de la Puerta | Un rascacielos en Japón que tiene una rampa de salida de la autopista que pasa por sus pisos quinto, sexto y séptimo. | |
Hallstatt (China) | Una réplica en construcción de una ciudad de Austria. | |
Parque Haesindang | También conocido como “Parque del Pene”, este es un parque en la costa coreana, conocido por estar lleno de estatuas de madera de penes, aparentemente relacionadas con el folclore chamánico local. | |
Habitación Hanazono | Una piscina cubierta en Japón utilizada como escenario de muchas películas pornográficas. | |
Pensión Hằng Nga | ¿El edificio más fantástico de Vietnam? | |
Iglesia de bodas con tacones altos | Una zapatilla de cristal que al Príncipe Azul le resultaría difícil encontrarle un ajuste adecuado. | |
Parque temático del queso Imsil | No sé, este lugar me parece un poco cursi. | |
Jackson Hole, China | Una ciudad turística planificada en las afueras de Beijing, basada en una pequeña ciudad de Wyoming . | |
Jatinga | El Triángulo de las Bermudas de las aves. | |
Jaxa (estado) | Un microestado del siglo XVII ubicado a orillas del río Amur, entre el Zarato de Rusia y la China Qing, con una población compuesta mayoritariamente por polacos y ucranianos. | |
Óblast Autónomo Judío | En lo más profundo de Siberia Oriental hay un lugar cuyas calles tienen nombres en yiddish , aunque el 99% de su población no es judía. | |
Sinagoga de Kabul | La última sinagoga de Kabul estaba habitada por dos hombres, que acabaron encarcelados por los talibanes porque les molestaba que ambos se quejaran constantemente el uno del otro, antes de que uno de los hombres la convirtiera más tarde en un restaurante de kebab. | |
Aeropuerto de Kai Tak | Un importante aeropuerto internacional cerró en 1998 y los aviones casi se estrellaban constantemente contra la ciudad debido a un giro a la derecha sobre la misma. | |
Templo Karni Mata | Un templo de mármol famoso por las 25.000 ratas negras veneradas que viven en el templo y que son consideradas los antepasados de los Charans . | |
Mina de sal de Khewra | Una de las minas de sal más grandes del mundo, supuestamente fue descubierta por los caballos de Alejandro Magno . | |
Distrito Kijong | Dos aldeas coreanas únicas, separadas por la DMZ y famosas por su carrera armamentística de astas gigantes. La aldea norcoreana contiene un altavoz que hace estallar la propaganda y ningún residente puede oírlo. Mientras tanto, su contraparte sureña prohíbe la residencia excepto a las familias que han estado allí desde antes de la guerra y cultiva "arroz DMZ" que hace que los agricultores sean excepcionalmente ricos. | |
Distrito de Daeseong | ||
Zoológico Central de Corea | Un zoológico con animales tan maravillosos como un chimpancé con el hábito de fumar, un loro que canta alabanzas a Kim Il-sung y perros . | |
Ciudad amurallada de Kowloon | Un antiguo enclave de la ciudad de Hong Kong, conocido por su anarquía y sus condiciones de hacinamiento extremo antes de ser destruido y convertido en parque. | |
El campo de Li | Un supuesto campo de fuerza que explica por qué los ciclones tropicales se alejan de Hong Kong. | |
Puente de raíz viviente | Puentes colgantes de dos pisos formados por raíces aéreas de plantas vivas de árboles de caucho mediante el modelado de árboles común en la parte sur del estado de Meghalaya, en el noreste de la India . | |
Tierra de amor | Un parque de esculturas de temática erótica en la isla de Jeju en Corea del Sur. | |
Grutas de Maijishan | Un enorme complejo de cientos de cuevas artificiales, escaleras y miles de esculturas budistas talladas en la ladera de una montaña en el siglo V, muy por encima de la superficie. | |
Masuleh | Un pueblo construido en la ladera de una montaña de tal manera que la mayor parte del espacio transitable en el pueblo está en los tejados de los edificios de la capa inferior. | |
Oficina de correos desaparecida | A dónde va todo el correo que no se puede entregar en todo el mundo. | |
Restaurante con baño moderno | Espera, ese no es el tipo de plato del que quiero comer... | |
No es nada | Uno de los ocho únicos contraenclaves (enclaves de enclaves). | |
República Autónoma de Najicheván | Un enclave sin salida al mar de Azerbaiyán (está rodeado por tres países diferentes en lugar de uno solo, por lo que no es un enclave ). | |
Nanjie | Un asentamiento en la provincia de Henan que a menudo se describe como "la última aldea maoísta de China ", que mantiene una economía de propiedad colectiva y exhibiciones públicas y estatuas de líderes marxistas-leninistas históricos . | |
Edificio de la Junta Nacional de Desarrollo Pesquero | Otro ejemplo de arquitectura mimética, esta vez en Hyderabad , en forma de un edificio con forma de pez enorme. | |
Isla Centinela del Norte | Una pequeña isla en la Bahía de Bengala , conocida por estar habitada por una tribu aislacionista prácticamente no contactada que ataca a todos los forasteros que intentan desembarcar en su isla. El gobierno indio los deja en paz y prohíbe todos los viajes a la isla, aunque eso no ha impedido que algunos viajeros insensatos lo intenten. | |
Ruta Nacional 339 | Una carretera nacional con una escalera en el medio. | |
Monumento a la Neutralidad | Un enorme arco con patas construido en la capital de Turkmenistán por el excéntrico ex dictador para conmemorar el hecho de que Turkmenistán es oficialmente neutral. También solía tener una estatua de él bañada en oro en la parte superior que giraba constantemente para estar siempre de cara al sol. | |
Okinoshima (Fukuoka) | Una isla entera que se considera un kami en la religión sintoísta y que está habitada continuamente por sacerdotes sintoístas solitarios que pasan turnos de diez días vigilando el santuario de la isla. Las mujeres tienen prohibido el ingreso debido a su menstruación , ya que la sangre se considera impura en el sintoísmo. | |
Okunoshima | Una isla entre las islas japonesas de Honshu y Shikoku, que antiguamente albergaba una planta de armas químicas durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial y que ahora es hogar de una enorme población de conejos salvajes, aunque en su mayoría domesticados. | |
Om Banna | Un santuario indio dedicado a una motocicleta supuestamente sensible. | |
Metro de Omsk | Un sistema de metro con una sola estación y una longitud total de cero kilómetros. | |
Agujero de maní | Una zona oceánica con un nombre muy agradable en el mar de Ojotsk que está totalmente rodeada por la ZEE de Rusia , pero no dentro de ella. A menudo es objeto de sobrepesca extranjera . | |
Palacio de porcelana | El palacio más grande y lujoso de China, está dedicado al humilde baño público . | |
Terraza Rednaxela | Una calle de Hong Kong, cuyo nombre, según se informa, fue invertido debido a un error administrativo. | |
Construcción de robots | Lo que se avecina en Bangkok no es un robot gigante; es simplemente la sede de un banco. | |
Roopkund | Un pequeño lago en el Himalaya conocido por tener misteriosamente cientos de esqueletos humanos antiguos a lo largo de sus bordes. | |
Hotel Ryugyong | En algún momento habría sido el hotel más alto del mundo, excepto que careció de ventanas, accesorios y artefactos durante más de veinte años. | |
— | San Seriffe | Una isla menos conocida del Océano Índico, tema del Guardian del 1 de abril de 1977 . |
Sansha | Una ciudad a nivel de prefectura en disputa en Hainan que consiste en un conjunto de atolones y arrecifes a lo largo del Mar de China Meridional . | |
Reino de Sedang | En la década de 1880, un aventurero francés creó un reino en Vietnam. | |
Línea Tappi Shakō del túnel Seikan | El funicular cerrado que conecta una estación de tren subterránea dentro del túnel Seikan con un museo. | |
Shani Shingnapur | Un pueblo sagrado hindú que no tiene puertas. | |
Shingo, Aomori | Una ciudad de Japón que (supuestamente) alberga la tumba de Jesús . La historia detrás de la supuesta tumba es aún más extraña. | |
Templo de la Serpiente | Un templo chino que destaca por tener serpientes (vivas) en su interior. También cuenta con una zona de cría de serpientes. | |
Distrito de Sokh | Un enclave de Uzbekistán enclavado dentro de Kirguistán con una población tayika del 99% . | |
Provincia de Taiwán, República Popular China | El gobierno comunista chino elige delegados para representar a una isla que nunca ha poseído ni controlado. | |
Templo Tashirojima | Una isla de Japón que se caracteriza por estar llena de gatos. Curiosamente, no es la única isla con gatos en Japón (ver: Aoshima, Ehime ). | |
Ciudad del Támesis | Una réplica completa de una ciudad de estilo inglés construida como una comunidad planificada de lujo cerca de Shanghái. Casi vacía, pero un destino popular para la fotografía de bodas. | |
La linea | Una ciudad planificada en Arabia Saudita que originalmente fue planeada para ser una línea recta de 110 millas de largo y ha sido descrita por los críticos como "distópica". | |
Thimmamma Marrimanu | Un solo árbol con una copa que cubre 19.107 m2 y , en consecuencia, se considera sagrado entre los seguidores de varias religiones indias. | |
Tumba de Suleyman Shah | Uno de los lugares de enterramiento del abuelo del primer emperador otomano es parte de Turquía a pesar de estar a 27 kilómetros (17 millas) al sur de la frontera del país con Siria . | |
Trunyan | Un pueblo de Bali donde los residentes depositan cadáveres abiertamente en el suelo y esperan a que se descompongan en lugar de incinerarlos o enterrarlos. | |
Estación de Tsu | Por kana , la estación de tren más concisa de Japón, que da servicio a la capital de una prefectura casi igual de concisa . Por el número de trazos, la más concisa del mundo. Por transliteración, la segunda más concisa. | |
Ciudad subterránea (Beijing) | Un enorme complejo de túneles debajo de Pekín, construido en la Guerra Fría como refugio contra bombas nucleares, equipado con instalaciones como escuelas, clínicas, fábricas e incluso una pista de hielo. | |
Centro comercial Villaggio | Un centro comercial qatarí construido para parecerse a una ciudad italiana, con canales venecianos y góndolas . También es conocido por ser el lugar donde se produjo un incendio mortal en un vivero en 2012. | |
Wang Saen Suk | Un lugar en Tailandia dedicado a las escenas materializadas del infierno budista . | |
Parque de atracciones Wonderland | El parque de atracciones abandonado más grande de Asia. | |
Semilla X 4000 | El edificio más alto jamás diseñado, de 4 kilómetros de altura y con capacidad para entre 500.000 y 1.000.000 de personas en 800 plantas, pero "nunca estuvo pensado para ser construido". | |
Pagoda Yongning | Una pagoda del siglo VI que posiblemente fue la estructura más alta del mundo hasta que fue destruida por un rayo 18 años después de su finalización. | |
Geoparque Nacional de Zhangye | Un parque nacional conocido por sus montañas con rayas multicolores naturales. | |
República de Zheltuga | Un asentamiento minero ilegal de oro que se convirtió en un próspero país no reconocido, que sólo sobrevivió porque el gobierno chino desconocía su existencia. |
Morada del Caos | Un artista compra una antigua casa pintoresca en un pueblo rural y la transforma en una réplica de una zona de guerra que sirve como museo al aire libre de arte radical de vanguardia, lo que enfurece a los lugareños lo suficiente como para demandarlo en la Corte Suprema de Francia. | |
Monumento OVNI de Ängelholm | Un monumento a un supuesto aterrizaje OVNI en Suecia. | |
Argleton | Una ciudad inexistente en Lancashire , Inglaterra, que apareció en Google Maps . | |
Baarle-Hertog | Dos municipios, uno de Bélgica y otro de los Países Bajos, que se rodean dos veces y muchas veces . Algunas casas y comercios se encuentran en ambos países. | |
Baarle-Nassau | ||
Plaza Barack Obama | Un área de servicio de autopista en el condado de Tipperary , Irlanda, que celebra el trabajo y la herencia irlandesa del presidente estadounidense Barack Obama . | |
Centro de Supercomputación de Barcelona | Una supercomputadora en una capilla medieval. | |
Barentsburg | Una ciudad completamente rusa, habitada por rusos, con edificios rusos, apoyada financieramente por el gobierno ruso, ubicada en Noruega. | |
Aeropuerto de Barra | Un aeropuerto que sólo funciona cuando la marea lo permite. | |
Estación de metro de Battersea Power Station | Una estación de tren que lleva el nombre de una estación que no es de tren. | |
Mina de frijoles y tocino | Con tan poca ventilación, los visitantes pueden querer evitar cualquier fuente de ignición. Las minas cercanas no se quedan atrás y tienen los siguientes nombres: Mule Spinner, Frogs Hole, Cackle Mackle y Wanton Legs. | |
Aeropuerto de Berlín Brandeburgo | Aeropuerto de Berlín cuya construcción ya ha finalizado, pero que en otras zonas está inconclusa. La construcción finalizó en 2012, pero la fecha de apertura se retrasó varias veces porque el sistema de extinción de incendios se instaló incorrectamente. Finalmente, se inauguró en octubre de 2020. | |
La conspiración de Bielefeld | El Bielefeld-Verschwörung intenta ocultar la horrible verdad sobre una ciudad de Westfalia , Alemania , que no existe... bueno, tal vez. | |
Montaña Brennenderberg | Una mina de carbón alemana en llamas desde 1668. | |
La escoba | Quizás el camino más peligroso del mundo. ¿Te unirías a los otros cien que murieron recorriendo el camino invisible? | |
Viaducto en espiral de Brusio | El título lo dice todo, realmente. | |
Lago del cubo | Un lago que sólo existe gracias al mal uso de un cubo de plástico. | |
Búnkeres en Albania | A Enver Hoxha le gustaban tanto que decidió llenar su país con más de 173.000 de ellos. | |
Büsingen en el Alto Rin | Una ciudad alemana que está totalmente contenida dentro de Suiza. | |
Camino del agujero del culo | Una pequeña calle residencial en el Reino Unido que era tan famosa por su nombre que se convirtió en una atracción turística. | |
Monumento a Buzludzha | Un monumento futurista construido por el Partido Comunista Búlgaro que parece una nave espacial comunista, especialmente por dentro. | |
Cárpatos-Ucrania | El tercer estado de menor duración en la historia (ver República de Benín en Nigeria ); fue independiente solo durante 24 horas. | |
Gigante de Cerne Abbas | Un hombre de tiza indecente en la campiña inglesa. | |
Puente de Clachan | ¡Cruza el Atlántico en sólo 30 segundos! | |
Colletto Fava | Una colina de 1.500 metros (4.900 pies) con un conejito rosa de peluche de 61 metros (200 pies) en la cima. | |
Sistema de alcantarillado de Colonia | Probablemente sea la única alcantarilla con un salón de candelabros que alberga actuaciones musicales. Probablemente. | |
Couto Misto | Un microestado independiente de facto en la frontera entre España y Portugal que existió hasta el siglo XIX. | |
Fondo arrugado | Una serie de tres parques temáticos construidos en toda Inglaterra, sin éxito, dedicados a un personaje grotesco y horroroso de la televisión infantil de la BBC de los años 90. Uno de ellos se derrumbó a los cuatro meses de su apertura debido a una disputa legal masiva y costosa con el consejo local sobre financiación y permisos de licor, mientras que el sitio abandonado de otro fue demolido después de que se usara para albergar raves ilegales. | |
La casa torcida | Un pub situado en la frontera de Staffordshire y Black Country que se encontraba en un ángulo debido al hundimiento del terreno como resultado de la actividad minera local, lo que hacía que las botellas rodadas sobre las mesas parecieran rodar cuesta arriba. Fue destruido en circunstancias sospechosas en agosto de 2023. | |
Bosque torcido | Un bosque de pinos que, al salir del suelo, se doblan todos en la misma dirección para luego volver a levantarse de forma normal. Nadie sabe por qué. | |
Casa cubo | Un grupo de casas de formas inusuales diseñadas para maximizar su espacio. | |
Casa danzante | También conocido como “Ginger y Fred” por su parecido a una pareja de bailarines. | |
Estación de tren de Dartmouth | Una estación de tren que lleva abierta desde 1864 a pesar de que nunca para ningún tren allí. | |
Puente seco | Después de que el río sobre el que se extendía este puente se secó, quedó unido, conectando dos partes del mismo campo que no tienen ninguna barrera física entre ellas. | |
El carril de la mujer tonta | Una calle de East Sussex con un nombre divertido. Spike Milligan vivía allí y Paul McCartney escribió un poema sobre ella. | |
Lugar Ebenezer, Wick | La calle más corta del mundo. | |
Lago Eichener | Un lago en el sur de Alemania que sólo ocasionalmente contiene agua. | |
Puentes europeos Spijkenisse | Los puentes genéricos de los billetes de euro hechos realidad. | |
Parque de los monumentos caídos | Un parque ruso conocido por sus estatuas derribadas. | |
Placa con el ruido del padre Pat | El puente O'Connell rinde homenaje a un sacerdote que fue tan recordado con cariño como completamente ficticio. | |
Fernando Cheval | Un cartero que durante treinta y tres años recogió piedras mientras hacía su ronda y las utilizó para construir un surrealista Palais Idéal ("Palacio Ideal") de proporciones asombrosas y detalles intrincados. | |
Isla Ferdinandea | La isla que desapareció. Y volvió a surgir. Y volvió a hundirse. Y volvió a surgir. Y volvió a hundirse. | |
Faro de las islas Flannan | Situado en Eilean Mór, este faro al oeste de Escocia es objeto de un misterio persistente por la desaparición de sus guardianes en 1900. | |
Esvástica del bosque | Una gigantesca esvástica hecha de árboles de alerce que pasó desapercibida durante casi sesenta años. | |
Estado libre de cuello de botella | Cuando las zonas de ocupación no se encuentran lo suficientemente cerca, se obtiene una pequeña porción de Renania que actúa como un país independiente. | |
Follando, Alta Austria | Un pueblo en Austria que solía llamarse "Fucking", pero que cambió su nombre profano después de años de tormento en forma de señales de tráfico robadas (algunas de las cuales tuvieron que ser clavadas en hormigón) a algo que todavía suena un poco profano. | |
Galešnjak | Una isla frente a la costa de Croacia que tiene naturalmente la forma del símbolo de un corazón . | |
Gammalsvenskby | Un pueblo sueco, poblado por suecos, que hablan un antiguo dialecto sueco , en Ucrania. | |
Grano en Vinschgau | El monumento más destacado de este pueblo es la torre de una iglesia submarina, el último vestigio del antiguo pueblo inundado que se encuentra justo al lado. | |
Gran Torre Neuwerk | El edificio más antiguo que aún se conserva en Hamburgo es un faro a más de 100 kilómetros de distancia. | |
Saludos desde la Avenida Jerusalén | Una palmera artificial gigante creada para recordar a todos el nombre de la calle en la que se encuentra. | |
Carril de coños manoseados | Un nombre de calle que se encuentra en las ciudades y pueblos ingleses durante la Edad Media . | |
Parque Grutas | Este parque, también conocido como el Mundo de Stalin, responde a la pregunta poco frecuente de "¿qué deberíamos hacer con todas estas estatuas y monumentos de la era soviética de nuestro pasado opresivo?". Su creador, el magnate de los hongos Viliumas Malinauskas, ganó el Premio Ig Nobel en 2001 . | |
Distrito residencial Reinhardswald | Un “pueblo” que ocupa 180 kilómetros cuadrados de bosque deshabitado, con sólo dos habitantes: los dueños de un restaurante. | |
Colina de las Cruces | Esta pequeña colina en el norte de Lituania alberga más de 100.000 cruces y otros símbolos católicos plantados en el suelo. | |
Te amo ¿te casarías conmigo? | Una propuesta de graffiti que sobrevivió a la relación y ahora está marcada por luces de neón. | |
Museo Falológico de Islandia | Un museo en Islandia dedicado exclusivamente a la colección de especímenes de pene y arte relacionado con el pene. | |
Reactor JASON | El único reactor nuclear en un edificio del siglo XVII. | |
Estación de autobuses de Kielce | Una estación de autobuses polaca que fue diseñada deliberadamente para parecerse a un OVNI. | |
Sistema de bodega Kőbánya | Budapest cuenta con un amplio complejo subterráneo de bodegas de cerveza y vino, tan grande que ocupa una superficie total de unos 200.000 metros cuadrados (2.200.000 pies cuadrados). | |
Cúpula de la cruz | La casa más interesante de Polonia. | |
Kursdorf | Un pueblo que fue abandonado después de ser cercado gradualmente por un aeropuerto importante cercano, lo que dio como resultado un nivel de sonido promedio de casi 60 decibeles. Se ganó el título de "el pueblo más ruidoso de Alemania". | |
Lago Curcio | Un pozo en medio del Foro Romano; ni siquiera los romanos sabían por qué estaba allí. | |
Lahn | Una ciudad tan impopular que no sólo duró sólo dos años, sino que sus únicas elecciones locales las ganó el partido que prometió borrarla del mapa. | |
Lago Karachay | Antiguamente era un lago, pero en él se arrojaron tantos desechos nucleares que ahora está completamente seco y es posiblemente el lugar más contaminado de la Tierra . | |
Torre inclinada de Suurhusen | Superando a la mundialmente famosa Torre inclinada de Pisa por 1,22 grados. | |
Lista de monumentos destruidos en España | Más de 60 edificios interesantes, incluidos grandes castillos, palacios reales, torres inclinadas y puertas de ciudades que fueron total o parcialmente demolidos y ya no existen, con sus respectivos artículos e imágenes. | |
Escucharburgo | El país europeo que la mayoría de los estadounidenses no pueden señalar en un mapa (porque no existe). | |
Aeropuerto Internacional de Llanegley | ¿Cuándo un aeropuerto internacional no es un aeropuerto internacional? Cuando no es un aeropuerto en absoluto. | |
Llanfairpwllgwyngyll | O Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch, si quieres ser técnico. | |
Lupanar | Un burdel preservado bajo las cenizas de Pompeya , con grafitis lascivos de hace 2000 años. | |
Rotonda mágica | Solo en el Reino Unido se puede encontrar una gran rotonda con seis minirrotondas (no hay que confundirlas con las «rotondas mágicas» de Colchester , Swindon o High Wycombe , o, en este caso, con esta «rotonda mágica» ). | |
Manneken Pis Jeanneke Pis | Una estatua en Bruselas que representa a un niño orinando. Y su contraparte femenina. | |
Mercado | Un faro construido en esta isla condujo a una redefinición de la frontera entre Suecia y Finlandia . | |
Metro-2 | Una supuesta línea de metro secreta en Moscú. | |
Monte Caolín | Una estación de esquí sin nieve. | |
Monte Athos | Un sistema político autónomo en Grecia que alberga 20 monasterios, notable por ser la única subdivisión política del mundo en la que las mujeres (así como los animales hembras) tienen prohibido el ingreso por cualquier motivo. | |
Municipios de Liechtenstein | Las fronteras irregulares y angulares entre estas divisiones parecen casi arbitrariamente extrañas. Las de los Emiratos Árabes Unidos son igualmente extrañas. | |
Museo de las relaciones rotas | Zagreb es el hogar de esta colección de cosas que quedaron atrás tras las rupturas. | |
El pilar de Nelson | Dublín solía tener su propia versión de la Columna de Nelson , que terminó sirviendo como símbolo del imperialismo británico hasta la década de 1960, cuando fue volada por republicanos irlandeses, lo que dio lugar a la creación de varias canciones populares celebratorias. | |
Moresnet neutral | Una pequeña región europea , de aproximadamente 1,4 millas cuadradas (3,6 km2 ), que existió durante un siglo como territorio neutral entre Alemania y Bélgica . | |
Estación de tren de Newhaven Marine | Una estación de tren que estuvo técnicamente abierta entre 2006 y 2020, a pesar de que (a) no había trenes de pasajeros en la estación durante ese tiempo, (b) no se podían comprar billetes para la estación y (c) la propia estación fue demolida en 2017. | |
Portal de Nueva York-Dublín | Una exhibición de arte que conecta visualmente las calles de las dos ciudades y que fue cerrada temporalmente después de múltiples instancias de exhibiciones intermitentes, blasfemias y exhibición de imágenes de los ataques del 11 de septiembre . | |
Reino del otro mundo | Una micronación y un complejo BDSM cuyo objetivo final es el " matriarcado absoluto ": que todos los hombres sean esclavizados por las mujeres. | |
Calaveras paradisíacas | Una colina para saltos de esquí con una zona de aterrizaje que pasa por debajo de una de las vías ferroviarias más transitadas de Suecia. | |
Isla del faisán | Una isla fluvial deshabitada cuya soberanía cambia entre Francia y España cada seis meses. | |
Estación de metro Piața Romană | Estación del metro de Bucarest que fue cancelada porque la esposa de Nicolae Ceaușescu temía que los estudiantes de la zona engordaran y necesitaran hacer ejercicio. De todos modos, se construyó en secreto y, por lo tanto, se inauguró en 1988. | |
Estación de radio militar Pierre-sur-Haute | Una modesta estación militar en Francia se convirtió en causa célebre después de que los servicios de inteligencia franceses intentaran amenazar a Wikipedia para que eliminara su artículo sobre ella. | |
Castillo de Predjama | Un castillo construido parcialmente dentro de la boca de una cueva cercana. | |
Principado de Sealand | Una micronación situada a 6 millas (9,7 kilómetros) de la costa de Suffolk , Inglaterra, cuya población rara vez supera los diez habitantes. | |
Pendiente de puntería | Un antiguo dique que antaño era hogar de prostitutas y que ahora es sede de un festival en el que un sastre cruza el río para comprobar si está congelado. | |
Punto de control de la realidad | Una farola con nombre propio. | |
Graben de Rösti | La "zanja de las patatas ralladas gruesas" en Suiza, que divide la cocina suizo-alemana y la suizo-francesa. | |
Bota Saatse | Un tramo de territorio ruso por el que pasa un tramo de 900 metros de carretera de Estonia. Aunque se permite circular por la carretera sin permiso ni visado, está prohibido circular a pie o detener el vehículo por cualquier motivo. | |
Cuerpo de protección contra accidentes | Una pieza de arquitectura nazi en Berlín, construida con el único propósito de ser pesada. | |
Tribunal escocés en los Países Bajos | Una antigua base holandesa de la OTAN llamada Camp Zeist fue cedida brevemente a Escocia para permitir la prueba de los bombarderos del vuelo 103 de Pan Am . | |
Osario de Sedlec | Una capilla cristiana decorada con los huesos de aproximadamente 40.000 personas. | |
Sexi (colonia fenicia) | Unas ruinas antiguas, también conocidas como Sex o Ex , con varios suburbios de la época romana, incluidos Pænis , Socordia y Villa Fatuus Maximus . | |
Gruta de las Conchas, Margate | Una gruta con un mosaico de 4,6 millones de conchas marinas, escondida debajo de un patio trasero. Nadie sabe quién la construyó, cuándo ni con qué propósito. | |
Museo de la mierda | No os preocupéis, es un buen museo para ver excrementos. | |
Mierdaton | Le robaron el cartel tantas veces que compraron una piedra de 1,5 toneladas con el nombre del pueblo grabado en ella. (Sorprendentemente, ese nombre tan grosero realmente significa lo que uno se imagina). | |
La casa más pequeña de Gran Bretaña | Solo 5,49 metros cuadrados (59,1 pies cuadrados) de tamaño, en el norte de Gales. | |
Castillo de nieve de Kemi | El fuerte de nieve y hotel de hielo más grande del mundo , reconstruido y rediseñado constantemente cada invierno. | |
Soberana Orden Militar de Malta | ¿Un Estado soberano sin territorio? ¿Cómo es posible? | |
Calle Spreuerhof | La calle más estrecha del mundo. | |
Bóveda mundial de semillas de Svalbard | Si ocurre una hambruna mundial , es mejor que esperes vivir en Svalbard . | |
Transnistria | Un estado no reconocido que se separó de Moldavia durante la caída de la Unión Soviética debido a tensiones étnicas y ha permanecido en el limbo desde entonces, conservando la estética de la era soviética e incluso una hoz y un martillo en su bandera. | |
Caballo blanco de Uffington | Una figura gigante de tiza que debe ser golpeada con martillos regularmente para mantenerla en su sitio. | |
Parada de autobús Unst | Única en su tipo en la isla de Unst , Shetland . Se renueva periódicamente y dispone de sofá y TV. | |
Inscripción rúnica de Uppland 53 | Una piedra rúnica del siglo XI que adquirió fama accidentalmente al ser encontrada para los cimientos de un edificio del siglo XVII en el centro de Estocolmo . | |
Castillo de Vajdahunyad | Un castillo en Budapest que originalmente fue construido parcialmente con cartón. | |
Ferrocarril del Vaticano | Consiste en un ramal de 680 metros (2.230 pies) y fue construido como resultado directo del reconocimiento del Vaticano como país. | |
Tren de cercanías | Un ferrocarril en desuso en Bélgica que separa cinco partes de Alemania del resto del país. | |
Veyshnoria | Un país fronterizo inexistente de Bielorrusia, inventado para un ejercicio militar del Estado de la Unión y adoptado por Internet. Es pura coincidencia que el territorio de este "estado enemigo" corresponda a las regiones más católicas , más anti-Lukashenko y menos rusohablantes de Bielorrusia, en serio. | |
Víctor Noir | Un joven periodista asesinado por el primo del emperador francés, que posteriormente se convirtió en un símbolo de resistencia antes de la caída del régimen ... que también recibió una estatua de sí mismo con un bulto enorme en la entrepierna que posteriormente se convirtió en un símbolo de fertilidad, con el bulto oxidándose debido a haber sido acariciado por tantos miembros del público. | |
Portal de Vilnius-Lublin | Un proyecto pionero que conecta a los residentes en las calles de las dos ciudades y que es el predecesor de uno mucho más caótico . | |
Salchicha blanca | El "ecuador de la salchicha blanca" en Alemania. | |
Ropa blanca | El club de caballeros más antiguo y famoso de Londres contaba con varios personajes famosos como miembros, entre ellos el rey Carlos III , el príncipe Guillermo , el ex primer ministro David Cameron, etc. El club es prácticamente de alto secreto, así que sí, los Illuminati ingleses definitivamente no están al acecho bebiendo té allí. Además, no se permiten chicas. | |
Látigo-Ma-Whop-Ma-Puerta | Y el mejor nombre de calle es el de esta calle de York , Inglaterra. ¡También se dice que es la calle más corta de la ciudad! | |
Museo de las Cucharas de Madera | Un museo con la colección de cucharas de madera más grande del mundo, con ejemplares que van desde 3.500 hasta más de 6.000. ¡También se pueden encontrar cucharones y 500 borradores! | |
Mapa del mundo en el lago Klejtrup | Después de encontrar una roca con la forma de la península de Jutlandia, un granjero danés se inspiró para crear un mapa del mundo a partir del paisaje rural circundante durante los siguientes 25 años. | |
Los enanos de Wrocław | ¡Tenemos que atraparlos a todos! | |
Piramida de tiempo | Para celebrar el 1200 aniversario de una ciudad bávara, un artista decidió apilar bloques de hormigón durante 1200 años. El próximo bloque está previsto para 2033. | |
Base aérea de Željava | Una base aérea abandonada, situada en la frontera entre Croacia y Bosnia , que es casi en su totalidad subterránea. | |
Zona roja | Una serie de zonas del noreste de Francia que quedaron tan devastadas por municiones sin explotar y toxinas durante la Primera Guerra Mundial que siguen siendo inhabitables un siglo después. |
Americana, São Paulo | Una ciudad de Brasil fundada por agricultores y soldados confederados después de la Guerra Civil estadounidense . | |
Museo Subacuático de Cancún | Un lugar donde se conservan obras de arte a varios metros bajo el nivel del mar. | |
Cándido Godói | Una ciudad brasileña llena de alemanes que produce cinco veces más gemelos que el promedio nacional; estos dos hechos combinados para crear teorías de que Josef Mengele había realizado experimentos allí. | |
Anacardo de Pirangi | Setenta veces más grande que un anacardo promedio, este árbol cubre aproximadamente dos acres de tierra por sí solo. | |
Cherán | Un pueblo mexicano cuyos habitantes decidieron abolir su propio gobierno local y su fuerza policial en 2011 debido a la corrupción rampante y los vínculos con el crimen organizado. No parecen tener ningún remordimiento. | |
Ciudad Mitad del Mundo | Este parque, que marca el ecuador del país que lleva su nombre, estaba un poco desviado cuando fue construido. | |
Colonia Dignidad | Una comunidad rural de Chile que tiene una historia que ni el escritor más loco podría imaginar. | |
Tapón del Darién | Este viaje es imposible con los modos que has seleccionado. | |
Isla del diablo | Una colonia penal notoria frente a la costa de la Guayana Francesa . | |
Isla Ernst Thälmann | Una isla frente a la costa de Cuba que fue (en cierto modo) cedida a Alemania del Este y, por lo tanto, (en cierto modo) sigue siendo parte de Alemania del Este, que ya no existe (en cierto modo). | |
Guarapari | Una ciudad brasileña con playas naturalmente radiactivas. | |
Fordlandia | El propio hombre no estuvo exento de fracasos abyectos en Brasil. | |
Parque de la Amistad (San Diego–Tijuana) | Dónde la gente puede darse la mano e interactuar a través de la frontera entre México y Estados Unidos . | |
Hacienda Nápoles | La lujosa finca del fallecido capo de la droga Pablo Escobar , desde donde se extendió una población invasora de hipopótamos en Colombia. | |
Heladería Coromoto | Ostentaba el récord mundial de mayor cantidad de sabores de helado servidos, incluidos chile, ajo, cangrejo, macarrones con queso, huevo, carne y muchos sabores alcohólicos. | |
Isla Apipé | Una isla argentina en el río Paraná rodeada de aguas paraguayas. | |
La isla de las muñecas | Ubicada en la Ciudad de México , esta es una isla llena de muñecas rotas y deterioradas de diversos estilos y colores, originalmente colocadas por el antiguo dueño de la isla. | |
Parque John Lennon | Un parque con una estatua de John Lennon , en un país que solía prohibir su música en los años 60, ya que era una importación cultural del bloque occidental . También es digno de mención el hecho de que su estatua normalmente no usa gafas, ya que las gafas de la estatua se las quitan o vandalizan constantemente, aunque el parque ahora tiene un guardia de seguridad cuyo trabajo es rondar la estatua y darle un par de gafas si se las pide. | |
Parque Nacional Lençóis Maranhenses | Un momento, los desiertos no se inundan estacionalmente. Simplemente no lo hacen. ¿O sí? | |
Mano del desierto | Una enorme escultura de una mano que se eleva desde el medio del desierto de Atacama , destinada a simbolizar la vulnerabilidad y la opresión humana. | |
Líneas de Nazca | Un museo de líneas, expuesto al aire libre en el sur del Perú . | |
El Ojo | Una isla casi perfectamente circular que gira constantemente en los pantanos de Argentina. Su nombre significa "El Ojo". | |
Paricutín | Un volcán que entró en erupción repentinamente en el campo de maíz de un granjero. | |
Penedo, Itatiaia | Una ciudad turística finlandesa... en el centro de Brasil. | |
Playa de los cerdos | Un lugar donde puedes nadar con cerdos. | |
Pizza Pacaya | Mientras muchos huirían de un volcán activo, un chef guatemalteco convirtió uno en su propia cocina personal. | |
Plymouth, Montserrat | Una capital nacional con cero población, ya que fue abandonada debido a una erupción volcánica. | |
Departamento Presidente Hayes | ¿Qué sucede cuando un presidente de Estados Unidos es mucho más famoso en un país sudamericano que en los propios Estados Unidos? | |
Río Rico, Tamaulipas | Una ciudad que fue cedida por Estados Unidos a México en 1977 debido a una desviación anterior del Río Grande . | |
Santa Cruz del Islote | Una pequeña isla artificial frente a la costa de Colombia que se dice es la isla más poblada de la Tierra, con su propia escuela, restaurante y otras comodidades, pero sin delincuencia ni policía. | |
Isla espiral | Una isla artificial, ahora destruida, construida a partir de miles de botellas de plástico vacías flotando. | |
Vinicunca | También conocida como Montaña Arcoíris, los diferentes minerales presentes en el suelo de esta montaña le dan un aspecto verdaderamente único. | |
Y Wladfa | Un grupo de asentamientos en la Patagonia argentina que alberga la mayor población de habla galesa fuera de las Islas Británicas y la ubicación del dialecto galés patagónico . | |
Camino de los Yungas | Una carretera de montaña increíblemente mortal en Bolivia, de sólo 3 metros de ancho en algunos tramos y sin barandillas. |
Puente 8+8 de 11 pies | También conocido como “Abrelatas”, se trata de un puente que corta el techo de los camiones que han caído víctimas de él. | |
Calle Thomas 33 | Un rascacielos sin ventanas en Nueva York y un presunto centro de vigilancia masiva de la NSA. Nada sospechoso. | |
Una montaña | También conocida como Sentinel Peak, esta colina en Tucson, Arizona, tiene literalmente una gran letra "A" en ella. | |
Agloe, Nueva York | Una ciudad ficticia de Nueva York . En un principio, era un asentamiento fantasma , creado como una trampa de derechos de autor para un cartógrafo, pero terminó convirtiéndose en un verdadero punto de referencia. | |
Abuso de alcohol y drogas en el lago | Supuestamente lleva el nombre del centro de tratamiento cercano. | |
Aroma de Tacoma | " Qué olor tan increíble has descubierto " podría haber sido el lema de esta ciudad de Washington. | |
Base de arrecife de Acuario | Un auténtico laboratorio submarino. | |
Guardián de las tierras baldías | Una característica topográfica natural en Alberta, Canadá, que, vista desde arriba, parece notablemente un ser humano con un tocado y auriculares de los nativos americanos . | |
Beatosu y Goblu | Dos pueblos inexistentes que aparecieron en el mapa oficial de carreteras de Michigan como referencia a la Universidad de Michigan y su rival, la Universidad Estatal de Ohio . | |
Gran insecto azul | Oficialmente llamada Nibbles Woodaway, esta termita de 58 pies de largo con vista a la I-95 es un hito de Providence y se dice que es el insecto artificial más grande del mundo. | |
Castillo del obispo | ¡Un castillo de piedra en las Montañas Rocosas! Este proyecto de construcción que escupe fuego parece no tener fin. | |
Cinturón de borscht | Para aquellos que aman el borscht y encuentran el Bible Belt y el Rust Belt demasiado aburridos. | |
Callejón de chicles | 70 pies de callejón con sus paredes cubiertas de chicles usados. | |
Arroyo burbujeante | La rama del río Chicago que estaba tan contaminada con sangre de Stock Yards que ganó este apetitoso apodo. | |
Condado de Bullfrog, Nevada | Antiguo condado de Nevada creado alrededor de una montaña que se convertiría en un vertedero de residuos radiactivos. A partir de 2022, es el único condado deshabitado que se haya creado en los Estados Unidos. | |
Isla de Busta Rhymes | Isla sin nombre porque había "cuerdas para columpiarse, arándanos y... cosas que a Busta le gustarían". | |
Calle Canusa | Una carretera que se encuentra tanto en Canadá como en Estados Unidos . | |
Máquina de refrescos misteriosa en Capitol Hill | Una máquina que ofrecía bebidas raras sin que nadie supiera quién la operaba. Estuvo en funcionamiento desde los años 90 hasta 2018, cuando desapareció y se dejó una nota que decía: "Fui a dar un paseo". | |
Mansión de la chica gato | Una mansión descrita como "la Mansión Playboy de la comunidad de juegos de gatitos ". | |
Centralia, Pensilvania | Un pueblo que está en llamas desde 1962. | |
Letrero de Citgo | Este anuncio de una compañía petrolera se colocó en el lugar perfecto para que se convirtiera en un hito reconocible del horizonte de Boston. | |
Clinton Road (Nueva Jersey) | Además de tener el semáforo más largo del país, la carretera también es conocida por sus reportes de ocurrencia de actividad paranormal. | |
Colma, California | Una ciudad donde los muertos superan en número a los vivos en una proporción de 1000 a 1. | |
República de la Concha | Como protesta contra las acciones del gobierno federal de los Estados Unidos , Key West en Florida se separó y luego le declaró la guerra a los Estados Unidos, se rindió un minuto después y luego solicitó mil millones de dólares en ayuda extranjera. | |
Centro de confianza de la corporación | Un pequeño edificio de una sola planta donde tienen su sede legal más de 285.000 empresas, o más del 15% de todas las empresas de Estados Unidos. | |
Aplastamiento, Texas | Una "ciudad" temporal establecida como escenario de un truco publicitario en 1896: un accidente de tren simulado. El accidente causó inesperadamente dos muertos y numerosos heridos entre los espectadores. | |
Monumento a Caballo Loco | La respuesta de los nativos americanos al Monte Rushmore, iniciada en 1948 y aún lejos de estar terminada. | |
Río Cuyahoga | El ambientalismo en Estados Unidos comenzó esencialmente porque un río en Cleveland seguía en llamas. | |
Círculo de Dave Thomas | Una intersección de seis vías en el noreste de DC con un restaurante Wendy's ubicado en el medio hasta 2021. Lugar de numerosas muertes en el tráfico, actualmente se está convirtiendo en un parque de la ciudad. | |
Desierto de Maine | Un terreno de arena de 20 acres justo en el medio del estado más boscoso de los EE. UU. | |
Centro comercial Dixie Square | Un centro comercial que estuvo abandonado durante más del doble del tiempo que estuvo en funcionamiento hasta que finalmente fue demolido en 2012. Apareció en la película The Blues Brothers de 1980 y se convirtió en un objetivo popular para los exploradores urbanos . | |
Parque estatal Donald J. Trump | El parque estatal más tremendo, fantástico y asombroso que jamás hayas visto. Los medios quieren decir que está mal conservado, que debería cambiarle el nombre, que ni siquiera es un verdadero parque estatal; pero son todos mentirosos y muy malas personas, créeme. | |
Dorset, Minnesota | Un pueblo que en múltiples ocasiones ha tenido a un niño como su “alcalde”. | |
Parque de relajación para tíos | Originalmente un cartel colocado en un parque de Vancouver como una broma, ahora es arte público oficialmente reconocido. | |
eBART | Una extensión del sistema BART que, a pesar de funcionar como su propia línea ferroviaria y estar propulsada por trenes diésel únicos, se muestra oficialmente como una extensión de la Línea Amarilla. | |
Pasos del exorcista | Un conjunto de escaleras en la calle 36, famosas por el lugar donde el personaje del Padre Karras cae y muere tras ser poseído. | |
Ascensor de Fenelon Place | El ferrocarril más corto y empinado del mundo, (supuestamente) ubicado en un pueblo de alrededor de 60.000 habitantes. | |
Torre de agua de Florence Y'all | Un cartel de "bienvenida" único en un pueblo del norte de Kentucky . | |
Espumadera | Una recreación exacta de Stonehenge hecha completamente de poliestireno. | |
Lista de antiguos condados, ciudades y pueblos de Virginia | Todos los lugares que ya no se encuentran en Virginia , como el condado de Illinois, y algunos que nunca se encontraron (incluido Walton's Mountain ). | |
Valle de Gann, Dakota del Sur | La sede del condado de Buffalo, Dakota del Sur , a pesar de que el cercano Fort Thompson tiene una población más de 120 veces mayor que Gann Valley. | |
Puerto espacial intergaláctico de Greater Green River | Consiste enteramente en una franja de tierra/grava profundamente surcada y sin personal y una manga de viento. | |
Muro de chicles | Un muro de ladrillos en Seattle cubierto de chicles. Limpiado en 2015, se convirtió en un monumento conmemorativo de París . | |
Hábitat 67 | Un complejo residencial futurista construido en la década de 1960 que se asemeja a una masa de cubos equilibrados aleatoriamente uno sobre el otro. | |
Isla Hans | Una isla desierta del Ártico por la que Canadá y el Reino de Dinamarca se pelearon durante décadas. El acuerdo de 2022 creó una frontera terrestre entre un país norteamericano y uno europeo. | |
Hawái 2 | Una pintoresca isla en Maine comprada por Cards Against Humanity en 2014. | |
Salto de búfalo con la cabeza aplastada | Lección de vida: si ves a cazadores persiguiendo búfalos por un acantilado , no te quedes abajo. | |
Triángulo de Hess | Esto solía ser parte de un terreno más grande, pero una carretera lo destruyó, pero los planificadores no pudieron planificar correctamente, por lo que dejaron este pedazo de tierra. | |
La casa del árbol de Horace Burgess | Una casa en el árbol construida por un ministro que afirmó haber recibido una visión de Dios . | |
Catacumbas de Indianápolis | A pesar del nombre, nunca se utilizó como lugar de enterramiento. | |
Interestatal 180 (Wyoming) | Una autopista interestatal que en realidad no es una autopista en absoluto. | |
Interestatal 19 | La única carretera de EE. UU. marcada en unidades métricas, una reliquia de un impulso histórico a la metrificación . | |
Isla de California | El tercer estado más grande de Estados Unidos antes era una isla, al menos en el papel. | |
Pisos Jackass | El sitio de pruebas que lleva un nombre muy apropiado para los primeros y únicos motores de cohetes de propulsión nuclear del mundo . | |
Colina de Jerimot | El punto natural más alto de Rhode Island . Durante años, uno de los puntos más difíciles de escalar en Estados Unidos, no por sus 247 metros de altura, sino por culpa de un anciano enojado que vivía cerca. | |
Planta de alcantarillado conmemorativa John Oliver | Una planta de tratamiento de aguas residuales en Danbury, Connecticut, lleva el nombre de John Oliver después de que insultara satíricamente a la ciudad en Last Week Tonight con John Oliver . | |
Escaleras de Joker | Vivimos en una sociedad en la que una película puede convertir un tramo de escaleras en una estrella. | |
Isla con espacio suficiente | Esta isla tiene un tamaño de aproximadamente un treceavo de acre, pero eso no impidió que la familia Sizeland construyera una casa en ella. | |
Lago Peigneur | Un lago para natación de 10 pies de profundidad que alguna vez se convirtió en el lago más profundo de Luisiana gracias a un accidente en una mina de sal. | |
Isla Landsat | Una isla solitaria con una historia francamente humorística. | |
Lista de lagunas en las carreteras interestatales | Intersecciones con semáforos, puentes levadizos y otras rarezas en el sistema de carreteras interestatales que violan las normas . | |
Lista de casinos de Las Vegas que nunca abrieron | Lo que ocurrió en la mesa de dibujo, se quedó en la mesa de dibujo. | |
Casa de Lizzie Borden | El lugar donde se produjo uno de los asesinatos con hacha más famosos de la historia, que se convirtió en un B&B en 1996. Según el antiguo propietario del edificio, la habitación donde asesinaron a Abby Borden es su "habitación más solicitada". | |
Puente de Londres | Un auténtico puente inglés de más de un siglo de antigüedad... que ahora se encuentra en medio del desierto. | |
M-185 (carretera de Michigan) | La única carretera estatal del país en la que está prohibido el paso de vehículos a motor. También es la única carretera estatal en la que no se produjo ningún accidente hasta 2005. | |
Tumba de Mary Ellis | Una tumba que se encontró en medio del estacionamiento de un cine. | |
Pirámide de Memphis | La décima pirámide más grande del mundo, ubicada en Memphis, Tennessee, y hogar de una megatienda Bass Pro Shops . | |
Michigan se fue | Las direcciones son más complicadas en Michigan. | |
Pilón de Mickey | Una torre de alta tensión cuya forma recuerda a la de un roedor ficticio. | |
Parque Mill Ends | El parque más pequeño del mundo – 452 in 2 (0,292 m 2 ) – en Portland, Oregón . | |
Cabina telefónica de Mojave | Una cabina telefónica pública que permaneció en pie durante varias décadas en medio de un desierto, a kilómetros de cualquier carretera u otras estructuras. | |
Base de la Fuerza Aérea Mountain Home | Una base de la fuerza aérea de Singapur en Idaho. | |
El pezón de Mollie | El nombre de varios lugares en Utah... incluido al menos un cerro . | |
Monowi | Un pueblo de Nebraska con una población de una sola persona. ¡Hola, Elsie! | |
Señor rueda de basura | Un interceptor de basura con ojos saltones gigantes que patrulla el puerto interior de Baltimore y devora basura. Tiene su propia página de Instagram. | |
Asesinato de Kroger | Un supermercado con una historia oscura. | |
Territorio Nataqua | Un territorio estadounidense fallido que estaba, literalmente, fuera de sí. | |
Museo Nacional de la Mostaza | Recopilando y registrando el condimento común. | |
Reserva Nacional de Pasas | Creado después de la Segunda Guerra Mundial para controlar los precios de las pasas. Dirigido por el Comité Administrativo de las Pasas, por supuesto. | |
Cruce de Ned Flanders | Un puente sobre la carretera interestatal 405 en Portland, Oregón , que originalmente se llamaba Flanders Crossing , pero que fue rebautizado en honor a un personaje ficticio que lleva el nombre de la carretera. | |
Lago Nettilling | Ubicado en la isla de Baffin , Nunavut, Canadá. Es el lago más grande de una isla y también contiene el lago más grande de una isla en un lago en una isla, que a su vez contiene la isla más grande del mundo en un lago en una isla en un lago en una isla . | |
Portal de Nueva York-Dublín | Una exhibición de arte que conecta visualmente las calles de las dos ciudades y que fue cerrada temporalmente después de múltiples instancias de exhibiciones intermitentes, blasfemias y exhibición de imágenes de los ataques del 11 de septiembre . | |
Cresta de Nitt Witt | Una casa en California , construida con latas de cerveza, conchas de abulón, piezas de automóviles y otros desechos que anteriormente tiraban los residentes locales, es ahora un monumento histórico. | |
Parque Nacional del Noreste de Groenlandia | El parque nacional más grande del mundo ocupa más de una cuarta parte de la superficie total de Groenlandia, es más grande que 166 estados soberanos y no tiene población humana permanente. | |
Angulo noroeste | Este pequeño radio que sobresale del norte de Minnesota fue creado como resultado de un error topográfico, y su territorio está completamente aislado del resto de los EE. UU. por el Lago de los Bosques . | |
El viejo de la montaña | Una formación rocosa en el norte de New Hampshire que se asemeja al perfil de una persona. Se derrumbó en 2003, pero está inmortalizada en las matrículas del estado, las señales de tráfico y las monedas de veinticinco centavos del estado. | |
Pedro Camani | Un profesor de arte canadiense (ahora jubilado) que construyó un enorme complejo de esculturas de caras gritando en su propiedad en su tiempo libre y convirtió su casa en un castillo con una torreta de una cara gritando. | |
Punto Roberts, Washington | A la hora de definir fronteras internacionales, a veces una línea recta no es la mejor solución. | |
Centro de retención de osos polares | Una prisión para osos polares . | |
Poozeum | Un museo dedicado a los coprolitos . | |
Prada Marfa, Texas | Para tus amantes de las compras de lujo, una tienda Prada en el desierto. | |
— | Mausoleos piramidales en América del Norte | El gobernador de Arizona, George Hunt, será llamado en adelante " Faraón Jorge I ". |
Hash de conejo, Kentucky | Un pueblo cuyos alcaldes, desde 1998, han sido todos perros. | |
El levantamiento de Chicago | Durante la década de 1850, la ciudad fue construida sobre pilotes, edificio por edificio. | |
Granja arcoiris | El único lugar donde las parejas homosexuales casadas podían proteger sus plantas de marihuana con armas . Visitado especialmente por Merle Haggard y Tommy Chong . | |
Corriente de la República de la India | Un área de tierra en el norte de New Hampshire que fue un país independiente desde 1832 hasta 1835. | |
República de Molossia | Una micronación de 34 personas en Nevada que lleva el significado de la frase " el hogar de un hombre es su castillo " a nuevos extremos. | |
McDonald's de Rock and Roll | Un restaurante McDonald's con temática de rock 'n roll ubicado en Chicago, famoso por ser el tema de una canción del músico outsider Wesley Willis . | |
Pasos rocosos | Gracias a su aparición en cierta película , las escaleras que conducen a la entrada principal del Museo de Arte de Filadelfia son una atracción turística tan popular como el propio museo. | |
Rough and Ready, California | Esta ciudad minera se separó de la Unión en 1850, pero regresó tres meses después porque se dieron cuenta de que no podían celebrar el Día de la Independencia. | |
Papá Noel, Arizona | En el condado de Mohave , visite una trampa para turistas abandonada en lo profundo del desierto, ¡donde supuestamente reside, entre todas las personas, Papá Noel! | |
Edificio Sam Kee | Conocido como el edificio comercial más estrecho del mundo. | |
Ciudad Slab, California | Un enorme parque de casas rodantes fuera de la red en una antigua base militar en el desierto de Sonora , que se convirtió en una comunidad alternativa a gran escala de inadaptados y vagabundos que ha persistido durante décadas, con varias exhibiciones de coloridas esculturas experimentales hechas con cualquier cosa que los residentes puedan conseguir. | |
SNPJ, Pensilvania | Un municipio formado únicamente por el centro recreativo de una fraternidad eslovena , creado (en parte) para eludir las leyes sobre bebidas alcohólicas . | |
Estado de Franklin | Un estado propuesto en el este de Tennessee que intentó lograr la independencia y cayó en deuda con España . | |
Estado de Scott | El condado de Scott, en el norte de Tennessee, se separó y formó su propio estado en oposición a la incorporación de Tennessee a la Confederación . Se mantuvo así durante más de un siglo hasta que se reincorporó a Tennessee en 1986. | |
Estatua de Lenin (Seattle) | Cómo una estatua de Lenin llegó desde Checoslovaquia al barrio Fremont de Seattle . | |
Carretera estatal 165 de Texas | La única carretera estatal del país designada específicamente para servir de cementerio ... y nada más. También es la única carretera estatal del país que permanece parcialmente cerrada todas las noches. | |
El brezo verde | Un complejo turístico de lujo que, durante tres décadas, albergó un búnker de emergencia desde el que el Congreso podía trabajar en caso de que estallara una guerra nuclear. | |
