Q 01/05

How many raised dots make up a full braille cell?

A) Six

B) Eight

C) Nine

D) Twelve

Answer · why

A) Six

That gives 64 possible combinations, counting the empty cell used as a word space.

Q 02/05

How old was Louis Braille when he first presented his tactile reading code in 1824?

A) 20

B) 25

C) 30

D) 15

Answer · why

D) 15

Louis Braille was 15 when he presented his dot code in 1824, having been blinded at three by an awl accident in his father's harness workshop; the sys...

Q 03/05

Braille's code was an improvement on 'night writing', a tactile system invented by whom?

A) Valentin Haüy

B) Denis Diderot

C) Charles Barbier

D) Sébastien Guillié

Answer · why

C) Charles Barbier

Charles Barbier, a French army captain, devised a 12-dot system of 'night writing' meant to let soldiers pass messages silently in the dark; Braille m...

Q 04/05

What term did Émile Javal coin for the short, rapid jumps the eyes make while reading?

A) Fixations

B) Saccades

C) Regressions

D) Glissades

Answer · why

B) Saccades

Saccades, from the French for 'jerks', was Émile Javal's 1879 term for the rapid jumps between fixations; contrary to earlier belief, the eyes do not ...

Q 05/05

In his Confessions, Saint Augustine remarks on which bishop's then-unusual habit of reading silently?

A) Jerome

B) Ambrose

C) Gregory

D) Benedict

Answer · why

B) Ambrose

Ambrose, bishop of Milan, read with his eyes while 'his voice and tongue were silent', Augustine wrote in Book VI; reading aloud was so much the norm ...