Q 01/05

Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of which country?

A) Argentina

B) Chile

C) Uruguay

D) Paraguay

Answer · why

A) Argentina

Argentina takes its name from the Latin word for silver, a relic of the riches early Spanish explorers dreamed of finding up its rivers.

Q 02/05

Buenos Aires sits on which estuary, often described as the world's widest river?

A) The Río Amazonas

B) The Río de la Plata

C) The Río Orinoco

D) The Río Magdalena

Answer · why

B) The Río de la Plata

The Río de la Plata means 'river of silver', but the silver was a myth: explorers named it for riches rumoured to lie upstream and searched in vain. I...

Q 03/05

Residents of Buenos Aires are commonly known by what nickname, which literally means 'port-city person'?

A) Bonaerenses

B) Capitalinos

C) Porteños

D) Rioplatenses

Answer · why

C) Porteños

The same word is used in Valparaíso, Montevideo, Acapulco and other port cities, but abroad it is almost always taken to mean someone from Buenos Aire...

Q 04/05

Buenos Aires is named after a Sardinian Madonna venerated as protector of whom?

A) Sailors

B) Soldiers

C) Farmers

D) Miners

Answer · why

A) Sailors

Sailors prayed to Our Lady of Bonaria: legend says her statue, thrown overboard in a crate from a storm-tossed ship, stilled the sea and floated ashor...

Q 05/05

Which Spanish conquistador led the expedition that first founded Buenos Aires, a settlement abandoned within a few years?

A) Pedro de Valdivia

B) Diego de Almagro

C) Pedro de Mendoza

D) Sebastián de Belalcázar

Answer · why

C) Pedro de Mendoza

Pedro de Mendoza arrived gravely ill and died at sea the next year on his way back to Spain. Short of food and under attack from the local people, the...