148 Fun Facts About World Facts

What is the smallest country in the world by land area?

Vatican City became a state only in 1929, when Mussolini's Lateran Treaty ended nearly 60 years in which popes had refused to leave the Vatican.

Which country has the longest coastline in the world?

Canada's coastline is the longest because it wraps the shores of the Arctic Archipelago, more than 36,000 islands in the far north.

What is the capital of Mongolia?

Ulaanbaatar began in 1639 as a mobile Buddhist monastery that changed location 29 times before settling at its present site in 1778.

Which river is the longest in the world?

The Nile is traditionally ranked longest, though some scientists argue for the Amazon; damming it at Aswan forced Egypt to cut the Abu Simbel temples into blocks and move them uphill.

Which country overtook China in 2023 to become the world's most populous?

India's lead rests on UN estimates, because its 2021 census was postponed by the COVID-19 pandemic and rescheduled for 2026–27.

Counting its overseas territories, which country spans the most time zones?

France spans 12 time zones because its overseas territories, from French Polynesia to Réunion, keep their own local clocks.

What is the driest non-polar desert in the world?

The Atacama's high, dry Chajnantor plateau is why astronomers built the ALMA telescope array there, since water vapour absorbs the signals it studies.

Which lake is the deepest in the world?

Lake Baikal froze so hard in the winter of 1920 that the retreating anti-Bolshevik White Army marched across it, and many soldiers died of exposure.

What is the capital of New Zealand?

Wellington replaced Auckland as capital in 1865, partly to reassure the gold-rich South Island, where settlers talked of forming a separate colony.

As of 2026, which country has the most UNESCO World Heritage Sites?

Italy leads the list, and one of its sites, Venice, began charging day-trippers a €5 entry fee in 2024 as it grappled with overtourism.

As of 2026, counting second-language speakers, which language has the most speakers?

English leads because most of its speakers learned it as a second language; counting native speakers alone, Mandarin Chinese has far more.

Which waterfall has the highest uninterrupted drop in the world?

Angel Falls is named after US pilot Jimmie Angel, whose plane sank into the mud atop the falls' mountain, forcing an 11-day trek back to the nearest settlement.

As of 2026, which country produces the most coffee in the world?

Brazil grew so much coffee that in 1906 its coffee states agreed to buy up surplus harvests and hold them back to prop up world prices.

Which Asian currency was the world's third most traded in 2022, behind only the dollar and euro?

The yen came under such heavy selling that Japan's government intervened in currency markets in 2022 and again in 2024 to slow its fall.

Which mountain is the tallest in the world measured from base to peak?

Mauna Kea is sacred in Native Hawaiian tradition, and plans to build the Thirty Meter Telescope on its summit sparked years of protests and dozens of arrests.

The rose-red Nabataean city of Petra, whose Greek name simply means 'rock', is carved into cliffs in which country?

Jordan's Petra was unknown to the western world until 1812, when Swiss explorer Johann Ludwig Burckhardt, travelling as 'Sheikh Ibrahim', reached it.

Which European country has about a quarter of its land below sea level?

The Netherlands has about 26% of its land below sea level, mostly because peat was dug away or land was reclaimed from the sea.

Which country is home to the most active volcanoes?

Indonesia's Mount Tambora erupted so violently in 1815 that its sulfur haze cooled the planet, making 1816 the 'Year Without a Summer'.

What is the official currency of South Africa?

The rand takes its name from the Witwatersrand, the gold-rich ridge on which Johannesburg was built.

Which country is home to the pyramids of Meroë, built by the kings of Kush?

Sudan holds the Meroë pyramids of the kings of Kush, whose 25th Dynasty once conquered and ruled Egypt itself.

Which is Africa's largest lake by surface area?

Lake Victoria averages only about 40 m deep, and sediment cores show it has dried up completely at least three times since it formed.

As of 2026, which is Africa's most populous country?

Nigeria moved its capital from Lagos, its biggest city, to purpose-built Abuja in 1991, a site chosen partly to be neutral among its ethnic groups.

What is the largest island in the world (excluding continental landmasses)?

Greenland got its name from the explorer Erik the Red, who supposedly hoped a pleasant name would attract settlers to the icy island.

