title: Home video game console generations

text: The first home console was the Magnavox Odyssey in September 1972 based on Baer's "Brown Box" design. Originally built from solid-state circuits, Magnavox transitioned to integrated circuit chips that were inexpensive, and developed a new line of consoles in the Odyssey series from 1975 to 1977. At the same, Atari had successfully launched "Pong" as an arcade game in 1972, and began work to make a home console version in late 1974, which they eventually partnered with Sears to the new home "Pong" console by the 1975 Christmas season. "Pong" offered several technological advantages over the Odyssey, including an internal sound chip and the ability to track score. Baer, who was struggling with Magnavox' management on how to market the console, gave his colleague Arnold Greenberg of Coleco a heads-up of a new low-cost chip ideal for home consoles, which led Coleco to develop the first Telstar console in 1976. With Magnavox, Atari and Coleco all vying in the console space by 1976 and further cost reductions in key processing chips from General Instruments, numerous third-party manufacturers entered the console market by 1977, most simply cloning "Pong" or other games and of poor quality. This led to market saturation by 1977, with several hundreds of consoles on the market, and the industry's first market crash. Atari and Coleco attempted to make dedicated consoles with wholly new games to remain competitive, including Atari's Video Pinball series and Coleco's Telstar Arcade, but by this point, the first steps of the market's transition to the second generation of consoles had begun, making these units obsolete near release.


title: Home video game console generations

text: The Japanese market for gaming consoles followed a similar path at this point. Nintendo had already been a business partner with Magnavox by 1971 and helped to design the early light guns for the console. Dedicated home game consoles in Japan appeared in 1975 with Epoch Co.'s TV Tennis Electrotennis, which it had made in partnership with Magnavox as well. As in the United States, numerous clones of these dedicated consoles began to appear, most made by the large television manufacturers like Toshiba and Sharp, and these games would be called "TV geemu" or "terebi geemu" (TV game) as the designation for "video games" in Japan. Nintendo became a major player when Mitsubishi, having lost their manufacturer Systek due to bankruptcy, turned to the company to help continue to build their Color TV-Game line, which went on to sell about 1.5 million units across five different units between 1977 and 1980.


title: Home video game console generations

text: The second generation of home consoles was distinguished by the introduction of the game cartridge, where the game's code is stored in read-only memory (ROM) within the cartridge. When the cartridge is slotted into the console, the electrical connections allow the main console's processors to read the game's code from the ROM. While ROM cartridges had been used in other computer applications prior, the ROM game cartridge was first implemented in the Fairchild Video Entertainment System (VES) in November 1976. Additional consoles during this generation, all which used cartridge-based systems, included the Atari 2600 (known as the Atari Video Computer System (VCS) at launch), the Magnavox Odyssey 2, Mattel Electronics' Intellivision, and the ColecoVision. In addition to consoles, newer processor technology allowed games to support up to 8 colors and up to 3-channel audio effects.


title: Home video game console generations

text: With the introduction of cartridge-based consoles came the need to develop a wide array of games for them. Atari was one of the forefronts in development for its Atari 2600. Atari marketed the console across multiple regions including into Japan, and retained control of all development aspects of the games. Game developments coincided with the Golden age of arcade video games that started in 1978–1979 with the releases of "Space Invaders" and "Asteroids", and home versions of these arcade games were ideal targets. The Atari 2600 version of "Space Invaders", released in 1980, was considered the killer app for home video game consoles, helping to quadruple the console's sales that year. Similarly, Coleco had beaten Atari to a key licensing deal with Nintendo to bring "Donkey Kong" as a pack-in game for the Colecovision, helping to drive its sales.


title: Home video game console generations

text: At the same time, Atari has been acquired by Warner Communications, and internal policies led to the departure of four key programmers David Crane, Larry Kaplan, Alan Miller, and Bob Whitehead, who went and formed Activision. Activision proceeded to develop their own Atari 2600 games as well as games for other systems. Atari attempted legal action to stop this practice but ended up settling out of court, with Activision agreeing to pay royalties but otherwise able to continue game development, making Activision the first third-party game developer. Activision quickly found success with titles like "Pitfall!", and were able to generate in revenue from about in startup funds within 18 months. Numerous other companies saw Activision's success and jumped into game development to try to make fast money on the rapidly expanding North America video game market. This led to a loss of publishing control and dilution of the game market by the early 1980s. Additionally, in following on the success of "Space Invaders", Atari and other companies had remained eager for licensed video game possibilities. Atari had banked heavily on commercial sales of "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial" in 1982, but it was rushed to market and poorly-received, and failed to make Atari's sales estimates. Along with competition from inexpensive home computers, the North American home console market crashed in 1983.


title: Home video game console generations

text: For the most part, the 1983 crash signaled the end of this generation as Nintendo's introduction of the Famicom the same year brought the start of the third generation. When Nintendo brought the Famicom to North America under the name "Nintendo Entertainment System", it helped to revitalize the industry, and Atari, now owned by Jack Tramiel, pushed on sales of the previously-successful Atari 2600 under new branding to keep the company afloat for many more years while he transitioned the company more towards the personal computer market. The Atari 2600 stayed in production until 1992, marking the end of the second generation.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Frequently called the "8-bit generation", the third generation's consoles used 8-bit processors, which allowed up to five bits of color (2 or 32 colors), five audio channels, and more advanced graphics capability including sprites and tiles rather than block-based graphics of the second generation. Further, the third console saw the market dominance shift from the United States to Japan as a result of the 1983 crash.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Both the Sega SG-1000 and the Nintendo Famicom launched near simultaneously in Japan in 1983. The Famicom, after some initial technical recalls, soon gained traction and became the best selling console in Japan by the end of 1984. By that point Nintendo wanted to bring the console to North America but recognized the faults that the video game crash had caused. It took several steps to redesign the console to make it look less like a game console and rebranded it as the "Nintendo Entertainment System" (NES) for North America to avoid the "video game" label stigma. The company also wanted to avoid the loss of publishing control that had occurred both in North America as well as in Asia after the Famicom's release, and created a lockout system that required all game cartridges to be manufactured by Nintendo to include a special chip. If this chip was not present, the console would fail to play the game. This further gave Nintendo direct control on the titles published for the system, rejecting those it felt were too mature. The NES launched in North America in 1985, and helped to revitalize the video game market there.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Sega attempted to compete with the NES with its own Master System, released later in 1985 in both the US and Japan, but did not gain traction to compete. Similarly, Atari's attempts to compete with the NES via the Atari 7800 in 1987 failed to knock the NES from its dominant position. The NES remained in production until 2003, when it was discontinued along with its successor, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.


title: Home video game console generations

text: The fourth generation of consoles, also known as the "16-bit generation", further advanced core console technology with 16-bit processors, improving the available graphics and audio capabilities of games.


title: Home video game console generations

text: NEC's TurboGrafx-16 (or PC Engine as released in Japan), first released in 1987, is considered the first fourth generation console even though it still had an 8-bit CPU. The console's 16-bit graphics processor gave it capabilities comparable to the other fourth generation systems, and NEC's marketing had pushed the console being an advancement over the NES as a "16-bit" system. Both Sega and Nintendo entered the fourth generation with true 16-bit systems in the 1988 Sega Genesis (MegaDrive in Japan) and the 1990 Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES, Super Famicom in Japan). SNK also entered the competition with a modified version of their Neo Geo MVS arcade system into the Neo Geo, released in 1990, which attempted to bridge the gap between arcade and home console systems with the shared use of common game cartridges and memory cards. This generation was notable for the so-called "console wars" between Nintendo and Sega primarily in North America. Sega, to try to challenge Nintendo's dominant position, created the mascot character Sonic the Hedgehog, who exhibited cool personality to appeal to the Western youth in contrast to Nintendo's Mario, and bundled the Genesis with the game of the same name. The strategy succeeded with Sega becoming the dominant player in North America until the mid-1990s.


title: Home video game console generations

text: During this generation, the technology costs of using optical discs in the form of CD-ROMs has dropped sufficiently to make them desirable to be used for shipping computer software, including for video games for personal computers. CD-ROMs offered more storage space than game cartridges and could allow for full-motion video and other detailed audio-video works to be used in games. Console manufacturers adapted by creating hardware add-ons to their consoles that could read and play CD-ROMs, including NEC's TurboGrafx-CD add-on (as well as the integrated TurboDuo system) in 1988, and the Sega CD add-on for the Genesis in 1991, and the Neo Geo CD in 1994. Costs of these add-ons were generally high, nearing the same price as the console itself, and with the introduction of disc-based consoles in the fifth generation starting in 1993, these fell by the wayside. Nintendo had initially worked with Sony to develop a similar add-on for the SNES, the Super NES CD-ROM, but just before its introduction, business relationships between Nintendo and Sony broke down, and Sony would take its idea on to develop the fifth generation PlayStation. Additionally, Philips attempted to enter the market with a dedicated CD-ROM format, the CD-i, also released in 1990, that included other uses for the CD-ROM media beyond video games but the console never gained traction.


title: Home video game console generations

text: The fourth generation had a long tail that overlapped with the fifth generation, with the SNES's discontinuation in 2003 marking the end of the generation. To keep their console competitive with the new fifth generation ones, Nintendo took to the use of coprocessors manufactured into the game cartridges to enhance the capabilities of the SNES. This included the Super FX chip, which was first used in the game "Star Fox" in 1993, generally considered one of the first games to use real-time polygon-based 3D rendering on consoles.


