New Guinea History, Geography and Culture Quiz

Answer: Second

The largest island in the world is Greenland, at over 2.1m square kilometres. New Guinea comes second at 785,000 square kilometres and Borneo is a close third at 748,000 sq. km.

Answer: Britain, Germany, Holland

Though initially contacted and surveyed by Portuguese and Spanish explorers in the early 1600s, the western half of the island was annexed by Holland (the Netherlands) from the early 1800s. The last part of the 19th century saw Britain take control of the southern half of the eastern portion of the island, while Germany took control of the northern half of the eastern portion.

This area included the major offshore islands today known as New Britain and New Ireland.

Answer: 1,000

The Island of New Guinea has the highest "language density" of any area on earth. With a total population of about ten million, Ethnologue has catalogued over 1,000 languages - 841 alone in Papua New Guinea (which constitutes the eastern half of the island) and an estimated minimum of 200 in the Indonesian-controlled western half of the island.

In fact there may be as many as 500 - 700 in the Indonesian portion, as research there has been much less extensive than in the east. The 1,000 languages represent about one-seventh of the total of nearly 7,000 languages estimated by Ethnologue to exist on the planet. That means with a total population of about 1/7 of 1% of the world, the island (and surrounding islands) have about 15% of the total languages. That is a "linguistic density" of about 105 times what would be expected based on population alone.

Answer: 16,020 ft.

It is stunning that what most think of as a "tropical island" can contain a peak of over 16,000 feet, but such is the case. To put this in perspective, that is higher by far than any peak in the contiguous 48 states of the United States (topped by Mt. Whitney in California at 14,505 ft.).

It is higher as well than any peak in the Alps or western Europe as a whole (topped by Mont Blanc at 15,782 ft.). It is by far the highest point on any island in the world, followed by Mauna Kea in Hawaii at about 13,800 ft.

There are several additional peaks on the main island that tower over 14,000 feet.

Answer: Melanesia

Melanesia or Melanesian are inexact terms used variably to refer to a genetic stock of human beings, a geographic area or a cultural tradition. In general, the Melanesians are considered to derive from the Papuan peoples. They were the original inhabitants of New Guinea and surrounding areas, resulting from the original human migration from Africa beginning about 150,000 years ago and eventuating in New Guinea by between 40,000 and 50,000 years ago.

A subsequent migration known as the Austronesian migration around 4,000 years ago moved through the area, supplanting the Papuan peoples along the coastlines in particular, but also continuing into the Pacific to become the forebears of the Polynesian people. Nonetheless, all the populations of New Guinea and the other islands cited are today considered to be Melanesian.

Answer: about three times as large as Jamaica

New Britain is about 13,500 square miles in area, making it the 39th largest island in the world. Jamaica is about 4,300 square miles and is ranked 71st in area. Both Bougainville and New Ireland are also major landmasses, ranked at 79th and 93rd in area among world islands.

Answer: The reigning monarch of Great Britain

Papua New Guinea is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, and the Head of the Commonwealth is the reigning monarch of the United Kingdom. However, Papua New Guinea is also in that subset of Commonwealth countries known as the Commonwealth Realm consisting of 16 nations (including Canada, Australia and Papua New Guinea) that explicitly recognise the queen (or king) of Great Britain as the reigning monarch and, therefore, Head of State.

Answer: Forest floor, understory, canopy, emergent

The forest floor is, unsurprisingly, the lowest layer. Because it receives so little sunlight, the floor is often relatively devoid of vegetation except in swampy or riverine areas. The forest floor is the "recycling centre" of the rainforest where detritus - both floral and faunal - falling from the overarching layers is broken down and returned to the soil.

The understory is next, consisting mainly of shrublike plants and young trees that will eventually grow to occupy higher layers. The canopy is next, consisting of the bulk of all trees, generally between 75 and 200 feet above the forest floor.

The canopy is the most biodiverse environment on earth, containing, by some estimates, fully half of all plant species and between a quarter and half of all insect species on earth.

The emergent layer - named not because it emerges from the forest floor but because it emerges above the canopy - is the highest level, and consists of particularly tall trees that extend above the canopy layer.

The trees of the emergent layer often grow to between 200 and 300 feet tall.

Answer: Sepik, Danube, Indus, Nile

Surprisingly, the Sepik discharges a greater volume of water than any of these other three major rivers. Though the Sepik is less lengthy than any of the other three, its source in the upper elevations of the island, an area of exceptionally heavy rainfall, ensures that it grows to a substantial volume in a relatively short distance.

Answer: Italy, Poland, Germany

Surprisingly Papua New Guinea, though constituting only about 60% of the main island (plus several major offshore islands), is larger than all three of these major European countries (in land area alone, not counting maritime area). At the same time it has only about 6.5 million people, about a tenth the population of those European countries.