Famous Jacobs
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40 free Famous Jacobs trivia questions with answers — pop culture quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Jacob has been one of the most popular boys' names in the English-speaking world for a generation, so it is no surprise how many well-known people answer to it. There are Jacobs on film sets and concert stages, in parliaments and on pitching mounds, in laboratories and in the pages of the Bible, where the name began. This quiz covers them all. Most questions give you a clue and ask you to pick out the right Jacob, or tell you about a famous Jacob and ask what he did. Others turn to fictional Jacobs from novels, films, television and video games, to people with Jacobs as a surname, and to a handful of places, brands and breeds that borrowed the name. It works as a themed pub quiz round, a birthday game for the Jacob in your life, or a test for anyone who likes general knowledge with a twist. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you learn something even when you guess wrong.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Jacobus, the Latin form of Jacob, also gave English which other common boys' name by way of Old French?
James
James grew out of a Late Latin variant, Jacomus, which is why the apostles called James in English Bibles are named Jacob in the original Greek.
Q 02John Jacob Astor IV, among the richest men in the world, was the wealthiest passenger lost aboard which ocean liner?
RMS Titanic
RMS Titanic sank on her maiden voyage in 1912. He helped his pregnant wife Madeleine into Lifeboat 4 and stayed behind on deck.
Q 03Jacob became the most popular boys' name in the United States in 1999, ending the long reign of which name?
Michael
Michael had ranked first every year but one since 1954. Jacob then stayed on top through 2012.
Q 04In Dickens's A Christmas Carol, which dead business partner visits Ebenezer Scrooge on Christmas Eve bound in chains?
Jacob Marley
Jacob Marley has been dead for seven years when the story opens, and he warns Scrooge that three more spirits are on their way.
Q 05In the Book of Genesis, Jacob buys the birthright of which older twin brother for a bowl of stew?
Esau
Esau sold his rights as firstborn for red lentil pottage, and Genesis ties that colour to his other name, Edom, which means red.
Q 06Which comic book artist, born Jacob Kurtzberg, co-created Captain America, the Hulk and the Fantastic Four?
Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby created Captain America with Joe Simon in 1940, then helped launch the Avengers, Thor and the X-Men for Marvel in the 1960s.
Q 07Which actor played Jacob Black, the Quileute shapeshifter who rivals Edward Cullen, in the Twilight Saga films?
Taylor Lautner
Taylor Lautner took his first karate class at six and won several junior world championships before he turned to acting.
Q 08Which Australian actor played the Creature in Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein after breaking out in Euphoria?
Jacob Elordi
Jacob Elordi earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for the part, years after he first became known in Netflix's The Kissing Booth films.
Q 09Which Canadian actor starred opposite Brie Larson in Room as a child and later voiced Pixar's Luca?
Jacob Tremblay
Jacob Tremblay became the youngest nominee for the Screen Actors Guild's supporting actor award for Room, then played Auggie Pullman in Wonder.
Q 10Jake Gyllenhaal, born Jacob Benjamin Gyllenhaal, won a BAFTA as a supporting actor in which film?
Brokeback Mountain
Brokeback Mountain paired him with Heath Ledger as two cowboys in love, and Ang Lee's drama also brought him an Academy Award nomination.
Q 11After wrestling a mysterious stranger until daybreak, the biblical patriarch Jacob was given which new name?
Israel
Israel then became the name of a whole people: each of his twelve sons is counted as the forefather of one of its tribes.
Q 12Which South African president resigned in 2018 under pressure from his own party, the African National Congress?
Jacob Zuma
Jacob Zuma stepped down as another no-confidence vote loomed in Parliament, and Cyril Ramaphosa replaced him the next day.
Q 13In Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, No-Maj factory worker Jacob Kowalski seeks a bank loan to open what?
A bakery
A bakery is his dream, and Newt Scamander secretly leaves him a case of silver Occamy eggshells to fund it after his memories of magic are erased.
Q 21Jacob's Creek, named after a stream in South Australia's Barossa Valley, is a widely exported brand of what?
Wine
Wine grapes have grown beside the creek since 1847, when Bavarian immigrant Johann Gramp planted his first vines on its banks; the brand itself arrived in 1976.
