Aarushhh/wikipedia-simple-splitted huggingface dataset:
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was written by J. K. Rowling and published on 16 July 2005. The book is the sixth Harry Potter book.

In the sixth book Harry begins his sixth year at the magical school Hogwarts with his best friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. During the year he has help in his worst class by the mysterious Half-Blood Prince (also known as Severus snape), he has his first romance and learns several very important facts about his enemy, Voldemort.

Film 
The film, based on the book, was to be released on 21 November 2008, but on 14 August 2008, it was announced that the film would be pushed back to 17 July 2009. On 8 January 2009, the film was given a PG rating by the MPPA. The previous two installments, Goblet of Fire and Order of the Phoenix, were rated PG-13.

Plot
Plot 

The book starts at Severus Snape's house. Narcissa Malfoy is very unhappy that Voldemort has made her son, Draco, put on a mission. Voldemort is a very bad man who does not like half-blood or Muggle (non-magical) wizards and witches. He wants to kill them. Bellatrix, Narcissa's sister, and Narcissa go to Snape's house. There, Snape agrees and says he will help Malfoy complete whatever his mission is.
The Half-Blood Prince is of great mystery to Harry. Harry finds a book with the Prince's name on it and finds that it has many helpful tips for making potions. He follows the tips and is seen as very smart to Professor Slughorn. His friend Hermione is mad that Harry is getting credit for information that he does not really know. The old professor, Professor Snape, is now teaching Defense of the Dark Arts.

Dumbledore gives private lessons to Harry. They usually involve looking into a Pensieve, which holds old memories. In flashback, Harry learns that Voldemort was the product of an unhappy witch and a Muggle father that never loved him. The witch was named Merope and she had an older brother and father that were very bad to her. They made her work and crushed her spirit. A Ministry of Magic wizard came and arrested the father and brother. Merope left the house and gave a love potion to a young man she liked named Tom Riddle.
After she was pregnant with the baby, she stopped giving him the potion and he left her. Soon afterwards, she goes to an orphanage and gives birth to Voldemort, naming him Tom Marvolo Riddle, and dies shortly afterwards. Voldemort is a very bad kid. He steals items from the other kids and uses magic against them. Dumbledore comes one night to tell him that he has magic and invites him to attend Hogwarts.

One final memory shows Voldemort trying to apply for a job at Hogwarts. Dumbledore, who was the Transfiguration teacher at the time, was just made Headmaster. Voldemort wanted to be the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. Dumbledore refused to make him a teacher. This angered Voldemort. Since then, no professor has held the Defense Against the Dark Arts job for more than a year and Dumbledore thinks it is because of this meeting.
Dumbledore tells Harry that Voldemort has six "Horcruxes," or pieces of his soul. While Voldemort has these Horcruxes, nobody can kill him. A couple of them have been destroyed. In Harry's second year, he stabbed Riddle's diary with a fang, destroying one. Before Harry's sixth year started, Dumbledore visited the old Marvolo home and found a ring and destroyed it but lost his hand as a result.

One night, Dumbledore and Harry go out to a cave area. Dumbledore thinks there is another Horcrux there. After getting there, they find a goblet. Dumbledore drinks the entire potion, which makes him dizzy. They find the locket and go back to Hogwarts, where they find that the Death Eaters and Malfoy have attacked. They take broomsticks and land at the top of one of the towers. Malfoy bursts where Harry and Dumbledore are. Harry is hiding under an invisibility cloak. Soon, other Death Eaters come up, but Malfoy cannot kill Dumbledore as Voldemort ordered him to do. Snape comes up and kills Dumbledore.
The Death Eaters all escape afterwards. Harry tries to get Snape, but Snape is too fast. When Harry tries to use some curses he found in the Half-Blood Prince's book, Snape fights back and then declares that he is the Half-Blood Prince. Later, Hermione says this is true, having found a newspaper article about a girl named Eileen Prince (a witch) marrying a man named Tobias Snape (a Muggle), making Snape a half-blood wizard.

Hogwarts holds a funeral for Dumbledore. Harry opens the locket, only to find that someone named R.A.B was there earlier and found and destroyed the Horcrux. He also says he will not be coming back to Hogwarts next year.

2005 books
Harry Potter books
Persian, also called Farsi, is a Western Iranian language. It is the official language of Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. It is also spoken by many people in Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and other neighbouring countries and by immigrants from Central Asia in Russia. Persian was also taught as a second language in schools in Pakistan until 2006. In the past, many of those places were parts of the Persian Empire.

Persian has many dialects and is officially called Farsi in Iran, Dari and Farsi in Afghanistan and Tajiki in Tajikistan. The literary language of each country is a little different, but people from each country can understand one another when they have a conversation. It has words from French in Iran and many from Russian Tajikistan.
Alphabet 
The Persian alphabet has the following letters:
ا ب پ ت ث ج چ ح خ د ذ ر ز ژ س ش ص ض ط ظ ع غ ف ق ک گ ل م ن و ه ی
The Persian alphabet used in Iran and Afghanistan is similar to the Arabic alphabet, but since Persian in a different family from Arabic, their vocabulary and grammar are very different. Since the 1930s, in the countries that were in the Soviet Union, like Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, Persian has been written in the Cyrillic alphabet, like Russian. All Persian-speakers used to use the Arabic alphabet.
History 
Persian is a very old language, and linguists use names for three different versions of Persian that were used in three different times. Old Persian was spoken in the first Persian Empire, under the Achaemenid kings, including Cyrus and Darius the Great. The empire existed from the 6th century BC to the conquest of Alexander the Great. The second Persian empire was ruled by the Sassanian kings from the 2nd century AD until the Muslim conquest of Iran by the Arabs in the 7th century and spoke Middle Persian, or Pahlavi.

