title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Arab Muslim and Tamil Indian Muslim traders in the 12th century AD. It is commonly held that Islam first arrived in the Malay peninsula since Sultan Mudzafar Shah I (12th century) of Kedah (Hindu name Phra Ong Mahawangsa), the first ruler to be known to convert to Islam after being introduced to it by Indian traders who themselves were recent converts. In the 13th century, the Terengganu Stone Monument was found at Kuala Berang, Terengganu, where the first Malay state to receive Islam in 1303 Sultan Megat Iskandar Shah, known as Parameswara prior to his conversion, is the first Sultan of Melaka. He converted to Islam after marrying a princess from Pasai, of present-day Indonesia.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: The religion was adopted peacefully by the coastal trading ports people of Malaysia and Indonesia, absorbing rather than conquering existing beliefs. By the 15th and 16th centuries it was the majority faith of the Malay people.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Contemporary Islam follows the Shafi‘ite school of Sunnism. Some Islamic terms, such as the word Allah, are forbidden to non-Muslims both orally and in government's ban on the use of the word "Allah" by non-Muslims, reversing the 2009 ruling of a court of first instance.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Until the 1970s, many Malay Muslims lived a liberal and moderate Islam, like Indonesian Muslims. At this time, a wave of Islamisation emerged (sparked by various social and ethnic conflicts, linked to the Al-Arqam parties and Islam Se-Malaysia), so that today, Malaysia lives in a more Islamic environment compared to the earlier years. Malays, who represent 50.4% of the total population, are almost all Muslims. About 70% of Malay Muslims wear headscarves, while their port was marginal until the 1980s. The traditional Malay garment, of Islamic origin, is also worn by many Malays.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Originally authorised for the country's independence in 1957, apostasy became illegal following an amendment to the country's constitution in 1988. The internationally reported attempt by Lina Joy to convert from Islam to Christianity is one of the most famous representations.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: While this was not a problem during the colonial era, Muslims wishing to change their religion face severe deterrence. Before 1988, the question of freedom of religion and therefore of questions relating to the desire of citizens to change their religion was exclusively within the jurisdiction of secular courts. But since the law has changed, an amendment stipulates that secular courts no longer have the right to deal with claims by Muslims and that only Islamic Shariah courts have jurisdiction to discuss issues related to human rights. Apostasy is one of them and it follows that it is constitutionally legally impossible for a Muslim to change his belief.Many Muslims who have changed their religion, whether it is conversion to Buddhism, Christianity, Sikhism, Taoism and other beliefs, are forced for their own safety to lead a double life. In some cases, denunciations of apostasy have already been reported as being reported to the authorities by family members or co-workers.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: In February 2014, Edry Faizal, a coordinator in charge of the Democratic Action Party, claimed that it was inconsistent from a Quranic point of view to forbid Muslims from freely changing beliefs, but from his point of view was the best alternative that the power had found to preserve its Malaysian electorate and consequently to remain in power continuously.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: In May 2014, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said during his speech about the future of the country that: "We will never tolerate any demand for the right to apostasy by Muslims, and we refuse that Muslims can have the right to be tried by courts other than sharia courts, and we will not allow Muslims to participate in LGBT activities". But he concluded that this was necessary because: "This is in line with our efforts to make Malaysia a modern, progressive Muslim country in order to achieve the status of a developed nation with a high income for 2020".


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: In recent years, more and more voices have been asked to try to determine the number of ethnic Malay people supposed to have left Islam for another belief. The government has remained silent on the question, believing that it is much too controversial to be debated. However, in October 2011, Harussani Zakaria, the mufti of the state of Perak, said that according to a 2008 government report that was kept secret, there would have been more than 260,000 Malayans since 1988 who secretly converted to Christianity. According to the 2010 population census, they would be between 3 and 4% of the Malaysian majority. Nevertheless, no data estimating the number of Malay who converted to another religion was provided.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Nonetheless, these remarks later triggered a polemic often repeated in the media by Islamist and nationalist circles that recognising the right of the Malayans and the entire Muslim community to be free to choose their own beliefs would risk provoking a "Massive exodus of apostates" within the nation, the same slogan has also been listed on the official website of Islam in Malaysia. On 17 December 2015, Malaysian Police Chief Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar during a speech, alluded to this mysterious report: "I can not tell you how much this issue is and potentially explosive. "


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: The state banishes and sanctions non-Muslim proselytism, but encourages conversions to Islam and remunerates them in order to facilitate the reduction of the non-Muslim population within the nation. Among the new rights provided to converts, if they have child/children, they have the right to convert their children by force to Islam, without having to consider the approval of his spouse.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: In March 2015, unrest erupted in Miri, Sarawak, when a 13-year-old Dayak schoolgirl complained to the police, along with her parents, after being sequestrated at her school by two of her teachers who wanted to convert her to Islam by forcing her to recite Shahada. The latter then rewarded his conversion by donating 250 ringgit. In order to ease interfaith tensions, the two teachers were subsequently fired and transferred out of the state of Sarawak.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: On 4 December 2015, Malaysian feminist and human rights activist, Shafiqah Othman Hamzah said, "What we are living in Malaysia is almost no different from apartheid. While segregation was racial in South Africa, in our country we live in religious segregation."


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: On 9 February 2016, the Putrajaya Federal Court ruled on a scandal termed the "S Deepa Affair" dating back to 4 September 2013, involving forced conversions of children to Islam in a Hindu couple married since 2003. In this case, the father N. Viran converted to Islam in November 2012 under the name of Izwan Abdullah decided to impose his conversion to his two children, his son Mithran and his daughter Sharmila. Shortly after that, the children had their names changed to Nabil for the son and Nurul Nabila for the girl. Becoming the only person judged capable of raising them, he had obtained from the Shari'a court of Seremban their sole custody and through this the dissolution of his marriage.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Their marriage, which had been celebrated according to the Hindu rites and subsequently registered in the civil registers, was thus dissolved by the Shari'a court on the sole ground of the conversion to Islam by the husband, making it immediately obsolete. However, the Seremban High Court ruled that the annulment of the marriage was illegal and decided to return the custody of the children to the mother on 7 April 2014.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: However, two days later Izwan kidnapped his son during a home visit by his ex-wife. Deepa quickly requested the High Court for police aid in getting her son back. Izwan decided to appeal the decision by the Seremban High Court and sought the help from the Shari'a court to assert his rights. The Court of Appeal rejected both appeals in December 2014. Child custody in February 2016 was finally divided by the Court of Appeal. The guard of the son was entrusted to the father, in this case, Izwan and the guard of the daughter to the mother, S Deepa. Asked by the media at the announcement of the verdict, she announced in tears: "This is injustice, I am upset. It was my last hope that the court would return my two children, but it was not so. Only my daughter was given to me."


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Zheng He is credited to have settled Chinese Muslim communities in Palembang and along the shores of Java, the Malay Peninsula, and the Philippines. These Muslims allegedly followed the Hanafi school in the Chinese language. This Chinese Muslim community was led by Hajji Yan Ying Yu, who urged his followers to assimilate and take local names.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: The Sunni Islam of the Shafi'i school of thought is the official, legal form in Malaysia, although syncretist Islam with elements of Shamanism is still common in rural areas. Mosques are an ordinary scene throughout the country and adhan (call to prayer) from minarets are heard five times a day. Government bodies and banking institutions are closed for two hours every Friday so Muslim workers can conduct Friday prayer in mosques. However, in certain states such as Kelantan, Terengganu, Kedah and Johor, the weekends fall on Friday and Saturday instead of Saturday and Sunday. It has been introduced to several states, notably Kelantan and Terengganu, all businesses close for 2 hours on every Friday for prayers. Failure to comply would result in fines.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Since it is compulsory for Muslims to perform a prayer 5 times a day no matter where they are, almost all public places, including shopping malls, hotels, condominiums, usually have allocated spaces called "Surau", for performing the Muslim prayers.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: In 2017, it was reported that Wahhabism is spreading among Malaysia's elite, and that the traditional Islamic theology currently taught in Government schools is gradually being shifted to a view of theology derived from the Middle East, particularly Saudi Arabia.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: The Malaysian government has strict policies against other Islamic sects, including a complete ban on Shia Islam, allegedly to "avoid violence between the two faiths that has sometimes broken out in other parts of the world by promoting only the Sunni faith". Due to decades of the Saudi funding, Shia Islam is openly and freely demonised and Shia Muslims are oppressed in the country, their prayers and gatherings are broken up, state's secret service also engages in Shia forced disappearances. Anti-Shi'ism reaches such an extent that the mainstream media always present Iran in bad light while blindly glorying Saudi Arabia. For example, in 2019 Malaysian police raided multiple private functions commemorating the martyrdom of Husayn ibn Ali at the battle of Karbala, arresting scores of foreign and local Shia Muslims. While the true numbers are not known, the number of Malaysian Shia Muslims is estimated at around 250,000.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Muslims who believe Mirza Ghulam Ahmad to be the fulfilment of the Islamic prophecies concerning the return of Jesus, the Ahmadiyya, are also present. There are approximately 2,000 Ahmadis in the country. Though small in number, they face state sanctioned persecution in Malaysia.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Muslims who reject the authority of hadith, known as Quranists, Quraniyoon, or Ahl al-Quran, are also present in Malaysia. The most notable Malaysian Quranist is the scholar Kassim Ahmad.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Islam is central to and dominant in Malay culture. A significant number of words in the Malay vocabulary can trace their origins to Arabic which is the common language of Islamic prayer and rituals. This is, however, not exclusive and words from other cultures such as Portuguese, Chinese, Dutch, Sanskrit, Tamil, English, and French can also be found in the Malay language. Islam is so ingrained in Malay life that Islamic rituals are practised as Malay culture. Muslim and Malays are interchangeable in many daily contexts.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Muslim women generally wear the "tudung" (hijab or headscarf) over their heads. However, Malay women not wearing any headgear are not reprimanded or penalised. Prominent Malaysian female examples are Rafidah Aziz, International Trade and Industry Minister and Siti Hasmah Mohamad Ali, wife of then Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir bin Mohamad. However, with the influx of Arabic travellers, foreign Muslim women (Arabs) wearing hijab that leave only their eyes exposed are often spotted in tourist attractions, not the least at the shopping malls. At certain Malaysian institutions such as the International Islamic University, wearing of the tudung is mandatory; however, for non-Muslim students this usually amounts to a loosely worn piece of cloth draped over the back of the head.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Some regard the "tudung" to be an indication of Arabic influence in Malay Muslim culture, and point to incidents such as the banning of the traditional Malay "wayang kulit" in the state of Kelantan (which was ruled by the Islamist PAS) to be "un-Islamic".