title: Home video game console generations

text: During this time home computers gained greater prominence as a way of playing video games. The video game console industry nonetheless continued to thrive alongside home computers, due to the advantages of much lower prices, easier portability, circuitry specifically dedicated towards video games, the ability to be played on a television set (which PCs of the time could not do in most cases), and intensive first party software support from manufacturers who were essentially banking their entire future on their consoles.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Besides the shift to 32-bit processors, the fifth generation of consoles also saw most companies excluding Nintendo shift to dedicated optical media formats instead of game cartridges, given their lower cost of production and higher storage capacity. Initial consoles of the fifth generation attempted to capitalize on the potential power of CD-ROMs, which included the Amiga CD32, 3DO and the Atari Jaguar in 1993. However, early in the cycle, these systems were far more expensive than existing fourth-generation models and has much smaller game libraries. Further, Nintendo's use of co-processors in late SNES games further kept the SNES as one of the best selling systems over new fifth generation ones.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Two of the key consoles of the fifth generation were introduced in 1995: the Sega Saturn, and the Sony PlayStation, both which challenged the SNES' ongoing dominance. While the Saturn sold well, it did have a number of technical flaws, but established Sega for a number of key game series going forward. The PlayStation, in addition to using optical media, also introduced the use of memory cards as to save the state of a game. Though memories cards had been used by Neo Geo to allow players to transfer game information between home and arcade systems, the PlayStation's approach allowed games to have much longer gameplay and narrative elements, leading to highly-successful role-playing games like "Final Fantasy VII". By 1996, the PlayStation became the best-selling console over the SNES.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Nintendo released their next console, the Nintendo 64 in late 1996. Unlike other fifth generation units, it still used game cartridges, as Nintendo believed the load-time advantages of cartridges over CD-ROMs was still essential, as well as their ability to continue to use lockout mechanisms to protect copyrights. The system also included support for memory cards as well, and Nintendo developed a strong library of first-party titles for the game, including "Super Mario 64" and "" that helped to drive its sales. While the Nintendo 64 did not match the PlayStation's sales, it kept Nintendo a key competitor in the home console market alongside Sony and Sega.


title: Home video game console generations

text: As with the transition from the fourth to fifth generation, the fifth generation has a long overlap with the sixth console generation, with the PlayStation remaining in production until 2005.


title: Home video game console generations

text: By the sixth generation, console technology began to catch up to performance of personal computers of the time, and the use of bits as their selling point fell by the wayside. The console manufactures focused on the individual strengths of their game libraries as marketing instead. The consoles of the sixth generation saw further adoption of optical media, expanding into the DVD format for even greater data storage capacity, additional internal storage solutions to function as memory cards, as well as adding support either directly or through add-ons to connect to the Internet for online gameplay. Consoles began to move towards a convergence of features of other electronic living room devices and moving away from single-feature systems.


title: Home video game console generations

text: By this point, there were only three major players in the market: Sega, Sony, and Nintendo. Sega got an early lead with the Dreamcast first released in Japan in 1998. It was the first home console to include a modem to allow players to connect to the Sega network and play online games. However, Sega found several technical issues that had to be resolved before its Western launch in 1999. Though its Western release was more successful than in Japan, the console was soon outperformed by Sony's PlayStation 2 released in 2000. The PlayStation 2 was the first console to add support for DVD playback in addition to CD-ROM, as well as maintaining backward compatibility with games from the PlayStation library, which helped to draw consumers that remained on the long-tail of the PlayStation. While other consoles of the sixth generation had not anticipated this step, the PlayStation 2's introduction of backwards compatibility became a major design consideration of future generations. Along with a strong game library, the PlayStation 2 went on to sell 155 million units before it was discontinued in 2013, and , remains the best selling home console of all time. Unable to compete with Sony, Sega discontinued the Dreamcast in 2001 and left the hardware market, instead focusing on its software properties. Nintendo's entry in the sixth generation was the GameCube in 2001, its first system to use optical discs based on the miniDVD format. A special Game Boy Player attachment allowed the GameCube to use any of the GameBoy cartridges as well, and adapters were available to allow the console to connect to the Internet via broadband or modem.


title: Home video game console generations

text: At this point Microsoft also entered the console market with its first Xbox system, released in 2001. Microsoft considered the PlayStation 2's success as a threat to the personal computer in the living room space, and had developed the Xbox to compete. As such, the Xbox was designed based more on Microsoft's experience from personal computers, using an operating system built out from its Microsoft Windows and DirectX features, utilizing a hard disk for save game store, built-in Ethernet functionality, and created the first console online service, Xbox Live to support multiplayer games.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Video game consoles had become an important part of the global IT infrastructure by the mid-2000s. It was estimated that video game consoles represented 25% of the world's general-purpose computational power in the year 2007.


title: Home video game console generations

text: By the seventh generation, Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo had all developed consoles designed to interface with the Internet, adding networking support for either wired and wireless connections, online services to support multiplayer games, digital storefronts for digital purchases of games, and both internal storage and support for external storage on the console for these games. These consoles also added support for digital television resolutions through HDMI interfaces, but as the generation occurred in the midst of the High-definition optical disc format war between Blu-ray and HD-DVD, a standard for high-definition playback was yet to be fixed. A further innovation came by the use of motion controllers, either built into the console or offered as an add-on afterwards.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Microsoft entered the seventh generation first with the Xbox 360 in 2005. The Xbox 360 saw several hardware revisions over its lifetime which became a standard practice for Microsoft going forward; these revisions offered different features such as a larger internal hard drive or a fast processor at a higher price point. As shipped, the Xbox 360 supported DVD discs and Microsoft had opted to support the HD-DVD format with an add-on for playback of HD-DVD films. However, this format ended up as deprecated compared to Blu-ray. The Xbox 360 was backward compatible with about half of the original Xbox library. Through its lifetime, the Xbox 360 was troubled by a consistent hardware fault known as "the Red Ring of Death" (RROD), and Microsoft spent over $1 billion correcting the problem.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Sony's PlayStation 3 was released in 2006. The PlayStation 3 represented a shift of the internal hardware from Sony's Emotion Engine to a novel processor named CELL that would require use of new parallel processing programming paradigms to use efficiently. The CELL had a notoriety of being hard to develop for, which would cause issues with many multi-platform game released for the PS3. Initial PlayStation 3 shipped with a special Emotion Engine daughterboard that allowed for backwards compatibility of PlayStation 2 games, but later revisions of the unit removed this, leaving software-based emulation for PlayStation games available. Sony banked on the Blu-ray format, which was included from the start. With the PlayStation 3, Sony introduced the PlayStation Network for its online services and storefront.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Nintendo introduced the Wii in 2006 around the same time as the PlayStation 3. Nintendo lacked the same manufacturing capabilities and relationships with major hardware supplies as Sony and Microsoft, and to compete, diverged on a feature-for-feature approach and instead developed the Wii around the novel use of motion controls in the Wii Remote. This "blue ocean strategy", releasing a product where there was no competition, was considered part of the unit's success, and which drove Microsoft and Sony to develop their own motion control accessors to compete. Nintendo provided various online services that the Wii could connect too, including the Virtual Console where players could purchase emulated games from Nintendo's past consoles as well as games for the Wii. The Wii used regular sized DVDs for its game medium but also directly supported GameCube discs. The Wii was generally considered a surprising success that many developers had initially overlooked. Based on the success of the Wii Remote controller, both Microsoft and Sony released similar motion detection controllers for their consoles. Microsoft introduced the Kinect motion controller device for the Xbox 360, which served as both a camera, microphone, and motion sensor for numerous games. Sony released the PlayStation Move, a system consisting of a camera and lit handheld controllers, which worked with its PlayStation 3.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Aside from the usual hardware enhancements, consoles of the eighth generation focus on further integration with other media and increased connectivity. Hardware improvements pushed for higher frame rates at up to 4k resolutions.


title: Home video game console generations

text: The Wii U, introduced in 2012, was considered by Nintendo to be a successor to the Wii but geared to more serious players. The console supported backward compatibility with the Wii, including its motion controls, and introduced the Wii U GamePad, a tablet/controller hybrid that acted as a second screen. Nintendo further refined its network offerings to develop the Nintendo Network service to combine storefront and online connectivity services. The Wii U did not sell as well as Nintendo had planned, as they found people mistook the GamePad to be a tablet they could take with them away from the console, and the console struggled to draw the third-party developers as the Wii had.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Both the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One came out in 2013. Both were similar improvements over the previous generation's respective consoles, providing more computational power to support up to 60 frames per seconds at 1080p resolutions for some games. Each unit also saw a similar set of revisions and repackaging to develop high- and low-end cost versions. In the case of the Xbox One, the console's initially launch had included the Kinect device but this became highly controversial in terms of potential privacy violations and lack of developer support, and by its mid-generation refresh, the Kinect had been dropped and discontinued as a game device.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Later in the eighth generation, Nintendo released the Nintendo Switch in 2017. The Switch is considered the first hybrid game console. It uses a special CPU/GPU combination that can run at different clock frequencies depending on how it is used. It can be placed into a special docking unit that is hooked to a television and a permanent power supply, allowing faster clock frequencies to be used to be played at higher resolutions and frame rates, and thus more comparable to a home console. Alternatively, it can be removed and used either with the attached Joy-Con controllers as a handheld unit, or can be even played as a tablet-like system via its touchscreen. In these modes, the CPU/GPU run at lower clock speeds to conserve battery power, and the graphics are not as robust as in the docked version. A larger suite of online services was added through the Nintendo Switch Online subscription, including several free NES and SNES titles, replacing the past Virtual Console system. The Switch was designed to address many of the hardware and marketing faults around the Wii U's launch, and has become one of the company's fastest-selling consoles after the Wii.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Both Microsoft and Sony released successors to their home consoles in November 2020. Both console families target 4k and 8k resolution televisions at high frame rates, support for real-time ray tracing rendering, and the use of high-performance solid-state drives (SSD) as internal high-speed memory to make delivering game content much faster than from reading from optical disc or standard hard drives, which can eliminate loading times and make open world games appear seamless.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Microsoft released the fourth generation of Xbox with the Xbox Series X and Series S on November 10, 2020. The Series X has a base performance target of 60 frames per second at 4k resolution to be four times as powerful as the Xbox One X. One of Microsoft's goals with both units was to assure backward compatibility with all games supported by the Xbox One, including those original Xbox and Xbox 360 titles that are backward compatible with the Xbox One, allowing the Xbox Series X and Series S to support four generations of games.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Sony's PlayStation 5 was released on November 12, 2020, and also is a similar performance boost over the PlayStation 4. The PlayStation 5 uses a custom SSD solution with much higher input/output rates comparable to RAM chip speeds, significantly improving rendering and data streaming speeds. The chip architecture is comparable to the PlayStation 4, allowing backwards compatible with most of the PlayStation 4 library while select games will need chip timing tweaking to make them compatible.


title: Home video game console generations

text: Below is a timeline of each generation with the top three home video consoles of each generation based on worldwide sales. For a complete list of home video consoles released in each generation please see the respective article of each generation.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The Line of Actual Control (LAC), in the context of the Sino-Indian border dispute, is a notional demarcation line


title: Line of Actual Control

text: that separates Indian-controlled territory from Chinese-controlled territory. The concept was introduced by Chinese premier Zhou Enlai in a 1959 letter to Jawaharlal Nehru as the "line up to which each side exercises actual control", but rejected by Nehru as being incoherent. Subsequently the term came to refer to the line formed after the 1962 Sino-Indian War.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The LAC is different from the borders claimed by each country in the Sino-Indian border dispute. The Indian claims include the entire Aksai Chin region and the Chinese claims include Arunachal Pradesh. These claims are not included in the concept of "actual control".


