Quiz 12 Flashcards
Which English singer-songwrite, who died tragically young in 1974, released only three albums diring his lifetime, Five Leaves Left, Bryter Later and Pink Moon, largely ignored at the time but now all acknowledged as classics?
Nick Drake
A Cream Cracker Under The Settee was the title of the last of Alan Bennett’s acclaimed 1988 series of TV monologues, Talking Heads. Which actress performed it?
Thora Hird
Aqua Fortis the Latin for strong water, was a name used achaically for which acid?
Nitric acid
What common process is known to botanists as positive geotropism
Roots growing downwards
The viral disease epidemic parotitis, most commonly afflicting children between the ages of 5 and 15, is commonly known by what name?
Mumps
What name is given to the long sleeveless out er vestment worn by priests, and normally distinguished by the liturgical colour appropriate to the mass being celebrated?
Chasuble
The Rev Canon Chasuble DD is a vicar in which of Oscar Wilde’s comedies?
The Importance of Being Ernest
Which naturalist and physician was responsible for giving us our biological name Homo sapiens?
Carl Linnaeus
Alphabetically, which is the last book of the Old Testament?
Zephaniah
Which 14th century manuscript, consisting of more than fifty poems, including some attributed to a bard who lived as early as the 6th century, inspired the title of an LP by the rock band Deep Purple?
The Book of Taliesin
Claire Tomalin, who biography of Charles Dicken was published in 2011, is also the author of an acclaimed biography of Dickens’ mistress, published twenty years earlier with the title The Invisible Woman. What was the mistress’s name?
Ellen Ternan
Patrick Troughton, Richard Greene, Michael Praed and Jonas Armstrong have all appeared in TV dramas playing which medieval figure?
Robin Hood
Which London railway terminus is depicted in WP Frith’s painting of 1862 entitled The Railway Station?
Paddington
What term is used in archeology to refer to the physical material - such as soil or sediment - in which culturaly artefacts or fossils are embedded?
Matrix
The organisation CSETI, founded in the USA in 1990 by Stephen M Greer, is dedicated to the furtherance of human understanding of what phenomenon?
Extra-terrestial intelligence
In 1985 the zoologist Dian Fossey was murdered while making a study of mountain gorillas - in which African country?
Rwanda
Which European capital city got its ancient name from the Latin word for mud
Paris - Lutetia
The book of my enemy has been remaindered / And I am pleased / In vast quantities it has been remaindered / Like a van-load of counterfeit that has been siezed - These are the opening lines of the title poem of which writer’s book of collected verse?
Clive James
In physics, what is the anti-particle to the electron called?
Positron
In the 17th century, Nicholas Lanier became the first person to hold what post at the English royal court?
Master of the King’s Musick
Certain insects have stridulatory organs. Can you explain what these are?
They make sound when rubbed
In Greeklegend, what did the craftsman Epeius fashion from timbers cut from the slopes of Mount Ida?
The Trojan Horse
A Satyr Against Reason and Mankind is a poem by which courtier of Charles II, who has been portrayed on film by Johnny Depp, and whose debauched lifestyle earned him the reputation of the wickedest man in England?
John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester
When the Republic of China was declared in 1912, who was named its first provisional President?
Sun Yat-Sen
In which city in France was Joan of Arc burned at the stake in 1431?
Rouen
In the Beatles’ 1964 film A Hard Days Night, which Irish-born actor, by then already familiar from TV, was cast as the grandfather?
Wilfred Brambell
The area known as The Hamptons, in Suffolk Country, an exclusive summer retreat for wealthy Americans, is at the eastern end of which island?
Long Island
From Doon With Death, first published in 1964, was the first novel from which British crime writer?
Ruth Rendell
Which year of the 20th century saw the start of the First Arab-Isreali War, the publication of the Kinsey report into sexual behaviour in the human male, and the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi?
1948
What common three letter word was originally an abbreviation of a two word Latin phrase meaning excitable crowd, a meaning that it often retains?
Mob
According to tradition, who was shot dead at Mann’s saloon in August 1876, holding, in a poker game, two eights and two aces, the combination of cards becoming known as the dead man’s hand?
Wild Bill Hickok
Which branch of mathematics was developed by John Von Neumeann with later collaboration by Oskar Morgenstern?
Game Theory
Which director-general of the BBC introduced on air the radio broadcast of the abdication speech made by Edward VIII on 11th December 1936
John Reith
Which district of New York City is situated north of 96th Street in Manhattan
Harlem
Which transition metal, which shares its name with a major London theatre, has atomic number 46 and atomic mass of 106.4?
Palladium
Which force created to preserve public order in London, originally numbering only six men, was founded by Henry Fielding in the 1740s, and lasted until being finally disbanded in the 1830s?
Bow Stree Runners
At 636m, which is the highest point in the Peak District?
Kinder Scout
The composer Richard Rodgers had two astronomically successful partnerships in his career. Can you name the two lyricists with which he scored his major hits?
Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II
What is the name of the man eating water monster who plagues the hall of King Hrothgar in the Anglo Saxon epic poem Beowulf?
Grendel
The so called underground cathedral, housed in a former mine in Wieliczka in South Eastern Poland, consists of a series of large-scale sculpures in which material?
Salt
