TriviaBug | Quiz on Famous Explorers

Famous Explorers

	Exploit	Explorer
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27.	First person to reach the North Pole	Robert Edwin Peary (1856 – 1920)
26.	Led the first successful Antarctic expedition between 1910 and 1912 to the South Pole	Roald Amundsen (1872 - 1928)
25.	Discovered Canada	Jacques Cartier (1491 – 1557)
24.	German explorer and scientist whose work was foundational to the field of biogeography	Alexander von Humboldt (1769 - 1859)
23.	English explorer who explored much of the North Atlantic, including Labrador, the coast of Greenland, and Hudson Bay. Presumed dead in a 1611 mutiny of his own crew	Henry Hudson (1570 - 1611)
22.	In 1643, became the first known European expedition to reach New Zealand and to sight the Fiji islands	Abel Tasman (1603 - 1659)
21.	Sailed from Portugal and reached the Cape of Good Hope	Bartholomeu Dias (c. 1450 - 1500)
20.	Completed the first circumnavigation of the globe in a single expedition after its captain, Magellan, was killed	Juan Sebastián Elcano (1476 - 1526)
19.	First to circumnavigate Great Britain and to explore Germany. Reached Thule, most commonly thought to be the Shetland Islands or Iceland	Pytheas (380 – c. 310 BC)
18.	Initiated the first circumnavigation of the globe in a single expedition. Named Pacific Ocean. Died in the Philippines after claiming them for Spain	Ferdinand Magellan (1480 - 1521)
17.	Danish explorer who explored the Siberian Far East and Alaska and claimed it for Russia	Vitus Bering (1681 - 1741)
16.	A French Navy officer and explorer whose expedition vanished in Oceania	Jean François La Pérouse (1741–1788)
15.	Regarded as first European discoverer of the sea route to Brazil	Pedro Álvares Cabral (c. 1467 - c. 1520)
14.	Discovered the "New World" of the Americas	Christopher Columbus (1451 - 1506)
13.	Searched for the Seven Cities of Gold and discovered the Grand Canyon in the process	Francisco Vásquez de Coronado (c. 1510 - 1554)
12.	Discovered Newfoundland and claimed it for the Kingdom of England	John Cabot (c. 1450 - 1499)
11.	Explored Florida while vainly trying to find the Fountain of Youth	Juan Ponce de León (c. 1460 - 1521)
10.	English naval captain who explored much of the Pacific including New Zealand, Australia and Hawaii	James Cook (1728 - 1779)
9.	Explored Florida, mainly northwest Florida, and discovered the Mississippi River	Hernando de Soto (c. 1496 - 1542)
8.	The first Englishman to sail around the world (and survive)	Sir Francis Drake (c. 1540 - 1596)
7.	The first European to cross the Isthmus of Panama and view the Pacific ocean from American shores	Vasco Núñez de Balboa (c. 1475 - 1519)
6.	French explorers best known for exploring the Great lake regions for fur.	Radisson and Groseilliers
5.	Scottish-Canadian explorer who in 1789, looking for the Northwest Passage, followed the river now named after him to the Arctic Ocean and then in 1793 crossed the Rockies and reached the Pacific in 1793, thus beating Lewis and Clark by 12 years	Alexander MacKenzie (1764-1820)
4.	Discovered Greenland	Erik the Red (950 - 1003)
3.	Discovered the sea route to India	Vasco da Gama (c. 1469 - 1524)
2.	American explorer and field scientist who led the Expedition into the Louisiana Purchase and the Pacific Northwest in 1804-1806	Captain Meriwether Lewis (1774 - 1809)
1.	First European to land in North America	Leif Ericson (980 - 1020)
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