Simon's Christmas Quizzes

Christmas Quiz 2021

1. Who is widely regarded as the first great white jazz musician, and had a biographical novel based on his life entitled 'Young Man with a Horn'?

Bix Beiderbecke

2. In which 1984 British comedy film does the female lead say to the male lead "I think sexual intercourse is in order, Gilbert"?

A Private Function (Maggie Smith as Joyce Chilvers, exhilarated by her success at killing the pig.)

3. Which familiar organisms most obviously display their sexual organs?

Flowering plants [angiosperms; Angiospermae; Magnoliophyta]

4. "Getting the bus to Hebden Bridge" is a euphemism for what?

Coming out as (or being or becoming) a lesbian. [Hebden Bridge is sometimes called the UK's lesbian capital.]

5. Mustafa Kemal is credited as founder of which country?

Turkey

6. Which geological period is known as the Age of Fishes?

Devonian

7. Who was the famous personal physician to several Roman emperors including Marcus Aurelius?

Galen (of Pergamon) [Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus]

8. Which eponymous hero of a radio and TV series was regularly called ke-mo sah-bee?

The Lone Ranger. (The epithet is used by his Native American companion Tonto.)

9. Who is the England footballer famous for the 'goggles' goal celebration?

Ellen White [Ellen Toni White, married name Convery]

10. Which globally vulnerable species of pelagic sea bird normally nests on sea cliffs, but has taken to breeding on the Tyne Bridge and the Baltic Centre, and is said to sport the black and white stripes of Newcastle United?

Kittiwake. [Black-legged kittiwake, Rissa tridactyla.]

11. What was the UK shipping area German Bight called until 1956?

Heligoland

12. The P-wave and the S-wave, sometimes said to denote primary and secondary, are the two main waves in which branch of science?

Seismology [accept geology; accept earth science]

13. Which British city earned the name Copperopolis in the 19th century because of its smelting industry?

Swansea

14. What is Sagittarius A* [pronounced "Sagittarius A-Star"]?

Black hole at the centre of our galaxy. [Accept black hole.] (Strictly, a very compact bright radio source at the centre of the Milky Way, probably a supermassive black hole.)

15. Which upland region is the largest area of granite in Britain?

Dartmoor

16. Which British prime minister had been an organ scholar at Balliol College Oxford?

Edward Heath

17. The Salmon of Knowledge figures in which mythology?

Irish [In the Fenian Cycle]

18. Which European capital lies on a large gulf named after it?

Riga

19. The Grade I listed Pulteney Bridge spans which English river?

Avon [River Avon; Lower Avon; Bristol Avon]

20. Which archaic adverb meaning 'gladly' occurs in Charles Wesley's hymn 'Gentle Jesus, meek and mild'?

Fain (I would to thee be brought)

21. In football, what is a draught excluder?

A defender who lies on the ground behind the defensive wall for a free kick. (Increasingly popular tactic in the Premier League in the 2020-21 season.)

22. Which sea is associated with The Spanish Main?

Caribbean Sea. [Accept Gulf of Mexico.]

23. A statue of whom sits atop Oxford's Radcliffe Observatory?

Atlas

24. What precisely does the word congenital mean when used to describe a medical condition?

Present at birth. [Do not accept 'inherited'.]

25. What is the etymology of chemical element indium?

Named for indigo, from the colour in its spectrum.

26. What is the name of the area between Loch Lomond and Stirling consisting of wooded glens, braes and quiet lochs?

The Trossachs

27. Annette Obrestad and Liv Boeree are famous names in which field?

They are very successful profession poker players.

28. Who was the first British monarch to feature on a Bank of England note?

Elizabeth II

29. What is a Painted Lady?

Butterfly (migratory nymphalid, Vanessa cardui)

30. What is the name for the short line placed above or below a musical stave to accommodate notes outside its nominal range?

Ledger line

31. What has been washing up on Cornish beaches since a container load sank off Land's End in 1997?

Lego.

32. Who were defeated at the Battle of Wolf 359?

The Borg [Star Trek: The Next Generation, episode: The Best of Both Worlds.]

33. Which African country's flag depicts a Kalashnikov assault rifle?

Mozambique

34. Intermediate between a century and a legion, what Roman military unit is considered the equivalent of a modern battalion?

Cohort [Latin cohors]

35. In which european capital is the iconic multi-purpose event venue, Tempodrom?

Berlin [Also referred to as Neues Tempodrom].

36. Fusarium TR4 is a worldwide pathogen that has been devastating crops of which major food plant?

Banana

37. What is the frequency of the A above middle C?

440 Hz. [It's the note that the oboe plays for orchestras to tune to.]

38. The title of Evelyn Waugh's novel "A Handful of Dust" is a quotation from which famous poem?

The Waste Land (T S Eliot). ["I will show you fear in a handful of dust".]

39. Alice and Bob are standard names for hypothetical scenario agents in which branch of technology?

Cryptography. (Alice and Bob want to exchange a private message …)

40. Which poet famously claimed to have been interrupted by a person from Porlock while writing down a poem inspired by a dream.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (while setting down Kubla Khan).

41. What is the name of the curve used in economic modelling by central banks as the primary framework to forecast inflation, despite its poor predictive power?

The Phillips curve.

42. S (for Springer) was used in the early days of which notation?

Algebraic chess notation (where K cannot be used for Knight, because K is for King).

43. Hattori Hanso is an anguished but talented craftsman in which famous 2003 film?

Kill Bill: Volume 1 [accept Kill Bill]

44. Where would you find a Rose Argent barbed and seeded proper?

Arms of West Yorkshire. (It's the blazonry for the white rose. Also the old arms of Yorkshire, and some other Yorkshire related bodies. [Accept arms of West Riding. Accept Yorkshire.]

45. William of Baskerville is the protagonist in which famous novel?

The Name of the Rose [Il nome della rosa, Umberto Eco, 1980]

46. In 2018, English cricketer Anya Shrubsole became the first woman to be honoured how?

First woman to appear on the cover of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack.

47. What is the main grape used to produce Chianti?

Sangiovese [Current regulation says at least 80%]

48. According to a 1955 song, which became a hit when re-recored live in 1968, "I shot a man in Reno", for what reason?

Just to watch him die. [Folsom Prison Blues, Johnny Cash]

49. What nationality was the sculptor Eduardo Paolozzi?

British. (He had a Scottish accept.) [Accept Scottish.]

50. Which children's picture book without a single depiction of Christmas was turned into a well known Christmas film?

The Snowman by Raymond Briggs