title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: After his leadership in the victory against the French in the Battle of Blenheim on 13 August 1704, the 1st Duke was honoured by Queen Anne granting him the royal manor of Woodstock, and building him a house at her expense to be called Blenheim. Construction started in 1705 and the house was completed in 1722, the year of the 1st Duke's death. Blenheim Palace has since remained in the Churchill and Spencer-Churchill family.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: With the exception of the 10th Duke and his first wife, the Dukes and Duchesses of Marlborough are buried in Blenheim Palace's chapel. Most other members of the Spencer-Churchill family are interred in St. Martin's parish churchyard at Bladon, a short distance from the palace.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The dukedom can theoretically pass through a female line. However, unlike the remainder to heirs general found in most other peerages that allow male-preference primogeniture, the grant does not allow for abeyance and follows a more restrictive Semi-Salic formula designed to keep succession wherever possible in the male line. The succession is as follows:


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: Succession to the title under the first and second contingencies has lapsed; holders of the title from the 3rd Duke trace their status from the third contingency.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: It is now very unlikely that the dukedom will be passed to a woman or through a woman, since all the male-line descendants of the 1st Duke's second daughter Anne Spencer, Countess of Sunderland—including the lines of the Viscounts Churchill and Barons Churchill of Wychwood and of the Earl Spencer and of the entire Spencer-Churchill and Spencer family—would have to become extinct.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: If that were to happen, the Churchill titles would pass to the Earl of Jersey (and merge with the earldom as long as it is extant), the heir-male of the 1st Duke's granddaughter Anne Villiers (born Egerton), Countess of Jersey, daughter of Elizabeth Egerton, Duchess of Bridgewater, the third daughter of the first Duke.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The next heir would be the Duke of Buccleuch, the heir-male of the 1st Duke's great-granddaughter Elizabeth Montagu, Duchess of Buccleuch, the daughter of Mary Montagu, Duchess of Montagu (1766 creation), the daughter of the 1st Duke's youngest daughter Mary, Duchess of Montagu (1705 creation).


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The fourth surviving line is represented by the Earl of Chichester and his family, the heir-male of the 1st Duke's most senior great-great-granddaughter Mary Henrietta Osborne, Countess of Chichester, daughter of Francis Osborne, 5th Duke of Leeds, only child of Mary Godolphin, Duchess of Leeds, daughter of the 1st Duke's eldest daughter Henrietta Godolphin, 2nd Duchess of Marlborough, by her husband Francis Godolphin, 2nd Earl of Godolphin.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The Duke holds subsidiary titles: "Marquess of Blandford" (created in 1702 for John Churchill), "Earl of Sunderland" (created in 1643 for the Spencer family), "Earl of Marlborough" (created in 1689 for John Churchill), "Baron Spencer" of Wormleighton (created in 1603 for the Spencer family), and "Baron Churchill" of Sandridge (created in 1685 for John Churchill), all in the Peerage of England.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The title "Marquess of Blandford" is used as the courtesy title for the Duke's eldest son and heir. The Duke's eldest son's eldest son can use the courtesy title "Earl of Sunderland", and the duke's eldest son's eldest son's eldest son (not necessarily the eldest great-grandson) the title "Lord Spencer of Wormleighton" (not to be confused with Earl Spencer).


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The title of "Earl of Marlborough", created for John Churchill in 1689, had previously been created for James Ley, in 1626, becoming extinct in 1679.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The 1st Duke was honoured with land and titles in the Holy Roman Empire: Emperor Leopold I created him a Prince in 1704, and in 1705, his successor Emperor Joseph I gave him the principality of Mindelheim (once the lordship of the noted soldier Georg von Frundsberg). He was obliged to surrender Mindelheim in 1714 by the Treaty of Utrecht, which returned it to Bavaria. He tried to obtain Nellenburg in Austria in exchange, which at that time was only a county ('Landgrafschaft'), but this failed, partially because Austrian law did not allow for Nellenburg to be converted into a sovereign principality. The 1st Duke's princely title of Mindelheim became extinct either on the return of the land to Bavaria or on his death, as the Empire operated Salic Law, which prevented female succession.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The original arms of Sir Winston Churchill (1620–1688), father of the 1st Duke of Marlborough, were simple and in use by his own father in 1619. The shield was Sable a lion rampant Argent, debruised by a bendlet Gules. The addition of a canton of Saint George (see below) rendered the distinguishing mark of the bendlet unnecessary.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The Churchill crest is blazoned as a lion couchant guardant Argent, supporting with its dexter forepaw a banner Gules, charged with a dexter hand appaumée of the first, staff Or.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: In recognition of Sir Winston's services to King Charles I as Captain of the Horse, and his loyalty to King Charles II as a Member of Parliament, he was awarded an augmentation of honour to his arms around 1662. This rare mark of royal favour took the form of a canton of Saint George. At the same time, he was authorised to omit the bendlet, which had served the purpose of distinguishing this branch of the Churchill family from others which bore an undifferenced lion.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: Sir Winston's shield and crest were inherited by his son John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough. Minor modifications reflected the bearer's social rise: the helm was now shown in profile and had a closed grille to signify the bearer's rank as a peer, and there were now supporters placed on either side of the shield. They were the mythical Griffin (part lion, part eagle) and Wyvern (a dragon without hind legs). The supporters were derived from the arms of the family of the 1st Duke's mother, Drake of Ash (Argent, a wyvern gules; these arms can be seen on the monument in Musbury Church to Sir Bernard Drake, d.1586).


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The motto was "Fiel pero desdichado" (Spanish for "Faithful but unfortunate"). The 1st Duke was also entitled to a coronet indicating his rank.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: When the 1st Duke was made a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire in 1705, two unusual features were added: the Imperial Eagle and a Princely Coronet. His estates in Germany, such as Mindelheim, were represented in his arms by additional quarterings.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: In 1817, the 5th Duke received Royal Licence to place the quarter of Churchill ahead of his paternal arms of Spencer. The shield of the Spencer family arms is: quarterly Argent and Gules, in the second and third quarters a fret Or, over all on a bend Sable three escallops of the first. The Spencer crest is: out of a ducal coronet Or, a griffin's head between two wings expanded Argent, gorged with a collar gemel and armed Gules. Paul Courtenay observes that "It would be normal in these circumstances for the paternal arms (Spencer) to take precedence over the maternal (Churchill), but because the Marlborough dukedom was senior to the Sunderland earldom, the procedure was reversed in this case."


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: Also in 1817, a further augmentation of honour was added to his armorial achievement. This incorporated the bearings from the standard of the Manor of Woodstock and was borne on an escutcheon, displayed over all in the centre chief point, as follows: Argent a cross of Saint George surmounted by an inescutcheon Azure, charged with three fleurs-de-lys Or, two over one. This inescutcheon represents the royal arms of France.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: These quartered arms, incorporating the two augmentations of honour, have been the arms of all subsequent Dukes of Marlborough.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The motto "Fiel pero desdichado" is Spanish for "Faithful though Joyless". "Desdichado" means without happiness or without joy, alluding to the first Duke's father, Winston, who was a royalist and faithful supporter of the king during the English Civil War but was not compensated for his losses after the restoration. Charles II knighted Winston Churchill and other Civil War royalists but did not compensate them for their wartime losses, thereby inducing Winston to adopt the motto. It is unusual for the motto of an Englishman of the era to be in Spanish rather than Latin, and it is not known why this is the case.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The earldom of Marlborough was held by the family of Ley from 1626 to 1679. James Ley, the 1st Earl (c. 1550 – 1629), was lord chief justice of the King’s Bench in Ireland and then in England; he was an English member of parliament and was lord high treasurer from 1624 to 1628. In 1624 he was created Baron Ley and in 1626 Earl of Marlborough. The 3rd earl was his grandson James (1618–1665), a naval officer who was killed in action with the Dutch. James was succeeded by his uncle William, a younger son of the 1st earl, on whose death in 1679 the earldom became extinct.


title: Duke of Marlborough (title)

text: The heir apparent to the dukedom is George John Godolphin Spencer-Churchill, Marquess of Blandford (b. 1992), eldest son of the 12th Duke.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: USS "Carl Vinson" (CVN-70) is the United States Navy's third supercarrier. She is named for Carl Vinson (1883-1981), a congressman from Georgia, in recognition of his contributions to the U.S. Navy. The ship was launched during Vinson's lifetime in 1980, undertook her maiden voyage in 1983, and underwent refueling and overhaul between 2005 and 2009.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: Besides deployments in Operation Desert Strike, Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Southern Watch, and Operation Enduring Freedom, "Carl Vinson" has been involved in a number of notable events. The body of Osama bin Laden was buried at sea in 2011 from the deck of "Carl Vinson", and that same year, on Veterans Day, she played host to the first NCAA basketball game on an aircraft carrier, between North Carolina and Michigan State.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: A member of the United States House of Representatives for 50 years, Carl Vinson was, for 29 years, the Chairman of the House Naval Affairs and Armed Services Committee; Vinson was the principal sponsor of the so-called "Vinson Acts", culminating in the Two-Ocean Navy Act of 1940, which provided for the massive naval shipbuilding effort in World War II.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: The seal of USS "Carl Vinson" shows an eagle, wings spread and talons extended, carrying a banner in its beak. The eagle is emblematic of the nation and the ship's motto, and also represents the power that resides in the ship's aircraft. The eagle flies in the form of a stylized letter "V," the initial of the ship's namesake, Congressman Carl Vinson. The "V" also represents the ship's hull when viewed bow-on. Inscribed on the banner that the eagle carries is the Latin phrase ""Vis Per Mare"" which means "Strength through the Sea".


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In October 2009, the US Navy announced that "Carl Vinson" would be the flagship of the newly established Carrier Strike Group One (CSG1), based in San Diego. The ship, under the command of then Captain Bruce H. Lindsey, departed Norfolk for San Diego on 12 January 2010. Accompanying the carrier was Carrier Air Wing Seventeen, Destroyer Squadron 1 and the guided missile cruiser "Bunker Hill".


