From geography to sport, can you solve Trivial Pursuit’s trickiest questions with our ultimate quiz as game turns 45

BOARD game favourite Trivial Pursuit has been entertaining – and frustrating – us for more than four decades, with 100MILLION copies sold worldwide

Now you can test your knowledge with Trivial Pursuit, The Ultimate Quiz Book, which is packed with more than 2,000 questions from the classic quiz and released in time for the 45th anniversary next year.

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If you think you keep up to date with what’s going on in the world and also know your capital cities, mountain ranges and the films everybody is watching, you will love our exclusive quiz taken from the book. Best of luck!

• Trivial Pursuit, The Ultimate Quiz Book (Farshore), is out tomorrow, £14.99.

Questions from the first edition

OVER 45 years, the questions in Trivial Pursuit have moved with the times, and if you’ve got an old edition you might find the odd reference to the USSR or some outdated language.

But would you be able to play the first ever edition of the game?

Here are some of the questions from each category of that Genus version.

1. Geography: What’s the largest Japanese island?
2. Art & Literature: What Irving Wallace book is about a black U.S president?
3. History: What World War I battle saw 60,000 troops killed on the first day?
4. Sports & Leisure: How many golf balls are there on the moon?
5. Entertainment: Who has a licence plate reading A1ANA2?
6. Science & Nature: What’s the most widely-eaten fruit in America?

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Trivial Pursuit trivia

THE game was created in December 1979 by Americans Chris Haney and Scott Abbott, when they were playing Scrabble – and were shocked at how much the board game cost.

When early editions hit the shops in 1981 they were sold at a loss.

• The design of the game board is based not on a pie, but a ship’s wheel.
• Fifty special editions of Trivial Pursuit have been made including; Star Wars Classic Trilogy, the Rolling Stones Edition, Baby Boomer Edition and the Harry Potter Edition.
• The original game had 6,000 questions printed on 1,000 cards.
• It was reported this year by fun.com that Trivial Pursuit was the seventh most popular board game of all time.
• It is estimated that Trivial Pursuit has made more than $2billion.
• The game has been sold in 26 countries and 17 languages.

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Geography

1. After China, what is the second-most heavily populated country in the world?
2. Which British explorer first circumnavigated Antarctica?
3. What is the longest above-ground mountain range in the world?
4. Which European language is the official language of Senegal?
5. Which of these UK motorways is the longest – M4, M5 or M6?
6. Stellenbosch is a mountainous wine region in which country?
7. Name the only James Bond film, as of 2023, that has a country name in its title.
8. Fiji has three official languages – English, Fijian and what is the third?
9. How many time zones does China use – 1, 3, 5 or 7?
10. Ouagadougou is the capital of which African nation?
11. The names of how many of the American States end in the letter ‘O’?
12. What is the world’s largest landlocked country?

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Sports & Leisure

1. Since the 1980s, Games Workshop has been getting fans of all ages to paint and battle miniature soldiers in which grim sci-fi game?
2. What is the name for the ballet shoes that allow a dancer to maintain balance on the tips of their toes?
3. Fast5 is a modified five-a-side version of which seven-a-side sport?
4. Gareth Bale joined Real Madrid from which English club in 2013?
5. Action Man toys were a UK version of what US figurine for boys?
6. Which aquatic sport shares part of its name with a 13th- century explorer?
7. Which staduim hosts the French Open tennis?
8. In which sport do you wear a lamé, plastron and mask?
9. Which casino game’s name derives from the French word for ‘little wheel’?
10. In Indian Premier League cricket, what colour cap is awarded to the player who scores the most runs in a season?
11. Which sports apparel and accessories manufacturer shares its name with the Greek goddess of victory?
12. Which Latin dance style is also the name for a group of rattlesnakes?

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History

1. Which world leader spearheaded glasnost?
2. Name two of the three products sold by the first Sainsbury’s store in 1869.
3. What milestone number of monthly users did Facebook reach in Oct 2012?
4. In which century was Britain first ruled by a king named George?
   5.Which animal was adopted by the Medici family as a symbol for their motto, “Make haste slowly”?
5. Who was the Labour Party candidate defeated by Boris Johnson in the London mayoral election in 2008?
6. In ancient Chinese mythology, what fruit was believed to represent longevity and immortality?
7. Which autumn event falls 50 days before Christmas Day?
8. What London landmark was classed as an antique by US Customs?
9. In 2016, which two Cold War countries restored full diplomatic relations?
10. Which residence of Jane Seymour, Henry VIII’s third wife, gave its name to a bestselling book and a BBC series starring Mark Rylance?
11. What massive dinosaur had arms that were only about the length of human arms?

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Entertainment

1. Which bespectacled character in Stranger Things became an Internet sensation in her own right?
2. Who founded Pixar?
3. What is the title of David Bowie’s final album, released in 2016?
4. Which television documentary series about genealogy shares its name with a Spice Girls hit?
5. The 1967 debut album by The Velvet Underground & Nico what fruit on it’s cover?
6. Alternative music radio station Radio X launched in 2015 following a revamp of which former station?
7. Which artist had the fastest-selling album of 2015?
8. Bamm-Bamm is the son of which Stone Age couple?
9. Which 2015 Oscar-nominated stop-animation film follows the antics of sheep from Mossy Bottom Farm?
10. In the 1975 film Jaws, Captain Quint crushes a can of which brand of beer?
11. When the show starts, who is the deputy director of the Pawnee Department in Parks and Recreation?
12. Which comedy character has the catchphrase “Am I bovvered?” – Lauren Cooper, Vicky Pollard or Waynetta Slob?

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Science & Nature

1. A human hand has more bones than a human foot. True or false?
2. Which mobile app started out under the name Picaboo?
3. What is studied in entomology?
4. How many pixels in a megapixel?
5. Which kind of nerves in the human body are called cervical, thoracic, lumbar, sacral and coccygeal?
6. Astronauts from what country are sometimes referred to as “taikonauts”?
7. On which continent do most ospreys spend the winter?
8. What are you afraid of if you suffer from acrophobia?
9. Peanuts are categorised as which type of plant?
10. Which scientist’s synthesised voice was sampled in a track on Pink Floyd’s 2014 album, Endless River?
11. Which branch of science specifically studies earthquakes?
12. Carrageenan, a slimy derivative of seaweed, is commonly used in which frozen food?

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Art & Literature

1. Name a Shakespeare play with an Italian place in its title.
2. Van Gogh’s ear was severed following a fight with which French Post-Impressionist artist?
3. In the film Pitch Perfect, in which singing style do the Barden Bellas perform?
4. What time are the clocks striking on a “bright cold day in April” in the first line of George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984?
5. Which children’s author, born in Wales, wrote many books in a garden shed, which had a Kids-Keep-Out rule?
6. What name is the secret identity of Wonder Woman?
7. What is melting in Salvador Dalí’s The Persistence of Memory?
8. In Aesop’s fable where “slow and steady wins the race”, who lost?
9. How many basic positions of the feet are there in ballet?
10. Which Romanian region, known for its medieval castles, provided the inspiration for the setting of Bram Stoker’s Dracula?
11. Which four instrument groups make up an orchestra?
12. Which character in the Herman Melville novel Moby Dick is the basis for the name of a successful coffee franchise?

This post first appeared on thesun.co.uk