h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

As numbers were a big thing in this individual's life, who was:

Born once,
Lived 24,
Had two with one,
Had several with two,
Had a at least two with three,
Rated first,
Scored 80,
Nearly killed once,
Was killed once,
Buried four times.

Probably too easy, No Klaxons but not many clues.

Seven of Nine?

Ha! but nope.

This one's real life.

Deke

Is it a magician?

Not a magician. But I think I see where you're going with that one, so not an escapologist either for that matter.

Deke

Was this person a scientist.

Buried four times? So it's not Till Eulenspiegel, who was baptised three times in a row...

Not a scientist and probably baptised only once.

Deke

He died at age 24 and had at least six children? Was he some kind of noble, then?

What about Bonnie Prince Charlie?

Given that he was rated first and scored 80, are we talking about some kind of sportsman?

B

Or woman? Or horse?

B

Buried 4 times .... Is it one of the Russian Royal family ?

He was a he.

But he wasn't Bonnie Prince Charlie.

He had no children.

He would have probably would have agreed that he was a sportsman, though it’s debateable if in modern parlance you would agree. He probably thought of himself more as 'a hunter'.

Not one of the Russian family, but of good stock and one of his countries aristocracy.

Deke

thomas abeckett

thomas abeckett

'fraid not. Come forward about seven and a half centuries.

Deke

Byron?

Not Byron either I'm afraid.

Deke

Apparently the "a" in Thomas a Becket is wrong, at least according to a recent episode of QI...

Anyway, my guess would be G H Hardy, but not everything seems to fit quite right. He was crazy about numbers, that's for certain. The story goes that he once visited Srinivasa Ramanujan, and declared himself disappointed that he could not find anything interesting about the number of his taxi, 1729. Of course Ramanujan, being the genius that he was, promptly declared that 1729 was the smallest number expressible as the sum of two cubes in two different ways!

Hmm... not getting us closer to the answer though. I have a gut feeling, having mentioned the Hardy name once, that Thomas Hardy fits a few of the clues - married a few times, lived to over 80, buried in more than one place. Not sure where "rated first" fits into all of that.

I've got a half memory here - there was someone who was thrown out of his own country (Italy I think) and died elsewhere and was buried there.

However he then became famous and his home country tried to claim his body back - but the church where he was buried had been damaged (in the war ?) and the tombs had been re-located with the church.

But when they got to the supposed new burial ground, they found the tomb empty. It transpired a local priest had moved the bones to keep them in the person's adopted country.

Eventually they found the bones and he was re-patriated.

That fits the buried 4 times - but I can't think who it was ! I think it was a writer, but I just don't know.

That sounds a bit like the Dante QI we got to guess recently...