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TIL In 1251, Henry III was given a Polar Bear by the King of Norway. It was kept in the Tower of London on a long chain so that it could swim in the Thames

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E1lZ0 TIL that Prince John William Friso (d. 1711) is the ancestor of every European royal house (Albania, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Spain, Sweden, UK, Yugoslavia)
R7NVw TIL that an Escher sentence is a comparative sentence that seems to make sense but doesn't on closer inspection: "more people have been to Russia than I have"
jb1p TIL that three Stanford “rocket scientist” mechanical engineering PhD students invented a disease-detecting breath analyzer and were approved to test their prototype on human patients – all in under one year, an almost unfathomable feat in the medical device realm
nWoJo TIL In the US. up until 1996, nicotine patches and gum required a prescription from a doctor
W7oo8 TIL that there is a species of ant called Tetramorium caespitum that is also known as “the pavement ant” because it often nests under sidewalks and driveways. They are notorious for having massive wars with other colonies over territory