40 questions about famous explorers and their journeys
Quick answer: 40 quiz questions on explorers from Ibn Battuta and Zheng He to Amundsen and Gagarin, with answers.
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Questions 1–10
| # | Question | Answer |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Who travelled for nearly 30 years from Tangier across Africa, Arabia, India and China? | Ibn Battuta |
| 2 | Which Venetian merchant described the court of Kublai Khan? | Marco Polo |
| 3 | Who led Chinese treasure fleets across the Indian Ocean in the early 1400s? | Zheng He |
| 4 | Who reached the Americas in 1492 for Spain? | Christopher Columbus |
| 5 | Who was the first European to sail from Europe to India around Africa? | Vasco da Gama |
| 6 | Whose expedition was the first to circumnavigate the globe? | Ferdinand Magellan’s (completed by Elcano) |
| 7 | Who first rounded the Cape of Good Hope in 1488? | Bartolomeu Dias |
| 8 | Which explorer conquered the Aztec Empire? | Hernán Cortés |
| 9 | Who conquered the Inca Empire? | Francisco Pizarro |
| 10 | Which Norse explorer reached North America around 1000 AD? | Leif Erikson |
Questions 11–20
| # | Question | Answer |
|---|---|---|
| 11 | Who mapped much of the east coast of Australia in 1770? | James Cook |
| 12 | Which Arab geographer made a world map for King Roger II of Sicily in 1154? | Al-Idrisi |
| 13 | Who was the first person to reach the South Pole? | Roald Amundsen, in 1911 |
| 14 | Which Scottish missionary explored Africa and named Victoria Falls? | David Livingstone |
| 15 | Who found Livingstone in 1871 and reportedly said “Dr Livingstone, I presume?” | Henry Morton Stanley |
| 16 | Who was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic? | Amelia Earhart, in 1932 |
| 17 | Who were the first to reach the summit of Everest in 1953? | Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay |
| 18 | Which Persian traveller wrote the Safarnama in the 11th century? | Nasir Khusraw |
| 19 | Who travelled to the Volga Bulgars in 921 and described the Vikings (Rus)? | Ahmad ibn Fadlan |
| 20 | Which Portuguese prince sponsored voyages along the African coast? | Henry the Navigator |
Questions 21–30
| # | Question | Answer |
|---|---|---|
| 21 | Who explored the Mississippi for France in 1682 and named Louisiana? | René-Robert de La Salle |
| 22 | Which explorers crossed the western United States in 1804–1806? | Lewis and Clark |
| 23 | Who was the first European to see the Pacific from the Americas, in 1513? | Vasco Núñez de Balboa |
| 24 | Which explorer’s name was given to America? | Amerigo Vespucci |
| 25 | Who was the first to fly solo non-stop across the Atlantic? | Charles Lindbergh, in 1927 |
| 26 | Who led the first expedition to reach the North Pole by surface, confirmed in 1969? | Wally Herbert |
| 27 | Which Chinese monk travelled to India in the 7th century to collect Buddhist texts? | Xuanzang |
| 28 | Who explored the Arabian Empty Quarter in the 1940s? | Wilfred Thesiger |
| 29 | Which Swiss explorer rediscovered Petra for Europeans in 1812? | Johann Ludwig Burckhardt |
| 30 | Who was the first person in space? | Yuri Gagarin, 1961 |
Questions 31–40
| # | Question | Answer |
|---|---|---|
| 31 | Who was the first woman in space? | Valentina Tereshkova, 1963 |
| 32 | Who was the first person to walk on the Moon? | Neil Armstrong, 1969 |
| 33 | Which Moroccan-born traveller served as a diplomat in Mali and Morocco and wrote a description of Africa in the 1500s? | Leo Africanus |
| 34 | Which ship carried Darwin around the world? | HMS Beagle |
| 35 | Who sailed the Kon-Tiki raft across the Pacific in 1947? | Thor Heyerdahl |
| 36 | Which explorer’s ship Endurance was crushed by Antarctic ice in 1915? | Ernest Shackleton |
| 37 | Who was the first Arab in space? | Sultan bin Salman Al Saud, 1985 |
| 38 | Which explorer circumnavigated the globe for England in 1577–1580? | Francis Drake |
| 39 | Who was the first European to cross Australia from south to north? | Burke and Wills, 1860–61 |
| 40 | Which Greek explorer sailed to Britain and possibly the Arctic around 325 BC? | Pytheas |
Frequently asked questions
Who travelled further, Marco Polo or Ibn Battuta?
Ibn Battuta, who covered about 120,000 km over nearly 30 years.
Who was the first person to reach the South Pole?
Roald Amundsen, in December 1911.