New or Modern Persian is spoken today and was first written down in the 9th century, during the Samanid Empire, which was the first Muslim Persian kingdom and was based in Central Asia. The earliest writers of New Persian included poets like Rudaki, and Ferdowsi, who wrote an epic, a very long poem, called the Shahname, translated as the Book of Kings in English. It has myths and historical stories from before the Arabs conquered Persia.
Many other famous writers in Persian language were poets too, a few being Saadi, Hafez, Rumi. The Persian language has been very important one for literature. After Arabic, it was the second most common written language in Muslim countries, especially in the East.

Sample

Related pages 
 Dari (Eastern Persian)
 Tajik language
Persian Inscriptions on Indian Monuments

References

 
Modern Persian
Copenhagen is the capital city of Denmark. It is also the largest city in Denmark. In 2014, 1,246,611 people lived in the urban area. Copenhagen is on the island of Zealand and the smaller island named Amager.

Founded as a Viking fishing village. Copenhagen was built in the 12th century A.D. and got City rights in 1254. A few years later, it was destroyed nearly completely. In 1443, Copenhagen became the capital of Denmark. In 1801, there were more than 100,000 inhabitants in Copenhagen for the first time. In the 1960s, more than 700,000 people lived in Copenhagen Municipality, and today there are 528,000 inhabitants in the municipality. Near the city centre there is the famous Freetown Christiania.

Districts
Copenhagen is divided into 10 districts. The districts are:
Indre By
Christianshavn
Vesterbro
Nørrebro
Østerbro
Frederiksberg
Amagerbro
Hellerup
Kastrup
Bispebjerg

Famous people

References
References

Other websites 
 Copenhagen Portal - Tourist & Visitors Guide to Copenhagen  
 Insider Travel Tips and Tourist Guides to Copenhagen 
 VisitCopenhagen.dk - Wonderful Copenhagen
 Copenhagen for Partiers - Tourist Guide 
 WorldFlicks in Copenhagen: Photos and interesting places on Google Maps 

 
11th-century establishments in Europe
The Nepali language is the official language of Nepal and a language in India. Besides Nepal it is spoken in India, Bhutan and parts of Burma. In the Indian states of Sikkim and  West Bengal also it is an official language. This language is also known as Gorkhali Language or Khaskura. It is believed to have originated from the ancient Sanskrit language from which it takes many words. It is written in Devanagari style of writing which is similar to Hindi. It is spoken throughout Nepal and is the mother tongue of more than half of the population. It is also used by the Government of Nepal for all official purposes. In Nepal it is compulsory to study Nepali language as a subject until Grade 10 (High School).

References

Indo-Aryan languages
Nepali culture
Languages of India
Languages of Nepal
Kathmandu is the capital city of Nepal. It is the largest city of Nepal. The population of the city is about 1.003 million. It has many Buddhist and Hindu temples and palaces.

Climate 
Kathmandu has a humid subtropical climate (Cwa in the Köppen climate classification).

Culture 
Kathmandu is home to several international and regional organizations.

International Buddhist Meditation Center operates in Kathmandu, the capital city of Nepal.

Related pages
 Kathmandu Valley
 Nepal
 Theravada

References
Nepali could mean:
Anything related to Nepal
Nepali language or Gorkhali – the official language of modern Nepal as well as parts of India and Bhutan
Nepal Bhasa or Newari – the literary language of the Kathmandu Valley and the old state of Nepal
The 11th century was the century from 1001 to 1100.

Decades and years 
Note: years before or after the 11th century are in italics.

Related pages 
 Heian period
The 10th century was a century that lasted from 901 to 1000. It was the last century of the 1st millennium.

Decades and years 
Note: years before or after the 10th century are in italics.

Related pages 
 Heian period
The 9th century was the century from 801 to 900.

