Discoveries
Dord: The Ghost Word
RETRO
Webster’s New International Dictionary (Second Edition) was the largest book to be mass produced, but – as was revealed on 28th February, 1939 – it contained an embarrassing error: on page 771, between the entries for Dorcopsis (a type of small kangaroo) and doré (golden in colour), was the word ‘dord’. Which doesn’t exist. The …
The Most Famous Sheep in the World
RETRO
Dolly The Sheep, the first ever successfully cloned mammal, was introduced to the world’s press at the Roslin Institute in Scotland on 22nd February, 1997. Born seven months earlier, with the comparatively unremarkable name ‘Lamb Number 6LL3’, news of her birth had been leaked by The Observer before the scientific paper about her genesis could …
The Lucy Fossil – No Homo
RETRO
It took over three million years to find her. But palaeontologists Donald Johanson and Tom Gray uncovered the remains of ‘the Lucy Fossil’ – a previously undiscovered species of pre-human – in Hadar, Ethiopia on 24th November, 1974. Despite the find’s massive significance, the event was not greeted with untrammelled joy by all their rival …
Digging Up King Tut
RETRO
Tutankhamun’s tomb was discovered by a water boy who serendipitously stumbled on a buried staircase in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings on 4th November, 1922. It marked the greatest triumph in archaeologist Howard Carter’s career, and unearthed dozens of priceless treasures. The loot included the famous golden death-mask – but also the Pharaoh’s walking sticks, linen …