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The term "line of actual control" originally referred only to the boundary in the western sector after the 1962 Sino-Indian War, but during the 1990s came to refer to the entire de facto border.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The term "line of actual control" is said to have been used by Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai in a 1959 note to Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. The boundary existed only as an informal cease-fire line between India and China after the 1962 Sino-Indian War. In 1993, India and China agreed to respect of the 'Line of Actual Control' in a bilateral agreement, without demarcating the line itself.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: In a letter dated 7 November 1959, Zhou proposed to Nehru that the armed forces of the two sides should withdraw 20 kilometres from the so-called McMahon Line in the east and "the line up to which each side exercises actual control in the west". Nehru rejected the proposal stating that there was complete disagreement between the two governments over the facts of possession:


title: Line of Actual Control

text: Scholar Stephen Hoffmann states that Nehru was determined not to grant legitimacy to a concept that had no historical validity nor represent the situation on the ground.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: During the Sino-Indian War (1962), Nehru again refused to recognise the line of control: "There is no sense or meaning in the Chinese offer to withdraw twenty kilometers from what they call 'line of actual control'. What is this 'line of control'? Is this the line they have created by aggression since the beginning of September? Advancing forty or sixty kilometers by blatant military aggression and offering to withdraw twenty kilometers provided both sides do this is a deceptive device which can fool nobody."


title: Line of Actual Control

text: Zhou responded that the LAC was "basically still the line of actual control as existed between the Chinese and Indian sides on 7 November 1959. To put it concretely, in the eastern sector it coincides in the main with the so-called McMahon Line, and in the western and middle sectors it coincides in the main with the traditional customary line which has consistently been pointed out by China."


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The term "LAC" gained legal recognition in Sino-Indian agreements signed in 1993 and 1996. The 1996 agreement states, "No activities of either side shall overstep the line of actual control." However clause number 6 of the 1993 Agreement on the Maintenance of Peace and Tranquility along the Line of Actual Control in the India-China Border Areas mentions, "The two sides agree that references to the line of actual control in this Agreement do not prejudice their respective positions on the boundary question".


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The Indian government claims that Chinese troops continue to illegally enter the area hundreds of times every year, including aerial sightings and intrusions. In 2013, there was a three-week standoff (2013 Daulat Beg Oldi incident) between Indian and Chinese troops 30 km southeast of Daulat Beg Oldi. It was resolved and both Chinese and Indian troops withdrew in exchange for an Indian agreement to destroy some military structures over 250 km to the south near Chumar that the Chinese perceived as threatening.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: In October 2013, India and China signed a border defence cooperation agreement to ensure that patrolling along the LAC does not escalate into armed conflict.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: China’s 1959 claim lines can be traced back to the Simla Convention, which gave birth to the McMahon Line that separated Tibet from India. Since signing the Simla Convention on 3 July 1914, the Chinese Government never raised any formal objection to the McMahon Line until January 1959, when Zhou Enlai, the first premier and head of government of the People’s Republic of China, wrote a letter to then-prime minister of India, Jawahar Lal Nehru.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The date of 7 November 1959, on which the Chinese premier Zhou Enlai alluded to the concept of "line of actual control", achieved a certain sanctity in Chinese nomenclature. But there was no line defined in 1959. Scholars state that Chinese maps had shown a steadily advancing line in the western sector of the Sino-Indian boundary, each of which was identified as "the line of actual control as of 7 November 1959".


title: Line of Actual Control

text: On 24 October 1962, after the initial thrust of the Chinese forces in the Sino-Indian War, the Chinese premier Zhou Enlai wrote to the heads of ten African and Asian nations outlining his proposals for peace, a fundamental tenet of which was that both sides should undertake not to cross the "line of actual control". This letter was accompanied by certain maps which again identified the "line of actual control as of 7 November 1959". Margaret Fisher calls it the "line of actual control as of 7 November 1959" "as published in November 1962". Scholar Stephen Hoffmann states that the line represented not any position held by the Chinese on 7 November 1959, but rather incorporated the gains made by the Chinese army before and after the massive attack on 20 October 1962. In some cases, it went beyond the territory the Chinese army had reached.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: India's understanding of the 1959 line passed through Haji Langar, Shamal Lungpa and Kongka La (the red line shown on Map 2).


title: Line of Actual Control

text: Even though the Chinese-claimed line was not acceptable to India as the depiction of an actual position, it was apparently acceptable as the line from which the Chinese would undertake to withdraw 20 kilometres. Despite the non-acceptance by India of the Chinese proposals, the Chinese did withdraw 20 kilometres from this line, and henceforth continued to depict it as the "line of actual control of 1959".


title: Line of Actual Control

text: In December 1962, representatives of six African and Asian nations met in Colombo to develop peace proposals for India and China. Their proposals formalised the Chinese pledge of 20-kilometre withdrawal and the same line was used, labelled as "the line from which the Chinese forces will withdraw 20 km."


title: Line of Actual Control

text: This line was essentially forgotten by both sides till 2013, when the Chinese PLA revived it during its Depsang incursion as a new border claim.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: At the end of the 1962 war, India demanded that the Chinese withdraw to their positions on 8 September 1962 (the blue line in Map 2).


title: Line of Actual Control

text: Political relations following the 1962 war only saw signs of improvement towards the later 1970s and 80s. Ties had remained strained until then also because of Chinese attraction to Pakistan during India Pakistan wars in 1965 and 1971. Restored ambassadorial relations in 1976, a visit of the Indian Prime Minister to China in 1988, a visit of the Chinese Premier to India in 1992 and then a visit of Indian President to China in 1992 preceded the 1993 agreement. Prior to the 1993 agreement, a trade agreement was signed in 1984, followed by a cultural cooperation agreement in 1988.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The 1993 agreement, signed on 7 September, was the first bilateral agreement between China and India to contain the phrase Line of Actual Control. The agreement covered force level, consultations as a way forward and the role of a Joint Working Group. The agreement made it clear that there was an "ultimate solution to the boundary question between the two countries" which remained pending. It was also agreed that "the two sides agree that references to the line of actual control in this Agreement do not prejudice their respective positions on the boundary question".


title: Line of Actual Control

text: In article 10 of the 1996 border agreement, both sides agreed to the exchange of maps to help clarify the alignment of the LAC. It was only in 2001 when the first in-depth discussion would take place with regard to the central/middle sectors. Maps of Sikkim were exchanged, resulting in the "Memorandum on Expanding Border Trade". However the process of exchange of maps soon collapsed in 2002–2003 when other sectors were brought up. Shivshankar Menon writes that a drawback of the process of exchanging maps as a starting point to clarify the LAC was that it gave both sides an "incentive to exaggerate their claims of where the LAC lay".


title: Line of Actual Control

text: On 30 July 2020, the Chinese Ambassador to India stated that China was not in favour of clarifying the LAC anymore as it would create new disputes. Similar viewpoints have been aired in India that China will keep the boundary dispute alive for as long as it can be used against India. On the other hand, there have been voices which say that clarifying the LAC would be beneficial for both countries.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: In the 1970s, India's China Study Group identified patrol points to which Indian forces would patrol. This was a better representation of how far India could patrol towards its perceived LAC and delimited India's limits of actual control. These periodic patrols were performed by both sides, and often crisscrossed.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: Patrolling Points were identified by India's China Study Group in the 1970s to optimize patrolling effectiveness and resource utilization along the disputed and non-demarcarted China–India border at a time when border infrastructure was weak. Instead of patrolling the entire border which was more than 3000km long, troops would just be required to patrol up to the patrolling points. Over time, as infrastructure, resources and troop capability improved and increased, the patrolling points were revised. The concept of patrol points came about well before India officially accepted the Line of Actual Control (LAC). Patrolling points give a more realistic on–ground guide of India's limits of actual control.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: Most patrolling points are close to the LAC. However, in the Depsang plains, the patrolling points are said to remain well inside in LAC, despite having been revised a number of times. Former Army officers have said that patrolling points provide a better on-the-ground picture of India's limits of control. Based on location, the periodicity of visiting patrolling points can vary greatly from a few weeks to a couple of months. In some cases, the patrolling points are well-known landmarks such as mountain peaks or passes. In other cases, the pattrolling points are numbered, PP-1, PP-2 etc. There are over 65 patrolling points stretching from the Karakoram to Chumar.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The patrolling points within the LAC and the patrol routes that join them are known as 'limits of patrolling'. Some army officers call this the "LAC within the LAC" or the actual LAC. The various patrol routes to the limits of patrolling are called the 'lines of patrolling'.


title: Line of Actual Control

text: During the 2020 China–India skirmishes, the patrolling points under dispute included PPs 10 to 13, 14, 15, 17, and 17A. On 18 September 2020, an article in "The Hindu" wrote that "since April, Indian troops have been denied access to PPs numbered 9, 10, 11, 12, 12A, 13, 14, 15, 17, 17A."


