4 November: Chair Day

Today is Chair Day. Since chances are you are sitting on one right now, here are 10 facts about chairs.

1. The word chair derives, via French, from the Latin word "Cathedra" which is made up of the words for "sit" and "down". A cathedral is so called because it was where the bishop had his seat.
2. The earliest chairs date back 5,000 years to Ancient Egypt, and were ceremonial furniture. It was generally only high ranking people who sat on chairs in those days. Common people sat on benches, stones, or the floor. It wasn't until the 16th century that chairs came into use for everybody.
3. This is probably why the a chair has become a symbol of authority. For example, the bishop's seat as mentioned above, the Speaker's Chair in the House of Commons, thrones, and even the person presiding over any committee is known as the "chairman" or "chair" in these times of political correctness. Just don't say it around Ann Widdecombe who is quoted as saying, “A chair is a piece of furniture. I am not a chair because no one has ever sat on me.”
4. Even orchestras use this terminology. The "first chair" in a section is the best player, who gets to play the solos and, if it's a professional orchestra, gets paid more.
5. Office chairs with wheels were invented by Charles Darwin. He came up with the idea so he could reach his specimens more quickly in his study. Later on, Otto von Bismarck issued all his parliament with wheeled office chairs, which helped make them popular.
6. The electric chair was invented by Thomas Edison in 1889 to show the dangers of alternating current. Human beings being the vicious creatures they are, it soon became an accepted way to kill people. Emperor Menelik II of Abyssinia was one ruler who liked the idea of frying people he didn't like in an electric chair, so he bought three of them. However, he's a classic case of someone who didn't read the small print. He got them home and only then remembered his country had no Electricity. Determined to get his money's worth, he used one as a throne.
7. There is no mention of chairs in the Bible, but Shakespeare mentions them a lot, especially in Henry VI Part III where there are eight references to chairs.
8. The game of musical chairs was first referenced in 1877.
9. In Geneva there is a 12 metres (39 ft) high wooden sculpture of a chair with a broken leg. Its purpose is to symbolise opposition to land mines.
10. It may be art now, but you can see it becoming reality in a dystopian future - In 2001 Steve Mann exhibited a chair sculpture in San Francisco which had spikes on the seat which would retract if a person inserted a credit card and downloaded a licence to sit on it.

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