English Trivia Questions and Answers

English Trivia Questions and Answers Part 1

1) What holiday did Anna Jarvis start in 1907?

Answer: Mother’s Day

2) Which region of France is Paris located in (there are 22 regions in France)?
A) Centre
B) Ile-de-France
C) Alsace
D) Rhone-Alpes

Answer: B

3) Budgie is another name for what bird?
A) Parakeet
B) Parrot
C) Canary
D) Mynah
E) Cockatoo

Answer: A
Budgie comes from the Australian outback word for “pretty good.”

4) What two countries are joined by the Ambassador Bridge?
A) Canada & United States
B) Ireland & Ulster
C) North & South Korea
D) Mexico & United States

Answer: A

5) In government, actress Jane Alexander was chosen by former President Clinton to head what federal program?

Answer: National Education Association

6) The factor that most determines the final form that a star becomes is its:
A) Oxygen content
B) Size
C) combustion

Answer: B

7) Which of these gems contains layers of nacre?
A) Jade
B) Lapis lazuli
C) Pearl
D) Amethyst

Answer: C

8) ‘Lamarckism’ is a theory of _____

Answer: Evolution

9) This 17th-century artist did a series of allegorical paintings of Queen Marie de Medici:
A) Jan Vermeer
B) Hieronymous Bosch
C) Rembrandt
D) Peter Rubens
E) Michelangelo

Answer: D
The series of large paintings can be seen at the Louvre in Paris.

10) What happens to the pressure of water as one goes deeper into the ocean?
A) Decreases
B) Increase
C) Stays the same

Answer: B

11) The Witch of Endor is a sorceress in:
A) Roman mythology
B) Shakespeare’s “Macbeth”
C) The Bible
D) The Salem witch trials
E) Goethe’s “Faust”

Answer: C
King Saul asked her to call up the spirit of the prophet Samuel so he could consult him.

12) Cooking a cake is:
A) An endothermic reaction
B) A physical change
C) Exothermic

Answer: A

13) What is the most distinctive exterior feature on a Russian Orthodox church?

Answer: The onion dome

14) Iodine solution is the chemical used to test for the presence of:
A) Protein
B) Starch
C) Sugar

Answer: B

15) How many people died in the flu epidemic of 1918-1919? (In millions)

Answer: 20 million
In the three waves of the 1918-1919 flu epidemic, at least twenty million people succumbed. Indeed, many estimates run as high as thirty million dead. Coming on the heels of the First World War (in which only ten million perished), the pandemic spread more quickly and widely because of the large troop movements of the time.

English Trivia Questions and Answers Part 2

16) Who wrote music to be performed while the royal barge floated down the Thames?

Answer: George Frideric Handel

17) Now called Black Creek Village, what upstate New York neighborhood was a dumping ground for chemical waste in the 1940s and the 1950s?

Answer: Love Canal

18) What is the alternative name for the “Pareto principle”?

Answer: The 80/20 rule.

19) Who is the month of January named for?
A) Janus, the Roman god of doors and gateways
B) Jan Hus, an important religious reformer
C) Django Reinhardt, a pioneering Belgian musician
D) Jan Beuckelzoon, a radical Protestant leader

Answer: A
January is named for Janus, the Roman god of doors and gateways, and also of beginnings. The month was named for him because it begins the year.

20) What is a bruxelloise?

Answer: A French sauce for asparagus.

21) What did Cyrus the Great find?
A) Russian Empire
B) Persian Empire
C) Ottoman Empire
D) Greek Empire
E) Roman Empire

Answer: B
In the 5th century B.C., Cyrus the Great overthrew three empires and united the Middle East.

22) What does the motto E Pluribus Unum on U.S. money mean?
A) One out of many
B) All for one
C) One for all
D) In god we trust

Answer: A

23) What animals was Albert Cuyp particularly famous for painting?
A) Horses
B) Elephants
C) Cows

Answer: C

24) What did A.C. Gregory excel at?

Answer: Exploration

25) According to Norse mythology, what “V” is where warriors go when they die?

Answer: Valhalla

26) Which is the largest lake in the British Isles?

Answer: Lough Neagh

27) What did archaeologist Hiram Bingham discover in 1911?

Answer: Machu Picchu

28) Isaac Newton, the mathematician, and physicist, was a Whig MP. True or False?
A) True
B) False

Answer: A

29) Who was the first man on the moon?

Answer: At 10:56 PM EDT, July 20, 1969, American astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first person to set foot on the Moon. Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin left the Eagle lunar landing module for more than two hours during which time they played a little goW and rode around in the lunar buggy. Meanwhile, astronaut Michael Collins orbited the moon in the Command module.

30) What do you call a grouping of leopards?

Answer: A leap of leopards

English Trivia Questions and Answers Part 3

31) Where is the lunar buggy now?

Answer: Still on the moon. Luckily, the moon has free parking.

32) Which US president had personally hung two men before he came to the White House?

Answer: Grover Cleveland
Cleveland was acting in his capacity as a sheriff of Eric County, New York in hanging two criminals.

33) How many milliliters are there in one cubic centimeter?

Answer: 1

34) The oldest living thing on earth, a tree, is in what western state?

Answer: California; the bristlecone pine is said to be 4,600 years old.

35) What well-known liquor is made from the agave plant?
A) Kahlua
B) Scotch Whiskey
C) Tequila
D) Vodka
E) Gin

Answer: C
It is actually the best brand of mescal, made only in and around the city of Tequila, Mexico.

36) What color is the Central Line on London Underground maps?

Answer: Red

37) A new kid at school introduces a new game, where the person who says the meanest thing wins. The Meanest Thing to Say was written by
A) Bill Cosby
B) Joan Rivers
C) Jodie Foster

Answer: A
Part of the Little Bill series, The Meanest Thing to Say was written by Bill Cosby, and Varnette P. Honeywood illustrated the series. In The Meanest Thing to Say, Cosby teaches beginning readers the importance of friendship and kindness.

38) What is the largest tortoise in the world?

Answer: The Galápagos giant tortoise. Some have actually lived to be over 170 years old! Leatherback turtles are the largest turtles at 4-6 feet. Although tortoises and turtles are both reptiles, the main difference is that tortoises are land-dwelling whereas turtles spend most of the time in the sea.

39) The sun is thought to be:
A) At the beginning of its life cycle
B) At the end of its life cycle
C) Half-way through its life cycle

Answer: C

40) A mixed-function gland, it secretes both digestive enzymes and the hormone Glucagon:
A) Pituitary
B) Thyroid
C) Pancreas
D) Pineal

Answer: C