The brainiest woman in Britain? Possibly. The most talked-about University Challenge contestant in history? Almost definitely. Either way, there’s no doubting Gail Trimble knows which end of the buzzer to press.

But do you? Well here’s your starter for 10 … get all of these questions correct and you’ll have every right to hold your head up and tell friends: “I’m cleverer than Jeremy Paxman, me.”

Q. 1. Two states that share borders with Turkey have currencies that are anagrams of the word Lira. Name one of them.

Q. 2. Kings of England according to Sellar and Yateman’s 1066 and All That
In each case give the name and reginal number of the king described
“Whenever he returned to England he always set out again immediately for the Mediterranean and was therefore known as Gare de Lion.

Q.3. He was very good at answering the Irish question and made a law called Poinings (?) law by which the Irish could have a parliament of their own but the English were to pass all the acts in it?

Q.4. He was found guilty of being defeated in a war against himself which was of course a form of high treason?

Q.5. The name of which evergreen shrub is a one word version of what the priestess Hero might have said to her lover after his nightly swim across the Hellespont?

Q.6. What precise type of quadrilateral is formed by lines drawn in order from the centre of the squares occupied by antimone polonium radon iodine and back to antipony?

Q.7.Which element is situated at the centre of the square of which the corners are cobalt, copper, gold and iridium?

Q.8. If you draw lines from palladium to cadmium and from copper to gold what mathematical symbol do you see?

Q.9 According to Homer which nymph and sorceress transformed Odysseus’s companions into swine?

Q.10  In George Orwell’s Animal Farm the pig Snowball is generally viewed as representing which Russian Revolutionar?

Q.11. A frequent winner of the fat pigs class in the local agricultural show, the empress of Blandings appears in the stories of which English humorist?

Q.12  Her name used to indicate an annoyingly virtuous person which title character of a widely published children’s work of 1765 is an orphan who spends the early part of her life with only one shoes?

Q.13 Which letter of the alphabet in the line “To be or not to be that is the question”?

Q.14. When printed in a simple plain font three upper case letters of the Roman  alphabet have a centre of symmetry but no plain of symmetry – for five points give me two of them?

Q.15. Which three consecutive upper case letters of the Roman Alphabet have no elements of symmetry ?

Q. 16 Which is the only letter of the Roman alphabet apart from O that has a four fold axis of rotational symmetry ?

Q. 17 Iskander Mirza, Muhammad Ayub Khan and Yahya Khan were from 1956 to 1971 the first three presidents of which Asian state?

Q.18 Having come to power in a 1977 coup d’état which President of Pakistan died in an unexplained air crash in 1988?

Q. 19 Which President of Pakistan announced his resignation in August 2008 having seized power in a coup of 1999?

Q. 20 In which decade did the following take place?
The Bill of Rights was adopted, John Adams was elected as the country’s second president, the cotton gin was invented by the Eli Whitney

Q. 21 Texas became a state of the Union, the Californian Gold rush and the Mexican American war both began

Q.22. The 19th amendment was ratified giving the vote to women, John T Scopes was tried for teaching the theory of evolution, Herbert Hover was elected President

Q. 23. Born in London 1971 which composer’s works include the operas Powder Her Face and The Tempest?

Q. 24. Premiered in April 2008 and centring on an eponymous creature from Greek Myth what was the second opera commissioned by the Royal Opera House from Sir Harrison Birtwistle?

Q. 25 Which North African leader was the subject of a production scored by Asian Dub Foundation and staged by the English National Opera in September 2006?

Q.26. The realm that according to Aristophanes was built by the birds to separate….

Q.27. Which German bacteriologist gave his name to the shallow glass or plastic cylindrical dish that biologists use to culture cells?

Q.28. What is the meaning of the prefix petro in the words petrology, petroleum, petrogliff?

Q.29 In which present day country is Petra a world heritage site once described as “a rose red city half as old as time”?

Q. 30 What surname is shared by the author of the Tao of Physics and the director of It’s A Wonderful Life?

Q. 31 What alternative name for the women known as Thads, Basserids and Maenads is the title of a play by Euripides?

Q. 32 The Bacchae carried ivy and vine draped staffs that were usually long stems of which member of the carrot family?

Q.33. In the Bacchae by Euripides the mother of Pentheus, the leader of the women who tore him apart in a frenzy, had what name – since bestowed by botanists on the genus of plants that includes the American Aloe or  Century plant?

Q.34. Which novel by Jane Austen is the story of Catherine Morland an avid reader of Gothic novels who is invited to stay in her friends eponymous family home?

Q. 35. The 18 nightmare abbey was the third satirical novel by which author? It was preceded by Headlong Hall and Melincourt?

Q.36 Which abbey in Surrey inspired the name of Walter Scott’s hero in a novel about the heir to an English estate who travels north and becomes involved in the 1745 Jacobite uprising?

Q. 37. Which of Shakespeare’s plays is the only one to be set in Vienna and concerns the city’s Duke adopting a disguise in order to observe the actions of his subjects, including his deputy Angelo?