Did You Know? General Knowledge Facts

English has the most speakers in the world in total, while Mandarin Chinese has the most native speakers.

Nepal's flag is the only national flag in the world that is not a rectangle or a square.

The seven colours of the rainbow, in order, are red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet.

Chocolate is made from cacao beans.

A corn kernel pops into popcorn because the water inside turns to steam when heated.

Japan is known as the 'Land of the Rising Sun'.

The Eiffel Tower in Paris was completed in 1889.

The Statue of Liberty in New York was a gift from France to the United States and was unveiled in 1886.

Football is the most popular sport in the world.

A leap year has 366 days and comes once every four years, such as 2024 and 2028.

There are 195 countries in the world today: 193 members of the United Nations and two observer states.

Tea is the most widely drunk beverage in the world after water.

The Taj Mahal in India was built in the 17th century.

Famous tales from 'One Thousand and One Nights' include Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves and Sinbad the Sailor.

A dozen means 12 items.

Pizza comes from the city of Naples in Italy.

A piano has 88 keys.

The name 'Lego' comes from two Danish words meaning 'play well'.

Leonardo da Vinci painted the famous 'Mona Lisa'.

A week has seven days in most of the world.

People in Brazil speak Portuguese.

The Nobel Prizes were first awarded in 1901.

The Louvre in Paris is the most visited museum in the world.

'Big Ben' is the name of the great bell inside London's clock tower, not of the tower itself.

The Red Crescent and the Red Cross are part of one international humanitarian movement.

UNESCO's headquarters are in Paris.

The United Nations has six official languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.

The distress signal SOS in Morse code is three dots, three dashes and three dots.

The oldest known musical instruments are flutes made of bone, about 40,000 years old.

The Arabic oud is the ancestor of the European lute, and the word 'lute' comes from al-'ūd.

The Library of Congress in Washington is one of the largest libraries in the world by number of items.

The Hijri year is about 11 days shorter than the Gregorian year.

A 'baker's dozen' means 13 items instead of 12.

The flag of Jordan has a white seven-pointed star on its red triangle.

International Women's Day is on 8 March every year.

World Teachers' Day is on 5 October every year.

International Mother Language Day is on 21 February every year.

World Book Day is on 23 April every year.

The New Seven Wonders are Petra, the Great Wall of China, Machu Picchu, Christ the Redeemer, Chichén Itzá, the Colosseum and the Taj Mahal.

The Italian city of Venice is built on more than 100 small islands.

Origami is the Japanese art of folding paper into shapes.

'Kalila wa Dimna' is one of the most famous books of animal fables, translated into Arabic by Ibn al-Muqaffa in the 8th century.

The Universal Postal Union, founded in 1874, is one of the oldest international organisations.

The metric system was introduced in France in the 1790s.

The International Date Line roughly follows the 180° line of longitude in the Pacific Ocean.

Esperanto is a language designed as a shared world language, created by Ludwik Zamenhof in 1887.

Since 2019 the kilogram has been defined by a physical constant, the Planck constant, instead of a metal block kept in France.

The Korean alphabet, Hangul, was created in 1443 under King Sejong.

The Dewey Decimal System has been used since 1876 to classify and arrange books in libraries.

Since 2007 the International Standard Book Number (ISBN) has had 13 digits.

Sudoku spread from Japan, and its name roughly means 'the digits must be single'.

The Voyager probes carry the 'Golden Record', with greetings in 55 languages, including Arabic.

Leonardo da Vinci wrote many of his notes in mirror writing, to be read in a mirror.

The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded in Oslo, while the other Nobel Prizes are awarded in Stockholm.

Louis Braille invented the raised-dot writing system for blind people in 1824, at the age of 15.

Five space agencies, from the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan and Canada, work together to run the International Space Station.

China uses a single time zone for the whole country, even though it spans five geographically.

Al-Hariri's 'Maqamat', from the 12th century, is one of the masterpieces of Arabic literary prose.

The Jerash Festival of Culture and Arts has been held in Jordan since 1981.

Wikipedia was launched in 2001 and is now available in more than 300 languages.

Arabic calligraphy was added to UNESCO's list of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2021.

In many European languages, the days of the week are named after the seven heavenly bodies known in ancient times, such as the Sun and the Moon.