title: Barrel

text: Although it is common to refer to draught beer containers of any size as barrels, in the UK this is strictly correct only if the container holds 36 imperial gallons. The terms "keg" and "cask" refer to containers of any size, the distinction being that kegs are used for beers intended to be served using external gas cylinders. Cask ales undergo part of their fermentation process in their containers, called casks.


title: Barrel

text: Casks are available in several sizes, and it is common to refer to "a firkin" or "a kil" (kilderkin) instead of a cask.


title: Barrel

text: The modern US beer barrel is , half a gallon less than the traditional wine barrel. (26 U.S.C. §5051)


title: Barrel

text: Barrels are also used as a unit of measurement for dry goods (dry groceries), such as flour or produce. Traditionally, a barrel is of flour (wheat or rye), with other substances such as pork subject to more local variation. In modern times, produce barrels for all dry goods, excepting cranberries, contain 7,056 cubic inches, about 115.627 L.


title: Barrel

text: In the northeastern United States, nails, bolts, and plumbing fittings were commonly shipped in small rough barrels. These were small, 18 inches high by about 10–12 inches in diameter. The wood was the quality of pallet lumber. The binding was sometimes by wire or metal hoops or both. This practice seems to have been prevalent up till the 1980s. Older hardware stores probably still have some of these barrels.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: The Mondragon Corporation is a corporation and federation of worker cooperatives based in the Basque region of Spain.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: It was founded in the town of Mondragon in 1956 by José María Arizmendiarrieta and a group of his students at a technical college he founded. Its first product was paraffin heaters.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: It is the seventh-largest Spanish company in terms of asset turnover and the leading business group in the Basque Country. At the end of 2016, it employed 74,117 people in 257 companies and organizations in four areas of activity: finance, industry, retail and knowledge. By 2019, 81,507 people were employed.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Mondragon cooperatives operate in accordance with the Statement on the Co-operative Identity maintained by the International Co-operative Alliance.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 1941, a young Catholic priest, José María Arizmendiarrieta settled in Mondragón, a town with a population of 7,000 that had not yet recovered from the poverty, hunger, exile, and tension of the Spanish Civil War.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 1943, Arizmendiarrieta established a technical college which became a training ground for managers, engineers and skilled labour for local companies, and primarily for the co-operatives.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Arizmendiarrieta spent a number of years educating young people about a form of humanism based on solidarity and participation, in harmony with Catholic social teaching, and the importance of acquiring the necessary technical knowledge before creating the first co-operative.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 1955, he selected five young people to establish the first company of the co-operative and industrial beginning of the Mondragon Corporation. The company was called Talleres Ulgor, an acronym derived from the surnames of Usatorre, Larrañaga, Gorroñogoitia, Ormaechea, and Ortubay, known today as "Fagor Electrodomésticos".


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In the first 15 years many co-operatives were established, thanks to the autarky of the market and the awakening of the Spanish economy. During these years, also with the encouragement of Don José María Arizmendiarrieta, the Caja Laboral (1959) and the Social Welfare Body Lagun Aro (1966) were established that played a key role. The first local group was created, Ularco. In 1969, Eroski was founded by merging ten small local consumer co-operatives.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: During the next 20 years, from 1970 to 1990, the dynamic continued, with a strong increase in new co-operatives promoted by Caja Laboral's Business Division, the promotion of co-operative associations, the formation of local groups, and the founding of the Ikerlan Research Centre in 1974.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: With Spain scheduled to join the European Economic Community in 1986, it was decided in 1984 to establish the "Mondragon Co-operative Group", the forerunner of the current corporation. In-service training for managers was strengthened by creating Otalora, dedicated to training, and the dissemination of co-operatives. The Group consisted of 23,130 workers at the end of 1990.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: On the international stage, the aim was to respond to growing globalisation, expanding abroad by establishing production plants in a number of countries. The first was the Copreci plant in Mexico in 1990, followed by many others: up to 73 by the end of 2008, and 122 at the end of 2013. The goals were to increase competitiveness and market share, bring component supply closer to customers' plants, especially in the automotive and domestic appliance sectors, and to strengthen employment in the Basque Country by promoting exports of co-operatives' products by means of new platforms.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: While they were commercialized as safe deposits, the courts classed them as riskier debt instruments.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 2008, the worker-owners of the cooperatives Ampo (metal casting) and Irizar (coaches) voted to leave the corporation.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In October 2009, the United Steelworkers announced an agreement with Mondragon to create worker cooperatives in the United States. On 26 March 2012, the USW, Mondragon, and the Ohio Employee Ownership Center (OEOC) announced their detailed union co-op model.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: The industrial sector ended 2012 with a new record of €4 billion in international sales, beating sales figures from before the financial crisis of 2007–2008. Mondragon opened 11 new production subsidiaries. International sales that year accounted for 69% of all sales, a 26% increase from 2009 to 2012, and with 14,000 employees abroad. Mondragon's share in the BRIC markets increased to 20% compared to the previous year. In 2013, international sales grew by 6.7% and accounted for 71.1% of total sales.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: On 16 October 2013, domestic appliance company Fagor Electrodomésticos filed for bankruptcy under Spanish law to renegotiate €1,1 billion of debt, after suffering heavy losses during the eurocrisis putting 5,600 employees at risk of losing their jobs. This was followed by the bankruptcy of the whole Fagor group on 6 November 2013. In July 2014, Fagor was bought by Catalonian company Cata for €42.5 million. Cata pledged to create 705 direct jobs in the Basque Country and to continue the brand names Fagor, Edesa, Aspes, and Splendid.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 2022, the worker-owners of ULMA Group (scaffolding) and Orona (elevators) voted to leave the corporation.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: As successful cooperatives they were contributing 10% of their profit to a common fund supporting ailing cooperatives.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: They will not contribute to the solidarity fund but they will keep insuring their workers with Lagun Aro and collaborate with Mondragon Unibertsitatea and other cooperatives in the group.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Mondragon co-operatives are united by a humanist concept of business, a philosophy of participation and solidarity, and a shared business culture. The culture is rooted in a shared mission and a number of principles, corporate values and business policies.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Over the years, these links have been embodied in a series of operating rules approved on a majority basis by the Co-operative Congresses, which regulate the activity of the Governing Bodies of the corporation (Standing Committee, General Council), the Grassroots Co-operatives and the Divisions they belong to, from the organisational, institutional and economic points of view as well as in terms of assets.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: This framework of business culture has been structured based on a common culture derived from the 10 Basic Co-operative Principles, in which Mondragon is rooted: Open Admission, Democratic Organisation, the Sovereignty of Labour, Instrumental and Subordinate Nature of Capital, Participatory Management, Payment Solidarity, Inter-cooperation, Social Transformation, Universality and Education.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: This philosophy is complemented by four corporate values: "Co-operation", acting as owners and protagonists; "Participation", which takes shape as a commitment to management; "Social Responsibility", by means of the distribution of wealth based on solidarity; and "Innovation", focusing on constant renewal in all areas.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: This business culture translates into compliance with a number of Basic Objectives (Customer Focus, Development, Innovation, Profitability, People in Co-operation and Involvement in the Community) and General Policies approved by the Co-operative Congress, which are taken on board at all the corporation's organisational levels and incorporated into the four-year strategic plans and the annual business plans of the individual co-operatives, divisions, and the corporation as a whole.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: At Mondragon, there are agreed-upon wage ratios between executive work and field or factory work which earns a minimum wage. These ratios range from 3:1 to 9:1 in different cooperatives and average 5:1. That is, the general manager of an average Mondragon cooperative earns no more than 5 times as much as the theoretical minimum wage paid in their cooperative. For most workers, this ratio is smaller because there are few Mondragon worker-owners that earn minimum wages, because most jobs are somewhat specialized and are classified at higher wage levels. The wage ratio of a cooperative is decided periodically by its worker-owners through a democratic vote.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Compared to similar jobs at local industries, Mondragon managers' wages are considerably lower (as some companies pay their best paid managers hundreds of times more than the lowest-paid employee of the company) and equivalent for middle management, technical and professional levels. Lower wage levels are on average 13% higher than similar jobs at local businesses. Spain's progressive tax rate further reduces any disparity in pay. These comparatively low wages can make it very difficult to recruit managers from investor-owned firms.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Mondragon Corporation operates in four areas: finance, industry, retail, and knowledge, with the latter distinguishing Mondragon from other business groups. In 2013, the corporation posted a total revenue of over €12 billion (roughly US$16 billion), and employed 74,061 workers, making it Spain's fourth-largest industrial and tenth-largest financial group.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: This area includes the banking business of Laboral Kutxa, the insurance company "Seguros Lagun Aro", and the Voluntary Social Welfare Body "Lagun Aro", which had an asset fund totaling €5,566 million at the end of 2014. The yield obtained from this fund is used to cover long-term retirement, widowhood, and invalidity benefits, complementary to those offered by the Spanish social security system.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: The corporation's companies manufacture consumer goods, capital goods, industrial components, products, and systems for construction, and services. The latter includes very diverse business groups such as Abantail: Adaptive design optimization, Alecop: Engineering training, LKS Consultores: Attorneys etc., KREAN: Architects and engineers. MCCTelecom: Telecommunication engineering. Mondragon Lingua: Translation and language schools, Mondragon Sistemas: Automation, Industrial Computing and Telecommunications. Ondoan: Turnkey projects in the energy and environmental sector.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In the leisure and sports area, it manufactures Orbea bicycles, exercise equipment and items for camping, garden and beach.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In capital goods, Mondragon posted a turnover of €976 million in 2009 and is the leading Spanish manufacturer of machining (Danobat Group) and sheet metal forming (Fagor Arrasate Group) machine tools. These machines are complemented by automation and control products for machine tools, packaging machinery, machinery for automating assembly processes and processing wood, forklift trucks, electric transformers, integrated equipment for the catering industry, cold stores, and refrigeration equipment. Specifically focusing on the automotive sector, the corporation also manufactures a wide variety of dies, molds and tooling for casting iron and aluminium, and occupies a leading position in machinery for the casting sector.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In Industrial Components, Mondragon posted a turnover of €1.5 billion in 2009, a sector in which it operates as an integrated supplier for the leading car manufacturers, offering from the design and development of a part to the industrialization and supply of components and assemblies. It has different business units such as brakes, axles, suspension, transmission, engines, aluminium wheel rims, fluid conduction, and other internal and external vehicle components. It also produces components for the main domestic appliance manufacturers in three business areas: white goods, home comfort, and electronics. And it manufactures flanges and pipe accessories for processing oil-gas, petrochemical plants and power generation, copper and aluminium electrical conductors, and components for conveyors.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In construction, sales totaled €974 million in 2009. Mondragon has constructed buildings and important infrastructure projects. It designs and builds large metallic (URSSA), laminated wood and prefabricated concrete structures; supplies prefabricated parts in polymer concrete; offers solutions for formwork and structures (ULMA Group) as well as public works machinery and the industrialization of the construction process, including engineering and assembly services. The ORONA Group produces elevators.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In services to business, sales totaled €248 million in 2008, including business consultancy services, architecture and engineering, property consulting, design and innovation (LKS Group), systems engineering for electromechanical installations, and integrated logistics engineering. It also offers a modern language service, manufactures educational equipment, and provides graphic arts services (mccgraphics S.Coop).


