Dragon Trivia
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This dragon trivia quiz has 99 free questions with answers and ranges across everywhere dragons turn up. Mythology first: the Latin and Greek roots of the word, the snake-like beasts of Mesopotamia and Egypt, China's rain-governing five-clawed emperor's dragon, the red dragon of Wales, Saint George, Beowulf's last fight, Fáfnir, Jörmungandr, the Hydra, the constellation Draco and the order that gave Dracula his name. Then fiction: Smaug and the thrush, Toothless and Berk, Daenerys and her eggs, Mushu, Shrek's Dragon, Puff and Jackie Paper, and why Charizard is not officially a Dragon type. And the real animals: Komodo dragons that roll in dung, dragonflies with 24,000-facet eyes, and the one map that really says 'here be dragons'. It suits a fantasy-loving family, a pub round or a classroom on myths and legends. Every answer has been checked against an encyclopaedic source and each question shows its citation once you have answered.
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Q 01'Dragon' entered English in the 13th century via Old French from a Latin word meaning what?
Huge serpent
Latin draco meant 'huge serpent'; the word reached English around 1220 through Old French, and its Greek root drakon is thought to derive from a verb meaning 'I see'.
Q 02Which hero sowed a dragon's teeth to raise the first warriors of Thebes?
Cadmus
Cadmus slew the dragon guarding a spring near the future Thebes and sowed its teeth; armed men called the Spartoi sprang from the ground and became the city's founding nobles.
Q 03Chinese dragons were traditionally thought to govern what?
Rain, the sea and other water
Chinese dragons ruled rain, the sea and other water: farmers prayed to them for rainfall, and the Dragon Kings of the Four Seas each governed an ocean.
Q 04Under the Ming and Qing dynasties, a dragon with how many claws was reserved strictly for the emperor?
Five
The five-clawed dragon was reserved for the emperor under the Ming and Qing; princes and high nobles were limited to four-clawed dragons, lesser officials to three.
Q 05Per the Han scholar Wang Fu, a Chinese dragon's scales resemble those of which animal?
A carp
Wang Fu's nine resemblances give the dragon the scales of a carp, plus a stag's antlers, a camel's head, a demon's eyes, an eagle's claws, a tiger's soles and a cow's ears.
Q 06Which coloured dragon appeared on the first Chinese national flag under the Qing dynasty?
Azure
The Qing 'Yellow Dragon Flag', adopted as the national flag in 1889, showed an azure dragon chasing a red pearl on a yellow ground.
Q 07The Dragon is which animal in the 12-year cycle of the Chinese zodiac?
Fifth
The Dragon is fifth, after the Rat, Ox, Tiger and Rabbit; birth rates in Chinese communities measurably rise in Dragon years because such children are considered lucky.
Q 08The Dragon Boat Festival commemorates which ancient Chinese poet-statesman?
Qu Yuan
Qu Yuan, a poet and minister of the state of Chu, drowned himself in the Miluo River around 278 BC; legend says locals raced out in boats and threw rice to protect his body.
Q 09In 2009 the Dragon Boat Festival became the first Chinese holiday recognised by UNESCO on which list?
Intangible Cultural Heritage list
UNESCO inscribed the Dragon Boat Festival on its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009, the first Chinese festival to be listed.
Q 10The red dragon on the flag of Wales fights an invading dragon of which colour in the Mabinogion?
White
In the tale of Lludd and Llefelys the white dragon stood for the Saxons and the red for the Britons; the red dragon later became the badge of Henry VII.
Q 11Wales's red dragon flag became the country's official flag in which year?
1959
The red dragon became the official national flag of Wales in 1959 by proclamation of Queen Elizabeth II; Henry VII had borne a red dragon banner after Bosworth in 1485.
Q 12The 13th-century Golden Legend places Saint George's dragon-terrorised city in which country?
Libya
Jacobus de Voragine's Golden Legend sets the story at the city of Silene in Libya, whereas the earliest 11th- and 12th-century versions had placed it in Cappadocia.
Q 13In the Old English epic Beowulf, what provokes the dragon that the aged king finally fights?
A slave steals a golden cup from its hoard
Q 21Leviathan, the sea dragon of the Hebrew Bible, reflects which older Canaanite monster defeated by Baal?
Lotan
Lotan, a seven-headed sea serpent smitten by Baal in the Ugaritic Baal Cycle, is the linguistic and mythic ancestor of Leviathan; Hobbes borrowed the name for his 1651 treatise on the state.