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Malaysia's top Islamic body, the National Fatwa Council, ruled against Muslims practising yoga, saying it had elements of other religions that could corrupt Muslims.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: As defined by the Constitution of Malaysia, Malays must be Muslim, regardless of their ethnic heritage; otherwise, legally, they are not Malay. Consequently, apostate Malays would have to forfeit all their constitutional privileges, including their Bumiputra status, which entitles them to affirmative action in university admissions and discounts on purchases of vehicles or real estate. It is legally possible to become a Malay if a non-Malay citizen with a Malaysian parent converts to Islam and thus claims all the Bumiputra privileges granted by Article 153 of the Constitution and the New Economic Policy (NEP). However, the convert must "habitually speak the Malay language" and adhere to Malay culture. A tertiary textbook for Malaysian studies following the government-approved syllabus states: "This explains the fact that when a non-Malay embraces Islam, he is said to "masuk Melayu" ("become a Malay"). That person is automatically assumed to be fluent in the Malay language and to be living like a Malay as a result of his close association with the Malays".


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Islam in Malaysia is thus closely associated with the Malay people, something an Islamic scholar has criticised, saying that Malaysian Islam is "still clothed in communal garb; that Muslims in Malaysia have yet to understand what the universal spirit of Islam means in reality".


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Parallel to the civil courts, there are Sharia courts which conduct legal matters related to Muslim family sphere. Legal issues like Muslim divorce and Muslim apostasy are conducted in the Syariah Courts. However, there are cases whereby apostasy cases are tried in the Federal Courts. Non-Muslims are not bound by Sharia.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: In mid-2017, Kamarul Zaman Yusoff who worked as a lecturer at Universiti Teknologi MARA alleged that it was the Christian members of the largely Chinese-based Democratic Action Party (DAP) that held effective power over the party and that it had a "Christian agenda". He claimed that numerous party officials including party Secretary-General Lim Guan Eng of being a Christian. DAP parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang refuted the allegations and accused the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) of spreading lies about the DAP.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: On 12 July 2018, UMNO Supreme Council member Datuk Lokman Noor Adam claimed that the DAP which is a component party of the then governing Pakatan Harapan coalition was attempting to make Christianity the official religion of Malaysia.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: As of 2013 most Muslim Malaysian women wear the tudung, a type of hijab. This use of the tudung was uncommon prior to the 1979 Iranian Revolution, and the places that had women in tudung tended to be rural areas. The usage of the tudung sharply increased after the 1970s, as religious conservatism among Malay people in both Malaysia and Singapore increased.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Several members of the Kelantan ulama in the 1960s believed the hijab was not mandatory. However, in 2015 the majority of Malaysian ulama believed this previous viewpoint was un-Islamic.


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Norhayati Kaprawi directed a 2011 documentary about the use of tudung in Malaysia, "Siapa Aku?" ("Who am I?").


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: Despite the hijab, or tudung being non-mandatory in Malaysia, some government buildings enforce within their premises a dresscode which bans women, Muslim and non-Muslim, from entering while wearing "revealing clothes".


title: Islam in Malaysia

text: According to the 2010 census, 61.3% of its population (17,375,794 people) were Muslim. All individuals who self-identify as ethnic Malays are categorised as Muslims (see also ethnoreligious group). The data shows the non-Malay who self-identifies as Muslim does not "menjadi Melayu" and still counted separately from Malay ethnic group. Information collected in the census based on respondent's answer and did not refer to any official document.


title: Aflac

text: Aflac Inc. (American Family Life Assurance Company) is an American insurance company and is the largest provider of supplemental insurance in the United States. The company was founded in 1955 and is based in Columbus, Georgia. In the U.S., Aflac underwrites a wide range of insurance policies, but is perhaps more known for its payroll deduction insurance coverage, which pays cash benefits when a policyholder has a covered accident or illness. The company states it "provides financial protection to more than 50 million people worldwide".


title: Aflac

text: In 2009, Aflac acquired Continental American Insurance Company for $100 million; this enabled Aflac to sell supplemental insurance on both the individual and group platform. , Aflac was represented by approximately 19,300 sales agencies in Japan, and 76,900 licensed sales associates in the U.S.


title: Aflac

text: The company was founded by brothers John, Paul (died 2014), and William Amos in Columbus, Georgia, in 1955, as American Family Life Insurance Company of Columbus. In 1964, the company name was changed to American Family Life Assurance Company of Columbus. In 1990, the company adopted the Aflac acronym, although the official name of the underwriting subsidiary remains American Family Life Assurance Company of Columbus. Aflac announced the appointment of Frederick J. Crawford as Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President in June 2015.


title: Aflac

text: The company signed 6,426 policyholders in its first year. Aflac pioneered cancer insurance in 1958. Beginning in 1964, the company decided to focus sales on worksite settings, eventually through policies sponsored by employers and funded through payroll deductions. By 2003, more than 98% of Aflac policies in the United States were issued on a payroll deduction basis, making the company a leader in that approach to policy distribution.


title: Aflac

text: Aflac operates in the United States and Japan, and has its worldwide headquarters and corporate offices in an eighteen-story tower just east of Downtown Columbus, Georgia, in an area known as MidTown. The Aflac tower is the tallest building in the city. , the corporation's total assets were more than $103 billion, and the company insured more than 50 million people worldwide.


title: Aflac

text: Aflac is the largest provider of guaranteed-renewable insurance in the United States and the largest insurance company overall in Japan, when measured by individual insurance policies in force.


title: Aflac

text: The company now offers several types of insurance policies in the United States, including the following:


title: Aflac

text: Aflac also offers un-reimbursed medical, dependent day-care, and transportation flexible spending accounts. The company additionally offers human resources services for HIPAA and COBRA. From 1979 to 1997, the company owned several television stations, most of them in small and medium markets. It sold the broadcasting division (including flagship station WTVM) to what became Raycom Media in 1997.


title: Aflac

text: Consumer groups and some government officials say that cancer insurance returns fewer premium dollars to policyholders than standard insurance. A United States General Accounting Office study found that the policies paid back as little as 35% of premiums (Aflac said its cancer insurance paid back 62.4%). In comparison, New York State requires most major-medical policies to pay back 82% and group policies to pay back 75%. New York State does not allow stand-alone cancer policies.


title: Aflac

text: In 1997, AFLAC spent $175,000 on lobbyists and campaign contributions to change the law. New York State lifted its ban in 1998 for purchasers who already have basic coverage. Consumer Reports recommended that policyholders use the money instead to buy lower-deductible insurance.


title: Aflac

text: Since December 1999, the company's identity and brand has become more widely recognized in the United States as the result of TV commercials featuring the Aflac Duck, who quacks the company's name with frustration to unsuspecting prospective policy holders. The duck concept and all of the commercials to date have been created by Kaplan Thaler Group, an advertising agency based in New York City. Metzer Farms, a Gonzales, California, waterfowl and gamebird hatchery, supplied them with the initial ducklings that each grew into the famous duck. Struggling to come up with a concept to make the big but relatively obscure insurance company's name memorable, one of the agency's art directors stumbled upon the duck idea while walking around Central Park at lunchtime uttering, "Aflac, Aflac." He soon realized how much the company's name sounded like a duck's quack. The Aflac Duck character has now starred in more than 30 commercials. In many of these commercials, character actor Earl Billings also appears. The Aflac Duck is enshrined on Madison Avenue's Walk of Fame as one of America's Favorite Advertising Icons.


title: Aflac

text: From 2003 to 2006, when both NASCAR on NBC & NASCAR on TNT were scheduled to televise the 2nd half of the Cup Series Season, they ran a 30 second segment in certain parts of each and every race they broadcast, called, "The Aflac Trivia Quiz." The segment would always begin when NASCAR on NBC-TNT Commentator/Cup Series Champion Benny Parsons would segue the topics he would be talking about by saying, "Cue The Duck!"


title: Aflac

text: In April 2009, Aflac introduced a new marketing campaign called "Get the Aflacts," designed to educate consumers about the specific benefits of the insurance products the company sells. The Aflacts campaign gave the Aflac Duck "a more prominent role", designed to "help potential customers learn the Aflacts, er, facts about policies and other products", according to "The New York Times".


title: Aflac

text: Celebrities have starred in the Aflac ads, including Chevy Chase (2003); Yogi Berra; Yao Ming; future First Lady of the United States, Melania Trump (2005); NASCAR Cup Series driver Carl Edwards (2008–2014); the United States Olympic synchronized swimming team (2004); and Wayne Newton playing at Stardust Hotel and Casino for the 2003 commercial. The duck also appeared with Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner, and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. In 2005, the company logo was changed to incorporate the duck. The first commercial using the new logo featured Gilbert Gottfried at a pet store because the duck kept saying, "Aflac!" and he had to trade in the duck for a parrot, saying, "If you're hurt and can't work".


title: Aflac

text: The duck was originally voiced by comedian Gilbert Gottfried, who also voiced Digit on the PBS Kids series "Cyberchase" and Iago in the Disney film "Aladdin". After 11 years as the voice of the Aflac duck, Gottfried was dismissed on March 14, 2011, due to jokes on Gottfried's Twitter account referencing the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. The company's chief marketing officer stated that "Gilbert's recent comments about the crisis in Japan were lacking in humor, and certainly do not represent the thoughts and feelings of anyone at Aflac."


