👑 Royal Traditions & Protocol Trivia Questions & Answers
Titles, ceremonies, etiquette and the rules of royal life. Below are 30 free royal traditions & protocol trivia questions with answers — part of Royalty trivia on BUZZ. Want a real challenge that adapts to what you know? Play the Royalty quiz — no signup needed to start.
30 Royal Traditions & Protocol trivia questions
Q1. What's the popular name for the annual parade marking the sovereign's official birthday in June?
Answer: Trooping the Colour
💡 It's held on Horse Guards Parade in central London.
Q2. What ceremony draws crowds to Buckingham Palace when the Old Guard swaps duty with the New Guard?
Answer: Changing of the Guard
💡 It's one of London's most popular free tourist attractions.
Q3. What annual British service has the monarch give special coins to elderly recipients?
Answer: Royal Maundy
💡 The number of recipients, and pence given, always matches the sovereign's age.
Q4. Which chivalric order, founded in 1348, uses the motto 'Honi soit qui mal y pense'?
Answer: The Order of the Garter
💡 The French motto translates roughly as 'shame on him who thinks evil of it.'
Q5. During a coronation, holy oil is poured onto a gold utensil before anointing — what's it called?
Answer: The Coronation Spoon
💡 The spoon is the oldest surviving piece of the English coronation regalia.
Q6. About how many gemstones decorate the solid gold crown used at British coronations?
Answer: 444
💡 They were only permanently set in 1911 — before that, jewels were hired and returned afterward.
Q7. Whose move into a London palace in 1837 made its forecourt home to the famous guard-swap ceremony?
Answer: Queen Victoria
💡 Foot Guards had already been protecting royal palaces since 1660, well before that move.
Q8. Which English king is credited with starting the 'touching for the King's Evil' ceremony, around 1400?
Answer: Edward the Confessor
💡 The custom persisted in England for centuries afterward.
Q9. Whose 1422 accession to the French throne is credited with first using the 'king is dead' proclamation?
Answer: Charles VII
💡 The phrase has since been echoed in monarchies well beyond France.
Q10. Which 1701 Act barred Roman Catholics, and those married to one, from the British throne?
Answer: The Act of Settlement
💡 Its marriage-to-a-Catholic bar was finally scrapped by the Succession to the Crown Act 2013.
Q11. Which sailing king's discomfort led the Royal Navy to toast monarchs while seated?
Answer: William IV
💡 Low wooden-ship deck beams meant he'd repeatedly banged his head as a young naval officer.
Q12. What silver-gilt font, first used in 1841, holds the water for royal christenings?
Answer: The Lily Font
💡 It was commissioned by Queen Victoria for the christening of her first child, the Princess Royal.
Q13. By tradition, the water for a British royal christening is brought from which river?
Answer: The River Jordan
💡 The custom symbolizes a link to the biblical site of Christ's own baptism.
Q14. In 1970, Queen Elizabeth II began a crowd-greeting stroll now nicknamed what?
Answer: The walkabout
💡 She started it during a tour of Australia and New Zealand, stepping out of her car to meet people directly.
Q15. Every summer, an ancient Thames ceremony counts and rings a bird owned by the Crown — which bird?
Answer: The mute swan
💡 The tradition, dating back to the 12th century, is known as Swan Upping.
Q16. What ancient stone, used to crown Scottish kings, was built into England's Coronation Chair after 1296?
Answer: Stone of Scone
💡 It was returned to Scotland in 1996 but travels back to Westminster Abbey for coronations.
Q17. Which English king commissioned the wooden chair built to house Scotland's coronation stone?
Answer: Edward I
💡 The chair is the oldest piece of furniture in the UK still used for its original purpose.
Q18. How many rounds does the Tower of London fire on royal anniversaries once every bonus is added up?
Answer: 62
💡 That's the basic 21 plus 20 for being a royal fortress plus 21 more in honour of the City of London.
Q19. A company that long supplies goods to the royal household can apply to display which official mark?
Answer: A Royal Warrant
💡 The system traces back to the 15th century, with printer William Caxton among the earliest holders in 1476.
Q20. The old belief that a royal touch cured the 'King's Evil' was really targeting what skin condition?
Answer: Scrofula
💡 Charles II reportedly touched over 90,000 people during his reign hoping to cure sufferers.
Q21. Scotland's Order of the Thistle, second only to the Garter, bears which Latin motto?
Answer: Nemo me impune lacessit
💡 It roughly translates as 'no one provokes me with impunity,' echoing the thistle's own prickly defence.
Q22. At royal investitures, the sword used to dub new knights once belonged to which king?
Answer: King George VI
💡 It was his sword from his days as Colonel of the Scots Guards, before he became king.
Q23. The Prince of Wales's badge of three ostrich feathers carries which German motto?
Answer: Ich dien
💡 It means 'I serve' and is traced back to Edward, the Black Prince, in the 14th century.
Q24. What title, granted to Henry VIII by the Pope in 1521, is still used by British monarchs?
Answer: Defender of the Faith
💡 Pope Paul III revoked it after Henry broke from Rome, but Parliament restored it for good in 1543.
Q25. Which ancient council meets at St James's Palace to formally proclaim a new monarch?
Answer: The Accession Council
💡 It's usually convened within about 24 hours of a sovereign's death.
Q26. Japan's enthronement ceremony seats a new emperor upon which canopied throne?
Answer: The Takamikura
💡 It's topped by a great golden phoenix and was reassembled inside Tokyo's Imperial Palace for Naruhito's 2019 enthronement.
Q27. Members of Britain's ancient Privy Council are formally styled 'The' what?
Answer: The Right Honourable
💡 The Council itself, as a body, is instead styled 'The Most Honourable.'
Q28. The Ceremony of the Keys has locked the Tower of London nightly for about how many years?
Answer: About 700 years
💡 Edward III ordered the nightly locking after a security scare exposed weak defences in 1340.
Q29. What was Emperor Naruhito's 2019 Tokyo enthronement ceremony formally called?
Answer: Sokui no Rei
💡 It's considered the most important of all Japan's imperial rituals.
Q30. At the State Opening of Parliament, a chamber door is ceremonially slammed on which royal messenger?
Answer: Black Rod
💡 The tradition traces back to 1642, when Charles I stormed into the Commons trying to arrest five MPs.
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