List of QI episodes (A series)

This is a list of episodes of QI, the BBC comedy panel game television show hosted by Stephen Fry.

The first series started on 11 September 2003. Although not mentioned at the time, all of the questions (with the exception of the final "general ignorance" round) were on subjects beginning with "a" (such as "arthropods", "Alans" and "astronomy"). The following four series continued the theme: the second series' subjects all began with "b", and so on.

The dates in the lists are those of the BBC Two broadcasts. The episodes were also broadcast on BBC Four, GeneRally a week earlier (as soon as one episode finished on BBC Two, the next was shown on BBC Four). Aside from Alan Davies and not adding clip shows, there are six guests that have appeared in ten or more episodes (out of 61), they are Jo Brand (18), Rich Hall (16), Phill Jupitus (16), Bill Bailey (15), Sean Lock (14) and Clive Anderson (10). Excluding the Pilot there have been a total of 51 different guest panellists in the four series to date. The fifth series began to air on BBC Two on 21 September 2007.

Disclaimer: Some facts stated during the series have since been found to be incorrect, in some cases due to a mistake and others by becoming outdated. Where possible these entries have been highlighted.

Pilot

Broadcast date:

• Unbroadcast on television but released as an extra on the Series 1 DVD. This is also the only episode in which the scores are announced after each round. On the broadcast episodes, the scores are only revealed at the end of the game.

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (118 points)
• Bill Bailey (Winner with 132 points)
• Eddie Izzard (131 points)
• Kit Hesketh-Harvey (125 points)

Topics:
Names

• Bobo Fing is a language spoken by 10,000 people in Mali. Not to be confused with Bobo (a language of Burkina Faso) or Gogo (spoken by 10 million in Tanzania).
• King Arthur's lance was called Ron, short for Rongomynad. His helmet was named Goosewhite, his armour was called Wygar and his war cry was "Clarence!"

Tangent: Paul Daniels performing a magic trick based on the legend of King Arthur.

• 'Butter hamlets' are small tropical fish which can be found in 10 different colours.
• Tim is the 6th most popular name for a baby boy in Germany. (Forfeit: Adolph - because Stephen's card was spelt like that and Alan who said the answer was thinking "Adolf" as in Adolf [...], the penalty was reduced to -8 points)
• Richard Gere's middle name is Tiffany. (Forfeit: Gerbil)

• Scores: Bill - 15, Alan - 25, Eddie - 31, Kit - 35

History

• William Huskisson, the first person killed in a rail accident, had previously escaped death after a horse fell on his head during his honeymoon.
• The bones from penises of badgers were used by Victorian gentlemen as tie clips. Every primate except man has a penis bone known as the baculum.
• Rectal inflation was an old method of blowing tobacco smoke through the rectum as a means to resuscitate the drowned.
• Victorians who could not afford chimney sweeps would drop a goose down to clean it instead.

• Scores: Alan - 45, Eddie - 46, Bill - 68, Kit - 80

Lingo

• Guessing the meanings of Dutch words.
  • Pronk - Flaunt
  • Sloot - Ditch
  • Kloof - Gap
  • Lonk - To Ogle
  • Oog - Eyes
  • Wanklank - A discordant noise
• "Tijdens de Tweede Wereldoorlog moesten vele Nederlanders tulpenbollen eten," is Dutch for, "During the Second World War, many Dutch people had to eat tulip bulbs," which is a true fact.

Tangent: If dogs eat toothpaste, they hallucinate. Alan admits he heard this fact from someone from the pub. (Although on an episode in Series "B", it is revealed that this fact is true) Another kind of dog hunts deer by biting off the testicles.

''Tangent: In Greece, the word for bread and lavatory seat is the same word, "Kolóura".

• The word "Thespian" means "Awful" in Greek, as in "Awe inspiring." It also means, "Divine".

• Scores: Alan - 77, Kit - 95, Eddie - 96, Bill - 107

General Ignorance:

• The largest mountain in the world is Mauna Loa (Forfeit: Mount Everest).

''Tangent: Mount Kilimanjaro is higher than Mount Everest because it raises straight out of the African plain, whereas Everest is just one mountain on top of lots in the Himalayas. Also, as Kilimanjaro is on the Equator, it is further away from the centre of the Earth as it is an oblate spheroid.