title: Line of Actual Control

text: The Line of Actual Control is one of the settings in Neal Stephenson's novel Termination Shock, where volunteer martial artists from India and China fight to move the line in skirmishes covered on social media.


title: Russell 2000 Index

text: The Russell 2000 Index is a small-cap stock market index that makes up the smallest 2,000 stocks in the Russell 3000 Index. It was started by the Frank Russell Company in 1984. The index is maintained by FTSE Russell, a subsidiary of the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG).


title: Russell 2000 Index

text: The Russell 2000 is by far the most common benchmark for mutual funds that identify themselves as "small-cap",


title: Russell 2000 Index

text: while the S&P 500 index is used primarily for large capitalization stocks. It is the most widely quoted measure of the overall performance of small-cap to mid-cap company shares. It is commonly considered an indicator of the U.S. economy due to its focus on small-cap companies in the U.S. market. The index represents approximately 10% of the total market capitalization of the Russell 3000 Index. , the weighted average market capitalization for a company in the index is around $3.1 billion; the median market cap is $1.0 billion. The market cap of the largest company in the index is $10.1 billion.


title: Russell 2000 Index

text: It first traded above the 1,000 level on May 20, 2013, and above the 2,000 level on December 23, 2020.


title: Russell 2000 Index

text: Many fund companies offer mutual funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that attempt to replicate the performance of the Russell 2000. Their results will be affected by stock selection, trading expenses, and market impact of reacting to changes in the constituent companies of the index. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.


title: Serbian Empire

text: The Serbian Empire (, ) was a medieval Serbian state that emerged from the Kingdom of Serbia. It was established in 1346 by Dušan the Mighty, who significantly expanded the state.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Under Dušan's rule, Serbia was the major power in the Balkans and a multi-lingual empire that stretched from the Danube to the Gulf of Corinth, with its capital in Skopje. He also promoted the Serbian Archbishopric to the Serbian Patriarchate. His son and successor, Uroš the Weak, lost most of the territory conquered by Dušan, hence his epithet.


title: Serbian Empire

text: The Serbian Empire effectively ended with the death of Uroš V in 1371 and the break-up of the Serbian state. Some successors of Stefan V claimed the title of Emperor in parts of Serbia until 1402, but the territory in Greece was never recovered.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Stefan Dušan was the son of the Serbian king Stefan Dečanski (r. 1322–1331). After his father's accession to the throne, Dušan was awarded with the title of "young king". Although this title bore significant power in medieval Serbia, Stefan wanted his younger son, Simeon Uroš, to inherit him instead of Dušan. However, Dušan had significant support from the major part of the Serbian nobility, including the Serbian archbishop Danilo, and some of the king's most trusted generals, such as Jovan Oliver Grčinić. Tensions slowly rose between the king and his son, especially after the battle of Velbužd, where Dušan showed his military capabilities, and they seem to have culminated when king Stefan raided Zeta, a province in Serbia where Dušan ruled autonomously, being a tradition of Serbian heirs to rule this province. Advised by the nobility, Dušan later marched from Zeta to Nerodimlje, where he besieged his father and forced him to surrender the throne. Stefan was later imprisoned in the fortress of Zvečan, where he died.


title: Serbian Empire

text: In 1333, Dušan launched a large attack on the Byzantine empire, at the time ruled by the ambitious emperor Andronikos III Palaiologos, with the help of a deserted Byzantine general, Syrgian. Dušan quickly conquered the cities of Ohrid, Prilep and Kastoria, and attempted to besiege Thessalonica in 1334, but was prevented conquering the city by the death of Syrgian, who had been assassinated by a Byzantine spy. Syrgian was a key figure in Dušan's army, as he had earned a great reputation in Greece, convincing Greek citizens to surrender cities rather than fight Dušan's armies.


title: Serbian Empire

text: By 1345, Dušan "the Mighty" had expanded his state to cover half of the Balkans, more territory than either the Byzantine Empire or the Second Bulgarian Empire in that time. Therefore, in 1345, in Serres, Dušan proclaimed himself ""Tsar"" ("Caesar"). On 16 April 1346, in Skopje (former Bulgarian capital), he had himself crowned "Emperor of the Serbs and Greeks", a title signifying a claim to succession of the Byzantine Empire. The ceremony was performed by the newly elevated Serbian Patriarch Joanikije II, the Bulgarian Patriarch Simeon, and Nicholas, the Archbishop of Ohrid. At the same time, Dušan had his son Uroš crowned as "King of Serbs and Greeks", giving him nominal rule over the "Serbian lands", although Dušan was governing the whole state, with special responsibility for the newly acquired Roman (Byzantine) lands. These actions, which the Byzantines received with indignation, appear to have been supported by the Bulgarian Empire and tsar Ivan Alexander, as the Patriarch of Bulgaria Simeon had participated in both the creation of a Serbian Patriarchate of Peć and the imperial coronation of Stefan Uroš IV Dušan. Dushan made marriage alliance with Bulgarian tsar Ivan Alexander, marrying his sister Helena.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Tsar Dušan doubled the size of Serbian state, seizing territories in all directions, especially south and southeast. Serbia held parts of modern Bosnia and Herzegovina, Moravian Serbia, Kosovo, Zeta, modern North Macedonia, modern Albania, and half of modern Greece. He did not fight a single field battle, instead winning his empire by besieging cities. Dušan undertook a campaign against the Byzantine Empire, which was attempting to avert a deteriorating situation after the destruction caused by the Fourth Crusade. Dušan swiftly seized Thessaly, Albania, Epirus, and most of Macedonia.


title: Serbian Empire

text: After besieging the emperor at Salonica in 1340, he imposed a treaty assuring Serbia sovereignty over regions extending from the Danube to the Gulf of Corinth, from the Adriatic Sea to the Maritsa river, and including parts of southern Bulgaria up to the environs of Adrianople. Bulgaria had never fully recovered since its defeat by the Serbs at the Battle of Velbazhd. The outcome of the battle shaped the balance of power in the Balkans for the next decades to come and although Bulgaria did not lose territory, the Serbs could occupy much of Macedonia. Bulgarian tsar Ivan Alexander, whose sister Helena Dušan later married, became his ally between 1332 and 1365. Dušan ruled over major central part of the Balkan peninsula. He gave sanctuary to the former regent of the Byzantine Empire, John VI Kantakouzenos, in revolt against the government, and agreed to an alliance.


title: Serbian Empire

text: In 1349 and 1354, Dušan enacted a set of laws known as Dušan's Code. The Code was based on Roman-Byzantine law and the first Serbian constitution, St. Sava's Nomocanon (1219). It was a Civil and Canon law system, based on the Ecumenical Councils, for the functioning of the state and the Serbian Orthodox Church. In 1355, Dušan began military preparations for new campaigns in the south and east, but suddenly died of an unknown illness in December 1355.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Bordering Serbia to the west was the banate of Bosnia, ruled by Stephen II Kotromanic. During the reign of Dušan's father, Stefan Dečanski, Stephen expanded his rule to the Serbian provinces of Hum and Krajina, which stretched from Dubrovnik on the east to river Cetina on the west, Dušan, being busy with his conquests on the south, tried to solve this territorial dispute with diplomacy, but that didn't succeed, as Stephen continually refused or ignored Dušan's requests, counting on the help of his Hungarian protector king Louis I.


title: Serbian Empire

text: However, the situation changed when Louis signed a treaty with Dušan, so he could attack the kingdom of Naples without Dušan attacking him from the south. Stephen, feeling that his position in Hum and Krajina is becoming harder to defend, started building fortresses around river Neretva, to strengthen his presence and even went as far as to raid the Serbian province of Travunia, reaching as far as Kotor. Dušan couldn't tolerate this, so he marched with his army westward.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Dušan led 50,000 infantry and 30,000 cavalry across the Bosnian border. Stephen, knowing he couldn't face such a force, opted to retreat in front of it in hopes of leading the Serbian army into hard terrain, where he could potentially fight them off. However, this didn't work out because Bosnian nobility and even some of Stephen's own soldiers, unhappy with his rule, started defecting to Dušan. Dušan soon reached Bobovac, the capital of Bosnia, to which he laid siege. The Bosnian ban fled to Hungary, and Bosnia was left open for Dušan to conquer.


title: Serbian Empire

text: He left a portion of his army to continue besieging Bobovac; sent another portion to conquer the region of Krajina, while he himself led a third portion to conquer Hum. Then, after conquering Hum, Dušan proceeded to enter Dalmatia, in order to secure his sister's domains. His sister, Jelena Nemanjic-Subic, was married to the ban of Croatia, Mladen Subic, who died of plague in 1348, leaving his lands to his wife. After his death, Hungarians and Venetians both continually tried to take control over these lands, so Dušan entered Dalmatia to protect her sister's legal domains. He was welcomed as a liberator in Sibenik and Trogir, but as the Byzantine emperor John Kantakouzenos attacked Dušan from the south, capturing the city of Veria and Edessa, Dušan was forced to retreat and repel him. While he was on his way back, he was welcomed and prepared a great feast in Dubrovnik, where his wife stayed for some time.


title: Serbian Empire

text: It is unclear if Dušan kept control in these lands. Certain historians say Stephen Kotromanic returned and regained control in Bosnia, but the sources don't mention anything about him after Dušan's conquests, until his death in late 1353. Dušan most likely kept control over Dalmatia, since after his conquests, Serbian Orthodox monastery of Krka was built in that region. Also, he is recorded sending 2 military units under the command of his generals Đuraš Ilijić and Palman Bracht to protect the Dalmatian cities of Klis and Skradin in 1355. Djuras Ilijic surrendered Skradin to the Venetians some time after Dušan's death, on 10 January 1356, and Klis was conquered by the Croatian general Nikola Banic for the Hungarian king sometime after 1356, ending Serbian presence in Dalmatia.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Dušan was succeeded by his son, Stefan Uroš V, called "the Weak," a term that also described the empire as it slowly slid into feudal anarchy. The failure to consolidate its holdings after a sudden conquest led to the fragmentation of the empire. The period was marked by the rise of a new threat: the Ottoman Turkish sultanate gradually spread from Asia to Europe and conquered first Byzantine Thrace, and then the other Balkan states. Too incompetent to sustain the empire created by his father, Stefan V could neither repel attacks of foreign enemies nor combat the independence of his nobility. The Serbian Empire of Stefan V fragmented into a conglomeration of principalities, some of which did not even nominally acknowledge his rule. Stefan Uroš V died childless on 4 December 1371, after much of the Serbian nobility had been killed by the Ottoman Turks during the Battle of Maritsa.


