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General Knowledge Quiz #12

Can you answer these random trivia questions?
Quiz by Quizmaster
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Featured Quiz
Last updated: May 12, 2022
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First submittedMay 4, 2011
Times taken160,835
Average score50.0%
Rating4.15
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Question
Answer
Who lived at Camelot?
King Arthur
What major war was fought in the years 1950–1953?
Korean War
What river has six shallow areas known as "cataracts"?
Nile River
What was supposedly invented by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008, and originally
traded for less than 1 cent?
Bitcoin
Who composed "Ride of the Valkyries"?
Richard Wagner
A cube is 5 meters on each edge. What is its surface area?
150 square meters
Which Greek god has a son named Triton?
Poseidon
Which major city in Japan has a name which starts with O?
Osaka
What animal is the "most dangerous game"?
Humans
Who supposedly said "let them eat cake"?
Marie Antoinette
In 1989, Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for the death of what famous writer?
Salman Rushdie
What U.S. state is geographically closest to Africa?
Maine
Who starred as Frodo in "The Lord of the Rings" movie trilogy?
Elijah Wood
What was the former name of Istanbul?
Constantinople
And what was it called before that?
Byzantium
What do the letters P.S. stand for at the end of a letter?
Postscript
What is the first name Bea short for?
Beatrice
He was born with the name Steven Demetre Georgio, and now goes by Yusuf Islam.
What other name was he known by?
Cat Stevens
In what country did the sauna originate?
Finland
What is the capital of Saskatchewan?
Regina
Yossarian
+12
Level 64
Jun 13, 2013
Seriously? Like no one got regina?
courthousedoc
+5
Level 77
Apr 14, 2014
I thought it was Moose Jaw.
Somequiztaker
+6
Level 77
Jun 21, 2018
Better than Moose Knuckle
IsleAuHaulte
+6
Level 89
Nov 23, 2018
Regina actually rhymes with that.
burntfrost
+13
Level 48
Jun 5, 2014
Check out the hilarious song "The Last Saskatchewan River Pirate" by the Arrogant Worms. You won't be able to forget.
Blackstar1991
+1
Level 82
Jun 21, 2018
Hilarious! Thanks for that!
WT2008
+3
Level 77
Jun 21, 2018
Regina, the city that rhymes with the funnest place on earth
blinky
+5
Level 58
Jun 26, 2018
I thought was "Mulva."
MassLumpBlockClod
+1
Level 83
May 26, 2022
Dolores, Colorado
WackyAnagramDude
+1
Level 63
Sep 20, 2022
Bovary?
BlackLab
+1
Level 65
Jun 30, 2023
Show us your Regina!
SMFlex
+1
Level 50
Oct 12, 2023
I only know because their Little League team got to the Little League World Series.
arsenal1
+2
Level 53
Nov 6, 2023
I was convinced that it was Saskatoon
NQChien
+1
Level 66
Dec 1, 2023
No surprise. People score poorly on geography but better in trivia related to celebrities.
buck1017
+3
Level 77
Jun 27, 2013
Crap...I pulled Byzantium from out of nowhere, but couldn't spell it for the life of my, so I figured I was wrong. Dagnabbit.
McKenzieFam
+2
Level 63
Nov 16, 2023
same but for me it was Posedion PoseidionPosedon arrggghhhh
TimofA
+1
Level 43
Aug 25, 2013
how far is it from north Alaska to southern Africa via the polar route? I reckon it is closer than Maine to northwest Africa via the Atlantic
Karppikala
+10
Level 22
Sep 6, 2013
Look at google earth. Alaska is practically on the other side of the world from southern Africa.
Symmetrik
+10
Level 57
Mar 4, 2014
Wrong poles. North Alaska is near the North Pole, and the southern edge of Africa is near the South Pole.