• Black boxes are orange.
• Dolphins are eaten in Genoa.
• Scuba diving is illegal off of the coast of Greece.

''Tangent: In Greece, the word for lifebelt is also "Kolóura".

A Series (2003)

Episode 1

Broadcast date:

• 11 September 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (-5 points)
• Danny Baker (Winner with 18 points)
• Hugh Laurie (11 points)
• John Sessions (10 points)

Topics:

• Adam's navel and the Archbishop of Canterbury's left ear are both purely decorative. The Creation of Adam was painted by Michelangelo.
• God allowed Noah to eat animals, a right he had previously denied to Adam and Eve.
• Christopher Plummer once said of Julie Andrews that working with her was like being hit on the head with a Valentine card.
• Andrew Graham-Dixon discovered that Caravaggio accidentally killed Ranuccio Tomassoni on a tennis court... he was merely attempting to cut off his testicles. (Forfeit: New Balls, Please)

Tangent: Sheep are castrated without breaking the skin.

Tangent: Discussion of Prince Albert's libido and the Prince Albert piercing.

• Finocchio (fennel) is Italian street slang for a homosexual.
• Andrew Marshall's writings on Burma in The Trouser People describe Burmese idioms and quote from the diary of Victorian adventurer Sir George Scott.
• Edward Woodward has four 'd's in his name to prevent it becoming 'Ewar Woowar'.

Tangent: Kiwifruit use up more than their own weight in aviation fuel getting from New Zealand to Europe.

Tangent: When Sir John Gielgud first heard of the name "Edward Woodward", he thought it sounded like a fart in a bath.

• Actor John Barrymore regretted not being able to see himself perform on stage.

Tangent: A drunken Peter O'Toole once went to see a play, having forgotten that he was supposed to be in it.

• Young Giant Anteaters indulge in 'bluff charging'. Their claws are sharp enough to eviscerate a human.
• Anteaters have sixteen-inch tongues, but mouths as narrow as a pencil.

Tangent: The average graphite pencil can write for thirty-five miles.

• Dwarf anteaters are the size of squirrels and are a delicacy in parts of South America.

General Ignorance:

• The country with the highest [...] rate is Lithuania. (Forfeit: Sweden)

''Tangent: A ship's captain cannot marry people, and lemmings jump over cliffs: both are urban myths concocted by the film industry.

• Caravaggio's real name was Michelangelo.
• The steam engine was invented by Hero of Alexandria, and was named the aeolipile. The railway was invented seven hundred years earlier by Periander of Corinth. The modern steam engine was invented by Richard Trevithick. When Stephenson's Rocket was introduced, people were concerned that travelling at such high speeds could cause irreparable brain damage.

Tangent: The Romans believed that buggery caused earthquakes.

• The twenty-third tallest tree in the world is a Giant sequoia called 'Adam'.

Episode 2

Broadcast date:

• 18 September 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (-30 points)
• Bill Bailey (5 points)
• Rich Hall (Joint Winner with 20 points)
• Jeremy Hardy (Joint Winner with 20 points)

Topics:

Tangent: The number of people killed by sharks since records began is equal to just five per cent of the number of toilet-related injuries in the USA in 1996.

• Both tigers and weasels make a 'fuff' sound when they attack.

Tangent: The national animal of Croatia is the weasel.

• The best way to escape from a polar bear is to remove one's clothing, leaving items of clothing on the ground while backing away.

Tangent: Animals don't follow the line of a finger like humans do. If you point at something, the animal will just look at the end of your finger.

• An alligator can be rendered helpless by placing a rubber band over its jaws.
• The Earth has two moons. (Forfeit: One) Cruithne is an asteroid sometimes described as Earth's second moon.
• Ninety per cent of the Universe is unaccounted for; it is believed to be made of dark matter.

Tangent: Claims that Ikea stores have no windows to decrease customers' awareness of the passage of time.

• The colour of the Universe is beige.
• There are eight planets in the Solar System. (Forfeit: Nine) Pluto does not meet the usual criteria for classification as a planet.

Tangent: William James' exchange with a woman who believed the Earth was balanced on top of a giant turtle.

