I Used to Know That_ Stuff You Forgot From School - Caroline Taggart [47]
3. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.
4. Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.
5. Honor thy father and thy mother.
6. Thou shalt not kill.
7. Thou shalt not commit adultery.
8. Thou shalt not steal.
9. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.
10. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbor’s.
Roman Numerals
I = 1
C = 100
V = 5
D = 500
X = 10
M = 1,000
L = 50
From there, the Romans could make up any number they wanted—except, interestingly enough, zero, because they didn’t have a symbol for it. They made the other numbers by adding (putting letters at the end) or subtracting (putting them at the beginning).
For example:
I = 1
II = 2
III = 3 but IV (for example, 1 before 5) = 4
Similarly,
V = 5
VI = 6
VII = 7
VIII = 8 but IX (1 before 10) = 9
The same principle applies with the big numbers, so you end up with something like XLIV (44, because it is 10 before 50 and 1 before 5) and CDXCIX (499, made up of 100 before 500, 10 before 100, and 1 before 10). You would have thought 499 might be ID (1 before 500), but it isn’t.
The Seven Wonders of the World
The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, described in an old encyclopedia as “remarkable for their splendor or magnitude,” were:
��� The Hanging Gardens of Babylon
• The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus
• The Lighthouse of Alexandria
• The Colossus of Rhodes
• The Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
• The Statue of Zeus at Olympia
• The Great Pyramid of Giza
Of the seven, only the Great Pyramid is still in existence.
A Bit of Classical Mythology
There are lots of Greek and Roman gods, as well as enough mythological characters and demigods to fill a book on their own, but these are some you might remember:
Famous Artists
This was meant to be a Top 20, but the list kept growing. There are so many artists that have contributed to the wonderful world of art we know today that I found I couldn’t leave any of these names out.
Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510, Italian): best known for The Birth of Venus (Venus with flowing hair, standing in a shell).
Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519, Italian): painter, sculptor, inventor, and all-around polymath—one of the great figures of the Renaissance. Among many of his celebrated works are Mona Lisa and The Last Supper.
Michelangelo Buonarotti (1475-1564, Italian): painter—most famous for the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican—and sculptor of the statue of David in Florence.
Raphael (1483-1520, Italian): painter of many versions of the Madonna and Child; and of frescoes, notably The School of Athens for the Sistine Chapel.
Titian (c. 1490-1576, Italian): greatest painter of the Venetian school. His religious and mythological subjects include Assumption of the Virgin and Bacchus and Ariadne.
Hans Holbein the Younger (c. 1497-1543, German, latterly in England): court painter to Henry VIII, responsible for the flattering portrait of Anne of Cleves, which encouraged the king to marry her.
Pieter Brueghel the Elder (1525-69, Flemish): famous for scenes of peasant life and landscapes.
El Greco (Domenikos Theotokopoulos, 1541-1614, Greek living in Spain): used distinctive elongated figures in his paintings of saints and in The Burial of Count Orgaz.
Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640, Flemish): greatest of the Baroque artists, based mainly in Antwerp. Painted the ceiling of the Banqueting Hall in Whitehall, London, but is best remembered for depictions of abundantly fleshy women.
Frans Hals (c. 1581-1666, Dutch): best known for portraiture. Painter of The Laughing Cavalier.
Diego de Velázquez (1599-1660, Spanish): court painter to Philip IV, producing many portraits of his patron and his family, notably Las Meninas. Also The Rokeby Venus,