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: The keel was laid at Newport News Shipbuilding on 11 October 1975, and on 15 March 1980 the ship was launched/christened. Congressman Carl Vinson became the first person in the history of the United States Navy to witness a ship's launching in his honor. After builder sea trials, she was delivered to the Navy on 26 February 1982.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: USS "Carl Vinson" was commissioned on 13 March 1982 at Newport News, Virginia. Present were the Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Thomas B. Hayward, Secretary of the Navy John F. Lehman, keynote speaker Senator John Tower, and ship's sponsor Molly Snead, who was Vinson's nurse for 34 years. After commissioning, "Carl Vinson" put to sea to conduct flight deck certifications, an evaluation designed to test the ship's ability to conduct modern US Navy carrier air operations. That was followed by numerous at sea periods for various training evolutions along the East Coast.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: "Carl Vinson" departed Norfolk on 1 March 1983 with Carrier Air Wing 15 embarked for her maiden deployment, an eight-month, around-the-world cruise that had them operate in the Mediterranean Sea, Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, Arabian Sea, South China Sea, and Pacific Ocean in a multitude of exercises and with port visits in Monte Carlo, Monaco, Casablanca, Morocco, Abidjan, Ivory Coast, Perth, Australia, Subic Bay, Philippines, Hong Kong, Sasebo, Japan, Pusan, Republic of Korea, and Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, before arriving in her new homeport of Naval Air Station Alameda, California, arriving on 28 October 1983.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: "Carl Vinson" participated in RIMPAC '84 before departing on 14 October 1984 for an overseas deployment in the Western Pacific. Carrier Air Wing 15 was embarked. From January until April 1985, "Carl Vinson" was in the Indian Ocean for 107 consecutive days. The WESTPAC deployment included Sea of Japan operations while pursuing a Soviet Charlie I class submarine in the Indian Ocean.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: The carrier received her first Meritorious Unit Commendation for operations conducted from November 1984 to May 1985. In February, the Chief of Naval Operations named "Carl Vinson" the winner of the Admiral James H. Flatley Memorial Award for operational readiness and aviation safety for 1984.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 12 August 1986, the ship departed Alameda for a western Pacific deployment, again with CVW-15 aboard, and in the process became the first modern U.S. aircraft carrier to operate in the Bering Sea. In January 1987, after operating extensively in the Indian Ocean and North Arabian Sea, "Carl Vinson" transited the Bering Sea once more while returning to NAS Alameda.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: "Carl Vinson" and CVW-15 departed for the ship's fourth overseas deployment on 15 June 1988. While on station, the carrier supported Operation Earnest Will, the escort of U.S. flagged tankers in the Persian Gulf. The carrier returned to the States on 16 December 1988 and was awarded the Admiral Flatley Memorial Award for aviation safety for 1988.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 18 September 1989, the carrier departed Alameda to participate in PACEX '89, the largest peacetime naval exercise since the Second World War. During the exercise "Carl Vinson" operated in the Bering Sea and the Aleutian Islands, eventually leading a three-carrier battle group operation in the Sea of Japan and the Pacific Ocean. "Carl Vinson" had a port call in Pusan, South Korea, and then returned to her home port of Alameda shortly after the devastating 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: "Carl Vinson" departed on her fifth deployment (again with CVW-15) on 1 February 1990, the last deployment for the A-7 Corsair. The ship returned to Alameda on 30 July 1990. On 22 September 1990, "Carl Vinson" entered the yards at Bremerton Naval Station, Washington for a 28-month complex overhaul (COH). The carrier received her first COMNAVAIRPAC Battle "E" award for 1990.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 17 February 1994, the carrier, with Carrier Air Wing Fourteen embarked, departed for the Persian Gulf in support of Operation Southern Watch. The carrier returned to Alameda on 17 August 1994, receiving her third Admiral Flatley Award for aviation safety.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In 1995, a documentary entitled "Carrier: Fortress at Sea" was aired on the Discovery Channel, which chronicled the carrier's six-month-long voyage to and from the Persian Gulf.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: From 26 August until 3 September 1995, "Carl Vinson" participated in Exercise Ke Koa, as well as ceremonies to commemorate the end of World War II in the Pacific. During these ceremonies, President Bill Clinton visited the ship in Hawaii. As part of the commemoration ceremonies, "Carl Vinson" launched 11 World War II-era planes.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: The ship departed for her seventh deployment 14 May 1996, heading for the Persian Gulf with CVW-14 in support for Operation Southern Watch and Operation Desert Strike. The ship also participated in Exercise Rugged Nautilus before returning to Alameda on 14 November 1996.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: With the closing of Naval Air Station Alameda, the ship was transferred to Bremerton, Washington, arriving at her new homeport on 17 January 1997, where she played host to the last carrier launch and recovery operations for the A-6E Intruder.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In 1998 with Carrier Air Wing Eleven (CVW-11) embarked, the ship participated in RIMPAC '98. During the exercise on the morning of 10 August, the Australian diesel-electric submarine located the 'enemy' carrier and 'sank' her. "Onslow" closed to within without being detected, then released green flares to indicate her location, 'sinking' the supercarrier. "Carl Vinson" then departed for the Persian Gulf, launching airstrikes on 19 December 1998 in support of Operation Desert Fox and Operation Southern Watch. These strikes continued into March 1999. In July 1999, "Carl Vinson" was drydocked in the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard for 13 months as the Navy spent more than $230 million to upgrade the ship. Post refit shakedowns continued into 2000.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In February 2001, "Carl Vinson" hosted actors Gene Hackman, David Keith, Owen Wilson, and others for filming of the carrier scenes for the movie "Behind Enemy Lines" during intermediate pre-deployment underway workups. During this two-week period, "Carl Vinson" crewmembers and CVW 11 crews took part in the filming along with the actors and film crews. Later, prior to commencement of Operation Enduring Freedom, David Keith returned to "Carl Vinson" on station in the North Arabian Sea to present the first international viewing of "Behind Enemy Lines" to the combined ship and air wing crew. Prior to deploying to the Persian Gulf. "Carl Vinson" (CVN-70) was on a roughly four week carrier quals mission off the coast of Hawaii.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 23 July 2001, "Carl Vinson" steamed from Bremerton, Washington to San Diego, California, where CVW-11 airgroup once again embarked, then was bound for the Persian Gulf to support Operation Southern Watch. This changed abruptly on 11 September 2001, as the ship was rounding the tip of India. In response to the terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, "Carl Vinson" changed course and sped toward the North Arabian Sea, where on 7 October 2001, "Carl Vinson" launched the first airstrikes in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. For 72 days, "Carl Vinson", along with Carrier Wing 11, launched over 4,000 combat sorties in the Global War on Terrorism, earning the ship the Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal. "Carl Vinson" earned the Battle E and Navy Unit Commendation during this deployment. In mid December, "Carl Vinson" began the return trip home, briefly stopping in Pearl Harbor Hawaii to commence a "Tiger Cruise" allowing crew member family members the opportunity to ride the ship to her homeport of Bremerton, Washington, arriving there on 23 January 2002. In April, the ship was overhauled, setting sail in September for a post-refit shakedown. During this time several new operational systems were installed, and the ship's flight deck and catapults were completely renovated. Numerous other spaces and crew living areas were also entirely restored, drastically improving working and living conditions for the crew. Completing her maintenance and overhaul period in record-setting time, "Carl Vinson" and crew got underway in September to conduct sea trials.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In January 2003 she was set for a one-month work up for Flight Deck Quals with Carrier Air Wing Nine (CVW-9) embarked. Due to the start of Operation Iraqi Freedom the ship was extended at sea indefinitely. From January 2003 until September 2003, she made port calls in Hawaii, Guam, South Korea, Japan, Australia, Hong Kong, and Singapore. After nine months, "Carl Vinson" finally returned to Bremerton on 15 September 2003. "Carl Vinson" participated in Foal Eagle, an annually scheduled joint and combined training exercise conducted in the Korean theatre.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In competition year 2004, "Carl Vinson" won the Marjorie Sterrett Battleship Fund Award, awarded to the most battle-ready ship in the U.S. Pacific Fleet.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In January 2005, "Carl Vinson" departed Bremerton, Washington with CVW-9 embarked for a Seven-month deployment, including several months in the Persian Gulf in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom & Operation Enduring Freedom. Highlights of the cruise included port calls to Singapore, Guam, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Rhodes, Greece and Lisbon, Portugal. "Carl Vinson" ended this deployment at Naval Station Norfolk on 31 July 2005. During this deployment two Marine F-18 pilots were lost over Iraq.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In November 2005, "Carl Vinson" became the third carrier to undergo a mid-life Refueling and Complex Overhaul (RCOH), which was scheduled to last 36 months. The ship moved out of dry dock to a pier side berth at Northrop Grumman Newport News shipyard in May 2007.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: "Carl Vinson" commenced post-refueling sea trials on 28 June 2009 and returned to Naval Station Norfolk on 1 July 2009. The Navy accepted the carrier back into the fleet on 11 July 2009, after successful completion of her sea trials.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In October 2009, "Carl Vinson" entered a four-month shipyard maintenance period at Northrop Grumman Newport News in preparation for her upcoming transit to the Pacific in the spring. The ship was scheduled to transit around South America to her new home at NAS North Island, San Diego, joining sister-carriers and , by early 2010.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 12 January 2010, just hours after the 2010 Haiti earthquake, "Carl Vinson" was ordered to redirect from her current deployment in the North Atlantic Ocean to Haiti to contribute to the relief effort as part of Operation Unified Response. Upon receiving orders from USSOUTHCOM, the "Carl Vinson" battle group proceeded to Mayport, Florida where the ships loitered offshore to receive additional supplies and helicopters. The ships arrived off Port au Prince on 15 January 2010 to commence operations. CNN medical correspondent and neurosurgeon Sanjay Gupta, pediatric surgeon Henri Ford, and two Navy doctors removed a piece of concrete from the skull of a 12-year-old earthquake victim in an operation performed aboard "Carl Vinson" on 18 January. In addition to providing medical relief, the ship's excess desalination capacity was critical to providing water to Haiti's population during the earthquake relief.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On March 2010, during her transit around South America performed Gringo-Gaucho / Southern Seas 2010 maneuvers with the Argentine Navy.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 12 April 2010, the carrier arrived at her new home port of Naval Air Station North Island, San Diego California.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 30 November 2010, with Carrier Air Wing Seventeen embarked, "Carl Vinson" departed Naval Air Station North Island for a three-week composite training unit exercise (COMPTUEX) and her 2010–2011 deployment to the U.S. Seventh Fleet Area of Responsibility (AOR) in the Western Pacific and U.S. Fifth Fleet Areas of Responsibility in the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf as part of Carrier Strike Group One. This is the first Western Pacific deployment for "Carl Vinson" in more than five years since the ship entered her Refueling Complex Overhaul (RCOH) in late 2005.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 11 April 2011 while operating in the Arabian Sea, an F/A-18 Hornet suffered an engine fire immediately after launch from the carrier. The aircraft returned to the carrier with one engine and the fire was extinguished without any damage to the ship or any injuries to the pilot or ship crew members.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 2 May 2011, following the death of Osama bin Laden, his body was brought aboard "Carl Vinson", which was operating in the Northern Arabian Sea, and buried at sea following religious rites.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: The ship docked in Manila Bay in the Philippines from 15 to 18 May 2011 for a "routine port call and goodwill visit" meant to "highlight the strong historic, community, and military connections between the United States and the Republic of the Philippines." Among those given a special tour of this aircraft carrier were Philippine President Benigno Aquino III and U.S. Ambassador to the Philippines Harry K. Thomas, Jr. This brief visit was criticized by cause-oriented group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan as well as Filipino youth leader Raymond Palatino and University of the Philippines political science professor Clarita Carlos.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: The ship docked in Hong Kong in the People's Republic of China on 22 May 2011 to take on supplies for her return to homeport San Diego, and to provide photo opportunities to the Chinese press. The ship returned to San Diego on 15 June 2011.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 21 June 2011, it was announced that the Michigan State Spartans would play a regular season men's basketball game against the North Carolina Tar Heels on the flight deck of "Carl Vinson" on Veterans Day. On 11 November 2011, the inaugural Carrier Classic took place at the Naval Air Station North Island on San Diego Bay in Coronado, California. U.S. President Barack Obama was one of 8,111 people in attendance as the Tar Heels defeated the Spartans by a score of 67–55.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 30 November 2011, "Carl Vinson" departed Naval Air Station North Island, California, on her scheduled Western Pacific (WESTPAC) deployment.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 23 May 2012, "Carl Vinson" returned to Naval Air Station North Island, California, to end her November 2011 deployment. The carrier had stopped earlier in Hawaii to pick up approximately 900 "Tigers" – friends and family of the sailors aboard the ship who traveled with the ship from Hawaii to San Diego.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 5 July 2012, "Carl Vinson" began preparations for a Planned Incremental Availability (PIA) period. PIA is a major maintenance phase that all American naval vessels must go through multiple times throughout their lifetime to be able to sustain underway operations. PIA 2012–2013 for "Carl Vinson" included overhauls of over 40 crew living spaces, 30 heads and hundreds of workspaces throughout the ship. Also included were upgrades to many of the electronics and defense systems that the ship uses during deployments, to include an upgrade from the Global Command and Control System-Maritime (GCCS-M) to the Distributed Common Ground System-Navy (DCGS-N).


