Countries in Spanish Trivia Quiz

Answer: Alemania

In honor of the quiz that inspired this one (see the introduction), I start off with the easy question for Germany. The answer, "Alemania", is similar to the French "Allemagne". "Deutschland" is the name in German. It is obviously not 'Geraldo'; "Germania" is not a country in modern times, but was once the name of the region occupied primarily by what is today Germany.

It is also used in a funny episode of the Simpsons that dealt with xenophobia (among other topics). "Go back to Germania" they say to Ute, the German kid. "Allemagno" is made up.

Answer: Sweden

Home of the Swedes! This one always tricked me in my early years of Spanish study. Suiza is Switzerland - the "z" is the key to remembering that.

Answer: El Reino Unido

'La Unida Reinada' isn't exactly good Spanish, but was the only one you should have been thrown off by. 'La Reina Sofia' is the current queen of Spain (in 2005) and 'Los Reyes Magos' are the three wisemen (or Wise Kings).

Answer: Marruecos

Yes, Marruecos! Although 'Morroco' sounds like it could be Spanish, it has always been called Marruecos. 'Maricarmen' is a popular Spanish name combo (María + Carmen). 'Mar Caribe' is Spanish for the Caribbean Sea.

Answer: el País Vasco

'El País Vasco' is home to important cities such as Bilbao, and San Sebastián. Bilbao is an industrial and, more recently, a cultural center and San Sebastián is a beautiful city on the bay of Biscay. 'El País Vasco' is also home to one of the most unique languages in the Western world - euskera. Like Catalán in eastern Spain, Euskera is only spoken by people from the region (called Euskadi by the native speakers) and still shunned by the national government since the days of Franco.

Answer: False

It is actually "Belice" in Spanish, with a "c".

Answer: True

It is spelled "Canadá" with an accent at the end. Haiti and Peru are two other countries that have the same spelling in Spanish and English, save the accent on the last letter.

Answer: Indonesia

The other countries are only slightly different: 'Tailandia, Filipinas, Japón'. You would not have a "th" or "ph" combination in Spanish.

Answer: Icelandia

'Estonia' is written the same, 'Finlandia' (though it sounds like a brand of cheese) is pretty close, 'Polonia' (for Poland) sounds like the love interest for Prince in Purple Rain, and 'Icelandia' is incorrect, as that spelling would get you "I-ce-lan-di-a". In order to keep the same amount of syllables as the English pronunciation, it would be spelled 'Islandia'.

Answer: Escocia

Ok, so I made up three of these. Often words beginning with "s" in English have an equivalent word beginning with 'es' in Spanish, such as; "Spanish" = 'español', "scene" = 'escena', and "stove" = 'estufa'. This note will come up later in the quiz.

Answer: False

It is 'Egipto'. It makes sense given that "gy" doesn't occur naturally in Spanish.

Answer: Yemen

This was a tough one. All I can say is "Yah, man". In Spanish, the others are: Omán, Líbano, and Irán.

Answer: Camerún

It has the accent. I made up 'Camerronia' and it would not look like the English spelling "Cameroon" since a double "o" is not pronounced the same in Spanish.

Answer: Eslovaquia

"Qu" is the more common way to spell out the /k/ sound in Spanish, so the '-quia' ending is correct. Also, see question 10 for the note about words in English beginning with "S". Not always the case, (see Sweden, Switzerland) but is often a safe bet.

Answer: Francia

As I said an easy one. Though 'reich' is the ending for some countries in German, Frank Reich was a former quarterback for the University of Maryland and then back up to Jim Kelly in Buffalo for many years. Frank orchestrated one of the biggest comebacks ever both in college and in the pros - what a player! I just think "Germania" is funny (see question 1 info as to why). I always think Translyvania is a cool name for a place and I figured Fransylvania was a witty creation blending France and Transylvania.

I hope you had fun with this one. I don't plan on doing another since I covered 4 continents. No disrespect to Australia, but where's the difficulty in that translation?