Oddities

And some odd facts for your perusal.  Bizarre truths that could harness the weather.

 When Albert Einstein died, his final words died with him. The nurse at his side didn't understand German.

 St Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, was not Irish.

 A South African monkey was once awarded a medal and promoted to the rank of corporal during World War I.

 The Toltecs, Seventh-century native Mexicans, went into battle with wooden swords so as not to kill their enemies.

 China banned the pigtail in 1911 as it was seen as a symbol of feudalism.

 Before it was stopped by the British, it was the not uncommon for women in some areas of India to choose to be burnt alive on their husband's funeral pyre.

 Before the Second World War, it was considered a sacrilege to even touch an Emperor of Japan.

 Ancient drinkers warded off the devil by clinking their cups

 The Nobel Prize resulted form a late change in the will of Alfred Nobel, who did not want to be remembered after his death as a propagator of violence - he invented dynamite.

 Coffee is the second largest item of international commerce in the world. The largest is petrol.

 King George III was declared violently insane in 1811, 9 years before he died.

 When George I became King of England in 1714, his wife did not become Queen. He placed her under house arrest for 32 years.

 The magic word "Abracadabra" was originally intended for the specific purpose of curing hay fever.

 Catherine the First of Russia, made a rule that no man was allowed to get drunk at one of her parties before nine o'clock.

 Queen Elizabeth I passed a law which forced everyone except for the rich to wear a flat cap on Sundays.

 At the age of 12, Martin Luther King became so depressed he tried committing suicide twice, by jumping out of his bedroom window.

 It is illegal to be a prostitute in Siena, Italy, if your name is Mary.

 The Turk's consider it considered unlucky to step on a piece of bread.

 The authorities do not allow tourists to take pictures of Pygmies in Zambia.

 The Dutch in general prefer their french fries with mayonnaise.

 Hindus don't like dying in bed, they prefer to die beside a river.

 Sir Winston Churchill rationed himself to 15 cigars a day.

 The childrens' nursery rhyme 'Ring-a-Ring-a-Roses' actually refers to the Black Death which killed about 30 million people in the fourteenth-century.

 During the reign of Elizabeth I, there was a tax put on men's beards.

 Some Eskimos have been known to use refrigerators to keep their food from freezing.

 It is illegal to play tennis in the streets of Cambridge.