The Old Country Trivia Quiz

Answer: Ethiopia

Though, today, the Abyssinia Region would actually contain both Ethiopia and Eritrea, these two countries were considered part of the same sovereign entity until the early 1990s when Eritrea gained its independence, taking with it a narrow, but long stretch of coastline along the East African Rift bordering the Red Sea.

Before this, the two countries formed the Abyssinian Kingdom, regarded as such since the thirteenth century AD. Ethiopia would gain its own independence in 1974 when the military deposed the final Emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie I, changing the sociopolitical landscape of the region and plunging the country into civil war for a decade and a half.

Answer: Lesotho

Surrounded completely by South Africa, the nation of Lesotho (formerly a Kingdom), sits amidst the Maloti Mountains at some of the highest elevations in this stretch of the continent. This region was originally known as Basutoland, however, and its borders were created to prevent the encroachment of Dutch colonizers looking to expand mining operations in South Africa.

As such, the region became a British Crown colony, eventually gaining its own independence in 1966 after decades of increasing reliance on what would eventually become a more independent South Africa.

Answer: Nigeria

Found along the Nigerian coast against the border with Cameroon to the southeast, Biafra became a territory of significance after Nigeria gained independence in 1960, separating themselves from British rule. It would take seven years until Biafra pushed for its independence in a violent and severe military offensive that would last an additional three years through the Nigerian Civil War.

At the end of the decade, Biafra would be reincorporated into Nigeria proper, leaving a complicated relationship between the Biafran people and the rest of the nation that would persist into the twenty-first century.

Answer: Georgia

Although modern geographers would refer solely to the current-day Iraq as being the key nation in what was once Mesopotamia, the reality is that this expanse, which followed along the watershed of the Tigris and Euphrates river system to create a fertile region straddling the desert ecosystems to the south in the Middle East, was much more vast than one might assume. Inhabited for more than five thousand years, Mesopotamia contains evidence of some of mankind's earliest technological advancements dating as far back as prehistoric times.

The concept of the Mesopotamian Region would end in the 5th century BCE when conquests would see it being ruled by many regional empires including the Greeks and the Persians.

Answer: Taiwan

The Kingdom of Tungning, or Tywan, only managed to exist for a few decades in the late seventeenth century, but it covered the southwest corner of what is now considered to be Taiwan. The Republic of Formosa, meanwhile, was the name of the island for much longer, specifically when it was colonized and overseen by the Dutch, the Spanish, and at one time, the Japanese.

In the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, Taiwan as it would become known normally, would become a densely-populated, modern powerhouse, especially in technology and banking.

Answer: Ukraine

All three of these long-gone regions, states, and expanses are part of the same overlapping territory in Europe, and all three happen to land at least in some part on the modern nation of Ukraine.

Ruthenia, for example, once stretched as far north as Lithuania and Poland on the Baltic Sea though it also fell in Western Ukraine and Belarus when it existed in the Middle Ages. Podolia, meanwhile, was much more centrally located in what is now Ukraine, also managing to spill southward into current-day Moldova and Transnistria. Transcarpathia, named after the mountain range in this region of Europe, bordered Hungary and Romania in southwest Ukraine.

Answer: Vietnam

With the borderline being marked by the Gianh River, Tonkin represented the north half of Vietnam from the late 19th century until 1949, when the French signed the region over to the State of Vietnam proper. Visitors to the city of Hanoi will find the French influence still going strong in its affluent French Quarter.

The French also oversaw the rest of Vietnam throughout its history with Central Vietnam being known as Annam and the south, including Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City), being called Cochinchina. French colonization didn't end there though-- at least not in the region-- since Laos, Cambodia, and parts of Indochina were also temporarily leased to the country at one point or another.

Answer: Vanuatu

Named as such because it reminded Captain James Cook of the Hebrides Islands of Scotland (somehow), Vanuatu held that moniker from its colonization in 1774 until its independence in 1980, at which point it had been overseen by both the British and the French.

The nation's history is actually much older than this as it was inhabited by the Melanesian people well before the British and French took to exploring the South Pacific. Those weren't even the first Europeans to visit either; the Portuguese and Spanish found it first, back in the early 17th century.

Answer: Belize

And you may wonder...what about regular Honduras? Well, the existing Honduras was the subject of conquest by Spain in the 16th century, leading it to be under their rule until 1821. British Honduras, meanwhile, which does NOT border Honduras, was established by the British as a Crown colony in 1783, forming as a result of conflict in local Mayan groups and a need for local resources.

British Honduras would gain independence later on through the 20th century, becoming sovereign as Belize in 1981. Interestingly, it would remain the only Central American nation whose official language was English.

Answer: Brazil

Brazil's name was in flux for many years of its history, but once you get past the initial naming from Portuguese colonizers, it starts to make a bit more sense. When Pedro Álvares Cabral first arrived in South America, he chose the name Ilha de Vera Cruz, but eventually, geographers realized he'd reached the mainland of the continent.

The Portuguese weren't the only ones to name the country though; the Italians named it Terra dos Papagaios when they met with explorers. Yes, that's 'Land of the Parrots'.

It would take about a decade before the name 'Brazil' came into use, again by the Portuguese, because they returned to harvest its bountiful brazilwood. The name remained from that point.