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 30 January 2013, "Carl Vinson" commenced sea trials, marking her first time underway in seven months, since the ammo offload which ended on 29 June 2012. Upon returning from this underway period, the ship's commanding officer, then Captain Kent D. Whalen, announced on 2 February 2013 that PIA had officially ended, marking the first on-time PIA completion since 1999. Since February 2013, the ship has been underway multiple times conducting carrier qualifications with Carrier Air Wing Seventeen as well as multiple crew certification exercises. The most recent accomplishment for "Carl Vinson" was the completion of her evaluation of nuclear reactor operation. During this evaluation, the Naval Sea Systems Command embarks a team of proctors who put the ship's Reactor Department through a multitude of drills and exercises to test their ability to safely operate a nuclear reactor and to contain any casualty of the reactor as it occurs. This was completed on 1 July 2013.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 22 August 2014, "Carl Vinson" and assigned CVW-17 began a scheduled deployment to the U.S. 5th and 7th Fleet areas of responsibility. , Destroyer Squadron 1 and its ships , , and deployed with the carrier as part of the "Carl Vinson" Carrier Strike Group (CSG). The carrier was deployed to the Persian Gulf to relieve USS "George H. W. Bush" in fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 11 September 2014 at 17:40 hrs local time, two F/A-18Cs from CVW-17 crashed in the western Pacific Ocean whilst operating from "Carl Vinson". The carrier was in her area of operations in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region. The planes were attached to Strike Squadron 94 and Strike Fighter Squadron 113 and collided from the carrier, an area approximately west of Wake Island. USS "Bunker Hill", USS "Gridley", USS "Sterett", USS "Dewey", and helicopters assigned to Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 15 (HSC 15) and Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron 73 (HSM 73) assisted in the search for the pilots. Whilst one pilot was recovered alive soon after the crash, the second pilot could not be located. The Navy continued its search for the second pilot until 13 September 2014, when the search was abandoned.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: "Carl Vinson" returned to San Diego on 4 June 2015. Over the course of the deployment, supporting strike operations in Iraq and Syria, CVW-17 successfully flew 12,300 sorties, including 2,382 combat missions and dropped more than half a million pounds (230 tons) of ordnance against ISIS.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 14 August 2015, "Carl Vinson" began a planned incremental availability (PIA) period at Naval Air Station North Island. The ship received more than $300 million worth of improvements over six months during this modernisation, including the first UAV command center installed aboard an aircraft carrier.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In 2016, Carrier Air Wing Two was reassigned to "Carl Vinson". The carrier began her next scheduled deployment to the Western Pacific with CVW-2 on 5 January 2017.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: In mid February 2017, it was reported that the "Carl Vinson" CSG commenced "routine operations" in the South China Sea. During the first half of April 2017, after conducting training exercises with the Republic of Korea Navy in the Western Pacific, the CSG was reportedly ordered towards the Korean Peninsula amid growing concerns about North Korea's ballistic missile program. "We are sending an armada," President Donald Trump announced on 12 April 2017, sending a signal to deter North Korea after missile and nuclear provocations.However, the "Carl Vinson" and her escorts were away, undertaking joint exercises with the Royal Australian Navy in the Indian Ocean south of Singapore. Confusion appeared to stem from a "glitch-ridden sequence of events" that included a premature announcement of the deployment from the Navy.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 5 January 2018, "Carl Vinson" left San Diego for her next scheduled deployment to the Western Pacific. On 5 March 2018, the ship entered Da Nang Port, alongside and , on a scheduled visit to Vietnam. This visit was planned from when President Donald Trump was on a State visit to Vietnam. U.S. Navy sailors on the ships engaged in cultural activities and training with the Vietnamese Navy. This visit was hoped to "increase the relations between the two countries." "Carl Vinson" returned to San Diego on 12 April 2018. In July 2018, "Carl Vinson" participated in exercise RIMPAC 2018.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 2 August 2018, it was announced that "Carl Vinson" will move from San Diego to Naval Base Kitsap to go through a period of maintenance at Puget Sound and will replace "Carl Vinson" at San Diego.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 8 January 2020, it was announced that "Carl Vinson" will be changing home port back to San Diego bringing the number of San Diego-based carriers from two to three, joining and .


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: The COVID-19 pandemic was reported to have spread to the crew of "Carl Vinson" when its first case was reported on 23 March 2020. At the time, the ship was in dry dock for maintenance at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, and it was reported that "the sailor did not board the vessel and had no contact with any shipyard personnel."


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 2 September 2020, "Carl Vinson" arrived in her new homeport of San Diego following a 17-month overhaul at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard. "Carl Vinson" left San Diego for her next deployment on 3 August 2021, with CVW-2 embarked. One of the squadrons assigned to CVW-2 was Strike Fighter Squadron 147 (VFA-147). This was the first operational deployment of a U.S. Navy squadron equipped with the F-35C Lightning II.


title: USS Carl Vinson

text: On 24 January 2022, while "Carl Vinson" was operating in the South China Sea, an F-35C with VFA-147 crashed while landing, resulting in injuries to at least seven crew members. The pilot safely ejected and was recovered from the water shortly after. The pilot and two of the injured deck crew were taken to a hospital in Manila, Philippines for treatment, while the remaining injured were treated in the carrier's medical facilities. The wreck of the F-35C was lost over the edge into the sea after the incident. 37 days after the incident, the plane was recovered.


Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life is a 2003 action adventure film directed by Jan de Bont and based on the "Tomb Raider" video game series. Angelina Jolie stars as the titular character Lara Croft with supporting performances from Gerard Butler, Ciarán Hinds, Chris Barrie, Noah Taylor, Til Schweiger, Djimon Hounsou and Simon Yam. An international co-production between the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany and Japan, the film is a sequel to the 2001 film "".


title: Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life

text: Critics regarded "The Cradle of Life" as an improvement on its predecessor, particularly in the action sequences, and continued to praise Jolie's performance as Lara Croft. Despite this, it did not repeat its box office performance, grossing $156 million compared to the previous instalment's $275 million. It was still a financial success, and plans were made for a sequel, but these were cancelled when Jolie declined to reprise her role as Croft.


text: On Santorini island, Greece, a strong earthquake uncovers the Luna Temple. The temple was built by Alexander the Great to house his most prized treasures. Among these treasures is a glowing orb with a pattern resembling a code etched into it. Treasure-hunting archaeologist Lara Croft and her group find this orb but are ambushed by the Lo brothers; Chen and Xien, both of whom are crime lords and leaders of Chinese syndicate Shay Ling. The duo kill the group and take the orb but Lara escapes with a strange medallion.


text: MI6 approaches Lara with information about Pandora's box, an object from ancient legends that supposedly contains a deadly plague (the companion to the origin of life itself). The box, hidden in the mysterious Cradle of Life, can only be found with a magical sphere that serves as a map. The sphere is the same orb that was stolen by Chen Lo, who plans to sell it to Dr. Jonathan Reiss - a Nobel Prize winning scientist and business magnate turned misanthropic bio-weapon arms dealer.