title: Serbian Empire

text: The crumbling Serbian Empire under Uroš the Weak offered little resistance to the powerful Ottomans. In the wake of internal conflicts and decentralization of the state, the Ottomans defeated the Serbs under Vukašin at the Battle of Maritsa in 1371, making vassals of the southern governors; soon thereafter, the Emperor died. As Uroš was childless and the nobility could not agree on a rightful heir, the Empire continued to be ruled by semi-independent provincial lords, who often were in feud with each other. The most powerful of these, Lazar Hrebeljanović, a Duke of present-day central Serbia (which had not yet come under Ottoman rule), stood against the Ottomans at the Battle of Kosovo in 1389. The result was indecisive, but it led to the subsequent fall of Serbia. Stefan Lazarević, the son of Lazar, succeeded as ruler, but by 1394 he had become an Ottoman vassal. In 1402 he renounced Ottoman rule and became a Hungarian ally; the following years are characterized by a power struggle between the Ottomans and Hungary over the territory of Serbia. In 1453, the Ottomans conquered Constantinople, and in 1458 Athens was taken. In 1459, Serbia was annexed, and then Morea a year later. During the following centuries of Ottoman rule, the legacy of former statehood, embodied in the Serbian Empire, became an integral part of Serbian national identity.


title: Serbian Empire

text: After finishing most of his conquests, Stefan Dušan dedicated himself to supervising the administration of the empire. One key objective was to create a written legal code, an effort his predecessors had only begun. An assembly of bishops, nobles, and provincial governors was charged with creating a code of laws, bringing together the customs of the Slav countries.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Dušan's Code was enacted in two state assemblies, the first on May 21, 1349 in Skopje, and the second in 1354 in Serres. The law regulated all social spheres, thus it is considered a medieval constitution. The Code included 201 articles, based on Roman-Byzantine law. The legal transplanting is notable with the articles 172 and 174 of Dušan's Code, which regulated juridical independence. They were taken from the Byzantine code Basilika (book VII, 1, 16-17). The Code had its roots in the first Serbian constitution — "St. Sava's Nomocanon" () from 1219, enacted by Saint Sava. St. Sava's Nomocanon was the compilation of Civil law, based on Roman Law and Canon law, based on Ecumenical Councils. Its basic purpose was to organize the functions of the state and Serbian Orthodox Church.


title: Serbian Empire

text: The legislation resembled the feudal system then prevalent in Western Europe, with an aristocratic basis and establishing a wide distinction between nobility and peasantry. The monarch had broad powers but was surrounded and advised by a permanent council of magnates and prelates. The court, chancellery and administration were rough copies of those of Constantinople. The code enumerated the administrative hierarchy as following: "lands, cities, župas and krajištes"; the župas and krajištes were one and the same, where župas on the borders were called krajištes ("frontier"). The župa consisted of villages, and their status, rights, and obligations were regulated in the constitution. The ruling nobility possessed hereditary allodial estates, which were worked by dependent "sebri", the equivalent of Greek "paroikoi": peasants owing labour services, formally bound by decree. The earlier "župan" title was abolished and replaced with the Greek-derived "kefalija" ("kephale", "head, master").


title: Serbian Empire

text: Commerce was another object of Dušan's concern. He gave strict orders to combat piracy and to assure the safety of travelers and foreign merchants. Traditional relations with Venice were resumed, with the port of Ragusa (Dubrovnik) becoming an important transaction point. Exploitation of mines produced appreciable resources.


title: Serbian Empire

text: East-west Roman roads through the empire carried a variety of commodities: wine, manufactures, and luxury goods from the coast; metals, cattle, timber, wool, skins, and leather from the interior. This economic development made possible the creation of the Empire. Important trade routes were the ancient Roman Via Militaris, Via Egnatia, Via de Zenta, and the Kopaonik road, among others. Ragusan merchants in particular had trading privileges throughout the realm. Security of trade and merchants on the roads was a major concern for the state authorities.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Srebrenica, Rudnik, Trepča, Novo Brdo, Kopaonik, Majdanpek, Brskovo, and Samokov were the main centers for mining iron, copper, and lead ores, and silver and gold placers. The silver mines provided much of the royal income, and were worked by slave-labour, managed by Saxons. A colony of Saxons worked the Novo Brdo mines and traded charcoal burners. The silver mines processed an annual 0.5 million dollars (1919 comparation).


title: Serbian Empire

text: The currency used was called "dinars"; an alternative name was "perper", derived from the Byzantine "hyperpyron". The "golden dinar" was the largest unit, and the imperial tax was one dinar coin, per house, annually.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Serbian military tactics consisted of wedge-shaped heavy cavalry attacks with horse archers on the flanks. Many foreign mercenaries were in the Serbian army, mostly Germans as cavalry and Spaniards as infantry. The army also had personal mercenary guards for the emperor, mainly German knights. A German nobleman, Palman, became the commander of the Serbian "Alemannic Guard" in 1331 upon crossing Serbia on the way to Jerusalem; he became leader of all mercenaries in the Serbian Army. The main strength of the Serbian army were the heavily armoured knights feared for their ferocious charge and fighting skills, as well as hussars, versatile light cavalry formations armed mainly with spears and crossbows, ideal for scouting, raiding and skirmishing.


title: Serbian Empire

text: The 1339 map by Angelino Dulcert depicts a number of flags, and Serbia is represented by a flag placed above Skoplje ("Skopi") with the name Serbia near the hoist, which was characteristic for capital cities at the time the drawing was produced. The flag, depicting a red double-headed eagle, represented the realm of Stefan Dušan. A flag in Hilandar, seen by Dimitrije Avramović, was alleged by the brotherhood to have been a flag of Emperor Dušan; it was a triband with red at the top and bottom and white in the center. Emperor Dušan also adopted the Imperial "divelion", which was purple and had a golden cross in the center. Another of Dušan's flags was the Imperial cavalry flag, kept at the Hilandar monastery on Mount Athos; a triangular bicolored flag, of red and yellow.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Influenced by the clergy, Dušan showed extreme severity towards Roman Catholicism. Those who adopted the Latin rite were condemned to work in mines, and people who propagated it were threatened with death. The Papacy grew concerned about this and the increasing power of Dušan and aroused the old rivalry of the Catholic Hungarians against the Orthodox Serbs. Once again Dušan overcame his enemies from whom he seized Bosnia and Herzegovina, which marked the height of the Serbian Empire in Middle Ages. However the most serious menace came from the East, from the Turks. Entrenched on the shores of the Dardanelles, the Turks were the common enemies of Christendom. It was against them that the question of uniting and directing all forces in the Balkans to save Europe from the invasion arose. The Serbian Empire already included most of the region, and to transform the peninsula into a cohesive whole under a rule of a single master required seizure of Constantinople to add to Serbia what remained of the Byzantine Empire. Dušan intended to make himself emperor and defender of Christianity against the Islamic wave.


title: Serbian Empire

text: Education, to which St. Sava had given the first impulse, progressed remarkably during Dušan's reign. Schools and monasteries secured royal favor. True seats of culture, they became institutions in perpetuating Serbian national traditions. The fine arts, influenced by Italians, were not neglected. Architectural monuments, frescoes and mosaics testify the artistic level archived during this period.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: The battle of Mykolaiv was a battle which started on the night of 26 February 2022, as part of the southern Ukraine offensive during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. It ended in Russian forces being repulsed from the city in March, and by April all but a few of its surrounding villages were under Ukrainian control.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: Mykolaiv is a strategically important shipbuilding city on the Black Sea and on 4 March was "seen as the next key stepping-stone for Russian forces on the road to Odesa."


