title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The film opens with a sequence of European Grand Prix races won by the same car over an instrumental version of the main theme ("Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"), concluding with the eponymous car crashing and burning in 1909. Years later, widowed inventor Caractacus Potts is raising two young children, Jeremy and Jemima ("You Two"), who have become fond of the crashed ex-racer, housed at a local rural English garage. When they learn the car is due to be scrapped, they beg Caractacus to save it, so he demonstrates numerous unsuccessful inventions to raise money, including a disastrous attempt to market a musical hard candy ("Toot Sweets") that summons stray dogs instead. Discouraged, he sings the children a lullaby that night ("Hushabye Mountain") and brings them to a carnival the next day, where he earns tips from a spirited song-and-dance act ("Me Ol' Bamboo"). He purchases the car and rebuilds it as "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" for its unusual engine sounds. In the first trip in the car, Caractacus and the children picnic on the beach with Truly Scrumptious, a wealthy woman with whom they have previously had awkward encounters ("Truly Scrumptious").


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: Caractacus tells the children a tale about nasty Baron Bomburst, the tyrant of fictional Vulgaria, who wants to steal Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, but the quartet escape Bomburst's pirates after the car transforms into a boat. On the way home, they stop to drop Truly off at Scrumptious Manor ("Lovely Lonely Man"). The tenacious Baron has sent two spies to capture the car, but they instead kidnap Truly's father, Lord Scrumptious, then Caractacus' father, Grandpa Potts, mistaking each for the car's creator. Arriving home, they see Grandpa Potts being taken away by airship ("Posh!") and follow it to Vulgaria, as the car sprouts wings and propellers to fly. Grandpa is taken to the castle, and has been ordered by the Baron to make another floating car just for him. He bluffs his abilities to the Baron to avoid being executed. The Potts' party is helped and hidden by the local Toymaker, who now works only for the childish Baron. Chitty is discovered and then taken to the castle. While Caractacus and the Toymaker search for Grandpa and Truly searches for food, the children are kidnapped by the Baroness's Child Catcher, as children are against the law in Vulgaria under Bomburst's rule.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The Toymaker takes Truly and Caractacus to a grotto beneath the castle where the townspeople have been hiding their children ("Hushabye Mountain" (reprise)). Grandpa and the other inventors rally their spirits by celebrating numerous failures to replicate the car ("The Roses of Success"). The Toymaker, Truly, and Caractacus concoct a scheme to free the children and the village from the Baron. As a present for the Baron's birthday ("Chu-Chi Face"), the Toymaker sneaks the pair into the castle disguised as life-size dolls ("Doll on a Music Box / Truly Scrumptious"). Caractacus snares the Baron, and the children swarm into the banquet hall, overcoming the Baron's palace guards and guests. In the ensuing chaos, the Baron, Baroness, and the evil Child Catcher are captured. Jeremy and Jemima are freed by Caractacus and Truly and fight against the guards. Chitty comes to their rescue and, at the same time, they are reunited with Grandpa. The Potts family and Truly bid farewell to the Toymaker and the rest of the village, then fly back home to England ("Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" (Finale)).


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: When Caractacus finishes the story, they set off for home again; Caractacus dismisses any possibility of a future together with Truly, which she regards as inverted snobbery. The Potts family arrive back at their cottage where Lord Scrumptious surprises Caractacus with an offer to buy the Toot Sweets as a canine confection, re-naming them Woof Sweets. Caractacus, realising that he will be rich, rushes to tell Truly the news. They kiss, and Truly agrees to marry him. As they drive home, he acknowledges the importance of pragmatism as the car takes off into the air again, this time without wings.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The part of Truly Scrumptious had originally been offered to Julie Andrews, to reunite her with Van Dyke after their success in "Mary Poppins". Andrews rejected the role specifically because she considered that the part was too close to Poppins. Sally Ann Howes was given the role. Van Dyke was cast after he turned down the role of Fagin from the 1968 musical "Oliver!".


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: Fleming used to tell stories about the flying car to his infant son. After the author had a heart attack in 1961, he decided to write up the stories as a novel.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The novel was published in 1964 after Ian Fleming's death. The book became one of the best selling children's books of the year. Albert Broccoli, who produced the James Bond films, based on novels by Ian Fleming, read the novel and was not enthusiastic about turning it into a film. He changed his mind after the success of "Mary Poppins".


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: In December 1965, it was reported Earl Hamner had completed a script from the novel. In July 1966, it was announced the film would be produced by Albert Broccoli. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman produced the James Bond films but would do separate projects as well; "Chitty Chitty" was done by Broccoli alone.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: In December 1966, Broccoli announced that Dick Van Dyke would play the lead. It was the first in a multi-picture deal Van Dyke signed with United Artists. By April 1967, Sally Ann Howes was set to play the female lead, and Ken Hughes would direct from a Roald Dahl script. Howes was signed to a five-picture contract with Broccoli. It was the first film for the child stars, and they were cast after an extensive talent search. Robert Helpmann joined the cast in May.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The film's songs were written by the Sherman Brothers, who had previously composed the music for "Mary Poppins". Director Ken Hughes claimed he had to rewrite the script.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The Caractacus Potts inventions in the film were created by Rowland Emett. In 1976, "Time" magazine, describing Emett's work, wrote that no term other than "Fantasticator...could remotely convey the diverse genius of the perky, pink-cheeked Englishman whose pixilations, in cartoon, watercolor and clanking 3-D reality, range from the celebrated Far Tottering and Oyster Creek Railway to the demented thingamabobs that made the 1968 movie "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" a minuscule classic."


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: Ken Adam designed the titular car, and six "Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang" cars were created for the film, only one of which was fully functional. At a 1973 auction in Florida, one sold for $37,000, equal to $ today. The original "hero" car, in a condition described as fully functional and road-going, was offered at auction on 15 May 2011 by a California-based auction house. The car sold for $805,000, less than the $1 million to $2 million it was expected to reach. It was purchased by New Zealand film director Sir Peter Jackson.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: United Artists promoted the film with an expensive, extensive advertising campaign, hoping for another "Sound of Music". The movie was released on a roadshow basis.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: Film critic Roger Ebert wrote: ""Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" contains about the best two-hour children's movie you could hope for, with a marvelous magical auto and lots of adventure and a nutty old grandpa and a mean Baron and some funny dances and a couple of [scary] moments."


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: "Time" began its review by stating the film is a "picture for the ages—the ages between five and twelve" and ended noting that "At a time when violence and sex are the dual sellers at the box office, "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" looks better than it is simply because it's not not all all bad bad"; the film's "eleven songs have all the rich melodic variety of an automobile horn. Persistent syncopation and some breathless choreography partly redeem it, but most of the film's sporadic success is due to director Ken Hughes's fantasy scenes, which make up in imagination what they lack in technical facility."


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: "The New York Times" critic Renata Adler wrote "in spite of the dreadful title, "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"...is a fast, dense, friendly children's musical, with something of the joys of singing together on a team bus on the way to a game"; Adler called the screenplay "remarkably good" and the film's "preoccupation with sweets and machinery seems ideal for children"; she ends her review on the same note as "Time": "There is nothing coy, or stodgy or too frightening about the film; and this year, when it has seemed highly doubtful that children ought to go to the movies at all, "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" sees to it that none of the audience's terrific eagerness to have a good time is betrayed or lost."


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The film was the tenth most popular at the U.S. box-office in 1969. However, because of its high budget, it lost United Artists an estimated $8 million during its run in cinemas. Five films produced by Harry Saltzman, including "The Battle of Britain", lost UA $19 million. This contributed to United Artists scaling back its operations in the UK.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: "Filmink" stated: "It's a gorgeous looking movie with divine sets, a fabulous cast and cheerful songs; it's also, like so many late ‘60s musicals, far too long and would have been better at a tight 90 minutes."


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: Film historian Leonard Maltin disagreed, giving the movie just 1.5 out of a possible 4 stars, and describing it as "...one big Edsel, with totally forgettable score and some of the shoddiest special effects ever."


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: , the film has a 69% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 29 reviews with an average rating of 5.9/10.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The original soundtrack album, as was typical of soundtrack albums of the period, featured mostly songs with few instrumentals. Some of the songs were edited to fit the time constraints of the standard 12 inch LPs of the time and to create a fluid listening experience.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The soundtrack has been released on CD four times, the first two releases using the original LP masters rather than going back to the original movie masters to compile a more complete soundtrack album with underscoring and complete versions of songs. The 1997 Rykodisc release included several short bits of dialogue from the film between some of the tracks, but otherwise used the same LP master and has gone out of circulation. On 24 February 2004, a few months after MGM released the movie on a 2-Disc Special Edition DVD, Varèse Sarabande reissued a newly remastered soundtrack album without the dialogue tracks, restoring it to its original 1968 LP format.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: In 2011, Kritzerland released the definitive soundtrack album, a two-CD set featuring the original soundtrack album plus bonus tracks, music from the "Song and Picture-Book Album" on disc 1, and the Richard Sherman demos, as well as six playback tracks (including a long version of international covers of the theme song). This release was limited to only 1,000 units.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: In April 2013, Perseverance Records re-released the Kritzerland double CD set with expansive new liner notes by John Trujillo and a new booklet by Perseverance regular James Wingrove.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: No definitive release of the original film soundtrack featuring the performances that lock to picture without the dialogue and effects can be made, as the original isolated scoring session recordings were lost or discarded once United Artists merged its archives. All that is left is the 6-track 70MM sound mix with the other elements already added in.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" was released numerous times in the VHS format as well as Betamax, CED, and LaserDisc. On 10 November 1998, the film saw its first DVD release. The year 2003 brought a two-disc "Special Edition" release. On 2 November 2010, MGM Home Entertainment through 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment released a two-disc Blu-ray and DVD combination featuring the extras from the 2003 release as well as new features. The 1993 LaserDisc release by MGM/UA Home Video was the first home video release with the proper 2.20:1 Super Panavision 70 aspect ratio.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The film did not follow Fleming's novel closely. A separate novelisation of the film was published at the time of the film's release. It basically followed the film's story but with some differences of tone and emphasis, e.g. it mentioned that Caractacus Potts had had difficulty coping after the death of his wife, and it made it clearer that the sequences including Baron Bomburst were extended fantasy sequences. It was written by John Burke.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: Corgi Toys released a scale replica of the airship with working features such as pop out wings. Mattel Toys also produced a replica with different features, while Aurora produced a detailed hobby kit of the car.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: Post Honeycomb cereal contained a free plastic model of the car inside its specially marked boxes, with cutout wings for the car on the back of the box.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: An educational PC game was released in October 1996, featuring the titular car where players have to solve puzzles to complete the game.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: The film was adapted into a musical by the same name for the stage. For the theatre, the music and lyrics were written by Richard and Robert Sherman with book by Jeremy Sams. The musical premiered in the West End at the London Palladium on 16 April 2002 with six new songs by the Sherman Brothers. The Broadway production opened on 28 April 2005 at the Hilton (later Lyric) Theatre.


