Woman with TEN brains!
QUESTION Leonardo da Vinci is said to have been able to write with one hand while drawing with the other. Has anyone else achieved this feat?
BETWEEN the 1920s and 1940s, Thea Alba, also known as Dorothea Sohm, was a multi-tasking German circus artiste billed as ‘the woman with ten brains’.
She was able to draw and write simultaneously with her hands, feet and mouth. She could even write in different languages – French, German and English – with different parts of her body at the same time.
Her most famous act was writing simultaneously with all ten fingers, with each digit composing a different text.
Simon Welch, Malvern, Worcester. LEONARDO DA VINCI was known by his contemporaries as mancino – which is Italian slang for a left-hander.
Experts use signs of left-handedness to authenticate the artist’s work, particularly his drawings.
There is ample evidence that he was ambidextrous. Several early sketches appear to have been rendered with his right hand and there are examples of him writing with his right hand.
Leonardo was famed for mirror writing – he would make his notes with his left hand writing from right to left. It’s thought he did this to prevent the ink smudging as he wrote. Leonardo also made several sketches showing his own left hand at work. It’s possible he did these with his right hand as he wrote.
In the early 1900s, Swiss artist Paul Klee painted with his left hand and would draw with both hands simultaneously, ‘taking his line for a walk’, as he put it.
Dutch artist Rajacenna van Dam, who works under her first name and is known for her hyperrealistic portraits, draws with both hands, in an effort to save time, she claims.
Emily Large, London NW5.
QUESTION Why was there a five-year naval blockade of Argentina in the mid-19th century?
THIS was a complicated power struggle that involved strife within Uruguay and Argentina, and intervention by France, Britain and Brazil.
The conflict began when Argentinian dictator Juan Manuel de Rosas, a former army officer known as the Restorer of Laws, attempted to annex Uruguay. He supported Manuel Oribe of the nationalist Blanco faction against the elected Uruguayan president Jose Fructuoso Rivera and his centrist Colorado party.
There was a nine-year siege of Rivera’s stronghold in Montevideo. To assist Rivera and maintain free trade with Uruguay, France dispatched a fleet to blockade the River Plate.
In 1845, they were joined by a British contingent under William Gore Ouseley.
Britain did not have significant trade interests in Buenos Aires, but chose to aid the French to foster cordial relations.
Their efforts were largely ineffective and, in 1850, Britain and France withdrew. Rosas had successfully resisted the two most powerful nations on Earth, but an uprising led by Justo Josede Urquiza dramatically changed the situation.
Brazil, fearing Rosas would annex Uruguay, intervened, providing Urquiza and the Colorados with money and naval forces. In the Battle of Monte Casceros on February 3, 1852, Urquiza drove Rosas from power. Ironically, Rosas fled to Britain in disguise, arriving in Plymouth on April 26, 1852, and was given asylum. He remarked: ‘It is not the people who have overthrown me. It is the monkeys, the Brazilians.’
Rosas’s legacy and regime are still hotly debated in Argentina. Some consider his dictatorial regime akin to fascism, yet nationalist politicians have honoured him on banknotes, postage stamps and monuments.
Richard Simms, Cambridge.
QUESTION potatoes Why are called spuds?
A SPUD was once a sharp, narrow spade used to dig up large-rooted plants. Samuel Pepys used one back in the 17th century, remarking: ‘We... begun with a spudd to lift up the ground.’
The word had first appeared in English around 1450 referring to a short dagger. A play called The Castle Of Perseverance refers to ‘my spud of sorwe swote’ or ‘my dagger of sweet repentance’.
Spud may be derived from the Dutch spyd, the Old Norse spjot (spear) or the Latin spad (sword). By the early 19th century, it was a three-pronged fork.
In 1805’s Practical Agriculture, R.W. Dickson described how ‘the labourer makes use of a threepronged fork, which in some places is termed a spud ... each prong being about an inch and a half in breadth’.
By the 19th century, the word began to describe the vegetable rather than the implement. An 1860 slang dictionary states: ‘In Scotland, a spud is a raw potato; and roasted spuds those cooked in the cinders with their jackets on.’
Mollie Smyth, Hereford.
QUESTION When did the Black Arrows change their name to the Red Arrows?
FURTHER to the earlier answer, 111 Squadron in Britain’s RAF was not, in fact, a night fighter squadron. Their Hawker Hunter aircraft were delivered in the usual camouflage colours for a frontline fighter squadron.
Their first formation aerobatics displays in 1956 were given in the original colours and it was not until March 1957 that they were painted black.
The colour choice was made by the team’s founder, Sqn Ldr Roger Topp, drawing from the ‘mean and purposeful’ appearance of the Bristol Beaufighter night fighters of World War II.
Another reason for choosing black was because it hid the ugly stains that appear on an operational aircraft in daily use.
A number of Black Arrows pilots are still with us, including my uncle, Ross Colwill.
I am the producer of a two-hour documentary about the Black Arrows, which is available at classicmachinefilms.co.uk.
Ian Stark, Farnborough.
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