Beyond the answers - interesting background to this quiz

The language Brazil actually speaks

Portuguese is the official language of Brazil, a legacy of the Treaty of Tordesillas, which in 1494 divided the newly discovered lands between Portugal and Spain. That is why South America's largest country speaks Portuguese while most of its neighbours speak Spanish. Brazil is also by far the largest Portuguese-speaking nation on Earth.

Everest's summit day

The first confirmed ascent of Mount Everest was made on 29 May 1953 by Edmund Hillary, a New Zealand beekeeper turned mountaineer, and Tenzing Norgay, a Sherpa from Nepal. They climbed as part of a British expedition led by John Hunt. News of the success reportedly reached London on the morning of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation.

Roman numerals that still count

MCM is 1900: M is 1000, CM is 900. The subtractive trick, where a smaller numeral before a larger one means subtraction, is what lets IV stand for 4 and CM for 900. Roman numerals still turn up on clock faces, film credits, monarchs' names and the Super Bowl.

A mountain range older than the Rockies

The Appalachians run from Newfoundland in Canada down to Alabama in the United States, a span of roughly 2,000 miles. They are far older than the Rockies, and geologists link their formation to ancient continental collisions, including the one that helped assemble Pangaea. Their eroded, rounded profile is a direct result of that immense age.

From ancient India to the living room

Chaturanga, a game from ancient India, is widely regarded as an ancestor of chess, and Mahjong is a tile-based game with deep roots in China. Tennis, by contrast, is a sport played with rackets and a ball. The line between board game and sport is mostly about equipment, not about how seriously people take it.