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: During the afternoon hours of 26 February 2022, 12 Russian tanks managed to break through in Kakhovka on the Dnieper and began heading towards Mykolaiv. Vitaly Kim, the governor of Mykolaiv Oblast, stated that the city had five hours to prepare for encirclement and urged citizens to prepare barricades and volunteer to defend the city. Artillery and other arms had also been prepared.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: By around 18:52, tanks were in the outskirts of the city and the mayor ordered citizens to stay at home and as far away from windows as possible. Shortly after, troops entered the city and a battle on the Southern Buh erupted around ten minutes later. According to some reports, tanks "passed through the city". Russian forces had also taken over the Mykolaiv Zoo.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: After roughly three hours of fighting, Russian forces were driven away by Ukrainian forces, and while some Russian tanks reportedly bypassed the city, fighting continued. Extensive fighting was recorded in , on 6th Slobidska Street, and on Central Avenue.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: By the early morning of 27 February, Ukrainian officials announced that Russian forces had been driven away from the city, with Kim posting on Telegram, "Mykolaiv is ours! Glory to Ukraine!" ("Миколаїв наш! Слава Україні[!]"). In the aftermath, some Russian soldiers were captured, and the city was extensively damaged.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 28 February, Russian troops advanced from Kherson towards Mykolaiv, reaching the city's outskirts and launching an assault at 11:00 a.m. local time.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 1 March, according to Ukrainian officials, a Russian column near the city of Bashtanka, just north of Mykolaiv, was defeated by Ukrainian forces. On 2 March, another Russian column was defeated at the city of Voznesensk, northeast of Mykolaiv, by Ukrainian regular army troops, members of the Territorial Defense force, and local volunteers.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: The Ukrainian Navy scuttled their only frigate and the flagship of the Ukrainian Navy, "Hetman Sahaidachny", in the port of Mykolaiv on or before 3 March. On that day, a photo was published showing the frigate partially sunk in port. On 4 March, the Ukrainian Defence Minister confirmed that "Hetman Sahaidachny" had been scuttled to prevent its capture by the Russian forces.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: Kim later announced that Russian troops were driven out of the city but were counterattacking. Ukrainian soldiers recaptured Kulbakino Air Base. Mayor Oleksandr Senkevich said that Russian troops were attacking the city from the north, east and south. Ukrainian troops held a single swing bridge spanning the Southern Buh, the easiest route for Russian forces to reach the port of Odesa. Russian forces were later forced to retreat back beyond the city limits.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 7 March, ten Ukrainian soldiers were killed and dozens of others were wounded in a Russian airstrike on the barracks of the 79th Air Assault Brigade at 05:15. Kim later stated that Ukrainian forces had recaptured Mykolaiv International Airport and civilians could now leave the city. At 05:00 Russian troops began shelling the city and a Kalibr cruise missile hit a military barracks, killing eight soldiers and wounding 19, while another eight were missing. Heavy clashes took place to the east of the city and a tank battle broke out at the airport. The shelling stopped around the evening, with Ukrainian forces declaring they had repelled the Russian assault.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: Kim claimed on 11 March that Ukrainian forces had pushed Russian troops back to the east by – and had also surrounded some units who were negotiating for a surrender. He said that the Russian force that attacked the city was relatively weak, but warned that a stronger one could easily capture the city. The head doctor of a local hospital, Oleksandr Dimyanov, said that 250 Ukrainian soldiers and civilians had been wounded during the battle, of whom 12 died.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: Russian forces still controlled villages away, with only the Southern Bug River keeping the city from being encircled. Senkevich told "The Guardian" that civilians were being evacuated through the road leading to Odessa, and about 250,000 had been evacuated.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: Civilians stacked tires on city streets in the battle, and burned them using Molotov cocktails to slow down Russian troops if they entered the city, so Ukrainian troops could target their tanks. Kim meanwhile organized the defenses and motivated people through videos he posted on social media. Sgt. Ruslan Khoda, who commanded the Ukrainian forces defending the airport, stated that Russian troops seemed to be mounting probing attacks to test vulnerabilities in their defenses and they were often preceded by surveillance drones. Maj. Gen. Dmitry Marchenko, who was leading the city's defense, stated that Ukrainian forces were trying to break the morale of Russian troops by repeatedly shelling them.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 15 March, Kim claimed that Ukrainian forces had pushed back Russian forces from the city center. On 18 March, Ukrainian forces reportedly broke through Russian lines at Mykolaiv, pushing them back into Kherson raion.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 18 March, two Russian Kalibr missiles, fired from either nearby Kherson or Crimea, struck a Ukrainian army barracks of the 36th Separate Marine Brigade (headquartered in Mykolaiv), used to train local soldiers, located in the northern suburbs of Mykolaiv. The attack occurred during the night, while the soldiers were asleep in their bunks. Not enough time was available to sound the alarm, as the missiles were fired from too close, from the vicinity of Kherson. The Belgian newspaper "Het Laatste Nieuws" reported that the city morgue and the Ukrainian army stated that at least 80 Ukrainian soldiers were killed, and their bodies recovered. However, the BBC reported that out of the 200 soldiers in the barracks, only one man was pulled from out of the rubble 30 hours after the attack.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: However, as of 16 April, Russian forces continued shelling the city. Cruise missile attacks also continued, although the city remained in Ukrainian control.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 12 April, the city lost its main water supply as a result of damage to the pipeline bringing fresh water from the Dnieper. Subsequently the people in Mykolaiv were forced to rely on water from rivers and streams as well as donations from neighboring towns and cities. Kim promised to get the water supply back to half capacity in the following days using wells, water purification equipment and desalination plants. A month later, water supply from Southern Bug was established, but this water is brackish, dirty and isn't suitable for drinking or cooking. According to BBC investigation, Russian forces deliberately broke the pipeline with explosive charge, and then did not allow repair team to access it.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 5 May, the Russian Defence Ministry claimed that its missiles destroyed a large ammunition depot in Mykolaiv.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 22 June, Ukrainian authorities reported that Russian forces launched seven missiles at Mykolaiv. According to the Russian Defence Ministry, the strike conducted by the Russian Aerospace Forces killed up to 500 servicemen of the 59th Motorized Brigade located in the Okean shipbuilding plant and destroyed a fuel terminal in the city.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 28 June, shelling damaged Central City Stadium and an abandoned military base. On 29 June, Russian rocket strike hit 5-storey residential building, killing at least 8 people and injuring 6.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 15 July, two largest universities of the city were struck by missiles: Admiral Makarov National University of Shipbuilding and Mykolaiv National University.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 29 July, five people were killed and seven were injured at a bus stop in Mykolaiv after Russians shelled the city. Another strike on July 30 killed Oleksiy Vadaturskyi, the owner of Ukrainian agricultural company Nibulon, along with his wife.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 17 August, two missiles hit Petro Mohyla Black Sea State University. Two days later, it was shelled with two more rockets S-300.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On November 1, new shelling partially destroyed historic gymnasium (1892), a polytechnic college and damaged neighboring residential buildings. One person was reported to be killed.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On November 11, shelling of the city caused collapse of part of a five-story residential building, killing 9 people.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: Olha Dierugina, the director of the forensic institute of Mykolaiv, told Agence France-Presse that their morgue had received 120 bodies during the battle, including 80 soldiers and 30 civilians. Some of the dead also included Russian soldiers.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: A cancer hospital and an eye clinic were bombed on 12 March. On 13 March, Kim stated that a gas turbine factory had been bombed by the Russians. He later said that nine people had been killed in the attack.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: According to a report by "The New York Times" on 16 March, 132 bodies were housed at the city's morgue.


title: Battle of Mykolaiv

text: On 29 March, a Russian missile strike had hit the regional administration's headquarters in Mykolaiv. 37 people had been killed and at least 33 injured.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: The film opens on Nippon Farm, with a mother cat who has given birth to kittens. One of the kittens is named Milo, or Chatran in the Japanese version (, literally Brown Tiger), and has a habit of being too curious and getting himself into trouble. He finds a pug puppy named Otis, or Poosky in the Japanese version (), and they soon become friends. When Milo is hiding inside a box floating in the river, it breaks loose and he accidentally drifts downstream. Otis runs after Milo, who himself goes on many adventures, escaping one obstacle after another.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: Milo encounters a bear, escapes from a raven and Deadwood Swamp, steals a dead muskrat from a fox, follows a railroad called Nippon Bearway to the home of a deer who shelters him, sleeps in a nest with an owl, stays for a while with a pig and her piglets, catches a fish and is robbed of it by a raccoon, is mobbed by seagulls, and evades another bear, then a snake, before falling into a deep pit.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: For his part, Otis follows Milo throughout, usually only an hour behind and less than a mile out of range. Finally, the two catch up with one another. While Milo is in the hole, Otis pulls him out by means of a rope. Milo and Otis are reunited, and soon find mates of their own: Joyce, a white cat, for Milo; and Sondra, a French pug, for Otis. Afterward, they briefly part ways and raise offspring of their own. Later, Milo, Otis, Joyce, and Sondra (along with their litters) happily find their way back together through the forest to their farm as the credits roll.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: Director Masanori Hata and associate director Kon Ichikawa edited the film together from 74 hours of footage ( of film), shot over a period of four years.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: The original Japanese soundtrack, released as "The Adventures of Chatran: Original Soundtrack", was composed by Ryuichi Sakamoto and included , a theme song performed by Keiko Yoshinaga. During the promotion of the film in Japan, the song , originally recorded by Ushiroyubi Sasaregumi for the Fuji TV anime series "High School Kimengumi", was used in commercials for the film.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: The musical score for the English-language version was composed by Michael Boddicker. Music was borrowed from Elmer Bernstein's score to "To Kill a Mockingbird" (specifically the two cues, "Roll in the Tire" and "Peek-a-boo" with minor changes in the music), and John Williams' score to "The Witches of Eastwick" (using these cues "The Township of Eastwick" and "Have Another Cherry!", again with minor changes in the music). The song "Walk Outside", written by Dick Tarrier, is performed by Dan Crow in the opening shots and end credits.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: In 1986, to tie in with the original Japanese version of the film, a video game was released for the Japan-exclusive Famicom Disk System.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: The film was shown during the film market at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival before opening on 200 screens in Japan on July 12, 1986.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: It was the number-one Japanese film on the domestic market in 1986, earning in distribution income that year. It grossed a total of ($90,822,000) in Japan. At the time, it was the third highest-grossing film ever in Japan, beaten only by "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial" (1982) and "Antarctica" (1983).


