What are some historical events that sound like jokes but actually existed?

I feel that we have to mention one person about what sounds like a joke but is a real historical fact, and that is Yuan Tiangang. Yuan Tiangang calculated that Wu Zetian was about to become a female emperor when she was very young. And since then, Yuan Tiangang has also made many judgments. He judged that the Tang Dynasty will perish when pigs climb trees, and this is just a metaphor. Zhu Wen did destroy the Tang Dynasty, so many of Yuan Tiangang's deeds make us Think about it like a joke, too fake, but it is real.

When Yuan Tiangang was traveling once, there was a local family named Wu. They were quite famous in the local area. At this time, their family invited Yuan Tiangang over and asked him. Please tell me how his children will develop in the future. At the beginning, they did not take Wu Zetian out. Yuan Tiangang calculated the future of several of them and found that their development was not very good.

And when he saw Wu Zetian, he was surprised, because this was exactly what the future emperor would look like. At that time, Wu Zetian was dressed like a little boy. If no one asked, it would be impossible to tell that Wu Zetian was a girl, so Yuan Tiangang mistook him for a boy. So he said, if this person is a woman, she will be the master of the world in the future. However, in fact, Wu Zetian is indeed a woman. Later, Wu Zetian successfully ascended the throne and became China's first and only female emperor. .

So when Yuan Tiangang calculated that Wu Zetian would become an empress when she was young, many people definitely didn't believe it, thinking it was definitely impossible, and laughed at Yuan Tiangang for talking nonsense. And our descendants also think that this is just passed down from future generations, and do not think that Yuan Tiangang is so miraculous. However, this is not the case. There is indeed such a record in the real official history records of the Tang Dynasty. And Yuan Tiangang later calculated a lot of things for Wu Zetian, so it sounds like a joke to us, but it actually happened.