100 Interesting Facts About France
Hello Guys:
Welcome to Countries Facts this so this is 100 facts about France.
1 In case you thought this Article is about a genre of electronic music that was popular in the early noughties world that's trance and innate sorry France is a country that is mostly located in Europe though there are a bit of front all over the place we'll get to that later.
2 The area in Europe is known as metropolitan France and is the third largest nation in Europe by land area and the largest in the EU ah the EU I remember.
3 France has a population of almost 67 million people were just slightly more than the UK ah they always have to be one up on our size French.
4 France is also one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council which was created by the main victorious States following the Second World War.
5 Frances national motto is liberté égalit a fraternity except probably in a better accent than that these emerged in the 17th century as enlightenment value spread throughout Europe however the three words did not become the nation's official motto until much much later.
6 Frances flag is a very famous and very fabulous combination of three columns of blue white and red blue and red other traditional colors are Paris and were adopted into the now iconic tricolour along with white which has been described as the ancient color of France.
7 The garlic rooster is an unofficial national animal of France the rooster as a symbol of France has its origins in an ancient pun from the word galas which means both the people of Gaul and cockerel apparently the people living in what is now known as France took the rooster on as an icon for their nation France they're being led by a [ __ ] just like the US.
8 The French Republic is divided into 18 regions 13 in metropolitan France and 5 and overseas France these regions are divided into departments these departments are further subdivided into era dissonance our diplomats are subdivided into Canton's and Canton's are subdivided into communes my god France you couldn't be less complicated.
9 As of January 2015 there are 36,000 681 communes in France that's more communist than a communications department in the communist community nothing political there I must stress they're just all sound a bit like the word commune that's the level of my humor.
10 Technically Corsica is known as a territorial collectivity giving it a greater degree of autonomy over itself but it's considered to be the equivalent to a region.
11 Air france also has several regions overseas Guadeloupe French Guiana Martinique reunion and my yacht from a legal standpoint these regions have exactly the same status as those in metropolitan France and so use the euro as their currency as a part of the European Union it would be like if I don't know Kent was in the Caribbean exactly the same legally weather-wise very different.
12 France also has overseas collectivities French Polynesia st. Maarten Saint barthélemy Wallis and Futuna and st. Pierre and Miquelon overseas collective have more autonomy so longer than use the euro some of them don't and some of them are in the EU and some of them.
13 France also has a few other territories that fit into neither category trust me don't worry we'll stop talking about decapitation soon New Caledonia which is known as a special collectivity of France Clipperton Island which is an uninhabited territory and the French southern and Antarctic lands which have no permanent population but generally around 140 military personnel and civilian scientists.
14 The most widely spoken language in France is shocker French or the francais yep I'd only be too much of a a show-off here but I did get a B grade at GCSE anyway French is the official language of France and France is the country with the most native French speakers so yeah pretty French.
15 However there are more french-speaking people in Africa than in France huh in fact the largest country by population where French is an official language is not France but it is the Democratic Republic of the Congo here there's a plot twist who didn't expect.
16 French like languages such as Spanish Portuguese and Italian is a Romance language though these languages are stereotypically associated with love and tenderness.
17 The Romance languages are those that evolved from vulgar latin that's a form of latin by the way it's not you know like kiss kiss [ __ ] dis sorry so popular is French that it is the second most studied language in the world after English I remember it like it was yesterday Sherma pal Sam Joe beetle Andre je travaille common voiced on the Internet yep still got it.
18 Apparentiy 34% of French people can't speak English which is much higher than the percentage of British people that can speak French.
19 There are several words in French that feature three consecutive E's such as Cree and agree E which means created and approved.
20 The word France comes from the Latin Francia or land of the Franks most of the Germanic European languages still have a variation on the Frank in its name for France FRA Grecian German Frank Reich in Dutch Franck eek in Swedish and Norwegian etc.
21 Where did the word Frank come from there are a few competing theories about this but the most likely of these appears to be that it comes from the Frankish word for rank meaning.