Pista 61 (Nueva York) | Una plataforma de tren secreta ubicada debajo del Waldorf Astoria de Nueva York, diseñada para ser utilizada por los presidentes de Estados Unidos cuando visitaban el hotel. | |
Verdad o consecuencias, Nuevo México | Un pueblo de Nuevo México que decidió cambiar su nombre en honor al concurso televisivo Truth or Consequences en 1950 y luego nunca se molestó en volver a cambiarlo. | |
Isla U Thant | Una isla en el East River con una historia sorprendentemente profunda para tan solo 2.000 pies cuadrados (190 m2 ) de superficie. | |
Camión de la ruta 19 de EE. UU. (Pittsburgh) | Una carretera en Pittsburgh que presenta varias concurrencias en sentido contrario , incluida una consigo misma. | |
Puente Vulcano | Un puente en la zona rural de Virginia Occidental cuyas reparaciones casi fueron financiadas por la Unión Soviética después de que un alcalde local, cansado de que el gobierno del estado de Virginia Occidental ignorara sus solicitudes de financiación, tendiera la mano al otro lado de la Cortina de Hierro. | |
Estación meteorológica Kurt | Aquella vez en que los nazis desembarcaron en América del Norte. | |
Cuña | Es más difícil de lo que piensas construir el estado de Delaware con una regla y un compás. | |
Whittier, Alaska | Una ciudad de Alaska donde (casi) todos sus residentes viven en un solo edificio: Begich Towers . | |
La casa misteriosa de Winchester | Una casa que se cree está embrujada por los fantasmas de personas asesinadas por rifles Winchester . | |
El rascacielos más pequeño del mundo | Fruto de un plan de inversión fraudulento , es un edificio de ladrillo de cuatro pisos construido en 1920 en el centro de Wichita Falls , Texas , que tiene sólo una habitación en cada uno de sus cuatro pisos. | |
Zilwaukee, Míchigan | "¿Es Milwaukee ?" "Eh... ¡sí, seguro que lo es!" | |
Zona de muerte | La parte del Parque Nacional de Yellowstone en Idaho donde, técnicamente, se puede cometer cualquier delito sin castigo, ¡pero no tientes al destino! |
Samoa Americana | A pesar de tener una legislatura funcional (el Fono ) y una población de 46.366 habitantes, Samoa Americana se considera un territorio "no incorporado ni organizado". También es el único territorio de los Estados Unidos donde las personas no nacen automáticamente como ciudadanos, a pesar de que gran parte de la población participa en el ejército. | |
Calle Baldwin | Una calle suburbana corta en Dunedin , Nueva Zelanda , supuestamente la calle más empinada del mundo. | |
Pirámide de Ball | Una pila de piedras de casi 600 metros de altura (2.000 pies) en medio del océano. | |
Estación de Banjawarn | ¿ Una secta apocalíptica japonesa probó una bomba nuclear en medio de la Australia rural? | |
Metro de Bayswater | Puente en Perth que fue golpeado por camiones 50 veces entre 2014 y 2020. | |
Montaña en llamas | Una montaña con un nombre claro y que ha estado en llamas durante más de 6000 años. | |
Valla de sostén Cardrona | Una atracción turística excéntrica en Nueva Zelanda. | |
Coober Pedy | Un pueblo minero donde la mayoría de los residentes viven bajo tierra. | |
Marquesinas de hormigón para autobuses en Canberra | Estas brutalistas marquesinas de autobuses cilíndricas son un icono de la capital de Australia. | |
Parque Nacional Egmont | Los límites de este parque nacional crearon un bosque circular. | |
Caídas horizontales | Este par de "cascadas" australianas parecen caer directamente sobre la tierra. | |
Sanitarios Hundertwasser | Por qué la ciudad de Kawakawa es el mejor lugar del mundo para hacer una parada de descanso. | |
Tonga Húngara | Una isla que se creó en 2015 después de que un volcán entrara en erupción entre dos islas y las conectara hasta que otra explosión volcánica en 2022 las volvió a separar. | |
Lago de las medusas | Un lago donde las medusas han evolucionado sin aguijón debido a la falta de depredadores. | |
Territorio de la bahía de Jervis | Cedido brevemente al ACT para darle acceso al mar a pesar de no limitar con el ACT . | |
Condado de Kalawao, Hawái | El segundo condado menos poblado de los Estados Unidos (después del condado de Loving, Texas ), con una población de 90 habitantes según el censo de los Estados Unidos de 2010. Establecido como colonia de leprosos en 1866, ocupa una península en Molokai y no está conectado por carretera con el resto de la isla. | |
Arrecife Kingman | Está designado como territorio estadounidense de ultramar a pesar de tener una superficie de sólo 0,03 kilómetros cuadrados (0,012 millas cuadradas) y estar casi totalmente bajo el agua durante la marea baja. | |
Isla Macquarie | El único lugar de la Tierra donde las rocas del manto terrestre quedan expuestas a la superficie. | |
Puente de la calle Montague | Un puente en Melbourne contra el cual se estrellaron tantos camiones que quedaron atrapados debajo, que el gobierno utilizó millones de dólares para instalar medidas de prevención (no hizo nada). | |
Monte Wycheproof | Se considera montaña cuando se encuentra a tan solo 43 metros (141 pies) sobre el terreno circundante y a 143 metros (469 pies) sobre el nivel del mar. Hay partes de Sídney que tienen una elevación mayor y no se consideran montañas. | |
Autopista del valle Murray | Una carretera de 671 kilómetros (417 millas) que tiene un número de ruta de carretera B400 durante 668 kilómetros (415 millas) en la sección de Victoria y sin marcar durante 3 kilómetros (1,9 millas) en la sección de Nueva Gales del Sur, lo que hace que la red de carreteras de Victoria no esté conectada a la red de Nueva Gales del Sur en esa área. | |
Ferrocarril teórico Nelson-Blenheim | Una carretera que el Gobierno de Nueva Zelanda consideró oficialmente como ferrocarril durante 22 años. | |
Carretera estatal 78 de Nueva Zelanda | Una carretera en Timaru , Nueva Zelanda, que está designada como autopista a pesar de tener solo 900 metros (3000 pies) de largo. | |
Playa de las noventa millas | Una playa de 55 millas. | |
Octópolis y Octlantis | Un par de asentamientos construidos por pulpos, descubiertos en el fondo del mar frente a la costa de la mencionada bahía de Jervis . | |
Atolón de Palmira | El único territorio "no organizado" incorporado de Estados Unidos , a pesar de que no hay gobierno ni prácticamente residentes permanentes a los que se pueda aplicar la Constitución ... | |
Islas Pitcairn | Territorio británico de ultramar donde toda la población es adventista del séptimo día y desciende de los amotinados del HMS Bounty . Toda la población se trasladó a la isla Norfolk durante tres años en la década de 1850 y actualmente corre el riesgo de extinguirse debido al elevado número de emigrantes. También fue el lugar de un escándalo en el que 13 hombres de las Islas Pitcairn, casi un tercio de la población de las islas, fueron condenados en un escándalo de abuso sexual, lo que le dio a las islas la tasa más alta de delincuentes sexuales del mundo. | |
Lago rosa | Un lago que naturalmente es rosa, pero que de repente se volvió azul en 2010. | |
Autopista Princes (este) | Una autopista con casas, semáforos y un límite de velocidad de 60 kilómetros por hora (37 mph) en algunas zonas. ¿Qué piensa VicRoads? | |
Pirámide de Carstensz | La montaña más alta de Australia está administrada por la República de Indonesia . | |
Isla Sandy | Una isla que apareció en la vista satelital de Google Maps hasta 2012 a pesar de no existir. | |
Ese árbol Wānaka | Un árbol que lleva el nombre de un hashtag en Instagram . | |
Taumata | Con un nombre completo que consta de 85 caracteres, esta colina puede ser el nombre de lugar más largo del mundo. | |
Te Urewera | Un área forestal en Nueva Zelanda que también es una persona jurídica (ver más abajo). | |
Río Whanganui | Un río en Nueva Zelanda que legalmente es una persona. | |
Pastel de bodas de roca | Una roca que parece exactamente un pastel de bodas. | |
Whangamomona | Un municipio de Nueva Zelanda que además es una república autoproclamada, entre cuyos presidentes anteriores se incluyen una cabra y un caniche. |
Balón de los Ardientes | Un baile de máscaras en el que el rey y algunos bailarines nobles se visten con disfraces de hombres salvajes y accidentalmente son incendiados por el hermano borracho del rey. |
Horizonte de casa quemada | El horizonte que consumió las culturas de los Balcanes y del Mar Negro . |
Sínodo del Cadáver | ¡Un Papa fallecido fue exhumado y llevado a juicio! |
Cagotes | Un grupo que fue una minoría perseguida en Francia y España hasta el siglo XX, y nadie sabe realmente por qué. |
Tablilla de quejas a Ea-nāṣir | El origen de la reseña de una estrella en Yelp es una queja sobre la mala calidad del cobre. |
Criterio de vergüenza | Sabes que es verdad porque es demasiado vergonzoso para alguien haberlo inventado. |
Hija del emperador Xiaoming del norte de Wei | Una disputada primera monarca femenina de la historia china antes de Wu Zetian , a quien la emperatriz viuda Hu declaró que era un niño y fue emperador por un día antes de ser reemplazado por otro infante . |
Heliogábalo | ¡El adolescente sirio número uno, polígamo y posiblemente transgénero, emperador romano cultista al sol ! |
Desastre de letrinas en Erfurt | Es increíble lo rápido que la vida de alguien puede irse al carajo. |
Casa de Colleoni | Una antigua familia noble italiana cuyo escudo incluía tres pares de testículos. |
Juan el Póstumo | Rey de Francia desde el momento en que nació hasta el momento en que murió (total: 5 días). |
Kottabos | El primer juego para beber del mundo. ¿Te apetece jugar? Todo lo que necesitas es un "candelabro" de bronce con una pequeña estatuilla encima y un poco de vino. |
Máel Brigte de Moray | Un noble picto que de alguna manera logró morder a un hombre hasta matarlo a pesar de que él mismo llevaba mucho tiempo muerto. |
Disturbios de Nika | Algo así como el vandalismo en el fútbol , salvo por las carreras de carros , y además si el resultado fue decenas de miles de muertos, la mitad de Constantinopla quemada hasta los cimientos y el Emperador casi linchado. |
En fin | Un niño medieval ruso de 7 años cuyas tablillas de tareas, repletas de garabatos de él mismo como una "bestia salvaje", se conservaron durante 700 años antes de ser excavadas y convertirse en una fuente primaria de información sobre la vida en la República de Nóvgorod . |
Teoría de la conspiración sobre el tiempo fantasma | Teoría de Heribert Illig según la cual la Alta Edad Media (614-911) nunca existió, por lo que ahora estamos en 1727 y no en 2024. |
Papa Benedicto IX | Se convirtió en Papa a los veinte años y luego vendió el papado. Fue Papa tres veces. |
Teorías precolombinas sobre el contacto transoceánico | ¿Los nativos americanos se encuentran entre las diez tribus perdidas ? ¿Los zuni están emparentados con los campesinos japoneses? Esta y otras teorías descabelladas se encuentran aquí. |
Publio Afranio Potito | Si vas a decir que cambiarías tu vida por la de tu emperador enfermo, asegúrate de que no mejore. |
Roland el pedorro | ¡Ojalá todos estuviéramos a un salto, un silbido y un pedo de distancia de la posteridad! |
Banda Sagrada de Tebas | Una fuerza de combate de élite formada por grupos cuidadosamente seleccionados de 150 parejas de amantes masculinos. |
Saneamiento de la civilización del valle del Indo | Resulta que el lugar donde se encontró el primer inodoro con descarga de agua fue Punjab. |
Relaciones chino-romanas | Estos imperios se fueron acercando progresivamente entre sí en el curso de la expansión romana en el antiguo Oriente Próximo y de las simultáneas incursiones militares de los chinos Han en Asia Central . El conocimiento mutuo siguió siendo bajo y el conocimiento firme de cada uno era limitado. |
Los Reyes Magos de Gotham | Se llaman así porque actuaron como idiotas para que el rey se fuera. |
El asunto de las salchichas | Uno de los acontecimientos más importantes de la Reforma Protestante en Suiza fue una disputa religiosa sobre si se podían comer salchichas durante la Cuaresma . |
Arquitectura terrible | Un estilo arquitectónico defendido por el arquitecto francés Jacques-François Blondel . |
Carlos II de España | El último rey de los Habsburgo en España, que padecía una endogamia tan severa que apenas podía gobernar su nación debido a sus constantes problemas de salud. Al morir, la autopsia reveló que sus órganos internos estaban tan marchitos y atrofiados que se sospechó que había sido víctima de brujería. |
Colonización de Curlandia | Un imperio colonial poco conocido de un ducado letón, formado por franjas de tierra a lo largo del río Gambia y la isla de Tobago . |
La plaga danzante de 1518 | En 1518, alrededor de 400 personas comenzaron a bailar durante días sin descanso y, en el transcurso de aproximadamente un mes, algunos de los afectados murieron de ataque cardíaco, derrame cerebral o agotamiento. |
Esquema de Darién | Un intento de colonizar el inhóspito Darién Gap , apoyado por el Reino de Escocia . El fracaso de la colonia arruinó la economía escocesa y pudo haber conducido a la Unión de Inglaterra y Escocia . |
Defenestraciones de Praga | ¿Cuándo fue la última vez que arrojar a alguien por una ventana inició una guerra? |
Timoteo Dexter | ¿Hombre de negocios genio o loco? |
Falso Dmitry | Un fenómeno extraño en la historia rusa, por todos los reyes falsos que alguna vez tuvieron. Uno, en realidad, se convirtió en gobernante. |
Delirio de cristal | Creer que uno estaba hecho de cristal estaba muy de moda entre la nobleza europea del Renacimiento. |
Gilles de Rais | Amigo de Juana de Arco y asesino en serie convicto. |
La gran revuelta del queso | Un motín que estalló en Nottingham en 1766 porque los comerciantes de Lincolnshire compraban queso de Nottingham con la intención de venderlo en Lincolnshire. |
Día del amor | ¿Pueden acabar una guerra civil tomándose de la mano e yendo a la iglesia? Resulta que no. |
Contacto de Makassan con Australia | Más de un siglo antes de que los europeos entraran en contacto con Australia, los habitantes de Makassar, procedentes de Sulawesi, que buscaban pepinos de mar, comerciaban con los aborígenes australianos de las tierras de Kimberley y Arnhem, aportando influencia islámica e indonesia a la cultura, el arte, el idioma y el estilo de vida locales. |
El milagro de 1511 | Cuando los habitantes de Bruselas protestaron contra sus gobernantes construyendo muñecos de nieve satíricos y pornográficos . |
Motín en el Bounty | La historia real comienza con un capitán severo y una tripulación lujuriosa en un barco de la Marina Real y termina con la cultura adventista del séptimo día de la Polinesia Británica de las Islas Pitcairn. Hay mucho drama en el medio. |
Orden del Pug | Una orden fraternal que existió para los católicos romanos en Baviera en el siglo XVIII. |
Jorge Salmonazar | Un francés que tuvo tanto éxito en convencer a los británicos del siglo XVIII de que era taiwanés que escribió una historia elaborada y descaradamente ficticia de la isla. |
Príncipe heredero Sado | Para evitar que se convirtiera en el nuevo monarca de Joseon, Corea , su padre, el rey, lo encerró en un cofre de arroz durante ocho días, matándolo por deshidratación. |
Yasuke | Un hombre africano que terminó convirtiéndose en sirviente de Oda Nobunaga , uno de los señores feudales más importantes de Japón, en 1581. |
Disturbios de la sandía | Un motín mortal que se desarrolló a causa de una rodaja de sandía robada. |
El discurso inaugural de Andrew Johnson como vicepresidente, bajo los efectos del alcohol | ¿Qué sucede cuando comienzas tu nuevo e importante trabajo fortalecido por tres vasos llenos de whisky puro, llenos hasta el borde, después de pasar la semana anterior en un estupor (más o menos) borracho? |
Kinjiro Ashiwara | Emperador de Japón , pero sólo en su propia mente. |
John Bentinck, quinto duque de Portland | Un noble inglés solitario que construyó un enorme laberinto debajo de su casa. |
Confederados | Un pequeño grupo de brasileños blancos con raíces en el sur de Estados Unidos. |
Drapetomanía | "¿Esos esclavos quieren ser libres? ¡Deben estar enfermos mentales!" |
Incendio del whisky de Dublín | En 1875, un almacén de una fábrica de whisky en Dublín se incendió y causó la muerte de 13 personas, no por el fuego, sino por intoxicación etílica mientras bebían whisky gratuito y sin diluir de la calle. |
Johann Georg August Galletti | El maestro de los giros lingüísticos extraños de principios del siglo XIX. |
El engaño de la gran luna | Un artículo infame de The Sun que afirmaba que se habían encontrado animales como unicornios y humanos con alas de murciélago viviendo en la luna . |
Gran hedor | Un verano londinense tan maloliente que obligó al gobierno a actuar. |
Charles J. Guiteau | El hombre más extraño que jamás haya asesinado a un presidente de Estados Unidos . Lo más destacado: el poema que escribió él mismo desde el punto de vista de un niño para su ejecución. |
Jerome de Sandy Cove | En 1861, en las playas de Nueva Escocia , se descubrió a un hombre sin piernas que no hablaba ningún idioma conocido por los lugareños . Vivió cincuenta años más, pero hasta el día de hoy sigue sin ser identificado. |
Lluvia de carne de Kentucky | No es tan sexy como te lo imaginas. |
Caballeros del Círculo Dorado | Una sociedad secreta de amos esclavistas estadounidenses que planeaban invadir tierras en América Latina para difundir sus opiniones a favor de la esclavitud. |
Inundación de cerveza en Londres | Nueve personas se ahogaron en una inundación de más de 300.000 galones de cerveza. |
Luis Antonio, duque de Angulema | Rey de Francia durante 20 minutos. |
Gregor MacGregor | Ese es su verdadero nombre. Posiblemente lo único honesto acerca de él. |
Pánico vampírico en Nueva Inglaterra | Un brote de tuberculosis a finales del siglo XIX llevó a algunos supersticiosos habitantes de Nueva Inglaterra a quemar los órganos internos de sus parientes muertos, en algunos casos dándoselos de comer a familiares enfermos, para tratar de evitar que la enfermedad se propagara. |
Nongqawuse | Durante (y probablemente debido a) la colonización, una adolescente xhosa se convirtió en una profetisa apocalíptica y ordenó a los xhosa que destruyeran sus propios cultivos y ganado, lo cual hicieron. |
Heinrich Schliemann | Fue pionero de la arqueología, aunque no por buenas razones. |
William Walker | En su intento de crear nuevas colonias esclavistas, se convirtió en presidente de Nicaragua durante un año e inspiró a América Latina a unirse por primera vez (para derrocarlo). |
¿Hay hombres en la Luna? | Un ensayo escrito por Winston Churchill en 1942 sobre la posibilidad de vida extraterrestre. |
El movimiento antitabaco en la Alemania nazi | De alguna manera, la Alemania nazi fue pionera en políticas de este tipo. |
Eduard Bloch | El médico judío que trató a la madre de Hitler y fue el único judío que fue protegido por el propio dictador cuando la Alemania nazi invadió Austria. |
Hugo Boss (empresario) | El fundador de la marca de ropa Hugo Boss ... que comenzó su negocio trabajando con los nazis |
Quema de la Embajada de España en Guatemala | Uno de los episodios más trágicos en la historia de las relaciones entre ambos países . |
Prohibición de venta de chicles en Singapur | El curioso caso de la prohibición de los chicles en una nación asiática. |
Tregua navideña | Un armisticio no oficial durante la Primera Guerra Mundial, en el que las naciones celebraban la Navidad y jugaban al fútbol. |
COINTELPRO | Nombre que el FBI da a su operación encubierta de investigación, y en ocasiones de desestabilización, de grupos y personas influyentes en el interior de los Estados Unidos durante la Guerra Fría. Entre las personas más famosas observadas en esta operación se encuentran: Martin Luther King Jr. , Muhammad Ali , John Lennon , Charles Chaplin y Malcolm X. |
Expedición a la Tierra de Crocker | Una expedición a una isla inexistente creada para estafar a un empresario . |
Togo checoslovaco | Un país de Europa del Este sin salida al mar propuso obtener una colonia en África, que sería administrada por sus tropas en Siberia . |
Incidente de Đorđe Martinović | Un hombre acude a urgencias con una botella en el ano y desencadena el colapso de Yugoslavia ... |
Escape en globo de Alemania del Este | Uno de los casos más famosos de alemanes del Este que huyeron a Occidente. |
Isabel, Señora Esperanza | Una mujer que se hizo famosa por crear un engaño en el que Charles Darwin renunciaba a sus teorías de la evolución en sus momentos finales. |
Dorothy Gibson | Una actriz famosa por sobrevivir al hundimiento del Titanic , y también por vivir una vida bastante turbulenta después. |
Gran funeral de pizza en Michigan | "Cenizas a las cenizas, corteza a corteza." |
Gran inundación de melaza | Un tanque de almacenamiento estalló e inundó las calles de Boston con una ola de melaza de 25 pies (7,6 m) de altura. |
Culto al mango | Se necesita todo un culto a la personalidad para que una fruta que regalamos sea venerada. |
Masabumi Hoson | El único sobreviviente japonés del hundimiento del Titanic , y alguien que no fue bienvenido en su país natal después del desastre. |
Violeta Jessop | Una enfermera argentina conocida por sobrevivir a tres desastres marítimos distintos, incluidos los hundimientos del Titanic y del Britannic . |
Charles Joughin | Otro sobreviviente del Titanic , famoso por estar tan borracho que las aguas heladas no lo mataron. |
Kilroy estuvo aquí | Un meme de la Segunda Guerra Mundial . |
Bobby Leach | Caminó sobre las cataratas del Niágara en un barril y sobrevivió, intentó nadar los rápidos debajo del barril y sobrevivió... luego murió después de resbalarse con una cáscara de naranja. |
Li Guangchang | Un hombre chino que fundó una secta y se declaró Emperador de China en la década de 1980. |
Plan Madagascar | Un plan nazi abandonado para transportar a toda la población judía de Europa a una pequeña isla. |
Francisco Macías Nguema | ¿Qué ocurre cuando un autoproclamado "marxista hitleriano" y mentalmente inestable se convierte en el líder de una nación? La música de Mary Hopkin que suena durante una ejecución en masa se convierte en uno de los acontecimientos menos extraños durante una presidencia. |
MKUltra | Los experimentos de la CIA con lavado de cerebro, privación sensorial y LSD . |
Oro de Moscú | Al comienzo de la Guerra Civil Española , más del 70% de las reservas de oro del Banco de España fueron transportadas a la Unión Soviética por el gobierno republicano. La controversia y el misterio sobre su destino siguen resonando en toda España. |
Franz Nopcsa von Felső-Szilvás | * respira profundamente * Es barón, paleontólogo, geólogo, aristócrata, aventurero, erudito, albanólogo y ex espía. Entre otras cosas, fue el primero en postular que ciertos dinosaurios se hacían más pequeños en las islas, casi fue el rey de Albania y nombró a una tortuga fósil con el nombre del trasero de su amante. |
Tiroteo en North Hollywood | En 1997, dos hombres fuertemente armados participaron en un robo a un banco, que se convirtió en un tiroteo de 44 minutos con agentes de policía. Como resultado, 20 personas resultaron heridas y sólo los delincuentes murieron. |
Octubre | ¿Estás en un país donde el cristianismo ha sido prohibido por "contrarrevolucionario" y aun así quieres bautizarte? ¡No hay problema! |
Kenzo Okuzaki | Un veterano del Ejército Imperial Japonés de la Segunda Guerra Mundial cuya determinación de responsabilizar al Emperador por las penurias de la guerra resultó en algunos actos particularmente extraños que involucraron obscenidad, asesinato y bolas de pachinko . |
Operación Paperclip | Mediante este acto, los científicos nazis (incluido el "padre de la ciencia espacial", Wernher von Braun ) obtuvieron amnistía por parte de Estados Unidos a cambio de sus secretos. |
Emilio Palma | Ciudadano argentino que fue la primera persona nacida en la Antártida. |
Asesinato de Olof Palme | El asesinato de un primer ministro sueco que se convirtió en uno de los misterios más duraderos del país. |
Mexicanos estadounidenses punjabis | Dos grupos discriminados en la California de la década de 1910 se casaron entre sí, creando una comunidad única y dinámica y una nueva y deliciosa cocina de fusión. |
Puyi | Se convirtió en el último emperador de China a los dos años y murió como un ciudadano común, poniendo fin a 2.133 años de gobierno dinástico en China. En sus últimos años, también hizo teatro comunitario . |
Línea Radcliffe | ¿Cuál es la verdadera razón de los numerosos conflictos entre India y Pakistán ? Le dieron a un hombre que nunca había estado allí cinco semanas para trazar una frontera. |
Atentado en Rangún | Un caso relativamente desconocido de violencia norcoreana dirigida contra representantes surcoreanos en Birmania. |
Rebelión de Reggio | Una coalición de demócratas cristianos, fascistas y anarquistas inició una revuelta armada porque el gobierno italiano eligió la ciudad equivocada como capital regional. |
Matías Rust | El alemán occidental que aterrizó en un puente de Moscú en 1987. |
La controversia de Los versos satánicos | Un libro provocó la muerte de miles de personas y dejó las relaciones de Oriente Medio con Occidente en el lamentable estado en el que se encuentran hoy. Tampoco hay que olvidar el momento en que el autor del libro fue apuñalado . |
Barcaza autopropulsada T-36 | Una barcaza soviética que flotó a través del Pacífico sin víctimas. |
Khalid Sheldrake | La historia de un comerciante de encurtidos inglés que se convirtió en un devoto musulmán y fue declarado rey por los rebeldes uigures durante la era de los caudillos chinos . |
Renmei de Shindo | Japoneses brasileños que se negaron a creer que Japón se había rendido y continuaron la causa... matando a otros japoneses brasileños. |
Señor Stanley | El capitán de un barco que podría haber sido el salvador de las víctimas del desastre del Titanic . |
Albert Stevens | El ser humano más radiactivo jamás visto. |
La epidemia de risa en Tanganyika | No es tan gracioso. |
Ignaz Trebitsch-Lincoln | Un hombre judío-húngaro que fue, en varias ocasiones, miembro del Parlamento del Reino Unido, espía alemán durante la Primera Guerra Mundial, colaborador nazi y autoproclamado Dalai Lama . |
Estudio de sífilis en Tuskegee | Uno de los experimentos biológicos más oscuros y extraños de la historia de Estados Unidos, que duró décadas. |
Roman von Ungern-Sternberg | Durante la Guerra Civil Rusa , un general ultra reaccionario alemán del Báltico se convirtió al budismo y trató de revivir el Imperio mongol . |
La participación de Estados Unidos en el cambio de régimen | Ahora bien, este es quizás el artículo más complicado y largo de esta lista. Sin embargo, encontrarás muchas sorpresas una vez que lo leas. Consulta también Operación Cóndor . |
Papúa Occidental | Tras la invasión intercontinental de Indonesia , la región se convirtió en el territorio más grande en la historia administrativa de las Naciones Unidas y en la única administración transferida por las Naciones Unidas a un agresor. |
Juan Zegrus | Apareció en Japón en 1959 y afirmó ser un héroe de guerra y reclutador militar para la UAR (y posiblemente también afirmó ser de África). Su verdadera identidad y motivos siguen siendo un misterio. |
Boicot al requesón | Una protesta contra el aumento de los precios de los alimentos básicos en Israel. |
Decano grita | Una campaña presidencial que terminó con un grito. |
Rudi Dekkers | Cómo los ataques del 11 de septiembre cambiaron todo para el instructor de vuelo de dos de los secuestradores. |
El gran robo de jarabe de arce canadiense | ¡Los ladrones robaron 3.000 toneladas! ¿Es realmente tan valioso? |
Uday Hussein | Hijo mayor de Saddam Hussein y verdadero villano de Far Cry o James Bond . Entre otras cosas, era violador y asesino, tenía un doble llamado Latif Yahia (a quien Uday mandaba a torturar) y también tenía la costumbre de secuestrar mujeres en las celebraciones de bodas. |
Bandera láser kiwi | La verdadera bandera de Nueva Zelanda en todos nuestros corazones. |
Crisis de la mantequilla noruega | Una inflación masiva de los precios de la mantequilla provocó un contrabando ilegal y un "llamamiento de emergencia" por parte de un programa de televisión danés. |
John P. O'Neill | Como agente especial del FBI, investigó a Al Qaeda y a Osama bin Laden, pero renunció debido a problemas internos. Luego aceptó un trabajo en el World Trade Center. En 2001. (Cita de su amigo al enterarse de que había aceptado ese trabajo: "Al menos no van a bombardearlo otra vez ". Su respuesta: "Probablemente intentarán terminar el trabajo"). |
Inundación de jugo de fruta Pepsi | El derrumbe de un almacén de PepsiCo inundó las calles de Rusia con una variedad de jugos . |
Viento estelar | Nombre en clave de una parte del Programa de Vigilancia Presidencial , la respuesta digital de la presidencia de George W. Bush al 11 de septiembre . Internamente, el personal del FBI responsable de la administración de este programa solía referirse a los casos de Stellar Wind como "casos de pizza", porque a menudo resultaban ser simples pedidos de comida para llevar. |
-0 | El cero tiene un sabor negativo en el mundo de la informática , la ciencia experimental y la mecánica estadística . |
0,999... | Una forma infinitamente larga de escribir 1. |
2 + 2 = 5 | ...o quizás equivale a 1984 ... |
616 (número) | ¿ El verdadero número de la bestia ? |
65537-gon | Este polígono de muchos lados se puede construir con un compás y una regla ... pero también se puede hacer un círculo, y no es como si notaras la diferencia de 15 partes por mil millones. |
Un millón de dígitos aleatorios con 100.000 desviaciones normales | Un libro pionero que hace exactamente lo que dice en la portada. De alguna manera, tampoco es el único libro sobre números aleatorios . |
Todos los caballos son del mismo color. | Prueba de inducción matemática defectuosa de que todos los caballos son del mismo color. |
Casi en todas partes | No se refiere a la publicidad ni a las prácticas corporativas corruptas, sino que es un término de la teoría de la medida . |
Casi entero | Por una extraña coincidencia, -y eso es sólo la punta del iceberg-. |
Función casi periódica | Bueno al menos lo intentaron. |
Paradoja de Banach-Tarski | Tutorial para hacer dos esferas a partir de una. |
El mejor momento de Belphegor | 1 seguido de 13 ceros seguido de 666 seguido de 13 ceros seguido de 1. |
Postulado de Bertrand | Aunque hoy en día es un teorema, convencionalmente todavía se le llama postulado. |
Calculadora de ortografía | 5318008! |
La complejidad de las canciones | Un tratado sobre la complejidad computacional de las canciones del venerable científico informático Donald Knuth . |
Máquina de Cox-Zucker | ¡¿Esta máquina hace qué?! |
Número de Erdős-Bacon | Una combinación de los grados de separación del actor Kevin Bacon y el matemático Paul Erdős . |
Número extravagante | No lo lleves de compras. Tampoco es muy amigable con los números frugales . |
El cuerno de Gabriel | Una figura geométrica con una superficie infinita pero un volumen finito . Por lo tanto, incluso si el cuerno estuviera lleno de pintura, nunca se podría pintar su superficie . |
El número de Graham | Un número tan grande que el universo observable no es lo suficientemente grande como para escribirlo completo en notación decimal o incluso en notación científica . |
Teorema de la bola peluda | En serio... ¿No se te ocurrió un nombre mejor? |
Número feliz | No es sólo una canción alegre en la radio. |
La paradoja de Hilbert del Grand Hotel | Un hotel con ocupación máxima no puede alojar a más huéspedes. ¿O sí? ¿O, una vez que puede, no puede ? |
Número ilegal | ¿El gobierno de Estados Unidos prohíbe el conocimiento de la existencia de ciertos números? |
Problema de iluminación | Una habitación con un poco de sombra. |
Proyecto de ley de Indiana Pi | Un intento notorio de legislar el valor de pi como 3,2. |
Teorema del mono infinito | Un número infinito de monos escribiendo en un número infinito de máquinas de escribir producirá ( casi con seguridad ) todos los textos escritos posibles. |
Interesante paradoja numérica | O bien todos los números naturales son interesantes o bien ninguno de ellos lo es. |
Teorema del árbol de Kruskal | ÁRBOL(1) = 1; ÁRBOL(2) = 3; ÁRBOL(3) = ...espera, ¿a dónde se fue todo mi espacio en disco? |
La constante de Legendre | Después de 91 años y mucho esfuerzo, se descubrió que esta constante legendaria era... 1. Sólo 1. |
Secuencia de mirar y decir | También conocido como Huevo del Cuco. |
Falacia matemática | Tratando de demostrar que 2 = 1 o que 1 < 0. |
Chiste matemático | Los números complejos son muy divertidos hasta que alguien pierde una i . Ahí es cuando las cosas se ponen serias . |
Función de signo de interrogación de Minkowski | Una función con una notación inusual y que posee propiedades fractales inusuales . |
Problema de Monty Hall | La forma contra-intuitiva de prevalecer al jugar Let's Make a Deal . |
Problema con el sofá móvil | ¿Cuál es el área más grande de un sofá que se puede mover a través de una esquina en forma de L? |
Número narcisista | El invariante digital pluscuamperfecto dice: "¡Cuenten conmigo !" |
Número sin escondite | Una cifra "por encima de toda sospecha". |
Número de la bestia | Para gente bestial aburrida del numero de la mala suerte. |
Estación de números | [Seis compases de la obra El cazador furtivo de Lincolnshire ] "¡Atención! ¡Atención! Uno, cuatro, diecisiete, veinticuatro..." |
Pi es 3 | ¿Las normas educativas japonesas redefinieron sorprendentemente el valor pi como exactamente 3? No, no lo hicieron, pero ¿dónde está la noticia y la protesta pública al respecto? |
Topología sin sentido | No es tan inútil como parece. |
Paradoja de la patata | Si las patatas, que están compuestas por un 99% de agua, se secan hasta quedar en un 98% de agua, pierden el 50% de su peso. |
Resumen de Ramanujan | ¿Qué se obtiene al sumar todos los números enteros positivos hasta el infinito? Se obtiene una fracción negativa . |
Número esquizofrénico | ¿Pueden los números tener trastornos mentales? |
Primer plano sexy | Números primos que se diferencian entre sí por el sexo. Eh... seis. |
Seis nueves en pi | Una coincidencia matemática : la secuencia "999999" aparece solo 762 dígitos después de la expansión decimal de pi . |
El problema del círculo cuadrado de Tarski | Cómo cuadrar el círculo de verdad. |
Clasificación de espaguetis | Un algoritmo para clasificar barras de espagueti. |
ardilla | No es exactamente un cuadrado, ni exactamente un círculo, y definitivamente tampoco es un Pokémon. |
Número de taxi | Nunca le digas a un aficionado a los números que un número no es interesante. |
Tetrafobia | A veces se encuentra en conjunción con la triscaidecafobia (ver más abajo) en las culturas del este de Asia. Es más frecuente en Japón, donde el 49 se asocia con "sufrir hasta la muerte". |
El Titanic en su máxima expresión | Sorprendentemente, no fue descubierto por Leonardo DiCaprio. |
Grupo de tetas | El grupo esporádico perfecto no exis- |
Triscaidecafobia | No, no está relacionado con el Código de Hammurabi . No, no siempre se considera que trae mala suerte. Sí, la exploración espacial se ha visto afectada por él. |
La fórmula autorreferencial de Tupper | ¡Una fórmula que se dibuja sola! |
Espiral de Ulam | Un matemático aburrido descubre un patrón numérico inusual mientras dibuja. |
Cálculo umbral | Un método matemático utilizado con éxito durante más de 100 años, a pesar de la notable limitación de que nadie en la Tierra sabía exactamente cómo o por qué funcionaba. |
Paradoja inesperada del ahorcamiento | Si te dicen que te van a ahorcar un día que nunca te esperas, puedes demostrar con lógica que no existe ningún día en el que te puedan ahorcar. Lo que, por supuesto, significa que no te lo esperarás cuando el ahorcamiento ocurra tal y como estaba previsto. |
Desenredar | El menos enredado de todos los nudos matemáticos. |
Verdad vacía | Todos los cerdos con alas hablan chino. |
Número de vampiro | Animales enteros con verdadera mordida; algunos incluso tienen múltiples pares de colmillos. |
Problema del trigo y el tablero de ajedrez | No te metas con el crecimiento exponencial, especialmente si aceptas una recompensa sospechosamente baja para un plebeyo. |
El fenómeno de Will Rogers | Al mover un elemento de un conjunto a otro, aumentan –contrariamente a lo que se podría pensar– los valores medios de ambos conjuntos. También se la conoce como paradoja de Will Rogers . |
Zenzizenzizenzic | ¿Sabes que a x 3 se le llama "x al cubo"? Pues bien, a x 8 se le llama... |
Cero | Un número ordinal popular en la informática y culturas relacionadas. |
Abolición de zonas horarias | Ya no es necesario preguntar: "¿Qué hora es allí?" |
Ruth Belville | Ella siguió a sus padres en el negocio de vender a la gente la hora del meridiano de Greenwich . |
Crismukkah | Un híbrido ficticio de Navidad y Hanukkah, popularizado por el programa de televisión The OC . |
Día del rollo de canela | Un día demasiado bueno para este mundo, demasiado puro. |
Festividad | 23 de diciembre: Fiesta celebrada por la familia Costanza en el programa de televisión Seinfeld , desde entonces apropiada por muchos. |
Día Internacional de Hablar como Pirata | Me tiemblan las piernas (¡a-harrr!) cada 19 de septiembre . |
Lista de fechas no estandarizadas | Incluidos, entre otros, el 0 de enero , el 30 de febrero y el 35 de mayo . |
El manhattanhenge | Dos veces al año, el sol poniente se alinea con la cuadrícula de calles de Manhattan. |
Día del topo | La constante de Avogadro se celebra el 23 de octubre a partir exactamente de las 6:02 am. |
Día de Pi | El día – 14 de marzo – en el que se celebra la constante π . |
Día de Pocky y Pretz | Día en Japón en el que se celebran las galletas largas y finas. Debido a su forma, se celebra el 11/11 . |
Día de los solteros | Uno es el número más solitario. El 11/11 es una fecha apropiada para celebrar la soltería. |
Día de la raíz cuadrada | Cualquier fecha en la que el día y el mes sean la raíz cuadrada de los dos últimos dígitos del año (el siguiente será el 5 de mayo de 2025). |
Día de la Guerra de las Galaxias | Que el 4 de julio esté contigo. |
Día del bistec y la mamada Día de la torta y el cunnilingus | Alternativa masculina a San Valentín y respuesta femenina a ese día. |
Tiempo de Internet de Swatch | En 1998, Swatch intentó reformular nuestro sistema de cronometraje. |
Acción de gracias | Un híbrido de Acción de Gracias y Hanukkah cuando ambos se superponen en noviembre en los EE. UU.; tal vez su regalo de Hanukkah pueda ser una cena de Acción de Gracias . |
Día de la toalla | No olvides traer una toalla , sea terrible o no. |
Descifrar | En Java , el decimotercer mes del año. |
Inviernoval | ¿Un intento de borrar la Navidad? No, sólo una palabra para los planes festivos colectivos del Ayuntamiento de Birmingham, pero eso no impidió que los medios de comunicación del Reino Unido se volvieran locos. |
Problema del año 2000 | Un posible problema informático de los años 90 que se suponía que se produciría cuando llegara el siglo XXI y el tercer milenio . Por supuesto, eso nunca ocurrió. |
Problema del año 2038 | El problema computacional que surgirá debido a la representación del tiempo Unix utilizada en muchas computadoras. |
Año cero | ¿Hubo un año entre el año 1 a.C. y el año 1 d.C. ? |
-ussy | Sí, significa lo que crees que significa. |
2002 Cambio de nombre de los meses y días de la semana turcomanos | Durante casi seis años, los meses y días de la semana en lengua turcomana cambiaron de nombre por orden del despótico presidente vitalicio de Turkmenistán . |
Academia de la Carpeta Inglesa | Una organización satírica francesa que otorga premios a "miembros de la élite francesa que se distinguen por promover implacablemente la dominación de la lengua inglesa sobre la lengua francesa en Francia y en las instituciones europeas". |
Disputa Antiqua-Fraktur | Disputa sobre qué tipografía era más "alemana". Al principio, los nazis estaban a favor de Fraktur... |
Manzanas y naranjas | Según los estudiosos, comparar ambos puede ser más fácil de lo que se creía anteriormente. |
Argumentum ad crumenam Argumentum ad lazarum | Incluso si el dinero no puede comprarte la felicidad, éste (o la falta de él) podría hacerte ganar una discusión. |
Arébica | Resulta que las lenguas de base eslava también pueden escribirse en alfabeto árabe . |
Alfabeto árabe bielorruso | |
Un libro del cielo | Una visita obligada para los amantes del galimatías . |
Efecto Bouba/kiki | Instintivamente sabes exactamente cuál es cuál, sin importar el idioma que hables. |
Búfalo búfalo Búfalo búfalo búfalo búfalo Búfalo búfalo | Una construcción gramatical significativa que ha inspirado a los lingüistas a hablar sobre el acoso escolar entre la población de bisontes del oeste de Nueva York. |
El caos | El poema que se burla de la ortografía y la pronunciación inglesas. ¡Intenta leerlo en voz alta! |
Caracteres chinos de la emperatriz Wu | ¿Alguna vez tuviste que ser tomado tan en serio que inventaste personajes completamente nuevos y obligaste a la gente a usarlos? |
Palabra china para "crisis" | Más notable entre los estadounidenses que entre los chinos, aparentemente . |
Códice Seraphinianus | Un texto enigmático inventado y publicado en 1981. |
Las ideas verdes sin color duermen furiosamente | Una frase ideada por Noam Chomsky para demostrar que una oración puede ser gramatical y, sin embargo, sin sentido. |
Ilusión comparativa | Más personas han investigado estas frases sin sentido que yo. [ sic ] |
Controversias sobre la palabra tacaño | ¿Cómo una simple palabra puede causar tanta controversia? |
Inglés loco | "El método poco convencional de Li Yang para enseñar inglés incluye gritar frases populares y aleatorias en inglés a un ritmo rápido y, ocasionalmente, implica movimientos de manos en patrones que reflejan la pronunciación de la palabra". |
Criptofasia | El lenguaje secreto de los gemelos idénticos, también llamado idioglosia . |
Desambiguación (desambiguación) | A veces la gente hace cosas tontas. |
Dord | Una palabra inglesa inexistente, que supuestamente significa " densidad ", que apareció en la segunda edición del Webster's New International Dictionary de 1935 a 1939. |
Las Docenas | Un juego afroamericano generalmente de buen carácter en el que dos competidores, generalmente hombres, intercambian insultos hasta que uno de ellos no tiene respuesta . |
Prueba del pato | Una prueba de razonamiento abductivo humorística basada en las actividades de un pato. |
Inglés tal como se habla | Un libro de frases portugués-inglés del siglo XIX que se volvió legendario por sus traducciones abiertamente literales e inexactas. |
Inglés | Intentos de los pueblos del este de Asia, especialmente los japoneses , de construir palabras y frases en inglés. |
Palabras esquimales para la nieve | La afirmación de que las lenguas esquimales tienen un número inusualmente grande de palabras para "nieve". |
Etaoin shrdlu | Ecos crípticos de los días de la composición tipográfica con metal caliente . |
Alfabeto Faggin-Nazzi | ¿Qué? Ese es su verdadero nombre. ¿De qué creías que se trataba ? |
Falso cirílico | Dale al texto algo de ese sabor ruso. |
Entrada ficticia | El contenido puede ser ficticio, pero la entrada es un hecho. |
Fnord | Deliberately misleading, irrelevant or false information meant to suggest conspiracy. A popular word among Discordians. |
Garden-path sentence | A sentence that doesn't seem grammatically correct, but that's because it tricks you into thinking the verb isn't where it is. It's very easy to catch yourself doing double takes when reading this article. |
Ghoti | As good an argument as any for English-language spelling reform. |
Glossary of Wobbly terms | Would you see the beanmaster fry a couple eggs on the banjo? |
Hamburgevons | Literally all you need to know if a typeface is any good. |
Hopi time controversy | A long-lived academic debate about the concept of time in the Hopi language. |
How now brown cow | A way to greet those well-versed in rhetoric. |
Hyphen War | A dash between communism and independence. |
Ingressive sound | In many languages and dialects around the world, a loud inhalation means "yes". |
Inherently funny word | Some influential comedians have long regarded certain words in the English language as humorous because of their sound or resemblance to other words. Poodle, wankel, ni... |
Intentionally blank page | The self-refuting meta-reference that is "This page intentionally left blank". |
Irony punctuation | Is your irony too subtle? |
Irreversible binomial | Or, why it's fish and chips and not chips and fish. |
James while John had had had had had had had had had had had a better effect on the teacher | Repetition gone wrong. |
Latin profanity | Latin for the profane. |
Law of holes | If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging! |
La plume de ma tante (phrase) | One of the first phrases stereotypicaly learned in French, and outside of being possesed by an ancient Mesopotamian demon, is one of the least likely phrases ever actually be used. |
Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den | A 92-character poem written in Classical Chinese, in which every syllable has the sound "shi" (in different tones) when read in modern Mandarin Chinese. |
List of common false etymologies of English words | Believe it or not, "crap" did not originate from Thomas Crapper. |
List of English words containing Q not followed by U | A Scrabbler's dream article. |
List of English words without rhymes | Does anything rhyme with orange? Or silver? |
List of ethnic slurs | Ever wondered why they got so angry at you? |
List of proposed etymologies of OK | There's more than you think, OK? |
List of shorthand systems | Featuring Gregg, Pitman, and other quickly-written but only-theoretically-readable scripts. |
Longest word in English | Floccinaucinihilipilification, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious and other contenders. |
Mamihlapinatapai | The Guinness World Record holder for the "most succinct word". |
Martian language | Chinese language + Internet = new language. |
Maternal insult | What is this article about? Your mom! |
May you live in interesting times | The worst curse you can put on someone. Probably not Chinese in origin. |
Metal umlaut | Gïvë thë lögö för ÿöür hëävÿ mëtäl bänd ä töügh Gërmänïc fëël. |
Murad Takla | Converting the Bengali language to Latin script can sometimes have interesting consequences. |
My postillion has been struck by lightning | A perfectly normal thing to say, as recommended by 19th century multilingual phrasebooks. |
Newton's flaming laser sword | Not an actual weapon, but a philosophical razor created by an Australian mathematician. |
Nucular | Enough people have mispronounced nuclear that it's apparently a real word now. |
Phaistos Disc | Ancient spirals of undeciphered hieroglyphs. |
Placeholder name | You know, thingamajigs, doohickeys, whatchamacallits... |
Pompatus | All Steve Miller's fault. |
Potrzebie | A Polish word best known to American readers of MAD magazine. |
Pronunciation of GIF | Remember when the internet spent most of 2014 arguing about this? Good times. |
RAS syndrome | ...which is itself an example of RAS. |
Response to sneezing | Achoo! A great fortunate occurrence! |
Retroflex click | The clicks can be represented by well uh… an emoji ‼️ |
Robert Shields | You think you are hooked on recording every detail of your life...? |
Rohonc Codex | A mysterious book found in Hungary that to this day remains unsolved. |
Scientific wild-ass guess | Please excuse my SWAG. |
Scots Wikipedia | What happens when an American teen writes 23,000 articles in a language he has no idea how to speak? |
Shavian alphabet | A new (well, 1960s) alphabet made exclusively for English. |
Shibboleth | A type of slang used to identify an individual with a very specific region, usually with accompanied value judgments. Also, a funny word. |
Shit happens | A statement of philosophical existentialism boiled down to two words. |
Shm-reduplication | Ah, Wikipedia-shmikipedia. |
Spelling of Shakespeare's name | What is the correct spelling of the famous English playwright? |
Taito | A kanji with 84 strokes, the most for any CJK character by some distance. |
Talk to the hand | ...'cause the face ain't listening. |
Tenevil | Chukchi man who independently created his own writing system for the Chukchi language. |
Thagomizer | The word referring to those spikes on the tails of Stegosauria originated from the same guy that made "Cow tools". |
That that is is that that is not is not is that it it is | Punctuation matters, people. |
The Moon is made of green cheese | Is it really made out of cheese? |
There is no sex in the USSR | Did you know that? |
Thinking about the immortality of the crab | A colorful Spanish idiom for daydreaming; try using this one if your teacher notices you becoming inattentive in class. |
Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana | Another example of syntactic ambiguity. |
Toynbee tiles | Tiles found embedded in asphalt, usually sporting cryptic messages. |
Tsundoku | Buy a book and then don't read it. |
Unknown unknowns | Things that we don't know we don't know, as immortalised by Donald Rumsfeld. |
Voynich manuscript | An undeciphered illustrated book written six hundred or so years ago by an anonymous author using an unidentified alphabet. |
Wine-dark sea | Homer's epithet that raises a theory that Greeks of Homer's time were color blind. |
Yan tan tethera | The proper, Brythonic way to count sheep oop North. |
Zhemao hoaxes | An editor on Chinese Wikipedia created over 200 articles about fake Russian history, making it one of the largest hoaxes on Wikipedia. |
Zzxjoanw | A fictional word that really confused linguists. |
Abercraf English | How an all-new variety of English has developed in a single Welsh village since World War II. |
Algonquian–Basque pidgin | The linguistic fruit of the travels of Basque whalers. |
Basque–Icelandic pidgin | |
Anāl language | Its phonemic inventory, sadly, doesn't include the voiced anal fricative. |
Andalusian language movement | A group of people have attempted to promote Andalusian Spanish as a distinct language. They have successfully created an Andalusian version of Minecraft. |
Antarctic English | Not spoken by penguins. |
Arcaicam Esperantom | How do you make things look "old" in a constructed language? By inventing a new one! |
Boontling | Bet it seems pretty crazeek to harp boont to a kimmie Brightlighter like you, huh? |
Broome Pearling Lugger Pidgin | A pidgin formed in 20th century Western Australia from Aboriginal Australian English, Japanese, and Kupang Malay to facilitate communication between the variety of groups working on pearling boats in the Kimberley region. |
Cia-Cia | A language in Indonesia that came to use the Korean script. |
DoggoLingo | Hoomanz wrote thiz cool article about mai language! |
Dravido-Korean languages | A discarded and mostly-forgotten hypothesis that Korean and the Dravidian languages of Southern India made up a single language family, despite being thousands of kilometres apart and sharing very little common history. |
E-Prime | A form of English without the verb 'to be'. |
High Tider | Some people in rural coastal areas of North Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland still speak a dialect derived from the English spoken over 300 years ago. |
Ithkuil | Try learning this in a weekend! |
Jamaican Maroon Spirit Possession Language | A creole language with Akan vocabulary that is spoken by Jamaican Maroons in rituals involving spiritual possession. |
Kebabnorsk | The delicious-sounding ethnolect prevalent in multi-ethnic Oslo. |
Lojban | A constructed language based on predicate logic. |
Mediterranean Lingua Franca | The original lingua franca. Spoken from the 11th to the 19th centuries with substratum from Venetian, Genoese, Catalan, Occitan, Spanish, Portuguese, Turkish, Arabic, Berber, Greek, Sicilian, Galician, and many more. |
Nicaraguan Sign Language | Nicaraguan deaf children create their own language after only being taught to lip-read Spanish, fascinate linguists. |
Pandanus language | "Don't use regular words, you'll ruin the screwpine nuts." A prime example of an avoidance language. |
Pirahã language | A language spoken by the Amazonian Pirahã people, and an example of a language that can be whistled. The subject of controversial claims that it proves the theory of linguistic relativity. |
Plains Indian Sign Language | Despite (mostly) not being deaf, the indigenous peoples of the North American Plains developed a sign language to use as a lingua franca. |
Proto-Human language | The (completely hypothetical) genetic ancestor to all the world's languages. |
Russenorsk | A Slavic-Scandinavian pidgin that lasted only 150 years. |
Silbo Gomero | The inhabitants of La Gomera of the Canary Islands communicate across valleys by whistling in Spanish. |
Solresol | A constructed language based around musical notes. |
Sḵwx̱wú7mesh | The native name of the indigenous Squamish language of British Columbia, which uses the number 7 as a letter. |
Toki Pona | The opposite of the previously mentioned Ithkuil. Inspired by minimalism and Taoist philosophy, this constructed language has only 137 regularly used words. |
Ubykh language | A very recently extinct Circassian language with 84 phonemic consonants (a record for non-click languages), but only 2 distinct vowels. |
Wenzhounese | And you thought Mandarin was hard? A Chinese dialect nicknamed "the devil's language" for its extreme divergence and difficulty. |
ǃXóõ | A click language with 122 consonants spoken by groups of San people in Namibia and Botswana. |
Yerkish | An artificial language developed for use by non-human primates. |
See Nominative determinism for the idea that people gravitate toward careers that fit their names, e.g. urologists named Splat and Weedon.