Events
An unknown event causes the decline of the Maya Classical Era.
Beowulf might have been written down in this century. It could also have been in the 8th century.
 Reign of Charlemagne, and the Carolingian Renaissance in Western Europe.
 Large-scale Viking attacks on Europe begin.
 Oseberg ship burial.
 The Magyars begin their conquest of Pannonia.
 The Tukolor settle in the Senegal river valley.
 Muslim traders settle in the northwest and southeast of Madagascar.
 800: Charlemagne is crowned emperor of Rome by Pope Leo III.
 800: Arab fleet sails up the Tiber.
 800 – 909: Rule of Aghlabids as an independent Muslim dynasty in North Africa, with their capital at Tunis.
 802: Jayavarman II of the Khmer people in Cambodia founds the Khmer empire and make the Angkorian dynasty.
 803: Construction on the Leshan Giant Buddha in Tang Dynasty China is complete, after 90 years of rock-carving on a massive cliff-side.
 805 - 820: Tang Dynasty was under the rule of Emperor Xianzong of Tang.
809 – 815: War between the Byzantine empire and Bulgaria.
 811: Battle of Pliska fought between a Byzantine force led by emperor Nicephorus I and a Bulgarian army commanded by Khan Krum. Byzantines are defeated in a series of engagements, ending with the death of Nicephorus I.
 813: In Battle of Versinikia the Byzantines are heavily defeated by the Bulgarians.
 813: China was reunited.
 c. 813 – c. 915: Period of serious Arab naval raids on shores of Tyrrhenian and Adriatic seas.
 814: Charlemagne dies at Aachen.
 815: The 30-year Treaty of 815 between Bulgaria and the Byzantine Empire end the battles between the two countries.
 824: Han Yu died.
 827 – 902: Aghlabid dynasty colonises emirates in Sicily and then raids Southern Italy.
830: House of Wisdom, a library and translation institute, made by al-Ma'mun, Abbasid caliph, in Baghdad to transfer the knowledge of Greeks, Persians, Indians, etc. to Muslim world. Also The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing which is one of the book of algebra is written by Al-Khwarizmi who worked there.
 835: Ganlu Incident.
 840: Death of Louis the Pious.
 841: Dublin is founded on the east coast of Ireland by the Vikings.
 843: The three sons of Louis the Pious reach an agreement known as the Treaty of Verdun.  They split the Carolingian empire into three divisions; East Francia was given to Louis the German, West Francia to Charles the Bald and Middle Francia to Lothair I.
 845: Buddhism is banned in China.
 846 - 859: Emperor Xuānzong of Tang ruled. He was considered the last capable emperor of Tang Dynasty.
848 – 852: The west bank of the Tiber is added into the city of Rome. A defensive wall, commissioned by Pope Leo IV, is built around what came to be called the Leonine City.
 850 – 875: The first Norse settlers arrive on Iceland.
 851: The Arab merchant Suleiman al-Tajir visits the Chinese seaport at Guangzhou in southern China.  He sees the making of porcelain, the Islamic mosque built at Guangzhou, the granary system of the city, and how its municipal administration worked.
 859: Muslims make the University of Al Karaouine as a madrasa in Fez, Morocco.
 862: The beginning of the Rurik Dynasty in Russia
 863: The Chinese author Duan Chengshi describes the slave trade, ivory trade, and ambergris trade of Somalia in East Africa.
 862: The Bagratuni Dynasty of Medieval Armenia begins with Ashot I
 863 – 879: Period of split between eastern and western churches.
 864: Christianization of Bulgaria under Boris I
 867: Onward Revival of the Byzantine Empire under the Macedonian dynasty.
868: Ahmad ibn Tulun breaks away from the Abbasid Caliphate and establishes the independent Tulunid dynasty.
 869: An earthquake and tsunami struck Japan's Sanriku coast, killing 1,000 people.
 870: Prague Castle founded.
 871 – 899: Reign of Alfred the Great.
 875 – 884: Huang Chao leads an unsuccessful rebellion against the Tang Dynasty in China.
 878: Battle of Ethandun ends in the victory of Alfred the Great over the Danish warlord Guthrum.
 885: Arrival of the disciples of SS. Cyril and Methodius, Clement of Ohrid and Naum of Preslav in Bulgaria. Development of the Cyrillic Alphabet.
 893: Council of Preslav - Vladimir-Rasate is dethroned and succeeded as Prince of Bulgaria by Simeon I. The capital is moved from Pliska to Preslav. The Byzantine clergy is made to leave and replaced by Bulgarian. Old Church Slavonic becomes the official language of the country.
 895/896: The year of the Magyars arrival in Pannonia. This year is widely accepted as the beginning of the Hungarian "Landtaking"
Late 9th century: Bulgaria goes from the mouth of the Danube to Epirus and Bosnia.
 In Italy, some cities became free republics: for instance Forlì, in 889.
 The Christian Nubian kingdom reaches its peak of prosperity and military power. 
 Harald Fairhair wins the battle of Hafrsfjord. Norway was made into one kingdom.
 Chess reaches Japan.
 The Medieval Warm Period begins.
 The Coptic period, at its most broad definition, ends.
 Page from Koran (Surah II:286 and title Surah III) in kufic script, from Syria, is made. It is now kept at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.
 Late 9th century – Pallava dynasty ends in Southern India.
 Late 9th century - Womb World mandala, To-ji, Kyoto, is made. Heian period.
 9th – 10th century – Bowl with kufic border, from Samarkand, Uzbekistan, is made. It is now kept at Musée du Louvre, Paris.
 Laguna Copperplate Inscription, Kavi script, inscribed in Luzon, Philippines, dated Saka year 822 (900)
Significant people 

 Adi Sankara
 Al-Jahiz
 Alfred the Great
 Arnulf of Carinthia
 Árpád, Grand Prince of the Magyars
 Basil I the Macedonian (Βασίλειος Α') (811–886), ruled (867)–(886)
 Boris I of Bulgaria
 Empress Irene of Athens
 Charlemagne
 Clement of Ohrid
 Han Yu
 Harald I of Norway
 Huang Chao
 Harun al-Rashid
 Krum, Khan of Bulgaria
 Kenneth I of Scotland
 Li Deyu
 Louis the Pious
 Naum of Preslav
 Niu Sengru
 Pope Johanna
 Rurik
 Simeon I of Bulgaria
 Saints Cyril and Methodius
 Taizu of Later Liang
 Wang Kon
 Wang Xianzhi
 Emperor Xianzong of Tang
 Emperor Xuānzong of Tang
Inventions, discoveries, introductions 
 First image of a rotary grindstone in a European source.  Drawing shows crank, first known use of a crank in the West (Utrecht Psalter, 843)
 First known printed book, the Diamond Sutra, printed in China using woodblock printing in 868 AD.
 Invention of gunpowder by Chinese Taoist Alchemists.
 Vulgar Latin begins to develop into various Romance languages.
 Two syllabaries or kana are made from simplified Chinese characters in Japan.