text: Agreeing that the sphere must be kept away from Reiss, Lara agrees to help MI6, with the condition that they release her old flame Terry Sheridan, who is familiar with Chen Lo's criminal operation. Together, Terry and Lara infiltrate Chen Lo's lair, where he is smuggling the Terracotta Soldiers. Lara defeats him in a fight and learns that the orb is in Shanghai, China. In Shanghai she discovers Chen's brother Xien is trying to hand over the orb to Reiss, however once Xien hands the orb over, Reiss betrays Xien and executes him, but not before Lara manages to put a tracker on the crate containing the orb during the handoff.


text: Lara and Terry manage to find the orb in a lab housed in Hong Kong. However, Lara is captured by Reiss and his men. Reiss reveals his plans to unleash the plague, saving only those people he deems worthy. He is about to kill Lara Croft. Helpless and condemned, Lara is saved by Terry and then they take the orb before fleeing using wingsuits. The next day, Lara uses the orb and learns the location of the mysterious Cradle of Life; in Kenya, Africa near Mount Kilimanjaro. After Lara sends returns information to her friend Bryce back at Croft Manor, Reiss and his men infiltrate the mansion and capture him and Hillary. Lara travels to Kenya where she meets up with her longtime friend Kosa. They question a local tribe about the Cradle of Life, wherein the chief states that the Cradle of Life is in a crater protected by the "Shadow Guardians".


text: As they set out on an expedition, Reiss' men ambush them and kill the tribesmen. Outnumbered, Lara surrenders. Using her companions as hostages, Reiss forces Lara to lead him to the Cradle of Life. At the crater, they encounter the Shadow Guardians, monsters that appear in and out of wet patches on dead trees. The creatures kill most of Reiss' men, but Lara manages to find the "keyhole" and drops the Orb in it. The creatures disintegrate and the entrance to the Cradle of Life opens.


text: Lara and Reiss are drawn into the Cradle, a labyrinth made of a strange crystalline substance where normal laws of physics do not apply. Inside, they find a pool of highly corrosive black acid (linking back to one of the myths about Pandora's box), in which the box floats. Terry arrives, frees the hostages and catches up to Lara.


text: Lara fights Reiss but Reiss succeeds in retrieving his gun. He is about to shoot her, throw her into the acid and take Pandora's Box, but unfortunately for him Terry distracts him and saves Lara. Then Lara knocks Reiss down and throws him into the acid pool, which kills and dissolves him. Then Terry announces his intention to take the box for himself. When he refuses to back down, Lara regretfully shoots him dead, replaces the box in the pool and leaves.


text: The budget for the film was $95 million (less than the first film's $115 million budget), and like the first film, it was financed through Tele München Gruppe. The picture was also distributed internationally by Japanese company Toho-Towa.


text: Filming lasted for three and a half months, which included six-day shoots on location in Hong Kong, Santorini, Llyn Gwynant in North Wales (doubling for mainland China), and a two-week stint in Kenya for shooting at Amboseli and Hell's Gate, with the remainder of the picture filmed on soundstages in the United Kingdom. One scene in the film was set in Shanghai, but it was shot on a set and not on location.


text: The film also featured the new 2003 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon, first seen when Lara parachutes into the moving vehicle in Africa and takes over the wheel from Kosa. As part of Jeep's advertising campaign, it was specially customised for the film by Jeep's design team along with the film's production designers, with three copies constructed for filming. 1,001 limited-run "Tomb Raider" models were produced—available only in silver like the film version and minus its special customisations—and put on the market to coincide with the release of the film. Jeep vice president Jeff Bell explained, "[The ad campaign] is more than just a product placement ... the Jeep Wrangler Rubicon is the most capable Jeep ever built, so the heroic and extreme environment in which Lara Croft uses her custom Wrangler Rubicon in "Tomb Raider" is accurate." In the end, Lara's Rubicon had less than two total minutes of screen time in the finished film.


text: Director Jan de Bont hated working on the movie: "It was not such a great experience. But more from the reason how the studio tried to really interfere with it in a way. And the thing itself is that the makers of the game were also involved. And they never told me that they, also, have a say in the story. Suddenly there were all these changes that have taken, and who had to be what, and what cast. And then suddenly it became such a big scene. Everything was a big deal." About working with Angelina Jolie, he said: "I kind of like working with her, and she’s a character, but I thought she was a very interesting character to work with. She’s definitely very opinionated. But not in a negative way, I feel. She was difficult to work with, but for me it was, probably, not a problem. I didn’t really see anything negative at that time. And I really ended up liking her very much, so."


text: A score composed and conducted by Alan Silvestri, and performed by London Symphony Orchestra, was released in 2003.


text: "Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life" was released on DVD and VHS on November 18, 2003; a Blu-ray release followed on October 8, 2013. A 4K UHD Blu-ray version was released on February 27, 2018.


text: In the United Kingdom, the film was watched by viewers on television in 2007, making it the year's fifth most-watched British film on television.


text: The film debuted in fourth place with a take of $21.8 million. In the United Kingdom, the film opened at number three, earning £1.5 million in its first three days. The film finished with a domestic gross of $65 million.


text: "The Cradle of Life" was considered more successful at the international box office, but was a domestic box office failure. It also faced competition with "Finding Nemo", a record-breaking animated film. Paramount blamed the failure of the film on the poor performance of the then-latest installment of the video game series, "". After numerous delays, "Angel of Darkness" was rushed to shelves just over a month before the release of the film, despite the final product being unfinished and loaded with bugs. It spawned mediocre sales, and mixed reviews from critics. Former Eidos Interactive senior executive Jeremy Heath-Smith, who was also credited as an executive producer in the film, resigned days after the game was released.


text: According to review aggregator Metacritic, "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life" received "mixed or average reviews" based on an average score of 43/100 from 34 critic reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a score of based on reviews, with an average rating of . The website's critical consensus reads, "Though the sequel is an improvement over the first movie, it's still lacking in thrills." Audiences polled by Cinemascore gave it a grade of "B−" on a scale of A to F.


text: Salon described it as a "highly enjoyable summer thrill ride." Roger Ebert gave the film 3 out of 4 stars, stating that the film was "better than the first one, more assured, more entertaining ... it uses imagination and exciting locations to give the movie the same kind of pulp adventure feeling we get from the "Indiana Jones" movies." David Rooney of "Variety" praised Jolie for being "hotter, faster and more commanding than last time around as the fearless heiress/adventuress, plus a little more human."


text: The film was nonetheless panned by most critics. Rene Rodriguez of "The Miami Herald" called it "another joyless, brain-numbing adventure through lackluster "Indiana Jones" territory". James Berardinelli of ReelViews said "The first "Tomb Raider" was dumb fun; "Cradle of Life" is just plain dumb ... the worst action movie of the summer." Wesley Morris of "The Boston Globe" wrote, "It's a bullet-riddled "National Geographic" special [that] produces a series of dumb, dismal shootouts that are so woefully choreographed there's reason to believe Debbie Allen may be behind them." He then said of director De Bont, "He has yet to meet a contraption he couldn't use to damage your hearing."


text: In March 2004, producer Lloyd Levin said that "The Cradle of Life" had earned enough internationally for Paramount to bankroll a third film, but any hopes of it going into production were soon quelled by Jolie's announcement that she had no desire to play Lara Croft a third time: "I just don't feel like I need to do another one. I felt really happy with the last one. It was one we really wanted to do." In 2018, the film series was rebooted with Alicia Vikander as Lara Croft.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Nzinga Ana de Sousa Mbande ( – 1663) was a Southwest African ruler who served as queen of the Ambundu Kingdoms of Ndongo (1624–1663) and Matamba (1631–1663), located in present-day northern Angola.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Born into the ruling family of Ndongo, Nzinga received military and political training as a child, and she demonstrated an aptitude for defusing political crises as an ambassador to the Portuguese Empire. She later assumed power over Ndongo after the death of her father and brother, who both served as kings, and would go on to conquer Matamba. She ruled during a period of rapid growth in the African slave trade and encroachment of the Portuguese Empire into South West Africa, in attempts to control the slave trade. Nzinga fought for the independence and stature of her kingdoms against the Portuguese in a reign that lasted 37 years.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In the years following her death, Nzinga has become a historical figure in Angola and in the wider Atlantic Creole culture. She is remembered for her intelligence, her political and diplomatic wisdom, and her military tactics.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Nzinga was born into the royal family of Ndongo in central West around 1583. She was the daughter of "Ngola" (a noble title translatable to "King") Kilombo of Ndongo. Her mother, Kengela ka Nkombe, was one of her father's slave wives and his favorite concubine. Nzinga had two sisters, Kambu, or Lady Barbara and Funji, or Lady Grace. She also had a brother, Mbandi, who took over the throne after their father died. According to legend, the birth process had been very difficult for Kengela, the mother. Nzinga received her name because the umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck (the Kimbundu verb "kujinga" means to twist or turn). Children of the royal household who survived difficult or unusual births were believed to possess spiritual gifts, and some saw their births as an indicator the person would grow to become a powerful and proud person.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: When she was 10 years old, her father became the king of the Ndongo. As a child, Nzinga was greatly favored by her father. Since she was not considered an heir to the throne (like her brothers), she was not seen as direct competition, so the king could freely lavish attention upon her without offending his more likely heirs. She received military training and was trained as a warrior to fight alongside her father, displaying considerable aptitude with a battle axe, the traditional weapon of Ndongan warriors. She participated in many official and governance duties alongside her father, including legal councils, war councils, and important rituals. Furthermore, Nzinga was taught by visiting Portuguese missionaries to read and write in Portuguese.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Queen Nzinga Mbande is known by many different names including both Kimbundu and Portuguese names, alternate spellings and various honorifics. Common spellings found in Portuguese and English sources include "Nzinga", "Nzingha", "Njinga" and "Njingha". In colonial documentation, including her own manuscripts, her name was also spelled "Jinga", "Ginga", "Zinga", "Zingua", "Zhinga" and "Singa". She was also known by her Christian name, Ana de Sousa. This name—Anna de Souza Nzingha—was given to her when she was baptised. She was named Anna after the Portuguese woman who acted as her Godmother at the ceremony. She helped influence who Nzingha was in the future. Her Christian surname, de Souza, came from the acting governor of Angola, João Correia de Souza.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: As a monarch of Ndongo and Matamba, her native name was Ngola Njinga. "Ngola" was the Ndongo name for the ruler and the etymological root of "Angola". In Portuguese, she was known as Rainha Nzinga/Zinga/Ginga (Queen Nzingha). According to the current Kimbundu orthography, her name is spelled "Njinga Mbandi" (the "j" is a voiced postalveolar fricative or "soft j" as in Portuguese and French, while the adjacent "n" is silent). The statue of Njinga now standing in the square of Kinaxixi in Luanda calls her "Mwene Njinga Mbande".


