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20060

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-2

MPEG-2

MPEG-2 (a.k.a. H.222/H.262 as was defined by the ITU) is a standard for "the generic coding of moving pictures and associated audio information". It describes a combination of lossy video compression and lossy audio data compression methods, which permit storage and transmission of movies using currently available storage media and transmission bandwidth. While MPEG-2 is not as efficient as newer standards such as H.264/AVC and H.265/HEVC, backwards compatibility with existing hardware and software means it is still widely used, for example in over-the-air digital television broadcasting and in the DVD-Video standard. Main characteristics MPEG-2 is widely used as the format of digital television signals that are broadcast by terrestrial (over-the-air), cable, and direct broadcast satellite TV systems. It also specifies the format of movies and other programs that are distributed on DVD and similar discs. TV stations, TV receivers, DVD players, and other equipment are often designed to this standard. MPEG-2 was the second of several standards developed by the Moving Pictures Expert Group (MPEG) and is an international standard (ISO/IEC 13818). Parts 1 and 2 of MPEG-2 were developed in a collaboration with ITU-T, and they have a respective catalog number in the ITU-T Recommendation Series. While MPEG-2 is the core of most digital television and DVD formats, it does not completely specify them. Regional institutions can adapt it to their needs by restricting and augmenting aspects of the standard. See Video profiles and levels. Systems MPEG-2 includes a Systems section, part 1, that defines two distinct, but related, container formats. One is the transport stream, a data packet format designed to transmit one data packet in four ATM data packets for streaming digital video and audio over fixed or mobile transmission mediums, where the beginning and the end of the stream may not be identified, such as radio frequency, cable and linear recording mediums, examples of which include ATSC/DVB/ISDB/SBTVD broadcasting, and HDV recording on tape. The other is the program stream, an extended version of the MPEG-1 container format with less overhead than transport stream. Program stream is designed for random access storage mediums such as hard disk drives, optical discs and flash memory. Transport stream file formats include M2TS, which is used on Blu-ray discs, AVCHD on re-writable DVDs and HDV on compact flash cards. Program stream files include VOB on DVDs and Enhanced VOB on the short lived HD DVD. The standard MPEG-2 transport stream contains packets of 188 bytes. M2TS prepends each packet with 4 bytes containing a 2-bit copy permission indicator and 30-bit timestamp. MPEG-2 Systems is formally known as ISO/IEC 13818-1 and as ITU-T Rec. H.222.0. ISO authorized the "SMPTE Registration Authority, LLC" as the registration authority for MPEG-2 format identifiers. The registration descriptor of MPEG-2 transport is provided by ISO/IEC 13818-1 in order to enable users of the standard to unambiguously carry data when its format is not necessarily a recognized international standard. This provision will permit the MPEG-2 transport standard to carry all types of data while providing for a method of unambiguous identification of the characteristics of the underlying private data. Video The Video section, part 2 of MPEG-2, is similar to the previous MPEG-1 standard, but also provides support for interlaced video, the format used by analog broadcast TV systems. MPEG-2 video is not optimized for low bit rates, especially less than 1 Mbit/s at standard definition resolutions. All standards-compliant MPEG-2 Video decoders are fully capable of playing back MPEG-1 Video streams conforming to the Constrained Parameters Bitstream syntax. MPEG-2/Video is formally known as ISO/IEC 13818-2 and as ITU-T Rec. H.262. With some enhancements, MPEG-2 Video and Systems are also used in some HDTV transmission systems, and is the standard format for over-the-air ATSC digital television. Audio MPEG-2 introduces new audio encoding methods compared to MPEG-1: MPEG-2 Part 3 The MPEG-2 Audio section, defined in Part 3 (ISO/IEC 13818-3) of the standard, enhances MPEG-1's audio by allowing the coding of audio programs with more than two channels, up to 5.1 multichannel. This method is backwards-compatible (also known as MPEG-2 BC), allowing MPEG-1 audio decoders to decode the two main stereo components of the presentation. MPEG-2 part 3 also defined additional bit rates and sample rates for MPEG-1 Audio Layer I, II and III. MPEG-2 BC (backward compatible with MPEG-1 audio formats) low bitrate encoding with halved sampling rate (MPEG-1 Layer 1/2/3 LSF - a.k.a. MPEG-2 LSF - "Low Sampling Frequencies") multichannel encoding with up to 5.1 channels, a.k.a. MPEG Multichannel MPEG-2 Part 7 Part 7 (ISO/IEC 13818-7) of the MPEG-2 standard specifies a rather different, non-backwards-compatible audio format (also known as MPEG-2 NBC). Part 7 is referred to as MPEG-2 AAC. AAC is more efficient than the previous MPEG audio