50 Fun Facts About Central Europe

Which river, Europe's second-longest, passes through or borders ten countries between Germany and its delta?

The Danube also runs through four national capitals, more than any other river in the world. For centuries it also marked a frontier of ancient Rome.

Which composer's heart was smuggled into Poland by his sister after his death in Paris in 1849?

Frédéric Chopin asked that his heart go home, so it was carried past border guards in a jar of alcohol, probably cognac. It was later sealed inside a pillar of a Warsaw church.

Poland's Wieliczka mine, with chapels carved underground by its miners, produced which mineral until 1996?

Salt was dug at Wieliczka for some 700 years, and the mine joined UNESCO's very first World Heritage list in 1978. Even its statues are carved from the rock.

The CH on Swiss car stickers and web addresses abbreviates Switzerland's formal name in which language?

Latin supplies the formal name Confoederatio Helvetica, recalling the Helvetii, a Gaulish tribe that once lived on the Swiss plateau. It has appeared on Swiss franc coins since 1879.

Which Bavarian castle, built for King Ludwig II, inspired Sleeping Beauty Castle at Disneyland?

Neuschwanstein was meant as the king's private retreat, yet it opened to paying visitors within six weeks of his death in 1886.

Which giant dog breed was bred for rescue work at a monks' hospice on a pass between Switzerland and Italy?

The St. Bernard is named after the monk who founded the hospice, Bernard of Menthon. The monks kept 18 of the dogs as late as 2004, purely out of tradition.

Which capital city, once known as Pressburg, is the only national capital bordering two other countries?

Bratislava meets both Austria and Hungary at its edges. For nearly three centuries Hungary's kings and queens were crowned in its St Martin's Cathedral.

Which Warsaw-born scientist named a radioactive element she discovered in 1898 after her partitioned homeland?

Marie Curie chose the name polonium for Poland, then divided between three foreign powers. She is the only person to have won Nobel Prizes in two different sciences.

Which red spice, unknown in Europe before the 16th century, gives Hungarian goulash its deep colour?

Paprika comes from peppers first grown in the Americas, so the herdsmen who invented goulash cooked it without any. Their stew dates back long before the spice arrived.

Which European country is one of only two doubly landlocked nations in the world?

Liechtenstein's only neighbours, Switzerland and Austria, are landlocked too, so reaching any coast means crossing at least two borders. Uzbekistan is the only other country in the same position.

Which city's Old Town Hall has a medieval astronomical clock where a skeleton figure strikes the hour?

Prague has had its clock since 1410, and every hour moving figures of the Apostles put on a short show above the dial. Badly damaged in the fighting of May 1945, it was running again by 1948.

Which pyramid-shaped peak above Zermatt, on the Swiss–Italian border, long featured on Toblerone packaging?

The Matterhorn was first climbed in 1865, a triumph that turned to disaster when four of the seven climbers fell to their deaths on the way down.

Which capital city, known for its thermal baths, was created in 1873 by uniting three towns?

Budapest joined Buda and Óbuda with Pest, and it sits on more than 100 hot springs. Its fame as a city of spas dates from the 1920s, when the waters began to draw visitors.

Which river, home to the Lorelei rock, plunges over Europe's most powerful waterfall near Schaffhausen?

The Rhine flows beneath the Lorelei, a 132-metre slate cliff whose name is usually traced to old German words for a murmuring rock. Its falls lie just inside Switzerland.

Which shallow Hungarian lake, a major summer resort, is the largest lake in Central Europe?

Lake Balaton averages only about three metres deep. Resort towns line its flat southern shore, while the hilly northern shore is wine country.

Which wooded range in southwest Germany, home of the cuckoo clock, has the spa town of Baden-Baden at its edge?

The Black Forest has turned out cuckoo clocks since the 18th century, though nobody knows who built the first one there. Its highest peak, the Feldberg, reaches 1,493 metres.

Which city, chosen ahead of Zurich and Lucerne in 1848, is Switzerland's seat of government?

