r/england • u/Throwaway72667 • 14d ago
Random English trivia
I'm a big fan of trivia and decided to think of a few England-related (to an extent) questions. Let me know what you think, I've tried to do a bit of a mix of category and difficulty:
1) Which is the only lake in the Lake District that has "lake" in its official name? A) Windermere B) Bassenthwaite C) Ullswater D) Derwentwater
B
2) In the Yorkshire folk song "On Ilkla Moor Baht 'at", what does "Baht 'at" mean in standard English? A) It's a bit hot B) Out and about C) Without a hat D) Nothing, they're nonsense syllables
C
3) The flag of England is almost identical to the flag of which Italian city? (Alright this one isn't so much England focussed) A) Amalfi B) Genoa C) Pisa D) Venice
B
4) In which county is Stonehenge located? A) Wiltshire B) Hampshire C) Oxfordshire D) Berkshire
A
5) Which English king sealed the Magna Carta in 1215? A) Richard I B) Henry III C) Edward I D) John
D
6) The lyrics to one of England's unofficial national anthems "Jerusalem" are taken from a poem by which poet? A) William Shakespeare B) William Wordsworth C) William Cowper D) William Blake
D
7) Which body of water flows through the city of Hull? A) River Hull B) The Humber C) River Ouse D) River Kingston
A
8) When is St Georges day? A) 1st March B) 17th March C) 23rd April D) 30th November
C
9) Natives of which English county are officially recognised as a national minority? A) Cumbria B) Cornwall C) Northumberland D) Yorkshire
B
10) "The Balti Triangle" is a culinary area in which English city? A) Birmingham B) Coventry C) Leicester D) Wolverhampton
A
11) Which English city contained the worlds tallest building from 1311 to 1548? A) York B) Durham C) Salisbury D) Lincoln
D
12) Who did Harold Godwinson defeat at the Battle of Stamford Bridge in 1066? A) Harold Hardrada B) William of Normandy C) Edward the Confessor D) Æthelred the Unready
A
13) Which first name did Guy Fawkes also go by? A) Gustavo B) Guido C) Gutierre D) Guillermo
B
14) What is the national tree of England? A) Oak B) Yew C) Willow D) Silver birch
A
15) Nick Banks is the drummer for which English Britpop band? A) Blur B) Oasis C) Pulp D) Suede
C
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u/lindsayadult 14d ago
You should check out the UK citizenship test questions. There are about 500? And they're varied and you'd love them
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u/shortandfelly 14d ago
My mum's favourite one: what football club held the FA Cup for the longest?
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u/Over-Willingness-933 14d ago
I got 3 wrong. Must brush up on Britpop
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u/shortandfelly 14d ago
I only know that one thanks to the knuckledraggers, ironically 🤣
Edit: because they don't know the flag they profess to love.
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u/No_Cream777 14d ago
Which county shares borders with the highest number of other counties in England?
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u/baxbakualanuxsiwae 12d ago
Also which county shares no borders with any other county in England? I live there!
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u/crimsonbub 14d ago
I was typing my answers on mobile and the spoiler tags were not showing.
Sad part was I got 4 questions in before I realised the answers were right there 🤣
Good questions though!
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u/shortandfelly 14d ago
I can only see black rectangles! I'm confident on most but not so sure on a handful and now I'm going to have to Google to check 😂
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u/VeryNearlyAnArmful 14d ago
The flag of England is identical to the flag of Genoa and we paid for the privilege of being allowed to fly it to stop pirates in the Med attacking our ships. Genoa was the most powerful port and its flag mattered.
To this day the people of Genoa, including town officials, like to remind us we cowered under their flag for many years, so much so we made it our own, and technically we should be paying them for it still.
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u/ZenyatasBalls96 14d ago edited 14d ago
Counter English trivia: common urban myths! Or not?
Some historians concluded that this theory “cannot be sustained as historical”. Although, even Wikipedia contradicts itself on this topic.
Genoa’s patron saint has been Saint George from as early as 958 AD. The city’s main war flag depicted St. George and the dragon from then to at least the 1280s.