General Ignorance:

• Krung Thep is the proper name for the capital of Thailand. (Forfeit: Bangkok)
• Brides do not walk down the aisle of a church; they walk down the central passageway. The aisle is down the side of the church.
• The earliest known soup is made from hippopotamus.
• No man-made objects can be seen from the Moon with the [...] eye. (Forfeit: Great Wall of China)

Episode 3

Broadcast date:

• 25 September 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (-20 points)
• Clive Anderson (Winner with 26 points)
• Bill Bailey (10 points)
• Meera Syal (19 points)

Topics:

• The longest animal in the world is the Lion's mane jellyfish, as described in the Sherlock Holmes story, The Adventure of the Lion's Mane. (Forfeit: Blue Whale)

Tangent: Lord Mackay of Clashfern and his apparent meanness with honey.

• Blue Whales have small throats and can swallow nothing larger than a grapefruit. Their diet consists of eating 3 tonnes of krill every day.
• An octopus can be taught to unscrew the lids of jars and bottles.

''Tangent: Octopus's ink is used to make risotto, they mate with their 3rd right arm and have 3 hearts.

• The continent of Antarctica has six seas and no bees.

''Tangent: The origin of the word "bee" means wedding in Greek.

• AmIAnnoying.com ranks Clive Anderson as seventeen percent less annoying than Antarctica. Unlike Hans Christian Andersen, Gillian Anderson and Pamela Anderson, he is not a vegetarian.
• John Henry Anderson, the Great Wizard of the North, was the first magician to pull a rabbit out of a hat.

''Tangent: Anderson left pats of butter with a stamp saying "Anderson Is Here" in hotels.

• Both Hans Christian Andersen and Joseph Stalin were the sons of a cobbler and a washerwoman.

''Tangent: Hans Christian Andersen is ranked less annoying than Clive Anderson on AmIAnnoying.com.

General Ignorance:

• In Greek mythology, Atlas was punished by Zeus and was forced to carry the sky. (Forfeit: The World)
• Over fifty percent of the world's oxygen is provided by algae. (Forfeit: Trees)
• The driest place on Earth is the Dry Valleys Region of Antarctica. Even though Antarctica is virtually all ice and snow, the Dry Valleys Region has no ice or snow and hasn't seen any rain for 2 million years. (Forfeit: Sahara Desert)
• The length of a day is not exactly 24 hours. The International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service is responsible for adding on occasional leap seconds.

Episode 4

Broadcast date:

• 2 October 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (-24 points)
• Jo Brand (Winner with 36 points)
• Howard Goodall (13 points)
• Jeremy Hardy (7 points)

Topics:

• The main component of air is nitrogen. (Forfeit: Oxygen)
• The most boring place in Great Britain is a field outside Ousefleet, near Scunthorpe, according to the Ordnance Survey map. It is the blankest square kilometre in the country, with only part of an electricity pylon in it.

Tangent: Charles Dickens despised Chelmsford, describing it as "the dullest and most stupid spot on the face of the Earth." He also invented the word 'boredom'.

• In 1983, with the aid of a sofa and a hot water bottle, Barbara Cartland wrote 23 novels, which broke the record for the most novels written in one year. She was buried in a cardboard coffin beneath an oak tree planted by Queen Elizabeth I.

Tangent: Clive James once compared Barbara Cartland's face to two crows that had crashed into the White cliffs of Dover.

• The ozone layer is fifteen miles above the Earth's surface. Ozone smells faintly of geraniums.
• Film critic John Simon described Walter Matthau as resembling "a half-melted rubber bulldog".
• Atoms contain mostly empty space. Ernest Rutherford described the centre of an atom as "like a few flies in a cathedral".

Tangent: Tmesis, the art of splitting a word in half and inserting another word inside. Examples given were "abso-blooming-lutely", "sen-[...]-sational" and Jo's suggestion, "S-[...]-horpe".

• A hydrogen atom has more frequencies than a grand piano has notes.

General Ignorance:

• King Henry VIII technically had either three or four wives, depending on the source. (Forfeit: Six) His marriage to Anne of Cleves was annulled, the Pope declared his marriage with Anne Boleyn to be void as he was still married to Catherine of Aragon, and the marriage to Catherine of Aragon was declared void by Henry himself as it was illegal to marry the widow of one's brother (Catherine had previously been married to Henry's older brother Arthur). After his death, while being moved to Westminster Abbey, the king's body swelled in the heat and exploded.

