› added 7 years ago

138

TIL that Apelles, an ancient Greek painter, was considered by many, including Pliny, to be the greatest artist in the world. Pliny recorded that Alexander the Great so admired Apelles's work that he gave his concubine to him. Today, none of Apelles's original works have survived.

awE5J TIL: Pineapples were once so rare and exotic during the 18th century they used mainly for display at dinner parties, rather than being eaten, and were used again and again until they began to rot.
BgbNy TIL that Ginger Spice's (Geri Halliwell) famous Union Jack dress worn at the 1997 Brit Awards was a black mini dress that she thought was boring, so she asked her sister to sew a union jack tea towel to the front of it.
ne81P TIL Coca-Cola has a medical application. It is sometimes used for the treatment of gastric phytobezoars (trapped mass in the gastrointetsinal system). In about 50% of cases studied, Coca-Cola alone was found to be effective in gastric phytobezoar dissolution.
GY4WN TIL that the plane John McClane blows up in Die Hard 2, N473EV, was later nearly destroyed in reality by extreme turbulence which caused one engine to be completely torn from the plane mid-flight.
laDK TIL Titanic was predicted to be a monumental flop. Even director James Cameron thought he was “headed for disaster” at one point during filming. “We labored the last six months on Titanic in the absolute knowledge that the studio would lose $100 million. It was a certainty,” he stated.