Death by Lazy Staff, Monks and a Fly!

Strange Deaths

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Daniel "Dan" Andersson
Died: 16 September, 1920
Manner of Death: The bedbugs bit!.

Dan Andersson was a Swedish author, poet, and sometime musician. He is a famous icon in his hometown of Sweden, with his poems, stories and songs being a household name, almost a century after they were written.

Poor Dan died by accident. On 16 September, 1920 Dan travelled to the Hotel Hellman in Stockholm, to apply for a position with the Social-Demokraten Newspaper. Earlier that day the hotel staff had used hydrogen cyanide in the room, to combat the bad case of bedbugs going around. Unfortunately, they had not used the cyanide correctly – and at 3pm that day, Dan was found dead – of cyanide poisoning. He was not the only victim of carelessness, an insurance inspector named Elliott Ericksson also died the same way.

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Hypatia
Died: 420AD
Manner of death: Murdered by Christian monks

Hypatia was the first documented female mathematician, astronomer and philosopher. She was a highly educated woman, which was incredibly rare in those times, and worked her way up to being the head of the Platonist school in Alexandria.

Hypatia was well known for having no prejudices when it came to learning. She would teach anyone, pagan and Christian alike, which caused no end of trouble with the cave dwelling (slight exaggeration) Christians of the time.

Socrates of Constantinople (not to be confused with the Greek philosopher Socrates) once described her as:

There was a woman at Alexandria named Hypatia, daughter of the philosopher Theon, who made such attainments in literature and science, as to far surpass all the philosophers of her own time. Having succeeded to the school of Plato and Plotinus, she explained the principles of philosophy to her auditors, many of whom came from a distance to receive her instructions. On account of the self-possession and ease of manner which she had acquired in consequence of the cultivation of her mind, she not infrequently appeared in public in the presence of the magistrates. Neither did she feel abashed in going to an assembly of men. For all men on account of her extraordinary dignity and virtue admired her the more.

Unfortunately for Hypatia, her ‘power’ in a man’s world, and worse, her unwillingness to live her life as a Christian, was her ultimate downfall. Her death was truly tragic.

One day, while travelling in her carriage, a mob of Nitrian monks, a fanatical sect of Christians who felt threatened by her scholarship, depth of knowledge and learning, attacked. The monks dragged her from her carriage, and into a church. Once inside, they stripped her of her clothing, beat her and flayed her with roofing tiles. Once she had died, they quartered her body, and set it alight.

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Pope Adrian IV
Died: 1159
Manner of Death: Choked on a fly in his wine.

Pope Adrian IV was the only Englishman to ever occupy the position as Pope. He was born Nicholas Breakspeare. He was Pope of the Roman Catholic Church for five years.

Pope Adrian had a bizarre medical condition known as Quinsy – a rare form of tonsillitis which causes excessive puss to build up in the mouth and throat.

It is believed that the build up of pus in this throat, combined with a cheeky fly which had settled in his wine goblet, caused the Pope to choke to death within minutes.