title: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

text: After its closing in London, "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" toured around the UK. The UK Tour visited Asia when it opened on 2 November 2007 in Singapore. The Australian national production opened on 17 November 2012. The German premiere took place on 30 April 2014.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Received Pronunciation (RP) is the accent traditionally regarded as the standard and most prestigious form of spoken British English. For over a century, there has been argument over such questions as the definition of RP, whether it is geographically neutral, how many speakers there are, whether sub-varieties exist, how appropriate a choice it is as a standard and how the accent has changed over time. The name itself is controversial. RP is an accent, so the study of RP is concerned only with matters of pronunciation; other areas relevant to the study of language standards such as vocabulary, grammar and style are not considered.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: RP has most in common with the dialects of South East Midlands, namely London, Oxford and Cambridge. By the end of the 15th century, "Standard English" was established in the City of London, though it did not begin to resemble RP until the late 19th century.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The introduction of the term "Received Pronunciation" is usually credited to the British phonetician Daniel Jones. In the first edition of the "English Pronouncing Dictionary" (1917) he named the accent "Public School Pronunciation", but for the second edition in 1926 he wrote: "In what follows I call it Received Pronunciation, for want of a better term." However, the term had been used much earlier by P. S. Du Ponceau in 1818 and the Oxford English Dictionary cites quotations back to about 1710. A similar term, "received standard," was coined by Henry C. K. Wyld in 1927. The early phonetician Alexander John Ellis used both terms interchangeably, but with a much broader definition than Jones's, saying, "There is no such thing as a uniform educated pron. of English, and rp. and rs. is a variable quantity differing from individual to individual, although all its varieties are 'received', understood and mainly unnoticed".


title: Received Pronunciation

text: According to "Fowler's Modern English Usage" (1965), "the correct term is 'the Received Pronunciation'. The word 'received' conveys its original meaning of 'accepted' or 'approved', as in 'received wisdom'."


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Some linguists have used the term "RP" while expressing reservations about its suitability. The Cambridge-published "English Pronouncing Dictionary" (aimed at those learning English as a foreign language) uses the phrase "BBC Pronunciation" on the basis that the name "Received Pronunciation" is "archaic" and that BBC News presenters no longer suggest high social class and privilege to their listeners. Other writers have also used the name "BBC Pronunciation". The term The Queen's English has also been used by some writers, though the term is more appropriately used to cover grammar as well as pronunciation.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The phonetician Jack Windsor Lewis frequently criticised the name "Received Pronunciation" in his blog: he has called it "invidious", a "ridiculously archaic, parochial and question-begging term" and noted that American scholars find the term "quite curious". He used the term "General British" (to parallel "General American") in his 1970s publication of "A Concise Pronouncing Dictionary of American and British English" and in subsequent publications. The name "General British" is adopted in the latest revision of Gimson's "Pronunciation of English". Beverley Collins and Inger Mees use the term "Non-Regional Pronunciation" for what is often otherwise called RP, and reserve the term "Received Pronunciation" for the "upper-class speech of the twentieth century". Received Pronunciation has sometimes been called "Oxford English", as it used to be the accent of most members of the University of Oxford. The "Handbook of the International Phonetic Association" uses the name "Standard Southern British". Page 4 reads:


title: Received Pronunciation

text: In her book "Kipling's English History" (1974) Marghanita Laski refers to this accent as "gentry". "What the Producer and I tried to do was to have each poem spoken in the dialect that was, so far as we could tell, ringing in Kipling's ears when he wrote it. Sometimes the dialect is most appropriately, Gentry. More often, it isn't."


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Faced with the difficulty of defining a single standard of RP, some researchers have tried to distinguish between sub-varieties:


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Traditionally, Received Pronunciation has been associated with high social class. It was the "everyday speech in the families of Southern English persons whose men-folk [had] been educated at the great public boarding-schools" and which conveyed no information about that speaker's region of origin before attending the school. An 1891 teacher's handbook stated, “It is the business of educated people to speak so that no-one may be able to tell in what county their childhood was passed”. Nevertheless, in the 19th century some British prime ministers, such as William Ewart Gladstone, still spoke with some regional features.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Opinions differ over the proportion of Britons who speak RP. Trudgill estimated 3% in 1974, but that rough estimate has been questioned by J. Windsor Lewis. Upton notes higher estimates of 5% (Romaine, 2000) and 10% (Wells, 1982) but refers to these as "guesstimates" not based on robust research.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The claim that RP is non-regional is disputed, since it is most commonly found in London and the southeast of England. It is defined in the Concise Oxford English Dictionary as "the standard accent of English as spoken in the South of England", and alternative names such as “Standard Southern British” have been used.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Despite RP's historic high social prestige in Britain, being seen as the accent of those with power, money, and influence, it may be perceived negatively by some as being associated with undeserved, or accidental, privilege and as a symbol of the southeast's political power in Britain. Based on a 1997 survey, Jane Stuart-Smith wrote, "RP has little status in Glasgow, and is regarded with hostility in some quarters". A 2007 survey found that residents of Scotland and Northern Ireland tend to dislike RP. It is shunned by some with left-wing political views, who may be proud of having accents more typical of the working classes.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Since the Second World War, and increasingly since the 1960s, a wider acceptance of regional English varieties has taken hold in education and public life. Nonetheless, surveys from 1969 to 2022 consistently show that RP is perceived as the most prestigious accent of English in the United Kingdom. In 2022, 25% of British adults reported being mocked for their regional accent at work, and 46% in social situations.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: In the early days of British broadcasting speakers of English origin almost universally used RP. The first director-general of the BBC, Lord Reith, encouraged the use of a 'BBC accent' because it was a "style or quality of English which would not be laughed at in any part of the country". He distinguished the BBC accent from the 'Oxford accent', to which he was "vehemently opposed". In 1926 the BBC established an Advisory Committee on Spoken English with distinguished experts, including Daniel Jones, to advise on the correct pronunciation and other aspects of broadcast language. The Committee proved unsuccessful and was dissolved after the Second World War.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: While the BBC did advise its speakers on pronunciation, there was never a formalised official BBC pronunciation standard. A notable departure from the use of pure RP came with the Yorkshire-born newsreader Wilfred Pickles during the Second World War; his accent allowing listeners to more clearly distinguish BBC broadcasts from German propaganda, though Pickles had modified his accent to be closer to RP.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Since the Second World War RP has played a much smaller role in broadcast speech. RP remains the accent most often heard in the speech of announcers and newsreaders on BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4, and in some TV channels, but non-RP accents are now more widely encountered.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Most English dictionaries published in Britain (including the Oxford English Dictionary) now give phonetically transcribed RP pronunciations for all words. Pronunciation dictionaries represent a special class of dictionary giving a wide range of possible pronunciations: British pronunciation dictionaries are all based on RP, though not necessarily using that name. Daniel Jones transcribed RP pronunciations of words and names in the English Pronouncing Dictionary. Cambridge University Press continues to publish this title, as of 1997 edited by Peter Roach. Two other pronunciation dictionaries are in common use: the "Longman Pronunciation Dictionary", compiled by John C. Wells (using the name "Received Pronunciation"), and Clive Upton's "Oxford Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English", (now republished as "The Routledge Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English").


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Pronunciation forms an essential component of language learning and teaching; a "model accent" is necessary for learners to aim at, and to act as a basis for description in textbooks and classroom materials. RP has been the traditional choice for teachers and learners of British English. However, the choice of pronunciation model is difficult, and the adoption of RP is in many ways problematic.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Nasals and liquids (, , , , ) may be syllabic in unstressed syllables. The consonant in RP is generally a postalveolar approximant, which would normally be expressed with the sign in the International Phonetic Alphabet, but the sign is nonetheless traditionally used for RP in most of the literature on the topic.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Voiceless plosives (, , , ) are aspirated at the beginning of a syllable, unless a completely unstressed vowel follows. (For example, the is aspirated in "impasse", with primary stress on "-passe", but not "compass", where "-pass" has no stress.) Aspiration does not occur when precedes in the same syllable, as in "spot" or "stop". When a sonorant , , , or follows, this aspiration is indicated by partial devoicing of the sonorant. is a fricative when devoiced.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Syllable final , , , and may be either preceded by a glottal stop (glottal reinforcement) or, in the case of , fully replaced by a glottal stop, especially before a syllabic nasal ("bitten" ). The glottal stop may be realised as creaky voice; thus, an alternative phonetic transcription of "attempt" could be .


title: Received Pronunciation

text: As in other varieties of English, voiced plosives (, , , ) are partly or even fully devoiced at utterance boundaries or adjacent to voiceless consonants. The voicing distinction between voiced and voiceless sounds is reinforced by a number of other differences, with the result that the two of consonants can clearly be distinguished even in the presence of devoicing of voiced sounds:


title: Received Pronunciation

text: As a result, some authors prefer to use the terms "fortis" and "lenis" in place of "voiceless" and "voiced". However, the latter are traditional and in more frequent usage.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The voiced dental fricative () is more often a weak dental plosive; the sequence is often realised as (a long dental nasal). has velarised allophone () in the syllable rhyme. becomes voiced () between voiced sounds.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Examples of short vowels: in "kit", "mirror" and "rabbit", in "foot" and "cook", in "dress" and "merry", in "strut" and "curry", in "trap" and "marry", in "lot" and orange", in ago" and "sofa".


