Q 01/05

Which fruit, never actually named in Genesis, do Western European artists most often show Adam and Eve eating?

A) Apple

B) Peach

C) Pear

D) Orange

Answer · why

A) Apple

An apple became the usual choice in medieval art, a habit often put down to Latin, in which the words for the fruit and for wrongdoing look almost ide...

Q 02/05

From which part of Adam's body did God make Eve while Adam lay in a deep sleep?

A) A finger

B) A rib

C) A tooth

D) A toe

Answer · why

B) A rib

A rib was taken while Adam slept, and when he woke he greeted Eve as bone of his bones and gave her the name Woman.

Q 03/05

Which artist painted The Creation of Adam, with two almost-touching fingers, on the Sistine Chapel ceiling?

A) Caravaggio

B) Botticelli

C) Michelangelo

D) Leonardo da Vinci

Answer · why

C) Michelangelo

Michelangelo left a gap of less than an inch between the two index fingers, which some scholars read as a sign that people can never quite reach the d...

Q 04/05

Which talking creature tempts Eve in Genesis 3, where it is called craftier than any other wild animal?

A) The fox

B) The raven

C) The scorpion

D) The serpent

Answer · why

D) The serpent

The serpent is never called Satan in Genesis, an identification later readers added, and its punishment is to crawl on its belly.

Q 05/05

Which tree's leaves did Adam and Eve sew together to cover themselves after eating the forbidden fruit?

A) Olive

B) Fig

C) Palm

D) Cedar

Answer · why

B) Fig

Fig leaves went on to become art's standard cover-up: painters, sculptors and later censors used them to hide nudity.