22 The oldest evidence of human life in what is now France dates back to approximately 1.5 7 million years ago.
23 France is home to numerous decorated cake from the Upper Paleolithic era including some of the most famous and best preserved examples such as the Loko and Chauvet caves unfortunately neither of these caves have been open to the public for years as visitors have the exceedingly rude habit of breathing inside the caves I know right meaning the carbon dioxide the people were sailing led to the growth of mold on the walls damaging the art sad.
24 Throughout the Iron Age what is now much upon us in France was inhabited by Celtic people known as the Gauls which is why France is sometimes referred to as a Gaul mostly by fans of the comic Asterix I imagine.
25 The ancient Romans had the gall to invade Gaul with Julius Caesar eventually subduing last remaining areas of the region in 51 AD the Romans had ultimately controlled Gaul for over five centuries until doctor.
26 Dr. the fifth century when the Germanic Franks conquered the region and formed the kingdom of France.
27 That's right get your history hats on folks cuz here we go into the old past one of the defining period in the history of France is the hundred year war in which france and england duked it out over the French throne France prevailed helping to transform it from a series of feudal lands into a national state and in England created the political and economic struggles that would ultimately lead to the War of the Roses in which loads of people died also Game of Thrones is based on that very war the Roses so we kind of had the French to thank for it merci France.
28 The 15th and 17th centuries the French Renaissance prompted advances in many areas of thought art architecture music and science Bray songs by the way means rebirth and flourish from the rediscovery of classical Greek philosophy lovely.
29 France eventually developed a hefty colonial empire ultimately controlling roughly 8% of the world's land in what would become the second-largest cologned Empire of the 20th century come on France invading places and creating an empire
30 In 1316 King John the first of France was proclaimed king five months prior to his birth and sadly only lived for five days the strange circumstances of his reign means that King John the first holds a number of distinctions he's the only French King to under position since birth making him the youngest French monarch his death five days later also makes him the only French King to rule for the entirety of his life.
31 Louis Philippe styled as the king of for French survived seven assassination attempts during his 18 year reign in 1835 he was targeted using an array of 20 separate muskets arranged on a wooden frame to fire simultaneously 18 people were killed in the attack but the King only suffered from a graced forehead.
32 Shockingly another French leader managed to beat the seven assassination attempts French president Charles de Gaulle is known to survived over 30 assassination attempts more than anyone else in the world how are the French so invincible.
33 During the sixteenth century France suffered through the French Wars of Religion or the Hyuga no wars though the war broadly pit Catholics against Protestants it also founded in a number of rivalries between various French aristocratic families approximately three million people died in this conflict.
34 One of the most famous events in French history is the French Revolution in the late 18th century the French public angered by growing social and economic equality overthrew the monarchy cementing Frances status as a republic it's basically what happens in the background of blame is remember.
35 Frances national day known in Frances Leffe Nationale but more commonly known to English speakers as Bastille Day is celebrated on the 14th of July and commemorates the storming of the Bastille prison during the French Revolution in 1789 the assault on the medieval fortress was mostly a symbolic act only seven prisoners were imprisoned at the time by the Bastille status as a symbol of the abuses of the monarchy made its downfall an important event in the revolution.
36 During the revolution thousands of people deemed to be acting against the will of the movement were executed in fact almost 17,000 people were beheaded using the guillotine although some estimates put that number far far higher this period became known as the reign of terror but hey yeah make a musical about it.
37 The guillotine was last used in France in 1977 for the execution of a convicted murderer from Tunisia named Hamidah Jan do be officially it remained as a method of execution for those centers to death until the abolition of the death penalty in France in 1981.
38 The monarchy was abolished in metropolitan France there are actually several kings of France's overseas territories for instance Wallis and Futuna in the South Pacific is a French territory and like the popular Christmas song it has three kings.
39 France has a semi-presidential system of government which means it has a popularly elected head of state who has more power than a mere ceremonial figurehead however the minister's that he or she chooses as part of cabinet are ultimately accountable for legislation yep there's another politics part for you I know you're love politics.
