100 Fun Facts About World History

Machu Picchu, built around 1450 likely for the emperor Pachacuti, was the work of which civilization?

The Inca built Machu Picchu around 1450, probably as an estate for the emperor Pachacuti; it sits at about 2,430 metres and was abandoned at the time of the Spanish conquest.

The Rosetta Stone carried its text in how many scripts?

The three inscriptions are Egyptian hieroglyphs, Egyptian Demotic and Ancient Greek, all carrying the same 196 BC decree for Ptolemy V, which is why the Greek could unlock the others.

What was the primary purpose of the Roman aqueducts?

Transporting water was the job: by the 3rd century AD eleven aqueducts brought water into Rome from outside, filling public baths, fountains and private homes. The Pont du Gard survives.

Which Greek city-state is often called the birthplace of democracy?

Athens is the answer: Cleisthenes introduced its democratic reforms in 508 BC, and under Pericles the city built the Parthenon and led the Delian League as the dominant naval power of Greece.

The Great Wall of China was primarily built to defend against invasions from which direction?

The Great Wall was built along China's northern border to defend against nomadic groups from the Eurasian Steppe, particularly the Xiongnu, Mongols, and other northern peoples. Construction began as early as the 7th century BC, with the most well-known sections built during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).

What ancient writing system used wedge-shaped marks pressed into clay tablets?

Cuneiform was developed by the Sumerians in Mesopotamia around 3400 BC and is one of the earliest known writing systems. The name comes from the Latin 'cuneus' meaning 'wedge,' describing the distinctive marks made by a reed stylus pressed into wet clay tablets.

Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC on a date the Roman calendar knew by what name?

The Ides of March, 15 March 44 BC: senators led by Brutus and Cassius stabbed Caesar at the Theatre of Pompey, three days before he was due to leave for a Parthian campaign.

Cyrus the Great, who took Babylon in 539 BC, founded which Persian dynasty's realm?

Achaemenid: Cyrus founded the Achaemenid Empire around 550 BC. The Cyrus Cylinder from Babylon records his restoration of temples and return of exiles; the last Shah promoted it as a charter of human rights.

What volcanic eruption in 79 AD buried the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum?

Mount Vesuvius erupted on 24 August 79 AD (by the traditional date); ash and pyroclastic flows sealed Pompeii and Herculaneum so completely that their 18th-century rediscovery gave an unmatched snapshot of Roman daily life.

Which ancient civilization is credited with inventing the concept of zero as a number?

While several ancient civilizations used placeholder symbols, Indian mathematicians were the first to treat zero as a number in its own right. Brahmagupta, in 628 AD, wrote rules for arithmetic involving zero, which eventually spread to the Islamic world and then to Europe.

What name did Ferdinand von Richthofen popularise in 1877 for the network of Asian trade routes?

Silk Road: the geographer Ferdinand von Richthofen coined 'Seidenstraße' in 1877. It was never one highway but a web of routes that carried religions, technologies and diseases as well as goods across Eurasia.

Reaching Europe in 1347 and caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, which pandemic killed 30 to 60 percent of Europeans?

The Black Death killed 30 to 60 percent of Europe's population after arriving in 1347, and roughly a third of the Middle East's; the culprit was the bacterium Yersinia pestis.

Magna Carta, sealed at Runnymede in 1215, primarily limited the power of which English monarch?

King John sealed Magna Carta at Runnymede on 15 June 1215 under pressure from rebel barons; it set out that the king was subject to the law, a foundation of later constitutional government.

Which city was the capital of the Byzantine Empire for over a thousand years?

Constantinople: Constantine I refounded Byzantium as 'New Rome' in 330, and it remained the eastern capital until the Ottomans took it in 1453; today it is Istanbul.

Which weapon did the archers of Henry V's army carry at Agincourt in 1415?

The longbow: Henry fielded roughly 1,500 men-at-arms and 7,000 archers against a far larger French force, and legend says the French had threatened to cut two fingers off every archer's right hand.

Which Mongol leader created the largest contiguous land empire in history?

Genghis Khan (born Temujin around 1162) united the Mongol tribes and conquered vast territories from China to Eastern Europe. At its peak under his successors, the Mongol Empire covered about 24 million square kilometers, making it the largest contiguous land empire ever.

