40 Scotland Facts and Trivia Questions
Scotland is a country full of myths, legends, and mountains. It is the home of Harry Potter, Nessie, and those caterwauling bagpipes. It is also full of history, tall mountains, and inventors.
What makes Scotland such an interesting country for people worldwide? Let’s examine some facts about Scotland and test your knowledge with the questions pack below.
You may also like our Scotland Trivia Quiz.
Scotland Information
Scotland is part of the United Kingdom (UK) and is at the northern end of these isles.
It is also situated in Europe.
Our border is shared with England, and being part of an island, the rest of our country is surrounded by water.
The capital city is Edinburgh (Edin-bruh), and Glasgow (Glas-goh) is the largest city.
Our population is 5.4 million.
The size of Scotland is 80,077 km².
The tallest mountain is Ben Nevis, which is also the tallest mountain in the United Kingdom.
In Scotland, mountains over 3,000 feet (914.4 m) are called Munros.
Traveling north to the Highlands, you might see some of Scotland’s famous Heilan coos, such as the Highland cows.
We have three languages!
The first is English, the most spoken language.
The second is Scots.
Scots is a language in its own right.
However, you won’t find people speaking Scots on its own, but you will be able to hear some Scots words in the different dialects spoken throughout Scotland.
The last language, Gaelic (pronounced gaa-lic) is currently going through a resurgence and people are learning what was deemed to be a dead language, again.
Gaelic is mainly spoken in the very northern parts of Scotland and on the islands.
There are many different accents around Scotland.
It can make it tricky to understand what is being said.
In the West, people tend to speak very fast.
In the East, they speak more slowly but with a stronger accent.
In the South, as they are closer to the border, it is easier to understand what is being said, and in the North, they speak with a lilt to their voices.
This is almost like a sing-song voice and is very easy to converse.
Our currency is the British pound sterling.
The weather in Scotland is unpredictable! It can be sunny, snowy, rainy, and windy all in one day!
This makes it a colder country than many others in Europe.
Scotland is a country in its own right as it has a devolved government; however, it is not an independent country.
Being a devolved parliament, Scotland can make laws on Health, Housing, Education, and Crime issues.
129 Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) debate and vote on these laws for the Scottish people.
The Scottish Parliament is located in Holyrood, Edinburgh.Other issues, such as whether Scotland can go to war, are decided by Members of Parliament (MPs) at Westminster, London.
These are called reserved issues.
As part of the United Kingdom, Scotland has a monarch, King Charles III.
He has his own residence here, Balmoral, in Royal Deeside, where he spends his summers.
The Parliament’s design resembles a famous painting called The Skating Minister by Henry Raeburn.
You can see the painting at the National Gallery in Edinburgh.
The Scottish Parliament building in Edinburgh
What is Scotland Famous For?
What’s the first thing that comes to mind about Scotland?
This is the traditional costume of Scotland.
Made from wool, it can be a bit itchy to wear, and on a hot day, you will be very warm.
They are different patterns and colours which are called ‘tartan’.
Each tartan is unique to a ‘clan’ or a family of Scotland.
You might have a surname originating in Scotland, such as MacDonald or Campbell.
These clans have their own tartan, which members of the clan wear to various events.
Both men and women wear kilts. Men mostly wear kilts to rugby matches, when Scotland plays, or weddings. Women wear kilts to compete in the Highland Dancing.
You either enjoy the sound of this musical instrument or hate it.
Fun facts about bagpipes: until 1996, bagpipes were considered a weapon of war!
They were played as armies marched out to battle, and often, the opposing armies had never heard such a noise which frightened them.
Nowadays, you can hear this musical instrument on the streets of Edinburgh as entertainment for tourists.
They are also played at weddings and important events, and there is even an international pipe band competition in which pipe bands from all over the world compete to win this trophy.
Yes, the Harry Potter books were written by J.K Rowling in Edinburgh.
They take their inspiration from many areas in Edinburgh, and even though Harry left for Hogwarts from Kings Cross Station in London, Hogwarts school was situated in Scotland.
The filming of Harry Potter from the third film onwards was set in famous Scottish places, including Glen Coe, Fort William, Glen Nevis, and Loch Morar.
You can even take a trip on the ‘Hogwarts Express’ from Fort William, across the famous Glenfinnan Viaduct, and then to Mallaig.
This is a food and not an animal.
You may hear people joking that they are off haggis hunting, but there is no such wee furry animal.
Haggis is made from a sheep’s heart, liver, and lungs, minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, and traditionally boiled in the animal’s stomach for approximately an hour.
Sounds lovely, doesn’t it?
Don’t worry; you can get a vegetarian haggis as well. It is just as tasty but with no animal parts in it.
If you study Scottish poets at school, you will have heard of Rabbie Burns.
