The three-course meal — soup, main, dessert — was reputedly brought to Europe by a Baghdad musician.
Ziryab, arriving in Córdoba in 822, set the fashions: haircuts, twice-daily baths, even toothpaste.
More amazing facts
- 800 When Charlemagne was crowned emperor in 800, Borobudur — the world's largest Buddhist temple — was being built on Java.
- 800 The Slavic word for 'king' comes from the name Charles — Charlemagne's, or perhaps his great-grandson Charles the Fat's: Latin Karolus became Russian korol', Polish król and Slovak kráľ.
- 800 Lowercase Latin letters go back to the handwriting of Charlemagne's scribes.
- 800 Charlemagne, patron of a great revival of learning, probably never mastered writing himself.
- 802 · 810 Charlemagne had an elephant.
- 842 The oldest text in French is an oath sworn by a German.