Tangent: Hans Holbein the Younger painted various royal portraits. His painting 'The Ambassadors' contains the image of a human skull, which can only be seen properly when viewed from an angle.

• The word silver rhymes with the English word '[chilver]', which is a ewe lamb. (Forfeit: Nothing)
• All diamonds are created beneath the Earth's surface, and brought to the surface in volcanoes. (Forfeit: South Africa) Diamonds and graphite are both made of pure carbon, but appear at opposite ends of the Mohs scale of mineral hardness.
• When travelling through sodium at -270 degrees, light slows to 38 miles per hour. The speed of light is only constant in a vacuum.
• A chameleon changes colour depending on its mood. (Forfeit: Background)

''Tangent: Their eyes can swivel independently, and it was once believed that they lived on air.

Episode 5

Broadcast date:

• 9 October 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (15 points)
• Gyles Brandreth (Winner with 54 points)
• Rob Brydon (17 points)
• Rich Hall (35 points)

Topics:

• Gerber baby food was poorly marketed in Africa, leading customers to believe that it contained babies. The tins bore a picture of the baby Ann Turner Cook, later a famous mystery author. (This is actually untrue)

Tangent: Strand cigarettes' "You're never alone with a Strand" advertising campaign was a spectacular failure. Queen Victoria smoked when in Scotland, in order to keep the midges away.

''Tangent: The chief architect of the London Eye shares a birthday with Gustave Eiffel.

• The Toyota MR2 provoked much amusement in France, as "MR2" in French sounds like merde, which is the French for "[...]". The Ford Pinto is equally amusing to Brazilians, as "pinto" is Brazilian slang for a small penis.
• Irish playwright Brendan Behan was asked to devise an advertising slogan for Guinness. He came up with "Guinness makes you drunk." (Forfeit: "Guinness is good for you" — that was actually written by Dorothy L. Sayers)

Tangent: Alec Guinness allegedly predicted James Dean's death.

• The Ancient Greeks believed that otters killed crocodiles by running into their open mouths and eating their entrails. Raphanizein was an Ancient Greek punishment for adultery that involved inserting a radish into the anus.
• Plato's real name was Aristocles. He taught Aristotle.
• Aristotle believed that buzzards had three testicles.

Tangent: Subbuteo was named after the Latin word for 'hobby'.

Tangent: Discussion of the (legendary) Pope Joan.

• The Ancient Greeks used blackberries as a cure for piles.
• Ancient Greeks voted for their leaders until they were invaded by Macedonia in 310 BC.

''Tangent: Michael Portillo's exploits as a young Conservative candidate.

General Ignorance:

• A centipede has between 30 and 382 legs. None has ever been found with 100 legs. It always has an odd number of pairs of legs.
• In 1994, 35,000 Americans insured themselves against alien abduction.
• Purple rhymes with 'hirple' and 'curple'. (Forfeit: Nothing)

Episode 6

Broadcast date:

• 16 October 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (8 points)
• Danny Baker (Winner with 19 points)
• Jo Brand (13 points)
• Howard Goodall (17 points)

Topics:

• Physicist Niels Bohr hung a horseshoe on his wall as "I understand it brings you luck whether you believe in it or not".

''Tangent: Edith Evans purchased a painting by Renoir, and hung it low down behind a curtain simply because "there was a hook" there.

Tangent: Discussion of the Schrödinger's cat problem.

Tangent: Bohr also said of quantum physics, "If you're not shocked by it, then you haven't understood it".

• Barbara Cartland, when asked whether British class barriers had broken down, replied "Of course they have, or I wouldn't be sitting here talking to someone like you". She also invented the aeroplane-towed glider.
• When asked by a priest if he forgave his enemies, the dying Spanish Captain-General Ramón Blanco y Erenas said "I have no enemies, I've had them all shot".
• Pliny the Elder:
  • believed that epilepsy could be cured by eating the heart of a black jackass, outside on the second day of the moon. Alternatively, lightly poached bear testes, a dried camel brain with honey, or fresh gladiator's blood.
  • suggested incontinence could be cured by touching the tips of the genitals with linen or papyrus. Alternatively, drinking a glass of wine mixed with the ash of a pig's penis, then urinating in your (or your neighbour's) dog's bed.
  • also suggested haemorrhoids could be cured with a cream made with pig lard and the rust from chariot wheels. Alternatively, swan's fat or the urine of a female goat.
  • thought that headaches were supposedly cured by a fox's genitals tied to the forehead.

