“Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it,” or so the saying goes. So, let’s brush up on your historical knowledge, shall we? This world history trivia should be no trouble for ya.
We’ve included the answers just underneath each question, so you can use this to quiz your friends, cover the answers as you scroll and quiz yourself, or just read through it to refresh your memory.
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1.When did WWI officially end?
November 11, 1918
2.What year was the Battle of Yorktown?
1781
3.Mary Antoinette was married to which French king?
Louis XVI
4.What is the name of the period of starvation lasting from 1845 to 1852 in Ireland?
The Irish Potato Famine
5.Who were the main combatants in the Peloponnesian War?
Athens and Sparta
6.What is Amerigo Vespucci famous for?
Inspiring the term “America”
7.Who were Henry VIII’s six wives?
Catharine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Katherine Howard, Anne of Cleves, and Katherine Parr
8.Where was William Shakespeare born?
Stratford-upon-Avon, England
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9.Who wrote the Illyad?
Homer
10.What leader came to power in Cuba after the Cuban Revolution?
Fidel Castro
11.Who was England’s longest-ruling monarch?
12.What political party was Mao Zedong the leader of?
The Chinese Communist Party
13.Who was the last Queen of Hawai’i before it was annexed by the US?
Queen Lili’uokalani
14.What year did Australia stop being a penal colony?
1868
15.What year did Constantinople become Istanbul?
1930
16.Which two wives did Henry VIII have beheaded?
Anne Boleyn and Katherine Howard
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17.Who is often called “the father of the atomic bomb”?
J. Robert Oppenheimer
18.What war ended dynastic rule in China in 1912?
The Xinhai Revolution
19.When did India win independence from the United Kingdom?
1947
20.What is the real name of the founder of Buddhism, commonly known as the Buddha?
Siddartha Gautama
21.Who was the first democratically elected president of South Africa?
Nelson Mandela
22.Who were the main combatants of the First Kashmir War?
India and Pakistan
23.What country was ruled by Pol Pot until he was overthrown by the Vietnamese army in 1979?
Cambodia
24.How many US vice presidents have gone on to become president?
25.What modern-day countries make up the land once known as the Babylonian Empire?
Iraq and Iran
26.How many rules are contained in the Code of Hammurabi?
282
27.What does the term Khmer Rouge refer to?
The Khmer Rouge was the radical Communist movement that violently came to power and ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979.
28.What are the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World?
The Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the Colossus of Rhodes, and the Lighthouse of Alexandria
29.Who is the most decorated Olympian athlete of all time?
Michael Phelps with 28 Olympic medals
30.Who was the final ruler of Assyria?
Ashur-uballit II
31.What was the original name of the Caribbean island that eventually became Haiti and the Dominican Republic?
Quisqueya
32.Which religion has the following deities: Krishna, Ganesh, Lakshmi, and Shiva?
33.Who founded Sikhism?
Guru Nanak
34.Which ancient civilization built the city of Carthage?
The Phoenicians of Tyre
35.Who is the current president of China?
Xi Jinping
36.What year was Saigon renamed Ho Chi Minh City?
1975
37.What Babylonian king is widely believed to have ordered the construction of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon for his wife, Amytis of Media?
Nebuchadnezzar II
38.What year did the Titanic sink?
1912
39.Who is credited with patenting the telephone?
Alexander Graham Bell
40.Who was Laika?
Laika was a Soviet space dog and test subject who was the first animal to orbit Earth and died from overheating a few hours into the voyage.
Heritage Images / Heritage Images / Getty Images
41.Which country was the first to grant women the right to vote?
New Zealand, on September 19, 1893
42.Which Greek goddess was the Parthenon dedicated to?
Athena
43.When was the last eruption of Mount St. Helens?
1980
44.What was the first country to use paper currency?
China
45.What did the Treaty of Versailles achieve?
It led to the end of World War I and placed most of the blame on Germany and other Central Powers.
46.Which of the following men did NOT sign the Declaration of Independence: John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, or Benjamin Franklin?
Alexander Hamilton
47.The first ten amendments of the US Constitution are known by what other name?
The Bill of Rights
48.What is the connection between Michelangelo and the Sistine Chapel?
Michelangelo famously painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.
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49.What country did Haiti gain its independence from in 1804?
France
50.Which Caribbean nation removed Queen Elizabeth II as its head of state to become a fully independent republic in November 2021?
Barbados
51.Who were the main combatants in the War of 1812?
The United States and the United Kingdom
52.How long did the Great Depression last?
12 years, from 1929 to1941
53.What was the shortest war in human history?
The Anglo-Zanzibar war, which lasted between 38 and 45 minutes.
54.What was the purpose of the Trinity test?
To test the success of the Manhattan Project, the purpose of which was to create an atom bomb.
55.How did Adolf Hitler die?
A self-inflicted gunshot
56.Who was the monarch of Greenland until she abdicated the Danish throne in January 2024?
57.What was the name of the first successful English colony in North America, established in 1607?
Jamestown
58.Who has been the youngest person to receive a Nobel Peace Prize?
Malala Yousafzai at age 17
59.Which continents were involved in the Triangular Trade?
North and South America, Europe, and Africa
60.How many months were in the Roman calendar?
10
61.When did the seven day week start?
In 321 EC, as decreed by Roman Emperor Constantine
62.Who founded the Sons of Liberty?
Samuel Adams and John Hancock
63.Who was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize of any kind?
Marie Curie
64.What were the first names of the Wright brothers?
65.What was the name of the family that ruled Russia until they were overthrown and killed in 1917?