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 2013, 71.1% of turnover came from international sales. Sales resulting from the export of products abroad and production generated in the 122 subsidiaries located in several different countries: China (15), France (17), Poland (8), Czech Republic (7), Mexico (8), Brazil (5), Germany (4), Italy (4), United Kingdom (3), Romania (3), United States (4), Turkey (2), Portugal (2), Slovakia (2), India (5), Thailand (1) and Morocco (1). Overall, in 2013 these 122 plants provided work for more than 11,000 people. The corporate industrial park in Kunshan, close to Shanghai houses seven subsidiaries. In 2012, it opened 11 new subsidiaries abroad, employing around 14,000 people. Its international sales that year marked a record number of 69% of its total sales (€5.8 billion, with a 2% fall compared to the previous year). Mondragon also participated in 91 international R&D projects.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 2014, the industrial cooperatives created 1,000 jobs, and internationalization continued with 125 production subsidiaries abroad – 3 more than the year before.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Mondragon runs Eroski, one of the leading retail groups all over Spain and in southern France, and maintains close contacts with the French group Les Mousquetaires and the German retailer Edeka, with whom it set up the Alidis international purchasing group in 2002. The worker-owners and consumer-members participate in the co-operative's decision-making bodies and management of Eroski. At the end of 2013, Eroski posted a turnover of €6.6 billion, operating 2.069 stores made up of 90 Eroski hypermarkets, 1,211 Eroski/center, Caprabo, Eroski/city, Aliprox, Familia, Onda and Cash & Carry supermarkets, 155 branches of Eroski travel agencies, 63 petrol stations, 39 Forum Sport stores and 221 IF perfume stores. In southern France Eroski had 4 hypermarkets, 16 supermarkets and 17 petrol stations, and 4 perfume stores in Andorra.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Retail includes the food group "Erkop", for catering, cleaning, stock-breeding, and horticulture with "Auzo Lagun", a co-operative in group catering and cleaning of buildings and premises, and integrated service in the health sector.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 2008, worker-members voted to expand the cooperative transformation to the retail group as a whole, turning subsidiaries into co-operatives, and making salaried workers worker-members.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: This area has a dual focus: education-training and innovation, which have both been key elements in the development of the corporation. Training-education is mainly linked to the dynamism of Mondragon University, the significant role that Politeknika Ikastegia Txorierri, Arizmendi Ikastola and Lea Artibai Ikastetxea play in their respective areas and the activity of the Management and Co-operative Development Centre Otalora.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Mondragon University is a co-operative university, which combines the development of knowledge, skills, and values, and maintains close relations with business, especially Mondragon co-operatives. Technological innovation is generated through the co-operatives' own R&D departments, the Corporate Science and Technology Plan, the corporation's 12 technology centers and the Garaia Innovation Park.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: The 15 technology centers play a fundamental role in the development of the sectors of focus. In 2009 they employed 742 people and had a budget of €53.7 million. In 2013 its network of technology centers and R&D units provided employment for 1,700 people and the commitment to R&D&I matters amounted to 136 million Euros, 8.5% of added value. Mondragon has 479 families of Patents for Inventions, which accounts for 25% patents in the Basque Country, participating in more than 30 R&D cooperation projects at the European level.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In 2012 Richard D. Wolff, an American professor of economics, hailed the Mondragon set of enterprises, including the good wages it provides for employees, the empowerment of ordinary workers in decision making, and the measure of equality for female workers, as a major success and cited it as a working model of an alternative to the capitalist mode of production.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In an April 2012 interview Noam Chomsky said that while Mondragon offers an alternative to capitalism, it was still embedded in a capitalist system which limits Mondragon's decisions:


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: Vicenç Navarro wrote that from a business perspective, Mondragon is successful in matching efficiency with solidarity and democracy. However, he writes that the number of employees who are not owners has increased more rapidly than worker-owners, to a point that in some companies, for example in the supermarket chains owned by Mondragon, the first is a much larger group than the second. In Navarro's view, this establishes a two-tier system – for example, in terms of whom to save in the case the company collapses. In the collapse of Fagor, the relocation of employees to other companies belonging to Mondragon favored those who were worker-owners, which may affect labor relations:


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: The Mondragon system is one of four case studies analyzed in "Capital and the Debt Trap", which summarized evidence claiming that cooperatives tend to last longer and are less susceptible to perverse incentives and other problems of organizational governance than more traditionally managed organizations.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: The founders of Cooperation Jackson, a network of worker cooperatives in Jackson, Mississippi in the United States, cite Mondragon as a key inspiration.


title: Mondragon Corporation

text: In "2312", a science fiction novel by Kim Stanley Robinson, the Mondragon Corporation has evolved into a planned economy system called "the Mondragon Accord". The Mondragon Accord is controlled by means of a network of AIs running on "quantum computers", and rules large parts of the Solar System, including Mercury and most of the moons of the gas giants; only part of Earth, and its colonies in space, retain remnants of capitalist economies, while Mars has withdrawn from the Accord in the century preceding the story. The Mondragon Corporation already appeared in Robinson's earlier "Mars trilogy", as one of the Terran groups involved in the colonization and terraforming of Mars; the coop is also portrayed as the inspiration of both the "bogdanovist" movement and the libertarian-leaning "Praxis Corporation" two of the main forces leading the revolution for the independence of Mars. In Robinson's book "The Ministry for the Future", the Mondragon Corporation is introduced in chapter 58 as a model for a future, post-capitalist, cooperative economy.


title: Minaret

text: A minaret (; , or ; ; ) is a type of tower typically built into or adjacent to mosques. Minarets are generally used to project the Muslim call to prayer ("adhan"), but they also served as landmarks and symbols of Islam's presence. They can have a variety of forms, from thick, squat towers to soaring, pencil-thin spires.


title: Minaret

text: Two Arabic words are used to denote the minaret tower: "manāra" and "manār". The English word "minaret" originates from the former, via the Turkish version (). The Arabic word "manāra" (plural: "manārāt") originally meant a "lamp stand", a cognate of Hebrew "menorah". It is assumed to be a derivation of an older reconstructed form, "manwara". The other word, "manār" (plural: "manā'ir" or "manāyir"), means "a place of light". Both words derive from the Arabic root "n-w-r", which has a meaning related to "light". Both words also had other meanings attested during the early Islamic period: "manār" could also mean a "sign" or "mark" (to show one where to go) and both "manār" and "manāra" could mean "lighthouse".


title: Minaret

text: The formal function of a minaret is to provide a vantage point from which the muezzin can issue the call to prayer, or "adhan". The call to prayer is issued five times each day: dawn, noon, mid-afternoon, sunset, and night. In most modern mosques, the ' is called from the ' (prayer hall) via microphone to a speaker system on the minaret.


title: Minaret

text: Additionally, minarets historically served a visual symbolic purpose. In the early 9th century, the first minarets were placed opposite the qibla wall. Oftentimes, this placement was not beneficial in reaching the community for the call to prayer. They served as a reminder that the region was Islamic and helped to distinguish mosques from the surrounding architecture. They also acted as symbols of the political and religious authority of the Muslim rulers who built them.


title: Minaret

text: The region's socio-cultural context have influenced the shape, size and form of minarets. Different regions and periods developed different styles of minarets. Typically, the tower's shaft has a cylindrical, cuboid (square), or octagonal shape. Stairs or ramps inside the tower climb to the top in a counter-clockwise fashion. Some minarets have two or three narrow staircases fitted inside one another in order to allow multiple individuals to safely descend and ascend simultaneously. At the top of the stairs, a balcony encircles the upper sections of the tower and from here the muezzin may give the call to prayer. Some minaret traditions featured multiple balconies along the tower's shaft. The summit often finishes in a lantern-like structure and/or a small dome, conical roof, or curving stone cap, which is in turn topped by a decorative metal finial. Different architectural traditions also placed minarets at different positions relative to the mosque. The number of minarets by mosques was also not fixed: originally only one minaret accompanied a mosque, but some later traditions constructed more, especially for larger or more prestigious mosques.


title: Minaret

text: Minarets are built out of any material that is readily available, and often changes from region to region. In the construction of the tall and slender Ottoman minarets, molten iron was poured into pre-cut cavities inside the stones, which then solidified and helped to bind the stones together. This made the structures more resistant to earthquakes and powerful winds.


title: Minaret

text: The earliest mosques lacked minarets, and the call to prayer was often performed from smaller tower structures. The early Muslim community of Medina gave the call to prayer from the doorway or roof of the house of Muhammad, which doubled as a place for prayer, and this continued to be the practice in mosques during the period of the four Rashidun Caliphs (632–661).


