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50 free Midsomer Murders trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Midsomer Murders has been killing off the residents of one small English county since 1997, and the body count is the joke everyone is in on: picture-postcard villages, a fete or a festival in every episode, and a murder weapon nobody saw coming. Two Chief Inspector Barnabys, a long line of sergeants and a rotating mortuary have kept Causton CID busy across more than two decades. These 50 questions cover the cast changes, the pathologists, the novels by Caroline Graham that started it all, the fictional geography and the real towns and pubs that stand in for it, the theme tune and the unusual way it is played, the guest stars who turned up before they were famous, how far the show has travelled, and the most outlandish deaths the writers have dreamed up. Most are pitched for anyone who has watched a few episodes with a cup of tea; a handful are for the completists who know which village is which. Play on your phone with instant answers and explanations, or print it for a pub quiz, a fan night or a rainy Sunday.
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Q 01Which dairy product, the pride of Midsomer Pastures, is the murder weapon in 'Schooled in Murder'?
A wheel of cheese
A wheel of cheese kills Debbie Moffett in the caves where Midsomer Blue is matured, the scene most often cited when the show's dark comedy comes up. The 2013 episode also bids farewell to DS Ben Jones with a party at the Barnabys' home.
Q 02Which instrument, played without touching it, gives the Midsomer Murders theme its eerie voice?
Theremin
The Theremin is played by moving the hands near two antennas, one for pitch and one for volume, and the Midsomer theme is a moderate-tempo waltz written around it. Leon Theremin patented it in 1928.
Q 03Midsomer takes its name from Midsomer Norton, a real town in which English county?
Somerset
Somerset also lent the show Midsomer Wellow and Causton, which are borrowed from the real villages of Wellow and Corston. Many of the fictional villages follow the same 'Midsomer' naming convention.
Q 04Which future film star played village thief Peter Drinkwater in the 2000 episode 'Judgement Day'?
Orlando Bloom
Orlando Bloom played thief and lothario Peter Drinkwater in 2000, a year before Legolas made him famous. The episode unfolds around Midsomer Mallow's bid to be crowned the 'Perfect English Village'.
Q 05What breed is Sykes, the rescue dog in every John Barnaby episode for five years?
Jack Russell terrier
Sykes was a Jack Russell terrier whose real owners retired him after series 18, so series 19 opened with the Barnabys at a grave in their back garden. By the end of that episode the family had taken in a new rescue dog.
Q 06The 100th Midsomer Murders episode went to which foreign capital, co-produced with its broadcaster DR?
Copenhagen
Copenhagen hosted 'The Killings of Copenhagen' in 2014, with scenes at Nyhavn and inside the circular courtyard of the city's police headquarters. Biscuit tycoon Eric Calder is poisoned there with strychnine posted from Badger's Drift.
Q 07Which writer adapted the first three Midsomer Murders episodes from Caroline Graham's novels?
Anthony Horowitz
Anthony Horowitz, also the author of the Alex Rider books, adapted six early episodes and wrote most of the first few series. Graham's first five novels supplied the first five episodes.
Q 08Which actress has played Causton pathologist Dr Fleur Perkins since 2019?
Annette Badland
Annette Badland played Margaret Blaine in Doctor Who and Babe Smith in EastEnders before taking over Causton's mortuary. In 2018 she reached the final of a charity Pointless alongside Neil Dudgeon.
Q 09Which Midsomer Murders regular, an experimental cook, longed to swap Causton for a picturesque village?
Joyce
Joyce was always put off by the grisly murders in the villages she fancied, and Tom took every chance to dine out rather than face her cooking. The couple met in London and married in the 1970s.
Q 10What full-time job does John Barnaby's wife Sarah hold, keeping her clear of most of his Midsomer cases?
A head teacher
A head teacher at Causton Comprehensive, Sarah has a career of her own and so features far less in the plots than her predecessor did. She and John marked their fifteenth wedding anniversary in 'Schooled in Murder'.
Q 11In 'Death and Dust', Tom Barnaby and Ben Jones follow a case out of Midsomer into which country?
Wales
Wales is Ben Jones's homeland, and he makes much of it on the trip; the episode is one of only a handful of cases ever set outside Midsomer. Jason Hughes, who plays him, is Welsh too.
Q 12Which future film star appeared in Midsomer Murders in 2003, a pre-fame turn recalled in '25 Years of Mayhem'?
Henry Cavill
Henry Cavill was fresh from The Count of Monte Cristo when he turned up in Midsomer, a decade before he first wore the cape. The 2022 ITV documentary marked the show's 25th anniversary.
Q 13Which Midsomer Wellow society, fresh from a £30,000 horse-race win, is picked off one by one in a 2002 episode?
The bell-ringers
Q 21'Secrets and Spies' reveals that Tom Barnaby once worked for which agency, long before he ran Causton CID?
MI6
MI6 was Barnaby's former employer, which is why the murder of ex-agent Geoffrey Larkin at a safe house run by retired spies draws him in personally. The 'Beast of Midsomer' gets the blame at first.
Q 22Tom Barnaby's final case, 'Fit for Murder', opens with a Swavely Manor spa client found dead in what?
