Fast facts
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Monday, March 29, 2004
Things you always never wanted to know
"Red tape," the rigid application of regulations and routine that delays productivity, got its name from the color of the tape commonly used to tie official papers. The term was coined as early as 1658.
A female pharaoh was unknown in Egypt before Hatshepsut, who began her reign in 1502 B.C. In order not to shock convention, she had herself portrayed in male costume, with a beard and without breasts.
Every day for 40 years after her prince consort died, Queen Victoria ordered that his evening clothes be laid afresh on his bed in his suite at Windsor Castle.
Andrew Jackson, later a U.S. president, was taken prisoner by the British during the American Revolution when he was 13 years old. He had refused to polish the boots of a British officer.
If Spartan youngsters, inspected at birth, were found physically unsound, they were abandoned and allowed to die. Those in good health were taken from their mothers when they reached the age of 7 and brought up in the barracks to live the "Spartan life."
4The Circus Maximus in Rome, after being rebuilt by Julius Caesar, could hold 150,000 people. It was enlarged again in the early empire to admit an additional 100,000.
The city of Corinth, in ancient Greece, made prostitution a major industry. More than a thousand women worked as prostitutes at the temple of Aphrodite Porne. The city became a notorious port of call for sailors.
The chrysanthemum requires an uninterrupted period of approximately 13 hours of darkness during an autumn night before it will flower.