Heads You Lose Trivia Quiz

Answer: 1981

Undoubtedly the most well-known head-severing device in human history, the guillotine's bloody past began in 1789 when the unfortunately-named Doctor Joseph-Ignace Guillotin spoke in front of the French National Assembly. Guillotin was giving a presentation on capital punishment, which the French citizenry protested was being given arbitrarily and asymmetrically. Guillotin proposed that all capital punishment cases be punished in the same way: instantaneous death, through decapitation. The National Assembly liked the idea so much that they named the device after him! Little did they know that the guillotine would ultimately claim, according to some counts, 30,000 lives during the French Revolution. The guillotine in Paris was set up in the Place de la Revolution, now the Place de la Concorde, the largest square in Paris.

The guillotine was a popular humane way to kill people during the eighteenth century. No one had to get up and personal to completely sever head and neck with a sword, and the authorities could also avoid the messy screaming with people condemned to burning. In fact, the guillotine's use wasn't disallowed in France until 1981; before then, it was the only legal way that civil criminals could be executed!

The unofficial title for "King of the Guillotine" probably belongs to Maximilien Robespierre ("The Incorruptible", apparently), leader of the Committee of Public Safety during the 1793-1794 Reign of Terror. After Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI were tragically shortened in 1793, very few of France's problems were actually solved. There was still foreign war and civil war, and general panic reigned. Robespierre, a member of the ironically-named Committee of Public Safety and author of the even more ironically-named "Report on the Principles of Political Morality," helped install a program of guillotining people who didn't agree with him. Unfortunately, it all caught up with him, and he was one of the more-than-a-thousand people who were executed in the summer of 1794.

Answer: Medusa

The story of Perseus, the killer of the Medusa, begins with the hero's grandfather, Acrisius, who was told by an oracle that he would be killed by his grandson. Furious, Acrisius locked his daughter Danae up in a tower, determined that she'd never conceive, and therefore, he couldn't have any grandchildren. Well, that didn't work, because Zeus, the chief Greek god and general luster for beautiful mortal women, visited Danae in a shower of gold and impregnated her.

Of course, when Acrisius found out that his daughter had given birth, to a son of Zeus no less, he was so irritated that he threw Perseus and Danae into a coffin and shipped them off to sea. They were saved by the gods, though, and arrived at the island of Seriphos, home of King Polydectes, who ended up marrying Danae. Polydectes didn't like his pesky step-son, so he maneuvered Perseus into going on a quest for the head of Medusa, surely an impossible goal. Medusa had been cursed by Athena to have the hair of snakes, which was so terrifying that it turned onlookers to stone. It wouldn't be an easy quest.

So, Perseus got even more help from the gods, who were apparently fawning over him, since Hades gave him a helmet of invisibility, Hermes gave him winged sandals, and Athena gave him a mirror shield. Perseus cut off Medusa's head by gazing at her in his shield rather than looking right at her, apparently because a perfect reflection of a hideous face is less hideous than the actual hideous face. After some more fun adventures, he delivered the head back to Polydectes in a flourish, turning the king to stone. And for fun, he later went to an athletic competition to prove how strong he was, and threw his quoit so hard that it tragically killed an innocent onlooker. The onlooker was, of course, Acrisius, so the prophecy was fulfilled too. Athena took Medusa's head and placed it atop her shield, or aegis, striking fear into her enemies in war.

Answer: Praying mantis

Despite the interesting trivia fact, praying mantis females actually eat their mates' heads less than 30% of the time during mating, which means that the average male could probably mate twice in his lifetime. What a relief. However, the male praying mantis' sacrifice is important to the success of his children.

The ravenous female needs all of the food she can get, for one thing. In addition, biologists have shown that the head actually limits the male's fertility. After the male has been decapitated, he continues to mate, and is actually able to release more gametes, thus improving the odds that one will be fertilized.

Answer: Franz Joseph Haydn

Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) remains one of the most influential composers of all time. With Mozart, he is known as one of the greatest composers of the Classical Era. His output of hundreds of pieces includes many symphonies and string quartets, contributing heavily to the development of those forms. He was Beethoven's teacher for several years. The music for the Deutschlandlied, in fact, also known as the German national anthem, was composed by Haydn.