A flotation chamber
A flotation chamber holds the first victim, and the mystery deepens when her husband disappears; the episode aired in the UK on 2 February 2011 and closed the thirteenth series. John Nettles had announced his exit two years earlier.
Q 23How many Midsomer Murders episodes did John Nettles's Tom Barnaby appear in before handing over to John Barnaby?
The bell-ringers are hoping to win the annual striking competition when a grudge from the past resurfaces, and the first victim is found in the belfry. The episode, 'Ring Out Your Dead', aired in 2002 in the fifth series.
Q 14'Destroying Angel', in which heirs to the Easterly Grange Hotel die one by one, takes its title from what?
A poisonous mushroom
A poisonous mushroom of the all-white Amanita genus goes by that name, and hotel chef Tristan Goodfellow eats a meal of mushrooms that includes it. The episode aired in 2001, in the fourth series.
Q 15Which Midsomer sergeant, arriving in series 19 alongside a new Barnaby family dog, is the longest-serving by tenure?
Jamie Winter
Jamie Winter, played by Nick Hendrix, has outlasted every predecessor, and his romance with pathologist Kam Karimore was written in from his first series. Hendrix is a nephew of the newsreader Alastair Stewart.
Q 16Which Causton pathologist joined the Midsomer Worthy choir in 'Death in Chorus'?
George Bullard
George Bullard, played by Barry Jackson, served from the pilot until 2011, when he told John Barnaby he was taking some time off at the end of 'The Oblong Murders'. Jackson was in the first fourteen series.
Q 17A film crew shooting which swashbuckler at Midsomer Magna's Manor House loses its director to a prop guillotine?
The Scarlet Pimpernel
The Scarlet Pimpernel is being filmed at Midsomer Magna's Manor House when the crew's arrival coincides with a known criminal lurking about the grounds. The trail leads to an elaborately planned robbery before the truth emerges.
Q 18In 'Small Mercies', a body tied down in the Little Worthy model village echoes which classic book?
Gulliver's Travels
Gulliver's Travels is the picture the scene evokes: model maker Bob Moss finds Richard Tanner pinned down like Gulliver on his early morning rounds. The model village belongs to the elderly Compton sisters.
Q 19In 'Death of a Hollow Man', an amateur actor's stage death turns real in the final act of which play?
Amadeus
Amadeus is being staged by the Causton Amateur Dramatics Society when Esslyn Carmichael is fatally wounded on stage, and Caroline Graham herself is credited as writer of this 1998 episode, adapted from her second novel.
Q 20In Caroline Graham's first Barnaby novel, Emily Simpson's autopsy finds red wine mixed with which poison?
Hemlock
Hemlock proves Miss Bellringer right that her friend did not die of a heart attack, and the case became the 1997 pilot, 'The Killings at Badger's Drift'. The novel made the Crime Writers' Association's list of the top 100 crime novels.
81
81 episodes across thirteen series, after which Nettles said it was 'always wise to leave people wanting more, rather than be booed off the stage'. His successor had already been introduced in 'The Sword of Guillaume'.
Q 24Causton is often played by which Oxfordshire market town, itself named after the river along its north side?
Thame
Thame has doubled for Causton many times for Bentley Productions, sharing the job with Wallingford, while the fictional county town houses Barnaby's home and the CID office. The town lies 13 miles east of Oxford.
Q 25Clues such as a body in the Thames in 'Dead in the Water' hint that Midsomer really covers which county?
Berkshire
Berkshire and part of northern Hampshire are where several episodes quietly place the county, although Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire provide many of the real filming locations. Buckinghamshire launched three themed location tours in 2021.
Q 26Which four-time BAFTA winner, who also scored the UK House of Cards, composed the Midsomer Murders theme?
Jim Parker
Jim Parker scored hundreds of programmes, including Foyle's War and The House of Eliott, and died in 2023 aged 88. His Midsomer waltz has been reworked across several soundtrack CDs.
Q 27How many Chief Inspector Barnaby novels did Caroline Graham write, the first of them published in 1987?
7
7 novels, the last of them published in 2004, while Midsomer Murders has run past 140 episodes, so almost every plot is original to television. Graham, from Nuneaton, took a master's degree at 60.
Q 28In October 2025, ITV announced the commission of which numbered series of Midsomer Murders?
26th
The 26th series was ordered while the 25th still awaited its UK airing, as new runs now often debut abroad or on Acorn TV first. By 30 December 2025, 138 episodes across 24 series had been broadcast in the UK.
Q 29Which producer was suspended in 2011 after calling Midsomer Murders 'the last bastion of Englishness'?
Brian True-May
Brian True-May told the Radio Times the show had no non-white characters because he wanted to keep it that way, and All3Media suspended him. His successor Jo Wright promised a range of ethnic groups on screen.
Q 30Cully Barnaby's unusual first name comes from a honeymoon village on which lake?
Geneva
Lake Geneva's village of Cully, in Switzerland, is where Tom and his wife conceived their only child, who grew up to take temporary jobs around Midsomer between acting roles. Laura Howard played her from 1997 to 2011.