For the past 21 years, the newsletter of Royal Statistical Society has published a fiendish Christmas quiz for its members.
To successfully tackle the quiz you’ll need a mixture of general knowledge, logic and lateral thinking. No specialist mathematical knowledge is required. Are you up to the task?
The 2014 version of this annual challenge appears below for data blog readers. A year’s subscription to Significance magazine is on offer to the reader submitting the highest scoring entry before the competition closes.
Answers should be sent by email to rssquiz@rss.org.uk by 18.00 GMT, Wednesday 7 January.
An explanation of your answer is required for some questions to receive full marks. The quiz editor’s decision is final and in the case of a tie an additional tie-breaker question may be used.
So here goes - and best of luck to all those brave enough to tackle it! We will publish the answers on the Datablog in January.
More information about the Royal Statistical Society can be found here.
1. Setting the scene (12 points)
In whole or in part, which works are set on, in or at:
- (a) A ship at sea; The Palace of Theseus; An open place; The guard-platform of the castle
- (b) Antwerp, c. 925; Thuringia, c. 1200; Rome, c. 1350; Gothic Spain, at an unspecified time
- (c) A Leicestershire castle, c. 1194; A Warwickshire castle, c. 1575; ‘A large and antiquated edifice’ in Northumberland, c. 1715; Prestonpans, 1745
2. Groups (6 points)
As of December 2014, which groups comprise:
- (a) Three royals, five lords, a baroness, two prime ministers, two historians, a mathematician, a naturalist, a surgeon, two other scientists, an artist, an art historian, a playwright, a classicist, a conductor and an internet pioneer
- (b) NC, VC, ED, DA, AC, and 17 blues
- (c) 45 of one, 53 of another, and two who belong to neither?
3. Coordinates (5 points)
What appear, in sequence, at
(2,1), (1,5), (1,3), (2,3), (3,3), (2,4), ..., (1,2), (3,6), (1,1)?
4. Calendar (12 points)
In 2014, what was won:
- In January, 5-0, for the second time in seven years?
- In February, by the hosts, with 13 out of 33?
- In March, by the Lord of the Lake, by a narrow margin?
- In April, by Charles Smith’s namesake, by three?
- In May, by two Welshmen, at around the same time, seven days apart?
- In June, by a Czech and a Serb, each for the second time?
- In July, generally, by a shark?
- In August, in Switzerland, by a Dutch woman at the double?
- In September, when 12 stars beat 13 stripes?
- In October, when Morse helped the SFG beat the KCR?
- In November, by 67, after the 11th of 19?
- In December, by the best of Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Mexico, Morocco, New Zealand and Spain?
5. British Studio (10 points)
Each of the nine names in the list below contains one mistake. Correct them, and with the help of the title, explain what they represent. Which one of the nine is represented by the corrections, read in order?
- Mama C
- Will Bourn
- Lambrini
- Eric Roget
- Billy Wu
- Rik Shaw
- W Loman
- Alexa Ponnet
- Paul Lea
6. ALW (6 points)
Identify the following.
- (a) 1968: ADWD, CED
- (b) 1970: HOTM, IDKHTLH
- (c) 1976: ASIAH, DCFMA
- (d) 1981: TSOTJ, M
- (e) 1986: TMOTN, AIAOY
- (f) 1989: LCE, ABL
7. Meetings (6 points)
Explain the diagram.
8. Lambrinis (9 points)
What do the following have in common?
- Henry Williamson’s best-known creation
- One of James Herbert’s first
- Two in ‘Wind in the Willows’
- Michael’s Amy
- One who ran ‘like a ripple of wind’
- A hairy pig that laughs, and another of the same family
- A close relative of the llama
- Gazza in Italy
9. Capital Name Poser (4 points)
Mali, Comoros, Togo and Senegal, and their capitals, share a particular property that is unique amongst the countries of Africa. What is it, and which two South American countries share the same property?
10. Farewell (10 points)
Identify the following, who all bade farewell in 2014.
- The portrayer of TS Persons (2005)
- The brother of one of 2 (a)
- One who called Rodney ‘Dave’
- Richard, who was Richard, as in 8
- Robert, who was Mario, as in 8
- Joan Collins, Henry VIII, a man from St Ives, …?
- An American Gangster’s mother
- A man who twice appeared, villainously, as a shark
- The one who Married a Millionaire
- ‘The Ugly’