A century after its founder died in 632, which religion's rulers held Spain to Central Asia?

Islam reached from Spain to Central Asia within a hundred years of Muhammad's death, spread by the Rashidun and Umayyad Caliphates through conquest, trade and missionary work.

Taken by the First Crusade in 1099 and retaken by Saladin in 1187, which city were the Crusades chiefly fought to control?

Jerusalem changed hands three ways: stormed by the First Crusade in 1099, retaken by Saladin in 1187, then handed back by negotiation during the Sixth Crusade in 1229.

Mansa Musa's 1324 hajj reportedly depressed gold's value in Egypt. Which West African state did he rule?

Mansa Musa spent three months in Cairo handing out gold and is said to have built a mosque every Friday of the journey.

What 1517 document by Martin Luther is considered to have launched the Protestant Reformation?

The 95 Theses: Luther, a theology professor at Wittenberg, wrote them in 1517 against the sale of indulgences; the famous nailing to the church door is a later tradition rather than a documented event.

Commissioned by Pope Julius II, which Italian artist painted the Sistine Chapel ceiling between 1508 and 1512, standing on scaffolding?

Michelangelo painted the ceiling standing on scaffolding, not lying on his back as legend says; its Genesis scenes, commissioned by Pope Julius II, include the Creation of Adam.

Sailing west for Spain with the Niña, Pinta and Santa María, which explorer reached the Bahamas in October 1492?

Christopher Columbus believed he had reached Asia when he landed in the Bahamas on October 12, 1492; his four voyages opened the way for European colonization of the Americas.

The 1494 Treaty of Tordesillas divided newly discovered lands between which two powers?

Spain and Portugal: the line ran 370 leagues west of the Cape Verde islands, which is why Brazil, lying east of it, became Portuguese while most of the Americas went to Spain.

Which Johannes Gutenberg invention of around 1440 spread Renaissance ideas so fast that 20 million volumes existed within 50 years?

The printing press with movable type let Europe mass-produce books for the first time; Gutenberg's Bible of about 1455 showed it off, and within 50 years some 20 million volumes had been printed.

Which Ottoman sultan, aged just 21, ended the Byzantine Empire in 1453 by capturing its capital?

Mehmed II, born in 1432, took Constantinople on 29 May 1453 at age 21. He then styled himself caesar of Rome, a claim the Orthodox Patriarchate accepted but most European monarchs rejected.

The transatlantic slave trade primarily transported enslaved Africans to which region?

The Americas received most of the 12.5 million Africans forcibly transported across the Atlantic between the 16th and 19th centuries, above all the Caribbean, Brazil and North America.

Which philosopher wrote 'The Prince,' a political treatise on gaining and maintaining power, in 1513?

Niccolo Machiavelli drafted it in 1513 under the Latin title De Principatibus, but The Prince was not printed until 1532, five years after his death.

Which 19th-century imperial power was described as the one 'on which the sun never sets'?

Its territories were spread so widely around the globe that daylight always fell on at least one of them.

Leonardo da Vinci's 'Mona Lisa' is housed in which famous museum?

The Louvre in Paris has held the Mona Lisa since 1797; Vincenzo Peruggia stole it from there in 1911, a theft that made the painting far more famous than it had been before.

The Peace of Westphalia, two treaties signed in Osnabrück and Münster in 1648, ended which conflict?

The Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) had killed between 4.5 and 8 million people, making it the deadliest of Europe's wars of religion; Westphalia also recognised Dutch and Swiss independence.

Holding just seven prisoners, which Paris fortress was stormed on 14 July 1789 in the symbolic start of the French Revolution?

The Bastille held only seven prisoners when it fell on 14 July 1789, but as a symbol of royal tyranny its storming marked the Revolution's start; the date is now Bastille Day.

Which country did Napoleon invade in 1812, leading to a disastrous retreat that destroyed much of his army?

Russia: some 600,000 soldiers, only about half of them French, crossed the Niemen in June 1812; scorched earth, disease and the winter retreat from Moscow destroyed the Grande Armée and began Napoleon's downfall.

Whose separate condenser, patented in 1769, made the steam engine far more efficient?

James Watt patented the separate condenser in 1769, cutting the fuel a Newcomen-type engine burned by well over half; Boulton & Watt engines then powered mills and mines across Britain.

