Riddles and jokes are found all over the world, and some are hundreds of years old. Riddles can be tricks, prayers or magic charms to bring rain or good health. They can be a test of someone's cleverness or part of a secret language. There are also life-saving riddles, usually found in stories, where someone has to solve a riddle to save their own or someone else's life. But mostly riddles are just for fun.

Sometimes a riddle can be one word that is a clue to the answer – 'Invisible!' (Answer: the wind) – or sometimes it can be a play on words – 'What has a bottom at the top?' (Answer: a leg!).

Oneof the oldest known riddles is the riddle of the Sphinx, about the ages of Man. One version was still being used by children in England in the 1950s:

Walks on four feet
On two feet, on three,
The more feet it walks on
The weaker it be.

Source: The Lore & Language of Schoolchildren, by Iona and Peter Opie, 1959

See how many of the riddles and jokes you know..