Nature
Where does European rabbit come from?
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.
More Animals & plants
Nature
Oil palm
📍 West Africa (Gulf of Guinea coast)
The oil palm is native to West and Central Africa, from Gambia down to Angola, where people have used it for millennia. Only much later was it planted in Malaysia and Indonesia, now home to huge plantations.
Nature
Eastern grey squirrel
📍 Eastern North America
Britain's grey squirrels are American: the species is native to eastern North America and was released on British estates from the 1870s. It has since displaced most of Britain's native red squirrels.
Nature
Sugarcane
📍 New Guinea
Sugarcane was first domesticated in New Guinea. Austronesian voyagers spread it across the Pacific and west to India, where Alexander's admiral Nearchus marvelled at “reeds that produce honey without bees”.
More from Europe
Invention
Cat's eye (road reflector)
📍 Halifax, England
Cat's eyes were invented by Percy Shaw of Halifax, England, who patented them in 1934 and named them after a cat's eyeshine. Wartime blackouts showed their value and helped spread them across British roads.
Game
Netball
📍 London, England
Netball grew out of basketball at a women's PE college in Hampstead, London, from 1893, and its first rules were published in England in 1901. It then spread across the British Empire.
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”.