A Great Zulu Victory Stuns the World, Comets Stink, Netflix's Fortunes Soar, and Princess' Wild Antics

Did you know?

Comets stink, and if you could get close enough to one, it would be like smelling like rotten eggs. We know this because traces of hydrogen sulphide, ammonia, sulphur dioxide, and hydrogen cyanide were all found in the makeup of the comet 67P/Churyumove-Gerasimenko.

On this day in history, January 22

1506 The first contingent of 150 Swiss Guards arrive at the Vatican to protect the pope. The Papal Guard is one of the oldest active military units in existence, and famous for their last stand which allowed Pope Clement VII to flee Rome during the War of the League of Cognac. Today, it provides close-quarters protection for Pope Leo XIII.

1833 Groot Constantia, which shipped wine to Napoleon in exile on the island of St Helena, concludes another sale with a VIP; this time with the King of France, Louis-Philippe.

1879 Suffering heavy losses, Cetshwayo’s impis, defy the odds and armed just with spears, wipe out British troops at Isandlwana in imperial Britain’s biggest defeat. The news makes headlines around the world, stunning readers. The survivors of the battle flee to the trading post at Rorke’s Drift where they hold off determined 3 000-4 000 attackers. Commanding officer General Lord Chelmsford subsequently abandons his invasion of Zululand and asks for significant reinforcements. A second invasion in May, ends in the defeat of the Zulu at the Battle of Ulundi, on July 4, 1879. The war saw the end of Zulu independence. Every year Isandhlwana is relived by the local Dundee DieHards reenactment group, local Zulu warriors and British soldiers from the UK.

1970 The Boeing 747, the world’s first “jumbo jet”, enters commercial service. The last, a freighter, was delivered in January 2024.

1971 A poll among white sportsmen show that of 101 surveyed, 79 were in favour of mixed sport, but apartheid continues.

1999 Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons are burned alive by radical Hindus while sleeping in their car in East India.

1992 A distraught Sarah, Duchess of York (aka Fergie) “knocks back champagne, throws wet towels, peanuts and tissues around, and places a sick bag over her head into which she reportedly made strange telephone noises”. It hastens her divorce from Prince Andrew.

2018 Netflix becomes the largest digital media and entertainment firm. It is worth $100 billion.

2019 Russian volcano Raikoke erupts. It turns sunsets purple in the Northern Hemisphere.

2023 China’s northernmost city, Mohe, records a bone-numbing temperature of -53ºC.

2024 A Hindu temple to the god Ram is inaugurated by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Ayodhya at the site of a mosque razed to the ground by Hindi militants in 1992.

DAILY NEWS