History for grades 3–4: questions with answers

The History questions for grades 3–4 from the game, with the correct answers and an explanation for each.

1. Who was the first President of the United States?

   • George Washington
   • Thomas Jefferson
   • Abraham Lincoln
   • John Adams

   Correct answer: George Washington — Washington took office in 1789 and refused a third term, setting a precedent that lasted until Franklin D. Roosevelt.

2. Who was Britain's prime minister for most of the Second World War?

   • Winston Churchill
   • Neville Chamberlain
   • Clement Attlee
   • Harold Macmillan

   Correct answer: Winston Churchill — Churchill led Britain from 1940 to 1945 and again from 1951 to 1955; he also won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953.

3. Which ancient Greek city-state is known as the birthplace of democracy?

   • Sparta
   • Corinth
   • Athens
   • Thebes

   Correct answer: Athens — Around 508 BC Athens let its citizens vote directly on laws — though women, slaves and foreigners were excluded.

4. Who led the Soviet Union during the Second World War?

   • Lenin
   • Stalin
   • Khrushchev
   • Gorbachev

   Correct answer: Stalin — Stalin ruled from the late 1920s until his death in 1953. The Soviet Union lost more people in the war than any other country.

5. Which civilisation built Machu Picchu?

   • Aztec
   • Maya
   • Inca
   • Olmec

   Correct answer: Inca — Machu Picchu was built in the 15th century high in the Peruvian Andes and brought to world attention in 1911.

6. The Cold War was mainly a rivalry between the United States and which country?

   • China
   • Japan
   • Germany
   • the Soviet Union

   Correct answer: the Soviet Union — The Cold War ran from about 1947 to 1991, when the Soviet Union dissolved. The two sides never fought each other directly.

7. In which country did the Industrial Revolution begin?

   • Britain
   • France
   • Germany
   • the United States

   Correct answer: Britain — It began in Britain in the late 18th century with steam engines and textile mills, then spread to Europe and America.

8. Which pharaoh's tomb was found almost intact in 1922?

   • Khufu
   • Ramesses II
   • Akhenaten
   • Tutankhamun

   Correct answer: Tutankhamun — Howard Carter found the tomb in the Valley of the Kings. Tutankhamun became pharaoh as a boy and died at about 19.

9. The Vikings came from which region?

   • Iberia
   • the Balkans
   • Scandinavia
   • the Caucasus

   Correct answer: Scandinavia — Between the 8th and 11th centuries Vikings from Denmark, Norway and Sweden raided, traded and settled from Russia to North America.

10. The atomic bombs of 1945 were dropped on Hiroshima and which other city?

    • Tokyo
    • Kyoto
    • Nagasaki
    • Osaka

    Correct answer: Nagasaki — The bombs fell on 6 and 9 August 1945. Japan surrendered days later, ending the Second World War.

11. Who was the first human to travel into space?

    • Yuri Gagarin
    • Alan Shepard
    • John Glenn
    • Neil Armstrong

    Correct answer: Yuri Gagarin — Gagarin orbited the Earth once on 12 April 1961 aboard Vostok 1 — a flight of 108 minutes.

12. Which country was ruled by tsars until 1917?

    • Austria
    • Prussia
    • Russia
    • the Ottoman Empire

    Correct answer: Russia — The last tsar, Nicholas II, abdicated in 1917 after the February Revolution; the Romanov dynasty had ruled since 1613.

13. In which country did the Renaissance begin?

    • France
    • Italy
    • Spain
    • the Netherlands

    Correct answer: Italy — The Renaissance began in Florence in the 14th century, funded largely by the Medici family, and spread across Europe.

14. Genghis Khan founded which empire?

    • Persian
    • Mongol
    • Ottoman
    • Mughal

    Correct answer: Mongol — Genghis Khan united the Mongol tribes in 1206; by his death in 1227 his empire stretched from the Pacific to the Caspian Sea.

15. Simón Bolívar liberated much of which continent from Spanish rule?

    • Africa
    • Asia
    • North America
    • South America

    Correct answer: South America — Bolívar helped free Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia — the last one is named after him.

16. Which country gave the Statue of Liberty to the United States?

    • Britain
    • France
    • Spain
    • Italy

    Correct answer: France — The statue was a gift for the centenary of American independence and was unveiled in New York in 1886.

17. Which US president was assassinated in Dallas in 1963?

    • Abraham Lincoln
    • Martin Luther King Jr.
    • John F. Kennedy
    • Robert Kennedy

    Correct answer: John F. Kennedy — Kennedy was shot on 22 November 1963 while riding in an open car. Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested the same day.

18. The samurai were the warrior class of which country?

    • China
    • Korea
    • Mongolia
    • Japan

    Correct answer: Japan — Samurai served Japan's feudal lords for centuries; their class was abolished in the 1870s during the Meiji reforms.

19. Which Roman city was buried by the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79?

    • Pompeii
    • Naples
    • Rome
    • Carthage

    Correct answer: Pompeii — Ash buried Pompeii and preserved it; excavations since the 18th century show streets, houses and even bread in ovens.

20. Which British monarch reigned for 70 years until 2022?

    • Victoria
    • Elizabeth I
    • Anne
    • Elizabeth II

    Correct answer: Elizabeth II — Elizabeth II reigned from 1952 to 2022 — the longest reign of any British monarch.

21. Which country launched the first artificial satellite, in 1957?

    • Soviet Union
    • United States
    • Germany
    • Japan

    Correct answer: Soviet Union — Sputnik 1 was a metal sphere that only beeped, but the beeps could be heard worldwide and started the space race.

22. Who made the first powered airplane flight, in 1903?

    • Louis Bleriot
    • The Wright brothers
    • Charles Lindbergh
    • Otto Lilienthal

    Correct answer: The Wright brothers — Their first hop at Kitty Hawk lasted twelve seconds and covered less ground than a modern airliner's wingspan.

23. In which century did the Black Death sweep across Europe?

    • 12th
    • 13th
    • 14th
    • 15th

    Correct answer: 14th — The plague arrived in 1347 on ships from the Black Sea and killed perhaps a third of Europe within a few years.

24. Which country fought alongside South Vietnam against the North?

    • China
    • France
    • United States
    • Australia

    Correct answer: United States — US combat troops arrived in 1965 and left in 1973; Saigon fell to the North two years later.

25. What was South Africa's system of racial segregation called?

    • Apartheid
    • Partition
    • Segregation
    • Reservation

    Correct answer: Apartheid — Written into law in 1948, it separated people by race in housing, schools and marriage until the early 1990s.

26. Which empire did Alexander the Great conquer?

    • The Roman Empire
    • The Persian Empire
    • The Egyptian Empire
    • The Mauryan Empire

    Correct answer: The Persian Empire — In under a decade he took the whole Achaemenid realm, from Asia Minor to the edge of India.

27. The trenches of the Western Front were dug in which war?

    • The Crimean War
    • The Franco-Prussian War
    • The First World War
    • The Second World War

    Correct answer: The First World War — From 1914 the front froze into two trench lines running from the North Sea to Switzerland, barely moving for years.

28. In which country was Christopher Columbus born?

    • Italy
    • Spain
    • Portugal
    • Greece

    Correct answer: Italy — He came from Genoa and spent years in Portugal before Spain agreed to pay for his voyage west.

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