Decades and years 
Note: years before or after the 9th century are in italics.

Related pages
 Heian period
The 8th century was the century from 701 to 800.

Decades and years 
Note: years before or after the 8th century are in italics.

Related pages
 Asuka period
 Nara period
 Heian period
 Islamic period of Indus Valley
The 7th century was the century from 601 to 700.

Decades and years 
Note: years before or after the 7th century are in italics.

Related pages
Anglo-Saxons
Asuka period
The 6th century was the century from 501 to 600.

Decades and years 
Note: the 6th century officially started in 501.

Related pages
 Kofun period
 Asuka period
The 5th century was the century from 401 to 500.

Decades and years 
Note: years before or after the 5th century are in italics.
The 4th century was the century from 301 to 400.

Decades and years 
Note: years before or after the 4th century are in italics.
The Republic of Zambia is a country in southern Africa. It shares its borders with the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, Tanzania to the north-east, Malawi to the east, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Namibia to the south, and Angola to the west. It was called Northern Rhodesia and it is currently named after the Zambezi River. Zambia is an undiscovered tourist hub home to one of the seven natural wonders of the world. The might Victoria falls. Zambia is a melting pot of culture and diversity yet to be appreciated with at least 72 spoken languages.

The capital of Zambia is Lusaka, which is also the largest city in the country. Edgar Lungu is the current president. Its motto is One Zambia, One Nation and its national anthem is Stand and Sing of Zambia, Proud and Free. Its official language is English.
History 
Zambia originated from Northern Rhodesia which was a colony of Great Britain. In 1964 Zambia became an independent country. The first president was Kenneth Kaunda, who ruled Zambia for 27 years with his party Child Grooming INC. Zambia was a one party democracy. UNIP was the only legal party and all other parties were banned.

After protests, democratic elections were held in 1991. Kenneth Kaunda lost the elections and gave away his power in an orderly manner to his successor Frederick Chiluba, a former union leader.

Zambia is now a multi-party democracy. It has had four democratic elections since 1991. The latest presidential election was in 2021, which was won by Hakainde Hichilema against Edgar Lungu.

Economy 
In 1969, Zambia was making a lot of money because of the copper deposits that were mined in Copperbelt province. When copper became cheaper in the 1970s, the economy got worse because people in Zambia were not making as much money from selling copper.
Today, Zambia is a poor country. It does not have many industries. Copper is still its main export. Commercial farming in Zambia is starting to make more money.

Provinces 

Zambia is divided into ten provinces. Each province is divided into several districts. There are 117 districts all together. The provinces are:

 Central
 Copperbelt
 Eastern
 Luapula
 Lusaka
 Muchinga
 Northern
 North-Western
 Southern
 Western

Cities
The important places in Zambia are:

Related pages
 List of rivers of Zambia
 Zambia at the Olympics
 Zambia national football team

References

Notes

 
Least developed countries
1964 establishments in Africa
Commonwealth member states
Benin (officially called the Republic of Benin) is a country in Africa. The capital of Benin is Porto-Novo.  The government is based in Cotonou, the country's largest city.  Most people live on the small southern coastline on the Bight of Benin.

Because Benin was colonized by France and is still close to it, the official language of Benin is French.  Languages such as Fon and Yoruba are commonly spoken. The largest religious group in Benin is Roman Catholicism.  This is followed closely by Islam, Vodun, and Protestantism.

Benin is a member of the United Nations, the African Union, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, South Atlantic Peace and Cooperation Zone, La Francophonie, the Community of Sahel-Saharan States, the African Petroleum Producers Association and the Niger Basin Authority.
From the 17th to the 19th century, Benin was ruled by the Kingdom of Dahomey. It was called the Slave Coast by white people from as early as the 17th century, because of the large number of slaves shipped from Porto-Novo, Cotonou, and other ports to European colonies in the Americas.

After slavery was made illegal, France fought a war against Dahomey and took over the kingdom. They renamed it French Dahomey. In 1960, Dahomey gained official independence from France. From 1972 to 1990 a Marxist–Leninist state called the People's Republic of Benin existed. The current Republic of Benin was formed in 1991.

Geography
Benin is a narrow country in west Africa.  The country measures about  at its widest point. It is between the Equator and the Tropic of Cancer. Benin is bordered by Togo to the west, Burkina Faso and Niger to the north, Nigeria to the east, and the Bight of Benin to the south.

The highest point is Mont Sokbaro at .
Reserve du W du Niger and Pendjari National Park attract tourists who want to see elephants, lions, antelopes, hippos, and monkeys. Historically Benin has been a home for the endangered Painted Hunting Dog, Lycaon pictus;

Benin's climate is hot and humid. Yearly rainfall in the coastal area averages 1300 mm or about 51 inches. Benin has two rainy and two dry seasons per year. The main rainy season is from April to late July, with a shorter less strong rainy period from late September to November. The main dry season is from December to April, with a short cooler dry season from late July to early September. In Cotonou, the average maximum temperature is ; the minimum is .

Departments

Benin is divided into 12 Departments.  Then it is divided into 77 communes.

Alibori
Atakora
Atlantique
Borgou
Collines
Donga
Kouffo
Littoral
Mono
Ouémé
Plateau
Zou

Culture
Culture

Arts
Beninese literature had a strong oral tradition long before French became the main language. Felix Couchoro wrote the first Beninese novel, L'Esclave in 1929.