He wrote a poem called ‘An Address to a Haggis’.
This is recited every year on Burns Night, where the haggis is brought into the room with bagpipes playing, and then someone will say the poem and the haggis is cut open with a huge sword.
We take our traditions very seriously in Scotland!
This is the nectar of all Scottish teenagers.
It is a fluorescent orange shade and looks very unappealing.
However, this is the drink of choice in Scotland – one of only five countries where Coca-Cola is not the top drink of choice.
Its secret recipe does contain iron!
They have made lots of very funny adverts for their television campaigns.
This mythological monster resides in Loch Ness near Inverness.
This isn’t the largest or the deepest Loch in Scotland, but it does contain the most water, it contains more water than all of the lakes in England and Wales combined!
Plenty of areas for the monster to hide in.
The water is dark due to the peat washed down from the surrounding mountains.
The tale of Nessie has been around since 565AD, making it a very old myth, but the first sighting was in 1933.
Since then, there have been various sightings of the monster, but no one is sure that she is really there.
If you want to explore yourself, Google Street View lets you view the area above and below the water.
Let us know if you spot her!
Facts About Scottish Food
Most people don’t know it, but Scottish people eat the same food as you do.
However, we do have some particular delicacies.
We invented the ‘fish supper’ in Dundee in the 1870s.
Fried in batter – often in the recipe, it is a huge secret; the fish is served with chips, salt, vinegar, and sauce.
How you season your “chippy” or “chipper” depends on where you are from – in Edinburgh, locals go for salt ‘n’ sauce.
At the end of a hot sunny day, nothing is better than sitting on the wall, enjoying this food.
Being an island nation, we love our fish and shellfish.
Another great dish is Cullen Skink.
This is a thick creamy fish soup which is served with warm bread.
Haggis is made from the heart, liver, and lungs of a sheep, minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, and traditionally boiled in the animal’s stomach for approximately an hour.
It is served with ‘neeps and tatties.’
That’s mashed turnip or swede and mashed potatoes.
This is meat from a deer.
It is meat with a very strong taste and is one of Scotland’s great natural products.
We love our cookies so much; this is a traditional ‘biscuit’ of Scotland.
Made with butter, sugar, and flour, it is a dish that most Scottish children learn to cook and enjoy.
We also give it as a gift if we go ‘first footing’ just after midnight on New Year’s Day.
Tablet is a crumbly sweet treat that will rot your teeth if you eat too much!
Ingredient includes sugar, milk, butter and condensed milk.
Invented in Stonehaven, a Mars bar is fried in the same batter you would find on a fish.
This dish causes a lot of arguments as everyone makes it differently.
There are many variations, but meat, potatoes, and onions are the main ingredients.
Thought to have originated from when masters gave their servants the leftovers from Sunday lunch, the recipients would make this dish.
It is a traditional dish eaten on St Andrew’s Day and Hogmanay.
This alcoholic drink is made from pure Scottish water, which is plentiful in Scotland.
It is often called the water of life.
They say the rain that falls in Scotland is just whisky waiting to be made.
There are many varieties all around Scotland and it is one of our biggest exports to the rest of the world.
Interesting facts about Scotland
We are a nation with many traditions, and here are some of them.
Across Scotland in the summer months, Scots gather and compete.
The games include tossing the caber, a large wooden pole, to show the strength of the competitor.
Another few are hammer throwing, haggis tossing, and a tug of war.
All these competitions take place over the day and are interspersed with Highland Dancing, which is a tough sport.
Our Scottish Bard or poet, Robert Burns, has his own day on which we commemorate his poetry.
Scottish schoolchildren compete in Burns Poetry competitions where they recite some of his most famous works in the traditional Scots language.
At night, the many Burns Societies meet across Scotland and enjoy a ‘Burns Supper’ of haggis, neeps, and tatties.
Scotland has its own patron Saint.
St Andrew was known for being a kind and compassionate man, much like the people of Scotland and on this day, we have traditional food like haggis and stovies, with parties going on across the country.
The Scottish flag has the St Andrew’s Cross on it.
It is also known as a saltire.
This is what we call New Year’s Eve (31st December).
It is a day when people across Scotland prepare to welcome the new year.
Houses are cleaned from top to bottom.
Beds are all changed, laundry is all done, dried and ironed.
We make sure that there is nothing that can bring us bad luck for the year ahead.
In Edinburgh, there is the world’s biggest street party.
On New Year’s Day, brave people run into the Firth of the Forth River at South Queensferry!
This swim is called The Loony Dook.
Traditionally a tall dark male should be the first person to cross the threshold of your house just after midnight on New Year’s Day.
He should bring gifts like coal, shortbread, salt, a black bun, and a wee dram of whisky.
These gifts symbolize that the home will be warm and never out of food for the next year.
