Female Rulers
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50 free Female Rulers trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Most thrones in history were built for men, which makes the women who sat on them all the more interesting. Some inherited a crown, some seized one, and a few were formally crowned as kings because their language or their custom had no place for a reigning queen. This quiz runs from the ancient world to the modern one: pharaohs and warrior queens, Cleopatra and Zenobia, Elizabeth I and Catherine the Great, Maria Theresa and Queen Victoria, and on to the first women elected to lead their countries. Expect coups, coronations, family feuds and a few surprises about what these rulers did away from the throne. It suits history fans, students of women's history and anyone building a quiz night round. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you pick up the story as you play.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Queen Victoria is credited with popularising which bridal fashion at her 1840 wedding to Prince Albert?
A white dress
A white dress of silk satin and Honiton lace made Victoria look like a bride rather than a monarch. Other royals had married in white before her, but press coverage of her wedding spread the fashion.
Q 02Egypt's famous queen Cleopatra came from a ruling family whose origins lay in which ancient kingdom?
Macedonia
Macedonia was the homeland of Ptolemy, the general of Alexander who founded her dynasty. Her family spoke Greek for generations, and she is the only one of them known to have learned Egyptian.
Q 03Which female pharaoh was portrayed with a false beard and built a famous temple at Deir el-Bahari?
Hatshepsut
Hatshepsut took the full regalia of a king, kilt and beard included, and sent a trading fleet to the land of Punt that came home with live myrrh trees.
Q 04Elizabeth II learned of her father's death and her accession in 1952 while staying in which country?
Kenya
Kenya was only a stopover on a tour bound for Australia and New Zealand. The news reached her at Sagana Lodge, just after a night spent at the Treetops Hotel.
Q 05Which former concubine proclaimed her own Zhou dynasty in 690 and became China's only female emperor?
Wu Zetian
Wu Zetian is the only woman in Chinese history to take the title huangdi, the one the emperors used. Her dynasty began and ended with her, and the Tang returned in 705.
Q 06Margrethe II of Denmark illustrated which fantasy epic under the pseudonym Ingahild Grathmer?
The Lord of the Rings
The Lord of the Rings drawings she sent to Tolkien in the early 1970s struck him as close to his own style. They were later used in Danish editions of the book.
Q 07Catherine the Great seized the Russian throne in 1762 by overthrowing which emperor, her own husband?
Peter III
Peter III had ruled for only six months when the coup removed him, and he died eight days later. Catherine, a German-born princess, went on to reign for 34 years.
Q 08Which queen of the Iceni led a revolt against Roman rule around AD 60 and burned Londinium?
Boudica
Boudica led the Iceni and other British tribes, and her army destroyed Colchester and Verulamium as well before the Roman governor defeated it.
Q 09Margaret Thatcher's nickname, the Iron Lady, was coined by an army newspaper in which country?
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union's army paper Red Star used the name in a headline about her hard line on Moscow. Thatcher embraced it a week later, comparing it to Wellington's nickname, the Iron Duke.
Q 10Liliʻuokalani, deposed in 1893 in a coup backed by US Marines, was the last monarch of which kingdom?
Hawaii
Hawaii lost its only reigning queen after she tried to restore royal powers with a new constitution. She also composed the farewell song Aloha ʻOe.
Q 11Elizabeth I of England was the only surviving child of Henry VIII and which of his six wives?
Anne Boleyn
Anne Boleyn was beheaded when her daughter was not yet three. Elizabeth still came to the throne at 25 and held it for 44 years without ever marrying.
Q 12Isabella I of Castile and her husband Ferdinand financed which explorer's first voyage across the Atlantic?
Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus sailed in the year the couple took Granada, ending the long Reconquista. Isabella held the crown of Castile herself and was never merely Ferdinand's consort.
Q 13Maria Theresa, the only woman to rule the Habsburg lands, was the mother of which queen of France?
Marie Antoinette
Q 21Jadwiga was crowned in 1384 with the title of king, not queen, of which country?
Poland
Poland crowned her as king while she was still a child, to stress that she was sovereign and not a consort. Her elder sister had been crowned king of Hungary in the same way.
Q 22Tamar, styled king of kings in the medieval chronicles, presided over the golden age of which country?