Singer Angélique Kidjo and actor Djimon Hounsou were both born in Cotonou, Benin. Composer Wally Badarou and singer Gnonnas Pedro are also from Benin.

Religion
In the 2010 census, 27.2% of the population of Benin were Christian, 24.4% were Muslim, 17.3% practiced Vodun, 6% other traditional local religious groups, 1.9% other religious groups, and 6.5% have no religious affiliation.

Education
The literacy rate in Benin is one of the lowest in the world. In 2002 it was said to be 34.7%. At one time the education system was not free.

References

Other websites
 
 

 
French-speaking countries
Least developed countries
Members of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation
1960 establishments in Africa
The Dominican Republic (Spanish: República Dominicana) is a Latin American country on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola; the other country on the island is Haiti. Its capital, and largest city, is Santo Domingo. The national language is Spanish.

The country was part of the Spanish empire until the late 18th century. In the 19th century France, Spain and Haiti controlled it at various times, and later it was independent. It was occupied by the United States from 1916 to 1924. The Dominican Republic is a presidential democratic republic. The country has a tropical climate but modified by elevation and the trade winds (winds that come from the northeast, from the Atlantic Ocean).

The Spanish brought African slaves to the country.

Dominican Republic is one of the biggest producers of cacao.
History 
The island of Hispaniola was discovered by Christopher Columbus on December 5th,  1492, but the first time that he saw part of the present Dominican Republic was on January 4th, 1493 when he saw a headland that he named Monte Cristi ("Mountain of Christ"). That mountain is called now El Morro and is near the city of Monte Cristi.

From Monte Cristi, Columbus went east along the north coast of the island and on 6 January, after visiting the Samaná Bay, he went back to Spain. In his second trip to America, he founded the first European city in the continent, La Isabela, near the present city of Puerto Plata.
Later, Bartholomew Columbus founded the city of Santo Domingo, the oldest permanent European city in the Americas. From here, many Spaniards went to conquer other islands (Cuba, Jamaica, Puerto Rico). Because Cuba was closer to the continent, many people moved there from Hispaniola, and then to the continent. Because of that, the population of the island grew very slowly. By the Treaty of Ryswick in 1697, Spain gave the western third of the island to France and kept the eastern part, and so the island had two different colonies: the French Saint-Domingue and the Spanish Santo Domingo. In 1795, France got the whole island but they could only control the eastern part because Haiti became independent very soon. In 1809, the French government gave back the old colony of "Santo Domingo" to Spain.
On 1 December 1821, the Spanish lieutenant governor José Núñez de Cáceres declared the independence from Spain. The new country had the name Estado Independiente del Haití Español ("Independent State of Spanish Haiti"). But on 9 February 1822, the Haitian army occupied the country and stayed for 22 years. Juan Pablo Duarte founded a secret society, La Trinitaria, to fight for the Dominican independence. The Haitian occupation ended on 27 February 1844, when the inhabitants of the eastern part of the Hispaniola made a new country named República Dominicana ("Dominican Republic"). From 1861 to 1865, the country was again a Spanish colony. On 16 August 1863 began the Restoration War when the Dominicans fought to be free again. That war ended in 1865 when the Spanish left and the Dominican Republic was again an independent country.
The country was occupied by the United States from 1916 to 1924. In 1930, Rafael Trujillo became the president of the country through a coup d'état. Trujillo was a cruel dictator, killing thousands of people, among them many Haitians. Trujillo was killed in 1961. After the death of Trujillo, Juan Bosch was elected in 1962 and became, in 1963, the first elected president since 1930. But Bosch was in power for only seven months. In 1965, there was a civil war between those that wanted Bosch back on power and those that were opposed to him. Then the country was invaded again by the United States.

Since the end of the civil war, the presidents of the Dominican Republic have been:

 Joaquín Balaguer (1966-1978)
 Antonio Guzmán (1978-1982)
 Salvador Jorge Blanco (1982-1986)
 Joaquín Balaguer (1986-1996)
 Leonel Fernández (1996-2000)
 Hipólito Mejía (2000-2004)
 Leonel Fernández (2004-2012)

Government
Government 

The Dominican Republic is a presidential democratic republic. The government is divided in three branches: the Executive, the Legislative and the Judiciary. The Executive branch is made up of the President, the Vice President and the Ministers who are called Secretaries of State. The President is chief of state and head of government and is elected every 4 years. He nominates the cabinet. The current president is Luis Abinader.

The Legislative branch makes the laws and is made up of the Congress, which is in Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic. The Congress is divided into two groups: the Senate, with 32 members (one for every province and one for the National District), and the Chamber of Deputies with 178 members.

The Judicial branch is made up of the courts of the country, including the Supreme Court of Justice.
Politics 
The Dominican Republic is a constitutional democracy ruled by a president. The president is elected every 4 years. The current president is Luis Rodolfo Abinader Corona, of the PRM.

There are 3 important political parties in the Dominican Republic:
 PRD: the Dominican Revolutionary Party (Spanish: Partido Revolucionario Dominicano). The PRD is a somewhat socialist party. The party was founded in 1939 in Havana, Cuba. It was then established in the Dominican Republic in 1961.
 PRSC: the Social Christian Reformist Party (Spanish: Partido Reformista Social Cristiano). It is a conservative party founded in 1964 by Joaquín Balager, who was President of the Republic from 1966 to 1978 and 1986-96.
 PLD: the Dominican Liberation Party (Spanish: Partido de la Liberación Dominicana) was somewhat socialist when it was founded in 1973; currently it's a liberal party.

