Take this Why Me? Quiz! Average Trivia | Death Becomes Them

Answer: Tutankamun

Tutankamun became king of Egypt at a very difficult time. His predecessor, Ikhnaton, also known as "the heretic", tried to turn Egypt into a monotheistic state under the protection of the god Aton. Tut was so young when he became pharaoh (no one really knows what happened to Ikhnaton), that it is probably realistic to imagine that his advisers pushed for the return to the old religion.

In 2010, a two-year study of Tut's mummy revealed that he had a club foot and a cleft palate, and that his cause of death was probably due to a leg injury "complicated by bone disease and bouts of malaria." Zahi Hawass,of the Secretary-General of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), says that Tut was likely a "frail king who needed canes to walk."

Answer: Pheidippides

Two days prior to the Battle of Marathon, Pheidippides ran one hundred fifty miles from Athens to Sparta to request help against the Persians. When the Greeks won this great battle - against all odds - Pheidippides was asked to run twenty-six more miles to tell the Athenians of the victory. He gave the news then collapsed and died. The Marathon race is run in his honor.

Answer: Caesarion

Well, being a son (anyway, that is what Cleopatra said) trumps being a great-nephew and adopted son any day of the week. Anyone would have felt threatened by Julius Caesar's only living heir. Little is know about his death, and technically, no one is really sure that it was ordered by Octavian.

However, it makes sense that it would have happened that way. Heir to his mother's title, he died eleven days after her death. Popular opinion states that Caesarion died by strangulation. Dynastic rule in Egypt ended and it became part of the Roman Empire.

Answer: William I of England

William the Bastard, William of Normandy, William I, William the Conqueror went down in history as the Norman invader of England, but he was so much more. He established the King's Council, a group of permanent royal advisers, which paved way for the Parliament.

He began a system of feudalism in England, which differed from that used on the Continent because all lords had to take the Salisbury Oath of fealty to William, giving him their primary allegiance. He took over control of the church; it was a good thing the pope was busy elsewhere at the time.

In time the battle-seasoned soldier also got heavy, and people really made fun of that. William decided to travel to Rouen for health treatments. On his way there, he sacked and burned the town of Mantes.

His horse stepped on a burning cinder; this movement threw William into his steel pommel, which impaled him. He died in agony five weeks later.

Answer: Pocahontas

Lady Rebecca Rolfe died of unknown causes at the age of twenty-two. She and her husband had traveled to England, and were on their way home when she became ill. Was it smallpox, pneumonia, or tuberculosis? Some people even say she might have been poisoned. Lady Rebecca did have one child, Thomas, and there are many present-day living descendents, Nancy Reagan, for example, who can trace their lineage to either Pocahontas or her father, Powhaten.

Answer: Archimedes

The Romans had been laying siege to Syracuse for two years during the Second Punic War! Both Greek and Roman historians report that during this time Archimedes invented a sort of "death ray" to set fire to the Roman ships in the harbor. General Marcellus viewed Archimedes as a valuable asset - one he wanted alive. One of Plutarch's accounts of his death is that he told the soldier that he had to finish working the problem before he could meet the general. Enraged, the soldier killed him on the spot.

Answer: Anne Frank

Anne and Margot Frank and their mother, Edith, were sent to Auschwitz, where they were separated from Mr. Frank. Anne and Margot were subsequently taken to Bergen-Belsen, leaving their mother, Edith behind. She had been giving the girls all her food, and eventually died from starvation. Anne and Margot both died just 3-4 weeks before Bergen-Belsen was liberated at the end of the war.

Their father, Otto Frank, survived the war and became the driving force behind the publication of the now-famous diary.

Answer: Tycho Brahe

The doctor who attended the great astronomer, Tycho Brahe, believed his urinary problems were caused by a kidney stone. However, when the body was exhumed for an autopsy in 1901, no kidney stones were found. Modern doctors feel it is likely that the cause of death was kidney failure.

However, some theorize the cause of death might have been connected with the prosthetic noses (he lost the tip of his nose in a duel when he was twenty years old) he made and the materials he used to form them.

Answer: Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey, The Nine Days' Queen, was only seventeen when she died. She was married to the son of Edward's chief minister, John Dudley, the Duke of Northumberland. Perhaps in a weakened state it was easy for the Duke to persuade Edward to alter his father's succession plans.

However, it led to the execution of several people (including the Duke and his son) once Mary (Bloody Mary) was able to rally support and denounce Jane. Poor Jane was to "be burned alive on Tower Hill or beheaded as the Queen pleases." Many viewed her as one of many Protestant martyrs.

Answer: Ivan Ivanovitch

Ivan the Terrible had sent his son's first two wives to convents because they did not produce heirs. His attack on Yelena, the third wife, led to her subsequent miscarriage. Along with this incident, father and son weren't seeing eye-to-eye on the running of the country, and tempers were short. The Tsarevich was hit on the head with his father's scepter, and died a few days later.