Q 22Which ruler founded the Order of the Dragon, the source of Vlad Dracul's name?
Sigismund of Luxembourg
Sigismund of Luxembourg, King of Hungary and later Holy Roman Emperor, founded the Order of the Dragon in 1408 to defend Christendom; Vlad II was inducted in 1431 and took the name Dracul.
Q 23A wyvern differs from a classic heraldic dragon in having how many legs?
Two
Beowulf kills it with the help of young Wiglaf but dies of his wounds fifty years after beating Grendel's mother.
Q 14Which of Beowulf's followers alone dares to help him against the dragon?
Wiglaf
Wiglaf, a young kinsman of Beowulf, alone stands by him when the other retainers flee; he stabs the dragon's belly and receives the dying king's collar and armour.
Q 15In Norse legend, Fáfnir became a dragon to guard a hoard taken from which dwarf?
Andvari
Loki seized the dwarf Andvari's gold, including a cursed ring, as weregild for Ótr; Fáfnir killed his father Hreiðmarr to keep it and was later slain by Sigurð with the sword Gram.
Q 16Jörmungandr, the Norse World Serpent, is the child of Loki and which giantess?
Angrboða
Angrboða, a giantess of Jötunheimar, bore Loki three children: the wolf Fenrir, Hel who rules the dead, and the serpent Jörmungandr, whom Odin cast into the sea around Midgard.
Q 17What does Jörmungandr do that makes him an example of an ouroboros?
Bites his own tail
Jörmungandr grew so large that he encircles Midgard and bites his own tail, the tail-eating loop that defines an ouroboros; his letting go is a sign of Ragnarök.
Q 18The Hydra slain by Heracles as his second labour lived at Lerna, reputedly an entrance to what?
The Underworld
Lerna's bottomless lake was reputed to be an entrance to the Underworld, which the Hydra guarded; Heracles's nephew Iolaus cauterised each neck so the heads could not regrow.
Q 19According to Hyginus, which goddess hurled the dragon Draco into the sky, where it froze at the pole?
Athena
In Hyginus's Astronomica, Athena (Minerva) snatched the dragon the Giants hurled at her and flung it spinning into the heavens, where it froze around the celestial pole.
Q 20Which star in Draco served as the northern pole star from around 3942 BC to 1793 BC?
Thuban
The Egyptian pyramids' entrance passages were aligned so it would be visible at night.
A wyvern has two legs and a pair of wings, whereas the classic heraldic dragon has four legs; the name comes via Old French wivre from Latin vipera, 'viper'.
Q 24The Komodo dragon is native to islands of which country?
Indonesia
Komodo dragons live only on Komodo, Rinca, Flores and a few neighbouring Indonesian islands; the world's largest living lizard first reached Western science in 1910.
Q 25Young Komodo dragons live in trees and roll in what to deter cannibalistic adults?
Faeces
Juveniles roll in faeces so that adult Komodo dragons, which readily eat young of their own species, will not treat them as prey; they stay up in trees until they are too big to be swallowed.
Q 26The first two live Komodo dragons in Europe went on show at which zoo's new Reptile House in 1927?
London Zoo
London Zoo's new Reptile House opened in 1927 with a pair of Komodo dragons, the first seen alive in Europe; curator Joan Procter famously walked one around the grounds on a leash.
Q 27Roughly how many facets, or ommatidia, does each of a dragonfly's compound eyes have?
24,000
Each compound eye holds roughly 24,000 ommatidia, some species approaching 30,000, giving dragonflies near all-round vision; damselflies fold their wings at rest while dragonflies hold theirs out flat.
Q 28Smaug in The Hobbit is killed by Bard the Bowman when a thrush reveals what?
A bare patch on his jewelled underbelly
Bilbo had spotted the gap while trading riddles with the dragon.
Q 29How many years before The Hobbit's events did Smaug seize the dwarf kingdom of Erebor?
171
Smaug took Erebor in Third Age 2770 and Bilbo's journey came in 2941, 171 years later; on the same day the dragon laid waste to the neighbouring town of Dale.
Q 30Who voiced Smaug, with performance capture, in Peter Jackson's Hobbit films?
Benedict Cumberbatch
Benedict Cumberbatch voiced Smaug and performed motion capture for him, and also supplied the voice of the Necromancer (Sauron) in the Hobbit trilogy.