title: Silent Hill: Origins

text: Gameplay drew a variety of reactions from "immersive" and "intriguing", to formulaic. The puzzles were generally considered by critics as challenging and well-done. The duration of the game was considered short, and reviewers criticized the spacing of the save points and absence of checkpoints. The game's adherence to the formula of the "Silent Hill" series also drew criticism; the opening comment of GameSpot's review remarked that "this old fog needs to learn some new tricks", and further detailed that the game provided "an entirely conventional adventure that relies on eight-year-old franchise hallmarks at the expense of anything truly new". Some camera issues were noted, especially in tight corridors. Reviewers wrote that "Origins" had a greater emphasis on combat than previous installments, although reaction to the combat was generally negative. Some reviewers felt that the player was encouraged to avoid combat, due to a variety of gameplay factors, including the breakable melee weapons. On the other hand, GameSpy's David Chapman stated that the readily available weapons made Travis too powerful. The inclusion of quick time events was not well received by reviewers, who felt that it added nothing appealing to the game. Additionally, the soundtrack was frequently praised as frightening, and a part of the game's appeal. The "PlayStation Official Magazine UK" wrote: "Despite its small-screen setting, "Origins" even manages a few genuine scares, mostly thanks to the first-rate sound: this should only be played through headphones".


title: Silent Hill: Origins

text: The PS2 port was not as well received by reviewers, with a lower aggregate score of 70 out of 100, indicating "mixed or average reviews". The graphics of the port were considered by reviewers to be not as good as the PSP release and other installments in the series for the PS2. Conversely, a reviewer for GameZone wrote that despite some technical issues with the graphics, the visuals of the port sufficed. Other issues with the port commented on by critics include the lack of manual camera control, the absence of a mini-map or overall map for the more challenging areas, and no new bonus material for the port.


title: Factor of safety

text: In engineering, a factor of safety (FoS), also known as (and used interchangeably with) safety factor (SF), expresses how much stronger a system is than it needs to be for an intended load. Safety factors are often calculated using detailed analysis because comprehensive testing is impractical on many projects, such as bridges and buildings, but the structure's ability to carry a load must be determined to a reasonable accuracy.


title: Factor of safety

text: Many systems are intentionally built much stronger than needed for normal usage to allow for emergency situations, unexpected loads, misuse, or degradation (reliability).


title: Factor of safety

text: The realized factor of safety must be greater than the required design factor of safety. However, between various industries and engineering groups usage is inconsistent and confusing; there are several definitions used. The cause of much confusion is that various reference books and standards agencies use the factor of safety definitions and terms differently. Building codes, structural and mechanical engineering textbooks often refer to the "factor of safety" as the fraction of total structural capability over what is needed. Those are realized factors of safety (first use). Many undergraduate strength of materials books use "Factor of Safety" as a constant value intended as a minimum target for design (second use).


title: Factor of safety

text: There are several ways to compare the factor of safety for structures. All the different calculations fundamentally measure the same thing: how much extra load beyond what is intended a structure will actually take (or be required to withstand). The difference between the methods is the way in which the values are calculated and compared. Safety factor values can be thought of as a standardized way for comparing strength and reliability between systems.


title: Factor of safety

text: The use of a factor of safety does not imply that an item, structure, or design is "safe". Many quality assurance, engineering design, manufacturing, installation, and end-use factors may influence whether or not something is safe in any particular situation.


title: Factor of safety

text: The difference between the safety factor and design factor (design safety factor) is as follows: The safety factor, or yield stress, is how much the designed part actually will be able to withstand (first "use" from above). The design factor, or working stress, is what the item is required to be able to withstand (second "use"). The design factor is defined for an application (generally provided in advance and often set by regulatory building codes or policy) and is not an actual calculation, the safety factor is a ratio of maximum strength to intended load for the actual item that was designed.


title: Factor of safety

text: By this definition, a structure with an FOS of exactly 1 will support only the design load and no more. Any additional load will cause the structure to fail. A structure with an FOS of 2 will fail at twice the design load.


title: Factor of safety

text: Many government agencies and industries (such as aerospace) require the use of a "margin of safety" ("MoS" or "M.S.") to describe the ratio of the strength of the structure to the requirements. There are two separate definitions for the margin of safety so care is needed to determine which is being used for a given application. One usage of M.S. is as a measure of capability like FoS. The other usage of M.S. is as a measure of satisfying design requirements (requirement verification). Margin of safety can be conceptualized (along with the reserve factor explained below) to represent how much of the structure's total capability is held "in reserve" during loading.


title: Factor of safety

text: M.S. as a measure of structural capability: This definition of margin of safety commonly seen in textbooks describes what additional load beyond the design load a part can withstand before failing. In effect, this is a measure of excess capability. If the margin is 0, the part will not take any additional load before it fails, if it is negative the part will fail before reaching its design load in service. If the margin is 1, it can withstand one additional load of equal force to the maximum load it was designed to support (i.e. twice the design load).


title: Factor of safety

text: M.S. as a measure of requirement verification: Many agencies and organizations such as NASA and AIAA define the margin of safety including the design factor, in other words, the margin of safety is calculated after applying the design factor. In the case of a margin of 0, the part is at exactly the "required" strength (the safety factor would equal the design factor). If there is a part with a required design factor of 3 and a margin of 1, the part would have a safety factor of 6 (capable of supporting two loads equal to its design factor of 3, supporting six times the design load before failure). A margin of 0 would mean the part would pass with a safety factor of 3. If the margin is less than 0 in this definition, although the part will not necessarily fail, the design requirement has not been met. A convenience of this usage is that for all applications, a margin of 0 or higher is passing, one does not need to know application details or compare against requirements, just glancing at the margin calculation tells whether the design passes or not. This is helpful for oversight and reviewing on projects with various integrated components, as different components may have various design factors involved and the margin calculation helps prevent confusion.


title: Factor of safety

text: For a successful design, the realized safety factor must always equal or exceed the design safety factor so that the margin of safety is greater than or equal to zero. The margin of safety is sometimes, but infrequently, used as a percentage, i.e., a 0.50 M.S is equivalent to a 50% M.S. When a design satisfies this test it is said to have a "positive margin", and, conversely, a "negative margin" when it does not.


title: Factor of safety

text: In the field of nuclear safety (as implemented at U.S. government-owned facilities) the margin of safety has been defined as a quantity that may not be reduced without review by the controlling government office. The U.S. Department of Energy publishes DOE G 424.1-1, "Implementation Guide for Use in Addressing Unreviewed Safety Question Requirements" as a guide for determining how to identify and determine whether a margin of safety will be reduced by a proposed change. The guide develops and applies the concept of a qualitative margin of safety that may not be explicit or quantifiable, yet can be evaluated conceptually to determine whether an increase or decrease will occur with a proposed change. This approach becomes important when examining designs with large or undefined (historical) margins and those that depend on "soft" controls such as programmatic limits or requirements. The commercial U.S. nuclear industry utilized a similar concept in evaluating planned changes until 2001, when 10 CFR 50.59 was revised to capture and apply the information available in facility-specific risk analyses and other quantitative risk management tools.


title: Factor of safety

text: A measure of strength frequently used in Europe is the "reserve factor" (RF). With the strength and applied loads expressed in the same units, the reserve factor is defined in one of two ways, depending on the industry:


title: Factor of safety

text: For ductile materials (e.g. most metals), it is often required that the factor of safety be checked against both yield and ultimate strengths. The yield calculation will determine the safety factor until the part starts to deform plastically. The ultimate calculation will determine the safety factor until failure. On brittle materials these values are often so close as to be indistinguishable, so it is usually acceptable to only calculate the ultimate safety factor.


title: Factor of safety

text: Appropriate design factors are based on several considerations, such as the accuracy of predictions on the imposed loads, strength, wear estimates, and the environmental effects to which the product will be exposed in service; the consequences of engineering failure; and the cost of over-engineering the component to achieve that factor of safety. For example, components whose failure could result in substantial financial loss, serious injury, or death may use a safety factor of four or higher (often ten). Non-critical components generally might have a design factor of two. Risk analysis, failure mode and effects analysis, and other tools are commonly used. Design factors for specific applications are often mandated by law, policy, or industry standards.


title: Factor of safety

text: Buildings commonly use a factor of safety of 2.0 for each structural member. The value for buildings is relatively low because the loads are well understood and most structures are redundant. Pressure vessels use 3.5 to 4.0, automobiles use 3.0, and aircraft and spacecraft use 1.2 to 3.0 depending on the application and materials. Ductile, metallic materials tend to use the lower value while brittle materials use the higher values. The field of aerospace engineering uses generally lower design factors because the costs associated with structural weight are high (i.e. an aircraft with an overall safety factor of 5 would probably be too heavy to get off the ground). This low design factor is why aerospace parts and materials are subject to very stringent quality control and strict preventative maintenance schedules to help ensure reliability. A usually applied Safety Factor is 1.5, but for pressurized fuselage it is 2.0, and for main landing gear structures it is often 1.25.


title: Factor of safety

text: In some cases it is impractical or impossible for a part to meet the "standard" design factor. The penalties (mass or otherwise) for meeting the requirement would prevent the system from being viable (such as in the case of aircraft or spacecraft). In these cases, it is sometimes determined to allow a component to meet a lower than normal safety factor, often referred to as "waiving" the requirement. Doing this often brings with it extra detailed analysis or quality control verifications to assure the part will perform as desired, as it will be loaded closer to its limits.


title: Factor of safety

text: For loading that is cyclical, repetitive, or fluctuating, it is important to consider the possibility of metal fatigue when choosing factor of safety. A cyclic load well below a material's yield strength can cause failure if it is repeated through enough cycles.