Which 1776 document by Thomas Jefferson announced the colonies' separation from Britain?

The Declaration of Independence was adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776; Jefferson wrote it with edits by Benjamin Franklin and John Adams, and its 'all men are created equal' endures.

The Haitian Revolution of 1791-1804 founded a state ruled by whom?

Former slaves: Toussaint Louverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines, both born enslaved, led the largest slave uprising since Spartacus; it defeated French, Spanish and British forces before independence on 1 January 1804.

What 1884-85 gathering hosted by Bismarck regulated European colonisation of Africa?

The Berlin Conference of 1884-85, organized by Otto von Bismarck, set rules for European colonization of Africa. No African leaders were invited; by 1914 only Ethiopia and Liberia remained independent.

Which event in 1914 is widely considered the immediate trigger for World War I?

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary by Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914, set off a chain of alliances and declarations of war that engulfed Europe. Within weeks, the complex alliance system turned a regional crisis into a global conflict.

What nickname was given to Article 231 of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles?

The War Guilt Clause: Article 231 made Germany accept responsibility for the Allies' war losses, the legal basis for reparations. The German delegation saw it as an insult, and resentment of it fed the politics of the 1920s and 1930s.

Which 1917 upheaval led to the creation of the world's first communist state?

The Russian Revolution of 1917 had two phases: the February Revolution toppled Tsar Nicholas II, and the October Revolution brought the Bolsheviks under Vladimir Lenin to power. This led to the creation of the Soviet Union in 1922, the world's first state governed by communist ideology.

By what name is General Dyer's April 1919 shooting of a Baisakhi crowd in Amritsar known?

The Jallianwala Bagh massacre: on 13 April 1919 Dyer's troops fired for about ten minutes on a crowd in the walled garden in Amritsar; the official count was 379 dead, Indian estimates ran to 1,000 or more.

What was the codename of the Allied campaign whose Normandy landings began on 6 June 1944?

Operation Overlord was the Normandy campaign; the landings themselves were Operation Neptune. Americans went ashore at Utah and Omaha, the British at Gold and Sword, and the Canadians at Juno.

The Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs were developed under what secret programme?

The Manhattan Project was a secret US programme that built the first nuclear weapons in WWII, led by J. Robert Oppenheimer and General Leslie Groves. The bombings of Hiroshima (August 6) and Nagasaki (August 9) led to Japan's surrender.

Roughly two-thirds of Europe's pre-war Jewish population, about how many Jews did Nazi Germany and its collaborators murder in the Holocaust?

Around six million Jews were murdered between 1941 and 1945, about two-thirds of Europe's pre-war Jewish population, with roughly half of the victims from Poland.

In which US state did Churchill deliver his 1946 'iron curtain' speech at a college?

Missouri: Churchill spoke at Westminster College in Fulton on 5 March 1946 with President Truman in the audience; he had first used 'iron curtain' in a telegram to Truman the previous May.

Which 13-day standoff of October 1962 ended with Kennedy's naval blockade and a Soviet withdrawal?

The Cuban Missile Crisis ended after 13 days when the Soviets agreed to remove the missiles in exchange for a US pledge not to invade Cuba, after Kennedy's naval blockade.

Built in 1961 to stop citizens fleeing west and opened on 9 November 1989, which barrier became the Cold War's defining symbol?

The Berlin Wall went up on 13 August 1961 to stop East Germans fleeing west, and its opening on 9 November 1989 became the defining image of the Cold War's end.

Mahatma Gandhi led the campaign for India's independence primarily through what method?

Nonviolent resistance, which Gandhi named satyagraha, was born at a mass meeting in Johannesburg in 1906, long before the Salt March of 1930 made it famous.

Which regime's leaders faced the Nuremberg Trials of 1945-46?

Nazi Germany: the tribunal held by France, the Soviet Union, the UK and the US tried 22 surviving Nazi leaders, sentenced twelve to death and established that 'following orders' is no defence.

Which country was divided at the 38th parallel after World War II, leading to a war from 1950 to 1953?

Korea was divided at the 38th parallel in 1945, the Soviets occupying the north and the US the south. North Korea's invasion in June 1950 began the Korean War, which ended in 1953 with an armistice, not a peace treaty.

Released in 1990 after 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela was elected the first Black president of which country in 1994?

