THE 39th QUIZ

Here we go:


1. Which Icelandic island, lying 25 miles north of the mainland, lies on the Arctic Circle and is home to the country’s northernmost population?
2. With only 16% of its citizens saying that they believe in a God, which country, according to a 2005 poll, is home to the most unreligious people of the 27 member states of the European Union?
3. Which early 19th Century Irish composer is best remembered for being the first composer to write Nocturnes?
4. Which Irish saint founded Lindisfarne monastery on Holy Island in the 7th Century?
5. The 11th Century Peel Castle, built by the Vikings under King Magnus Barelegs, stands on which island off the Isle of Man?
6. In 1861, who became the first king of a united Italy?
7. Who was the so-called ‘Mad Mullah’ of Somalia who led armed resistance to the British, Italian and Ethiopian forces in Somalia during the first twenty years of the Twentieth Century?
8. In which country could you visit Castle Liechtenstein?
9. Which is the largest port on the Mediterranean?
10. Which battle of 1275 resulted in the death of Godfred VI Magnuson, the last Norse King of the Isle of Man?
11. Which military order of German warrior monks was first organised by Albert of Buxhoeveden in 1202?
12. Discovered by Christiaan Huygens in 1655, which is the only moon in our solar system known to have a dense atmosphere?
13. Which war, ended by the Treaty of Nystad in 1721, that saw the Russian Empire take on Sweden for the domination of Eastern Europe marked the end of the Swedish Empire?
14. Which artist's last work was 'The Transfiguration' which he left unfinished at his death in 1520?
15. Named after a fire giant in Norse mythology, what is the name of the Icelandic island that was formed during a volcanic eruption and reached the surface in November 1963?
16. Which male tennis player did Billie Jean King defeat in straight sets 1973 in a match dubbed 'The Battle of the Sexes'?
17. Consisting of the Dáil and the Seanad, what is the name of the Irish parliament?
18. Who succeeded Benito Mussolini as Prime Minister of Italy in 1943?
19. Deriving from the Gaelic for ‘bent’, what is the name of the Manx team sport, similar to hurling and shinty, that is played annually in St Johns?
20. Diaphoresis is the technical name for which bodily process?
21. Campione d’Italia is an Italian exclave completely surrounded by which Swiss canton?
22. In Greek mythology, who was the goddess of the moon who fell in love with the shepherd boy, Endymion?
23. What name is given to the symbol consisting of three bent human legs that is used on the flags of the Isle of Man and Sicily?
24. Which general and commander-in-chief led the New Model Army at the Battle of Naseby in 1645?
25. Which Icelandic politician became the world’s first female President when she was elected in 1980? She held the position until 1996.
26. Which Roman historian is best known for his monumental work 'Ab Urbe Condita', usually referred to in English as the 'History of Rome'?
27. Regarded as the unofficial national poet of Italy, which poet, whose collections include ‘Rime Nuove’ (New Rhymes) and ‘Odi Barbare’ (Barbarian Odes), became, in 1906, the first Italian to win the Nobel Prize for Literature?
28. Roy of the Rovers first appeared in a weekly strip in which comic magazine in 1954?
29. A doubly landlocked country is a country that is not only landlocked but also entirely surrounded by other landlocked countries. There are only two such countries in the world. Which two?
30. Whilst incarcerated in which prison did John Bunyan write 'The Pilgrim's Progress'?
31. Which is the only land mammal native to Iceland?
32.Which Roman Emperor was assassinated in 41AD by members of the Praetorian Guard, led by Cassius Chaerea?
33. One of the earliest recognised operatic works, and sometimes described as the earliest opera to remain dramatically viable by modern standards, which work, inspired by a story from Greek mythology, by the Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi, with text by Alessandro Striggio, was first performed in the ducal palace at Mantua in 1607?
34. Born Frank Edwin Wright III, Tré Cool is the drummer for which successful American rock group?
35. The Battle of Flowers has been held annually on the second week of August since 1902 on which island?
36. Named after the French chemist who formulated it in 1884, which scientific theory, used to predict the effect of a change in conditions on a chemical equilibrium, states that if a change is made in the pressure, temperature or concentration of a system in chemical equilibrium, the equilibrium will be displaced in such a way as to oppose this change?
37. According to Landnámabók, who became the first permanent Norse settler on Iceland in 874AD?
38. Sharing its name with a German synthpop group, which 1965 Jean-Luc Godard film has the original French subtitle "Une étrange aventure de Lemmy Caution"?
39. The United States House of Representatives ruled that, legally, if which Italian inventor “had been able to pay the $10 fee to maintain the caveat after 1874, no patent (for the telephone) could have been issued to Bell"?
40. Who is the American aviator and adventurer, best known for holding many world records including five nonstop circumnavigations of the Earth, who has been reported missing since 3rd September 2007 after his plane disappeared over the Nevada Desert?
41. Lasting between 1941 and 1944, the Soviet Union fought the Continuation War against which country?
42. Which Italian satirist and playwright wrote 'Accidental Death of an Anarchist' and 'Can't Pay? Won't Pay!'?
43. Known as ‘The Gateway to Hell’, which is Iceland’s most active volcano, its last eruption occurring in February 2000?
44. Situated in the North Caucasus mountains, which large republic, a federal subject of the Russian Federation, was established in January 1921 and has its capital at Makhachkala?
45. In 1768, France purchased the island of Corsica from which city state?
46. Which former British MP served as Secretary-General of NATO from 1999 to 2003?
47. Which founding member of the 2nd Red Brigades, was sentenced to six life sentences for the murder of the Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro in 1978, but was released after just 15 years in 1998?
48. Which popular British artist, born in Surrey in 1926 but active in Plymouth from the 1960s, is famous for her paintings of fat people?
49. The English doctor Sir Henry Howarth Bashford wrote which satirical work, with the subtitle 'Being the Autobiography of a Really Good Man', that was first published anonymously in the UK in 1924?
50. With 41 to date, which country is home to the world’s most UNESCO World Heritage Sites?


Hope you enjoyed that lot. More tomorrow. The answers:


1. GRÍMSEY
2. ESTONIA
3. JOHN FIELD
4. ST AIDAN
5. ST PATRICK’S ISLE
6. VICTOR EMMANUEL II
7. MOHAMMED ABDULLAH HASSAN
8. AUSTRIA
9. MARSEILLE
10. BATTLE OF RONALDSWAY
11. LIVONIAN BROTHERS OF THE SWORD (or LIVONIAN ORDER)
12. TITAN
13. GREAT NORTHERN WAR
14. RAPHAEL
15. SURTSEY
16. BOBBY RIGGS
17. OIREACHTAS
18. PIETRO BADOGLIO
19. CAMMAG
20. SWEATING
21. TICINO
22. SELENE
23. TRISKELION (or TRISCELI in Sicily)
24. THOMAS FAIRFAX
25. VIGDÍS FINNBOGADÓTTIR
26. LIVY
27. GIOSUÈ CARDUCCI
28. TIGER
29. LIECHTENSTEIN & UZBEKISTAN
30. BEDFORD
31. ARCTIC FOX
32. CALIGULA
33. L'ORFEO
34. GREEN DAY
35. JERSEY
36. LE CHATELIER'S PRINCIPLE
37. INGÓLFUR ARNARSON
38. ALPHAVILLE
39. ANTONIO MEUCCI
40. STEVE FOSSETT
41. FINLAND
42. DARIO FO
43. HEKLA
44. DAGESTAN
45. GENOA
46. GEORGE ROBERTSON
47. MARIO MORETTI
48. BERYL COOK
49. AUGUSTUS CARP, ESQ., BY HIMSELF
50. ITALY