title: Factor of safety

text: According to Elishakoff the notion of factor of safety in engineering context was apparently first introduced in 1729 by Bernard Forest de Bélidor (1698-1761) who was a French engineer working in hydraulics, mathematics, civil, and military engineering. The philosophical aspects of factors of safety were pursued by Doorn and Hansson


title: Strait

text: A strait is an oceanic landform connecting two seas or two other large areas of water. The surface water generally flows at the same elevation on both sides and through the strait in either direction. Most commonly, it is a narrow ocean channel that lies between two land masses. Some straits are not navigable, for example because they are either too narrow or too shallow, or because of an unnavigable reef or archipelago. Straits are also known to be loci for sediment accumulation. Usually, sand-size deposits occur on both the two opposite strait exits, forming subaqueous fans or deltas.


title: Strait

text: The terms "channel", "pass", or "passage" can be synonymous and used interchangeably with "strait", although each is sometimes differentiated with varying senses. In Scotland, "firth" or "Kyle" are also sometimes used as synonyms for strait.


title: Strait

text: Many straits are economically important. Straits can be important shipping routes and wars have been fought for control of them.


title: Strait

text: Numerous artificial channels, called "canals", have been constructed to connect two bodies of water over land, such as the Suez Canal. Although rivers and canals often provide passage between two large lakes or a lake and a sea, and these seem to suit the formal definition of strait, they are not usually referred to as such. The term "strait" is typically reserved for much larger, wider features of the marine environment. There are exceptions, with straits being called canals; Pearse Canal, for example.


title: Strait

text: Straits are the converse of isthmuses. That is, while a strait lies between two land masses and connects two large areas of ocean, an isthmus lies between two areas of ocean and connects two large land masses.


title: Strait

text: Some straits have the potential to generate significant tidal power using tidal stream turbines. Tides are more predictable than wave power or wind power. The Pentland Firth (a strait) may be capable of generating 10 GW. Cook Strait in New Zealand may be capable of generating 5.6 GW even though the total energy available in the flow is 15 GW.


title: Strait

text: Straits used for international navigation through the territorial sea between one part of the high seas or an exclusive economic zone and another part of the high seas or an exclusive economic zone are subject to the legal regime of transit passage (Strait of Gibraltar, Dover Strait, Strait of Hormuz). The regime of innocent passage applies in straits used for international navigation (1) that connect a part of high seas or an exclusive economic zone with the territorial sea of a coastal nation (Straits of Tiran, Strait of Juan de Fuca, Strait of Baltiysk) and (2) in straits formed by an island of a state bordering the strait and its mainland if there exists seaward of the island a route through the high seas or through an exclusive economic zone of similar convenience with respect to navigational and hydrographical characteristics (Strait of Messina, Pentland Firth). There may be no suspension of innocent passage through such straits.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Gustavo Augusto Poyet Domínguez (; born 15 November 1967) is a Uruguayan professional football manager and former footballer. He is currently the head coach of the Greece national football team.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Poyet played as a midfielder and began his career with short spells at Grenoble and River Plate. He then spent seven years at Real Zaragoza, with whom he won the Copa del Rey and the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup. In 1997, Poyet moved to Chelsea on a free transfer and helped the club win the FA Cup and the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup. In 2001, he moved to Tottenham Hotspur, where he saw out the remainder of his career. He was also part of the Uruguay side which won the 1995 Copa América.


title: Gus Poyet

text: After his playing career ended, Poyet moved into coaching. He served as assistant manager to Dennis Wise at Swindon Town and Leeds United, and Juande Ramos at Tottenham Hotspur. In November 2009, Poyet was appointed manager of Brighton & Hove Albion and in his first full season led the club to promotion as League One Champions, for which he was named League One Manager of the Year by the LMA. In October 2013 he was hired by Premier League team Sunderland and guided them to the League Cup Final in his first season, but was sacked in March 2015 after a poor run of results. He later had spells at Superleague Greece side AEK Athens, La Liga club Real Betis, Chinese Super League team Shanghai Shenhua, Bordeaux of Ligue 1, and Universidad Católica in Chile.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Born in Montevideo, a goalscoring midfielder, he began his career with spells at Grenoble and River Plate. Poyet moved to Real Zaragoza in 1990; winning the Copa del Rey in 1994 and the Cup Winners' Cup a year later, beating Arsenal in the final. He became Zaragoza's longest-serving foreign player, and scored 60 goals in 240 games for the club.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Poyet joined Chelsea on a free transfer in June 1997. Not long into his first season at the London club, he suffered cruciate ligament damage, this meant he missed the victorious 1998 Football League Cup Final but recovered to play in the team's successful Cup Winners' Cup Final against VfB Stuttgart. The following year, he contributed 14 goals – making him the club's second highest scorer – to help Chelsea finish third in the Premiership, including a crucial headed goal in 1–0 win against Leeds United. He also scored the winner for Chelsea in the 1998 UEFA Super Cup against Real Madrid. In 1999–2000, he scored 18 goals (which again made him Chelsea's second highest scorer), with a scissors-kick volley against Sunderland, a long range strike against Lazio, and both of Chelsea's goals in the FA Cup semi-final against Newcastle United, among the most memorable, as the team won the FA Cup and reached the UEFA Champions League quarter-finals.


title: Gus Poyet

text: With the arrival of new manager Claudio Ranieri in September 2000, Chelsea was a team in transition. With Ranieri seeking to reduce the average age of the squad, Poyet became surplus to requirements and requested a transfer.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Poyet joined Tottenham Hotspur in May 2001 for around £2.2 million. He scored 14 goals in his debut season for Spurs and helped his team reach the League Cup final, but they lost 2–1 to Blackburn Rovers. His time at the club was blighted by injuries, and he again sustained cruciate ligament damage in August 2002, but still managed to score 23 goals in 98 games.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Poyet was a Uruguay international, making his international debut on 13 July 1993 in a friendly match against Peru (1–2). After 67 minutes, he was substituted by Carlos Aguilera.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Poyet helped his country win the Copa América in 1995. In doing so, he was voted as the best player in his position at the tournament.


title: Gus Poyet

text: In July 2006, he became a player and assistant manager at Swindon Town alongside ex-Chelsea teammate, Dennis Wise. Both Poyet and Wise were given permission to talk about forming the new Leeds United management team on 23 October 2006 and looked set to take the place of caretaker manager, John Carver, until Swindon withdrew permission due to disagreements over compensation. On 24 October 2006, Poyet was confirmed as assistant manager of Leeds with Dennis Wise as the manager.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 29 October 2007, Poyet rejoined his former club Tottenham Hotspur to work alongside new head coach Juande Ramos as a first team coach with Marcos Álvarez as a fitness coach. During his first season as assistant manager at White Hart Lane, he won the 2007–08 League Cup, beating Chelsea 2–1 after extra time in the Final after a penalty from Dimitar Berbatov in normal time and a header early into extra time from Jonathan Woodgate.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 25 October 2008, Poyet parted company with Tottenham Hotspur along with manager Juande Ramos, first team coach Marcos Álvarez and sporting director Damien Comolli.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 10 November 2009, Poyet was announced as the new manager of English League One side Brighton & Hove Albion on a one-and-a-half-year contract. Former Tottenham teammate Mauricio Taricco was also announced as Poyet's assistant manager. He steered the club to safety as he had a brilliant start to his career at Brighton by going to Southampton and winning 3–1. He started the 2010–11 season by making a number of signings including Gordon Greer, Radostin Kishishev, Liam Bridcutt, Matt Sparrow, Casper Ankergren and Ashley Barnes. He also signed a new four-year contract along with his assistant Mauricio Taricco.


title: Gus Poyet

text: The season started with five wins from the first eight games putting Brighton top of the League One table. Brighton started the year 2011 with a 5–0 home win on New Year's Day against Leyton Orient. Most notable was a run of eight straight league victories in March, leaving the club 13 points clear at the top with games in hand over all of their closest rivals with the exception of Southampton. Brighton secured promotion to the Championship following a 4–3 home win over Dagenham & Redbridge, Ashley Barnes scoring the winner in the 63rd minute. The League One title was clinched on 16 April 2011, as Brighton beat Walsall 3–1, having been top without slipping since the eighth game of the season and with four games of the season still to play. On 23 May 2011, Poyet was voted LMA League One Manager of the Year for his achievements in the 2010–11 season – his first full season as a football manager.


title: Gus Poyet

text: During pre-season 2011, Poyet twice broke the club's record transfer-fee in signing Will Buckley and Craig Mackail-Smith, and also brought in former Spain and Valencia playmaker Vicente on a free transfer. After an unbeaten start to the 2011–12 season, Poyet was named as Championship manager of the month for August 2011. Poyet shortly after signed a new and improved five-year contract to remain at the club until 2016. In March 2012, Poyet won the Outstanding Managerial Achievement Award at the Football League Awards ceremony, beating Crystal Palace manager Dougie Freedman and former Huddersfield Town boss Lee Clark.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 23 June 2013, Brighton released an official statement declaring that Poyet had been informed that "his employment has been terminated with immediate effect". Poyet said that he was only made aware of his sacking when a member of the BBC production staff handed him a printout of the club statement, whilst working as a pundit for BBC Three's coverage of the Spain vs. Nigeria group game in the FIFA Confederations Cup.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 8 October 2013, it was announced that Poyet had been appointed as Head Coach at Sunderland on a two-year contract, becoming the first Uruguayan to manage in the Premier League. Eleven days later in his first match in charge, they lost 4–0 away to Swansea City. His second game in charge, and first at the Stadium of Light, resulted in a 2–1 win against local rivals Newcastle United on 27 October.


title: Gus Poyet

text: In his first season in charge, he took Sunderland to the League Cup Final after a penalty shootout win over Manchester United in the semi-finals. On 19 April 2014, Poyet defeated José Mourinho in his first-ever home league defeat in the Premier League as Chelsea manager, a 2–1 win to Sunderland at Stamford Bridge. Poyet led Sunderland to a 2–0 win at home to West Bromwich Albion on 7 May to guarantee Premier League safety with one game remaining, performing "a miracle" in his own words by arresting a decline that saw Sunderland seven points adrift of safety as late as 7 April, when they lost 5–1 to Tottenham Hotspur. Defeat to Everton in their following league game made avoiding relegation look like a near impossible task for the club, but Sunderland, under Poyet's stewardship, earned 13 points out of a possible 15 in their following five league games.