Nelson Mandela went from 27 years as a prisoner of South Africa's apartheid regime to its first Black president in 1994, serving one term and negotiating apartheid's end.

Which Portuguese navigator first rounded the Cape of Good Hope in 1488?

Bartolomeu Dias rounded the Cape of Good Hope in 1488, proving that the Atlantic and Indian Oceans connect; King John II is said to have renamed his 'Cape of Storms'.

Which Greek philosopher founded the Peripatetic school, also known as the Lyceum?

Aristotle, a student of Plato and tutor to Alexander the Great, established the Lyceum in Athens, where he taught and developed his philosophical system, influencing Western thought for centuries.

In what year was the Roman Republic traditionally established, following the overthrow of the monarchy?

According to tradition, the Roman Republic was founded in 509 BCE after the last king of Rome, Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, was expelled, leading to the establishment of a new form of government.

Who defeated Harold Godwinson at the Battle of Hastings in 1066?

William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy, defeated Harold at Hastings on 14 October 1066, three weeks after Harold had beaten Harald Hardrada at Stamford Bridge; William was crowned on Christmas Day.

Which explorer led the first circumnavigation expedition, though he did not complete it himself?

Ferdinand Magellan led the expedition that sailed from Spain in 1519; he was killed at Mactan in the Philippines in 1521, and his ship Victoria completed the circumnavigation under Juan Sebastián Elcano in 1522.

Who became the first Roman emperor in 27 BC?

Augustus, born Gaius Octavius and adopted as Julius Caesar's heir, received the title from the Senate in 27 BC and ruled until his death in AD 14.

Which Mongol ruler completed the conquest of China and established the Yuan Dynasty in the 13th century?

Kublai proclaimed the Great Yuan in 1271, and by 1279 his forces had crushed the last Song resistance, making him the first non-Han ruler of all of China.

Which Central Asian conqueror made Samarkand his capital and died in 1405 marching on China?

Tamerlane (Timur) ruled from Samarkand from 1370 until his death at Otrar in 1405 on the way to invade Ming China, having marched across Central Asia, Persia and into India, where he sacked Delhi in 1398.

Which ancient figure is traditionally credited with unifying Upper and Lower Egypt?

Narmer is widely considered to be the first pharaoh who unified Upper and Lower Egypt, laying the foundation for one of the longest-lasting civilizations in history. Some scholars identify him with the legendary Menes.

In what year is the traditional date for the deposition of the last Western Roman Emperor?

The year 476 CE is traditionally recognized as the end of the Western Roman Empire, marked by the Germanic general Odoacer deposing Emperor Romulus Augustulus. The Eastern Roman Empire, however, continued for many centuries.

What post-WWII American initiative funded Western European reconstruction?

The Marshall Plan, officially known as the European Recovery Program, was a U.S.-sponsored initiative launched in 1948 to help rebuild war-torn Western European economies and counter the spread of communism.

The Meiji Restoration of 1868 restored imperial rule in Japan after the collapse of which shogunate?

The Tokugawa shogunate, founded by Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1603, fell in 1868; its troubles were compounded by foreign pressure, notably Commodore Perry's expedition sent by US president Millard Fillmore.

Which Egyptian leader's nationalisation of the Suez Canal triggered the tripartite invasion of 1956?

Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalised the canal on 26 July 1956; Britain, France and Israel invaded in late October but withdrew under pressure from the US, the USSR and the UN, and the canal reopened in spring 1957.

Hong Xiuquan, leader of China's Taiping Rebellion, claimed to be whom?

Hong Xiuquan claimed to be the younger brother of Jesus after visions in 1837; his Taiping civil war against the Qing in 1850-64 killed an estimated 20 to 30 million people.

Who led the Frankish forces that defeated an Umayyad army at the Battle of Tours in 732?

Charles Martel, mayor of the palace and grandfather of Charlemagne, won at Tours in October 732; historians such as Edward Gibbon credited the victory with curbing the spread of Islam into Western Europe.

The Mauryan emperor Ashoka turned toward Buddhism after the brutal conquest of which region around 260 BCE?

Kalinga, on India's east coast, fell to Ashoka around 261 BCE; his own edicts say the slaughter turned him to Buddhism, and they went on to promote 'dhamma' from his capital at Pataliputra.