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Examples of long vowels: in "fleece", in "goose", in "bear", in "nurse" and "furry", in "north", "force" and "thought", in "father" and "start".


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The long mid front vowel is elsewhere transcribed with the traditional symbol . The predominant realisation in contemporary RP is monophthongal.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Many conventional descriptions of the RP vowel system group the non-diphthongal vowels into the categories "long" and "short". This should not be taken to mean that English has minimal pairs in which the only difference is vowel length. "Long" and "short" are convenient cover terms for a number of phonetic features. The long-short pairings shown above include also differences in vowel quality.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The vowels called "long" high vowels in RP and are slightly diphthongized, and are often narrowly transcribed in phonetic literature as diphthongs and .


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Vowels may be phonologically long or short (i.e. belong to the long or the short group of vowel phonemes) but their length is influenced by their context: in particular, they are shortened if a voiceless (fortis) consonant follows in the syllable, so that, for example, the vowel in 'bat' is shorter than the vowel in 'bad' . The process is known as "pre-fortis clipping". Thus phonologically short vowels in one context can be phonetically "longer" than phonologically long vowels in another context. For example, the vowel called "long" in 'reach' (which ends with a voiceless consonant) may be "shorter" than the vowel called "short" in the word 'ridge' (which ends with a voiced consonant). Wiik, cited in , published durations of English vowels with a mean value of 17.2 csec. for short vowels before voiced consonants but a mean value of 16.5 csec for long vowels preceding voiceless consonants.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: In natural speech, the plosives and often have no audible release utterance-finally, and voiced consonants are partly or completely devoiced (as in ); thus the perceptual distinction between pairs of words such as 'bad' and 'bat', or 'seed' and 'seat' rests mostly on vowel length (though the presence or absence of glottal reinforcement provides an additional cue).


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Unstressed vowels are both shorter and more centralised than stressed ones. In unstressed syllables occurring before vowels and in final position, contrasts between long and short high vowels are neutralised and short and occur (e.g. "happy" , "throughout" ). The neutralisation is common throughout many English dialects, though the phonetic realisation of e.g. rather than (a phenomenon called "happy"-tensing) is not as universal.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The centring diphthongs are gradually being eliminated in RP. The vowel (as in "door", "boar") had largely merged with by the Second World War, and the vowel (as in "poor", "tour") has more recently merged with as well among most speakers, although the sound is still found in conservative speakers, and in less common words such as "boor". See – merger. More recently has become a pure long vowel , as explained above. is increasingly pronounced as a monophthong , although without merging with any existing vowels.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The diphthong is pronounced by some RP speakers in a noticeably different way when it occurs before , if that consonant is syllable-final and not followed by a vowel (the context in which is pronounced as a "dark l"). The realization of in this case begins with a more back, rounded and sometimes more open vowel quality; it may be transcribed as or . It is likely that the backness of the diphthong onset is the result of allophonic variation caused by the raising of the back of the tongue for the . If the speaker has "l-vocalization" the is realized as a back rounded vowel, which again is likely to cause backing and rounding in a preceding vowel as coarticulation effects. This phenomenon has been discussed in several blogs by John C. Wells. In the recording included in this article the phrase "fold his cloak" contains examples of the diphthong in the two different contexts. The onset of the pre- diphthong in "fold" is slightly more back and rounded than that in "cloak".


title: Received Pronunciation

text: RP also possesses the triphthongs as in "tire", as in "tower", as in "lower", as in "layer" and as in "loyal". There are different possible realisations of these items: in slow, careful speech they may be pronounced as two syllables with three distinct vowel qualities in succession, or as a monosyllabic triphthong. In more casual speech the middle vowel may be considerably reduced, by a process known as smoothing, and in an extreme form of this process the triphthong may even be reduced to a single long vowel. In such a case the difference between , , and in "tower", "tire", and "tar" may be neutralised with all three units realised as or . This type of smoothing is known as the "tower"–"tire", "tower"–"tar" and "tire"–"tar" mergers.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: There are differing opinions as to whether in the lexical set can be considered RP. The pronunciations with are invariably accepted as RP. The "English Pronouncing Dictionary" does not admit in words and the "Longman Pronunciation Dictionary" lists them with a § marker of non-RP status. John Wells wrote in a blog entry on 16 March 2012 that when growing up in the north of England he used in "bath" and "glass", and considers this the only acceptable phoneme in RP. Others have argued that is too categorical in the north of England to be excluded. Clive Upton believes that in these words must be considered within RP and has called the opposing view "south-centric". Upton's "Oxford Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English" gives both variants for words. A. F. Gupta's survey of mostly middle-class students found that was used by almost everyone who was from clearly north of the isogloss for words. She wrote, "There is no justification for the claims by Wells and Mugglestone that this is a sociolinguistic variable in the north, though it is a sociolinguistic variable on the areas on the border [the isogloss between north and south]". In a study of speech in West Yorkshire, K. M. Petyt wrote that "the amount of usage is too low to correlate meaningfully with the usual factors", having found only two speakers (both having attended boarding schools in the south) who consistently used .


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Jack Windsor Lewis has noted that the Oxford Dictionary's position has changed several times on whether to include short within its prescribed pronunciation. The "BBC Pronouncing Dictionary of British Names" uses only , but its author, Graham Pointon, has stated on his blog that he finds both variants to be acceptable in place names.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Some research has concluded that many people in the North of England have a dislike of the vowel in words. A. F. Gupta wrote, "Many of the northerners were noticeably hostile to , describing it as 'comical', 'snobbish', 'pompous' or even 'for morons'." On the subject, K. M. Petyt wrote that several respondents "positively said that they did not prefer the long-vowel form or that they really detested it or even that it was incorrect". Mark Newbrook has assigned this phenomenon the name "conscious rejection", and has cited the vowel as "the main instance of conscious rejection of RP" in his research in West Wirral.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: John Wells has argued that, as educated British speakers often attempt to pronounce French names in a French way, there is a case for including (as in "bon"), and and (as in "vingt-et-un"), as marginal members of the RP vowel system. He also argues against including other French vowels on the grounds that not many British speakers succeed in distinguishing the vowels in "bon" and "banc", or in "rue" and "roue". However, the "Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary" draws a distinction between (there rendered as ) and the unrounded of "banc" for a total of four nasal vowels.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Not all reference sources use the same system of transcription. Clive Upton devised a separate system for the "Shorter Oxford English Dictionary" (1993) and this is now used in many other Oxford University Press dictionaries.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The linguist Geoff Lindsey has argued that the system of transcription for RP has become outdated and has proposed a new system as a replacement, rather than RP.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Lindsey's system is as follows, differences between it and standard transcription are depicted with the usual transcription in brackets.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: Like all accents, RP has changed with time. For example, sound recordings and films from the first half of the 20th century demonstrate that it was usual for speakers of RP to pronounce the sound, as in "land", with a vowel close to , so that "land" would sound similar to a present-day pronunciation of "lend". RP is sometimes known as the Queen's English, but recordings show that even Queen Elizabeth II had changed her pronunciation over the past 50 years, no longer using an -like vowel in words like "land". The change in RP may be observed in the home of "BBC English". The BBC accent of the 1950s is distinctly different from today's: a news report from the 1950s is recognisable as such, and a mock-1950s BBC voice is used for comic effect in programmes wishing to satirise 1950s social attitudes such as the Harry Enfield Show and its "Mr. Cholmondley-Warner" sketches.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: A few illustrative examples of changes in RP during the 20th century and early 21st are given below. A more comprehensive list (using the name 'General British' in place of 'RP') is given in "Gimson's Pronunciation of English".


title: Received Pronunciation

text: A number of cases can be identified where changes in the pronunciation of individual words, or small groups of words, have taken place.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The "Journal of the International Phonetic Association" regularly publishes "Illustrations of the IPA" which present an outline of the phonetics of a particular language or accent. It is usual to base the description on a recording of the traditional story of the North Wind and the Sun. There is an IPA illustration of British English (Received Pronunciation).


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The female speaker is described as having been born in 1953, and educated at Oxford University. To accompany the recording there are three transcriptions: orthographic, phonemic and allophonic.


title: Received Pronunciation

text: The North Wind and the Sun were disputing which was the stronger, when a traveller came along wrapped in a warm cloak. They agreed that the one who first succeeded in making the traveller take his cloak off should be considered stronger than the other. Then the North Wind blew as hard as he could, but the more he blew the more closely did the traveller fold his cloak around him, and at last the North Wind gave up the attempt. Then the Sun shone out warmly, and immediately the traveller took off his cloak. And so the North Wind was obliged to confess that the Sun was the stronger of the two.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism is an advantage, privilege, or position that is granted to relatives and friends in an occupation or field. These fields may include but are not limited to, business, politics, academia, entertainment, sports, fitness, religion, and other activities. The term originated with the assignment of nephews to important positions by Catholic popes and bishops.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism has been criticized since the ancient times by several philosophers, including Aristotle, Valluvar, and Confucius, condemning it as both evil and unwise.


title: Nepotism

text: The term comes from Italian word "nepotismo", which is based on Latin root "nepos" meaning nephew. Since the Middle Ages and until the late 17th century, some Catholic popes and bishops – who had taken vows of chastity and, therefore, usually had no legitimate offspring of their own – gave their nephews such positions of preference as were often accorded by fathers to sons.


title: Nepotism

text: Several popes elevated nephews and other relatives to the cardinalate. Often, such appointments were a means of continuing a papal "dynasty". For instance, Pope Callixtus III, head of the Borgia family, made two of his nephews cardinals; one of them, Rodrigo, later used his position as a cardinal as a stepping stone to the papacy, becoming Pope Alexander VI. Alexander then elevated Alessandro Farnese, his mistress's brother, to cardinal; Farnese would later go on to become Pope Paul III.


