The Field of Cloth of Gold
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 4, 2022
Situated just ten miles south of Calais, Balinghem is an unremarkable little village, but five hundred years ago this quiet countryside play...
The Turf Mazes of Britain
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 3, 2022
Turf mazes are labyrinths made by cutting a convoluted path in an area of short grass or lawn, and were once a common feature of the English...
Tarrare: The Man Who Ate Too Much
Kaushik Patowary
Mar 1, 2022
If gluttony is a sin, then perhaps the worst offender was a man named Tarrare who lived in 18th century France. He had such an insatiable ap...
Mensur And Bragging Scars
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 25, 2022
This is Otto Skorzeny, often regarded as Hitler’s deadliest general. An Obersturmbannführer (lieutenant colonel) in the SS during World W...
Giuseppe Fieschi’s Infernal Machine
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 24, 2022
On July 28, 1835, Giuseppe Marco Fieschi positioned himself in front of an open window on the third floor of N. 50 Boulevard du Temple in Pa...
The Eagle Made Out of Lincoln's Hair
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 23, 2022
In a small dimly lit back room of the Onondaga Historical Association in Syracuse, New York, is a unique and priceless treasure—a civil-war ...
The Clink: England’s Oldest Prison
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 22, 2022
The oldest prison in England and the country’s most notorious was owned not by the reigning monarch but the Bishop of Winchester. Now why wo...
The First Airmail Was Delivered During The Siege of Paris
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 22, 2022
When Prussian forces had Paris under siege during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, the beleaguered Parisians had only one hope to get messag...
Thomas Harriot: The Scientific Genius Who Eschewed Fame
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 21, 2022
Four hundred years ago, on July 2 1621, a remarkable Englishman named Thomas Harriot died in London. He left behind some 8,000 pages of scie...
Ashford v Thornton: The Last Challenge to Trial by Battle
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 18, 2022
Many personal disputes in the past have been settled by one-to-one combat. When a crime was committed, or a complainant accused a person of ...
The Donkey Wheel of Carisbrooke Castle
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 16, 2022
After King Charles I of England surrendered to Scottish forces following his defeat in the English Civil War (1642–1651), he was captured an...
The Pneumatic Clocks of Paris
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 15, 2022
When French-born but London-based civil and electrical engineer, Jules Albert Berly, traveled to Paris for the 1881 International Exposition...
Wood Gas Vehicles: Cars That Run on Firewood
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 14, 2022
In the early 19th century, in addition to coal and natural gas, a new kind of fuel became available to people. It was called synthetic gas (...
The Great Meteor Procession of 1913
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 11, 2022
On the night of February 9, 1913, inhabitants of a large portion of the northeastern United States and southeastern Canada witnessed a meteo...
The Pyramid of Cestius
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 10, 2022
Although we associate pyramids with Ancient Egypt, these four-sided structures with a tapering top are found all over the world, built by ma...
Kīpuka: A Different Kind of Volcanic Island
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 10, 2022
Sometimes when a volcano erupts and the subsequent lava flows engulf the mountain slope and the surrounding terrain, some pieces of the land...
Acta Diurna: The First Roman Newspaper
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 8, 2022
According to Cicero, from the beginning of Roman history the Pontifex Maximus compiled on a white table the most important events that had ...
How to Color The World
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 7, 2022
In addition to classifying thousands of animals and plants, early naturalists faced an enormous challenge: accurately describing their color...
Weighing The Mayor of High Wycombe
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 4, 2022
Every year at the Annual Meeting of the Charter Trustees of the town of High Wycombe, in Buckinghamshire, England, a new mayor is elected. T...
The 477-Mile Lightning Bolt
Kaushik Patowary
Feb 3, 2022
How far can a lightning bolt travel? Awfully far, as revealed by the World Meteorological Organization recently. In a press release publi...
