Flaming red hair gave the Viking Eric Thorvaldson his well-known nickname.
Eric (or Erik) was a Norwegian-born mariner, who became the first European to explore Greenland, though it seems other Norsemen had been there before him. He named it Greenland to indicate that it was more visually appealing that Iceland.
Eric was escaping murder charges in [more…]
Amongst the younger generation, it is fairly safe to say that Eva Perón is known primarily as the woman Madonna portrayed in the musical film Evita.
Argentinians will agree however, that there was more to Perón than a movie and the following synopsis of her life is merely the tip of the iceberg.
María Eva Duarte [more…]
Shaka kaSenzangakhonawas Zulu chief from 1818 – 1828. He changed the face of southern Africa by setting in motion the Mfecane and uniting the Zulu clans.
The Mfecane or ‘the crushing’, as the period became known, was a time of warfare and forced migrations. Zulu warriors, led by Shaka conquered and subjugated those in their [more…]
Reference to this insect dates back a thousand years.
The word is derived from the Old English colloquial term for insect, which was wicga.
Pronounced as ‘widger’, this word is thought to have come from the prehistoric Germanic base wig and is roughly equivalent in feeling to the term creepy-crawly.
Many folk used to believe that earwigs [more…]
Extract from Crossed Wires BIG 192
Crocodile tears refers to an insincere display of emotion. This ancient expression, which was used in ancient Rome, comes from an ancient anecdote that crocodiles weep in order to lure their prey, or that they cry for the victims they are eating. It may come from the fact that [more…]
Known as ‘the scourge of God’, Attila waged a reign of terror, ravaging vast areas of Europe and Asia between the Rhine and the Caspian Sea.
Attila lived from 406-453 and was king of the Huns from 433 until his death.
The Huns were already very powerful before Attila succeeded his uncle, Roas or Ruglias. Attila [more…]
According to James A H Murray, founding editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, the word Limerick has long been associated with nonsense verse and the Irish custom of drinking and reciting poems.
This Irish pub ritual ended with the participants reciting the refrain ‘Will you go down to Limerick?’ Hence the name of these five [more…]
Colossus is a popular large Lovatts crossword but where did the name come from?
In Ancient Greek the word was first used by the historian Herodotus as a name for certain gigantic statues in Egypt.
It became better known, of course, when applied to the Colossus of Rhodes, a 36 metre-high statue of Apollo that stood [more…]
The word DOLLAR originally started out in English as doler.
In the 16th century, the present day town of Jachymov, situated in the Erzgebirge Mountains, Czechoslavakia, was known as Sankt Joachimsthal and was in Bohemia.
In 1519, under the direction of the Count of Schlick, large coins were minted there using silver from a nearby mine.
A [more…]
