Did You Know?
| Did you know? | The word ‘Goodbye’ originally comes from an Old English phrase meaning ‘God be with you’. |
| Did you know? | Did you know that an Elephant weighs less than a blue whales tongue. |
| Did you know? | International Tongue-twister day is celebrated on the second Sunday in November every year. Yes there is a day for celebrating tongue-twisters. |
| Did you know? | Psychologists have recently claimed, " Pad kid poured curd pulled cold." as the most frustrating tongue-twister ever. They claim that no one could speak it accurately when spoken fast 10 times. Tongues just 'froze.' |
| Did you know? | His Holiness, the 14th Dalai Lama, Tibets Spiritual leader, has a hobby of collecting and repairing watches. |
| Did you know? | The Old English language, often called Anglo-Saxon, was spoken in England from 450AD to 1100AD. Old English is very different from Modern English; it has many more Germanic words, and its grammar is more difficult. Old English slowly turned into Middle English |
| Did you know? | Learning a second language can actulually make you smarter. Studies suggests that it slows down the aging process of the mind. |
| Did you know? | George Bush, former President of the USA, had allocated a budget of $114 million for teaching Hindi in the US. |
| Did you know? | Jane Austen was a British writer of timeless classics that have recieved critical and popular successes even till now. She has a Jane Austen fan club even now and her novels routinely feature in the top 10 most read books. |
| Did you know? | Jane Austen was born 240 years ago in 1775 and went on to become one of the most famous novelist after her death. The Oxford English Dictionary credits Jane Austen as the first recorded author of over 40 words including door-bell, double-bed, spongecake and dinner-party. |
| Did you know? | Pt. Lawahar Lal Nehru India’s first prime minister after its independence wrote his autobiography in Prison in 1935. The Book written by him titled “Toward Freedom” was Published in year 1936 in USA. |
| Did you know? | Bihar was the first state of British India to have adopted Hindi as its sole official language and replacement of Urdu in the year 1881. |
| Did you know? | Buddhism, the fourth largest religion in the world, with 360 million followers, originated from around 400BC. The first mention of the The Buddha in Western writing is in the writings of Clement of Alexandria, 2 AD. |
| Did you know? | Abraham Lincon the 16th President of USA, practiced law without a degree. Lincoln had about 18 months of formal schooling. He also was a wrestler, who took part in bouts. |
| Did you know? | Nelson Mandela revolutionary and first black president of South Africa,probably won more awards than anyone in history. In addition to the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize, Mandela has received more than 250 awards, including honorary degrees from more than 50 universities worldwide. |
| Did you know? | Bill Gates co-founder of Microsoft is America's richest man and second richest in the world. In 2010, Gates and his friends Mark Zuckerberg and Warren Buffett signed the "Gates Giving Pledge," promising to give half of their wealth to charity. |
| Did you know? | Mark Twain, was a major American writer from Missouri. His writings are famous for their humor, vivid details, and memorable characters. His best-known works are The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, both classics in American literature. |
| Did you know? | Born in 350 B.C, Chanakya has been credited as the pioneer of economics and political science and his theories in economics are relevant even today. He was imperative in the rise of the Mauryan dynasty, the largest ever recorded Indian empires in history. |
| Did you know? | Dr B R Ambedkar the first Indian to pursue an Economics doctorate degree abroad, he is also the first Ph.D in Economics and the first double doctorate holder in Economics in South Asia. He was also among the highest educated Indians of his generation. |
| Did you know? | One of the greatest Indian tycoons, Dhirajlal Hirachand 'Dhirubhai' Ambani, was the founder of Reliance Industries which he started with Rs 50,000 and two assistants. In just three decades, the combined fortune of the family was over 60 billion USD. |
| Did you know? | The warrior-king Alexander III of Macedon (356–323 B.C.) conquered territories stretching from Greece to Egypt and through present-day Turkey, Iran and Pakistan. He never lost a battle in his 15 years of conquests. |
| Did you know? | Pele is considered the greatest football player of all times. He is credited to have scored a total of 1,283 first-class goals, including 77 for Brazil. |
| Did you know? | In 1967, a 48-hour ceasefire was declared in Nigeria so that Federal and Rebel troops could watch Pele play on a visit to the war-torn nation. |
