Italians: Famous & Historical Trivia

1. To help our party along, we need some music. Bartolomeo Cristofori is generally credited as being the inventor of which musical instrument?

From Quiz Inventive Italians

Answer: Pianoforte

Prior to Cristofori's development of the piano, the main keyboard instrument had been the harpsichord, which worked by plucking at strings. The harpsichord gave the player little control over the volume of the notes. Cristofori's instrument was originally called 'gravicembalo con piano e forte', meaning 'harpsicord that plays soft and loud'. The xylophone is a traditional instrument with no known inventor, and the saxophone was developed by Adolphe Sax, a Belgian. The violin evolved from the lyre, and there are many famous Italian violin makers, including the Amati and Stradivari families.

From Quiz What's With the Azzurri

Answer: Leaning Tower of Pisa

The experiment was described by Vincenzo Viviani in a biography he wrote about Galileo. Galileo himself did not record the experiment which has led many historians to argue that it didn't actually happen. Despite the doubt, the event is well known and the point it was intended to prove was being investigated by Galileo - that objects of different weight would fall at the same speed. I cannot find out which balls he used, but maybe the Azzurri won't mind playing with a tennis ball for a change if no soccer ball was involved.

From Quiz What's With the Azzurri

Answer: Raphael

The only Italian artist listed is Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, usually known in English as Raphael, who was one of the three major Renaissance artists, bracketed with Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo. 'La Madonna di San Sisto', its Italian name, was painted for Pope Julius II in 1512 as an altarpiece for the church of San Sisto from which the painting gets its name. It was sold in 1754 and taken to be put on display in Dresden. It was then removed by the Russians at the end of World War II and displayed at Moscow's Pushkin Museum. It was returned to Germany ten years later. Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Henri Rousseau were both French and Dante Gabriel Rossetti was English, although born to an Italian family. I'm not sure any of the artists would find painting white lines to their taste, but they would be beautifully done.

From Quiz Inventive Italians

Answer: Luciano Pavarotti

Luciano Pavarotti was born in Modena in Northern Italy in 1935. He, along with Spanish singers Plácido Domingo and José Carreras, started their partnership on the eve of the 1990 FIFA World Cup Final in Rome, Italy. He died of pancreatic cancer in 2007.

From Quiz Festa Italiana

Answer: Christopher Columbus

The man credited with discovering the New World was looking at the Genoa salami on the antipasto plate thinking of his birthplace in Genoa, Italy. He was born on Hallowe'en in 1451 and died in 1506. His most famous voyage would most probably be the one in 1492 with the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria, although he made more voyages to the New World.

From Quiz Inventive Italians

Answer: Evangelista Torricelli

Torricelli has been accredited with the invention of the first atmospheric pressure barometer, by creating a constant vacuum. His creation was based on a suggestion made by Galileo a few years earlier. The process he used was to fill a 1.2 metre long glass test tube with mercury and turn it upside down onto a dish. He noticed that the mercury he put in did not pour out of the test tube, observing that an empty space was formed above the mercury creating a form of vacuum. After many observations he concluded that the variations in the height of the mercury were caused due to external factors created by the atmospheric pressure.

From Quiz What's With the Azzurri

Answer: Gino D'Acampo

Gino was born near Naples and moved to England to pursue his career in cookery. He appeared regularly on the British daytime television show 'This Morning' before moving to present his own shows such as 'Gino's Italian Escape', which had its first series in 2013. He appeared on the 2009 series of 'I'm a Celebrity', where a number of (reasonably) well-known people are left to fend for themselves in the Australian jungle. D'Acampo's series included the actor George Hamilton and snooker player Jimmy White, with D'Acampo emerging victorious. The other men named are all Italians who made their name as celebrity chefs. This proves to be one of the more successful choices, as the Azzurri all enjoy their food.

