Quiz Monkey
What do you want to know?
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Quiz Monkey |
Strictly speaking, this page isn't exclusively about nationalities. It's about the countries that people were born in. They may have moved to a different country at a very young age, and/or they may have ultimately found fame in another country. They may even have become naturalised citizens of a different country. Some of them (like the two people named in the first question) were born in a colony of the country that their forebears came from, whose nationality they may well retain.
In the case of historical characters, the answer is the modern country that their birthplace is in.
Notes on individual countries:
| • | Soviet Union – the answer is the name of the modern–day country in which their birthplace can be found. This is always (unless I'm mistaken) the same as the name of the Soviet republic that it was in at the time |
| • | Yugoslavia – as with the Soviet Union, it's the name of the modern day country |
| • | Czechoslovakia – always Czechoslovakia (no distinction between Slovakia and the Czech Republic) |
| • | Germany – always Germany (no distinction between East and West) |
There is one special case, where the birthplace of the person concerned is in a completely different country now to what it was then. This case gets a section all to itself.
At the bottom of the page you will find details of a few people who weren't born in the country you might think they were born in.
| Q: In which country was (or were) ... born? | A: | |
| Yves St. Laurent, Albert Camus |
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Algeria |
| Che Guevara, Juan Manuel Fangio, Chris de Burgh; David Nalbandian, Juan Martin del Potro (tennis) |
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Argentina |
| Percy Grainger, Thomas Keneally, Peter Carey, Errol Flynn, Dame Nellie Melba, Sir Charles Mackerras (conductor, 1925–2010), Elle Macpherson (supermodel) |
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Australia |
| Marie Antoinette; Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler |
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Austria |
| Composers Mozart, Schubert, Strauss (father and son), Mahler, Bruckner | ||
| Erwin Schrödinger (physicist, who devised the famous thought experiment – often described as a paradox – about a cat that may or may not be dead) | ||
| Garry Kasparov (world chess champion 1985–93) |
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Azerbaijan |
| Tony Cozier (cricket journalist and commentator; died in 2016 aged 75); Rihanna (singer, born 1988) |
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Barbados |
| Victoria Azarenka (tennis player) |
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Belarus |
| Georges Simenon (writer, creator of Maigret) |
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Belgium |
| Django Reinhardt (jazz guitarist) | ||
| Eddy Merckx (cyclist – five times winner of the Tour de France, 1969–74) | ||
| Jacky Ickx (Formula 1 racing driver) | ||
| The Singing Nun (real name Jeanne Deckers, known in French as Soeur Sourire) | ||
| Jacques Brel (songwriter) | ||
| Hergé (real name Georges Remi – creator of Tintin) | ||
| Adolphe Saxe (inventor of the saxophone) | ||
| Leo Baekeland (inventor of bakelite, the first plastic) | ||
| Rene Magritte, Peter Paul Rubens and Sir Anthony Van Dyck (painters) | ||
| Audrey Hepburn (actress) | ||
| Jean–Claude Van Damme (actor) | ||
| Justine Henin and Kim Clijsters (tennis players) | ||
| Jean–Marc Bosman (footballer) | ||
| Willy Claes (disgraced former Secretary General of NATO) | ||
| Emerson Fittipaldi, Nelson Piquet, Ayrton Senna (all Formula 1 drivers); Silvestre de Sousa (Flat Racing Champion Jockey in 2015, 2017 and 2018) |
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Brazil |
| Giselle Bundchen (supermodel) | ||
| U Thant |
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Burma |
| Yannick Noah |
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Cameroon |
Andrew Bonar Law; Roy Thomson (1st Baron Thomson of Fleet – 1894–1976); Oscar Peterson (jazz pianist);
James Cameron (film director) |
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Canada |
| Singer–songwriters Paul Anka, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Alanis Morissette, Neil Young | ||
| Actors Pamela Anderson, Dan Aykroyd, Jim Carrey, Glenn Ford, Michael J. Fox, Lorne Greene, Margot Kidder, Raymond Massey, Lois Maxwell, Rick Moranis, Mike Myers, Leslie Nielsen, Mary Pickford, Walter Pidgeon, Christopher Plummer, William Shatner, Norma Shearer, Donald Sutherland, Fay Wray | ||
| Linda Evangelista (supermodel) | ||
| Manuel Pellegrini (football manager – Manchester City, 2013–16) |
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Chile |
