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60 free Geneva trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Geneva trivia quiz covers Switzerland's second city from every angle: the Rhône leaving Lake Geneva, the Jet d'Eau, Mont Salève and the Pierres du Niton, plus the international city of the Palace of Nations, the Red Cross, the Geneva Conventions and CERN, where the World Wide Web was born. It also digs into the city's history — Caesar's Genava, John Calvin's Protestant Rome, the burning of Servetus, the 1602 Escalade and Mère Royaume's soup cauldron, the assassination of Empress Sisi on the quayside and the ghost-story summer that produced Frankenstein — along with watchmaking, commodity trading, Servette FC and Genève-Servette HC. Questions run from easy to expert with the difficulty shown on each one. Every answer has been checked against a primary reference and each question carries its citation.
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Q 01Which river flows out of Lake Geneva at the city of Geneva?
Rhône
The river then heads through France to the Mediterranean, having started at a glacier near the Grimsel Pass.
Q 02Which language is official in both the city and canton of Geneva?
French
Geneva is the largest city of Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland; in 2000 about 72% of residents spoke French as a first language.
Q 03Where does Geneva rank among Swiss cities by population?
Second
Only Zurich is larger; the city proper had about 204,000 residents in 2021 within just 16 square kilometres.
Q 04Which nickname reflects Geneva's role as a global centre for diplomacy?
Peace Capital
It hosts more international organisations than any other city in the world.
Q 05Which international body did Geneva host after World War I?
The League of Nations
Its old headquarters, the Palais Wilson, still stands on the lakeshore just downhill from the later Palace of Nations.
Q 06In which year did Geneva join the Swiss Confederation?
1815
Geneva had just recovered its independence from France at the end of the Napoleonic Wars when it joined on 19 May.
Q 07Which Roman leader's Latin texts spelled the city's name Genava?
Julius Caesar
The name likely comes from a Celtic root meaning mouth or estuary, an origin it shares with the Italian port of Genoa.
Q 08In which year did the Roman Republic take the Allobrogian border town of Geneva?
121 BC
It was fortified against the Helvetii tribe and became Christian under the Late Roman Empire, acquiring its first bishop in the 5th century.
Q 09Which Protestant reformer became Geneva's spiritual leader in 1541?
John Calvin
His rule turned the city into a so-called Protestant Rome and a haven for Reformed refugees from across Europe.
Q 10Which reformer persuaded Calvin to stay in Geneva in 1536?
William Farel
He is one of the four central figures on the Reformation Wall, alongside Calvin, Beza and Knox.
Q 11Which Spanish nontrinitarian was burned at the stake in Geneva in 1553?
Michael Servetus
He had been condemned by Catholics and Protestants alike; Calvin denounced him and possibly contributed to the sentence.
Q 12Where did Calvin and Geneva's Reformed preachers deliver their sermons?
St. Pierre Cathedral
The Reformation Wall, Collège Calvin and the old Town Hall all sit within a short walk of it in the old city.
Q 13What is Geneva's Latin motto?
Post Tenebras Lux
Meaning 'after darkness, light', it comes from the Vulgate version of Job and was adopted by the wider Reformation.
Q 21What was the original purpose of the first Jet d'Eau, built in 1886?
A safety valve for a power network
It reached only about 30 metres and stood downstream at the Usine de la Coulouvrenière before being moved to the lake in 1891.
Q 22Which 1960s British TV series featured the Jet d'Eau in its title sequence?
The Champions
The show's agents worked for a fictional Geneva-based agency called Nemesis.
Q 23Who founded the Red Cross in Geneva in 1863 and shared the first Nobel Peace Prize?
Henry Dunant
He was moved to act after seeing 40,000 wounded left on the field at Solferino in 1859.
Q 14Which two objects appear on Geneva's coat of arms?
A half-eagle and a key
The half-eagle recalls the Holy Roman Empire and the key is St. Peter's, patron of the cathedral; citizens adopted the arms in 1387.
Q 15Which December festival marks the failed Savoyard attack on Geneva in 1602?
L'Escalade
Traditions include smashing chocolate cauldrons filled with marzipan vegetables and a torchlit procession in 17th-century armour.
Q 16Which legendary Geneva heroine tipped boiling soup on the Savoyard attackers?
Mère Royaume
Catherine Cheynel, a cook from Lyon, supposedly killed a soldier with the heavy cauldron and roused the town.
Q 17Which duke sent the troops that tried to scale Geneva's walls in 1602?
Charles Emmanuel I of Savoy
He wanted Geneva as his capital north of the Alps; the defeat led to a lasting peace, the Treaty of St. Julien of 1603.
Q 18What did the night guard Isaac Mercier cut to foil the 1602 attack?
The portcullis rope
Dropping the portcullis blocked the plan to open the main gate; the Genevese lost 18 men to the Savoyards' 54.
Q 19What does Geneva's Jeûne genevois holiday traditionally commemorate news of?
The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre
It falls on the first Thursday after the first Sunday in September and is observed only in Geneva.
Q 20How tall does the Jet d'Eau fountain shoot its water?
150 metres
About 500 litres per second leave the nozzle at 200 km/h, so roughly 7,000 litres are in the air at any moment.
Q 24In which year was the first Geneva Convention adopted?
1864
Twelve states signed the treaty on the treatment of wounded soldiers on 22 August of that year.
Q 25How many Geneva Conventions were adopted in 1949?
Four
They cover wounded soldiers on land, at sea, prisoners of war and civilians, and have been ratified by 196 countries.
Q 26Which building is the home of the UN Office at Geneva?
Palace of Nations
Built for the League of Nations from 1929 to 1938, it was Europe's second-largest building complex by volume after Versailles.
Q 27In which year did Switzerland finally join the United Nations?
2002
The UN had been operating from Geneva's Palace of Nations since 1946, decades before its host country became a member.
Q 28Which four reformers stand as 5-metre statues at the centre of the Reformation Wall?
Farel, Calvin, Beza, Knox
Flanking them are smaller figures including Oliver Cromwell, Roger Williams and William the Silent.
Q 29The Reformation Wall was inaugurated in 1909 to mark which anniversary?
400 years since Calvin's birth
It also marked 350 years of the University of Geneva, which Calvin founded as an academy in 1559.
Q 30Which particle physics laboratory sits in Meyrin on Geneva's western edge?
CERN
Founded in 1954, it operates the Large Hadron Collider in a 27-kilometre tunnel that runs mostly under France.