title: Nepotism

text: Paul III also engaged in nepotism, appointing, for instance, two nephews, aged 14 and 16, as cardinals. The practice was finally limited when Pope Innocent XII issued the bull "Romanum decet Pontificem", in 1692. The papal bull prohibited popes in all times from bestowing estates, offices, or revenues on any relative, with the exception that one qualified relative (at most) could be made a cardinal.


title: Nepotism

text: In the second book of the Kural literature, which forms a manual for governments and corporations, Valluvar suggests about nepotism and favouritism thus: "If you choose an unfit person for your job just because you love and you like him, he will lead you to endless follies." According to him, nepotism is both evil and unwise.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism is a common accusation in politics when the relative of a powerful figure ascends to similar power seemingly without appropriate qualifications. The British English expression "Bob's your uncle" is thought to have originated when Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, promoted his nephew, Arthur Balfour, to the esteemed post of Chief Secretary for Ireland, which was widely seen as an act of nepotism.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism in organizations leads to monopolization of power because when members involved in institutional decision-making are related, decisions made within institutions risk favoring a group of closely connected people.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism can also occur within organizations, when a person is employed due to their familial ties. It is generally seen as unethical, both on the part of the employer and employee. One of the consequences of nepotism in an organization is the creation of a limitation in the organization's network of contacts, reducing the opportunities for negotiation with other social circles, which can lead to a reduction in the success and duration of organizations in the long term.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism at work can mean increased opportunity at a job, attaining a job or being paid more than other similarly situated people. Arguments are made both for and against employment granted due to a family connection, which is most common in small, family run businesses. On one hand, nepotism can provide stability and continuity. Critics cite studies that demonstrate decreased morale and commitment from non-related employees, and a generally negative attitude towards superior positions filled through nepotism. An article from "Forbes" magazine stated "there is no ladder to climb when the top rung is reserved for people with a certain name." Employing intimate people favors perpetuating the ideas or goals of those who employ them, knowing that the people around them will face up to them. However, it can lead to a lack of competent staff or a reduction in productivity because even if the employees are not the best options for their functions, they will be protected by those who employ them. Some businesses forbid nepotism as an ethical matter, considering it too troublesome and disruptive.


title: Nepotism

text: Outside of national politics, accusations of "nepotism" are made in instances of "prima facie" favoritism to relatives, in such cases as:


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism is also frequent in academia where it is frequent for professors to have their partners, and sometimes children, hired by the same faculty in which they work. Countries with high levels of corruption and higher education systems with low competition between universities are generally have higher levels of corruption in academia. Italy has been noted for having particularly high levels of nepotism in its academic system, when compared to other developed nations.


title: Nepotism

text: In Argentina, nepotism is a very common practice. Although there have been various attempts of reducing it, it is difficult in a country where state jobs are used as a gratitude token or party favoritism.


title: Nepotism

text: Former president Mauricio Macri has been investigated for nepotism after allegedly extending a tax amnesty to their family.


title: Nepotism

text: The Kirchnerist party has openly stated the beliefs in nepotism, treating meritocracy as a pejorative concept. The government's ministries and secretariats are plagued with friends, family and militants of the current party leaders, many of which were criticized for being incapable in their jobs. This has been very evident during the Cristina Kirchner's presidencies (2007–2015) and Alberto Fernández presidency (2019–present).


title: Nepotism

text: Shortly after his appointment as the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney in 2001, Peter Jensen was accused, in an Australian Broadcasting Corporation interview, of nepotism after nominating his brother Phillip Jensen as Dean of Sydney and appointing his wife Christine Jensen to an official position in the Sydney diocese.


title: Nepotism

text: Anna Bligh, who won the 2009 Queensland State election, has been accused of nepotism by giving her husband Greg Withers a position as the Office of Climate Change head.


title: Nepotism

text: On 21 February 2017, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev created the position of Vice President of Azerbaijan, then appointed his wife Mehriban Aliyeva to the position. Since 1993, the presidency of Azerbaijan has always been in the hands of a member of the Aliyev family: in 1993, Heydar Aliyev was elected president of Azerbaijan, and after his death in a United States hospital in 2003, his son Ilham Aliyev became president and has been since then. His regime has been accused for a lack of democratic freedoms and press freedom.


title: Nepotism

text: Over the past decade, criticism has been growing over the creation of political dynasties in Belgium. This phenomenon has been explained by the fact that prominent party members control the ranking of candidates on party lists for elections and a candidate's place on a list determines who is elected. Another justification for the phenomenon is the importance of name recognition for collecting votes.


title: Nepotism

text: Claims of nepotism have been made against Bruno Tobback, the son of senator and former minister Louis Tobback, a member of the Flemish socialists, became the Belgian federal government's minister for the pensions and environment at 35 in 2005. Alexander De Croo, the son of former speaker of the Belgian parliament Herman De Croo, ran for the leadership of his father's party Open VLD at age 33. Finally there is the example of Maya Detiège, the daughter of former mayor of the city of Antwerp Leona Detiège, who herself is the daughter of the former mayor of Antwerp Frans Detiège.


title: Nepotism

text: Among other examples are former minister Freya Vandenbossche and senator Jean Jacques De Gucht, being the daughter and son of respectively former minister Luc Vandenbossche and former minister Karel De Gucht.


title: Nepotism

text: Prime Minister Hun Sen and senior members of Parliament are known for their hand in getting family members into government positions. In the 2013 Cambodian parliamentary elections, at least eight candidates were sons of high-ranking Cambodian People's Party officials. All ruling party sons lost, but were eventually appointed into high-ranking government positions.


title: Nepotism

text: For the past 3,000 years, nepotism has been common in China's clan and extended family based culture. Confucius wrote about the importance of balancing "filial piety with merit". The clan-based feudal system collapsed during Confucius' lifetime, yet nepotism has continued through the modern age.


title: Nepotism

text: In October 2009, Jean Sarkozy, the second son of the President of the French Republic Nicolas Sarkozy, was poised to become the director of the major authority despite lacking any higher education degree and professional experience. In 2008 he was voted regional councillor of Neuilly-sur-Seine, the town of which his father had previously been mayor.


title: Nepotism

text: In September 2009, rap-producer Pierre Sarkozy, the first son of then-President Nicolas Sarkozy, asked for a financial contribution of around €10000 towards an €80000 artistic project. Because he was not a SCPP member, the request was automatically rejected. Pierre Sarkozy then went to the Élysée which led to an Élysée aide contacting the SCPP, and SCPP president Marc Guez assuring the issue would soon be favorably resolved. According to president and SCPP member Yves Riesel, however, this would not happen as SCPP's financial help has been restricted to members only for months.


title: Nepotism

text: In Greece it is common practice for family members of current or former party leaders to be party members and get appointed as ministers when the party is in government. In addition, there have been three prime ministers from the Papandreou family, two from the Mitsotakis family (one currently serving), two from the Karamanlis family (a third one is currently serving as minister of transportation).


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism in India is common in politics, judiciary, business, the film industry, religious circles, and many other types of organizations.


title: Nepotism

text: Since the 1980s, Indian politics has become dynastic, possibly due to the absence of elected party organization, independent civil society associations that mobilize support for a party, and centralized financing of elections.One example of dynastic politics has been the Nehru–Gandhi family which produced three Indian prime ministers. Family members have also led the Congress party for most of the period since 1978 when Indira Gandhi floated the then Congress(I) faction of the party. The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party also features several senior leaders who are dynasts. Dynastic politics is prevalent also in a number of political parties with regional presence such as All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM), Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK), Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), Jammu & Kashmir National Conference (JKNC), Jammu and Kashmir Peoples Democratic Party (JKPDP), Janata Dal (Secular) (JD(s)), Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM), National People's Party (NPP), Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK), Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), Samajwadi Party (SP), Shiromani Akali Dal (SKD), Shiv Sena (SS), Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS),Yuvajana Shramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP) and Telugu Desam Party (TDP)..


title: Nepotism

text: Many judges and advocates of the high courts and the Supreme Court of India are alleged to be appointed by exercising casteism, nepotism, and favoritism, primarily due to the Supreme Court and the high court appointment process called Collegium which recommends to the President, in a legally binding manner, the names of judges to be appointed or promoted to the higher judiciary. The various judicial services exams are also infamous for these practices.


title: Nepotism

text: The Kapoor family, one of the most prolific generational families involved in Indian cinema, have been known for bringing their children into the industry with their endorsements and influence. In June 2020 a fresh debate on nepotism followed soon after the suicide of actor Sushant Singh Rajput, which fans believe was in reaction to efforts by Bollywood insiders to boycott him. Filmmaker Karan Johar, who Rajput had worked with in the Netflix film "Drive", was quickly accused of nepotism by actress Kangana Ranaut, with Rajput's fans calling for a boycott of Johar and his studio, Dharma Productions, as well as of actor Salman Khan and his brothers, who were accused of bullying outsiders in the past. Actors and actresses Alia Bhatt, Varun Dhawan, Janhvi Kapoor, Ishaan Khatter, Ananya Pandey, Athiya Shetty, Tiger Shroff, Arjun Kapoor and Sara Ali Khan, all of whom hail from film families, were also widely criticized.


title: Nepotism

text: Former President of Sri Lanka, Mahinda Rajapaksa, has been accused of nepotism, appointing three brothers to run important ministries and giving out other political positions to relatives, regardless of their merit. During his presidency, the Rajapaksa family held the ministries of finance, defence, ports and aviation, and highways and road development. The president's brother, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, was given the post of Defence Secretary. He also controlled the armed forces, the police and the Coast Guard, and was responsible for immigration and emigration. Rajapaksa appointed his brother Basil Rajapaksa as minister of Economic Development. Together, the Rajapaksa brothers controlled over 70% of Sri Lanka's public budget. Mahinda Rajapaksa's eldest brother, Chamal Rajapaksa, was appointed as the Speaker of the Parliament of Sri Lanka, and has held many other posts before, while his eldest son, Namal Rajapaksa, is also a member of the parliament and holds undisclosed portfolios.