| Did you know? | The Brazilian government declared Pelé an official national treasure in 1961 to prevent him from being transferred out of the country. |
| Did you know? | Pele scored three or more goals a staggering 129 times during his career." |
| Did you know? | You can use an ATM in Latin in Vatican City. |
| Did you know? | For his work on the development of ballistic missile and launch vehicle technology, Dr Abdul Kalam came to be known as Missile Man of India. |
| Did you know? | In 1977, NASA put recordings of Earth on the Voyager spacecraft including greetings in 55 languages. These "Hellos" are currently travelling in space. |
| Did you know? | J. K. Rowling,famous for her Harry Potter series, is the ninth-best-selling fiction author of all time (estimated 500 million copies of her work has been sold world wide) |
| Did you know? | Bhagwad Gita was part of the great epic 'Mahabharata' and was written by the greatest of sages, Vedvyasa somewhere around 5th century to 2nd century BCE. |
| Did you know? | The autobiography of Dr Abul Kalam, the 11th President of India, Wings of Fire: An Autobiography , first published in English, has been translated into 13 languages including French and Chinese. |
| Did you know? | Albert Einstein, started assimilating the wisdom contained in Bhagavad-Gita in the later stages of his life! He deeply regretted the fact that he should have indulged in Bhagavad-Gita in the early formation years of his life! |
| Did you know? | Now one of the most powerful businesswoman, Pepsi chief Indra Nooyi worked midnight to 5 A.M. as a receptionist to earn money while getting her masters at Yale University. |
| Did you know? | India is the world's second-largest English speaking country. India is second only to the USA when it comes to speaking English with around 125 million people speaking the language, which is only 10% of our population. So knowing Hindi becomes equally important |
| Did you know? | The human calculator. Shakuntla Devi was given this title after she demonstrated the calculation of two 13 digit numbers: 7,686,369,774,870 × 2,465,099,745,779 which were picked at random. She answered correctly within 28 seconds. |
| Did you know? | India has the world’s largest school in terms of students, the City Montessori School in Lucknow. It has more than 45 thousand students! |
| Did you know? | Chess was invented in India. |
| Did you know? | India’s tech capital, Bangalore, has increased its office supply by six times since 2006, and now has more Grade-A offices than Singapore. |
| Did you know? | There is emphasis on learning more languages in Finland and most of the students speak more than 3 Language. And those languages are generally English, Finnish, Spanish. Swedish, French, and German. |
| Did you know? | There is no differentiation between the Schools of Finland. Every school is provided with the same facility. So there is no mad race between the schools that which school is number one. |
| Did you know? | Finlands education system is finest in the world, and its free all the way from kindergarden to university. |
| Did you know? | Most Japanese schools don’t have janitors. Instead children do the cleaning daily as part of a practice rooted in Buddhist traditions that associate cleaning with morality |
| Did you know? | The University of Oxford is the world’s oldest English-speaking university. Though the date of its founding is unclear, the formal date is usually considered to be A.D. 1096 |
| Did you know? | While Vowel like, 'a' & "i' can be words in itself like, I am Nitin, a cat and a mouse. No single consonant can be a word in itself, it needs help from a vowel. |
| Did you know? | A 15th anniversary is called Quindecennial. |
| Did you know? | There are 6500 languages spoken in the world and about 2000 of them are in danger of getting extinct. |
| Did you know? | English is the second most spoken language and the most spoken language in the world is Mandarin( Chinese). |
| Did you know? | 14th September is celebrated as Hindi Day. |
| Did you know? | English Alphabet is the most extensively used across the world as over 100 languages use the same alphabet as in English, A to Z. |
| Did you know? | The word Vowel originated from the Latin word 'Vox', which means Voice. |
| Did you know? | Queueing' is the only word with longest consecutive use of vowels." |
| Did you know? | The word 'taramasalata' which is a pink dip made out of fish paste, is one of the words with maximum number of vowel 'a's (6) in a word. |
| Did you know? | Vowel 'e' is the most common letter used in English. |
| Did you know? | The only word without a true vowel is, 'rhythm' ( as y is a semi vowel ) & 'indistinguishability' is one of the words in English with maximum number of 'i's (6) |