Amandagamani Abhaya of Anuradhapura | A king of Anuradhapura whose name has way too many As for me to be comfortable with. |
Alfonso de Borbón y Borbón | A Spanish nobleman with a whopping 88 forenames. |
Arses of Persia | Unfortunately, 4th century BC Persian rulers were unable to predict modern profanity. |
Dick Assman | What? He was a celebrity for four months! |
Harry Baals | Mayor of Fort Wayne, Indiana in the 1950s and had a really unfortunate name. Almost immortalized in the Harry Baals Government Center, but it ended up being named Citizens Square instead. |
C. H. D. Buys Ballot | No evidence of electoral fraud by the chairman of a precursor to the World Meteorological Organization. |
Praise-God Barebone | Christened Unless-Jesus-Christ-Had-Not-Died-For-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned Barebone; not to be confused with his son Nicholas If-Jesus-Christ-Had-Not-Died-For-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned Barbon. |
Bishop Bishop (disambiguation) | There have been four different bishops named Bishop in England. |
Dick Bong | The most successful American fighter pilot's legal name was Richard, but he only ever went by the name "Dick Bong". |
Bumpy Bumpus | He bumped too hard and too far. Rest in peace, Bumpy Bumpus. |
Cesar Chavez | Formerly Scott Fistler, this right-wing, pro-business politician changed his name to match the Hispanic left‑wing labor activist in an attempt to get more votes. |
Thursday October Christian I | The son of Fletcher Christian, leader of the mutiny on the Bounty. |
Seymour Cocks | British MP between 1929 and 1953. |
Deportivo Wanka | An unfortunately named Peruvian football team whose strips are remarkably popular in Britain. |
Donaudampfschiffahrtsgesellschaft | An officials' association in pre-war Vienna, Austria, of a shipping company for transporting passengers and cargo on the Danube. |
Preserved Fish | A historical New York City shipping merchant. |
FM-2030 | A transhumanist philosopher changed his name to this, inspired by his predictions for the year 2030. |
Gag name | Deliberately humorous names based on double entendres, with quite a few examples listed on the page. |
Goodspaceguy | Perennial political candidate in the Seattle area of the United States who legally changed his name to align with his passion for space colonization. |
Gregor Fučka | A Slovenian-born Italian basketball player with another socially problematic last name. |
Guy Standing | Observed sitting in the infobox photo. |
John le Fucker | His surname probably didn't mean what you think it might mean. |
Argel Fucks | A Brazilian footballer with a socially problematic last name. An unforgettable newspaper headline once declared "Fucks Off to Benfica". |
Jakob Fugger | One of the richest men in history, with another quite unfortunate surname. |
States Rights Gist | A Confederate general during the American Civil War. |
John B. Goodenough | Being good enough, this guy invented random access memory and the lithium-ion battery. |
Curtis Hidden Page | An American writer whose middle and last names accidentally predicted the Internet, and the countless pages on it that could only be accessed by typing their URLs in the URL bar manually. |
Ima Hogg | American society leader, philanthropist, patron and collector of the arts, and one of the most respected women in Texas during the 20th century. |
Huang Hong-cheng, Ah Cheng from Taiwan, World’s Greatest Man, God of Wealth, and President | A performance artist who took full advantage of Taiwan's naming law. |
Christmas Humphreys | A British judge, named after the festival celebrating the birth of Christ, who helped make Buddhism popular in the UK. |
Tiny Kox | A Dutch politician. |
Jennifer 8. Lee | A former New York Times reporter whose middle name is the number eight. And you thought Harry S. Truman had an exceptional middle name... |
List of examples of Stigler's law | Bode didn't discover Bode's Law, and Pascal didn't discover Pascal's Triangle. (And Stigler didn't create Stigler's law.) |
Henry Lizardlover | Yes, he appreciates reptiles. |
Seán Dublin Bay Rockall Loftus | An Irish politician who changed his name to emphasize political affiliations. |
Mannanafnanefnd | A committee in Iceland that determines whether a name is suitable for integration into the Icelandic language. Apparently voted yes about themselves. |
Adolf Lu Hitler Marak | This Indian politician does not dispraise his parents' questionable name choice. |
Mister Mxyzptlk | Sometimes called Mxy, a fictional impish character who appears in DC Comics' Superman comic books. |
Names of Soviet origin | In the wake of the Russian Revolution, there was a craze for parents giving names of overtly revolutionary or Soviet inspiration. Examples include "Vladlen" (short for Vladimir Lenin), "Revmir" ("Revolution of the world"), "Elmira" (electrification of the world), "Barrikad" (barricade) and "Geliy" (helium). |
Naming law in Sweden | An odd Swedish law regulating children's names, which has led to disgruntled parents submitting names such as Brfxxccxxmnpcccclllmmnprxvclmnckssqlbb11116, A (both pronounced "Albin"), and Metallica. |
Neville Neville | The father of English footballers Phil Neville and Gary Neville. |
Metta World Peace | An NBA player who wants to promote World Peace and has a reputation for on-court brawls. |
Pro-Life | A perennial political candidate with strongly held views. |
Public Universal Friend | An 18th century Quaker who died, and was then revived, becoming an evangelist, gaining this unusual name, and becoming one of the earliest instances in recorded history of a person identifying as genderless. |
Rinderkennzeichnungs- und Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz | And that's the short title of this German beef labelling law. |
Tokyo Sexwale | Despite not being Japanese or a sperm whale, he has control over the global diamond industry. |
Sjokz | Commentator with an equally unpronounceable real name (Eefje Depoortere). Watch out! Eep! |
Mansfield Smith-Cumming | The first head of MI6, whose name became appropriate as he promoted the use of semen as invisible ink. |
M. K. Stalin | What if old Joe was Tamil? |
Téa | This name is surprisingly French and not English. |
Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos | A warning to us all about taking double-barrelled surnames too far... |
Leone Sextus Denys Oswolf Fraudatifilius Tollemache-Tollemache de Orellana Plantagenet Tollemache-Tollemache | Somehow, it's not even the longest or most extravagant name among his family. |
Tonibler | A name given in Kosovo in honor of a certain British politician. |
Turnipseed | Only the most hardcore turnip farmers have this name! |
Hubert Blaine Wolfeschlegelsteinhausenbergerdorff Sr. | The longest name ever given. Note: the page title is only the short form. |
Marijuana Pepsi Vandyck | Educational professional who earned her Ph.D. with a dissertation on uncommon Black names in the classroom. |
Osama Vinladen | Brother to the equally concerning Sadam Huseín and Georgia Bush. |
Vladimiro Lenin Ilich Montesinos | Did you know that Russian revolutionary and leader of the Bolsheviks Vladimir Lenin was a CIA asset? |
Archaeoacoustics | Can ancient pottery be used to play back recorded voices from the distant past? |
Airborne radioactivity increase in Europe in autumn 2017 | It's bizarre, but it did happen. |
Ota Benga | The tragic story of a Pygmy man from the Belgian Congo who was briefly exhibited in the Bronx Zoo. |
Beringer's Lying Stones | Fossils planted by God? No, just a prank created to discredit a professor whom the hoaxers didn't like. |
Buttered cat paradox | If a cat always lands on its feet and toast always lands buttered-side-down, what if...? |
Buttered toast phenomenon | But only if you're eating at a table. |
Campanology | For the good of society, we must study how to properly ring bells. |
Claude Émile Jean-Baptiste Litre | SI rules says you can't use a capital letter for a unit unless it's named after a person, but everyone uses L for the litre... so they made up a namesake. |
Cneoridium dumosum (Nuttall) Hooker F. Collected March 26, 1960, at an Elevation of about 1450 Meters on Cerro Quemazón, 15 Miles South of Bahía de Los Angeles, Baja California, México, Apparently for a Southeastward Range Extension of Some 140 Miles | This scientific paper has the longest article name on Wikipedia (250 characters out of a possible 255). The paper itself only has five words, though. |
Vladimir Demikhov | Eminent Soviet biologist and father of the canine head transplant. |
Drake's Plate of Brass | A forgery-related practical joke that went horribly awry. |
Elvis taxon | A taxon (species, genus, family, etc.) that is extinct but is later imitated by others. |
Further research is needed | Some journals have banned this infuriating and redundant cliché. Some researchers are researching its effects, but FRIN... |
Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Laboratory | You may have had a chemistry set when you were a child. I bet it didn't come with radioactive substances in the box. |
Greeble | Stimuli used in studies of object and face recognition with hilarious names. |
Lazarus taxon | Leaping Lazarus! Somewhat like Monty Python's Dead Parrot, it's not really dead; it's just resting. |
List of Ig Nobel Prize winners | Nobel Prize meets Weird Science. Result: Award-winning papers like "Injuries Due to Falling Coconuts" and "Chickens Prefer Beautiful Humans". |
Nylon-eating bacteria and creationism | The intersection of science and religion in a simple bacterium. |
'Pataphysics | A parody of science that purports to study what lies beyond the realm of metaphysics. |
Archaeological interest of Pedra da Gávea | Did ancient Phoenicians visit Brazil centuries before the Portuguese? Actually, no, they did not. |
Pathological science | A pejorative term for scientific ideas that will simply not "go away", long after they are given up on as wrong by the majority of scientists in the field. |
Project Steve | In response to creationists' attempts to create a list of evolution-denying scientists, this even longer list consists of scientists who believe in evolution and are called Steve (or some variation). |
Raven paradox | First, you'll grant that all ravens are black, yes...? |
Sokal affair | Physicist Alan Sokal demonstrates that at least some postmodernists can't see an emperor with no clothes. |
Timeline of the far future | The ultimate list of spoilers. Also gives you an existential crisis. |
Halomonas titanicae | A unique bacteria found at the Wreck of the Titanic. |
John G. Trump | A physicist and inventor with a quite underrated career. Among other things, he was the co-inventor of one of the first million-volt X-ray generators and the man that analyzed Nikola Tesla's hotel room after his death. Also the paternal uncle of Donald Trump. |
Women-are-wonderful effect | A subconscious bias that makes people consider positive attributes to be connected to women more than men, regardless of the gender you ask. |
Anatoli Bugorski | What happens when you stick your head in a particle accelerator? |
Colors of noise | Including white, pink, purple, blue... |
David Hahn | A 17-year-old, known as the Radioactive Boy Scout, who irradiated his back yard attempting to build a nuclear breeder reactor from spare parts. |
Demon core | A two-time radioactive killer. |
Deutsche Physik | Or "German physics" during the Third Reich. |
F. D. C. Willard | A published author in the field of cryogenics, and a cat. |
Fictional elements, materials, isotopes and subatomic particles | Not actual periodic elements. Many end in '-ite'. Some of the elements may indeed be minerals. |
Fourth, fifth, and sixth derivatives of position | Named after a famous cereal phenomenon. |
Flying ice cube | They happen to live inside the computers of scientists trying to simulate molecules. |
Frog battery | A curious experiment to determine the existence of animal electricity. |
Impossible color | Try to see it! |
Kundt's tube | A serious piece of scientific apparatus whose name has induced sniggering among English-speaking schoolchildren for over 150 years. |
List of unusual units of measurement | Fortnights and nibbles, super feet and Sagans. |
Mpemba effect | Hot water freezes faster than cool water, and no one is sure why. Also probably the only scientific term named after a Tanzanian schoolboy. |
Oh-My-God particle | Proof that physicists have a dramatic flair. |
Pauli effect | Something in the lab not working? Technical difficulties? Blame this guy. |
Quantum suicide and immortality | An infinite number of parallel universes means that any one person will always live forever. |
Ranque-Hilsch vortex tube | What happens when you blow in a hole in a tube? Hot air comes out one end and cold air comes out the other. No consensus reached on why it happens yet. |
Rheology of peanut butter | A serious analysis of the tastiest viscoelastic colloid. |
Shower-curtain effect | Nobody knows why when you turn on the hot water in the shower, the curtain blows in. |
Smoot | A strange unit of distance used to measure the Harvard Bridge. |
Sound of fingernails scraping chalkboard | Urrrgggh! |
The Hum | A phenomenon involving a persistent and invasive low-frequency noise of a humming character and unknown origin, not audible to all people, reported in various geographical locations. |
Aachenosaurus | A fossil plant that was mistakenly identified as a dinosaur. |
Andrée's Arctic balloon expedition | An ill-fated attempt to reach the North Pole in 1897. |
Ararat anomaly | A strange geological element that, for years, has confused practicing Christians and geologists. |
Bloop | Does a mystery sound from the bottom of the sea indicate that Cthulhu may awake...? |
Catatumbo lightning | At one lake in Venezuela, constant thunderstorms are just a regular occurrence. |
Floyd Collins | A cave explorer from the early 20th century that got stuck in a cave in Kentucky. Despite a massive rescue effort, he ended up dying there, but that wasn't the end of his story. |
Continental drip | A playful theory devised to explain why the continents are tapered toward the south. |
Expanding Earth | A theory that the Earth is growing. |
Gore effect | Whereby it gets colder when climate change campaigners come to town. |
Hector (cloud) | A cumulonimbus thundercloud cluster that forms regularly nearly every afternoon on the Tiwi Islands in the Northern Territory of Australia, from approximately September to March each year. Also known as "Hector the Convector." |
Kentucky meat shower | It's raining meat. Hallelujah it's raining meat. |
List of unexplained sounds | Must've been the wind. |
Mumbai "sweet" seawater incident | Salty creek becomes sweet for one tide cycle. |
Rain of animals | When it's literally raining cats and dogs. |
Red rain in Kerala | Did blood rain from the sky? |
Snow in Florida | Yes, snow is not unknown in the "Sunshine State". |
South-up map orientation | The crew of Apollo 17 snapped Earth with Antarctica on top. NASA followed Ptolemy and rotated it "back". |
Roy Sullivan | An unlucky park ranger who was hit by lightning on seven separate occasions. He survived them all, but came to his own tragic end. |
Tinnunculite | A recently discovered mineral that forms from bird feces. |
Waffle House Index | The U.S. government's alternative measure of disaster impact. |
Weather rock | The only 100% active and 100% accurate meteorologist. |
9,10-Dithioanthracene | The molecule that walks. |
Botulinum toxin | One of the most deadly substances known is nonetheless extremely common in the cosmetic industry. |
26th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union | The largest gem diamond ever found in Russia. |
Dihydrogen monoxide | A commonly used chemical that can be deadly to all forms of plant and animal life, contributing to global warming, erosion, acid rain, torture and countless other maladies. Or... that's what they want you to think. |
Elephant's Foot | One of the world's most toxic objects, created as a product of the Chernobyl disaster. |
Fogbank | A nuclear warhead-related material so classified that its creators – the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration – forgot how to make it. |
Goiânia accident | The world's worst nuclear incident that didn't begin in a radioactive power plant. |
List of chemical compounds with unusual names | Some a consequence of their constituents or origins, others simply the work of whimsical chemists. |
Thomas Midgley Jr. | Inventor of two of the world's most severe pollutants – and a machine that killed him. |
NanoPutian | A series of organic molecules having a structure that looks human. |
New car smell | Ahh, that new car smell. What do you mean, it might be toxic? |
Nitrogen triiodide | What's purple and explodes if a feather brushes it? |
Orotidine 5'-phosphate decarboxylase | Known for its extreme catalysis, this enzyme can reduce the time required for a reaction from 78 million years to 18 milliseconds. |
Pitch drop experiment | The world's most viscous liquid, dripping out of a funnel at the University of Queensland since 1927. There's been 9 drops so far. |
James Price | An alchemist who went to the most extreme lengths possible to avoid having to prove his findings. |
Pykrete | A bullet-resistant frozen-water compound once used in an attempt to create an aircraft carrier. |
Smell of freshly cut grass | A nostalgic odor that plays a role in plant communication as a chemical cry of agony. |
Thiotimoline | A fictional chemical which dissolves before it comes into contact with water. |
Trimethylaminuria | Do you smell something fishy? It may be you! |
Unobtainium | A term used to describe any material with properties that are unlikely or impossible for any real material to possess. |
1561 celestial phenomenon over Nuremberg | Perhaps one of the first "alien" sightings in recorded history. |
Apollo 15 postal covers incident | Three astronauts never flew to space again after being paid to take postal covers with them on Apollo 15. But that's not much of a punishment though, considering they got to go to the freakin' Moon. |
Blue Origin v. United States & Space Exploration Technologies Corp. | Two companies got into a brat fight and sued NASA in the process. |
Judith Love Cohen | One of the most important female scientists involved with the Apollo program, and Jack Black's mother. Some might say this is not the best article on Wikipedia.... this is just a tribute to her. |
Cosmic latte | The average colour of the Universe: a slightly beige white. |
Cydonia (Mars) | You've heard of the man on the Moon, now get ready for the "Face on Mars", well, sort of... |
Edward Makuka Nkoloso | The leader of a non-government Zambian space program planned to send "Afronauts" to Mars with the goal of establishing a Christian ministry to civilise Martians. |
Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster | Driving in space becomes reality. |
Embryo space colonization | A proposal for colonizing space using embryos raised by robots. |
Extraterrestrial real estate | Want to buy a housing plot on the Moon? |
Fallen Astronaut | A small statuette which is the only sculpture on the Moon. |
Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, and Phooey | Five mice who circled the Moon 75 times on Apollo 17, among the last eight Earthlings to travel to the Moon. Upon returning to Earth, the four remaining living mice were soon murdered and dissected in the name of science. ("That's one small squeak...") |
Finger of God Globule | A molecular cloud known for resembling the middle finger, a hand pointing at other stars, and worst of all, ...a penis? |
Gauss's Pythagorean right triangle proposal | Proposal of Pythagorean theorem "drawing" to be constructed in the Siberian tundra as a signal for extraterrestrials. |
Harlan J. Smith Telescope | Have you heard about the telescope that got shot? Contrary to initial reports, the harm from the bullets was extraordinary small. |
Hot, dust-obscured galaxy | Hot DOGs, anyone? |
International Space Station cannabis experiment hoax | Need we say more? |
Jovian–Plutonian gravitational effect | Sadly, the alignment of two planets wouldn't allow the British public to float. Maybe the fact that the news came out on April 1 should have clued them in. |
List of hypothetical Solar System objects | The planets that could have been. You think Pluto had it rough? At least it got its fifteen minutes of astronomical fame. |
Lunarcrete | Perfect for building your own cut-price Moon base. |
Mars Climate Orbiter | Failed Mars mission that disintegrated in the Martian atmosphere due to a unit conversion error. |
Matrioshka brain | Star-sized computer. |
Milkdromeda | The birth of a future galaxy, and the death of our own. |
Mimas (moon) | A moon that looks like the Death Star. |
The Moon is made of green cheese | Scientific consensus says it isn't, but are there people (or wolves) who think so? |
Moon landing conspiracy theories | Fake photos, slow-motion cameras and secret studios. All directed by Stanley Kubrick. |
Moon Museum | Only two people have ever seen its exhibits in person. |
Nazi UFOs | Did the Luftwaffe, in fact, explore the final frontier and make contact with alien races? Whether the secret Nazi base is on the Moon or in Antarctica, the truth is apparently out there. |
Nuclear pasta | Gnocchi, spaghetti, lasagna, bucatini and Swiss cheese may sound tasty at first, until you realized that one teaspoon of this pasta outweighs Mount Everest... |
Peryton (astronomy) | Don't use microwaves next to radio telescopes! |
Seatbelt basalt | A lunar sample spotted by David Scott while driving the Lunar Roving Vehicle on the moon. He assumed that mission control wouldn't allow him to stop and get it, so he pretended he was fastening his seatbelt. |
Sex in space | And when you've exhausted the list, here's something new to try! |
Solway Firth Spaceman | "Wasn't there when I took the pic – honest!" |
Space advertising | Plans to launch giant billboards into space. |
Space elevator competitions | How high can you go? |
Spaghettification | What happens when you fall into a black hole. |
Space Poop Challenge | A challenge in 2016 to design a new toilet system for use in space. |
Space selfie | Doing it for the 'gram. |
Stolen and missing Moon rocks | The rocks were out of this world! Unfortunately, they fell into the wrong hands. |
Supermoon | It's a bird! It's a plane! It's Supermoon! (Actually, this is a phenomenon where the moon appears slightly larger than normal. Still impressive, though.) |
Sylacauga (meteorite) | The first fallen meteorite in recorded history to have verifiably injured a human. |
Tabby's Star | A star that has been suggested to have an alien megastructure surrounding it. |
Timekeeping on Mars | How Martians know when they are. |
Vatican Observatory | One of the few official scientific institutions linked with the Catholic Church. |
Voyager Golden Record | A compilation of sounds and images of humanity on a phonograph record made of gold-plated copper. It was sent to space in 1977 and is currently the farthest man-made object from Earth. |
274301 Wikipedia | An asteroid named after Wikipedia. We truly came to the stars. |
Wow! signal | Alien radio transmission, or, at least, the strongest candidate for that role. |
Writing in space | How do you write in space? |
iPTF14hls | A star that seems to have exploded 6 times in the past 70 years. |
Accessory breast | Some people have more than two. |
Alien hand syndrome | An unusual neurological disorder, also known as "Dr. Strangelove syndrome", whereby one of the sufferer's hands seems to take on a life of its own. |
Anal wink | Here's looking at you! |
Auto-brewery syndrome | Like a microbrewery in your digestive system. |
Banana equivalent dose | A banana for scale. |
Black hairy tongue | Really? |
Bristol stool scale | Taking a close look at a toilet bowl for the sake of science. The scale was inspired by eye charts. |
ChIA-PET | Chromatin Interaction Analysis by Paired-End Tag sequencing, that is. |
Chronic Lyme disease | A conspiracy theory about long-lasting effects of Lyme disease, not to be confused with actual latent symptoms of lyme disease |
Coffee enema | A bizarre type of alternative medicine. |
Danger triangle of the face | A very specific area of your face where bursting a boil could mean certain death. |
Dimples of Venus | For fans of those dimples you don't find on a face. |
DNA origami RNA origami | Two different types of nanoscale origami. |
Dr. Young's Ideal Rectal Dilators | Forcibly withdrawn after officials clamped down on them. |
Eigengrau | The color seen by the eye in perfect darkness. |
Fart lighting | The act of igniting gases produced by human flatulence. |
Fiddler's neck | Maybe this is proof that God hates violinists. |
Five-second rule | The notion that food dropped on the floor is safe to eat only as long as it's picked up within five seconds. |
Geographical tongue | When a map appears on your tongue. |
Gynecomastia | Also known as "man boobs" or "moobs". |
Hair-grooming syncope | Who knew that brushing your hair could be deadly? |
Human–animal breastfeeding | If you have breast milk to spare, a puppy, piglet or monkey would like to hear from you. |
Hypertrichosis | Also known as "human werewolf syndrome". |
Hypoalgesic effect of swearing | Got hurt? Swear the pain away! |
Jenkem | Huffing the gas from fermented human feces for a hallucinating effect. |
Jogger's nipple | That uncomfortable friction some people get while running has a name. |
Louse-feeder | In search of a cure for typhus, humans let lice feed on them. |
Lucky iron fish | Treat anemia by putting an iron fish in your soup. |
Maggot therapy | Those hungry, wriggling little larvae will clean up festering wounds because they are hungry. |
Male lactation | Given the right conditions, just about any male can do it. |
Maple syrup urine disease | For once, a sweet smell you don't want your infants exuding. |
Medical students' disease | A condition frequently reported in medical students who perceive themselves to be experiencing the symptoms of the diseases they are studying. |
Mellified man | A legendary medicinal substance from Arabia involving honey. |
Michelin tire baby syndrome | Babies that look like the Michelin man. |
Moebius syndrome | A disease, most envied by poker players, that makes facial expressions impossible. |
Mucophagy | The consumption of mucus. |
Nacirema | An obscure New World tribe with some interesting practices. |
Navel lint | A study proves that most belly button fluff is blue and that women are less likely to have it. |
Nasal sebum | Yes, that stuff on the surface of your nose. |
Old person smell | Apparently developed to allow humans to avoid partnering with people who are too old for them. Not to be confused with death smell (though they're not incompatible in some places). |
Osteo-odonto-keratoprosthesis | A tooth in the eye (is worth two in the foot?). |
Paleofeces | Our ancestors' poop. Worth a close look, apparently. |
Peanut butter test | A diagnostic test for Alzheimer's disease which measures subjects' ability to smell peanut butter through each nostril. |
Photic sneeze reflex | People who sneeze when suddenly exposed to bright light. |
Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis | That's a mouthful! Good thing it has a much shorter name: silicosis. |
Powder of sympathy | Healing a wound of war by applying a powder... to the weapon that caused it. |
Rapunzel syndrome | Chewing on your hair is one thing, but actually eating it can have some untoward results. |
Resting bitch face | Some people may look angry or contemptuous when they're actually perfectly relaxed. |
Retained surgical instruments | An unfortunate possible side-effect of surgery. |
Schmidt sting pain index | An entomologist is stung by just about everything known to sting and, en route, describes the pain involved in terms of a four-point comparative scale. |
Supernumerary nipple | A condition in which one has an additional nipple. Apparently 1 in 18 people have this condition. |
Takotsubo cardiomyopathy | Yes, you can die from a broken heart. |
Thumb twiddling | Maybe this is unusual to you. |
Traditional Chinese medicines derived from the human body | Just because you're not a rhino, or a tiger, or a pangolin, doesn't mean you're safe. |
Trepanation | A form of surgery where a hole is drilled or scraped into the skull. It was thought that such a procedure could cure problems like epilepsy or allow a person to enter into a higher state of consciousness. |
Uncombable hair syndrome | Not just a bad hair day. |
White-nose syndrome | Bats with white noses: sounds cute, is horrifying. |
Autocunnilingus | Like autofellatio (see below), but much more difficult. |
Autofellatio | Acts of oral self-stimulation. |
Armin Meiwes | German guy who met another German guy on a Yahoo Gay-Kannibalengruppe (they exist) in 2001. The rest, as they say, is history... |
Bathroom sex | Ever wanted to defecate and have sex at the same time? Well now you can! |
Bread dildo | A supposed sex toy originating from Ancient Greece, made of bread. |
Cello scrotum | A hoax illness allegedly affecting male cello players. |
Coregasm | An orgasm caused by exercising of the core abdominal muscles. |
Death during consensual sex | Talk about going out with a bang... |
Donkey punch | Allegedly a sex move involving punching one's partner in the back of the head during intercourse. |
Female hysteria | A once-common diagnosis of a range of symptoms in women, cured through masturbation. |
Footsies | Did you know? It's possible for a couple to flirt by touching each other's legs. |
Gerbilling | An urban legend about a sexual practice purportedly conducted. It was made popular by South Park. |
Global Orgasm for Peace | Oh yeah, the end of human conflict just turns me on... |
Hamster zona-free ovum test | A test – sometimes called a "hamster test" – involving human semen, hamster eggs and a petri dish. |
Human penis size | Scientific data on average size, racial variations, surgical enlargement and urban legends. |
Koro | A condition where one (mistakenly) believes that his or her genitals are slowly disappearing. |
Lithopedion | The rare condition of an unborn fetus calcifying. |
Male pregnancy | For now, it's just a seahorse thing, but... |
Napoleon's penis | (Allegedly) cut off after his death and, among other things, displayed at a museum in Manhattan. |
National Masturbation Day | Not related to the week, and certainly not related to the month. |
Parasitic twin | A medical condition where one of two conjoined twins lacks essential organs and must rely on the other for survival, often leeching its blood. An especially rare variant of this, fetus in fetu, involves one partially formed fetus developing within the body of the other. |
Persistent genital arousal disorder | Not as funny as it may sound. |
Post-coital tristesse | "But after the enjoyment of sensual pleasure is passed, the greatest sadness follows." –Baruch Spinoza |
Puppy pregnancy syndrome | A condition found in remote regions of India in which people believe they have conceived a puppy shortly after being bitten by a dog. |
Scrotal inflation | For real now, boys: DO NOT try this at home. You can put your life at risk while doing it. |
Self-inflicted caesarean section | A harrowing practice, verified to have occurred at least five times. |
Sexual headache | Not the one that wives pretend to have to dissuade their husbands; this type happens during the act. |
Sleep sex | A form of parasomnia (similar to sleepwalking) that causes people to engage in sexual acts while they are asleep. |
Smoking fetishism | Apparently, this is a thing. |
Soggy biscuit | Don't finish last, whatever you do. |
Zombie pornography | Modern reincarnation of necrophilia. |
Elisabeth Anderson Sierra | Diagnosed with hyperlactation syndrome, her generous donations of excess breast milk have earned her the title of "Milk Goddess". |
Jaxon Buell | A child born with only 20% of a brain. He lived for 5 years despite doctors' expectations that he would only live for 1 year. |
Jeanne Calment | A Frenchwoman with the longest verified human lifespan in recorded history. She was 122 at the time of her death. |
Legrand G. Capers | The only person ever to witness a woman being impregnated by a bullet. |
Stubbins Ffirth | An American trainee doctor who went to unusual lengths in his quest to prove that yellow fever is not contagious. |
Phineas Gage | A 19th-century construction worker who survived a three-foot-long (0.91 m) tamping iron going through his skull. His resultant behavioral changes have made him an important figure in the development of neuroscience. |
Genie | A feral child who was neglected by her father and was locked in a room for the first 13 years of her life. |
James Harrison | An Australian man whose 1,173 blood donations have saved over 2.5 million babies. |
Abby and Brittany Hensel | Conjoined twins with separate heads but joined bodies. |
Paul Karason | An American man known for having blue skin. |
"Benjaman Kyle" | Found naked and unconscious outside a Burger King dumpster (where he derived his new alias from), he doesn't remember 20 years of his life, or how he ended up in Georgia from Colorado. |
Eugene Landy | A psychologist who developed a form of 24-hour therapy and later became business partners with one of his many celebrity patients, Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys. |
Hans Langseth | A guy who had the longest beard recorded in history. |
Robert Liston | A 19th-century Scottish surgeon who, among other things, performed what has been described as "the only operation in history with a 300 percent mortality rate". |
Barry Marshall | A doctor who, against the consensus of mainstream medicine, drank a vial of bacterial culture to prove that stomach ulcers were caused by bacteria rather than stress, spicy foods, and too much acid as was believed at the time. He won the Nobel Prize for it, too. |
Alexis St. Martin | A 19th-century French-Canadian fur trader who survived a gunshot wound and was left with a hole in his stomach, which allowed revolutionary experiments on digestion to be conducted. |
Lina Medina | A Peruvian girl who gave birth to a son when she was five years old, becoming the youngest human mother on record. |
Billy Milligan | A man with 24 personalities, popularized by the 1981 book The Minds of Billy Milligan. |
Wenceslao Moguel | Accused of participating in the Mexican Revolution, he was sentenced to death, survived his execution, and lived for another 6 decades. |
Blanche Monnier | A French woman who was locked in an attic for 26 years because her parents disapproved of her choice of suitor. |
Mariam Nabatanzi | A Ugandan woman who had given birth to 44 children by the age of 36. |
Chandre Oram | A man in India with a 13-inch (33 cm) tail. |
Adam Rainer | The only person known to be both a dwarf and a giant. |
Tarrare | A Frenchman with an insatiable appetite, who made a show out of his ability to eat just about anything. Including, allegedly, a toddler. |
Mary Toft | An English woman who hoaxed doctors into believing that she had given birth to rabbits. |
Robert Wadlow | An American man who, at 8 ft 11.1 in (2.72 m), was the tallest verified person in human history. |
Alice in Wonderland syndrome | Distortions of perception that may include one's surroundings appearing too large or too small, faint noises sounding loud, or time slowing to a trickle. |
Anton syndrome | People who are blind but convinced they can see. |
Bananadine | Exactly how psychedelic are those dried banana peels? |
Bicameral mentality | Neuroscientific hypothesis that the human mind before the Bronze Age was split into two discrete components, a speaking mind and obeying mind. |
Capgras delusion | When you're sure a friend or loved one is an impostor. |
Cortical homunculus | A distorted representation of the human body based on areas of the brain dedicated to processing motor functions for different body parts. |
Cotard delusion | Suffered by people, very much alive, who believe they're dead. |
Conversion disorder | Blindness and similar disabilities caused by anxiety. |
Cute aggression | The reason why people want to squeeze cute things without harm. |
Dancing mania | Unknown forces cause large groups of people to dance hysterically until dropping from exhaustion in multiple incidents in Europe from the 13th to 17th centuries. |
Electromagnetic hypersensitivity | For those allergic to Wi-Fi. |
Encopresis | Voluntary or involuntary defecation in persons who are toilet trained (older than 4 years of age.) |
Exploding head syndrome | Ever woken up after an hour or two of sleep thinking you've just heard a massive explosion? |
Expressive aphasia | You know when you have a word on tip of your tongue but you just can't remember it? It's that, but with every word. |
False memory | Forming of false memories; sometimes leads to thousands of people having the same false memory. |
Fugue state | You black out and when you wake up years have passed, you're in a different city, you have a new name and have lived a different life while you were unconscious. Also known as dissociative fugue or psychogenic fugue. |
Foreign accent syndrome | A rare medical condition whereby sufferers speak their native language with a foreign accent. |
Fregoli delusion | The belief that different people are actually one person in disguise. |
Geophagia | Eat dirt, pal. |
Homicidal sleepwalking | A real parasomnia that has been successfully used as a defence in court. |
Impossible color | Supposed colors that do not appear in ordinary visual functioning. |
Jumping Frenchmen of Maine | Like Tourette syndrome, but more Gallic. |
Klüver–Bucy syndrome | One specific kind of brain damage causes hypersexuality and a desire to put random things in your mouth. Named after two doctors who gave psychotropic drugs to lobotomized monkeys. |
Mariko Aoki phenomenon | A Japanese expression referring to an urge to defecate that is suddenly felt after entering bookstores. |
Paris syndrome | Being clinically disappointed by Paris. Particularly common among Japanese tourists. Not to be confused with Jerusalem syndrome or Stockholm syndrome. |
Rosenhan experiment | An experiment involving certifiably sane mental patients. |
Somatoparaphrenia | A type of delusion in which a sufferer denies ownership of a limb or an entire side of the body. |
Stendhal syndrome | A psychosomatic illness that causes rapid heartbeat, dizziness, fainting, confusion and even hallucinations when an individual is exposed to art or natural beauty. |
Tanganyika laughter epidemic | What happens when contagious laughter becomes an actual epidemic. |
Target fixation | To become so fixated on an object you are trying to avoid that you collide with it. |
Tip of the tongue | What was this article about again... Wait, I think I am just about to remember... |
The Truman Show delusion | Those afflicted feel they are being watched all the time by a television audience, like Jim Carrey's character in the 1998 movie The Truman Show. |
Urophagia | The consumption of urine. Not always for survival reasons. |
Visual release hallucinations | Millions of perfectly sane people are having freakish hallucinations – and just not admitting it. |
Zero stroke | An alleged mental disorder that caused patients to write endless rows of zeroes. |
Cherophobia | Fear of happiness |
Chromophobia | Fear of colors |
Coprophobia | Fear of feces or even defecation, and possibly enjoying constipation |
Dentophobia | Fear of dentists |
Emetophobia | Fear of vomiting |
Globophobia | Fear of balloons or balloons popping |
Genuphobia | Fear of knees or the act of kneeling |
Koumpounophobia | Fear of buttons |
Mageiricophobia | Fear of cooking |
Numerophobia | Fear of numbers |
Osmophobia | Fear of odors and smells |
Phallophobia | Fear of the erect penis |
Philophobia | Fear of love |
Phobophobia | Fear of having a phobia |
Pogonophobia | Fear of beards |
Submechanophobia | Fear of submerged man-made objects |
Technophobia | Fear of computers and internet |
Telephobia | Fear of making or answering telephone calls |
Adactylidium | A mite with a very unusual life cycle. |
Animals in space | An annotated list of the various animals used in space programs. |
Animal attack | Not kidding: death by beavers, bunnies, squirrels, crocodiles, and other creatures you should not have as pets. |
Anting (bird activity) | Not recommended for humans. |
Apophallation | Are you a slug and can't extract your penis? Amputate and change your gender. |
Bee removal | Removal of bees. |
Blast fishing | Catch a lot of fish at once by blowing up a lake. |
Boiling frog | Despite the metaphor, they won't really sit there and let themselves boil to death. |
Candiru | Barbed fish allegedly attracted to, lodged in, and extracted from human penises. |
Carcinisation | Crustaceans may evolve how they wish, but eventually, it all comes back to crab shape. |
Common Surinam toad | The mother's back is where the eggs are embedded and where they develop. |
Conservation-induced extinction | The extinction of highly endangered parasites at the hands of conservationists. |
Depopulation of cockroaches in post-Soviet states | A great ecological problem indeed complete with fourteen references in Russian. |
Cat–dog relationship | For centuries the two most popular house pets have been fighting like, well, cats and dogs. |
Cymothoa exigua | A parasitic crustacean that, when female (they are hermaphroditic), attaches to and then destroys a fish's tongue, hooks itself to the remaining stub and becomes the fish's new tongue. |
Epomis | A deceptive beetle larva that entices its own predators by feigning prey-like movements in order to eat its predator. |
Eunice aphroditois | "Armed with sharp teeth, it is known to attack with such speeds that its prey is sometimes sliced in half." As if being a three-metre (9 ft 10 in) worm were not impressive enough. |
Fat-tailed sheep | BBL... BTL? |
Goblin shark | Indeed, a monster from the deepest oceans. |
Goldfish swallowing | A fad that started in American colleges in the 1930s. |
Hallucinogenic fish | No, the fish are not trippin'; they will cause hallucinations if ingested. It is not known if hallucinations will occur if one fish consumes another. |
Hebrew character | Actually a species of moth. |
Hotwheels sisyphus | A pretty rad name for a ground spider... until you know what inspired such name. |
Hurricane Shark | The meteorological equivalent of Bigfoot. (Except it's real. Kind of. Probably. At least once.) |
Israel-related animal conspiracy theories | Has an animal looked suspicious? It was probably Israel. |
Jenny Haniver | A grotesque-looking sea monster made from the corpse of a ray. |
Lioconcha hieroglyphica | A type of clam with a shell covered in hieroglyph-like markings. |
List of animals displaying homosexual behavior | Everything from salmon to seagulls to dragonflies. |
List of animal sounds | Snail do "Munch, crunch", Squirrel do "squeak". |
List of animals awarded human credentials | Mostly due to pranks pulled on diploma mills. |
London Underground mosquito | A species of mosquito that lives in underground railways. |
Love dart | Hermaphroditic snails play Cupid. |
Lyall's wren | Made extinct by feral cats, possibly the offspring of one pregnant female. |
Metoecus paradoxus | A beetle with - as prophet of our age Megan Thee Stallion put it - eyelashes "on fleek". |
Nightingale excrement as facial | Droppings of a nightingale variety used in facials. Some claim that it helps with acne. Project Medicine states that the references are not MEDRS. (MEDical Reliable Source) |
Orbiting Frog Otolith | A NASA frog experiment, sending two bullfrogs into space to test their sense of balance. |
Paracerceis sculpta | A species of isopod that has some males that mimic females and others that mimic juveniles, allowing them to mate without the alpha males realising what is going on behind their backs. |
Pasilalinic-sympathetic compass | Telepathic communication is not possible in snails no matter how far apart they may be. Nothing else has been ruled out. |
Penis fencing | A |
Polar bear jail | For polar bear criminals. |
Prostitution among animals | Did you know that prostitution exists among animals? |
Rotating locomotion in living systems | Why don't animals have wheels? |
Shortarse feelerfish | Bathymicrops brevianalis is a fish so named for its short anal fins – brevianalis meaning "short anus". |
Supernumerary body part | Having an extra body part, be it as simple as an eleventh finger or as extreme as a second head! |
Tasselled wobbegong | "With several records of apparently unprovoked attacks on people, the tasselled wobbegong has a reputation beyond other wobbegongs for aggressive behavior." |
Thagomizer | A feature of Stegosaurus anatomy named after a Far Side comic strip. |
Traumatic insemination | A form of mating in invertebrates in which the male stabs the female in the abdomen with his penis, and injects his sperm through the wound. |
Trout tickling | Coochy coo! |
Uraba lugens | It's called the mad hatterpillar for a reason... |
Worm charming | No spade? No worries! There's a better way to get hold of earthworms. |
Bonsai Kitten | The practice of growing small jar-shaped kittens caused controversy years after it was revealed to be a hoax. |
Cat burning | A form of entertainment in the Middle Ages, sometimes participated in by royalty. |
Cats That Look Like Hitler | Kitlers exist, live with it. |
Demon Cat | A cat that supposedly haunts government buildings in Washington, D.C. |
Odd-eyed cat | One of the national treasures of Turkey. |
Pittsburgh refrigerator cat | A "breed" of cat that lived in refrigerators that people actually believed existed. |
Popular cat names | Cat names, ranked by popularity. |
Polydactyl cat | Cats with extraordinary numbers of toes. |
Ray cat | A proposed genetically engineered breed that glows in presence of nuclear radiation. |
Cow tipping | This actually takes up to 14 people to make it happen. |
Craven Heifer | The largest cow ever shown in England. |
Hardware disease | A condition in bovines caused by ingesting stray bits of metal. |
Cannibalism in poultry | See: tastes like chicken. |
Chicken eyeglasses | Tiny spectacles for chicks, to stop them from seeing red. |
Chicken Dance, Chicken (dance) | There is a huge difference. |
Chicken gun | Valuable for the mitigation of damage from bird strikes. The chicken carcass must be thawed first, though. |
Chicken hypnotism | Have you ever wanted to hypnotize a chicken? If not, why not? |
Chicken or the egg | Which came first? |
Chicken sexer | A person whose job is to determine the sex of chicken hatchlings. |
Chicken powered nuclear bomb | A British project to lay nuclear mines in West Germany during the Cold War that were planned to be kept warm by live chickens. |
Empathy in chickens | Have some empathy when eating crunchy chicken nuggets. |
Tastes like chicken | But baked, grilled, or fried? |
Arctic ground squirrel | The squirrel that freezes itself solid. |
Electrical disruptions caused by squirrels | Two squirrels on a wire... |
Squirrel fishing | A sport of skill and patience. |
Squirrels on college campuses | Squirrels are noted to be prominent fauna there. |
Ambergris | Do you really want to know what your fancy perfume was made from? |
Berserk llama syndrome | The result of being too friendly with llamas. |
Danish Protest Pig | A pig bred to look like the flag of Denmark, to circumvent prohibition of the flag. |
Deer penis | It is said to enhance sexual potency in men and was banned by the Chinese government from the 2008 Olympics. |
Diving horse | A short-lived attraction during the 1880s. |
The dog ate my homework | Instead of a pathetic excuse for an article, an article about a pathetic excuse. |
Domesticated silver fox | Soviet Russia subsidizes the breeding of silver foxes. |
Exploding whale | The next time a whale washes on shore in one Oregon county, the authorities will leave the dynamite at home. |
Fainting goat | A breed of goat whose muscles freeze for about 10 seconds when it is startled. |
Flying primate hypothesis | Hypothesis that megabats are primates like us. |
Globster | Blobs of organic matter found washed up on beaches, which are frequently as mysterious as they are disgusting. |
Guided rat | Implanted electrodes let researchers "steer the animal over an obstacle course, making it twist, turn and even jump on demand". |
House hippo | The world's biggest domestic pest. If you can believe that. |
Human | An article that reads as if non-humans wrote it. |
New Guinea singing dog | Not only that, but it climbs trees too! |
Overtoun Bridge | A bridge from which dogs keep leaping to their death. |
Panda pornography | Pornographic movies created to achieve sexual arousal for Giant pandas, which have been proven to be unaffected by the popular drug Viagra. |
Quokka | An Australian animal which has developed a habit of posing for selfies with humans. |
Revival of the woolly mammoth | Plans to clone the woolly mammoth and re-introduce them to Siberia. |
Rhinogradentia | A fictitious order of mammal invented by a German zoologist with a sense of humour. |
Skunks as pets | For pet owners who like a challenge. |
Street dogs in Moscow | Some of them have figured out how to commute using the subway system. |
Weasel war dance | The behavior of extremely excited ferrets who are enjoying themselves too much. |
What Is It Like to Be a Bat? | Life’s most important questions. |
Whale fall | The ecological consequences associated with a dead whale sinking to the seafloor. |
52-hertz whale | Dubbed the "world's loneliest whale", it vocalizes at a frequency used by no known whale species. |
Adwaita | Possibly the oldest creature of modern times, this 255 year-old tortoise was the former pet of Robert Clive of the British East India Company. |
Ken Allen | Orangutan nicknamed the "Hairy Houdini" for his many escapes. |
Andy | A footless goose who wore sneakers as prosthesis and was tragically murdered. |
Benson | A fish. A big fish. Called Benson. |
Bubbles | A chimpanzee who used human toilet facilities, moonwalked, and (allegedly) attempted suicide. |
Casper | A cat famed for traveling on a bus around Plymouth, England. |
Clever Hans | A horse that allegedly knew arithmetic and could read in German. |
Cocaine Bear | A bear found dead in the Tennessee wilderness, having gone through a drug smuggler's dropped bag of cocaine. Inspired a 2023 film (though in that one, the bear didn't just drop dead, as there'd be no plot that way). |
Conan the Barbarian | Argentinian president's dog that was cloned after its death and who advised the guy on politics. The man also said that he and the dog "first met in a previous life more than 2,000 years ago as a gladiator and a lion in the Roman Colosseum"... |
Domino Day 2005 sparrow | Unlucky sparrow who dropped some 23,000 dominos and got killed for that. |
Dusty the Klepto Kitty | Redefining the term "cat burglar". |
Enumclaw horse sex case | An unfortunate case of a horse riding a man, as opposed to a man riding a horse. |
Fungie | Ireland's favourite dolphin. |
Gef | A mongoose that talked (allegedly). |
George | A lobster weighing 20 pounds (9.1 kg), estimated to be 140 years old. |
Grape-kun | A Humboldt penguin who gained worldwide fame after apparently falling in love with a cutout of an anime character. |
Grumpy Cat | Unfortunately, this cat couldn't turn that frown upside down. |
Hachikō | A well-known story of a Japanese dog that will make you cry by the end of it. |
Harambe | A gorilla killed to prevent it killing a child it was saving. Became a meme. |
Henry the Hexapus | An octopus missing two arms due to an unfortunate birth defect. |
Hoover the talking seal | Hoover. A seal. Which talked. |
Jack | A Baboon who took over for his disabled owner as an employee of the Cape government railway. |
Jackie | A dalmatian dog who was taught by his owner to do the Nazi salute, long before Count Dankula did. |
Jeremy | A left-coiled snail who became famous after a campaign to find another left-coiled snail so he could mate. |
Joe the Pigeon | Was put on death row for being American, but later acquitted and released. Named after the then President-elect. |
Jonathan | Oldest known living terrestrial animal in the world (if it weren't Adwaita). He made the reverse of the 5p of Saint Helena. What have you done? |
Khanzir | Possibly the world's loneliest pig. Even more lonely during the swine flu outbreak. |
Lily Flagg | A Jersey cow that produced record amounts of butter and got a sizable neighborhood named for her. |
Lion of Gripsholm Castle | What happens when you tell a taxidermist who doesn't know what a lion is to stuff and mount a lion. |
Lonesome George | The last known individual of the species Pinta Island tortoise. He was known as the rarest creature in the world. |
Long Boi | A "exceptionally tall" duck living on the University of York campus. |
Mayor Max II | The world's cutest mayor-for-life creature: a Golden Retriever. |
Mike the Headless Chicken | A rooster that lived for 18 months with his head cut off. |
Ming | A ~500-year-old clam that was killed when scientists opened its shell to see how old it was. |
Moo Deng | The internet's favorite baby hippo, who reached such a level of popularity that her zoo had to limit the amount of time visitors could see her enclosure. |
Nim Chimpsky | A chimpanzee, subject of long-running studies into animal language acquisition, named punningly for linguist Noam Chomsky. |
Major General Sir Nils Olav, Baron of the Bouvet Islands | A high-ranking military officer of Norway who happens to live in the penguin exhibit at Edinburgh Zoo. |
Oscar the Cat | A hospice cat who was featured in the New England Journal of Medicine for his purported ability to predict the impending death of terminally ill patients. |
Owen and Mzee | Hippo and tortoise that befriended each other after the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami. |
Paul | A now-deceased psychic octopus who could predict the winner of football games, notably during the 2010 FIFA World Cup. |
Pep | A dog jokingly sentenced to a life sentence in prison to help improve prisoners' morale- though many publications took the sentence literally. |
Potoooooooo | Actually, it's pronounced "potatoes". |
Penelope (platypus) | A platypus who faked a pregnancy and escaped from the Bronx Zoo. |
Raccoon of Kherson | A zoo animal becomes a prisoner of war after the liberation of Kherson. |
Ravens of the Tower of London | Ravens used as soldiers in the Tower of London. |
River Thames whale | In 2006, a Northern Bottlenose swam into London and on to the front pages of the British newspapers. |
Sergeant Reckless | A horse that held an official rank in the US military, fought in the Korean War and participated in an amphibious landing. |
Stubbs | A cat who was the mayor of an Alaskan town for nearly 20 years. |
