10 Amazing Scientific “Facts of The World” interesting facts for Class 10 and 12 Part 28

Facts of The World – 28

931. The Portuguese brought potatoes to India in the early 17th century. They started potato cultivation along the west coast where they were called ‘batata’. The British also introduced potatoes to Bengal, where they were known as ‘alu’.

932. The original name of Martin Luther King, Junior, was Michael.

933. Because the River Nile flows North, Upper Egypt is actually in the South and Lower Egypt is in the North.

934. More than 70 per cent of the earth’s dry land is affected by desertification.

935. Historians have traced some of the current traditions surrounding Father Christmas (Santa Claus) back to the ancient Celtic roots. Santa Claus’ elves are the modernization of the ‘Nature folk’ of the pagan regions. His reindeers are associated with the ‘Horned God’ which was one of the Pagan deities.

936. The poinsettia, traditionally an American Christmas flower, originally grew in Mexico where it was known as the ‘Flower of the Night’ Joel Poinsett brought it to American in 1829.

937. The Wright Brothers tested the first airplane in a wind tunnel.

938. The word ‘Jeep’ came from the abbreviation used in the army for the ‘General Purpose’ vehicle, G.P.

939. The nursery rhyme, ‘Ring around the Rosey’ is a rhyme about the plague. People infected with the plague disease would get red circular sores which would smell very badly. So the local people would put flowers on their bodies so as to cover the smell of the sores (‘a pocket full of posey’). People who died from the plague would be burned so as to check the possibility of the disease spreading ‘ashes, ashes, we all fall down’). Today, the nursery rhyme is sung in a much different way. It goes like this: “Ring – a , Ring – a roses, pocket full of poses….”

940. Both Julius Caesar and Napoleon Bonaparte suffered from epilepsy.