title: Gus Poyet

text: The club sacked Poyet on 16 March 2015. At the time of his sacking, they were in 17th place in the league, one point above the relegation places.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 29 October 2015, AEK Athens reported that Poyet had agreed in principle to be the club's manager until summer 2016. In February 2016, he guided his team to successive wins against neighbours Olympiacos and Panathinaikos. He was sacked on 19 April 2016 after the team finished third in the league and awaited a Greek Cup semi-final; the board had taken issue with him informing the press before them that he would leave at the end of the campaign.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 9 May 2016, Poyet had signed a two-year deal with Real Betis. On 12 November 2016, he was sacked and replaced by Víctor Sánchez.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 29 November 2016, Poyet became the manager of Chinese Super League side Shanghai Shenhua. Despite of being blamed by public for poor performance in the league and resigning on 11 September, he was still appreciated by some fans for his contribution to the team's championship in 2017 Chinese FA Cup later in November, including a 1-0 home victory over classic rival Beijing Guoan in 4th round, and a 3-1 away victory over Shandong Luneng in quarter final.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 20 January 2018, Poyet became the manager of Ligue 1 side Bordeaux. In August, he was suspended by the club after criticising the sale of Gaëtan Laborde to Montpellier. He was subsequently fired and replaced by Ricardo Gomes on 5 September.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 28 February 2021, Poyet became the manager of Chilean Primera División club Universidad Católica. He began his tenure by winning the delayed 2020 Supercopa de Chile against rivals Colo-Colo and made the last 16 of the 2021 Copa Libertadores, but left by mutual consent at the end of August with the worst campaign in the last 10 years.


title: Gus Poyet

text: On 3 February 2022, Poyet became the manager of the Greece national team. He guided the team to four victories from their four opening fixtures in League C of the 2022 UEFA Nations League, helping Greece earn promotion to League B for the following campaign.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Poyet is married to Madelon González with whom he has two sons: Diego (born 1995) and Matias (born 1993). Diego is also a midfielder, making his professional debut in 2014 for Charlton Athletic before moving to West Ham United, and has represented England at youth international level.


title: Gus Poyet

text: Poyet's father was Olympic basketball player Washington Poyet, while his brother Marcelo also played the sport professionally in South America. Poyet introduced basketball to Sunderland academy training sessions, believing it to share many attributes with football, particularly marking.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Syriac Christianity ( / "Mšiḥoyuṯo Suryoyto" or "Mšiḥāyūṯā Suryāytā") is a distinctive branch of Eastern Christianity, whose formative theological writings and traditional liturgies are expressed in the Classical Syriac language, a variation of the Aramaic language. In a wider sense, the term can also refer to Aramaic Christianity in general, thus encompassing all Christian traditions that are based on liturgical uses of Aramaic language and its variations, both historical and modern.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Along with Greek and Latin, Classical Syriac was one of the three most important languages of Early Christianity. It became a vessel for the development of a distinctive Syriac form of Christianity which flourished throughout the Near East and other parts of Asia during Late Antiquity and the Early Medieval period, giving rise to various liturgical and denominational traditions, represented in modern times by several Churches which continue to uphold the religious and cultural heritage of Syriac Christianity.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: The East Syriac Rite (also known variably as the Chaldean, Assyrian, Sassanid, Babylonian or Persian Rite), whose main anaphora is the Holy Qurbana of Saints Addai and Mari, is that of the Iraq-based Chaldean Catholic Church, Assyrian Church of the East and Ancient Church of the East, and the Indian Syro-Malabar Catholic Church and Chaldean Syrian Church (the latter being part of the Assyrian Church of the East).


title: Syriac Christianity

text: The West Syriac Rite (also called Antiochian Syriac Rite or St. James Rite), which has the Divine Liturgy of Saint James as its anaphora, is that of the Syriac Orthodox Church, the Lebanon-based Maronite Church and Syriac Catholic Church, and the Indian Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, Jacobite Syrian Christian Church (part of the Syriac Orthodox Church), Malabar Independent Syrian Church. Reformed versions of this rite are used by the Eastern Protestant Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church and the more strongly reformed St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In India, indigenous Eastern Christians (Saint Thomas Christians) of both liturgical traditions (eastern and western) are called "Syrian" Christians. The traditional East Syriac community is represented by the Syro-Malabar Church and the Chaldean Syrian Church of India (a part of the Assyrian Church of the East). The West Syriac liturgical tradition was introduced after 1665, and the community associated with it is represented by the Jacobite Syrian Christian Church (a part of the Syriac Orthodox Church), the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church (both of them belonging to the Oriental Orthodoxy), the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church (an Eastern Catholic Church), the Malankara Marthoma Syrian Church (part of the Anglican Communion)and the Malabar Independent Syrian Church (an independent Oriental Orthodox Church not part of the Oriental Orthodox Communion).


title: Syriac Christianity

text: The Syriac language is a variety of Aramaic language, that emerged in Edessa, Upper Mesopotamia during the first centuries AD. It is related to the Aramaic of Jesus, a Galilean dialect. This relationship added to its prestige for Christians. The form of the language in use in Edessa predominated in Christian writings and was accepted as the standard form, "a convenient vehicle for the spread of Christianity wherever there was a substrate of spoken Aramaic". The area where Syriac or Aramaic was spoken, an area of contact and conflict between the Roman Empire and the Sasanian Empire, extended from around Antioch in the west to Seleucia-Ctesiphon, the Sasanian capital (in Iraq), in the east and comprised the whole or parts of present-day Syria, Lebanon, Israel/Palestine, Iraq, and parts of Turkey and Iran.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In modern English language, the term "Syriac Christianity" is preferred over the alternative form "Syrian Christianity", that was also commonly used in older literature, as a synonym, particularly during the 19th and the 20th centuries. Since the latter term proved to be very polysemic, a tendency occurred (firstly among scholars) to reduce the term "Syrian Christianity" to its primary (regional) meaning, that designates the Christianity in Syria, while more specific term (Syriac Christianity) came to be used as preferred designation for the entire Syriac branch of Eastern Christianity. That distinction is not yet universally accepted, even among scholars. It is gradually introduced in most of the English speaking world, with some notable exceptions. Churches of Syriac tradition in India still self-identify, in Indian English, as "Syrian" Churches, both for sociolinguistic and legal reasons.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Modern distinctions between "Syrian" and "Syriac" (Christianity) are observed in English language as a partially accepted convention, but such distinctions do not exist in most of the other languages, nor on the endonymic (native) level among adherents of Syriac Christianity. Native terms (ethnonyms, demonyms, linguonyms) that were derived from the name of Syria did not possess a distinctive formal duality that would be equivalent to the conventional English distinction between terms "Syrian" and "Syriac". Since the proposed distinction is not yet universally accepted among scholars, its individual and often inconsistent application has created a complex narrative, that is additionally burdened by older problems, inherited from terminological controversies that originated much earlier, within Syriac studies in particular, and also within Aramaic studies in general.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: The use of Syrian/Syriac labels was also challenged by common scholarly reduction of Syriac Christianity to the Eastern Aramaic Christian heritage, and its offspring. Such reduction was detaching Syriac Christianity from Western Aramaic Christian traditions, that were enrooted in the very homeland of Christianity, encompassing ancient Aramaic-speaking communities in Judea and Palestine, with Galilee and Samaria, and also those in the regions of Nabatea and Palmyrene to the east, and Phoenicia and Syria proper to the north. Since Western Aramaic Christians did not fit into narrow scholarly definition of Syriac Christianity, focused on Eastern Aramaic traditions, various researchers have opted for an additional use of some wider terms, like "Aramaic Christianity", or "Aramaic Christendom", thus designating a religious, cultural and linguistic continuum, encompassing the entire branch of Christianity that stemmed from the first Aramaic-speaking Christian communities, formed in apostolic times, and then continued to develop throughout history, mainly in the Near East and also in several other regions of Asia, including India and China.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In English language, the term "Aramaic Christianity" should not be confused with term "Aramean Christianity", since the first designation is linguistically defined and thus refers to Aramaic-speaking Christians in general, while the second designation is more specific and refers only to Christian Arameans.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Christianity began in the Near East, in Jerusalem among Aramaic-speaking Jews. It soon spread to other Aramaic-speaking Semitic peoples along the Eastern Mediterranean coast and also to the inland parts of the Roman Empire and beyond that into the Parthian Empire and the later Sasanian Empire, including Mesopotamia, which was dominated at different times and to varying extents by these empires.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: The ruins of the Dura-Europos church, dating from the first half of the 3rd century are concrete evidence of the presence of organized Christian communities in the Aramaic-speaking area, far from Jerusalem and the Mediterranean coast, and there are traditions of the preaching of Christianity in the region as early as the time of the Apostles.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: However, "virtually every aspect of Syriac Christianity prior to the fourth century remains obscure, and it is only then that one can feel oneself on firmer ground". The fourth century is marked by the many writings in Syriac of Saint Ephrem the Syrian, the "Demonstrations" of the slightly older Aphrahat and the anonymous ascetical "Book of Steps". Ephrem lived in the Roman Empire, close to the border with the Sasanian Empire, to which the other two writers belonged.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Other items of early literature of Syriac Christianity are the Diatessaron of Tatian, the Curetonian Gospels and the Syriac Sinaiticus, the Peshitta Bible and the Doctrine of Addai.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: The bishops who took part in the First Council of Nicea (325), the first of the ecumenical councils, included twenty from Syria and one from Persia, outside the Roman Empire. Two councils held in the following century divided Syriac Christianity into two opposing parties.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Syriac Christianity is divided on several theological issues, both Christological and Pneumatological.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In 431, the Council of Ephesus, which is reckoned as the third ecumenical council, condemned Nestorius and Nestorianism. That condemnation was consequently ignored by the East Syriac Church of the East, which had been previously established in the Sasanian Empire as a distinct Church at the Council of Seleucia-Ctesiphon in 410, and which at the Synod of Dadisho in 424 had declared the independence of its head, the Catholicos, in relation to "western" (Roman Empire) Church authorities. Even in its modern form of Assyrian Church of the East and Ancient Church of the East, it honours Nestorius as a teacher and saint.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In 451, the Council of Chalcedon, the fourth ecumenical council, condemned Monophysitism, and also rejected Dyoprosopism. This council was rejected by the Oriental Orthodox Churches (among which is the Syriac Orthodox Church) that use the West Syriac Rite. The Patriarchate of Antioch was consequently divided between two communities, pro-Chalcedonian and non-Chalcedonian. The Chalcedonians were often labelled as 'Melkites' (Imperials), while their opponents were labelled Monophysites (those who believe in the one rather than two natures of Christ) and Jacobites (after Jacob Baradaeus).