Tamworth Two | Two pigs who, in 1998, escaped an abattoir in England and attracted media attraction. Thanks to a newspaper, they were never made into bacon, ham or sausages. |
Tillamook Cheddar | The world's most successful and widely shown animal artist. |
Timothy | A tortoise that was present during the bombardment of Sevastopol during the Crimean War in 1854 and survived until 2004. |
Tombili | A cat famously pictured looking chill on the streets of Istanbul, who is now immortalised by a statue on the site. |
Turra Coo | An insurance protest gone too far. |
Ubre Blanca | Fidel Castro's favourite cow that produced 113 liters in one day, and was used as a symbol of superior agriculture under communism. When she died, a marble statue was erected in her memory. |
Unsinkable Sam | A cat that has survived the sinking of three ships. |
Vacanti mouse | A mouse with a human ear on its back. |
Whitney Chewston | A dog that gained fame due to having the manner of a homophobic white woman. |
William Windsor | A cashmere goat who served as a lance corporal in the 1st Battalion, the Royal Welsh, an infantry battalion of the British Army. |
Wojtek | A soldier of the 22nd Artillery Supply Company of the Polish II Corps who also happened to be a Syrian Brown Bear. He enjoyed beer and cigarettes. |
Abul-Abbas | An Asian elephant given to Carolingian emperor Charlemagne by the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashid. |
Hanno | An Indian elephant that was a gift from the Portuguese king Manuel I to the pope in the 16th century. |
Jumbo | An elephant with gigantism and legendary circus attraction, who gave his name to large things everywhere. |
Lin Wang | A Taiwanese elephant made famous for his participation in the Second Sino-Japanese War. |
Mary | Makes the phrase "hung like an elephant" take on a whole new meaning. |
Osama bin Laden | An elusive elephant who terrorized the jungle of Assam. He was eventually shot, but there are those who question the official story of his death. Much like his famous namesake. |
Topsy | An elephant that was electrocuted, as the event was filmed by the Edison Manufacturing Company. |
Aha ha | Alan Partridge's favorite wasp? |
Anophthalmus hitleri | Rare blind beetle named after Adolf Hitler, poached by collectors of Hitler memorabilia. |
Aptostichus barackobamai | A trapdoor spider named after former U.S. President Barack Obama. |
Aptostichus stephencolberti | Another trapdoor spider, this time named after Stephen Colbert. Naturally, because he asked for it. |
Bill Gates' flower fly | A flower fly, Eristalis gatesi, named after Bill Gates. |
Colon | Someone pulled this beetle name out of their butt. Including the glorious species Colon rectum. |
Gamergate (ant) | "Actually, it's about ethics in ant breeding..." |
GoldenPalace.com Monkey | A new species of monkey that was officially named after the GoldenPalace.com online casino. |
Harryplax | A genus of crab named in part after the titular character of the Harry Potter franchise. The sole species of this genus is named after the coldly hostile, yet emotion-concealing character from the same franchise. |
Kimjongilia | A flower named after North Korean leader Kim Jong-il by a Japanese botanist. |
Kinda baboon | Is it a baboon? Well, kinda. |
Mini | A genus of tiny Madagascar frogs containing 3 species: Mini ature, Mini mum, and Mini scule. |
Mothers against decapentaplegic | Actually, it's a protein. |
Mountain Chicken | Is it a frog or a chicken? |
Neopalpa donaldtrumpi | A moth remarkable for its orange head and small genitalia. |
Pachygnatha zappa | A spider whose abdominal markings resemble a very famous mustache |
Pikachurin | An extracellular matrix-like retinal protein named after Pikachu. |
Setaceous Hebrew character | A European moth with wing markings bearing a chance resemblance to a letter in the Hebrew alphabet. |
You may snicker now, but if you had any of these, I guarantee you wouldn't be laughing much. | |
Sonic hedgehog | A protein in the vertebrate hedgehog family that was officially named after Sega's video game character Sonic the Hedgehog. |
Spongiforma squarepantsii | A type of mushroom named after SpongeBob SquarePants. |
Strigiphilus garylarsoni | A biting louse named for cartoonist Gary Larson of Far Side fame. |
Synalpheus pinkfloydi | A species of snapping shrimp named after the famous English rock band. |
Thaumatodryinus tuukkaraski | A wasp named after NHL goaltender Tuukka Rask as both are acrobatic, and have a killer glove hand. |
Zombie taxon | Paleontology of the undead. |
Zoosphaerium darthvaderi | Named after Darth Vader, this one has an anal shield with a "pronounced bell shape"! |
Zyzyxia lundellii and Zyzzyzus warreni | The last plant name and animal name in the dictionary, respectively. |
Spiralix heisenbergi | A freshwater snail named after Walter White's alter-ego, Heisenberg. It is thought to be in danger, but it IS the danger. |
Bialbero di Casorzo | A cherry tree that grows upon a mulberry tree in Italy. |
Chandelier Tree | A 300-foot-tall (91 m) redwood with a giant hole cut through the middle for cars to drive through. |
Echinopsis lageniformis | A cactus the Germans call Frauenglück, or "Women's Joy", because, well...just look at it. |
Eisenhower Tree | A tree on a golf course that became famous after the President of the United States tried and failed to have it taken down. |
Golfballia ambusta | Can a burnt golf ball technically be considered a fungus? |
Olympic oaks | Gifts from the Führer. Some are still alive. |
Moon tree | Trees planted from seeds that were taken into space by Apollo 14. |
Nepenthes lowii | A plant that lures animals to release their droppings into a pitcher. |
Mimosa pudica | A plant that rapidly closes or folds its leaves after they are touched. |
Old Man of the Lake | A 30-foot (9 m) tree stump that has been floating around Oregon's Crater Lake since at least 1896. |
Pando | An 80,000 year old quaking aspen colony that is believed to be one of the oldest and heaviest organisms on the planet. |
Plant arithmetic | Plants can do math! |
Plant rights | If other living beings like humans and animals can have rights, then why not plants? |
Pomato | It's both potato and tomato! |
Radiotrophic fungus | A type of fungus that thrives in radioactive environments. Some species have even been discovered in Chernobyl! |
Tendril perversion | A geometric phenomenon sometimes observed in helical structures like plant tendrils and telephone handset cords. |
Tree of Knowledge (Australia) | Killed by ignorance. |
Tree of Ténéré | A solitary acacia that was once the most isolated tree on Earth before being run over by a drunken Libyan truck driver. |
Tree That Owns Itself | Its owner loved it so much that he granted it ownership of itself. |
300-page iPhone bill | AT&T Mobility's billing policy for the first iPhone gave a real sense of how much money was being wasted... on paper and printer ink. |
Abraham Lincoln's patent | For lifting boats over shoals. Lincoln is the only US president who held a patent. |
Antikythera mechanism | An analog computer built in Ancient Greece. |
Baby cage | The pre-War way to get your baby some fresh air if you live in a high-rise apartment. Used by none other than Eleanor Roosevelt. |
Bild Lilli doll | A German doll that was the main inspiration for Barbie and is now considered its "grandmother". |
Billy Possum | When Taft tried to get his own Teddy Bear. |
Blåhaj | Stuffed shark, IKEA bestseller, transgender icon. |
Breakout | How this simple 1976 Atari video game, started by Steve Jobs and finished by Steve Wozniak, helped spur the creation of the Apple II. |
Canard Digérateur | Or "Digesting Duck", an automaton built to simulate a duck eating, digesting, and excreting. |
Centennial Light | A light bulb that has been burning nonstop for 119 years. |
Chindōgu | The practice of inventing solutions to everyday problems that just make the problem worse. |
Clock of the Long Now | A clock that, once completed, should be able to keep time for 10,000 years. |
Clocky | An alarm clock that hides from its owner. |
Concealing objects in a book | Hopefully you weren't planning to read it before you hollowed it out. |
Digital sundial | Unlike an analog sundial, a clock that indicates the current time with numerals formed by the sunlight striking it. |
Dreamachine | A device made with a light bulb and a record turntable that reportedly induces lucid dreaming. (And you thought the makers of Die Another Day made it up. There's still no news about invisible Aston Martin V12 Vanquishes.) |
Electronic voice phenomenon | Alleged spiritual voices heard in white noise and radio interference. |
Friendly Floatees spill | Rubber ducks and their friends who went on a long, long journey. |
Gun-powered mousetrap | Patented in 1882. According to its inventor, it can also be used as a booby trap to kill attempted home invaders. |
Hitler teapot | Some people thought that this JCPenney teapot resembled the famous dictator. |
Marvin Heemeyer | Why it's always a bad idea to put the guy next door out of business if he has a ten-ton armor-plated bulldozer in his garage. |
History of perpetual motion machines | The concept has eluded and baffled the greatest minds for thousands of years – and will continue to elude anyone who tries to build one. |
Hitachi Magic Wand | Its manufacturers continue to claim that it's just a massager for health purposes and not, you know, the world's best-known sex toy. |
I-Doser | Like taking drugs through your ears. |
Jibba Jabber | The hot new stress toy where you simulate shaking a baby to death. |
Klerksdorp sphere | Spheres with three parallel grooves dated to be three billion years old... Evidence of ancient intelligent life? An unusual natural phenomenon? Who knows... |
Zbigniew Libera | Creator of the Lego Concentration Camp. |
List of inventors killed by their own invention | Perilous parachutes, lethal lighthouses and murderous motorcycles! |
Love chair | Made to allow a fat king to have sex with two women at the same time. |
Mengenlehreuhr | You'll have to read between the lights to see the time. |
Moo box | Cow in a can. |
Mosquito laser | A bug zapper with a difference. |
Museum of Failure | A collection of sorts focusing on... well, failed things. Notably includes the Nokia N-Gage, Bic's woman-only pens, and Google Glass. |
My Friend Cayla | That doll is a spy! |
One red paperclip | A man's small piece of metal turns out to be worth more than expected. |
Parking chair | Using household objects to reserve parking spaces. |
Pigeon photography | Pigeons were used by the Germans for aerial surveillance in World War I, and apparently also in World War II. Not to forget the CIA's own pigeon camera. |
Predictions of the end of Wikipedia | All good things must come to an end...... but not for now. |
Project Cybersyn | Chilean robo-socialism control chamber invented by a Brit with a gigantic beard. |
Pythagorean cup | When the cup is filled beyond a certain point, it will empty itself. |
Quartz crisis | Not a comic book story arc, but the upheaval in watchmaking caused by the introduction of quartz watches. |
Radio hat | A strange-looking (and strange-sounding) piece of headgear. |
Royal Mail rubber band | One billion are used every year and often seen littering the streets of UK cities. |
Russian floating nuclear power station | Self-contained, low-capacity, floating nuclear power plants. |
Sony timer | Rumours that Sony uses a particularly aggressive form of planned obsolescence continue to this day. |
Splayd | 33.3% spoon, 33.3% knife, 33.3% fork. |
Tempest Prognosticator | Meteorology by frightened annelid. |
Turboencabulator | A device whose sole function is to expose technological ignorance. |
Uncanny valley | How to measure your emotional response to androids. |
Useless machine | In most cases, toys for adults. |
Vin Mariani | A drink made from cocaine and consumed by Thomas Edison, Pope Leo XIII, Ulysses S. Grant and French prime minister Jules Méline. |
Wrap rage | Ever been driven mad by packaging that just won't open? |
Xianxingzhe | A Chinese robot, according to the Japanese, that will save its country from corporate capitalism with its crotch cannon. |
Committee to End Pay Toilets in America | A 1970s organization whose campaign was to end pay toilets in the U.S.; its newsletter was humorously titled the Free Toilet Paper. |
"Darkie" toothpaste | Racist toothpaste from Taiwan. |
Fatberg | A congealed lump of fat and non-biodegradable buildup in sewer systems. A 250-metre-long, 140 tonne specimen was discovered under London in September 2017. |
Female urination device | Used by women when needing or wanting to pee standing up. |
Groom of the Stool | The most intimate Royal office. |
Hotel toilet-paper folding | Ever wondered why it was so? |
Interactive Urinal Communicator | A talking urinal made for advertising purposes. |
iLoo | Microsoft's attempt to bring you the interwebzzz inside the portable toilet. |
Jack Black | Not the actor, but the 19th century rat catcher who bred unusually colored rats and sold them as pets. |
Japanese toilets | The most advanced toilets in the world with computers, nozzles and flashing lights. |
Lloyds Bank turd | Possibly the largest example of fossilised human feces ever found, discovered under the future site of a Lloyds Bank in England. |
Shit flow diagram | This is the technical term. |
Stainless steel soap | Metallic soap that removes odours from the hands, allegedly. |
Toilet-related injury | Not all injuries and deaths linked to toilets are urban legends. |
Toilet papering | Art or vandalism? |
Toilet paper orientation | On the pros and cons of letting toilet paper hang over or under the roll. |
Whizzinator | A fake penis usually used to beat drug tests, complete with dried urine, a heater, and a syringe. Comes in white, tan, Latino, brown, and black. |
Aglet | That little plastic or metal thing at the end of your shoelace has a name. |
The dress | The biggest question of 2015: Is it white and gold or black and blue? |
Fatsuit | Yes, this makes you look fat. |
Gorilla suit | What to wear when you don't want to look human. |
Koteka | An unusual traditional garment of western New Guinea, also known as the "penis gourd". |
Meat dress of Lady Gaga | A dress made of flank steak. Currently preserved as jerky in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. |
Muffin top | A marketing mishap, many well-meaning young women, and vanity came together to form this demographic. |
Shoe tossing | The practice of throwing footwear, whether for humorous or political purposes. |
Sweater curse | Think your loved one will be pleased if you knit them a sweater? Think again. |
Three Wolf Moon | A T-shirt with wolves howling at the moon that gained popularity after one person wrote a parodic review for it on Amazon.com. |
Tin foil hat | Headgear which allegedly prevents a person from having their minds read or controlled. |
2001 Japan Airlines mid-air incident | Two Japan Airlines aircraft were roughly 135 m (443 ft) away from causing the deadliest aviation accident in history. |
2003 Angola 727 disappearance | A Boeing 727 was stolen, with at least two people aboard, and never found. |
2010 Filair Let L-410 crash | As Hollywood taught us, letting reptiles loose on a plane is never a good idea. |
2018 Horizon Air Q400 incident | A ground service agent with no flight experience whatsoever managed to do insanely difficult aerial maneuvers in a stolen plane that was thought to be impossible to do those maneuvers in. |
Aeroflot Flight 593 | A plane that crashed because the pilot let his kids fly it. |
Aeroflot Flight 6502 | A plane that crashed after the pilot made a bet with the first officer that he could land it blind. Unfortunately for 70 people on board, he couldn't. |
Aloha Airlines Flight 243 | Landed safely and with only one casualty, despite the plane's ceiling flying off mid-flight. |
Ampelmännchen | The East German "traffic-light little-man". |
Amtrak paint schemes | Various colors of the National Railroad Passenger Corporation. |
Animals taking public transportation | Nonhuman commuters. |
AVE Mizar | This nightmare lovechild of a Cessna Skymaster and a Ford Pinto eventually killed its inventor. |
Bayside Canadian Railway | A 220 foot (70 meter) long railway created solely to exploit a loophole in the Jones Act. U.S. Customs and Border Protection found out and promptly issued a $350 million fine. |
Billups Neon Crossing Signal | A local inventor's extreme solution to railway crossing safety. |
Boaty McBoatface | What happens when you allow the British public to name a ship in an online poll? |
Brighton and Rottingdean Seashore Electric Railway | What do you do when there's water in the way of your train? Just build the rails underwater and make the train a moving pier on 23 foot high legs, complete with lifeboats and a requirement a ship captain be aboard at all times. |
British Rail flying saucer | Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's the 10:13 to Venus. |
China National Highway 110 traffic jam | The world's longest-lasting traffic jam, in which some drivers were stuck for up to 5 days, moving only 1km (0.6 miles) per day. |
Crash at Crush | A high-speed head-on collision between two locomotives, staged as a publicity stunt and attended by an estimated 40,000 people. |
Daallo Airlines Flight 159 | A terrorist detonated a bomb on a plane and ended up becoming the sole casualty of the incident. |
Cycloped | The entrant into the Rainhill Trial that placed Horse Power against Steam Power. |
Dagen H | September 3, 1967: The day that Sweden changed its traffic directionality. |
Deli Mike | An Airbus A340 that does what she wants. |
Dymaxion car | A 1933 concept car with 3 wheels. It was 20 feet (6.1 m) long, carried up to 11 passengers, could go at speeds of up to 120 miles per hour (190 km/h), and had a steering wheel that turned the car in the opposite direction. One of Buckminster Fuller's Dymaxion concepts. |
Experiment | A boat with eight horse-powers. Literally. |
Fastest Shed | Holder of the world land speed record for sheds. |
Ferry Lina | The world's shortest regular ferry located in Sweden that takes 25-30 seconds (depending on how strong you are). |
Gadgetbahn | Fun fun fun. And useless. |
Ganz MFAV | An odd-looking train that is designed specifically to be used on the second-oldest underground metro line in the world. |
Get Out and Push Railroad | Just what it sounds like. |
Gimli Glider | A confusion over units leads to a Boeing 767 plane running out of fuel mid-flight and becoming a glider. |
Horsey Horseless | How to stop cars scaring horses? Put a wooden horse's head on the front. |
Human mail | Why buy an expensive ticket when you can go by mail? |
Iron Dobbin | A mechanical horse made in 1933 for the Italian Fascist Youth Movement, later copied by the Germans. |
Jesus nut | Not your local Bible-thumping preacher but the bolt on the top of a helicopter that connects it to the rotor blades. |
Loose wheel nut indicator | Yes, those little red tags you see on truck wheels really do have a purpose. |
Nut rage incident | Macadamia nuts: delicious, instigator of air rage. Helped coin a neologism to describe hierarchical social systems in South Korea. |
M-497 Black Beetle | The New York Central Railroad decided to see what would happen when they strapped two jet engines on a railcar; this was the result. It currently holds the record for fastest train in the Americas at 183.68 mph (295.6 km/h). |
Mehran Karimi Nasseri | An Iranian refugee who lived in Charles de Gaulle Airport from 1988 until 2006 and again from September 2022 until his death in November that year. |
Men's parking space | An antonym to women's parking spaces. The only known instances are two spaces in a garage in Germany. |
Mile high club | Soaring members. |
Miss Belvedere | A car buried in a time capsule in 1957 and unearthed in 2007, only to discover that it had suffered 50 years of water damage underground and wouldn't start. |
MTT Turbine Superbike | The most powerful street-legal motorcycle is run by a turboshaft engine designed for aircraft and can hit 250 miles per hour (400 km/h). |
Northwest Airlines Flight 253 | Bombing a plane with an exploding underwear is never a good idea. |
Parliamentary train | Have a useless railway station but can't afford to close it? Just run one train every few weeks there! |
Passenger train toilets | Why passengers must be discouraged from flushing or using toilets while the train is at a station. |
Paternoster lift | Strange European elevators without doors that travel in a loop. Considered by many to be very dangerous. |
Peel P50 | The world's smallest production car. |
Pimpmobile | Drive like a blaxploitation movie protagonist. |
Plastic bicycle | It seems that making bikes out of plastic is not a recipe for success. |
PZL M-15 Belphegor | A Soviet attempt at a turbofan-powered crop duster. It is the slowest jet aircraft to enter production as well as the only jet biplane or jet crop duster to exist. |
Reliant Regal | A three-wheeled car formerly manufactured in England that could be driven with a motorcycle license. |
Rocket mail | The delivery of mail by rocket or missile, attempted by various organisations in many different countries, with varying levels of success. |
Rolligon tires | Probably the only way you can survive getting run over. |
RP FLIP | A manned ship that was designed to be capsized at a 90° angle for weeks on end. |
Schienenzeppelin | An unholy combination of a Zeppelin and a locomotive. |
School bus yellow | A color specially formulated for use on school buses in the United States. |
Screw-propelled vehicle | Get there by screwing. |
Shipping container architecture | The concept and art of using intermodal containers to build stuff. |
Society for the Prevention of Calling Sleeping Car Porters "George" | An association formed to oppose the dehumanizing custom of addressing railway sleeping car porters as "George" regardless of their actual name. |
South Pointing Chariot | An ancient Chinese mechanical compass which took a millennium to reproduce. |
Tall bike | A bike which consists of two conventional bicycle frames connected one atop the other. |
Train surfing | As respectable and practical as drying one's hair in most parts of the world. |
Unused highway | Lost highways, unloved and unused. |
Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 | How do you survive on a freezing cold glacier with the impending threat of starvation? Answer: eat your friends. |
USGlobal Airways | An active airline founded in 1989 that has never operated a single commercial flight. |
ValuJet Airlines | Quite possibly the most unsafe airline in history. Think of it as being the air transport equivalent of Action Park. |
Vomit Comet | Lack of gravity is not good for the stomach. |
Vortech Meg-2XH Strap-On | A discontinued strap-on helicopter designed for amateur construction. Somehow no lawsuits are mentioned in the article. |
Wallsend Metro station | All railroads lead to Rome. With "no smoking" signs, although tobacco was unknown to ancient Romans... |
Westray to Papa Westray flight | The world's shortest passenger flight, lasting as little as 53 seconds. Just don't expect an in-flight meal. |
The wrong type of snow | Possibly the most feeble excuse for why British trains are so awful. |
.bv | A top-level domain that isn't being sold, made for an Antarctic island where no one lives. |
.io | How is a top-level domain for a group of islands with a population of about 3000 military personnel and contractors where leisure tourism is banned so popular? |
.kp | North Korea's top-level domain. Interestingly, some websites under this ccTLD can be accessed outside of the DPRK. |
.nu | Niue's top-level domain, which is regulated by Sweden and almost exclusively used by European countries. |
.su | How a piece of the Soviet Union's internet is not only still online but also still in use to this day. |
.tv | Sales of websites under this top-level domain name make up 10% of Tuvalu's GDP. |
999 phone charging myth | Some people in the UK seriously believe that calling their emergency phone number charges your phone. |
Any key | Press any key to continue. |
Blinkenlights | DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER GEFINGERPOKEN UND MITTENGRABEN! |
Bogosort | The world's worst sorting algorithm works like this: Randomise the list. Is it in order? If not, try again. Or maybe it is the best… |
The Book of Mozilla | A well-known computer Easter egg found in the Netscape and Mozilla series of browsers. |
Brainfuck | An intentionally difficult to use programming language containing only eight commands. |
Brian's Brain | He's so smart, he has his own cellular automaton. |
Bush hid the facts | Revelations of a vast right-wing conspiracy, or just a glitch? |
Chudnovsky brothers | A pair of mathematicians who built a supercomputer out of spare parts. |
Creeper and Reaper | The world's very first computer virus and computer antivirus, respectively. |
Conway's Game of Life | A simple game with only four rules that people have made beautifully complex machines with. It even has the ability to self-replicate! See also Brian's Brain above. |
Electric unicycle | The ongoing academic effort to teach robots to ride unicycles. |
Elvis operator | An operator in programming languages with an unusual name. |
Emojli | A now-defunct emoji-only social network. Started as a parody of Yo (see below). |
Enshittification | Every site you like gets worse and worse. Except Wikipedia (hopefully). |
Esoteric programming language | Refers to programming languages designed as a test of the boundaries of computer programming language design, as a proof of concept, or as jokes, and not with the intention of being adopted for real-world programming. |
Evil bit | Indicates if a packet has been sent with malicious intent, so that it can be ignored. |
Guru Meditation error | If you thought the blue screen of death was bad, this computer error would hamper your quest to reach Nirvana. |
Heisenbug | A programming bug that disappears when you study it. |
Hyper Text Coffee Pot Control Protocol | Protocol for controlling and monitoring coffee pots. Attempting to use a teapot while brewing coffee will yield you the "HTTP 418: I'm a teapot" error message. |
I Am Rich | You must be if you could afford this US$999.99 iPhone application that only displayed a red gem and a (misspelled) mantra. |
Intelligence Quotient (IQ) and Browser Usage | Internet Explorer users have lower than average IQ, according to this (nonexistent) study. |
International Obfuscated C Code Contest | A competition to create code that no human can read. |
IP over Avian Carriers | An Internet protocol for sending data packets using homing pigeons. |
iSmell | A computer peripheral designed to emit smells for websites and emails, later named one of the "Worst Tech Products" by PC Magazine. |
Leet | T3h 1@ngu/\&e 0f H@xx0rz. |
Lenna | How an image of a nude Playboy model became the industry-standard digital image compression test subject. |
Loab | According to AI, the exact opposite of many prompts is the same picture of an old woman. |
lp0 on fire | Want to panic a Unix user? Display an error that their printer is on fire. |
Macquarium | Vintage Macintosh computers-turned-fishtanks. |
Magic smoke | When a chip fails, it's because the smoke has gotten out. |
The Million Dollar Homepage | A web page sold for advertising space at 1 dollar per pixel. |
MONIAC | A water-based analogue computer used to model the United Kingdom economy, bringing a new meaning to the term liquidity. |
Mystery meat navigation | The process of not telling you what you're about to click on. |
Not a typewriter | Well, what is it, then? |
On the Cruelty of Really Teaching Computer Science | A 1990 academic paper which argues that computer programming should be understood as a branch of mathematics, and that the formal provability of a program is a major criterion for correctness. |
Pentium F00F bug | An Intel Pentium bug with an unusual name. |
Reality distortion field | Surely an obscure quantum-physics phenomenon? Nope! |
Red Star OS | North Korea's official Linux distribution. In line with Kim Jong-un apparently being an Apple fanboy, Red Star OS's latest UI design mimics macOS. |
Rubber duck debugging | Code debugging by explaining your code to a rubber duck. Quack! |
RTFM | Four letters that solve most problems. |
Rubber-hose cryptanalysis | Cryptography by other means. |
Scunthorpe problem | Spam filtering based on text strings can cause problems. Just ask the residents of S****horpe. |
Send Me To Heaven | A mobile game won by throwing your phone as close to heaven as you can without it getting there. |
Tay (chatbot) | An artificial intelligence chatbot designed by Microsoft to learn the speech patterns of the Twitter users who interacted with it, Tay lasted 16 hours before becoming too racist to remain online. |
TempleOS | A biblical-themed operating system designed by a single schizophrenic programmer over the course of 10 years after receiving instructions from God. Some assembly required. |
Trojan Room coffee pot | The fascinating target of the world's first webcam: a coffee machine at the computer science department of Cambridge University. |
Utah teapot | A 3D model which has become a standard reference object (and something of an in-joke) in the computer graphics community. |
Yo | A messaging service whose only function was to send "Yo" to people. |
Action Park | "There's nothing in the world like"... hiring untrained teenagers, plying guests with alcohol, and letting the accidents stack right up. Most infamously poor ride idea: a water slide with a vertical loop, so dangerous it was barely ever open. |
"The Aristocrats" | A joke considered to be both "the world's funniest" and "the world's worst". Also a 2005 documentary of the same name. |
Balloonfest '86 | One of Cleveland's most infamous celebrations. |
Baseball metaphors for sex | Two of America's favorite pastimes. |
Beezin' | A fad in which people apply Burt's Bees lip balm to their eyelids. |
Bigipedia | A unique experiment in "broadwebcasting", Bigipedia is the website on your radio. In association with Chianto—"Officially recognised by the EU as a wine-type product or by-product". |
Boston cop slide | A slide in the Boston City Hall Plaza playground that became famous after a viral video of a police officer emerging from the slide going upside-down at an abnormally high rate of speed. |
"Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them!" controversy | T-shirt slogan aimed towards young women, rocks aimed towards young men. |
George P. Burdell | A fictitious student officially enrolled at Georgia Tech in 1927, and, except for his "service" in World War II, has been continuously enrolled at the school ever since. |
Caltech-MIT prank rivalry | They've been sabotaging each other since 2005. |
Conan the Librarian | A perennial parody of Conan the Barbarian that has appeared in film, television, comics, and fan fiction. |
Croydon facelift | A hairstyle peculiar to parts of England. |
Cultural depictions of Napoleon | Fictional characters believing they are Napoleon are often used to suggest mental ill health. |
Cultural history of the buttocks | A cheeky article. |
Chicago rat hole | A decades-old rat-shaped hole on a sidewalk in Chicago that garnered international fame in early 2024. Pilgrims made offerings of coins, flowers, toys, food and much more. |
Christo and Jeanne-Claude | A pair of 20th century artists that became famous for their colossal side ecological works, such as 1972's Valley Curtain and 2012's The Floating Piers. |
Dick joke | Jokes about dicks. |
Evil clown | A recent development in American popular culture in which the playful trope of the clown is rendered as disturbing through the use of dark humor and horror elements. |
F.A.T.A.L. | The worst-reviewed tabletop role-playing game of all time, where you roll for your character's anal circumference and can listen to a theme song that "sounds like the Cookie Monster chasing a drum kit being pushed down a flight of stairs". |
Flash mob | Wherein a group of people quickly meet up, engage in a random action such as a pillow fight, then disappear just as quickly. |
Frozen Peas | Orson Welles: brilliant director, notorious pitchman. |
Fuck for Forest | Do your bit to save the rainforest—have an orgy! |
Ashrita Furman | Holds the Guinness World Record for holding the most Guinness World Records. |
Garden hermit | In case you are in need of some backyard friends. |
Ghost riding | A trend popularized by hyphy culture. |
Gongoozler | A person who likes to watch British canals. |
Great Stork Derby | What could possibly be in the will of a notorious practical joker? |
Gurn | A Western term for creating odd appearances of the face. |
Hacks at MIT | Large-scale pranks and practical jokes, mostly involving Harvard. |
He lücht | Like a German Jungle Cruise, Hamburg port tour guides tell such tall tales that "He's lying" has become a name for them. |
Human rainbow | A huge gathering of colours. |
Hundeprutterutchebane | A rollercoaster themed around dog farts. |
Issei Sagawa | Writer, commentator, minor celebrity, murderer, and cannibal. |
K Foundation Burn a Million Quid | Why did the K Foundation burn a million pounds in cash? |
Kayfabe | In professional wrestling, the portrayal of events within the industry as real. |
Alvin "Shipwreck" Kelly | Claimed to have survived five shipwrecks, three car crashes and two plane crashes, and still found time to create a craze for sitting on a flagpole for hours at a time. |
Killer toy | When children's toys attack! |
Kuchisake-onna | A Japanese urban legend (probably). Also known as "the slit-mouthed woman", Kuchisake-onna is asking you if you think she's pretty. No matter what you answer, you're doomed. Except if you say "pomade" three times. |
Land diving | The original bungee jumpers are from Vanuatu. |
Lawnchair Larry flight | Successfully piloted a lawn chair to 16,000 feet (4,900 m) over Los Angeles. |
Le Pétomane | A French entertainer famous in Victorian times for being able to break wind at will. Practitioners of this... art are called flatulists. |
Lighthouse and naval vessel urban legend | An old classic for those who like a laugh at the expense of the US Navy. |
List of defunct amusement parks | I thought Marine World was open! Darn it... |
List of games with concealed rules | Games with clear, obvious rules can be so boring. |
List of incidents at Walt Disney World | Did you think that Mickey's home would only be a place of sunshine and fun times? Think again. |
List of stories set in a future now in the past | Some aged well, some not really. |
Lincoln–Kennedy coincidences urban legend | Turns out, they have a bit of similarities with each other (not really). |
Love lock | Padlock your love to a fence, and throw away the key. That is if it doesn't get removed first. |
MacGuffin | An object whose value lies in its ability to kick-start a plot. |
Masturbate-a-thon | It's okay – it's for charity! |
Metafiction | Fiction about fiction. |
Miss Bumbum | An annual beauty pageant to find Brazil's best buttocks. |
Mooning the Cog | Bad weather isn't the only reason to avoid the summit of Mount Washington. |
Nazi chic | The approving use of Nazi-era style, imagery, and paraphernalia in clothing and popular culture. |
No soap radio | A prank joke intended to fool one of its listeners into believing that it is a joke. |
Robert Opel | The life and eventual murder of the streaker of the 46th Academy Awards. |
Pass by catastrophe | Has your college just burnt down? Congrats, you now have a bachelor's degree! Sadly, that isn't really the case in reality. |
Ping pong show | You've heard of baseball metaphors for sex, now get ready for... |
Pen spinning | An activity in which assorted tricks are used to manipulate a pen in aesthetically pleasing ways. |
Purple Aki | Do not let this man touch your muscles. |
Radio Yerevan | The "radio station" with the widest reach in the Soviet Union, despite having no transmitters. |
Aron Ralston | One tough guy who, to escape from death, cut off his own arm with a dull knife after a boulder fell on it. Inspired the movie 127 Hours. |
Real-life superhero | All you need is a cape and a dream. |
Sardarji joke | Popular jokes in India, based on stereotypes of Sikhs. |
Self-referential humor | A joke that refers to itself as the joke. |
Sewer alligator | A legend that became a pop culture sensation. |
Stunting | The things radio stations and TV networks will do for attention. |
Treacle mining | The fictitious mining of treacle (molasses) in a raw form similar to coal. |
Tube Bar prank calls | A series of prank calls to a bar in Jersey City, New Jersey during the 1970s, where two pranksters would call for double-entendre names, such as 'Al Coholic' and 'Phil Mypockets'. A recording of it inspired a running gag in a very well-known sitcom. |
Umarell | Old people who watch construction sites. |
Voluntary Human Extinction Movement | A group of people trying to get everyone to stop reproducing. |
When a white horse is not a horse | A Chinese philosophy about a white horse either being a horse or not being a horse. |
Willy's Chocolate Experience | A world of pure imagination... if you can only imagine empty warehouses staffed by underpaid actors, where the main attraction is lemonade. |
Works based on dreams | Sometimes you should follow your dreams; after all, it might lead you to create the most-covered song in the world, write Frankenstein, or discover the structure of the atom. |
World Famous Bushman | A street entertainer in San Francisco who makes a living by pretending to be a bush. |
You kids get off my lawn! | I'm gonna call your parents, you kids! |
747 | A performance art piece in which the artist fired shots at a Boeing 747 flying overhead, leading him to be questioned by the FBI. |
America | A fully-functioning solid gold toilet, formerly on display (and available for use) in one of New York's finest art museums. |
Artist's Shit | A quite literal and humorous meta-art. |
Australia's big things | Giant folk art as tourist traps. |
Augsburg Book of Miracles | A book dated from the 16th century full of weird religious drawings. Featuring a human–donkey–demon hybrid as one of its highlights. |
Babylonokia | A clay Nokia phone with cuneiform keys. Was once misrepresented as an actual artifact. |
Bliss (photograph) | The most viewed photograph in all of human history is... the default wallpaper for Windows XP. |
Bog Standard Gallery | It's a museum... inside a portable toilet. |
Boll Weevil Monument | The only known monument built to honor an agricultural pest. |
Joachim-Raphaël Boronali | The world's most artistically-tailed donkey. |
Bottle Rack | A modern art piece created by Dada artist Marcel Duchamp. His sister, who mistook it for trash, threw it out. |
Pierre Brassau | "That's not art; a chimp could have painted that!" |
Cabazon Dinosaurs | Comprises of "Dinny the Dinosaur," a larger-than-life, 150 ton sculpture of a brontosaurus in the desert of Southern California west of Palm Springs. Dinny's companion is "Mr. Rex," a 150 ton sculpture of a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Made by people that think dinosaurs never existed. |
Cerne Abbas Giant | A very interesting hill figure in the English countryside. |
Chamber of Art and Curiosities, Ambras Castle | A cabinet of curiosities created by Ferdinand II, Archduke of Austria in the 16th century. |
Cool S | A symbol of uncertain origins often used in graffiti. |
Degenerate Art exhibition | When the Nazis exhibited examples of art that they didn't consider "purely German" enough, so people could hate it in person. It ended up drawing visitor numbers that regular art galleries in the country could only dream of. |
The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife | An 1814 Hokusai woodcut of a woman getting intimate with a pair of octopuses, sometimes described as the originator of tentacle erotica. |
Droste effect | The effect of a picture appearing within itself. |
Disumbrationism | A novelist who's never picked up a paintbrush before creates a false art school and submits amateurish paintings as part of it... and is successful for a while. |
Earring Magic Ken | How Barbie's boyfriend, in an attempt to look cooler, became a gay icon. |
Ecce Homo | An otherwise-unremarkable fresco of Jesus that was "restored" by an untrained amateur and now looks like a monkey. |
Equestrian statue of the Duke of Wellington, Glasgow | Has been regularly topped off with a traffic cone since the 1980s. |
Fire photography | The act of taking photographs of firefighting operations. |
Fourth plinth, Trafalgar Square | The horse is missing. |
Fremont Troll | An 18 foot, 13,000 pound concrete sculpture of a troll clutching a Volkswagen Beetle. |
Fuckart & Pimp | Going all the way to own your own art. |
Gävle goat | A giant straw Yuletide goat that is the target of frequent arson attacks and vandalism. |
Geostationary Banana Over Texas | An Argentinian artist's plan(?) to launch a banana-shaped airship over Texas. |
Hahn/Cock | A giant blue cock in Trafalgar Square. |
Headington Shark | An Oxford man has had a 25-foot (7.6 m) long sculpture of a shark embedded headfirst into the roof of his unassuming house since 1986. |
He-gassen | It really puts the "art" in "fart". |
Hellmouth | The entrance to Hell envisaged as the gaping mouth of a huge monster, an image which first appears in Anglo-Saxon art. |
Hobby tunneling | Some people just love to dig. |
Howard Hallis | An artist who attempted to draw the "Picture of Everything", a massive painting containing drawings of thousands of people and items, both real and imaginary. |
Megumi Igarashi | Perhaps the world's most prominent in the field of drawing and sculpting the vulva. |
Jazz | An iconic 1990s disposable cup design. |
Katrina refrigerator | Loot this! Free meal inside! |
Knitta Please | NYC hip hop graffiti knitters. |
Kryptos | A sculpture on the grounds of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency containing four encrypted messages, only three of which have been solved. |
Latte art | The best art is caffeinated. |
Latrinalia | The sage and insightful scribblings on your local public bathroom wall. |
List of largest photographs | Includes information on print and digital photos that are reputedly the world's largest. |
Musca depicta | For some reason, a lot of artists wanted you to think a fly had landed on their paintings. |
Museum of Bad Art | A Museum "dedicated to the collection, preservation, and exhibition of really awful artwork". |
Emil Nolde | The curious case of an artist who was an avid supporter of Nazism, yet was later featured in the country's "degenerate art" gallery. |
Paintings by Adolf Hitler | The Nazi dictator and perpetrator of one of the worst genocides in history was also a painter. |
Pantone 448 C | "Drab dark brown", the least attractive colour, according to research. Used for plain tobacco packaging. |
Phallic architecture | Does the Washington Monument, Ypsilanti Water Tower or Peoples Daily building remind you of something? |
Pink Lady | In 1966, a woman secretly painted a 60-foot (18 m) tall portrait of a nude woman over a tunnel and sued when the county tried to take it down. |
Piss Christ | A photograph of a crucifix submerged in the artist's urine. |
Portland International Airport carpet | A carpet design so famous that it gained a cult following. |
Pricasso | A man who paints with his genitalia. |
La Princesse | A 15-metre (50 ft) mechanical spider which stomped about Liverpool in 2008. |
Project Graham | A work of art "symboliz[ing] the vulnerability of human bodies in [car] crashes". |
Abel Ramírez Águilar | A Mexican sculptor who made a name for himself in ice and snow sculpture after winning gold at the 1992 Winter Olympics. |
Le Rêve | A Picasso painting that purportedly would have sold for a record price had its owner, Steve Wynn, not accidentally poked a hole in it, and which eventually did sell for a different record price. |
Roundabout dog | Seen any dog on the loose while out driving lately? Chances are it's a roundabout dog. |
Sacred Cod | There's also a "Holy Mackerel", Batman. |
Scandinavian Institute of Comparative Vandalism | Mine is better than yours. |
Seedfeeder | An illustrator who contributed around 48 free-use drawings to Wikipedia, each being sexually-graphic drawings for articles on each (in)appropriate act. Lives up to their name, don't they? |
Les songes drolatiques de Pantagruel | A spin-off of the famous medieval book Pantagruel, about the adventures of a gluttonous gigantic being; in the illustrated book, we can have a clue of what that wonderful fella dreams at night. Spoiler alert: it's all hellish creatures. |
Superlambanana | A statue in Liverpool that's half-lamb, half-banana. |
Tennis Girl | Photo of a girl with no underwear that became so popular politicians began to cosplay it. |
Thomasson | Finding the art in things that are still maintained despite being useless. |
Tillie | An odd painting of a grinning face, that used to be on the Palace Amusements building in Asbury Park, New Jersey before it was demolished. |
Tipu's Tiger | A very... curious mechanical toy created for Indian ruler Tipu Sultan that represented his feelings for the expansionist East India Company on the Indian sub-continent. |
Trump, the Buddha of Knowing of the Western Paradise | A surreal Buddha-ified statue of Donald Trump, promoted on Taobao with the slogan "make your company great again". |
Turnip Prize | The prize that satirises modern art by giving awards to low-effort collections of junk. Bonus points for titling it with a bad pun. |
Unique Forms of Continuity in Space | At least sixteen casts of this "unique" sculpture exist. Not to mention that the sculptor already made a few similar designs. |
William Utermohlen | An artist who drew self-portraits after being diagnosed with probable Alzheimer's disease in 1995, and would continue these portraits for six years, until 2001. |
les UX | A French artistic movement that expresses itself in underground places. |
101 Uses for a Dead Cat | A collection of illustrations all about exactly that - its first edition sold over 2 million copies. |
Aachi & Ssipak | A South Korean animated film about a dystopian future where poop is used as a power source. |
Acme Corporation | Their products have been used and endorsed by all the best cartoon characters. |
Afghanis-tan | Central Asian history has never been cuter. (Osama bin Laden makes an appearance as a turban-wearing stray cat.) |
Archie Meets the Punisher | The team-up you thought would never happen. |
Archie vs. Predator | Teenagers somehow become worthy game. |
Arm-Fall-Off-Boy | The first applicant to be rejected from the Legion of Super-Heroes. His superpower was the ability to temporarily detach either arm and use it as a club with the other. |
Behind Closed Doors (book) | An unreleased book of pornographic SpongeBob SquarePants drawings by some of the storyboard artists, partially leaked in July 2023. |
Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo | Name of a Japanese manga whose subject matter is as surreal as its title. |
Bring Me the Head of Charlie Brown | A slasher-themed parody of the Peanuts TV series with a mass-murdering Charlie Brown, whose director went on to work for Disney. |
Cartoon physics | In animation, humour takes precedence over the ordinary laws of physics. |
Censored Eleven | A group of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons pulled from syndication due to their racist depictions of black people. |
Cheat Slayer | An isekai manga axed after just one chapter when it was noticed that the villains were thinly-veiled clones of other isekai heroes. |
Corona-chan | A fictional personification of the coronavirus which caused racial controversies. |
"Cow tools" | A cartoon from the comic strip The Far Side that was so confusing thousands of people called the author trying to understand its meaning. |
Comic book death | Comic book characters have a tendency to rarely, if ever, stay dead. |
Dennis the Menace | Two comic strips, in the United Kingdom and the United States, that debuted on the exact same day, with the exact same name. |
"Dennō Senshi Porygon" | An episode of the "harmless" Pokémon cartoon that caused seizures in almost 700 children. |
Der Fuehrer's Face | Donald Duck won an Oscar as a Hitler-saluting Nazi. |
Ebola-chan | Fictional personification of the Ebola virus promoted with racist intentions. |
Eveready Harton in Buried Treasure | A short pornographic cartoon from the 1920s about a man with an oversized, sentient detachable penis. |
Foreskin Man | Introducing Foreskin man, the superhero who wants to end the practice of circumcision. |
Gorillas in comics | A curious abundance of gorillas in comic book plots during the Silver Age of Comics. |
Homosexuality in the Batman franchise | Do Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson do more together than fighting crime? |
ISIS-chan | Created by Japanese internet users to purposely offset search results for... the actual thing it was referencing. |
Jenny Everywhere | An open-source webcomic character. |
Kuso Miso Technique | A homoerotic, scatological manga that ended up becoming an online meme. |
Manga Bible | And the Lord said unto John, "Omae wa mō shinde iru". |
The Metric Marvels | As part of the 1970's campaign to encourage use of the metric system in the U.S, the creators of Schoolhouse Rock! produced these shorts to teach children about liters, meters, and most things in between. |
Moe anthropomorphism | Even a washing machine can be the girl of your dreams. |
Mr. Immortal | A Marvel Comics superhero with no special powers except immortality, who has been killed in ways including crushing, burning, self-impalement on giant novelty scissors, bear trap, cannon, chainsaw, piranhas, ferrets, spear, python, and alcohol poisoning (three times). Prone to fits of rage upon returning to life. |
NFL SuperPro | A comic book series about a super American football player, perhaps taking Super Bowl too far. |
Pinky & Pepper Forever | A short furry graphic novel dealing with themes such as Catholicism, lesbianism, relationship struggles, BDSM, suicide, and the afterlife, expressed through characters from a short-lived line of fashion dolls. |
Pokémon episodes removed from rotation | Episodes of the Pokémon TV show that, for one reason or another, were never re-ran, skipped over in international dubs, or just never aired at all. |
Popetown | Due to complaints by Catholics, this animated series' original broadcaster BBC Three never showed it at all. |
Squirrel and Hedgehog | The height of the North Korean animation industry. A tale of talking animals as an allegory for the North Korean version of history, featuring Americans depicted as laser-eyed wolves. |
Syaoran Li Syaoran (Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle, clone) Syaoran (Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle, original) | What happens on Wikipedia when a group of manga artists take a character from one of their earlier works and perform several cross-references and plot twists. |
Tentacle erotica | Human-cephalopod sexual relations, popular in hentai. |
The Leader (web series) | Chinese propaganda anime based on the life of Karl Marx. |
Tiger Mask donation phenomenon | The other time manga's most famous pro wrestler entered the real world. |
Truck-kun | The character responsible for sending more protagonists to other worlds than any other. |
*** | The story of a man who creates ***s out of raws. It is never explained what "***" nor "raw" means. |
1601 | A quite risqué squib telling a conversation between Queen Elizabeth I and various famous 16th century writers fully on scatological topics, described as "the most famous piece of pornography in American literature". Notably written by Mark Twain. |
112 Gripes About the French | A handbook produced to help American soldiers understand the French. |
A True Story | An Ancient Greek parody of tall tales that were told as true in ancient sources, that contains the first literary references to space travel and fighting wars against aliens. The story ends with "the biggest lie of all" - a promise of future sequels. |
A Void | An entire novel written without using the letter e. See also Gadsby below. |
Aldiborontiphoskyphorniostikos | Published in 1825 as a Victorian children's book and described as "a round game for merry parties", the object of the game was to quickly recite alphabetical tongue-twisting mock-Latin gibberish. |
Alien space bats | An implausible divergence from the real world, used as a plot device in alternate history. |
Anthropodermic bibliopegy | The practice of binding books in human skin. |
Archaeology, Anthropology, and Interstellar Communication | Your helpful NASA guide on talking to aliens. |
Atlanta Nights | A group of science fiction authors get together and deliberately write an absolutely horrible novel to fool and embarrass a "vanity publisher". |
Bad Sex in Fiction Award | Created to draw attention to the worst-of-the-worst in describing sex. |
The Beginning Was the End | A piece of racist pseudoscience written by a self-proclaimed psychic, that posits man devolved from a species of intelligent cannibalistic apes. Would be completely obscure if not for Devo. |
Betteridge's law of headlines | Why, when a newspaper asks a yes-no question, the answer is usually "no". |
Big Dumb Object | Objects in science fiction literature and media that are specifically created to be interesting. Too bad they'll probably be overlooked with a name like this... |
The Book of Heroic Failures | A book which glorifies failure. Started off by The Not Terribly Good Club of Great Britain. The book was a success and thus declared a "failure as a failure". |
Bookseller/Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of the Year | Who can forget such classics as Greek Rural Postmen and Their Cancellation Numbers, How to Avoid Huge Ships or Natural Bust Enlargement with Total Power: How to Increase the Other 90% of Your Mind to Increase the Size of Your Breasts? |
La Bougie du Sapeur | A French newspaper published every February 29th. |
Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest | A contest to find the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels. |
Cain's Jawbone | A murder mystery puzzle book that only three people have solved since it was published in 1934. |
Catullus 16 | An explicit ancient Roman poem whose opening line has been described as "one of the filthiest expressions ever written in Latin". |
The Anarchist Cookbook | Have you ever been in need of an easy-to-follow bomb manual? Well, now you have it. |
Codex Seraphinianus | An illustrated encyclopedia of an imaginary world, written in an imaginary language. |
Confessions of an English Opium-Eater | This highly popular autobiographical account about the effects of laudanum led several English authors to opium use. |