title: Minaret

text: The origin of the minaret is unclear. Many 19th-century and early 20th-century scholars traced the origin of minarets to the Umayyad Caliphate period (661–750) and believed that they imitated the church steeples found in Syria in those times. Others suggested that the these towers were inspired by the ziggurats of Babylonian and Assyrian shrines in Mesopotamia. Some scholars, such as A. J. Butler and Hermann Thiersch, agreed that the Syrian minarets were derived from church towers but also argued that the minarets of Egypt were inspired by the form of the Pharos Lighthouse in Alexandria (which survived up until medieval times). K. A. C. Creswell, an orientalist and important early-20th-century scholar of Islamic architecture, contributed a major study on the question in 1926 which then became the standard scholarly theory on the origin of minarets for roughly fifty years.Creswell attributed the origin of minaret towers to the influence of Syrian church towers and regarded the spiral or helicoidal minarets of the Abbasid period as deriving from local ziggurat precedents, but rejected the possible influence of the Pharos Lighthouse. He also established that the earliest mosques had no minarets and he suggested that the first purpose-built minarets were built for the Mosque of Amr ibn al-As in Fustat in 673. In 1989 Jonathan Bloom published a new study which argued that the first true minaret towers did not appear until the 9th century, under Abbasid rule, and that their initial purpose was not related to the call to prayer.


title: Minaret

text: References on Islamic architecture since the late 20th century often agree with Bloom's view that the mosques of the Umayyad Caliphate did not have minarets in the form of towers. Instead of towers, some Umayyad mosques were built with platforms or shelters above their roofs that were accessed by a staircase and from which the muezzins could issue the call to prayer. These structures were referred to as a "mi'dhana" ("place of the "adhān"") or as a "ṣawma῾a" ("monk's cell", due to its small size). An example of these platforms is documented during the reconstruction of the Mosque of Amr ibn al-As in 673 by Mu'awiya's local governor, Maslama ibn Mukhallad al-Ansari, who was given orders by the caliph to add one to each of the mosque's four corners, similar to the Great Mosque of Damascus which had a "ṣawma῾a" above each of the Roman-era towers at its four corners. Historical sources also mention such features in mosques in other parts of North Africa. In another example, under the Umayyad Emirate of al-Andalus, emir Hisham I ordered the addition of a "ṣawma'a" to the Great Mosque of Cordoba in 793.


title: Minaret

text: A possible exception to the absence of tower minarets is documented in Caliph al-Walid's renovation of the Prophet's Mosque in Medina in the early 8th century, during which he built a tower, referred to as a "manāra", at each of the mosque's four corners. However, it's not clear what function these towers served. They do not appear to have been used for the call to prayer and may have been intended instead as visual symbols of the mosque's status. Historical sources also reference an earlier stone tower, called a "manāra", being added to the mosque of Basra in 665 by the Umayyad provincial governor.


title: Minaret

text: The first known minarets built as towers appeared under Abbasid rule. Four towers were added to the Great Mosque of Mecca during its Abbasid reconstruction in the late 8th century. In the 9th century single minaret towers were built in or near the middle of the wall opposite the qibla wall of mosques. These towers were built across the empire in a height to width ratio of around 3:1. One of the oldest minarets still standing is that of the Great Mosque of Kairouan in Tunisia, built in 836 and well-preserved today. Other minarets that date from the same period, but less precisely dated, include the minaret of the Friday Mosque of Siraf, now the oldest minaret in Iran, and the minaret opposite the qibla wall at the Great Mosque of Damascus (known as the "Minaret of the Bride"), now the oldest minaret in the region of Syria (though its upper section was probably rebuilt multiple times). In Samarra, the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate in present-day Iraq, the Great Mosque of Samarra was built in the years 848–852 and featured a massive helicoidal minaret behind its northern wall. Its design was repeated in the nearby Abu Dulaf Mosque (861). The earlier theory which proposed that these helicoidal minarets were inspired by ancient Mesopotamian ziggurats has been challenged and rejected by some later scholars including Richard Ettinghausen, Oleg Grabar, and Jonathan Bloom.


title: Minaret

text: Bloom also argues that the early Abbasid minarets were not built to host the call to prayer, but were instead adopted as symbols of Islam that were suited to important congregational mosques. Their association with the muezzin and the call to prayer only developed later. As the first minaret towers were built by the Abbasids and had a symbolic value associated with them, some of the Islamic regimes opposed to the Abbasids, such as the Fatimids, generally refrained from building them during these early centuries. The earliest evidence of minarets being used for hosting the call to prayer dates to the 10th century and it was only towards the 11th century that minaret towers became a near-universal feature of mosques.


title: Minaret

text: The oldest minarets in Iraq date from the Abbasid period. The Great Mosque of Samarra (848–852) is accompanied by one of the earliest preserved minarets, a cylindrical brick tower with a spiral staircases wrapped around it, standing outside the walls of the mosque. It is the tallest of the early minarets of the Abbasid period and remains the most massive historic minaret in the world, involving over 6000 cubic meters of brick masonry. The Abu Dulaf Mosque, built near Samarra and finished in 861, has a smaller minaret of similar shape.


title: Minaret

text: In the later Abbasid period (11th to 13th centuries), after the Seljuk period, minarets were typically cylindrical brick towers whose square or polygonal bases were integrated into the structure of the mosque itself. Their main cylindrical shafts were tapered and culminated in "muqarnas" cornices supporting a balcony, above which is another small cylindrical turret topped by a dome. Two examples of this style are the Mosque of al-Khaffafin and the Mosque of Qumriyya.


title: Minaret

text: Starting with the Seljuk period (11th and 12th centuries), minarets in Iran had cylindrical shafts with square or octagonal bases that taper towards their summit. These minarets became the most common style in the eastern Islamic world (in Iran, Central Asia, and South Asia). During the Seljuk period minarets were tall and highly decorated with geometric and calligraphic design. They were built prolifically, even at smaller mosques or mosque complexes. The Kalyan Minaret in Bukhara remains the most well known of the Seljuk minarets for its use of brick patterned decoration. The tallest minaret of this era, the Minaret of Jam, in a remote area of present-day Afghanistan, was built circa 1175 by the Ghurids and features elaborate brick decoration and inscriptions. The Qutb Minar in Delhi, the most monumental minaret in India, was built in 1199 and was designed on the same model as the Minaret of Jam.


title: Minaret

text: In later periods, however, minarets in this region became generally less monumental in comparison with the mosques for which they were built. The tradition of building pairs of minarets probably began in the 12th century, but it became especially prominent under the Ilkhanids (13th-14th centuries), who built twin minarets flanking important iwans such as the mosque's entrance.


title: Minaret

text: The rise of the Timurid Empire, which heavily patronized art and architecture, led to what is now called the "international Timurid" style which spread from Central Asia during and after the 15th century. It is categorized by the use of multiple minarets. Examples of this style include the monuments of Mughal architecture in the Indian subcontinent, such as the minarets on the roof of the south gate in Akbar's Tomb at Sikandra (1613), the minarets on the Tomb of Jahangir (1628-1638), and the four minarets surrounding the mausoleum of the Taj Mahal. Elsewhere in India, some cities and towns along the coast have small mosques with simple staircase minarets.


title: Minaret

text: The styles of minarets has varied throughout the history of Egypt. The minaret of the 9th-century Ibn Tulun Mosque imitated the spiral minarets of contemporary Abbasid Samarra, though the current tower was reconstructed later in 1296. Under the Fatimids (10th-12th centuries), new mosques generally lacked minarets. One unusual exception is the Mosque of al-Hakim, built between 990 and 1010, which has two minarets at its corners. The two towers have slightly different shapes: both have square bases but one has a cylindrical shaft above this and the other an octagonal shaft. This multi-tier design was only found in the minarets of the great mosques at Mecca and Medina at that time, suggesting a possible link to those designs. Shortly after their construction, the lower sections of the minarets were encased in massive square bastions, for reasons that are not clearly known, and the tops were rebuilt in 1303 by a Mamluk sultan.


title: Minaret

text: Under the Ayyubids (late 12th to mid-13th centuries), the details of minarets borrowed from Fatimid designs. Most distinctively, the summits of minarets had a lantern structure topped by a pointed ribbed dome, whose appearance was compared to a "mabkhara", or incense burner. This design continued under the early Bahri Mamluks (13th to early 14th century), but soon began to evolve into the shapes distinctive to Mamluk architecture. They became very ornate and usually consisted of three tiers separated by balconies, with each tier having a different design than the others. This configuration was particularly characteristic of Cairo. The minaret of the al-Maridani Mosque (circa 1340) is the first one to have an entirely octagonal shaft and the first one to end with a narrow lantern structure consisting of eight slender columns topped by a bulbous stone finial. This style later became the basic standard form of Cairene minarets, while the "makhbara"-style summit disappeared.


title: Minaret

text: Later minarets in the Burji Mamluk period (late 14th to early 16th centuries) typically had an octagonal shaft for the first tier, a round shaft on the second, and a lantern structure with finial on the third level. The stone-carved decoration of the minaret also became very extensive and varied from minaret to minaret. Minarets with completely square or rectangular shafts reappeared at the very end of the Mamluk period during the reign of Sultan al-Ghuri (r. 1501–1516). During al-Ghuri's reign the lantern summits were also doubled – as with the minaret of the Mosque of Qanibay Qara or al-Ghuri's minaret at the al-Azhar Mosque – or even quadrupled – as with the original minaret of al-Ghuri's madrasa.


title: Minaret

text: Minarets in the Maghreb (region encompassing present-day Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco) and historic al-Andalus (present-day Spain and Portugal) traditionally have a square shaft and are arranged in two tiers: the main shaft, which makes up most of its height, and a much smaller secondary tower above this which is in turn topped by a finial of copper or brass spheres. Some minarets in the Maghreb have octagonal shafts, though this is more characteristic of certain regions or periods; e.g. the minarets of the Great Mosque of Chefchaouen, the Great Mosque of Ouazzane, the Kasbah Mosque of Tangier, and the Great Mosque of Asilah in Morocco or the Ottoman-era minarets of Tunisia such as the Youssef Dey Mosque and the Hammouda Pacha Mosque. Inside the main shaft a staircase, and in other cases a ramp, ascends to the top of the minaret.


