Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. With the words, "there will be no whitewash at the White House", Richard Nixon attempted to convince a dubious US public that he knew nothing of the Watergate break-in. The investigations of journalists Woodward and Bernstein made it increasingly obvious that this was not the case. What was the pseudonym of the insider who provided them with the information that allowed them to expose the president's lies?
2. Born in Italy in 1882, this man invented a form of investment scheme that would see thousands of people scammed out of sometimes very large sums of money. In 2009, the billionaire financier Bernard Madoff would receive a jail sentence of 150 years for conducting such a scheme. After which man was this scam named?
3. Having valiantly defended their city as it lay under siege for ten years, the Trojans were finally undone by their enemy's clever deception. Outside the gates of the city was left a tribute to the resilience of the Trojan people: a gigantic wooden horse. The Trojans took the gift at face value and wheeled it inside the city walls, failing to realise that the horse was almost exactly the right size to contain 40 soldiers from which invading army?
4. It was a lie that lasted for nearly a century before being disproved. Anna Anderson was one of a number of women that claimed to be which princess of the Romanov dynasty, who allegedly survived the assassination of her entire family following revolution in Russia in 1917?
5. The best lies to tell in the scientific world are ones that perfectly fit with the prevailing view of the time. So it was with the "discovery" in southern England in 1908, of human remains that supposedly provided the missing link between apes and humans. What was the name given to the fraudulent remains?
6. Titus Oates had a long history of spinning yarns. It even landed him a brief spell in prison on one occasion. However, in 1678, he fabricated a series of stories that had far-reaching consequences, including the execution of more than twenty men, all incorrectly charged with being part of a "Popish Plot" to assassinate which recently re-instated English monarch?
7. Alfred Dreyfus was convicted in 1894 of betraying France by giving military secrets to Germany. But his conviction was all based on lies. The conspiracy was uncovered after re-examination of the case was prompted by the famous letter "J'accuse", written by which famous French author?
8. History is written by the winners, so the saying goes. No clearer demonstration of this can be shown than by the remarkable loss to history of several Pharaohs of the 18th dynasty in Egypt. The official list of Pharaohs showed that the line of succession went directly from Amenhotep III to Horemheb, completely erasing which Pharaoh, father of Tutankhamun, from history?
9. Han van Meegeren was an artist of prodigious skills. However, his original art, though impressive, was out of synch with critical tastes of the time. To challenge the critical barbs, he turned to forgery and successfully duped the critics who had derided him. They accepted paintings such as "Supper at Emmaus" as original works by which Dutch master, famous for such masterpieces as "The Girl with the Pearl Earring"?
10. Colin Powell told the UN he'd found them. Tony Blair told the UK parliament that he had evidence of their existence. Yet, despite this being used as the pretext for an invasion and a war that cost tens of thousands of lives, the UN inspector Hans Blix could find no evidence of these weapons of mass destruction in which Middle Eastern country?
Source: Author
Snowman
This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor
gtho4 before going online.
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