Great Zimbabwe, Southern Africa's largest precolonial stone city, was built by ancestors of which people?

Ancestors of the Shona built Great Zimbabwe; its mortarless granite walls rose from the 11th century and the city flourished as a gold-trading capital until about 1450, when it was abandoned.

Which statesman chaired the Congress of Vienna in 1814-15?

Metternich, Austria's foreign minister, presided over the Congress of Vienna, which rebalanced Europe's powers after Napoleon's fall and set out to suppress revolutionary and liberal movements.

Which other power joined Britain in waging the Second Opium War against China from 1856 to 1860?

France joined Britain in the Second Opium War, which ended in 1860 with China forced to legalise opium; the First Opium War had been fought by Britain alone from 1839 to 1842.

Srivijaya, a Malay maritime empire of the 7th to 11th centuries, was based on which island?

Sumatra: Srivijaya was centred on Palembang in the island's south-east, and it was the first polity to dominate much of western Maritime Southeast Asia on the strength of the Malacca Strait trade.

Hammurabi, whose law code survives on a basalt stele, was the sixth king of which city?

Babylon: Hammurabi reigned there from about 1792 to 1750 BC. The stele was dug up at Susa in Iran in 1901, where an Elamite king had carried it off as loot, and it now stands in Paris.

The Holy League's 1571 naval victory at Lepanto crushed which empire's fleet?

The Ottoman fleet lost well over 100 galleys at Lepanto on 7 October 1571; Miguel de Cervantes fought there and lost the use of his left hand, later calling it the greatest occasion the centuries had seen.

In what year did farmers digging a well near Xi'an uncover the Terracotta Army?

In March 1974 farmers drilling for a well struck the pits; the figures guard the tomb of Qin Shi Huang, China's first emperor, and no two soldiers' faces are thought to be identical.

Which king led the relief army that broke the 1683 siege of Vienna?

John III Sobieski of Poland led the relief army on 12 September 1683; his winged hussars' charge down the Kahlenberg is often cited as one of the largest cavalry charges in history.

In which French city was Joan of Arc tried for heresy and burned at the stake in 1431?

Rouen, then held by the English, saw Joan burned on 30 May 1431; a retrial ordered by Charles VII annulled her conviction in 1456, and she was canonised in 1920.

Menelik II's 1896 victory at Adwa kept which African state free from Italian rule?

Ethiopia: Menelik II's victory at Adwa on 1 March 1896 toppled the Italian government of Francesco Crispi and left Ethiopia one of only two African states never colonised in the Scramble.

The tea dumped into Boston Harbor in 1773 was the cargo of which firm?

The East India Company's tea, 342 chests of it, was destroyed on 16 December 1773; Britain answered with the Coercive Acts, which closed the port and pushed the colonies toward war.

The 1900 Boxer Rebellion in China was crushed by an alliance of how many foreign nations?

Eight: the Eight-Nation Alliance of American, Austro-Hungarian, British, French, German, Italian, Japanese and Russian troops lifted the 55-day siege of Beijing's legations on 14 August 1900.

The 1842 Treaty of Nanking, ending the First Opium War, ceded which island to Britain?

Hong Kong Island was ceded in perpetuity in 1842; it returned to China only on 1 July 1997 along with Kowloon and the leased New Territories.

The 1947 India–Pakistan partition line is named after which British lawyer who drew it?

Cyril Radcliffe had never been to India before, had about five weeks in 1947 to divide 88 million people, and reportedly refused his fee after the Radcliffe Line was published.

Admiral Zheng He's treasure-fleet voyages of 1405–33 sailed under which Chinese dynasty?

The Ming: Zheng He sailed for the Yongle Emperor and his successors. Born Ma He to a Muslim family in Yunnan, he was captured as a boy, castrated and rose to command fleets that reached East Africa.

Which Byzantine emperor built the present Hagia Sophia in Constantinople between 532 and 537?

Justinian I commissioned it after the Nika riots of 532; its designers were Anthemius of Tralles and Isidore of Miletus, and its dome covered the world's largest cathedral interior for nearly a thousand years.

Robert Clive's 1757 victory at Plassey secured British control over which Indian region?

Bengal: Clive had bribed the Nawab Siraj ud-Daulah's commander Mir Jafar to hold back his troops at Plassey, so much of the Bengal army never fought, and Mir Jafar was installed as a puppet Nawab.

