Curious Questions

Curious Questions: Is there any such thing as coincidence?

Just when you were musing about the nature of coincidences, along comes Martin Fone to explain exactly what they are — and what they aren't.

Curious Questions: Why is the pork pie associated with Melton Mowbray?

Martin Fone tells the tale of a true British culinary classic: the pork pie.

Who wrote 'God Save The King'? The extraordinary tale of the British national anthem

What are the origins of our national anthem? John Goodall investigates the extraordinary story behind both the tune and the words, as well as their influence on other nations.

Curious Questions: Can ancient technology of wind, water and hot springs help make a sustainable future?

The UK is switching on to a future of home-grown, greener power — and yet this future is drawing on the past. Jonathan Lee revisits the renewable revolution that started right here.

Curious Questions: Why do the British love to queue?

After a summer of stoic queuing in planes, trains and automobiles, Country Life has identified five reasons why patient queueing is the British tradition that we secretly love to love.

Curious Questions: Was Captain Webb the first to swim the channel?

Captain Matthew Webb was famously the first man to successfully swim the English Channel — or was he? Martin Fone investigates.

Curious Questions: What is the world's oldest extant rowing race?

The annual Oxford v Cambridge Boat Race has been a fixture on the sporting calendar of Britain for almost two centuries — but there is a far older example still going, Doggett's Coat and Badge, which boasts an unbroken record of winners for more than three centuries examples. Martin Fone explains.

Curious Questions: Which came first — the plastic flower pot or the garden centre?

Martin Fone takes a look at the curiously intriguing tale of the evolution of nurseries in Britain.

Curious Questions: Should you get rid of wasps?

Yes, they're a pain at your summer barbecue, but wasps are also voracious predators of other insects — and some of Nature’s most important pest controllers. Seirian Sumner, author of ‘Endless Forms: The Secret World of Wasps’, explains a few of the reasons that you might want to hold off calling the pest controller — and, indeed, why you it might be time to start providing wasp nesting houses in your garden, alongside that designer bee hotel.

Curious Questions: How did the strawberry become the ultimate summer fruit?

Martin Fone tells a tale of fruit, sensuality and espionage as he digs in to the tale of the strawberry we know and love.

Curious Questions: When did the first passenger jet take off?

'Nowadays we travel to all parts of the globe, often within a day and often without changing planes,' says Martin Fone, as he muses on the birth of commercial air travel exactly 70 years ago.

Curious Questions: What is it like to sing at a royal coronation in Westminster Abbey?

The choristers at the Coronation are now in their eighties, but recall vividly the day they sang for The Queen, as Andrew Green discovers.

Curious Questions: Why were ferns considered magical?

Martin Fone considers the beautiful and ancient fern, once commonly held to have mysterious properties.

Curious Questions: What is a crinkle-crankle wall?

The mysterious term crinkle-crankle wall is something you'll see scattered in to architecture books and even property listings. But what are crinkle-crankle walls? Why are they shaped as they are? And who first came up with the idea? Martin Fone explains all.

What it's like to live in the world's most famous crooked house

A few months ago this irresistibly pretty house in Lavenham, Suffolk, featured on the cover of Country Life. We caught up with Alex and Oli Khalil-Martin, the couple who own and live there, to find out what it's like living in one of the country's — and indeed the world's — most photographed homes.

Curious Questions: Who invented the Ploughman's Lunch?

Unimaginable as it seems in the era of the gastropub, in the relatively recent past the ploughman's lunch was the only food served at most British pubs — and it was so much a part of agricultural labourers' lives that some even went to court for their right to bread, cheese and pickles. Martin Fone takes a look at the curious tale of the ploughman's lunch.

Curious Question: Why was the tomato considered to be poisonous?

Martin Fone takes a look at the history of one of our mealtime staples, from its first introduction into Europe in the early 16th century as an exotic plant, to how it ended up on our plates.

Curious Questions: Are Mothering Sunday and Mother's Day the same thing?

Mothering Sunday and Mother's Day have distinct meanings, as Martin Fone explains in the latest of his Curious Questions.

Curious Questions: Did the Tower of London menagerie provide the animals for London Zoo?

Wolves in the Tower of London and an elephant so well trained that Lord Byron wanted to adopt it as his butler — Martin Fone discovers the strange and terrifying history of the last of London's menageries, and how they helped establish what we'd recognise today as its first zoos.

Curious Questions: Who invented the pneumatic tyre?

The names of Goodyear, Dunlop, and Michelin are familiar to motorists and cycling enthusiasts alike, but it is thanks to another inventor that we enjoy comfortable rides on inflated rubber tyres. Martin Fone tells a tale of an inventor's extraordinary ingenuity in creating a design that pre-dated its usefulness by several decades.