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Évariste Galois Trivia Questions

How much do you really know about Évariste Galois? Below are 8 true or false statements. Click each one to reveal the answer and explanation.

1.

Galois died in a duel at age 20, but the exact circumstances remain mysterious.

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Medium
✓ TRUE

He died from a duel in 1832, but historians still debate whether it was over a woman, politics, or a police provocation.

2.

Galois wrote his groundbreaking mathematical theories the night before his duel.

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Medium
✓ TRUE

He frantically outlined his group theory and solvability of equations in letters, famously writing 'I have no time.'

3.

Galois’s work was entirely ignored until the 20th century, when Einstein rediscovered it.

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Medium
✗ FALSE

His papers were published 14 years after his death by Liouville, and influential by the late 1800s; Einstein had no role.

4.

Galois solved the quintic equation using radicals, proving it was always possible.

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Medium
✗ FALSE

He proved the opposite: general quintics are unsolvable by radicals. Abel independently proved it earlier; Galois generalized the theory.

5.

Galois’s father was a mayor who committed suicide after a political smear campaign.

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Hard
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His father, Nicolas-Gabriel Galois, hanged himself in 1829 after being tormented by a forged, libelous poem.

6.

Galois invented the term 'group' in mathematics, but only for finite permutation groups.

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Hard
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He formally introduced 'groupe' in his 1830 memoir, though earlier mathematicians like Lagrange had hints of the concept.

7.

Galois failed the entrance exam for the École Polytechnique twice due to poor mathematical ability.

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Hard
✗ FALSE

He failed because he refused to show his work or explain simple steps—his genius made him impatient, not incompetent.

8.

Galois was arrested and imprisoned for threatening the life of King Louis-Philippe.

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Hard
✓ TRUE

He was jailed for republican activism and once toasted with a dagger, shouting 'To Louis-Philippe!'—a capital offense.

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