Henry Darger | Writer of a 15,000-page manuscript along with several thousand watercolor paintings and other drawings illustrating the story, who rarely left his small room. His word was worth millions a few years after his death. |
Dinosaur erotica | Have you ever been Taken by a T-Rex or Ravished by a Triceratops? |
Death poem | The urge to have famous last words, taken to its logical, carefully rewritten extreme. |
Empty book | A literal example of why you should not judge a book by its cover. |
English as She Is Spoke | A 19th-century Portuguese–English conversational guide and phrase book that is regarded as a classic of unintentional humour since it was apparently the product of translating a Portuguese–French phrase book by non-English-speaking Portuguese with the help of a French–English phrase book. |
English-language editions of The Hobbit | Now collectors' items because of their printing differences. |
Evil laughter | "Mua-ha-haha-ha-haaa" and the like. |
The Eye of Argon | An infamously bad heroic fantasy novella, written in 1970 by Jim Theis and circulated anonymously in science fiction fandom since then. |
Fallout: Equestria | A five volume, 620,000-word long crossover fanfiction of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic and the post-apocalyptic Fallout video game franchise. |
Fart Proudly | An essay written by Benjamin Franklin about flatulence. |
The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstruous Regiment of Women | A 1558 diatribe by John Knox against Mary, Queen of Scots and Mary Tudor. |
Fly Fishing by J. R. Hartley | A non-existent book by a non-existent author, created for a Yellow Pages UK ad, and made real eight years later. |
"For sale: baby shoes, never worn" | Supposedly the shortest story possible in the English language, though Ernest Hemingway had nothing to do with it. |
Future Library project | Project that collects an original work by a popular writer every year from 2014 to 2114. The works will remain unread and unpublished until 2114; one thousand trees were specially planted for the project; the 100 manuscripts will be printed using paper made from the trees. |
Gadsby | A 50,110-word long book famous for not using the letter "e". |
Grammarians' War | At the start of the 16th century, British schoolmasters were insulting one another. In Latin, of course. |
Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality | Textbook on rationality disguised as a Harry Potter fanfiction. |
Hawking Index | Are you one of the 1.9% to have read Hillary Clinton's Hard Choices from cover-to-cover? |
Help! Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed | The perfect picture book for your little conservative. |
Hitler Diaries | A sensational discovery in 1983, which turned out to be an elaborate hoax. |
Hogwarts School of Prayer and Miracles | An evangelical Christian version of the Harry Potter series, featuring creationism, anti-Catholicism, and Biblical references that assume you have a Bible handy. Maybe written by a traditionalist wife and mother for her children, maybe a hoax - who knows? |
How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming | No, this isn't about the murder of a Disney character. This is the memoir of the man responsible for declassifying Pluto. |
Hundred Thousand Billion Poems | Raymond Queneau's 1961 book consisting of ten sonnets printed on card with each line on a separate strip. As all ten sonnets have not just the same rhyme scheme but the same rhyme sounds, any lines from a sonnet can be combined with any from the nine others, allowing for 1014 (= 100,000,000,000,000) different poems. |
I Am a Cat | A novel written from the perspective of a cat. |
I Am God | A novel in which God is made to keep a diary to chronicle his love for an atheist. |
I Sexually Identify as an Attack Helicopter | A pro-transgender story, written by a transgender woman, that's named after a transphobic meme. |
I, Libertine | A non-existent novel that was the subject of a hoax intended to criticize the manner in which best-seller lists are determined. |
If Israel Lost the War | A very soft alternate history romance. |
The Iraq War: A Historiography of Wikipedia Changelogs | A 2010 book, divided into 10 editions, entirely about Wikipedia changes made on page about the Iraq War (2003-2011) when the US was still involved in the confrontation. |
Jennifer Mills News | A weekly newspaper written by, and about, herself since 2002. |
The Jungle | A 1906 book that secretly exposed the dark side of meat factories from that time, eventually resulting in the passage of the Federal Meat Inspection Act and later, by extension, the FDA. |
Lajja | How this 1993 novel was the primary reason for the exile of its author overseas. |
Lecherous Limericks | Dirty limericks by Isaac Asimov. |
Lesbian vampire | They don't bite...necks. |
"Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den" | A poem written by a Chinese poet in Classical Chinese. It can be read and understood by all who understand the language, even though it consists entirely of the word "shi" repeated 92 times in different tones. |
Lobby Lud | "You are ____ and I claim my five pounds". |
Lopadotemachoselachogaleokranioleipsanodrimhypotrimmatosilphiokarabomelitokatakechymenokichlepikossyphophattoperisteralektryonoptekephalliokigklopeleiolagoiosiraiobaphetraganopterygon | A fictional dish with a quite long name. |
Magical Negro | An outdated stock character who helps out white protagonists. |
Marlovian theory of Shakespeare authorship | A theory which states that Christopher Marlowe's unnatural death was a hoax and that he continued to write and publish under the pseudonym "William Shakespeare". |
William McGonagall | A writer widely held to be the worst poet in the English language. |
Men in Aida | A homoerotic homophonic translation of Homer: "Men in Aida, they appeal, eh? A day, O Achilles." |
The Meaning of Hitler | Sir Max Hastings called it 'among the best' studies of Hitler. |
Yukio Mishima | A nominee for the Nobel Prize in Literature who is perhaps more notorious for attempting an ultranationalist coup d'etat against the Japanese government, despite only being supported by four other people. After this inevitably failed, he committed seppuku, and speculation as to his true psychological motives has raged ever since. |
Mock Turtle | The weirdest, and least recorded, character in Alice in Wonderland. |
Monostich | Poetry doesn't need rhyme, or meter, or in this case, even more than one line. |
My Immortal | A legendarily terrible piece of Harry Potter fan fiction that awkwardly inserted vampires, time travel, and emo/"goff" subcultures into J.K. Rowling's wizarding world. Someone who may have been the author of the piece almost got a major publishing deal for her memoirs. |
My Life as a 10-Year-Old Boy | Not literally; this autobiography about one of the Simpsons's voice actors was once performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2004, by the author herself. |
Naked Came the Stranger | Journalists prove a point when their intentionally awful sex novel becomes a bestseller. Later the basis of a porn film starring Darby Lloyd Rains. |
Nat Tate: An American Artist 1928–1960 | A hoax biography written about a fictional artist, written as part of an elaborate prank pulled on art critics. |
Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats | Cat poems by T. S. Eliot. |
Omegaverse | What if humans had alphas, too? This is the question asked by a generation of fanfic writers. |
On Bullshit | A very serious essay by Harry Frankfurt sketching a philosophical theory of, well, bullshit. |
Order of the Occult Hand | "It was as if an occult hand had edited this Wikipedia article." |
Ossian | "The greatest poet that has ever existed", according to Jefferson. But he didn't. |
P Is for Pterodactyl: The Worst Alphabet Book Ever | "M" is for... mnemonic? "B" is for bdellium? What? |
Philip M. Parker | Writer of The 2007-2012 Outlook for Tufted Washable Scatter Rugs, Bathmats and Sets That Measure 6-Feet by 9-Feet or Smaller in India and thousands of other works... by means of a computer program. |
A Pickle for the Knowing Ones | Without questions one of finnest Pieces of wrriten text in the English language. |
Pinocchio paradox | What if Pinocchio said his nose will grow? |
Political interpretations of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz | Understanding the political context of the mid-to-late 1890s in the United States will give you a different understanding of the gold, silver and emerald symbolism, among other things. |
Print Wikipedia | Yes, it does exist. |
Project Mars: A Technical Tale | A sci-fi book about Mars exploration and the Martians led by "the Elon", written by NASA's chief rocketer Wernher von Braun in 1949. |
Rangila Rasul | How this religious satire made a massive controversy between India's Muslim and Hindu communities, and helped change the nation's legal system. |
Rejecting Jane | Turns out publishers really don't know anything about literature. |
Rolling Stone (Uganda) | The Ugandan version isn't a music magazine, but instead tries to out gay men and get them killed. |
Amanda McKittrick Ros | The McGonagall of prose. J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis competed as to who could read her longest without laughing. |
Saddam Hussein's novels | Crimes against literature? |
The Satanic Verses | An infamous fictional play that to this day endangers the life of the Author and The translators due to religious fanatics. |
Shakespeare apocrypha | Anti-Stratfordians (see "Shakespeare authorship question" below) can take heart that there really are works attributed to Shakespeare that weren't written by him! |
Shakespeare authorship question | A great conspiracy that concealed the identity of the true author of "Shakespeare's" works, implying that all contemporary references to Shakespeare's authorship were fraudulent or mistaken. |
Society of Science, Letters and Art | 19th century bogus literary society which duped learned (and would-be learned) people into purchasing the right to the society's academic dress and letters after their name. |
Peter Sotos | A writer and musician who explores serial killer and pedophile lore, while simultaneously praising them in his work. For one of his magazine covers, he used an image taken from real child pornography, which he plead guilty to possessing. |
Striking and Picturesque Delineations of the Grand, Beautiful, Wonderful, and Interesting Scenery Around Loch-Earn | Angus McDiarmad, a native Scots-Gaelic speaker, writes a book on a Scottish Highland area with the help of an English dictionary to great comic effect and is termed "the world's worst author". |
The Tale of Two Lovers | A 15th century erotic novel written by a future pope. |
There once was a man from Nantucket... | A gratifying theme for limericks; some of them obscene. |
Time travel in The Lord of the Rings | Turns out time travel is embedded into The Lord of the Rings in several different ways. |
Chuck Tingle | A monster erotica writer whose stories feature sexual encounters with almost anything you can imagine, ranging from a sentient jet plane to the concept of time. Also a master of taekwondo (allegedly) and is always seen wearing a pink sack on his head. |
Le Train de Nulle Part | A French novel, 233 pages long, written without verbs. |
The Unfortunates | A book whose chapters you can read in pretty much any order. |
"Whitey on the Moon" | Not everybody was happy to see the first man on the Moon. |
Winnie ille Pu | Winnie-the-Pooh in Latin that became a bestseller. |
Wonders of the East | An Old English text from a millennium ago, all about the various creatures that can supposedly be found in Asia. These apparently include dragons, giant ants, hens which burn people, human-donkey hybrids and humans with fan-like ears that cover their entire bodies. |
27 Club | A number of prominent musicians have died at this age, though statisticians attribute the "club" to apophenia – seeing patterns in random data. See also the related white lighter myth. |
Animutation | The practice of taking lyrics of foreign songs, "mishearing" them into English, and producing a Flash video to go along with it. |
Avril Lavigne replacement conspiracy theory | The "Paul is dead" (see below) of the millennial generation, with Melissa Vandella playing the role of Billy Shears. |
Bouncing ball | That thing in music videos that helps you sing along to the lyrics. It dates back to 1924. |
"Brian Wilson is a genius" | A music journalist's meme from the 1960s that arguably destroyed the career of the Beach Boys' main songwriter and producer. (Within three years, Wilson was working as a grocery store cashier.) |
Characters in Devo music videos | Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Wikipedia! |
"Clapton is God" | Graffiti that's famous for a photo of a dog urinating on it. |
Clear Channel memorandum | America banning "Learn to Fly" by Foo Fighters from radio airplay after 9/11 is an odd choice. Though "What a Wonderful World" by Louis Armstrong brings to mind more questions. |
Curse of the ninth | The superstition that any composer of symphonies, from Beethoven onwards, will die soon after writing their own Ninth Symphony. |
The Dark Side of the Rainbow | What happens when you mix Pink Floyd and The Wizard of Oz? |
Dave Matthews Band Chicago River incident | The band's tour bus dumped 800 pounds of sewage on a passenger boat. Funnily enough, the opener of that night's concert was "Don't Drink the Water"... |
Earworm | It's got a hook in you. |
Elvis impersonator | People pretend to be Elvis Presley and only him. |
Elvis sightings | There are many who still believe. |
Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc. | That time John Fogerty was sued for sounding like himself. |
Fyre Festival | The organizers spent so much money promoting the event that they ran out of money to spend on the actual event. They were later faced with eight lawsuits. |
Industrial musical | Musicals about a business, intended to be seen by the business' employees to improve loyalty and motivation. |
Jazz ambassadors | Subliminal American values delivered through smooth jams. |
Lebenslaute | Open air classical music performances as a form of political protest. |
List of classical music concerts with an unruly audience response | Concerts which didn't work out quite as well as hoped. |
Literal music video | What happens when you replace the lyrics in a music video with lyrics that describe what's actually happening in the music video? Hilarity ensues. |
Loudness war | Why recorded music is getting "louder" over time. |
Manualism | The little-known art of playing music by squeezing air through the hands. |
Marilyn Manson–Columbine High School massacre controversy | News media falsely accused Marilyn Manson and his band of the same name for influencing two mass shooters who actually hated his music. |
Metal Open Air | Intended as Brazil's version of Wacken Open Air, it instead became their version of Fyre Festival. |
Millennial whoop | Put on a "best of the 2010s" playlist, and hear the same repeated two notes everywhere. |
"More Cowbell" | I got a fever, and the only prescription... is more cowbell! |
"More popular than Jesus" | A remark that later proved deadly for John Lennon. |
Mozart and scatology | Mozart was fond of toilet humour, his letters to friends and family often contained scatological passages. He even wrote music dedicated to scatology, which was shared among a closed group of most likely inebriated friends, the most infamous of which is Leck mich im Arsch (literally "Lick me in the arse"). |
Musikalisches Würfelspiel | A system written by Mozart in which the musical piece is decided randomly by playing dice. |
"My Way" killings | You can get killed for singing Frank Sinatra's signature tune in the Philippines. |
P-Funk mythology | The whimsical universe surrounding the P Funk all stars. |
"Paul is dead" | Was Paul McCartney replaced by a lookalike in the 1960s? |
Pink Floyd pigs | The band's recurring props and references. |
PopMart Tour | Take an unfinished studio album, hold a press conference at Kmart, and put on a show in countries around the world, complete with a spinning mirrorball lemon, a giant martini olive, a large golden arch, and the largest video screen ever toured. That would be U2's 1997–98 tour in a nutshell. |
Publius Enigma | A mystery wrapped in an enigma related to Pink Floyd, which has remained unsolved since it appeared on Usenet in 1994. |
Operation Nifty Package | How do you get a dictator out of an embassy? With music, of course! |
Rockism and poptimism | What happens when pop music fans take themselves way too seriously? Actually, nothing fun. |
Unusual types of gramophone records | From changing speeds, to endlessly-looping locked grooves, to... Bhutanese postage stamps? |
"Up to eleven" | This article is one louder. |
Uruguayan Invasion | Just as British bands were crossing the pond, Uruguayan bands were crossing the Uruguay River to Argentina. |
Vestal Masturbation T-shirt | A shirt released by the British heavy metal band Cradle of Filth depicting a masturbating nun on the front and calls Jesus Christ a cunt on the back. Multiple people have been arrested for wearing it out in public. |
Whamageddon | A festive music challenge where you have to avoid listening to a certain Christmas song throughout the Christmas period. Perfect if you're not a fan of George Michael. |
Blackbird | A playable violin made out of black stone. |
Cat organ | A keyboard instrument in which the keys cause cats to meow. |
Electroencephalophone | A musical instrument controlled by brainwaves. |
Escopetarra | The guitAR-15 of Colombia. |
Great Stalacpipe Organ | Made in a cave using stalactites and a lot of patience and ingenuity. |
Musical saw | The least favourite instrument of Ronnie Wood, the Hollies and the Screaming Trees. |
Piganino | Like a harpsichord, but instead of plucking strings, you're poking pigs. May not have existed, but inspired some good music anyway. |
Ugly stick | An instrument in Newfoundland, an insult everywhere else. |
Viola jokes | You can tell if a viola player is playing out of tune if you can see the bow moving. |
Biomusic | Music made by non-humans. |
Chap hop | Rap music about being English in the 19th-century. |
Chillwave | The term was invented to make fun of music journalists and bloggers who hype "the next big thing". Ironically, they then wrote about chillwave as "the next big thing". |
Christian ska | Apparently, not even God himself can resist the raw power of ska. |
Danger music | The name is very much literal, music that tries to harm the listener or performer. |
Early Norwegian black metal scene | More church arsons per capita than any other known music scene! |
Gothabilly | What if Buddy Holly was goth? |
Grunge speak | That time a receptionist convinced The New York Times that "wack slacks" was slang for ripped jeans and "lamestain" meant an uncool person. |
Jihadism and hip hop | Straight outta ISIS. |
Kawaii metal | The cutest metal subgenre. |
Lowercase | A genre of ultra-minimalist music that is known for deliberately utilizing silence to contrast with mundane field recordings which have been amplified in volume. |
Pirate metal | Heavy metal music combined with pirate mythology and jargon. |
Proibidão | As part of a crackdown on drug cartels in Rio de Janeiro, this uniquely Brazilian form of gangsta rap cannot legally be performed or broadcast on the radio. |
Unblack metal | Black metal, but Christian. |
Yu-Mex | Mexican music... from Yugoslavia. |
AKB48 Group | Girl group or franchise? Same with her "official" rival group and "spin-off" group as well! |
ArnoCorps Austrian Death Machine | A pair of bands who perform songs solely based on Arnold Schwarzenegger films. |
Y. Bhekhirst | A mysterious man with an implaceable accent hands over copies of his self-recorded cassette to random New York record stores in the 80s/90s, which contain a selection of strange, barely comprehensible songs set against sparse, repetitive instrumentation, later spawning a cult following among outsider music enthusiasts and a decades-long mystery. |
Bis Kaidan | What happens when noise music meets J-pop? |
Boston Typewriter Orchestra | Ah, the beautiful sound of... typewriters. |
Rosemary Brown | A spiritualist who claimed that dead composers dictated new musical works to her. |
Buckethead | A virtuoso electric guitarist known for always wearing a white mask and a KFC bucket on his head while performing and releasing over 300 albums over the course of over 30 years. |
Bull of Heaven | A group that is known for their extremely long albums. Most known for 210: Like a Wall in Which An Insect Lives and Gnaws at a runtime of 5.7 years; their longest album is 310: ΩΣPx0(2^18×5^18)p*k*k*k at 3.343 quindecillion years long. |
GG Allin | A punk-rocker who would attack people attending his concerts, consisting of hoarse, disheveled vocals. He would also take an excessive amount of drugs, strip naked, and defecate on stage. |
CD Rev | Because nothing says gangsta like being funded by a corrupt communist government. |
Death in June | Not many other anti-fascist music groups can claim to be so blanketed with fascist imagery, even down to the name. |
Eva Braun | A rock band from Serbia. |
Damião Experiença | An eccentric Brazilian singer-songwriter, known for being a reclusive hoarder and singing in his own made-up dialect of Portuguese (which he claimed was spoken on his "home planet"), often about self-contradictory and pro-authoritarian political themes and popular culture. |
Matt Farley | A songwriter who has released thousands of songs under at least seventy pseudonyms such as "Papa Razzi and the Photogs", "The Hungry Food Band", and "The Odd Man Who Sings About Poop, Puke and Pee". |
The Gerogerigegege | A very special music project that released the sound of a man defecating and a record commemorating the deceased Japanese emperor with the sound of people having sex to the national anthem, and had a member who just masturbated on stage. |
Half Man Half Biscuit | Have you ever listened to "Man of Constant Sorrow (With a Garage in Constant Use)" from the album No-One Cares About Your Creative Hub So Get Your Fuckin' Hedge Cut? |
Hanatarash | The Japanese noise band that drove a bulldozer into their concert venue. |
Hatebeak | The thing that should not beak. |
Hatari | A band that entered the 2019 Söngvakeppnin (Iceland's Eurovision Song Contest selection competition) as a joke, only to win first place. The band then finished third in Eurovision's semi-finals, advancing to the Grand Final and finishing 10th place there. |
Joyce Hatto | A pianist who had many doctored recordings falsely attributed to her long after she stopped performing in public. |
Bobby Jameson | A hippie singer-songwriter outcast who never received financial compensation for his songs and records. Thought to be dead after the 1960s, but then resurfaced with a blog in 2007 aiming to set the record straight about his life story. |
Jandek | A prolific and pseudonymous singer/songwriter active since 1978 who only grants the occasional interview and has never provided any biographical information. |
Florence Foster Jenkins | An American soprano famous for her singing ability or lack thereof. |
Kevin MacLeod | Perhaps the most heard musician on the whole internet. |
Klaus Nomi | Countertenor with an unusually wide vocal range, whose style of dress was commonly referred to as "alien-like" and enjoyed recording new wave covers of 1950s pop. |
The KLF | An electronic band that became mainstream chart-toppers while undertaking confrontational Situationist-influenced performance stunts, culminating in them performing at the nationally-televised 1992 BRIT Awards with a grindcore band while firing machine gun blanks into the audience, dumping a dead sheep at the afterparty, and then disbanding. |
Kunt and the Gang | If you think his name is a bit rude, you should hear his songs such as "Use My Arsehole as a Cunt", "I'm Wanking over a Pornographic Polaroid of an Ex-Girlfriend Who Died" and "Jesus Died of a Stranglewank". Then there was the one about his paperboy... See also: "Boris Johnson is a Fucking Cunt". |
LadBaby | A British YouTuber who had five Christmas number ones in the UK in a row between 2018 and 2022, all of them being sausage roll-themed parodies of well-known songs. Strongly disliked by Kunt and the Gang (see above). |
Laibach | A Slovenian industrial band known for combining totalitarian aesthetics with pop culture, including martial covers of the Beatles and Queen. Also known as the first Western band to perform in North Korea. |
Merzbow | A Japanese experimental music project whose most popular album has been affectionately described as "What a bug hears when it's being flushed down the toilet" and "Directly looking at the sun with your ears". |
Moondog | A blind composer, theoretician, poet, and inventor of musical instruments who dressed like a viking and lived as a street musician in New York between the 1940s and 1970s. |
MP4 | Rock music and Members of Parliament do mix. |
Okilly Dokilly | A band that performs metalcore songs about the character Ned Flanders from The Simpsons, while dressed as the character as well. |
One Pound Fish Man | A man who works at a market who saw his sales patter go viral and challenge the X Factor for the Christmas number one single in 2012. |
Panchiko | A group of British teenagers form a band and record a demo CD-R which is quickly forgotten about. Around fifteen years later, someone discovers a corrupted copy in a charity shop, and it becomes an online phenomenon. |
Eilert Pilarm | The Elvis impersonator who looks and sounds nothing like Elvis, according to Alfo Media. |
Charles Manson discography | Wait, whose discography?? |
R. Stevie Moore | A one-man band who has self-released over 400 albums through his home-based mailing service since 1982. Later noted as a pioneer of DIY music and indie rock. |
Portsmouth Sinfonia | An orchestra made up entirely of people with no experience in playing their respective assigned instruments. |
Les Rallizes Dénudés | A pioneering Japanese experimental rock band, known for releasing virtually no studio material despite being active for around 30 years, their reclusive founder refusing nearly all interviews and media coverage, while nevertheless going on to be highly influential among Japan's avant-garde underground. This may or may not have been due to the fact the original bassist was involved in hijacking a domestic air flight, redirecting it towards North Korea. |
The Residents | A long-running avant-garde music collective that perform wearing eyeball helmets and disguises, successfully maintaining their anonymity for around 50 years. One early rumor was that they were actually the Beatles. |
Rockbitch | An all-female pagan rock band who were notorious for performing live sex acts on stage. |
Mamoru Samuragochi | A "deaf composer" who wasn't deaf and didn't compose anything. |
The Shaggs | None of this band's members really wanted to form a band, nor did they really have any musical talent, but hey, a fortune teller predicted success, so off they went... |
Thai Elephant Orchestra | An orchestra of elephants playing specially-designed instruments. |
TISM | An (extremely) Australian rock band whose members are anonymous, perform wearing balaclavas and use pseudonyms like "Eugene de la Hot Croix Bun" and "Ron Hitler-Barassi". Known for their confrontational dark comedy, their song titles include "Defecate on My Face", "I Might Be A Cunt, But I'm Not A Fucking Cunt", "Martin Scorsese Is Really Quite A Jovial Fellow", "What Nationality Is Les Murray?", "Whatareya? (You're a Yob or You're a Wanker)" and "Everyone Else Has Had More Sex Than Me". |
Tonetta | A reclusive divorced man who gained a cult following in his sixties after posting videos to YouTube of his own lo-fi, independently made songs, often with sexually explicit lyrics coupled with footage of himself cross-dressing. |
Tout-à-Coup Jazz | A Burkinabé jazz band from the 1970s whose membership included two future leaders of the country: coincidentally, both the victim and perpetrator of the same coup d'état. |
The Vegetable Orchestra | An Austrian orchestra whose musical instruments are made solely from vegetables. |
Viper | Has released over 1,927 albums, though a majority contain recycled material. Titles of his work include You'll Cowards Don't Even Smoke Crack and Kill Urself My Man. Arrested in 2024 for allegedly holding a woman captive in his garage in Houston for five years. |
The Wealdstone Raider | A supporter of English non-league football team Wealdstone whose retorts towards rival supporters went viral and saw him challenging for the Christmas number one spot in 2014. |
Wesley Willis | A musician and visual artist who recorded songs about topics such as his home town of Chicago, his schizophrenia, violent confrontations with cartoon superheroes, and bestiality, was fond of headbutting fans, and often ended his songs with "Rock over London, rock on, Chicago" followed by a product slogan. |
Gary Wilson | An experimental musician who sings about stalking girls and plays with duct tape, fake blood, powder, and mannequins when on stage. |
Wild Man Fischer | A schizophrenic Los Angeles street entertainer whose big break was recording an album with Frank Zappa. Their collaborations ended when Fischer, in a violent rage, threw a bottle that nearly hit Zappa's daughter Moon. |
Ya Ho Wha 13 | A cult psych rock band... literally. |
The Zimmers | A rock band made up of elderly musicians. As of 2017[update], the oldest member had lived to 101. |
The Zombeatles | Paul is undead. |
A Musical Joke | A composition that Mozart allegedly made to mock bad composers. |
As Slow as Possible | A piece of music by John Cage to be performed until 2640. |
"Carnival of Light" | The Holy Grail for Beatles fans: an 11-minute recording of the Fab Four aimlessly bashing their instruments and shouting gibberish. |
Cat fugue | A piece for harpsichord allegedly inspired by the sounds the composer's cat produced by walking along the instruments keyboard. |
Duetto buffo di due gatti | A duet in which two sopranos repeatedly meow at each other. |
Grosse Fuge | A composition written by Ludwig van Beethoven which was universally put down at the time as being "incomprehensible", now accepted as one of his greatest works. |
Helikopter-Streichquartett | A string quartet composition by Karlheinz Stockhausen that must be played in four circling helicopters, the sound remixed, chopper sounds and all, for an audience on the ground. |
Homage to Hans Keller | A piece for four tubas by Anthony Burgess written immediately after Keller reviewed the operetta Blooms of Dublin as a "pathetic pastiche". It was described as "a kind of lavatorial blast" in a review. |
I Am Sitting in a Room | A piece in which the composer recites and records a brief explanation of the work, plays back and records the echo of the recording, then records the echo of the echo of the recording, and so on until it is transformed into a completely unrecognizable sound. |
"Leck mich im Arsch" "Leck mir den Arsch fein recht schön sauber" "Difficile lectu" | Three canons by Mozart about... "licking him in the arse". |
List of musical works in unusual time signatures | What's the most absurd time signature you can imagine? 1/12? ⅔/2? How about 32⁄2/4? |
List of silent musical compositions | Not to be confused with "The Sound of Silence", these tunes don't have really much to hear. Among them is one of the most famous classical compositions of the 20th century. |
List of music considered the worst | We built this city on not being very good. |
Marinka (operetta) | An operetta in which a group of American teenagers watch a film about and then discuss the Mayerling incident, the murder-suicide pact that indirectly led to World War I. However, this version of the story has a happy ending. |
Rage Over a Lost Penny | An audience favorite from Beethoven's oeuvre. It's gleefully angry, but the maestro left it unfinished. |
"The Anacreontic Song" | An 18th-century drinking song whose melody was later adopted for "The Star-Spangled Banner". |
"All Summer Long" | A song where two karaoke cover versions became one-hit wonders in 2008 on the Billboard Hot 100 because the original song was not released on iTunes, only to radio. One of the covers even charted a few places higher than the original. |
"Boris Johnson Is a Fucking Cunt" | A foul-mouthed comedy punk song about the British Prime Minister that attempted to be the UK Christmas number one in 2020. Despite getting no air time, it got to No. 5. The following year, it spawned a sequel, which also got to No. 5 in the Christmas chart. From the same band that brought you "Prince Andrew Is a Sweaty Nonce" and "Fuck the Tories". See also: Kunt and the Gang. |
"Camouflage" | A vinyl single from 1983 that contained a computer programme for the song's own music video for the ZX81. Created by a man who later found fame wearing a papier-mâché head. |
"Chocolate Salty Balls" | A 1998 song from South Park, which got to the top 10 in several countries' charts, including number one in the UK, but it isn't actually about food. |
"Do the Bartman" | A novelty dance one-hit wonder rap song from the Simpsons in 1990, whose backing vocals were done by none other than Michael Jackson. |
"Eat Your Salad" | The Latvian entry of the Eurovision Song Contest 2022. The lyrics speak of "eating veggies and p*ssy", along with numerous other sexual innuendos. Somehow, the song still has a serious message. |
"E depois do adeus" | The Portuguese Entry of the Eurovision Song Contest 1974 was used as a signal to launch a successful national coup d'état. |
"Euro-Vision" | The Belgian entry of the Eurovision Song Contest 1980 whose lyrics spoke precisely of the event in which they took part, and deliberately attempted to be last-place. |
"Five Per Cent for Nothing" | A very short instrumental by a band noted for very long songs that was retitled as a parting shot at their former manager, who sued them afterwards. |
"Flappie" | A Dutch Christmas song about cannibalism. |
"Flatline" | Who knew the guy who made "Nothin' on You" and "Airplanes" would veer into the most redundant conspiracy theories? |
"The Fox (What Does the Fox Say?)" | A 2013 song "created to fail" by Norwegian comedy duo Ylvis that instead ended up becoming a global smash hit. |
"Give That Wolf a Banana" | A song that combines Little Red Riding Hood and two crazy 4.5 billion year old yellow wolves called Keith and Jim. The meaning of the song is debated, but one common theory is of all things, vaccines. It's also a Eurovision song, to boot. |
"Gloomy Sunday" | A Hungarian dirge from the 1930s that the press of the time claimed was linked to over 100 suicides, earning it the moniker of the "Hungarian Suicide Song". |
"Hitler Has Only Got One Ball" | Was der Führer only half a man? See also Possible monorchism of Adolf Hitler. |
"Jeg har set en rigtig negermand" | A Danish #1 single from 1970, extolling the virtues of racial equality while calling a "negro man" "black as a bucket of tar". |
"Jiggle Jiggle" | That time when an autotuned interview with Louis Theroux became so popular they convinced him to do a song. |
"Justice for All" | A surreal choral/spoken-word... thing recorded by Donald Trump and 20 men in prison for attacking the Capitol on January 6. |
"Lemon Incest" | Fun for the whole family!.....NOT! |
"Lift Yourself" | Poopy-di scoop. Scoop-diddy-whoop. Whoop-di-scoop-di-poop. |
Lostwave | Unknown songs, lost to time. |
"The Most Mysterious Song on the Internet" | The name says it all. (Well, almost.) |
"The Most Unwanted Song" | Featuring operatic rapping, a children's choir urging listeners to go to Walmart, bagpipes, cowboy music, and political slogans shouted through a bullhorn. |
"Never Learn Not to Love" | The Beach Boys' collaboration with Charles Manson. (Yes, that Charles Manson.) |
"Nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah" | If you can see someone's underwear, here's the tune to tell them by. |
"Planet of the Bass" | The 2023 affectionate parody of 1990s Europop that became a hit in its own right. |
"Poison: Iitai Koto mo Ienai Konna Yo no Naka wa" | A random Japanese rock song that gained popularity due to its ability to calm crying babies. |
"Prisencolinensinainciusol" | The song where the lyrics are deliberately unintelligible gibberish intended to sound to its Italian audience as if it is sung in English spoken with an American accent. |
"Ram Ranch" | A spoken-word heavy metal song about a gay cowboy orgy that became an internet meme and a counter-protest song against the Canadian convoy protest. |
"Ready 'n' Steady" | A song mentioned in a top songs list of a notable magazine, that was long-believed by some to be non-existent because collectors were unable to find a recording or further information on it until 33 years after it was written. |
"Rocket Queen" | If you want to hear the sound of a woman having sex with Axl Rose set to music, now's your chance! |
"Shukusei!! Loli Kami Requiem" | Touch her, you'll be arrested. |
"Supermarioland" | Rapping set to the theme of Super Mario Land. After hearing the song, Nintendo not only cleared the sample but also requested they make an album of Super Mario material. |
"Suzukake no Ki no Michi de 'Kimi no Hohoemi o Yume ni Miru' to Itte Shimattara Bokutachi no Kankei wa Dō Kawatte Shimau no ka, Bokunari ni Nannichi ka Kangaeta Ue de no Yaya Kihazukashii Ketsuron no Yō na Mono" | Apparently AKB48's producers couldn't come up with a snappier title. |
"Teletubbies say "Eh-oh!"" | A novelty nursery-rhyme remix of the Teletubbies theme tune that got to number one in the United Kingdom, and was narrowly beaten for Christmas number one in 1997. This did not stop Bob the Builder from getting Christmas number one three years later, although. |
"Tetris" | A Eurodance version of the Tetris theme co-produced by Andrew Lloyd Webber. It was in the British charts at the same time as "Supermarioland" mentioned above. |
"Timothy" | A top 40 hit in 1970, written by Rupert Holmes of "The Piña Colada Song" fame, that gained success despite (or due to) the fact it was about cannibalism during a mining disaster. |
"To Be or Not to Be (The Hitler Rap)" | A comic rap performed by Mel Brooks, sung as Adolf Hitler. "Don't be stupid, be a smarty. Come and join the Nazi Party". |
"To Me, To You (Bruv)" | An unexpected collaboration between rapper Tinchy Stryder and British comedy duo the Chuckle Brothers. |
"Ulterior Motives" | A lostwave song which mysteriously surfaced on the Internet in 2021 on a little-known song finding website, which went viral in 2023 when a group of Redditors tried to find the origin of it; it was later found in an obscure porn film from 1986 the year after. |
"United Breaks Guitars" | A protest song against United Airlines which caused their stock price to fall by 10% and cost shareholders $180 million. |
"We Didn't Start the Fire" | A song covering the major events of 40 years. Check Events mentioned for explanations of each. |
"Wear Sunscreen" | A newspaper column of a hypothetical commencement speech, which prominently mentions the benefits of sunscreen, which Baz Luhrmann mashed up a recording of it with a dance track, creating the successful song 'Everybody's Free (to Wear Sunscreen)'. |
"You Suffer" | At a full 1.316 seconds in length, the shortest song with a physical single release of all time. |
"You're Pitiful" | The true story of how a Weird Al Yankovic parody caused the article for Atlantic Records to be regularly vandalized. |
( ) | An album by Icelandic band Sigur Rós featuring songs in an entirely made-up language. |
21½ Minutes in Berlin/23 Minutes in Brussels | A pair of live recordings by the band Suicide, with the B-side showing an audience grow increasingly agitated at Elvis Costello not performing, before devolving into a riot. |
A Rubber Band Christmas | An album of Christmas music created using office supplies. |
Altered States of America | This grindcore album by Agoraphobic Nosebleed has 100 tracks, including many under 15 seconds in length. It even has a track 0! |
Amore | A Japan-exclusive city pop album from the granddaughter of former Italian fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini. |
All Lights Fucked on the Hairy Amp Drooling | An early album by Godspeed You! Black Emperor, which had such a tiny release it was considered lost until a 2022 release. |
The Boy Bands Have Won | Actually, this album's full title is "The Boy Bands Have Won" followed by a further 151 words. As of August 2009, it holds the record for the longest album title. |
Christmas in the Stars | Jon Bon Jovi's recorded music debut was for a Star Wars-themed holiday album. |
Cigarettes and Valentines | An entire record by Green Day whose master tracks were stolen. This led to the creation of American Idiot. |
Dark Night of the Soul | Due to a legal dispute, this album was released with a blank CD-R. |
Elvis' Greatest Shit | Not the one he was trying to pass the night he allegedly died. |
Embrace (American band Embrace album) Embrace (English band Embrace album) | What happens to Wikipedia article titles when two different bands with the exact same name both release self-titled albums. |
Eurobeat Disney | A Japan-exclusive album of eurobeat remixes to Disney songs. Made by some of the biggest names in eurobeat |
Everywhere at the End of Time | A 61⁄2 hour concept album series portraying the stages of mental deterioration caused by Alzheimer's disease. Sounds obscure? It became popular in the most unexpected of places. |
Everyday Chemistry | A supposed album by the Beatles, from an alternate dimension where they never broke up. |
The Fucking Cunts Treat Us Like Pricks | The title of this album led to obscenity charges. |
Having Fun with Elvis on Stage | An official Elvis Presley live album that has no music, instead consisting of random on-stage banter and comments from between songs stripped of any coherence or context. |
Helter Stupid | Negativland fabricated a moral panic claiming that their music had inspired a teenager to murder his family, and then created a sound collage album based on samples of media reporting on the story to make fun of them for falling for it. |
In Search of The | A box set isn't particularly unusual. A box set of 13 full albums that have never been released before, handmade by the artist, is pretty unusual. |
The Lillywhite Sessions | Never officially released, and yet fans and critics can argue that it's the best "album" by the Dave Matthews Band. |
Meow the Jewels | Mew mrrp meow purr mrrp. |
Metal Machine Music | A 1975 album by Lou Reed that consists of 64 minutes of audio feedback, widely believed to have either been an elaborate joke, or an attempt by Reed to escape from a record label contract. |
The Monty Python Matching Tie and Handkerchief | A three-sided LP. |
Mouth Sounds | In which Modest Mouse, Alanis Morrisette, and Huey Lewis and the News are mixed with "All Star". ASMR lovers avoid, Shrek lovers welcome. |
Musique pour Supermarché | This album by Jean-Michel Jarre had only a single copy produced, which was then auctioned off like a painting. The master tapes were subsequently destroyed, making the copy unique. |
No Love Deep Web | To protest the album being delayed without their consent, the band leaked it online early while using a photo of the drummer's penis as cover art. |
Once Upon a Time in Shaolin | A Wu-Tang Clan album that only had one copy produced, being bought by Martin Shkreli for two million dollars, making it the most expensive work of music ever sold. |
Orgasm | How a bunch of tripped-out hippies in 1969 decided to invite random people from the streets of New York to contribute to their experimental album, and in the process ended up inventing industrial music, noise rock and perhaps even black metal decades ahead of schedule. |
The Road to Freedom | A "spectacular hit album" of... Scientology songs? |
Sleep | An 81⁄2 hour concept album about sleep. Also available in a one-hour version if you're in a hurry. |
Sleepify | Silence is golden, especially when you're trying to fund a world tour. |
Smile | An unfinished Beach Boys album that is one of the most written-about and speculated-upon works in popular music history. |
Sweet Insanity | A rejected Brian Wilson album that was written and recorded with his ex-psychologist. Includes a rap song that opens with the line, "My name is Brian and I'm the man, I write hit songs with the wave of my hand!" Wilson's fans threatened to murder a critic for publishing a positive review. |
Trout Mask Replica | A chaotic 1969 pop album by Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band containing bizarre and disjointed musical compositions. |
Wake Up! | A rock album officially sanctioned by the Pope. |
Yesterday and Today | A North American release from the Beatles that is most notorious for its album art, which features the Fab Four posing with decapitated baby dolls and chunks of raw meat. |
3 Dev Adam | A Turkish movie featuring (unlicensed) Captain America and El Santo battling evil Spider-Man. Quite successful in Turkey, resulting in other unlicensed films such as the infamous Turkish Star Wars. |
100 Years | A movie that your grandchildren and great-grandchildren might be able to enjoy! |
An Alan Smithee Film: Burn Hollywood Burn | A movie about a director who makes a bad movie, but can't remove his name from the credits because his real name is Alan Smithee. In reality, the movie about the movie was so bad that director Arthur Hiller was credited as Alan Smithee to disguise himself from the production. |
Ambiancé | An experimental film that was scheduled to have a thirty day-long running time, with the only copy being destroyed after its premiere, only for it to be unexpectedly cancelled by the director after its release date passed without a showing. |
Atuk | A comedy screenplay, never filmed as its intended lead actors just kept dying. |
Barbenheimer | The biggest movie phenomenon of 2023, where Malibu meets the Manhattan Project. |
Big Dumb Object | A mysterious object (usually of extraterrestrial origin) in a film that is there simply to cause a sense of wonder. |
Black and white hat symbolism in film | The hat, sir, whatever could it mean? |
Cat Soup | An anime shortfilm about cute cats? Wrong! Actually a surrealist short film about concepts such as nihilism, Child Death, The Afterlife or lack thereof, etc. |
William Castle | Horror director who loved a promotional gimmick. One film offered a $1000 insurance policy if you died of fright, and another offered audiences a full refund if they were too scared to see the ending. |
Cocksucker Blues | A Rolling Stones documentary which was banned from being shown unless the director was physically present. |
The Conqueror | John Wayne IS Genghis Khan! The filming location IS radioactive! |
The Cure for Insomnia | A movie that runs for 85 hours. Not the longest movie ever screened though (see below). |
The Day the Clown Cried | A notorious unreleased film about the Holocaust by Jerry Lewis – hey, it's a comedy! |
Deafula | A vampire movie shot entirely in American Sign Language. |
Death of a President | A mockumentary film created about the hypothetical future assassination of George W. Bush, released while he was still in office. |
Dump months | The opposite of the summer movie season. |
Empire | A film by Andy Warhol consisting entirely of eight hours of still footage of the Empire State Building. |
Empires of the Deep | A $140 million unreleased US-Chinese aqua-fantasy film that sunk to the depths of the sea... |
First on the Moon | Proof that the Soviets got there, thirty years before Armstrong and Aldrin didn't. |
Him | One of the most sought-after lost films is a 1974 gay porno about Jesus. |
I Killed My Lesbian Wife, Hung Her on a Meat Hook, and Now I Have a Three-Picture Deal at Disney | "I knew I wanted to be a director, and I did a couple of short films, and this is the only one that haunts me." —Ben Affleck, Academy Award winner |
In the Aftermath | A B-movie studio gets the rights to a surrealist anime and re-edits it into a post-apocalyptic thriller. |
Italian Spiderman | An Australian production made with the goal of being a tribute to old Italian action films. |
Lee Kin-yan | A Hong Kong actor repeatedly cast in Stephen Chow films as a nose-picking, bearded transvestite. |
List of films featuring giant monsters | You are never safe in Tokyo. |
List of films featuring time loops | Study this to know what to do if you're trapped in a time loop. |
List of films that most frequently use the word "fuck" | Golly! |
Logistics | The world's longest movie ever made, it follows the entire five-week process of making and selling a pedometer in reverse chronological order. |
The Longest Most Meaningless Movie in the World | A movie that runs for 48 hours. Despite its title, it isn't the world's longest movie, but the jury's still out on whether it's the most meaningless.... |
Maidstone | A film notable for a real, bloody fight between its director and its star actor that was kept in the final edit. |
Manic Pixie Dream Girl | A female stock character in (usually) movies who is extremely eccentric and girlish, and serves mainly to motivate and/or provide character development for the male protagonist. |
Manos: The Hands of Fate | A low-budget film created by a fertilizer salesman from Texas, which is often considered to be the worst film of all time. |
The Many Faces of Jesus Gay Jesus film hoax | A very controversial abandoned film which would have depicted a bisexual Jesus engaged in robbery and drunkenness, personally condemned by Pope Paul VI. Its screenwriter was personally banned from entering the United Kingdom following its announcement. Since the 1980s, a widespread hoax has came up claiming that a similar film will feature Jesus as a swinger. |
Mockbuster | Not the movie you want, but the bargain-bin equivalent. |
Modern Times Forever (Stora Enso Building, Helsinki) | The second longest film ever shot: ten whole days of one decaying building Life After People-style and first screened in front of itself. The directors have a point. |
The Mystery of the Leaping Fish | A 1910s silent film about an ace detective who takes loads of cocaine. |
Night of the Day of the Dawn of the Son of the Bride of the Return of the Revenge of the Terror of the Attack of the Evil, Mutant, Alien, Flesh Eating, Hellbound, Zombified Living Dead | Part 2 has the longest film title in the English language. |
Norodom Sihanouk filmography | The prolific, decades-long filmmaking career of the former king and prime minister of Cambodia. |
Oscar bait | There are certain rules one follows when making an Oscar film. Including mental illness, the Holocaust and Meryl Streep in your film also helps. |
On the Art of the Cinema | North Korean cinema is best Korean cinema. |
The Overcoat | A Russian animated film that the director has been struggling to complete for forty years. |
Paint Drying | Created to test the patience of the British Board of Film Classification. |
Palm Dog Award | An award given out every year at the Cannes Film Festival to celebrate outstanding performances by dogs in movies. |
Passage de Vénus | A six second long "film" made in 1876, consisting of plates capturing the 1874 transit of Venus. Currently rated a 6.8 on IMDb. |
Patterson–Gimlin film | Bigfoot's most famous appearance. |
Pink Flamingos | A cult 1972 film following "the filthiest person alive", notorious for its deliberately disgusting content and culminating in to protagonist eating dog feces. |
Plan 9 from Outer Space | The epitome of so-bad-it's-good cinema. |
Pulgasari | An anti-feudal Godzilla-esque cult film, supposedly an allegory for unchecked capitalism. It was directed by Shin Sang-ok, a South Korean filmmaker who Kim Jong Il had ordered to be kidnapped along with his wife so that they could make films for the North. |
Rampart | A 2013 Woody Harrelson flick now infamous for its horrible marketing, including possibly the worst AMA of all time. |
Rapsittie Street Kids: Believe in Santa | An all-star cast appear in this badly written, badly animated picture. The producer apparently gave the animators $500,000 and didn't check their work until he saw it on television. |
Raza | A drama about a family's roles in the Spanish Civil War that was written and supposingly ghost-directed by Francisco Franco himself. Takes "history is written by the victors" to a new level. |
Reefer Madness | A 1930s anti-marijuana propaganda film which failed at its task so badly it became a cult classic within the marijuana subculture. |
Return of the Ewok | One of the rare cases of lost media within the Star Wars franchise. |
Roar | Back in the 1970s, a family of African wildlife activists gathered together to make a movie with over 150 untrained big cats, leading to seventy members of the cast and crew getting injured. Its genre? A comedy, of course! |
The Room Tommy Wiseau | Perhaps the worst film ever created, filled with bad acting, poor dialogue, scenes that go nowhere, crazy behind-the-scenes, and more. And, of course, the man behind it all. |
Roundhay Garden Scene | The first ever moving picture, which lasted for an epic two seconds. |
Self-Portrait | An experimental film by Yoko Ono, featuring a 42-minute shot of John Lennon's half-erect penis. A later Lennon/Ono collaboration called Erection is surprisingly unrelated. |
Schichlegruber Doing the Lambeth Walk | Was the world's first video mashup British WW2 propaganda? |
Shaken, not stirred | Why 007 prefers his martini shaken. |
Sharknado | Exactly what it implies: Sharks + Tornado = the best damn disaster movie on earth. You better know it's got an ungodly amount of sequels and a cult following too! |
Smell-O-Vision | A system designed to enhance films with odors. Used once for the 1960 film Scent of Mystery and never again. |
Stay Puft Marshmallow Man | "I tried to think of the most harmless thing. Something I loved from my childhood. Something that could never ever possibly destroy us!" |
Stinking badges | Something nobody needs. Possibly the most frequently quoted and misquoted line from a movie ever. |
Taylor Mead's Ass | An Andy Warhol film consisting of a single prolonged shot of exactly what the title says. |
Titanic (1943 film) | A Historical Fiction drama made in Nazi Germany as a propaganda film. Weirdly enough, the movie was later extensively shown in the Communist Europe for its anti-greed story. |
Twin films | When two studios make the same idea at the same time. |
The Uranus Experiment | An unusually high-concept porn film that contains a real scene of sex in zero-gravity and was nominated for a Nebula science fiction award as an act of protest by a group of disgruntled authors. |
United Passions | A $30 million film sponsored by FIFA about how great they are. Came out right after the 2015 FIFA corruption case came to light. One of the lowest grossing sports movies of all time. |
