Quizzes & Puzzles 22

Some new problems with which to exercise the brain. But first a look at answers and solutions to Quizzes & Puzzles 21. New problems below the image (cartoon).

Answer to Quiz 21:1

…

In which country can we find the world's largest pyramid?

Which country has more pyramids than Egypt?

The largest pyramid in the world is found in Mexico. It is The Quetzalcoatl Pyramid in Cholula de Rivadavia.

Sudan has more pyramids than Egypt. In Meroë, once the capital of a Nubian (or Kushite) kingdom, there are over 200 pyramids (Egypt has 118), although they are smaller and newer than those in Egypt.

Answer to Quiz 21:2

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), one of the most played and most influential composers of European classical music, was almost forgotten during the 80 years following his death. He was re-discovered by a later composer, who did set up one of J. S. Bach's works in 1829, which triggered his return. Who was this other composer, who brought J. S. Bach back to the top where he belonged? He, too, is famous, but not to the level of Bach.

It was Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy.

(Below: Felix Mendelssohn in 1834, drawing by Friedrich Wilhelm von Schadow. Public Domain. Original at Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin.)

Mendelssohn was born in 1809, in Hamburg. He belonged to a wealthy Jewish family, whose wealth was based on banking. In his home, during his childhood, famous thinkers and creative artists were frequent guests; people like Hegel, Heinrich Heine, and E.T.A. Hoffmann. Later, he befriended the aged Goethe.

Felix was a talented child who early developed into a good musician and composer. Cultivated, wealthy, and talented he learned to master the formal side of composition almost to perfection. Yet, in my opinion, something is missing in his music. Formally perfect, it has no depth, no pathos. Perhaps life was a little bit too easy for him, devoid of genuine life experience; experience from which maturity grows. A too easy life does not provide fertile soil for a mind to deepen.

One of Mendelssohn's most important contributions to music was that he revived the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. In those times Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was THE Bach, the one everyone knew about. But his father, J.S. Bach, the one we all know today, got hardly any attention at all. In 1829, Mendelssohn performed Bach's (J.S.) "Matthäuspassion," which triggered the return of Johann Sebastian, a return that has been extraordinary, leading to a unique position with a monumental influence on subsequent music.

On 4 November 1847 Mendelssohn died, only 38 years old. With a longer life, maybe he and his art would have matured and deepened.

Answer to Quiz 21:3

One of the greatest boxers of all time, 3 times heavyweight champion of the world, changed his name when he changed religion. Thus he boxed under two different names, first one, and then the other; what two names?

Cassius Clay and Muhammad Ali.

Answer to Quiz 21:4

Wadjet is a deity from old Egypt. She is associated with an animal. What animal?

She is also associated with a colour. What colour?

Wadjet is associated with as well Horus' as Ra's eye.

“I created my Eye in flame... I made my Eye, a living serpent.”

(Horus, according to Coffin Text, Spell 313)

In one version of the myth, Ra sent away his eye and created a new. When the first eye returned, it was not pleased over this, so he transformed it to a fiery snake goddess:

"Malachite glitters for me, I live according to my will, for I am Wadjet, Lady of the Devouring Flame, and few approach me”.

(From The Book of the Dead)

She is mainly associated with the royal cobra, and her colour is green. She is also associated with the mineral malachite, which is a shade of green.

So the right answers are the animal is the cobra and the colour is green.

You can read more about Wadjet and other Egyptian cobra deities in From the Sacred Cobras of Egypt to Quezalcoatl: Serpents & Snakes in Mythology and you can find more about Wadjet and the colour green in Colours VI: Green in Focus – Religion, Life, Death, Sex, Witchcraft...

Answer to Quiz 21:5

Which continent has a name having to do with bears?

The answer is Antarctica, which literally means anti-Arctic, the opposite of Arctic – while Arctic is derived from Greek “arktos”, which means “bear”, and “arktoi”, which refers to bear constellations on the Arctic circle.

If you want to read more about continents, please see Continents - Real & Mythical.

Answer to Quiz 21:6

So-called Siamese twins, that is conjoined twins, have physically connected bodies. Why are, or were, they called Siamese twins?

Because of Chang and Eng Bunker, born in Siam (today Thailand), who, in the 1800s, came to the West, where they were shown for money.

And now some new exercises for brain & memory...

Quiz 22:1

We start with a very difficult question. Look at this verse:

"A beautiful forest in India is found,

Wherein two birds together are bound.

One is snow-white, the other red.

They bite each other until both are dead.”

This is alchemic symbolism. What does it mean? What is really described here?

(The verse is taken from: D. Stolcius von Stolcenberg, Viridarium chymicum, Frankfurt 1624)

Quiz 22:2

A Japanese court lady wrote what is sometimes considered as the world's first novel. What is its name? (In Romanised Japanese or in English translation.)

Quiz 22:3

This map shows how the world is divided (red and blue) in one certain aspect. What aspect? What is the difference between the red and blue parts?

Quiz 22:4

A (stage) play from 1921 coined a word denoting an artificial worker. Today that word is common in a large number of languages.

What word, and who wrote the play?

Quiz 22:5

There are colours with their own wavelength and colours without their own wavelength: mention at least one colour having no wavelength of its own.

Quiz 22:6

Last, a question about art.

Here we have a painting only in shades of dark green. With a term borrowed from French, what is such a painting called?

You'll find answers and solutions in the next “Quizzes & Puzzles”.

Quizzes & Puzzles has its own label in my Index, where all issues of the series can be found.

In my INDEX, you can find all my writings on Read.Cash, sorted by topic.

Copyright © 2022 Meleonymica/Mictorrani. All Rights Reserved

(Cartoon by Christian Dorn/Pixabay, CC0/Public Domain.)