| Gabriel Garcia Marquez (writer, died Mexico City 2014); Juan Pablo Montoya (Formula One driver), Shakira (pop singer, 1990s on), Nairo Quintana (cyclist – runner–up in the Tour de France in 2013 and 2015), Faustino Asprilla (footballer – Newcastle United 1996–8) |
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Colombia |
| José Raúl Capablanca (chess champion); Gloria Estefan; Carlos Acosta (ballet dancer, born 1973) |
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Cuba |
| Tom Stoppard, Robert Maxwell, Bedrich Smetana, Antonin Dvorak, Martina Navratilova, Hana Mandlikova, Franz Kafka, Ivana Trump (Donald's first wife – née Zelníčková) |
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Czechoslovakia |
| Eva Herzegova (supermodel) | ||
| Hans Christian Andersen (author of nine volumes of fairy tales); Vitus Bering (explorer); Helena Christensen
(supermodel); Carl Nielsen (composer); Sandi Toksvig (comedian and TV presenter); Caroline Wozniacki (tennis player)
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Denmark |
| Boutros Boutros–Ghali |
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Egypt |
| St. Patrick, Gustav Holst, John Joule |
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England |
| Carmen Kass (supermodel); Arvo Pärt (minimalist composer) |
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Estonia |
| Vijay Singh (golfer) |
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Fiji |
| Jean Sibelius, Keke Rosberg |
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Finland |
| Sarah Bernhardt, John Calvin |
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France |
| Joseph Stalin, Katie Melua |
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Georgia |
| Karl Baedeker, Pope Benedict XVI, Catherine the Great, Albert Einstein (see below), Anne Frank (WWII diarist), Charles Halle, John McEnroe (see below) |
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Germany |
| Composers Bach, Handel, Beethoven, Brahms, Schumann, Richard Strauss | ||
| Scientists Robert Bunsen, Gabriel Fahrenheit, Julius Richard Petri (inventor of the petri dish) | ||
| Heidi Klum, Claudia Schiffer (supermodels) | ||
| Joe Bugner, Harry Houdini (Erich Weiss), Joseph Pulitzer, Franz Liszt, Bela Bartok, Zoltan Kodaly, Alexander Korda, Peter Lorre (Laszlo Löwenstein), Bela Lugosi, Laszlo Biro, Ernő Rubik (inventor of the eponymous Cube) |
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Hungary |
| Magnus Magnusson; Bjork (pop singer) |
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Iceland |
| Colin Cowdrey, David Gower, Nasser Hussain; Engelbert Humperdinck (Gerry Dorsey), Rudyard Kipling, Vivien Leigh, Zubin Mehta, Spike Milligan, Cliff Richard, Basil Spence |
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India |
| Dame Ninette de Valois, Lord Kitchener (Britain's Secretary of State for War in World War One, until his death in 1916); writers James Joyce, George Bernard Shaw, Jonathan Swift, Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde, W. B. Yeats |
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Ireland |
| Chaim Topol, Uri Geller |
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Israel |
| Mario Andretti (F1 world champion 1978 – family moved to USA when he was 15); St. Thomas Aquinas; Rudolf Valentino (moved to the USA in 1913 in search of work, aged 18; died in 1926) |
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Italy |
| John Cabot, Christopher Columbus |
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Italy (Genoa) |
| Reinhold Messner |
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Italy (South Tyrol) |
| Kolo Toure, Yaya Toure, Didier Drogba, Gervinho, Salomon Kalou, Chieck Tiote (footballers – the first two are brothers) |
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Ivory Coast |
| John Barnes (footballer) |
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Jamaica |
| Keanu Reeves
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Lebanon |
| Al Jolson |
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Lithuania |
| Jean–Claude Juncker (prime minister of his country, 1995–2013; President of the European Commission, 2014–19) |
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Luxembourg |
| Madonna's two adopted children, David and Mercy |
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Malawi |
| Jimmy Choo (shoe designer); of Chinese descent, he has lived in the UK since at least 1980 |
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Malaysia |
| Edward de Bono (inventor of lateral thinking), Tony Drago (snooker player) |
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Malta |
| Anthony Quinn (actor); Frida Kahlo (painter); Alfonso Cuarón, Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Guillermo del Toro (Oscar–winning film directors) |
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Mexico |
| Eusebio |
