Q 01/05

Which Roman emperor created the Vigiles, the first organised public firefighting force, in AD 6?

A) Nero

B) Augustus

C) Trajan

D) Julius Caesar

Answer · why

B) Augustus

Augustus founded the Vigiles in AD 6 after a run of serious fires: 7,000 men in seven cohorts, each patrolling two of Rome's fourteen districts, nickn...

Q 02/05

Which Alexandrian inventor developed the first fire pump in the third century BC?

A) Archimedes

B) Ctesibius

C) Hero

D) Euclid

Answer · why

B) Ctesibius

Ctesibius of Alexandria devised a double-cylinder force pump in the third century BC that could throw a jet of water; Hero of Alexandria described an ...

Q 03/05

The Great Fire of London in 1666 began in a bakery on which street?

A) Fleet Street

B) Fish Street Hill

C) Pudding Lane

D) Cheapside

Answer · why

C) Pudding Lane

Thomas Farriner's bakery on Pudding Lane caught fire early on 2 September 1666; the blaze destroyed more than 13,000 houses and 87 parish churches, ye...

Q 04/05

After the 1666 fire, London's first fire brigades were run by whom?

A) Insurance companies

B) The Royal Navy

C) Parish churches

D) The Lord Mayor's guard

Answer · why

A) Insurance companies

Insurers protected only their own clients, whose buildings were marked with metal fire insurance marks so brigades knew which fires to fight.

Q 05/05

Which Dutch artist and inventor's workshop developed the fire hose in the 1670s?

A) Rembrandt van Rijn

B) Jan van der Heyden

C) Christiaan Huygens

D) Johannes Vermeer

Answer · why

B) Jan van der Heyden

Jan van der Heyden, an Amsterdam painter who later ran the city's fire service, and his brother Nicolaes produced the first fire hoses in 1672: 50-foo...