Saint Christopher
0Loading crowd target
0Loading crowd target
6correct to beat the crowd
40 free Saint Christopher trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Saint Christopher is one of the most familiar faces in Christianity, even for people who have never opened a book of saints. His image hangs from rear-view mirrors and key rings around the world, yet the stories behind it are stranger than most people expect: a giant searching for the strongest master on earth, a river crossing that nearly drowned him, and icons that give him the head of a dog. This quiz covers the legend as medieval writers told it, the trials and miracles of his martyrdom, his feast day and what really happened to it in the 1969 calendar reform, and the places, paintings, books and films that carry his name or his medal. The questions are written for curious families, classrooms, parish groups and anyone who has ever worn the medal without knowing the story. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so kids and adults can pick up the fun facts as they play.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01According to legend, a child who grew crushingly heavy on Saint Christopher's shoulders revealed himself to be whom?
Jesus
Jesus told the exhausted giant that he had carried the whole world and the one who made it, then vanished from the riverbank.
Q 02Saint Christopher is best known today as the patron saint of which group?
Travelers
Travelers claimed him because legend has him spending his days carrying strangers across a dangerous river.
Q 03In the Golden Legend, whom did Saint Christopher serve until he saw his master flee from a roadside cross?
The devil
The devil admitted that the cross terrified him, so the giant quit on the spot and went looking for a stronger master.
Q 04In the Golden Legend, Saint Christopher's staff, planted in the ground overnight, had turned into what by morning?
A palm tree
A palm tree heavy with dates stood where the staff had been, the sign the child had promised as proof of who he was.
Q 05Which Caribbean island, paired with Nevis in one nation, is named with an old nickname for Saint Christopher?
St Kitts
St Kitts is short for Saint Christopher Island, because Kit was once the usual pet form of the name.
Q 06Which Beatle had a Saint Christopher medal snatched from his neck by a fan in New York in 1964?
Ringo Starr
Ringo Starr got it back, because the fan returned the medal to him in a much-publicized meeting.
Q 07Which German carmaker has published a customer magazine named Christophorus, after Saint Christopher, since 1952?
Porsche
Porsche chose the saint who watches over people on the road, and the magazine is among the oldest customer publications in the world.
Q 08Eastern icons give Saint Christopher a dog's head, an image scholars link to which Egyptian god?
Anubis
Anubis was fused with the Greek Hermes as Hermanubis, a dog-headed guide whose statues may have shaped the earliest icons of the saint.
Q 09Medieval believers thought a glance at an image of Saint Christopher protected them from what for that day?
Sudden death
Sudden death was the fear, so his picture went up on city gates, bridges and church walls where nobody could miss it.
Q 10Which emergency vehicles in Germany are named Christoph, plus a number or place, in honour of Saint Christopher?
Rescue helicopters
Rescue helicopters got the name in 1970, when Christoph 1 began flying from a Munich hospital as Germany's first permanent civilian rescue helicopter.
Q 11In the Golden Legend, what name did Saint Christopher go by before baptism gave him a new one?
Reprobus
Reprobus is how he introduces himself to the king who puts him on trial, adding that baptism made him Christopher.
Q 12In the Golden Legend, who taught Saint Christopher the faith and suggested he carry people across a dangerous river?
A hermit
A hermit first proposed fasting and long prayers, but the giant said he could manage neither, so river duty became his service.
Q 13In the Golden Legend, the child on Saint Christopher's shoulders grew as heavy as which metal in mid-river?
Lead
Lead is the legend's comparison, and the weight kept growing as the water rose until the giant feared he would drown.
Q 21San Cristóbal, a place name found across Latin America, is Saint Christopher's name in which language?
Spanish
Spanish turned the Greek Christophoros into Cristóbal, while Portuguese speakers say São Cristóvão and the French say Saint-Christophe.
Q 22The Roman Martyrology remembers Saint Christopher on the 25th of which month, his traditional Western feast day?
July
July 25 is also the feast of the apostle James the Great, so the two saints share a date on Western calendars.
Q 23Which pope's 1969 calendar reform left Saint Christopher's feast day to local calendars instead of the worldwide one?
Paul VI
Paul VI dropped the feast from the worldwide calendar because it had joined the Roman calendar late, but Christopher kept his place in the official list of martyrs.
Q 14In the Golden Legend, an arrow fired at Saint Christopher hung in the air, then turned and struck what?
The king's eye
The king's eye was blinded, and the saint told him the cure: clay mixed with the martyr's own blood, applied once the execution was over.
Q 15After fire, hot iron and arrows all failed in the legends, how was Saint Christopher finally martyred?
Beheading
Beheading was the end he foretold himself: in the Golden Legend he tells the king a day ahead that he will die the next morning.
Q 16In an early Greek legend, which Roman emperor demands pagan sacrifices and has Saint Christopher executed?
Decius
Decius really did order everyone in the empire to sacrifice, and those who complied received a certificate recording it.
Q 17The Golden Legend says the giant Saint Christopher was born into which people named in the Old Testament?
Canaanites
Canaanites were his kin in this telling, which also makes him twelve cubits tall, at least seventeen feet.
Q 18Which country's church banned dog-headed icons of Saint Christopher in 1722, though Old Believers kept painting them?
Russia
Russia had taken to the dog-headed saint in the late 1500s, and after the ban official icons had to show him with a human face.
Q 19In a folk tale from Cyprus, why did a handsome Saint Christopher pray to be given a dog's head?
To avoid temptation
To avoid temptation is the reason given: his good looks kept attracting local women, so he asked God to disfigure him.
Q 20The second half of the Greek name Christopher comes from pherein, a verb with which meaning?
To bear
To bear is the sense of pherein, so the name itself describes the deed the legend made famous: hoisting a sacred passenger onto his shoulders.
Q 24Saint Christopher belongs to which group of saints, first invoked together in the Rhineland during the Black Death?
Fourteen Holy Helpers
Fourteen Holy Helpers were each prayed to for a particular danger, and Christopher was one of two called on against the plague itself.
Q 25The oldest evidence of devotion to Saint Christopher is a church inscription from 452 found near which modern city?
Istanbul
Istanbul has since swallowed ancient Chalcedon, where the inscription names a shrine to a blessed Christopher but says nothing about his life.
Q 26Which Caribbean capital was founded under a name honouring Saint Christopher, who is still the city's patron saint?
Havana
Havana began as San Cristóbal de la Habana, and its cathedral still displays a statue of the saint carved in Seville in 1632.
Q 27Which Baltic capital's coat of arms shows a silver Saint Christopher carrying a child on his shoulder?
Vilnius
Vilnius has stamped the saint on its seals since the 1400s; the Soviets abolished the arms in 1940 and Lithuania reinstated them in 1991.
Q 28A gold-plated reliquary on the Croatian island of Rab is claimed to hold which part of Saint Christopher?
His skull
His skull is the claim, and tradition says a bishop held the relic up on the town wall in 1075 to end a siege.
Q 29San Cristóbal Island, named for Saint Christopher, is where Charles Darwin first went ashore in which archipelago?
Galápagos Islands
Galápagos Islands charts once labelled it Chatham Island, and a Darwin statue now marks the spot where he stepped ashore in 1835.
Q 30In which Stephen King novel is the gentle giant John Coffey given a Saint Christopher medal after a healing?
The Green Mile
The Green Mile hands the medal to a healer of enormous size, a fitting echo of a saint whom legend describes as a giant.