A Baron, a Count, a Duke and an Earl met at a jousting tournament. In the first round, two met in the first joust, and the other two met in the second joust; the two winners from the first round met at the second round for the final joust. After the jousting, they declared:

Baron: I beat the Earl.

Count: I faced both the Baron and the Duke.

Duke: I didn't make it past the first round.

Earl: At the first round, I lost to the Duke.

I knew how many were knights, and how many were liars (though not who was what) but that wasn't enough to know what jousts there had been.

However, I happened to know that a certain joust had taken place (though I didn't know who won and if it had been in the first or the second round) and that allowed me to know every result.

Can you deduce this?

(In reply to Ignorance is key by Paul)

I know why I stay away from these puzzles; because I am too dense to see the obvious.

Case in point, I got lost on this argument in exactly the same spot I got lost in Clinton's argument ... at the begining. Is the argument as to why the first statement must be true simplistically obvious??? Both solutions insist that it is, and it isn't clear to me :-(

Posted by owl on 2005-08-16 03:56:09