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In 553, the Council of Constantinople, the fifth ecumenical council, anathematized Theodore of Mopsuestia, and also condemned several writings of Theodoret of Cyrus and Ibas of Edessa (see: Three-Chapter Controversy). Since those three theologians were highly regarded among Eastern Syriac Christians, further rifts were created, culminating in 612, when a major council of the Church of the East was held in Seleucia-Ctesiphon. Presided by Babai the Great (d. 628), the council officially adopted specific Christological formulations, using Syriac term "qnoma" (ܩܢܘܡܐ) as designation for dual (divine and human) properties within one prosopon (person) of Christ.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Theological estrangement between East Syriac and West Syriac branches was manifested as a prolonged rivalry, that was particularly intensive between the Church of the East and the Maphrianate of the East (Syriac Orthodox Church), with each branch claiming that its doctrines were not heretical while also accusing the other of teaching heresy. Their theological estrangement has persisted through the medieval and early modern periods and into the present era. In 1999, the Coptic Orthodox Church, a sister-church of the Syriac Orthodox Church, blocked admittance of the Assyrian Church of the East to the Middle East Council of Churches, which has among its members the Chaldean Catholic Church, and demanded that it remove from its liturgy the mention of Diodorus of Tarsus, Theodore of Mopsuestia and Nestorius, whom it venerates as "the Greek doctors".


title: Syriac Christianity

text: The liturgies of the East and West Syriacs are quite distinct. The East Syriac Rite is noted especially for its eucharistic Qurbana of Addai and Mari, in which the Words of Institution are absent. West Syriacs use the Syro-Antiochian or West Syriac Rite, which belongs to the family of liturgies known as the Antiochene Rite.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: The Syriac Orthodox Church adds to the Trisagion ("Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, have mercy on us") the phrase "who were crucified for us". The Church of the East interpreted this as heretical. Patriarch Timothy I of the Church of the East declared: "And also in all the countries of Babylon, of Persia, and of Assyria, and in all the countries of the sunrise, that is to say, among the Indians, the Chinese, the Tibetans, the Turks, and in all the provinces under the jurisdiction of this Patriarchal See, there is no addition of Crucifixus es pro nobis".


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Among the Saint Thomas Christians of India, the East Syriac Rite was the one originally used, but those who in the 17th century accepted union with the Syriac Orthodox Church adopted the rite of that church.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: A schism in 1552 in the Church of the East gave rise to a separate patriarchate, which at first entered into union with the Catholic Church but later formed the nucleus of the present-day Assyrian Church of the East and Ancient Church of the East, while at the end of the 18th century most followers of the earlier patriarchate chose union with Rome and, with some others, now form the Chaldean Catholic Church.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In India, all of the Saint Thomas Christians are still collectively called "Syrian Christians". The majority of the Saint Thomas Christians, who initially depended on the Church of the East, maintained union with Rome in spite of discomforts felt at Latinization by their Portuguese rulers and clergy, against which they protested. They now form the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church. A small group, which split from these in the early 19th century, united at the beginning of the 20th century, under the name of Chaldean Syrian Church, with the Assyrian Church of the East.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Those who in 1653 broke with the Catholic Church as dominated by the Portuguese in India and soon chose union with the Syriac Orthodox Church later split into various groups. The first separation was that of the Malabar Independent Syrian Church in 1772. At the end of the 19th century and in the course of the 20th, a division arose among those who remained united with the Syriac Orthodox Church who insisted on full autocephaly and are now called the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church and those, the Jacobite Syrian Christian Church, who remain faithful to the patriarch.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: A reunion movement led in 1930 to the establishment of full communion between some of the Malankara Syrian Orthodox and the Catholic Church. They now form the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In the Middle East, the newly enthroned patriarch of the Syriac Orthodox Church, Ignatius Michael III Jarweh, declared himself a Catholic and, having received confirmation from Rome in 1783, became the head of the Syriac Catholic Church.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In the 19th and 20th centuries many Syriac Christians, both East and West, left the Middle East for other lands, creating a substantial diaspora.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In modern times, several Churches of Syriac tradition are actively participating in ecumenical dialogue.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: Indigenous Aramaic-speaking communities of the Near East (, ) adopted Christianity very early, perhaps already from the first century, and began to abandon their three-millennia-old traditional ancient Mesopotamian religion, although this religion did not fully die out until as late as the tenth century. The kingdom of Osroene, with the capital city of Edessa, was absorbed into the Roman Empire in 114 as a semi-autonomous vassal state and then, after a period under the supremacy of Parthian Empire, was incorporated as a Roman province, first in 214, and finally in 242.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In 431 the Council of Ephesus declared Nestorianism a heresy. Nestorians, persecuted in the Byzantine Empire, sought refuge in the parts of Mesopotamia that were part of the Sasanian Empire. This encouraged acceptance of Nestorian doctrine by the Persian Church of the East, which spread Christianity outside Persia, to India, China, Tibet and Mongolia, expanding the range of this eastern branch of Syriac Christianity. The western branch, the Jacobite Church, appeared after the Council of Chalcedon's condemnation of Monophysitism in 451.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: East Syriac Christians were involved in the mission to India, and many of the present Churches in India are in communion with either East or West Syriac Churches. These Indian Christians are known as Saint Thomas Christians.


title: Syriac Christianity

text: In modern times, even apart from the Eastern Protestant denominations like Mar Thoma Syrian Church of Malabar and St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India, which originated from Churches of the West Syriac Rite, various Evangelical denominations continue to send representatives among Syriac Christians. As a result, several Evangelical groups have been established, particularly the Assyrian Pentecostal Church (mostly in America, Iran, and Iraq) from East Syriac Christians, and the Aramean Free Church (mostly in Germany, Sweden, America and Syria) from West Syriac Christians. Because of their new (Protestant) theology these are sometimes not classified as traditional Churches of Syriac Christianity.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Child sacrifice is the ritualistic killing of children in order to please or appease a deity, supernatural beings, or sacred social order, tribal, group or national loyalties in order to achieve a desired result. As such, it is a form of human sacrifice.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Child sacrifice is thought to be an extreme extension of the idea that the more important the object of sacrifice, the more devout the person giving it up is.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The practice of child sacrifice in Europe and the Near East appears to have ended as a part of the religious transformations of late antiquity.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Archaeologists have found the remains of more than 140 children who were sacrificed in Peru's northern coastal region.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Archeologists have found remains of 42 children. It is alleged that these remains were sacrificed to Tlaloc (and a few to Ehécatl, Quetzalcoatl and Huitzilopochtli) in the offerings of the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan by the Aztecs of pre-Columbian Mexico. In every case, the 42 children, mostly males aged around six, were suffering from serious cavities, abscesses or bone infections that would have been painful enough to make them cry continually. Tlaloc required the tears of the young so their tears would wet the earth. As a result, if children did not cry, the priests would sometimes tear off the children's nails before the ritual sacrifice.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Human sacrifice was an everyday activity in Tenochtitlan and women and children were not exempt. According to Bernardino de Sahagún, the Aztecs believed that, if sacrifices were not given to Tlaloc, the rain would not come and their crops would not grow.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The Inca culture sacrificed children in a ritual called "qhapaq hucha". Their frozen corpses have been discovered in the South American mountaintops. The first of these corpses, a female child who had died from a blow to the skull, was discovered in 1995 by Johan Reinhard. Other methods of sacrifice included strangulation and simply leaving the children, who had been given an intoxicating drink, to lose consciousness in the extreme cold and low-oxygen conditions of the mountaintop, and to die of hypothermia.


title: Child sacrifice

text: In Maya culture, people believed that supernatural beings had power over their lives and this is one reason that child sacrifice occurred. The sacrifices were essentially to satisfy the supernatural beings. This was done through "k'ex", which is an exchange or substitution of something. Through "k'ex" infants would substitute more powerful humans. It was thought that supernatural beings would consume the souls of more powerful humans and infants were substituted in order to prevent that. Infants are believed to be good offerings because they have a close connection to the spirit world through liminality. It is also believed that parents in Maya culture would offer their children for sacrifice and depictions of this show that this was a very emotional time for the parents, but they would carry through because they thought the child would continue existing. It is also known that infant sacrifices occurred at certain times. Child sacrifice was preferred when there was a time of crisis and transitional times such as famine and drought.


