Q 01/05

Albert Einstein's 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded chiefly for his discovery of the law of what?

A) Brownian motion

B) The photoelectric effect

C) Mass-energy equivalence

D) Stimulated emission

Answer · why

B) The photoelectric effect

The photoelectric effect: the citation passed over relativity, which some physicists still doubted and the prize's presentation speech called a subjec...

Q 02/05

Which Leonardo-attributed painting sold for a record US$450.3 million in 2017?

A) Lady with an Ermine

B) Ginevra de' Benci

C) Portrait of a Musician

D) Salvator Mundi

Answer · why

D) Salvator Mundi

Salvator Mundi: it smashed the auction record even though the panel was badly damaged and not every expert accepts it as Leonardo's own work.

Q 03/05

Cleopatra VII, last ruler of Ptolemaic Egypt, came from a royal dynasty of what origin?

A) Macedonian Greek

B) Native Egyptian

C) Nubian Kushite

D) Persian

Answer · why

A) Macedonian Greek

Macedonian Greek: the line began with Ptolemy I Soter, a general of Alexander the Great, and Cleopatra was the first of its rulers known to have learn...

Q 04/05

On which Mediterranean island was Napoleon Bonaparte born in 1769?

A) Sardinia

B) Malta

C) Corsica

D) Sicily

Answer · why

C) Corsica

Corsica: France had acquired the island only the year before, and Napoleon's father had joined Pasquale Paoli's resistance to French rule.

Q 05/05

At which Washington venue was Abraham Lincoln shot by John Wilkes Booth in April 1865?

A) The National Theatre

B) Grover's Theatre

C) The Willard Hotel

D) Ford's Theatre

Answer · why

D) Ford's Theatre

Ford's Theatre: Booth, a star actor, had performed there, and in November 1863 Lincoln had watched him play in The Marble Heart on that very stage.