11 Craziest Things People Have Done In The Name Of Science

Supposedly inspired by the Greek fable of Daedalus, Eilmer the Monk was determined to master the art of flight. The 12th century historian, William of Malmesbury, recorded the tale of Eilmer as he strapped homemade wings to his arms and legs and threw himself from the top of Malmesbury Abbey:

"He was a man learned for those times, of ripe old age, and in his early youth had hazarded a deed of remarkable boldness. He had by some means, I scarcely know what, fastened wings to his hands and feet so that, mistaking fable for truth, he might fly like Daedalus, and, collecting the breeze upon the summit of a tower, flew for more than a furlong [201 metres]. But agitated by the violence of the wind and the swirling of air, as well as by the awareness of his rash attempt, he fell, broke both his legs and was lame ever after. He used to relate as the cause of his failure, his forgetting to provide himself a tail."

It was the omission of the tail that seemed to bother Eilmer the most, rather than the fact that he had just shattered both of his legs into smithereens, and he vowed to make another attempt (which he thankfully never did and lived to a ripe old age).

It has been calculated that Eilmer would probably have been airborne for about 15 seconds, and that it's likely he didn't so much fly as glide down the steep hill to the southwest of the Abbey. It has also been postulated that, had he indeed remembered his tail, the flight might have been significantly more successful - but nobody tell Eilmer that.