Quiz Bowl Practice 3

What idiom relates to the occupational disease described below? Hatmaking once involved treating fur with nitrate of mercury, prolonged exposure to which often resulted in a nervous condition interpreted as a symptom of insanity.

mad as a hatter

What is the international radio distress signal?

mayday

What three-syllable term used in art has these meanings? • a work created from a single color • the tonal range from black to white • the gradations of a single color

monochrome

What kind of organism is the Aedes Aegypti, the creature that carries yellow fever?

mosquito

What is the term for the individual parts of a composite musical work such as a symphony or concerto?

movement

Something that is to the greatest extent or amount imaginable is to the ---- degree.

nth

Which of the seven elementary colors of sunlight is missing from this list? red indigo yellow blue green violet

orange

What name do Australians use for their continent's parched interior?

outback

What five-syllable term describes light consisting of several colors?

polychromatic

In metals, it is represented by quicksilver. In precious stones, it is represented by amethyst. In planets, it stands for Mercury. Name this color associated with justice and royalty.

purple (violet)

What marking on the abdomen of a spider tells you that it is a black widow?

red hourglass

Although we hear these phrases all the time, what single grammatical error is illustrated by each one? - null and void - ways and means - upright and honest - each and every one - betwixt and between

redundancy

What expression derived from a Hindu dietary prohibition applies to anything - a belief, institution, or person - so revered as to be beyond public criticism?

sacred cow

They symbolized resurrection and immortality and their images were carved from precious stones and metals for use as charms and ornaments by the ancient Egyptians. Name these sacred beetles.

scarabs

The somewhat grotesque head of a tapeworm contains hooks and suckers. The head is also called the ...

scolex

What method of communication involves signaling by means of two flags or mechanical arms held in various positions?

semaphore

Which creatures have a particular fondness for the paste in book bindings and invade damp areas in basements and bathrooms?

silverfish

Colonial triangular trade involved the exchange of rum, molasses and ...

slaves

The forked tongue of a snake is an organ mainly related to the sense of ...

smell

Which device separates visible light into various colors according to their wavelengths?

spectroscope

Colors which cannot be made by mixing other colors are ---- colors.

spectrum

Desert plants capable of holding considerable quantities of water are classified as ...

succulents

What type of compositions are these? Beethoven's "Pastoral" Haydn's "Surprise" Mozart's "Jupiter" Dvorak's "New World"

symphonies

What ended in 1861, just two days after the first coast-to-coast telegraph line was completed?

the Pony Express

Two basic kinds of equipment are needed for radio communication. One is a receiver. Name the other.

transmitter

What term describes the relative lightness or darkness of a color in an art work?

value

The phyla Platyhelminthes, Nematoda, and Annelida include which creatures?

worms

Who wrote "Moonlight Sonata"?

Beethoven

He entrusted the keys of his castle to each of his new brides along with a warning not to open a particular door. Of course, none of his brides could resist taking a peek and all but one were murdered. Name this villain.

Bluebeard

What composer is famed for a lullaby that bears his name?

Brahms

The southernmost point in South America is ...

Cape Horn

The opera, "Amahl and the Night Visitors" is particularly appropriate for which season?

Christmas

By 1750, most of the Europeans living along the Mississippi River were from what country?

France

James Oglethorpe was a philanthropist from England who established which colony as a haven for the poor and the persecuted?

Georgia

Who wrote "Rhapsody in Blue"?

Gershwin

Name the venomous lizard of the American Southwest.

Gila monster

Temperatures drop to -40 degrees F in the winter and rise to 115 degrees F in summer. Icy winds blow in winter, sandstorms howl in summer, and average annual rainfall is 6 inches. Name this desert that is spread across the Mongolian People's Republic and the People's Republic of China.

Gobi

Radio and television station call letters in the western half of the United States all begin with what letter?

K

Who wrote "Hungarian Rhapsodies"?

Liszt

This vessel left Plymouth, England in September of 1620. Two months and five days later it arrived in Massachusetts Bay. Name the ship.

Mayflower

What was the first document providing for self-government in the New World?

Mayflower Compact

Who was the military leader of the Plymouth colony?

Miles Standish

In 1664, the English combined New Netherland and New Amsterdam into what colony?

New York

Who produced the 1938 radio play that panicked millions by convincing them the U.S. had been invaded by Martians?

Orson Welles

William Bradford was the first governor of which colony in America?

Plymouth

Name the Massachusetts site where the Pilgrims originally landed in the New World.

Plymouth Rock

The first nationally televised presidential debate involved John Kennedy and what other candidate?

Richard Nixon

Name the composer of the opera about Odin's handmaidens who conducted slain heroes to Valhalla.

Richard Wagner

Virginia Dare was the first English child born in the New World. She was born where?

Roanoke

The largest of the world's deserts is the ...

Sahara

After abandoning his interest in painting in 1832, what American inventor devised a code of dots and dashes that was to bear his name?