title: Minaret

text: The minaret at the Great Mosque of Kairouan, built in 836 under Aghlabid rule, is the oldest minaret in North Africa and one of the oldest minarets in the world. It has the shape of a massive tower with a square base, three levels of decreasing widths, and a total height of 31.5 meters. The first two levels are from the original 9th-century construction but the third level was reconstructed at a later period. Another important minaret for the architectural history of the region is the minaret built by Abd ar-Rahman III for the Great Mosque of Cordoba in 951–952, which became the model for later minarets in the Maghreb and al-Andalus. Jonathan Bloom has suggested that Abd ar-Rahman III's construction of the minaret – along with his sponsoring of other minarets around the same time in Fez – was partly intended as a visual symbol of his self-declared authority as caliph and may have also been aimed at defying the rival Fatimid Caliphs to the east who did not endorse the construction of minarets at the time. Other important historic minarets in the region are the Almohad-era minarets of the Kutubiyya Mosque and the Kasbah Mosque in Marrakesh, the Hassan Tower in Rabat, and the Giralda in Seville, all from the 12th and early 13th centuries.


title: Minaret

text: The Seljuks of Rum, a successor state of the Seljuk Empire, built paired portal minarets from brick that had Iranian origins. In general, mosques in Anatolia had only one minaret and received decorative emphasis while most of the mosque remained plain. Seljuk minarets were built of stone or brick, usually resting on a stone base, and typically had a cylindrical or polygonal shaft that is less slender than later Ottoman minarets. They were sometimes embellished with decorative brickwork or glazed ceramic decoration up the level of their balconies.


title: Minaret

text: Ottoman architecture followed earlier Seljuk models and continued the Iranian tradition of cylindrical tapering minaret forms with a square base. Classical Ottoman minarets are described as "pencil-shaped" due to their slenderness and sharply-pointed summits, often topped with a crescent moon symbol. The presence of more than one minaret, and of larger minarets, was reserved for mosques commissioned by the Ottoman sultans themselves. Taller minarets often also had multiple balconies along their shafts instead of one. The Üç Şerefeli Mosque in Edirne, finished in 1447, was the first sultanic mosque to have multiple minarets with multiple balconies. Of its four minarets, the northwestern minaret was the tallest Ottoman minaret up to that time, rising to 67 metres. Its height was only surpassed by the minarets of the Selimiye Mosque in Edirne (1574), which are 70.89 meters tall and are the tallest minarets in Ottoman architecture. Later Ottoman minarets also became plainer and more uniform in design. The trend of multiple minarets culminated in the six minarets of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque (also known as the Blue Mosque) in Istanbul.


title: Minaret

text: Next to the Huaishengsi Mosque in Guangzhou is the Tower of Light, also known as the Guangta minaret (1350). The mosque and the minaret merge aspects of Islamic and Chinese architecture. Its circular shaft and the double staircase arrangement inside it resembles the minarets of Iranian and Central Asian architecture, such as the Minaret of Jam.


title: Kennedy and Heidi

text: "Kennedy and Heidi" is the 83rd episode of the HBO television series "The Sopranos", the sixth episode of the second half of the show's sixth season, and the 18th episode of the season overall. Written by Matthew Weiner and series creator and showrunner David Chase and directed by Alan Taylor, it premiered in the United States on May 13, 2007.


title: Kennedy and Heidi

text: A.J.'s therapist sees that the prescribed drugs are working: he is happier and calmer, and taking college courses again. He continues to spend time with Jason Parisi and Jason Gervasi at their frat house. They laugh about Victor, who had his toes amputated after they injured him with sulfuric acid. The two Jasons and others assault a Somali student while A.J. stands by, distressed, and he relapses into depression. "Why can't we all just get along?" he says.


title: Kennedy and Heidi

text: Phil discovers that the construction/demolition waste that Tony has been sending to Barone Sanitation contains asbestos. At a meeting in New York, he says that he will not accept any more unless he receives a 25% cut; Tony refuses. As Christopher drives him back to Newark, Tony admits he may have to yield, but the waste is eventually dumped into a lake.


title: Kennedy and Heidi

text: Chris is restless as he drives, and Tony looks at him carefully. Their car drifts into the opposite lane, then swerves sharply to avoid an approaching car. They go off the road and the car rolls many times as it descends an embankment. Tony exits the wreckage in pain but with only minor injuries. Chris, who was not wearing a seat belt, is seriously injured, with internal bleeding. He manages to tell Tony to call a taxi as he would not pass a drug test. Tony begins to call for help but abruptly changes his mind. He pinches Chris's nose shut so that he cannot breathe, and he chokes to death on his own blood.


title: Kennedy and Heidi

text: Tony dreams that he tells Dr. Melfi that he killed Chris, Pussy, and Tony B. During his actual session, he recalls Chris as a liability and an embarrassment and says he resents having to feign remorse in front of his family. At the wake, he is disgusted by the display of sorrow. He and Carmela also make an appearance at the wake of Paulie's adoptive mother Nucci, who has died of a stroke; Paulie is angered by the poor attendance but appreciates Tony and Carmela's appearance.


title: Kennedy and Heidi

text: Tony decides to get away to Las Vegas. He meets Sonya, a stripper who was Chris's mistress. They have sex, smoke marijuana, and take peyote. Playing roulette, he has a winning streak. He mumbles, "He's dead," and collapses on the casino floor laughing. With Sonya, he watches the sun rise over the Red Rock Canyon. There is a flash in the sky, and Tony cries: "I get it!"


title: Lothair I

text: Lothair I or Lothar I (Dutch and Medieval Latin: "Lotharius"; German: "Lothar"; French: "Lothaire"; Italian: "Lotario") (795 – 29 September 855) was emperor (817–855, co-ruling with his father until 840), and the governor of Bavaria (815–817), King of Italy (818–855) and Middle Francia (840–855).


title: Lothair I

text: Lothair was the eldest son of the Carolingian emperor Louis the Pious and his wife Ermengarde of Hesbaye, daughter of Ingerman the duke of Hesbaye. On several occasions, Lothair led his full-brothers Pepin I of Aquitaine and Louis the German in revolt against their father to protest against attempts to make their half-brother Charles the Bald a co-heir to the Frankish domains. Upon the father's death, Charles and Louis joined forces against Lothair in a three-year civil war (840–843). The struggles between the brothers led directly to the breakup of the Frankish Empire assembled by their grandfather Charlemagne, and laid the foundation for the development of modern France and Germany.


title: Lothair I

text: Lothair was born in 795, to Louis the Pious and Ermengarde of Hesbaye. His father was the son of the reigning Emperor, Charlemagne. Little is known of Lothair's early life, which was probably passed at the court of his grandfather Charlemagne. In 814, the elderly emperor died, and left his sole surviving legitimate son Louis the Pious as successor to his vast empire. The next year, Lothair would be sent to govern Bavaria for his father, the new emperor. In 817, Louis the Pious drew up his "Ordinatio Imperii". In this, Louis designated Lothair as his principal heir and ordered that Lothair would be the overlord of Louis' younger sons Pippin of Aquitaine (who was 20) and Louis the German (who was 13), as well as his nephew (Lothair's cousin) Bernard of Italy. Lothair would also inherit their lands if they were to die childless. Lothair, aged 22, was then crowned joint emperor by his father at Aachen. At the same time, Aquitaine and Bavaria were granted to his brothers Pippin and Louis, respectively, as subsidiary kingdoms. Following the death of Bernard, brought on by his plotting against and blinding by Louis the Pious, Lothair also received the Kingdom of Italy. In 821, Lothair married Ermengarde (d. 851), daughter of Hugh the Count of Tours.


title: Lothair I

text: In 822, he assumed the government of Italy, and at Easter, 5 April 823, he was crowned emperor again by Pope Paschal I, this time at Rome. In November 824, Lothair promulgated a statute, the "Constitutio Romana", concerning the relations of pope and emperor, which reserved the supreme power to the secular potentate, and he afterwards issued various ordinances for the good government of Italy.


title: Lothair I

text: On Lothair's return to his father's court, his stepmother Judith won his consent to her plan for securing a kingdom for her son Charles, a scheme which was carried out in 829, when the young prince was given Alemannia as king. Lothair, however, soon changed his attitude and spent the succeeding decade in constant strife over the division of the Empire with his father. He was alternately master of the Empire, and banished and confined to Italy, at one time taking up arms in alliance with his brothers and at another fighting against them, whilst the bounds of his appointed kingdom were in turn extended and reduced.


title: Lothair I

text: The first rebellion began in 830. All three brothers fought their father, whom they deposed. In 831, their father was reinstated and he deprived Lothair of his imperial title and gave Italy to Charles. The second rebellion was instigated by Angilbert II, Archbishop of Milan in 833, and again Louis was deposed in 834. Lothair, through the loyalty of the Lombards and later reconciliations, retained Italy and the imperial position through all remaining divisions of the Empire by his father.


title: Lothair I

text: When Louis the Pious was dying in 840, he sent the imperial insignia to Lothair, who, disregarding the various partitions, claimed the whole of the Empire. He was 45 years old when his father died. Negotiations with his brother Louis the German and his half-brother Charles, both of whom resisted this claim, were followed by an alliance of the younger brothers against Lothair. A decisive battle was fought at Fontenay-en-Puisaye on 25 June 841, when, in spite of his and his allied nephew Pepin II of Aquitaine's personal gallantry, Lothair was defeated and fled to Aachen. With fresh troops he began a war of plunder, but the forces of his brothers were too strong, and taking with him such treasure as he could collect, he abandoned his capital to them. He met with the leaders of the "Stellinga" in Speyer and promised them his support in return for theirs, but Louis and then the native Saxon nobility put down the "Stellinga" in the next years.