From Quiz What's With the Azzurri

Answer: Clothing

Tacchini was actually a professional sportsman himself before turning his hand to producing fashionable sportswear. He began his tennis career in 1955, becoming the Italian champion in 1960. Tacchini founded his sportswear company in 1966, naturally specialising in tennis wear and with players such as Jimmy Connors, Martina Navratilova and Pete Sampras wearing his designs. The company expanded into other sports, including golf and skiing, as well as general leisure wear. The Italian team are, of course, very conscious of what they are wearing. Blue is the main colour of their strip, which gives them their name (Gli Azzurri means 'The Blues'). Their kit has been supplied at various times by Adidas, Nike and Puma, but not by Tacchini.

From Quiz Festa Italiana

Answer: "Marconi" and Cheese

Guglielmo Marconi is often credited as being the inventor of the radio, as well as the founder of a radio telegraph system, and Marconi's Law, the relation between the height of antennae and the maximum signalling distance. Marconi was a co-winner the 1909 Nobel Prize for Physics, and was ennobled in 1924, becoming Marchese Marconi.

From Quiz What's With the Azzurri

Answer: The Millionairess

The film was based on the play written by George Bernard Shaw, who also provided the idea for 'My Fair Lady', filmed four years later in 1964. 'The Millionairess' is a rather convoluted story about an heiress who can only marry a man who proves his ability to make money. Sellers plays the Indian doctor with whom she falls in love and who eventually, despite his best attempts to fail, meets the conditions to enable the couple to marry. Footballers are renowned for their ability to feign injury and attempting to convince the referee that they have been fouled. Sometimes the injuries and fouls are genuine but often the acting is pathetically poor, so Sophia's guidance on how to act convincingly would be more than welcome.

From Quiz Inventive Italians

Answer: Maria Montessori

Dr. Montessori's educational methods are used in schools all over the world. Its major conception is to allow children to develop their learning skills and mental capacities by giving them liberty within limits and to allow them to develop at their own pace. Classrooms usually have a mixture of students of different ages, this allows an interaction between children of different mental and physical abilities, allowing their natural curiosity to drive them, which is comparable to what happens in our adult life.

From Quiz What's With the Azzurri

Answer: Italian partisans

Mussolini was one of the founders of Fascism and was Hitler's main ally in Europe in the Second World War. He became Prime Minister of Italy in 1922 before taking control as a dictator in 1925. In April 1945, Mussolini could see that the war was lost and attempted to escape. He was captured by a group of partisans, who opposed both his regime and the Germans who were occupying Italy, and executed along with his mistress, Clara Petacci and other members of his group. The partisans were Communist supporters, so were at the opposite end of the political spectrum. In football terms, the right winger is nothing to do with politics, but describes the player who plays on the far right of the pitch. I doubt that Mussolini would be particularly athletic in any event (even if he wasn't dead).

From Quiz What's With the Azzurri

Answer: Goalkeeper

At last, the Azzurri say. Dino Zoff is classed as one of the best goalkeepers of the twentieth century, alongside Russia's Lev Yashin and England's Gordon Banks. He played for Italy on 112 occasions between 1968 and 1983 and was in the squad for four FIFA World Cups, playing in three of the tournaments. He was not picked to play in his first, in 1970, but crowned his career by winning the World Cup in Spain. Not only was he the captain, Zoff set a record for being the oldest man to be in the winning team, at the age of forty - a record which still stands in 2014. Thank goodness we have one real footballer for the team. With the rather eclectic group of people otherwise assembled it seems a good goalkeeper will be essential. I suspect even the mighty Zoff would have his work cut out captaining this motley crew.

From Quiz Inventive Italians

Answer: Achille Gaggia

Gaggia applied for his patent in September 1938 for a machine to be used in his own coffee bar. He founded a company in 1947, producing machines for commercial purposes, before expanding into the home market in 1977. The Gaggia company became a subsidiary of the Dutch owned Philips group in 1999, although the machines produced continue to bear the Gaggia name. Caruso was an Italian tenor and Cirio was a pioneer in the canning of meat and vegetables. Fermi was a physicist who worked on the first nuclear reactor.

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Last Updated Nov 16 2024 5:50 AM

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