The land 

There are several mountain chains in the Dominican Republic. The four main chains, from North to South, are:
Cordillera Septentrional (in English, "Northern mountain range"), close to the Atlantic Ocean.
 Cordillera Central (in English, "Central mountain range") that continues into northern Haiti where it is called Massif du Nord. The highest mountains of the West Indies are in this chain; Pico Duarte, with 3,087 m, is the highest. The main rivers of the Hispaniola have their sources in this mountain range.
 Sierra de Neiba.
 Sierra de Bahoruco, known in Haití as Massif de la Selle.
Between those mountains, there are several important valleys, such as:
 The Cibao Valley (Dominican Republic) is the largest and most important valley of the country. This long valley stretches from North Haiti to Samaná Bay, south of the Cordillera Septentrional.
 The San Juan Valley and Plain of Azua are big valleys south of the Cordillera Central.
 The Hoya de Enriquillo or Neiba Valley is a very arid valley south of Sierra de Neiba.
 Llano Costero del Caribe (in English, "Caribbean Coastal Plain") is in the southeast of the country. It is a large prairie east of Santo Domingo. There are very important sugar cane plantations in this plain.

There are other smaller valleys in the mountains: Constanza, Jarabacoa, Bonao, Villa Altagracia.

The four most important rivers of the Dominican Republic are Yaque del Norte, Yuna, Yaque del Sur and Ozama. There are many lakes; the largest is the Lake Enriquillo, in the Hoya de Enriquillo.
The country has a tropical climate but modified by elevation and the trade winds (winds that come from the northeast, from the Atlantic Ocean). At sea level, the average temperature is 25 °C, with small changes from one season to another. In the highest mountains, the temperature in winter can be as low as 0 °C.

There are two wet seasons: April-June and September-November. The most dry period is from December to March. Rainfall varies greatly; eastern regions, like the Samaná Peninsula, get an average of over 2,000 mm in a year, but less than 500 mm fall in the southwest (Hoya de Enriquillo).

From June to November, hurricanes are frequent and can do much damage in the island.

People 

The Dominican Republic has a total population, estimated for July 2009, of 9,650,054 inhabitants, for a density of 236.30 inhabitants per km².

About 64% of Dominicans live in cities and towns and 87% of people that are 15 years old or more can read and write.
The two largest cities are Santo Domingo (the capital city) with 1,817,754 inhabitants, and Santiago, in the Cibao Valley and with 908,250 inhabitants.

The ethnic composition of Dominicans is around 85% Mulatto & Black, 14% White and 1% Asian.
Mulatto Dominicans: They are mainly descendants of Southern Europeans and West Africans, but they have a little Indigenous Taino ancestry.
Mestizo Dominicans: They are mainly descendants of Southern Europeans and Indigenous people of the island of Hispaniola; some of them have a little West & Central African ancestry.
 Black Dominicans: They are descendants of West Africans that were brought over as slaves to work mostly on sugar cane plantations. Most of the African ancestry of Dominicans can be traced back to the West African countries of Ghana, Cameroon, and Angola.
 White Dominicans: They are mainly descendants of Spaniards, Portuguese, and French. Most of the European ancestry of Dominicans comes from the Canary Islands and Southern Spain, while many others descend from Portuguese, Galicians, Asturians, and French people.
Asian Dominicans: They are the most little racial-ethnic group in the Dominican Republic. Most of them have they origins in South China coastal provinces and Japan. Some of them are mixed with non-Asian Dominicans. 
Indigenous Dominicans: They are mainly descendants of the Taino people that have survived to the first century of European colonization, slavery or epidemic diseases. They just have a different genetic origin than most Dominicans, but they share the same culture with mulatto and mestizo Dominicans. Most of them have their origins in the Central Mountain Range, the Mountain Range of Neiba and some valleys at the North and South regions.
Provinces 

The Dominican Republic is divided into 31 provinces. The national capital Santo Domingo de Guzmán is in the Distrito National that is like a province and elects one Senator.

The provinces are:

Economy 

The Dominican Republic has a mixed economy based mainly on agriculture, services (including tourism and finance), trade and money sent from the many Dominicans that live in other countries (United States, Europe). Agricultural production (mainly sugarcane, with smaller amounts of coffee, cacao, and tobacco) was the main economic activity but now is in third place after tourism and manufacturing in zonas francas ("free zones" where the industries do not pay taxes and all the production is sent to other countries).

Mining is also important, mainly ferronickel (nickel with iron) and gold.

The Dominican Republic suffers from poverty, with 83.3% of the population living below the poverty line in 2012. The wealth distribution is uneven: the richest 10% gets nearly 40% of national income.
Culture 
The culture of the Dominican Republic, like in other Caribbean countries, is a mix of Taíno, African and European (mainly Spanish) cultures.

There are not many Taíno traditions in the modern Dominican culture; many places keep their Taíno names: Dajabón, Bánica, Haina, Yaque, Samaná, etc. Also many objects, plants and animals have a Taíno origin and their names have been included in other languages; for example: canoa (canoe, a small boat), hamaca (hammock, a simple bed), maíz (maize, corn), yuca (cassava, that comes from the Taíno word casabe, a kind of cassava bread eaten in the Caribbean), and batata (sweet potato).