  ''Tangent: British bees died out after World War I – new bees were introduced from Mexico.

  • claimed that choking on a piece of bread could be cured by placing pieces of the same loaf in the ears.
  • died investigating the eruption of Mount Vesuvius.
• Twenty four people every year are murdered by the Swiss Army, due to the relatively free availability of handguns.

Tangent: The Swiss have their own navy despite being a land-locked country. Disney has the 4th largest navy in the world, if you go by boats alone.

Tangent: Switzerland has 4 official languages, but they useConfoederatio Helvetica'' on their stamps.

• During the Vietnam War, the US Military prevented wounded soldiers from swallowing their tongues by pinning the tongue to their cheeks. More soldiers committed [...] after Vietnam than died in combat.
• Costa Rica has no army: it was disbanded in 1949. The constitution now specifically forbids the country from having an army.

Tangent: The French statesman Talleyrand famously said "I'm more afraid of an army of 100 sheep, led by a lion, than of an army of 100 lions led by a sheep."

• Alsatians are forbidden from serving in the Spanish Army, as they have an IQ of 60: an IQ of 70 is the minimum required.

General Ignorance:

• The Goliath frog of Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea (the largest frog in the world) is mute. (Forfeit: Ribbit) The only frog to go "ribbit" is the Pacific Tree Frog, the species native to Hollywood and thus sampled for use on hundreds of movie soundtracks.
• An acre is 40 poles long and 4 poles wide. (Forfeit: The Polish Army)
• The Chicago World's Fair in 1933 was opened by light from Arcturus.

Episode 7

Broadcast date:

• 23 October 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (0 points)
• Jo Brand (-38 points)
• Jimmy Carr (-1 point)
• Jackie Clune (Winner with 5 points)

Topics:

• Australia was discovered by the Chinese. (Forfeit: James Cook)
• Aborigines - the term comes from the Latin meaning "from the origin" and was first used to describe a pre-Roman people.

Tangents: The scrotum and sperm

• The word Kangaroo means horse in the Begangi language of New South Wales. (Forfeit: "I Don't Know" - That comes from the Guugu Yimithirr language for kangaroo)
• Homo sapiens evolved from a common ancestor that hasn't yet been discovered, otherwise known as the "missing link". (Forfeit: Apes (they also evolve from this same ancestor))
• Tanzania's Hehe tribe got their name, because it was their war cry.

''Tangents: Stupid answers given in trivia games.

• In Swaziland, it is bad manners to shield your eyes with one hand and it's forbidden to point at the king's hut.
• The speaker of the Swazi Parliament was sacked in June 2000, after he stole a cowpat belonging to the king, Mswati III.
• Henry VIII wiped his bottom using the hand of the Groom of the Stool.
• The word that takes up the most words to define in the Oxford English Dictionary is set.
• Arthropods - the male European earwig has a spare penis.
• The name given to insects with piercing and sucking mouth parts is a bug.
• The highest amount of legs seen on a millipede is 710 on the South African millipede. (Forfeit: 1000)

General Ignorance:

• The colour of water is blue. (Forfeit: Colourless)
• More people have been killed by ducks than by atomic bombs, as they were responsible for the 1918 outbreak of the Spanish flu.
• No animals bury their head in the sand. (Forfeit: Ostrich)
• Rubber boots were invented by Amazonian Indians. (Forfeit: The Duke of Wellington).

''Tangent: Charles Goodyear with his invention of vulcanised rubber.

''Tangent: Stephen's father's pronunciation of Volvic and Volvo.

Episode 8

Broadcast date:

• 30 October 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (-30 points)
• Clive Anderson (Winner with 37 points)
• Sean Lock (25 points)
• Linda Smith (30 points)

Topics:

• Elephants can become drunk by eating fruit which ferments in their stomachs.
• James Bond's Bradford is a cocktail that is shaken, not stirred. The vesper was invented in Casino Royale.

Tangent: A "blowjob" is a type of cocktail, made with either Drambuie or Bailey's, whipped cream on the top and is served in a shooter glass. You are not allowed to use your hands to drink it.

• C. B. Fry held the world long jump record in 1913, could jump backwards on to a mantlepiece from a standing position without losing his balance, and after the first world war, was offered the throne of Albania, but turned it down.

