10Q (Mar 20, 2024)

1. The right-wing historian P.N. Oak (1917-2007) was well known for his crackpot theories, which the RW world loves to repeat and amplify. From his mind arose such gems as that the Taj Mahal is actually a Shiva temple called Tejo Mahalaya, that the word 'Christianity' came from the Sanskrit words 'Krishna-neeti', and that the name 'Abraham' comes from 'Brahma'. In the same vein, he proposed that this placename comes from the Sanskrit for 'garden' or 'grove', whereas it is actually likely to have originated from the name of a Roman deity thought to endow infants with the capacity for speech, evidenced by their first wail (the technical term for which is rooted in the same deity's name). What place am I referring to?

2. Located in Guildford, Surrey, in the UK, where the book's author spent his last years and is buried, the sculpture shown below – created by local sculptor Edwin Russell in 1984 – depicts the opening scene from which 1865 book?

3. Talking about books, a roman à clef is a novel in which real persons or actual events are presented in a disguised version. The genre gets its name from the fact that early booksof the type sometimes included a list matching fictional characters with their real-life counterparts, that helped readers recognize the players. The term roman à clef accordingly translates to 'novel with a ___'. What small word fills the blank?

4. The clergyman educator in the image below only had a short stint in India, but there are well-known schools named after him in Shimla, Bangalore and Nagpur. Having been put in charge of the diocese at Calcutta, he moved there from Britain in 1858, and established a number of schools that brought British-style education to India. On 6th October, 1866, he had consecrated a cemetery at Kushtia on the Ganges, and was crossing a plank leading from the bank to the steamer when he slipped and fell into the river. He was carried away by the current and never seen again. Name him (a religious title and surname will do).

5. Penateka Comanche chief Tosahwi (c. 1805/10 – c.1878/80, pictured below) engaged in many raids in the American Southwest in the 1860s, but in 1867-68 became the first Comanche leader to surrender to the US military, at Fort Cobb in the Indian Territory. Tosahwi reputedly told General Philip Sheridan, "Me Tosahwi. Me good Indian," to which Sheridan supposedly replied, "The only good Indians I ever saw were ____." This led to the coining of a derogatory racist slogan that was resurrected during the Vietnam War as "The only good red is one that's ____". Fill in the blank (single word).

6. This spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, it is the westernmost town of the country, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands. In World War 2, it was the first German city to be captured by the Allies. Its French name is Aix-la-Chapelle; the German name places it at or near the top of alphabetical lists of cities of the world. What's that name?

7. Obviously, this term in the military context has nothing to do with either cricket or superheroes. Instead, it traces its roots back to the Late Latin 'bastum', meaning 'packsaddle', as it originally referred to a soldier in charge of a horse that carried the packsaddle with the officer's kit during a campaign. What 6-letter word is this?

8. The largest air base in Asia, it is an Indian Air Force base under the Western Air Command. It is the home of the C-17 Globemaster, the backbone of Heavy Air Lift division of the IAF. Since the Union Government opened a civil enclave in its space in 2019, allowing commercial flights, it has been under a legal cloud as it violates earlier directives vis-a-vis the operational territory of Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport. Named after a river in the vicinity, what airport with the IATA code HDO is this?

9. The Portuguese word for people of mixed European and Amerindian descent in South America derives from an Arabic word for 'slave' which is used for a dynasty that ruled the Delhi Sultanate from 1206 to 1290. Give me either word.

10. The sovereignty of nations has been a subject of much chest-beating in recent years. What's a related word for a political status where a region or people constitutes a tributary to a more powerful entity that controls its foreign affairs while allowing the tributary vassal state some limited domestic autonomy? The term was originally used to describe the relationship between the Ottoman Empire and its surrounding regions.

Answers
1. Vatican, perhaps from Vagitanus (a baby's first cry is called a vagitus); Oak proposed 'vatika' as the root word
2. 'Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland'
3. Key
4. Bishop Cotton
5. Dead
6. Aachen
7. Batman
8. Hindon (or Hindan)
9. Mameluco / Mamluk
10. Suzerainty