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: In the United States, "The Adventures of Milo and Otis" grossed , adding up to a combined grossed in Japan and the United States.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: Adjusted for inflation, the film grossed the equivalent of in Japan and in the United States as of , for a combined inflation-adjusted in Japan and the United States.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: In terms of box office admissions, the film sold tickets in Japan, tickets in the United States, and 1,318,750 tickets in Germany and France, for a combined tickets sold in Japan, North America and Mainland Europe.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: In 2010, the film's DVD version sold 810,334 units and grossed $5,464,010 in the United States. It was released on Blu-ray on January 24, 2012.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: Reviews for the US version were positive, with an 80% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 10 reviews.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: When the film was first released, several Australian animal rights organizations raised allegations of animal cruelty during filming and called for a boycott. "The Sunday Mail" reported at the time that Animal Liberation Queensland founder Jacqui Kent alleged the killing of more than 20 kittens during production and added that she was disturbed by reports from Europe which alleged that other animals had been injured, as in one case where a producer had allegedly broken a cat's paw to make it appear unsteady on its feet. Other scenes that were the source of controversy were a scene of a cat falling off a cliff and trying to climb back up, and a scene of a pug fighting a bear, all of which were deleted from the American version. Kent said her organization had a number of complaints from people who had seen the film and were concerned that it could not have been made without cruelty. The Tasmanian and Victorian branches of the RSPCA also alleged abuse.


title: The Adventures of Milo and Otis

text: The film was reported to have the approval of the American Humane Society, despite not having their officers present during filming. The American Humane Association attempted to investigate cruelty rumors through "contacts in Europe who normally have information on movies throughout the world". While noting that the contacts had also heard the allegations, they were unable to verify them. The organization also reported, "We have tried through humane people in Japan, and through another Japanese producer to determine if these rumors are true, but everything has led to a dead end." The same report noted that several Japanese Humane Societies allowed their names to be used in connection with the film and that the film "shows no animals being injured or harmed."


title: Ronald Isley

text: Ronald Isley (; born May 21, 1941) is an American recording artist, songwriter, record producer, and occasional actor. Isley is the lead singer and founding member of the family music group The Isley Brothers.


title: Ronald Isley

text: Born in 1941 to Sallye Bernice (née Bell) and O'Kelly Isley Sr, Isley was the third of six brothers (O'Kelly Isley Jr., Rudolph Isley, Vernon Isley, Ernie Isley, Marvin Isley). Ronald, like many of his siblings, began his career in the church. Isley began singing at the age of two, winning a $25 war bond (approx. $429 in 2022) for singing at a spiritual contest at the Union Baptist Church. By the age of seven, Isley was singing on-stage at venues such as the Regal Theater in Chicago, alongside Dinah Washington and a few other notables.


title: Ronald Isley

text: By his early teens, Isley was singing regularly with his brothers in church tours and also first appeared on TV on Ted Mack's "Amateur Hour". In 1957, 16-year-old Isley and his two elder brothers O'Kelly and Rudy then 19 and 18 moved to New York to pursue a music career. While in New York, Isley and his brother began recording doo-wop for local labels before landing a major deal with RCA Records in 1959, where the trio wrote and released their debut single "Shout". By the summer of 1959, the Isley family had moved from Cincinnati to a home in Englewood, New Jersey.


title: Ronald Isley

text: Isley has been the Isley Brothers' most longstanding member as well as the main lead vocalist, occasionally sharing with his older brothers. In 1969, Isley reformed T-Neck Records with his brothers in a need to produce themselves without the control of record labels, forming the label shortly after ending a brief tenure with Motown. In 1973, the group's style and sound changed following the release of the "3 + 3" album where brothers Ernie Isley and Marvin Isley and in-law Chris Jasper joined the founding brothers' full-time. The younger brothers had been providing instrumental help for the brothers since the late 1960s. By the mid-1970s, Isley was living in Teaneck, New Jersey.


title: Ronald Isley

text: After Kelly Isley's death in 1986 and Rudy Isley's departure to the ministry in 1989, Ronald has carried on with the Isley Brothers name either as a solo artist or with accompanying help from younger brothers, particularly Ernie. In 1990, Isley scored a top-ten duet with Rod Stewart with a cover of his brothers' hit "This Old Heart of Mine (Is Weak for You)", and in 2003 Ronald recorded a solo album, "Here I Am: Bacharach Meets Isley", with Burt Bacharach. In addition, Ron Isley became a sought-after hook singer for R. Kelly, Warren G, 2Pac and UGK. Isley released his first solo album "Mr. I" on November 30, 2010. The album includes the first single "No More". It debuted at number 50 on the "Billboard" 200, selling 22,243 copies. It was his first solo album to crack that chart.


title: Ronald Isley

text: In 2010, Isley received a "Legend Award" at the Soul Train Music Awards. In 2013, Ronald released his second solo album "This Song Is For You" sign labels eOne. Ronald received a nominees Independent R&B/Soul Artist Performance, at the Soul Train Music Awards. In 2014, Ronald made a cameo appearance in the music video for the Kendrick Lamar song "i".


title: Ronald Isley

text: Including his work on songs recorded by the Isley Brothers and R. Kelly, Isley's singles appeared on the US Billboard Hot 100 charts in six straight decades, from the 1950s (1959's "Shout") through the 2000s (2001's "Contagion"). His 2015 appearance on Lamar's "How Much a Dollar Cost" peaked just under the Hot 100 at 109, and his 2021 Isley Brothers track "Friends and Family" failed to hit the main Billboard chart (although it was a Top 50 hit on the R&B and Hip-Hop chart), but do serve to extend his appearances on Billboard charts to


title: Ronald Isley

text: Ronald Isley was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992 as a member of the Isley Brothers.


title: Ronald Isley

text: Isley married Margret Tinsley in 1960, and in 1969 their daughter Tia Isley was born. In 1993, he married singer Angela Winbush in Los Angeles, California. They quietly divorced in early 2002.


title: Ronald Isley

text: Isley suffered a mild stroke in London in 2004, which halted an Isley Brothers tour. In September 2005, he married background singer Kandy Johnson of the duo JS/Johnson Sisters.Their son, Ronald Isley, Jr., was born in December 2006. In 2007, it was reported Isley had kidney problems. Isley still resides in St. Louis.


title: Ronald Isley

text: In 2006, Isley was convicted of tax evasion charges and sentenced to three years and one month in prison. Isley's sentence was affirmed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Isley was imprisoned at the Federal Correctional Institution at Terre Haute, Indiana, and was scheduled for release on April 13, 2010. He was moved to a half-way house (Dismas House) in St. Louis, Missouri, following an early departure that October. After his sentence was completed, Isley was released from a federal half-way house on April 13, 2010. Isley is listed as one of California's most delinquent taxpayers, with a $303,411.43 debt from a lien filed on October 22, 2002.


title: Hyouka

text: At the request of his older sister, student Hotaro Oreki joins Kamiyama High School's Classic Literature Club to stop it from being abolished, joined by fellow members Eru Chitanda, Satoshi Fukube and Mayaka Ibara. The story is set in Kamiyama City, a fictional city in Gifu Prefecture that the author based on his real hometown of Takayama, also in Gifu. The fictional Kamiyama High School is based upon the real life . They begin to solve various mysteries, both to help with their club and at Eru's requests.


title: Hyouka

text: "Hyouka" is the first novel in the series, written by Honobu Yonezawa and published by Kadokawa Shoten on October 31, 2001. As of November 30, 2016, six volumes (novels and short story collections) have been published in the series. A seventh novel has been confirmed by the author on Twitter. Short stories are published in Kadokawa Shoten's "Yasei Jidai" magazine. Each of the novels has an English subtitle, most of which reference other detective novels. A book titled , featuring interviews with Yonezawa and others involved in the series, a new short story, and other reference material was released on October 13, 2017.


title: Hyouka

text: A manga adaptation, titled "Hyouka" and illustrated by Taskohna, started serialization in the March 2012 issue of Kadokawa Shoten's "Shōnen Ace". Kadokawa Shoten published 14 "tankōbon" volumes from April 26, 2012 to March 25, 2022. The manga's first twelve volumes adapted the first four novels, same as the anime series. A sequel series started in the August 2019 issue of "Shōnen Ace".


title: Hyouka

text: In 2012, a television anime series based on the "Classical Literature Club" series novels aired in Japan. It was produced by Kyoto Animation.


title: BrahMos-II

text: is a hypersonic cruise missile currently under joint development by India's Defence Research and Development Organisation and Russia's NPO Mashinostroyenia, which have together formed BrahMos Aerospace Private Limited. It is the second of the BrahMos series of cruise missiles. The BrahMos-II is expected to have a range of and a speed of Mach 8. During the cruise stage of flight the missile will be propelled by a scramjet airbreathing jet engine. Other details, including production cost and physical dimensions of the missile, are yet to be published.


title: BrahMos-II

text: The planned operational range of the BrahMos-II had initially been restricted to 290 kilometres as Russia is a signatory to the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), which prohibits it from helping other countries develop missiles with ranges above . However, subsequent to India becoming a MTCR signatory in 2014, the parameters for Brahmos 2 will get enhanced. Its top speed will be double that of the current BrahMos-I, and it has been described as the fastest cruise missile in the world.


title: BrahMos-II

text: Fourth-generation multi-purpose Russian Naval destroyers (Project 21956) are also likely to be equipped with the BrahMos II.


title: BrahMos-II

text: BrahMos Aerospace named the missile "BrahMos-II (K)" in honour of the former President of India, APJ Abdul Kalam.


title: Alicia von Rittberg

text: Alicia Gräfin ("Countess") von Rittberg (born 10 December 1993) is a German actress. Following numerous roles in German films and television series, she came to attention outside Germany for her brief role as Emma in the 2014 film "Fury". Rittberg starred as Ida Lenze in the lead role in the German TV series "Charité" for which she received the Bambi Award in 2017. In 2022, she starred as Elizabeth Tudor in the historical drama Becoming Elizabeth.


title: Alicia von Rittberg

text: Alicia von Rittberg was born to the noble family of and grew up in Munich with three brothers. She attended a humanities-oriented "Gymnasium". She studied corporate management and economics at Zeppelin University in Friedrichshafen, where she was due to complete her bachelor's degree thesis in June 2017.


title: Alicia von Rittberg

text: For her starring role as a foster child in the 2012 ZDF TV film "And all were silent", she received the 2013 Young Artist Award at the Bavarian Television Award.


title: Alicia von Rittberg

text: In 2014, she co-starred as Emma alongside Brad Pitt, Logan Lerman and Shia LaBeouf in the American war film "Fury", directed by David Ayer. She appeared in "Our Kind of Traitor", a 2016 spy thriller film directed by Susanna White. She played the lead role of Ida Lenze in season 1 of the German TV series "Charité" for which she received the Bambi Award in the category of German actress in 2017.


title: Amanda Donohoe

text: Amanda Donohoe (born 29 June 1962) is an English actress. She first came to attention as a 16-year-old living with pop singer Adam Ant, appearing in the music videos for the Adam and the Ants singles "Antmusic" (1980) and "Stand and Deliver" (1981) during their four-year relationship. She later moved to the United States, where she appeared in films and on television series, including a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress-winning performance during her two years (1990–92) as C.J. Lamb on the NBC drama series "L.A. Law". Other television roles include Natasha Wylde on the British soap opera "Emmerdale" (2009–10). She has had numerous stage roles, including Yelena in "Uncle Vanya" (New York City 1996).


