Problem
Einstein wrote this riddle early during the 19th century. He said 98% of the world could not solve it.
“There are 5 houses in 5 different colors. In each house lives a person with a different nationality. The 5 owners drink a certain type of beverage, smoke a certain brand of cigar, and keep a certain pet. No owners have the same pet, smoke the same brand of cigar, or drink the same beverage.”
The question is: Who owns the fish?
Hints:
- The Brit lives in the red house.
- The Swede keeps dogs as pets.
- The Dane drinks tea.
- The green house is on the left of the white house.
- The green homeowner drinks coffee.
- The person who smokes Pall Mall rears birds.
- The owner of the yellow house smokes Dunhill.
- The man living in the center house drinks milk.
- The Norwegian lives in the first house.
- The man who smokes Blend lives next to the one who keeps cats.
- The man who keeps the horse lives next to the man who smokes Dunhill.
- The owner who smokes Bluemaster drinks beer.
- The German smokes prince.
- The Norwegian lives next to the blue house.
- The man who smokes Blend has a neighbor who drinks water.
Solution
a) We know that Norwegian lives in the 1st house (Hint: #9) and next to him lives a guy who stays in a blue house (Hint: #14). So far we have the following:
1st House
2nd House
Norwegian
Blue House
b) We know that the green house is on the left of the white house (Hint: 4), therefore we can form a new group with the Green and White house next to each other.
Green House
White House
c) Now think carefully the combination of (a) and (b). We should reach to the conclusion that the Norwegean guy who lives in the first house, he either lives in the Red or Yellow house since the Green & White houses group can only have a position of either 3-4 or 4-5.
d) Since the Brit is the guy who lives in the Red house (Hint: 1), now we definitely know that the Norwegian lives in the Yellow house. So far we have the following information:
1st House
2nd House
Norwegian
Yellow
Blue
British
Red
Group:
Green House
White House
e) Next, we know that the owner of the Green house drinks coffee (Hint: 5) and the man living in the center house drinks milk (Hint: 8). As a result, we conclude that the group of Green and Yellow house are the 4th and 5th house in order and that the center house (number 3) is the Brit.
1
2
3
4
5
Norwegian
British
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Milk
Coffee
f) Hint 7 gives us another information on the first house (The owner of the yellow house smokes Dunhill). In-addition, the man who keeps the horse lives next to the man who smokes Dunhill (Hint 11), therefore the man living in house #2 keeps horses.
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
British
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Milk
Coffee
Pet
Horses
Smoke
Dunhill
g) Hint 15 states that “The man who smokes Blend has a neighbor who drinks water.” We conclude that only 2 people can have a neighbor who drinks water (House 1&2), but since House #1 already smokes Dunhill that means that House #2 smokes Blend and House #1 drinks water.
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
British
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Water
Milk
Coffee
Pet
Horses
Smoke
Dunhill
Blend
h) Hint 12 states “The owner who smokes Bluemaster drinks beer.” See the table above and you will notice that we are missing the drink only for houses 2 and 5 but since we already know that the owner of house 2 smokes Blend, then the combination of Hint 12 applies to house #5.
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
British
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Water
Milk
Coffee
Beer
Pet
Horses
Smoke
Dunhill
Blend
Bluemaster
i) Hint 3 states that “The Dane drinks tea.”. We are missing only the drink for house #2 therefore this applies to house #2.
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
Danish
British
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Water
Tea
Milk
Coffee
Beer
Pet
Horses
Smoke
Dunhill
Blend
Bluemaster
j) Hint 10 states “The man who smokes Blend lives next to the one who keeps cats.” As a result, house #1 keeps cats since house #2 has the owner who smokes Blend.
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
Danish
British
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Water
Tea
Milk
Coffee
Beer
Pet
Cats
Horses
Smoke
Dunhill
Blend
Bluemaster
k) Hint #13 states that “The German smokes prince”. We are missing the nationalities of the owners who live in house #4 and #5 but since the owner of house #5 smokes Bluemaster, this hint applies to house #4.
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
Danish
British
German
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Water
Tea
Milk
Coffee
Beer
Pet
Cats
Horses
Smoke
Dunhill
Blend
Prince
Bluemaster
l) Hint #6 states that “The person who smokes Pall Mall rears birds”. We are only missing the tabacco of House #3 therefore:
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
Danish
British
German
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Water
Tea
Milk
Coffee
Beer
Pet
Cats
Horses
Birds
Smoke
Dunhill
Blend
Pall Mall
Prince
Bluemaster
m) Finally hint #2 states that “The Swede keeps dogs as pets”. This combination can only be applied to house #5.
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
Danish
British
German
Swedish
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Water
Tea
Milk
Coffee
Beer
Pet
Cats
Horses
Birds
Dogs
Smoke
Dunhill
Blend
Pall Mall
Prince
Bluemaster
n) Now who owns the fish? The German owns the fish!!!
Congratulations, according to Einstein you now belong to the 2% of the people who can solve this riddle!!!
House
1
2
3
4
5
Nation
Norwegian
Danish
British
German
Swedish
Color
Yellow
Blue
Red
Green
White
Drink
Water
Tea
Milk
Coffee
Beer
Pet
Cats
Horses
Birds
FISH
Dogs
Smoke
Dunhill
Blend
Pall Mall
Prince
Bluemaster
Reference