Samuel Morse

The first two attempts by the English to establish colonies in the New World were feeble and doomed. One was l

Sir Walter Raleigh

On what continent are the Sechura, Patagonian, and Atacama deserts?

South America

St. Augustine, Florida is the oldest surviving European city in America. The original fort was established in 1565 by soldiers of what country?

Spain

Who wrote "The Emperor Waltz"?

Strauss

Who composed a famed piece of music based on this story? Upon receiving a Nutcracker for Christmas, a little girl dreams that the Nutcracker becomes a handsome prince who leads the toys in a battle against the mice.

Tchaikovsky

Rimsky-Korsakov composed a suite entitled "Scheherazade," a musical interpretation of ...

The Thousand and One Nights

What three proper names comprise the idiom that means "anybody at all"?

Tom, Dick, and Harry

The first representative assembly created in America was the House of Burgesses. It was formed in which colony?

Virginia

Rossini composed an overture about what legendary character?

William Tell

A political candidate who earns unexpected support or rapidly achieves unforeseen prominence is a ...

a dark horse

A tint is a reduction in the saturation of a hue made by adding white. What results from adding black to a hue?

a shade

According to folklore, one nap equals how many winks?

40

Which amendment prohibits a policeman from crashing through your door and conducting a search of your home without a warrant?

4th

Geologists speculate that what continent will eventually split along its Great Rift Valley?

Africa

What continent produces 40% of the world's chromium, 23% of the world's coffee, 52% of the world's cocoa, 41% of the world's cobalt, 36% of the world's gold, and 48% of the world's diamonds?

Africa

Identify the German scientist who proposed in 1911 that the continents were once part of a supercontinent.

Alfred Wegener

Who else, besides Roger Williams, was banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony?

Anne Hutchinson

Less than ten centimeters of precipitation annually falls on what continent?

Antartica

The human population of what continent rarely exceeds 1500 people?

Antartica

What mountain range formed the western border of many of the original American colonies?

Appalachians

For most of history, two out of three people in the world have lived on what continent?

Asia

The world's tallest mountains are in ...

Asia

The Ural Mountains form a natural border between ...

Asia and Europe

What two continents are separated by the Bering Strait?

Asia and North America

What three French words that literally mean "stroke of mercy" are used idiomatically in English for "the final blow"?

Coup de grace

Dante's View overlooks a region where summer temperatures reach 135 degrees F and less than 2 inches of rain falls annually. Name this hottest, driest, and lowest place in North America.

Death Valley

The Disney movie has Pocahontas spending the last part of her life in the New World but she really died in ...

England

A population density of about 263 people per square mile makes which continent the most densely populated in the world?

Europe

Which is the abbreviation for the federal agency that licenses radio and television stations?

FCC

Name one of the three secondary colors.

Green-violet-orange

What idiom, reminiscent of Marie Antoinette's nutrition guidelines for peasants, means to enjoy the advantages of two alternative courses of action when it is actually impossible to do both at once?

Have your cake and eat it too

What American writer said this? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, then perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.

Henry Thoreau

What four-syllable noun refers to the quality of displaying various and changing colors such as with mother-of-pearl and soap bubbles?

Iridescence (opalescence)

In 1606, 104 colonists left England aboard three ships. They arrived in Chesapeake Bay in May of 1607 where they founded what colony?

Jamestown

What compound word, expressed in hertz or cycles per second, is used to indicate the capacity of a communications channel?

bandwidth

A surface painted what color absorbs the greatest range of light wavelengths?

black

In metals it is represented by tin. In precious stones it is represented by the sapphire. It stands for the planet Jupiter. Name this color symbolic of hope, love, divine contemplation, piety, and sincerity.

blue

What cliche was derived from the Native American practice of covering tomahawks and scalping knives with earth while smoking a peace pipe with former enemies?

bury the hatchet

What animal is known as "the ship of the desert"?

camel

Official permission to establish an English colony in America was given by the king in the form of a ...

charter

During the early colonial period, what fish was so important to the Massachusetts Bay Colony that a wooden sculpture of one was installed in the capitol in Boston?

cod

Which numerical expression means "to get rid of something"?

deep six

The continents float on the mantle because there is a difference in ---- between the mantle and the continents.

density

In Africa, sand buries huge tracts of land every year. Whole villages are covered and thousands of people evacuate their homelands. What term describes this process by which arable land is replaced by arid wasteland?

desertification

Guaranteeing the privacy of data on computer networks through the use of algorithmic patterns is called ...

encryption

What is the two-word name for the hair-thin cables that can carry vast amounts of data by means of laser light?

fiber optics

In metals it is represented by copper. In precious stones it is represented by emerald. It stands for the planet Venus. Name this color associated with faith, gladness, immortality, and resurrection.

green

Drums consist of a membrane stretched over a hollow cylinder or hemisphere. Name this tightly-stretched membrane of a drum.

head

It includes sinuous hip movements and mimetic hand gestures that tell a story to a drumming and chanting accompaniment. Name this traditional dance of Hawaii.

hula