Hounded by History Trivia Quiz

Answer: In a Swedish peat bog

The Gerum Cloak was dug out of a peat bog near the village of Östra Gerum in southern Sweden in 1920. While initially described as a cloak, the purpose of the large oval cloth with a distinctive tessellated check pattern reminiscent of modern houndstooth material, cannot be known for certain. Peat bogs are noted for their ability to preserve both materials and human remains and as such can be a fascinating source of evidence of the distant past for both historians and archaeologists.

Answer: Enrico Dandolo

Enrico Dandolo was elected Doge of Venice in 1192 when he was probably aged in his 70s or 80s (his date of birth is unknown and little is known about his early life) and had been blind for a number of years. Despite this, he was an active leader in both home and foreign affairs and is best remembered for his role in financing and then leading the forces of the Fourth Crusade that sacked Constantinople in April 1204. Dandolo died the following year and was buried in the Hagia Sophia.

The incorrect options were the final three Venetian Doges before the position was abolished by Napoleon after the Republic of Venice fell to French forces in 1797.

Answer: James II

King James II reigned over Scotland from 1437 until 1460. His dislike of the popularity of golf is said to have stemmed from the fact that young men were playing golf rather than practicing archery - and archery was a much more useful skill on the battlefield. The ban remained in place for nearly 50 years until James II's grandson, King James IV, overturned it in 1502 following the signing of the Treaty of Perpetual Peace with Scotland's main enemy, England.

The Old Course at St Andrews, which is widely accepted to be the oldest golf course in the world and known as "The Home of Golf", dates back to this period of history.

Answer: 26

The Siege of Ceuta began in 1694 when the Spanish-held city in North Africa was surrounded and besieged by Moroccan forces led by Ali ben Abdala. Unable to capture the city, the Moroccans occupied and built on the surrounding land in order to sustain their army and later received help from the British who had captured Gibraltar in 1704.

The Moroccan siege lasted until 1720 when Spanish forces were bolstered by troops led by the Marquis de Lede who forced them to retreat. However, the following year an outbreak of the plague led many of the Spanish troops to leave Ceuta and it was captured by the Moroccans in 1721, with a second (relatively short) siege lasting until they left in 1727 and Spain regained control of the city.

Answer: Pope Pius IX

The Immaculate Conception refers to the concept that the Mary, the mother of Jesus, was conceived without original sin. Despite having apparently occurred nearly 2000 years earlier, it wasn't until 1854 that Pope Pius IX took the relatively unusual step of using the status of papal infallibility to declare it part of the church's dogma - a belief that is officially designated as true. Prior to this, most Roman Catholic dogma had been declared following official Ecumenical Councils, such as the First Council of Nicaea in the year 325.

Pius IX was pope from 1846 to 1878. The incorrect options all held the office in the 16th century.

Answer: The box behind the driver originally designed to hold retriever dogs

The dogcart was originally designed to transport people taking part in shooting parties. It was a lightweight carriage, generally pulled by a single horse (not a large dog!), and had room for just a driver and single passenger facing forwards with a box on the back for the shooters' dogs to sit in. Later versions were used more widely by people to get around towns and cities.

These often had a second seat facing backwards in place of the dog box.

Answer: Train

The first railway bridge over the Firth of Tay, near Dundee in eastern Scotland, collapsed during a storm on 28 December 1879. The design of the bridge hadn't accounted for the force that would likely be placed on the structure by high winds gusting into it at 90 degrees, and the bridge subsequently failed in those circumstances while a train was passing over it. The train and a large portion of the iron bridge collapsed into the river in terrible weather conditions with the loss of around 75 lives. The disaster is particularly remembered as a result of William McGonagall's awful poem about it:

"Beautiful railway bridge of the silv'ry Tay
Alas! I am very sorry to say
That ninety lives have been taken away
On the last sabbath day of 1879
Which will be remember'd for a very long time."

Answer: Russia

The Dogger Bank incident was named after the region of the North Sea in which it took place on the night of the 21st and 22nd of October 1904, during the Russo-Japanese War. The Russian naval fleet was passing through the North Sea when they mistook a group of British trawlers from the port of Hull for a squadron of enemy Japanese torpedo boats (although quite why they thought Japanese ships would be lurking around off the coast of Britain, thousands of miles from home, isn't really clear).

The Russians sank one of the trawlers, killing two British fishermen and then in the chaos managed to end up firing on their own ships.

The unmitigated disaster caused major diplomatic friction between Britain and Russia.

Answer: Mexican Revolution

The Mexican Revolution lasted for nearly ten years between 1910 and 1920. It was triggered by a political crisis following the failed 1910 presidential election and was fought by a range of different revolutionary groups over the period as different factions grasped power and were then defeated in turn. Mercenary soldiers from many countries played a significant role in the war, but it was two American pilots employed to fight for different sides who took part in what is commonly described as the first aerial 'dogfight'.

However, it probably wasn't much of a battle as the two men were only armed with pistols and apparently chose deliberately to miss each other when firing them.

Answer: Douglas Bader

Douglas Bader was a Second World War RAF flying ace who piloted a Hawker Hurricane fighter during the Battle of Britain despite having lost both his legs in a plane crash in 1931. He was placed in command of a Spitfire squadron the following year. His Spitfire had his initials "DB" painted on the side, which led to him being given the nickname and callsign of "Dogsbody".

Bader's Spitfire crashed over northern France in August 1941 and he spent the remainder of the conflict as a prisoner of war. He was knighted in 1976 for services to the disabled and died in 1982 at the age of 72.