It's no wonder, then, that Haydn's genius attracted onlookers from afar, even after the composer's death. That year, two men named Joseph Rosenbaum and Johann Peter successfully severed the head from the corpse and took the composer's skull from his grave. Their purpose? The scientific study of phrenology, which is the now-discredited theory that believed the skull's physical shape, with bumps and nodules, determined an individual's intellectual abilities. The "theft" was only realized in 1820, more than a decade later, when Haydn's patron Prince Esterhazy II remembered that he had intended to send Haydn's remains away from Vienna. Through some nefarious trickery, Rosenbaum and Peter managed to conceal from Esterhazy that they possessed the skull, which was being kept in an ornate box under a mattress.

After Peter's death, the skull (and not the rest of the body) became the possession of music society of Vienna. It wasn't until 1954 that Esterhazy's descendant managed to acquire Haydn's skull and place it in the composer's newly-created marble tomb. In fact, a fake replacement skull was placed in the tomb during Haydn's head's absence, so the tomb itself now contains the two skulls of Joseph Haydn.

Answer: Indiana Jones

Indiana Jones, an archaeologist played by Harrison Ford in a movie series directed by Steven Spielberg, nearly loses his life from a decapitating blade in 1989's "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade". In this film, for the first time, audiences learn the back-story of Indiana (real name: Henry) and his father, a man who has devoted his life to searching for the Holy Grail. After a brief flashback to Indiana, age 13, the plot centers on a real-time quest for the Holy Grail, undertaken by the archaeologist and his father, played by Sean Connery. As usual, Jones is opposed by legions of Nazis, who are intellectually unable to grasp the meaning of the riddles on the Grail's treasure map.

Jones, who also appeared in "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom", made his reappearance in 2008 in "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull". In addition to the films, the franchise created by George Lucas has also spawned a series of novels, a television series, and various Disney amusement park rides, despite not being Disney-related in the slightest.

Answer: The Master and Margarita

Mikhail Bulgakov (1891-1940) finished his masterpiece "The Master and Margarita" in 1928, but perhaps fear over losing his own head prevented him from publishing the work during his lifetime. The anti-Soviet and Stalinist themes of the novel probably wouldn't have gone over well had Bulgakov actually published the novel on his own; however, in the 60s, Nikita Khrushchev led the Soviet Union, and his liberalization of society made it easier for authors to critique the government. Therefore, it wasn't until 1966, when Bulgakov's widow finally published the novel, that the rest of the world was exposed to the author's genius.

The novel begins when Satan, disguised as a Professor Woland, and two of his cronies enter Moscow during the 30s and meet two authors: Mikhail Alexandrovich Berlioz and Ivan Nikolayevich Bezdomny. Woland warns Berlioz that he will die that night, and Ivan nearly goes crazy when Woland's bizarre prediction involving spilled sunflower oil comes true. As Ivan declines into insanity, Woland and his gang wreak havoc with "magic tricks" and devilish activity which confounds insular Russian society. About halfway through the novel, the actual protagonist is finally introduced. Known only as "The Master," he is working on a historical novel about Pontius Pilate, the plot of which is interwoven with the chapters of the book which take place in Moscow. The Master and his lover Margarita make the acquaintance of Woland through a complex series of events which parallel the Biblical story of Jesus' crucifixion.

The novel is also known for many allusions to the legend of Faust, the German scholar who sold his soul to the Devil, and to classical music. In addition to Berlioz, many of the novel's characters share their surnames with famous composers. Berlioz is particularly apt, since the real-life composer Hector Berlioz wrote an opera titled "The Damnation of Faust" as well as a work titled "Symphonie fantastique" which depicts-you guessed it!-the beheading of a man in its fourth movement.

Answer: Mayas

Although the "ballgame" was prevalent in many Mesoamerican societies, it's perhaps most associated today with the Mayas, who thrived in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico and parts of Central America. The Mayas declined mysteriously around 900 CE, and their descendants like the Aztecs were around to greet European conquistadors in the sixteenth century. However, they left behind a great cultural history, revealed in deserted cities like Tikal and Chichen Itza. In fact, the Mayan ballgame might even be more interesting than their controversial calendar.