| Did you know? | The word ,'Iouea' meaning fossil sponge, is the shortest word which contains all five regular vowels and no consonants. |
| Did you know? | The word "triskaidekaphobia" means "extreme fear of the number 13". This superstition is related to "paraskevidekatriaphobia", which means "fear of Friday the 13th". |
| Did you know? | The oldest English word that is still in use is ‘town’. |
| Did you know? | The word ‘Goodbye’ originally comes from an Old English phrase meaning ‘God be with you’. |
| Did you know? | The first use of apostrophe can be traced back to 1496, when it is found in the works of an Italian scholar and in English the apostrophe was introduced in the 16th century. |
| Did you know? | An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language. It includes norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation. |
| Did you know? | Most English grammar and spellings follow the standardised rules set out in Dr Johnson’s Dictionary, which was published in 1755. |
| Did you know? | The original name for butterfly was flutterby. |
| Did you know? | The words, 'Month, orange, silver, and purple' do not rhyme with any other word. |
| Did you know? | English is the official language of 67 countries but not of USA at the federal level. USA, doesn’t have an official language. |
| Did you know? | India has a higher English speaking population than United Kingdom! It comes second only after USA. |
| Did you know? | The idea of creating Google came to Larry King in a dream. We associate dreams with peace and quiet but actually our brains are more active during sleep than they are during the day. |
| Did you know? | There are 50,000 characters in the Chinese language. You’ll need to know about 2,000 characters to read a newspaper. |
| Did you know? | The oldest written language is believed to be written in 4500 Bc. |
| Did you know? | Kim Peek was a man with photographic memory, he had the ability to read two pages at a time, one with each eye, he had prefectly memorised 12000 books in his lifetime. |
| Did you know? | English is the language of the air. This means that all pilots have to identify themselves and speak in English while flying, regardless of their origin. |
| Did you know? | Shakespeare is rumored to have contributed about 2000 English words to the language. Some common words from Shakespearean English are, fashionable, jaded, belonging, cold-blooded, manager, inaudible etc. |
| Did you know? | The word 'set' has the highest number of definitions in the dictionary. It has a huge 64 definations, listed. |
| Did you know? | Forbes has estimated the net worth of author J K Rowling to be $650 million . Her worth would have been more if she hadn't donated $150 million to various charities. She is supposed to be wealthier than Queen Elizabeth II. |
| Did you know? | J K Rowling is a british novelist who is best known for the Harry Potter fantasy series. Her books have become the best selling series in history and has been translated in 65 languages, an estimated 500 million copies of the books have been sold till date. |
| Did you know? | The most commonly used Modal verb is 'can'. |
| Did you know? | The oldest Old English word still used today that has the same direct meaning is ‘town’. Town has kept the same meaning as its original Old English word “tun” meaning area of dwelling. |
| Did you know? | Kabir or Kabira as he was fondly known was born around 1398 and was one of the finest poets and musicians. He is respected by Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs. Kabir suggested that true God is with the person who is on the path of righteousness, considered all creatures on earth as his own self. |
| Did you know? | Dengue is widely pronounced as Den-gue, whereas the actual pronunciation is Den-gee. Hence, dengue makes it to the list of the most mispronounced words along with pronunciation, almonds and women. |
| Did you know? | The first publishing of Shakespeare’s all plays in one book is the ‘First Folio’ published in 1623. He wrote 38 play and 154 sonnets and numerous poems. |
| Did you know? | At more than 4000 lines and 30,000 words, Hamlet is Shakespeare’s longest play. In 2012, Guinness World Records declared Hamlet the second most portrayed human character on film and TV, after Sherlock Holmes and the top spot for non human went to Dracula. |
| Did you know? | Shakespeare widely known as the greatest dramatist was born 26 April 1564, Stratford. Shakespeare worked as an actor, writer and co-owner of a drama company called the ‘Lord Chamberlain’s Men’- Later known as the King’s Men. It's the company that built the first theater in London. |