Tangent: Jumping backwards

• In Albanian, "Vetullushe" means "A goat with brown eyebrows".

Tangent: The philtrum

• The pink fairy is a type of armadillo, whereas the green fairy is Absinthe.
• Benjamin Franklin thought it would be a great idea to find a way to stop flatulence from smelling so bad.

Tangent: Frankin was not allowed to draft the American constitution, because people thought he might have put jokes in it.

• The first processed food produced by H. J. Heinz in 1869 was horseradish. (Forfeit: Tomato Ketchup, Baked Beans)

General Ignorance:

• Fingernails and hair do not grow after you die.
• Bananas come from a herb. (Forfeit: Trees)

Tangent: Banana plants walk up to 40 centimetres in a lifetime.

• A lili is the offspring of a liger and lion, and a titi is the offspring of a tigon and a tiger.
• The phrase "Survival of the fittest" was coined by Herbert Spencer, inventor of the paper clip. (Forfeit: Charles Darwin)

Episode 9

Broadcast date:

• 6 November 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (10 points)
• Jo Brand (15 points)
• Dave Gorman (Winner with 20 points)
• Jeremy Hardy (15 points)

Topics:

• A bongo is a rare type of antelope.

''Tangent: Syllogisms, Queen Elizabeth and Kylie Minogue and J.Lo.

• The bongo-player of T. Rex was Steve Peregrin Took.

Tangent: Marc Bolan was dyslexic but obsessed withThe Lord of the Ringsnovels

• In South Africa, there is a pastime called Bokdrol spoeg, which is Kudu dung spitting
• Alexander the Great:
  • was a "short, left-handed, epileptic, bisexual Albanian with a high-pitched voice".
  • introduced to Europe the banana, crucifixion, sugar, cotton and the Ring-necked parakeet.
  • washed his hair in saffron.
  • was embalmed in honey.
  • was taught by Aristotle.
• Aristotle taught that flies have four legs, that mucus was brain-matter.

Tangent: The Common cold.

• Auricle is another name for the outer part of the ear.
• Vincent van Gogh, after [...] off half of his own ear, presented it to the prostitute that had spurned his affection.
• Snakes do not have ears.
• The okapi can clean its own ears with its tongue.
• Galileo discovered "ear-like growths" – the rings of Saturn.

General Ignorance:

• The first King of England was Athelstan from 924 to 939. (Forfeit: Alfred the Great)
• Aristotle claimed that hedgehogs had [...] intercourse face-to-face, with the female lying on her back. (Forfeit: Very Carefully)
• The most dangerous creature in history is the mosquito, having killed half of the people on Earth.
• The Lords of Shouting are angels that sing to God every morning, according to the Jewish faith.
• Samson's hair was cut off by a servant of Delilah. (Forfeit: Delilah)

Episode 10

Broadcast date:

• 13 November 2003 (BBC Two)

Panelists:

• Alan Davies (Winner with 23 points!)
• Rich Hall (3 points)
• Julia Morris (9 points)
• Peter Serafinowicz (-5 points)

Topics:

• The aeroplane was invented by John Stringfellow. (Forfeit: The Wright Brothers)
• A person would have, "Mad, bad, fat, sad old git," on their luggage, because they are airport luggage codes.
  • MAD is Madrid Barajas International Airport.
  • BAD is Barksdale Air Force Base, Bossier City, Louisiana.
  • FAT is Fresno Yosemite International Airport, California.
  • SAD is Safford Regional Airport, Arizona.
  • OLD is Old Town Municipal Airport, Old Town, Maine.
  • GIT is Geita Airport, Geita, Tanzania.
• Madonna plans to buy the prettiest airport in the world, Compton Abbas Airfield in Dorset and shut it down, because it's ruining her weekend place.
• The smallest aircraft carrier in the world is a Mitsubishi Shogun (Everywhere else in the world it's known as the Pajero, except in Spain, where 'pajero' means 'one who fiddles with himself for [...] pleasure').

Tangent: Julia's time working in Hokkaidō, Japan's northern island. The island is known for having good milk due to the grass.

• It was a bad idea to ban smoking on aeroplanes, due to companies saving money by using both fresh and recycled air, which increases the threat from viruses.
• The Alans are a tribe of people who live on the Russian border, since the Huns drove them there in the 4th century.