standards, and is in some ways less complicated than its predecessor, MPEG-1 Audio, Layer 3, in that it does not have the hybrid filter bank. It supports from 1 to 48 channels at sampling rates of 8 to 96 kHz, with multichannel, multilingual, and multiprogram capabilities. Advanced Audio is also defined in Part 3 of the MPEG-4 standard. MPEG-2 NBC (Non-Backward Compatible) MPEG-2 AAC multichannel encoding with up to 48 channels ISO/IEC 13818 MPEG-2 standards are published as parts of ISO/IEC 13818. Each part covers a certain aspect of the whole specification. Part 1 Systems – describes synchronization and multiplexing of video and audio. (It is also known as ITU-T Rec. H.222.0.) See MPEG transport stream and MPEG program stream. Part 2 Video – video coding format for interlaced and non-interlaced video signals (Also known as ITU-T Rec. H.262). Part 3 Audio – audio coding format for perceptual coding of audio signals. A multichannel-enabled extension and extension of bit rates and sample rates for MPEG-1 Audio Layer I, II and III. Part 4 Describes procedures for testing compliance. Part 5 Describes systems for Software simulation. Part 6 Describes extensions for DSM-CC (Digital Storage Media Command and Control). Part 7 Advanced Audio Coding (AAC). Part 8 10-bit video extension. Primary application was studio video, allowing artifact-free processing without giving up compression. Part 8 has been withdrawn due to lack of interest by industry. Part 9 Extension for real time interfaces. Part 10 Conformance extensions for DSM-CC. Part 11 Intellectual property management (IPMP) History MPEG-2 evolved out of the shortcomings of MPEG-1. MPEG-1's known weaknesses: An audio compression system limited to two channels (stereo). No standardized support for interlaced video with poor compression when used for interlaced video Only one standardized "profile" (Constrained Parameters Bitstream), which was unsuited for higher resolution video. MPEG-1 could support 4k video but there was no easy way to encode video for higher resolutions, and identify hardware capable of supporting it, as the limitations of such hardware were not defined. Support for only one chroma subsampling, 4:2:0. Sakae Okubo of NTT was the ITU-T coordinator for developing the H.262/MPEG-2 Part 2 video coding standard and the requirements chairman in MPEG for the MPEG-2 set of standards. The majority of patents underlying MPEG-2 technology are owned by three companies: Sony (311 patents), Thomson (198 patents) and Mitsubishi Electric (119 patents). Hyundai Electronics (now SK Hynix) developed the first MPEG-2 SAVI (System/Audio/Video) decoder in 1995. Filename extensions .mpg, .mpeg, .m2v, .mp2, .mp3 are some of a number of filename extensions used for MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 audio and video file formats. Applications DVD-Video The DVD-Video standard uses MPEG-2 video, but imposes some restrictions: Allowed Dimensions 720 × 480, 704 × 480, 352 × 480, 352 × 240 pixel (NTSC) 720 × 576, 704 × 576, 352 × 576, 352 × 288 pixel (PAL) Allowed Aspect ratios (Display AR) 4:3 (for letterboxed widescreen and non-widescreen frames) 16:9 (for anamorphic widescreen) Allowed frame rates 29.97 interlaced frame/s (NTSC) 23.978 progressive frame/s (for NTSC 2:3 pull-down to 29.97) 25 interlaced frame/s (PAL) Audio + video bitrate Video peak 9.8 Mbit/s Total peak 10.08 Mbit/s Minimum 300 kbit/s YUV 4:2:0 Additional subtitles possible Closed captioning (NTSC only) Audio Linear Pulse Code Modulation (LPCM): 48 kHz or 96 kHz; 16- or 24-bit; up to six channels (not all combinations possible due to bitrate constraints) MPEG Layer 2 (MP2): 48 kHz, up to 5.1 channels (required in PAL players only) Dolby Digital (DD, also known as AC-3): 48 kHz, 32–448 kbit/s, up to 5.1 channels Digital Theater Systems (DTS): 754 kbit/s or 1510 kbit/s (not required for DVD player compliance) NTSC DVDs must contain at least one LPCM or Dolby Digital audio track. PAL DVDs must contain at least one MPEG Layer 2, LPCM, or Dolby Digital audio track. Players are not required to play back audio with more than two channels, but must be able to downmix multichannel audio to two channels. GOP structure (Group Of Pictures) Sequence header must be present at the beginning of every GOP Maximum frames per GOP: 18 (NTSC) / 15 (PAL), i.e. 0.6 seconds both Closed GOP required for multi-angle DVDs HDV HDV is a format for recording and playback of high-definition MPEG-2 video on a DV cassette tape. MOD and TOD MOD and TOD are recording formats for use in consumer digital file-based camcorders. XDCAM XDCAM is a professional file-based video recording format. DVB Application-specific restrictions on MPEG-2 video in the DVB standard: Allowed resolutions for SDTV: 720, 640, 544, 528, 480 or 352 × 480 pixel, 24/1.001, 24, 30/1.001 or 30 frame/s 352 × 240 pixel, 24/1.001, 24, 30/1.001 or 30 frame/s 720, 704, 544, 528, 480 or 352 × 576 pixel, 25 frame/s 352 × 288 pixel, 25 frame/s For HDTV: 720 x 576 x 50 frame/s progressive (576p50) 1280 x 720 x 25 or 50 frame/s progressive (720p50) 1440 or 1920 x 1080 x 25 frame/s progressive (1080p25 = film mode) 1440 or 1920 x 1080 x 25 frame/s