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The Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution was ratified on 13 December 1865. What was achieved by the thirteenth amendment?
Formerly known as Boulder Dam, Arizona's Hoover Dam is on which river?
What is the name of the governing body of the Church of England, set up in 1970 to give the laity more say in the decisions of the Church?
Published in 1956, The last battle is the final volume in which series of novels for children?
The poem Ode to Joy by Friedrich Schiller is particularly known for its setting in which musical work?
In March 2004, which cricketer became the first slow bowler to take 500 wickets in Test matches and only the second ever bowler to do so?
Which TV detective series starring Alan Davies used an arrangement of Saint-Saens' Danse Macabre as its signature tune?
What type of building first appeared in Britain in Shoreditch, just outside the City of London, built by James Burbage in 1576?
What name is usually given to the wood of any of several tropical hardwood timber trees including the family Meliaceae, which is of a reddish-brown colour when mature, much used in making furniture?
Who wrote in a letter published in abridged form in 1905: 'The two great turning points in my life were when my father sent me to Oxford and when society sent me to prison?'
Which physical constant usually denoted by the letter h has the value 6.63 x 10 to the minus 34 joule-second?
Usually administered to infants at two or three months of age, DTP is a triple immunisation against three diseases. The P refers to pertussis or whooping cough; what do the letters D and T stand for?
Which British politician, MP for Hamilton from 1978 to 1997 and for Hamilton South from 1997 to 1999, was Secretary-General of NATO from 1999 to 2003?
Name the former Glasgow criminal whose rehabilitation at Barlinnie Prison's Special Unit led to a career as a sculptor and writer?
Which term indicating the amount of energy stored at any point in an electrical or magnetic field was introduced by the nineteenth-century English mathematician George Green in his essay on the application of mathematical analysis to the theory of electricity and magnetism?
Whose diary, discovered almost a year after his death in 1912, concluded with the plea: 'For God's sake look after our people'?
Located on North Island and flowing for approximately 425 kilometres, which is New Zealand's longest river?
What is the common name for the genus of snail Cypraea which includes the four-inch Cypraea aurantium, traditionally worn by royalty in the Pacific islands, and the one-inch Cypraea moneta, which has been used as currency in Africa and elsewhere?
Basil II, known as Bulgaroctonus or 'Slayer of the Bulgars', was ruler of which empire in the year AD 1000?
Which single, which first reached number one in 1971, was the subject of a prolonged legal action when it was accused of plagiarising the melody from the 1963 Chiffons single 'He's so fine'?
With vestigial wings hidden within its plumage, and nostrils at the end of its long bill rather than the base, which bird belongs to the genus Apteryx and is related to the extinct moa?
At what precise time does the time signal broadcast by the BBC to indicate 12 noon begin?
Which of Shakespeare's characters voices his mistrust of leaner men with the lines: 'Let me have men about me that are fat, sleek-headed men and such as sleep a' nights'?
In 1967, the British sportsman Tommy Simpson collapsed and died while competing in which event?
In which 1946 film directed by Frank Capra does James Stewart play George Bailey, an embittered idealist who is helped by an angel to see how significant he has been to his family and his community?
Who was the last British prime minister to succeed a younger incumbent in office?
Inland from Causeway Bay and a famous home to horse racing, Happy Valley Racecourse is in the middle of which island?
The term 'Black Friars' refers to members of which religious order founded in 1215?
For his resolute action at which battle in 1861 did the Confederate general Thomas Jackson earn the epithet 'Stonewall'?
The red triangle trademark of Bass ale had the distinction of being one of the first trademarks to appear in a major work of art, when it was incorporated into which painting by Edouard Manet?
Best known as a dramatist, which Russian writer qualified as a doctor in 1884 and supported his family with earnings from comic writing until he began to make a name for himself with more serious works?
In the title of the detective story by Dorothy L. Sayers, who or what were The nine tailors?
Only four words from the Aleutian and Inuit languages have become part of common English usage. 'Parka', 'anorak' and 'igloo' are three; what is the fourth?