40 The capital of France is Paris but Paris was originally a Roman city old notes are it I mean Roman Amin Roman sorry I'm hungry a Roman city called Lutetia Lutetia is a Celtic word meaning a place near a swamp which is kind of nice but mainly if you're Shrek.
41 A staggering 20% of French people live in the surrounding area of Paris known as the Parisian region the meaning of life though Paris is indeed a very nice pretty sparkly place the nicknamed city of Mike's actually refers to a high.
42 Intellectuals who have lived there throughout history though it's early adoption of street lighting probably helped that name along.
43 There is only one stop sign in the entire city of Paris is what an incorrect person would say this commonly stated factoid is no longer true the sign was removed at some point in 2012 to actually now there's none sounds like an accident waiting to happe.
44 When Hitler invaded Paris during World War 2 the French cut the lift cables in the Eiffel Tower so that if he wanted to visit the top he'd have to walk up the stairs nice passive-aggressiveness among regular old aggression.
45 The oldest bridge in Paris is called the Pont Neuf which translates to me bridge very funny Paris very funny.
46 A slightly more mcard fact about the nation's capital is that of the catacombs of Paris which are osteo Aires located beneath the city in the underground tunnels what an ossuary I hear you say I'm glad you asked us you Ares are boxes or rooms that contain the skeletal remains of the deceased it's thought that remains up to 7 million people are kept beneath the surface to Paris an elaborately arranged displays of limb bones and skulls so just think about that next time someone talks about the city of love.
47 Paris with its big metal towers and underground bone reserves receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually the most of any country in the world.
48 The Louvre museum in Paris is the most visited Museum in the world with an amazing 7.3 million visitors in 2016 meaning that it basically received the entire country of Sweden the whole of Sweden didn't visit there by the way that would be mental I just mean the numbers to say sorry I should have made that clearer.
49 The Louvre palace which houses the museum was originally built as a fortress by philip ii in the 12th century as protection against attacks from Vikings I'm sure that glass bit wasn't built by him Lucas how would that protect against any Vikings.
50 The most visited attraction in the capital is Disneyland Paris which attracts well over twice the amount of visitors as the Louvre so you know that's two whole Sweden's.
51 The Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris it's the resting place of many esteemed writers artists and academics such as Frederic Chopin honoré de Balzac Marcel Proust Oscar Wilde and the frontman of The Doors Jim Morrison unsurprisingly for this reason it's the most visited graveyard in the world.
52 Louie XIX no relationship Charli XCX was technically the King of France for just 20 minutes two shortest ever reign in French history he ascended to the French throne in July 1830 following the abdication of his father Charles of tennis and abdicated himself 20 minutes later.
53 France you can marry a dead person who said romance was dead well France apparently in 1959 a damn broken Freya's killing over 400 people including a man named Andre Capra who was engaged to Irene jaada jaada begged then President Charles de Gaulle to allow her to marry him posthumously with the support from the media she was given permission and since then hundreds of French men and women have married dead people you can say mud at least that way you can have the wake in the reception at the same time.
54 The French army was the first to use camouflage in 1915 following a heavy defeat to the Germans that convinced the military leaders to deter usually bright to red trousers and white gloves which look great by the way.
55 France is sometimes known as the hexagon due to its roughly hexagonal shape very roughly hexagonal.
56 There is a commune in the north of France simply called e it's the shortest place name in France and one of the shortest in the whole world although I don't know how you can get any shorter.
57 Additionally there's a small village in the southeast of France called Percy the name comes from Perseus he was a Roman fella who owned a place way back when I've never been but I'd love to be found in Percy stop laughing.
58 There's also a town in southwestern France called called condom the French word for condom is actually preservative but a few years ago the mayor decided to capitalize on the town's name in English by opening a condom museum it closed in 2005.
59 Until 2016 at least 40 percent of the music on private radio stations in France had to be a French origin however following protests from French fry do stations the requirement was reduced down to 35 percent the rule was first introduced in 1994 to combat what the government called an anglo-saxon cultural invasion now we are pretty.
