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History Analogies #1

Can you fill the blanks in these historical analogies?
Quiz by Quizmaster
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Last updated: January 5, 2021
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First submittedJuly 17, 2013
Times taken74,141
Average score75.0%
Rating4.40
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This is to this …
As …
Nixon is to Johnson
Eisenhower is to Truman
Lenin is to Russia
Mao is to China
Cortés is to the Aztecs
Pizarro is to the Incas
Newton is to Gravity
Einstein is to Relativity
Plato is to Aristotle
Socrates is to Plato
Odin is to Valhalla
Zeus is to Olympus
Caesar is to
March 15, 44 BC
Kennedy is to
November 22, 1963
Henry VIII is to Tudor
Elizabeth II is to Windsor
Hitler is to Führer
Mussolini is to Duce
Wright Brothers are to
Airplanes
Montgolfier Brothers are to
Hot Air Balloons
This is to this …
As …
United Nations is to WWII
League of Nations is to WWI
Gandhi is to India
Mandela is to South Africa
Bligh is to HMS Bounty
Cook is to HMS Endeavour
Philip is to Elizabeth II
Albert is to Victoria
"Bard" is to Shakespeare
"Iron Lady" is Thatcher
Byzantium
is to Constantinople
Constantinople is to Istanbul
Napoleon is to France
Genghis Khan is to Mongolia
Abolition is to Slavery
Prohibition is to Alcohol
Brazil is to Portugal
Indonesia is to Netherlands
Ivan is to Terrible
Vlad is to Impaler
88 Comments
+2
Level 76
Aug 14, 2013
Good quiz - couldn't think of Socrates or Lee.
+2
Level 63
Aug 14, 2013
I tried Tepes and Dracula before I was like "Vlad the...what?"
+2
Level 36
Aug 17, 2013
Good Quiz. Got 15 out of 20. Hope i can get out of this rutt. 15 out of 20...on the last six (including this one) quizzes... no less...no more. Oh well.
+4
Level 15
Aug 19, 2013
Strictly, it should be Galileo and Relativity
+2
Level 78
Dec 9, 2018
What? Why? It would be Galileo (or Copernicus, depending on whether you're going with "theorized" or "proved") and heliocentrism, but relativity is pretty firmly Einstein.
+2
Level 86
Dec 9, 2018
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galilean_relativity
+8
Level ∞
Jan 5, 2021
Galileo will work now. Somehow I'm doubting that anyone actually typed that first.
+1
Level 66
Sep 30, 2022
I did
+1
Level 47
May 26, 2020
Both should be right
+1
Level 45
Jun 16, 2014
Vlad the Impaler is actually supposed to be the man the story of Dracula is based upon. Interesting, huh?
+1
Level 34
Sep 24, 2022
wow I've never heard that before! thanks!
+1
Level 80
Aug 27, 2023
<Fry squinting meme>
+1
Level 45
Jun 16, 2014
Byzantium:Constantinople::Constantinople:Istanbul was Constantinople, now it's Istanbul... yeah, I know, I'm weird.
+6
Level 68
Feb 21, 2015
Why did Constantinople get the works?
+14
Level 45
Dec 12, 2018
That's nobody's business but the Turks
+1
Level 69
Apr 22, 2021
Maybe they wanted to do away with the Greek name. The irony would be that Istanbul is also from a Greek etymology (it derives from a phrase that more or less means "this way to the city").
+2
Level 53
Mar 16, 2023
Interesting answer – but I think Geoguy was referencing the They Might Be Giants song.
+1
Level 68
Oct 30, 2024
Fun fact, They Might Be Giants popularized it but didn't actually write it. It's actually a song from the 50s by The Four Lads
+2
Level 58
Sep 11, 2015
It's sad how many people don't know that the HMS Endeavour was Cook's ship. But then again, I live in Australia.
+2
Level 74
Nov 27, 2018
To be completely honest, I would have known that fact, but I had never heard of Bligh or his ship, and baselessly assumed that "Bligh" was a nautical term and therefore I had no chance whatsoever of getting the question correct.
+1
Level 74
Dec 9, 2018
Read Mutiny on the Bounty or watch the film sometime - I like the 1960s remake with Marlon Brando and Trevor Howard, but the old one with Clark Gable is great, too.
+2
Level 78
Jan 10, 2021
My favorite is the least-known 1984 version, with Anthony Hopkins and Mel Gibson.
+2
Level 66
Dec 9, 2018
There is a quiz on here somewhere about who captains the ship. There's quite a few.
+1
Level 45
Dec 10, 2018
I don't know why, but I first thought of Woodes Rogers for the Endeavour. But now I have no idea whether or not he actually captained a ship of that name. Why did I think of him ?
+1
Level 40
Jan 24, 2019
Assassin's Creed - the pirate version?
+1
Level 71
Apr 22, 2021
I only got that because I watched a video about Captain Cook a few days ago!
+1
Level 55
Dec 18, 2015
doge was also used instead of duce
+1
Level 66
Dec 9, 2018
I always heard el duce. Finally put in duce.
+11
Level 62
Dec 9, 2018
Doge is a different term that refers to Medieval and Renaissance rulers of various Italian city-states, most notably Venice.
+6
Level 78
Jan 10, 2021
And 'el' is used in Spanish, while 'il' is correct in Italian.
+4
Level 61
Jan 28, 2016
Why in God's name are you comparing Shakespeare to Thatcher? Because they're British? Give the man a break.
+19
Level 90
Jan 28, 2016
Shakespeare is not being compared to Thatcher, they just both happen to have nicknames.
+3
Level 61
Jan 29, 2016
Bard just mean poet. For it to be Shakespeare's nickname it would have to be 'bard of Avon'.
+7
Level 60
Feb 3, 2016
He's commonly known as "The Bard" which is what the quiz is asking for. This isn't complicated.
+20
Level ∞
Jan 5, 2021
As a person who studies fallacies, can I just mention how much I absolutely loath this argument?