title: Nepotism

text: Others include: his nephew, Shashindra Rajapaksa, who is the former Chief minister of Uva; one of his cousins, former Sri Lankan ambassador to the United States, Jaliya Wickramasuriya; and another cousin, Udayanga Weeratunga, who is the former ambassador to Russia. Dozens of nephews, nieces, cousins, and in-laws have also been appointed as heads of banks, boards, and corporations.


title: Nepotism

text: Chandrika Kumaratunga, who served as the former President of Sri Lanka from 1994 to 2005 and former Prime Minister of Sri Lanka in 1994, is the daughter of S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike and Sirimavo Bandaranaike who both served as Prime Ministers of Ceylon from 1956 to 1959, 1960 to 1965, 1970 to 1977 and 1994 to 2000. Her brother Anura Bandaranaike served as the Speaker of the Parliament of Sri Lanka from 2000 to 2001


title: Nepotism

text: Also, former president Ranasinghe Premadasa's son Sajith Premadasa is the Opposition leader of Sri Lanka who ran for presidential election in 2019 as well.


title: Nepotism

text: Also Ranil Wickremesinghe who served as prime minister of Sri Lanka from 1993 to 1994, 2001 to 2004, 2015 to 2018 and 2018 to 2019 is a nephew of former Sri Lankan president J. R. Jayewardene. Also a defense state minister of his government Ruwan Wijewardene is also a cousin of Ranil Wickremesinghe. Also Ruwan is the great grandson of UNP founder and Sri Lanka's first Prime Minister D. S. Senanayake. Ruwan has been given a high priority in the party by Ranil by giving leadership roles.


title: Nepotism

text: Suharto, Indonesia's second president, is involved in nepotism, alongside corruption and collusion (together, they are known as corruption, collusion, and nepotism ) (usually abbreviated to as "KKN"). Companies belonging to Suharto's children, particularly Siti Hardiyanti Rukmana ("Tutut"), Hutomo Mandala Putra ("Tommy"), and Bambang Trihatmodjo, were given lucrative government contracts and protected from market competition by monopolies. Examples include the toll-expressway company (monopolized by Tutut), the national car project Timor (monopolized by Bambang and Tommy), and the cinema market (monopolized by , which is owned by Suharto's cousin Sudwikatmono). The family is said to control about 36,000 km of real estate in Indonesia, including 100,000 m of prime office space in Jakarta and nearly 40% of the land in East Timor. Additionally, Suharto's family members received free shares in 1,251 of Indonesia's most lucrative domestic companies (mostly run by Suharto's ethnic-Chinese cronies), while foreign-owned companies were encouraged to establish "strategic partnerships" with the former Indonesian president's family companies.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism is very common and very rampant in Mauritian politics, with many relatives and friends of high-ranking politicians being appointed high-ranking positions and associated companies being granted government contracts.


title: Nepotism

text: Since the first democratic elections in 1948, the field of politics in Mauritius has been marked by a handful of families who have controlled the four major political parties which exist to this day. They are often referred to as the "modern dynasties" of Mauritian politics such as the Duval, Bérenger, Curé, Uteem, Mohamed, Boolell, Ramgoolam and Jugnauth families. The Boolell family's involvement in politics started with Satcam Boolell in 1955, paving the way for his son Arvin Boolell, nephews Satish Boolell, Anil Gayan, and Sanjay Bhuckory, and son-in-law Sushil Kushiram to enter politics. The Duval dynasty started with ex-Lord mayor and minister Gaetan Duval, followed by his sons Xavier and Richard as well as grandson Adrien. Lall Jugnauth was the first of his clan to enter politics in the 1950s and was followed by his cousins Aneerood and Ashock as well as nephew Pravind. Abdool Razack Mohamed, who migrated from India in the 1930s, became Lord Mayor and minister; his son Yousuf and grandson Shakeel were also elected and served as ministers. Roshi Bhadain, who was a minister of the MSM government, is the nephew of former Labour Party minister Vasant Bunwaree. Roshi Bhadain and Akilesh Deerpalsing (Bhadain's advisor and campaign manager, who is also the son of former minister Kishore Deerpalsing), were investigated by ICAC in 2019 for suspicious recruitment practices when he was a minister.


title: Nepotism

text: In March 2020 Harry Ganoo, the retired brother of Minister Alan Ganoo, was nominated as the new president du Civil Service College Mauritius a few months after the November 2019 General Elections.


title: Nepotism

text: Until mid-2020, construction company PAD & Co. Ltd was awarded a string of major contracts such as constructing the new airport control tower, a new weather radar at Trou aux Cerfs, renovating the Bank of Mauritius, rehabilitating the coast line of Cap Malheurueux, renovating the Port Louis waterfront, upgrading roads, constructing the Harbour Cruise Terminal in Port Louis for the Mauritius Port Authority, and upgrading the navigation channels at Port Mathurin, Pointe La Gueule, and Baie aux Huîtres in Rodrigues, among other projects. PAD & Co. Ltd's owner, Alain Hao Thyn Voon, is the son of Philippe Hao Thyn Voon, president of the Olympic Committee, with very close ties to the MSM. Following the St Louis gate scandal and discovery of fake bank guarantees, PAD & Co. Ltd went under voluntary administration.


title: Nepotism

text: In June 2020, MP Eshan Juman revealed details of a contract between the Ministry of Land and Housing and a private firm called Smart Clinics Ltd. The firm is partly owned by MSM Parliamentary Private Secretary Ismaël Rawoo and his family. The contract was a lease of 60 years on 2 acres of prime beachfront state-owned land in Grande Rivière Noire, in the exclusive precinct of Tamarin in Black River. As part of the deal, Rawoo's family will acquire the lease for Rs 15.05 million and will onsell the lease for Rs 250 million, generating a profit of around Rs 235 million.


title: Nepotism

text: In August 2020, V. Gobin, a 75-year-old retired school teacher and father of Attorney General Maneesh Gobin, was nominated as Chairman of the Mahatma Gandhi Institute and the Rabindranath Tagore Institute. Maneesh Gobin was elected to Parliament within the ruling MSM government in 2014 and 2019 and his father V. Gobin was elected once in 1987. A week earlier, Rishikesh Hurdoyal, the brother of MSM Minister of Civil Service Vikram Hurdoyal, was nominated as chairman and President of the Mauritius Shipping Corporation Ltd, in addition to being a director of the State Bank of Mauritius. The new nomination will allow Rishikesh Hurdoyal to receive an extra Rs 54,540 per month, as well as an additional Rs 10,125 per month as entertainment allowance, with access to a chauffeured company car with 245 litres of fuel per month.


title: Nepotism

text: In May 1992, the Bank of Mauritius issued a Rs 20 note which featured the portrait of Sarojini Jugnauth, wife of Prime Minister Anerood Jugnauth. The portrait was considered to be a birthday gift from Anerood to his wife. This developed into a major controversy, which led to Anerood confirming in parliament that he had approved the issue of the new note. He apologised to the population and stated he would not commit such a mistake in the future.


title: Nepotism

text: Despite her defeat in the 2014 general elections, Maya Hanoomanjee became Speaker of the National Assembly, Sarojini Jugnauth's niece. In 2015, Maya's daughter Naila was appointed to the newly created position of CEO of the State Property Development Company. In 2018, she was also appointed as CEO of Landscope Mauritius, another state-owned corporation. Maya's other daughter, Sheila, was involved in a 2017 controversy, when it was revealed that her company was allocated the contract to supply biscuits to various state-owned organisations and municipal councils. The tins had misleading labels that read "Made in UK" when in fact they were produced by a local Mauritian baker.


title: Nepotism

text: In December 2015 Rita Venkatasawmy, niece of Sarojini Jugnauth, was nominated the "Ombudsman For Children" despite having no qualifications in the judiciary. Her predecessor Vidya Narayen was a retired judge who held the position from 2011. Prior to Judge Vidya Narayen the position was held from 2003 to 2011 by lawyer Shirin Aumeeruddy-Cziffra.


title: Nepotism

text: Soon after the retirement of Satyaved Seebaluck in 2016, Prime Minister Aneerood Jugnauth nominated his close relative Nayen Koomar Ballah as Head of the Civil Service and Secretary to Cabinet. Nayen Ballah is the cousin of Sarojini Jugnauth. In March 2018, Ballah was decorated with the title of Grand Order of the Star and Key of the Indian Ocean.


title: Nepotism

text: In 2017, several opposition MPs raised questions in the National Assembly about the business dealings of MSM Minister of Technology Yogida Sawmynaden's wife Wenda. It was revealed that the buyer of controversial clinic Apollo Bramwell had been pressured to use the services of notary public Wenda Sawmynaden, Yogida's wife. The private clinic had been valued at Rs 2 billion but was sold for only Rs 77 million. Despite the conflict of interest, Wenda pocketed fees worth Rs 7 million. In another instance political pressure was applied for SIT Property Development Ltd to host an emergency meeting for Wenda to be made the preferred notary public regarding the sale of parcels of prime real estate within a new gated community at Côte-d'Or. Wenda's brother Harry Krishna Vydelingum was also appointed as president of the Mauritius Institute of Training and Development following a failed attempt to make him part of the management board of Mauritius Post. Wenda was also allocated various contracts by various state-run corporations, such as NHDC, the Mauritius House Company, SICOM, the Sugar Investment Trust, the Sugar Industry Pension Fund Board, and various banks.


title: Nepotism

text: Following the electoral defeat of the Labour Party in 2014, ex-Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam was arrested on suspicions of money laundering and conspiracy. A police raid of his house exposed several safes containing brand new bank notes to the value of Rs 220 million rupees, exclusive credit cards and prescription medication tablets. His girlfriend Nandanee Oogarah-Soornack, accompanied by his Xara, had escaped Mauritius to her castle in Italy a day before the proclamation of election results with an estimated Rs 800 million rupees. Attempts to extradite her back to Mauritius failed. Nandanee's rapid accumulation of wealth with the help of Ramgoolam was closely examined by the press and investigators, and it was revealed how she collected millions of rupees through companies set up as monopolies of food outlets at Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam International Airport.


