tidbits cross time
Nov. 2nd, 2021 11:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marycatelliThe contribution of the taxis carrying to the Battle of the Marne was, strategically, less than it is generally portrayed as. As a piece of propaganda it was of wonderful effect.
Different railroad companies in Britain took to GMT at different times, so that one schedule was in it, and another in local time.
A quartz ladle in ancient Rome could be worth a hundred times the working man's typical annual income.
When the village of Autun tried to put rats on trial for destroying their barley crops, the rats' lawyer successfully argued that the rats were entitled to not appear because the villagers' cats put them in danger of their lives, which is justification for not appearing. This case was actually cited as precedent.
The first railways in England dated to the Elizabethean era. They would carry wagons with heavy loads and were valuable because they spread the weight over the width of the road.
The Yazuka punished members by chopping off their pinkies because among other problems, it makes it impossible to properly grip a sword.
The Inca referred to the first horses they saw as "large sheep in silver shoes" according to the Spanish writer, who was using "sheep" to mean "llama."
A nun wrote one of the earliest English treatises on rod fishing.
Cochineal was a valuable property when seized off Spanish ships, and the pirates of the era loved getting it. Red dye was valuable.
In the United States, the Panic of 1857, virtually all the suffering was concentrated in the North, where the South continued to export cotton and prosper. This contributed to the belief that the South's prosperity was real and substantial, but the North's unreal and fugitive.
Picnics were originally gatherings at tavern at which everyone was expected to pay his own bill.
Recorded insults from the Elizabethan era are always addressed to "Thou" and not "You."
Athens lost the battle of Delium because when part of the army they had already fought showed up, the cavalry, their forces took it for a new, fresh army and panicked.
The real benefit of bombing Germany during WWII was quite possibly the luring out, and destruction, of the Luftwaffe, thus preventing it from providing air support for the army in Russia.
Slate was known as "blue gold" because it was so valued. It would last, it required a much less steep pitch of roof to shed water effectively, it could be split so thin that you could use lighter timbers to make your roof.
The Boat of Purity and Ease, is actually a lakeside pavilion by the Summer Palace in Beijing. It was notorious that the Empress Dowager Cixi spent monies meant for the navy on it, resulting a defeat by Japan and the loss of Taiwan.
The first hardcover books were wooden covers to restrain vellum's tendency to buckle and ripple.
The train had interesting effects on agriculture in Britain. First was the problem of cutting through fields, and changing whether land was wet or dry, and making it harder to get animals to pasture. Then there was the use of it to get animals to market while much fatter than they would be after the long, hard drove with limited pasture. Then there was the American train, bringing agricultural products to ports that could ship it over the Atlantic, and sending British agriculture into depression. Then, some farmers coped with new, more perishable products, such as strawberries or watercress, using the trains to get them to market.
The scent of roses will avert vampires. Putting a wild rose on its grave will keep it in.
King James II of Scotland banned golf because young men should spend their time on archery.
Spanish adopted the term pavo, peacock, for turkeys so thoroughly that to refer to a peacock, you must specify a pavo real -- royal peacock.
Oliver Cromwell disapproved of quinine because Jesuits found its anti-malarial properties.
Assyrians had to make all their siege machinery, such as siege towers, on the spot because it was too heavy to carry.
In the Manhattan project, "copper" was the code name for plutonium, meaning eventually they needed the code name of "honest-to-God copper" to mean copper.
Eleanora, daughter of Edward I, wrote her assent to her marriage to Alphonse, King of Aragon (the only record we have of any of his daughter's on their marriages), and noted that since she had no seal of her own, she was using her grandmother's and two bishop's.
There is a Finnish proverb: beautiful when threshing, always beautiful. That is, a woman who can look beautiful after the hard work and dirt of threshing is obviously simply beautiful (and also a sturdy worker).
The speed boats used to smuggle alcohol in the Caribbean during the Prohibition influenced WWII torpedo boats.
Bowing and curtseying in Elizabethan times were a trick to make insulting. Merely omitting them made you the boorish one, so a man had to bow more slowly, or quickly, or with exaggerated formality to insult. A woman's was less complicated, giving her less scope, but she was supposed to keep her eyes down, so her glancing up at the depth was known to be coquettish, and if she maintained eye contact the whole time, she was insolent. Because the elaborations were generally noble -- some writers held that no one could keep up with proper bowing outside of court, even in a noble home -- a lowly person could manage to be insolent by merely doing it with complete propriety.
