In the sibling department, every president has had, at minimum, one half-brother or half-sister. However, a few presidents are sometimes considered to have been raised as only children — most notably Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose only half-sibling (his father’s oldest son, James) was 28 years FDR’s senior. Bill Clinton’s half-brother, Roger, is about a decade younger than him. Barack Obama also has a 10-year age gap with his younger half-sister Maya, although he learned later in life that he had at least five more half-siblings on his father’s side. Meanwhile, Gerald Ford is the only child his mother and father produced, but he was raised with three younger half-brothers after his mother remarried, and as a teen, learned that he also had three younger half-sisters, via his father. 

Almost one-third of U.S. presidents were born in either Ohio or Virginia.

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Of the 45 people to serve as president so far, seven were born in Ohio, while eight were born in Virginia when it was either a colony or a state. Only 21 states have produced a president.

The no-only-children rule isn’t the only presidential birth quirk. Fifteen presidents are firstborns. Just seven occupants of the Oval Office have been the babies of their families, among them Andrew Jackson and Ronald Reagan. That means 23 presidents have fallen somewhere in the middle of the birth order, with the likes of Grover Cleveland and Herbert Hoover being true middle children. (They were born to families with nine and three offspring, respectively.) John Tyler, the 10th president, fathered the most youngsters himself: 15. 

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Sculpture from classical antiquity is often presented in museums, textbooks, and more as a world of white marble. Whether unearthed from the ground or perched upon crumbling temples, these supposedly pale masterpieces influenced Renaissance artists such as Michelangelo, who — in the throes of a classic art obsession — created sculptures meant to highlight the natural beauty of stone. Other Renaissance masterpieces, such as Raphael’s early 1500s fresco “The School of Athens,” placed colorful figures of antiquity against a backdrop of white marble. But these representations aren’t an accurate portrayal of the past: Ancient Athens and Rome were full of eye-popping color, with statues sporting vibrant togas and subtle skin tones — in fact, no sculpture was considered complete without a dazzling coat of paint. 

European Renaissance artists invented oil painting.

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The very first known oil paintings were created far from Europe. In the seventh century CE, Buddhist monks in Afghanistan used oil paints to create murals on cave walls.

Over time, these impermanent paints —  left unprotected from the elements — wore away, leaving behind unblemished stone and a false legacy of monotone marble. This perception of the “whiteness” of antiquity was cemented in the 18th century, tied to racist ideals that equated the paleness of the body with beauty. When German scholar Johann Winckelmann (sometimes called the “father of art history”) glimpsed flecks of color on artifacts found near the ancient Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, he brushed off the work as Etruscan — a civilization he considered beneath the grandeur of ancient Rome. Besides bits of color still clinging to some statues, other evidence of the Mediterranean’s colorful past survives in frescoes from Pompeii (which even depict a Roman in the act of painting a statue); the Greek playwright Euripides also mentions colored statues in his work Helen. In recent decades, the art world has been busy recreating the colorful past of Western civilization as archaeologists use UV light to illuminate certain pigments and art exhibits travel the world to unshroud the colorful palette of these ancient civilizations.

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A few years into his reign, Russian Czar Peter I (aka “Peter the Great”) decided to study abroad. Worried that Russia was lagging behind in key technological areas, especially when it came to shipbuilding, Peter traveled incognito from 1697 to 1698 to various European countries, including Prussia, Holland, and England, in an effort to modernize his own nation. Afterward, with his newly learned shipbuilding know-how, he created Russia’s first navy.

The Roman Empire taxed urine.

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In Rome, urine was prized for its ammonia, which was used in cleaning products and toothpaste. The urine trade was so lucrative that Emperor Vespasian placed a tax on it in 70 CE. When confronted about the new tax, he famously stated “pecunia non olet,” or “money doesn’t stink.”

But it wasn’t just maritime skills Peter learned on his “Grand Embassy.” He also picked up a few fashion and grooming ideas — including a particular interest in the freshly shaven chins of most Western European men. Determined to integrate Russia into the increasingly powerful club of European countries, Peter established (around 1705) a tax that fiscally punished anyone sporting a beard. The tax was progressive, with the well-to-do shelling out more for their facial adornments than the peasantry; nobility and merchants could pay as much as 100 rubles a year, while peasants might pay one kopek (1/100 of a ruble). Yet the tax was almost universally reviled — and even helped spark a few riots. The biggest opponent of the tax was the Russian Orthodox Church, which regarded clean-shaven faces as sinful. Despite this stiff opposition, Peter I stuck with the tax and was known to even shave off the beards of his guests at parties, much to the horror displayed on their now-clean-shaven faces. 

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