Captain Cook's ship Endeavour ran aground on which reef?

The Great Barrier Reef holed Endeavour in 1770, and Cook's crew threw six of her guns overboard to lighten her so she could float free.

Which country topped the CIA World Factbook's life expectancy ranking in 2024?

Monaco's lead of about 89.8 years is a CIA estimate; the UN's own 2023 figures put the principality nearer 86 years.

What is the largest desert in the world?

The Antarctic counts because deserts are defined by scant precipitation, not heat, and at about 14.2 million km² it edges out the Arctic.

Which country shares land borders with 14 others, tying with Russia for the most in the world?

China officially runs on Beijing Time alone, so many people in far-western Xinjiang keep an unofficial local time of their own.

Brazil, South America's largest and most populous country, has which European language as its official tongue?

Portuguese spread with colonial rule, and in 1808 Portugal's royal court fled Napoleon to Rio de Janeiro, which served as the empire's capital for 13 years.

Which is Japan's largest island, home to Tokyo and Kyoto?

Honshu is linked to Hokkaido by the undersea Seikan Tunnel, pushed ahead after five ferries sank in a 1954 typhoon, killing 1,430 passengers.

What is the deepest point in the world's oceans?

The Mariana Trench's Challenger Deep went 52 years without a crewed visit after the first dive in 1960, until film director James Cameron piloted a solo descent in 2012.

Which country's flag bears a green cedar tree between two red stripes?

Lebanon's cedar flag was hastily drawn up in 1943 by seven MPs who managed to get into the occupied parliament building.

Which is the only named sea on Earth with no coastline, being bounded entirely by ocean currents?

The Sargasso Sea is where European eels are thought to spawn, after the adults swim out across the Atlantic from Europe's rivers.

Why is the Great Wall so hard to see from orbit?

It is far too narrow: the wall is long enough to spot, but its local stone and earth blend into the surrounding land.

Which two South American countries are landlocked?

Bolivia and Paraguay are landlocked; Bolivia lost its coast to Chile in the War of the Pacific but still keeps a navy to nurture hopes of regaining the sea.

As of 2020, which was the world's most widely practiced religion?

Christianity still led in 2020, but Pew found Muslims grew fastest over the previous decade while Christians lagged behind global population growth.

Which mountain range is the world's longest, running through seven countries?

The Andes carried the Inca road network, along which relay runners called chasquis passed messages across the empire.

Which southern African country recognises 16 official languages, including Shona and Ndebele?

Zimbabwe's 2013 constitution lists 16 officially recognised languages, from Shona to sign language, and orders the state to treat them all equitably.

Which was the world's busiest airport by passenger traffic in 2024?

Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson is so busy partly because Delta runs the world's largest airline hub there.

Which narrow waterway through Istanbul separates Europe from Asia?

Persian king Darius I once marched his army across the Bosphorus on an enormous bridge of boats joining Asia to Europe.

As of 2025, which country has the largest proven oil reserves in the world?

Venezuela's proven reserves jumped in the late 2000s, when the extra-heavy oil of its Orinoco Belt was judged economic to extract.

Which country has the world's only non-rectangular national flag?

Nepal's flag stacks two pennants once flown by rival branches of its ruling dynasty, which also makes it the only national flag taller than it is wide.

Which Scandinavian capital stretches across fourteen islands where Lake Mälaren meets the Baltic Sea?

Stockholm's warship Vasa sank barely 1.3 km into her maiden voyage in 1628, then was raised from the harbour almost intact in 1961.

Which country was the world's largest producer of diamonds by weight in 2024?

Russia mined the most carats in 2024 even though the EU had banned imports of its diamonds from 1 January that year.

Bordered by five countries and lacking any outlet, which body of water is the world's largest lake yet usually called a sea?

The Caspian Sea's five shoreline states signed a convention on its legal status in 2018, but left the division of its oil-rich seabed to later deals.

Which Central Asian country is doubly landlocked, every neighbour being landlocked too?

Uzbekistan's Soviet-era irrigation schemes diverted the rivers feeding the Aral Sea, which had shrunk to about 10% of its original size by 2007.

What is the largest country in Africa by land area?

