The Unbelievable Truth

David Mitchell is joined by Sindhu Vee, Lloyd Langford, Zoe Lyons, and Henning Wehn are the panellists obliged to talk with deliberate inaccuracy on subjects as varied as goats, sound, fighting and ghosts.

The Truths

Henning Wehn - Ghosts

- Most US theatres do not open on Mondays, so ghosts that haunt them can put on their own plays. Conveniently, Monday is the day actors normally have off following their weekend performances. Found by Zoe.

- The kamikiri is a Japanese ghost that secretly cuts people's hair without humans noticing. It has a scissor-like beak and hands like razors. Found by Zoe.

- Heinzelmannchen are little goblins who used to do all the work in Cologne during the night. The belief in this story appears to come from the belief in other German cities that the people of Cologne were lazy. Found by Sindhu.

- In October 1995, Southern Electricity rejected the claim from a woman on the Isle of Wight who tried to get out of paying a £900 electricity bill because she said that ghosts were turning on all the lights and TVs on. Found by Lloyd.

- The southern wing in Clifton Hall, Nottinghamshire, was bought for £3.6million in January 2008, but sold for £900,000 less after eight months because it was too haunted for the millionaire owner, Anwar Rashid, to live there. Found by Sindhu.

Sindhu Vee - Goats

- The fainting goat of Tennessee falls over when they are startled. Found by Lloyd.

- Billy goats' blood has been a desirable commodity for its ability to dissolve diamonds. In medieval times it was believed that only the hot blood of a male goat could achieve this. Successfully smuggled.

- The collective noun for a group of goats is a "trip". Successfully smuggled.

- Goats do not cry, as they have no tear ducts. Successfully smuggled.

- In Kenya, goats wear condoms. Successfully smuggled.

Zoe Lyons - Fighting

- One planned Allied scheme during WWII was to drop glue on the Nazis in order to make their troops stick to the ground. Other plans included dropping boxes of poisonous snakes on the enemy, disguising bombs in tins of fruit and boxes of chocolates, and smuggling female sex hormones into Hitler's food to make him less aggressive. None of these plans went ahead. Found by Lloyd.

- In 2014, the NYPD launched Operation Angry Birds in an attempt to stop cockfighting. 70 people were arrested. Found by Lloyd.

- At the Battle of Crecy in 1346, the French nicknamed the English "the bare-bottomed army", as much of the English forces suffered from dysentery. Despite this, the English still won the battle. Found by Lloyd.

- In WWII, Finnish troops had a war cry that translated into English as: "Shoot them in the testicles." The troops were instructed to fire low as their rifles would often jerk upwards when fired. Found by Lloyd.

- The Gombe War in Tanzania was fought between two armies of chimpanzees. Documented by Jane Goodall, the war started in 1974 after a community split in two when leading separatist brothers Charlie and Hugh attacked the original group lead by Humphrey and Satan. The war ended when all the males from the separatist group were killed in 1978. Successfully smuggled.

Lloyd Langford - Sound

- In the Olympics, the sound of rowers rowing is added on afterwards as the sound of the chase boat and helicopters filming the event are much louder. Found by Sindhu.

- In Japan, a noise-cancelling fork has been invented in 2017 in order to reduce the sound of people eating noodles. Found by Henning.

- With just its penis, a lesser water boatman can chirp as loud as a lawnmower. It is the loud noise made by any animal relative to its size. Found by Zoe.

- Small icebergs are called "growlers" because of the sound they make as they melt. Found by Zoe.

- "Cloup" is the word the noise a champagne cork makes. It is valid in Scrabble, scoring nine points. Successfully smuggled.

Scores

- Sindhu Vee: 3 points
- Lloyd Langford: 2 points
- Zoe Lyons: 1 point
- Henning Wehn: -6 points