Monday Trivia, No. 20

Burt Likko 19 Comments

Among the member states of the United Nations, Albania, Bhutan, Egypt, Mexico, Sri Lanka, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe share a particular distinction that no other member state can claim. What is it?

Burt Likko

Pseudonymous Portlander. Homebrewer. Atheist. Recovering litigator. Recovering Republican. Recovering Catholic. Recovering divorcé. Recovering Former Editor-in-Chief of Ordinary Times. House Likko's Words: Scite Verum. Colite Iusticia. Vivere Con Gaudium.

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19 Comments

  1. All subscribe to a plan for a form of universal currency called WorldCash.

  2. Tuesday hint: The United States of America does not qualify for this list, but almost half of the individual states within the U.S. would qualify if they were autonomous nations. Those states are: California, Delaware, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. For our friends to the north, the provinces of Manitoba, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island would qualify too, but Canada does not.

  3. Does it have anything to do with the lack of population size of the capitals compared to the rest or the country?

    • Mexico’s capital is the largest city in the country and one of the largest cities in the world. Ditto with Egypt.

      • Interesting angle, you two. But not what I was thinking of.

        • If it weren’t for the Kansas and Missouri, I’d be guessing it’s where my grandfather thought Satan had influence.

  5. Wednesday hint: One could argue that Albania should be on the list twice.

        • also, fish you very much for making me start to think about this damn question again.

        • I think it has to be more specific than just animals or birds on a flag – it has to be “animals or birds on a civil flag.” If state/official government flags are included, then Austria, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Germany, Haiti, Peru, Poland, and Spain would also belong on this list.

          • Birds are animals, last time I checked.

            Mark’s is the most precise answer to the question, but RTod’s answer is acceptable as far as I’m concerned because the civil flag is the most common, although not the most vexillogicaly precise, understanding of the phrase “flag of a nation.”

            Each of the eight nations’ civil national flags bear an image of an animal of some sort — whether that is a landbound creature (Sri Lanka’s lion) or a bird (Albania’s double eagle) or a mythical creature (Bhutan’s dragon).

            I was originally going to ask a question about national (civil) flags that incorporate the color purple, the classic color of royalty in Western civilization. Then I found that there are none — even for nations that are still either nominally or overtly monarchies. Isn’t that odd?

          • If we were to include military flags, one version of the U.S. naval jack uses an image of a rattlesnake.

          • “I was originally going to ask a question about national (civil) flags that incorporate the color purple, the classic color of royalty in Western civilization. Then I found that there are none ”

            A gagillion ugly-ass multi colored rectangle conceivable out there, and not one touch of purple? That is surprising, and perhaps a good trivia question in the making in it’s own right.

          • The main reason I thought the distinction was useful is just because state flags are what typically fly outside of government buildings, and I don’t know whether the flags that fly outside the UN are state or civil flags.

          • Grand Fenwick, too: a double-headed eagle saying both Yes and No.

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