Bern is styled the federal city because the Swiss constitution names no official capital. Legend says its founder named it after a bear he met while hunting.

Which city's Prater park has a giant Ferris wheel from 1897 that appeared in the film The Third Man?

Vienna nearly lost its wheel in 1916, when a demolition permit was issued but nobody could pay for the work. Taller rivals built for Chicago, London and Paris had all been pulled down by 1920.

Which Berlin landmark, topped by a four-horse chariot, stood sealed off beside the Berlin Wall until 1989?

The Brandenburg Gate lost its chariot to Napoleon, who carried it off to Paris in 1806. It came back eight years later, and its goddess was given an Iron Cross topped by a crowned eagle.

Which country dissolved peacefully at the end of 1992 in a split nicknamed the Velvet Divorce?

Czechoslovakia became the Czech Republic and Slovakia without a referendum ever being held. The nickname echoes the bloodless Velvet Revolution of 1989.

Which Austrian city, the birthplace of Mozart, was the setting and filming location of The Sound of Music?

Salzburg was ruled for centuries by prince-archbishops, one of whom employed Mozart and then dismissed him. Their fortress above the old town is among Europe's largest medieval strongholds.

Which Polish city, the royal capital until 1596, grew up in legend above the cave of the Wawel dragon?

Kraków lost its role when King Sigismund III Vasa moved the court to Warsaw. Legend says its founder, a ruler named Krakus, built the city above the dragon's cave.

Which river, the longest in Poland, flows through Warsaw on its way to the Baltic Sea?

The Vistula runs for 1,047 kilometres, which also makes it the longest river emptying into the Baltic. Poles sometimes call their homeland simply the land on the Vistula.

Which mountains on the Polish–Slovak border, home to Zakopane, are the highest in the Carpathians?

The Tatras peak at Gerlachovský štít, 2,655 metres, which lies wholly inside Slovakia. Poland's highest point, Rysy, sits right on the border ridge.

Which lake lies where Germany, Switzerland and Austria meet, with no agreed borders across its waters?

Lake Constance saw the first Zeppelin airship fly in July 1900, after it was built in a floating hangar on the water. The three countries still disagree on where their borders cross it.

Which dynasty, named after a castle in present-day Switzerland, ruled Austria until 1918?

The Habsburg family lost its ancestral castle to the expanding Swiss Confederacy in 1415, five centuries before its rule in Austria came to an end.

Which pope, born Karol Wojtyła in Wadowice, Poland, was the first non-Italian pontiff since the 16th century?

John Paul II spent part of the Second World War labouring in a quarry, a job he took to avoid being sent to a German forced labour camp.

Which inventor, born in Mainz, built Europe's first printing press using movable type in the 15th century?

Johannes Gutenberg paid for the work with a loan of 800 guilders from a wealthy moneylender, Johann Fust. His masterpiece was the first printed version of the Bible.

Which puzzle did a Hungarian architecture professor invent in 1974, then take about a month to solve himself?

The Rubik's Cube was first sold as the Magic Cube, and its early test batches reached Hungarian toy shops only in late 1977.

Which dumplings, often filled with potato and cheese or sauerkraut, are a traditional dish of Poland?

Pierogi appear in Poland's first cookbook, published in 1682. The word is already a plural, since a single dumpling is a pieróg.

Which phrase did Winston Churchill use in a 1946 speech for the divide running from Stettin to Trieste?

The Iron Curtain became a literal barrier of razor wire, minefields and watchtowers along the western edge of the Eastern Bloc. Churchill spoke in Fulton, Missouri, with President Truman in the audience.

Which river rises in the Giant Mountains of the Czech Republic and reaches the North Sea beyond Hamburg?

The Elbe is where American and Soviet troops linked up near Torgau in April 1945. For the next 45 years part of it marked the border between East and West Germany.

Which river, known in German as the Moldau, is the longest in the Czech Republic?

