This is a followup to Today I Learned 2024, Today I Learned 2023, Today I Learned 2022 and Today I Learned 2021.
20 Feb 2025: It is likely that the Battle of Hastings in 1066 had a lunch break Link to heading
The battle is likely to have begun around 9am, and lasted until around 6pm, which made it an unusually long battle for the era. Given the battle length, it is thought likely that there would have been a lull in the early afternoon, while the dead and wounded were moved, leaders took stock of their positions and plans, and fighters on both sides got some food and rest. Not quite both sides agreeing to put down their weapons while they sat down for lunch and refreshments, but still a kind-of lunch break none-the-less.
7 Mar 2025: “Umbles” are the entrails of animals, originally put in pies eaten by the poor Link to heading
Hence the expression “eat umble pie” (later becoming “eat humble pie”).
15 Apr 2025: The square windows which crashed the first jet airliner weren’t passenger windows Link to heading
A bit of background for this one: The first commercial jet airliner was the de Havilland Comet, which first flew in 1949 and began passenger flights in 1952. Unfortunately there were 3 crashes in the first year of operation and all the planes were grounded. The cause of these was eventually traced to metal fatigue, which was poorly understood at the time (and so would probably have caused a problem for any other pioneering aircraft manufacturer too). The story I’d heard many times before is that square windows were subsequently found to suffer much more metal fatigue than round windows, and that’s why all aircraft have had round windows ever since. But while it is true that the Comet passenger windows were originally square and were changed to be round after the discovery, in airline engineering terminology “window” also includes metal panels (aka cut outs), and in this case the main issue was not the passenger windows, but the ADF (Automatic Direction Finder) antenna cut out. Source: National Museum Of Flight, Scotland.
18 Apr 2025: Kimonos are worn left over right, unless you are dead in which case it is right over left Link to heading
22 Apr 2025: The only countries whose names start with “the” are The Bahamas and The Gambia Link to heading
2 May 2025: Keep following the first link of any Wikipedia page and you’ll reach the Philosophy page Link to heading
For most pages, it will be 10-30 links until you reach the Philosophy page. Source: Wikipedia talk:Getting to Philosophy.
3 Jul 2025: You’ll never be more than 34.9km from a road in the USA or 9.1km from a road in the UK Link to heading
That is 21.7 miles and 5.65 miles respectively, and is for the contiguous USA (the 48 mainland USA states) and mainland UK. Source for the USA is https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42104894 . Source for the UK is a tweet from the Ordnance Survey (/ordnancesurvey/status/1133372498777640960) which I believe says “It’s about 344m west of Loch Beinn Dearg and 667m east of Cadhachan Riabhach in #Scotland. It’s around 9.1km WNW from the nearest road (restricted) and you’d have to cross Fionn Loch! The nearest numbered road is A832 about 10.6km ENE”.
12 Jul 2025: Of the 47 Presidents of the United States, 34 (or 23) have Scottish ancestry Link to heading
“Of the 45 Presidents of the United States, 34 have Scottish ancestry” according to a (now no-longer-available) National Library of Scotland page. However, the Wikipedia page at Ancestral background of presidents of the United States puts the number at 23 of 47.
17 Aug 2025: Fedora and Trilby hats are named after characters in plays Link to heading
A hat of the Fedora style was worn by the character Fédora Romazoff in the first US performance of the 1882 play by Victorien Sardou called Fédora, and a hat of the Trilby style was worn by the character Trilby O’Ferrall in the first London production of the stage adaptation of George du Maurier’s 1894 novel Trilby.
25 Aug 2025: A currywurst is just a normal bratwurst but with curry powder and sauce on it Link to heading
For some reason I thought the sausage itself was made with the curry inside it. Have to admit to being slightly disappointed when I found this one out.
9 Oct 2025: The salt in salted liquorice (salmiakki in Finland) is not table salt Link to heading
Table salt is sodium chloride, while the salt in salted liquorice is ammonium chloride.
10 Dec 2025: There haven’t always been different shoes for left and right feet Link to heading
I came across a claim by a high end shoe manufacturer that they had invented the idea of having different shoes for the left and right feet in the Victorian era. However, it seems that this isn’t quite true. The real story is (probably) that there were separate shoes for left and right feet through most of recorded history, e.g. the Romans had separate sandals for left and right (see e.g. These boots were made for Romans) and there are references to different shoes for different feet in Shakespeare (e.g. “falsely thrust upon contrary feet,”), but this practice was “forgotten” and most shoes were “straight lasted” by the late 1700s (most likely to simplify production), before the idea of separate shoes for separate feet was “rediscovered” in the Victorian era.
17 Dec 2025: If someone dies in the Houses of Parliament they wouldn’t be declared dead there Link to heading
I heard from a reliable source that if someone dies in the Houses of Parliament they would be taken to the nearest hospital before being declared dead, because they can’t put the place of death as a royal palace. According to Prohibition of dying it appears some people mistakenly believe this is because dying in a royal palace would entitle the dead person to a state funeral. However, the more likely explanation is that, under the Coroners Act 1988, a death in a royal palace has to be investigated by the coroner of the monarch’s household, so it may be procedurally simpler to declare any death at a nearby hospital (where any coroner could be used) instead. In the process of looking for sources for this, I also came across a (now no-longer-available) document from the Law Commission, where there are many other gems, e.g. it is illegal to wear a suit of armour in the Houses of Parliament due to a law dating back over 700 years to 1313, but it has never been illegal to eat mince pies on Christmas Day (although it was illegal to celebrate festivals such as Christmas and Easter between 1647 and 1660).