title: Child sacrifice

text: There is archaeological evidence of infant sacrifice in tombs where the infant has been buried in urns or ceramic vessels. There have also been depictions of child sacrifice in art. Some art includes pottery and steles as well as references to infant sacrifice in mythology and art depictions of the mythology.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The Moche of northern Peru practiced mass sacrifices of men and boys. Archeologists found the remains of 137 children and 3 adults, along with 200 camelids, during excavations in 2011, 2014 and 2016, beneath the sands of a 15th-century site called Huanchaquito-Las Llamas. This sacrifice was possibly made during the heavy rains as there was a layer of mud on top of the clean sand.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The Timoto-Cuicas offered human sacrifices. Until colonial times children sacrifice persisted secretly in Laguna de Urao (Mérida). It was described by the chronicler Juan de Castellanos, who cited that feasts and human sacrifices were done in honour of Icaque, an Andean prehispanic goddess.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The Tanakh mentions human sacrifice in the history of ancient Near Eastern practice. The king of Moab gives his firstborn son and heir as a whole burnt offering ("olah", as used of the Temple sacrifice). In the book of the prophet Micah, the question is asked, 'Shall I give my firstborn for my sin, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?', and responded to in the phrase, 'He has shown all you people what is good. And what does Yahweh require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.' The Tanakh also implies that the Ammonites offered child sacrifices to Moloch.


title: Child sacrifice

text: According to scholars such as Otto Eissfeldt, Paul G. Mosca, and Susan Ackerman, Moloch was not a name for a god, but instead is a word for a particular form of child sacrifice practiced in Israel and Judah which was not abandoned until the reforms of Josiah. In the Tanakh mentions are made in books such as Kings, Leviticus, and Jeremiah of children being given "to the "mōlek"". According to Patrick D. Miller these child sacrifice traditions were not originally part of the Yahwism, but were instead foreign imports. Francesca Stavrakopoulou contradicts this asserting that sacrifices were native to Israel and part of the royal line's attempts to perpetuate itself.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Genesis 21 relates the binding of Isaac, by Abraham to present his son, Isaac, as a sacrifice on Mount Moriah. It was a test of faith (Genesis 21:12). Abraham agrees to this command without arguing. The story ends with an angel stopping Abraham at the last minute and making Isaac's sacrifice unnecessary by providing a ram, caught in some nearby bushes, to be sacrificed instead. Later interpretations of the text have contradicted this version. For example, Martin S. Bergmann states "The Aggadah rabbis asserted that "father Isaac was bound on the altar and reduced to ashes, and his sacrificial dust was cast on Mount Moriah." A similar interpretation was made in the Epistle to the Hebrews. Margaret Barker notes that "Abraham returned to Bersheeba without Isaac" according to a possible sign that he was indeed sacrificed. Barker also notes that wall paintings in the ancient Dura-Europos synagogue explicitly show Isaac being sacrificed, followed by his soul traveling to heaven. According to Jon D. Levenson a part of Jewish tradition interpreted Isaac as having been sacrificed. Similarly the German theologians and maintain that due to the grammatical perfect tense used to describe Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac, he did, in fact, follow through with the action.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Rabbi A.I. Kook, first Chief Rabbi of Israel, stressed that the climax of the story, commanding Abraham not to sacrifice Isaac, is the whole point: to put an end to, and G-d's total aversion to the ritual of child sacrifice. According to Irving Greenberg the story of the binding of Isaac, symbolizes the prohibition to worship God by human sacrifices, at a time when human sacrifices were the norm worldwide.


title: Child sacrifice

text: In Leviticus 18:21, 20:3 and Deuteronomy 12:30–31, 18:10, the Torah contains a number of imprecations against and laws forbidding child sacrifice and human sacrifice in general. The Tanakh denounces human sacrifice as barbaric customs of Baal worshippers (e.g. Psalms 106:37).


title: Child sacrifice

text: James Kugel argues that the Torah's specifically forbidding child sacrifice indicates that it happened in Israel as well. The biblical scholar Mark S. Smith argues that the mention of "Tophet" in Isaiah 30:27–33 indicates an acceptance of child sacrifice in the early Jerusalem practices, to which the law in Leviticus 20:2–5 forbidding child sacrifice is a response. Some scholars have stated that at least some Israelites and Judahites believed child sacrifice was a legitimate religious practice.


title: Child sacrifice

text: In the aftermath of the War against the Midianites narrated in Numbers 31, the Israelites appear to be dedicating 32 captive Midianite virgin girls to be sacrificed to Yahweh as his share in the spoils of war.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The most extensive accounts of child sacrifice in the Hebrew Bible refer to those carried out in Gehenna by two kings of Judah, Ahaz and Manasseh of Judah.


title: Child sacrifice

text: In the Book of Judges, chapter 11, the figure of Jephthah makes a vow to God, saying, "If you give the Ammonites into my hands, whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering" (as worded in the New International Version). Jephthah succeeds in winning a victory, but when he returns to his home in Mizpah he sees his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels, outside. After allowing her two months preparation, Judges 11:39 states that Jephthah kept his vow. According to the commentators of the rabbinic Jewish tradition, Jepthah's daughter was not sacrificed but was forbidden to marry and remained a spinster her entire life, fulfilling the vow that she would be devoted to the Lord. The 1st-century CE Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, however, understood this to mean that Jephthah burned his daughter on Yahweh's altar, whilst pseudo-Philo, late first century CE, wrote that Jephthah offered his daughter as a burnt offering because he could find no sage in Israel who would cancel his vow. In other words, this story of human sacrifice is not an order or requirement by God, but the punishment for those who vowed to sacrifice humans.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The practice of child sacrifice among Canaanite groups is attested by numerous sources spanning over a millennium. One example is in the writings of Diodorus Siculus:


title: Child sacrifice

text: "They also alleged that Kronos had turned against them inasmuch as in former times they had been accustomed to sacrifice to this god the noblest of their sons, but more recently, secretly buying and nurturing children, they had sent these to the sacrifice; and when an investigation was made, some of those who had been sacrificed were discovered to have been substituted by stealth... In their zeal to make amends for the omission, they selected two hundred of the noblest children and sacrificed them publicly; and others who were under suspicion sacrificed themselves voluntarily, in number not less than three hundred. There was in the city a bronze image of Kronos, extending its hands, palms up and sloping towards the ground, so that each of the children when placed thereon rolled down and fell into a sort of gaping pit filled with fire. It is probable that it was from this that Euripides has drawn the mythical story found in his works about the sacrifice in Tauris, in which he presents Iphigeneia being asked by Orestes: "But what tomb shall receive me when I die? A sacred fire within, and earth's broad rift." Also the story passed down among the Greeks from ancient myth that Cronus did away with his own children appears to have been kept in mind among the Carthaginians through this observance." Library 20.1.4


title: Child sacrifice

text: "Again, would it not have been far better for the Carthaginians to have taken Critias or Diagoras to draw up their law-code at the very beginning, and so not to believe in any divine power or god, rather than to offer such sacrifices as they used to offer to Cronos? These were not in the manner that Empedocles describes in his attack on those who sacrifice living creatures: "Changed in form is the son beloved of his father so pious,Who on the altar lays him and slays him. What folly!" No, but with full knowledge and understanding they themselves offered up their own children, and those who had no children would buy little ones from poor people and cut their throats as if they were so many lambs or young birds; meanwhile the mother stood by without a tear or moan; but should she utter a single moan or let fall a single tear, she had to forfeit the money, and her child was sacrificed nevertheless; and the whole area before the statue was filled with a loud noise of flutes and drums so that the cries of wailing should not reach the ears of the people." Moralia 2, De Superstitione 3


title: Child sacrifice

text: "With us, for instance, human sacrifice is not legal, but unholy, whereas the Carthaginians perform it as a thing they account holy and legal, and that too when some of them sacrifice even their own sons to Cronos, as I daresay you yourself have heard." (Minos 315)


title: Child sacrifice

text: "And from then on to the present day they perform human sacrifices with the participation of all, not only in Arcadia during the Lykaia and in Carthage to Kronos, but also periodically, in remembrance of the customary usage, they spill the blood of their own kin on the altars, even though the divine law among them bars from the rites, by means of perirrhanteria and the herald's proclamation, anyone responsible for the shedding of blood in peacetime."


title: Child sacrifice

text: ". . . was chosen as a . . . sacrifice for the city. For from ancient times the barbarians have had a custom of sacrificing human beings to Kronos."


title: Child sacrifice

text: "Some even proposed renewing a sacrifice which had been discontinued for many years, and which I for my part should believe to be by no means pleasing to the gods, of offering a freeborn boy to Saturn —this sacrilege rather than sacrifice, handed down from their founders, the Carthaginians are said to have performed until the destruction of their city—and unless the elders, in accordance with whose counsel everything was done, had opposed it, the awful superstition would have prevailed over mercy. But necessity, more inventive than any art, introduced not only the usual means of defence, but also some novel ones." History of Alexander IV.III.23


title: Child sacrifice

text: "In Africa infants used to be sacrificed to Saturn, and quite openly, down to the proconsulate of Tiberius, who took the priests themselves and on the very trees of their temple, under whose shadow their crimes had been committed, hung them alive like votive offerings on crosses; and the soldiers of my own country are witnesses to it, who served that proconsul in that very task. Yes, and to this day that holy crime persists in secret." Apology 9.2-3


title: Child sacrifice

text: "Among ancient peoples in critically dangerous situations it was customary for the rulers of a city or nation, rather than lose everyone, to provide the dearest of their children as a propitiatory sacrifice to the avenging deities. The children thus given up were slaughtered according to a secret ritual. Now Kronos, whom the Phoenicians call El, who was in their land and who was later divinized after his death as the star of Kronos, had an only son by a local bride named Anobret, and therefore they called him Ieoud. Even now among the Phoenicians the only son is given this name. When war’s gravest dangers gripped the land, Kronos dressed his son in royal attire, prepared an altar and sacrificed him."


title: Child sacrifice

text: "There is another form of sacrifice here. After putting a garland on the sacrificial animals they hurl them down alive from the gateway and the animals die from the fall. Some even throw their children off the place, but not in the same manner as the animals. Instead, having laid them in a pallet, they drop them down by hand. At the same time they mock them and say that they are oxen, not children."


