Superlatives

This page is a varied selection of things that are characterised by ... superlatives.

Incidentally ... "superlative" is one of the most misused words in the English language. How often do we hear someone say in the media (particularly the sports media), "I'm running out of superlatives ...", when they haven't actually used any superlatives at all? What they invariably mean is that they're running out of terms to imply excellence. You have to wonder if they think a superlative is any word that means something like "super" or "superb".

"Superlative", when used as a noun, refers to the superlative form of an adjective. All adjectives can have three degrees of comparison: positive, comparative, and superlative. For example: the positive form of the adjective "good" is "good"; the comparative form is "better", and the superlative form is "best".

A superlative doesn't necessarily need to denote that something is good. "Worst", "stupidest" and "slowest" are superlatives, as well as "best", "cleverest" and "fastest".

If you look at the descriptions in the table below, you'll see that we have "most", "commonest", "first", "largest", "longest", "highest" ... etc., etc.

"Superlative" can also be used as an adjective, as in "superlative wisdom". But this is still not what the media morons mean when they say they're running out of superlatives – because they're clearly using the word "superlative" as a noun.

End of lesson ...

At the bottom of the page are a few things where the superlative – in other words, the quality that the named item is famous for – is the answer.

Annual European sporting event with the most spectators		Tour de France
Britain's commonest pub name		Red Lion
Britain's (and the world's) first Teletext service		Oracle
Britain's first birth control clinic was founded in 1921 by		Marie Stopes
Britain's first frozen food (10 May 1937, by Smedley's of Wisbech, Cambs)		Asparagus
Britain's first iron–clad warship		HMS Warrior (1861)
Britain's first motorway (1958) – now part of the M6 – was a by–pass to		Preston
Britain's first nuclear power station, and the first in the world to generate electricity in commercial quantity		Calder Hall
Britain's first supermarket		Co–op (London?)
Britain's largest bell – housed in St. Paul's Cathedral		Great Paul
Britain's (and, according to some sources, Europe's) largest brick–built structure is the railway viaduct in		Stockport
Britain's longest escalators (London Underground station)		Angel
Britain's most–visited tourist attraction (fee–charging)		Madame Tussauds
Butlins' first holiday camp (1936)		Skegness
England's highest (sea?) cliffs		Boulby, Cleveland
England's highest public house (1,732 feet above sea level) – North Yorkshire		Tan Hill Inn
England's second highest public house (1,690 feet above sea level) – Cheshire		Cat & Fiddle
England's longest railway platform (1990)		Bournemouth
Europe's largest city park		Phoenix (Dublin)
The first actor to be knighted		Henry Irving
The first Archbishop of Canterbury		St. Augustine
The first ready–to–eat breakfast cereal (US, 1893 – corn flakes 1894)		Shredded wheat
The first book ("first major book" – Wikipedia) printed in Europe (1450s)		Gutenberg Bible
The first book printed in English (by William Caxton in Bruges, 1475)		History of Troy
The first book printed in Britain (by Caxton at Westminster, 1476)		Canterbury Tales
The first Briton to die in a flying accident		Charles Rolls
The first building in Britain to have glass windows was St. Peter's Monastery, in		Monkwearmouth
The first charge card		Diner's
The first Christian martyr		St. Stephen
The first city bombed from the air (pilotless balloons, time fuses)		Venice
The first cotton spinning factory: Cromford, Derbys, 1771. Built by		Richard Arkwright
The first English martyr		St. Alban
The first Holy Roman Emperor		Charlemagne
The first human invention to break the sound barrier		Whip
The first iron–clad warship		La Gloire (1858)
The first motor show (1898 – held every two years ever since)		Paris
The first novel to sell one million copies		Uncle Tom's Cabin
The first nuclear submarine		Nautilus
The first person to ascend into the Stratosphere (51,000 ft, 1931)		Auguste Picard (Swiss)