Here's an example.

Politician #1: "Martin Luther King had a dream that one day people wouldn't be judged by their race. I'd like to help make that dream a reality."

Politician #2: "I can't believe my opponent is comparing himself to Martin Luther King."

It doesn't take a genius level IQ to realize that politician #2 is being a dishonest jerk by employing a strawman argument. I hereby call this particular variant the "comparison strawman". Once you see it, you'll see it everywhere.

+2
Level 75
Jan 5, 2021
Sure, twained was being a twit, but the best analogies do have a tighter connection between the two imo.

e.g. "Mutti" is to Merkel as "Iron Lady" is to ______

+2
Level 82
Jan 8, 2021
Thatcher was a very polarising and controversial neoliberal and authoritarian right-wing politician, while Shakespeare is often regarded as the world's most important playwright. To link the two just because they have a nickname and are from England is, to me, strange and anachronistic. So I agree with Alex Thirkell. Besides, ding dong the witch is dead!
+1
Level 69
Apr 22, 2021
Shakespeare the "world's most important playwright"... Good grief! England is not the world, and not the whole world speaks English!
+8
Level 78
Apr 22, 2021
@gandalf: Shakespeare is the most widely performed dramatist of all time and the one most often adapted to film (by some of the greatest directors including Kurosawa, Welles, and Zeffirelli). It is hard to find a noteworthy author who does not praise him. Goethe would agree enthusiastically that Shakespeare is not only the most important playwright, but author in general (and perhaps one of the most important thinkers even); German literature from at least as early as Sturm and Drang is inconceivable without Shakespeare. Marx and Freud cite him, feminists still refer back to him. Numerous quotes from his plays now exist as idioms in foreign languages, a feat that was not achieved by fellow greats such as Molière, Chekhov and Ibsen. Native english speakers sometimes overstate the total significance of some of their authors (as everyone else), but in this case they are dead right. Also note that the user wrote "is often regarded as...", which no one in their right mind can argue against.
+2
Level 69
Apr 22, 2021
I'm not saying that Shakespeare isn't an important author. I just think that it's weird to consider that there is such a thing as a single most important author. That's like saying that there is a "best painting".

Shakespeare has become iconic, as a shorthand for literature, in the same way the Mona Lisa has become a shorthand for painting.

There is no Shakespeare without countless others before him. The plot for Romeo and Juliet he (brilliantly) adapted from Ovid. The use of blank verse he got from Marlowe. Theater was invented by Greeks.

That's not knocking Shakespeare in any way: every author is influenced by other, borrows, adapts, makes his own, and, if he's good, adds to it and inspires others in turn.

+3
Level 69
Apr 22, 2021
It also seems like a rather ethnocentric view. How significant is Shakespeare really to Chinese literature? To Japanese literature? To any of the African literatures?
+2
Level 69
Apr 22, 2021
Anyway, my point it: Thatcher was awful. May she rot in hell.
+2
Level 78
Apr 22, 2021
But hardly anyone outside of China (perhaps except for a few neighboring countries) will name a Chinese playwright as the most important one. The thing about Shakespeare is that he is considered extremely important outside of the territory of his mother tongue, more so than any other playwright. That doesn't necessarily mean that he is the best or that there can be an objective best. And again, vomitingdiamonds' statement was not that absolute anyway.

