One of most powerful political organisations in the late Middle Ages. Their ranks were filled by the richest aristocratic families of Europe. Formed in Jerusalem in the 11th Century to provide hospital care and protection for Christian pilgrims visiting the Holy Land. Still exist today though split into many Orders.
Knights Hospitallers
Fact of the Day
James I punished one person who had been unwilling to extend him credit by ordering the offender to attend on him - by walking behind the royal procession as they progressed from London to Carlisle (a distance of about three hundred miles).
Quote of the Day
"A desperate disease requires a dangerous remedy.
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~ Guy Fawkes
On This Day
1846 Scottish surgeon Robert Liston was the first European to use anaesthesia during an amputation. He could amputate a leg in two and a half minutes.
1898 Scientists Pierre and Marie Curie discovered the radioactive element radium.
1937 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs', the world's first full-length animated film, premiered in the USA
1946 A tsunami caused by an undersea earthquake killed at least 1,362 and left thousands homeless in Japan.
1967 Louis Washkansky, the first man to undergo a heart transplant, died in Cape Town, South Africa, 18 days after his operation.
1988 Pan Am Flight 103 exploded as it was flying over Lockerbie, Scotland. All 243 passengers and 16 crew, and 11 residents of Lockerbie were killed