Q 01/05

Napoleon was born in 1769 on which Mediterranean island?

A) Corsica

B) Sicily

C) Malta

D) Sardinia

Answer · why

A) Corsica

Genoa had ceded the island to France only a year earlier; his first languages were Corsican and Italian.

Q 02/05

What was Napoleon's family name at birth, before it was Frenchified?

A) Buonaventura

B) di Buonaparte

C) Bonapartini

D) de Bonneparte

Answer · why

B) di Buonaparte

His paternal ancestors were minor Tuscan nobles who moved to Corsica in the 16th century.

Q 03/05

In which Corsican town was Napoleon born, at the Maison Bonaparte?

A) Corte

B) Bastia

C) Ajaccio

D) Calvi

Answer · why

C) Ajaccio

He was baptised Napoleone di Buonaparte; the house is now a museum.

Q 04/05

Napoleon was famously mocked by the British as short. What was his height, according to modern estimates?

A) About 152 cm (5 ft), well below average

B) About 178 cm (5 ft 10 in), tall for the time

C) About 160 cm (5 ft 3 in)

D) About 168 cm (5 ft 6 in), average for the time

Answer · why

D) About 168 cm (5 ft 6 in), average for the time

British cartoonists called him 'Little Boney', and a nursery rhyme warned children he ate naughty people.

Q 05/05

The term 'Napoleon complex' for aggressive short men was inspired by which psychologist's writing?

A) Sigmund Freud

B) Alfred Adler

C) Carl Jung

D) Erich Fromm

Answer · why

B) Alfred Adler

Adler used Napoleon to illustrate the inferiority complex; the joke is that the man himself was of average height.