Different railroad companies in Britain took to GMT at different times, so that one schedule was in it, and another in local time.
A quartz ladle in ancient Rome could be worth a hundred times the working man's typical annual income.
When the village of Autun tried to put rats on trial for destroying their barley crops, the rats' lawyer successfully argued that the rats were entitled to not appear because the villagers' cats put them in danger of their lives, which is justification for not appearing. This case was actually cited as precedent.
The first railways in England dated to the Elizabethean era. They would carry wagons with heavy loads and were valuable because they spread the weight over the width of the road.
The Yazuka punished members by chopping off their pinkies because among other problems, it makes it impossible to properly grip a sword.
The Inca referred to the first horses they saw as "large sheep in silver shoes" according to the Spanish writer, who was using "sheep" to mean "llama."
A nun wrote one of the earliest English treatises on rod fishing.
Cochineal was a valuable property when seized off Spanish ships, and the pirates of the era loved getting it. Red dye was valuable.
In the United States, the Panic of 1857, virtually all the suffering was concentrated in the North, where the South continued to export cotton and prosper. This contributed to the belief that the South's prosperity was real and substantial, but the North's unreal and fugitive.
Picnics were originally gatherings at tavern at which everyone was expected to pay his own bill.
Recorded insults from the Elizabethan era are always addressed to "Thou" and not "You."
Athens lost the battle of Delium because when part of the army they had already fought showed up, the cavalry, their forces took it for a new, fresh army and panicked.
The real benefit of bombing Germany during WWII was quite possibly the luring out, and destruction, of the Luftwaffe, thus preventing it from providing air support for the army in Russia.
Slate was known as "blue gold" because it was so valued. It would last, it required a much less steep pitch of roof to shed water effectively, it could be split so thin that you could use lighter timbers to make your roof.
The Boat of Purity and Ease, is actually a lakeside pavilion by the Summer Palace in Beijing. It was notorious that the Empress Dowager Cixi spent monies meant for the navy on it, resulting a defeat by Japan and the loss of Taiwan.
The first hardcover books were wooden covers to restrain vellum's tendency to buckle and ripple.
The train had interesting effects on agriculture in Britain. First was the problem of cutting through fields, and changing whether land was wet or dry, and making it harder to get animals to pasture. Then there was the use of it to get animals to market while much fatter than they would be after the long, hard drove with limited pasture. Then there was the American train, bringing agricultural products to ports that could ship it over the Atlantic, and sending British agriculture into depression. Then, some farmers coped with new, more perishable products, such as strawberries or watercress, using the trains to get them to market.
The scent of roses will avert vampires. Putting a wild rose on its grave will keep it in.
King James II of Scotland banned golf because young men should spend their time on archery.
Spanish adopted the term pavo, peacock, for turkeys so thoroughly that to refer to a peacock, you must specify a pavo real -- royal peacock.
Oliver Cromwell disapproved of quinine because Jesuits found its anti-malarial properties.
Assyrians had to make all their siege machinery, such as siege towers, on the spot because it was too heavy to carry.
In the Manhattan project, "copper" was the code name for plutonium, meaning eventually they needed the code name of "honest-to-God copper" to mean copper.
Eleanora, daughter of Edward I, wrote her assent to her marriage to Alphonse, King of Aragon (the only record we have of any of his daughter's on their marriages), and noted that since she had no seal of her own, she was using her grandmother's and two bishop's.
There is a Finnish proverb: beautiful when threshing, always beautiful. That is, a woman who can look beautiful after the hard work and dirt of threshing is obviously simply beautiful (and also a sturdy worker).
The speed boats used to smuggle alcohol in the Caribbean during the Prohibition influenced WWII torpedo boats.
Bowing and curtseying in Elizabethan times were a trick to make insulting. Merely omitting them made you the boorish one, so a man had to bow more slowly, or quickly, or with exaggerated formality to insult. A woman's was less complicated, giving her less scope, but she was supposed to keep her eyes down, so her glancing up at the depth was known to be coquettish, and if she maintained eye contact the whole time, she was insolent. Because the elaborations were generally noble -- some writers held that no one could keep up with proper bowing outside of court, even in a noble home -- a lowly person could manage to be insolent by merely doing it with complete propriety.
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Date: 2021-11-03 11:03 pm (UTC)