title: Nepotism

text: After the December 2014 elections, the new government instigated criminal proceedings to recover about 1,000 acres (1,150 arpents) of state-owned land which had been allocated to the activists and allies of Ramgoolam under his Labour government since 2005. The principal recipients of the various lots of Crown land ranged from Labour activists to associates to corporations, and the land was used for varying purposes including resorts, restaurants, and houses. One recipient of the land, Sandranee Ramjoorawon's husband Rajiv Beeharry, was a trusted adviser of Navin Ramgoolam and was appointed as CEO of the state-owned MauBank. Labour Party Treasurer Deva Virahsawmy's company Midas Acropolis was also granted 31 arpents of Crown land at St-Félix after the Labour government cancelled the development permit previously awarded to a businessman from Réunion Island. Prior to the December 2014 elections the ministry held by Deva Virahsawmy approved the Environment Impact Assessment for land clearing of the 31 arpents in preparation of the development of a new hotel. Within the harbour precinct, state land was granted to Beta Cement, owned by Veekram Bhunjun, a relative of ex-minister Rajesh Jeetah. Bhunjun was also awarded 12.5 arpents at Petite-Rivière-Noire via his company Western Marina.


title: Nepotism

text: In 2008, a private company called Pride Bridge Limited was formed by Nandanee Soornack's father and his associates. Pride Bridge Ltd was soon granted 30 arpents of "pas géométriques" state-owned land at Poste de Flacq in 2008 for a "mixed development project" against a deposit of Rs 5 million. However the owners of the well-established estate Constance La Gaité objected against the proposed project by questioning its legality and six years later Soonack's and Chundunsing's company gave up the 30 arpents as Navin Ramgoolam was defeated in the 2014 elections, soon after which Nandanee Soornack fled to Italy.


title: Nepotism

text: Ramgoolam's sister Sunita Ramgoolam-Joypaul claimed and received more than Rs 3.1 million from the government as "per diem" for accompanying the then-PM's wife overseas. One of the visits was in September 2007 when she travelled to New York. Another costly visit was when Sunita Ramgoolam-Joypaul travelled to France in 2008. Veena Ramgoolam claimed and received more than Rs 6 million from the government for accompanying her husband overseas.


title: Nepotism

text: Romanian Communist dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu's family members "dominated" the country for decades. Elena Băsescu, the daughter of President Traian Băsescu, was elected in 2009 to the European Parliament, despite the fact that she had no significant professional or political experience.


title: Nepotism

text: Singapore's government has been the target of numerous charges of nepotism, with several members of the Prime Minister's family holding high ranking posts. Lee Kuan Yew, who was prime minister from 1959 to 1990, preceded his son Lee Hsien Loong. Other family members holding high positions include the elder Lee’s daughter, Lee Wei Ling, the director of the National Neurological Institute, his other son, Lee Hsien Yang, the chief executive officer of Singapore Telecommunications from 1995 to 2007 and the younger Lee's wife Ho Ching, who was appointed chief executive officer of state holding investment company Temasek Holdings. The family members dispute the charges as they arise.


title: Nepotism

text: Juan Antonio Samaranch Salisachs, son of Juan Antonio Samaranch, president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) from 1980 to 2001, has been a member of the International Olympic Committee since 2001, and his daughter, Maria Teresa Samaranch Salisachs, has been president of the Spanish Federation of Sports on Ice since 2005.


title: Nepotism

text: The Marquess of Salisbury, who was Prime Minister for three separate occasions from 1885 to 1902 for a total of approximately 14 years, appointed his nephew Arthur Balfour as Chief Secretary for Ireland in 1887 and later as Prime Minister in 1902. This is supposedly the origin of the phrase "Bob's your uncle".


title: Nepotism

text: In February 2010, Sir Christopher Kelly, chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, said that more than 200 MPs used Parliamentary allowances to employ their own relatives in a variety of office roles. He suggested that the practice should be banned.


title: Nepotism

text: In 2005, Councillor Ann Reid of York arranged for all nine sets of traffic lights on her daughter Hannah's wedding route through York to be switched to green for the five-car convoy. As a result, the wedding party took only 10 minutes to pass through the city.


title: Nepotism

text: North Yorkshire Police's Chief Constable Grahame Maxwell was disciplined by the IPCC in 2011, but refused to resign, after admitting that he assisted a relative through the first stages of a recruitment process.


title: Nepotism

text: Many Northern Irish politicians employ family members. In 2008, 19 elected politicians of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) directly employed family members and relatives comprising 27 of its 136 staff.


title: Nepotism

text: Boris Johnson, the former Prime Minister was accused of nepotism for having appointed his brother Jo Johnson to the House of Lords, having previously also appointed him to his Cabinet as Minister of State for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation.


title: Nepotism

text: Jesse Norman is a British Conservative Party politician serving as Financial Secretary to the Treasury since 2019. He has personally endorsed the retrospective 2019 Loan Charge despite there being seven confirmed suicides linked to the charge, including one in which he was named. In 2020, Norman's wife, Kate Bingham was appointed chair of the UK's Vaccine Taskforce—the group set up to lead UK efforts to find and manufacture a COVID-19 vaccine—despite other more qualified people being proposed.


title: Nepotism

text: Palm Beach County, Florida schools reinforced nepotism rules as of 2012 to ensure an "equitable work environment".


title: Nepotism

text: In December 2012, a report from the Washington Post indicated various nepotism practices from the District of Columbia and Northern Virginia's Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA), including one family with five members working for the MWAA. One of the reasons given by the associate general counsel to defend the alleged nepotism was "if [the employees are] qualified and competed for [the positions] on their own, I don't see a problem with relatives working in the same organization." The inspector general of the U.S. Department of Transportation and the U.S. Congress pressured the MWAA to resolve practices of nepotism. Authority employees are no longer allowed to directly or indirectly influence hiring or promotion of relatives, as documented in their ethics policy.


title: Nepotism

text: President John Adams appointed his son John Quincy Adams as the first United States Minister to Prussia.


title: Nepotism

text: Around 30 family members or relatives of President Ulysses S. Grant prospered financially in some way from either government appointments or employment.


title: Nepotism

text: Franklin Roosevelt submitted the name of his son Elliott Roosevelt to the Senate for promotion to brigadier general. Following threats of resignation and pressure, Elliott Roosevelt was made a rated pilot during World War II. A suitable vacancy could not be found for him after his father's death, and his last day of service was VJ-Day. Franklin Roosevelt also appointed his son James Roosevelt as administrative assistant to the president and secretary to the president. James Roosevelt was the White House coordinator for 18 federal agencies. Time magazine suggested that James Roosevelt might be considered "Assistant President of the United States".


title: Nepotism

text: John F. Kennedy made his brother-in-law, Sargent Shriver, the first director of the Peace Corps and his brother, Robert F. Kennedy, Attorney General.


title: Nepotism

text: President Richard Nixon appointed John Eisenhower as United States Ambassador to Belgium. Richard Nixon was the father to Eisenhower's daughter-in-law.


title: Nepotism

text: In 1979, Bill Clinton, within weeks of being newly elected as Governor of Arkansas, appointed his wife Hillary to chair of the Rural Health Advisory Committee. In 1993, newly elected as President of the United States, he again appointed his wife to chair a Task Force on National Health Care Reform. In 2013, Bill appointed his daughter Chelsea a member of the governing board of the Clinton Foundation and Clinton Global Initiative.


title: Nepotism

text: In 2017, President Donald Trump was accused of nepotism after appointing both his son-in-law Jared Kushner and his daughter Ivanka (married to Kushner) into advisory roles to the president. In 2020, President Trump appointed his son Eric Trump's brother-in-law, Kyle Yunaska, to the position of NASA Deputy Chief of Staff. Yunaska holds a 2009 MBA and a 2007 Bachelor of Science in Management and Physics, both from East Carolina University. Yunaska was a paid government employee.


title: Nepotism

text: Current (since 1995) U.S. court rulings have held that the White House itself does not constitute an "agency" for the purposes of adhering to existing anti-nepotism laws on the books.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism is known to be practiced by President of the Venezuela National Assembly, Cilia Flores. Nine positions in the National Assembly were filled by Flores' family members, including a mother-in-law, aunt, 3 siblings, a cousin and her mother, and 2 nephews.


title: Nepotism

text: The late Robert Mugabe was reported to be preparing his wife Grace Mugabe to be the next president of Zimbabwe while he was president. Vice President Joice Mujuru was previously considered to be the favored successor to Mugabe.


title: Nepotism

text: Nepotism refers to partiality to family whereas cronyism refers to partiality to an associate or friend. Favoritism, the broadest of the terms, refers to partiality based upon being part of a favored group, rather than job performance.


title: Titus

text: Titus Caesar Vespasianus ( ; 30 December 39 – 13 September 81 AD) was Roman emperor from 79 to 81. A member of the Flavian dynasty, Titus succeeded his father Vespasian upon his death.


title: Titus

text: Before becoming emperor, Titus gained renown as a military commander, serving under his father in Judea during the First Jewish–Roman War. The campaign came to a brief halt with the death of emperor Nero in 68, launching Vespasian's bid for the imperial power during the Year of the Four Emperors. When Vespasian was declared Emperor on 1 July 69, Titus was left in charge of ending the Jewish rebellion. In 70, he besieged and captured Jerusalem, and destroyed the city and the Second Temple. For this achievement Titus was awarded a triumph; the Arch of Titus commemorates his victory to this day.


title: Titus

text: During his father's rule, Titus gained notoriety in Rome serving as prefect of the Praetorian Guard, and for carrying on a controversial relationship with the Jewish queen Berenice. Despite concerns over his character, Titus ruled to great acclaim following the death of Vespasian in 79, and was considered a good emperor by Suetonius and other contemporary historians.


title: Titus

text: As emperor, Titus is best known for completing the Colosseum and for his generosity in relieving the suffering caused by two disasters, the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79 and a fire in Rome in 80. After barely two years in office, Titus died of a fever on 13 September 81. He was deified by the Roman Senate and succeeded by his younger brother Domitian.