title: Aflac

text: On March 23, 2011, Aflac announced that the company was taking applications for the new voice of the Aflac Duck through QuackAflac.com until April 1. Commercials requesting the submissions, first aired in 2006 but updated, resemble a silent movie. On April 26, 2011, it was announced that Daniel McKeague, a television advertising sales manager from Hugo, Minnesota, would be the new voice of the Aflac duck. The first Aflac commercial featuring the duck's new voice aired on May 1, 2011.


title: Aflac

text: In 2018, an Aflac ad inserted an animated Aflac duck into the opening credits of the "DuckTales" reboot.


title: Aflac

text: The company states that through a partnership with Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, Aflac has contributed more than $100 million to childhood cancer research and treatment.


title: Aflac

text: Aflac employees are formally involved in an array of charitable organizations such as Habitat for Humanity International, the Easter Seals, and the United Way.


title: Aflac

text: Aflac's stated objectives include the decrease of its environmental impact, for which the company is into a partnership with the Clean Air Campaign to encourage employees to engage with greater frequency in alternate commuting methods.


title: Aflac

text: Starting in 2001, Aflac and Macy’s have partnered to sell the annual Aflac holiday plush duck in select Macy’s stores nationwide. Net proceeds from each duck sold are donated to the participating children’s cancer facility nearest to where it is purchased. Since 2001, more than $3 million has been raised from the sale of the ducks.


title: Aflac

text: Aflac has participated in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade for the past six years. A new balloonicle was unveiled in 2014, featuring the Aflac Duck wearing ice skates.


title: Aflac

text: The Jackie Robinson Award is given to the high-school player who is entering his senior year and who best displays character, leadership, and the values of being a student athlete in academics and community affairs. The award is presented at an annual All-American Awards banquet, which was first held in 2003. The banquet follows the annual All-American Baseball Classic, an East-West all-star game featuring the 38 best players from around the nation who are entering their senior year of high school. First held in 2003, the game is played at Petco Park, San Diego, California. Proceeds from the game and banquet are donated to Rady Children's Hospital in San Diego and its fight against childhood cancer.


title: Chamunda

text: Chamunda (Sanskrit: चामुण्डा, ISO-15919: Cāmuṇḍā), also known as Chamundeshwari, Chamundi or Charchika, is a fearsome form of Chandi, the Hindu Divine Mother Shakti and is one of the seven Matrikas (mother goddesses).


title: Chamunda

text: She is also one of the chief Yoginis, a group of sixty-four or eighty-one Tantric goddesses, who are attendants of the warrior goddess Parvati. The name is a combination of Chanda and Munda, two monsters whom Chamunda killed. She is closely associated with Kali, another fierce aspect of Parvati. She is identified with goddesses Parvati, Kali or Durga.


title: Chamunda

text: The goddess is often portrayed as residing in cremation grounds or around holy fig trees. The goddess is worshipped by ritual animal sacrifices along with offerings of wine. The practice of animal sacrifices has become less common with Shaivite and Vaishnavite influences.


title: Chamunda

text: Ramakrishna Gopal Bhandarkar says that Chamunda was originally a tribal goddess, worshipped by the tribals of the Vindhya mountains in central India. These tribes were known to offer goddesses animal as well as human sacrifices along with rituals offering liquor. These methods of worship were retained in Tantric worship of Chamunda, after assimilation into Hinduism. He proposes the fierce nature of this goddess is due to her association with Rudra (Shiva), identified with fire god Agni at times. Wangu also backs the theory of the tribal origins of the goddess.


title: Chamunda

text: The black or red coloured Chamunda is described as wearing a garland of severed heads or skulls ("Mundamala"). She is described as having four, eight, ten or twelve arms, holding a Damaru (drum), trishula (trident), sword, a snake, skull-mace ("khatvanga"), thunderbolt, a severed head and "panapatra" (drinking vessel, wine cup) or skull-cup (kapala), filled with blood. Standing on a corpse of a man ("shava" or "preta") or seated on a defeated demon or corpse ("pretasana"). Chamunda is depicted adorned by ornaments of bones, skulls, and serpents. She also wears a "Yajnopavita" (a sacred thread worn by mostly Hindu priests) of skulls. She wears a "jata mukuta", that is, headdress formed of piled, matted hair tied with snakes or skull ornaments. Sometimes, a crescent moon is seen on her head. Her eye sockets are described as burning the world with flames. She is accompanied by evil spirits. She is also shown to be surrounded by skeletons or ghosts and beasts like jackals, who are shown eating the flesh of the corpse which the goddess sits or stands on. The jackals and her fearsome companions are sometimes depicted as drinking blood from the skull-cup or blood dripping from the severed head, implying that Chamunda drinks the blood of the defeated enemies. This quality of drinking blood is a usual characteristic of all Matrikas, and Chamunda in particular. At times, she is depicted seated on an owl, her vahana (mount or vehicle) or buffalo and or Dhole. Her banner figures an eagle.


title: Chamunda

text: These characteristics, a contrast to usual Hindu goddess depiction with full breasts and a beautiful face, are symbols of old age, death, decay and destruction. Chamunda is often said as a form of Kali, representing old age and death. She appears as a frightening old woman, projecting fear and horror.


title: Chamunda

text: In Hindu scripture "Devi Mahatmya", Chamunda emerged as "Chandika Jayasundara" from an eyebrow of goddess "Kaushiki", a goddess created from "sheath" of Durga and was assigned the task of eliminating the demons Chanda and Munda, generals of demon kings Shumbha-Nishumbha. She fought a fierce battle with the demons, ultimately killing them.


title: Chamunda

text: According to a later episode of the "Devi Mahatmya", Durga created Matrikas from herself and with their help slaughtered the demon army of Shumbha-Nishumbha. In this version, Kali is described as a Matrika who sucked all the blood of the demon Raktabīja, from whose blood drop rose another demon. Kali is given the epithet Chamunda in the text. Thus, the Devi Mahatmya identifies Chamunda with Kali.


title: Chamunda

text: In the "Varaha Purana", the story of Raktabija is retold, but here each of Matrikas appears from the body of another Matrika. Chamunda appears from the foot of the lion-headed goddess Narasimhi. Here, Chamunda is considered a representation of the vice of tale-telling ("pasunya"). The Varaha Purana text clearly mentions two separate goddesses Chamunda and Kali, unlike Devi Mahatmya.


title: Chamunda

text: According to another legend, Chamunda appeared from the frown of the benign goddess Parvati to kill demons Chanda and Munda. Here, Chamunda is viewed as a form of Parvati.


title: Chamunda

text: The "Matsya Purana" tells a different story of Chamunda's origins. She with other matrikas was created by Shiva to help him kill the demon Andhakasura, who has an ability - like Raktabīja - to generate from his dripping blood. Chamunda with the other matrikas drinks the blood of the demon ultimately helping Shiva kill him. Ratnakara, in his text "Haravijaya", also describes this feat of Chamunda, but solely credits Chamunda, not the other matrikas of sipping the blood of Andhaka. Having drunk the blood, Chamunda's complexion changed to blood-red. The text further says that Chamunda does a dance of destruction, playing a musical instrument whose shaft is Mount Meru, the string is the cosmic snake Shesha and gourd is the crescent moon. She plays the instrument during the deluge that drowns the world.


title: Chamunda

text: Chamunda is one of the saptamatrikas or Seven Mothers. The Matrikas are fearsome mother goddesses, abductors and eaters of children; that is, they were emblematic of childhood pestilence, fever, starvation, and disease. They were propitiated in order to avoid those ills, that carried off so many children before they reached adulthood.


title: Chamunda

text: Chamunda is included in the "Saptamatrika" (seven Matrikas or mothers) lists in the Hindu texts like the "Mahabharata" (Chapter 'Vana-parva'), the "Devi Purana" and the "Vishnudharmottara Purana". She is often depicted in the Saptamatrika group in sculptures, examples of which are Ellora and Elephanta caves. Though she is always portrayed last (rightmost) in the group, she is sometimes referred to as the leader of the group. While other Matrikas are considered as Shaktis (powers) of male divinities and resemble them in their appearance, Chamunda is the only Matrika who is a Shakti of the great Goddess Devi rather than a male god. She is also the only Matrika who enjoys independent worship of her own; all other Matrikas are always worshipped together.


title: Chamunda

text: The "Devi Purana" describe a pentad of Matrikas who help Ganesha to kill demons. Further, sage Mandavya is described as worshipping the "Māṭrpaňcaka" (the five mothers), Chamunda being one of them. The mothers are described as established by the creator god Brahma for saving king Harishchandra from calamities. Apart from usual meaning of Chamunda as slayer of demons Chanda and Munda, the "Devi Purana" gives a different explanation: "Chanda" means terrible while "Munda" stands for Brahma's head or lord or husband.


title: Chamunda

text: In the "Vishnudharmottara Purana" - where the Matrikas are compared to vices - Chamunda is considered as a manifestation of depravity. Every matrika is considered guardian of a direction. Chamunda is assigned the direction of south-west.


title: Chamunda

text: Chamunda, being a Matrika, is considered one of the chief Yoginis, who are considered to be daughters or manifestations of the Matrikas. In the context of a group of sixty-four yoginis, Chamunda is believed to have created seven other yoginis, together forming a group of eight. In the context of eighty-one yoginis, Chamunda heads a group of nine yoginis.


title: Chamunda

text: A South Indian inscription describes ritual sacrifices of sheep to Chamunda. In Bhavabhuti's eighth century Sanskrit play, Malatimadhva describes a devotee of the goddess trying to sacrifice the heroine to Chamunda's temple, near a cremation ground, where the goddess temple is. A stone inscription at Gangadhar, Rajasthan, deals with a construction to a shrine to Chamunda and the other Matrikas, "who are attended by Dakinis" (female demons) and rituals of daily Tantric worship ("Tantrobhuta") like the ritual of "Bali" (offering of grain).


title: Chamunda

text: The Chapa dynasty worshiped her as their Kuladevi. The Kutch Gurjar Kshatriyas worship her as Kuladevi and temples are in Sinugra and Chandiya. Alungal family, a lineage of Mukkuva caste — (Hindu caste of seafarer origin) in Kerala — worship Chamundi in Chandika form, as Kuladevta and temple is in Thalikulam village of Thrissur, Kerala. This is an example of Chamunda worship across caste sects.


