thanks for the obscenity 'everhelpful' but my answer was 100% correct. When did you think Portugal was discovered, last week? Who needs to go back to school, I wonder?
Everhelpful - I have to agree that the question as stated doesn't make a lot of sense. Is this the exact form of the question in the Times? Was it in a quiz or a crossword? It would make more sense if it was something like "famous Portuguese discoverer" because several of the great explorers (da Gama, Diaz, Magellan etc) did come from Portugal.
That was the way it was worded. Thought it was Vasco da Gama myself. Question was asked by a friend of mine and I have checked with him and he insists that was the wording.
the earliest known tribe in Portugal were Lusitanians, probably about 8000 BC, but there were most likely people there millennia before that, and as I said neanderthals (who were not direct ancestors of humans but coexisted with them before dying out) earlier still. So goodness knows what the Times is after. That's why it seemed such an odd question. It's like 'who discovered Britain?'.
Question Author
What was silly about the question? Was asked in "The Times" Newspaper quiz.!!
Doesn't matter who first asked it, it was an utterly fatuous question. Since you didn't actually see it first written I believe there has been a misinterpretation somewhere along the line.