title: Amanda Donohoe

text: Donohoe was born in London, to Ted and Joanna Donohoe. She has an older sister, Cordelia. She is of Irish, Russian and Swiss ancestry. Her father worked for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, which led to her family moving a great deal, with a base in London but also living for periods overseas. After her father's retirement, he joined her mother in her antiques-dealing business.


title: Amanda Donohoe

text: Educated at the Francis Holland School, at age 15 she met Adam Ant. At 16 she left her parents' home, and moved in with Ant in Notting Hill. In October 1980 she accompanied Ant to the recording of the "Top of the Pops" performance of "Dog Eat Dog" and in an incident in BBC corridors afterwards, she personally stepped in to physically defend Ant from assault by rival band 4be2 who were also on the premises. In 1981, Donohoe appeared in the promotional videos for the songs "Antmusic" and "Stand and Deliver" by Adam and the Ants, which were screened on TV when the band were at the height of their fame. Shortly before the band began their 1981 world tour, Donohoe was offered a place at the Central School of Speech and Drama and she left Ant.


title: Amanda Donohoe

text: After graduation, Donohoe came to the attention of worldwide audiences with her film debut in 1986 when she was cast as Lucy Irvine in "Castaway". She followed this with roles in two Ken Russell films, "The Lair of the White Worm" and "The Rainbow". Another major film role was "Liar Liar" (1997).


title: Amanda Donohoe

text: After moving to Los Angeles in 1990, Donohoe made her debut on television in the role of lawyer Cara Jean "C.J." Lamb on the American television series "L.A. Law" in which she appeared during the fifth and sixth seasons of the series. In February 1991, she took part in the first of the so-called "lesbian kiss episodes" on American television when her character privately kissed fellow lawyer Abby Perkins, played by Michele Greene. Some of her other television roles include "Murder City", "Bad Girls" and a guest appearance in "Ally McBeal".


title: Amanda Donohoe

text: Donohoe made her Broadway debut in a 1995 production of "Uncle Vanya", at the Circle in the Square Theatre. She returned to the UK to play Mrs. Robinson in a 2001 stage production of "The Graduate".


title: Amanda Donohoe

text: After moving back to the UK in the early 2000s, Donohoe took the role of DI Susan Alembic in the crime drama "Murder City" (2004–2006). In 2009 she joined the cast of ITV soap opera "Emmerdale" as businesswoman Natasha Wylde. Donohoe played the character until leaving the series in November 2010. On 18 and 19 February 2010, she was a guest panellist on "Loose Women". She has also lent her voice to the Activision PC video game "Santa Fe Mysteries: The Elk Moon Murder" as Karen Gordon.


title: Amanda Donohoe

text: Donohoe won a Golden Globe Award for her role in "L.A. Law" and was nominated for an Outer Critics Circle Award for her Broadway debut in "Uncle Vanya".


title: Michael Constantine

text: Michael Constantine (born Gus Efstratiou (Ευστρατίου); May 22, 1927 – August 31, 2021) was an American actor. He is most widely recognized for his portrayal of Kostas "Gus" Portokalos, the Windex bottle-toting Greek father of Toula Portokalos (Nia Vardalos), in the film "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" (2002). Earlier, he earned acclaim for his television work, especially as the long-suffering high school principal, Seymour Kaufman, on ABC's comedy-drama, "Room 222," for which he won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series in 1970; he was again recognized by the Emmy Awards, as well as the Golden Globe Awards, the following year. After the conclusion of "Room 222", Constantine portrayed night court magistrate Matthew J. Sirota on the 1976 sitcom "Sirota's Court", receiving his second Golden Globe nomination. Constantine reprised his role as Gus Portokalos in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2" (2016).


title: Michael Constantine

text: Constantine was born Gus Efstratiou in Reading, Pennsylvania. He was the son of Andromache (née Fotiadou) and Theocharis Ioannides Efstratiou (a steel worker), both immigrants from Greece.


title: Michael Constantine

text: He began his career on the New York stage in the mid-1950s as understudy to Paul Muni in "Inherit the Wind". While in the cast, he met and married actress Julianna McCarthy on October 5, 1953; they had two children, Thea Eileen and Brendan Neil. The marriage ended in divorce in 1969, the same year that Constantine began his role on "Room 222". He later married Kathleen Christopher, though they also later divorced.


title: Michael Constantine

text: He studied acting with such prominent mentors as Howard Da Silva and played character roles on and off Broadway in his mid-twenties, supplementing his income as a night watchman and shooting-gallery barker. In 1959, he appeared in his first film, "The Last Mile" (1959). He had a small but memorable supporting role in "The Hustler" (1961). In 1964 and 1965, Constantine appeared on "Perry Mason", both times as the murderer. He played the role of wannabe private eye Dillard in "The Case of the Blonde Bonanza", then he played Pappy Ryan in "The Case of the Runaway Racer". In 1967, he appeared in the first part of "The Judgment", the two-episode conclusion of "The Fugitive", starring David Janssen. Constantine played a long-suffering anti-organized-crime agent in Walt Disney's caper film "The North Avenue Irregulars" (1979), where he appeared alongside Edward Herrmann and Cloris Leachman. He also played an organized crime mobster who worked for Frank Nitti in the television version of "The Untouchables". In 1988, he played the estranged father of one of the main characters in "".


title: Michael Constantine

text: He played Santa Claus in "Prancer" (1989). In 1993, Constantine appeared in the independent drama "Question of Faith", starring Anne Archer and Sam Neill. He played Tadzu Lempke in Stephen King's "Thinner" (1996). In 2002, he enjoyed an unexpected comeback as the Windex-toting Gus Portokalos in the hit movie "My Big Fat Greek Wedding", a role he reprised on the short-lived television series "My Big Fat Greek Life", and a sequel film with the original cast, "My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2", which was released on March 25, 2016.


title: Michael Constantine

text: Constantine was cast as the historical John Chisum in the 1965 episode, "Paid in Full", on the syndicated television anthology series, "Death Valley Days". He also appeared in another 1965 "Death Valley Days" episode "The Great Turkey War".


The Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople (, ; ; , "Roman Orthodox Patriarchate, Ecumenical Patriarchate") is one of the fifteen to seventeen autocephalous churches (or "jurisdictions") that together compose the Eastern Orthodox Church. It is headed by the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, currently Bartholomew, Archbishop of Constantinople.


title: Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople

text: Because of its historical location as the capital of the former Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire and its role as the mother church of most modern Orthodox churches, Constantinople holds a special place of honor within Orthodoxy and serves as the seat for the Ecumenical Patriarch, who enjoys the status of "primus inter pares" (first among equals) among the world's Eastern Orthodox prelates and is regarded as the representative and spiritual leader of Eastern Orthodox Christians.


text: The status of Ecumenical Patriarchate is not officially recognized by the Republic of Turkey; Turkey only recognises the authority of the Ecumenical Patriarchate over the Greek minority in Istanbul, Bozcaada and Gökçeada.


text: The Ecumenical Patriarchate promotes the expansion of the Christian faith and Eastern Orthodox doctrine, and the Ecumenical Patriarchs are involved in ecumenism and interfaith dialogue, charitable work, and the defense of Orthodox Christian traditions. Prominent issues for the Ecumenical Patriarchate's policy in the 21st century include the safety of the believers in the Middle East, reconciliation of the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic churches, and the reopening of the Theological School of Halki, which was closed down by the Turkish authorities in 1971.


text: Christianity in the Greek city of Byzantium was brought by Apostle Andrew himself who visited Byzantium, founded the See of Byzantium in 38 AD and appointed the bishop Stachys the Apostle who remained until 54 AD. Therefore, the Greek Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople claims its legitimate appointment from Apostle Andrew from whom the subsequent ordination of ministries claim legitimate inheritance through the sacrament of Holy Orders.


text: In the year 330 the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great moved his residence to the town renaming it "Nova Roma" (), or "New Rome." Thenceforth, the importance of the church there grew, along with the influence of its bishop.


text: Prior to the moving of the imperial capital, the bishop of Byzantium had been under the authority of the metropolitan of Heraclea, but from the 4th century on, he grew to become independent in his own right and even to exercise authority throughout what is now Greece, Asia Minor, Pontus, and Thrace. With the development of the hierarchical structure of the Church, the bishop of Constantinople came to be styled as exarch (a position superior to metropolitan). Constantinople was recognized as the fourth patriarchate at the First Council of Constantinople in 381, after Antioch, Alexandria, and Rome. The patriarch was usually appointed by Antioch.


text: Because of the importance of the position of Constantinople's church at the center of the Roman Empire, affairs involving the various churches outside Constantinople's direct authority came to be discussed in the capital, particularly where the intervention of the emperor was desired. The patriarch naturally became a liaison between the emperor and bishops traveling to the capital, thus establishing the position of the patriarch as one involving the unity of the whole Church, particularly in the East.


text: In turn, the affairs of the Constantinopolitan church were overseen not just by the patriarch, but also by synods held including visiting bishops. This pan-Orthodox synod came to be referred to as the (, "resident synod"). The resident synod not only governed the business of the patriarchate but also examined questions pertinent to the whole Church as well as the eastern half of the old empire.


text: The patriarch thus came to have the title of "Ecumenical", which referenced not a universal episcopacy over other bishops but rather the position of the patriarch as at the center of the , the "household" of the empire.


text: As the Roman Empire stabilized and grew, so did the influence of the patriarchate at its capital. This influence came to be enshrined in Orthodox canon law, to such an extent that it was elevated even beyond more ancient patriarchates: Canon 3 of the First Council of Constantinople (381) stated that the bishop of that city "shall have primacy of honor after the Bishop of Rome because Constantinople is the New Rome."


text: In its disputed 28th Canon, the Council of Chalcedon in 451 recognized an expansion of the boundaries of the Patriarchate of Constantinople and of its authority over bishops of dioceses "among the barbarians", which has been variously interpreted as referring either to areas outside the Byzantine Empire or to non-Greeks. The council resulted in a schism with the Patriarchate of Alexandria.