title: Chamunda

text: In Vajrayana Buddhism, Chamunda is associated with Palden Lhamo. She is seen as a wrathful form of Kali and is a consort of Mahakala and protectress of the Dalai Lama and Panchen Lama of the Gelug school.


title: Chamunda

text: Early Jains were dismissive of Chamunda, the goddess who demands blood sacrifice - which is against the primary principle of Ahimsa of Jainism. Some Jain legends portray Chamunda as a goddess defeated by Jain monks like Jinadatta and Jinaprabhasuri.


title: Chamunda

text: Another Jain legend tells the story of conversion of Chamunda into a Jain goddess. According to this story, Chamunda sculpted the Mahavir image for the temple in Osian and was happy with the conversions of Hindu Oswal clan to Jainism. At the time of Navaratri, a festival that celebrates the Hindu Divine Mother, Chamunda expected animal sacrifices from the converted Jains. The vegetarian Jains, however, were unable to meet her demand. Jain monk Ratnaprabhasuri intervened, and as a result, Chamunda accepted vegetarian offerings, forgoing her demand for meat and liquor. Ratnaprabhasuri further named her "Sacciya", one who had told the truth, as Chamunda had told him the truth that a rainy season stay in Osian was beneficial for him. She also became the protective goddess of the temple and remained the clan goddess of the Osvals. The Sachiya Mata Temple in Osian was built in her honour by Jains. Some Jain scriptures warn of dire consequences of worship of Chamunda by the Hindu rites and rituals. Many Kshatriyas and even the Jain community worship her as her Kuladevi or family/clan deity.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot Investigates is a short story collection written by English author Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by The Bodley Head in March 1924. In the eleven stories, famed eccentric detective Hercule Poirot solves a variety of mysteries involving greed, jealousy, and revenge. The American version of this book, published by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1925, featured a further three stories. The UK first edition featured an illustration of Poirot on the dust jacket by W. Smithson Broadhead, reprinted from the 21 March 1923 issue of "The Sketch" magazine.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot receives a visit from Miss Mary Marvell, the famous American film star on her visit to London. She has received three letters, handed to her by a Chinese man, which warn her to return her fabulous diamond jewel, the "Western Star", to where it came from – the left eye of an idol – before the next full moon. Her husband, Gregory Rolf, who bought it from a Chinese man in San Francisco, gave Mary the jewel three years ago. The pair are going to stay at Yardly Chase, the home of Lord and Lady Yardly when the moon is next full to discuss the making of a film there and Mary is determined to go with her diamond. Both Poirot and Hastings remember society gossip from three years back that linked Rolf and Lady Yardly. The Yardlys also own an identical diamond that came from the right eye of the idol – the Star of the East. After Mary has gone Poirot goes out and Hastings receives a visit from Lady Yardly, who was advised to visit Poirot by her friend Mary Cavendish. Hastings deduces that she too has received warning letters. Her husband plans to sell their jewel as he is in debt. When Poirot learns this he arranges to visit Yardly Chase and is there when the lights go out and Lady Yardly is attacked by a Chinese man and her jewel stolen. The next day, Mary's jewel is stolen from her London hotel. Poirot makes his investigations and returns the Yardlys' jewel to them.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot tells Hastings that there never were two jewels or any Chinese man – it was all an invention by Rolf. Three years before in the United States he had an affair with Lady Yardly and blackmailed her into giving him the diamond which he then gave to his wife as a wedding present. Lady Yardly's was a paste copy that would have been discovered when her husband sold it. She was starting to push back against her blackmailer and Rolf arranged the deception against his wife that Lady Yardly copied when Hastings told her of the threats. Poirot's threats manage to persuade Rolf to give the real diamond back and leave the Yardlys in peace.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot is asked by a friend, who is the director of the Northern Union Insurance Company, to investigate the case of a middle-aged man who died of an internal haemorrhage just a few weeks after insuring his life for fifty thousand pounds. There were rumours that Mr Maltravers was in a difficult financial position and the suggestion has been made that he paid the insurance premiums and then committed suicide for the benefit of his beautiful young wife. Poirot and Hastings travel to Marsdon Manor in Essex where the dead man was found in the grounds, with a small rook rifle by his side. They interview the widow and can find nothing wrong. They are leaving when a young man, Captain Black, arrives. A gardener tells Poirot that he visited the house the day before the death. Poirot interviews Black and by using word association finds out that he knew of someone who committed suicide with a rook rifle in East Africa when he was there.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot figures out that this story, told at the dinner table the day before the tragedy, gave Mrs Maltravers the idea of how to kill her husband by making him demonstrate to her how the African farmer would have put the gun in his mouth. She then pulled the trigger. Mr Maltravers is seen by a maid in the garden. She thinks that it is just a mistake, but then in the living room a strange thing happens. The lights suddenly go out and Mrs Maltravers clasps Poirot's hand. Mr Maltravers appears in the room, his index finger glowing and pointing at Mrs Maltravers' hand, which is covered in his blood. Terrified, she confesses. Poirot explains that he hired a man, with phosphorescent applied to his finger, to impersonate Mr Maltravers and turn off the lights. When Mrs Maltravers grabbed Poirot's hand, he put fake blood on hers.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Hastings is at a friend's house with several other people when the talk turns to flats and houses. Mrs Robinson tells the party how she and her husband have managed to obtain a flat in Knightsbridge for a very attractive price. Poirot is interested and decides to investigate. The porter at the flat tells them that the Robinsons have been there for six months, despite Mrs Robinson's telling Hastings they had only just obtained the lease. Poirot rents another flat in the building and, by use of the coal lift, manages to gain entry to the Robinsons' flat and fix the locks so he can enter at will. Inspector Japp tells Poirot that important American naval plans were stolen from that country by an Italian called Luigi Valdarno who managed to pass them to a suspected spy for Japan, Elsa Hardt, before being killed in New York. Hardt fled the United States using the name Robinson.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: That night, when the Robinsons' flat is empty, Poirot and Hastings lie in wait and apprehend another Italian who has come to kill Elsa Hardt and her accomplice in revenge for the death of Valdarno. They disarm the man and take him to another house in London. Poirot tracked down the two spies there, having previously lived in Knightsbridge as a Mr and Mrs Robinson. In fear of their lives, the spies rented the flat cheaply to a real couple of the same name, in the hope that this innocent couple would be killed in their place. They trick Hardt into revealing the hiding place of the plans before the Italian escapes and Japp arrests the two spies.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot and Hastings receive a visit from a Mr Roger Havering, the second son of a Baronet who is married to an actress. Mr Havering stayed at his club in London the previous evening and the following morning received a telegram from his wife saying that his Uncle Harrington Pace was murdered the previous evening and to come at once with a detective. As Poirot is indisposed, Hastings sets off with Havering for the scene of the crime.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Mr Pace, the brother of Mr Havering's mother, owns a hunting lodge on the Derbyshire moors. When Hastings and Havering arrive there they meet Inspector Japp as Scotland Yard has been called. As Havering goes off with Japp, Hastings speaks with the housekeeper, Mrs Middleton, who tells him she showed a black-bearded man into the house the previous evening who wanted to see Mr Pace. She and Mrs Zoe Havering were outside the room where the two men were talking when they heard a shot. The door to the room was locked but they found an open window; gaining entry, they found Mr Pace dead, shot by one of two pistols on display in the room. The pistol and the man are now missing.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Mrs Middleton sends Zoe Havering to see Hastings and she confirms the housekeeper's story. Japp confirms Havering's alibi for his train times to London and his attendance at the club. Soon the missing pistol is found dumped in Ealing. Hastings wires to Poirot with the facts, but Poirot is interested only in the clothes worn by and descriptions of Mrs Middleton and Mrs Havering. Poirot wires back to arrest Mrs Middleton at once but she disappears before this can happen. Upon investigation, no trace can be found of her existence, either from the agency that sent her or how she reached Derbyshire.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Once Hastings is back in London, Poirot gives Hastings his theory – Mrs Middleton never existed. She was Zoe Havering in disguise. Only Mr Havering claims to have seen the two women together at the same time. Havering did go to London with one of the pistols which he dumped and Mrs Havering shot her uncle with the other pistol. Japp is convinced of the theory but does not have enough evidence to make an arrest. The Haverings inherit their uncle's fortune but not for long: the two are soon killed in an aeroplane crash.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The fiancée of Philip Ridgeway asks Poirot to prove his innocence. Ridgeway is the nephew of Mr Vavasour, the joint general manager of the London and Scottish Bank and a million dollars of bonds have gone missing whilst in his care. Poirot meets Ridgeway at the Cheshire Cheese to hear the facts of the case: Ridgeway was entrusted by his uncle and the other general manager, Mr Shaw, with taking a million dollars of Liberty bonds to New York to extend the bank's credit line there. The bonds were counted in Ridgeway's presence in London, sealed in a packet and then put in his portmanteau that had a special lock on it. The packet disappeared just a few hours before the liner on which Ridgeway was travelling, the "Olympia", docked in New York. Attempts had been made to break into the portmanteau but its lock must have then been picked. Customs were alerted and they sealed the ship that they then searched but to no avail. The thief was selling the bonds in New York so quickly that one dealer swears to buying some bonds before the ship docked. Poirot then questions the two general managers who confirm this story. He then travels to Liverpool where the "Olympia" has just returned from another crossing and the stewards confirm the presence of an elderly man wearing glasses in the cabin next to Ridgeway, who never left it.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot meets back with Ridgeway and his fiancée and explains the case to them. The real bonds were never in the portmanteau. Instead they were posted to New York on another faster liner, the "Gigantic", which arrived before the "Olympia". The confederate at the other end had instructions to begin selling the bonds only when the "Olympia" docked but he failed to carry out his orders properly, hence one sale took place half an hour before docking. In the portmanteau was a false packet that the real villain took out with a duplicate key and threw overboard – this was Mr Shaw who claims he was off work for two weeks due to bronchitis whilst these events transpired. Poirot caught him by asking him if he can smoke a cigar, which, given his bronchitis, Shaw should have immediately declined. However, he said yes, convincing Poirot of his guilt.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Lady Willard consults Poirot. She is the widow of the famous Egyptologist, Sir John Willard. He was the archaeologist on the excavation of the tomb of the Pharaoh Men-her-Ra together with an American financier, Mr Bleibner. Both men died within a fortnight of each other, Sir John of heart failure and Mr Bleibner of blood poisoning. A few days later Mr Bleibner's nephew, Rupert, shot himself and the press is full of stories of an Egyptian curse. Lady Willard's son, Guy, has now gone out to Egypt to continue his father's work and she fears that he will die next. To Hastings' surprise, Poirot states that he believes in the forces of superstition and agrees to investigate. Poirot cables New York for details concerning Rupert Bleibner. The young man was an itinerant in the South Seas and borrowed enough money to take him to Egypt. His uncle refused to advance him a penny, and the nephew returned to New York, where he sank lower and lower and then shot himself, leaving a suicide note saying that he was a leper and an outcast.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot and Hastings travel to Egypt and join the expedition, only to find that there has been another death in the party, that of an American by tetanus. As Poirot investigates the dig, he feels the forces of evil at work. One night, an Arab servant delivers Poirot his cup of chamomile tea. Hastings hears Poirot choking, after drinking the tea. He fetches the expedition surgeon, Dr Ames. This is, however, a pretext to get the doctor into their tent where Poirot orders Hastings to secure him. The doctor, however, quickly swallows a lethal cyanide capsule.