Tangent: "Alan" means "Rock" or "Pebble", as does "Peter". Alan and Stephen argue as to whether his "Alan" is either a rock or a pebble. Stephen's father is called Alan.

• Edgar Allan Poe predicted the Big Bang, the theory of relativity, parallel universes and the structure of the atom in a prose poem called Eureka.
• Alan Smithee is the Alan with the worst reputation in Hollywood. It is the name used when directors dissociate themselves from a film.
• In Boy on a Dolphin, Sophia Loren had to stand and walk in a trench due to shortness of Alan Ladd.
• Alan Whicker's is Cockney rhyming slang for knickers.

Tangent: The Australian version is Reg Grundy's, undies. Listerine was an example of rhyming slang that has moved on one. If you are "Listerine", then you are an antiseptic, and septic is rhyming slang for American (Septic tank, yank).

General Ignorance:

• The first man to circumnavigate the globe was Juan Sebastián Elcano. (Forfeit: Magellan)
• The helicopter was invented by the Chinese. (Forfeit: Italian)

Tangent: The first modern helicopter was invented by the French.

• Nothing happens if you suck your pencil, as it is made out of graphite, which is the crystalised form of carbon. (Forfeit: Lead Poisoning)

Episode 11

Broadcast date:

• 20 November 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (-18 points)
• Bill Bailey (-2 points)
• Richard E. Grant (Winner with 12 points)
• Linda Smith (5 points)

Buzzers:

• Richard: Trumpet fanfare
• Linda: Harp
• Bill: Bagpipes ending in dischord
• Alan: Donkey heehaw

Topics:

• Pigeons do not like going to the movies, because they see the world ten times faster than humans. To them, a film is a slow slide show.
• It was once believed that a pigeon's arse could be used to suck out the poison from an adder's bite. Pigeons are the only birds that can suck.
• The ant has the largest brain in comparison to its body size. (Forfeit: Human)

Tangent: Alan's problem with an ant infestation.

• There are 8,000 species of ant.
• Soldier ants were used in Ancient India as stitches after operations.
• In Thailand, red ants are poured into open wounds, and they secrete an acid which acts as a pain killer and an antiseptic.
• A greasy butcher, a hog snout and Gene Pitney are all kinds of apple.
• Apples and a game played with headless goats both originated from Kazakhstan.
• Both Ulysses S. Grant and John Prescott were both arrested for speeding and both won unusual prizes. Grant won a prize for taming a pony in a circus. The Prescott family came second a competition searching for, "The most typical family in Britain," in Brighton in 1951, but he should have won because the winning family was discovered to be distantly related to the organiser of the competition.

General Ignorance:

• The largest living thing on the Earth is the honey mushroom. (Forfeit: Blue Whale, Giant Redwood)
• The first man to claim that the Earth revolves around the Sun was Aristarchus. (Forfeit: Copernicus)
• The African animal which kills more humans than any other is the hippopotamus, other than other humans.

Tangent: A hippopotamus breath is so bad, they use it as part of their weaponry. George Washington had hippopotamus false teeth.

• The telephone was invented by Antonio Meucci.

''Tangent: Louis Daguerre asked a woman to take her top off to demonstrate his prototype camera.

''Tangent: Alexander Graham Bell believed that one day every town in America would have a telephone.

Episode 12 – Christmas special

Broadcast date:

• 23 December 2003 (BBC Two)

Panellists:

• Alan Davies (-6 points)
• Phill Jupitus (5 points)
• Sean Lock (7 points)
• John Sessions (Winner with 28 points)

Theme:

• The general theme of all the questions was Christmas, with the panellists asked to draw a Christmas tree. Alan Davies drew a traditional childlike portrayal of a Christmas tree – a triangular style tree showing (incorrectly) that the branches point downwards.

Topics:

• A Gripple is a gripping device made in Sheffield. Thousands of gripples hold together the Dingo Fence, the worlds longest fence.
• The first domesticated animal after the dog, was the reindeer.
• Another common name for a reindeer (in North America) is caribou.

Tangent: Sami (the people who originally herded the reindeer) means "plebs" in Ancient Swedish.