title: Child sacrifice

text: "And Kleitarchos says the Phoenicians, and above all the Carthaginians, venerating Kronos, whenever they were eager for a great thing to succeed, made a vow by one of their children. If they would receive the desired things, they would sacrifice it to the god. A bronze Kronos, having been erected by them, stretched out upturned hands over a bronze oven to burn the child. The flame of the burning child reached its body until, the limbs having shriveled up and the smiling mouth appearing to be almost laughing, it would slip into the oven. Therefore the grin is called “sardonic laughter,” since they die laughing."


title: Child sacrifice

text: "The Phoenicians too, in great disasters whether of wars or droughts, or plagues, used to sacrifice one of their dearest, dedicating him to Kronos. And the ‘Phoenician History,’ which Sanchuniathon wrote in Phoenician and which Philo of Byblos translated into Greek in eight books, is full of such sacrifices."


title: Child sacrifice

text: "When the king of Moab saw that the battle had gone against him, he took with him seven hundred swordsmen to break through to the king of Edom, but they failed. Then he took his firstborn son, who was to succeed him as king, and offered him as a sacrifice on the city wall. The fury against Israel was great; they withdrew and returned to their own land." (2 Kings 3:26-27)


title: Child sacrifice

text: At Carthage, a large cemetery exists that combines the bodies of both very young children and small animals, and those who assert child sacrifice have argued that if the animals were sacrificed, then so too were the children. Recent archaeology, however, has produced a detailed breakdown of the ages of the buried children and, based on this and especially on the presence of prenatal individuals – that is, still births – it is also argued that this site is consistent with burials of children who had died of natural causes in a society that had a high infant mortality rate, as Carthage is assumed to have had. That is, the data support the view that Tophets were cemeteries for those who died shortly before or after birth. Conversely, Patricia Smith and colleagues from the Hebrew University and Harvard University show from the teeth and skeletal analysis at the Carthage Tophet that infant ages at death (about two months) do not correlate with the expected ages of natural mortality (perinatal), apparently supporting the child sacrifice thesis.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Greek, Roman and Israelite writers refer to Phoenician child sacrifice. Skeptics suggest that the bodies of children found in Carthaginian and Phoenician cemeteries were merely the cremated remains of children that died naturally. Sergio Ribichini has argued that the Tophet was "a child necropolis designed to receive the remains of infants who had died prematurely of sickness or other natural causes, and who for this reason were "offered" to specific deities and buried in a place different from the one reserved for the ordinary dead".


title: Child sacrifice

text: According to Stager and Wolff, in 1984, there was a consensus among scholars that Carthaginian children were sacrificed by their parents, who would make a vow to kill the next child if the gods would grant them a favor: for instance that their shipment of goods was to arrive safely in a foreign port.


title: Child sacrifice

text: Archaeologist Peter Warren was involved in the British School at Athens excavation of Palekastro for one season and the excavation at Lefkandi for two seasons. Then he led the excavation at Fournou Korifi, Myrtos from 1967 to 1968. During the 1980s, in two archology magazines, Warren wrote about "child sacrifice" despite the no mention when the official excavation report was completed and published along with his book in 1972.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The Ver Sacrum is a religious practice of ancient Italic peoples, especially the Sabelli (or Sabini) and their offshoot Samnites. The practice is related to that of "devotio" in Roman religion. It was customary to resort to it at times of particular danger or strife for the community. Some scholars believe that in earlier times "devoted" or vowed children were actually sacrificed, but later expulsion was substituted. Dionysius of Halicarnassus states the practice of child sacrifice was one of the causes that brought about the fall of the Pelasgians in Italy.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The human children who had been "devoted" were required to leave the community in early adulthood, at 20 or 21 years of age. They were entrusted to a god for protection, and led to the border with a veiled face. Often they were led by an animal under the auspices of the god. As a group, the youth were called "sacrani" and were supposed to enjoy the protection of Mars until they had reached their destination, expelled the inhabitants or forced them into submission, and founded their own settlement.


title: Child sacrifice

text: The continued murder of black children of all ages, for body parts with which to make muti, for purposes of witchcraft, still occurs in South Africa. Muti murders occur throughout South Africa, especially in rural areas. Traditional healers or witch doctors often grind up body parts and combine them with roots, herbs, seawater, animal parts, and other ingredients to prepare potions and spells for their clients.


title: Child sacrifice

text: In the early 21st century Uganda has experienced a revival of child sacrifice. In spite of government attempts to downplay the issue, an investigation by the BBC into human sacrifice in Uganda found that ritual killings of children are more common than Ugandan authorities admit. There are many indicators that politicians and politically connected wealthy businessmen are involved in sacrificing children in practice of traditional religion, which has become a commercial enterprise.


title: Bugs Moran

text: George Clarence "Bugs" Moran (; Adelard Leo Cunin; August 21, 1893 – February 25, 1957) was an American Chicago Prohibition-era gangster. He was incarcerated three times before his 21st birthday. Seven members of his gang were gunned down and killed in a warehouse in the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre of February 14, 1929, supposedly on the orders of his rival Al Capone.


title: Bugs Moran

text: Moran was born Adelard Cunin to French immigrant Jules Adelard Cunin and Marie Diana Gobeil, Canadian descendent, in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He attended Cretin High School, a private Catholic school in Saint Paul, but he also joined a local juvenile gang and left school at age 18. He was later caught robbing a store and was sent to the state juvenile correctional facility, and was put in jail three times before he turned 21. He then fled to Chicago where he was caught trying to rob a warehouse, taking part in a horse-stealing ring, taking part in robbery involving the death of a police officer, and robbing a freight car, for which he received a variety of prison and jail sentences.


title: Bugs Moran

text: Prohibition was established in 1920 with the enactment of the 18th Amendment, which banned the distribution of alcoholic beverages, resulting in bootlegging.


title: Bugs Moran

text: Among the involved gangs were Dean O'Banion and his mostly Irish group, including Bugs Moran, who became known as the North Side Gang and Al Capone as the leader of the Italian mob on the South Side. These two rivals fought violently, resulting in what is known as "The Bootleg Battle of the Marne".


title: Bugs Moran

text: The bootlegging operation of Hymie Weiss and Bugs Moran continued to pose a significant challenge to Capone's South Side Gang. Moran and Capone then led a turf war with each other that cost them both. Moran's hatred of Capone was apparent even to the public. Moran was disgusted that Capone engaged in prostitution. He would not increase profits himself by engaging in prostitution rings because of his Catholic religion. Johnny Torrio's gang killed Dean O'Banion, and in an attempt to avenge him, Bugs Moran and Earl "Hymie" Weiss made an attempt on Torrio's life. Later they went on to make a failed attempt on Al Capone's life at his headquarters, the Hawthorne Inn in Cicero, Illinois. More than one thousand shots were fired at the inn and at a nearby restaurant in their attempts to kill Capone. In retaliation, Weiss's life was taken by Al Capone's gang, and Bugs Moran became the new boss of the North Side Gang.


title: Bugs Moran

text: According to historian of Twin Cities organized crime Paul Maccabee, Bugs Moran had a close friendship with St. Paul-based Irish mob boss Danny Hogan. Following Hogan's murder by car bomb on December 4, 1928, Bugs Moran personally stood guard outside the Hogan family residence at West Seventh Street in St. Paul, "apparently to protect the Hogan family from further underworld attacks."


title: Bugs Moran

text: Responding to Weiss's death, Moran tried to kill a member of Capone's gang, resulting in an attack, allegedly from Capone, known as the St. Valentine's Day Massacre.


title: Bugs Moran

text: On February 14, 1929, seven members of Moran's gang died in the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. Moran was offered a truckload of whiskey at a bargain price, which he had ordered to be delivered at 10:30 a.m. to the garage of the S.M.C. Cartage Company on North Clark Street, where he kept his bootlegging trucks. Two gunmen dressed as Chicago police officers and two others in plain clothes lined up Moran's people against the wall in the warehouse and shot them. Bugs Moran, the main target of the "assassination" was not present, having arrived late and saw the approaching Police car he turned around going to a nearby café instead. Another North Sider, Al Weinshank, was misidentified as Moran by one of the lookouts who signaled for the attack to begin.


title: Bugs Moran

text: Police response was delayed when witnesses saw the two "police officers" exit the scene. There were six corpses and another man near death when police arrived on the scene. The man, Frank Gusenberg, following the gangster's code of silence, refused to identify the killers before dying. When Moran learned of the carnage, he broke the gangster code, accusing Capone of the murders. No one was convicted, Capone denying involvement in the massacre, though twice being summoned to court, which he avoided by claimed illness.


title: Bugs Moran

text: There is some evidence implicating Chicago police officers in the killings. Prior to the massacre, some officers were stealing bootleg liquor from the gang's trucks and were allegedly disciplined by the chief of police, but no substantiation is available. It has been established that Al Capone was in Florida on the day of the massacre.


title: Bugs Moran

text: Moran managed to keep control of his territory and what remained of his gang through the early 1930s, but the North Side gang never fully recovered its power or former place in Chicago's underworld as the chief rival to Capone's Italian mob. Moran eventually left the area, quitting the gang entirely—though not the criminal lifestyle. He reverted to his earlier gangster ways of petty crime such as mail fraud and robbery.


title: Bugs Moran

text: On April 30, 1939, Moran was convicted of conspiracy to cash $62,000 worth of American Express checks. He was freed on appeal when he posted a bond; he fled but was captured and not released until December 21, 1944. He was almost penniless by the 1940s, only 17 years after being one of the richest gangsters in Chicago. On July 6, 1946, he was arrested for his involvement in the robbery of a Dayton, Ohio tavern on June 28, 1945, and he received a sentence of 20 years after being found guilty. He was paroled in 1956, but was immediately arrested for his role in the 1945 robbery of a bank in Ansonia, Ohio. He was found guilty in 1957 and sentenced to 10 more years in prison.


title: Bugs Moran

text: Moran died of lung cancer a few months into his 10-year sentence at Leavenworth Federal Prison in Kansas on February 25, 1957, at the age of 63.