interlace (1080i50) ATSC The ATSC A/53 standard used in the United States, uses MPEG-2 video at the Main Profile @ High Level (MP@HL), with additional restrictions such as the maximum bitrate of 19.39 Mbit/s for broadcast television and 38.8 Mbit/s for cable television, 4:2:0 chroma subsampling format, and mandatory colorimetry information. ATSC allows the following video resolutions, aspect ratios, and frame/field rates: 1920 × 1080 pixel (16:9, square pixels), at 30p, 29.97p, 24p, 23.976p, 60i, 59.94i. 1280 × 720 pixel (16:9, square pixels), at 60p, 59.94p, 30p, 29.97p, 24p, or 23.976p 704 × 480 pixel (4:3 or 16:9, non-square pixels), at 60p, 59.94p, 30p, 29.97p, 24p, 23.976p, 60i, or 59.94i 640 × 480 pixel (4:3, square pixels), at 60p, 59.94p, 30p, 29.97p, 24p, 23.976p, 60i, or 59.94i ATSC standard A/63 defines additional resolutions and aspect rates for 50 Hz (PAL) signal. The ATSC specification and MPEG-2 allow the use of progressive frames, even within an interlaced video sequence. For example, a station that transmits 1080i60 video sequence can use a coding method where those 60 fields are coded with 24 progressive frames and metadata instructs the decoder to interlace them and perform 3:2 pulldown before display. This allows broadcasters to switch between 60 Hz interlaced (news, soap operas) and 24 Hz progressive (prime-time) content without ending the MPEG-2 sequence and introducing several seconds of delay as the TV switches formats. This is the reason why 1080p30 and 1080p24 sequences allowed by the ATSC specification are not used in practice. The 1080-line formats are encoded with 1920 × 1088 pixel luma matrices and 960 × 540 chroma matrices, but the last 8 lines are discarded by the MPEG-2 decoding and display process. ATSC A/72 is the newest revision of ATSC standards for digital television, which allows the use of H.264/AVC video coding format and 1080p60 signal. MPEG-2 audio was a contender for the ATSC standard during the DTV "Grand Alliance" shootout, but lost out to Dolby AC-3. ISDB-T Technical features of MPEG-2 in ATSC are also valid for ISDB-T, except that in the main TS has aggregated a second program for mobile devices compressed in MPEG-4 H.264 AVC for video and AAC-LC for audio, mainly known as 1seg. Blu-ray MPEG-2 is one of the three supported video coding formats supported by Blu-ray Disc. Early Blu-ray releases typically used MPEG-2 video, but recent releases are almost always in H.264 or occasionally VC-1. Only MPEG-2 video (MPEG-2 part 2) is supported, Blu-ray does not support MPEG-2 audio (parts 3 and 7). Additionally, the container format used on Blu-ray discs is an MPEG-2 transport stream, regardless of which audio and video codecs are used. Patent pool As of February 14 2020, MPEG-2 Patents have expired worldwide, with the exception of only Malaysia. The last US patent expired on February 23, 2018. MPEG LA, a private patent licensing organization, had acquired rights from over 20 corporations and one university to license a patent pool of approximately 640 worldwide patents, which it claimed were "essential" to use of MPEG-2 technology. The patent holders included Sony, Mitsubishi Electric, Fujitsu, Panasonic, Scientific Atlanta, Columbia University, Philips, General Instrument, Canon, Hitachi, JVC Kenwood, LG Electronics, NTT, Samsung, Sanyo, Sharp and Toshiba. Where Software patentability is upheld and patents have not expired (only Malaysia), the use of MPEG-2 requires the payment of licensing fees to the patent holders. Other patents were licensed by Audio MPEG, Inc. The development of the standard itself took less time than the patent negotiations. Patent pooling between essential and peripheral patent holders in the MPEG-2 pool was the subject of a study by the University of Wisconsin. According to the MPEG-2 licensing agreement any use of MPEG-2 technology in countries with active patents (Malaysia) is subject to royalties. MPEG-2 encoders and decoders are subject to $0.35 per unit. Also, any packaged medium (DVDs/Data Streams) is subject to licence fees according to length of recording/broadcast. The royalties were previously priced higher but were lowered at several points, most recently on January 1 2018. An earlier criticism of the MPEG-2 patent pool was that even though the number of patents had decreased from 1,048 to 416 by June 2013 the license fee had not decreased with the expiration rate of MPEG-2 patents. Patent holders The following organizations have held patents for MPEG-2, as listed at MPEG LA. See also List of United States MPEG-2 patents. See also MPEG encoding MPEG-1 Audio Layer II (MP2) MPEG-1 Audio Layer III (MP3) DVD DVB-S2 ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29 References External links A Beginners Guide for MPEG-2 Standard MPEG-2 Overview (figures are lost) MPEG-2 video compression MIT 6.344 – Slides from lectures on video compression at MIT. A Discrete Cosine Transform tutorial IPTV MPEG and Quality of Experience Testing OpenIPMP: Open Source DRM Project for MPEG-2 ISO/IEC 13818 – MPEG-2 at the ISO Store. MPEG Books - A list of MPEG reference books. - Recommended Practice: Guide to the Use of the ATSC Digital Television Standard, including Corrigendum No. 1 Audio codecs Video codecs Interactive television ISO/IEC standards Open standards covered by patents Video compression Videotelephony