Unsimulated sex | When two actors really have sex for a scene, rather than a simulation. |
Who Killed Captain Alex? | A 2010 Ugandan action-comedy film produced on a budget of $85. |
Wilhelm scream | A stock sound effect first recorded in 1951 and used in dozens of films (including seven Star Wars films, two Lord of the Rings films and Kill Bill). |
Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey | Horror movie about Winnie-the-Pooh, from the director who probably hated that bear as a kid. The film went onto "win" five Razzies. |
Zyzzyx Road | Budget: $1.2 million. Box office: 30 bucks. It makes sense in context. |
2010 Georgian news report hoax | A "simulated" news broadcast that reported on the parliament's breakdown and deaths of politicians, including a reported assassination of the President, leading to Russia invading Georgia. It caused widespread panic accross the country and resulted to three deaths. |
Al Murray's Compete for the Meat | A British game show where the top prize is a frozen chicken and the second prize is some sausages. |
Alternative 3 | An April Fools joke by an ITV science show leads many to believe that scientists were being kidnapped to prepare for the colonization of Mars. |
Anti-Barney humor | An article for all Barney & Friends haters. |
Australia's Naughtiest Home Videos | Forget Turn-On – this never even made it to the end of its only episode. An American attempt fared little better. |
BBC Green Book | Comedy show broadcasting standards, circa 1949. Avoid the vulgar use of "basket", don't joke about stammering, and whatever you do don't mention the McGillycuddy of the Reeks! |
Bernd das Brot | The mascot of a German children's television network: a chronically depressed loaf of bread who laments his life and enjoys very boring activities. |
The Canadian Conspiracy | A mockumentary released in 1985 that asserts that Canada is subverting the United States by taking over its media. |
Captain Midnight broadcast signal intrusion | On a clear night in April 1986, a frustrated electrical engineer jams HBO's signal to protest against its rates for satellite dish owners in what has been dubbed an act of "video terrorism". |
"The City on the Edge of Forever" | How an internal fight between the screenwriter and the series creator resulted in one of the most celebrated episodes of the original Star Trek series. |
Conspiracy 58 | A mockumentary that claimed that the 1958 World Cup was never actually held. Despite being revealed as a hoax at the end, people still believed it. |
Dinner for One | A classic British comedy sketch, virtually unknown in its homeland, that has become the most-repeated television programme in German history. |
Don't Scare the Hare | A British television game show involving a large robotic hare and an underground forest. It was not popular and lasted only one season. |
Flanderization | When a TV character becomes a literal caricature of their initial form. |
Flemish Secession hoax | Our regular programming is now interrupted to declare independence from Belgium. |
The Force is with Cristal Beer | Imagine waking up to watch Star Wars only to be served beer advertisements. |
Friday night death slot | Where TV shows go to die. |
Graggle Simpson | What do you mean, "who"? You know him! He's your favorite Simpsons character! |
Greg Packer | A man on the street, no matter which street you're talking about. |
De Grote Donorshow | An apparently terminally ill woman offers her kidney to one of three lucky patients live on TV. Controversy erupts before broadcast, in which it is then revealed that the whole show is a hoax meant to draw attention to the lack of available organ donors in the Netherlands. |
Guy Goma BBC interview | A man who went to the BBC for a job interview is instead interviewed on its news channel about the Apple Corps v. Apple Computer lawsuit. |
Heil Honey I'm Home! | Hitler has his own sitcom, with his Jewish neighbors. |
Historiography of The Simpsons | An in-depth analysis of whether, when and why people stopped finding The Simpsons funny. |
History of Pop | How a TV program guide became an actual channel. |
"Hold on Tight!" (Inside No. 9) | An entirely fake episode of the dark comedy anthology series Inside No. 9, featuring mocked-up photos and clips for a trailer, designed to trick the show's viewers. |
"How to Eat with Your Butt" | The plot and the title of this South Park episode are pretty strange, even by the show's standards. |
Hypothetical | The only quiz containing only hypothetical questions, such as: "You must steal Russell Crowe's shower gel. How do you do it?", "How much money do you have to be paid to eat a packet of crisps every time you have a conversation with someone for a year?", and the stone-cold original: "Big hat or small hat?" |
I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant | A documentary series on TLC. You can probably guess the plot. |
It's So Funny | A North Korean comedy show which is anything but funny. |
I Wanna Marry "Harry" | An American reality show to find "Prince Harry" (really an actor they tried to pass off as him) a wife. Meghan Markle was not a contestant. |
John Dillermand | A Danish children's series featuring a man gets into all sorts of (family friendly) trouble with his elongated penis. |
Judaism in Rugrats | A Maccababy's gotta do what a Maccababy's gotta do. |
Jumping the shark | Metaphor, based on something that Fonzie actually did on an episode of Happy Days, for the moments when popular TV series lose all credibility and have undeniably entered their twilight years. |
Michael Larson | Through countless VCR recordings and pattern memorization, this man became Press Your Luck's biggest winner ever. |
List of Saturday Night Live incidents | From Ashlee Simpson's lip-sync fail to Adrien Brody's possibly racist introduction to Sean Paul. |
Max Headroom signal hijacking | TV signals in Chicago are twice overpowered on 22 November 1987 by broadcasts featuring a person (possibly a male) disguised as the 1980s virtual TV character Max Headroom. The source of the broadcasts and the people involved remain unknown. |
Mikhail Gorbachev Pizza Hut commercial | The real former leader of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev starred in a Pizza Hut commercial. What more can I say? |
Nasubi Susunu! Denpa Shōnen | A man who became famous after appearing in a reality show in which he was locked in an apartment for 11 months until he won ¥1 million from mail-in sweepstakes. Said show also featured, among other things, two men who had to hitchhike their way from the Cape of Good Hope to Norway, a challenge to shave the beard of Fidel Castro, and a segment in which baseball fans would only be allowed to eat if their supported team won a game. |
Odagiri effect | Turns out that women find sexy men on TV shows quite appealing. |
Reborn as a Vending Machine, I Now Wander the Dungeon | Exactly as the title says, it's an anime about a guy who was reborn as a vending machine. |
Shaun Micallef's Mad as Hell | What's wrong Shaun? Why must you be mad as hell? |
Will Smith–Chris Rock slapping incident | What happens when a G.I. Jane joke goes horribly wrong. At an awards ceremony. On worldwide television. |
Soap opera rapid aging syndrome | A tragic condition suffered by some young characters on soap operas. |
Southern Television broadcast interruption | A news program in England interrupted by an interstellar message from Vrillon, representative of the mighty Ashtar Galactic Command. |
Space Cadets | Four lucky average Joes got tricked into thinking that they were shot into space. The entire show was, in fact, so planned out that people thought the contestants were actors - basically making the show a prank in itself. |
Spaghetti-tree hoax | Place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best. |
Star Wars Holiday Special | What do you get when you combine Star Wars and Christmas? One of the worst films of all time. |
Superstar USA | A music competition looking for the worst singers America has to offer. |
Tomorrow's Pioneers | A Palestinian children's show produced by Hamas and co-hosted by various costumed characters, including one resembling Mickey Mouse. Most of said costumed characters are killed by Jews in some violent manner. |
Turn-On | An ABC comedy series that was cancelled even before the first episode had finished. |
"Turner Doomsday Video" | When he founded CNN, Ted Turner made sure they would be ready for the end of the world. |
TV pickup | Britons regularly cause massive power surges by simultaneously making tea during program breaks. |
Uh Oh! | 90's Canadian children's game show, with an energetic wacky host, fun trivia questions, and a leather daddy dumping slime on kids! What could go wrong! |
Very special episode | A genre of television episodes with controversial life lessons interweaved into the storyline, popularized by Blossom. |
Wank Week | A Channel 4 project for all those who think there aren't enough jerks on TV. |
Tommy Westphall | How an autistic child and Detective Munch may be responsible for more than 200 TV series. |
Who's Your Daddy? | To win $100,000, adoptees have to pick their biological father out of 25 men. |
Zuiikin' English | A Japanese TV series from 1992 which combined gymnastic exercises with the teaching of "useful" English language phrases, such as "Spare me my life!", "I am allergic to penicillin", "I have a bad case of diarrhea" and "Lovely golf weather today!" |
Action 52 | Inspired by Taiwanese NES multicarts, one businessman sets to create an all-American version with original games... but leaves the devs only 3 months to create 52 of them, resulting in disaster. Also, a tie-in comic book for a franchise that never got started, and a contest where the game is so bugged you can't even enter it. |
The Adventures of Ninja Nanny & Sherrloch Sheltie | An "educational" PC game from 1993 that became notorious decades later for being built upon random public domain media strewn together in a wildly nonsensical fashion, complete with animation, audio clips, hyperlinked text, and some sort of plot. |
Atari video game burial | Are your video games not selling? Why not do what Atari did and bury them in a New Mexico landfill? |
Bad Rats | A physics-based puzzle game about rats killing cats. It was so bad it became a viral gag gift and got a sequel. |
Bartle taxonomy of player types | What type of gamer are you? |
Battle of B-R5RB | A player-versus-player battle in Eve Online which involved over 7,500 players, lasted 21 hours, and cost over $300,000 worth of in-game currency. |
Beat 'Em & Eat 'Em | An early "erotic" game for the Atari 2600. Control a pair of nude women trying to catch and eat falling semen. |
Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing | A racing game considered one of the worst of all time with Metacritic's worst-ever score of 8/100. It has opponents that don't move, the ability to drive through buildings and accelerate infinitely in reverse, and a notorious "YOU'RE WINNER !" [sic] message after each race. |
BMX XXX | A controversial 2002 video game mixing strippers with BMX cycling. |
Bob's Game | An unreleased homebrew game of a game, in a game, within a game. The developer went on a protest against the evil corporation known as "Gantendo". |
Boong-Ga Boong-Ga | The first arcade game about shoving a giant finger up someone's anus. |
Boss key | A special key or key combination used in computer games to quickly hide the game from superiors or coworkers. |
Breast physics | Follow the bouncing boobs! |
Cadillacs and Dinosaurs: The Second Cataclysm | A sequel in name only to a classic beat 'em up, based on an unrelated comic book that predates the first game, and programmed by none other than Elon Musk. |
Calculator | The best video game ever: A $10 software calculator. |
Cat hair mustache puzzle | Considered among the worst puzzles of any video game. |
Catechumen | Hallelujah! Shoot possessed Roman soldiers with a magical sword until they turn Christian and start to pray. |
Chex Quest | Doom for ages 6 and up, made as a promotion for Chex cereal. |
Cho Aniki | A long-running series of games from Japan, known for their absurdist humor and homoeroticism, about the quest of sweaty bodybuilders for protein supplements. |
Communist Mutants from Space | A Cold War Space Invaders clone in which you do battle with the Mother Creature, driven mad by radioactive vodka. |
Concord | What happens when you try to make people spend $40 plus microtransactions for a genre (mostly) full of free-to-play fare; a game that spent over 8 years in development, but lasted only a fortnight (14 days, or 2 weeks) from its August 2024 release. For perspective: The average lifespan of a housefly (Musca domestica) is around twice the period this game was available (28 days). Still didn't dissuade them from making an adaptation, though. |
Corrupted Blood incident | An unintentional virtual epidemic in World of Warcraft, which became an important medical case study. |
Crab Champions | From the guy who brought you "Crab Rave". Be a crab. Have a gun. Shoot up a beach. 🦀. |
Cubic Ninja | A game that ended up being resold for over $500 due to its unintentional ability to let a 3DS run homebrew. |
Dance Dance Immolation | It's exactly like Dance Dance Revolution, just with flamethrowers pointed at you. |
Dark Room Sex Game | Contains explicit sex. Contains no graphics. |
Development of Duke Nukem Forever | A chronicle of fourteen years of development hell, complete with four changes of engines, lawsuits, and profane responses to company executives. The end result was judged by critics to have been very much not worth the wait. |
Don't Buy This | A rare example of truth in advertising. |
Edge Games | A company that decided that the "Edge" in their name was so important that it started to sue everything video game-related using that word. Until Electronic Arts got involved. |
Eggplant run | A challenge playthrough of Spelunky in which you carry an eggplant and toss it into the final boss's face. |
Ethnic Cleansing | Perhaps the most racist video game ever made. |
Fortnite Holocaust Museum | A virtual museum on the victims of the Holocaust created in Fortnite. |
The Goat Puzzle | Goats' contributions to gaming aren't all positive. |
Goat Simulator | What do you mean, you've never fantasised about being a goat? Enough people have to warrant the oddly named sequel Goat Simulator 3. |
Goodboy Galaxy | A video game made for the Game Boy Advance ...made in 2023 (for its 20th anniversary). |
The Great Giana Sisters | A game that was withdrawn from the shelves virtually as soon as it went on them. |
Grezzo 2 | Doom mod that spoofs modern Italian culture, featuring blasphemous references to the Catholic Church, including the main character killing Jesus. Twice. |
Hatoful Boyfriend | A dating sim where your romantic partners are all sapient birds. |
Hong Kong 97 | A video game where you play as Bruce Lee's superpowered, heroin-addicted cousin, who has been assigned to kill the entire population of China. The giant head of Deng Xiaoping has been revived as a weapon of mass destruction and the death screen displays an actual dead body from the Yugoslav Wars. |
"Hot Coffee" | All you had to do was do yo' damn girlfriend, CJ! |
I Am Bread | You play as bread. |
"I am Error" | A line line said by a character in Zelda II, |
I Love Bees | A very creative marketing strategy for Halo 2. |
I Love You, Colonel Sanders! | A dating sim where you romance KFC founder Colonel Sanders. The best part: It's official. |
Incidente em Varginha | Brazil's first ever first-person shooter is based on a UFO sighting. Also used to train Army division soldiers. |
Incredible Crisis | Just an ordinary day in the life of a family... |
Islamic Fun | All the classic Muslim-themed educational games you could want. Help build a mosque! Race some rabbits! Defend Lebanon against Israel's 1978 invasion! Wait, what? |
JFK Reloaded | A first-person shooter where the player gets to kill President John F. Kennedy and is rewarded for accurately recreating his assassination. |
Kanye Quest 3030 | Just an innocent game about Kanye West. There definitely aren't any secret cults lying around! |
Kanye Zone | He's definitely in his zone... |
Killer7 | Play an assassin inhabited by the personas of seven dead hitmen and use their abilities to fight a terrorist group of virus-infected humans while uncovering conspiracies about Japan's interference in US politics and being haunted by your former victims. |
Laden VS USA | In the early 2000s, a shady Chinese LCD game manufacturer decided that 9/11 was the hottest new cash-grab. |
List of Doom ports | Slay demons on your PC, your console, your phone, your... thermostat? |
List of video games notable for negative reception | And we were so sure No Man's Sky would be a hit! |
LSD: Dream Emulator | The trippiest game in existence. |
Mighty No. 9 | A video game notable for having the longest closing credits of any media, at just under 3 hours and 48 minutes long, in part thanks to the game's sluggish and somewhat mismanaged development and the developers' decision to credit all 71,494 of the game's Kickstarter backers. |
MissingNo. | A Pokémon species that only appears as the result of a glitch and has since been the subject of many sociological studies. |
Mister Mosquito | Be a mosquito. |
Moonbase Alpha | A simulation video game officially published by NASA themselves that is most well known for its built-in text-to-speech function. |
The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog | As an April Fools' joke, Sega released a free visual novel where you have to investigate the murder of Sonic. It's sweeter than it sounds. |
Ninja Golf | Hole in your enemies! |
Nuclear Gandhi | According to an urban legend, a bug in Civilization makes Mahatma Gandhi prone to start a nuclear war. More recent games in the series made it a feature. |
Overwatch and pornography | Yes, many people would like to "Nerf This!" |
Penn & Teller's Smoke and Mirrors | A compendium of games to trick your friends, including Desert Bus, a painstakingly realistic eight-hour bus journey from Tucson, Arizona, to Las Vegas. |
Pepsiman | Save people from thirst! But not from tooth decay. |
PETA satirical browser games | Bored of playing your usual video games? Try PETA's Super Chick Sisters and Super Tofu Boy, they will definitely get you to work. |
Phalanx | Who knew that putting an old man playing a banjo on the box of an unrelated game would make for effective marketing? |
Playing History 2 - Slave Trade | An educational game that featured a minigame where you would fit slaves into a slave ship like Tetris pieces. |
Pokémon and pornography | Hey guys, did you know that in terms of male human and female Pokémon breeding, Vaporeon is the most compatible Pokémon for humans? |
Pokémon Uranium | A fangame set in a region of the Pokémon universe that was victim to a nuclear disaster. |
Polybius | An arcade game that supposedly causes its players to go insane. |
Pyongyang Racer | The height of North Korea's gaming industry tries to lull you into travelling there. |
Quest for Bush | A first-person shooter, released by al-Qaeda's propaganda arm, with George W. Bush as its final boss. |
Rex Ronan: Experimental Surgeon | A game for the Super Nintendo that aims to educate kids about the harmful effects of smoking. The game's publisher, Raya, also published a few other health-themed games, such as Captain Novolin about diabetes and Bronkie the Bronchiasaurus about asthma. |
Seaman | A game where you take care of a fish with a human head while being guided by Leonard Nimoy. |
Sex with Hitler | Want to get frisky with the Führer? |
Sex with Stalin | Seize the means of (re)production! |
Simlish | The language spoken by characters in The Sims. |
Soda Drinker Pro | The gamified menial task of drinking soda that contains a hidden surrealist minigame compilation. |
Sonic Dreams Collection | This surreal fangame, said to be unfinished Sonic the Hedgehog games on the Dreamcast, pulls no punches to the notorious Sonic fandom. |
Special Force | Hezbollah recreated its battles against Israel as a first-person shooter... twice. |
Stalin vs. Martians | The Man of Steel takes on an alien menace. |
The Story of Kamikuishiki Village | A resource management strategy game created by the same people responsible for Hong Kong 97 where you play as Shoko Asahara and the end goal is to carry out the Tokyo subway sarin gas attack. Often mistakenly believed to have been created by Aum Shinrikyo themselves as propaganda. |
Super Columbine Massacre RPG! | A gamified(?) recreation of the Columbine massacre, featuring a Hell sequence where the perpetrators fight South Park-style Satan. Allegedly the Dawson College shooter's favorite game. |
Syobon Action | A platformer known for its levels designed to cause extreme frustration. |
Takeshi no Chōsenjō | A deliberately unfair and confusing video game made by Takeshi Kitano, noted video game hater. |
Tetris effect | A psychological effect where Tetris players start arranging blocks in the real world. |
Thatcher's Techbase | A mod of Doom II where the main goal is to kill an undead Margaret Thatcher. |
The Thompson Twins Adventure | One of the only video games to ever be released via vinyl record. |
Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion | A young turnip goes on a quest to evade taxes; see also its sequel Turnip Boy Robs a Bank. |
Untitled Goose Game | A game where you can bother the inhabitants of an English village. As a goose. |
Yeah! You Want "Those Games," Right? So Here You Go! Now, Let's See You Clear Them! | A game parodying advertisements for mobile games. |
You Have to Burn the Rope | ...and doing the titular task takes about half as long as listening to the credits song. |
2 Hours Doing Nothing | An Indonesian kid who gained fame by staring into his camera for two hours. |
A group where we all pretend to be boomers | A group of Facebook friends who decided to pretend to be elderly. |
All your base are belong to us | A phrase that originated in the 1989 video game Zero Wing and sparked an Internet phenomenon in 2001 and 2002. |
Babiniku | The phenomenon of men on the Internet depicting themselves as anime women, often without using voice changers. |
The Backrooms | A very strange online urban legend originating from the concept of liminal spaces. And it all came from an image taken from someone renovating a furniture store into a hobby shop. |
Bernie Sanders' Dank Meme Stash | A Facebook group dedicated to memes about American politician Bernie Sanders. |
Bogdanoff twins | A pair of French twin brothers known for their extravagant looks and (pseudo)scientific claims; which made them the subject of a long-lasting internet meme involving aliens, secret knowledge and bear markets. |
Boobquake | Female users of social networking websites agree to determine whether their scandalous clothing can cause earthquakes. |
Bowsette | The Internet was once titillated over this Bowser-Peach fusion. |
British scientists | Not a list of some scientific pioneers from Europe, but a Russian internet meme. |
The Bus Uncle | A Hong Kong resident gets into an uncomfortably tense argument with a fellow passenger—all caught on video. |
Bronies | You thought My Little Pony could never be loved by grown men. Wrong. Very wrong. |
Carstuckgirls.com | An erotic(?) website devoted to women trying to free their cars from various obstacles. |
Chad | From the incel forums comes this whole new slang. |
Cinnamon challenge | Unless you enjoy lung damage, please do not try this at home. Actually, better yet, don't try it at all. |
Consumption of Tide Pods | Ever thought a Tide pod looked kind of like candy? Apparently you're not alone. |
Countryballs | A comic genre with balls and other bits for different countries doing what real countries do. |
Crush on Obama | That's great. |
Cursed image | Low quality images with a mysterious aura, sometimes with a comedic effect. |
Cute cat theory of digital activism | "Web 1.0 was invented to allow physicists to share research papers. Web 2.0 was created to allow people to share pictures of cute cats." — Ethan Zuckerman |
Dancing baby | One of the very first internet memes: a weird 3D baby dancing in 1996. |
DashCon | A Tumblr convention where the organisers unexpectedly announced that the hotel needed $17,000 extra - and that was just the first day. Anyone fancy an extra hour in the ball pit? |
Dave rule | "Dave-to-girl ratio" as gender balance criterion. |
Doge | very readers, such article, much wiki |
Elsagate | Here kids, watch these YouTube videos with Elsa and Spider-Man, I'm sure nothing inappropriate will be on them... |
Every time you masturbate... God kills a kitten | If that's not a good enough reason why you shouldn't, I don't know what is. |
Extremely online | A state that everybody reading this can probably relate to. |
Florida Man | Superhero native to the state of Florida best known for his frequent run-ins with law enforcement and intoxicating substances. |
Getting to Philosophy | All links lead to Philosophy. |
Godwin's law | Every long, protracted online discussion always ends with comparisons of others to Hitler. Really... |
Goncharov | The 1973 Martin Scorsese classic... that was entirely made up by the Internet 49 years later. |
Googling | Google created a verb that is really in the dictionary. |
Half-Life: Full Life Consequences | The worst Half-Life fan fiction ever written, later adapted to video. |
Hampster Dance | A web page featuring dancing hamsters set to music. |
"Heartbreaking: The Worst Person You Know Just Made A Great Point" | A 2018 ClickHole article about a truly devastating moment, complete with a stock image of a random Spanish man. |
Homunculus loxodontus | A bizarre blob-like creature known in Russia as "The One Who Waits". |
Sam Hyde | A transgressive American comedian blamed for numerous terrorist attacks and killings. |
Instagram egg | An image of any old egg...is what this egg would be if it didn't take over Instagram and become the most-liked post on the internet until December 2022. |
It's Decorative Gourd Season, Motherfuckers | A viral online essay celebrating the joys of Autumn. |
The Jerma985 Dollhouse | Streamer sets about making an interactive version of The Truman Show with himself as the main character. |
Joe Biden (The Onion) | What if Joe Biden was actually pretty rad? |
Josh fight | The face-off of the century to determine who could keep the name Josh. |
Eduard Khil | Our eternal Mr. Trololo. |
Lasagna Cat | Live-action reenactments of Garfield strips followed by absurd concluding pieces, including a mouse performing oral sex on Garfield, Odie committing suicide, and John Blyth Barrymore musing over a single strip for a whole hour. Don't even get me started on the ending to "Sex Survey Results"... |
Lenin was a mushroom | A hoax that Vladimir Lenin consumed large quantities of psychedelic mushrooms and eventually became a mushroom himself. |
Markovian parallax denigrate | Three random words that caused over 25 years of mystery. |
Meow Wars | A flame war on Usenet that lasted for over 2 years. |
Microsoft acquisition of the Roman Catholic Church | Sadly for those who were hoping for an online Eucharist, this was an early Internet hoax. |
Miguxês | A brief guide to Portuguese Internet slang. |
NAFO (group) | An internet meme and social media movement which fights Russian internet propoganda through shitposting and trolling. |
Neuro-sama | Who said a VTuber even needs a human behind it? To that idea, Neuro says "(Filtered)". |
No Nut November | ...and its antithesis, Destroy Dick December. |
Nukemap | New York got blown up by the Tsar Bomba! Well, at least you can do that in this. |
Numa Numa | Or how a fat kid dancing to the O-Zone song "Dragostea din tei" in front of his computer became very popular. |
Omission of New Zealand from maps | New Zealand is forgotten from maps so often it has become a meme. |
Omission of Tasmania from maps of Australia | And Tasmania is not any luckier... |
On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog | Little-known fact: all articles on this page were written by a team of Golden Retrievers. And thanks to the anonymity of the Internet, you didn't know until now. |
OS-tan | A small Internet phenomenon where certain types of software (including various Microsoft and Linux operating systems) are depicted as young anime women. |
PewDiePie vs T-Series | A competition between two YouTube channels to be the most subscribed channel. |
Philosophical zombie | I am dead, therefore I eat brains. |
Planet X637Z-43 | A planet covered in cannabis! Well, that's what they want you to think. |
Press F to pay respects | Have you ever wondered why you might see the letter "F" being spammed on pages about someone's death? |
Rickrolling | Careful: that link you're about to click on might take you to a video of Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up". |
Rule 34 | "If it exists, there is Internet porn of it." |
Mark V. Shaney | A fake Usenet user whose computer-generated postings were created using Markov chain techniques. |
Shitposting | 🗿 |
Shock site | Don't look! (No, really.) |
Shrek fandom | Maybe "fandom" isn't the correct word? |
Sitting and Smiling | A YouTube series in which a man sits and smiles for four hours, documenting his descent into inevitable madness. |
Skibidi Toilet | One of the most popular web series among the children of today is a series of animated YouTube Shorts about the battle for world domination between a race of toilets with human heads and a race of humans with cameras for heads. |
Storm Area 51 | An Internet meme which, as all great things, began on Facebook and spiralled a bit of out control, and of course Wikipedians couldn't be stopped in making it its own article. |
Suntukan sa Ace Hardware | Fight Club taking place at a hardware store of all places. |
Techno Viking | When the protagonist of a meme sues its creator. |
Ted Cruz–Zodiac Killer meme | A mock conspiracy theory gone wild. |
Time Cube | The personal website of a schizophrenic old man who claimed that time is "cubic" in nature and that all of modern science is a lie. |
John Titor | The name of a purported time traveller from the year 2036. He posted on several time travel-related Internet bulletin boards during 2000/2001. |
This Man | The dreamiest man you'll ever meet. |
Tourist guy | The picture of a Hungarian man on 9/11. |
Twitter suspensions | Tweeting's not a right, it's a privilege. |
Unusual eBay listings | Those strange things people sell on the Internet... |
uwu | *notices ur Wikipedia article* owo what's this? uwu |
Very erotic very violent | See also very good very mighty. |
wikiFeet | The world's largest image sharing website devoted to foot fetishism. |
WTFPL | A public domain software license whose abbreviation stands for "Do What The Fuck You Want To Public License". |
Wikipedia Star Trek Into Darkness debate | Is it "into" or "Into"? Listed at Wikipedia's lamest edit wars. |
Yaminjeongeum | 세종머앟늰익 읚머한 윾산. |
See also List of Internet memes.
Kanamara Matsuri | A phallus festival in Kawasaki, Japan. |
Mexico City Alebrije Parade | Parade and contest of giant alebrijes ("colorful monsters"). |
Testicle festival | "Would you like to supersize those?" |
All in a Row | A play about a child on the autism spectrum... portrayed as an inhuman-looking puppet who makes his family's lives miserable. |
Cherry Sisters | The first truly "so bad it's good" act, whose vaudeville performances drew packed houses of audiences who just wanted to hurl abuse at them. Sued newspapers for printing a negative review of them, and lost. |
The Elvis Dead | Evil Dead II retold in the style of Elvis Presley, later released on VHS in 2020. "I gonna build a groovy chainsaw arm". |
In My Life | Brain cancer, OCD, a child killed by a drunk driver... all subjects made light of in this surreal musical by the guy who wrote "You Light Up My Life". |
Jahrhundertring | The centenary production of the Ring cycle was transported to the Industrial Revolution, with the gods as capitalist fat cats and the Rhinemaidens as prostitutes. Near-riots ensued. |
Jerry Springer: The Opera | This musical has got it all, from God and Satan to the KKK. |
Moose Murders | A bizarre play that became a byword for the worst of Broadway. Signature moment: an apparently-unplanned scene where a paraplegic man wrapped in bandages gets up to kick a man in a moose costume in the crotch. |
Mortal Kombat: Live Tour | A family friendly adapation of a violent video game. To make things even better, there was audience participation. |
Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark | At $75 million, the most expensive Broadway musical, which is infamous for its troubled production history and cast member accidents. Also holds the record for the largest number of preview showings (182) before the official opening. |
Alcohol-infused whipped cream | Do you like to squirt whipped cream right into your mouth from the bottle? This should spice that right up. |
Ant egg soup | A nostalgic soup with a "distinctive, sour pop". |
Ayds | Ayds was a great way to lose weight, until the mid-1980s... |
Bacon Explosion | Not as dangerous as it sounds. Unless you're a Vegan of course. |
Bacon ice cream | They said we were mad... they said we could never combine the world's two greatest foods. They were wrong! |
Banana production in Iceland | Weirder than fermented shark? |
Biangbiang noodles | A type of Chinese noodle whose name is written with an incredibly complex Chinese character. |
Boneless Fish | A frozen fish scaled, gutted and deboned, then glued to its original shape using a food-grade enzyme. |
British Rail sandwich | A culinary match to the quality of the train service. |
Carmine | A common food dye manufactured from insects. |
Casu martzu | Italian "maggot cheese" – cheese designed to be eaten while it is infested with cheese fly larvae. |
Century egg | A Chinese dish which involves preserving a duck, chicken or quail egg for several weeks to several months before eating. |
Chả rươi | Vietnamese dish made from the polychaete worm. |
Chocolate-coated marshmallow treats | Notable for the huge variety of racist names given to them all over the world. |
Chubby bunny | A common (but sometimes lethal) game played with marshmallows. |
Cockle bread | Bread made by English women in the seventeenth century that involved kneading and pressing against the woman's buttocks. |
Competitive eating | In which the main goal is the quick and vast consumption of food. |
Cookie cake | Schrödinger's dessert. |
Deep-fried Mars bar | A Scottish delicacy, often touted as an example of their diet's unhealthiness. See also deep fried Twinkies, deep fried pizza, and deep fried Oreos. |
Dilberito | A vegan burrito promoted by Dilbert. "Because of the veggie and legume content, three bites of the Dilberito made you fart so hard your intestines formed a tail." - Dilbert creator Scott Adams |
Dishwasher salmon | Salmon cooked using the heat from a dishwasher. |
Charles Domery | A Polish soldier noted for his unusually large appetite. While imprisoned in England, he remained ravenous despite being put on ten times the rations of other inmates, eating the prison cat, at least twenty rats and, on a regular basis, the prison candles. |
Doug | Its record as "world's biggest potato" was denied due to mistaken identity. |
Durian | King of fruits. King of smells? |
Edible underwear | Yes, this exists. |
Engastration | Dishes consisting of animals stuffed into each other. Turducken and whole stuffed camel are prominent examples. |
Eyes (cheese) | There are eyes in the cheese, but no cheese in the eyes. |
Flies' graveyard | A delicacy in the United Kingdom. |
Fool's Gold Loaf | A sandwich consisting of a single warmed, hollowed-out loaf of bread filled with the contents of one jar of creamy peanut butter, one jar of grape jelly, and a pound of bacon. Reportedly a favorite of Elvis. |
Freedom fries | "I know what'll teach France for not wanting to invade Iraq... we'll rename our food!" -Bob Ney, 2003 |
Fried spider | Exactly as it sounds – and a regional delicacy in Cambodia. |
Fruit ketchup | Plum ketchup, anyone? |
Adolf Hitler and vegetarianism | Hitler believed that a vegetarian diet could both alleviate his personal health problems and spiritually renew the Aryan race. |
Hedgehog Flavour Crisps | If you think that usual crisps are boring, try this. |
Hitler bacon | Can it possibly be kosher? |
Hottest chili pepper | Gettin' silly with chili. |
Hufu | For all you vegetarian cannibals out there, the tofu product designed to look and taste like human flesh. |
Human placentophagy | The consumption of a newborn's placenta is common among mammals; humans do it too. |
Kit Kats in Japan | There have been more than 300 limited-edition seasonal and regional flavors of Kit Kats produced in Japan since 2000. |
Ketchup as a vegetable | Makes junk food seem healthier. |
Kosher locust | Can Jews eat grasshoppers? |
Kuai Kuai culture | In Taiwan, it is considered fortuitous to place a particular brand of snack next to machines. |
Latke–Hamantash Debate | The debate of the century that began in 1946 and has never been resolved. About Jewish food. |
Luther Burger | Described as a "cardiologist's worst nightmare". |
Lychee and Dog Meat Festival | Vegans are the only group who can oppose this festival without any fear of hypocrisy. |
McWords | McDonald's has their own McLanguage now. |
Michel Lotito | Ate 45 door hinges, 18 bicycles, 15 shopping carts, a Cessna 150 light aircraft, and much more. |
Milbenkäse | A type of German cheese containing live mites, which are eaten along with the cheese. |
Monkey brains | A supposed delicacy that has been made famous through films. |
None pizza with left beef | An infamous online pizza order. |
Nutellagate | In which Columbia University students stole Nutella at a rapid rate. |
Alferd Packer | Before Dahmer there was Packer... |
Pieing | A slapstick stunt, or a kind of political protest. And there's even a list of victims. |
Products produced from The Simpsons | Fictional trademarks gone real. |
Rhubarb Triangle | A recipe or a dangerous area to fly through? |
Roadkill cuisine | Yes, Skunk a la Michelin sounds tasty to some people. |
Salmon chaos | The turmoil of salmon. |
Šakotis | Rotisserie |
San-nakji | Small octopuses eaten alive with sesame oil. |
Sealed crustless sandwich | A patented peanut butter and jelly sandwich. |
Spotted dick | Actually a type of pudding. |
Square watermelon | Rather expensive and very much inedible. |
Stargazy pie | A Cornish fish pie that looks back at you. |
Star Spangled Ice Cream | Real patriotic ice cream for real patriotic Americans. With flavors such as "Smaller Governmint", "I hate the French Vanilla", and "Bill Clinton Im-peach" |
Stinky tofu | Fermented soybean curd is apparently a delicacy for some people. One external link describes its scent as "a used tampon baking in the desert." |
Superman (ice cream flavor) | It's a bird! It's a plane! It's... ice cream? |
Surströmming | A Swedish dish consisting of fermented herring, said to have the worst smell in the world. |
Takeru Kobayashi | A slightly built Japanese competitive eater. He has consumed 63 Nathan's Famous hot dogs and buns in 12 minutes and holds a host of eating records for other foods. |
Testicles as food | Available fresh during castration season. |
Toast sandwich | An English dish with an "extravagance of blandness". Add salt and pepper to taste. |
La Tomatina | A gigantic food fight with a ham-topped greased pole as the start. |
Sonya Thomas | What weighs 105 pounds (48 kg) and eats more hot dogs in 12 minutes than most people do all summer? |
United States military chocolate | Originally designed to taste "little better than a boiled potato." Not much has changed. |
Unusually shaped vegetable | "While some examples are just oddly shaped, others are heralded for their amusing appearance, often representing a body part such as the buttocks." |
Vantage loaf | The bread that makes a baker's dozen. |
Virgin boy egg | Eggs cooked with the help of young boys' urine. |
Volkswagen currywurst | Volkswagen's best-selling product isn't cars, but sausages. |
"Who Ate All the Pies?" | A chant sung by football fans in England and Scotland, aimed at supposedly overweight footballers, officials or opposing supporters. |
1985 diethylene glycol wine scandal | A wine scandal where it was discovered that Austrian wineries were putting a toxic component of antifreeze into their wines to make them sweeter. |
Beer can pyramid | Or beeramid, if you prefer. |
Carmona Wine Urn | They say a fine wine gets better with age, but this is ridiculous. The 2000-year-old world record holder, and its merely 1700-year-old predecessor. |
Speyer wine bottle | |
Civet coffee | Not coffee made from civets, but rather from ordinary coffee beans the civet has, well, excreted. |
Cock ale | A type of ale that has a bag stuffed with a parboiled, skinned and gutted chicken later added. |
Cola wars | A marketing battle between Coca-Cola and Pepsi. |
Diet Coke and Mentos eruption | Diet Coke + Mentos = geyser. |
Fucking Hell | A German beer named after the Austrian village of Fucking. (It was renamed Fugging in 2021, so there goes the fun...) |
Ganesha drinking milk miracle | Hindu statues drinking milk. |
Grapefruit juice–drug interactions | Be careful – that delicious food item could be dangerous to prescription-drug users. |
Gustav III of Sweden's coffee experiment | When a king of Sweden tried (and failed) to prove that coffee could kill. |
H2NO | Why drink tap water, when you can pay to have a cool, refreshing glass of Coca-Cola or freshly chilled bottled tap water? |
If-by-whiskey | A famous speech successfully both attacking and defending booze. |
ISO 3103 | The ISO standard cup of tea. |
OpenCola | The world's first open-source beverage. |
Pepsi Number Fever | Large-scale riots in the Philippines in 1992 that led to the deaths of five people. The cause? A failed PepsiCo promotional event. |
Pussy | The drink's pure, it's your mind that's the problem. |
Snake wine | A type of Vietnamese wine that includes a whole venomous snake in the bottle. |
Vaskning | Allegedly, showing off wealth in a Swedish nightclub by pouring champagne down the kitchen sink. |
Vodka eyeballing | Here's looking at you, kid. |
Claudia Sanders Dinner House | A restaurant founded by Colonel Sanders and his wife Claudia after he became unhappy with changes at KFC, which was in turn sued by KFC. |
Conflict Kitchen | A Pittsburgh take-out restaurant that exclusively served ethnic foods from countries in which the United States was in conflict. |
Cross Cafe | A Hitler-themed Indian restaurant, formerly known as "Hitlers' Cross" [sic]. |
Dinner in the Sky | Enjoy a delicious meal—suspended 150 feet (46 m) in the air. |
Fortezza Medicea restaurant | Elegant, fine dining in a high-security prison. |
Hamburger University | Where McDonald's employees learn their stuff. |
Heart Attack Grill | Noted for its 8,000-calorie "Quadruple Bypass Burger". It also lives up to its name. |
Heladería Coromoto | Want a scoop of macaroni and cheese ice cream? How about beef? Chili? Cheese? Crab? Mushrooms in wine? British Airways? Viagra Hope? |
Ithaa | The world's first underwater restaurant. |
Jewish-American patronage of Chinese restaurants | For lack of dairy products, proximity in inner cities, and open hours during Christian holidays. |
Kayabukiya Tavern | A Japanese restaurant where guests are served by employed monkeys. |
Loving Hut | A vegan restaurant run by a cult. Get to watch "Supreme Master TV" in nearly all of their locations! |
MaDonal | A McDonald's knock-off in Iraq. |
McDonald's ice cream machine | Always broken. |
McDonald's urban legends | Is that worm meat in your Big Mac? |
Modern Toilet Restaurant | A restaurant chain whose furniture and decor is based on – yes – toilets. |
Original Spanish Kitchen | A Los Angeles restaurant that suddenly and unexpectedly closed in 1961, giving rise to an urban legend about the fate of its proprietors. The restaurant's contents – even as far as the place settings – remained untouched for decades. |
Pizza Pacaya | A restaurant in Guatemala that makes its pizza using an active volcano as its oven. |
Pyongyang | A restaurant chain whose sole proprietor is the Government of North Korea. |
Seriously McDonalds | Not seriously, in fact, because this new policy that black customers would pay more at McDonald's was an obvious (but believed) hoax. |
The Shed at Dulwich | TripAdvisor's #1 fake restaurant. |
Wiener King | It's all in the name. |
24 Hours of Lemons | An endurance race for terrible cars, with a $500 spending limit, infractions determined by a random wheel, and the grand prize going to the worst car that managed to finish the thing. Holds the world record for most participants in a single race. |
1916 Cumberland vs. Georgia Tech American football game | The most lopsided game in American football history (featuring the godfather of American football himself, John Heisman). |
1956 Olympic flame hoax | Why the Olympic Flame is pants. |
1967 NFL Championship Game | Often called "The Ice Bowl", a game between the Dallas Cowboys and the Green Bay Packers played in absolutely frigid conditions, at a temperature of −15 °F (−26 °C) (and that's before the wind chill.) |
1969 Talladega 500 | "Them dang unions trying to bust my race that I paid millions for because of tire failures! What am I ever going to do now?" - Probably NASCAR CEO Bill France Sr. |
1978 CONCACAF Champions' Cup | The only time in the history of association football in which an official championship ended up being championed ex aequo by more than one team; in this case there were three. |
1992 Troy State vs. DeVry men's basketball game | The highest scoring NCAA basketball game ever. |
2005 United States Grand Prix | A race in which 14 out of 20 drivers retired before the start of the race. |
2012 Daytona 500 | The 54th running of the Daytona 500 (which was supposed to start on Sunday afternoon) did not finish until early Tuesday morning because of rain and a freak jet dryer accident. |
2014 Hiram vs. Mount St. Joseph women's basketball game | How a dying teenager's wish became one of the year's biggest stories in American sports. |
2021 Belgian Grand Prix | The shortest race in Formula One history, notable for its lack of any actual "racing", but instead three laps of caution in the rain. |
Artistic roller skating | All the grace and charm of figure skating...but with roller skates. |
AS Adema 149–0 SO l'Emyrne | Taking own goals to the extreme. |
Athletics at the 1904 Summer Olympics – Men's marathon | The worst-run Olympic event in history. No water in the blazing Missouri heat, a winner who'd been poisoned by his trainers, the "winner" being disqualified for "illegal use of cars", a postman joining at the last minute and a tribesman being chased by aggressive dogs. Among other things. |
Australia 31–0 American Samoa | The most lopsided "fair" match in association football history since World War I. |
Australian Football International Cup | The "World Cup" of Australian rules football...in which Australia does not participate. |
Barbados 4–2 Grenada | A strange rule change in this soccer match saw one team defending both goals for several minutes, then winning 4–2 despite only scoring three goals. |
Bat and trap | An English bat-and-ball pub game. |
Battle of Bramall Lane | An English professional association football match that was ended at the 83rd minute because the home team lost too many of their players due to injuries and red cards. |
Battle of Surfaces | Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal went head-to-head to determine which court was more victorious: grass or clay? |
Bladderball | Yale University's contribution to the world of team sports. |
British baseball | An intermediate species between cricket and baseball played in the hinterlands of Wales and Western England. |
Bog snorkelling | The noble art of competitive snorkelling through cold, noxious bog water. |
Bottle-kicking | A ruleless drunken rugby-like sport played every Easter Monday since the 1700s in Hallaton, Leicestershire. |
Butt Fumble | Be careful where you run with that ball, Mark. |
Chess boxing | A sport that alternates rounds of speed chess and boxing. |
Collision in Korea | A WCW pay per view event in 1995 wasn't so unusual. A professional wrestling match in North Korea, however, is a once in a lifetime event. |
Cooper's Hill Cheese-Rolling and Wake | Don't let it get away! |
Coventry City 2-2 Bristol City West Germany 1-0 Austria | Match fixing with benefits. |
David Arquette in World Championship Wrestling | "When you're out of ideas, make an outsider actor your World Champion", said no one ever. |
Disco Demolition Night | What could go wrong with encouraging people to bring unwanted disco albums to a baseball doubleheader and blowing up the records between games? |
Dot-com commercials during Super Bowl XXXIV | "We haven't made any revenue this quarter? Let's spend millions of dollars on a Super Bowl commercial! There's no way we can lose!" |
A drive into deep left field by Castellanos | When professionalism meets apologising – as there's a drive into deep left field by Castellanos, it will be a home run. And so that will make it a 4–0 ballgame – and smashes into tiny pieces. |
Dwarf-tossing | A sporting competition where padded dwarfs are thrown by competitors. |
Dwile flonking | A sport that gives a new meaning to the term "drinking game". |
Elephant polo | Variant of polo that is played while riding elephants, mostly played by royals in Rajasthan. |
Enhanced Games | The Olympics, just without drug testing requirements. They hope an athlete can beat Usain Bolt's 100m dash record soon. |
Eton wall game | A sport played annually on St. Andrew's Day on a 5-by-110-metre (16 ft × 361 ft) field. The last goal was scored in 1909. |
Extreme ironing | A sport whereby participants take an ironing board to a remote location and iron a few items of clothing. |
Fair catch kick | A little-known way to score points in American football left over from rugby. It was last used successfully in the pro game in 1976. |
Fan Controlled Football | The world's first professional sports league completely owned by its fans. |
Fierljeppen | A Frisian sport where the objective is to jump over a trench. |
Football tennis | Wimbledon meets Wembley... in Czechoslovakia. |
Gillidanda | In this Indian game, instead of hitting a ball with a stick, players use a stick (danda) to hit another stick (gilli). |
Heidi Game | The last-minute comeback in this American football game wasn't seen by television viewers, as the network cut off the game to show the children's film Heidi. |
Henley-on-Todd Regatta | An Australian boat race that is cancelled when there is water in the river. |
International Rutabaga Curling Championship | Rutabaga curling originated in the frosty December climes of Ithaca, New York. |
Isner–Mahut match at the 2010 Wimbledon Championships | A record-breaking 11-hour, 5-minute tennis match at the Wimbledon 2010. |
Laser Space Cannon | A purple beam shooting out of the roof of the Sacramento Kings' arena, lit after every Kings home win, that became a symbol of the team that broke the NBA's longest-ever playoff drought. |
Lawn mower racing | Leaves the lawn in a very poor condition. |
Lingerie Football League | "Uniforms consist of helmets, shoulder pads, elbow pads, knee pads, garter belts, bras, and panties." Renamed the Legends Football League in 2013 and Extreme Football League in 2020, with the garters, bras, and panties replaced by slightly more modest performance sportswear. |
Mall walking | Usually done with larger groups of senior citizens. |
Mass Transit incident | What happens when you combine a professional wrestler prone to violence with a 17 year old that had lied about his age and experience? |
Mormons vs. Mullets | December 2, 2020: An unbeaten college football team finds itself with an unexpected open date... and another unbeaten team is looking for a game. December 3: Game on. December 5: Kickoff. |
Mythical national championship | When is a champion not exactly a champion? |
Naha Tug-of-war | Requires thousands of participants and a 40-metric-ton, 1.5-metre diameter rope. |
New Testament athletic metaphors | Blessed are the healthy in heart... |
One-armed versus one-legged cricket | According to Charles Dickens: "The one-legged men were pretty well with the bat, but they were rather beaten when it came to fielding." |
Pelota purépecha | You've heard of ice hockey, but how about fire hockey? |
Pillow Fight League | The first rule of Pillow Fight League is that you do not discuss Pillow Fight League. |
Plainfield Teachers College | Their American football team was unbeaten ...and non-existent. |
The Play | Before going onto the field for your postgame musical performance, make sure the game is over. |
Public image of Roman Reigns | Pushed to the top of the wrestling world, he was rejected by fans, but WWE kept trying, and trying, and trying for years on end. By 2019, Reigns was the most hated man in wrestling, despite being (allegedly) the good guy. |
Quidditch (real-life sport) | An international real-life sport, without magic objects. |
RoboCup | The goal of this robotics project: to create a robot soccer team that can beat the most recent FIFA World Cup winners. |
Rocket Racing League | A racing league intending to use rocket-powered aircraft to race a closed-circuit air racetrack. |
Scorigami | A scoring combination that has never happened in a league's history. |
Ski ballet | Skiers doing flips and spins on a slope. A smooth slope. Wearing skis. |
Smiggin Holes 2010 Winter Olympic bid | During the 2002 Winter Olympics, the two Australian comedians who gave the world Fatso the Fat-Arsed Wombat (see "Animals in sports" below) launched a bid to host the 2010 Winter Olympics in New South Wales, Australia. |
SpoGomi | A sport where teams have to collect as much litter as possible. |
Sports-related curses | A variety of excuses for bad performance. |
Stoolball | An ancestor of cricket (a game it resembles), baseball, and rounders. |
Swimming at the 1896 Summer Olympics – Men's sailors 100 metre freestyle | Not just any old sailor - this most niche of events was only open to those serving in the Greek Navy. |
Ten Cent Beer Night | A Major League Baseball game that tried to attract fans with a beer promotion got progressively worse, until an all-out riot broke out at Cleveland Stadium. |
Traditions and anecdotes associated with the Stanley Cup | An ice hockey trophy with a long history of abuse, superstition, and tests of buoyancy. |
Ultimate Tazer Ball | A sport in which players must compete to get a large ball into the goal of the opposing team. Oh, and everybody is armed with a stun gun. |
Ultimate Typing Championship | Created in order to promote typing and find the fastest typists in the United States of America. |