title: Bugs Moran

text: Moran married Lucille logan bilezikdian, with whom he had a son with, john George Moran (1920 – 1959)., who left him because of his criminal lifestyle. In 1922, he married Evelyn herrell (no known photos of evelyn)


title: Bugs Moran

text: Salem Press. American Villains. Pasadena, Calif: Salem Press, 2008. 386–389. Accessed March 22, 2015. EBSCOhost.


title: Slavutych

text: Slavutych () is a city and municipality in northern Ukraine, purpose-built for the evacuated personnel of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant after the 1986 disaster that occurred near the city of Pripyat. Geographically located within Chernihiv Raion, Chernihiv Oblast, Slavutych is administratively subordinated to the Kyiv Oblast and is part of Vyshhorod Raion. It hosts the administration of Slavutych urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. In 2021 the city had a population of .


title: Slavutych

text: Slavutych is situated on the left bank of the Dnieper River, 40 kilometers (25 miles) from Chernihiv, 45 kilometers (30 miles) from the city of Pripyat, 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Chernobyl (both in Ivankiv Raion) and 200 kilometers (100 miles) from Kyiv. While being geographically located in Chernihiv Raion (part of Chernihiv Oblast, until 2020 in Ripky Raion), administratively it belongs to Kyiv Oblast. It is an administrative exclave, that prior to 2020 did not belong to any "raion". Prior to 2020 administrative reform the city was classified as a city of oblast significance. In 2020 Slavutych was downgraded to a city of district significance and made part of Vyshhorod Raion.


title: Slavutych

text: Slavutych was named after the Old Slavic name (Slavutych) for the Dnieper River. The city was built in 1986 shortly after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, to provide homes for those who had worked at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and their families. They were evacuated from the abandoned city of Pripyat. The economic and social situation of the city is still heavily influenced by the power plant and other Chernobyl zone installations. Many of the residents still work in the energy industry in the region.


title: Slavutych

text: In an interview with "Pravda" published on 10 October 1986, Erik Pozdyshev, the newly appointed Director of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, officially announced that a new city was to be built. Construction of the town started shortly thereafter, and the first inhabitants settled in October 1988. The city was intended to replace Pripyat which became a ghost town after it was evacuated thirty-six hours after the nuclear disaster due to radioactive material. There is a memorial in Slavutych to remember the victims of the disaster, especially to those who lost their lives immediately after the event from radiation-related diseases.


title: Slavutych

text: The city is mostly home to survivors of the disaster who had to be relocated from the evacuation zone around the reactor, among them about 8,000 people who were children when the disaster occurred. Many inhabitants still work at the site of the former plant for monitoring, maintenance or scientific purposes. They commute to the zone on a regular basis. A rail line (twice crossing the international border with Belarus) runs directly from the city to the site of the plant.


title: Slavutych

text: Slavutych is located about 50 kilometers (30 miles) east of the former plant. The site had to be a reasonable distance away from the Chernobyl zone to ensure the risk of radiation-related illnesses was reduced. However, other factors that contributed to the choosing of the site were the availability of a nearby ready railroad infrastructure, and an accessible water supply from the nearby Dnieper River. In order to build the city, the ground was covered with a two-meter (6') layer of uncontaminated soil.


title: Slavutych

text: Until 18 July 2020, Slavutych was incorporated as a city of oblast significance. In July 2020, as part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced the number of raions of Kyiv Oblast to seven, the city of Slavutych was merged into Vyshhorod Raion.


title: Slavutych

text: During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Slavutych became encircled and isolated by the Russian forces in the course of their Kyiv offensive in late February 2022. On 25 March 2022, following days of shelling, the Russian troops entered the city, seized a hospital and detained the mayor Yuri Fomichiv, while locals took to the streets to protest the occupation.


title: Slavutych

text: Following the persistence of the protests when confronted with flashbang grenades and warning shots, the Russian forces agreed to leave Slavutych and release the mayor on the conditions that the Ukrainian military would not be present in the town and most weapons would be handed over to the mayor.


title: Slavutych

text: From the start, Slavutych was planned to become a "21st-century city". Compared to other cities in Ukraine, Slavutych has a modern architecture with pleasant surroundings, and the standard of living in the city is much higher than in most other Ukrainian cities. During the construction of the city, workers and architects from eight former Soviet republics became involved: Armenian SSR, Azerbaijan SSR, Estonian SSR, Georgian SSR, Latvian SSR, Lithuanian SSR, Russian SFSR and Ukrainian SSR. As a result, the city is divided into eight districts named after the capitals of the contributing republics, each with its own unique style and atmosphere. In addition, the city has a youth center, a modern community center, a town hall, an Internet cafe, numerous sports facilities, modern clinics, and a hotel. Around 80% of housing in the city is formed by apartments while the other 20% is formed by small, family houses. The city has a uniquely high birth rate as well as surprisingly low mortality. As a result, the average age in Slavutych is by far the lowest of any city in Ukraine. More than one third of its inhabitants are under 18.


title: Slavutych

text: The infrastructure and public facilities of the city were mostly funded by the company which operated the Chernobyl nuclear plant. Because the remaining units of the nuclear power plant were shut down in 2001, the city faces significant social problems and an uncertain future. Until 2001, approximately 9,000 people worked at the plant. Since the shutdown, this number has dropped to 3,000, most of them working on monitoring and maintenance. 85% of the city budget was funded by the operator of the plant. In order to support the settlement and establishment of new companies, Slavutych was declared a Special Economic Zone. In addition, substantial vocational retraining programs are provided by the government to improve the occupational outlook of those who lost jobs. Despite these efforts, about 1,500 people have already left the city, a trend which is predicted to continue for the foreseeable future.


title: Slavutych

text: Slavutych has been the venue of numerous cultural activities since its foundation in 1989. Most recently, the 86 Film and Urbanism Festival, which ran six editions (2013–2018) and EASA/SESAM, which was due to take place in 2020, but was postponed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Slavutych

text: The unique modernist architecture of the city remains one of its main attractions, as captured in the architectural guide "Slavutych", by author Ievgeniia Gubkina.


title: Slavutych

text: Slavutych has a railway station, and a minor stop in the locality of Poselok Lesnoi, on the Chernihiv–Ovruch line. It is served by a branch (Semenyahivka-Slavutych) of the regional highway P56 Chernihiv-Chernobyl, and by the provincial road T2506.


title: Pneumatics

text: Pneumatics (from Greek ‘wind, breath’) is a branch of engineering that makes use of gas or pressurized air.


title: Pneumatics

text: Pneumatic systems used in industry are commonly powered by compressed air or compressed inert gases. A centrally located and electrically-powered compressor powers cylinders, air motors, pneumatic actuators, and other pneumatic devices. A pneumatic system controlled through manual or automatic solenoid valves is selected when it provides a lower cost, more flexible, or safer alternative to electric motors, and hydraulic actuators.


title: Pneumatics

text: Pneumatic systems in fixed installations, such as factories, use compressed air because a sustainable supply can be made by compressing atmospheric air. The air usually has moisture removed, and a small quantity of oil is added at the compressor to prevent corrosion and lubricate mechanical components.


title: Pneumatics

text: Factory-plumbed pneumatic-power users need not worry about poisonous leakage, as the gas is usually just air. Any compressed gas other than air is an asphyxiation hazard—including nitrogen, which makes up 78% of air. Compressed oxygen (approx. 21% of air) would not asphyxiate, but is not used in pneumatically-powered devices because it is a fire hazard, more expensive, and offers no performance advantage over air. Smaller or stand-alone systems can use other compressed gases that present an asphyxiation hazard, such as nitrogen—often referred to as OFN (oxygen-free nitrogen) when supplied in cylinders.


title: Pneumatics

text: Portable pneumatic tools and small vehicles, such as Robot Wars machines and other hobbyist applications are often powered by compressed carbon dioxide, because containers designed to hold it such as soda stream canisters and fire extinguishers are readily available, and the phase change between liquid and gas makes it possible to obtain a larger volume of compressed gas from a lighter container than compressed air requires. Carbon dioxide is an asphyxiant and can be a freezing hazard if vented improperly.


title: Pneumatics

text: The origins of pneumatics can be traced back to the first century when ancient Greek mathematician Hero of Alexandria wrote about his inventions powered by steam or the wind.


title: Pneumatics

text: German physicist Otto von Guericke (1602 to 1686) further developed the idea. He invented the vacuum pump, a device that can draw out air or gas from the attached vessel. He demonstrated the vacuum pump to separate the pairs of copper hemispheres using air pressures. The field of pneumatics has changed considerably over the years. It has moved from small handheld devices to large machines with multiple parts that serve different functions.


title: Pneumatics

text: Both pneumatics and hydraulics are applications of fluid power. Pneumatics uses an easily compressible gas such as air or a suitable pure gas—while hydraulics uses relatively incompressible liquid media such as oil. Most industrial pneumatic applications use pressures of about . Hydraulics applications commonly use from , but specialized applications may exceed .


title: Pneumatics

text: Pneumatic logic systems (sometimes called air logic control) are sometimes used for controlling industrial processes, consisting of primary logic units like:


title: Pneumatics

text: Pneumatic logic is a reliable and functional control method for industrial processes. In recent years, these systems have largely been replaced by electronic control systems in new installations because of the smaller size, lower cost, greater precision, and more powerful features of digital controls. Pneumatic devices are still used where upgrade cost, or safety factors dominate.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: "Other ranks" (abbreviated "ORs") is the term used to refer to all ranks below officers in the British Army and the Royal Marines. It includes warrant officers, non-commissioned officers ("NCOs") and ordinary soldiers with the rank of private or regimental equivalent. Officers may, in speaking, distinguish themselves from those "in the ranks".