Georgia
Georgia's first woman to rule in her own right was called mepe, the word for a king, to set her apart from royal wives, who were called dedopali.
Q 23Which French philosopher died in Stockholm in 1650 after Queen Christina of Sweden summoned him to tutor her?
René Descartes
René Descartes had to give his lessons at five in the morning and caught pneumonia within months. Christina later gave up her throne, became a Catholic and settled in Rome.
Marie Antoinette, born Maria Antonia, was her youngest daughter. Maria Theresa wrote to her every fortnight, scolding her for laziness and frivolity.
Q 14Cleopatra's eldest son, who reigned beside her as Ptolemy XV, was fathered by which Roman leader?
Julius Caesar
Julius Caesar had no other known son, and the boy was nicknamed Caesarion, meaning little Caesar. Cleopatra's twins, born some years later, were acknowledged by Mark Antony.
Q 15In the Hebrew Bible, the Queen of Sheba travels to Jerusalem with a caravan of gifts to visit which king?
Solomon
Solomon and the queen had a son, Menelik, in Ethiopian tradition, and Ethiopia's royal dynasty claimed descent from him.
Q 16In Greek and Roman legend, Queen Dido fled her tyrannical brother and founded which North African city?
Carthage
Carthage began, the story goes, with a trick: offered only as much land as an oxhide could cover, Dido cut the hide into fine strips and ringed a whole hill with them.
Q 17Wilhelmina, first of three Dutch queens in a row, made her World War II radio broadcasts from which city?
London
London was the home of Radio Oranje, whose broadcasts made her a symbol of resistance. Her daughter Juliana and granddaughter Beatrix followed her, so the country had no king from 1890 to 2013.
Q 18The pope treated Empress Irene's Byzantine throne as vacant in 800 and crowned which Frankish king emperor?
Charlemagne
Charlemagne was crowned on Christmas Day on the pretext that a woman could not hold the title alone. Irene had been sole ruler since 797, after years as regent for her son.
Q 19Catherine the Great of Russia began buying paintings in 1764, founding the collection of which museum?
The Hermitage
The Hermitage started with canvases bought from a Berlin merchant, Rembrandts among them. In her day it was a private retreat, and few people were allowed to see what it held.
Q 20Eleanor of Aquitaine, a reigning duchess and queen of two kingdoms, was the mother of which crusader king?
Richard the Lionheart
Richard the Lionheart left her to govern as regent during his long absences. Her husband Henry II had earlier kept her imprisoned for backing their sons' revolt against him.
Q 24Queen Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba spent decades resisting which European power in what is now Angola?
Portugal
Portugal declared war on her kingdom in 1626 and drove her into exile, but she fought on, later joining forces with the Dutch after they captured Luanda.
Q 25Empress Dowager Cixi, who began as a concubine, controlled the government of which Chinese dynasty until 1908?
Qing
Qing rule was steered by her as regent from 1861, first for her young son and then for the nephew she put on the throne. The dynasty collapsed within four years of her death.
Q 26Theodora, a former actress, became empress and adviser to which Byzantine emperor, builder of Hagia Sophia?
Justinian I
Justinian I had her crowned beside him in 527, and she played a crucial part in putting down the Nika riots that threatened his throne five years later.
Q 27Zenobia annexed Egypt and defied Rome in the third century as queen of which desert city in Syria?
Palmyra
Palmyra's queen was besieged in her capital and captured by the emperor Aurelian in 272. By most accounts he took her to Rome, where she spent the rest of her life.
Q 28Lady Jane Grey, proclaimed England's monarch in July 1553 and quickly deposed, is remembered by which nickname?
The Nine Days Queen
The Nine Days Queen was a teenager whom the dying Edward VI named as his heir to keep his Catholic half-sister off the throne. She was beheaded the following year.
Q 29Which monarch inherited her throne at six days old and was beheaded at Fotheringhay Castle in 1587?
Mary, Queen of Scots
Mary, Queen of Scots, spent more than eighteen years as a captive in England before she was found guilty of plotting to assassinate Elizabeth I.
Q 30Which term describes a woman who reigns as monarch in her own right, as opposed to the wife of a king?
Queen regnant
Queen regnant means a sovereign with all the powers of the crown. A queen regent, by contrast, only governs in place of a monarch who is a child or away from the realm.