January 9, 2007 12:39pm by David Farrar

100 things we didn’t know last year

The BBC has a list of 100 things we didn’t know last year. Some highlights:

9. Fathers tend to determine the height of their child, mothers their weight.

20. Sex workers in Roman times charged the equivalent price of eight glasses of red wine.

27. Just one cow gives off enough harmful methane gas in a single day to fill around 400 litre bottles.

44. For every 10 successful attempts to climb Mount Everest there is one fatality.

58. Forty-one percent of English women have punched or kicked their partners, according to a study.

60. The clitoris derives its name from the ancient Greek word kleitoris, meaning “little hill”.

64. Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobiacs is the term for people who fear the number 666.

85. The age limit for marriage in France was, until recently, 15 for girls, but 18 for boys. The age for girls was raised to 18 in 2006.