St. Ives Problem/Solution 1

Classic Problem

As I was going to St. Ives

I met a man with seven wives

Every wife had seven sacks

Every sack had seven cats

Every cat had seven kits

Kits, cats, sacks and wives

How many were going to St. Ives?

Solution

This is a trick puzzle, to which the trick answer is:

$1$.

The narrator is travelling to St. Ives.

The man he meets, with the colossal entourage, is, by assumption of the definition of the word meet, travelling in the opposite direction, from St. Ives.

Technically, as it is not specified whether the narrator is travelling alone or not, the answer should actually be:

at least $1$.

Sources

• 1992: David Wells: Curious and Interesting Puzzles ... (previous) ... (next): The World's Oldest Puzzle: $3$
• Weisstein, Eric W. "St. Ives Problem." From MathWorld--A Wolfram Web Resource. https://mathworld.wolfram.com/StIvesProblem.html