A cat? That’s just barking!
QUESTION Was the Tasmanian tiger (now extinct) a
species of cat? The so-called Tasmanian tiger, Tasmanian wolf or thylacine ( Thylocinus cynocephalus) wasn’t even vaguely catlike, apart from having tabby-like stripes on its lower back and tail. It was a Labrador- sized marsupial predator, related to the Tasmanian devil and the numbat, with a very dog-like head and body, and a long, stiff tail. They were shy, secretive creatures, and reportedly made a husky barking sound when anxious.
The last official specimen died in hobart Zoo in 1936, but there have been repeated claims of sightings and footprints of the animal in Tasmania and New South Wales on the mainland, continuing to this day.
There did used to exist an animal known as the marsupial lion, Thylacoleo carnifex, which was a large and somewhat cat-like predator despite being closely related to kangaroos, koalas and wombats.
early Aboriginal rock art suggests that Thylacoleo was also striped. This animal is believed to have been extinct for tens of thousands of years, but some people think occasional sightings of a mysterious animal known as the ‘Queensland cat’ might mean that a few marsupial lions survived into the mid-20th century.
Claire M. Jordan, West Calder, West Lothian.
QUESTION
Why did Virgil keep a pet fly? PubLIuS VeRGILIuS MARO (70bC19bC), commonly known as Virgil, the son of a farmer in northern Italy, became one of Rome’s great poets. he’s best known for three major works — the bucolics (or eclogues), the Georgics and Rome’s national epic, The Aeneid — but several minor poems are also attributed to him.
One fascinating story about him is the curious tale of his pet fly, and the lavish funeral held in its honour. held in the grounds of his home on Rome’s esquiline hill, it was attended by city dignitaries, dirges were sung and tributes read.
Virgil’s patron, Maecenas, delivered a long eulogy to the departed insect, and Virgil himself was said to have recited odes over the recumbent insect. To the wails of professional mourners, the fly was eventually interred in a great mausoleum. The whole lavish ceremony was estimated to have cost more than 800,000 sesterces.
In fact, Virgil hadn’t kept a fly as a pet: the funeral was reputed to be a ruse to save his land. having defeated Julius Caesar’s assassins at the battle of Philippi, the Second Triumvirate was intent on confiscating the estates of the rich and dividing them among the war veterans returning home. The only exception was if the estate held a burial plot. So by burying his house fly, Virgil saved his house.
Like any good story, it contains elements of truth. Virgil did live on the esquiline hill; his mentor was Maecenas; the government was seizing land for the resettlement and Virgil’s land, or that of his father, was contested.
Yet Suetonius, t he pre - eminent chronicler of the age, doesn’t mention this anecdote, and nor do any of the various commentaries on, or biographies of, Virgil written over the past 2,000 years.
In his will, Virgil stipulated that he should be buried just outside Naples. his grave soon became a major attraction and place of quasi-religious pilgrimage, and it’s likely that the fly story is part of the body of Neapolitan legend that built up around him after his death.
Oliver Caine, London SW8. FROM the beginning of the 20th century, seed companies i n America started sending out catalogues to farmers to advertise their goods. To make these more attractive, they would scatter jokes and cartoons throughout the pages.
The jokes were of dubious quality, and the catalogues started to be known as ‘corn catalogue jokes’, which was then shortened to ‘ corny’, and eventually applied to all humour considered embarrassingly unsophisticated.
Tim Brooks, Wrexham.
QUESTION
Why a ‘corny’ joke? QUESTION A plaque on the wall of an old warehouse in Hackney Wick, East London, says one of the first plastics was invented there. What was that plastic like? FuRTheR to earlier answers, shellac, also called the ‘original plastic’, was first known for black laquerwork in the Far east and as French polish, or knotting, in the West. In the 19th century it was imported for the red dye in the resin, to dye the Redcoats’ coats red, until i t was replaced by cochineal. The resin was a by-product, but 20th-century research discovered a huge number of other uses for it.
Its main characteristic was that it was hard until heated, when it became a plastic state, almost liquid. If heated further, then cooled, it became insoluble. In its plastic/ liquid state it could be pumped and moulded and would hold any intricate shape, for example 78rpm records.
The resin was produced in Pakistan and India in the west and China in the east. The tree from which it was collected grows only at certain altitudes, and is infected with ‘broodlac’ twice a year. The mature lac insect sucks the sap to use as an egg casing for its young. The resulting hard, crusty exudate on the twigs is removed, crushed and processed, then sold as ‘flakelac’ or ‘buttonlac’.
Shellac is refined further by dissolving it in solvents, bleaching and filtering it, then returning it to its solid form. The process was invented by my grandfather, A. F. Suter, who built a factory on eastway, on hackney Wick, where I worked in the Seventies with my three uncles, who’d entered the business in the Thirties.
The Greeks and Romans were familiar with shellac, and its uses are many and varied, r anging f r om coatings f or pharmaceuticals, foods and confectionery, cosmetics, paper finishes, printing inks, wood finishes such as paints and varnishes, cloth and more.
Oil-based resins have now displaced shellac in many i ndustries, and the chemical processing was moved to the Far east. The company stopped processing it in the Nineties, and the premises closed.
Simon Suter, Heathfield, E. Sussex.
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