Algeria became Africa's largest country only in 2011, when South Sudan's independence shrank Sudan, which had held the title until then.

Which Pacific nation's atolls stretch into all four hemispheres, northern, southern, eastern and western?

Kiribati is spread so widely that in 1995 it moved the International Date Line far to the east, so the whole country could share one calendar day.

What is the Ring of Fire?

A quake-and-volcano belt around the Pacific, the Ring of Fire runs through the Cascades, where the 1980 eruption tore about 400 m off the top of Mount St. Helens.

Which is the only independent state that lies entirely above 1,000 metres in elevation?

Lesotho dams its highland rivers to deliver water to its neighbour's Vaal River system, and the same scheme generates hydropower at home.

Which microstate claims to be the world's oldest extant sovereign state, founded in AD 301?

San Marino is named after Saint Marinus, a stonemason said to have fled Emperor Diocletian's persecution to found a community on Monte Titano.

Which lake is often called the world's highest navigable lake?

Lake Titicaca is home to the Uros people, who live on floating islands they build themselves from totora reeds.

Which Asian country absorbs more greenhouse gases than it emits, thanks largely to its forests?

Bhutan's constitution requires at least 60% of its land to stay under forest cover for all time.

The world's oldest legislature, founded in 930 at Þingvellir, belongs to which country?

Iceland's Althing once decided a nation's faith by vote, ruling in the year 1000 that the whole country would convert to the new religion.

The shores of which body of water are the lowest land-based elevation on Earth?

The Dead Sea is so salty that plants and animals cannot flourish in it, which is how it got its name.

The summit of which mountain is the farthest point on Earth's surface from its centre?

Chimborazo reaches only 6,263 m above sea level, but it sits on Earth's equatorial bulge, so its summit is farther from the planet's centre than Everest's.

Which country has over 800 spoken languages, more than any other?

Papua New Guinea's language groups often bridge their differences in Tok Pisin, a creole that many children of mixed-language parents now learn first.

Which Pacific nation earns a slice of its government revenue from the .tv internet domain?

Tuvalu's internet code happens to spell TV, the abbreviation for television, so leasing out .tv addresses is one of the government's main earners.

At just 21 km², which Pacific island nation is the world's third-smallest country?

Nauru officially renamed itself Naoero in 2026; a century of phosphate strip-mining had already hollowed out most of the island's interior.

At over 9,000 km, which is the world's longest railway line?

The Trans-Siberian Railway joined Moscow to the Pacific coast and opened Siberia up to settlement and industry.

The Pan-American Highway is broken only by the Darién Gap, between which two countries?

The Darién Gap between Panama and Colombia stays roadless partly because US agriculture officials feared a highway would let foot-and-mouth disease spread north.

Which river carries the largest discharge of water of any river in the world?

The Amazon has no bridge across its full width, not because it is too wide, but because most of its course runs through rainforest with few roads or cities.

Which is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface area?

Lake Superior is where the freighter Edmund Fitzgerald sank in a November 1975 storm, taking all 29 crew down with her.

Which South Atlantic island is considered the remotest inhabited place in the world?

In 1961 a volcanic eruption forced Tristan da Cunha's entire population to evacuate to England, and most families returned in 1963.

The oceanic pole of inaccessibility, the spot farthest from any land, is nicknamed what?

Point Nemo is so far from land that space agencies aim retired spacecraft at the ocean near it, a region nicknamed the spacecraft cemetery.

The world's shortest scheduled flight links Westray and Papa Westray in which island group?

Loganair inaugurated the hop in December 1967 as part of the islands' inter-island air service; in good wind the flight can take under two minutes.

The 85-letter place name beginning 'Taumatawhakatangi...' belongs to a hill in which country?

New Zealand's 85-letter hill name tells of Tamatea, a legendary explorer, playing his flute to his loved one there.

Which city, at roughly 3,650 m above sea level, is the highest administrative capital in the world?

La Paz is only the seat of government: the country's constitutional capital is Sucre, the historic 'White City'.

How many months are there in the Ethiopian calendar?

Twelve months of exactly thirty days are followed by a short month of five or six epagomenal days, which is why the country markets itself as having thirteen months of sunshine.