The Romanovs
66.What was the document that President Abraham Lincoln issued in 1863 to abolish slavery in the Confederate states?
The Emancipation Proclamation
67.How many years after the Emancipation Proclamation were the last enslaved people freed?
Just under two and a half years later, on June 19, 1965
68.Which world leader is famous for his “Little Red Book”?
Mao Zedong
69.Who was Helen Keller’s teacher and lifelong companion?
Anne Sullivan
70.Who was the first woman in space?
Valentina Tereshkova
71.Which US Supreme Court case ruled on the constitutionality of Virginia’s anti-miscegenation law (a law that prohibits interracial marriage)?
Loving v. Virginia
72.What was the significance of the scarab beetle in Ancient Egypt?
It was associated with the sun god Khepri and symbolized the cycle of life, death, and resurrection.
Paul Starosta / Getty Images
73.What do John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, and James Earl Ray have in common?
They all assassinated influential political figures (Abraham Lincoln, JFK, and Martin Luther King, Jr., respectively).
74.Which mountaineer and his Sherpa guide became the first men to climb to the top of Mount Everest?
Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay
75.What event led to the United States entering World War II?
The bombing of Pearl Harbor
76.The Han Dynasty lasted around 426 years in which country?
China
77.Which US President gave the order to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II?
Harry S. Truman
78.Who nailed (or mailed) his 95 theses to the Catholic Church in 1517?
Martin Luther
79.Who wrote the words: “We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal”?
Thomas Jefferson
80.How did Joan of Arc die?
She was burned at the stake.
Catherine Leblanc / Getty Images
81.How many US states were once part of Mexico?
Ten — California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, and parts of Arizona, Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Wyoming
82.Where does the Mona Lisa currently reside?
At the Louvre Museum in France.
83.Eva Perón was the first lady of which country?
Argentina
84.What is the shortest presidential term in US history?
32 days, belonging to William Henry Harrison
85.How many US presidents have been assassinated?
Four — Abraham Lincoln, James A. Garfield, William McKinley, and John F. Kennedy
86.Who invented the cotton gin?
Eli Whitney
87.Who was the emperor of Rome when it fell in 476 AD?
Romulus Augustulus
88.Who is Mahatma Gandhi?
An Indian lawyer who used non-violent resistance to fight for Indian independence
Bettmann / Bettmann Archive
89.When was Berlin reunified?
October 3, 1990
90.The Incan Empire was located in which modern-day country?
Peru
91.What is the relationship between the Rubicon and Julius Caesar?
The Rubicon is a river that Julius Caesar crossed with his legion in 49 BC.
92.What 14th-century disease decimated a third of Europe’s population?
The Bubonic Plague
93.Where was JFK assassinated?
Dallas, Texas
94.What Indigenous group inhabited Puerto Rico when Christopher Columbus arrived there in 1492?
The Tainos
95.What is the only known disease to have been completely eradicated, according to the World Health Organization?
Smallpox
96.What scandal forced Richard Nixon to resign from the presidency in 1974?
97.Who led the only effective, sustained slave rebellion in United States history in 1831?
Nat Turner
98.What was Attila the Hun’s nickname?
“The scourge of God”
99.Who was known as the “Virgin Queen”?
Elizabeth I
100.How many years did the Hundred Years War last?
116
101.Which ancient civilization was centered around the city of Tenochtitlan?
The Aztecs
102.Was Cleopatra real?
Yes
103.Which event incited World War I?
The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
104.What movie star famously married the Prince of Monaco?
105.Where was Che Guevara from?
Argentina
106.Which country was the first to legalize same-sex marriage?
The Netherlands, on April 1, 2001.
107.Who wrote Don Quixote?
Miguel de Cervantes
108.When did the construction of the Great Wall of China begin?
7th century BC
109.What was the capital city of the Inca Empire?
Cusco
110.In which country was the Battle of Culloden fought in 1746?
Scotland
111.How old was Queen Elizabeth II when she was crowned the Queen of England?
27
112.What year was the first iPhone released?
113.Which cities have hosted the last five Summer Olympics?
Paris, Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro, London, and Beijing.
114.What two Roman cities were decimated with the eruption of Mount Vesuvius?
Pompeii and Herculaneum
115.Who was the first Roman emperor?
Augustus
116.What is the name of the empire founded by Genghis Khan?
The Mongol Empire
117.What ancient civilization built the city of Uruk?
The Sumerians
118.Who was the first person to set foot on the moon?
Neil Armstrong
119.How did Jesus of Nazareth die?
He was crucified.
120.What famous Dutch painter cut off his ear during a heated argument with a fellow artist?
121.Who wrote Les Miserables?
Victor Hugo
122.Who was the first person to be tried and executed during the Salem witch trials?
Bridget Bishop
123.What was the name of Benito Mussolini and Francisco Franco’s political ideology?
Fascism
124.Which two African countries avoided colonial rule?
Ethiopia and Liberia
125.In what country did the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and subsequent massacre take place?
China
126.What did the Treaty of Paris achieve?
It ended the American Revolution and granted independence to the United States.
127.Who overthrew Chilean leader Salvador Allende in a coup d’etat?
Augusto Pinochet
128.Who is King Tutankhamun?
King Tut was an Ancient Egyptian pharaoh who came to power at the age of nine and died when he was around 18.
Tim Graham / Tim Graham / Getty Images
129.What painting movement was founded by Claude Monet?
Impressionism
130.Where is the Pyramid of the Sun located?
Teotihuacán, Mexico
131.Who was the first woman to be elected Vice President of the United States?
Kamala Harris
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