Q 22Which Conservative politician's old-fashioned manner saw him dubbed the Honourable Member for the 18th century?
Jacob Rees-Mogg
Jacob Rees-Mogg was raised largely by the family nanny, who later looked after his own children too; he went on to be Leader of the House of Commons.
Q 23Which Honolulu-born actor plays Ned Leeds, the best friend of Peter Parker, in Marvel's Spider-Man films?
Jacob Batalon
Q 14Twins Jacob and Evie Frye fight to free Victorian London from Templar control in which video game series?
Assassin's Creed
Assassin's Creed Syndicate, the 2015 entry, lets players switch between the hot-headed brother, a brawler, and his stealthier sister.
Q 15Which American fashion designer became creative director of Louis Vuitton in 1997 while still running his own label?
Marc Jacobs
Marc Jacobs was also the youngest designer to receive the Council of Fashion Designers of America's Perry Ellis Award for new talent, in 1987.
Q 16Jacob Grimm collected German fairy tales such as Hansel and Gretel with which younger brother?
Wilhelm
Wilhelm Grimm co-wrote the fairy tales, while the sound-shift rule that linguists call Grimm's law was formulated by his older brother.
Q 17Which pitcher won back-to-back National League Cy Young Awards with the Mets in 2018 and 2019?
Jacob deGrom
Jacob deGrom played shortstop until his junior year of college, and the Mets did not draft him until the ninth round.
Q 18Which English musician went viral with split-screen YouTube covers and won Grammys for each of his first four albums?
Jacob Collier
Jacob Collier's cover of a Stevie Wonder song caught the attention of Quincy Jones and Herbie Hancock, who befriended him in 2014.
Q 19Comedian Rodney Dangerfield, born Jacob Cohen, landed his breakout film role in which 1980 ensemble comedy?
Caddyshack
Caddyshack cast him as a boorish, newly rich golfer, and his album from the same year won the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album.
Q 20The Jacob, a piebald British breed that most commonly grows four horns, is which kind of farm animal?
Sheep
Sheep of this breed were kept for centuries as ornamental park animals on large estates, and their dark-and-white fleece is prized by hand spinners.
Jacob Batalon was born to Filipino parents and later took the title role in the Syfy series Reginald the Vampire.
Q 24Which English actor played Grey Worm in Game of Thrones and records music under the name Raleigh Ritchie?
Jacob Anderson
Jacob Anderson's Grey Worm commanded the Unsullied army of Daenerys Targaryen; he then took the lead as Louis in AMC's Interview with the Vampire.
Q 25In Sara Gruen's Depression-era novel, veterinary student Jacob Jankowski hops a passing train and finds work with what?
A circus
A circus takes him on in the depths of the Great Depression; Robert Pattinson played him in the 2011 film of the novel, Water for Elephants.
Q 26Which activist wrote The Death and Life of Great American Cities and fought Robert Moses over Greenwich Village?
Jane Jacobs
Jane Jacobs helped stop the Lower Manhattan Expressway, was arrested at a 1968 hearing on it, and then took up the same fight in Toronto.
Q 27Which actress played Britta Perry, the dropout and would-be psychologist, in the NBC sitcom Community?
Gillian Jacobs
Gillian Jacobs went on to star as Mickey in the Netflix romantic comedy Love and to voice Atom Eve in the animated series Invincible.
Q 28Which Danish-born reporter exposed New York's slums in the 1890 photo book How the Other Half Lives?
Jacob Riis
Jacob Riis was one of the first photographers to adopt flash, after reading in 1887 that even the darkest corner could now be pictured.
Q 29Which painter won national fame at 23 with the 60-panel Migration Series about Black Americans moving north?
Jacob Lawrence
Jacob Lawrence found his subjects in everyday Harlem, where his mother had enrolled him in after-school art classes to keep him busy.
Q 30Which favourite son of the biblical Jacob was given a coat of many colours and sold into slavery by his brothers?
Joseph
Joseph rose to be Pharaoh's second-in-command, and it was through him that the whole family later moved to Egypt to escape a famine.