…is that it turns up stuff like this.

The VirtualDutch timeline of Anglo-Dutch relations. It’s built using MITs Simile software and it’s packed full of utterly fascinating detail. Amongst more familiar historical events it includes such gems as the following:

1120s: first appearance of name Fleming in Scotland,
post-1154: introduction of oxtail soup in England,
c. 1310: pirate John Crab moves to Aberdeen,
1457: first recording of golf in Scotland,
1576: calls for immigrants to be sent back in English parliament (plus ça change),
1585: cacao beans enter Europe for first time,
1587: first cultivation of sprouts in Europe,
1637: crash of tulipomania
1662: piracy legally forbidden
1673: first performance of The Dutch Lover
1685: first mention of Sauce hollandaise
1689: Dutch fire engines in England
1709: first raids on molly clubs in London
1712: frog as insult for the Dutch
1793: first description of Britain as treacherous
1824: Dutch translation of Waverley
1829: Mons Meg moved to Edinburgh

Brilliant! Of course this has completely derailed any “real” work I was going to do this afternoon