60 The reading and writing system for the blind known as Braille was created by Louie Braille a Frenchman who was blinded as a child while playing with a leather all that slipped and struck him in the eye.
61 Since February 2016 it's been illegal in France for supermarkets to throw away or destroy unsold food shops are legally required to make wastage to charities and food banks which is good I reckons all done France bon bon mercy.
62 The Academie Francaise was founded in 1634 by a small group of French intellectuals to preserve the French language today it attempts to limit the influence of new foreign words from other languages mostly English such as blog hashtag and email admittedly though they have mixed results.
63 France can also lay claim to being really good and not dying as those assassination dodging guys proved earlier French woman Jeon Louise Cole meant was born on the 21st of February 1875 and died on the 4th of August 1997 making her the world's oldest ever human being at an incredible age of 122 years and 164 days Nintendo.
64 The oldest recorded human voice is French Parisian inventor Etowah de leon scott de martinville created a device known as the phone autograph which itched sound waves onto paper covered insert he never intended the recordings to be played back but some smartypants in America converted them into a digital file availing the sound of a woman or small child singing an old French song called oh Claire de Lune which is honestly creepy.
65 Mont blanc in the French Alps is Europe's highest mountain standing proudly at fifteen thousand seven hundred and seventy seven feet tall it's also Europe's deadliest mountain with an average fatality rate of one hundred climbers a year.
66 Du Nord in Paris is not only the largest train station in Paris it's also Europe's busiest railway station by far with around 190 million passengers passing through it each year choo-choo.
67 In new surprising - exactly nobody France produces roughly a billion tons of cheese a year in around 1200 different varieties.
68 In fact almost 50% of French people eat cheese every day number isn't enough oh boy the world's longest novel it's Frenchman Marcel Proust a LaRouche.
69 Tom Purdue which translates to remembrance of things past it was first published in 13 volumes starting in 1912 and contained two staggering papercut inducing 4215.
70 France was the very first country to introduce the license plate when it passed the Paris Police Ordnance Act on August 14th 1893.
71 In 1748 the cultivation of potatoes was made illegal in France as they were thought to call some leprosy 24 years later and I can't believe what I'm about to say but potatoes were decriminalized in 1170.
72 It's often stated that in France it's illegal to name a pig Napoleon this isn't technically true it's illegal to insult the head of state but this law is barely ever enforced so I guess feel free to name your French Pig Napoleon got these facts keep getting weirder and weirder guys.
73 I spoke too soon in the year 13 86 a pig was hanged in France for apparently eating a baby's face during the trial yes there was a trial the pig was allegedly dressed in human clothing and was executed in front of other pigs as a warning which I imagine was very effective due to the well-known ability of pigs to comprehend quite why humans would dress one of them up as people and then murdered them just for eating a delicious baby's face.
74 Beauty pageants for children under the age of 16 are illegal in France good farah said it and anyone caught attempting to organise or enter a child into such competition can't be punished with up to two years in prison or a thirty thousand euro fine.
75 Including its overseas territories France stretches over 12 different time zones more than any other country in the world.
76 Remember all the way back in fact 6 when I talked about white being the ancient color of France well that manifested in a slightly unfortunate manner between 1814 and 1830 when the flag of the kingdom of France was just plain white which probably didn't exactly do wonders for them as they were probably seen as cowards surrendering all the time.
77 For 214 years until 2012 it was illegal for women to wear trousers in Paris without official authorization how the heck would you even enforce that law take them off now lady.
78 Members of the French Foreign Legion wounded while fighting for France can immediately apply for French citizenship apparently such people are French by spilled blood however you do get French citizenship anyway for serving in the French Foreign Legion for 3 years.
79 The French are known for escargot which if you're I don't know silly is French for cooked land snails the French eat approximately 30,000 tons of snails a year but recently French snail farmers have warned that up to 90% of snails found in the French restaurants actually come from Eastern Europe wherever leaders gather them in the wild meaning you could see beating a snail from a roadside in Poland mmm mouth-watering.
