Q 01/05

What did Jason lose carrying an old woman across a river, just as an oracle had warned King Pelias?

A) A helmet

B) A cloak

C) A sandal

D) A spear

Answer · why

C) A sandal

A sandal was all it took: an oracle had told Pelias to beware a man wearing only one. Jason lost his in the river Anauros and walked into town half sh...

Q 02/05

Colchis, the kingdom where Jason sought the Golden Fleece, lies mostly in which modern country?

A) Georgia

B) Armenia

C) Ukraine

D) Bulgaria

Answer · why

A) Georgia

Georgia's western half was the Colchis of Greek myth. People there really did sink sheepskins in streams to catch flecks of gold, one likely root of t...

Q 03/05

Which hero left the Argonauts to search for Hylas, a companion pulled into a spring by nymphs?

A) Achilles

B) Heracles

C) Perseus

D) Odysseus

Answer · why

B) Heracles

Heracles searched so long for Hylas that the Argo sailed on without him. In one Roman telling the boy appears to him in a dream and says the nymph's s...

Q 04/05

Which musician among the Argonauts saved the crew by out-playing the Sirens on his lyre?

A) Arion

B) Amphion

C) Linus

D) Orpheus

Answer · why

D) Orpheus

Orpheus drew his lyre and drowned out the Sirens with music louder and lovelier than theirs. Jason's old tutor had warned that the Argonauts would nev...

Q 05/05

What did Jason sow in a ploughed field at Colchis, only to see armed warriors spring from the soil?

A) Dragon's teeth

B) Golden seeds

C) Bronze arrowheads

D) Giant's bones

Answer · why

A) Dragon's teeth

Dragon's teeth were the seed, and each one sprouted a fully armed fighter. The Greeks called such earth-born men Spartoi, meaning the sown ones.