title: Lothair I

text: Peace negotiations began, and in June 842 the brothers met on an island in the Saône. They agreed to an arrangement which developed, after much difficulty and delay, into the Treaty of Verdun, signed in August 843. By this, Lothair received the imperial title as well as northern Italy and a long stretch of territory from the North Sea to the Mediterranean, essentially along the valleys of the Rhine and the Rhône; this territory includes the regions Lorraine, Alsace, Burgundy, and Provence. He soon ceded Italy to his eldest son, Louis, and remained in his new kingdom, engaging in alternate quarrels and reconciliations with his brothers and in futile efforts to defend his lands from the attacks of the Northmen (as Vikings were known in Frankish writings) and the Saracens (as those loyal to the various Fatimids, Umayyads and Abbasides are known in Frankish writings).


title: Lothair I

text: In 845 the count of Arles, Fulcrad, led a rebellion in Provence. The emperor put it down and the count joined him in an expedition against the Saracens in Italy in 846.


title: Lothair I

text: In 855 he became seriously ill, and despairing of recovery renounced the throne, divided his lands among his three sons, and on 23 September entered the monastery of Prüm, where he died six days later. He was buried at Prüm, where his remains were found in 1860. It was at Prüm that Lothair was most commemorated.


title: Lothair I

text: The same year, Lothair's kingdom was divided between his three sons in a deal called the Treaty of Prüm: the eldest, Louis II, received Italy and the title of emperor; the second, Lothair II, received Lotharingia; the youngest, Charles, received Provence.


title: Super Sharanya

text: Super Sharanya is a 2022 Indian Malayalam-language coming-of-age comedy film written and directed by Girish A. D. The film stars Anaswara Rajan in the titular role while Arjun Ashokan, Mamitha Baiju and Naslen K. Gafoor plays supporting roles. The film was produced by Shebin Backer and Girish A. D. and the music was composed by Justin Varghese. The film was released on 7 January 2022 to mixed reviews but was commercially successful.


title: Super Sharanya

text: Sharanya goes to engineering college and becomes friends with her roommates. A professor, a senior, and a classmate likes her and she rejects or shows her displeasure with them. She finds romance with a young adult, Deepu through Instagram. She met him accidentally while roaming through Ernakulam and he tracked down her profile. Sharanya and her friends' campus life and evolving character traits are captured throughout the story.


title: Super Sharanya

text: "Super Sharanya" was announced in August 2020 as Gireesh A. D.'s second directorial after "Thanneer Mathan Dinangal" with Anaswara Rajan and Arjun Ashokan in lead roles. Kunchacko Boban shared the first look character posters of the film. A second-look poster has been revealed by the filmmakers, announcing the January 2022 release of the film in theatres. Shebin Backer is producing the film, which is co-produced by Girish A. D.. Sajith Purushan did the cinematography, while Akash Joseph Vargheese did the editing. Justin Varghese, who was also the composer of Thanneer Mathan Dinangal composed the music. The film's production was stated to begin in April 2020 but instead started in December 2020 due to the Covid outbreak.


title: Super Sharanya

text: Times Of India gave it a rating of 3/5 and wrote " A college story too caught up in its own cuteness ". Indian Express wrote, " A few narrative flourishes notwithstanding, the film tells the same love story all over again. It never explains its title either." The News Minute gave a rating of 3/5 and wrote, "Starts promisingly but deviates from the plot".


title: Equites

text: The equites (; literally "horse-" or "cavalrymen", though sometimes referred to as "knights" in English) constituted the second of the property-based classes of ancient Rome, ranking below the senatorial class. A member of the equestrian order was known as an eques ().


title: Equites

text: During the Roman kingdom and the first century of the Roman Republic, legionary cavalry was recruited exclusively from the ranks of the patricians, who were expected to provide six "centuriae" of cavalry (300 horses for each consular legion). Around 400BC, 12 more "centuriae" of cavalry were established and these included non-patricians (plebeians). Around 300 BC the Samnite Wars obliged Rome to double the normal annual military levy from two to four legions, doubling the cavalry levy from 600 to 1,200 horses. Legionary cavalry started to recruit wealthier citizens from outside the 18 "centuriae". These new recruits came from the first class of commoners in the Centuriate Assembly organisation, and were not granted the same privileges.


title: Equites

text: By the time of the Second Punic War (218–202 BC), all the members of the first class of commoners were required to serve as cavalrymen. The presence of "equites" in the Roman cavalry diminished steadily in the period 200–88 BC as only "equites" could serve as the army's senior officers; as the number of legions proliferated fewer were available for ordinary cavalry service. After 88 BC, "equites" were no longer drafted into the legionary cavalry, although they remained technically liable to such service throughout the Principate era (to AD 284). They continued to supply the senior officers of the army throughout the Principate.


title: Equites

text: With the exception of the purely hereditary patricians, the "equites" were originally defined by a property threshold. The rank was passed from father to son, although members of the order who at the regular quinquennial (every five years) census no longer met the property requirement were usually removed from the order's rolls by the Roman censors. In the late republic, the property threshold stood at 50,000 "denarii" and was doubled to 100,000 by the emperor Augustus (sole rule 30 BC – AD 14) – roughly the equivalent to the annual salaries of 450 contemporary legionaries. In the later republican period, Roman senators and their offspring became an unofficial elite within the equestrian order.


title: Equites

text: Under Augustus, the senatorial elite was given formal status (as the "ordo senatorius") with a higher wealth threshold (250,000 "denarii", or the pay of 1,100 legionaries) and superior rank and privileges to ordinary "equites". During the Principate, "equites" filled the senior administrative and military posts of the imperial government. There was a clear division between jobs reserved for senators (the most senior) and those reserved for non-senatorial "equites". But the career structure of both groups was broadly similar: a period of junior administrative posts in Rome or Roman Italy, followed by a period (normally a decade) of military service as a senior army officer, followed by senior administrative or military posts in the provinces. Senators and "equites" formed a tiny elite of under 10,000 members who monopolised political, military and economic power in an empire of about 60 million inhabitants.


title: Equites

text: During the 3rd century AD, power shifted from the Italian aristocracy to a class of "equites" who had earned their membership by distinguished military service, often rising from the ranks: career military officers from the provinces (especially the Balkan provinces) who displaced the Italian aristocrats in the top military posts, and under Diocletian (ruled 284–305) from the top civilian positions also. This effectively reduced the Italian aristocracy to an idle, but immensely wealthy, group of landowners. During the 4th century, the status of "equites" was debased to insignificance by excessive grants of the rank. At the same time the ranks of senators were swollen to over 4,000 by the establishment of the Byzantine Senate, a second senate in Constantinople and the tripling of the membership of both senates. The senatorial order of the 4th century was thus the equivalent of the equestrian order of the Principate.


title: Equites

text: According to Roman legend, Rome was founded by its first king, Romulus, in 753 BC. However, archaeological evidence suggests that Rome did not acquire the character of a unified city-state (as opposed to a number of separate hilltop settlements) until 625BC.


title: Equites

text: Roman tradition relates that the Order of Knights was founded by Romulus, who supposedly established a cavalry regiment of 300 men called the "Celeres" ("Swift Squadron") to act as his personal escort, with each of the three Roman "tribes" (actually voting constituencies) supplying 100 horses. This cavalry regiment was supposedly doubled in size to 600 men by King Lucius Tarquinius Priscus (traditional dates 616–578 BC). That the cavalry was increased to 600 during the regal era is plausible, as in the early republic the cavalry fielded remained 600-strong (two legions with 300 horses each). However, according to Livy, King Servius Tullius (traditional reign-dates 578–535 BC) established a further 12 "centuriae" of "equites", a further tripling of the cavalry. Yet this was probably anachronistic, as it would have resulted in a contingent of 1,800 horse, incongruously large, compared to the heavy infantry, which was probably only 6,000 strong in the late regal period. Instead, the additional 12 "centuriae" were probably created at a later stage, perhaps around 400 BC, but these new units were political not military, most likely designed to admit plebeians to the Order of Knights.


title: Equites

text: Apparently, "equites" were originally provided with a sum of money by the state to purchase a horse for military service and for its fodder. This was known as an "equus publicus".


title: Equites

text: Theodor Mommsen argues that the royal cavalry was drawn exclusively from the ranks of the patricians ("patricii"), the aristocracy of early Rome, which was purely hereditary. Apart from the traditional association of the aristocracy with horsemanship, the evidence for this view is the fact that, during the republic, six "centuriae" (voting constituencies) of "equites" in the "comitia centuriata" (electoral assembly) retained the names of the original six royal cavalry "centuriae". These are very likely the ""centuriae" of patrician nobles" in the "comitia" mentioned by the lexicologist Sextus Pompeius Festus. If this view is correct, it implies that the cavalry was exclusively patrician (and therefore hereditary) in the regal period. (However, Cornell considers the evidence tenuous).


title: Equites

text: It is widely accepted that the Roman monarchy was overthrown by a patrician coup, probably provoked by the Tarquin dynasty's populist policies in favour of the plebeian class. Alfoldi suggests that the coup was carried out by the "celeres" themselves. According to the Fraccaro interpretation, when the Roman monarchy was replaced with two annually elected "praetores" (later called "consuls"), the royal army was divided equally between them for campaigning purposes, which, if true, explains why Polybius later said that a legion's cavalry contingent was 300 strong.


title: Equites

text: The 12 additional "centuriae" ascribed by Livy to Servius Tullius were, in reality, probably formed around 400 BC. In 403 BC, according to Livy, in a crisis during the siege of Veii, the army urgently needed to deploy more cavalry, and "those who possessed equestrian rating but had not yet been assigned public horses" volunteered to pay for their horses out of their own pockets. By way of compensation, pay was introduced for cavalry service, as it had already been for the infantry (in 406 BC).


title: Equites

text: The persons referred to in this passage were probably members of the 12 new "centuriae" who were entitled to public horses, but temporarily waived that privilege. Mommsen, however, argues that the passage refers to members of the first class of commoners being admitted to cavalry service in 403 BC for the first time as an emergency measure. If so, this group may be the original so-called "equites" "equo privato", a rank that is attested throughout the history of the republic (in contrast to "equites" "equo publico"). However, due to a lack of evidence, the origins and definition of "equo privato" "equites" remain obscure.


