Q 01/05

The Rosetta Stone was found in the delta of which river?

A) The Jordan

B) The Nile

C) The Euphrates

D) The Tigris

Answer · why

B) The Nile

The Nile: the stone turned up near Rashid, where a branch of the river meets the sea. It had probably stood in a temple before being carted off and bu...

Q 02/05

Visitors to the museum that holds the Rosetta Stone are invited to do what with a copy kept in another gallery?

A) Touch it

B) Take rubbings from it

C) Photograph it with flash

D) Sign their names on it

Answer · why

A) Touch it

Touch it: the copy stands in the open, just as the real stone did when it first went on show. The original proved too tempting to visitors' fingers an...

Q 03/05

The Rosetta Stone gave its name to a well-known brand of what?

A) Satellite navigation

B) Encryption software

C) Language-learning software

D) Genealogy websites

Answer · why

C) Language-learning software

Language-learning software: Rosetta Stone, launched in 1992, borrows the stone's fame as the key to a lost language. Its method is the reverse of the ...

Q 04/05

Europe's Rosetta space probe carried a comet lander named after which Egyptian island?

A) Elephantine

B) Pharos

C) Roda

D) Philae

Answer · why

D) Philae

Philae: a monument from the island carried a second two-language inscription that gave Champollion his final clues, so the European Space Agency named...

Q 05/05

Which French leader's 1798 invasion of Egypt led to the discovery of the Rosetta Stone?

A) Robespierre

B) Napoleon

C) Lafayette

D) Talleyrand

Answer · why

B) Napoleon

Napoleon sailed home soon after the find, leaving his army and the stone behind. When that army surrendered, the stone passed to the British as a priz...