Which country's flag holds the record as the oldest continuously used national flag?

Denmark's Dannebrog, legend says, fell from the sky during the Battle of Lindanise in 1219, and it was recognised as the national flag in 1625.

Which Pacific nation skipped Friday 30 December 2011 by moving across the date line?

Samoa jumped from UTC−11 to UTC+13 at the end of 2011, and neighbouring Tokelau followed its lead, skipping the very same Friday.

Which is the largest country in the world with no permanent rivers?

Saudi Arabia has no permanent rivers or lakes, so desalinated seawater, groundwater and scarce surface water must supply its needs.

Which port overtook Singapore in 2010 to become the world's busiest container port?

Shanghai built its Yangshan terminal on offshore islands because the city's river docks were too shallow for the biggest container ships.

Which Caribbean country is named after a 4th-century female martyr from Syracuse?

Saint Lucia's name, legend says, came from French sailors shipwrecked there on 13 December, the feast day of St Lucy.

Big and Little Diomede, 3.8 km apart across the date line, sit in which strait?

In the Bering Strait the date line runs between the two Diomedes, so Little Diomede looks across at an island already living in tomorrow.

Excluding Western Sahara, which is the world's most sparsely populated sovereign state?

Mongolia's herders face dzud, a periodic disaster in which severe winter weather stops livestock grazing and huge numbers of animals starve.

Which is widely regarded as the world's first national park?

Yellowstone's last wolves were killed in 1926, and bringing them back took a decades-long campaign that the 1973 Endangered Species Act finally cleared the way for.

Mount Thor, with Earth's greatest vertical drop of 1,200 m, is on which Arctic island?

Baffin Island's Mount Thor was carved by glaciers grinding through the Akshayuk Pass until its cliff came to overhang at about 105 degrees.

The Great Blue Hole, a giant circular marine sinkhole, lies off the coast of which country?

Belize's Great Blue Hole formed during the ice ages, when sea levels were much lower, and was flooded as the seas rose again.

Which river flows past four national capitals: Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest and Belgrade?

The Danube's Iron Gate dam flooded the island of Ada Kaleh, whose Turkish Muslim community emigrated in 1967 before the waters rose.

Which African lake is home to more species of fish than any other lake in the world?

Lake Malawi holds at least 700 species of cichlid, and in 2011 Mozambique officially declared its portion of the lake a reserve.

Which country's government paid the entire construction cost of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault?

Norway paid the vault's full construction cost after conservationist Cary Fowler campaigned for it and approached the Norwegian government.

Kilimanjaro, the highest free-standing mountain in the world, is in which country?

Tanzania's Kilimanjaro defeated several European expeditions before German geographer Hans Meyer finally reached its highest summit in 1889.

Which is the world's fourth-largest island?

Madagascar's wildlife evolved in long isolation, which is why lemurs occur naturally nowhere else on Earth.

Which is the deepest recorded river in the world, with measured depths of around 220 m?

The Congo's Livingstone Falls, a chain of rapids near its mouth, stop riverboats from sailing through to the sea.

The Salar de Uyuni, the largest salt flat in the world, is in which country?

Bolivia's Salar de Uyuni is so vast, flat and clear-skied that it is used to calibrate the altimeters of Earth observation satellites.

Which desert, arid for some 55–80 million years, may be the oldest in the world?

The Namib's dense coastal fog has caused so many shipwrecks that wrecks litter its Skeleton Coast.

The Anglo-Zanzibar War of 1896, in which British warships shelled the sultan's palace, lasted roughly how long?

Under an hour: Sultan Khalid ignored a British ultimatum to leave the palace, and the shelling ended the shortest recorded war in history within 38 to 45 minutes.

Which Siberian settlement is the coldest permanently inhabited place on Earth?

The village in the Sakha Republic sits on the Indigirka River along the Kolyma Highway; its name comes from an Even word for an unfrozen patch of water.

The hottest air temperature ever officially recorded, 56.7 °C in July 1913, was measured where?

Death Valley took the official record in 2012, when the World Meteorological Organization threw out Libya's 58 °C reading from Al Aziziyah.