title: Equites

text: It is widely agreed that the 12 new "centuriae" were open to non-patricians. Thus, from this date if not earlier, not all "equites" were patricians. The patricians, as a closed hereditary caste, steadily diminished in numbers over the centuries, as families died out. Around 450 BC, there are some 50 patrician "gentes" (clans) recorded, whereas just 14 remained at the time of Julius Caesar (dictator of Rome 48–44 BC), whose own Iulii clan was patrician.


title: Equites

text: In contrast, the ranks of "equites", although also hereditary (in the male line), were open to new entrants who met the property requirement and who satisfied the Roman censors that they were suitable for membership. As a consequence, patricians rapidly became only a small minority of the equestrian order. However, patricians retained political influence greatly out of proportion with their numbers. Until 172 BC, one of the two consuls elected each year had to be a patrician.


title: Equites

text: In addition, patricians may have retained their original six "centuriae", which gave them a third of the total voting-power of the "equites", even though they constituted only a tiny minority of the order by 200 BC. Patricians also enjoyed official precedence, such as the right to speak first in senatorial debates, which were initiated by the "princeps senatus" (Leader of the Senate), a position reserved for patricians. In addition, patricians monopolized certain priesthoods and continued to enjoy enormous prestige.


title: Equites

text: The period following the end of the Latin War (340–338 BC) and of the Samnite Wars (343–290) saw the transformation of the Roman Republic from a powerful but beleaguered city-state into the hegemonic power of the Italian peninsula. This was accompanied by profound changes in its constitution and army. Internally, the critical development was the emergence of the Senate as the all-powerful organ of state.


title: Equites

text: By 280 BC, the Senate had assumed total control of state taxation, expenditure, declarations of war, treaties, raising of legions, establishing colonies and religious affairs, in other words, of virtually all political power. From an "ad hoc" group of advisors appointed by the consuls, the Senate had become a permanent body of around 300 life peers who, as largely former Roman magistrates, boasted enormous experience and influence. At the same time, the political unification of the Latin nation, under Roman rule after 338 BC, gave Rome a populous regional base from which to launch its wars of aggression against its neighbours.


title: Equites

text: The gruelling contest for Italian hegemony that Rome fought against the Samnite League led to the transformation of the Roman army from the Greek-style "hoplite" phalanx that it was in the early period, to the Italian-style manipular army described by Polybius. It is believed that the Romans copied the manipular structure from their enemies the Samnites, learning through hard experience its greater flexibility and effectiveness in the mountainous terrain of central Italy.


title: Equites

text: It is also from this period that every Roman army that took the field was regularly accompanied by at least as many troops supplied by the "socii" (Rome's Italian military confederates, often referred to as "Latin allies"). Each legion would be matched by a confederate "ala" (literally: "wing"), a formation that contained roughly the same number of infantry as a legion, but three times the number of horses (900).


title: Equites

text: Legionary cavalry also probably underwent a transformation during this period, from the light, unarmoured horsemen of the early period to the Greek-style armoured cuirassiers described by Polybius. As a result of the demands of the Samnite hostilities, a normal consular army was doubled in size to two legions, making four legions raised annually overall. Roman cavalry in the field thus increased to approximately 1,200 horses.


title: Equites

text: This now represented only 25% of the army's total cavalry contingent, the rest being supplied by the Italian confederates. A legion's modest cavalry share of 7% of its 4,500 total strength was thus increased to 12% in a confederate army, comparable with (or higher than) any other forces in Italy except the Gauls and also similar to those in Greek armies such as Pyrrhus's.


title: Equites

text: Despite an ostensibly democratic constitution based on the sovereignty of the people, the Roman Republic was in reality a classic oligarchy, in which political power was monopolised by the richest social echelon. Probably by 300 BC, the "centuriate" organisation of the Roman citizen body for political purposes achieved the evolved form described by Polybius and Livy. The "comitia centuriata" was the most powerful people's assembly, as it promulgated Roman laws and annually elected the Roman magistrates, the executive officers of the state: consuls, "praetors", "aediles" and "quaestors".


title: Equites

text: In the assembly, the citizen body was divided into 193 "centuriae", or voting constituencies. Of these, 18 were allocated to "equites" (including patricians) and a further 80 to the first class of commoners, securing an absolute majority of the votes (98 out of 193) for the wealthiest echelon of society, although it constituted only a small minority of the citizenry. (The lowest class, the "proletarii", rated at under 400 "drachmae", had just one vote, despite being the most numerous).


title: Equites

text: As a result, the wealthiest echelon could ensure that the elected magistrates were always their own members. In turn, this ensured that the senate was dominated by the wealthy classes, as its membership was composed almost entirely of current and former magistrates.


title: Equites

text: In the ""polybian"" army of the mid-republic (338 – 88 BC), "equites" held the exclusive right to serve as senior officers of the army. These were the six "tribuni militum" in each legion who were elected by the "comitia" at the start of each campaigning season and took turns to command the legion in pairs; the "praefecti sociorum", commanders of the Italian confederate "alae", who were appointed by the consuls; and the three "decurions" that led each squadron ("turma") of legionary cavalry (a total of 30 "decurions" per legion).


title: Equites

text: As their name implies, "equites" were liable to cavalry service in the legion of the mid-republic. They originally provided a legion's entire cavalry contingent, although from an early stage (probably from c. 400 and not later than c. 300 BC), when equestrian numbers had become insufficient, large numbers of young men from the first class of commoners were regularly volunteering for the service, which was considered more glamorous than the infantry.


title: Equites

text: The cavalry role of "equites" dwindled after the Second Punic War (218–201 BC), as the number of equestrians became insufficient to provide the senior officers of the army and general cavalrymen as well. "Equites" became exclusively an officer-class, with the first class of commoners providing the legionary cavalry.


title: Equites

text: From the earliest times and throughout the Republican period, Roman "equites" subscribed, in their role as Roman cavalrymen, to an ethos of personal heroism and glory. This was motivated by the desire to justify their privileged status to the lower classes that provided the infantry ranks, to enhance the renown of their family name, and to augment their chances of subsequent political advancement in a martial society. For "equites", a focus of the heroic ethos was the quest for "spolia opima", the stripped armour and weapons of a foe whom they had killed in single combat. There are many recorded instances. For example, Servilius Geminus Pulex, who went on to become Consul in 202 BC, was reputed to have gained "spolia" 23 times.


title: Equites

text: The higher the rank of the opponent killed in combat, the more prestigious the "spolia", and none more so than "spolia duci hostium detracta", spoils taken from an enemy leader himself. Many "equites" attempted to gain such an honour, but very few succeeded for the reason that enemy leaders were always surrounded by large numbers of elite bodyguards.


title: Equites

text: One successful attempt, but with a tragic twist, was that of the decurion Titus Manlius Torquatus in 340 BC during the Latin War. Despite strict orders from the consuls (one of whom was his own father) not to engage the enemy, Manlius could not resist accepting a personal challenge from the commander of the Tusculan cavalry, which his squadron encountered while on reconnaissance. There ensued a fiercely contested joust with the opposing squadrons as spectators. Manlius won, spearing his adversary after the latter was thrown by his horse. But when the triumphant young man presented the spoils to his father, the latter ordered his son's immediate execution for disobeying orders. "Orders of Manlius" ("Manliana imperia") became a proverbial army term for orders that must on no account be disregarded.


title: Equites

text: In 218 BC, the "lex Claudia" restricted the commercial activity of senators and their sons, on the grounds that it was incompatible with their status. Senators were prohibited from owning ships of greater capacity than 300 "amphorae" (about seven tonnes) – this being judged sufficient to carry the produce of their own landed estates but too small to conduct large-scale sea transportation.


title: Equites

text: From this time onwards, senatorial families mostly invested their capital in land. All other equestrians remained free to invest their wealth, greatly increased by the growth of Rome's overseas empire after the Second Punic War, in large-scale commercial enterprises including mining and industry, as well as land. Equestrians became especially prominent in tax farming and, by 100 BC, owned virtually all tax-farming companies ("publicani").


title: Equites

text: During the late Republican era, the collection of most taxes was contracted out to private individuals or companies by competitive tender, with the contract for each province awarded to the "publicanus" who bid the highest advance to the state treasury on the estimated tax-take of the province. The "publicanus" would then attempt to recoup his advance, with the right to retain any surplus collected as his profit. This system frequently resulted in extortion from the common people of the provinces, as unscrupulous "publicani" often sought to maximise their profit by demanding a much higher rates of tax than originally set by the government. The provincial governors whose duty it was to curb illegal demands were often bribed into acquiescence by the "publicani".


title: Equites

text: The system also led to political conflict between "equites publicani" and the majority of their fellow-"equites", especially senators, who as large landowners wanted to minimise the tax on land outside Italy ("tributum solis"), which was the main source of state revenue. This system was terminated by the first Roman emperor, Augustus (sole rule 30 BC – 14 AD), who transferred responsibility for tax collection from the "publicani" to provincial local authorities ("civitates peregrinae"). Although the latter also frequently employed private companies to collect their tax quotas, it was in their own interests to curb extortion. During the imperial era, tax collectors were generally paid an agreed percentage of the amount collected. "equites publicani" became prominent in banking activities such as money-lending and money-changing.


title: Equites

text: The official dress of equestrians was the "tunica angusticlavia" (narrow-striped tunic), worn underneath the toga, in such a manner that the stripe over the right shoulder was visible (as opposed to the broad stripe worn by senators.) "equites" bore the title "eques Romanus", were entitled to wear an "anulus aureus" (gold ring) on their left hand, and, from 67 BC, enjoyed privileged seats at games and public functions (just behind those reserved for senators).


title: Equites

text: The Senate as a body was formed of sitting senators, whose number was held at around 600 by the founder of the "Principate", Augustus (sole rule 30 BC – AD 14) and his successors until 312. Senators' sons and further descendants technically retained equestrian rank unless and until they won a seat in the Senate. But Talbert argues that Augustus established the existing senatorial elite as a separate and superior order "(ordo senatorius)" to the "equites" for the first time. The evidence for this includes:


title: Equites

text: A family's senatorial status depended not only on continuing to match the higher wealth qualification, but on their leading member holding a seat in the Senate. Failing either condition, the family would revert to ordinary knightly status. Although sons of sitting senators frequently won seats in the Senate, this was by no means guaranteed, as candidates often outnumbered the 20 seats available each year, leading to intense competition.


