Weekend Link Dump

For the month of December, our Link Dump will be sponsored by the Cats of Christmas!

What the hell was the Star of Bethlehem?

What the hell were the Palatine Lights?

What the hell are the Min Min Lights?

What the hell is the Swedish Atlantis?

What the hell is the Voynich Manuscript?  Now we know!  It's a calendar!

What the hell happened to the Holy Grail?

What the hell happened to this Irish village?

Who the hell poisoned the Goebbels children?

Why the hell do people put pineapples outside their door?

Watch out for those malevolent Aztec gods!

Watch out for those haunted TVs!

Watch out for those Devil Chains!

Watch out for the Shutterkin!

The princess and the gypsies.

More from the "pushing back human technology" file.

Some helpful tips if you're planning to take up bodysnatching as a career.

The Mummers of Midwinter.

An interesting peek at social history:  14th century "proofs of age."

No question, my favorite link of the week:  That time Queen Victoria went all King Herod.

The ghosts of Shrewsbury prison.

A "lost" ghost story written by H.G. Wells has just been published.

Voices of the Barbary Coast.

Food of the California Gold Rush.

The sole American killed in the 1814 burning of Washington.

London "city characters," 1824.

A new look at Rasputin.

It used to be great entertainment to watch royals eat.

Dickens and the flea-ridden dog.

How the tango was nearly destroyed.

The fine art of 18th century salads.

A medieval Christmas cookbook.

Along that same theme, here's a look at medieval royal feasts.

The temple of lucky cats.

A disturbing tale of "organ harvesting."

Corpse bread fishing and the dangers of palm-reading.

Tales from the Parish Register.

The dark side of Regency-era Bath.

Hey, let's nuke a hurricane!  What could go wrong?

19th century Persian pageantry.

The mystery of our underground oceans.

When snuff was good for whatever ailed you.

Dorothy Kilgallen and the JFK Assassination.

The "Six Wives" in the archives.

A scandalous royal marriage.  Not that there were any shortage of those.

More on the alleged "Bosnian Pyramid."

The world's largest pyramid is in hiding in Mexico.

The man who sees UFOs.

If you've been dying to know what a pound of snuff cost in 1836, today is your lucky day.

If you've been dying for a recipe for pickled purslane, step right up.

The sad fate of Barnardo's children.

The Grinch who stole Henry VIII's Christmas.

The curious case of the Wollaton Park Gnomes.

The curious case of the coffins in Edward IV's tomb.

Holiday gift ideas, 1913.

A famed French salon hostess.

Experimenting with salamanders.

A surprise at Sutton Hoo.

The ghosts and witches of Joseph Glanvill.

The legend of the haunted apples.

Charles Dickens' uh, unusual way of memorializing his cat.

A Fortean tree of lights.

A case of a bleeding corpse.

The execution of a figure in the Edmund Berry Godfrey mystery.

A telepathic tribe in the Amazon.

Always room in the Link Dump for stories about stolen mummy hands.

Not to mention stories about mystical hermits.  Or mysterious green children. Or people killed by corpses.

The market cat of Spitalfields.

That time a miner captured the Devil.

An interview with the author of "Gods of Eden."

Language falls into a cycle.

The traveling corpses of Wurzburg.

The 1518 "Dancing Plague."

All you need to know about the Dogs of the Titanic.

This week's Advice From Thomas Morris:  What not to do with a piece of wood.

Also: Don't laugh at snakes.  And think twice about buying second-hand boots.

Uncovering the sad end of a 19th century supermodel.

A bloody ax provides clues about human history.

A mammoth skeleton provides clues about human history.

That wraps it up for this week.  See you on Monday, when we'll visit one of Scotland's most beloved villains.  In the meantime, here's some Tennessee Ernie Ford.  Because, damn it, I like Tennessee Ernie Ford.