Ball-courts around Mesoamerica do prove that ollamaliztli spread to several areas, and its rules remained roughly the same for various civilizations. The court consists of a long straight alley between two slopes walls, with stone rings at the end of the court on both sides. The scoring was fairly similar to modern-day volleyball: if you let the ball bounce before returning it to your opponents' side, or if you hit the ball out of bounds, then they win the point. There are a few catches, though. You can earn lots of points if you successfully navigate the ball through the ring on your opponents' side--this was difficult, as the rings were a long way off from the actual playing area. And, you could only use your hips. A heavy ball was used, and injuries were common even when players wore leather hip-guards. However, being hurt by the ball was still far superior to the punishment for losing in some Mesoamerican cultures: death. Various artwork in Mayan cultural sites reveals that losers of the ballgame were sometimes decapitated and sacrificed to the gods. Some scholars have even suggested that the decapitated heads were used as balls in future games. If that's not motivation to get the ball to the other side of the court, I'm not sure what is.

Answer: John the Baptist

According to the Gospels of the New Testament, John the Baptist is the individual who baptizes Jesus in the Jordan River. Unfortunately, St. John's story turns out rather grim. John the Baptist had criticized King Herod Antipas' divorce of Phasaelis, the daughter of a king, to marry his brother's wife, a Jewish princess named Herodias. For that, Herod imprisoned him. Later, Herodias' daughter Salome did a salacious dance in front of the ruler of Galilee, which is icky anyway, since Herod was Salome's stepfather and uncle. Herod was impressed and offered Salome anything that she desired. The girl went to her mother Herodias and asked what Herodias wanted, which turned out to be the head of John the Baptist, a man who had irritated her with his holier-than-thou attitude. According to the Gospel of Matthew, Herod was shocked and disgusted by Salome's request, but he ordered John's decapitation anyway.

Acclaimed Irish playwright Oscar Wilde wrote "Salome", a play about the woman whose name ironically means "peace" in Hebrew. The play popularized the phrase "dance of the seven veils", for Salome's lewd behavior. Later, the twentieth-century composer Richard Strauss wrote his own treatment of the story in his opera "Salome".

Answer: Antoine Lavoisier

One of the best-known victims of the guillotine was Antoine Lavoisier, who is rightfully monikered as the "father of modern chemistry." Lavoisier named the elements of hydrogen and oxygen, disproving the "phlogiston" theory of combustion by discovering that fire requires both fuel and oxygen to burn. Among his best-known contributions, however, is the law of conservation of mass, which essentially states that in a chemical reaction, mass is neither created nor destroyed. Before, scientists believed that matter disappeared when wood was burned. Lavoisier showed that oxygen and carbon were combined to form carbon dioxide as a product in combustion reactions. He used this discovery to examine respiration in animals, which takes a similar form: oxygen is absorbed, carbon dioxide is released.

Ever a scientist, when Lavoisier was brought to the guillotine on trumped-up charged of opposing the Revolution and aiding foreign scientists, he was determined to make one last contribution. He told an assistant that after the guillotine split his body into two unequal parts, he would try to keep blinking for as long as possible. According to legend, the assistant counted at least a dozen blinks from the severed head of Lavoisier, before the brain passed out from lack of oxygen. Of course, the legend has never been verified.

Answer: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Lewis Carroll's beloved children's classic "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" has several antagonists to Alice's progress, but few are as memorable as the "Off with their heads!" Queen of Hearts. Perhaps she would have been a satisfied citizen during the French Revolution, but in the novel, she orders the execution of nearly everyone she meets, including Alice. Luckily, her husband saves innocents from their premature foreshortenings, but still. In her free time between executions, the Queen of Hearts enjoys playing croquet with flamingoes and hedgehogs and hating her enemy the Duchess.

Some critics have suggested that the Queen of Hearts is in fact a veiled allusion to Queen Victoria of England. However, they've also suggested that about pretty much every royal female character that Carroll ever created, including the Queen's "Looking Glass" successor, the Red Queen.