title: Equites

text: As regards the equestrian order, Augustus apparently abolished the rank of "equo privato", according all its members "equo publico" status. In addition, Augustus organised the order in a quasi-military fashion, with members enrolled into six "turmae" (notional cavalry squadrons). The order's governing body were the "seviri" ("Committee of Six"), composed of the "commanders" of the "turmae". In an attempt to foster the "equites" "esprit de corps", Augustus revived a defunct republican ceremony, the "recognitio equitum" (inspection of the "equites"), in which "equites" paraded every five years with their horses before the consuls. At some stage during the early Principate, "equites" acquired the right to the title "egregius" ("distinguished gentleman"), while senators were styled ""clarissimus"", "most distinguished").


title: Equites

text: Beyond "equites" with "equus publicus", Augustus' legislation permitted any Roman citizen who was assessed in an official census as meeting the property requirement of 100,000 "denarii" to use the title of "eques" and wear the narrow-striped tunic and gold ring. But such "property-qualified "equites"" were not apparently admitted to the "ordo equester" itself, but simply enjoyed equestrian status.


title: Equites

text: Only those granted an "equus publicus" by the emperor (or who inherited the status from their fathers) were enrolled in the order. Imperial "equites" were thus divided into two tiers: a few thousand mainly Italian "equites equo publico", members of the order eligible to hold the public offices reserved for the "equites"; and a much larger group of wealthy Italians and provincials (estimated at 25,000 in the 2nd century) of equestrian status but outside the order.


title: Equites

text: Equestrians could in turn be elevated to senatorial rank (e.g., Pliny the Younger), but in practice this was much more difficult than elevation from commoner to equestrian rank. To join the upper order, not only was the candidate required to meet the minimum property requirement of 250,000 "denarii", but also had to be elected a member of the Senate. There were two routes for this, both controlled by the emperor:


title: Equites

text: In public service, "equites" "equo publico" had their own version of the senatorial "cursus honorum", or conventional career-path, which typically combined military and administrative posts. After an initial period of a few years in local government in their home regions as administrators (local "aediles" or "duumviri") or as priests ("augures"), "equites" were required to serve as military officers for about 10 years before they would be appointed to senior administrative or military posts.


title: Equites

text: Equestrians exclusively provided the "praefecti" (commanders) of the imperial army's auxiliary regiments and five of the six "tribuni militum" (senior staff officers) in each legion. The standard equestrian officer progression was known as the ""tres militiae"" ("three services"): "praefectus" of a "cohors" (auxiliary infantry regiment), followed by "tribunus militum" in a legion, and finally "praefectus" of an "ala" (auxiliary cavalry regiment). From the time of Hadrian, a fourth militia was added for exceptionally gifted officers, commander of an "ala milliaria" (double-strength "ala"). Each post was held for three to four years.


title: Equites

text: Most of the top posts in the imperial administration were reserved for senators, who provided the governors of the larger provinces (except Egypt), the "legati legionis" (legion commanders) of all legions outside Egypt, and the "praefectus urbi" (prefect of the city of Rome), who controlled the "cohortes urbanae" (public order battalions), the only fully armed force in the city apart from the Praetorian Guard. Nevertheless, a wide range of senior administrative and military posts were created and reserved for equestrians by Augustus, though most ranked below the senatorial posts.


title: Equites

text: In the imperial administration, equestrian posts included that of the governorship ("praefectus Augusti") of the province of Egypt, which was considered the most prestigious of all the posts open to "equites", often the culmination of a long and distinguished career serving the state. In addition, "equites" were appointed to the governorship ("procurator Augusti") of some smaller provinces and sub-provinces e.g. Judaea, whose governor was subordinate to the governor of Syria.


title: Equites

text: Equestrians were also the chief financial officers (also called "procuratores Augusti") of the imperial provinces, and the deputy financial officers of senatorial provinces. At Rome, equestrians filled numerous senior administrative posts such as the emperor's secretaries of state (from the time of Claudius, e.g. correspondence and treasury) and the "praefecti annonae" (director of grain supplies).


title: Equites

text: In the military, equestrians provided the "praefecti praetorio" (commanders of the Praetorian Guard) who also acted as the emperor's chiefs of military staff. There were normally two of these, but at times irregular appointments resulted in just a single incumbent or even three at the same time. Equestrians also provided the "praefecti classis" (admirals commanding) of the two main imperial fleets at Misenum in the bay of Naples and at Ravenna on the Italian Adriatic coast. The command of Rome's fire brigade and minor constabulary, the "vigiles", was likewise reserved for "equites".


title: Equites

text: Not all "equites" followed the conventional career-path. Those equestrians who specialised in a legal or administrative career, providing judges ("iudices") in Rome's law courts and state secretaries in the imperial government, were granted dispensation from military service by Emperor Hadrian (r. AD 117–138). At the same time, many "equites" became career military officers, remaining in the army for much longer than 10 years. After completing their "tres militiae", some would continue to command auxiliary regiments, moving across units and provinces.


title: Equites

text: Already wealthy to start with, "equites equo publico" accumulated even greater riches through holding their reserved senior posts in the administration, which carried enormous salaries (although they were generally smaller than senatorial salaries). For example, the salaries of equestrian "procuratores" (fiscal and gubernatorial) ranged from 15,000 to a maximum of 75,000 "denarii" (for the governor of Egypt) per annum, whilst an equestrian "praefectus" of an auxiliary cohort was paid about 50 times as much as a common foot soldier (about 10,000 "denarii"). A "praefectus" could thus earn in one year the same as two of his auxiliary rankers combined earned during their entire 25-year service terms.


title: Equites

text: It was suggested by ancient writers, and accepted by many modern historians, that Roman emperors trusted equestrians more than men of senatorial rank, and used the former as a political counterweight to the senators. According to this view, senators were often regarded as potentially less loyal and honest by the emperor, as they could become powerful enough, through the command of provincial legions, to launch coups.


title: Equites

text: They also had greater opportunities for peculation as provincial governors. Hence the appointment of equestrians to the most sensitive military commands. In Egypt, which supplied much of Italy's grain needs, the governor and the commanders of both provincial legions were drawn from the equestrian order, since placing a senator in a position to starve Italy was considered too risky.


title: Equites

text: The commanders of the Praetorian Guard, the principal military force close to the emperor at Rome, were also usually drawn from the equestrian order. Also cited in support of this view is the appointment of equestrian fiscal "procuratores", reporting direct to the emperor, alongside senatorial provincial governors. These would supervise the collection of taxes and act as watchdogs to limit opportunities for corruption by the governors (as well as managing the imperial estates in the province).


title: Equites

text: According to Talbert, however, the evidence suggests that "equites" were no more loyal or less corrupt than senators. For example, c. 26 BC, the equestrian governor of Egypt, Cornelius Gallus, was recalled for politically suspect behaviour and sundry other misdemeanours. His conduct was deemed sufficiently serious by the Senate to warrant the maximum penalty of exile and confiscation of assets. Under Tiberius, both the senatorial governor and the equestrian fiscal procurator of Asia province were convicted of corruption.


title: Equites

text: There is evidence that emperors were as wary of powerful "equites" as they were of senators. Augustus enforced a tacit rule that senators and prominent equestrians must obtain his express permission to enter the province of Egypt, a policy that was continued by his successors. Also, the command of the Praetorian Guard was normally split between two "equites", to reduce the potential for a successful "coup d'état". At the same time, command of the second military force in Rome, the "cohortes urbanae", was entrusted to a senator.


title: Equites

text: Because the Senate was limited to 600 members, "equites" "equo publico", numbering several thousands, greatly outnumbered men of senatorial rank. Even so, senators and "equites" combined constituted a tiny elite in a citizen-body of about 6 million (in AD 47) and an empire with a total population of 60–70 million. This immensely wealthy elite monopolised political, military and economic power in the empire. It controlled the major offices of state, command of all military units, ownership of a significant proportion of the empire's arable land (e.g., under Nero (), half of all land in Africa Proconsularis province was owned by just six senators) and of most major commercial enterprises.


title: Equites

text: Overall, senators and "equites" cooperated smoothly in the running of the empire. In contrast to the chaotic civil wars of the late Republic, the rule of this tiny oligarchy achieved a remarkable degree of political stability. In the first 250 years of the Principate (30 BC – AD 218), there was only a single episode of major internal strife: the civil war of 68–69.


title: Equites

text: It seems that from the start the equestrians in the imperial service were organised on a hierarchical basis reflecting their pay-grades. According to Suetonius, writing in the early part of the second century AD, the equestrian procurators who "performed various administrative duties throughout the empire" were from the time of Emperor Claudius I organised into four pay-grades, the "trecenarii" the "ducenarii", the "centenarii", and the "sexagenarii", receiving 300,000, 200,000, 100,000, and 60,000 sesterces per annum respectively. Cassius Dio, writing a century later, attributed the beginnings of this process to the first emperor, Augustus, himself.


title: Equites

text: There is almost no literary or epigraphic evidence for the use of these ranks until towards the end of the 2nd century. However, it would seem that the increasing employment of equestrians by the emperors in civil and military roles had had social ramifications for it is then that there begin to appear the first references to a more far-reaching hierarchy with three distinct classes covering the whole of the order: the "Viri Egregii" (Select Men); the "Viri Perfectissimi" ("Best of Men"); and the "Viri Eminentissimi" ("Most Eminent of Men"). The mechanisms by which the equestrians were organised into these classes and the distinctions enforced is not known. However, it is generally assumed that the highest class, the "Viri Eminentissimi", was confined to the "Praetorian prefects", while the "Viri Perfectissimi" were the heads of the main departments of state, and the great prefectures, including Egypt, the city watch ("vigiles"), the corn supply ("annona") etc. and men commissioned to carry out specific tasks by the emperor himself such as the military "duces". The defining characteristic of the "perfectissimate" seems to have been that its members were of or associated socially (i.e. as "clientes" - see Patronage in ancient Rome of Great Men) with the imperial court circle and were office-holders known to the emperor and appointed by his favour. It is also possible that system was intended to indicate the hierarchy of office-holders in situations where this might be disputed. The "Viri Egregii" comprehended the rest of the Equestrian Order, in the service of the emperors.