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot explains that Rupert was Bleibner's heir, and the doctor, secretly, must have been Rupert's heir. Sir John died of natural causes. His death started superstitious speculation. Everyone assumed that Rupert's friend in the camp was his uncle but that could not have been the case as they argued so frequently. Despite having no money, Rupert returned to New York, which shows that he did have an ally in the expedition. This was a false ally – the doctor, who told Rupert he had contracted leprosy in the South Seas and it must be part of the curse. Rupert merely had a normal skin rash. After Dr Ames killed his uncle, Rupert believed himself cursed and shot himself. His note refers to the leprosy, which everyone assumed was a metaphorical reference, not a real condition. Bleibner and the American, respectively, were also killed by the doctor, using injections of bacterial cultures.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot and Hastings are staying at the Grand Metropolitan hotel in Brighton where they meet Mr and Mrs Opalsen. He is a rich stockbroker who amassed a fortune in the oil boom and his wife collects jewellery using the proceeds. She offers to show Poirot her pearls and goes to fetch them from her room but they have been stolen. Poirot is asked to assist.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: There have only been two people in the room since the pearls were last seen - Mrs Opalsen's maid, Celestine, and the hotel chambermaid. Celestine has orders to remain in the room all of the time that the chambermaid is there. Both girls are questioned and each blames the other. The hotel room has a side room where Celestine sleeps and a bolted door which leads to the room next door. The two maids were in sight of each other all the time, except for two pauses of between twelve and fifteen seconds apiece when Celestine went into her room – not enough time to extract the jewel case from the drawer, open it, take the jewels and return the case. Both are searched but nothing is found. Both rooms are then searched and the missing pearls are found underneath Celestine's mattress. The case is seemingly over but Poirot tells Hastings that the newly found necklace is a fake. He questions the chambermaid and the valet who looks after Mr Opalsen, and asks them if they have ever seen before a small, unusually glossy white card which he has found. They both examine the card and then return it, claiming ignorance of its origins.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot rushes to London, and the next day breaks the news to Hastings and the delighted Opalsens that the case is solved and the real pearls found. The chambermaid and the valet were a pair of international jewel thieves – Poirot gave them the card in order to obtain their fingerprints, which he gave to Japp for testing. The valet was on the other side of the bolted door, and the chambermaid passed him the case in the first interval when Celestine was in her room. When she next went in there, the chambermaid returned the empty case to the drawer whose runners had been silenced with French polish, traces of which Poirot found in the room next door. After the pearls were found in the valet's room, the pair were arrested and the Opalsen's pearls were returned to their grateful owners.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Towards the end of the First World War, Hastings calls on Poirot in his rooms to discuss the sensational news of the day – the attempted assassination of the Prime Minister, David MacAdam. They are interrupted by two visitors: Lord Estair, Leader of the House of Commons and Bernard Dodge, a member of the War Cabinet. They enlist Poirot to help with a national crisis – the Prime Minister has been kidnapped. He was on his way to a secret peace conference to be held the next day at Versailles. He arrived in Boulogne-sur-Mer where he was met by what was thought to be his official car but it was a substitute. The real car was found in a side road, with its driver bound and gagged. As they tell Poirot the details, news reaches them by special courier that the bogus car has been found abandoned and containing Captain Daniels, the Prime Minister's secretary, chloroformed and gagged. His employer is still missing.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot wants to know the full details of the shooting that took place earlier. It occurred on the way back from Windsor Castle when, accompanied by Daniels and the chauffeur, Murphy, the car took a side road and was surrounded by masked men. Murphy stopped and one man shot at the P.M., but only grazing his cheek. Murphy drove off, leaving the would-be murderers behind. The P.M. stopped off at a small cottage hospital to have his wound bandaged and then went straight on to Charing Cross Station to get the Dover train. Murphy has also disappeared, the P.M.'s car being found outside a Soho restaurant frequented by suspected German agents. As Poirot packs to leave for France he voices his suspicions of both Daniels and Murphy and wonders why the shooting by masked men took place before the kidnap. Poirot goes over the Channel with various detectives involved in the case, among them Japp. Once in Boulogne he refuses to join in the search. He instead sits in his hotel room and thinks for several hours.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Abruptly, he returns to Britain where he begins a tour of cottage hospitals to the west of London in an official car. They call at a house in Hampstead; the police raid it and recover both Murphy and the Prime Minister. The villain was Daniels who kidnapped both men in the shooting, taking to London substitutes with the "P.M.'s" face disguised by bandages from a shooting that had never occurred; Poirot's search of the cottage hospitals proved that no one's face was bandaged up that day. Investigation was misdirected to France, when the real P.M. had never left the country. Daniels was known to have a sister near Hampstead but she is Frau Bertha Ebenthal, a German spy for whom Poirot has been searching for some time. The real Prime Minister is whisked off to Versailles for the conference.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot and Hastings are entertaining Japp when the conversation turns to the recent disappearance of a banker, Mr Davenheim, from his large country house, the Cedars. Boasting, Poirot agrees to a five-pound bet with Japp that he could solve the case within a week without moving from his chair.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The facts of the case are that Davenheim arrived home from the city at midday on Saturday. He seemed normal and went out to post some letters late in the afternoon. He said that he was expecting a business visitor, a Mr Lowen, who should be shown into the study to wait for his return. Mr Davenheim never did return and no trace of him can be found. The police were called on Sunday morning and on the Monday it was discovered that the concealed safe in Davenheim's study was forced open and the contents removed – cash, a large amount of bearer bonds and jewellery. Lowen has not been arrested, but is under observation. He was there to discuss some business in South Africa with Mr Davenheim, who was in Johannesburg the previous autumn.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot is interested that the house has a boating lake, which Japp tells him is being searched tomorrow. Japp also reports that Mr Davenheim wears his hair rather long, with a moustache and bushy beard. The next day Japp returns with the news that Davenheim's clothes have been found in the lake and that they have arrested Lowen. A common thief called Billy Kellett, known to the police for pick-pocketing, saw Lowen throw Davenheim's ring into a roadside ditch on the Saturday. He picked it up and pawned it in London, got drunk on the proceeds, got arrested and is in custody.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot has one question for Japp: Did Mr and Mrs Davenheim share a bedroom? When the reply is returned in the negative, Poirot knows the solution and tells Hastings and Japp to withdraw any funds they have in Davenheim's bank before it collapses. This predicted event occurs the next day and Poirot reveals the truth. Davenheim knew of his bank's financial troubles and started to prepare a new life for himself. Last autumn he did not go to South Africa but instead took on the identity of Billy Kellett. He served three months in jail at the same time he was supposed to be in Johannesburg and then, to set up Lowen, on the Saturday robbed his own safe before Lowen arrived at the house. When Davenheim 'disappeared' he was already in police custody as Kellett and no one looked for a missing man in jail. Mrs Davenheim identifies her husband and Japp pays Poirot his five pounds.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot and Hastings are in their rooms with a neighbour, Dr Hawker, when the medical man's housekeeper arrives with the message that a client, Count Foscatini, has phoned for the doctor, crying out for help. Poirot, Hastings and Hawker rush to Foscatini's flat in Regent's Court. The lift attendant there is unaware of any problems. The attendant says that Graves, the Count's manservant, left half an hour earlier with no indication of anything wrong. The flat is locked but the manager of the building opens it for them. Inside, they find a table set for three people, with the meals finished. The Count is alone and dead – his head crushed in by a small marble statue. Poirot is interested in the remains on the table. He questions the kitchen staff at the top of the building. They describe the meal they served and the dirty plates passed up to them in the service elevator. Poirot seems especially interested in the fact that little of the side dish and none of the dessert were eaten, while the main course was consumed entirely. He also points out that after crying out for help on the phone, the dying man replaced the receiver.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The police arrive at the flat as Graves returns. He tells them the two dinner guests first visited Foscatini on the previous day. One was a man in his forties, Count Ascanio, and a younger man. Graves said that he listened to their first conversation, and heard threats uttered; then the Count invited the two men to dinner the next evening. Graves says that the next night Foscatini unexpectedly gave him the night off after dinner, when the port had been served. Ascanio is quickly arrested, but Poirot states three points of interest: the coffee was very black, the side dish and dessert were relatively untouched, and the curtains were not drawn. The Italian ambassador provides an alibi for Ascanio, which leads to suspicions of a diplomatic cover-up, and Ascanio denies knowing Foscatini. Poirot invites Ascanio for a talk and forces him to admit that he did know that Foscatini was a blackmailer. Ascanio's morning appointment was to pay him the money he demanded from a person in Italy, the transaction being arranged through the embassy where Ascanio worked.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: After Ascanio leaves, Poirot tells Hastings that Graves is the killer and explains his reasoning. Graves overheard the monetary transaction, and realised that Ascanio could not admit to the relationship with Foscatini hence enabling theft of the ill-gotten lucre.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Graves killed Foscatini when he was alone – there never were any dinner guests - then ordered dinner for three and ate as much of the food as he could; but after consuming the three main courses, he could eat only a little of the side dishes and none of the desserts. Coffee was served for three and presumably drunk, but Foscatini's brilliant white teeth show that he never drank such staining substances. Finally, the open curtains show that Graves left the flat before nightfall and not after, which would not have been the case if the account given by Graves were true. This theory is passed on to Japp, and when he investigates, Poirot is proven right.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot receives an unusual request from Miss Violet Marsh. She was orphaned at fourteen years of age, when she went to live with her Uncle Andrew in Devon. He was recently returned from making his fortune in Australia. He was opposed to his niece bettering herself through book learning. Violet rebelled against him and got herself into Girton College some nine years before meeting Poirot. Although somewhat strained, her relations with Andrew Marsh remained cordial. He died a month before she meets with Poirot, leaving a will with a strange clause. The will is dated 25 March and timed at 11:00 am. Marsh gave instructions that his "clever" niece was allowed to live in his house for one year; in that time she had to "prove her wits". If at the end of that time she had not done so, all his worldly goods would go to charitable institutions and she would be left with nothing.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Poirot and Miss Marsh are convinced that there is either a second will or a sum of money hidden in the house; he agrees to look. Poirot and Hastings travel to Devon, where they are looked after by Mr and Mrs Baker, Marsh's housekeepers. They tell Poirot that they signed and witnessed two wills, as Marsh said he had made a mistake with the first, although they did not see its contents. Immediately afterwards, Marsh left the house to settle tradesmen's accounts.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Looking round the house, Poirot is pleased with the dead man's order and method, except for one particular: the key to a roll top desk has been affixed, not to a neat label, but instead to a dirty envelope. After a long search, Poirot declares himself beaten and is about to return to London when he remembers the visit to the tradesmen. He rushes back to the house and holds up the opened envelope to the fire. Faint writing in invisible ink appears, which is a will dated after the one in Violet's possession and leaving everything to her. The two wills signed by the Bakers were a ruse. The tradesmen in town must have signed the true last will, which Marsh turned into an envelope attached to a key. This was left as a deliberate clue. According to Poirot, Miss Marsh proved her superior intelligence by employing Poirot to solve the case.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The American edition of the book, published one year later, featured an additional three stories which did not appear in book form in the UK until 1974 with the publication of "Poirot's Early Cases".