title: Titus

text: Titus was born in Rome, probably on 30 December 39 AD, as the eldest son of Titus Flavius Vespasianus, commonly known as Vespasian, and Domitilla the Elder. He had one younger sister, Domitilla the Younger (born 45), and one younger brother, Titus Flavius Domitianus (born 51), commonly referred to as Domitian.


title: Titus

text: Decades of civil war during the 1st century BC had contributed greatly to the demise of the old aristocracy of Rome, which was gradually replaced in prominence by a new Italian nobility during the early 1st century. One such family was the "gens Flavia", which rose from relative obscurity to prominence in only four generations, acquiring wealth and status under the Emperors of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Titus's great-grandfather, Titus Flavius Petro, had served as a centurion under Pompey during Caesar's Civil War. His military career ended in disgrace when he fled the battlefield at the Battle of Pharsalus in 48 BC.


title: Titus

text: Nevertheless, Petro managed to improve his status by marrying the extremely-wealthy Tertulla, whose fortune guaranteed the upwards mobility of Petro's son Titus Flavius Sabinus I, Titus's grandfather. Sabinus himself amassed further wealth and possible equestrian status through his services as tax collector in Asia and banker in Helvetia. By marrying Vespasia Polla, he allied himself to the more prestigious patrician "gens Vespasia", ensuring the elevation of his sons Titus Flavius Sabinus II and Vespasian to the senatorial rank.


title: Titus

text: The political career of Vespasian included the offices of quaestor, aedile and praetor and culminated with a consulship in 51, the year Domitian was born. As a military commander, he gained early renown by participating in the Roman invasion of Britain in 43. What little is known of Titus's early life has been handed down by Suetonius, who recorded that he was brought up at the imperial court in the company of Britannicus, the son of Emperor Claudius, who would be murdered by Nero in 55.


title: Titus

text: The story was even told that Titus was reclining next to Britannicus on the night he was murdered and sipped of the poison that was handed to him. Further details on his education are scarce, but it seems he showed early promise in the military arts and was a skilled poet and orator both in Greek and Latin.


title: Titus

text: From around 57 to 59 he was a military tribune in Germania. He also served in Britannia and perhaps arrived about 60 with reinforcements needed after the revolt of Boudica. About 63, he returned to Rome and married Arrecina Tertulla, daughter of Marcus Arrecinus Clemens, a former Prefect of the Praetorian Guard. She died about 65.


title: Titus

text: Titus then took a new wife of a much more distinguished family, Marcia Furnilla. However, Marcia's family was closely linked to the opposition to Nero. Her uncle Barea Soranus and his daughter Servilia were among those who perished after the failed Pisonian conspiracy of 65. Some modern historians theorise that Titus divorced his wife because of her family's connection to the conspiracy.


title: Titus

text: Titus never remarried and appears to have had multiple daughters, at least one of them by Marcia Furnilla. The only one known to have survived to adulthood was Julia Flavia, perhaps Titus's child by Arrecina, whose mother was also named Julia. During this period Titus also practiced law and attained the rank of quaestor.


title: Titus

text: In 66, the Jews of the Judaea Province revolted against the Roman Empire. Cestius Gallus, the legate of Syria, was defeated at the battle of Beth-Horon and forced to retreat from Jerusalem. The pro-Roman King Agrippa II and his sister Berenice fled the city to Galilee, where they later gave themselves up to the Romans.


title: Titus

text: Nero appointed Vespasian to put down the rebellion, who was dispatched to the region at once with the Fifth Legion and Tenth Legion. He was later joined at Ptolemais by Titus with the Fifteenth Legion. With a strength of 60,000 professional soldiers, the Romans prepared to sweep across Galilee and march on Jerusalem.


title: Titus

text: The history of the war was covered in detail by the Roman-Jewish historian Josephus in his work "The War of the Jews". Josephus served as a commander in the city of Yodfat when the Roman army invaded Galilee in 67. After an exhausting siege which lasted 47 days, the city fell, with an estimated 40,000 killed. Titus, however, was not simply set on ending the war.


title: Titus

text: Surviving one of several group suicides, Josephus surrendered to Vespasian and became a prisoner. He later wrote that he had provided the Romans with intelligence on the ongoing revolt. By 68, the entire coast and the north of Judaea were subjugated by the Roman Army, with decisive victories won at Taricheae and Gamala, where Titus distinguished himself as a skilled general.


title: Titus

text: The last and most significant fortified city held by the Jewish resistance was Jerusalem. The campaign came to a sudden halt when news arrived of Nero's death. Almost simultaneously, the Roman Senate had declared Galba, the governor of Hispania, as emperor. Vespasian decided to await further orders and sent Titus to greet the new "princeps".


title: Titus

text: Before reaching Italy, Titus learnt that Galba had been murdered and replaced by Otho, the governor of Lusitania, and that Vitellius and his armies in Germania were preparing to march on the capital, intent on overthrowing Otho. Not wanting to risk being taken hostage by one side or the other, he abandoned the journey to Rome and rejoined his father in Judaea. Meanwhile, Otho was defeated in the First Battle of Bedriacum and committed suicide.


title: Titus

text: When the news reached the armies in Judaea and Ægyptus, they took matters into their own hands and declared Vespasian emperor on 1 July 69. Vespasian accepted and, after negotiations by Titus, joined forces with Gaius Licinius Mucianus, governor of Syria. A strong force drawn from the Judaean and Syrian legions marched on Rome under the command of Mucianus, and Vespasian travelled to Alexandria, leaving Titus in charge to end the Jewish rebellion. By the end of 69, the forces of Vitellius had been beaten, and Vespasian was officially declared emperor by the Senate on 21 December, thus ending the Year of the Four Emperors.


title: Titus

text: Meanwhile, the Jews had become embroiled in a civil war of their own by splitting the resistance in Jerusalem among several factions. The Sicarii, led by Menahem ben Judah, could hold on for long; the Zealots, led by Eleazar ben Simon, eventually fell under the command of the Galilean leader John of Gush Halav; and the other northern rebel commander, Simon Bar Giora, managed to gain leadership over the Idumeans. Titus besieged Jerusalem. The Roman Army was joined by the Twelfth Legion, which had been previously defeated under Cestius Gallus, and from Alexandria, Vespasian sent Tiberius Julius Alexander, governor of Egypt, to act as Titus' second in command.


title: Titus

text: Titus surrounded the city with three legions (Vth, XIIth and XVth) on the western side and one (Xth) on the Mount of Olives to the east. He put pressure on the food and water supplies of the inhabitants by allowing pilgrims to enter the city to celebrate Passover and then refusing them egress. Jewish raids continuously harassed the Roman Army, one of which nearly resulted in Titus being captured.


title: Titus

text: After attempts by Josephus to negotiate a surrender had failed, the Romans resumed hostilities and quickly breached the first and second walls of the city. To intimidate the resistance, Titus ordered deserters from the Jewish side to be crucified around the city wall. By that time the Jews had been exhausted by famine, and when the weak third wall was breached, bitter street fighting ensued.


title: Titus

text: The Romans finally captured the Antonia Fortress and began a frontal assault on the gates of the Second Temple. As they breached the gate, the Romans set the upper and lower city aflame, culminating with the destruction of the Temple. When the fires subsided, Titus gave the order to destroy the remainder of the city, allegedly intending that no one would remember the name Jerusalem. The Temple was demolished, Titus's soldiers proclaimed him "imperator" in honour of the victory.


title: Titus

text: Jerusalem was sacked and much of the population killed or dispersed. Josephus claims that 1,100,000 people were killed during the siege, most of whom were Jewish. Josephus's death toll assumptions are rejected as impossible by modern scholarship since about a million people then lived in the Land of Israel, half of them Jewish, and sizable Jewish populations remained in the area after the war was over, even in the hard-hit region of Judea. However, 97,000 were captured and enslaved, including Simon Bar-Giora and John of Gischala. Many fled to areas around the Mediterranean Sea. Titus reportedly refused to accept a wreath of victory, as he claimed that he had not won the victory on his own but had been the vehicle through which their God had manifested his wrath against his people.


title: Titus

text: The Jewish diaspora during the Temple's destruction, according to Josephus, was in Parthia (Persia), Babylonia (Iraq), and Arabia, and some were beyond the Euphrates and in Adiabene (Kurdistan).


title: Titus

text: Unable to sail to Italy during the winter, Titus celebrated elaborate games at Caesarea Maritima and Berytus and then travelled to Zeugma on the Euphrates, where he was presented with a crown by Vologases I of Parthia. While he was visiting Antioch, he confirmed the traditional rights of the Jews in that city.


title: Titus

text: On his way to Alexandria, he stopped in Memphis to consecrate the sacred bull Apis. According to Suetonius, that caused consternation since the ceremony required Titus to wear a diadem, which the Romans associated with monarchy, and the partisanship of Titus's legions had already led to fears that he might rebel against his father. Titus returned quickly to Rome in the hope, according to Suetonius, of allaying any suspicions about his conduct.


title: Titus

text: Upon his arrival in Rome in 71, Titus was awarded a triumph. Accompanied by Vespasian and Domitian, Titus rode into the city, enthusiastically saluted by the Roman populace and preceded by a lavish parade containing treasures and captives from the war. Josephus describes a procession with large amounts of gold and silver carried along the route, followed by elaborate re-enactments of the war, Jewish prisoners and finally the treasures taken from the Temple of Jerusalem, including the Menorah and the Pentateuch. Simon Bar Giora was executed in the Forum, and the procession closed with religious sacrifices at the Temple of Jupiter.


title: Titus

text: The triumphal Arch of Titus, which stands at one entrance to the Forum, memorialises the victory of Titus.


title: Titus

text: With Vespasian declared emperor, Titus and his brother Domitian received the title of "Caesar" from the Senate. In addition to sharing tribunician power with his father, Titus held seven consulships during Vespasian's reign and acted as his secretary, appearing in the Senate on his behalf. More crucially, he was appointed Praetorian prefect (commander of the Praetorian Guard), ensuring its loyalty to the emperor and further solidifying Vespasian's position as a legitimate ruler.