20061

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-3

MPEG-3

MPEG-3 is the designation for a group of audio and video coding standards agreed upon by the Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) designed to handle HDTV signals at 1080p in the range of 20 to 40 megabits per second. MPEG-3 was launched as an effort to address the need of an HDTV standard while work on MPEG-2 was underway, but it was soon discovered that MPEG-2, at high data rates, would accommodate HDTV. Thus, in 1992 HDTV was included as a separate profile in the MPEG-2 standard and MPEG-3 was rolled into MPEG-2. References External links MPEG Official Site Video codecs Audio codecs MP3

20062

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meditation

Meditation

Meditation is a practice in which an individual uses a technique – such as mindfulness, or focusing the mind on a particular object, thought, or activity – to train attention and awareness, and achieve a mentally clear and emotionally calm and stable state. Meditation is practiced in numerous religious traditions. The earliest records of meditation (dhyana) are found in the Upanishads, and meditation plays a salient role in the contemplative repertoire of Buddhism and Hinduism. Since the 19th century, Asian meditative techniques have spread to other cultures where they have also found application in non-spiritual contexts, such as business and health. Meditation may significantly reduce stress, anxiety, depression, and pain, and enhance peace, perception, self-concept, and well-being. Research is ongoing to better understand the effects of meditation on health (psychological, neurological, and cardiovascular) and other areas. Etymology The English meditation is derived from Old French meditacioun, in turn from Latin meditatio from a verb meditari, meaning "to think, contemplate, devise, ponder". In the Catholic tradition, the use of the term meditatio as part of a formal, stepwise process of meditation goes back to at least the 12th century monk Guigo II, before which the Greek word Theoria was used for the same purpose. Apart from its historical usage, the term meditation was introduced as a translation for Eastern spiritual practices, referred to as dhyāna in Hinduism and Buddhism and which comes from the Sanskrit root dhyai, meaning to contemplate or meditate. The term "meditation" in English may also refer to practices from Islamic Sufism, or other traditions such as Jewish Kabbalah and Christian Hesychasm. Definitions Meditation has proven difficult to define as it covers a wide range of dissimilar practices in different traditions. In popular usage, the word "meditation" and the phrase "meditative practice" are often used imprecisely to designate practices found across many cultures. These can include almost anything that is claimed to train the attention of mind or to teach calm or compassion. There remains no definition of necessary and sufficient criteria for meditation that has achieved universal or widespread acceptance within the modern scientific community. In 1971, Claudio Naranjo noted that "The word 'meditation' has been used to designate a variety of practices that differ enough from one another so that we may find trouble in defining what meditation is." A 2009 study noted a "persistent lack of consensus in the literature" and a "seeming intractability of defining meditation". Dictionary definitions Dictionaries give both the original Latin meaning of "think[ing] deeply about (something)"; as well as the popular usage of "focusing one's mind for a period of time", "the act of giving your attention to only one thing, either as a religious activity or as a way of becoming calm and relaxed", and "to engage in mental exercise (such as concentrating on one's breathing or repetition of a mantra) for the purpose of reaching a heightened level of spiritual awareness." Scholarly definitions In modern psychological research, meditation has been defined and characterized in a variety of ways. Many of these emphasize the role of attention and characterize the practice of meditation as attempts to get beyond the reflexive, "discursive thinking" or "logic" mind to achieve a deeper, more devout, or more relaxed state. Bond et al. (2009) identified criteria for defining a practice as meditation "for use in a comprehensive systematic review of the therapeutic use of meditation", using "a 5-round Delphi study with a panel of 7 experts in meditation research" who were also trained in diverse but empirically highly studied (Eastern-derived or clinical) forms of meditation: {{blockquote|three main criteria [...] as essential to any meditation practice: the use of a defined technique, logic relaxation, and a self-induced state/mode. Other criteria deemed important [but not essential] involve a state of psychophysical relaxation, the use of a self-focus skill or anchor, the presence of a state of suspension of logical thought processes, a religious/spiritual/philosophical context, or a state of mental silence. [...] It is plausible that meditation is best thought of as a natural category of techniques best captured by 'family resemblances' [...] or by the related 'prototype' model of concepts."