Factplay is your daily dose of the most fascinating, mind-bending, and unbelievable facts. Fuel your curiosity and discover the secrets of the world around you.
Archaeologists have found pots of honey in ancient Egyptian tombs that are over 3,000 years old and still perfectly edible. Its low water content and high acidity make it an inhospitable environment for bacteria and microorganisms.
An octopus has one main, systemic heart that pumps blood through its body and two smaller branchial hearts that pump blood through its gills. Also, their blood is blue because it uses a copper-based protein called hemocyanin to transport oxygen.
Venus rotates on its axis incredibly slowly. It takes 243 Earth days to complete one rotation (a Venusian day), but it only takes 225 Earth days to orbit the Sun (a Venusian year). This makes its day longer than its year.
Cleopatra, the last pharaoh of Egypt, lived from 69 BC to 30 BC. The Great Pyramid of Giza was completed around 2560 BC. This means she lived closer in time to the launch of the first iPhone (2007 AD) than to the construction of the pyramids.
In Strasbourg, a woman began to dance uncontrollably in the street. Within a month, around 400 people had joined her. Many danced until they collapsed from exhaustion or died. The cause remains a mystery, with theories ranging from mass hysteria to ergot poisoning.
The popular image of Vikings with horned helmets is a 19th-century invention, popularized by costume designers for a Wagner opera. Actual Viking helmets were typically simple, conical caps made of leather or metal, without any horns.
This isn't a joke. Wombats produce cube-shaped feces. They use these blocky droppings to mark their territory, and the flat sides prevent them from rolling away. Scientists believe their intestinal elasticity varies to create the cube shape.
In botanical terms, a berry is a fruit produced from the ovary of a single flower. By this definition, bananas, grapes, and even avocados are berries. Strawberries, however, develop from a receptacle that holds multiple tiny fruits, making them "aggregate fruits."
The sound a rubber duck makes is called a "mimp." This specific onomatopoeic word was coined to describe the unique, soft squeak, differentiating it from a "squeak" or "squawk." It's a fun, little-known piece of linguistic trivia.