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: During this period, the kingdom of Ndongo was managing multiple crises, largely due to conflicts with the Portuguese Empire. The Portuguese had first come to Ndongo in 1575 when they established a trading post in Luanda with the help of the Kingdom of Kongo, Ndongo's northern rival. Despite several years of initial peace between Ndongo and Portugal, relations soured between the two kingdoms and devolved into decades of war between them. Ndongo faced intense military pressure from Portugal and Kongo, both of which seized Ndongan territory. By the 1580s, large parts of Ndongo had fallen under Portuguese control. The Portuguese waged war in a brutal style, burning villages and taking hostages. In addition to territorial conquests, the Portuguese seized large numbers of slaves during the conflict (50,000 according to one source) and built forts inside Ndongan territory to control the slave trade. Ndongo rallied against the Portuguese, defeating them at the Battle of Lucala in 1590, but not before the kingdom had lost much of its territory. The conflict had also eroded the power of the king, with many Ndongan noblemen, "sobas", refusing to pay tribute to the crown and some siding with the Portuguese. By the time that Nzingha's father became king in 1593, the area had been devastated by war and the power of the king greatly diminished. The king tried a variety of methods to handle the crisis, including diplomacy, negotiations, and open warfare, but he was unable to improve the situation.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: The situation grew worse for Ndongo when in 1607 the kingdom was invaded by the Imbangala, tribal bands of mercenaries known for their ferocity in battle and religious fervor. The Imbangala allied themselves with the Portuguese, and the new threat forced the Ndongan king to give up any attempts to reconquer his lost territory.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In 1617, Ngola Mbandi Kiluanji died and Ngola Mbandi, his son and Nzinga's brother, came to power. Upon assuming the throne, he engaged in months of political bloodletting, killing many rival claimants to the throne, including his older half brother and their family. 35 at the time, Nzingha was spared, but the new king ordered her young son killed while she and her two sisters were forcibly sterilized, ensuring that she would never have a child again. According to some sources, Nzingha was singled out for harsh treatment as she had a longstanding rivalry with her brother. Perhaps fearing for her life, Nzinga fled to the Kingdom of Matamba.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Having consolidated his power, Mbandi vowed to continue the war against the Portuguese. However, he lacked military skill, and while he was able to form an alliance with the Imbangala, the Portuguese made significant military gains. Faced with the Portuguese threat, in 1621 he contacted Nzingha, asking her to be his emissary to the Portuguese in Luanda. She was the best fit for the job, as she was both of royal lineage and spoke fluent Portuguese. She agreed to lead the diplomatic mission with the stipulation that she be granted the authority to negotiate in the king's name and permission to be baptized – an important diplomatic tool she hoped to use against the Portuguese. Nzingha departed the Ndongan capital with a large retinue and was received with considerable interest in Luanda, compelling the Portuguese governor to pay for all of her party's expenses. While Ndongo leaders typically met the Portuguese in European clothing, she chose to wear opulent traditional clothing (including feathers and jewels) of the Ndongo people, in order to display that their culture was not inferior. The story goes that when Nzingha arrived, there were chairs for the Portuguese individuals and only a mat provided for her. This type of behavior from the Portuguese was common; it was their way of displaying a “subordinate status, a status reserved for conquered Africans.” In response to this, Nzingha's attendant formed himself to be her chair while she spoke to the governor face to face. She employed flattery as a diplomatic tool, and according to some sources deliberately chose to contrast her brother's belligerent style with her own diplomatic decorum.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: As ambassador, Nzingha's main goal was to secure peace between her people and the Portuguese. To this end, she promised the Portuguese an end to hostilities (describing her brother's previous actions as the mistakes of a young king), allowed Portuguese slave traders inside Ndongo, and offered to return escaped Portuguese slaves fighting in her brother's army. In return, she demanded that Portugal remove the forts built inside Ndongan territory and was adamant that Ndongo would not pay tribute to Portugal, noting that only conquered peoples paid tribute and her people had not been defeated. She also expressed a desire for cooperation between the two kingdoms, noting that they could support each-other against their common enemies in the region. When the Portuguese questioned her commitment to peace, Nzingha offered to be publicly baptized, which she was with great aplomb in Luanda. She adopted the name "Dona Anna de Sousa" in honor of her godparents, Ana da Silva (the governor's wife and her ordained godmother) and Governor Joao Correia de Sousa. A peace treaty was subsequently agreed upon, and Nzingha returned to Kabasa in triumph in late 1622.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Despite her success in the negotiations with the Portuguese, the peace between Ndongo and the Imbangala – themselves engaged in expanding their territory – collapsed. After a series of defeats, the Ndongan royalty were driven out of their court in Kabasa, putting the king in exile and allowing for some of the Imbangala to establish the Kingdom of Kasanje. The Portuguese wanted to proceed with the treaty, but refused to aid Ndongo against the Imbangala until the king had recaptured Kabasa and been baptized. King Mbandi retook Kabasa in 1623 and took tentative steps towards Christianity, but remained deeply distrustful of the Portuguese. An increasingly powerful figure in the royal court, Nzingha (in a possible political ploy) warned her brother that a baptism would offend his traditionalist supporters, convincing him to reject any idea of being baptized. In addition, the Portuguese began reneging on the treaty, refusing to withdraw from their fortresses inside Ndongo and conducting raids for loot and slaves into Ndongo's territory. By 1624, King Mbandi had fallen into a deep depression and was forced to cede many of his duties to Nzingha.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In 1624, her brother died of mysterious causes (some say suicide, others say poisoning). Before his death, he had made it clear that Nzingha should be his successor. Nzingha quickly moved to consolidate her rule, having her supporters seize the ritual objects associated with the monarchy and eliminating her opponents at court. She also assumed the title of "Ngola", conferring a position of great influence among her people. An opulent funeral for her brother was arranged, and some of his remains were preserved in a "misete" (a reliquary), so they could later be consulted by Nzingha. One major obstacle to her rule, her 7 year old nephew, was under the guardianship of Kasa, an Imbangala war chief. To remove this potential pretender to her throne, Nzingha approached Kasa with a marriage proposal; the couple were married, and after the wedding she had her nephew killed—in Nzingha's view, final revenge for her own murdered son.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: However, her ascension to the throne faced severe opposition from male claimants from other noble families. According to Mbande tradition, neither Nzingha nor her predecessor brother had a direct right to the throne because they were children of slave wives, not the first wife. Nzingha countered this argument, strategically using the claim that she was properly descended from the main royal line through her father, as opposed to her rivals had no bloodline connection. Her opponents, on the other hand, used other precedents to discredit her, such as that she was a female and thus ineligible. In addition, Nzingha's willingness to negotiate with the Portuguese (as opposed to previous rulers, whom had fought against them) was seen as a sign of weakness by some of the Ndongan nobility; specifically, the treaty's allowing of Portuguese missionaries inside Ndongo was seen with distaste.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: While the succession crisis deepened, relations between Ndongo and Portugal became more complex. Nzingha hoped to fulfill the treaty she had signed with the Portuguese in 1621, and thereby regain Ndongan lands lost during her brother's disastrous wars. Governor de Sousa was also keen to avoid conflict, and both he and Nzingha were eager to re-open the slave trade that was so vital to the region's economy. However, tensions rose between Nzingha and de Sousa. When Nzingha asked for the return of "kijikos" (a servile caste of slaves traditionally owned by the Ndongan royalty) living in Portuguese controlled territory, as had been agreed in the treaty, de Sousa refused and demanded that Nzingha return escaped Portuguese slaves serving in her army first. De Sousa also demanded that Nzingha become a vassal of the king of Portugal and pay tribute, demands she refused outright. Further straining relations, in late 1624 de Sousa began an aggressive campaign to force Mbande nobles, "sobas", to become Portuguese vassals. "Sobas" were traditionally vassals of the ruler of Ndongo, and provided as tribute the valuable provisions, soldiers, and slaves needed to control Angola - thus, by making the "sobas" vassals of Portugal, the Portuguese were able to undermine Nzingha's position as queen of Ndongo.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: To weaken the Portuguese colonial administration, Nzingha dispatched messengers ("makunzes") to encourage Mbande slaves to flee Portuguese plantations and join her kingdom, thereby depriving the colony of its income and manpower. When the Portuguese complained about the escapes, Nzingha replied that she would abide by her earlier treaty and return escaped slaves, but that her kingdom had none. Her actions were a success and many "sobas" joined forces with her, strengthening her position and causing the Portuguese to fear a Mbande uprising was imminent.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Despite these successes, Nzingha's policies threatened the income of the Portuguese and Mbande nobles, and soon the Portuguese began to foment rebellion in her kingdom. In late 1625, the Portuguese sent soldiers to protect Hari a Kiluanje, a "soba" who had broken ties with Nzingha. Kiluanje opposed having a woman rule Ndongo, and was himself descended from the royal family; upon learning of his actions, Nzingha sent warriors to crush his revolt but was defeated, weakening her position and convincing more nobles to revolt. Nzingha petitioned the Portuguese to stop supporting Kiluanje, and attempted to negotiate as long as possible while she gathered more forces, but the Portuguese guessed this was a delaying tactic and soon recognized Kiluanje as king of Ndongo. The Portuguese subsequently declared war on Nzingha on 15 March 1626.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Facing a Portuguese invasion, Nzhingha gathered her army and withdrew to a group of islands in the Kwanza river. After a series of battles, she was defeated and forced to make a long march into eastern Ndongo; during the retreat, she was forced to abandon most of her followers, a strategy that greatly benefited her as the Portuguese were more interested in re-capturing slaves than in pursuing her army. The Portuguese soon suffered their own setback when Hari a Kiluanje died of smallpox, forcing them to replace him as king with Nogla Hari, another Ndongan nobleman. Nogla Hari proved to be an unpopular leader with the Ndongan people, who viewed him as a Portuguese puppet, while some "sobas" supported his rule. A divide soon formed inside the kingdom of Ndongo in which the common people and lesser nobles supported Nzingha, while many powerful nobles supported Nogla Hari and the Portuguese.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In November 1627, Nzingha again attempted to negotiate with the Portuguese, sending a peace delegation and a gift of 400 slaves. She indicated that she was willing to become a vassal of the kingdom of Portugal and pay tribute if they supported her claim to the throne, but was adamant that she was the rightful queen of Ndongo. The Portuguese, however, rejected the offer, beheading her lead diplomat and issuing the counter demand that she retire from public life, renounce her claim to the kingdom of Ndongo, and submit to Nogla Hari as rightful king—these demands were within the diplomatic norm in Europe, but were utterly unacceptable to Nzingha. Faced with the Portuguese rebuke and the realization that many Ndongan nobles stood against her, Nzingha (as had her father and brother) slipped into depression, locking herself in a room for several weeks. She emerged, however, and within a month had begun a new campaign to rebuild her alliances in Ndongo.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: While rebuilding her strength, Nzingha took advantage of Nogla Hari's political weakness, highlighting his lack of political experience. Nogla Hari was despised by both his nobles and his Portuguese allies, for while previous kings of Ndongo had all been warriors, Nogla Hari had no soldiers of his own and was forced to rely on Portuguese soldiers. Nogla Hari and the Portuguese launched a counter-propaganda campaign against Nzingha, hoping to use her gender as a means to delegitimize her strength, but this backfired as she increasingly outmaneuvered Nogla Hari in Ndongan politics. In one notable incident, Nzingha sent Nogla Hari threatening letters and a collection of fetishes, challenging him to combat with her forces; the messages terrified Hari, who was forced to call on his Portuguese allies for support, thus greatly diminishing his own prestige while adding to Nzingha's reputation. However, she was still unable to directly face the Portuguese in battle, and was forced to retreat from the advancing Portuguese army. She suffered a series of military defeats, most notably in a Portuguese ambush that saw half of her army, most of her officials, and her two sisters captured, though she herself was able to escape. By late 1628, Nzingha's army had been greatly reduced (down to around 200 soldiers according to one source) and she had been effectively expelled from her kingdom.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Following her expulsion, Nzingha and her supporters continued to fight against the Portuguese. To bolster her forces, the queen looked to make allies in the region while keeping her battered forces out of reach of the Portuguese army. During this time she was contacted by Kasanje, a powerful Imbangala warlord who had established his own kingdom on the Kwanza river. Kasanje and the Imbangala were traditional enemies of Ndongo, and Kasanje himself had previously executed several of Nzingha's envoys. Kasanje offered Nzingha an alliance and military support, but in return demanded that she marry him and discard her "lunga" (a large bell used by Ndongan war captains as a symbol of their power). Nzingha accepted these terms, married Kasanje and was inducted into Imbangala society. The exiled queen adapted quickly to the new culture, adopting many Imbangala religious rites. Sources (African, Western, modern, contemporary) disagree on the intricacies and extent of Imbangala rites and laws ("ijila"), but the general consensus is that Nzingha was compelled to participate in the customary cannibalistic (the drinking of human blood in the "cuia", or blood oath ceremony) and infanticidal (through the use of an oil made from a slain infant, the "maji a samba") initiation rites required for a woman to become a leader in the highly-militarized Imbangala society. The ritual was in part to prevent a succession crisis amongst the Imbangala in the future. She did not, however, completely abandon her Mbundan cultural roots, instead combining the beliefs of her people with those of her new Imbangalan allies. As noted by historian Linda Heywood, Nzingha's genius was to combine her Mbundu heritage with the Imbangalan's Central African military tradition and leadership structure, thus forming a new, highly capable army. To increase her numbers, she granted freedom to escaped slaves and land, new slaves, and titles to other exiled Ndongans. According to some sources, Nzingha – having been disenfranchised by the Mbundu-dominated nobility of Ndongo – was politically attracted to the Imbangalans, who placed more value on merit and religious fervor as opposed to lineage, kinship (and by extension, sex).


