Got your 'Bering'? Let's explore! Quiz

Answer: Denmark

Bering was born on 12th August, 1681 to Jonas Svendsen Halmstad and Anne Pedersdatter Bering in Horsens, Denmark. Horsens is located in East Jutland at the end of the Horsens fjord. It lies approximately 200 kilometers from Copenhagen.

Answer: Sweden

Bering served with distinction during his tour of duty during the war, and while that conflict was still ongoing, he was sent in 1710 to Russia's fleet in the Azov Sea to take part in the Russo-Turkish war.

Incidentally, Russia (along with her allies Denmark-Norway, Saxony-Poland-Lithuania, Hanover, and Brandenburg-Prussia) successfully fought the Swedish Empire for dominance in north Central and Eastern Europe.

Answer: Peter the Great

Tsar Peter I (Pyotr Alexeyevich Romanov) ruled the Tsardom of Russia (later the Empire of Russia) from 1682 (jointly with Ivan V until 1696) until his death in 1725, coincidentally the same year that Bering was commissioned for what would be his first expedition to the North Pacific. He didn't actually depart until three years later, in 1728.

Answer: Kamchatka

In all, Bering led two Kamchatkan expeditions; the first in 1728 and the second in 1741. The first expedition was a commission from the government, while the second was an approved proposal forwarded by Bering himself. After the successes of his first expedition, Bering was rewarded with ennoblement.

Answer: Michael

Bering sailed on 'Gabriel' on his first expedition, up through the strait that would one day bear his name. The second expedition saw Bering commission two new ships, naming them Sviatoi Piotr and Sviatoi Pavel.

Answer: Petropavlovsk

Bering arrived in the Avacha Bay on July 10, 1740, and established the port, naming it, appropriately, Petropavlovsk (Peter and Paul). Today, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky is the administrative center of the Kamchatka Peninsula.

Answer: Commander Islands

The expedition discovered some of the Aleutian Island group (the Shumagin Islands - named for one of their sailors who died and was buried there), as well as the Aleksander Archipelago (discovered by the one ship while separated from the other). However, it was in the Commander Islands in the southwest Bering Sea (as it is now called), near the Kamchatkan coast, where they ended up.

The expedition never made it as far as the Queen Charlotte Islands, which are located along the coast of British Columbia.

Answer: Scurvy

Bering died along with 28 other crew members. They were buried on the uninhabited island that (again) would one day bear his name. The expedition experienced further hardship when one of the ships (Sviatoi Piotr) was shipwrecked. The ship's carpenter managed to build another vessel from the wreckage, and more than half of the ship's complement survived to return home.

Answer: Bering Peninsula

Bering's two expeditions, while not truly successful when measured against their original goals, nevertheless became a major part of what later came to be known as the Great Northern Expedition - the totality of Russia's exploration efforts in the North Pacific.

Answer: 1991

The six bodies were exhumed and transported to Moscow for forensic study. Scientists used Bering's remains to create a digital reconstruction of what he looked like. A year later, in 1992, Bering and the others were returned to their burial site on Bering Island.