}} Several other definitions of meditation have been used by influential modern reviews of research on meditation across multiple traditions: Walsh & Shapiro (2006): "[M]editation refers to a family of self-regulation practices that focus on training attention and awareness in order to bring mental processes under greater voluntary control and thereby foster general mental well-being and development and/or specific capacities such as calm, clarity, and concentration" Cahn & Polich (2006): "[M]editation is used to describe practices that self-regulate the body and mind, thereby affecting mental events by engaging a specific attentional set.... regulation of attention is the central commonality across the many divergent methods" Jevning et al. (1992): "We define meditation... as a stylized mental technique... repetitively practiced for the purpose of attaining a subjective experience that is frequently described as very restful, silent, and of heightened alertness, often characterized as blissful" Goleman (1988): "the need for the meditator to retrain his attention, whether through concentration or mindfulness, is the single invariant ingredient in... every meditation system" Separation of technique from tradition Some of the difficulty in precisely defining meditation has been in recognizing the particularities of the many various traditions; and theories and practice can differ within a tradition. Taylor noted that even within a faith such as "Hindu" or "Buddhist", schools and individual teachers may teach distinct types of meditation. Ornstein noted that "Most techniques of meditation do not exist as solitary practices but are only artificially separable from an entire system of practice and belief." For instance, while monks meditate as part of their everyday lives, they also engage the codified rules and live together in monasteries in specific cultural settings that go along with their meditative practices. Meditation traditions Origins The history of meditation is intimately bound up with the religious context within which it was practiced. Rossano has suggested that the emergence of the capacity for focused attention, an element of many methods of meditation, may have contributed to the latest phases of human biological evolution. Indian religions Jainism Jain meditation and spiritual practices system were referred to as salvation-path. It has three parts called the Ratnatraya "Three Jewels": right perception and faith, right knowledge and right conduct. Meditation in Jainism aims at realizing the self, attaining salvation, and taking the soul to complete freedom. It aims to reach and to remain in the pure state of soul which is believed to be pure consciousness, beyond any attachment or aversion. The practitioner strives to be just a knower-seer (Gyata-Drashta). Jain meditation can be broadly categorized to Dharmya Dhyana and Shukla Dhyana. Jainism uses meditation techniques such as pindāstha-dhyāna, padāstha-dhyāna, rūpāstha-dhyāna, rūpātita-dhyāna, and savīrya-dhyāna. In padāstha dhyāna one focuses on a mantra. A mantra could be either a combination of core letters or words on deity or themes. There is a rich tradition of Mantra in Jainism. All Jain followers irrespective of their sect, whether Digambara or Svetambara, practice mantra. Mantra chanting is an important part of daily lives of Jain monks and followers. Mantra chanting can be done either loudly or silently in mind. Contemplation is a very old and important meditation technique. The practitioner meditates deeply on subtle facts. In agnya vichāya, one contemplates on seven facts – life and non-life, the inflow, bondage, stoppage and removal of karmas, and the final accomplishment of liberation. In apaya vichāya, one contemplates on the incorrect insights one indulges, which eventually develops right insight. In vipaka vichāya, one reflects on the eight causes or basic types of karma. In sansathan vichāya, one thinks about the vastness of the universe and the loneliness of the soul. Buddhism Buddhist meditation refers to the meditative practices associated with the religion and philosophy of Buddhism. Core meditation techniques have been preserved in ancient Buddhist texts and have proliferated and diversified through teacher-student transmissions. Buddhists pursue meditation as part of the path toward awakening and nirvana. The closest words for meditation in the classical languages of Buddhism are bhāvanā, jhāna/dhyāna, and vipassana. Buddhist dhyana may have been an original contribution of Gautama Buddha (5th cent. BCE), the founder of Buddhism. The Silk Road transmission of Buddhism introduced meditation to other Asian countries, and in 653 the first meditation hall was opened in Singapore. Returning from China around 1227, Dōgen wrote the instructions for zazen.The Cambridge History of Japan: Medieval Japan by Kōzō Yamamura, John Whitney Hall 1990 Buddhist meditation techniques