svitapeneela
+3
Level 65
Jun 22, 2018
Flat Earther maybe?
Sifhraven
+7
Level 67
Jul 21, 2019
Dont you know? There is a wormhole at each pole, for easy travel... guess that was classified info.. oops..
McKenzieFam
+1
Level 63
Nov 16, 2023
shhhh!
SolomonPierce
+3
Level 35
Jun 26, 2014
I spelled Rushdie incorrectly >.
IsleAuHaulte
+3
Level 89
May 13, 2022
You'll never find him then.
TanithEdgley
+4
Level 36
Aug 11, 2014
The fact that only 32% of people got Richard Wagner upsets me deeply.
Malbaby
+10
Level 71
Mar 27, 2016
Wagner died 133 years ago, how many of todays musicians will be remembered in 2149?
Osiris
+31
Level 62
Apr 22, 2018
Hopefully not many, for the future's sake.
buck1017
+9
Level 77
Apr 23, 2018
LMFAO for certain...not sure about any of the others though.
duckwantbread
+5
Level 64
Jun 27, 2022
To be fair if you played Ride of the Valkyries I'd say most people would recognise it, they just wouldn't know who composed it.
divantilya
+1
Level 37
Nov 23, 2018
I remembered Richard Wagner only because of the movie of a similar name in which Tom Cruise attempted to assassinate Hitler. (I then made the connection that Wagner was Hitler's favorite composer).
GrammarBeane1
+2
Level 82
May 13, 2022
The only reason I know Wagner is because we played a piece of his in middle school, and my band director pronounced his name in a very exaggerated German accent like Ree-card Vahg-nahr. Very hard to forget something like that XD
SgtMac
+1
Level 55
Dec 6, 2017
Ironic that Maine is the closest state to Africa, considering it is either the whitest, or one of the top 3 whitest, states in the U.S. (by population.
svitapeneela
+18
Level 65
Jun 22, 2018
That's about as ironic as an Alanis Morisette song
stromae
+2
Level 70
Mar 8, 2019
that's not really ironic, spain borders africa and they're pretty white
Sifhraven
+1
Level 67
Jul 21, 2019
Spaniards are hardly more white, by skintone, than morrocans.
IsleAuHaulte
+2
Level 89
Dec 13, 2020
Lewiston and Portland actually have significant populations of immigrants from Africa, mostly Somalia and Darfur.
Coyuznik
+3
Level 83
Apr 24, 2018
Darn you, Kramer! My first quess was SalBASS Rushdie!
Djilas
+3
Level 82
Jun 19, 2018
Stick to the last names :)
trebek
+3
Level 70
Jun 21, 2018
Another perfect score wrecked by lord of the rings. Sigh. I need to tape a sheet to my laptop with common answers for lotr. Fell asleep during the first movie. Didn’t bother with the rest
TheCrusher
+24
Level 72
Jun 21, 2018
Why are people so proud to hate LOTR (or other popular cultural phenomenons, for that matter)?
IsleAuHaulte
+2
Level 89
Dec 13, 2020
Watching people walk for 2 1/2 hours is kind of tiring.
joeythelemur
+3
Level 84
May 12, 2022
Aside from all the battles.
Quibbler123
+1
Level 28
Sep 18, 2022
love all the battles XD
ChaosLord
+4
Level 74
Sep 18, 2022
Congratulations, you special boy. You proclaimed your disdain for the most decorated film trilogy of all time. You won the Internet. You can rest now.
Freestatebear
+1
Level 85
Jun 21, 2018
I have to wonder how "famous" Salmon Rushdie would be if not for the infamous fatwa...?
PrinceEric
+2
Level 56
Jun 21, 2018
For the longest time, I thought he was the founder of the Church of Satan (because he wrote the unrelated The Satanic Verses). But that was most definitely Anton LaVey.
Djilas
+4
Level 82
May 12, 2022
He won the Booker prize among other things
mrputter
+3
Level 81
May 23, 2022
Ok, I'll bite. How many other people do you know of just because they won the Booker Prize?