Underarm bowling incident of 1981 | An infamous end to an international cricket match that was arguably not cricket at all. |
Wellie wanging | Competitors are required to hurl a Wellington boot as far as possible. |
Wife-carrying | One need not carry one's own wife to take part, although you may want to run away as fast as possible afterwards. |
Wooden spoon | A Cambridge University tradition adopted by rugby league and rugby union, the Wooden Spoon is awarded to the last-placed team in a competition. |
World Black Pudding Throwing Championships | A super championship for a super food. |
Wrestling at the 1912 Summer Olympics – Men's Greco-Roman light heavyweight | Possibly the longest final in any Summer Olympic event. Also possibly the only one where no gold medal was awarded (ignoring those Olympics where gold medals had yet to be introduced). |
Yukigassen | Competitive snowball fighting. |
Buzkashi | Something like rugby, played on horseback, with a dead goat. |
Conger cuddling | The "most fun a person could have with a dead fish". |
Egg tapping | One holds a hard-boiled egg and taps the egg of another participant with one's own egg intending to break the other's, without breaking one's own. |
Fatso the Fat-Arsed Wombat | Sydney's other Olympic mascot. |
Ferret-legging | A stunt in which a live ferret is put down one's trousers. |
Fox tossing | A popular sport in 17th and 18th century Europe that involved tossing foxes and other live animals as high as possible into the air. |
Goose pulling | Hang a live goose from a rope, gallop under it on a horse and pull its head off. What could be simpler? |
Hamster racing | A uniquely British response to foot and mouth disease. |
Kudu dung-spitting | Games for conservationists. |
Kyz kuu | Involving a man and a woman racing horses. Described as a kissing game, but the woman wins by whipping the man. |
Legend of the Octopus | If you're going to an ice hockey game in Detroit, be sure to bring your octopus. |
Octopus wrestling | A sport which once attracted crowds of thousands to watch free divers wrestle North Pacific Giant Octopus from the waters of the Puget Sound. |
Pig Olympics | An international contest between pigs. |
Rabbit show jumping | Watership up, Watership Down. Watership up, Watership Down. Watership... |
Robot jockey | Robots designed to ride dromedary camels. |
Snail racing | Ready, steady, slow! |
Teddy bear toss | A Christmas tradition in minor league ice hockey. |
Turkey bowling | So much for "don't play with your food". |
Vinkensport | Finch-singing in Belgium. More competitive than you might think. |
Yak racing | A spectator sport held at traditional festivals in Tibet and Mongolia, among other places. |
Margaret Abbott | Possibly the only Olympic champion who was never made aware of their achievement. |
Sebastián Abreu | Prolific Uruguayan striker, most known for switching through clubs like his underwear. |
Nasra Ali Abukar | Possibly the record holder for the slowest ever competitive 100-meter dash, after she got into the University Games by being related to the chair of the Somali Athletics Committee. |
Anthony Ammirati | A French pole vaulter who went viral for appearing to knock over the bar with his, um, other pole in the 2024 Summer Olympics. |
Arrhichion | A multi-time Olympic champion of the ancient Greek predecessor of MMA, who didn't let being dead stop him from retaining his title. |
David Ayres | A 42-year-old arena building operator, who briefly played as an emergency goalie in the National Hockey League. |
Barefoot running | Why is there an entire article devoted to running without shoes? |
Paula Barila Bolopa | A swimmer from Equatorial Guinea, who – much like Eric Moussambani below – competed in the Sydney Olympics. Her time in the 50m freestyle is apparently the longest in Olympic history. |
Steve Bartman incident | Similar to, yet also the polar opposite of, the Jeffery Maier incident (see below), a fan is blamed for causing the Cubs to lose that year's NLCS and continue the Curse of the Billy Goat. |
Philip Boit | How many other Kenyan skiers can you name? |
Steven Bradbury | Australia's first Winter Olympics gold medalist, who won speed skating gold after everyone in front of him crashed. |
Rogério Ceni | It's not often you see a goalscoring goalkeeper in soccer, much less one with over 100 recorded goals. |
Oksana Chusovitina | Most gymnasts plan retirement in their 20s – she's 40 and still going! |
Cup of coffee | A minor-league player who makes it to the majors just long enough to have a... |
JamesOn Curry | In perhaps the most extreme example of the above, his NBA career lasted a grand total of 3.9 seconds. |
Curse of Billy Penn | How a skyscraper in Philadelphia kept the city's sports teams from winning championships for over 20 years. |
Curse of the Colonel | Colonel Harland Sanders wreaks revenge from beyond the grave on a Japanese baseball team. |
Rajai Davis | "Quick, Jason, ride me to Citi Field, I've been called up!" |
Ali Dia | A guy who tricked his way into English soccer team Southampton by claiming he had won 12 caps for Senegal, was related to George Weah and had played for Paris Saint-Germain. In 2007, The Times branded him the worst-ever player in top-flight soccer. |
Mariya Dmitriyenko | A Kazakh Olympic sports shooter. When she won the Amir of Kuwait International Shooting Grand Prix, the parody national anthem from Borat was accidentally played instead of the Kazakh national anthem. |
Daniel Dye | A man who got arrested for quite literally busting a nut. |
Dock Ellis | Baseball pitcher who, among other things, threw a no-hitter while under influence of LSD, and once tried to hit every batter in the Cincinnati Reds lineup. |
Eddie "The Eagle" Edwards | A British sportsman famous for coming last in the 1988 Winter Olympics ski-jump competition. |
Sidd Finch | A fictitious baseball player who learned yoga in Tibet and could pitch a fastball at 168 miles per hour, among other things. |
Eddie Gaedel | A 65-pound (29 kg) baseball player, 3 ft 7 in (1.09 m) tall. Career on‑base percentage: 1.000. |
Sajjad Ganjzadeh | Getting your head kicked isn't always bad – it won this Iranian an Olympic gold medal. |
Dolly Gray impostor | Possibly the least known NFL player in history. |
Rachael Gunn | An Australian breakdancer whose less-than-smooth moves took the Olympics by storm. |
Ferdinand Habsburg | One of the greatest racing drivers Austria has to offer. He's also the heir to the throne of one of Europe's most powerful royal families, but nevermind that. |
Hannes Þór Halldórsson | An Icelandic filmmaker who also served as the national team's goalkeeper during their most successful period in history and saved a Lionel Messi penalty kick in the World Cup. |
John Hilton | A man who won the men's singles at the European Table Tennis Championships despite being only the fourth-ranked player at his local YMCA. |
Prince Hubertus of Hohenlohe-Langenburg | A blue blooded Alpine skier, from the frozen wastes of Mexico City. |
Carlos Kaiser | A footballer who managed a decade-long career despite lacking pro-level ability and never playing a regulation game. |
Shizo Kanakuri | An Olympic marathon runner who took a 54-year detour. |
Oliver Kirk | It's not unusual for a boxer to win two (or more) Olympic gold medals. But it is unusual for them to be won in the same edition. |
Evel Knievel | A biker known for his numerous stunts, and accidents during said stunts. |
Kyle Larson | A NASCAR driver who is most known for three things: crashing and taking down the catchfence at Daytona, saying a racial slur during a virtual race during a pandemic, and winning the NASCAR Cup Series championship. Among other things. |
Bob Lemon | A below-average MLB hitter suddenly gets put on pitching duty after other players said he was good at it when they fought in World War II together. Now he's in the Hall of Fame. |
Jeffrey Maier | The twelve-year-old who helped the Yankees win the pennant. |
Mendoza Line | Baseball's standard for underperformance. |
Eric Moussambani | A swimmer from Equatorial Guinea in the 2000 Summer Olympics whose time in the 100m freestyle was seven seconds behind the winner - of the 200m freestyle. |
José Offerman | Former baseball player who is most remembered for charging the mound with a bat in one game and attempting to punch an umpire in another. |
Phantom ballplayer | A baseball player who spent time on an MLB roster without actually playing, or occasionally one who never existed. |
Fuahea Semi | As though being a luger from Tonga wasn't unusual enough, he tricked the world's media and the International Luge Federation for more than two years into believing that he bore the same name as a German lingerie firm. |
Sturla Snær Snorrason | An Icelandic alpine skier who (as of October 2018) has competed in 1 Olympic Games and 2 World Championships, but has yet to finish a single race. |
Elizabeth Swaney | A Hungarian-American freestyle skier who competed at the halfpipe event at the 2018 Winter Olympics, despite being incapable of performing basic tricks. |
Manti Te'o | Played in eight NFL seasons, but is perhaps more known for being the victim of one of the most famous catfishing schemes ever. |
Taro Tsujimoto | An imaginary ice hockey player, drafted because a manager was reportedly "fed up with the slow drafting process via the telephone". |
Kazuo Uzuki | The greatest baseball prospect who never played. |
L. W. Wright | Racing driver and confidence trickster who is often referred to as the "D. B. Cooper of NASCAR". Competed in one career race, attempted to qualify for the next race, and then disappeared for a full 40 years. |
Atlanta Black Crackers | A Negro League baseball team named like many others after a local white baseball team, but in this case the Atlanta Crackers were named after a racial nickname. |
Baltimore Colts relocation to Indianapolis | How an entire NFL team relocated to another city overnight. |
East Africa rugby union team | Did this rugby team really select a future dictator to play for them? |
FC Cuntum | A club based in the Cuntum Madina district of Bissau. |
FC Slutsk | How a group of Australians brought worldwide fame to this modest Belarusian football club. |
Jamaican bobsled team | The real life inspiration for the film Cool Runnings. |
London Rippers | A Canadian independent league baseball team that modeled its logo and mascot after Jack the Ripper. Local feminists were not amused, but Rush Limbaugh came to the team's defense. |
Mongolia national baseball team | They've only scored 3 runs at the Asian Games. Without ever finishing a game, because of the mercy rule. |
New Zealand national team nomenclature based on the "All Blacks" Badminton New Zealand | When your national rugby team is successful, what do you do? Follow New Zealand's example and rebrand all of your other sports teams as something similar to them. Including a badminton team that tried to rename itself "Black Cocks". |
Oorang Indians | An all-Native American National Football League team put together as a marketing gimmick to sell Airedale Terriers and known more for its halftime dog shows than for its football play. |
Sark national football team | Also known as The Bad Lions, the only national team that failed to ever score a goal. |
Sealand national football team | The football team of a micronation with a permanent population of 2. |
Somalia national bandy team | The only African national bandy team is seated in Sweden. |
Steagles Card-Pitt | Sports teams get relocated all the time (especially in the NFL), but what if they had mergers? Wartime conscription during World War II forced the Pittsburgh Steelers to do exactly that. Twice. |
Tropical nations at the Winter Olympics | More than just Jamaican bobsledders. |
Wichita Monrovians | A Negro League baseball team that played a game against the KKK... and won! |
Windsor Swastikas | A Canadian ice hockey team with a well-known logo. |
Vatican City national football team | The squad makes up more than 2 percent of the national population. |
Atomic chess Beirut chess Stratomic | Three different variations on the same idea: combining chess with explosions. |
Blood-vomiting game | "Go" is serious business. |
Bongcloud Attack | An explanation of why 2. Ke2 is the height of modern chess theory. |
The Campaign for North Africa | The peak of wargaming, this frighteningly complex beast is estimated to take over a real-time decade to complete (you know, if you want to do things like eat and sleep as well). |
Carlsen–Niemann controversy | Chess doesn't always produce drama, but when it does, it's glorious. A tale of cheating, lawsuits, and vibrating butt plugs. |
Chess on a really big board | Self-explanatory. |
Fairy chess pieces | Looking to spice up a game of chess? Throw one of these into the mix. |
The Game | A mind game in which players try not to think about The Game – which means that, by reading this, you just lost The Game. |
Ghettopoly | An unauthorized version of Monopoly that played on black and other stereotypes. The NAACP was not amused. |
Human chess | Enacted by costumed "pieces" on a scaled-up chessboard. |
Kanchō | Popular among East Asian children, this "game" is played by going up to someone and sneakily poking them in the ass. |
Kasparov versus the World | "The greatest game in the history of chess", per Kasparov. His opponent suffered from flame wars, poor chess software and accusations of ballot stuffing. |
List of games that Buddha would not play | What would Buddha do? Well, he wouldn't play any of these. |
Mornington Crescent | A deceptively tricky game of navigating the London Underground—don't be caught in Nidd! |
Poole versus HAL 9000 | "I'm sorry, Frank, I think you missed it..." |
Potato race | On foot, a tame activity for children. On horseback, a chaotic no-holds-barred blood sport where anything goes–except biting. |
Taikyoku shogi | Japanese 'ultimate chess', with over 400 pieces per side. |
The Turk | An 18th century chess computer, which turned out to be a hoax. |
USA Rock Paper Scissors League | Organised finger sport. |
War on Terror, the Board Game | A boardgame satire of the real War on Terror that has proved so popular, it has ended up in national museums, in a TV sitcom, as part of a military training simulation and as a teaching aid in higher education institutions. |
1593 transported soldier legend | Folk legend of a soldier who fell asleep in Manila and woke up in Mexico City. |
Baltic Sea anomaly | Looks like someone left their Millennium Falcon underwater. |
Behind the sofa | Where young British children hid from menacing scenes in sci-fi TV, now recalled humorously and nostalgically by British adults. |
Bigfoot trap | Believed to be the world's only Bigfoot trap. |
Brites de Almeida | A legendary 12-fingered Portuguese baker who baked a group of Castilian soldiers in her oven as part of the fight for Portuguese independence. |
Cottingley Fairies | A successful photographic hoax in 1910s England which fooled Arthur Conan Doyle. |
Count of St. Germain | The original Tommy Wiseau, an eighteenth century polymath who made a number of contradictory claims about his origins, including that he was 500 years old. People have also claimed he is an important theosophical figure who many have claimed to have met years after his supposed death in 1784. |
Easter Bilby | How do you have an Easter Bunny in a country that has had a bad experience with rabbits? With an Easter Bilby of course! |
Faxlore | Forms of folklore circulated via fax machine. |
Flying ointment | A hallucinogenic ointment said to be used by witches in the Early Modern period. |
Green children of Woolpit | A tale of two purportedly green children who ate nothing but beans and claimed to be from a place where the sun never shone called Saint Martin's Land. |
Headless men | The most unknown, yet bizarre and intriguing, humanoid monsters in European mythology. Possibly more famous nowadays for having a cameo in Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated. |
Headless Mule | They've got fire in place of their heads. Because regular mules are for weak people. |
Heraclitus the Paradoxographer | Before there were 14-year-old Internet atheists, this guy was saying "um, ACKSYUALLY" about Greek myth. |
Icelandic Elf School | Possibly the only school granting elf-spotting degrees. (Though certificates are also available from John Oliver.) |
Josiah S. Carberry | An expert on cracked pots, and one of only three fictional people to have won the Ig Nobel Prize. |
Kaspar Hauser | A German youth who claimed to have grown up in the total isolation of a darkened cell, and was once thought to be linked to the princely House of Baden. |
Liver-Eating Johnson | A 19th-century mountain man with a penchant for revenge and the consumption of livers. |
Machine elf | An entity that people claim they become aware of after having taken tryptamine based psychedelic drugs such as DMT. |
Man-eating tree | Hoaxes and unsubstantiated reports in Madagascar and elsewhere. |
Mapinguari | A cyclops in the Amazon rainforest. |
Mari Lwyd | It's all fun and games until the horse skull comes knocking on your door. |
Monkey-man of New Delhi | Reports in 2001 of a strange monkey-like creature appearing in New Delhi at night and attacking people. |
Nightmarchers | One of the coolest creatures in Hawaiian folklore, a group of ghost warriors from the past that walk throughout the island, armed with oceanic weapons. |
Panotti | And you thought you had atypically large ears. |
Phantom social workers | Mysterious claims of "social workers" seeking to abduct infants and children. |
Proverbs commonly attributed to be Chinese | ...although they're probably not. |
Pseudo-mythology | The, very curious, cases of "invented mythology" in a few nations from europe. |
Rods | Photographic anomalies which some think are undiscovered flying creatures or miniature UFOs. |
Russian reversal | In Soviet Russia, Wikipedia edits YOU! |
Spring Heeled Jack | A mysterious character said to have existed in England during the Victorian age. |
Telling the bees | An alternative explanation for the declining bee population. |
Tió de Nadal | A log that defecates sweets for Catalan children on Christmas eve. |
Titivillus | The patron demon of scribes, responsible for many errors. |
Tsukumogami | According to Japanese folklore, if you keep a household item for 100 years, it becomes alive with a spirit, and may grow a face and teeth. |
Vagina dentata | The tooth, and nothing but the hole tooth. |
Vampire pumpkins and watermelons | In Balkan legend, an explanation for the blood-red streaks across these fruits: that they'd been left out on a full moon night, and thus turned by vampires. |
Vril | A book by the "dark and stormy night" guy that spawned rumours about German secret societies, a real master race living underground, and Nazi UFOs. |
Well to Hell | A 9-mile (14 km) borehole drilled by Soviet scientists uncovers the sounds of millions of damned souls. Hot stuff. |
Witch window | A superstitious practice in the State of Vermont to prevent witches from flying through open windows at night. |
Yonaguni monument | Between Japan and Taiwan lies the last remnant of the sunken continent of Mu (or rather, a natural rock formation that looks interesting enough to pass as it). |
Bake-danuki | Uses its testicles as a weapon. |
Beast of Gévaudan | A mammal(s) that went on a killing spree in southern France in the 1700s, causing significant and expensive Royal intervention. |
Bird people | The widely recurring motif in legends and fiction of birds who are people, or people who are birds. |
Bonnacon | A mythical ox which flings burning dung at its enemies from its rear and horn. |
Cattle mutilation | The alleged killing and subsequent mutilation of cattle, sheep or horses by unknown perpetrators. Some say they may be aliens. |
Chupacabra | A legendary creature in the folklore of parts of the Americas, generally reported in Latin America, that preys on livestock. |
Cynocephaly | A kind of human-wolf hybrid where only the head is dog-like. |
Dog spinning | Do Bulgarians really twizzle their domestic canines to foretell prosperity? The British Green Party thinks so, and they're not happy about it. |
Drop bear | A fictitious Australian marsupial supposedly related to the koala. |
Fearsome critters | North American lumberjack folklore, with Axhandle hounds and jackalopes. |
Flying pig | The classic impossibility has been officially proved possible by the Internet Engineering Task Force: "With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine." |
Gef the talking mongoose | A poltergeist-like creature which claimed to have been an 80-year-old Indian mongoose, alleged to have haunted a Manx cottage during the 1930s. |
Humanzee | A hypothetical(?) human/chimpanzee hybrid. |
Jersey Devil | A mythological creature said to inhabit the New Jersey Pine Barrens. |
Liver bird | A legendary cormorant or eagle that is the symbol of a major English city. |
Living entombed animal | Tales of toads and other creatures supposedly remaining alive encased in stone. |
Lluvia de Peces | It's raining fish in Honduras. |
Mamlambo | One of the most interesting beasts in Zulu folklore. |
Mongolian death worm | A large, bright red worm that kills using acid and electrical discharges – allegedly. |
Montauk Monster | Actually a decaying raccoon... or is it? |
Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus | An endangered creature, whose major predator is the sasquatch. Apparently. |
Phantom kangaroos | They're not just found in Australia. |
Popobawa | A bat-winged monster from Zanzibar said to sodomize people during election campaigns. |
Pig-faced women | A lesson never to compare a person's children to pigs when pregnant, lest you be cursed. |
Rat king | Not the rodent monarch familiar from The Nutcracker, but a rare (some say nonexistent) phenomenon in which a group of rats grow up with their tails tangled in a knot. |
Reptilian humanoid | A recurring theme in fiction, especially science fiction, pseudoscientific theories and conspiracy theories. |
Rhinogradentia | A fictitious mammal order documented by an equally fictitious German naturalist. |
Sea monk | An aquatic hallelujah. |
Sidehill gouger | Fictional creatures said to inhabit the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia and the southwestern sandhills of Saskatchewan. |
Spherical cow | "Consider a spherical cow in a vacuum..." |
Squonk | A Pennsylvania-based creature that cries constantly because it's so ugly. The most relatable mythical animal. |
Tarasque | One of the strangest mythical beasts in France. |
Vegetable Lamb of Tartary | Money might not grow on trees, but maybe sheep do. |
Widow's man | A strange myth that fishmen and seamen have been telling for centuries now. |
Absurdistan | The place where silly bureaucracy rules. Has been located in places as diverse as Czechoslovakia and Iraq. |
Bagism | A social ideology created by the Beatle John Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono which involves wearing a bag over one's entire body to promote peace and equality. |
Beard Liberation Front | A British interest group which campaigns in support of beards and opposes discrimination against those who wear them. |
Berners Street hoax | The day that all of London gathered at one house. |
Birth tourism | Going on vacation to get a different citizenship for the child. |
Frank Chu | All he wants is royalties for being featured in a real life soap opera broadcast in 12 galaxies – or was it 785,249,000,000,000? |
Correspondence between the Ottoman sultan and the Cossacks | Amongst other insults and profanity, it supposedly told Sultan Mehmed IV of the Ottoman Empire to fuck his mother. |
Crypt of Civilization | A time capsule not to be opened before 8113 A.D. |
Cutting in line | How rude! |
Elaine Davidson | A Brazilian woman that has the record of having the most piercings in the face. |
Erika Eiffel | Wife of the Eiffel Tower. |
Elvavrålet | The time of night when Swedish university students throw open their windows and scream their stress away. |
Escalator etiquette | Which side are you on? |
Fat men's club | Social clubs for the weightiest members of society. |
Female husband | Women who specifically marry other women whilst pretending to be men. |
Jenaro Gajardo Vera | A Chilean lawyer who claimed to own the Moon. |
Justo Gallego Martínez | A Spanish Catholic priest who, for almost seven decades, single-handedly constructed his own church. |
Georgia Guidestones | A granite monument commissioned to help guide humanity, which became the subject of conspiracy theories, and the target of a bomber. |
Guerrilla gardening | "Quick... torch on... plant those carrots!" |
Go Topless Day | A day to advocate topfreedom for women. |
Great Stork Derby | The strangest competition in Canadian history: female residents of Toronto were promised a financial reward to give birth to the most kids in just ten years. |
Charles Harrelson | One of the most infamous hitmen in US history... and the father of actor Woody Harrelson. |
He never married | A euphemism often used in mid-20th century obituaries in United Kingdom for gay men. |
Marie Sophie Hingst | The late German historian and blogger who claimed to be born to Holocaust survivors, despite not being Jewish. |
Ancient and Honorable Order of Turtles | Not a ninja turtles fan group, but "an honorable drinking fraternity composed of ladies and gentlemen of the highest morals and good character, who are never vulgar." |
Japanese adult adoption | The vast majority of adoptees in Japan are childless adult males, adopted by families needing a strong heir or a male successor for their businesses. |
Elizabeth Klarer | A 20th century Afrikaner woman who claimed that she dated an extraterrestrial being and gave birth to an alien. She later wrote two books about this. |
Knobbly knees competition | A favourite in holiday camps all over the UK. |
Let's trim our hair in accordance with the socialist lifestyle | A television show produced by the North Korean government intended to educate the public on good and bad hairstyles. |
List of people who have lived in airports | Wish you were here? |
Long-term nuclear waste warning messages | How do you warn people to stay away from nuclear waste repositories, in a way that will be understandable 10,000 years from now? |
Jean-Marie Loret | He (and his children) claimed that he was the son of an affair between his mother and a WW1-era, pre-infamy Adolf Hitler. |
Mónica Macías | The daughter of Equatoguinean president Francisco Macías Nguema who grew up in North Korea, with Kim Il Sung himself serving as her second father. |
Man of the Hole | The last survivor of an uncontacted tribe in Brazil, and arguably the world's loneliest person. |
Mitsuyasu Maeno | Porn actor, yakuza member, Japanese ultranationalist and failed assassin. |
Mongrel complex | A concept regarding an inferiority complex reportedly felt by some Brazilians. Coined following an especially agonizing World Cup loss. |
Montreal–Philippines cutlery controversy | A 7-year-old boy's eating habits became an international incident. |
Neturei Karta | An international organization of Orthodox Jews that oppose Israel. |
Niche insurance | Insure yourself against being abducted by aliens, losing your genitalia, or conceiving the second Christ. |
Emperor Norton | A man who claimed to be "Emperor of the United States and Protector of Mexico" in 1859. |
Panty tree | Trees covered in various articles of clothing cast off by ski lift passengers. |
Pole and Hungarian brothers be | A two-nation proverb often cited, usually while drinking, in both Poland and Hungary. |
Posthumous marriage | Saying "'til death do us part" with someone who's already dead. |
The Queue | A queue, stretching for 10 miles at one point, all the way to Southwark Park, formed by Britons in September 2022 in order to pay their respects to their late sovereign. |
Sentinelese | An autonomous Stone Age human tribe which completely avoids contact with the outside world. |
Travelling gnome | Taking a garden gnome on an adventure... occasionally without telling the owner of the garden it was on. |
Vesna Vulović | A Serbian flight attendant who became famous for surviving the highest fall without the use of parachutes. |
War of the stop signs | Free movement means free movement. |
Ziona | An Indian man that holds the record for fathering the largest living family in the world. In total, he had 39 spouses and 94 children. Talk about the weekly home bills.... |
1803 Gatton by-election | Two candidates, only one ballot cast, in this by-election in one of the UK's most notorious rotten boroughs of the early 19th century. |
1927 Liberian general election | The most fraudulent election in recorded history, with a turnout of 1,680%. |
1986 Illinois gubernatorial election | Followers of a bizarre political figure hijack an election, and force one of the main candidates into running under a different party. |
2018 Makassar mayoral election | In which Munafri Arifuddin ran unopposed for mayor of Makassar, Indonesia, won more than 250,000 votes, and lost. |
Above Znoneofthe | A Canadian politician who changed his name so that people would misread it as "none of the above" on the ballot (with the Z added to appear at the end of the list) and pick his name by mistake. |
Alaska Mental Health Enabling Act | An apparently innocuous piece of congressional legislation that became the subject of outrageous but widely believed conspiracy theories in 1956. |
Animals as electoral candidates | Why be ruled by some monkey, RINO or pig when you can get a real chimp, rhino or pig into office? |
André Dallaire | How often do would-be assassins break into a Prime Minister's residence without resistance? |
Anarchist Pogo Party of Germany | A satirical party formed in the 1980s. Some of its main objectives include balkanizing Germany, legalizing all drugs and creating so-called "fuckpooling centers". |
Antanas Mockus | The surprisingly effective mayor of Bogotá, Colombia known for civically-targeted publicity pranks. |
Anti-Japaneseism | Advocates for self-inflicted genocide. |
Anti-PowerPoint Party | Fighting the overuse of Microsoft PowerPoint in offices since 2011. |
Bald–hairy | Russian leadership has alternated between bald and hairy leaders since 1825. |
Banned in Boston | Boston now has a reputation as a liberal city, but it wasn't always so... |
Barack Obama "Joker" poster | You wanna know how I got these scars? |
Alejandro Cao de Benós | A Spanish man who is the only non-Korean person to officially work for the North Korean government. Benós is also featured in some documentaries about North Korea, such as The Propaganda Game and The Mole: Undercover in North Korea. |
Biotic Baking Brigade | Pie-throwing anarchists. |
Boris Skossyreff | Belarusian adventurer, who tried to seize the monarchy of Andorra and called himself Boris I of Andorra. |
British Israelism | A long discredited form of British nationalism, by way of the idea that the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel made their way to Britain. |
Brown Dog affair | Political scandal that resulted in police protection for the statue of a dog. |
Bunga bunga | Nobody knew what it meant, until one Italian politician made it mean "kinky sex". |
Bushism | Any of a number of peculiar words, phrases, pronunciations, malapropisms, semantic or linguistic errors that have occurred in the public speaking of former United States President George W. Bush. |
Bush shoeing incident | An incident where Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi threw a pair of shoes at George W. Bush on December 14th, 2008 during a press conference. |
Byron (Low Tax) Looper | Not only did he give himself a parenthetical middle name, he tried to win an election by simply murdering his opponent. It didn't quite work out. |
Candy Desk | A desk on the floor of the U.S. Senate has been kept filled with candy since 1968. |
Catmando | A cat who was the head of the Official Monster Raving Loony Party. |
Charles the Bald | A 9th century emperor of the Carolingian Empire who is depicted in artwork as having a full head of hair. |
Chernomyrdinka | Russia can do Bushisms too. |
Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office | An official government position in the United Kingdom. |
Count Binface | An intergalatic warlord and British political candidate (formerly Lord Buckethead). |
Celso Daniel | A city mayor in Brazil who was, allegedly, assassinated in 2002 by criminals, but many people say that he was murdered for political reasons. Within five years, seven witnesses were found dead. To this day, the case remains unsolved. |
Congressional office lottery | The process that determines when representatives in the House can pick their rooms, host to such rituals as playing Frank Sinatra songs and Jedi mind tricks. |
Crusade of Romanianism | 1930s Romania saw possibly the world's only political movement which attempted to synthesize fascism with libertarian socialism. |
David Rice Atchison | Possibly President for a day, only finding out after his "term" had ended. |
Deez Nuts | A satirical candidate who ran for president during the 2016 U.S. presidential election and polled 10% at his best. In the polls, he had defeated other notable candidates such as Harambe, Beast Mode, Darrell Castle (this one is real), and nearly Jill Stein. |
Division of Batman | A former electoral district in Melbourne, Australia. And no, it wasn't named after the superhero. |
Democracy sausage | Part of Australia's tradition of holding a fundraising sausage sizzle at polling places on election day. Not connected to the observation about similarities between how laws and sausages are made. |
"Dewey Defeats Truman" | When Thomas E. Dewey was falsely thought to have defeated Harry S. Truman in the 1948 election. |
Dizzy Gillespie 1964 presidential campaign | Had it succeeded, it would have created a dream cabinet including Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, Louis Armstrong, Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, and Ray Charles. |
Donald Duck Party | A non-existent political party, at occasions among the top ten parties in Swedish parliamentary elections. |
Dunwich | Another rotten borough which had almost entirely fallen into the sea over two centuries before it was abolished. Not to be confused with the other Dunwich... |
Ed Miliband bacon sandwich photograph | The biggest enemy of British politician - and then Leader of the Opposition - Ed Miliband? A simple bacon sandwich. |
Eddie Eagle | Not the British ski-jumping pioneer, but the NRA's firearm safety mascot. For kids! |
Wolfgang Engels | A 19-year old civilian employee of the National People's Army who smashed through the Berlin Wall with a stolen APC. |
Euromyth | Paranoid and imaginative speculations about the bureaucratic excesses of the European Union. |
Four Pests campaign | Mao Zedong's campaign to eliminate all sparrows in China. Helped (in some small way, at least) cause the Great Chinese Famine. |
Four Seasons Total Landscaping press conference | The bizarre scene when Trump's presidential campaign hosted a presser not at the Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia... but at Four Seasons Total Landscaping, Philadelphia. |
Fuddle duddle | A Canadian political incident involving most unparliamentary language. |
Gaysper | When Spain's major far-right party accidentally created an LGBT+ icon. |
George H. W. Bush broccoli comments | The president's strategy for winning the baby vote. |
German Apples Front | A campaign to purify the German... fruit crop. |
Glee Club | Predating the American television series by some decades, one British political party hosts this evening of entertainment in which participants are encouraged to sing rude songs making fun of politicians past and present, both in the party and in more general politics. |
Greek Ecologists | A Green party which uses nudity in its political campaigns. |
Günter Schabowski | A Freudian slip of this East German official started the demolition of the Berlin Wall. |
H'Angus | A monkey football mascot who was elected mayor of Hartlepool, England, with a platform of "free bananas for all schoolchildren". |
Harcourt interpolation | The speaker then said he felt inclined for a bit of fucking. |
Harold Holt | He goes swimming, and then missing. |
Helengrad | A nonexistent communist dystopia that supposedly gripped Wellington, New Zealand between 1999 and 2008. |
Huh Kyung-young | A perennial South Korean political candidate who owns a palace filled with portraits of himself, claims to be able to levitate and teleport, and that he has an IQ of 430. Got 0.8% of the vote for President in 2022. |
Hungarian Two-Tailed Dog Party | The best satirical party in Hungary. |
Ich bin ein Berliner | President Kennedy did not call himself a jelly donut in front of a German audience. |
Ilona Staller | A Hungarian porn star elected to the Italian Parliament. |
Incidents of objects being thrown at politicians | In various countries, objects have been thrown at politicians for reasons varying from comedic to harmful with objects from pies to grenades. |
Jakob Maria Mierscheid | A fictitious politician in the German Bundestag since 1979, originally introduced in the 1920s by Weimar Social Democrats to avoid paying restaurant bills. Discovered the Mierscheid Law. |
Jimmy Carter Peanut Statue | A statue of a grinning peanut in honor of Jimmy Carter... |
Jimmy Carter rabbit incident Jimmy Carter UFO incident | ...who had two very strange incidents happen to him. Was the rabbit really a killer? And is the truth really out there? |
Jón Gnarr | An Icelandic comedian who started the satirical Best Party, and became the mayor of Reykjavík. |
John Turmel | With a record of no wins and 100 losses in campaigns since 1979, he's probably the world's least-successful would-be politician. |
Dennis Hof | An American pimp who owned several legal brothels in Nevada and won the Nevada 36th district election in 2018... While he was dead. |
Justin Humphrey | An American politician who made a bill that would make it illegal to be a furry in Oklahoma schools. |
Kasongo Ilunga | A man who spent several months of 2007 as the Minister for Foreign Trade of the Democratic Republic of the Congo – even though he wasn't a real person. |
Ku Klux Klan titles and vocabulary | If you ever find yourself an alien in the Klavern and someone asks "AYAK?" remember to answer "AKIA". It's all "CABARK". |
Lyndon LaRouche | What does the Glass-Steagall Act, concert pitch, and a hypothetical Eurasian Land Bridge have in common? According to him, Elizabeth II's attempts to suppress "the truth" about them. |
Legislative violence | Where politicians actively fight for what they believe in. |
Liz Truss lettuce | The vegetable that outlasted a British prime minister. |
Lord Bloody Wog Rolo | Australian political personality and founder of the British Ultra Loyalist League Serving Historical Interests Today (B.U.L.L.…). |
Luke Lea | Former American Senator who tried to kidnap the exiled former Kaiser of Germany in 1919. The plan failed when the Kaiser refused to allow him to visit. He ended up stealing a bronze ashtray instead. |
List of Kim Jong Il's titles | Because just being the "Great Leader" wasn't enough. |
Marxist–Leninist Party of the Netherlands | A fake Maoist political party set up by the BVD in order to spy on the Chinese government. Fooled Zhou Enlai, and may have helped facilitate Richard Nixon's tour of China. |
Mitsuo Matayoshi | Perennial candidate. Self-proclaimed God. Repeatedly told opponents to kill themselves. |
McGillicuddy Serious Party | A satirical political party in New Zealand. |
Mel Carnahan | In 2000, he was elected to the United States Senate, despite dying in a plane crash 3 weeks before election day. |
Merkel-Raute | More than one German leader has been known for a distinctive hand gesture. |
Nagriamel | A libertarian, welfarist, traditionalist, cargo cultist Ni-Vanuatu political movement that was once led by a man named "Moses" with 23 wives and briefly tried to secede. Still represented in the Parilament of Vanuatu, making it perhaps the world's strangest non-satirical party with actual influence. |
New shoes on budget day | One of Canada's less grand political traditions. |
Nicolás Zúñiga y Miranda | Mexican eccentric who repeatedly ran for president, lost, and claimed he'd won. Sound familiar? |
NHK Party | The Japanese anti-TV licensing fees party with nine names since 2020, two feuding leaders, and a habit of picking YouTubers as candidates, that is somehow still represented in the Diet. |
Niuas Nobles' constituency | An electoral constituency consisting of just three voters, who elect one of their number to one of the twenty-six seats in the Legislative Assembly of Tonga. |
Nobody for President | Vote for Nobody! Nobody will listen to their campaign promises! |
Nuisance candidate | In the Philippines political candidates can be disqualified for bringing the election into disrepute or mockery, having a name which confuses voters or not actually intending to run for office. |
Official Monster Raving Loony Party Screaming Lord Sutch | Among other policies, this British political party advocates the banning of semicolons as "no-one knows how to use them". Its original leader still holds a British record by standing in 40 elections and losing all of them. |
Old Sarum | A notorious UK rotten borough which elected 2 MPs, despite having an electorate of 11, none of whom actually lived there. |
Gabriele Paolini | His sole aim in life: to get condoms on TV. |
Panda diplomacy | Turns out that the best Chinese diplomats are pandas. |
Parliamentary snuff box | The only place where you can legally get free tobacco in the UK is the House of Commons. |
Pascual Racuyal | A Filipino presidential aspirant who promised to build plastic roads and govern the Philippines "via satellite". |
Patrol 36 | The most famous group of Neo-Nazi Israelis. |
Pedro Lascuráin | President of Mexico for 45 minutes. |
People's Revolutionary Government | The only Marxist-Leninist constitutional monarchy in history with Elizabeth II as monarch. |
Pink Pistols | They're here, they're queer – and they're armed to the teeth. |
Polish Beer-Lovers' Party | One of the major political powers in Poland in the early 1990s. |
Political Google bombs in the 2004 U.S. presidential election | I was searching for waffles, not John Kerry. |
¿Por qué no te callas? | It's not often a head of state tells another head of state to shut up at an official summit. |
Proposed Canadian annexation of the Turks and Caicos Islands | First proposed in 1917. |
Puedo prometer y prometo | Spain's first political joke after the end of the Franco era. |
Putin khuylo! | Or "Putin is a dickhead", in Ukrainian. |
Ratfucking | What the Watergate conspirators did. (Not bestiality, if that's what you're thinking.) |
Redskins Rule | When Washington's NFL team won, the party of the current president retained the presidency; when they lost, the opposition party won. |
Resignation from the British House of Commons | Illegal since 1624. |
Revolutionary Communist Party (UK, 1978) | A British Trotskyist |
Rhinoceros Party | A former political party in Canada, which often promised outlandishly impossible schemes designed to amuse and entertain the voting public. |
Richard Nixon mask | One of the United States' most popular masks. |
Russian political jokes | In Soviet Russia, the article reads you. |
Shanghai Fugu Agreement | A completely fictitious international treaty accepted by the German state of Hesse in 1985. |
Shawinigan Handshake | A tense Prime Minister puts a chokehold on a protestor. |
Shi Pei Pu | A male Chinese opera singer-turned-spy who seduced French diplomat Bernard Boursicot for 20 years by pretending to be a woman, even "having" a child with him. |
Sister Boom Boom | A drag queen who dressed as a nun and ran for the Board of Supervisors of San Francisco. |
Socialist fraternal kiss | When two socialist leaders are very close... |
Socialist Patients' Collective | An organization that charged that diseases were caused by capitalism. |
Strom Thurmond filibuster of the Civil Rights Act of 1957 | You've got to really care about white supremacy to talk for 24 hours straight. (Happily, it didn't stop the Civil Rights Act from passing.) |
Taiwan Communist Party | The founder of the party claimed he had no knowledge of communist theory and only picked the name to garner interest. |
The Wizard of New Zealand | The Prime Minister of New Zealand gave a friend the title of "Wizard of New Zealand." |
"There's No One as Irish as Barack O'Bama" | A 2008 song celebrating the Irish heritage of then-candidate for President of the United States Barack Obama. |
Toad worship | The online cult of former Chinese President, Jiang Zemin. |
Tsang Tsou-choi | From the 1970s to his death, he claimed to be the "Kowloon emperor". |
Wilson Tucker | The power of group voting tickets brought a man living in America to Australian regional office despite only having gained 98 votes. |
Unabomber for President | 1996 saw a presidential campaign for an infamous domestic terrorist serving eight life sentences in a supermax prison. |
Union of the Centrist Center | Actually centre-right. |
Vermin Supreme | A presidential candidate with a boot on his head, who carries around a large toothbrush and pledges that, if elected, he will give every U.S. citizen a pony. |
Waitangi dildo incident | Once upon a time in New Zealand, Minister for Economic Development Steven Joyce was attacked with a dildo. |
White House horseshoe pit | Where George H. W. Bush won an epic duel of horseshoes 21-0 in five minutes. |
Why I Want to Fuck Ronald Reagan | A spoof scientific study by J.G. Ballard which compares the face of Ronald Reagan to an erect penis. Was circulated at the 1980 RNC as a prank. |
You have two cows | A political satire comparing different political ideologies with cows, for some reason. |
1933 double eagle | An extremely rare U.S. coin that is illegal to privately own. |
2018 Samsung fat-finger error | When new Samsung Securities shareholders got 112 trillion won (1017719218.54 USD) richer. |
BackpackersXpress | It's hard to see what went wrong with this proposal to fly Boeing 747s full of singing, dancing and drinking backpackers between Australia and the UK. |
Bads | Like goods, but no one wants them. Notable for being exactly the word a child would come up with for this concept as a joke. |
Bank of England £100,000,000 note | If you thought the largest UK banknote was £50, then you're VERY wrong. |
Big Mac Index | Ronald McDonaldonomics. |
Billboard Utilising Graffitists Against Unhealthy Promotions | Or "BUGA-UP" for short. An Australian group of subversive artists who live up to their self-description by defacing tobacco and alcohol billboard advertisements to promote healthy living. |
Boss key | A special button on an application used to quickly mask an employee's counterproductivity. |
Dead cat bounce | In finance, a small, brief recovery in the price of a declining stock, because "even a dead cat will bounce if it falls from a great height." |
CeX (retailer) | It sells. |
Dead mall | That formerly active and popular mall that no one goes to anymore. |
Elongated coin | What better souvenir than a mangled and defaced penny. |
EURion constellations | Not-so-secret recognition patterns you can find on banknotes. |
Fedspeak | A deliberately confusing, carefully rehearsed cryptic language, whose delphic dialect is used to effectively prevent the understanding of Federal Reserve Board policy. |
Financial Modeling World Cup | An esport competition of financial modelling, using Microsoft Excel. |
Fukuppy | A branding exercise by a Japanese refrigeration company, which turned into a, well, ... |
GameStop short squeeze | Internet traders meme their way into a battle for Wall Street. To the moon! |
Ghetto tourism | And if you look to your left you will see an impoverished minority neighborhood. |
Gruen transfer | In shopping mall design, the moment when consumers enter a mall or store and, surrounded by an intentionally confusing layout, lose track of their original intentions, making them more susceptible to making impulse buys. |
Prix Guzman | A prize given by the French Academy of Sciences to the first person who succeeded in communicating with a celestial body, other than Mars (as many believed it to be inhabited at the time), and receiving a response. The prize caught the attention of Nikola Tesla among others, but was not awarded until Apollo 11 in 1969. |
Hallmark holiday | A holiday that seemingly exists primarily for commercial purposes. |
Hemline index | The other reason why CEOs like women with short skirts. |
Hungarian pengő | The worst inflation in history caused this currency to be replaced with another that was 400,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times its value. |
Inflatable rat | Common tool of U.S. labor unions. |
IKEA pencil | Free, popular, and even used in surgery. |
Kongo Gumi | The world's oldest company that is still in operation today. |
Maid café | So cuteeee. |
Men's underwear index | An economic indicator popularised by Alan Greenspan. |
Meme coin | Actual traded cryptocurrencies based on internet memes. |
Merchant Marine of Switzerland | A landlocked country with a significant commercial fleet. |
Money burning | Which can provide for behaviour modification, political notoriety and a warm fireplace. (See also K Foundation Burn a Million Quid in the "Popular culture, entertainment and the arts" section above.) |
Olim L'Berlin | A Facebook page that urged Israelis to move to Germany by comparing prices of a popular Milky pudding. |
Oil futures drunk-trading incident | A rather costly drunken mistake. |
Operation Bernhardt | When Nazi Germany came up with a plan to drop counterfeit pound notes over Britain: in theory, massively inflating their currency and collapsing their economy. |
Purple squirrel | Mythical creature, a job candidate with precisely the right education, experience, and qualifications that perfectly fits a job's requirements. |
Rai stones | Stone money, some of which is 3 meters (10 ft) in diameter, and weighs 4 metric tons (8,800 lb). |
Gerald Ratner | Business 101: If you own an incredibly popular jewellery company, maybe don't publicly announce that your products are all cheap garbage. |
Swastika Laundry | A laundry service whose electric vans cheerfully displayed the notorious symbol around Dublin until the 1960s. |
Tanganyika groundnut scheme | A scheme, stymied by a lack of water, to grow peanuts where none had been grown before. |
Therbligs | In motion studies, the elemental motions used by a person when performing a process in the workplace. Named by and after Frank Bunker Gilbreth and Lillian Moller Gilbreth (yes, the parents in Cheaper by the Dozen). |
Ting Hai effect | A sudden drop in the stock market that follows whenever Hong Kong actor Adam Cheng stars in a new TV show. |
Tingo Group Dozy Mmobuosi | A seemingly magical Nigerian agri-fintech company that was once valued for more than $1 billion. Actually discovered to be a personal vehicle for its founder, who's now charged with securities fraud. |
Toyokawa Shinkin Bank incident | How idle chatter between three high school girls led to a 2-billion-yen bank run. |
Trillion-dollar coin | A concept that was proposed as a way to bypass US debt-ceiling crisis through the minting of high-value platinum coins. |
Tulip mania | The first recorded asset bubble was for Dutch tulips, which at the peak of the mania sold for 10 times a skilled artisan's income. Disputed to have ever occurred by some. |
"Us Tareyton smokers would rather fight than switch!" | An ad campaign that figured the best way to sell cigarettes is to show all the consumers with black eyes. |
Veblen good | Goods whose demand increases as price increases, violating the law of demand. |
Why didn't you invest in Eastern Poland? | Because if you don't, your in-laws will hate you, your children won't respect you, even your therapist will judge you, according to this mocked PR campaign. |
Zero-rupee note | A method of reducing bribery in India. |
1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack | The first and largest bioterror attack in United States history involved the poisoning of salad bars with Salmonella in an attempt to sway an election in favor of the followers of an Indian mystic. |
2007 Boston Mooninite panic | A guerilla marketing campaign for an animated TV series that quickly became a homeland security issue. |
Sada Abe | Sensational journalism—from the Land of the Rising Sun. |
Acoustic Kitty | A failed CIA experiment at using a cat for covert surveillance. |
Animal trial | Historically, the law in some areas of Europe subjected animals to criminal liability for their conduct. |
Attempted theft of George Washington's skull | Alas, poor George! |
Baby Jesus theft | When a child is gone... |
Batman rapist | Batman's back at it again, but this time it's actually a sex offender who attacked women in the city of Bath. |
Bowling Green massacre | A nonexistent massacre mentioned by the Trump administration, subject to parody. |
Burke and Hare murders | What is the best way to accelerate scientific progress? Killing people, of course. |
Chamoy Thipyaso | At 141,078 years, she holds the record for the longest prison sentence without lifetime imprisonment – and didn't even serve 1% of it. |
Chewbacca defense | "Now, why would Wikipedia have an article about the Chewbacca defense? That does not make sense!" |
Michael Cicconetti | A judge renowned for his strange alternative punishments. |
Cicada 3301 | Criminals or puzzle enthusiasts? |
Commission Regulation (EC) No. 2257/94 | The infamous "bendy banana law", this seemingly-dry piece of EU quality standards legislation convinced the UK media and many ordinary people that Brussels had banned bananas from being curved. One of the most infamous Euromyths. |
Confraternities in Nigeria | In Nigeria, university student societies have been frequently linked to kidnapping, sexual assault and mass murder. |
Crime in Antarctica | It's not the Wild West—er, South. |
Crime in Vatican City | Because of its low population and large number of tourists, the statistics suggest the average citizen commits two crimes per year. |
Dead Man's Statute | Enacted to prevent a witness from testifying about communications with a dead person. |
Easter Act 1928 | The government of the United Kingdom legally mandated a change of date for Easter Sunday to a period of seven days - and then never actually enforced it. |
Emo killings in Iraq | Music fans killed for their alleged Satan worship and homosexuality. |
Expert wizard amendment | New Mexico narrowly avoided requiring all psychiatrists testifying in court to put on a robe and wizard hat. |
Free Bench | An unusual English legal custom permitting a widow to inherit her deceased husband's land. In one version, she would have to ride into court backwards on a black ram while reciting a nonsense verse. |
