Daily Content Archive

Word of the Day
flagellation Definition: (noun) Beating with a whip or strap or rope as a form of punishment. Synonyms: flogging, lashing, tanning Usage: The poor servant boy bore the scars of flagellation, which was his master's preferred punishment for nearly any infraction.

Article of the Day

Count Alessandro di Cagliostro Born Giuseppe Balsamo, Cagliostro was an 18th-century charlatan and adventurer. He roamed Europe posing as a physician, alchemist, mesmerist, necromancer, and Freemason and claimed to know the secrets of the philosopher's stone and other potions. Once well-regarded in the court of King Louis XVI, he was banished following a scandal and returned to his native Italy. There, the Inquisition charged him with heresy and sorcery and imprisoned him for life. What had led to his banishment from France? More...

This Day in History

George Bizet's Carmen Premieres in Paris (1875) Though it is today one of the most popular operas ever written, Carmen was initially met with such scathing reviews that the opera house had to give away tickets to get people to see it. Shortly after its disastrous premiere, its author, Bizet, died of a heart attack and the director of the struggling opera house resigned. Later that year, however, Carmen opened in Vienna to wide acclaim. Why did critics initially hate Bizet's story of a soldier's doomed love for a wild Gypsy girl? More...

Today's Birthday

George Mortimer Pullman (1831) Pullman was a successful American industrialist and the inventor of the railroad sleeping car. In 1893, he built a company town for his workers in Illinois, and it was showcased in the World's Fair as a grand social experiment. The next year, the town of Pullman was the scene of a violent workers' strike that nearly halted US rail traffic. When Pullman died in 1897, he had to be buried in a massive steel-and-concrete vault to keep activists from disinterring his body. What happened to his town? More...

Quotation of the Day
How gladly would I meet Mortality my sentence, and be earth Insensible! how glad would lay me down As in my mother's lap! John Milton (1608-1674)

Idiom of the Day
make a mark — To do something that makes one famous or successful; to do something that is very important or meaningful. More...

Today's Holiday

Hina Matsuri (2024) Hina Matsuri is a festival for girls, celebrated in homes throughout Japan since the Edo Period (1600-1867). A set of 10 to 15 dolls (or hina), usually family heirlooms from various generations, is displayed on a stand covered with red cloth. Dressed in elaborate silk costumes, the dolls represent the emperor and empress, court ministers, and servants. In parts of Tottori Prefecture, girls make boats of straw, place a pair of paper dolls in them and set them afloat on the Mochigase River. The custom dates back to ancient times when dolls were used as talismans to exorcize evil. More...