Famous people you should know

The test rarely wants depth — it wants the pairing. Learn each name next to the one thing it is tested on, grouped by field. The ★ marks the people who come up most often, so revise those first. Use the chips to focus on a single field, the ★ High-yield chip to drill the priority names, or type a name to find it fast.

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Scientists, inventors & engineers

Sir Isaac Newton ★

Science

Worked out gravity and the laws of motion; wrote the Principia. The scientist the test returns to most.

Charles Darwin ★

Science

Set out the theory of evolution in On the Origin of Species (1859).

Sir Alexander Fleming ★

Science

Discovered penicillin in 1928, opening the era of antibiotics.

Michael Faraday ★

Science

Pioneering work on electricity and electromagnetism.

Sir Tim Berners-Lee ★

Science

Invented the World Wide Web around 1989–90.

Isambard Kingdom Brunel ★

Engineering

Leading engineer of the Industrial Revolution — the Great Western Railway, major tunnels and bridges, and the SS Great Britain.

Francis Crick & James Watson

Science

Worked out the structure of DNA in 1953 at Cambridge, with Maurice Wilkins.

Alexander Graham Bell

Invention

Scottish-born inventor of the telephone.

John Logie Baird

Invention

Scottish pioneer of television.

Sir Frank Whittle

Engineering

Invented the jet engine.

Ada Lovelace

Science

Regarded as the first computer programmer, through her work with Charles Babbage.

Sir Ian Wilmut & Keith Campbell

Science

Led the Edinburgh team that cloned Dolly the sheep in 1996, the first cloned mammal.

James Watt

Engineering

Scottish engineer who greatly improved the steam engine during the Industrial Revolution.

Sir Robert Watson-Watt

Science

Developed radar.

Sir Christopher Wren

Architecture

Architect who rebuilt St Paul's Cathedral after the Great Fire of London.

Edward Jenner

Science

Developed vaccination, working against smallpox.

Florence Nightingale

Science

Founder of modern nursing; served in the Crimean War and wrote Notes on Nursing.

Stephen Hawking

Science

Physicist known for work on black holes and the book A Brief History of Time.

William Shakespeare ★

Writing

Playwright and poet from Stratford-upon-Avon — Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Macbeth.

Geoffrey Chaucer

Writing

Wrote The Canterbury Tales, about pilgrims journeying to Canterbury.

Jane Austen

Writing

Novelist — Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility.

Charles Dickens

Writing

Novelist — Oliver Twist, A Christmas Carol, Great Expectations.

Robert Burns

Writing

Scotland's national poet ("the Bard"); wrote "Auld Lang Syne" and is celebrated on Burns Night, 25 January.

The Brontë sisters

Writing

Charlotte (Jane Eyre), Emily (Wuthering Heights) and Anne.

Thomas Hardy

Writing

Novelist and poet, for example Far from the Madding Crowd.

The Romantic poets

Writing

A group including Wordsworth, Blake, Byron, Keats and Shelley; Wordsworth wrote "Daffodils".

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Writing

Created the detective Sherlock Holmes.

Agatha Christie

Writing

Crime novelist; created Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple.

Dylan Thomas

Writing

Welsh poet — Under Milk Wood.

J.K. Rowling

Writing

Contemporary author of the Harry Potter books.

J.R.R. Tolkien

Writing

Author of The Lord of the Rings.

The Poet Laureate

Writing

An honorary royal poet post; recent holders are rarely asked for by name.

J.M.W. Turner ★

Art

Romantic landscape painter; today's Turner Prize for modern art, awarded at the Tate, is named after him.

Thomas Gainsborough

Art

Eighteenth-century portrait painter.

Sir Joshua Reynolds

Art

Portrait painter; the first president of the Royal Academy.

John Constable

Art

Landscape painter — The Hay Wain.

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood

Art

A nineteenth-century art movement.

Henry Moore

Art

Sculptor known for large abstract bronze figures.

Barbara Hepworth

Art

Twentieth-century sculptor.

David Hockney

Art

Contemporary painter, from the Pop-art era onward.