Glasgow ice cream wars | In the 1980s, violent conflicts between ice-cream vendors (who also sold drugs and stolen goods) left six people dead. |
Troy Leon Gregg | Escaped from death row, got killed in a bar fight that same night. |
Disappearance of Johnny Gosch | In 1982, a 12 year-old went missing. As of 2023, the case is still unsolved, and Gosch's whereabouts remain a mystery. However, Gosch's mother claims that he visited her in 1997, and in 2006 she found a photo sent by an anonymous person to her front door. |
Guano Islands Act | This strange piece of legislation enables citizens of the U.S. to take possession of islands containing guano deposits. |
Gresham cat hostage taking incident | In 1994, a cat was taken hostage by its owner in a store. The owner would later get shot and killed by police. |
Robert Hanssen | Tasked by the FBI to help rat out Soviet spies. The problem? He was one of them. |
Helen Duncan | The last woman convicted under the UK's Witchcraft Act. Her favourite trick: "ectoplasm" made out of fabric and egg. |
Hobby Lobby smuggling scandal | A craft store chain purchases stolen Iraqi artifacts. |
'I know it when I see it' | "Not that, but something sort of like that?" |
John Smeaton | Sometimes, the best way to avoid a terrorist attack is to simply kick the terrorist in the balls. |
John "Half-hanged" Smith | They tried to hang him, but he survived. Later attempts to try him fizzled out until they just decided to deport him to America. |
Lake Erie Walleye Trail fishing tournament cheating scandal | "We got weights in FISH!!!" |
Learned Hand | Thanks to his name, this American judge could've part-timed as a superhero—"The Learned Hand of the Law" has a nice ring to it. Given his impact on tax law, his birth name of Billings Learned Hand is even more apropos. |
Jay Leiderman | The lawyer that represented Anonymous. |
Lesbian rule | Not the replacement for the Patriarchy, but an archaic term meaning legal flexibility (and originally a building tool from Lesbos). |
Ley de fugas | Prisoners were allowed to escape, as an excuse to kill them for trying to escape. |
Viola Liuzzo | One of the FBI's darkest criminal cases. |
Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano | A Guatemalan attorney who arranged his own death and blamed it on the President, seeking justice for his murdered girlfriend. |
Massachusetts School Laws | How 17th-century Massachusetts sought to rid itself of the Prince of Darkness. |
The Matrix defense | A claim that the defendant committed a crime under the belief of being inside a simulated reality. The defense has been successful more than once. |
Gary McKinnon | How a UFO enthusiast with Asperger syndrome was able to hack into the US government's computers. |
Moron in a hurry | Used in passing-off law, this is the sort of fictional person who would look at a knockoff product and think it's the real thing for long enough to buy it. |
Mug shot of Donald Trump | How a photo of the 45th president of the U.S. getting arrested (and released shortly after) became a source of comedy on the internet. |
My Way killings | There's one song you shouldn't sing in a Filipino karaoke bar. |
Ninja of Heisei | An elderly Japanese man who successfully committed over 250 burglaries while disguised in a ninja outfit. |
Not proven | A controversial Scots law verdict for those neither guilty nor innocent. |
Disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi | In 1983, a teenage girl went missing in the Vatican and the search for her whereabouts became a major controversy. In 2023, the religious state opened for the first time an official investigation on the matter. |
Onion Futures Act | Why you can't buy any onion futures, but you can for corn, oats, rice, aluminum, crude oil, wood, etc. |
Operation Flagship | Do not trust the San Diego Chicken. |
Perry Mason moment | "Mr. Menendez, did you know Big 5 stopped selling pistols in 1986?" |
Phantom of Heilbronn | A DNA-traced serial killer, also known as the "Woman without a face", who turned out to be nonexistent. |
Phantom social workers | They make children disappear. |
Prenda Law | A law firm that blackmailed people for allegedly downloading pornography; the firm was described by one court as a "porno-trolling collective". |
Prohibition of dying | There are really some places where death is illegal. (Although it is unknown what happens to anyone who breaks this law.) |
Regulation of flamethrowers in the United States | No permit needed in 48 states. |
Rough sex murder defense | It is what it is. |
Mitchell Rupe | The man who was too fat to hang. |
Salmon Act 1986 | A UK law, designed to curb illegal fishing, which creates the humorously-named crime of "handling salmon in suspicious circumstances". |
Sand theft | What do you mean I can't take the sand home? |
Shaggy defense | Caught committing a crime, but don't know what to do? Say it wasn't you. |
Shawn Nelson | They say that being in a tank gives you the high ground. It certainly reigns true here. |
Small penis rule | A technique used by authors to avoid libel lawsuits. |
Steve Comisar | America's #1 solar-powered dryer salesman. |
Tennessee login law | Laws against password sharing are older than you think, but have always been this unpopular. |
Keron Thomas | In 1993, aged sixteen, he posed as a motorman on the New York City Subway and managed to operate a scheduled passenger train for over three hours. |
Andre Thomas | Serial killer who tore out his eyes and consumed them in order to prevent the government from reading his mind. |
Twinkie defense | When you don't want to go to jail. |
Ugly law | A type of U.S. city ordinance banning anyone "diseased, maimed, mutilated or deformed in any way, so as to be an unsightly or disgusting object" from being in public. |
United Airlines Flight 976 | The worst case of air rage ever? Or just a very bad case of traveler's diarrhea? |
Angie Sanclemente Valencia | A former lingerie model alleged to have run one of the largest drug cartels in the world. |
Clement Vallandigham | A lawyer who proved his client had not killed a man, but the victim had shot himself... by shooting himself dead. |
Whipping Tom | The name given to multiple London sex attackers. One of them, upon seeing an unaccompanied woman, would grab her, lift her dress, and slap her buttocks repeatedly before fleeing. He would sometimes accompany his attacks by shouting "Spanko!" |
Wet feet, dry feet policy | America seems to not like wet feet. |
2008 French mistaken virginity case | France's most bizarre lawsuit: an angry man takes legal action against his newly married wife for not being a virgin. |
62 Cases of Jam v. United States | When is imitation jam not jam? |
Batman v. Commissioner | Batman said his teenage son was his partner. The Commissioner wasn't having any of it. |
FTC v. Balls of Kryptonite | In some ways, the U.S. government is more powerful than Superman. |
Hermesmann v. Seyer | A Kansas Supreme Court case that decided that a 12-year-old boy who was molested by his 16-year-old babysitter had to pay for her child support. |
Iceland v Iceland Foods Ltd | Who has a greater claim to the name Iceland - a country established in 874 or a British retailer founded in 1970? |
Jarvis v Swans Tours Ltd | A legal complaint about the lack of gemütlichkeit during a Swiss Christmas holiday. |
Lawsuits against supernatural beings | Even if you can serve process on them, they are unlikely to show up in court. |
Leonard v. Pepsico, Inc. | Would you expect to be able to swap 7 million points (worth $700,000) for a Harrier jump jet (worth $22 million)? This man did and took Pepsi to court when they failed to supply him one. Unsurprisingly – to everyone except him – he lost the case. |
Louisiana ex rel. Francis v. Resweber | Do you still count as "executed" even if you didn't die? This was a surprisingly contentious issue. |
Manacled Mormon case | The religious rape case that became a movie and involved the cloning of a dog. |
Memoirs v. Massachusetts | A U.S. Supreme Court case concerning whether the 1748 book Fanny Hill was entitled to First Amendment protection. One of the dissenting opinions contained an extensive discussion of the supposedly pornographic content. |
McMartin preschool trial | The most expensive trial in US history. Amid the 1980s' day-care sex-abuse hysteria, hundreds of children wasted 7 years of court time and $15 million of public money by telling bizarre and fanciful tall tales. |
Microsoft v. MikeRoweSoft | When your name is too good not to buy a domain name featuring. |
Miles v. City Council of Augusta, Georgia | Can a city require a business license for a talking cat, and does the cat have free-speech rights? |
Monkey selfie copyright dispute | An actual monkey made a monkey out of the law. |
Nix v. Hedden | The U.S. Supreme Court decides that the tomato is a vegetable, not a fruit. |
Pearson v. Chung | Also known as the $54 million pants case, or "The Great American Pants Suit" according to one Wall Street Journal reporter. |
Stambovsky v. Ackley | Also known as the "Ghostbusters case", the court ruled that a house in Nyack, New York was legally haunted by ghosts. |
State v. Linkhaw | He sang so badly in church that a jury found him guilty of "disturbing a religious congregation". |
Trial of Arne Cheyenne Johnson | The first and only murder case where demonic possession was used as a defense. |
Toy Biz, Inc. v. United States | Are the X-Men humans under U.S. law? |
Trial of the Pyx | Whence the British Pound lands in court every year. |
United States ex rel. Gerald Mayo v. Satan and His Staff | Who has jurisdiction over Satan? |
United States v. 11 1/4 Dozen Packages of Articles Labeled in Part Mrs. Moffat's Shoo-Fly Powders for Drunkenness | The FDA will not tolerate misbranding. |
United States v. Approximately 64,695 Pounds of Shark Fins | The fins won a case that turned on whether buying something from someone counts as "aiding or assisting" them. |
United States v. Causby | Planes vs. farmers. |
United States v. Ninety-Five Barrels Alleged Apple Cider Vinegar | When is apple cider vinegar not apple cider vinegar? |
United States v. Strong | A court case about someone who supposedly had an accident in a courtroom's bathroom, covering much of it. |
Bachelor tax | Implicit in many jurisdictions which offer a marital tax relief. |
Beard tax | Used to be imposed in England and Russia. |
Breast tax | An unusual tax meant to enforce the caste system in an indirect way. |
Chicken tax | A U.S. tariff on trucks, which resulted in a period of chicken trade related tension known as the Chicken War. |
Flatulence tax | When you keep a lot of cattle, you're contributing significantly to the greenhouse effect ... aren't you? |
Taxation of illegal income in the United States | Don't worry: you can deduct your illegal activity expenses. |
Bamboo torture | Death by a growing bamboo shoot. |
Blood eagle | The "wings" were your lungs pulled out through your back. |
Brazen bull | Encased in bronze and boiled to death, with wind instruments attached so your screams would turn into moos. |
Disneyland with the Death Penalty | Best way to describe Singapore according to William Gibson. |
Drunkard's cloak | Attire for the village drunk. |
Enhanced interrogation techniques | No inhumane torture over here. |
Half-hanging | For when you don't want to go all the way. |
Hanged, drawn and quartered | Dark Ages punishment for high treason. |
Pitchcapping | A hat made of tar was molded on to your head, then ripped off, taking your skin with it. |
Poena cullei | Taking a fatal trip down the river with a dog, snake, monkey, and rooster (none of whom did anything wrong). |
Rhaphanidosis | For sex crimes in classical times, you got a radish shoved up your rear. |
Rough music | A form of vigilantism, more loud than violent. |
Scaphism | Probably the worst ever execution method - the condemned was enclosed in a pair of boats, covered with milk and honey, and eaten to death by insects. |
Schwedentrunk | Victims were bound and were forced to swallow large amounts of foul liquid, usually excrement. |
Scold's bridle | A muzzle for the nagging wife. |
Washing out the mouth with soap | That'll teach you to say dirty words! |
Whipping boy | A boy who received corporal punishment for misdemeanors of a prince; as well as some of his privileges. |
Abeguwo | Remember when you were a kid, and joked that the rain was peeing? Well... |
Adorcism | For when you want spirits inside you. |
Asher yatzar | A Jewish blessing, read to praise the ability to excrete urine or faeces. |
Axinomancy | Foretelling the future by looking at an axe or hatchet. |
Jim Bakker | Televangelist founds a Christian theme park so successful that it competes with Disneyland, gets arrested for fraud and loses his park, then promptly returns to televangelism upon release. Also admitted to never fully reading the Bible until his imprisonment, and to getting information on it from Lyndon LaRouche. |
Ben Hana | A homeless man in Wellington, New Zealand who worshiped the Māori sun-god Ra (not to be confused with the ancient Egyptian sun-god Ra). |
Bhekuli Biya | "Frog marriage", designed to bring rain. At least one has ended in divorce in order to stop floods. |
Braco (faith healer) | Meet the Gazer and be healed with a single glance. |
Cargo cult | Tribal rites and rituals developed in the belief they will attract the goods, wealth and materials – the "cargo" – of a more technologically advanced and affluent culture. |
Church of the SubGenius | A parody religion created in Texas which preaches that a 1950s salesman, who is also a yeti, is their messiah and tries to protect people from the numerous conspiracies that haunt their lives. |
Coconut Religion | A religion founded in Vietnam that advocates subsisting solely off of coconuts and coconut milk, created a "Coconut Kingdom" on an islet of the Mekong River, and referred to its leader and founder as "His Coconutship". |
Coke Fatwa | It's the real thing... and thankfully, it's not haram. |
Crepitus (mythology) | A Roman god of flatulence (allegedly) |
Ded Moroz | Like Santa, but Russian, and blue. |
Dendera light | Does an engraving of the Egyptian creation myth show that Ancient Egypt had lightbulbs? As it turns out, no. |
Dhana Kumari Bajracharya | A woman did not walk for 60 years. |
Dinkoism | A parody religion that places Dinkan, a comic character from Malayalam children's magazine Balamangalam, as the one true God and the creator of the Universe. |
Disconnection (Scientology) | The result of a poor signal with Scientology. |
Fluffy bunny | A controversial epithet in Wicca. |
Flying Spaghetti Monster | The basis of a satirical religion created to make fun of intelligent design. |
Gang Bing | After his act of self-castration, he became the patron saint of eunuchs. |
Haitian Vodou and sexual orientation | Surely a troll, you say? No! A perfectly legitimate article! |
High-Heel Wedding Church | Want to get married in a giant shoe in Taiwan? |
Iglesia Maradoniana | A religion with the Argentine footballer Diego Maradona as its god. |
Incident (Scientology) | Bubble Gum Incident, Obscene Dog Incident, Bodies in pawn, blah, blah... |
International date line in Judaism and Jewish law in the polar regions | Jewish law can get tricky when you travel to Hawaii... or go for a hike near the North Pole. |
Invisible Pink Unicorn | Best buds with the Flying Spaghetti Monster. |
Jedi census phenomenon | A phenomenon in which 390,000 British citizens listed their religion as "Jedi Knight" on a 2001 census form, which would've made it the fourth-largest religion in England and Wales. |
Jerusalem syndrome | For some people, a visit there is just too much. |
Jewish pope Andreas | A Jewish pope..? |
Johnson cult | Was US President Lyndon B. Johnson worshiped as a god in Papua New Guinea? |
Judeo-Masonic conspiracy theory | Can't decide whether to blame the Jews or the Freemasons? The conspiracy nuts have you covered. |
Kacchera | Sikh underwear. |
Kapo (mythology) | The Hawaiian fertility goddess, known for having a detachable vagina. |
List of UFO religions | Our Father, which art in spaceship... |
Lou de Palingboer | God sells eels? |
Love jihad | The Indian far-right posits that Muslims are converting the world by... being more attractive to women than them. |
Jesús Malverde | A popular saint among drug dealers in Mexico. |
Matshishkapeu | The "fart man" of Innu mythology. Don't cross him or he'll make you constipated. |
Missionary Church of Kopimism | To Ctrl+C is human; to Ctrl+V is divine. |
Mizab al-Rahma | The holiest rain gutter in Islam. |
Oomoto | L. L. Zamenhof as kami. |
Open-source religion | And we're not talking about the Church of Emacs either. |
Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption | A legally recognized religion created by comedian John Oliver for the sole purpose of exempting his show from taxes by way of the Religious Tax Exemption. |
Prince Philip movement | A religious movement on the island of Tanna in Vanuatu which holds that Queen Elizabeth II's late husband, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, was a divine being. |
Pseudoskepticism | The philosophical or scientific argument that tries to appear skeptical, but really is trying to prove a position, as in "I don’t see enough evidence that we landed on the moon". |
Raël | A French journalist who started a religion named after himself in the 1970s. |
Religion in Antarctica | There's no continent on Earth without organized religion. |
Reincarnation Application | Must be filed by all living Buddha within the People's Republic of China before they are allowed to reincarnate. |
Religious pareidolia | A tendency to see religious imagery in the textures of corn chips, cinnamon rolls, toast, clouds, etc. |
Saint Urho | A fictitious saint of Finland created in Minnesota. |
Silver Sisterhood | A bizarre neo-Victorian Irish spiritual movement with a sideline in creating text adventure games, including the first 18-rated game. |
Sin-eater | An old belief that someone eating over a body would consume the sins of the deceased. |
St. Priapus Church | A religion based on the worship of the phallus. |
Space opera in Scientology | L. Ron Hubbard's history of the universe, including alien Invader Forces, "little orange-colored bombs that would talk" and brainwashing episodes in "a railway carriage quite like a British railway coach with compartments". |
Sudanese teddy bear blasphemy case | How a British schoolteacher teaching overseas in Sudan got in trouble for letting her six-year-old students name a teddy bear "Muhammad". |
Taghairm | A couple of uncomfortable methods of fortune telling. |
Tlazōlteōtl | Aztec god of vice, purification, steam baths, lust, filth, and a patroness of adulterers. |
Toilet god | God living in the toilet. |
Turtles all the way down | A myth about the nature of the universe, or perhaps a myth about a myth about the nature of the universe. |
United Nation of Islam | Royall, Allah in Person claims to have spent the 1980s in a spaceship with angels who informed him that he was God and instructed him on how to govern the world. Public records say he was a truck driver. |
Universe People | Specific cult in Czech Republic and Slovakia. |
The Urantia Book | Over two thousand pages of anonymous, religious, subconscious ramblings on religion and "God" (whatever that means in the billion planets out there). |
Xenu | An ancient interstellar dictator who unleashed a genocide which created Christianity and psychiatry and whose story is "calculated to kill (by pneumonia etc.) anyone who attempts to solve it". |
Yakub (Nation of Islam) | Mad scientist creates white race. |
Adam-God doctrine | A previous Christian belief that Adam was an alien who became God on his death. |
Alexamenos graffito | Possibly the oldest depiction of the crucifixion of Jesus was made by a boy mocking his Christian peer by depicting the Messiah with a donkey for a head. |
The All-Joking, All-Drunken Synod of Fools and Jesters | Started by Peter the Great, and consisted mostly of drinking and partying. |
As a dog returns to his vomit, so a fool repeats his folly | An oldie but a goodie from the Bible. |
Banquet of Chestnuts | Enough to make even the most committed and diehard Roman Catholic agree that the church was in a pretty poor state at the time of the Reformation. |
Bible errata | A typesetter's complaint finds justification in Psalm 119. |
Carlo Acutis | The Catholic Patron Saint of the Internet. |
Cadaver Synod | In 897, Pope Stephen VI had the body of the former Pope that appointed him, Pope Formosus exhumed, dressed in papal vestments and then seated on a throne while he read charges against it and conducted a trial. |
Caganer | A traditional Catalan statue, similar to a garden gnome, that depicts a person defecating. Often included in Catalan nativity scenes or other Christmas decorations. |
Christmas in Nazi Germany | The Nazi Party reinvented Christmas by removing a certain baby boy raised in the Jewish faith. |
Church of the First Born of the Lamb of God | A fundamentalist Mormon group with a surprisingly large body count. |
Chute na santa incident | An infamous kicking of a saint. Apparently done to one-up a rival TV network's previous blasphemous broadcasting. |
Clare of Assisi | Because she claimed to have seen and heard Mass on the walls when she was ill, she was made the patron saint of television in 1958, despite dying 674 years before television was invented. |
Criticism of Mother Teresa | Seriously? Yep, seriously. Her detractors include Christopher Hitchens, Tariq Ali and devout Hindus. |
David Berg | A Christian cult leader that was so perverse, even Jim Jones mocked his sexual fixations. |
Harold Davidson | A 1930s Church of England clergyman, known as "The Prostitutes' Padre", who was defrocked and later died after being mauled by a toothless lion. |
Ejaculatory prayer | A short and impulsive prayer not—as the name may suggest—a prayer related to ejaculation. |
Ruben Enaje | A former construction worker from the Philippines who has been voluntarily crucified 35 times as of 2024. |
Ezekiel 23 | One of the odder visions from God: a piece of Rule 34 with Samaria and Jerusalem portrayed as women who sleep around. |
Feast of the Ass | No... this isn't about that ass. It's an old tradition where a girl and a child on a donkey go to church together, with the donkey sitting beside the altar during the sermon. |
Flirty Fishing | Sharing the Gospel through prostitution. |
Freedomites | A Canadian religious cult that bombed and set fire to public buildings. All while nude. |
Gambling on papal elections | How much you wanna bet he's going to be Catholic? |
General Butt Naked | A former Liberian warlord who found Christ and now preaches to the communities he committed atrocities against would be pretty odd even if he weren't called... that. |
Great Disappointment | Hundreds of people were convinced the world would end on a very specific date. Turns out they were wrong. Ahem. |
Hell house | A type of Christian horror house to make children more pious. |
Holy Prepuce | One of several relics purported to be associated with Jesus. Also known as The Holy Foreskin. (See also Circumcision of Jesus.) |
Jesus H. Christ | Does it stand for Henry? |
Kolob | Which star does God live on? |
List of people claimed to be Jesus | Christ has risen...again...and again. |
Mental health of Jesus | Jesus? Are you okay? |
Miracle of the Sun | 70,000 people in Portugal gather to witness a miracle and are treated to an inexplicable solar event. |
Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God | Suicide cult or mass murder? You decide. |
Non-canonical books referenced in the Bible | The Bible refers to lost books – even pagan ones – much more than you'd think. |
Omphalos hypothesis | The answer to all the evidence against creationism – maybe the Earth was created to look like it was billions of years old! |
Phallic saint | Figures of holy people, but a hundred times more hung. |
Pope Joan | Medieval documents cite the existence of a female pope – proof of a Vatican cover up or a blasphemous slur? |
Pope John numbering | There have been 21 legitimate Popes John, but there have been two known as John XXIII. |
Pope Michael | Elected Pope in 1990 (by six people, including his parents) as a conclavist opponent to the current Pope, while not even an ordained priest. |
Pornocracy | A near-60-year period, also known as Saeculum obscurum or the "Rule of the Harlots", where the Popes were controlled by the women of a corrupt noble family. |
Prophecy of the Popes | According to this document, Pope Francis is the one who will bring about the fall of Rome. Most aren't convinced. |
Rumspringa | Amish Gone Wild. |
Saint Guinefort | A Saint who was also a dog. Not to be confused with this Saint, who was also a dog. Sort of. |
Secret Gospel of Mark | An incredibly elaborate forgery, or proof Jesus was gay? |
Self-crucifixion of Mattio Lovat | An Italian attempts to crucify himself in public settings. Two times. And prevented by passerby in both attempts. |
Skoptsy | "Holy" emasculation, started by a man who claimed to be a deceased emperor. |
St. James-Bond Church | No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and saviour! |
Tiberius Julius Abdes Pantera | Was Jesus' father buried in Germany? |
Unfulfilled Christian religious predictions | Doomsdays that didn't. |
Wicked Bible | A 1631 reprint of the King James Bible, which rendered commandment number 7 as "Thou shalt commit adultery". |
Zipporah at the inn | God apparently tries (and fails) to kill Moses. |
Adrian Carton de Wiart | Fought in two World Wars, shot repeatedly, survived two plane crashes, escaped a POW camp, married a countess, and amputated his own fingers when his doctor refused. Also looked like a pirate. |
Angels of Mons | Phantom bowmen from the Battle of Agincourt rose up from the dead to enact justice on the invading German Empire during the Battle of Mons...supposably. |
Vasily Arkhipov | Potentially averted a nuclear war. |
Bolivian Navy | Not having access to the sea won't stop Bolivia from having a 5,000 man navy. |
Boot Monument | In celebration of Benedict Arnold's foot. |
List of camoufleurs | Pioneering artists in the field of military camouflage. |
Caspian Sea Monster | Actually a product of the Cold War. |
Jack Churchill | Longbows and broadswords weren't used in World War II. Or were they? |
The Crucified Soldier | A Canadian soldier who was reportedly crucified with bayonets during the Second Battle of Ypres...ouch. |
CONOP 8888 | The Pentagon's zombie apocalypse plan. |
Boston Corbett | English-born soldier who killed John Wilkes Booth. Devoutly religious to the point of eccentricity, he was later committed to a mental institution, and disappeared after escaping from it. |
D-Day Daily Telegraph crossword security alarm | Crossword puzzles: A major danger to national security. |
Deborah's Hole Camp | An Iron Age hillfort situated atop the cliff above Deborah's Hole cave. |
Demob suit | Imagine the feeling: you've come back from war and they've given you a nice civilian suit, but it's too small for you. |
Devil Eyes | This CIA psyop plan called for Hasbro to make G.I. Joe style figures of Osama bin Laden with a hidden demon face underneath. |
Dreadnought hoax | A practical joke at the expense of the Royal Navy, inspiring the influential Bloomsbury Group. |
Juan Pujol García | A spy who worked as a double agent for the Nazis and the United Kingdom during World War II. |
Henry Gunther | The last man to die in World War I, and quite possibly the dumbest. |
Simo Häyhä | Showed some extraordinary Finnish sisu in the Winter War against the Soviets. |
Ice cream barge | Warning! Delicious creamy goodness ahead! |
Kamikaze | A series of typhoons which were said to have prevented two Mongol fleets from invading Japan, seven years apart. |
Koshiro Tanaka | What happens when a salaryman decides he wants to do more with his life in the mid 1980s? If you guessed joining an Afghani paramilitary group in order to fight invading Soviets, you'd be correct. |
Aimo Koivunen | Finnish soldier in the Continuation War, and first documented case of meth overdose during combat. |
Line-crossing ceremony | An initiation rite performed when a ship crosses the equator. |
List of wartime crossdressers | Because war demands proper fashion. |
Alan Mcilwraith | A call center worker who pretended to be a British Army officer, and then pretended to be a magician. |
Wilmer McLean | It can be said that the American Civil War both started and ended in one man's front yard. |
Miss Russian Army | A beauty contest minus the swimsuit competition but plus the automatic weapons drills. |
Montauk Project | Real military science experiment or urban legend? Maybe the civilians who were in full view of the military base will be able to tell you. |
Moro Islamic Liberation Front | A rebel, some might say terrorist, group in the Southern Philippines who may or may not be aware that their initials are also an acronym for mom I'd like to... |
Mozart Group | An ambitious American private military company created for the purpose of supporting Ukraine during the 2022 Russian invasion. Fell apart after less than a year due largely to underfunding, infighting and rowdy soldier behavior. |
Navies of landlocked countries | Mongolia once had one of the world's largest navies. Today they have one vessel with a crew of seven sailors, one of them able to swim. |
Nebraska Admiral | The landlocked U.S. state of Nebraska and its "Great Navy". |
Night Witches | An all-women Soviet bomber regiment who, despite flying in wooden training planes (or perhaps because of it), were highly successful and contained 23 different Heroes of the Soviet Union. |
NORAD Tracks Santa | A tradition with the American and Canadian military to track Santa Claus for children. |
Hiroo Onoda | A Japanese soldier who hid out in the Philippines during World War II, refusing to surrender until 1974. |
Stanislav Petrov | Another man who potentially averted nuclear war. |
Pentagon UFO videos | Yes, they're official. |
Philadelphia Experiment | An alleged experiment in 1943 involving electromagnetic technology to render vessels invisible. |
Portuguese Fireplace | A fireplace in the middle of the New Forest. |
Project A119 | If you can't land on the Moon, nuke it. |
Ratlines | The underground secret lines for fleeing Nazis after World War II. |
Russian warship, go fuck yourself | An eternalized catchphrase of the Russo-Ukrainian war. |
Shi Yousan | Early 20th-century Chinese general who seemingly made it his life mission to betray everyone he met. |
Siachen Glacier | The world's highest battlefield, with very predictable terrain. |
Otto Skorzeny | His career reads like several thriller novels in a row; he worked for the Nazis, Nasser, Perón, and apparently Mossad as a hit man (without ever denouncing Nazism). |
Henry Tandey | Allegedly met a young Adolf Hitler during World War I - and spared his life. |
The terrorists have won | Or have they? |
Truelove Eyre | A man who supposedly saved William the Conqueror's life during the Battle of Hastings. |
András Toma | A Hungarian soldier taken as a prisoner of war by the USSR in 1945 and declared dead... until he turned up in a Russian mental hospital in 2000, having not spoken to anyone for 55 years. |
Lauri Törni | Fought in the Finnish Army, Waffen-SS, and United States Army, in that order. Only member of the Waffen-SS interred in Arlington National Cemetery. |
USS William D. Porter | The US Navy's unluckiest ship ever? |
William Patrick Hitler | Judging from his surname alone, you can guess who he was related to. Actually fought in the U.S. Navy during WWII, and lived to be the last member of the Hitler family. |
Tsutomu Yamaguchi | Survived both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings in 1945. See also Jacob Beser. |
Yang Kyoungjong | A mysterious Korean soldier said to have served Japan, the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany. |
Z (military symbol) | What does it mean? And why has Russia used it so heavily? |
Zeppelin LZ 66 | Real-life sky pirates. |
Zhang Zongchang | Eccentric Chinese warlord that, among other things, assigned numbers to his many concubines, as he could not remember all of their names. |
Corporal Jackie | A baboon owned by a draftee who didn't want to leave him behind, he ended the First World War as a South African corporal, having picked up several injuries and a habit of saluting superior officers. |
Dickin Medal | Only awarded to animals. |
Moose cavalry | The supposed moose cavalries of Sweden and Russia. |
Sergeant Stubby | The only dog to be promoted to sergeant through combat. |
United States Camel Corps | Full-blooded Arabian mount, imported! |
Unsinkable Sam | Three strikes (or in this case, sunken ships) didn't knock him out at all. |
Wojtek | Arguably the most extraordinary soldier of all time. |
1998 Sokcho submarine incident | North Korean submarine becomes entangled in a large South Korean fishing net. All of the crew aboard perished before it could be towed to port. |
Anglo-Zanzibar War | The world's shortest war. It literally lasted 38 minutes. |
Attack of the Dead Men | Russian combatants looking like zombies win the battle by scaring away the Germans. |
Attack on Marstrand | A Danish-Norwegian siege in Sweden that succeeded partly because the Danish commander used all sorts of trickery to force a Swedish surrender. One popular story tells that he ordered his soldiers to walk slowly and in larger groups so it looked like there were more of them. |
Bahia incident | Did you know that the American Civil War also took place in Brazil? |
Battle of Castle Itter | American and German soldiers team up against the Nazis in a battle for a medieval castle. |
Battle of Domažlice | A Hussite army routs the twice as numerous crusading Holy Roman army with the power of singing. |
Battle of Fishguard | That time when France tried to invade Wales, got drunk and surrendered because they took the British forces too seriously. |
Battle of Karánsebes | How the Austrians fought against themselves over liquor and resulted in 1,200 own casualties. |
Battle of Lake Baikal | Czechoslovak Legionnares stole a steamship and won a naval battle against the Red Army. |
Battle of Tanga | A World War I battle where 8,000 British troops were defeated by a German-led force of 1,100 Askaris – aided by swarms of angry bees. |
Battle of the Eclipse | Lydia and Media had been fighting for six years, until an eclipse happening during one of their battles abruptly convinced them to stop. |
Battle of the Herrings | An incident during the siege of Orléans, where French and Scottish forces attempted to stop a supply convoy full of barrels of herring. |
British invasion of Iceland | How do you stop an enemy nation from invading a neutral country? By invading it yourself. |
Chen Sheng and Wu Guang uprising | When you're subject to execution for being late, what else can you do but revolt? |
Dai Hong Dan incident | North Korea and the United States team up to defeat Somali pirates. |
Empresa de China | Spain's plan for an Iberian-Filipino-Japanese motley crew to take over China. Cancelled after England sunk the Armada. |
Emu War | Final score for this one: Emus 1, Australians 0. |
Flagstaff War | A war that started between British military forces and the indigenous Polynesian people in New Zealand after a flagstaff was cut down four times. |
Football War | A six-day war fought between El Salvador and Honduras in 1969 that was triggered by a game of football (soccer). |
Gombe Chimpanzee War | A four-year war, fought between two groups of chimpanzees in Tanzania. |
Huéscar-Danish War | When one town joined a war on the opposite side from the rest of its country, then forgot about it for 170 years. |
If Day | A simulated Nazi invasion of the Canadian city of Winnipeg, complete with book-burning, arrests of politicians, and newspaper censorship. |
Iowa Cow War | A battle between cow ranchers and the state of Iowa over tuberculosis testing. |
Lobster War | A particularly heated dispute over whether lobsters swim or walk. |
Operation Cottage | The Japanese never showed up. |
Operation Mincemeat | A misinformation plan to hide the invasion of Sicily using a corpse as a British officer. |
Operation Paul Bunyan | An American and South Korean military operation conducted over a tree. |
Operation Pig Bristle | A daring air force operation to transport 25 tonnes of pig bristles from Chongqing in China to Hong Kong during the Chinese Civil War. The bristles were shipped to Australia to be made into paint brushes. |
Operation Red Dog | A group of American and Canadian white supremacists plot to independently filibuster a small Caribbean nation. A plan straight from the mid-1800s: foiled in 1981. |
Operation Tamarisk | Claimed to be the most successful intelligence operation in the Cold War; emptying supplies of Soviet Union toilet paper, forcing them to use documents, and retrieving these documents after use. |
Operation Wikinger | Poor communication leads to the German air force scoring a great victory ... against the German navy. |
Pastry War | Looting a pastry shop? This means war! |
Pig War | A war between the United States and the British Empire that almost erupted over one dead pig. |
Taiping Rebellion | One of the most lethal wars in history centers around a Chinese man claiming to be the brother of Jesus Christ. |
Three Hundred and Thirty Five Years' War | A "war" that lasted 335 years without a single shot being fired, between the Netherlands and the tiny Isles of Scilly. |
Toledo War | A war between the State of Ohio and the Michigan Territory that resulted in one injury and over a century of bitterness. |
Toyota War | A war in the last phase of the Chadian–Libyan conflict, named after the Toyota trucks that were used in the battle. |
Turkish Abductions | A 1627 slave raid by Turkish pirates off the coast of Iceland. |
War of the Bucket | Started when Modenese soldiers stole a bucket from a city well in Bologna. |
War of Jenkins' Ear | A nine-year war, started when Captain Robert Jenkins complained that the Spanish Coastguard had cut off his ear. |
War of the Stray Dog | Greek soldier chases his pooch across the Bulgaria border. Warfare nearly ensues. |
War of the Donkey | Two Venetian noble families go to war over a single donkey. Just one. It probably died during the conflict anyway. |
War of the Insane | Hmong revolt against taxing by the French colonial administration in Indochina lasting from 1918 to 1921. |
War of the League of Cambrai | A war that started when France and the Pope attacked Venice. Ended when France and Venice defeated literally everyone else in Western Europe. |
War Plan Red | U.S. war plans from the 1930s to invade Canada in the unlikely event of war with the United Kingdom. Also see the counterpart war plan Defence Scheme No. 1 (the Canadian war plan to invade the United States). |
Anti-tank dog | Failed Soviet weapon of the Second World War. |
Antonov A-40 | The "flying tank", an experimental Soviet tank with wings and tailboom, meant to glide into the battlefield, ready for combat. Trials were unsuccessful. |
Bat bomb | A World War II plan to bomb Japan with bats carrying tiny incendiary bombs. |
Baynes Bat | An experimental British glider, designed to convert tanks into gliders which could fly into battle. |
Bazooka Vespa | A heavily armed scooter |
Bicycle infantry | Soldiers have occasionally been trained to use the bicycle for military purposes. |
Blue Peacock | In case the Soviets decided they wanted the whole of Germany, the British planned to plant a bunch of nuclear landmines... heated by chickens. |
Cornfield Bomber | An F-106 jet fighter made a perfect gear-up landing in a farmer's field – after the pilot had ejected at 15,000 feet (4,600 m). |
Dazzle camouflage | A colorful way to hide in plain sight. |
Davy Crockett (nuclear device) | A portable nuclear weapon. |
Double-barreled cannon | A failed civil war era attempt to create a weapon of mass destruction. Now a monument in Athens, GA. |
Explosive rat | A World War II weapon designed to cause boiler explosions. Never used, yet still a success. |
Gay bomb | A speculative non-lethal chemical weapon that could be dropped on enemy troops to cause "homosexual behaviour". Not to be confused with the fag bomb. |
German submarine U-1206 | A Nazi submarine that was attacked by British forces after it was forced to surface due to a malfunctioning toilet. |
Golden rivet | The hidden secret in every Navy ship (allegedly). |
Grand Panjandrum | Britain's World War II Catherine wheel of death. |
Harmonica gun | What's the best way to play the harmonica? Turn it into a weapon, of course! |
History of military ballooning | Aerial warfare had to start somewhere. |
HNLMS Abraham Crijnssen (1936) | A Navy ship that attempted to avoid detection by Japanese aircraft and escape back to Australia by having it disguised as a tropical island. |
Human torpedo | Secret naval weapons of World War II. |
Millwall brick | An improvised weapon constructed from a newspaper. |
Most-wanted Iraqi playing cards | A set of playing cards created by U.S. Army soldiers featuring the most-wanted Iraqis, with Saddam Hussein as the Ace of spades. |
Project Habakkuk | A British plan to construct an aircraft carrier out of ice (pykrete). |
Project Pigeon | Bombs guided by pigeon pecks. |
Project Plowshare | The search for peaceful uses of nuclear bombs. Most audacious and impractical idea: nuking a 160-mile canal out of Israel. |
Puckle gun | A gun with square bullets to be used against non-Christian enemies. |
Schwerer Gustav | The largest piece of artillery ever used in combat. |
Skunk (weapon) | A nonlethal weapon with an extremely strong odor that may linger on clothes for years. |
Sticky bomb | The most unpopular weapon the British soldier has ever been asked to use. |
Tachanka | Twentieth century chariot used in combat. |
Tsar Tank | An Imperial Russian tank designed as a tricycle with nine-metre wheels. |
United States Navy Marine Mammal Program | A U.S. Navy program which studies the military use of Bottlenose Dolphins and California Sea Lions. |
Whistling Dick (cannon) | A cannon of "rather modest proportions". Huh, I wonder why they mentioned the size... |
Who Me | A top secret stench weapon designed to be unobtrusively sprayed on German officers by French Resistance members. |
Zhanmadao | An anti-horse sword. |
Atacama skeleton | Remains found in Chile that caused much speculation about ancient aliens for 10 years, until they were discovered to just be of a foetus. |
Badge Man | Unknown figure reportedly visible atop the grassy knoll in the Moorman photo of the Kennedy assassination. |
Black Volga | The car that makes people disappear in the Eastern Bloc. Its equivalent on the other side of the Iron Curtain is the black helicopter. |
Mercy Brown vampire incident | One of the best documented cases of vampire investigation. |
Richard Chase | The only way to stop the Nazi-controlled UFOs from poisoning your macaroni and cheese is to inject yourself with animal blood and eat human brains. |
Coffin birth | When a pregnant woman dies, the decomposition of her body can result in a gas build-up that causes the fetus inside her to be expelled. |
Collyer brothers | When packratting was taken to a tragic extreme. |
The Dawn of the Black Hearts | Black metal musician takes staged photograph of his recently deceased bandmate, photograph outlives him despite being destroyed. |
Death by coconut | You can die if a coconut falls on your coconut. |
Death by GPS | Turn-by-turn directions to the afterlife. |
Death during consensual sex | These two are not related to each other. Usually. |
Death erection | |
Death from laughter | Don't laugh – it's happened. |
Death by misadventure | Death probably due after one saying "Hold my beer, and watch this!" |
Death by vending machine | A penny wise and several hundred pounds foolish. |
Death Master File | No, it's not a Bond villain's kill list. It's just the SSA keeping track of everyone who dies in the United States. Wait... |
Defenestration | The time-honoured tradition of throwing people out of windows. |
Disappearance of Frederick Valentich | An Australian pilot disappeared in the ocean, having seen a strange object above his aircraft. No trace of either his body or the aircraft have been found. |
Dyatlov Pass Incident | A group of Russian hikers attempt to escape an unknown horror on "Death Mountain." |
Euthanasia Coaster | A roller coaster intended to kill its passengers. |
Execution by elephant | An unusual form of capital punishment used throughout history. (See also History of elephants in Europe.) |
Fan death | A persistent urban legend in South Korea, where the media – and even medical professionals – regularly report on people dying because they left a fan running in a closed room. |
Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead | An early catch phrase used on Saturday Night Live, based upon the dictator's lengthy death. |
Ghost bike | Bicycle rider in memoriam. |
Green Boots | A climber who became a landmark on Everest even after freezing to death. |
Hammersmith nude murders | Murders that involved the other unidentified serial killer named Jack, with the title "the Stripper". |
The Hands of Che Guevara | Documentary about the search for the severed hands of the Latin American guerrilla fighter Ernesto Che Guevara, who was captured and executed by Bolivian Special Forces in October 1967. |
Hell money | Apparently, the Chinese afterlife is subject to hyperinflation. |
Sogen Kato | Believed to be the oldest living man in Tokyo... until the discovery of his 30-year-old mummified corpse. |
Kennedy curse | Apparently John F. Kennedy was not the only Kennedy to meet an early demise-far from it. |
Kick the bucket | A heated argument lies behind the origin of this idiom. |
Lampshades made from human skin | They probably wouldn't even be that good at diffusing light. |
Ricardo López | An obsessed fan who attempted to kill Icelandic singer Björk by a letter bomb rigged with sulfuric acid. |
Henry Lee Lucas | Claimed to be the most prolific serial killer in history, confessing to over 600 murders. Later recanted almost all of them. |
Children of Llullaillaco | Two incredibly well preserved cadavers of two Incan children found next to the Argentina–Chile border. |
List of expressions related to death | "Go home in a box", "go bung", "hop the stick", ... |
List of people who died on the toilet | You could say they died on the throne. |
List of entertainers who died during a performance | "And for my last act...I shall die and not come back to life!" |
List of postal killings | "Don't let Walter Hobbs deceive you; this life is not all shiny bins and fun", ... |
List of selfie-related injuries and deaths | Extreme cases of people being unaware of their surroundings. |
Lead Masks Case | Two electricians tried to contact aliens with psychedelic drugs and masks made out of lead. They died shortly after. |
London Necropolis railway station | Single tickets only, unless you're a mourner or other visitor. |
Lord Uxbridge's leg | The grisly afterlife of a leg lost during the Battle of Waterloo, formerly owned by Henry Paget, 1st Marquess of Anglesey. |
Maschalismos | The act of mutilating the dead to prevent them from rising again. |
Michael Malloy | Like Rasputin, but homeless, drunk, and Irish. |
Elmer McCurdy | A dead criminal whose mummified body was bought by carnies and used as a prop for decades, its later owners not even knowing the corpse was real. |
Ken McElroy | "Nobody saw nothing" taken to its logical extreme. |
Micromort | A quantitative death risk equivalent to one in a million. |
Mordred | Mordred is back for revenge—watch out! |
Murder of Vivianne Ruiz | The first recorded "Jane Doe" in Australia, and a murder with enough twists and turns to be a legal drama. The case for the defence (unsuccessfully) contended that a bloody fingerprint found on a newspaper shoved down the victim's throat was actually tomato juice. |
Herbert Mullin | Haven't had any earthquakes recently? Thank this man. |
Oliver Cromwell's head | This English political leader's head has an interesting journey after its owner is posthumously executed, more so than the one he cut off himself. |
Richard Paul Pavlick | Plotted to kill then president-elect John F. Kennedy via suicide bombing, but delayed it upon seeing Kennedy with his family. |
Poe Toaster | Not a kitchen appliance, but a mysterious figure who paid an annual tribute to American author Edgar Allan Poe. |
Post-mortem photography | Back in the early days of photography it was common to take pictures of recently deceased loved ones, propped up to look as if they were alive. |
Death of Gloria Ramirez | One of the most bizarre unsolved deaths ever documented. The media nicknamed her the "Toxic Lady". |
Refrigerator death | A cool way to die. |
Republican marriage | A form of execution in which a naked man and woman are tied together and drowned. (What did you think it was?) |
Rookwood Cemetery railway line | A former railway line that served a cemetery near Sydney. |
Safety coffin | Coffins manufactured just in case their tenant is not actually dead before being buried. |
Salish Sea human foot discoveries | Dismembered feet keep washing up. |
Frane Selak | Dubbed the luckiest/unluckiest man to exist, cheated death seven times and also managed to win the lottery! |
Sky burial | It's not really a form of burial. Also known as jhator which means "giving alms to the birds." |
Sokushinbutsu | A practice of self-mummification among Buddhist monks. |
Space burial | Around 150 people have had their remains interred in space. Or would that be ex-terred? |
Spontaneous human combustion | The sudden burning of a person's body without any apparent source of ignition. |
Suicide booth | A common feature in the world of tomorrow. |
Suicide of Sunil Tripathi | "The perpetrator of the Boston Marathon bombing was... a student who'd already been dead for a month! We did it, Reddit!" |
Tamam Shud case | A dead man is found on an Australian beach with no identification and a bizarre fragment of a book in his pocket. To this day, his identity and cause of death are still unconfirmed. |
Carl Tanzler | A radiographer who became obsessed with a dead TB patient, had her exhumed, and lived with her corpse for 7 years. |
Toilet-related injuries and deaths | As if constipation wasn't enough. |
Uttar Pradesh Association of Dead People | A group of Indians suffering more from theft than cardiac failure. Its founder managed to run for political office despite having been declared dead for over a decade. |
Lal Bihari | |
Joyce Vincent | A woman who sat dead in her home with the TV and heater running and Christmas presents on her lap for three years until her corpse was found. |
Video-Enhanced Grave Marker | Graves with video screens and speakers on them. |
Xin Zhui | A remarkably preserved Chinese mummy from 163 B.C. with all features and soft tissue still intact. |
Wikipedia is not afraid to tackle the tough questions:
How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? | A proverbial question of theology. |
If a tree falls in a forest | Philosophy meets the logging industry. |
Meaning of life | Why are we here? |
What Is It Like to Be a Bat? | Have you ever wondered that? No? Apparently this is one of the most important contemporary philosophical questions. |
Where's the beef? | In 1984, people thought this was really funny for some reason. |
Why did the chicken cross the road? | People have asked this for over 150 years. |
List of American and British defectors in the Korean War | Yes, somehow yes? |
List of animals awarded human credentials | Animals getting so-called diplomas from diploma mills. |
List of catgirls and catboys | This one had an edit war over whether or not Hermione Granger should be added. |
List of common misconceptions | A gold mine of strangeness. |
Lists of Danish football transfers 2008–09 | Keep in mind that this is not just a list, this is a list of lists. |
List of dates predicted for apocalyptic events | But in the end, nothing happened. |
List of foreign-born samurai in Japan | That's right. |
List of garlic festivals | Even one festival devoted entirely to garlic of all things is strange enough. |
List of helicopter prison escapes | Yes, you read that right. |
List of incidents at Disney parks | Donald Duck's anger issues are far from being your main concern at a Disney attraction. |
List of inventors killed by their own invention | Including everyone from Marie Curie to Thomas Midgley Jr. |
List of largest hourglasses | Wikipedia probably wasted as much time on this pointless list as it takes for one of these to run out. |
List of lists of lists | A list of all lists of lists -- and yes, it contains itself. |
List of non-water floods | Beep beep, massive waves of melted butter, wine, and chocolate coming through! |
List of paraphilias | Just too many to list. |
List of people imprisoned for editing Wikipedia | Yes, this has actually happened. |
List of people who have been considered deities | People from emperors to John Coltrane have been considered deities. |
List of people who have been pied | A pie to the face, usually as the result of differing political views. |
List of people who have lived in airports | Quite a few, in reality. |
List of potato museums | How are there enough to warrant a list? |
List of scholarly publishing stings | Instances of people submitting fake or nonsense scholarly articles to expose an academic journal as a predatory publisher. |
List of sexually active popes | A surprisingly long list for a supposedly celibate role. |
List of shoe-throwing incidents | The recurring trend of high-ranking people being attacked with shoes. |
List of wrong anthems incidents | Everything from playing the wrong country's anthem to playing Ricky Martin's "Livin' la Vida Loca". |
Wikipedia:Before they were notable | Celebrities (and products) having their articles deleted years ago. |
Wikipedia:Deleted articles with freaky titles | Wikipedia articles that have existed and, judging by the title and contents, probably shouldn't have existed. |
Wikipedia:List of really, really, really stupid article ideas that you really, really, really should not create | The title says it all, really. |
Wikipedia:Unusual articles | The page you're currently reading. |
Wikipedia:Unusual articles/Removed | If you're looking for more. |
Ø (Disambiguation) | Not to be confused with Ø (disambiguation) |
Disambiguation (disambiguation) | Not to be confused with a disambiguation page |
Wikipedia:Disambiguation (disambiguation) | Not to be confused with the above page. |
meta:meta:meta | Two pages with weird titles. |
commons:commons:commons | |
Talk:Talk | Four talk pages with weird titles. |
Talk:Talk Talk | |
Talk:Talk Talk Talk | |
Talk:Talk Talk (Talk Talk song) | |
Wikipedia:Discussions for discussion | Great venue for grating big discussions. |
Wikipedia:Featured pictures contains some unusual images.