With a highest natural point of only about 2.4 m, which is the world's lowest-lying country?

In 2009 the Maldives held the world's first underwater cabinet meeting, part of a campaign publicising the threat climate change poses to the islands.

Which is the world's most populous island, home to about 56% of all Indonesians?

More than 158 million people live on just 7% of Indonesia's land area; Jakarta sits on the island's northwestern coast.

Indonesia's new capital Nusantara, designated by a 2022 law, is on which island?

Borneo was picked for the new capital to escape Jakarta's environmental and overpopulation problems, and building work began there in 2022.

Russia leases the Baikonur Cosmodrome, its crewed spaceflight launch site, from which country?

Kazakhstan's Baikonur launched Sputnik 1 and Vostok 1 in Soviet days, and Russia now leases it under a 2005 agreement that runs until 2050.

Victoria Falls, the world's largest sheet of falling water, lies between which two countries?

Zambia and Zimbabwe share the falls that Scottish missionary David Livingstone, the first European recorded to see them, named after Queen Victoria in 1855.

K'gari (Fraser Island), the world's largest sand island, lies off which Australian state?

Queensland officially renamed Fraser Island K'gari in 2023, restoring the Butchulla name settlers had replaced to honour a shipwrecked captain.

The Three Gorges Dam, the world's largest power station by capacity, spans which river?

The Yangtze's Three Gorges Dam displaced somewhere between 1.13 and 1.4 million people, and its reservoir flooded ancient sites along the river.

At over 800 m, which structure was the world's tallest as of 2026?

Burj Khalifa led in 2026, but Jeddah Tower, designed to top 1 km, was nearing its 100th floor that spring.

Bir Tawil, a land area claimed by no recognised state, lies between which two countries?

Egypt and Sudan each assert a different colonial boundary, from 1899 or 1902, so both claim the richer Halaib Triangle and neither claims Bir Tawil.

Which volcano's 1883 eruption made the loudest sound ever measured, heard nearly 4,800 km away near Mauritius?

Krakatoa erupted so violently on 27 August 1883 that people on Rodrigues island mistook the blast for cannon fire from a nearby ship.

Which mythical creature, cast in legend as the natural enemy of the lion, is the national animal of Scotland?

The unicorn has supported Scotland's royal arms for centuries, and one still stands beside England's lion on the royal arms of the United Kingdom.

The largest pyramid by volume known in the world, at Cholula, is hidden under a hill in which country?

Mexico holds the record with a pyramid so overgrown that 16th-century colonists built a church on top of it. Its volume is estimated at over 4.45 million cubic metres.

Which European country's national anthem, a royal march dating from 1761, has no official lyrics to sing?

Spain's Olympic committee once ran a public contest to add words, but the winning lyrics drew such criticism that they were pulled only five days later.

Which landmark, built as the centrepiece of an 1889 world's fair, was slated for dismantling after just 20 years?

The Eiffel Tower was due to come down in 1909 yet still stands. It was the tallest structure in the world for 41 years, until the Chrysler Building topped it in 1930.

Which Central American country abolished its army after a brief civil war in 1948 and has had none since?

Costa Rica wrote the ban on a standing army into its 1949 constitution, making it one of the few sovereign nations with no military.

Which country, crossed by the line of 0° latitude near its capital, takes its name from that line?

Ecuador is simply the word for 'equator' in the country's official language. Its capital, Quito, lies right beside the line.

Which northern European country, nicknamed the land of a thousand lakes, actually has well over 100,000 of them?

Finland has well over 100,000 lakes and about as many islands, some 179,000. Water covers roughly a tenth of the country.

Which purpose-built capital city was founded as a compromise between the rival cities of Sydney and Melbourne?

Canberra is an entirely planned city, based on a design by the American architects Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin.

Which city is built on more than 100 small islands in a shallow lagoon, linked by over 400 bridges?

Venice rests on closely spaced wooden piles, mostly alder trunks, that its founders drove through mud and sand into a harder layer of clay.

The first voyage around the world set out in 1519 under which captain, who was killed before it ended?

Ferdinand Magellan was killed in battle in 1521, so Juan Sebastián Elcano brought the last ship home in 1522 with only 18 of the crew.