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Using her new power base, Nzinga remodeled her forces after the highly effective Imbangala warriors. By 1631 she had rebuilt her army and was waging a successful guerilla war against the Portuguese, with one Jesuit priest (living in the Kongo at the time) describing her as being akin to an Amazon queen and praising her leadership. Between 1631 and 1635, Nzingha invaded the neighboring Kingdom of Matamba, capturing and deposing Queen Mwongo Matamba in 1631. Nzingha had the defeated queen branded but spared her life (Imbangala custom mandated she execute her) and took Mwongo's daughter into her service as one of her warriors. Having defeated the Matambans, Nzingha assumed the throne of Matamba and began settling the region with exiled Ndongans, hoping to use the kingdom as a base to wage her war to reclaim her homeland. Unlike her native Ndongo, Matamba had a cultural tradition of female leadership, giving Nzingha a more stable power base after she overthrew the previous queen. With Matamba under her control, Nzingha worked extensively to expand the slave trade in her new kingdom, using the profits from slave trading to finance her wars and divert trade income away from the Portuguese. Over the next decade, Nzingha continued to struggle against the Portuguese and their allies, with both sides attempting to limit each other's influence and take control over the slave trade. During this decade, Nzingha took on more masculine traits, adopting male titles and clothing. She established an all-female bodyguard for herself, and ordered that her male concubines wear women's clothing and address her as king. She also instituted communal sleeping quarters at her court, and enforced strict chastity rules for her male councilors and female bodyguards.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: By the late 1630s, Nzingha had expanded her influence to the north and south of Matamba. Using her forces, she cut other rulers off from the Portuguese-controlled coast, capturing parts of the Kwango River and bringing the region's key slave supplying lands under her control. She also expanded her territory to the north, and in doing so established diplomatic relations with the Kingdom of the Kongo and Dutch merchants, who were increasingly active in the area. Nzingha also established a lucrative slave trade with the Dutch, who purchased as many as 13,000 slaves per year from Nzingha's kingdom. She continued to occasionally send peace overtures to the Portuguese, even suggesting a military alliance with them, but only if they supported her return to Ndongo. She also refused to be re-admitted to the Christian faith, which became a point of contention between the two parties.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In 1641, forces from the Dutch West India Company, working in alliance with the Kingdom of Kongo, seized Luanda, driving out the Portuguese and setting up the directorate of Loango-Angola. The fall of Luanda was a major blow to the Portuguese, and Nzingha quickly dispatched an embassy to the Dutch-controlled city. Hoping to form an Afro-Dutch coalition against the Portuguese, Nzingha requested an immediate alliance and offered to open the slave trade to them, though she was concerned that the Kingdom of Kongo (her people's traditional northern rivals) was growing too powerful. The Dutch accepted her offer of an alliance and sent their own ambassador and soldiers (some of whom brought their wives) to her court, soon assisting her in her fight against the Portuguese. Having lost large amounts of territory and forced to retreat to Massangano, the Portuguese governor attempted to make peace with Nzingha, but she refused these overtures. Nzingha moved her capital to Kavanga, in the northern part of Ndongo's former domains. The capture of Luanda also left Nzingha's kingdom as the pre-eminent, if temporary, slave-trading power in the region, allowing for her to build a sizeable war-camp ("kilombo") of 80,000 (a figure which included non-combatants) members, including mercenaries, escaped slaves, allies, and her own soldiers.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Using the large size of her army, her new wealth and her famous reputation, Nzingha was able to reclaim large parts of Ndongo from 1641 to 1644. However, her expansionism caused alarm amongst other African kingdoms; in one infamous incident, she invaded the Wandu region of Kongo, which had been in revolt against the Kongolese king. Though these lands had never been part of Ndongo, Nzingha refused to withdraw and added the conquest to her kingdom, an act which greatly offended the Kongolese king, Garcia II. The Dutch, hoping to preserve their alliance with both Kongo and Nzingha, brokered a peace, but relations between Nzingha and other regional leaders remained strained. In addition, her former husband and ally, Kasanje, feared her growing power in the region and formed a coalition of Imbangala leaders against Nzingha, invading her lands in Matamba (though they made little progress). By the mid-1640s, her successes had won her the support of many Ndongan nobles. With the nobility flocking to her side, Nzingha was able collect more tribute (in the form of slaves) which she in turn sold to the Dutch in exchange for firearms, thereby increasing her military and economic power; by 1644, she considered Garcia II of the Kongo to be her only political equal in the region, while the Portuguese viewed her as their most potent adversary in Africa.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In 1644, Nzingha defeated the Portuguese army at the Battle of Ngoleme. Then, in 1646, she was defeated by the Portuguese at the Battle of Kavanga and, in the process, her sister Kambu was recaptured, along with her archives, which revealed her alliance with Kongo. These archives also showed that her captive sister, Funji, had been in secret correspondence with Nzingha and had revealed coveted Portuguese plans to her. As a result of the woman's spying, the Portuguese reputedly drowned the sister in the Kwanza River. The Dutch in Luanda sent Nzingha reinforcements, and with their help, Nzingha routed a Portuguese army in 1647 at the Battle of Kombi. Nzingha then laid siege to the Portuguese capital of Massangano, isolating the Portuguese there; by 1648, Nzingha controlled much of her former kingdom, while her control over the slave trade increased the economic power of Matamba.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Despite these successes, the allies' control over Angola remained tenuous. Lacking artillery, Nzingha was unable to effectively break the Portuguese defenses at Massangano, while political infighting and developments in Europe weakened the Dutch forces in Angola. In August 1648 a Portuguese expedition, led by newly appointed governor Salvador Correia de Sá, besieged Luanda. After suffering through a major Portuguese bombardment, on 24 August 1648 the Dutch commander sued for peace with the Portuguese and agreed to evacuate Angola. When Nzingha's army and the remaining Dutch forces arrived outside Luanda, the peace between Dutch and Portuguese was signed, and unbeknownst to Nzinga, the Dutch forces sailed for Europe. Faced with a bolstered Portuguese garrison, Nzingha and her forces retreated to Matamba. Unlike previous decades however, after 1648 Nzinga concentrated her efforts on preventing a Portuguese push inland (as opposed to trying to re-conquer Ndongan territory), disrupting their soldiers and fomenting wars between smaller tribes and kingdoms.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: While her wars against the Portuguese and their allies continued, Nzingha created alliances with neighboring kingdoms, expanding her influence even as she aged. She sent soldiers to enforce her rule over local noblemen, dispatched forces to fight against Kasanje's Imbangalans in eastern Matamba, and fought against the Kingdom of Kaka in the Congo. She also used her army as a political tool, using its influence to sway the outcomes of succession disputes in her favor.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Throughout the 1640s and 1650s, Nzingha began to tentatively adopt Christian cultural traditions, following her conversion to the faith in 1623. This began in 1644 when her army captured a Portuguese priest, and expanded when her forces in Kongo captured two Spanish Capuchins in 1648; unlike other European prisoners, the queen granted missionaries extended freedoms in her war camp. One of the Spaniards, Father Calisto Zelotes do Reis Mago, would go on to become a longtime resident at her court and her personal secretary. Whereas previous missionaries (either parish priests or Jesuits) had been strongly affiliated with the Portuguese and their colonial administration, the Spanish Capuchins were more sympathetic to Nzingha's positions. During the early 1650s, Nzingha sent requests to the Capuchin order for more missionaries and for support against the Portuguese – effectively turning the missionaries into de facto diplomats between her and the Vatican. She pursued closer relations with Catholic leaders in Europe for the rest of her life, even receiving correspondence from Pope Alexander VII in 1661 praising her efforts.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In addition to using Christianity as a diplomatic tool, Nzingha adopted Christian customs into her court. From the 1650s onward, she increasingly relied on Christian converts at her court. Just as she had done with the Imbangalan culture several decades before, Nzingha appropriated aspects of Christian ideology and culture, adding these to her existing court traditions to create a new class of Christian councilors loyal to her. She also began practicing Catholic-inspired rituals, placed crosses in places of high honor in her court, and built many churches across her kingdom.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Nzingha's efforts to convert her people was not without controversy, and some conservative religious figures pushed back against her policies. In response, Nzingha empowered her Christian priests to burn the temples and shrines of practitioners who opposed her, and ordered that they be arrested and turned over to her for trial. Traditionalists were dismissed from her court, after which she sentenced them to public whippings. Several prominent Mdundu and Imbangala priests were sold as slaves to the Portuguese, with Nzingha personally asking that they be shipped overseas; profits of the sale were then used to furnish a new church. Some of the wanted priests, however, escaped Nzingha's purge and went into hiding, later working to undermine her legitimacy as queen.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: By 1650 the kingdoms of Matamba and Portugal had been at war for nearly 25 years, with both sides having become exhausted. Tentative peace talks between Nzingha and the Portuguese began in 1651, would continue in 1654, and would culminate in 1656. The negotiations were aided by Nzingha's recent conversion to Christianity and by the pressure Portugal was facing from its war against Spain. The Portuguese hoped to end the expensive war in Angola and re-open the slave trade, while Nzingha – increasingly cognizant of her age – hoped to have her sister Kambu (often referred to by her Christian name, Barbara, during this period) released. She would not, however, pay the ransom the Portuguese demanded for her sister, and so negotiations repeatedly stalled.