Q 01/05

What is the leopard's scientific name?

A) Panthera pardus

B) Panthera onca

C) Panthera leo

D) Acinonyx jubatus

Answer · why

A) Panthera pardus

Panthera onca is the jaguar, Panthera leo the lion and Acinonyx jubatus the cheetah; the leopard is one of just five living Panthera species.

Q 02/05

How many living species make up the genus Panthera, the group the leopard belongs to?

A) Five

B) Nine

C) Seven

D) Twelve

Answer · why

C) Seven

The five are the lion, tiger, jaguar, leopard and snow leopard; the clouded leopards sit in a separate genus, Neofelis.

Q 03/05

The ancient Greek word 'pardos', the second half of 'leopardos', meant what?

A) Swift

B) Spotted

C) Golden

D) Hunter

Answer · why

B) Spotted

The first half, 'leon', means lion, so the name literally reads 'spotted lion'.

Q 04/05

The Greek word 'leopardos' originally referred to which animal, not the leopard at all?

A) The lynx

B) The hyena

C) The cheetah

D) The caracal

Answer · why

C) The cheetah

The ancients had trouble telling the spotted cats apart, and the name eventually settled on the wrong one.

Q 05/05

Who first gave the leopard a scientific name, Felis pardus, in 1758?

A) Georges Cuvier

B) Carl Linnaeus

C) Charles Darwin

D) Lorenz Oken

Answer · why

B) Carl Linnaeus

Oken later coined the genus Panthera in 1816, but his name was not widely accepted until the 20th century.