In which year did the Suez Canal officially open to shipping?

The canal opened on 17 November 1869 after ten years of construction under French control; Britain bought Egypt's shares in 1875 and Egypt nationalised the canal in 1956.

After Waterloo, Napoleon was exiled to which remote island in the South Atlantic?

Saint Helena: Napoleon arrived in October 1815 and died there in May 1821 aged 51; his earlier exile to Elba had lasted under a year before he escaped for the Hundred Days.

Tenochtitlan, reached by Hernán Cortés in 1519, was the capital of which empire?

The Aztec capital, founded in 1325 on an island in Lake Texcoco, was linked to the shore by causeways; it fell to Cortés in 1521, and Mexico City now sits on top of it.

Francisco Pizarro ambushed and seized the Inca ruler Atahualpa in 1532 at which town?

Cajamarca, 16 November 1532: Atahualpa then offered a room filled once with gold and twice with silver for his freedom; the Spanish took the ransom and executed him anyway in July 1533.

Commodore Perry's 1854 Convention of Kanagawa opened which two Japanese ports to US ships?

Shimoda and Hakodate were opened for supplies and shelter, ending over 200 years of sakoku seclusion; Britain, Russia and France extracted similar treaties within four years.

Which Spanish king sent the Armada against Elizabeth I's England in 1588?

Philip II's fleet was commanded by the Duke of Medina Sidonia, who had no naval experience; Atlantic storms on the voyage home round Scotland and Ireland wrecked more ships than English guns did.

The 1916 Easter Rising against British rule was centred on which city?

Dublin: Patrick Pearse read the Proclamation of the Republic outside the General Post Office on 24 April 1916; the execution of 16 leaders swung public opinion behind the rebels.

The Berlin Airlift, which ended in September 1949, kept West Berlin supplied for how long?

Fifteen months: the airlift ran from 26 June 1948 to 30 September 1949, four months after the Soviets lifted the blockade in May; at its peak a plane landed roughly every minute, and pilots dropped candy on tiny parachutes.

Angkor Wat, built as a Hindu temple to Vishnu, was commissioned by which Khmer king?

Suryavarman II built Angkor Wat in the first half of the 12th century; unusually for a Khmer temple it faces west, which is why many scholars think it was meant as his mausoleum.

At Gaugamela in 331 BC, Alexander the Great routed which Persian king?

Darius III fled east after Gaugamela and was murdered by his own satrap Bessus in 330 BC, ending the Achaemenid line; Alexander gave him a royal burial.

The Third Punic War ended in 146 BC with Rome destroying which rival city?

Carthage: the Romans under Scipio Aemilianus razed the city and sold the roughly 50,000 survivors into slavery; the story that they salted the earth is a modern invention.

A 793 Viking raid on which Northumbrian monastery is often taken as the start of the Viking Age?

Lindisfarne, or Holy Island, was sacked on 8 June 793; the monks later fled with St Cuthbert's coffin, wandering for years before settling at what became Durham.

The Congo Free State (1885–1908) was the personal property of which European monarch?

Leopold II of Belgium ran the Congo Free State as a private venture; rubber quotas enforced by hand-chopping caused international outrage, and in 1908 the Belgian parliament took the colony away from him.

Which tsar founded Saint Petersburg in 1703 on land seized from Sweden?

Peter the Great named the city after the apostle Saint Peter, not himself, and moved the capital there from Moscow in 1712; the land had been taken from Sweden in the Great Northern War.

The Hanseatic League grew out of which north German port, rebuilt by Henry the Lion in 1159?

Lübeck, the league's 'Queen of the Hansa', hosted its diets; at its peak the Hanseatic League spanned nearly 200 settlements in eight modern countries, from Estonia to the Netherlands.

Tsar Nicholas II and his family were executed by Bolsheviks in July 1918 in which city?

Yekaterinburg: the family had been held in the Ipatiev House there and were shot on 17 July 1918; the remains were only identified by DNA tests in the 1990s and 2000s.

The city where the 1942–43 Battle of Stalingrad was fought was renamed what in 1961?

Volgograd: Germany's 6th Army surrendered there on 2 February 1943, the first of Hitler's field armies to capitulate, and Stalingrad was renamed Volgograd in 1961 during de-Stalinisation.