have become popular in the wider world, with many non-Buddhists taking them up. There is considerable homogeneity across meditative practices – such as breath meditation and various recollections (anussati) – across Buddhist schools, as well as significant diversity. In the Theravāda tradition, there are over fifty methods for developing mindfulness and forty for developing concentration, while in the Tibetan tradition there are thousands of visualization meditations. Most classical and contemporary Buddhist meditation guides are school-specific. According to the Theravada and Sarvastivada commentatorial traditions, and the Tibetan tradition, the Buddha identified two paramount mental qualities that arise from wholesome meditative practice: "serenity" or "tranquility" (Pali: samatha) which steadies, composes, unifies and concentrates the mind; "insight" (Pali: vipassana) which enables one to see, explore and discern "formations" (conditioned phenomena based on the five aggregates). Through the meditative development of serenity, one is able to weaken the obscuring hindrances and bring the mind to a collected, pliant and still state (samadhi). This quality of mind then supports the development of insight and wisdom (Prajñā) which is the quality of mind that can "clearly see" (vi-passana) the nature of phenomena. What exactly is to be seen varies within the Buddhist traditions. In Theravada, all phenomena are to be seen as impermanent, suffering, not-self and empty. When this happens, one develops dispassion (viraga) for all phenomena, including all negative qualities and hindrances and lets them go. It is through the release of the hindrances and ending of craving through the meditative development of insight that one gains liberation. In the modern era, Buddhist meditation saw increasing popularity due to the influence of Buddhist modernism on Asian Buddhism, and western lay interest in Zen and the Vipassana movement. The spread of Buddhist meditation to the Western world paralleled the spread of Buddhism in the West. The modernized concept of mindfulness (based on the Buddhist term sati) and related meditative practices have in turn led to mindfulness based therapies. Hinduism There are many schools and styles of meditation within Hinduism. In pre-modern and traditional Hinduism, Yoga and Dhyana are practised to recognize 'pure awareness', or 'pure consciousness', undisturbed by the workings of the mind, as one's eternal self. In Advaita Vedanta jivatman, individual self, is recognized as illusory, and in Reality identical with the omnipresent and non-dual Ātman-Brahman. In the dualistic Yoga school and Samkhya, the Self is called Purusha, a pure consciousness undisturbed by Prakriti, 'nature'. Depending on the tradition, the liberative event is named moksha, vimukti or kaivalya. Some of the earliest references to meditation, as well as proto-Samkhya, are found in the Upanishads of India. The earliest clear references to meditation are in the middle Upanishads and the Mahabharata (including the Bhagavad Gita).The Katha Upanishad describes yoga, including meditation. On meditation in this and other post-Buddhist Hindu literature see Randall Collins, The Sociology of Philosophies: A Global Theory of Intellectual Change. Harvard University Press, 2000, p. 199. According to Gavin Flood, the earlier Brihadaranyaka Upanishad is describing meditation when it states that "having become calm and concentrated, one perceives the self (ātman) within oneself". One of the most influential texts of classical Hindu Yoga is Patañjali's Yoga sutras (c. 400 CE), a text associated with Yoga and Samkhya, which outlines eight limbs leading to kaivalya ("aloneness"). These are ethical discipline (yamas), rules (niyamas), physical postures (āsanas), breath control (prāṇāyama), withdrawal from the senses (pratyāhāra), one-pointedness of mind (dhāraṇā), meditation (dhyāna), and finally samādhi. Later developments in Hindu meditation include the compilation of Hatha Yoga (forceful yoga) compendiums like the Hatha Yoga Pradipika, the development of Bhakti yoga as a major form of meditation and Tantra. Another important Hindu yoga text is the Yoga Yajnavalkya, which makes use of Hatha Yoga and Vedanta Philosophy. Sikhism In Sikhism, simran (meditation) and good deeds are both necessary to achieve the devotee's Spiritual goals; without good deeds meditation is futile. When Sikhs meditate, they aim to feel God's presence and emerge in the divine light. It is only God's divine will or order that allows a devotee to desire to begin to meditate. Nām Japnā involves focusing one's attention on the names or great attributes of God. East Asian religions - Taoism Taoist meditation has developed techniques including concentration, visualization, qi cultivation, contemplation, and mindfulness meditations in its long history. Traditional Daoist meditative practices were influenced by Chinese Buddhism from around the 5th century, and influenced Traditional Chinese medicine and the Chinese martial arts. Livia Kohn distinguishes three basic types of Taoist meditation: "concentrative", "insight", and "visualization". Ding 定 (literally