Q 01/05

Botanically, the sweet orange is a hybrid between the mandarin and which other citrus fruit?

A) Lemon

B) Pomelo

C) Grapefruit

D) Citron

Answer · why

B) Pomelo

Genome analysis puts it at roughly 42% pomelo and 58% mandarin; the grapefruit in turn arose from a sweet orange crossed back with pomelo.

Q 02/05

The earliest known mention of the sweet orange, from 314 BC, appears in the literature of which country?

A) India

B) Persia

C) China

D) Egypt

Answer · why

C) China

The fruit was domesticated in a region spanning southern China, northeast India and Myanmar; it does not exist in the wild.

Q 03/05

Which country produced the most oranges in 2024, about 23% of the world total?

A) Brazil

B) Spain

C) China

D) United States

Answer · why

A) Brazil

About 67 million tonnes were grown worldwide, with China and Mexico next.

Q 04/05

Oranges first appear in Western art in which famous 1434 painting by Jan van Eyck?

A) Man in a Red Turban

B) The Ghent Altarpiece

C) The Madonna of Chancellor Rolin

D) The Arnolfini Portrait

Answer · why

D) The Arnolfini Portrait

Chinese painters had shown them centuries earlier, and Botticelli later set his Primavera in an orange grove.

Q 05/05

What did Louis XIV confiscate from Nicolas Fouquet's estate after condemning him in 1664?

A) Over 1,000 orange trees

B) A fleet of gondolas

C) His entire library

D) The plans for Versailles

Answer · why

A) Over 1,000 orange trees

Louis loved orange trees, kept them in silver tubs around Versailles and built the grandest royal orangery there.