I mean, obviously I don't know you so maybe you're really into literature and peruse the NY Times Bestseller lists weekly, and follow any number of literary awards. Maybe.

But for the average person? I very much doubt that having won the Booker Prize is the sort of thing that would give an author nearly as much fame (and/or notoriety) as Rushdie has, among the populace at large.

Like: I'm reasonably well-read. And I'm on a trivia site like JetPunk, which gives me a bit of a head start already. But when I look over the list of Winners, I see that I've read (and enjoyed, to be sure!) maybe 10 of them.

But not a single one of those authors I would suggest (Yann Martel being the only possible exception) are in any way broadly famous (i.e.: among the populace at large) because of having won the Booker Prize.

richiesyxx
+3
Level 72
Sep 18, 2022
I’ll definitely bite… Margaret Attwood, Ian McEwan, George Saunders, Alan Hollinghurst, William Golding, J.M. Coetzee, Iris Murdoch, Graham Swift, Kingsley Amis… from the top of my head.

It’s a very prestigious award, the fact that you’re unfamiliar with it doesn’t diminish that. Neither does it mean that everyone else is similarly unfamiliar. Also, he was already famous for winning the Booker for Midnights Children, without which it’s unlikely The Satanic Verses would have come to the attention of the Ayatollahs.

If you’re after doing a little self-improvement though, any of the above are worth a read, but my recommendation would be “The Inheritance of Loss” by Kiran Desai, a very good place to start.

AlmostAGenius
+1
Level 80
Sep 18, 2022
Well then, I will bite your biting. I wouldn’t say that everyone is unfamiliar, but I imagine if you polled the general populace, the vast majority of people would have read at most one of these books (most likely Life of Pie, if any). Your own reading experience cannot be applied to everyone. Reading just is not a priority nowadays, and no matter how prestigious the award is, it does not mean everyone has read the books. I am fairly certain that I am more well read than the average person, and I have never heard of most of these books. Mrputter is correct in that the Booker award is not something that most people would know about.
vermiciousknid
+2
Level 88
Oct 11, 2022
@AlmostAGenius, let me present your own words back to you: "Your own reading experience cannot be applied to everyone." Apparently reading is not a priority for you, but I think you underestimate the popularity of reading among the general populace. Sure, not "everyone" has read the books on the list, but that's not what we're talking about. In my opinion, many people would recognize at least some of the book titles and authors on the list, and it seems fair to say that winning a prestigious award plays a role in that name recognition.

All that said, I agree that the fatwa likely raised Rushdie's profile quite a bit.

RiscaGame
+2
Level 49
Mar 31, 2020
Thanks to Curb You Enthusiasm, for giving me the fatwa answer.
mikroustiko
+2
Level 15
Mar 7, 2021
I was very amused by the "What was [Istanbul] called before [Constantinople]" question! In Greece we are taught this detail quite thoroughly at school, so it's interesting to see 72% of the people who took this quiz knew about Constantinople but only 29% about Byzantium. Gives me some comfort after realizing I don't know a lot of facts about the USA, lol.
Dontforget
+4
Level 60
Mar 26, 2021
I reckon many people only knew avout constantinople because of the song "Istanbul not constantinople"
InfiniteBulk
+1
Level 65
Mar 24, 2021
After Constantine moved the capital of the Roman Empire to Byzantium, he renamed it New Rome, a name that the city held for quite a while. Then it was renamed in his honor (Constantinople). Finally, the Ottomans conquered Constantinople and called it Istanbul. So this is the path:

Byzantium ---> New Rome ---> Constantinople ---> Istanbul.

In summary, New Rome was Constantinople's name before it was changed.

PeregrineFalcon
+1
Level 76
Sep 18, 2022
The official name of the city in the Ottoman period remained Constantinople (Konstantiniyye). The Turkish Republic changed it to Istanbul in 1930, though this name had been used colloquially for centuries.
walmartdrivethru
+4
Level 24
Apr 2, 2021
Ah, got the most dangerous game from reading many short stories in school
joeythelemur
+13
Level 84
May 12, 2022
How is Beatrice not an answer for the "Bea" question? I have a family member named Beatrice and she has always gone by Bea. Maybe she's an outlier as I don't think I know anyone else with that name, but it seems natural.
Quizmaster
+1
Level ∞
May 12, 2022
Fixed
WillemLAif
+5
Level 76
May 15, 2022
Tried Guinevere, didn't work. But it should.
EmeraldOracle
+2
Level 69
May 18, 2022
And Merlin.
richiesyxx
+3
Level 72
Sep 18, 2022
I’d imagine quite a lot of people lived in Camelot. The best name has to be Uther Pendragon though, no?
redsplat
+1
Level 74
Feb 16, 2023
Agreed. Please accept Guinevere for Camelot. I'll bet dollars to doughnuts she spent more time there than her hubby who was off galavanting all the time :)
iluveli
+4
Level 62
May 31, 2022
I'm from Finland and I live in sauna.
vacationmom
+2
Level 65
Jul 11, 2022
What's the deal with this site and questions related to Jack and Jill or to Cat Stevens? Not a complaint per se
giommaso
+6
Level 72
Sep 18, 2022
P.S. stands for "post scriptum".