title: Equites

text: The "Viri Egregii" included officials of all four pay-grades. "Ducenariate" procurators governing provinces not reserved for senators were of this category as were the "praefecti legionum", after Gallienus opened all legionary commands to equestrians. However, it seems that after 270 AD the "procuratores ducenarii" were elevated into the ranks of the "Viri Perfectissimi".


title: Equites

text: The 3rd century saw two major trends in the development of the Roman aristocracy: the progressive takeover of the top positions in the empire's administration and army by military equestrians and the concomitant exclusion of the Italian aristocracy, both senators and "equites" and the growth in hierarchy within the aristocratic orders.


title: Equites

text: Augustus instituted a policy, followed by his successors, of elevating to the "ordo equester" the "primus pilus" (chief centurion) of each legion, at the end of his single year in the post. This resulted in about 30 career-soldiers, often risen from the ranks, joining the order every year. These "equites primipilares" and their descendants formed a section of the order that was quite distinct from the Italian aristocrats who had become nearly indistinguishable from their senatorial counterparts.


title: Equites

text: They were almost entirely provincials, especially from the Danube provinces where about half the Roman army was deployed. These Danubians mostly came from Pannonia, Moesia, Thrace, Illyria and Dalmatia. They were generally far less wealthy than the landowning Italians (not benefiting from centuries of inherited wealth) and they rarely held non-military posts.


title: Equites

text: Their professionalism led emperors to rely on them ever more heavily, especially in difficult conflicts such as the Marcomannic Wars (166–180). But because they were only equestrians, they could not be appointed to the top military commands, those of "legatus Augusti pro praetore" (governor of an imperial province, where virtually all military units were deployed) and "legatus legionis" (commander of a legion). In the later 2nd century, emperors tried to circumvent the problem by elevating large numbers of "primipilares" to senatorial rank by "adlectio".


title: Equites

text: This met resistance in the Senate, so that in the 3rd century, emperors simply appointed equestrians directly to the top commands, under the fiction that they were only temporary substitutes ("praeses pro legato"). Septimius Severus () appointed "primipilares" to command the three new legions that he raised in 197 for his Parthian War, Legio I, II & III Parthica Gallienus () completed the process by appointing "equites" to command all the legions. These appointees were mostly provincial soldier-equestrians, not Italian aristocrats.


title: Equites

text: Under the reforming emperor Diocletian (), himself an Illyrian equestrian officer, the military equestrian "takeover" was brought a stage further, with the removal of hereditary senators from most administrative, as well as military posts. Hereditary senators were limited to administrative jobs in Italy and a few neighbouring provinces (Sicily, Africa, Achaea and Asia), despite the fact that senior administrative posts had been greatly multiplied by the tripling of the number of provinces and the establishment of dioceses (super-provinces). The exclusion of the old Italian aristocracy, both senatorial and equestrian, from the political and military power that they had monopolised for many centuries was thus complete. The senate became politically insignificant, although it retained great prestige.


title: Equites

text: The 3rd and 4th centuries saw the proliferation of hierarchical ranks within the aristocratic orders, in line with the greater stratification of society as a whole, which became divided into two broad classes, with discriminatory rights and privileges: the "honestiores" (more noble) and "humiliores" (more base). Among the "honestiores", equestrians were divided into five grades, depending on the salary-levels of the offices they held.


title: Equites

text: These ranged from "egregii" or "sexagenarii" (salary of 60,000 "sesterces" = 15,000 "denarii") to the "eminentissimi" (most exalted), limited to the two commanders of the Praetorian Guard and, with the establishment of Diocletian's Tetrarchy, the four "praefecti praetorio" (not to be confused with the commanders of the Praetorian Guard in Rome) that assisted the tetrarchs, each ruling over a quarter of the empire.


title: Equites

text: From the reign of Constantine the Great () onwards, there was an explosive increase in the membership of both aristocratic orders. Under Diocletian, the number of sitting members of the Senate remained at around 600, the level it had retained for the whole duration of the Principate. Constantine established Constantinople as a twin capital of the empire, with its own senate, initially of 300 members. By 387, their number had swollen to 2,000, while the Senate in Rome probably reached a comparable size, so that the upper order reached total numbers similar to the "equo publico" "equites" of the early Principate. By this time, even some commanders of military regiments were accorded senatorial status.


title: Equites

text: At the same time the order of "equites" was also expanded vastly by the proliferation of public posts in the late empire, most of which were now filled by equestrians. The Principate had been a remarkably slim-line administration, with about 250 senior officials running the vast empire, relying on local government and private contractors to deliver the necessary taxes and services. During the 3rd century the imperial bureaucracy, all officials and ranks expanded. By the time of the "Notitia Dignitatum", dated to 395 AD, comparable senior positions had grown to approximately 6,000, a 24-fold increase. The total number enrolled in the imperial civilian service, the "militia inermata" ('unarmed service') is estimated to have been 30–40,000: the service was professionalized with a staff made up almost entirely of free men on salary, and enrolled in a fictional legion, I Audiutrix.


title: Equites

text: In addition, large numbers of "decuriones" (local councillors) were granted equestrian rank, often obtaining it by bribery. Officials of ever lower rank were granted equestrian rank as reward for good service, e.g. in 365, the "actuarii" (accountants) of military regiments. This inflation in the number of "equites" inevitably led to the debasement of the order's prestige. By AD 400, "equites" were no longer an echelon of nobility, but just a title associated with mid-level administrative posts.


title: Equites

text: Constantine established a third order of nobility, the "comites" (companions (of the emperor), singular form "comes", the origin of the medieval noble rank of count). This overlapped with senators and "equites", drawing members from both. Originally, the "comites" were a highly exclusive group, comprising the most senior administrative and military officers, such as the commanders of the "comitatus", or mobile field armies. But "comites" rapidly followed the same path as "equites", being devalued by excessive grants until the title became meaningless by 450.


title: Equites

text: In the late 4th and in the 5th century, therefore, the senatorial class at Rome and Constantinople became the closest equivalent to the "equo publico" equestrian class of the early Principate. It contained many ancient and illustrious families, some of whom claimed descent from the aristocracy of the Republic, but had, as described, lost almost all political and military power. Nevertheless, senators retained great influence due to their enormous inherited wealth and their role as the guardians of Roman tradition and culture.


title: Equites

text: Centuries of capital accumulation, in the form of vast landed estates ("latifundia") across many provinces resulted in enormous wealth for most senators. Many received annual rents in cash and in kind of over 5,000 lbs of gold, equivalent to 360,000 "solidi" (or 5 million Augustan-era "denarii"), at a time when a "miles" (common soldier) would earn no more than four "solidi" a year in cash. Even senators of middling wealth could expect an income 1,000–1,500 lbs of gold.


title: Equites

text: The 4th-century historian Ammianus Marcellinus, a former high-ranking military staff officer who spent his retirement years in Rome, bitterly attacked the Italian aristocracy, denouncing their extravagant palaces, clothes, games and banquets and above all their lives of total idleness and frivolity. In his words can be heard the contempt for the senatorial class of a career soldier who had spent his lifetime defending the empire, a view clearly shared by Diocletian and his Illyrian successors. But it was the latter who reduced the aristocracy to that state, by displacing them from their traditional role of governing the empire and leading the army.


title: Elisabeth Harnois

text: Elisabeth Harnois ( ; born ) is an American actress. Her career started at the age of five, where she began appearing in a number of film and television roles. As a child, she starred as Alice in Disney's "Adventures in Wonderland" and as an adult, she starred as Morgan Brody in the CBS forensics drama "" from 2011 to 2015.


title: Elisabeth Harnois

text: Harnois was born in Detroit, Michigan, to a hairstylist mother and a computer programmer father. She was raised in Los Angeles. She is the eldest of five children with four brothers. She attended St. Mel's School in Woodland Hills and Canyon Springs High School in Moreno Valley, California, and graduated from Wesleyan University with a degree in film studies in 2001.


title: Elisabeth Harnois

text: Harnois appeared in two films at the age of five, "One Magic Christmas" and "Where Are the Children?". She did commercials until landing the role of Emily in "Timeless Tales from Hallmark" and the role of Alice in the 1992 Disney Channel series "Adventures in Wonderland". In 1998, she appeared in "My Date with the President's Daughter" alongside Boy Meets World actor Will Friedle and 9 to 5 actor Dabney Coleman as part of The Wonderful World of Disney. In 2005, she starred in the short-lived Fox teen mystery/supernatural/horror drama "Point Pleasant" as Christina Nickson, and also landed a role opposite Evan Rachel Wood in the black comedy/satirical film "Pretty Persuasion", portraying the best friend of Wood's character.


title: Elisabeth Harnois

text: In May 2011, Harnois guest-starred in the long-running CBS police procedural drama "" in Season 11, episode 21, titled "Cello and Goodbye", as Morgan Brody, a CSI from the L.A.P.D. Scientific Investigation Division. In September that same year, when the twelfth-season premiere, called "73 Seconds" aired, Harnois was added to the main cast, wherein her character transfers to the Las Vegas Crime Lab. Harnois remained on the show until it ended in September 2015 with the two-hour series finale titled "".


title: Elisabeth Harnois

text: Harnois was nominated in 1987 for the Young Artist Award at the Young Artist Awards for Exceptional Performance by a Young Actress Starring in a Feature Film in Comedy or Drama for "One Magic Christmas" (1985) and again in 1988 for Best Young Actress Guest Starring in a Television Drama for "Highway to Heaven" (1987) for the episode "Man's Best Friend". She won the same award in 1993 for Outstanding Performer in a Children's Program for "Adventures in Wonderland" (1992).