Which peak, dubbed the Savage Mountain by a 1953 climber, is the second-highest mountain on Earth?

K2 was the last of the 8,000-metre peaks to be climbed in winter, a feat a ten-strong team finally managed in January 2021.

Which supercontinent did all of today's continents once form before it began breaking apart in the age of the dinosaurs?

Pangaea was C-shaped, stretched between the polar regions and was surrounded by a single superocean called Panthalassa.

Which island, separated from the mainland by the narrow Strait of Messina, is the largest in the Mediterranean Sea?

Sicily is also the most populous island in the Mediterranean, and its Mount Etna is the tallest active volcano in Europe.

Which country flew a plain green national flag, with no emblem or design at all, from 1977 to 2011?

Libya adopted the all-green banner under Muammar Gaddafi in place of a red, white and black flag, and gave it up in 2011.

Which archipelago's wildlife, studied by Charles Darwin in the 1830s, helped inspire his theory of evolution?

The Galápagos lie around 1,000 km west of the South American mainland, and all of the islands are protected as a national park and marine reserve.

Which was the only country in Southeast Asia to avoid colonisation by European powers during the age of empire?

Thailand, then called Siam, kept its independence at a price, ceding territory, trade rights and legal privileges through several unequal treaties.

Which city opened the world's first underground railway in 1863, with steam engines hauling gas-lit carriages?

London hailed its Metropolitan Railway a success from the start: 38,000 passengers rode the wooden carriages on opening day.

The Darvaza gas crater, a blazing pit that earned the nickname Door to Hell, is in which country?

Turkmenistan officially calls the pit the Shining of Karakum, after the desert around it. The crater is 60 to 70 metres across and about 30 metres deep.

Which country takes its name from the Latin word for silver, a metal early explorers hoped to find there?

Argentina is a Latinised echo of the Río de la Plata, the 'Silver River', where 16th-century explorers heard legends of silver mountains.

An 1884 conference chose a line through the Royal Observatory in which place as the world's prime meridian?

Greenwich won out at a meeting of 41 delegates in Washington, D.C. Satellite navigation now puts zero longitude about 102 metres east of the old line.

Which explorer led the first expedition to reach the South Pole, arriving in 1911 five weeks ahead of his rivals?

Roald Amundsen and four companions reached the pole on 14 December 1911. He had first planned an Arctic drift, then switched goals after others claimed the North Pole.

Which river, the longest in Europe, flows some 3,500 km past the cities of Kazan and Samara?

The Volga never reaches an ocean: it is the longest river in the world that drains into an inland basin instead of the open sea.

Which river carved Arizona's Grand Canyon, a gorge more than a mile deep and 446 km long?

The Colorado supplies water to 40 million people, and so much is drawn off that its delta at the Gulf of California is now mostly dry.

Which African country's national flag features an AK-47 rifle crossed with a hoe over an open book?

Mozambique has faced calls to remove the rifle ever since its democratisation in 1990. Its constitution says only that the flag shows a crossed hoe and gun.

Which island country, where British planters swapped coffee for tea, was formally called Ceylon until 1972?

Sri Lanka adopted its present name in 1972 on becoming a republic, 24 years after it gained independence in 1948.

Which country of more than 7,600 islands was named by a 1540s explorer in honour of a future king?

The Philippines honours Philip II: explorer Ruy López de Villalobos named two of the islands 'Felipinas' in 1542, while Philip was still a prince.

Which river, the eastern of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia, flows through the city of Baghdad?

The Tigris rises in the mountains of the Armenian Highlands and finally joins the Euphrates near al-Qurnah to form the Shatt al-Arab.

Which country's coat of arms shows a gold harp with silver strings on a blue background?

Ireland adopted the harp as its emblem in 1922, modelling the design on a late-medieval instrument, the Trinity College Harp.

Socotra, an island where a third of the plant life is found nowhere else on Earth, belongs to which country?

Yemen's Socotra is home to the dragon blood tree, which is named after the blood-like colour of its red sap.

Which sandstone monolith, sacred to the Anangu people, has been closed to climbers since October 2019?

Uluru stands 348 m high with most of its bulk lying underground, and its red colour comes from iron oxide in the sandstone.

