London’s Fleet Street, named after the river Fleet which flows at one end of the street, had many legal offices and courts surrounding it in the late 15th century. From 1500s onwards, several publishing and printing shops began locating themselves on Fleet Street to serve the legal offices in its neighbourhood. From 1702, when London’s first daily newspaper The Daily …

Fat Tuesday is Mardi Gras, where ‘Gras’ is French for ‘fat’ and ‘Mardi’ is French for ‘Tuesday’. The name comes from the tradition of slaughtering and feasting on a fattened calf on the last day of a carnival. The annual festivities start on January 6, the Twelfth Night Feast of the Epiphany, when the three kings are supposed to have …

Falconry is the ancient practice of training birds of prey to kill for man. It dates back thousands of years, the earliest falconers probably using the birds as a means of obtaining food. It soon developed into a sport for kings and queens and the well-to-do, and became very fashionable during the Middle Ages in Europe. Today it is much …

Ethical fashion involves taking into consideration the various people involved in making a piece of clothing. For instance, even as one buys a pair of jeans, not many think about the farmers who grew the cotton that went into creating the material, the workers (mainly from poor countries) who helped sew the jeans, the various chemicals used on it and …

In the 1890s, the British military developed a bullet to be used at Dum Dum arsenal in India’s North-West frontier and was named ‘dumdum’ bullet. It comprised a jacketed .303 bullet in which the jacket nose opened to expose its lead core to improve the effectiveness of the bullet by increasing its expansion upon impact. Afterwards, the term dumdum was …

Dies Irae literally means day of wrath. The mediaeval Christians were preoccupied with the end of the world; they anticipated the Last Judgement, followed by the millennium. After the fall of the Roman Empire there was a revival of the belief. The year 1000 excited mythological speculation, as did famines, plagues and earthquakes. The visionary Joachim of Fiore divided history …

Dervish word originates from the Turkish word ‘darvis’, meaning poor or mendicant. Dervish music began among Muslim religious groups, known for their practice of energetic dancing, whirling, chanting or singing.

Deliberately seeking a romantic dalliance with someone less successful or famous. In Hollywood, where egos are very fragile, many celebrities have adopted the habit of ‘dating down’ or the process of trading out a partner whose success is equal to theirs in favour of one who falls about three notches below them on the fame ladder. It’s always easier to …

Their name may give you a clue as to why these fishes must be handled very carefully. These striking fishes are popular in marine aquariums. Drifting through the water with all their fins fully extended, they look wonderfully majestic. The fins are composed of long, separate spines and it is eighteen of these that are potentially very dangerous. The spines …

Crop milk is a secretion from the lining of the crop of parent birds that is regurgitated to young birds. They are found among all pigeons and doves where they are referred to as pigeon milk. Crop milk is also produced by flamingos and some penguins. Crop milk bears little resemblance to mammalian milk, being a semi-solid substance somewhat like …