Who was Commander-in-Chief of RAF Bomber Command from 1942 to 1946, and developed saturation techniques of mass bombing?
Which Russian composer wrote several symphonies commemorating revolutionary Russia, his Second Symphony being commonly known as the October Symphony?
The Black Hills, which include the sculpted granite faces of Mount Rushmore, lie across South Dakota and the north-eastern region of which other US state?
Which statesman, born at Schonhausen in Brandenburg in 1815, became the first Chancellor of the German Empire?
Which term is used for fractures occurring in young children in which the softness of the bones allows them to bend in response to stress rather than to break?
Led by Colonel Dragutin Dimitrijevich, which secret society used terrorist methods to promote the liberation of Serbs from Hapsburg or Ottoman rule and was instrumental in planning the 1914 assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand?
What specific form of lighting was invented by the French engineer Georges Claude in about 1910, which had a significant impact on the advertising industry?
When the left-wing drama group Theatre Workshop moved from the north of England to the Theatre Royal, Stratford East, in 1953, which woman became its artistic director?
Who, after winning 29 caps representing Ireland at rugby union, pursued a highly successful business career which included the presidency of the H.J. Heinz corporation and media interests both in his native Ireland and in the UK?
Zabriskie Point, La notte and Blow-up were all directed and co-written by which Italian film-maker?
Which religious movement was founded in Pittsburgh in 1872 and has adherents who meet in Kingdom Halls?
Over thirty-six kilometres long, triangular in shape and forming part of the boundary between Strathclyde and Central Regions, which of the Scottish lochs covers the largest area?
Revealing their loyalty to their home city, which group's first album, released in 1986, was entitled London Nil Hull Four?
Which British sculptor, whose early work under the influence of Giacometti was angular and menacing, became noted in the 1960s for her horses and riders and her more than life-size human heads?
Which dukedom was created in the fourteenth century and first conferred on Edmund Longley, fourth surviving legitimate son of Edward III, six of the thirteen subsequent dukes later becoming king?
Which literary work, completed in 1353, takes the form of tales related by ten travellers departing Florence to escape its plague?
What was the title of Thomas Hardy's last novel, which concerned a would-be student?
What was the four-word telegram which the American drama critic, actor and humorist Robert Benchley, when he first arrived in Venice, reputedly sent to his editor?
The fourth movement of which piece of classical music is entitled In the hall of the mountain king?
Which four letters referred to the Soviet secret police force which operated from 1934 to 1946 and had the abbreviated Russian name for 'People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs'?
What word, derived from an old German word for 'bracelet', is given to a hard ring-shaped salty roll of bread?
To two decimal places, one pound is equal to how many kilograms?
Where did a Synod take place in 664, when disputes between the Roman and Irish missions over the correct date of Easter were resolved, King Oswiu deciding in favour of the Roman usage?
The Bismarck Archipelago, so named after they were annexed by Germany in 1884, is an island group in the south-west Pacific and is now a part of which country?
The term 'enriched uranium' refers to an increase in the proportion of which isotope of uranium to natural uranium for use in a nuclear reactor or weapon?
Which fictional character was created by Charles Dickens and has been played on screen by Lon Chaney in 1922, Alec Guinness in 1948 and Ron Moody in 1968?
What name is given to the seven-branched candelabrum of the tabernacle used in Jewish ritual, which signifies, among other things, the seven days of Creation?
The four-volume commentaries of Sir William Blackstone published between 1765 and 1769 are a comprehensive description of the doctrines and principles in which field?
Which Premiership football team are sometimes called 'the Toffees' because of an ancient toffee house which stood near the hotel where the club was founded?
Which poet and playwright, born in St Lucia in 1930, received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1992?
Which thirteenth-century English philosopher was the first person in the west to describe the production of gunpowder?
The point 0 degrees latitude 0 degrees longitude lies due south of which African country?
Which poem contains the following lines: 'It was a miracle of rare device, a sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice'?