title: Titus

text: In that capacity, Titus achieved considerable notoriety in Rome for his violent actions, frequently ordering the execution of suspected traitors on the spot. When in 79, a plot by Aulus Caecina Alienus and Eprius Marcellus to overthrow Vespasian was uncovered, Titus invited Alienus to dinner and ordered him to be stabbed before he had even left the room.


title: Titus

text: During the Jewish Wars, Titus had begun a love affair with Berenice, the sister of Agrippa II. The Herodians had collaborated with the Romans during the rebellion, and Berenice herself had supported Vespasian in his campaign to become emperor. In 75, she returned to Titus and openly lived with him in the palace as his promised wife. The Romans were wary of the eastern queen and disapproved of their relationship. When the pair was publicly denounced by Cynics in the theatre, Titus caved in to the pressure and sent her away, but his reputation suffered further regardless.


title: Titus

text: Vespasian died of an infection on 23 or 24 June 79 AD, and was immediately succeeded by his son Titus. He was the first Roman emperor to come to the throne after his own biological father. As Pharaoh of Egypt, Titus adopted the titulary "Autokrator Titos Kaisaros Hununefer Benermerut" (“Emperor Titus Caesar, the perfect and popular youth”). Because of his many (alleged) vices, many Romans feared that he would be another Nero. Against those expectations, however, Titus proved to be an effective emperor and was well loved by the population, who praised him highly when they found that he possessed the greatest virtues, instead of vices.


title: Titus

text: One of his first acts as emperor was to order a halt to trials based on treason charges, which had long plagued the principate. The law of treason, or law of majestas, was originally intended to prosecute those who had corruptly "impaired the people and majesty of Rome" by any revolutionary action. Under Augustus, however, that custom had been revived and applied to cover slander and libel as well. This led to numerous trials and executions under Tiberius, Caligula, and Nero, and the formation of networks of informers ("delators"), which terrorised Rome's political system for decades.


title: Titus

text: It is impossible for me to be insulted or abused in any way. For I do naught that deserves censure, and I care not for what is reported falsely. As for the emperors who are dead and gone, they will avenge themselves in case anyone does them a wrong, if in very truth they are demigods and possess any power.


title: Titus

text: Consequently, no senators were put to death during his reign; he thus kept to his promise that he would assume the office of Pontifex Maximus "for the purpose of keeping his hands unstained". Informants were publicly punished and banished from the city. Titus further prevented abuses by making it unlawful for a person to be tried under different laws for the same offense. Finally, when Berenice returned to Rome, he sent her away.


title: Titus

text: As emperor, he became known for his generosity, and Suetonius states that upon realising he had brought no benefit to anyone during a whole day he remarked, "Friends, I have lost a day".


title: Titus

text: Although Titus's brief reign was marked by a relative absence of major military or political conflicts, he faced a number of major disasters. A few months after his accession, Mount Vesuvius erupted. The eruption almost completely destroyed the cities and resort communities around the Bay of Naples. The cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum were buried under metres of stone and lava, killing thousands. Titus appointed two ex-consuls to organise and coordinate the relief effort and personally donated large amounts of money from the imperial treasury to aid the victims of the volcano. Additionally, he visited Pompeii once after the eruption and again the following year.


title: Titus

text: During the second visit, in spring of 80, a fire broke out in Rome and burned large parts of the city for three days and three nights. Although the extent of the damage was not as disastrous as during the Great Fire of 64 and crucially spared the many districts of insulae, Cassius Dio records a long list of important public buildings that were destroyed, including Agrippa's Pantheon, the Temple of Jupiter, the Diribitorium, parts of the Theatre of Pompey, and the Saepta Julia among others. Once again, Titus personally compensated for the damaged regions. According to Suetonius, a plague also broke out during the fire. The nature of the disease, however, and the death toll are unknown.


title: Titus

text: Meanwhile, war had resumed in Britannia, where Gnaeus Julius Agricola pushed further into Caledonia and managed to establish several forts there. As a result of his actions, Titus received the title of imperator for the fifteenth time, between 9 September and 31 December 79 AD.


title: Titus

text: His reign also saw the rebellion led by Terentius Maximus, one of several false Neros who appeared throughout the 70s. Although Nero was primarily known as a universally-hated tyrant, there is evidence that for much of his reign, he remained highly popular in the eastern provinces. Reports that Nero had survived his overthrow were fuelled by the confusing circumstances of his death and several prophecies foretelling his return.


title: Titus

text: According to Cassius Dio, Terentius Maximus resembled Nero in voice and appearance and, like him, sang to the lyre. Terentius established a following in Asia Minor but was soon forced to flee beyond the Euphrates and took refuge with the Parthians. In addition, sources state that Titus discovered that his brother Domitian was plotting against him but refused to have him killed or banished.


title: Titus

text: Construction of the Flavian Amphitheatre, now better known as the Colosseum, was begun in 70 under Vespasian and was finally completed in 80 under Titus. In addition to providing spectacular entertainments to the Roman populace, the building was also conceived as a gigantic triumphal monument to commemorate the military achievements of the Flavians during the Jewish Wars.


title: Titus

text: The inaugural games lasted for a hundred days and were said to be extremely elaborate, including gladiatorial combat, fights between wild animals (elephants and cranes), mock naval battles for which the theatre was flooded, horse races and chariot races. During the games, wooden balls were dropped into the audience, inscribed with various prizes (clothing, gold or even slaves), which could then be traded for the designated item.


title: Titus

text: Adjacent to the amphitheatre, within the precinct of Nero's Golden House, Titus had also ordered the construction of a new public bath house, the Baths of Titus. Construction of the building was hastily finished to coincide with the completion of the Flavian Amphitheatre.


title: Titus

text: Practice of the imperial cult was revived by Titus, but apparently, it met with some difficulty since Vespasian was not deified until six months after his death. To honour and glorify the Flavian dynasty further, foundations were laid for what would later become the Temple of Vespasian and Titus, which was finished by Domitian.


title: Titus

text: At the closing of the games, Titus officially dedicated the amphitheatre and the baths in what was his final recorded act as Emperor. He set out for the Sabine territories but fell ill at the first posting station where he died of a fever, reportedly in the same farmhouse as his father. Allegedly, the last words he uttered before passing away were "I have made but one mistake".


title: Titus

text: Titus had ruled the Roman Empire for just over two years: from the death of his father in 79 to his own on 13 September 81. He was succeeded by Domitian, whose first act as emperor was to deify his brother.


title: Titus

text: Historians have speculated on the exact nature of his death and to which mistake Titus alluded in his final words. Philostratus wrote that he was poisoned by Domitian with a sea hare ("Aplysia depilans") and that his death had been foretold to him by Apollonius of Tyana. Suetonius and Cassius Dio maintain that he died of natural causes, but both accuse Domitian of having left the ailing Titus for dead. Consequently, Dio believed the mistake to refer to not having Titus's brother executed when he was found to be openly plotting against him.


title: Titus

text: The Babylonian Talmud (Gittin 56b) attributes Titus's death to an insect that flew into his nose and picked at his brain for seven years in a repetition of another legend referring to the biblical King Nimrod. According to Rabbinic literature, Titus was a descendant of Esau and dared to challenge the Lord. Jewish tradition says that Titus was plagued by God for destroying the second Temple Mount and died as a result of a gnat going up his nose, causing a large growth inside of his brain that killed him. A story is recorded in which Onkelos, a nephew of the Roman emperor Titus who destroyed the Second Temple, intent on converting to Judaism, summons up spirits to help make up his mind. Each describes his punishment in the afterlife."Onkelos son of Kolonikos ... went and raised Titus from the dead by magical arts, and asked him; 'Who is most in repute in the [other] world? He replied: Israel. What then, he said, about joining them? He said: Their observances are burdensome and you will not be able to carry them out. Go and attack them in that world and you will be at the top as it is written, Her adversaries are become the head etc.; whoever harasses Israel becomes head. He asked him: What is your punishment [in the other world]? He replied: What I decreed for myself. Every day my ashes are collected and sentence is passed on me and I am burnt and my ashes are scattered over the seven seas..."


title: Titus

text: Titus's record among ancient historians stands as one of the most exemplary of any emperor. All surviving accounts from the period, many of them written by his own contemporaries, present a highly favourable view toward Titus. His character has especially prospered in comparison with that of his brother Domitian.


title: Titus

text: "The Wars of the Jews" offers a first-hand eyewitness account of the Jewish rebellion and the character of Titus. The neutrality of Josephus's writings has come into question, however, as he was heavily indebted to the Flavians. In 71, he arrived in Rome in the entourage of Titus, became a Roman citizen and took on the Roman nomen Flavius and praenomen Titus from his patrons. He received an annual pension and lived in the palace.


title: Titus

text: It was in Rome and under Flavian patronage that Josephus wrote all of his known works. "The War of the Jews" is heavily slanted against the leaders of the revolt by portraying the rebellion as weak and unorganised and even blaming the Jews for causing the war. His credibility as a historian later came under fire.


title: Titus

text: Another contemporary of Titus was Publius Cornelius Tacitus, who started his public career in 80 or 81 and credits the Flavian dynasty with his elevation. "The Histories", his account of the period, was published during the reign of Trajan. Unfortunately only the first five books from this work have survived, with the text on Titus's and Domitian's reign entirely lost.


title: Titus

text: Suetonius Tranquilius gives a short but highly-favourable account on Titus's reign in "The Lives of Twelve Caesars", emphasising his military achievements and his generosity as emperor and in short describing him as follows:


title: Titus

text: Titus, of the same surname as his father, was the delight and darling of the human race; such surpassing ability had he, by nature, art, or good fortune, to win the affections of all men, and that, too, which is no easy task, while he was emperor.


title: Titus

text: Finally, Cassius Dio wrote his "Roman History" over 100 years after the death of Titus. He shares a similar outlook as Suetonius, possibly even using the latter as a source but is more reserved by noting: