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Science Weekly
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What You've Learned From Comparing the Body Strength of the Friars in Cambridge
It has thrown up that the friars are actually a bit taller than all the other men from the town on average. If you joined as a novice at about 14, which was the standard age, then you're still going through sort of your male growth spur. How tall you grow is partly a combination of genetics, but also your environment when you're growing up. One of the things I found most interesting is that in terms of sort of body strength from things like their arms, they're actually very similar to everyone else in Cambridge. So they're probably doing as much manual activity as everyone else.
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