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Category: South America

Solander
By The Generalist Posted on July 1, 2020January 25, 2023

The Apostles of Linnaeus

Between 1746 and 1792, seventeen students of Carl Linnaeus set out across the globe to collect plant and animal samples for his new taxonomy. Seven of these apostles died on the trip, and one would betray Linnaeus.

Categories: Africa, Animals, Early modern history, Europe, History, Middle East, North & Central America, Oceania, Places, Plants, Sciences, South America
Qullqa
By The Generalist Posted on June 19, 2020January 25, 2023

Walking the Imperial Andes

The 40,000km-long Incan road system connected 12 million people, but it also supplied the Incan army with food from thousands of storage depots spread across the whole network.

Categories: Architecture, History, Medieval history, Places, South America
Heladería Coromoto
By The Generalist Posted on June 12, 2020June 1, 2020

A thousand flavours

The Heladería Coromoto ice cream parlour in Merida, Venezuela offers nearly a thousand different flavours of ice cream, including avocado, garlic, onion, sweetcorn, and crab.

Categories: Economics & business, Food & agriculture, Places, Sciences, South America
Carbonado
By The Generalist Posted on May 27, 2020April 17, 2021

Black diamond mystery

Where do black diamonds come from? We don’t actually know.

Categories: Africa, Astronomy, Earth science, Places, South America
Rapa Nui
By The Generalist Posted on May 18, 2020April 28, 2021

Blackbirding

In 1862, between a third and half of the entire population of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) were kidnapped by Peruvian slavers.

Categories: 19th century history, History, Language, Oceania, Places, South America
Centro Financiero Confinanzas
By The Generalist Posted on April 29, 2020April 28, 2021

Skyscraper squatting

The Centro Financiero Confinanzas skyscraper was unfinished at the time of the 1994 Venezuelan banking crisis. In 2007, squatters moved in.

Categories: Architecture, Economics & business, Places, South America
Evita
By The Generalist Posted on March 9, 2020April 28, 2021

Body swap

The corpses of Eva Perón, the first lady of Argentina, and Pedro Eugenio Aramburu, one of the generals who overthrew her husband’s government, became the centrepieces of a bitter dispute more than twenty years after Evita’s death.

Categories: 20th century history, History, Places, Politics & law, South America
Black teeth
By The Generalist Posted on February 20, 2020April 28, 2021

Black teeth

In southern and south-eastern Asia and the Pacific, teeth were blackened or lacquered to keep them intact and healthy.

Categories: Arts & recreation, Fashion & design, Health & medicine, Oceania, Places, Sciences, South America, South Asia, Southeast Asia
By The Generalist Posted on December 29, 2019January 25, 2023

Flattest toad

In Suriname there is a species of toad that looks like it has been flattened under a rock: it grows up to twenty centimetres long, but only reaches a couple of centimetres high.

Categories: Animals, Places, Sciences, South America
Catatumbo lightning
By The Generalist Posted on December 23, 2019April 17, 2021

Endless lightning

There is a storm above the mouth of the Catatumbo River in Venezuela that produces endless lightning – and has been doing so consistently, year-round, for hundreds of years.

Categories: Earth science, Places, Sciences, South America
Guiana Amazonian Park
By The Generalist Posted on December 10, 2019April 17, 2021

European rainforest

The largest national park in the European Union is in South America.

Categories: Europe, Places, Plants, Politics & law, Sciences, South America
Plaza de Mayo
By The Generalist Posted on December 5, 2019April 28, 2021

Grandmothers vs. the dirty war

As part of Argentina’s Dirty War, hundreds of children were taken from their parents and adopted into military families. The Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo are trying to get them back.

Categories: 20th century history, History, Military, Places, South America
Nadaism
By The Generalist Posted on September 15, 2019January 25, 2023

Nadaism

In 1958, surrealism, the Beat Generation, and a decade of civil war in Colombia distilled itself into the Nadaist movement – a rejection of Colombian government, literature, religion, and orthodoxy.

Categories: Arts & recreation, Literature, Places, South America
Cristina Calderón
By The Generalist Posted on September 7, 2019January 25, 2023

Final speakers

Around the world today, several languages have just one native speaker left. When they die, their language dies with them.

Categories: Language, Places, South America
Yma Sumac
By The Generalist Posted on June 12, 2019June 12, 2019

Peruvian octaves

The Peruvian singer Yma Sumac had a vocal range of four or five octaves – far beyond most singers, and one of the widest ranges on record.

Categories: Arts & recreation, Music, Places, South America
Putana
By The Generalist Posted on June 9, 2019April 17, 2021

Mystery volcano

In late 1808, a colossal volcanic eruption disrupted weather around the world. It was one of the three biggest eruptions of the 19th century – but we don’t know where it happened.

Categories: Earth science, Oceania, Places, Sciences, South America

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