The first person to be awarded the VC (1856, for action in 1854)		Lt. C. D. Lucas
The first person to be run over by a train		William Huskisson MP
The first person to send a radio signal across the Atlantic (Cornwall to Newfoundland)		Marconi
The first person to swim the English Channel (1875)		Captain Matthew Webb
The first person to swim the English Channel underwater (US, 1962)		Fred Baldasare
The first plastic		Celluloid (1869)
The first secretary–General of the United Nations		Trygve Lie
The first singer to sell a million copies of a record		Enrico Caruso
The first sporting outside broadcast on television		Wimbledon (21.6.37)
The first sub–four–minute mile		Roger Bannister, Oxford, 1954
The first test tube baby		Louise Brown
The first waterproof wristwatch – produced by Rolex since 1926 (many different models)		Oyster
France's most common surname		Martin
The Keen Order of Wallerites (founded c. 1900) was the first		Fan club
The largest and heaviest thing on land		Sequoia pine (Great redwood)
The last person to be hanged for treason in Britain		William Joyce
The last prisoner to be held in the Tower of London		Rudolf Hess
The last public jousts in England		Gawsworth Hall, Cheshire
The last Viceroy of India		Mountbatten
The last woman to be hanged in Britain		Ruth Ellis (1955)
The most–decorated US serviceman of World War II		Audie Murphy
The oldest chocolate bar currently on sale in Britain		Fry's Chocolate Cream
The oldest person to become Poet Laureate		Wm Wordsworth (73)
Old Honesty (1896): the first		Cigarette coupons
The tallest man ever (Robert Pershing Wadlow, 1918–40) was		8' 11"
The world's best–selling copyright book		Guinness Book of Records
The world's busiest airport – Hartsfield–Jackson International – serves (US city)		Atlanta
The world's busiest international airport (most international passengers): replaced Heathrow in 2014		Dubai
The world's busiest port (in terms of tonnage handled)		Rotterdam
The world's deepest known cave		Jean Bernard, France (4900ft)
The world's driest desert		Atacama (Chile)
The world's first free library (Manchester, 1653 – now a school of music)		Chetham's
The world's largest bell, in the Kremlin (name means Tsar of Bells)		Tsar Kolokol
The world's largest cut diamond (over 500 carats, in the British Royal Sceptre)		Star of Africa
The world's largest creature ever		Blue whale
The world's largest civil administrative building houses the parliament of		Romania
The world's largest office building		The Pentagon
The world's largest library		Library of Congress
The world's largest sculpture – in South Dakota – is of		Crazy Horse
The world's largest sporting venue, by capacity (257,325)		Indianapolis Motor Speedway
The world's largest tidal variation (between the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, with a small portion touching the US state of Maine)		Bay of Fundy
The world's longest canal (China: Beijing to Hangzhou – 1,115 miles / 1,794 km)		Grand Canal
The world's longest frontier (4,000 miles)		USA / Canada
The world's longest pleasure pier		Southend
The world's most common forename		Mohammad
The world's most commonly grown fruit		Apple
The world's oldest zoo		London
The world's tallest building (completed in 2010 – 830 metres / 2,723 feet)		Burj Khalifa (Dubai)
The world's tallest roller coaster is in		Blackpool
Youngest person to be awarded a VC		Jack Cornwell

On 1 April 1979, from Clifton Suspension Bridge (Bristol), David Kirke, co–founder of the Dangerous Sports Club, made the first		Bungee jump
Pearson's Magazine, in 1922, published Britain's first		Crossword
Waimangu, in New Zealand, is the world's tallest		Geyser
The Carolina reaper replaced the Trinidad moruga scorpion, in 2013, as the world's		Hottest chilli pepper
The Yomirui Shimbun, Ashai Shimbun and Mainichi Shimbun – all produced in Japan – are the world's biggest–selling		Newspapers
On 20 April 1974, during the half–time interval of a rugby union match at Twickenham between England and France, a 25–year–old Australian named Michael O'Brien became the first person (at a major sporting event) to		Streak
In 1801, on the River Seine, Robert Fulton tried out the first		Submarine

© Haydn Thompson 2017–23