Lucian Freud

Art

Twentieth-century portrait painter.

Sir Edward Elgar ★

Music

Composer of Pomp and Circumstance, the source of "Land of Hope and Glory".

Henry Purcell

Music

Baroque composer and organist at Westminster Abbey.

George Frideric Handel

Music

German-born British composer — Messiah, Water Music and Music for the Royal Fireworks.

Gustav Holst

Music

Composer of The Planets.

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Music

English composer.

Benjamin Britten

Music

Composer of The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra; founded the Aldeburgh Festival.

Andrew Lloyd Webber

Music

Modern musical theatre — Cats and The Phantom of the Opera.

The Beatles & the Rolling Stones

Music

Defining British popular music of the 1960s.

The Proms

Music

An annual season of classical concerts; the Last Night of the Proms is held at the Royal Albert Hall.

Sir Roger Bannister ★

Sport

First person to run a mile in under four minutes, in 1954.

Sir Steve Redgrave

Sport

Rower who won gold at five consecutive Olympic Games.

Bobby Moore

Sport

Captained England to victory in the 1966 FIFA World Cup.

Sir Ian Botham

Sport

Celebrated cricketer.

Sir Jackie Stewart & Lewis Hamilton

Sport

Formula 1 world champions — Stewart Scottish; Hamilton a multiple title-winner.

Dame Kelly Holmes

Sport

Won 800 m and 1500 m gold at the Athens 2004 Olympics.

Dame Ellen MacArthur

Sport

Set the record for the fastest solo sail around the world in 2005.

Sir Chris Hoy

Sport

Scottish cyclist with multiple Olympic gold medals.

Sir Mo Farah

Sport

Long-distance runner with multiple Olympic gold medals.

Sir Andy Murray

Sport

Scottish tennis player; Wimbledon and Olympic champion.

Jessica Ennis-Hill

Sport

Won heptathlon gold at the London 2012 Olympics.

Bradley Wiggins

Sport

First British rider to win the Tour de France, in 2012.

Sir Winston Churchill ★

Politics

Prime Minister through the Second World War; voted Greatest Briton in a 2002 poll. Died in 1965.

Margaret Thatcher ★

Politics

The first female Prime Minister; Conservative leader in office from 1979 to 1990.

Clement Attlee

Politics

Post-war Labour Prime Minister who built the welfare state and set up the NHS in 1948.

William Beveridge

Reform

His 1942 report became the blueprint for the welfare state.

Aneurin (Nye) Bevan

Reform

Drove the creation of the NHS in 1948.

Emmeline Pankhurst

Reform

Led the suffragette campaign for women's right to vote.

William Wilberforce

Reform

Led the campaign to abolish the slave trade, ended in 1807.

Mary Seacole

Reform

Jamaican-British nurse who cared for soldiers during the Crimean War.

Sake Dean Mahomet

Society

Opened the first curry house in Britain and introduced "shampooing".

Mary Quant ★

Fashion

1960s designer who popularised the miniskirt and shaped the "Swinging Sixties" London look.

Vivienne Westwood

Fashion

A pioneer of British punk fashion.

Alexander McQueen

Fashion

British fashion designer (Lee Alexander McQueen) known for dramatic, avant-garde tailoring and theatrical catwalk shows.

Stella McCartney

Fashion

British fashion designer known for sustainable, vegan fashion that avoids leather and fur; daughter of Paul McCartney.

Sir Francis Drake

Exploration

First Englishman to sail around the world, in the Golden Hind; helped defeat the Spanish Armada.

Captain James Cook

Exploration

Charted the coasts of Australia and New Zealand.

Sir Walter Raleigh

Exploration

Explorer and figure at the Elizabethan court.

Captain Robert Falcon Scott

Exploration

Led an Antarctic expedition and died returning from the South Pole.

Sir Ernest Shackleton

Exploration

Antarctic explorer.

Olympics & Paralympics — the bit people skip

These come up more often than candidates expect, and the Paralympics question in particular catches people out.