Hard General Knowledge Quiz
Fifteen brutal questions. Score ten or more and you have earned bragging rights.
Which treaty, signed in 1648, ended the Thirty Years' War?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Peace of Westphalia
The Peace of Westphalia was a pair of treaties signed at Osnabruck and Munster in 1648, ending the Thirty Years' War and the Dutch Eighty Years' War.
Historians often date the modern idea of state sovereignty to Westphalia, hence the term 'Westphalian system'.
What is the only letter that does not appear in any U.S. state name?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Q
Every other letter appears somewhere in the 50 state names; Q is the only one missing. Even Z appears in Arizona and X in Texas and New Mexico.
Maine is the only U.S. state whose name has just one syllable, while Louisiana has the most letters.
In which organ of the human body would you find the islets of Langerhans?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Pancreas
The islets of Langerhans are clusters of cells scattered through the pancreas that produce hormones including insulin and glucagon.
Paul Langerhans identified the islets in 1869 while still a medical student, decades before anyone knew what they did.
Which metal has the highest melting point?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Tungsten
Tungsten melts at about 3,422 degrees Celsius, the highest of any metal, which is why it was used for the filaments in incandescent bulbs.
Carbon resists heat even better, but at normal pressure it sublimes straight from solid to gas rather than melting.
The Rosetta Stone is inscribed in three scripts. Ancient Greek, Demotic, and which other?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Egyptian hieroglyphics
The stone carries a 196 BC decree in hieroglyphic, Demotic and Greek, and the Greek text let Jean-Francois Champollion crack hieroglyphs in 1822.
It has been in the British Museum since 1802, after British forces took it from the French army in Egypt.
What is the deepest point in the world's oceans?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Challenger Deep (Mariana Trench)
Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench reaches roughly 10,935 meters, deeper than Everest is tall by more than two kilometers.
Only three people had reached the bottom before 2019; Victor Vescovo's expeditions have since taken dozens of visitors down.
Who wrote the novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude"?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Gabriel García Márquez
Gabriel Garcia Marquez published One Hundred Years of Solitude in 1967, following seven generations of the Buendia family, and won the Nobel Prize in 1982.
Netflix adapted the novel as a Spanish-language series in 2024, the first screen version the author's family had ever authorized.
In what year was the first message sent over ARPANET, the precursor to the internet?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
1969
The first ARPANET message was sent from UCLA to the Stanford Research Institute on October 29, 1969; the system crashed after the letters L and O.
Email did not arrive until 1971, when Ray Tomlinson chose the @ symbol to separate user names from machine names.
Which country's Via Appia, the ancient Roman road, became its 60th UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2024?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Italy
The Appian Way was inscribed in July 2024 as Italy's 60th site; Italy and China have traded places at the top of the UNESCO list ever since.
The Via Appia was begun in 312 BC and eventually ran about 570 km from Rome to Brindisi on the Adriatic coast.
What is the term for a word that is spelled the same forwards and backwards?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Palindrome
A palindrome reads the same in both directions, from 'level' and 'racecar' to whole sentences like 'A man, a plan, a canal: Panama'.
The word comes from the Greek palin, meaning again, and dromos, meaning way or direction.
Which blood type is known as the universal donor?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
O negative
O negative red cells carry no A, B or Rh antigens, so they can be given to patients of any blood type in an emergency.
Only about 7% of people have O negative blood, which is why blood banks constantly appeal to those donors.
Mount Chimborazo in Ecuador is the farthest point from the Earth's center. Why is it farther than Everest?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
The Earth's equatorial bulge adds distance from the center
Earth bulges at the equator by about 21 km, and Chimborazo sits almost on the equator, so its summit is roughly 2 km farther from the center than Everest's.
Everest remains the highest point above sea level at 8,849 meters, while Chimborazo tops out at only 6,263 meters.
What is the smallest prime number greater than 50?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
53
51 is 3 times 17, 55 is 5 times 11 and 57 is 3 times 19, which leaves 53 as the first prime after 47.
57 is nicknamed the 'Grothendieck prime' because the great mathematician once mistakenly offered it as an example of a prime.
Which composer became completely deaf before completing his Ninth Symphony?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Ludwig van Beethoven
Beethoven's hearing failed from his late twenties, and at the 1824 premiere of the Ninth he had to be turned around to see the applause he could not hear.
The Ninth's 'Ode to Joy' theme has been the official anthem of the European Union since 1985.
Which tiny principality, wedged between Switzerland and Austria, lies entirely within the Alps?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Liechtenstein
Liechtenstein covers just 160 square km of Alpine valley and mountainside along the Rhine, with its highest point, the Grauspitz, at 2,599 meters.
It is one of only two doubly landlocked countries in the world, the other being Uzbekistan.
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All General Knowledge quizzes →About the Hard General Knowledge Quiz
Which treaty ended the Thirty Years' War? Where in your body are the islets of Langerhans? Why is a mountain in Ecuador farther from the center of the Earth than Everest? A hard general knowledge quiz is where the easy stuff stops and the questions that separate the pub team captain from the rest begin. Every question here has a definite, checkable answer, but the distractors are chosen to look just as plausible.
The 15 questions span history, geography, science, mathematics, music and literature, so nobody gets to lean on a single specialty. It suits quiz league regulars, anyone who finds standard trivia rounds too gentle, and quiz hosts who need a final round with teeth. Ten or more is a strong score, and a perfect 15 is genuinely rare.