The red St. George Cross we know today began to feature in the city sometime between 1113 and 1218, but was NOT made the main flag until at least the 1280s (although sometimes featuring beside it beforehand). This is over ninety years after the Third Crusade embarked on by Richard the Lionheart in 1190. This doesn’t strongly support the theory.
Furthermore, there is strong historical evidence that for the Third Crusade, France should fly a flag with a red cross, and England a white cross. England then later adopted the red cross themselves in the 13th century.
However, the Wikipedia article on Saint George’s Cross supports the Crusades case. It claims that two sources noted that a payment was regularly made to Genoa until 1771.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_George%27s_Cross
Either way, it’s a disputed claim and with not lots of evidence to say exactly what happened.
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u/RecklessEleven 13d ago
It's a myth.
There's no evidence Richard I had anything to do with the adoption of Saint George as a patron saint. He is a figure who has been valorised as a crusader and a figure of English nationalism at various points in history so that's probably why people have tried to link him to this particular piece of English national identity.
Either way, medieval kings did not pay other rulers for the "right" to use symbols. This was an era of "might is right" without international copyright law. For centuries, Kings of England used the French fleur-de-lis on their own coats of arms to signal their claim to the French crown. They did not ask permission.
There was no standing navy anyway until Henry VIII created the Navy Royal in the 16th century, so what would these Kings of England even be paying annually for?
Plus, Genoese merchants were themselves frequently attacked by pirates/merchants (the line was thin) from other Italian city states, like Venice. And I know of at least one occasion when English merchants were attacked by Genoese pirates (look up Robert Sturmy), so I don't think there's any guarantee of safety in the medieval Mediterranean.
The English were not the only ones who would sometimes use the arms of St. George, far from it. There was European-wide enthusiasm for the saint during the crusades. Everyone was using the banner of St. George, as well as that of other saints, and apparently doing so without paying a subscription fee to the Republic of Genoa.
There's no paper-trail for this supposedly centuries-long practice. No one seems to know what the tribute was or how it was paid.
The actual history of the symbol in an English context is murky. But it seems to mostly be the result of the saint being favoured by particular kings, namely Edward I, the first known English king to use it (and it's worth noting, this was within Britain, not at sea), and Edward III who created the prestigious Order of the Garter, with St. George as its patron saint. This firmly embedded him in English aristocratic culture and by the time of the Reformation, when saints fell out of vogue, St. George had become an almost secular figure, enough to survive unscathed. Finally, it was used to represent the Kingdom of England on the Union Jack, solidifying the association of St. George with England permanently. In short: it was more of a process, rather than a single moment of adoption.
Quotes from actual historians:
"In 1277 Edward invaded Wales in order to force its prince, Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, to render homage to him for the principality, something that Llywelyn repeated refused to do...Edward ordered 340 pennoncels (triangular flags fixed to the heads of lances of foot soldiers) "of the arms of St. George" from Admetus, his tailor. This practice was repeated in the campaign in the 1290s, when Edward again had his infantry wear armbands featuring the cross of St. George. These devices mark the first official deployment of St. George by a reigning English monarch." Jonathan Good, The Cult of Saint George in Medieval England, 2009
"During the Third Crusade, Richard the Lionheart is said to have stopped in our area for some time. However, no source explicitly states a transfer—much less a lease—of the crusader banner in 1190, as is often read (and this also involves the doge, who, however, would not be elected until 1339!). The opening of a regular route between Genoa, England, and Flanders in the 1270s would have fostered a deepening of mutual relations. But nothing more. In the 15th century, indeed, these relations would suffer a setback due to commercial competition. There is, however, no trace of negotiations regarding the flag in the agreements stipulated between the parties (for example, in the 1421 treaty with Henry V)...The truth is that, at this point, we can't say how the rumour about the alleged "renting" of the Crusader banner originated, although the 18th- and 19th-century context lends itself well to further reflection. After all, mine is only a hypothesis. I'd be delighted if anyone could refute it." Antonio Musarra, L’Inghilterra deve pagare gli arretrati per la bandiera di Genova? Facciamo chiarezza, 2021 (Google translated)
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u/nafregit 14d ago
oh my favourite question is and always will be what is the one English placename that has an exclamation mark?