The word "Mamluk" means “owned” in Arabic.

As young boys they were taken from their homes, brought to Egypt and forged into the warrior elite.

However, they would not remain servants forever. Eventually, they seized control.

This is the story of the slaves who ruled an empire. It is the 12th century AD and the Ayyubids Sultunate is ruling Egypt and Syria.

They starts importing young boys from Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Turkic steppe.

Why? Because they needed a loyal, highly trained military force separate from local tribal factions.

The Eternal City stood unconquerable for 800 years until the King of the Visigoths showed up.

Alaric would go rogue and bring Rome to its knees by sacking it with a vengeance.

A violent tale of betrayal, defiance and what happens when an Empire turns on one of its own...

🧵 If we want to understand why Alaric put Rome to the torch we first have to look at the society and context he grew up in.

The Visigoths were a group of people that lived north of the Danube river, in present day Romania & Bulgaria.

The Medici ruled Florence, a rivaling family, the Pazzi wanted them dead.

So they plotted the perfect assassination…

But they forgot one thing: Lorenzo de’ Medici doesn’t die easily.

He would raise hell in Florence in his quest for vengeance.

🧵👇 The year is 1478 in Florence.
The Renaissance is in full swing.

Art, money, and power flow through the city.
And at the heart of it all?

The Medici.

A goldsmith walks into a room filled with Italy’s greatest architects.

He tells them he can build a dome without scaffolding.

They all laugh, he walks out...

Three years later, he gets the contract.

A 🧵 on the greatest engineering marvel of the Renaissance. The year is 1418. Florence needs a miracle.

For over a century, the Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral has been waiting for its dome.

The problem?

No one knows how to build one big enough to cover its 150-foot-wide base.

A contest is announced.

To travel is to be transformed.

Marco Polo didn’t set out to make history.

Across scorching deserts & foreign empires, he followed curiosity like a compass until travel became a way of life.

A young man from Venice mastered the art of travel, and now you can do to.🧵👇 Born in 1254, Marco Polo grew up in a Venice alive with trade.
But his father and uncle were already gone, on a trading mission deep into Asia.

When they returned 15 years later, they brought tales no one believed…

Tales of a Mongol emperor named Kublai Khan.

No name. No past. Just a rifle, a uniform, and a promise:

Bleed for France 🇫🇷, and earn a chance to become citizen.

France was built by sacrifice, why should entry be without it today? 🧵 The year is 1831. King Louis-Philippe signs a decree.

A force of foreign volunteers, bound not by birthplace but by loyalty, will fight France’s colonial wars.

The French Foreign Legion is born.

Versailles was more than a palace, it was a trap.

"The Sun King" lured France’s most dangerous nobles into his glittering cage.

Once they entered, they never truly escaped. 🧵 The year is 1682.

Louis XIV has just moved his court into the most extravagant palace Europe has ever seen, Versailles.

To the outside world, it is a marvel of gold, fountains & endless gardens.

But to France’s nobility it became a gilded cage.

The Mongol campaigns claimed the lives of an estimated 60 million people.

They mastered the art of mass depopulation and systematic culling.

Their inflicted death toll was so high that the world's carbon footprint was forever altered.

Here is how they did it.🧵 Their campaigns were defined by speed, strategy, and an unparalleled ability to instill fear.

But what set them apart wasn’t just their mobility and battlefield brilliance—it was their calculated approach to depopulation and control.

Born to rule, but cursed from the start.
His body was fragile, marked by a merciless disease.

Yet beneath the fading flesh,
a divine fire burned fierce and unyielding.

This is the tale of the "Leper King" and his fight against impossible odds. The year is 1174 AD.

Baldwin IV inherits a kingdom in chaos, and a disease that should have killed him before he wore the crown.

Jerusalem is fragile, torn by rival nobles and threatened by the rise of the great Muslim leader, Saladin.

Jesus Christ, God, or man?

In 325 AD, the answer to that question nearly broke the Roman Empire apart.

Here's how Constantine tried to save it and have the council answer the following question:

Is Christ of the same substance as the Father?🧵 The Roman Empire had just barely survived centuries of civil war, plagues, and persecution.

In 312, Constantine became emperor, and everything changed.

Jesus told us to love our enemies.
Michael tells us what to do when they refuse peace.

Michael doesn’t contradict Christ.
He completes the picture.

They're not opposites, they are two aspects of divine will.

Here is why 🧵👇 First of all: Who is Michael?