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The review in "The Times Literary Supplement" of 3 April 1924 began with a note of caution but then became more positive: "When in the first of M. Poirot's adventures, we find a famous diamond that has been the eye of a god and a cryptic message that it will be taken from its possessor 'at the full of the moon' we are inclined to grow indignant on behalf of our dear old friend the moonstone. But we have no right to do so, for the story is quite original". The review further described Poirot as "a thoroughly pleasant and entertaining person".


title: Poirot Investigates

text: "The New York Times Book Review" chose to review the 1924 UK publication of the novel in its edition of 20 April that year, rather than wait for the 1925 Dodd, Mead publication. The unnamed reviewer liked the book but seemed to consider the stories somewhat clichéd and not totally original, making several comparisons to Sherlock Holmes. He began, "Agatha Christie's hero...is traditional almost to caricature, but his adventures are amusing and the problems which he unravels skilfully tangled in advance." He did admit that "it is to be feared that some of the evidence [Poirot] collects would fare badly in criminal courts" but concluded, "Miss Christie's new book, in a word, is for the lightest of reading. But its appeal is disarmingly modest, and it will please the large public which relishes stories of crime, but likes its crime served decorously."


title: Poirot Investigates

text: "The Observer" of 30 March 1924 said, "The short story is a sterner test of the 'detective' writer than the full-grown novel. With ample space almost any practised writer can pile complication upon complication, just as any man could make a puzzling maze out of a ten-acre field. But to pack mystery, surprise and a solution into three or four thousand words is to achieve a feat. There is no doubt about Miss Christie's success in the eleven tales (why not a round dozen?) published in this volume. All of them have point and ingenuity, and if M. Poirot is infallibly and exasperatingly omniscient, well, that is the function of the detective in fiction." Unlike "The New York Times", the reviewer favourably compared some of the stories to those of Sherlock Holmes and concluded, "We hope that the partnership [of Poirot, Hastings and Japp] will last long and yield many more narratives as exciting as these. With "The Mysterious Affair at Styles" and this volume to her credit (to say nothing of others) Miss Christie must be reckoned in the first rank of the detective story writers."


title: Poirot Investigates

text: "The Scotsman" of 19 April 1924 said, "It might have been thought that the possibilities of the super-detective, for the purposes of fiction, had been almost exhausted. Miss Agatha Christie, however, has invested the type with a new vitality in her Hercule Poirot, and in "Poirot Investigates" she relates some more of his adventures. Poirot is most things that the conventional sleuth is not. He is gay, gallant, transparently vain, and the adroitness with which he solves a mystery has more of the manner of the prestidigitator than of the cold-blooded, relentless tracker-down of crime of most detective stories. He has a Gallic taste for the dramatic, and in "The Tragedy of Marsdon Manor" he perhaps gives it undue rein, but mainly the eleven stories in the book are agreeably free from the elaborate contrivance which is always rather a defect in such tales. Poirot is confronted with a problem and Miss Christie is always convincing in the manner in which she shows how he lights upon a clue and follows it up.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Robert Barnard remarked that this was one of her "Early stories, written very much under the shadow of Holmes and Watson." His critique was that "The tricks are rather repetitive and the problems lack variety".


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The Prime Minister who features in the story "The Kidnapped Prime Minister" is also referenced in the 1923 short story "The Submarine Plans", which was published in book form in the 1974 collection "Poirot's Early Cases". It is possible that his name, "David MacAdam", is a Celtic wordplay on the name of the real Prime Minister during the latter days of the First World War, David Lloyd George.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: In "The Adventure of the Western Star", Lady Yardly was advised to visit Poirot by her friend Mary Cavendish, a long time friend of Hastings. Cavendish appears in "The Mysterious Affair at Styles", Christie's first mystery novel, and the one which introduced Hercule Poirot to the literary world.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: "The Disappearance of Mr Davenheim" was presented on television as a thirty-minute play by CBS as an episode in the series "General Electric Theater" on 1 April 1962 under the title of "Hercule Poirot". Introduced by Ronald Reagan and directed by John Brahm, the adaptation starred Martin Gabel as Poirot. The program was made as a pilot for a series that did not happen; instead it was the debut of the character on English-language television. (An earlier adaptation of the same story starring José Ferrer as Hercule Poirot had been filmed by MGM in 1961 but never aired, and in 1955, German television aired "Murder on the Orient Express".)


title: Poirot Investigates

text: All of the stories contained in "Poirot Investigates" have been adapted as episodes in the ITV television series "Agatha Christie's Poirot" with David Suchet in the role of Poirot, Hugh Fraser as Hastings, Philip Jackson as Japp and Pauline Moran as Miss Lemon. As is the custom with these adaptations, they differ somewhat from their originals.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: "The Kidnapped Prime Minister" was partly filmed in Kent at Ingress Abbey in Greenhithe, St Margaret’s Bay and Dover.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The adaptation adds Miss Lemon to the story. Poirot is arrested as an attempted burglar while Hastings manages to escape, and later informs Japp about the incident who lets Poirot go. Gertie had an accomplice who pretended to be Lavington and Lavington's real name was Lavington indeed, not Reed as was in the short story.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The adaptation adds Miss Lemon to the story and replaces inspector Miller by chief inspector Japp. Charles Lester has a wife who visited Poirot, unlike in the short story, the fact about his status is unknown. Pearson's plan is little changed from the story. In the adaptation he never saw Wu Ling, but in the story he saw him, but acted as he didn't. Poirot called Pearson into the den, unlike in the short story it was Pearson who called Poirot.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The adaptation saw Hastings play a large role, and, in a complete change from the short story, Poirot gets a parrot (leading to one of the famous exchanges: Delivery boy: "I've a parrot here for Mr Poy-rott." Poirot: "It is pronounced 'Pwa-roh'." Delivery boy: "Oh sorry. I've a Poirot here for a Mr Poy-rott.").


