- Moscow is located on Moskva River in western Russia - it was the river which gave the city its name. The name of the river means "wet" and possibly signified a wetland or marsh.
- There are 49 bridges crossing the river.
- In 2015, Moscow's population was 12 million, making it bigger in population terms than several countries, including Norway, Switzerland and Portugal. It's the largest city in Europe and among the top ten in the world.
- Moscow has more billionaires than any other city in the world. According to Forbes, there are 84 billionaires in Moscow with a combined wealth of 367 billion dollars. New York, in second place, has 62.
- It has more high rise buildings than any other city in the world. 11,783, to be exact. They include the Ostankino Tower, the highest TV tower in Europe at 540.1 meters tall; and seven buildings designed in the Stalinist style, which look virtually the same. This set of buildings have been nicknamed "the Seven Sisters", but not by the Muscovites themselves. They call them "(Stalin's) high-rises" (or "Stalinist Skyscrapers") and probably wouldn't understand what people were talking about if they refer to them as "Seven Sisters". These buildings are Moscow State University (the world's largest university building), Hotel Ukraina, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Leningradskaya Hotel, Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Building. Kudrinskaya Square Building, and Red Gates Administrative Building. There were plans for an eighth, the Zaryadye skyscraper, but it was never built.
- Red Square and the Kremlin are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Red Square was also known as ‘Fire Square’, because medieval Moscow was so often burned.
- The word "kremlin" means castle or fortified complex, and that's pretty much what the Kremlin is. In fact, it's the world’s largest medieval fortress still in active use, built in 1331. It's almost a city in itself with five palaces, four cathedrals and 20 towers. They all have names apart from two, which have been dubbed ‘the first unnamed’ and ‘the second unnamed’. The tallest is Troitskaya, at 80 feet tall. The most recognisable one is Spasskaya, the one with the clock tower. The building has five stars on top of it. They each weigh a ton and are made of ruby so they shine. The Kremlin is also home to the world's largest bell, the Tsar Bell, which has never been rung because it was broken in construction; the largest cannon in the world, and Vladimir Putin, who has lived there since 2015. During World War II, they disguised the Kremlin as housing, painting on fake doors and windows, so it escaped significant damage.
- Moscow has a metro system which is not only extremely efficient, but very beautiful, too, known for its architecture and murals. People go on guided tours of the metro itself. Trains run more regularly than in any other metro in the world - every 1.5 minutes in peak times, and it never stops working for engineering works, strikes or power failures. It has only stopped working once since it opened in 1935, and that was in 1941 when it was attacked by invading German forces - but the stoppage even then lasted less than a day.
- The first mention of Moscow in writing was in 1156. Russian documents of the time refer to a wall being built around the growing city.
- Talking of documents, Moscow is home to Europe's largest library, which has been known as the Russian State Library, Lenin Library, the V. I. Lenin State Library of the USSR, and even, briefly nicknamed the “Lennon Bitlioteka” when The Beatles were popular. It contains 43 million objects including maps, sheet Music, sound recordings, rare books, dissertations and Newspapers.
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