Unusual and Random Facts

[Bryd0]

The strings of a guitar, violin and any other stringed instrument are made from the gut lining of a cat.

I honestly do not believe that, but apparently that's what my mum told me when she knew this from Biology during her school days. DrLeftover, find out if that's really true if you want since you seem to prove to us that some of these things are right and wrong.

 

[Evil Eye]

The strings of a guitar, violin and any other stringed instrument are made from the gut lining of a cat.

There is something called catgut, but it's made from cattle, not cats. Modern strings tend to be more synthetic. (After all, vegans wouldn't stand for it.)

 

[Bryd0]

I see... thanks for the correction

 

[DrLeftover]

Sorry I missed that one.

Not only for instruments, but other 'things with strings' as well.

Here's a link to people that know that kind of thing.

Natural gut has been regarded as the premiere tennis string since the early 1800s. It has been, and remains, the most frequently used string on the pro tour. The history of natural gut tennis string dates back almost to the beginning of tennis itself - the first set of natural gut tennis string was manufactured by Pierre Babolat in 1875. Fifty years later, Babolat would launch VS Brand Gut. Seventy-eight years later, VS Brand Gut continues to be one of the most recognized brands of natural gut.

http://www.tennis-warehouse.com/lc/naturalgut.html

 

[buysell-browse.com]

There is something called catgut, but it's made from cattle, not cats. Modern strings tend to be more synthetic. (After all, vegans wouldn't stand for it.)

Now about that catgut...

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[Bryd0]

If any of you recall the Popeye cartoons where Popeye himself gained superhuman strength by eating a can of spinach, there is a funny fact behind that. Firstly, it contains iron but not a lot of it. Now this is where the funny fact comes in... the misconception of spinach making you strong is from a fault in a study made in 1870 by Emil von Wolff, where he placed the wrong decimal point of spinach's iron content, leading to its value of iron ten times higher than it should've been. This faulty measurement had gone unnoticed until the 1930s.