I agree with accepting postscript, but the shown answer should be the correct one.

Just like R.I.P. stands for "requiescat in pacem" and not "rest in peace" - although they're the same sentence, or E.G. stands for "exempli gratia" and not "example given".

martay
+3
Level 70
Sep 18, 2022
Etymologically, that might be what they originally meant, but that's not what people mean when they use those abbreviations now. Regardless, words and abbreviations can have more than one meaning.
Ampersandwich
+1
Level 44
Jun 16, 2023
Quit being such a pedant
IamTheSam
+2
Level 41
Sep 18, 2022
Huh. I had forgotten how to calculate the surface area of a cube. I might have got that one if I was still in high school.
Odx3
+2
Level 43
Sep 19, 2022
You don't need to know how to calculate the surface of a cube. I mean, you dont need any specific formulas. You just need to know how to count the area of a square and that there's 6 faces.
SeaNomad
+2
Level 77
Sep 19, 2022
Being Finnish myself I dare slightly dispute the statement of sauna being invented in Finland. Similar inventions have been created in many places (for example native Americans did it). Actually it looks to me that people living in touch climates (deserts, cold winters etc., or just places where water has been a scarce resource) have often used something like sauna.
Odx3
+1
Level 43
Sep 19, 2022
Yes, similar invetions have existed, I mean, it's essentially trapping heat from a fire to an enclosed space. However, sauna as we know and understand it today did originate from Finland. Also the word comes from Finnish. You mentioned the Native American "saunas" which were not saunas at all, they were used for rituals and the warming effect as pleasure was merely a by-product.
redsplat
+1
Level 74
Feb 16, 2023
No need to use the past tense in relation to traditional Indigenous practices around sweatlodges (and other heat/steam related practices in what are now called the Americas). These practices are alive and well :)

As a side note, while sweatlodges encompass sacred/ceremonial purposes and have traditional protocols, they can also have health/family/social components, depending on the community and the situation.

On another note, here's a PSA: beware non-Indigenous for-sale fake-shaman "sweatlodge" events -- these can be dangerous because they are not built/conducted in traditional ways and there have been injuries and even fatalities at them.

dunkinggandalf2
+4
Level 68
Sep 20, 2022
I still think you shouldn't accept "Marie" for "Marie-Antoinette". the Antoinette is not a middle name, it's the second part of her first name, which is why they're hyphenated. If you refer to her as "Queen Marie", even in context, nobody will know who you're talking about.
Ferbin
+2
Level 76
Sep 21, 2022
True.
vermiciousknid
+2
Level 88
Oct 11, 2022
I agree. It seems both inconsistent and excessively generous to accept just "Marie" as a type-in.
CMC315
+2
Level 59
Sep 20, 2022
I knew Cat Stevens and couldn't understand why it wouldn't accept my answer. I think I must have been spelling it as Stephens.
RoyalCat
+1
Level 19
Apr 5, 2023
Only reason I knew Constantinople was because of Just Dance 4 XD
majdis23
+1
Level 32
Aug 20, 2023
Noooio, there's no way it's spelled Constantinople. I knew the answer but kept trying ConstantinopOle and almost cried when I saw the correct answer,. Bc in Czech it's called Konstantinopol, so that got me kinda confused, dammit.
Zefyrinus
+2
Level 71
Sep 18, 2023
I don't understand the answer for the "most dangerous game". This animal is seldom hunted for sport, or hunted at all.
RobNobody
+1
Level 76
Oct 8, 2023
It's from the title of an American short story from 1924 about... well, that sort of hunt. It's been adapted for movie, TV, and radio numerous times, either directly or as an homage, often making specific reference to the title.
leontodon
+1
Level 64
Dec 21, 2023
Really loved this one — it taught me a lot that I'm embarrassed I didn't know. Bit disappointed that it didn't accept "me" for the most dangerous game.
BryceBelhumeur
+1
Level 66
Jan 16, 2024
always thought that Saskatoon was the capital of Saskatchewan given the name, I guess I was misinformed
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