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Miss Lemon is inserted into the story. Elsa Hardt is renamed to Carla Romero. Poirot set the trap for an Italian assassin and later tricked him with giving him an empty gun which the assassin used as a treat, unaware that the gun is empty. The Italian assassin is also arrested by Japp.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Inspector Barnes is omitted from the adaptation while Miss Lemon is inserted instead of him. The year of the plot is changed from towards the end of First World War to the 1930s. Daniels' sister's name is changed from Bertha Ebenthal to Imogen Daniels and is not a German spy, but a fighter for Ireland's independence.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Chief inspector Japp and Miss Lemon are put into the story. Rolf is arrested by Japp along with the man who tried to buy the diamond, rather than sent away by Poirot.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Miss Lemon is inserted into the story. The character of Mr Vavasour appears in the episode, unlike in the short story, he is only mentioned.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Chief inspector Japp is inserted into the story. Poirot goes a call from the amateur novelist for help with the plot of his new book and heard from him about Maltraver's death. Maltraver's wife staged the attempt on her life and blood on a mirror.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The adaptation is slightly changed. Poirot and Hastings were guests of Roger Havering. Poirot didn't want to investigate because of his illness. The pistol wasn't found. Roger Havering refused to give his alibi because he didn't want his wife to know where he was. Japp and Hastings wanted to search for Mrs Middleton, but Poirot explained them that she does not exist.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Miss Lemon is inserted into the story. Dr Ames did not kill himself with the cyanide, and instead, he tried to escape and had been arrested.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The adaptation was heavily changed: the death of Andrew Marsh is changed into a murder. The "missing will" of the title was also changed: it is not a hidden will but an old document that is stolen from Marsh's papers after it is made clear that Marsh intends to write a new will leaving everything to Violet Wilson (as she is renamed in the adaptation). Andrew Marsh is an old friend of Poirot's and Poirot was already in Andrew's house when he died. Chief inspector Japp and Miss Lemon are put into the adaptation.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Miss Lemon is inserted into the adaptation and was a love interest for Foscatini's butler Graves who asked Poirot for help. The unnamed inspector from the short story is replaced by chief inspector Japp in the adaptation. Ascanio wasn't arrested. Ascanio's name is changed from Paolo to Mario. the new character, Mr Vizzini, is created. The butler, Graves, got the first name Edwin and tried to escape after the denouement.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: There were small differences in the television adaptation of "The Chocolate Box" from the short story. Captain Hastings is not involved. Poirot and Chief Inspector Japp visit Belgium for Japp to receive the prestigious Branche d'Or (Golden Branch) Award. The case is told in flashback and Poirot admits his error in a circular fashion. Poirot's friend Chantalier, who does not appear in the original story, appears in the adaptation. Virginie Mesnard does marry him and has two sons. The flashback year is changed from 1893 to 1914.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Miss Lemon is inserted into the story. Chief inspector Japp appears, unlike in the original short story, where he is just mentioned. Grace Wilson's accomplice wasn't the valet but the new character, Saunders, Opalsen's driver. The pearls are found hidden in a prop vase in the theatre.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Five of the stories were adapted as anime episodes of the Japanese television series "Agatha Christie's Great Detectives Poirot and Marple". These were as follows:


title: Poirot Investigates

text: Chapters from the book appeared in "Agatha Christie's Crime Reader", published by Cleveland Publishing in 1944 along with other selections from "Partners in Crime" and "The Mysterious Mr Quin".


title: Poirot Investigates

text: All of the stories were first published, unillustrated, in the UK in "The Sketch" magazine. Christie wrote them following a suggestion from its editor, Bruce Ingram, who had been impressed with the character of Poirot in "The Mysterious Affair at Styles". The stories first appeared in "The Sketch" as follows:


title: Poirot Investigates

text: In the US, all of the stories first appeared in the monthly "Blue Book Magazine". Each story carried a small, uncredited illustration. The publication order was as follows:


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The preparation of the book marked a further downturn in the relationship between Christie and the Bodley Head. She had become aware that the six-book contract she had signed with John Lane had been unfair to her in its terms. At first she meekly accepted Lane's strictures about what would be published by them, but by the time of "Poirot Investigates" Christie insisted that their suggested title of "The Grey Cells of Monsieur Poirot" was not to her liking and that the book was to be included in the tally of six books within her contract. The Bodley Head opposed this because the stories had already been printed in "The Sketch". Christie held out and won her case.


title: Poirot Investigates

text: The dustjacket front flap of the first edition carried no specially written blurb. Instead it carried quotes from reviews for "In the Mayor's Parlour" by J. S. Fletcher, whilst the back flap carried the same for "The Perilous Transactions of Mr Collin" by Frank Heller.


title: Burghley House

text: Burghley House () is a grand sixteenth-century English country house near Stamford, Lincolnshire. It is a leading example of the Elizabethan prodigy house, built and still lived in by the . The exterior largely retains its Elizabethan appearance, but most of the interiors date from remodellings before 1800. The house is open to the public on a seasonal basis and displays a circuit of grand and richly furnished state apartments. Its park was laid out by Capability Brown.


title: Burghley House

text: The house is on the boundary of the civil parishes of Barnack and St Martin's Without in the Peterborough unitary authority of Cambridgeshire. It was formerly part of the Soke of Peterborough, an historic area that was traditionally associated with Northamptonshire. It lies south of Stamford and northwest of Peterborough city centre.


title: Burghley House

text: Burghley was built for Sir William Cecil, later 1st Baron Burghley, who was Lord High Treasurer to Queen Elizabeth I of England, between 1555 and 1587, costing £21,000 at the time. It was modelled on the privy lodgings of Richmond Palace. It was subsequently the residence of his descendants, the Earls, and since 1801, the Marquesses of Exeter. Since 1961, it has been owned by a charitable trust established by the family.


title: Burghley House

text: Lady Victoria Leatham, antiques expert and television personality, followed her father, Olympic gold medal-winning athlete, IAAF President and MP, David Cecil, the 6th Marquess, by running the house from 1982 to 2007. The Olympic corridor commemorates her father. Her daughter, Miranda Rock, is now the most active live-in trustee. However, the Marquessate passed it in 1988 to Victoria's uncle, Martin Cecil, 7th Marquess of Exeter, and then to his son, William Michael Anthony Cecil, both Canadian ranchers on land originally bought by the 5th Marquess, who have not lived at Burghley.


title: Burghley House

text: The house is one of the main examples of stonemasonry and proportion in sixteenth-century English Elizabethan architecture, reflecting the prominence of its founder, and the lucrative wool trade of the Cecil estates. It has a suite of rooms remodelled in the baroque style, with carvings by Grinling Gibbons. The main part of the house has 35 major rooms, on the ground and first floors. There are more than 80 lesser rooms and numerous halls, corridors, bathrooms, and service areas.


title: Burghley House

text: In the seventeenth century, the open loggias around the ground floor were enclosed. Although the house was built in the floor plan shape of the Letter E, in honour of Queen Elizabeth, it is now missing its north-west wing. During the period of the 9th Earl's ownership, and under the guidance of the famous landscape architect, Capability Brown, the south front was raised to alter the roof line, and the north-west wing was demolished to allow better views of the new parkland. A chimney-piece after the design of Venetian printmaker Giovanni Battista Piranesi was also added during his tenure.


title: Burghley House

text: The so-called "Hell Staircase" and its neighbour "The Heaven Room" has substantial ceiling paintings by Antonio Verrio, between 1697 and 1699. The walls to the "Hell Staircase" are by Thomas Stothard, who completed the work about a century later. The Bow Room is decorated with wall and ceiling paintings by Louis Laguerre.


title: Burghley House

text: Although depleted of a number of important pieces by death duties in the 1960s, the Burghley art collections are otherwise mainly intact and are very extensive. The house still displays several hundred paintings, a large proportion of which are of the 17th century, bought in Italy by John Cecil, 5th Earl of Exeter (–1700), and by Brownlow Cecil, the 9th Earl (1725–1793). They visited Italy eight times, bringing back large quantities of art. John Cecil purchased 300 works of art during his 22 years in Burghley and spent on his last visit to Europe £5,000 (c. £600,000 in 2017 currency).


title: Burghley House

text: The chapel has a large altarpiece by Paolo Veronese and his workshop, and two large paintings by Johann Carl Loth, a German painter active in Venice with few works in British collections. There are in total seven works by Luca Giordano, including a self-portrait.


title: Burghley House

text: In the Pagoda Room, there are portraits of the Cecil family, Elizabeth I, Henry VIII, and Oliver Cromwell. Many delicately painted walls and ceilings of the house were done by Antonio Verrio. The Billiard Room displays six oval portraits of members of the Order of Little Bedlam, the 5th Earl's drinking club.


title: Burghley House

text: The large collection of Japanese export porcelain is especially important because, almost uniquely, pieces still in the house, and others sold in 1888 and 1959, can be identified with pieces in an inventory of the house with several hundred ceramic items made in 1688. These are the "earliest recorded pieces in Europe" that can be documented in this way, and of great interest to scholars.


title: Burghley House

text: There are a number of outstanding pieces of furniture including work by celebrated 18th-century cabinet makers, Ince and Mayhew, in addition to silver, tapestry and collections of other porcelain, much of this is on public display in the state rooms, or display cases for the ceramics. A new "Treasury" space in the Brewhouse displays annually changing exhibitions highlighting aspects of the collections.


title: Burghley House

text: The avenues in the park were all laid out according to the 1755-1779 designs by Capability Brown, paying due respect to pre-existing plantings, some of which were from the 16th century or earlier.


title: Burghley House

text: Brown also created the park's man-made lake in 1775–80. He discovered a seam of waterproof "blue" clay in the grounds, and was able to enlarge the original nine-acre (36,000 m) pond to the existing 26-acre (105,000 m) lake. Its design gives the impression of a meandering river. Brown designed the Lion Bridge at a cost of 1,000 guineas (£1,050) in 1778. He was paid £23,000 in total of the park designs in Burghley. Brown's landscape has been conserved by planting 30,000 new trees between 2012 and 2016.


title: Burghley House

text: Originally, Coade-stone lions were used as ornamentation. After these weathered, the existing stone examples were made by local mason Herbert Gilbert in 1844. Queen Victoria and her husband Prince Albert planted two trees to commemorate their visit.


title: Burghley House

text: As well as the annual Burghley Horse Trials, the park plays host to the "Burghley Run" for Stamford School and an annual meet for the Cambridge University Draghounds.


title: Burghley House

text: Recent developments have included starting a sculpture garden around the old ice house and, in 2007, a "garden of surprises" was created using traditional ideas of water traps, shell grottos and a mirror maze, but in a 21st-century style. The Burghley House trust has commissioned contemporary artwork in the grounds from leading artists.


title: Burghley House

text: The parkland and gardens of Burghley House are listed Grade II* on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.


title: Burghley House

text: The Lincolnshire county boundary crosses the park between the town of Stamford and the house. Burghley is located in the ancient Soke of Peterborough, once a part of Northamptonshire but now for ceremonial purposes in Cambridgeshire; for planning and other municipal functions the house is in the Peterborough unitary authority.


title: Burghley House

text: The house is a Grade I listed building, with separately Grade I listed north courtyard and gate. The listing document for the House provided this summary: "C19 and C20 formal gardens and pleasure grounds, developed from those originally designed by Lancelot Brown, surrounded by a park of C16 origins for which Brown provided extensive plans between 1754 and 1777".