Michael is known as the chief warrior angel in Christianity.

He is not gentle. He is not poetic.
He is Heaven’s sword.

The name “Michael” means:

“Who is like God?”

In the 8th century, the fate of Europe teetered on a knife’s edge.

A vast caliphate swept westward, unstoppable, unchallenged.

But in the heart of Gaul a man rose to stop the Muslim invasion in a final battle that saved Western Civilization. 🧵👇 The year is 732.

In the heart of Europe, the world holds its breath.

A storm approaches from the south, an empire on horseback, forged in the deserts of Arabia, now sweeping westward with the force of destiny itself.

When Augustus emerged from the chaos of civil war he hand-picked an elite group of soldiers as personal bodyguards.

No longer would emperors be assassinated.

But what began as a safeguard for Rome’s first emperor…
Became a dagger at the throat for those that followed. Following the assassination of Caesar, Rome had bled itself dry in civil war.

Augustus ended it with military victor and with a vision.

He built peace on foundations of strength.
And standing behind him, was the newly formed Praetorian Guard.

When three legions entered the Teutoburg Forest they were wiped off the face of the earth.

The Varian Disaster marked one of the most catastrophic defeats in Roman imperial history.

A thread🧵 on the ambush that shook the ancient world.

“Varus! Bring me back my legions!” The year is 9 AD. Augustus was the first Emperor, and the Romans were expanding their empire (no surprise there).

Rome had established control over various Germanic tribes and aimed to integrate additional territories into its domain.

His crown was heavy. Sweat slid beneath the armor.
His breath, slow and tight beneath the visor.

Across the field, banners snapped,
and there he emerged.

The Black Prince. His rival. His reckoning.

“So be it,” the king whispered.
It will end here... France was on its knees.

A decade of plague had hollowed its cities. The English burned the countryside. Civil war stirred in the shadows.

And now, the heir of England, Edward the Black Prince, had carved a path of fire through the heart of Aquitaine.

He was the kind of man legends are written about.

Praised by Kings. Feared by Enemies. Respected by friend and foe alike.

His manual is one of the most authentic insights into how knights saw themselves.

And this is what any self-respecting man should learn from him. 🧵 In the 14th century, France was bleeding.

The Hundred Years’ War raged across its fields.
Armies clashed, kings fell, and the code of chivalry was tested by fire.

And in the middle of it all stood a man who would become legend: Geoffroi de Charny.

For centuries, the mist-shrouded island in the northern seas deemed unconquerable.

It’s tribes were too wild, its coastline too rugged, its location too distant.

But when Emperor Claudius decided to launch a daring invasion, the tides of history would forever be shifted.

🧵 This story starts a century earlier, when Julius Caesar in 54 BC launched a reconnaissance mission and landed with five legions on the coast of Kent.

While successful in battle and the subsequent collecting of tributes, no territory was conquered before leaving back to Gaul.

In perhaps one of the most audacious military maneuvers in history, Hannibal crossed the Alps.

A feat so improbable, it borders on legend.

For the following 15 years, he haunted the Italian countryside like a ghost.

This is how one man made an empire tremble in fear. 🧵 The year is 247 BC.

In the mighty port city of Carthage, a boy is born to a general.
His name: Hannibal.

His father? Hamilcar Barca, hero of the First Punic War, and sworn enemy of Rome.

Joseph of Cupertino reportedly experienced ecstatic visions so intense that he would levitate—often during Mass or prayer.

Pilgrims flocked. Inquisitors followed.

Crowds called it divine, but to the Church it was a problem.

A thread on the saint that rose to heaven. The year is 1603.

In a dusty village in southern Italy, a child is born who will one day defy gravity—literally.

His name?

Joseph of Cupertino.

What fascinates me about Al Capone isn’t just the violence, the style, or the empire, it’s how one man became both a villain and a folk hero at the same time.

This is the story of how crime, charisma, and chaos made one man king. 🧵👇 The year is 1919.

The United States has just passed the 18th Amendment: Prohibition.

Alcohol is now illegal.

But that doesn’t stop anyone from drinking.
It just means someone has to supply it.

He told Americans to stop copying Europe—and start thinking for themselves.

Europe had the past. but Emerson gave America its future.

A thread on his core ideas, and why they still matter. Ralph Waldo Emerson was born in 1803 in Boston.

He grew up in a deeply religious household. His father was a Unitarian minister.

Young Emerson seemed destined to follow in his footsteps.