After more than three centuries, a geometry problem that originated with a royal bet has been solved.
Imagine you’re holding two equal-size dice. Is it possible to bore a tunnel through one dice that’s big enough for the other to slide through?
Perhaps your instinct is to say “Surely not!” If so, you’re not alone. In the late 1600s, an unidentified person placed a bet to that effect with Prince Rupert of the Rhine. Rupert — a nephew of Charles I of England who commanded the Royalist forces in the English Civil War — spent his sunset years studying metallurgy and glassmaking in his laboratory at Windsor Castle.