title: Burghley House

text: The residents of the house since 2007 were Miranda Rock, director of the Burghley House Preservation Trust, granddaughter of the 6th Marquess of Exeter and daughter of Lady Victoria Leatham with Orlando Rock (chairman of Christie's UK) and their family. Data before the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom indicated that the number of visitors to the site each year had almost doubled during Miranda Rock's tenure, to 110,000.


title: Burghley House

text: Burghley House has been featured in several films. Its virtually unaltered Elizabethan façades and a variety of historic interiors make it an ideal location for historical and period movies.


title: Burghley House

text: The medieval settlement of Burghley, mentioned in Domesday, was abandoned by 1450. Failure to locate its site leads to the supposition that the settlement was near Burghley House, and perhaps lies below the estate.


title: Strange matter

text: Strange matter (or strange quark matter) is quark matter containing strange quarks. In nature, strange matter is hypothesized to occur in the core of neutron stars, or, more speculatively, as isolated droplets that may vary in size from femtometers (strangelets) to kilometers, as in the hypothetical strange stars. At high enough density, strange matter is expected to be color superconducting.


title: Strange matter

text: Ordinary matter, also referred to as atomic matter, is composed of atoms, with nearly all matter concentrated in the atomic nuclei. Nuclear matter is a liquid composed of neutrons and protons, and they are themselves composed of up and down quarks. Quark matter is a condensed form of matter composed entirely of quarks. When quark matter does not contain strange quarks, it is sometimes referred to as non-strange quark matter.


title: Strange matter

text: In particle physics and astrophysics, the term 'strange matter' is used in two different contexts, one broader and the other more specific and hypothetical:


title: Strange matter

text: In the general context, strange matter might occur inside neutron stars, if the pressure at their core is high enough (i.e. above the critical pressure). At the sort of densities and high pressures we expect in the center of a neutron star, the quark matter would probably be strange matter. It could conceivably be non-strange quark matter, if the effective mass of the strange quark were too high. Charm quarks and heavier quarks would only occur at much higher densities.


title: Strange matter

text: Strange matter comes about as a way to relieve degeneracy pressure. The Pauli exclusion principle forbids fermions such as quarks from occupying the same position and energy level. When the particle density is high enough that all energy levels below the available thermal energy are already occupied, increasing the density further requires raising some to higher, unoccupied energy levels. This need for energy to cause compression manifests as a pressure. Normally, matter consists of twice as many down quarks (charge − "e") as up quarks (charge + "e"), so the degeneracy pressure of down quarks dominates electrically neutral quark matter. However, when the required energy level is high enough, an alternative becomes available: half of the down quarks can be transmuted to strange quarks (charge − "e"). The higher rest mass of the strange quark costs some energy, but by opening up an additional set of energy levels, the average energy per particle can be lower, making strange matter more stable than non-strange quark matter.


title: Strange matter

text: A neutron star with a quark matter core is often called a hybrid star. However, it is hard to know whether hybrid stars really exist in nature because physicists currently have little idea of the likely value of the critical pressure or density. It seems plausible that the transition to quark matter will already have occurred when the separation between the nucleons becomes much smaller than their size, so the critical density must be less than about 100 times nuclear saturation density. But a more precise estimate is not yet available, because the strong interaction that governs the behavior of quarks is mathematically intractable, and numerical calculations using lattice QCD are currently blocked by the fermion sign problem.


title: Strange matter

text: One major area of activity in neutron star physics is the attempt to find observable signatures by which we could tell whether neutron stars have quark matter (probably strange matter) in their core.


title: Strange matter

text: If the "strange matter hypothesis" is true then nuclear matter is metastable against decaying into strange matter. The lifetime for spontaneous decay is very long, so we do not see this decay process happening around us. However, under this hypothesis there should be strange matter in the universe:


title: Kumite

text: Kumite (, literally "grappling hands") is one of the three main sections of karate training, along with kata and kihon. Kumite is the part of karate in which a person trains against an adversary.


title: Kumite

text: Kumite can be used to develop a particular technique or a skill (e.g. effectively judging and adjusting one's distance from one's opponent) or it can be done in competition.


title: Kumite

text: Since the word "kumite" refers to forms of sparring, it covers a vast range of activities. In traditional Shotokan karate, the first type of kumite for beginners is "gohon kumite". The defender steps back each time, blocking the attacks and performing a counterattack after the last block. This activity looks nothing like the "jiyu kumite" (or "free sparring") practiced by more advanced practitioners.


title: Kumite

text: Many schools feel it is important that karateka "pull their punches". Karate training is designed to give its practitioners the ability to deliver devastating power through techniques like punches and kicks. Often the aim of training is that each single strike should be enough to subdue the opponent. However, this clearly would make it difficult to train due to the possibility of injury. Many beginners, while sparring, will be instructed to develop control and accuracy first, then speed and power later. In doing this, it may seem like the student is pulling his punches, when actually, he is developing technique first. For injury purposes, certain targets are discouraged, like strikes to the knee and face contact for low ranks. Many schools prohibit strikes to the groin, while others allow it completely. Some schools might limit contact to light contact all around, while others may employ power usage at higher grades.


title: Kumite

text: All types of sparring allow the martial artist to develop both control and experience in delivering powerful strikes against an opponent. In full contact karate, punches are often "pulled" to some slight extent in training, to minimize the occurrence of injuries that would interrupt practice. However, some karate schools use protective gear in free sparring, so that strikes can be delivered closer to their full power. Most karate clubs and most styles of karate combine some controlled full-contact sparring and some sparring with protective gear (from gloves to feet pads and up to full head and even chest guards such as in taekwondo).


title: Kumite

text: However, a few more traditional clubs that never use protective gear for sparring (except groin and mouth guards that protect against accidental injuries) argue that a karateka will not be able to make their most powerful strike when sparring in the dojo (against a friend whom they no doubt do not want to injure) even if this opponent is wearing protective clothing. Therefore, the karateka will still be using some level of control, as is obviously necessary, and cannot truly capture the spirit of one lethal strike whilst sparring. Except for a life or death self-defense situation, the spirit and power of the single lethal strike can only be achieved when a karateka does not have to avoid injuring their training partner. The traditionalists therefore argue that there is no benefit to sparring with more forceful strikes.


title: Kumite

text: However, in Kyokushin Karate no padding is used and fighters don't "pull their punches" as fights are finished by knockdown.


title: Kumite

text: In some forms of competition kumite, punching ("tsuki") and kicking ("keri") techniques are allowed at the head ("jodan") and abdomen ("chudan"). In some tournaments, face contact is allowed, sometimes limited to senior practitioners. One example of a scoring system is that the first competitor to take eight points in three minutes wins the bout.


title: Kumite

text: Kumite is an essential part of karate training, and free sparring is often experienced as exciting, because both opponents have to react and adapt to each other very quickly.


title: Kumite

text: In tournaments kumite often takes place inside of a 'ringed' area similar to that of a boxing ring. If a karateka steps out of the ring, they are given a warning. If they step out of the ring two times, the other person gains a point. Many international tournaments use a "point sparring" form of kumite that requires control ('pulling punches') and therefore warnings can be dealt for excessive force on techniques to the head, or sensitive areas. Full contact is permitted to the torso area of the body only. Some tournament rules allow for light contact to the head, whereas other rules do not allow this.


title: Kumite

text: Kumite also includes a series of guidelines that, if followed correctly, result in a clean and safe fight. These are some of those guidelines:


title: Kumite

text: For the last point about stance and footwork: it is often taught that a karateka who wishes to be fast and agile while competing in kumite should always be 'pulsing'. Pulsing is where the karateka remains almost bouncing on the balls of their feet to maintain minimal frictional contact with the ground, allowing them to move quickly.


title: Kumite

text: Another aspect of kumite which is often seen in international tournaments, as well as many local competitions is what is referred to as clashing. Clashing is where both opponents throw techniques against each other at the same time, often resulting in both getting hit with the techniques. This creates a problem for referees as they are unable to make out which technique was quick, on target and recoiled - all the things that constitute a clean technique that is scored. Because of clashing, most modern day karateka are taught to practice kumite in a 'one for one' situation where one attacks, then the other attacks and so on. However, due to the speed of these techniques, and the speed of the footwork of each karateka, to the casual observer it may appear that they are still clashing when in fact they are not. When opponents are considered to be clashing, the head referee should declare "aiuchi" which means "simultaneous hit". When a winner is decided, the referee will announce "~ no kachi" which means "~'s win".


title: Kumite

text: The tournament rules of full contact or "knockdown" styles of karate often don't award any points for controlled techniques delivered to the opponent. In fact, they usually don't award points for full-force techniques delivered to the opponent either. Instead, points are only awarded for knocking, sweeping, or throwing your opponent to the floor. Kyokushinkai and its "offshoot" karate organizations are the styles usually known to promote knockdown tournament rules. They believe this type of tournament competition is closer to "real life" personal combat, although still in a tournament setting with rules.


title: Kumite

text: There are three criticisms to date. First, is the quickness versus skill argument. The tournament fighter learns how to shoot in quickly but deliver an unimpressive strike that gains him or her a point. Also, the question of discoloration of face due to contact, which can allow for disqualification. It is often difficult to gauge the true intensity of the attack, so this could cause questioning. Last, it is seen as sport and sport alone. Traditionalists may dismiss it as "useless", but modern dojos often band with other dojos to form organizations that utilize a tournament circuit as a way to promote their dojos.


title: Kumite

text: International competition under the World Karate Federation also includes the following point scoring:


title: Jönköping

text: Jönköping (, ) is a city in southern Sweden with 112,766 inhabitants (2022). Jönköping is situated on the southern shore of Sweden's second largest lake, Vättern, in the province of Småland.


title: Jönköping

text: The city is the seat of Jönköping Municipality, which has a population of 144,699 (2022) and is Småland's most populous municipality. Jönköping is also the seat of Jönköping County which has a population of 367,064 (2022). Jönköping is the seat of a district court and a court of appeal as well as the Swedish National Courts Administration. It is the seat of the Swedish Board of Agriculture.