Test your knowledge: fun French facts
Try our fun quiz featuring UFOs and patron saints
1. Mayor bans UFOs
France takes UFOs seriously and the national Space agency CNES has a branch called Geipan, which is the official study department for ‘unidentified aerospatial
phenomena’, or ‘PANs’ in their official French acronym. Based in Toulouse, there are two full-time CNES workers, backed up by a team of scientific advisors.
In the 1950s the mayor of Châteauneuf-du-Pape in Rhône made a byelaw banning UFOs from landing in a bid to reassure residents, who were worried about sightings at the time.
Q: French people call UFOs soucoupes volantes (flying saucers) or ‘OVNIs’ - what do the letters stand for?
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The term OVNI comes from objet volant non-identifié (unidentified flying object).
2. Patron saints
Most countries have one patron saint but France has the Virgin Mary plus nine ‘secondary’ ones.
Joan of Arc is one, as is the Archangel Michael and one of the medieval kings, St Louis. The others are Martin de Tours, Denis, Remi, Petronilla, Radegund and last, but not least, Thérèse of Lisieux, a popular French nun who died aged 24 in 1897 and is called ‘the Little Flower’.
Q: What popular tourist destination is named after the Archangel Michael?
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The Mont Saint-Michel is the popular tourist site linked to St Michael
3. Face of France
Marianne – a young woman in a ‘Phrygian cap’ (symbolising liberty), is used as a symbol to represent the French Republic and can be seen in all mairies.
Q: Which of these French women has not had their face used as a model for Marianne?
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Carla Bruni
Brigitte Bardot, Michèle Morgan, Catherine Deneuve, Inès de la Fressange, Laetitia Casta, Sophie Marceau, Carla Bruni