You will find 15 multiple choice questions here, each with four options. Difficulty: Hard. Most people finish in about 6 minutes, and every answer comes with a short explanation and one extra fact worth keeping.
How to play
Read the question and pick one of the four answers. The correct answer is revealed straight away with a short explanation, then press Next question to keep going. At the end you get your score out of 15 and a full review of your round. Play again any time and the questions arrive in a fresh order. There is no timer and no account.
Good to know before you play
How hard is the Hard General Knowledge Quiz really?
Hard by design. Most players score between six and ten, and the questions on Westphalia, Chimborazo and the islets of Langerhans catch out even experienced quizzers.
What subjects do the 15 questions cover?
History, geography, human biology, chemistry, mathematics, classical music and world literature, with no more than two questions from any single subject.
Is a hard quiz suitable for a pub quiz final round?
Yes. Hosts often use it as a tie-break or final round, since each question comes with a short explanation and an extra fact to read out with the answer.
Answer key: all 15 questions with explanations
- Which treaty, signed in 1648, ended the Thirty Years' War?
Peace of Westphalia The Peace of Westphalia was a pair of treaties signed at Osnabruck and Munster in 1648, ending the Thirty Years' War and the Dutch Eighty Years' War. Historians often date the modern idea of state sovereignty to Westphalia, hence the term 'Westphalian system'. - What is the only letter that does not appear in any U.S. state name?
Q Every other letter appears somewhere in the 50 state names; Q is the only one missing. Even Z appears in Arizona and X in Texas and New Mexico. Maine is the only U.S. state whose name has just one syllable, while Louisiana has the most letters. - In which organ of the human body would you find the islets of Langerhans?
Pancreas The islets of Langerhans are clusters of cells scattered through the pancreas that produce hormones including insulin and glucagon. Paul Langerhans identified the islets in 1869 while still a medical student, decades before anyone knew what they did. - Which metal has the highest melting point?
Tungsten Tungsten melts at about 3,422 degrees Celsius, the highest of any metal, which is why it was used for the filaments in incandescent bulbs. Carbon resists heat even better, but at normal pressure it sublimes straight from solid to gas rather than melting. - The Rosetta Stone is inscribed in three scripts. Ancient Greek, Demotic, and which other?
Egyptian hieroglyphics The stone carries a 196 BC decree in hieroglyphic, Demotic and Greek, and the Greek text let Jean-Francois Champollion crack hieroglyphs in 1822. It has been in the British Museum since 1802, after British forces took it from the French army in Egypt. - What is the deepest point in the world's oceans?
Challenger Deep (Mariana Trench) Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench reaches roughly 10,935 meters, deeper than Everest is tall by more than two kilometers. Only three people had reached the bottom before 2019; Victor Vescovo's expeditions have since taken dozens of visitors down. - Who wrote the novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude"?
Gabriel García Márquez Gabriel Garcia Marquez published One Hundred Years of Solitude in 1967, following seven generations of the Buendia family, and won the Nobel Prize in 1982. Netflix adapted the novel as a Spanish-language series in 2024, the first screen version the author's family had ever authorized. - In what year was the first message sent over ARPANET, the precursor to the internet?
1969 The first ARPANET message was sent from UCLA to the Stanford Research Institute on October 29, 1969; the system crashed after the letters L and O. Email did not arrive until 1971, when Ray Tomlinson chose the @ symbol to separate user names from machine names. - Which country's Via Appia, the ancient Roman road, became its 60th UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2024?
Italy The Appian Way was inscribed in July 2024 as Italy's 60th site; Italy and China have traded places at the top of the UNESCO list ever since. The Via Appia was begun in 312 BC and eventually ran about 570 km from Rome to Brindisi on the Adriatic coast. - What is the term for a word that is spelled the same forwards and backwards?
Palindrome A palindrome reads the same in both directions, from 'level' and 'racecar' to whole sentences like 'A man, a plan, a canal: Panama'. The word comes from the Greek palin, meaning again, and dromos, meaning way or direction. - Which blood type is known as the universal donor?
O negative O negative red cells carry no A, B or Rh antigens, so they can be given to patients of any blood type in an emergency. Only about 7% of people have O negative blood, which is why blood banks constantly appeal to those donors. - Mount Chimborazo in Ecuador is the farthest point from the Earth's center. Why is it farther than Everest?
The Earth's equatorial bulge adds distance from the center Earth bulges at the equator by about 21 km, and Chimborazo sits almost on the equator, so its summit is roughly 2 km farther from the center than Everest's. Everest remains the highest point above sea level at 8,849 meters, while Chimborazo tops out at only 6,263 meters. - What is the smallest prime number greater than 50?
53 51 is 3 times 17, 55 is 5 times 11 and 57 is 3 times 19, which leaves 53 as the first prime after 47. 57 is nicknamed the 'Grothendieck prime' because the great mathematician once mistakenly offered it as an example of a prime. - Which composer became completely deaf before completing his Ninth Symphony?
Ludwig van Beethoven Beethoven's hearing failed from his late twenties, and at the 1824 premiere of the Ninth he had to be turned around to see the applause he could not hear. The Ninth's 'Ode to Joy' theme has been the official anthem of the European Union since 1985. - Which tiny principality, wedged between Switzerland and Austria, lies entirely within the Alps?
Liechtenstein Liechtenstein covers just 160 square km of Alpine valley and mountainside along the Rhine, with its highest point, the Grauspitz, at 2,599 meters. It is one of only two doubly landlocked countries in the world, the other being Uzbekistan.
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