• Rudolph and all of Santa's other reindeer must be either female or castrated, because male reindeer lose their antlers during winter.
• In "days of yore" Yorkshiremen would gather around their beehives during Christmas because they believed that the bees would start humming at midnight (the time of Christ's birth), even when the calendars changed.
• Mince pies were banned by Oliver Cromwell because they symbolised Catholicism.
• From 1840 to the end of World War II, the German village of Lauscha in Thuringia provided the world with baubles, with 95% of US houses.
• In 1908, US insurance companies tried to ban the placing of live candles on Christmas trees, mainly because a fire from a Christmas tree that caught fire on a Santa's beard destroyed a Chicago hospital in 1895.

Tangent: Insurance companies and their avoidance of paying out.

• During the 1870 siege of Paris by the Prussians the Parisians ran out of food and so one restaurant used rats in their cooking.

Tangent: John Gielgud once advised a young West End actor not to pause during a performance, because when he paused he heard someone in the audience say "Oh, you hideous beast, you've just come all over my umbrella!".

General Ignorance:

• Christmas Island includes places called Paris, London, Poland and Banana.
• The youngest age that a child can drink alcohol in a pub restaurant or beer garden in the UK is 5 years old, as long as an adult buys the drink. (Forfeit: Eighteen)
• Santa Claus comes from Turkey. (Forfeit: Lapland)
• The image of Santa Claus was originally noted in the 1823 poem Twas The Night Before Christmas.

DVD Extras

In the DVD (released late 2006), there were some extra features which contained some quite interesting facts. The order in which they were put on the disk is the order in which they were recorded in 2003.

Episode 1

No Extras

Episode 6

• In China, there is a group of people known as the Dong, who just sing to each other. The Chinese government gave them a telephone box, but because they knew everyone in the area, it became a chicken box.

Tangent: The word,Hello'' was created by a competition in the New York Times, as the word used to answer a telephone call, instead of Ahoy!

• George III's last words were "I think I'll have another one of Mr. Bellamy's pork pies". He died on the toilet, like Elvis Presley.

Episode 2

• An adder's bite is generally no more dangerous than a wasp. No-one in Britain has died of an adder's bite since 1977, when a 5-year-old girl died.

''Tangent: Stephen's inability to read out passages in a different tense

''Tangent: Using the correct tense when using none/not one.

Episode 9

No Extras

Episode 10

• In Papua New Guinea, the inhabitants mainly speak in Pidgin English. In Pidgin English, Prince Charles is rendered as Number 1 pickaninny belong Mrs. Queen. A male contraceptive is known as gummy belong [...]. A helicopter is known as a Magimix belong Jesus.

Episode 5

• Spam (an acronym for spiced ham) is a very popular in Hawaii. The state holds Spam carving contests.
• At least 2,370 tigers live in Texas, the most in the world apart from Asia.
• The toilet paper capital of the world is Green Bay, Wisconsin.

''Tangent: Two-thirds of the world's lawyers live in the United States, American children get $65 billion of pocket money per year, there are 15,000 practising vampires in America, most of them living in Seattle, 10,113 virgins insured themselves from giving birth to the Messiah at the millennium and Americans are twice as likely to die from liposuction than in a car crash.

Episode 4

• William Shakespeare invented the phrase, "Vanish into thin air". Hamlet contains the clichés, "It's cruel to be kind", "To the manor born" and "To thine own self be true, neither a borrower nor a lender be".

Episode 7

• Humans are not classified as arthropods, despite having jointed legs.

''Tangent: The fable of Athena and Arachne and how the word arachnid came into existence.

Episode 3

• Amongst Idi Amin's bizarre titles were King of Scotland, Ruler of the Beasts of the Earth and the Fishes of the Sea & Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular.

Episode 8

No Extras

Episode 11

• The country that consumes the most apples per head is Turkey, with 36kg per head of population. The United Kingdom is the lowest in Europe at only 10kg per head.

''Tangent: The banana is the most traded item in the supermarket. The UK eats the most bananas per head of population anywhere in the world.

Episode 12

• Genghis Khan never fought the Sami (the inhabitants of Lapland), because they always hid from him, because he was so brutal.
• The opening for the show had to be re-shot - leading Alan to go into a hissy fit at the amount of rubbish strewn around as a result of the crackers. This led to a delay, which in turn led to banter about Easter, Pancake Day and Yom Kippur QI specials - and when Stephen launched into his opening monologue, he fluffed it anyway.