Common knowledge has a destiny to say about hats — but is it truthful ?
1. DANIEL BOONE WORE A COONSKIN CAP.
FALSE!While the American mountain man Daniel Boone became one of the chapeau ’s poster boys , he never wore one . On the contrary , as his son Nathan compose , he “ always scorn the raccoon fur caps and did not have on one himself . ”
2. YOU LOSE 70 PERCENT OF YOUR BODY HEAT THROUGH YOUR HEAD.
FALSE!You recede just as much heat through your head as you do from other eubstance parts ; it just feels cold because the skin on your face and oral sex is more sensitive . ( At most , you ’ll miss about 10 pct of your torso ’s heat through your noggin . ) This myth start back in the 1950s after a not - so - scientific military study dress Volunteer in natural selection courtship and tossed them into the sulfurous cold . Since their head were the only part uncover , they lose most of their heat energy there .
3. VIKINGS WORE HORNED HELMETS.
FALSE!Lots of ancient citizenry wore horned helmets ! Teutonic knights , Celtic warriors , late popish US Army , the samurai , Indo - Iranian warrior , Conan the Barbarian . But Vikings ? Not a chance . The figure was popularized in Richard Wagner ’s 1876 four - part opera , Der Ring des Nibelungen .
4. HATTERS WENT “MAD” FROM MERCURY POISONING.
UNKNOWN.Although olde tyme modiste used mercury salts to make felt for hats , we ’re not confirming the practice drove them insane . It ’s more potential that the phrase “ mad as a hatter ” is n’t even about people — it ’s about snakes . Back in the eighteenth century , “ mad ” was synonymous with “ venomous , ” and “ milliner ” was a bastardization of the Scripture “ adder , ” for viper . In that shell , the musical phrase imply “ virulent as a viper . ”
5. TIN FOIL CAPS CAN STOP BIG BROTHER FROM READING YOUR MIND.
FALSE!Actually , they make it easier . A foil cap is supposed to represent as a Faraday John Cage , a equipment that — like your kitchen microwave oven — shields you from electromagnetic radiation . trouble is , the concept works only if the cap roll around your total head . In 2005 , a squad of MIT graduate student found that your typical foil lid amplifies the relative frequency used most by the FCC — let in space - to - land satellite .
6. THE CAP OF INVISIBILITY MAKES YOU INVISIBLE.
TRUE!In Greek mythology , gods and goddess could wear the Cap of Invisibility to sneak past other supernatural beings unseen . We still have n’t picture one , so it must be lawful .
7. COWBOYS WORE COWBOY HATS.
FALSE!Invented in 1865 , the classic Stetson face more like a flat , boring version of a sombrero than the fashionable , full-bosomed hat we know today . And it was n’t the most popular chapeau at the cow pen to begin with . In the cowboy ’s heyday , most wranglers wore top hats , sailor ’s caps , and — above all — derby lid .
