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50 free Tenzing Norgay trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Tenzing Norgay stood on the summit of Everest on 29 May 1953 and became the most famous Sherpa in history, yet almost everything about his early life, from his birthday to his birthplace, is uncertain. This quiz covers the man behind the ice-axe photograph. The easy questions ask who climbed with him, what year it was, what he left on the summit and where he lived and died. From there it moves into the climbing career: Eric Shipton's 1935 reconnaissance, the illegal 1947 attempt with Earl Denman, the 1952 Swiss expedition where he and Raymond Lambert set an altitude record, the crevasse rescue that made Hillary choose him, the frozen boots, the Hillary Step and the fifteen minutes on top. The harder end is for mountaineering readers: the head lama who renamed him, the Tiger Medal, the uniform that got him across India without a ticket, Jan Morris's coded telegram, the George Medal controversy and Nehru's rumoured veto, the 1955 autobiography that finally said who stepped up first, the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, the Bhutan trek of 1975, the Soviet sporting title, Tenzing Peak, Tenzing Montes on Pluto, the Lukla airport and the sons and grandsons who followed him up the mountain. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries on Tenzing, the 1953 expedition and its members, and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. If you enjoy this one, try our Mount Everest, Edmund Hillary and famous explorers quizzes next.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01With whom did Tenzing Norgay make the first confirmed ascent of Everest?
Edmund Hillary
They reached the summit at 11:30 a.m. as part of the 1953 British expedition.
Q 02On what date did Tenzing and Hillary reach the summit?
29 May 1953
Tenzing later chose to celebrate his birthday on that date, since he never knew the real one.
Q 03What was Tenzing Norgay's name at birth?
Namgyal Wangdi
The head lama of Rongbuk Monastery advised the change; the new name means 'wealthy-fortunate-follower-of-religion'.
Q 04Which US weekly named Tenzing one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century?
Time
Hillary made the same list.
Q 05Under which Tibetan calendar sign was Tenzing born, pointing to 1914?
Year of the Rabbit
He judged from the weather and crops that it was late May.
Q 06To which two places did the teenage Tenzing run away from home?
Kathmandu and Darjeeling
The second was the base for most eastern Himalayan expeditions, and he eventually became an Indian citizen.
Q 07What was Tenzing the eleventh of?
13 children
Several of his siblings died young; his father was a Tibetan yak herder.
Q 08Which monastery was Tenzing once sent to in order to become a monk?
Tengboche
He decided the life was not for him and left.
Q 09Which British climber chose the 20-year-old Tenzing for the 1935 Everest reconnaissance?
Eric Shipton
Two other candidates failed their medicals and Tenzing's smile caught Shipton's eye.
Q 10Which award did the Himalayan Club give Tenzing in 1938 for high-altitude work?
The Tiger Medal
It followed his third Everest expedition as a porter.
Q 11How did Tenzing cross India by train without a ticket during Partition in 1947?
Wearing an old army officer's uniform
He had been batman to a Major Chapman in Chitral and kept one of his uniforms.
Q 12With which Canadian-born climber did Tenzing sneak into Tibet for a 1947 Everest attempt?
Earl Denman
A storm at 22,000 feet ended it and all three men turned back safely.
Q 13Which nation's 1952 expeditions first seriously attempted Everest from the Nepalese side?
Switzerland
Tenzing was treated as a full member for the first time, 'the greatest honour that had ever been paid me'.
Q 21About how long did the pair spend on the summit?
15 minutes
They took extra photos looking down the mountain to prove they had made it.
Q 22Why is there no summit photograph of Hillary?
Tenzing had never used a camera
Tenzing's autobiography says he offered but Hillary shook his head.
Q 23What did Tenzing leave on the summit as an offering?
Chocolates
Hillary left a cross given to him by John Hunt.
Q 24Who was the first person the pair met on their descent, bringing hot soup?
Q 14With which Swiss climber did Tenzing set an altitude record of about 8,595 m in May 1952?
Raymond Lambert
The two became lasting friends; Lambert climbed despite losing his toes to frostbite.
Q 15How many times had Tenzing been to Everest before the 1953 expedition?
Six
Expedition leader John Hunt had been three times.
Q 16What incident led Hillary to choose Tenzing as his partner for the summit?
He arrested the New Zealander's fall into a crevasse
He secured the rope with his ice axe before Hillary hit the bottom.
Q 17How many porters did John Hunt's 1953 expedition employ?
362
The party of over 400 also had 20 Sherpa guides and 10,000 pounds of baggage.
Q 18Which pair turned back 300 feet below the summit on 26 May 1953 when an oxygen set failed?
Bourdillon and Evans
They had reached the South Summit; Hunt then sent Tenzing and Hillary.
Q 19What problem delayed the summit pair on the morning of 29 May?
Hillary's boots had frozen solid
Hillary spent two hours thawing them before they set off with 30-pound packs.
Q 20What was the 40-foot rock face on the final ridge later named?
The Hillary Step
Hillary wedged up a crack between rock and ice, and Tenzing followed.
George Lowe
Hillary greeted him with 'Well, George, we knocked the bastard off.'
Q 25What coded phrase did Times reporter Jan Morris use to signal that the summit was reached?
'Snow conditions bad'
'Advanced base abandoned' meant Hillary and 'awaiting improvement' meant Tenzing.
Q 26On the morning of which event did news of the ascent reach the British public?
Queen Elizabeth II's coronation
It was perhaps the last major news story delivered to the world by runner.
Q 27Which honour did Tenzing receive from the Queen while Hillary and Hunt were knighted?
The George Medal
He was not a British subject and so not eligible for a knighthood; some claim Nehru also objected.
Q 28Which Indian prime minister was rumoured to have vetoed a knighthood for Tenzing?
Jawaharlal Nehru
His grandson Tashi later said he deserved more than 'a bloody medal'.
Q 29In which year did Tenzing's autobiography finally reveal that Hillary stepped up first?
1955
It was ghost-written, since Tenzing could speak several languages but not read or write.
Q 30Which American writer ghost-wrote Tenzing's autobiography?
James Ramsay Ullman
The book, titled Man of Everest, was also published as The Tiger of the Snows.