means "decide; settle; stabilize") refers to "deep concentration", "intent contemplation", or "perfect absorption". Guan 觀 (lit. "watch; observe; view") meditation seeks to merge and attain unity with the Dao. It was developed by Tang Dynasty (618–907) Taoist masters based upon the Tiantai Buddhist practice of Vipassanā "insight" or "wisdom" meditation. Cun 存 (lit. "exist; be present; survive") has a sense of "to cause to exist; to make present" in the meditation techniques popularized by the Taoist Shangqing and Lingbao Schools. A meditator visualizes or actualizes solar and lunar essences, lights, and deities within their body, which supposedly results in health and longevity, even xian 仙/仚/僊, "immortality". The (late 4th century BCE) Guanzi essay Neiye "Inward training" is the oldest received writing on the subject of qi cultivation and breath-control meditation techniques. For instance, "When you enlarge your mind and let go of it, when you relax your vital breath and expand it, when your body is calm and unmoving: And you can maintain the One and discard the myriad disturbances. ... This is called "revolving the vital breath": Your thoughts and deeds seem heavenly." The (c. 3rd century BCE) Taoist Zhuangzi records zuowang or "sitting forgetting" meditation. Confucius asked his disciple Yan Hui to explain what "sit and forget" means: "I slough off my limbs and trunk, dim my intelligence, depart from my form, leave knowledge behind, and become identical with the Transformational Thoroughfare." Taoist meditation practices are central to Chinese martial arts (and some Japanese martial arts), especially the qi-related neijia "internal martial arts". Some well-known examples are daoyin "guiding and pulling", qigong "life-energy exercises", neigong "internal exercises", neidan "internal alchemy", and taijiquan "great ultimate boxing", which is thought of as moving meditation. One common explanation contrasts "movement in stillness" referring to energetic visualization of qi circulation in qigong and zuochan "seated meditation", versus "stillness in movement" referring to a state of meditative calm in taijiquan forms. Also the unification or middle road forms such as Wuxingheqidao that seeks the unification of internal alchemical forms with more external forms. Monotheistic religions Judaism Judaism has made use of meditative practices for thousands of years.Jacobs, L. (1976) Jewish Mystical Testimonies, Jerusalem, Keter Publishing House Jerusalem. For instance, in the Torah, the patriarch Isaac is described as going "לשוח" (lasuach) in the field – a term understood by all commentators as some type of meditative practice (Genesis 24:63). Similarly, there are indications throughout the Tanakh (the Hebrew Bible) that the prophets meditated. In the Old Testament, there are two Hebrew words for meditation: hāgâ (), to sigh or murmur, but also to meditate, and sîḥâ (), to muse, or rehearse in one's mind. Classical Jewish texts espouse a wide range of meditative practices, often associated with the cultivation of kavanah or intention. The first layer of rabbinic law, the Mishnah, describes ancient sages "waiting" for an hour before their prayers, "in order to direct their hearts to the Omnipresent One (Mishnah Berakhot 5:1). Other early rabbinic texts include instructions for visualizing the Divine Presence (B. Talmud Sanhedrin 22a) and breathing with conscious gratitude for every breath (Genesis Rabba 14:9). One of the best known types of meditation in early Jewish mysticism was the work of the Merkabah, from the root /R-K-B/ meaning "chariot" (of God). Some meditative traditions have been encouraged in Kabbalah, and some Jews have described Kabbalah as an inherently meditative field of study.Kaplan, A. (1982) Meditation and Kabbalah, Maine, Samuel Weiser. Kabbalistic meditation often involves the mental visualization of the supernal realms. Aryeh Kaplan has argued that the ultimate purpose of Kabbalistic meditation is to understand and cleave to the Divine. Meditation has been of interest to a wide variety of modern Jews. In modern Jewish practice, one of the best known meditative practices is called "hitbodedut" (התבודדות, alternatively transliterated as "hisbodedus"), and is explained in Kabbalistic, Hasidic, and Mussar writings, especially the Hasidic method of Rabbi Nachman of Breslav. The word derives from the Hebrew word "boded" (בודד), meaning the state of being alone. Another Hasidic system is the Habad method of "hisbonenus", related to the Sephirah of "Binah", Hebrew for understanding. This practice is the analytical reflective process of making oneself understand a mystical concept well, that follows and internalises its study in Hasidic writings. The Musar Movement, founded by Rabbi Israel Salanter in the middle of the nineteenth-century, emphasized meditative practices of introspection and visualization that could help to improve moral character. Conservative rabbi Alan Lew has emphasized meditation playing an important role in the process of teshuvah (repentance). Jewish Buddhists have adopted Buddhist styles of meditation. Christianity Christian meditation is a term for a form of prayer