All About Turtles, First Herd Trivia Quiz

Answer: Yertle the Turtle

"Yertle the Turtle, the King of the Pond" appeared in a children's picture book entitled "Yertle the Turtle and Other Stories" in 1958. Theodor Seuss Geisel wrote and drew the book under his pen-name Dr. Seuss. Written in anapestic tetrameter, it tells the story of a turtle who commanded his subject turtles to pile themselves up so that he could be higher than the moon. Mack, the turtle at the bottom of the pile, burps causing the whole pile, including Yertle, to tumble into the mud.

The use of the word "burp" in a children's book was controversial in 1958.

Answer: Renaissance artists

The TMNT were four cartooned teenage turtles who were anthropomorphic and talked like American teenagers. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were named Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo and Donatello, but were called Leo, Ralph, Mikie and Donnie for short. Their leader/mentor was a rat named Splinter who taught them ninjutsu. They have appeared in motion pictures, television series, video games, comic books and tied-in to breakfast cereal, pudding pies, gelatin desserts, ice cream and canned pasta.

Answer: its shape

A turtle, in the confectionery sense, is a chocolate nut cluster. Originally, pecans were bound together with caramel and then dipped in chocolate to produce "Turtles" which was registered as a trademark of the DeMet's Candy Company in 1918. It was so called because it looked rather like a turtle. Later varieties used Spanish peanuts in place of pecans.

There are molds shaped like a turtle for home chocolate makers to employ. Nestle sells Turtles in Canada, marketed with an anthropomorphic turtle in a tuxedo and top hat as a mascot on the packaging.

Answer: the American colonies

Modern submariners look back to the Turtle, built in 1775, as the proto-submersible used in combat. General George Washington commissioned its construction by David Bushnell. It attempted (unsuccessfully) to attach explosives to the hulls of British naval vessels anchored in New York Harbour in 1776. The Turtle was lost when the British sunk its support ship on which it was being carried.

Answer: Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman

"Happy Together" was the Turtles' greatest hit. The two vocalists who led the group, Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman, continued to record after the band broke up in 1970 as the duo Flo & Eddie. Kaylan and Volman reconstituted the Turtles in 2010 and toured.

Answer: Aesop

The earliest telling of "The Tortoise and the Hare" is in Aesop's Fables (#226 in the definitive index by Ben Edwin Perry (1892-1968)). This original version has the hare mocking the tortoise for his slowness. When the tortoise challenges him to a race, the hare is so confident of his impending victory that he takes a nap midway whilst the tortoise plods across the finishing line.

The Latin adage and oxymoron "festina lente" (make haste slowly) is indebted to this story. Consider also Ecclesiastes 9:11 which says, in part, "... the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong ..." (KJV).

Answer: "turtle" is an error for "turtledove"

Major league baseball broadcaster Ernie Harwell (1918-2010) began the first broadcast from Detroit Tigers spring training by quoting this passage from the Song of Solomon. The voice of a turtle seems out of place in the context of these romantic signs of spring. Most modern translations (NKJV, RSV, NIV, CSB, NRSV, Darby, ESV, NASB) substitute "turtledove" for "turtle" in this verse. Shakespeare uses "turtle" as a substitute for "turtledove" in his romantic poem "The Phoenix and the Turtle" which is about two birds, not a bird and a reptile.

Answer: the testudo

Roman legionaries were particularly subject to missile attacks of all sorts, especially from archers. The testudo formation, so called because it resembled a tortoise, was a good defense against missile attacks. "Testudo" is the Latin word for tortoise. There are several existing descriptions of this formation's successful use by the legions of Mark Anthony in the 1st century.

Answer: Uncle Remus

American journalist Joel Chandler Harris published a series of the Old South beginning with "Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings: The Folk-lore of the Old Plantation" (1880). These included the adventures of Br'er Rabbit, Br'er Bear and Br'er Turtle. Harris collected these stories from Black Americans and preserved them; his use of dialect has been strongly criticized.

Answer: Touché Turtle

Touché Turtle and Dum Dum began as one offering on a Hanna-Barbera anthology programme alongside Wally Gator, Lippy the Lion, and Hardy Har Har. The dapper swordsman turtle was voiced by Bill Thompson, better known as the voice of Droopy. His sidekick Dum Dum was voiced by Alan Reed, better known as the voice of Fred Flintstone. Routinely, Touché would politely interrupt a sword fight with evil-doers to take a phone call when the phone inside his shell rang with a request for help elsewhere.