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Despite difficulties, a peace treaty was signed between Nzingha and the Portuguese in late 1656. Under the term of the peace treaty, Nzingha agreed to cede lands on her kingdom's western coast to Portugal, with the Lucala River becoming the new border between Portuguese Angola and Matamba. In return, Portugal ceded the Kituxela region to her. Nzingha also agreed to allow Portuguese traders inside Matamba, while they agreed to intervene if Kasanje or Nogla Hari attacked her. The Portuguese agreed to concentrate the slave trade in a market in her capital (effectively giving her a monopoly on the slave trade) and send a permanent representative to her court. In return, Nzingha agreed to provide military assistance to the Portuguese and allowed for missionaries to reside in her kingdom. A final provision asking that Matamba pay Portugal tribute was proposed, but never ratified. While several sources describe the treaty as making concessions to Portugal, others note that her recognition as a ruler by Portugal gained Nzingha legitimacy and political stability. On 12 October Nzingha's sister arrived at Nzingha's court in Matamba in a procession led by Father Ignazio de Valassina. Upon Kambu's arrival to Matamba the terms of peace were officially agreed upon, and as was tradition Nzingha and her officials clapped their hands letting the Portuguese know that peace terms were accepted.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: After the wars with Portugal ended, Nzingha attempted to rebuild her kingdom. As noted by Linda Heywood, Nzingha's final years were spent establishing a unified kingdom she could pass on to her sister. However, her native Ndongo had been ravaged by decades of war, with wide swathes of the land left depopulated; as such, Nzingha focused her efforts on strengthening Matamba. She developed Matamba as a trading power by capitalizing on its strategic position as the gateway to the Central African interior, strengthening her hold on the slave trade. She resettled former slaves on new land and allowed women in her war camp to bear children, which had been banned under the wartime Imbangala customs. She also reformed the legal code of her kingdom and established contact with Christian rulers in Europe, hoping to certify Matamba's status as an internationally recognized Christian kingdom.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Peace caused major changes at Nzingha's royal court. Whereas in wartime she had adopted the masculine dress and mannerisms of an Imbangala warlord, in the postwar era Nzingha's court became more feminine; she adopted new fashions in court, imported silk and goods from Europe, placed renewed focus on education (replacing military drills) and abolished concubinage, eventually marrying her favorite concubine in a Christian ceremony. Nzingha – wary of a potential succession crisis – also worked to increase the power of the royalty in Ndongo. She distanced herself from the Imbangalan culture and abolished many of the democratic and meritocratic policies she had tolerated in wartime, seeing them as a threat to the monarchy. During her later reign, divides opened in her court between educated Christian converts who supported her royalist policies and traditionalists Imbangalans and Mbundus, who supported a return to the more militaristic, meritocratic policies of the past.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: During the 1660s (specifically after a period of serious illness in 1657) Nzingha grew increasingly concerned about who would succeed her as ruler of Ndongo and Matamba. She feared that her death would lead to a succession crisis, which would cause her Christian conversions to be undone, and spark renewed Portuguese aggression. To ensure the transition would be smooth, she appointed her sister Kambu as her heir, forgoing any of the traditional Mbundu elections. However, she grew increasingly concerned that her sister's husband, Njinga a Mona, was growing too powerful. Njinga a Mona was a skilled soldier who was raised in the Imbangala tradition, and while he had been a lifelong soldier in Nzingha's army, in his older age he increasingly came into conflict with Nzingha. She feared that Njinga Mona's adherence to Imbangala tradition would destabilize the new, Christian kingdom she had established.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In October 1663, Nzingha fell ill with infection in her throat and became bedridden. By December of that year the infection had spread to her lungs, and Nzingha died in her sleep on the morning of 17 December. She was buried with great aplomb in accordance with Catholic and Mbundu traditions. Ceremonies were held across Matamba and in Luanda, where both the Portuguese and Mbundu populations held services in her honor.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Following Nzingha's death, her sister Kambu (more commonly known as Barbara or Dona Barbara) assumed the throne.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: In her native Angola, oral traditions celebrating Nzingha's life began immediately after her death. Though her kingdoms would eventually be incorporated into Portuguese Angola, commemoration of Nzingha and her achievements persisted. In the mid-20th century, Nzingha became a powerful symbol of Angolan resistance against Portugal during the Angolan War of Independence. Nzingha's legacy would outlast the Angolan Civil War and remains an area of interest in the country.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: The Portuguese, Nzingha's longtime rivals, wrote a number of works relating to her life. The first biography of Nzingha was published by Antonio da Gaeta (a Capuchin priest who had lived in her court) in 1669; Gaeta's work praised Nzingha's diplomatic skills and compared her to famous women from antiquity, but also pointedly noted that she had ultimately been persuaded by divine providence to accept Christianity. Antonio Cavazzi (another Capuchin who had resided in Nzingha's court) wrote a biography of her in 1689, again noting her political skill, but also describing her as a queen who had ruined the land. Together, Gaeta and Cavazzi's biographies became the primary sources for Nzingha's life. Portuguese writers would continue to write about Nzingha into the 20th century, normally depicting her as a skilled, "savage" opponent who had ultimately been forced to submit to Portugal and accept Christianity.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Numerous western authors have written about Nzingha. The first notable, non-Portuguese Western work mentioning Nzingha was written by French Jesuit Jean-Baptiste Labat in 1732. A heavily-edited translation of Cavazzi's earlier biography, Labat's work formed the basis on which many Western sources would depict their image of Nzingha; whereas Portuguese sources focused on Nzingha's capabilities as a leader and conversion to Christianity, Western sources in the 18th and 19th centuries tended to heavily focus on her sexuality, alleged cannibalism, and brutality. Jean-Louis Castilhon wrote a fictional story of her life in 1769, portraying her as cruel (but not a cannibal), while the Marquis de Sade wrote about Nzingha's alleged cruelty and promiscuity in his 1795 work "Philosophy in the Bedroom", in which he cites her as an example of a woman driven to evil by passion. Likewise, Laure Junot included Nzingha as a symbol of cruelty and lust in her "Memoirs of Celebrated Women of All Countries", grouping her alongside women such as Lady Jane Grey, Marie Antoinette and Catherine I. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was also critical of Nzingha's (though he did not directly name her) "female state", describing her kingdom as a barren, unfertile land that had eventually collapsed due to her usurping of the natural order.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Nzingha's reputation in the West recovered significantly in the 20th century. Nzingha's usage as a symbol in the Angolan War of Independence increased interest in her life, and authors began to take a more nuanced approach to her biography. American historian Joseph C. Miller published a widely-cited essay on Nzingha in the 1975 "The Journal of African History", highlighting her struggles and innovations but also criticizing her autocratic methods. Afro-Cuban poet Georgina Herrera published a 1978 poem extolling Nzingha's wisdom and connecting her culturally with Afro-Caribbeans in the Americas. American feminist author Aurora Levins Morales wrote about Nzingha, praising her anti-colonial and anti-patriarchal struggles but also criticizing her status as a ruling elite and her propagation of the slave trade. In his writings on Nzingha, American historian John Thornton focused on her lifelong struggle to establish her authority over the Mbundu culture, noting that her legendary reputation and actions helped to establish a wider Atlantic Criole culture. American historian Linda Heywood wrote an extensive biography of Nzingha in 2017, featuring much of her life and describing her as a great historical figure. Heywood cautioned against portraying Nzingha as either a populist hero or tyrant, noting instead that she should be viewed as a complicated individual who used culture, diplomacy, religion and war to secure her kingdom.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: One legend records that Nzingha executed her lovers. She kept 50–60 men dressed as women, according to Dapper's "Description of Africa," as her harem, and she had them fight to the death for the privilege and duty of spending the night with her. In the morning, the winner was put to death.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: According to an account by the Capuchin priest Cavazzi, Nzingha maintained her strength well into her later years. Upon witnessing her during a military review in 1662 (the year prior to her death), Cavazzi praised her agility, to which the elder queen replied that, in her youth, she was able to wound any Imbangala warrior, and that she would have stood against 25 armed men - unless they had muskets.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Today, she is remembered in Angola as the Mother of Angola, the fighter of negotiations, and the protector of her people. She is still honored throughout Africa as a remarkable leader and woman, for her political and diplomatic acumen, as well as her brilliant military tactics. Accounts of her life are often romanticized, and she is considered a symbol of the fight against oppression. Nzingha ultimately managed to shape her state into a form that tolerated her authority, though surely the fact that she survived all attacks on her and built up a strong base of loyal supporters helped as much as the relevance of the precedents she cited. While Njinga had obviously not overcome the idea that females could not rule in Ndongo during her lifetime, and had to 'become a male' to retain power, her female successors faced little problem in being accepted as rulers. The clever use of her gender and her political understandings helped lay a foundation for future leaders of Ndongo today. In the period of 104 years that followed Njinga's death in 1663, queens ruled for at least eighty of them. Nzingha is a leadership role model for all generations of Angolan women. Women in Angola today display remarkable social independence and are found in the country’s army, police force, government, and public and private economic sectors. Nzingha was embraced as a symbol of the People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola during civil war.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: A major street in Luanda is named after her, and a statue of her was placed in Kinaxixi on an impressive square in 2002, dedicated by President Santos to celebrate the 27th anniversary of independence. Angolan women are often married near the statue, especially on Thursdays and Fridays.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: On 23 December 2014, the National Reserve Bank of Angola (BNA) issued a 20 Kwanza coin in tribute to Nzingha "in recognition of her role to defend self-determination and cultural identity of her people."