As for Thatcher, our views on her really have nothing to do with whether she should be in this quiz.

+2
Level 69
Apr 23, 2021
I didn't object to the question at all!

As for Shakespeare, the fact that many people might say something does not make it true. His perceived uniqueness today has probably more to do with Hollywood hegemony than with what he actually wrote. I'm willing to bet that there's a higher percentage of people who think he's the "most important of all time" among those who haven't read a single line he wrote than among those who did.

As for other cultures. Are you sure that the Italians would agree that Shakespeare is more important than Dante? That the French would agree he's more important than Molière or Hugo? That the Germans would put him above Goethe or Schiller? That the Greeks would put him above Homer? That the Russians value him above Tolstoi or Dostoievsky? Those are just some cultures I happen to know about.

I think the whole idea of "ranking" authors according to significance is flawed, and has some unpalatable undertones of colonialism to it (not that you meant it that way).

+1
Level 59
Jul 15, 2023
Dante is, in fact, more important than Shakespeare. Dante's Comedy represents the entire european medieval culture and has had a huge influence on the entirety of european literature
+3
Level 78
Apr 23, 2021
Does important mean objectively influential, or perceived as such, and is there even a clear difference? What you say about people who haven't even read his lines might be true but I would bet that his works are also the most discussed in uni lectures. What I meant was that Shakespeare is considered the most important playwright in most countries outside of their own national treasures. Although I think that he'd stand a good chance to trump Schiller and even Goethe in the perception of many Germans. And to be true to the argument, Hugo, Tolstoi and Dostoyevsky were not playwrights. :) But yeah, of course I agree that Shakespeare's... importance, or popularity, or whatever you may call it, owes much to cultural colonialism. And that definite, objective rankings of such things as best playwrights are impossible to achieve. And vomitingdiamonds didn't write a treatise pompously claiming any such thing. It was a passing remark that means as much as 'an important author'.
+1
Level 78
Apr 23, 2021
Self-correction: Tolstoy and Hugo did also write plays. However, those didn't contribute much to their status as national poets, at least as far as I know.
+1
Level 69
Apr 23, 2021
Hugo's plays were actually pretty influential - one in particular, Hernani, sparked a huge debate still known as the "Bataille d'Hernani", and is considered the epitome of the literary opposition between classics and modernists in France, but that's beside the point.

I think we more or less agree on a lot of points. In any case, it's been very interesting!

I will fully admit that I don't so much object to Shakespeare than to this idea that whole fields of art can be reduced to just one icon that is both the epitome and embodiement of the whole field, as if they could have existed without everyone else before and after them. The reduction of art to icons, where "Shakespeare" is often used as a shorthand for all literature, just as the Mona Lisa is used to signify "all art".

Neither you nor vomitingdiamonds have done this - but I've seen it often enough that I sometimes react to people who aren't even there ;-).

+1
Level 80
Sep 4, 2021
And yet Thatcher is consistently voted and ranked as the greatest and most successful British prime minister since the Second World War. Hmm...
+2
Level 64
Sep 4, 2021
If you're going to get on your high horse, mester Quizmaster, please at least correct the answer slot, which should read "Iron Lady" is * to*
+3
Level 72
Dec 14, 2021
@AlexThirkell :

I disagree, and it points out (in addition to what @Quizmaster has pointed out), why @twained complaint is so invalid.

There is no necessary or even desirable relationship between the sources of each limb of an analogy of this kind. What is being compared are the relationships, not each individual member. Shakespeare : The Bard :: New York City : The Big Apple is a totally valid analogy, because the puzzle being solved is really identifying the mapping between Shakespeare and The Bard, and calculating the same mapping for New York City. The relationship between Shakespeare and New York City matters not at all.

In fact, in my opinion, having dissimilar sources or dissimilar targets sometimes makes for a more entertaining analogy, because more wit is required to apply the mapping.

+1
Level 75
Mar 16, 2023
I personally find the closer analogies more satisfying. The further away they are the more ambiguous they become and it gets frustrating (for me). QM seems to go along with that, since the Shakespeare/Thatcher one contains probably the biggest difference between the members of each analogy in this quiz, and it's not even that huge of a difference - they're both influential historical British figures after all.

It's all IMO, and I can totally understand someone preferring to navigate a series of more stretched or varied analogies.