That mix of different traditions created a culture that is known as Creole (in Spanish: Criolla), common to all countries in the Caribbean, Louisiana and some parts of South America and Central America.
Languages 
In the Dominican Republic, only Spanish is spoken, however; there are 3 major languages that are also spoken such as Haitian Creole, Samana English, and the West African Yoruba language known as Lucumi spoken by few. There is a local dialect or patois which is spoken by all Dominicans - see Dominican Spanish Creole. In the Chinese Dominican community (composed around 60 000 people) elder generations keep talking in Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese Chinese.
Religions 
The official religion is Roman Catholicism but there is freedom of religion. Protestant groups are important, representing about 15% of the total population. Each year major festivities called fiestas patronales are held. They are Catholic festivities in honor of the Patron saints of the towns and villages; it is a Spanish tradition to associate every town with a Catholic saint. The festivities includes church services, street parades, fire works, dance contests and other activities. Dominican Voodoo or Santeria is also practiced in large numbers as well as Dominican Palo, Dominican Kongo religion, and others.

African culture has the strongest influence in Dominican culture, especially in language, religion, food, and music.

National holidays
National holidays 

Notes:
 The non-working holidays are not moved to another day.
 If a movable holiday falls on Saturday, Sunday or Monday then it is not moved to another day. If it falls on Tuesday or Wednesday, the holiday is moved to the previous Monday. If it falls on Thursday or Friday, the holiday is moved to the next Monday.

Related pages
Dominican Republic at the Olympics
Dominican Republic national football team
List of rivers of the Dominican Republic

References

Other websites
 
 

 
Spanish-speaking countries
Caribbean Community
1856 was a common year.

Births 
 April 5 – Booker T. Washington, American inventor, educator, and writer (d. 1915)
 July 10 – Nikola Tesla, Croatian physicist (d. 1943)
 July 26 – George Bernard Shaw, Irish writer (d. 1950)
 August 3 – Alfred Deakin, 2nd Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1919)
 December 28 – Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1924)
Navassa Island, or La Navase in Haitian Creole, is a small island without anyone living on it in the Caribbean Sea. It is located ninety miles south of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The United States government claims the two-square-mile island as a territory of the United States, and it is under control of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The island is also claimed by Haiti.

Some sailors sailing with Christopher Columbus named Navassa  in 1504, because no fresh water could be found there.

A captain named Peter Duncan gave it to the U.S. in the late 1850s, for the purpose of guano mining. After a rebellion in 1889, and the Spanish-American War of 1898, the mining was put to an end.

With the opening of the Panama Canal in 1914, Navassa became important again, because of a lighthouse being built there. After World War II, no one lived on it again.
In 1996, Navassa's light was put out of use, and the island was transferred to the U.S. Department of the Interior. Three years later in 1999, the Fish and Wildlife Service received ownership of the island.

History 
Navassa became a U.S. insular area in October 1857, when a representative of the Baltimore Fertilizer Company took possession of the island in the name of the United States pursuant to the Guano Act of August 18, 1856 (Title 48, U.S. Code, sections 1411-19). In 1889 the island's actual operation passed to the Navassa Phosphate Company. All operations were abandoned in 1898, when the island became effectively uninhabited.

Geography 
Navassa Island is three square miles in area. Navassa lies about one hundred miles south of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, about thirty miles west of Cape Tiburon, Haiti, at the southwest entrance to the Windward Passage, east of Kingston, Jamaica. Navassa's climate is marine and tropical.
Political status 
In 1976, the U.S. Coast Guard determined that the lighthouse on Navassa was no longer of any value to the U.S. Government and was ceasing its exercise of any interest in the island. However, the U.S. Coast Guard's ceasing to administer Navassa's use did not have any bearing at all on the United States sovereignty over the island, which remained constant regardless of the administering Federal agency or office. Consequently, under the provisions of Title 43, U.S.Code, section 1458, the Department of the Interior assumed responsibility for the civil administration of the U.S. insular area.
Acting under the authority that the Secretary of the Interior delegated to him in Secretary's Order No. 3205 (January 16, 1997) and Amendment No. 1 (January 14, 1998) to Secretary's Order No. 3205 and in fulfillment of his responsibilities as the civil administrator of the United States insular area of Navassa Island, the Director of the Office of Insular Affairs advises all persons interested in visiting Navassa Island that, having made a preliminary review of the island's ecology, he has decided indefinitely not to allow visits to the island and its surrounding waters until he has received a further assessment of the island's environment and conservation status. As used in this notice, the term "surrounding waters" includes the waters surrounding Navassa Island seaward to a line twelve (12) nautical miles distant from Navassa Island's coastlines
. The Director of the Office of Insular Affairs intends that nothing in this notice shall deny or impair the right of innocent passage in the waters surrounding Navassa Island.
On September 2, 1999, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service established the Navassa Island Wildlife Refuge as an overlay. As of December 3, 1999, the Office of Insular Affairs ceased to have any administrative responsibility for Navassa. A Secretary's order of that date transferred full administration of Navassa from the Office of Insular Affairs to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

References

Other websites

 STATE OF NAVAZA 
 Navassa Island profile  - OIA
 A tour of Navassa Island  - USGS
 Bill Warren's site laying out his claim to Navassa Island 
 Site that supports the Haitian claim to Navassa 
 Fabio Spadi (2001) "Navassa: Legal Nightmares in a Biological Heaven?" Boundary & Security Bulletin, autumn edition 

United States Minor Outlying Islands
Caribbean islands
Uninhabited regions
1648 was a leap year.