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Mozambique |
| Desiderus Erasmus, Abel Tasman; Mata Hari; Rutger Hauer (star of Blade Runner and the Guinness commercials), Piet Mondrian |
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Netherlands |
| Peter Jackson (film director), David Low (cartoonist), Katherine Mansfield (novelist), Ngaio Marsh (crime writer), Bruce McLaren (Formula One driver and team founder), Russell Crowe (see below), Ernest Rutherford (physicist), Pamela Stephenson (see below), Kiri Te Kanawa (singer) |
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New Zealand |
| Bianca Jagger (born Blanca (sic) Pérez–Mora Macías) |
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Nicaragua |
| Edvard Grieg, Thor Heyerdahl, Henrik Ibsen, Trygve Lie, Edvard Munch, Roald Amundsen |
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Norway |
| Anni–Frid Lyngstad (the dark one out of ABBA – the other three were Swedish) |
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Norway |
| Roberto Duran (world lightweight boxing champion, 1972–80) |
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Panama |
| Xavier Perez de Cuellar |
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Peru |
| Manny Pacquiao (first boxer ever to hold world titles at seven different weights, 2009) |
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Philippines |
| Frederic Chopin, Joseph Conrad, Marie Slodowskaya (Curie), Nicholas Copernicus, Marie Rambert, David Ben Gurion, Menachem Begin, Karol Wojtyla (Pope John Paul II) |
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Poland |
| Bartholomew Diaz, Vasco da Gama, Ferdinand Magellan |
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Portugal |
| Edward G. Robinson (Emmanuel Goldenberg); The Cheeky Girls (Monica and Gabriela Irimia) |
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Romania |
| Marc Chagall, Irving Berlin |
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Russia |
| Natalia Vodianova (supermodel) | ||
| Derek Walcott (Nobel prize–winning poet) |
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St. Lucia |
| Monica Seles, Novak Djokovic, Ana Ivanović, Jelena Janković |
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Serbia |
| Melania Trump (US 'First Lady', 2017–21, née Knauss) |
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Slovenia |
| Imam (David Bowie's supermodel wife); Mo Farah |
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Somalia |
| Sid James, Miriam Makeba, Elon Musk, Jody Scheckter, Andrew Strauss, Charlize Theron |
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South Africa |
| J. R. R. Tolkien | ||
| Gary Player, Ernie Els, Retief Goosen, Charl Schwartzel, Louis Oosthuizen (golfers) | ||
| Kyung–wha Chung, violinist |
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South Korea |
| Manolo Blahnik (shoe designer); Jon Rahm (golfer – ranked World No. 1 for four weeks in the summer of 2020)
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Spain |
| Alek Wek (supermodel) |
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Sudan |
| Anders Jonas Angstrom, Anders Celsius, Dag Hammarskjold, Alfred Nobel, Ingmar Bergman, Ingrid Bergman (no relation), Max Von Sydow (actor), Sven Hedin (geographer and explorer) |
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Sweden |
| Ursula Andress, Louis Chevrolet (racing driver, and founder of the car manufacturing company), Le Corbusier (architect Charles Edouard Jeanneret), Roberto di Matteo (former Chelsea player and manager), Carl Jung (psychiatrist), Auguste Picard (balloonist and sea explorer), César Ritz (hotelier), William Tell, Madame (Marie) Tussaud |
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Switzerland |
| Ang Lee (Oscar–winning film director) |
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Taiwan |
| James Wattana (snooker player) |
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Thailand |
| Golda Meir |
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Ukraine |
| Nancy Astor, Maria Callas, Eamon de Valera, Yehudi Menuhin, Charles Ives and Samuel Barber (composers), Bruce Lee (see below), Mel Gibson (see below), Michael Flatley, Cindy Crawford (supermodel); Jonas Salk (the physician who developed the first successful polio vaccine), Robert Van de Graaf (inventor of the eponymous high–voltage generator) |
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USA |
| Ilich Ramirez Sanchez (Carlos the Jackal); Simon Bolivar |
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Venezuela |
| Henry Morton Stanley, Ian Hislop, Paula Yates, Paul Whitehead |
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Wales |
| Then | Now | |||
| Mother Teresa (of Calcutta) |
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Albania |
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Macedonia |
© Haydn Thompson 2017–23