Which constructed language did an eye doctor from Białystok publish in 1887 under a pen name that became its name?

Esperanto took its name from that pen name, Doktoro Esperanto, meaning 'one who hopes'. Its creator, L. L. Zamenhof, had simply called it the international language.

Which city hosts NATO's headquarters and serves as the de facto capital of the European Union?

Brussels houses the main EU institutions, though the judicial branch sits in Luxembourg and the European Parliament meets for a minority of the year in Strasbourg.

Al-Qarawiyyin, founded as a mosque in the 850s and often cited as the world's oldest university, is in which country?

Morocco owes the institution to a woman, by tradition: Fatima al-Fihri, a wealthy merchant's daughter, is credited with founding it in the city of Fez.

Which currency is the world's oldest still in continuous use, with roots in medieval silver pennies?

Pound sterling began as a weight: the medieval silver penny, or sterling, weighed about 1/240 of a tower pound.

Which map projection, first presented in 1569, inflates the size of lands the farther they lie from the equator?

Mercator maps became the standard for navigation in the 18th century because a course of constant compass bearing appears on them as a straight line.

Which 12th-century temple, the largest religious complex in the world, appears in white on Cambodia's national flag?

Angkor Wat was built for the Khmer king Suryavarman II as a Hindu temple dedicated to Vishnu, and is thought to have been intended as his mausoleum.

Which country, the smallest on the African mainland, is bounded by Senegal on every side except its Atlantic coast?

The Gambia follows the lower Gambia River, lying on both banks as the river flows through the centre of the country to the ocean.

Mount Ararat, the snow-capped volcano long linked to the story of Noah's Ark, is the highest peak in which country?

Turkey holds the 5,137 m peak, although the mountain is the principal national symbol of neighbouring Armenia and appears on its coat of arms.

Timbuktu, a desert trading city that grew rich on salt, gold and ivory, lies in which West African country?

Mali was also the name of the medieval empire that absorbed Timbuktu early in the 14th century, when the city became a famed centre of Islamic scholarship.

Which language of the western Pyrenees is Europe's only known isolate, unrelated to any other living language?

Basque is the only surviving language of Paleo-European origin, even though Romance languages now surround it on every side.

Which peak, one of the Seven Summits at nearly 7,000 metres, is the highest mountain outside Asia?

Aconcagua is the roof of the Americas, and only one mountain on Earth stands taller above its surroundings by the measure climbers call prominence.

Lake Assal, a salt lake 155 metres below sea level that is Africa's lowest point, lies in which country?

Djibouti mines salt from the lake, whose water has no outflow and is about ten times saltier than the sea.

Which city, a seat of national government but not the official capital, is home to the International Court of Justice?

The Hague also hosts the International Criminal Court and about 200 other international bodies, while Amsterdam is the country's official capital.

In which desert did Roy Chapman Andrews's 1923 expedition uncover the first nests of dinosaur eggs known to science?

The Gobi eggs went back to the American Museum of Natural History, and Andrews is allegedly the model for the film hero Indiana Jones.

Which West African country, settled by freed African Americans, named its capital after US president James Monroe?

Liberia was the first African republic to gain independence, and Monrovia is one of only two world capitals named after an American president.

Which rocky headland, lying farther south than the Cape of Good Hope, is the true southern tip of Africa?

Agulhas lies about 55 km farther south than its famous neighbour, and a marker there shows the official dividing line between two oceans.

Which European microstate has two heads of state, a Catalan bishop and a foreign president, serving as co-princes?

Andorra passed to the Diocese of Urgell in 988, and its bishop still shares the throne today. Tradition credits Charlemagne with creating the country.

Which strait, formed by rising seas about 8,000 years ago, separates Tasmania from the Australian mainland?

Bass Strait is named after George Bass, the naval surgeon who sailed around Tasmania with Matthew Flinders in 1798–99, proving it was an island.

Which canal, opened in 1869, links the Mediterranean and Red seas so ships can avoid sailing around Africa?

The Suez Canal took ten years to dig, from 1859 to 1869, and trims roughly 8,900 km off the sea journey from the Arabian Sea to Britain.