| Did you know? | Shakespeare had little interest in seeing his plays printed in book. He’d written them not to be read, but to be performed on stage. They were usually written in haste often before a performance but with a natural ease so there were never any cutting or blotting of the lines. |
| Did you know? | Charles Dickens (1812 to1870) is regarded as one of the greatest novelist of the victorian era. |
| Did you know? | A growlery is a place you like to retire to when you’re unwell or in a bad mood. This word was coined by Charles Dickens in his novel. |
| Did you know? | Charles Dickens wrote the classic novels of all times, Oliver twist, David Coperfield and Great Expectations . These classics form part of curriculams across the world even today. |
| Did you know? | Kabir is believed to have lived in the locality of Kabir Chaura in Varanasi. Kabīr maṭha (कबीरमठ), located in Kabir Chaura, celebrates his life and times till date. Accompanying the property is a house named Nīrūṭīlā (नीरू टीला) which accommodates students and scholars who reside their to study Kabir's work. |
| Did you know? | The hallmark of Kabir's works consists of his two line couplets, known as the 'Kabir ke Dohe'. |
| Did you know? | Charles Dickens is credited for coining 247 words by Oxford dictionary, most of these words are still in use today like, Creepy the, rampage, devil-may-care, flummox, abuzz etc. |
| Did you know? | Leonardo Da Vinci, the artist known most for his work 'Monalisa' was also a scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, sculptor, architect, botanist, musician, and a writer. Leonardo wanted to know everything about nature. |
| Did you know? | Leonardo drew the plans for the first armored car in 1485 and invented the bicycle 300 years before it appeared on the road. Also he created an inflatable tube so people could float in the water. |
| Did you know? | Leonardo Da Vinci sketched the first parachute, first helicopter, first aeroplane, first tank, first repeating rifle, swinging bridge, paddleboat and the first motorcar. |
| Did you know? | Leonardo Da Vinci established modern techniques of scientific illustration with highly accurate renderings such as ‘Embryo in the Womb’. |
| Did you know? | Leonardo Da Vinci, the artist known most for his work 'Monalisa' was also a scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, sculptor, architect, botanist, musician, and a writer. Leonardo wanted to know everything about nature. |
| Did you know? | So great was his quest for knowledge that Franklin became a vegetarian at age 16 so that he can save money to buy books to read. Within years his house was jammed with books from wall to wall. |
| Did you know? | Benjamin Franklin (January 17, 1706 to April 17, 1790) is renowned as the Founding Father of United states and also as a polymath, inventor, scientist, printer, politician, freemason and diplomat. |
| Did you know? | Franklin invented Bifocal lens that could be used for both long distance and for reading. It helped bpeople who needed to carry two glasses all the time for long and short sightedness. He never patented his findings. |
| Did you know? | Benjamin Franklin designed the American Penny in 1787 and his picture has been on every $100 bill printed since 1928. |
| Did you know? | Franklin helped to draft the decleration of independence and the US Constitution and his scientific persuits led him to discover franklin stove, electricity rod, musical instrument armonica, rocking chair, flexible cathedral among others. |
| Did you know? | In The prepositions to, of, in, for, on, with, at, by, from are all in the list of most used top 25 words in English. |
| Did you know? | Two of Leonardo Da Vinci's works, the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, are the most famous, most reproduced and most parodied portrait and religious painting of all time. |
| Did you know? | Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous painting—the Mona Lisa—sits behind a six-foot bulletproof barrier and can be seen on display at the Louvre Museum in Paris, where it has been kept for more than 200 years. |
| Did you know? | Rabindranath Tagore is the proud son of India who was the first to receive the Nobel Prize for literature from Asia. This multitalented personality was at once a philosopher, poet, dramatist, painter, novelist, educationist and a composer. |
| Did you know? | Bookkeeper, Mississippi are known words with 3 occurrence of consecutive letters. Strengths is the longest word with a single vowel. |
| Did you know? | You can spell out all the numbers from 1 to 99 without using the letter A, B, C, or D. |
| Did you know? | Did you know that Malayalam, (language spoken in the southern state of Kerala in India)is a word that reads the same backwards and forwards in the English language? MALAYALAM, see for yourself. |
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