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: During the 18th century corporals might indicate their ranks with a knot with cord loops on their right shoulder and, from 1768, an epaulette instead. Sergeants had clothing that was of slightly better quality and wore lace trim on their hats and uniforms. Infantry sergeants were armed with fusils (grenadier companies, from 1769), halberds or, from 1792 until 1830, with spontoons. They, as well as their countreparts in cavalry and artillery, were also permitted sashes of crimson wool, with a single stripe of facing colour following the clothing regulations of 1727. Whereas it remained vague as to whether the sash was to be worn over the shoulder or around the waist, it was clarified in 1747 that sergeants had to wear their sashes around the waist. From 1768, the sergeant's waist sash had stripes of facing colour one (until 1825) resp. three (until 1845); in regiments with red or purple facings the sergeant's sash had white stripes or remained plain crimson. Sergeants of highland regiments wore their sashes over the left shoulder and tied at the right hip in the same manner as the officers. Beginning from the same year, sergeants wore a pair of silk epaulettes with fringe while sergeant-majors had a pair of gold or silver laced epaulettes with bullion fringe.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: The chevrons worn by many non-commissioned officers are based on heraldic devices and their current use originates from 1802. As today, sergeants wore three chevrons, point downwards, on the upper arm, and corporals wore two, with sergeant-majors and quarter-master-sergeants then having four. Whereas corporals and sergeants discarded their silk epaulettes by now, sergeant-majors continued to wear their metal epaulettes along with their new chevrons for a while. Lance corporal, at the time, not a rank but an appointment is historically known as "chosen man" and carrying extra pay for privates holding it, were given a single chevron a few years later, and later in the century, the lance-sergeant appeared, wearing three chevrons. The infantry rank of colour sergeant was created in 1813 as a reward for senior sergeants with one allowed per company. He was allowed to wear a badge consisting of a regimental colour supported by two crossed swords.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: The Royal Artillery had the special rank of bombardier below the corporal, and both he and the acting bombardier wore one chevron. The Royal Engineers and Army Ordnance Corps also had an additional rank of second corporal, who wore one chevron. On full-dress tunics, badges in white or gold lace were worn only on the right arm, but on service dress jackets, badges in worsted embroidery were worn on both arms. In February 1918 the acting bombardier was renamed lance-bombardier, and the full bombardier gained a second chevron in 1920 replacing the rank of corporal in the RA. Second corporals also disappeared at that time (the second corporal had been an actual rank, whereas lance-corporal was private acting in the rank of corporal).


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: The pre-war infantry rank of colour sergeant had generally given way to the ranks of company sergeant-major and quartermaster-sergeant in 1914 when the four-company organization was introduced. Both of these ranks, their squadron, and battery equivalents, and staff-sergeants in other arms, wore three chevrons and a crown, although, in 1915 company, battery, squadron, and troop sergeant-majors became warrant officers class II (by Army Order 70) and thereafter wore a single large crown, without any chevrons, on each forearm. The designation of warrant officer classes was in Roman rather than Arabic numerals until the latter half of the 20th century.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: Regimental quartermaster-sergeants wore four chevrons on the lower sleeve, point upwards, with an eight-pointed star above, but adopted the crown when they too became warrant officers class II in 1915. In their case, however, the crown was surrounded by a wreath. Regimental sergeant-majors, who before the Boer War had worn four chevrons with a crown, were given in 1902 the badge of a single large crown on the lower arm but adopted a small version of the Royal arms in its place in 1915 when they became warrant officers class I.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: Certain senior grades of warrant officer were also peculiar to the specialist branches, which ranked above regimental sergeant-majors. These were the conductors of the Army Ordnance Corps and the first-class staff sergeant-majors of the Army Service Corps and the Army Pay Corps. They also wore a large crown, surrounded by a wreath, on the lower arm, although in 1918 this was replaced by the Royal Arms within a wreath. The RA also had its master gunners in three classes, but these were technical specialists and not normally seen in the field. The Royal Arms within a wreath is the badge of rank for a conductor, the most senior of all WO1 appointments, confined to the Royal Logistic Corps and held by fewer than twenty people as of 2004.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: From 1938, there was also a rank of warrant officer class III. The only appointments held by this rank were platoon sergeant major, troop sergeant major, and section sergeant major. The WOIII wore a crown on his lower sleeve. The rank was placed in suspension in 1940 and no new appointments were made, but it was never officially abolished. From 1938 to 1947 all WOII ranks wore the crown in wreath rank now worn by regimental quartermaster sergeants.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: The grades of lance-sergeant and lance-corporal were not strictly ranks but were appointments, held by selected corporals and privates, and usually carrying extra pay. The appointment was made by the man's commanding officer and could be taken away by him for disciplinary reasons, unlike full sergeants and corporals who could only be demoted by order of a court-martial. It is only since 1961 that lance-corporal has been a separate rank in its own right, and the appointment of lance-sergeant was discontinued in 1946, except in the Foot Guards and Honourable Artillery Company (and its equivalent, lance-corporal of the horse, in the Household Cavalry).


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: As most units in the British Army have long traditions (some dating as far back as the 1600s) some variation has developed in the terminology and insignia used for non-commissioned ranks, most notably in the Foot Guards and Household Cavalry. Many units do not use the rank "Private", using instead:


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: The Royal Artillery also uses the ranks Gunner instead of Private, and Lance Bombardier and Bombardier instead of Lance Corporal and Corporal, while The Rifles use the spelling "Serjeant" in place of "Sergeant".


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: The Household Cavalry maintains the old cavalry tradition of having no rank of sergeant, which was originally an infantry rank only. It has its own peculiar set of insignia and ranks with the following equivalents:


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: Similarly, warrant officer appointments are different, with, for example, "regimental corporal major" being used in place of regimental sergeant major. Uniquely, NCOs and warrant officers of the Household Cavalry do not wear any insignia on their full dress uniforms (although officers do). Rank is indicated by a system of aiguillettes.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: In several cavalry regiments including the 1st The Queen's Dragoon Guards and the Queen's Royal Hussars, NCOs holding the rank of lance corporal wear two stripes. Full corporals are distinguished by the addition of a cypher above their two stripes in dress uniforms.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: Staff sergeants in an appointment as squadron quartermaster sergeant in the cavalry, sometimes wear four stripes with a crown and are referred to as "sergeant major". The term "mister" is confined to WO2s.


title: British Army other ranks rank insignia

text: The spelling "serjeant" is sometimes seen. This was the official spelling in the British Army and Royal Marines, although not the Royal Air Force, until the 1930s and appeared in such publications as King's Regulations and the Pay Warrant, which defined the various ranks. In common usage, the modern spelling "sergeant" was already more usual, as in the volumes of the Official History which began to appear in the 1920s. Serjeant-at-Arms is a title still held by members of the security staff in the Houses of Parliament. The old spelling is also retained by The Rifles, as successor to the Royal Green Jackets and The Light Infantry, which also used it.


title: Star Trek: Discovery (season 1)

text: The first season of the American television series "" is set a decade before the events of "" and follows the crew of the USS "Discovery" during the Federation–Klingon war. The season was produced by CBS Television Studios in association with Secret Hideout, Roddenberry Entertainment, and Living Dead Guy Productions, with Gretchen J. Berg and Aaron Harberts serving as showrunners, and Akiva Goldsman providing producing support.


title: Star Trek: Discovery (season 1)

text: Sonequa Martin-Green stars as Michael Burnham, first officer of the USS "Shenzhou" and later the "Discovery", along with Doug Jones, Shazad Latif, Anthony Rapp, Mary Wiseman, and Jason Isaacs. The series was announced in November 2015, and Bryan Fuller joined as showrunner the next February. He brought on Berg and Harberts to support him, and they took over as showrunners when Fuller left the series in October 2016 following creative disagreements with CBS. The season's war storyline was intended to represent the divide between different political factions of the modern United States, with effort put into redesigning the Klingon species and developing their culture and biology. Filming took place in Toronto, Canada, from January to October 2017, with additional filming on location in Jordan for the series premiere. The crew, including the visual effects team—led by Pixomondo—and composer Jeff Russo, aimed for the series' production values to match that of a feature film. The season features several guest stars taking on roles from "The Original Series".


title: Star Trek: Discovery (season 1)

text: The first episode was broadcast on CBS and released on the streaming service CBS All Access on September 24, 2017. The rest of the 15-episode season was released weekly on All Access in two chapters: the first ended on November 12, and the second was released from January 7 to February 11, 2018. The season led to record subscriptions for All Access, and generally positive reviews from critics who highlighted Martin-Green's performance, the production values, and new additions to "Star Trek" canon. Some criticized the writing. The season was nominated for two Primetime Emmy Awards and received several other awards and nominations. A was ordered in October 2017.


title: Star Trek: Discovery (season 1)

text: In March 2018, a "secret scene" was released depicting an alternative ending to the season finale, in which Mirror Georgiou is approached by an operative of Section 31. This storyline is further explored in the .


title: Star Trek: Discovery (season 1)

text: On November 2, 2015, CBS announced that a new "Star Trek" television series would premiere in January 2017, "on the heels" of "" 50th anniversary in 2016. The series would be developed specifically for the streaming service CBS All Access. Bryan Fuller was hired to be showrunner and executive producer in February 2016, as well as co-creator with Alex Kurtzman. Fuller began his career writing for the series "" and "", and had publicly called for "Star Trek" to return to television for years after the end of the previous series, "", in 2005. When Fuller first met with CBS about the series, the company did not have a plan for what the show would be. He proposed an anthology series where each season would be a standalone, serialized show set in a different era, beginning with a prequel to the original series. CBS told Fuller to start with a single serialized show and see how that performs first, and so he began further developing the prequel concept. In June, Fuller announced that the first season would consist of 13 episodes, and a month later, at "Star Trek"s 50th anniversary San Diego Comic-Con panel, he revealed the series' title to be "Star Trek: Discovery." He also said it would be set in the "Prime Timeline" alongside the previous "Star Trek" series, rather than in the alternate "Kelvin Timeline" that the concurrent "Star Trek" film series was set in.