+1
Level 66
Jan 28, 2016
Missed Netherlands, kept thinking Spain.
+1
Level 43
Jan 28, 2016
why isn't zedong accepted for 'mao'?
+13
Level 92
Jan 29, 2016
The same reason that John isn't accepted for Kennedy. Zedong is his first name.
+5
Level 79
Apr 22, 2021
Probably better to say that Zedong is his given name since it doesn't actually come first.
+2
Level 39
Apr 23, 2021
I though Mao was his first name.
+1
Level 68
Oct 30, 2024
In China people generally put their family name/surname first and their given name second. So his "first" name is really Zedong.
+1
Level 40
Jun 23, 2016
"Mao" is accepted, but "Zedong" is not. Why?
+13
Level 58
Dec 23, 2016
See the answer immediately above.
+1
Level 56
Jun 27, 2016
loved this quiz
+1
Level 83
Aug 11, 2016
I couldn't stop typing "Window" for "Windsor" for some reason.
+7
Level 88
Jan 5, 2021
Maybe you're running Microsoft Windsors 10.
+7
Level 74
Oct 13, 2017
Nixon is to Johnson . . . well, Nixon was Ike's VP and Johnson was JFK's VP, so couldn't the answer be Eisenhower is to Kennedy?
+3
Level 78
Mar 21, 2018
I mean, if you think of Nixon and Johnson as Vice Presidents before you think of them as Presidents....
+5
Level 89
Mar 21, 2018
I had the same thought as Pitzikat. It made sense because it compares administration to administration--VP to VP, President to President. I eventually got to Truman but that's only after I retyped Kennedy a few times.
+2
Level 78
Dec 9, 2018
Again, that requires you to think of Nixon and Johnson as VPs before you think of them as Presidents, which just seems odd.
+1
Level 57
Mar 16, 2023
Well, if they both were VPs before they were Presidents, it's not that odd..?
+1
Level 74
Mar 16, 2023
It kind of is, though. Tons of presidents were VPs first. They also were both senators before they were VPs, as was Kennedy actually. Usually, though, we start with the biggest office and work our way down, not the reverse.

But the main issue with this line of reasoning is that it fails to understand how the basic analogy works, as Rob pointed out already.

+1
Level 73
Mar 26, 2021
I also thought of this first.
+1
Level 78
Apr 22, 2021
Not to jump back on this three years later, but that's also not how analogies work. In an analogy "A is to B as C is to D," then A has to have the same relationship to B as C has to D. In order for the answer to be "Kennedy," the analogy would have to be "Nixon was the VP before Johnson, like Eisenhower was the President before Kennedy," which are two different relationships.
+1
Level 51
Oct 30, 2017
Aced it with 3:20 remaining. Great quiz.
+1
Level 45
Dec 10, 2018
Dammit, spelt Duce as Deuce
+2
Level 43
Mar 22, 2020
Stupid Chinese naming customs
+4
Level 73
Mar 26, 2021
I don't see any way in which the Chinese custom is better or worse than the "Western" custom.
+2
Level 53
Aug 19, 2020
I missed my own name...
+3
Level 69
Jan 5, 2021
A hot air balloon is known as "une montgolfière" in French.
+1
Level 73
Mar 26, 2021
I wonder why this quiz was reset.
+1
Level 81
Apr 22, 2021
looks like the whole series was so I assume there was some shuffling and reorganizing of answers. Maybe some were moved around from quiz to quiz.
+1
Level 66
Apr 22, 2021
God bless Prince Philip. RIP
+2
Level 77
Apr 22, 2021
shakespeare-thatcher one is missing a ‘to’
+4
Level 60
Nov 22, 2022
Not sure if the mythology question is where the gods live - since Zeus lived in Olympus, but Odin definitely did not live in Valhalla, or if it just a place in that given mythology.
+4
Level 52
Mar 2, 2023
Came here to say the same thing.

Odin would be to Asgard as Zeus to Olympus.

Elysian Fields are the equivalent to Valhalla.

+2
Level 52
Mar 2, 2023
Really, comparing slavery to prohibition? I really think that is an AWFUL analogy. You could talk about 13th amendment and 18th amendment, but the way it is...
+4
Level 75
Mar 16, 2023
Chalk is to white as cheese is to yellow.

Really, comparing chalk to cheese is awful. They are the complete opposite!

+3
Level 65
Mar 16, 2023
Abolition = making slavery illegal

Prohibition = making alcohol illegal

Here is the analogy

+1
Level 46
Mar 16, 2023
please accept alchohol as an answer for alcohol
+2
Level 65
Mar 17, 2023
Please accept C2H6O and CH3CH2OH