80 Brace yourselves brace yourselves croissants are not French not originally anyway the kipferl the ancestor of the croissant dates back to 13th century austria indeed the family of French pastries which croissants fall into via nurseries means things from vienna.
81 It gets worse for French cuisine french toast isn't French it dates back as far as the fifth century and in France the usual term for what we call French toast is Pompidou meaning lost bread a soaking milk and eggs was a method of reclaiming bread that had gone stale.
82 The name french toast in english apparently an innkeeper named joseph french created a similar dish in eighteenth-century albany new york and instantly began advertising it as French's toast but due to his poor grammar he missed off the possessive apostrophe and the name eventually evolved into french toast however there's no real antal evidence for this story and the more likely explanation is that was popularized in America by French immigrants.
83 France has a reputation for it's pretty nice cuisine Francis actually McDonald's most profitable market outside the US obviously with more than 1,000 restaurants spread throughout the nation.
84 Despite his entire croisine apparently being founded on lies France can claim one particularly impressive for accolade France has the highest number of Nobel Prize in Literature winners of an e country with 17.
85 The world's most famous bicycle race their Tour de France which meanders through the French landscape has been running for over 100 years and was originally started to boost sales of a sports newspaper called lotto.
86 France gives people medals for raising children with dignity it's known as the module de la familia francais meaning medal of the French family and is awarded in three classes bronze for raising four or five children silver for parents with six or seven children and gold for those raising eight or more children in 1983 it was reformed to allow fathers to be awarded as well.
87 According to one study France suffers from the highest rate of depression in the world oh man that sucks sorry France.
88 The first and only French actor to won Best Actor at the Oscars is Jean Dujardin for his role in the 2011 film the artist.
89 One of France's most iconic structures the Eiffel Tower was only ever meant to be temporary and was going to be demolished after 20 years and sold as scrape.
90 The Tauri fell as it's known in French ended up staying as it was useful for scientific experiments with radio it now has to be painted every 7 years to keep it looking spiffy a bit like my statue of Jennifer Lawrence that I made out of clay.
91 A replica of the torch carried by the Statue of Liberty known as the flame of Liberty stands at plus Dalma as a gift from the USA to France due to its location it's become an unofficial memorial to Princess Diana of Wales who was killed in a car accident in the Paris underpass in August 1992.
92 France was the fourth country to acquire nuclear weapons and tested its first a bomb in the Algerian portion of the Sahara Desert in 1960 France is now only one of five nations that possesses hydrogen bombs which uses nuclear fusion instead of nuclear fission to create explosions even more powerful than those created by the United States when they bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
93 Speaking of atoms the two-piece bathing suit known as the bikini was almost called the atomic Croton in 1946 by French fashion designer Jacques Heim and French automotive engineer Louie riad.
94 There's a coffee shop in Nice called La Petite Sirah we're not saying please or si vous play makes your coffee more expensive I love those manners those guys.
95 Have you ever drank champagne and other factors of course you have you classy people but make sure you never drink champagne as real champagne can only be called champagne if it's from champagne otherwise it's just sparkling wine.
96 Apparently French people sleep for longer than anyone else in the developed world with an average of eight point eight three hours a night of all the reasons to be jealous of the French this is probably the biggest one.
97 During World War two seek aid or Benga Brits of the Moscow Paris helped as many as a hundred Jews to escape the Nazis by giving them fake Muslim identity documents.
98 Two new cookbooks are published every day in France they love food and they hey all of these food.
99 It's illegal to say you follow us on Twitter or check us out on Facebook on French television as this is apparently unfair promotion of these social media sites over others Paul Deschanel who served as president of France for several months in 1920 was known for his eccentric behavior he's known to have walked out of a state meeting and jumped into a lake fully clothed and on one other occasion he greeted.
100 The British ambassador wearing the French sash of office and nothing else basically he wore clothes when he shouldn't have and didn't wear clothes when he really really should have no more roll send or in 1997 a group of medieval enthusiasts began building a carton in France using only tools materials and techniques available in the 13th century it's known as Gwendolyn castle and is due to be completed sometime in the 2020.
We will see you soon in the next Article God bless you.