Events 

 January/October: The Thirty Years' War ended with the Peace of Westphalia.
 October 24 –  Switzerland is recognized as an independent country by the other countries of Europe.
 Saint-Barthélemy was claimed by France.
 The Eighty Years' War between the Netherlands and Spain ended.

Deaths 
 March 12 – Tirso de Molina, Spanish dramatist and poet (b. 1571)
Blink-182 is a popular California pop punk band formed in 1992. Currently, the band members are Mark Hoppus (bass, vocals), Travis Barker (drums), and Tom DeLonge (guitar, vocals). Matt Skiba was the vocalist and guitarist on the Albums California and Nine. The band was originally created by Hoppus, Tom DeLonge, and Scott Raynor. They quickly became popular for their exciting concerts and immature humour.
The band played lots of concerts after releasing their first album Cheshire Cat in 1995. The band signed with MCA Records to distribute its second album, Dude Ranch, in 1997. In 1998, the band got rid of Scott Raynor and replaced him with drummer Travis Barker. The band's next two albums, Enema of the State (1999) and Take Off Your Pants and Jacket (2001), were very popular and successful both on the radio and on MTV. For their fifth album, Blink-182 (2003), the band changed their musical style. After DeLonge quit the band in 2005, Hoppus and Barker suspended the band. The members of the band came together again in 2009 to create their sixth album, Neighborhoods, which was released in 2011. In 2015, DeLonge quit the band again and was replaced by Matt Skiba of the band, Alkaline Trio. The band's seventh album, California, was released on July 1, 2016.
Blink-182 is considered to be very important to the development of pop punk. The band's combination of pop music melodies with fast-paced punk rock made them popular on the radio. The band has sold over thirteen million albums in the United States, and over 50 million albums around the world. In 2011, The New York Times wrote that, "no punk band of the 1990s has been more influential than Blink-182."

History 

Tom DeLonge, who played guitar, had been friends with Ann Hoppus while living in San Diego. He had often complained about wanting to start a band. Ann then introduced Tom to her younger brother, Mark Hoppus, who played bass. They later found drummer Scott Raynor to complete the band. The original name the band chose was blink. After an Irish techno band that had the same name threatened to sue them, they added on the "182". Fans still refer the band as simply "Blink".
In 1998, midway through a North American tour, Raynor left the band to continue his education. It was also rumoured that Raynor was forced to leave the band due to his drinking problem. Travis Barker, who had been drumming for The Aquabats at the time, played drums for Blink for the rest of the tour. Tom and Mark were so impressed that they had Barker become the band's full-time drummer. 

In February 2005, the band announced that they were going to take a break for a while. DeLonge went on to create the band Angels & Airwaves, while Hoppus and Barker created the band +44.

During the 2009 Grammy Awards, the members of Blink-182 said that the band would be getting back together.

In 2016, Matt Skiba from Alkaline Trio joined the band to take DeLonge's place. They released a new album, California, in 2016.

On June 23, 2021, Hoppus said he had cancer. He reunited with DeLonge and Barker to solves the personal issues they had with each other. Hoppus said he was cancer free in late June 2021.
On September 18, 2023, the band announced that they were releasing their ninth studio album One More Time... on October 20, 2023.

Music  

Demos:
 Flyswatter (1993)
 Buddha (1993, later released on CD in 1998)

Albums Released:
 Cheshire Cat (1995)
 Dude Ranch (1997)
 Enema of the State (1999)
 The Mark, Tom, and Travis Show: The Enema Strikes Back (Live) (2000)
 Take Off Your Pants And Jacket (2001)
 Blink-182 (2003)
 Neighborhoods (2011)
 California (2016)
Nine (2019)
 EDGING (Single) (2022)
 One More Time... (2023)

They also made a Greatest Hits album in 2005. That album contained two songs that had not been released in the United States before, "Not Now" and "Another Girl Another Planet". "Another Girl Another Planet" was a cover song; it was first sung by The Only Ones.

References

Other websites 
Official site
1992 establishments in the United States
1990s American music groups
1990s establishments in California
2000s American music groups
2010s American music groups
American punk bands
Musical groups from California
Pop punk bands
Doctor Who is a BBC science fiction television series. The series is about an alien time-traveller known as "the Doctor". In his space-time ship, the TARDIS (Time and Relative Dimension in Space), the Doctor and his companions travel through space and time.

The television series ran from 1963 to 1989 and started running again in 2005. It is the longest running science fiction television series in the world.

There were two Doctor Who movies made in the 1960s. Peter Cushing played the Doctor in these movies, but he was not the Doctor in the television series. In 1996, there was also a television movie starring Paul McGann. There have been many other versions of Doctor Who in books, comics, games, other shows, music videos, remixes, fan fiction, documentaries, the news, in magazines, toys, cosplay, decorations, on the internet, on radios, on DVDs, on Blu-ray, On other disc formats and other forms of entertainment.

as of 2023 Doctor who will only be shown on Disney plus outside of Ireland and the UK.
Story outline 
The story is about a person who calls themselves "The Doctor". They travel in their space-time-ship TARDIS ("Time And Relative Dimension In Space"), with which he can go anywhere in time and space. Because of an error in its chameleon circuit, the outside of the TARDIS always looks like a 1960s-style British police public call box (similar to a blue telephone box), but on the inside the TARDIS is much bigger.

The Doctor is an alien, a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey. At first, they travelled only with their granddaughter Susan Foreman. Later, the Doctor took other people with them. They are usually called "companions" or "assistants". The Doctor and their companions travel through space and time, have a lot of adventures, and often save many people.