Invention
Where does Kaleidoscope come from?
Scottish physicist David Brewster discovered the effect while experimenting with light around 1815 and patented the toy in 1817, naming it from Greek words for 'beautiful form' and 'to look'.
More Inventions
Invention
Hot-air balloon
📍 Annonay, France
Paper-makers Joseph and Étienne Montgolfier first flew their hot-air balloon publicly in their hometown of Annonay, France, in June 1783. Chinese sky lanterns came first, but theirs carried the first passengers: a sheep, a duck and a rooster.
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Invention
Aerosol spray can
📍 Oslo, Norway
Norwegian chemical engineer Erik Rotheim of Oslo applied for the first aerosol spray can patent in 1926. Americans later made spray cans famous with WWII 'bug bombs' that sprayed insecticide against malaria mosquitoes.
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Invention
Animated feature film
📍 Buenos Aires, Argentina
The first feature-length cartoon wasn't Snow White (1937) but El Apóstol, made in Buenos Aires in 1917 by Quirino Cristiani from 58,000 frames of cut-out animation. Its only copy was lost in a 1926 studio fire.
More from Europe
Nature
European rabbit
📍 Iberia & southwestern France
Rabbits are Iberian natives: the oldest fossils of the species, 600,000 years old, come from southern Spain. Australia's rabbit plague began with just 24 rabbits released in Victoria in 1859.
Game
Cribbage
📍 England
Cribbage grew out of noddy, an old English card game, and the poet Sir John Suckling is credited with inventing it in the early 1600s. Points are scored by moving pegs along a wooden board full of holes.
Game
Parkour
📍 Lisses (near Paris), France
Parkour took shape in Lisses, near Paris, where David Belle and friends trained together. They called themselves the Yamakasi, from a Lingala phrase meaning “strong man, strong spirit”.