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: A Starz series, "Queen Nzinga", is in development with Yetide Badaki as the titular character and 50 Cent, Steven S. DeKnight and Mo Abundu as producers.


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Nzinga (referred to as Nzinga Mbande) leads the Kongolese civilization in the 2016 4X video game "Civilization VI", since the release of "Great Negotiators" on 21 November 2022, as part of the DLC "Leader Pass".


title: Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba

text: Nzinga is one of Africa's best documented early-modern rulers. About a dozen of her own letters are known (all but one published in Brásio, "Monumenta" volumes 6–11 and 15 passim). In addition, her early years are well described in the correspondence of Portuguese governor Fernão de Sousa, who was in the colony from 1624 to 1631 (published by Heintze). Her later activities are documented by the Portuguese chronicler António de Oliveira de Cadornega, and by two Italian Capuchin priests, Giovanni Cavazzi da Montecuccolo and Antonio Gaeta da Napoli, who resided in her court from 1658 until her death (Cavazzi presided at her funeral). Cavazzi included a number of watercolours in his manuscript which include Njinga as a central figure, as well as himself. However, Cavazzi's account is peppered with a number of pejorative statements about Nzinga for which he does not offer factual evidence, such as her cannibalism.


title: Expo 2025

text: The theme for the expo is "Designing Future Society for Our Lives", with sub-themes of "Saving Lives", "Empowering Lives" and "Connecting Lives". The theme "Saving Lives" includes infant vaccinations, sanitation, lifestyle (diet and exercise) and extending lifespans.


title: Expo 2025

text: The directors of the expo were announced on 23 May 2019 and include Hiroyuki Ikeda, Kengo Sakurada, Hirofumi Yoshimura (Governor of Osaka), and Ichirō Matsui (Mayor of Osaka), with Hiroyuki Ishige as the secretary general, and Hiroyuki Takeuchi and Manatsu Ichinoki acting as vice secretaries general.


title: Expo 2025

text: The current Chairman and Representative Director of the Japan Association for the 2025 World Exposition is , Chairman of the Japan Business Federation. He has been the Chairman and Representative Director of the Japan Association for the 2025 World Exposition since June 2021.


title: Expo 2025

text: The registration dossier for Japan's expo containing a detailed plan with proposed operational dates (13 April to 13 October 2025) and legacy plans has been submitted to the BIE for review.


title: Expo 2025

text: On 22 November 2016, France submitted to the BIE its candidature to host World Expo 2025. This first submission launched the bidding process for this Expo by opening the candidate list. All other countries wishing to organise World Expo 2025 had until 22 May 2017 to submit their own bids, after which the project examination phase started.


title: Expo 2025

text: A secret ballot took place to select the winner at BIE's 164th General Assembly on 23 November 2018. The first ballot awarded 85 votes to Osaka, 48 votes to Yekaterinburg and 23 votes to Baku, which meant that Baku was eliminated. The second round ballot resulted in 92 votes for Osaka and 61 for Yekaterinburg.


title: The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey

text: The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey is an American drama miniseries based on the 2010 novel of the same name by Walter Mosley that premiered on Apple TV+ on March 11, 2022.


title: The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey

text: A lonely 91-year-old man with dementia is temporarily able to remember his past and uses the time to investigate the death of his nephew.


title: The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey

text: The series was announced in December 2020, with Samuel L. Jackson set to star in and executive produce the series with Walter Mosley adapting his own novel into the screenplay. Dominique Fishback was added to the cast in March 2021. Walton Goggins, Marsha Stephanie Blake, Damon Gupton, Cynthia Kaye McWilliams and Omar Benson Miller were added to the cast in April 2021, with production beginning that month. Episodes were directed by Ramin Bahrani, Debbie Allen, Hanelle Culpepper, and Guillermo Navarro. Filming concluded on June 26, 2021. Craig DeLeon is the composer for the limited series.


title: The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey

text: The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported an 87% approval rating with an average rating of 6.9/10, based on 34 critic reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, ""The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey" loses some luster in its final stretch, but Samuel L. Jackson and Dominique Fishback's sterling performances make this an unmissable elegy." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 72 out of 100 based on 11 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".


title: Color of Night

text: Color of Night is a 1994 American erotic mystery thriller film produced by Cinergi Pictures and released in the United States by Buena Vista Pictures (through its Hollywood Pictures label). Directed by Richard Rush, the film stars Bruce Willis and Jane March.


title: Color of Night

text: The cast also features Ruben Blades, Lesley Ann Warren, Brad Dourif, Lance Henriksen, Kevin J. O'Connor and Scott Bakula. It is one of two well-known works by director Rush, the other being "The Stunt Man" 14 years before.


title: Color of Night

text: "Color of Night" flopped at the box office and won a Golden Raspberry Award as the worst film of 1994. It later, however, became one of the 20 most-rented films in the United States home video market in 1995. "Maxim" magazine also singled the film out as having the best sex scene in film history.


title: Color of Night

text: In 2018, Kino Lorber (under license from Disney) released a special edition Blu-ray of the film; it contains an audio commentary by director Richard Rush.


title: Color of Night

text: Dr. Bill Capa, a New York psychologist, falls into a deep depression after Michelle, an unstable patient, dies by suicide in front of him by jumping from his office window. The sight of the bloody body clad in a bright green dress causes Bill to suffer from psychosomatic color blindness, taking away his ability to see the color red. Bill travels to Los Angeles to stay with a friend, fellow therapist Dr. Bob Moore, who invites him to sit in on a group therapy session. However, Bob is violently murdered in the office and Bill is plunged into the mystery of his friend's death.


title: Color of Night

text: Lt. Hector Martinez considers everyone in Moore's therapy group, including Bill, as suspects in the murder. Bill continues to live in Bob's house and begins an affair with Rose, a beautiful but mysterious young woman who comes and goes. Bill takes the therapy group, which includes: Clark, a temperamental OCD sufferer; Sondra, a nymphomaniac and kleptomaniac; Buck, a suicidal ex-cop; Casey, who paints sado-masochist images; and Richie, a 16-year old with gender dysphoria and a history of drug use.


title: Color of Night

text: After Casey is found violently murdered, Bill becomes the target of several attempts on his life. He discovers that all but one of his patients have been romantically involved with Rose. He eventually learns that "Richie" is really Rose, and the murders were the work of her deranged brother, Dale. They once had an actual brother named Richie, who was molested by his child psychiatrist along with Dale.


title: Color of Night

text: After Richie committed suicide, Dale abused Rose into playing the part of their brother. Rose began to re-emerge during therapy and, under another personality named "Bonnie", started relationships with the other patients. Dale proceeded to kill them, fearing that they would soon link Rose to Richie.


title: Color of Night

text: Bill confronts them and is overpowered by Dale, who is about to kill him with a nail gun but is instead killed by Rose. Deeply traumatized, she then tries to commit suicide. Bill is able to stop her, bookending the story with two suicide attempts, one at the beginning, resulting in Bill's loss of color vision, and one at the end, thwarted and resulting in his regaining it.


title: Color of Night

text: The soundtrack to "Color of Night" as composed by Dominic Frontiere, with songs from Lauren Christy, Jud Friedman, Brian McKnight, and Lowen & Navarro was released on August 9, 1994, by Mercury Records.


title: Color of Night

text: Richard Rush turned his cut of the film over to producer Andrew Vajna in late 1993. Vajna was concerned about the film's commercial prospects and demanded a recut, something Rush refused. Nonetheless, Vajna mandated he had final cut per contractual obligation, and insisted on testing his own version of the film. After both versions were given a number of test screenings, Vajna determined that his cut would be released and fired Rush in April 1994.