The Vltava is often called the Czech national river, and Bedřich Smetana named one of the six symphonic poems of Má vlast after it.

Which peak, with the Austrian border running over its summit, is the highest mountain in Germany?

The Zugspitze was first climbed in 1820 by an army surveyor, his assistant and a mountain guide. A rack railway and cable cars now carry around 500,000 people to the top every year.

Which lake in Slovenia's Julian Alps has an island church reached by traditional wooden boats called pletnas?

Lake Bled's island church stands at the top of a Baroque stairway of 99 stone steps. Each pletna seats 20 passengers and resembles an Italian gondola.

Which Austrian lakeside town had its church and centre copied in a housing estate in Guangdong, China?

Hallstatt also gave its name to an archaeological culture of early Celtic peoples that flourished in Europe from about 800 BC.

Which currency, whose name literally means golden, does Poland use in place of the euro?

The złoty began as the Polish name for foreign gold coins, such as Venetian ducats, in the 14th and 15th centuries. Today it is divided into 100 groszy.

Which realm of the German lands, dissolved in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars, had lasted about a thousand years?

The Holy Roman Empire ended when Emperor Francis II abdicated and formally dissolved it. Voltaire had already mocked it as neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire.

The world's first pale lager, brewed in 1842 by a Bavarian brewmaster, takes its name from which Czech city?

Plzeň hired Josef Groll for its new civic brewery, and the town's remarkably soft water helped his first batch turn out clear and golden.

The Sedlec chapel near Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic is famous for decorations made of which material?

Human bones from an estimated 40,000 to 70,000 skeletons fill the chapel. Its chandelier is said to include at least one of every bone in the body.

Which mountain in the Julian Alps, pictured on the national flag, is the highest summit in Slovenia?

Triglav has a name meaning three heads, and it was the highest peak in all of Yugoslavia before Slovenia became independent in 1991.

The alliance of Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic takes its name from which Hungarian castle town?

Visegrád hosted a congress of the kings of Bohemia, Hungary and Poland in 1335, and the modern leaders deliberately chose the same spot for their founding summit in 1991.

Which Polish city on the Oder, called Breslau in German, has hundreds of small dwarf figurines on its streets?

Wrocław's dwarfs recall the Orange Alternative, an anti-communist protest movement that used the dwarf as its symbol. The first small figures appeared in 2005.

Which Baltic island, known for the white chalk cliffs of Jasmund National Park, is the largest in Germany?

Rügen owes its cliffs to chalk laid down about 70 million years ago. The best known of them, the Königsstuhl or King's Chair, rises 118 metres above the sea.

Which peak, rising above the Pasterze glacier, is the highest mountain in Austria?

The Grossglockner stands 3,798 metres high, which also makes it the tallest Alpine summit anywhere east of the Brenner Pass.

What name is given to the treeless grassland of the Great Hungarian Plain, home of the csikós mounted herdsmen?

The puszta takes its name from a word of Slavic origin meaning bare or deserted. Its herders raise Hungarian Grey cattle and woolly Mangalitsa pigs.

Which region, nicknamed the land of a thousand lakes, includes Śniardwy, the largest lake in Poland?

Masuria in fact holds about 2,000 lakes, ground out by glaciers some 14,000 years ago. Canals with sluices link the biggest of them.

Which Hungarian wine region produces aszú, the world's oldest wine made from grapes shrivelled by noble rot?

Tokaj won royal fans after a Transylvanian prince sent bottles to Louis XIV of France in 1703. Sales of the wine later helped pay for Hungarian wars of independence.

Which order of crusading monks built Malbork in Poland, the largest castle in the world by land area?

The Teutonic Knights dedicated the fortress to the Virgin Mary. On its completion in 1406 it was also the largest brick castle in the world.

Which name is shared by a Swiss Alpine pass and the 57-kilometre rail tunnel that opened in 2016 as the world's longest?

The Gotthard Base Tunnel gave trains their first flat, low-level route through the Alps. It is also the deepest traffic tunnel in the world.