Similar to morphine in its analgesic effect, which drug used in the form of its hydrochlorite salt first became available at the end of World War II and is the most effective form of treatment for addiction to heroin and other narcotics?
What in years is the average length of time between appearances of Halley's Comet?
Between 1940 and 1942 the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra provided accompaniment for which singer born in Hoboken, New Jersey, in 1915?
Following the military coups of 1987 led by Colonel Sitiveni Rabuka, which island group in the South Pacific allowed its membership of the Commonwealth to lapse?
What name is given to the painting technique in which opaque water-based colours are thickened with gum or glue and honey before application to the canvas?
Which keyboard layout, developed in the 1930s and named after a lecturer at the University of Washington, is designed so that the most commonly used keys are in the centre?
What name is given to the letters supposed to have been written between Mary Queen of Scots and the Fourth Earl of Bothwell, at least one of which was held to prove the complicity of Mary in the murder of her husband Lord Darnley?
What was the surname of the brothers Nicolaas and Diederick, on whose farm near Kimberley in the 1860s the first diamond in Southern Africa was found, later named the Star of Africa?
What is the name of the cartoon strip, written and drawn by Garry Trudeau and published in Britain in The Guardian, in which he has commented on various aspects of American life, the title being the surname of one of his fictional characters?
In Noel Coward's Private lives, 'very flat' is the perfunctory description of which English county?
Of which of Italy's twenty administrative regions is Milan the capital?
The fish the golden orfe, more commonly kept in pools and park lakes, is a member of which family, which also includes the goldfish?
Which long-winded two-word term is a euphemism for a downright lie, and was first used in 1906 by Winston Churchill in a speech about labour contracts?
Which messianic religious movement worships Haile Selassie I, former emperor of Ethiopia, under his precoronation name?
What name is given to Mahler's orchestral song cycle of 1908 which consists of six German versions of eighth-century Chinese poems?
Sacked by Alexander the Great in 330 B.C., which ancient city in the Iranian province of Fars began to be built in the late sixth or early fifth century B.C. by order of Darius I, who made it his capital?
Which flat race is run at Newmarket and gets its name from the future Alexander II of Russia, who attended the inaugural race in 1839?
In chemistry, what were originally defined as substances such as starch or gelatine which will not diffuse through a membrane, but are now regarded as systems in which there are two or more phases with one distributed in the other?
What is the name of the music hall comedian played by Laurence Olivier in both the stage and film versions of John Osborne's play The entertainer?
Which Wiltshire village lies partly within one of the largest stone circles in Europe?
Named after the two German chemists who developed it, which manufacturing process synthesises ammonia from nitrogen and hydrogen?
Which FTSE 100 company was formed by the merger of Grand Metropolitan and Guinness in 1997?
According to Greek mythology, Stheno and Euryale were immortal: what was the name of their sister, the only mortal among them?
Which term is used for the group of young French film directors including Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard and Louis Malle, which emerged at the end of the 1950s?
'Queen Anne's War', fought with France for the control of North America between 1702 and 1713, was contemporaneous with which European war?
What was the name of the Swiss psychologist who devised the so-called 'inkblot' psychological test?
What word can mean 'adverse criticism' or 'abuse', and derives from an abbreviation of a German term referring to an anti-aircraft gun?
What is the name of the structure in a green plant cell within which photosynthesis takes place?
The English poet and literary critic William Empson was the author in 1930 of a work entitled Seven types of ... what?
Which two-word term was coined in 1992 by the then Senator Al Gore Jr to refer to a unified interactive system of electronic communication?
What is the second largest of Japan's four major islands?
Which American honorary society for distinguished scholars takes its name from the initial letters in Greek of the motto 'Philosophy is the guide to life'?
Sometimes abbreviated to MFP, what term is used for the average distance that a gas molecule travels between collisions with other gas molecules?
Which British Conservative politician said in a speech in Bedford in 1957: 'Let us be frank about it: most of our people have never had it so good'?

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