in which a structured attempt is made to get in touch with and deliberately reflect upon the revelations of God. In the Roman Empire, by 20 BCE Philo of Alexandria had written on some form of "spiritual exercises" involving attention (prosoche) and concentration and by the 3rd century Plotinus had developed meditative techniques. The word meditation comes from the Latin word meditatum, which means to "concentrate" or "to ponder". Monk Guigo II introduced this terminology for the first time in the 12th century AD. Christian meditation is the process of deliberately focusing on specific thoughts (e.g. a biblical scene involving Jesus and the Virgin Mary) and reflecting on their meaning in the context of the love of God. Christian meditation is sometimes taken to mean the middle level in a broad three stage characterization of prayer: it then involves more reflection than first level vocal prayer, but is more structured than the multiple layers of contemplation in Christianity. Interactions with Indians or the Sufis may have influenced the Eastern Christian meditation approach to hesychasm, but this can not be proved. Between the 10th and 14th centuries, hesychasm was developed, particularly on Mount Athos in Greece, and involves the repetition of the Jesus prayer. Western Christian meditation contrasts with most other approaches in that it does not involve the repetition of any phrase or action and requires no specific posture. Western Christian meditation progressed from the 6th century practice of Bible reading among Benedictine monks called Lectio Divina, i.e. divine reading. Its four formal steps as a "ladder" were defined by the monk Guigo II in the 12th century with the Latin terms lectio, meditatio, oratio, and contemplatio (i.e. read, ponder, pray, contemplate). Western Christian meditation was further developed by saints such as Ignatius of Loyola and Teresa of Avila in the 16th century.Christian spirituality: themes from the tradition by Lawrence S. Cunningham, Keith J. Egan 1996 p. 38After Augustine: the meditative reader and the text by Brian Stock 2001 p. 105 In Catholic Christianity, the Rosary is a devotion for the meditation of the mysteries of Jesus and Mary. “The gentle repetition of its prayers makes it an excellent means to moving into deeper meditation. It gives us an opportunity to open ourselves to God’s word, to refine our interior gaze by turning our minds to the life of Christ. The first principle is that meditation is learned through practice. Many people who practice rosary meditation begin very simply and gradually develop a more sophisticated meditation. The meditator learns to hear an interior voice, the voice of God”. Similarly, the chotki of the Eastern Orthodox denomination, the Wreath of Christ of the Lutheran faith, and the Anglican prayer beads of the Episcopalian tradition are used for Christian prayer and meditation. According to Edmund P. Clowney, Christian meditation contrasts with Eastern forms of meditation as radically as the portrayal of God the Father in the Bible contrasts with depictions of Krishna or Brahman in Indian teachings. Unlike some Eastern styles, most styles of Christian meditation do not rely on the repeated use of mantras, and yet are also intended to stimulate thought and deepen meaning. Christian meditation aims to heighten the personal relationship based on the love of God that marks Christian communion.The encyclopedia of Christianity, Volume 3 by Erwin Fahlbusch, Geoffrey William Bromiley 2003 p. 488 In Aspects of Christian meditation, the Catholic Church warned of potential incompatibilities in mixing Christian and Eastern styles of meditation. In 2003, in A Christian reflection on the New Age the Vatican announced that the "Church avoids any concept that is close to those of the New Age". Islam Salah is a mandatory act of devotion performed by Muslims five times per day. The body goes through sets of different postures, as the mind attains a level of concentration called khushu. A second optional type of meditation, called dhikr, meaning remembering and mentioning God, involved the repetition of the 99 Names of God since the 8th or 9th century.Global Encyclopaedia of Education by Rama Sankar Yadav & B.N. Mandal 2007 p. 63 It is interpreted in different meditative techniques in Sufism or Islamic mysticism. This became one of the essential elements of Sufism as it was systematized traditionally. It is juxtaposed with fikr (thinking) which leads to knowledge. By the 12th century, the practice of Sufism included specific meditative techniques, and its followers practiced breathing controls and the repetition of holy words. Sufism uses a meditative procedure like Buddhist concentration, involving high-intensity and sharply focused introspection. In the Oveyssi-Shahmaghsoudi Sufi order, for example, muraqabah takes the form of tamarkoz, "concentration" in Persian.Tafakkur or tadabbur in Sufism literally means reflection upon the universe: this is considered to permit access to a form of cognitive and emotional development that can emanate only from the higher level, i.e. from God. The sensation of receiving divine inspiration awakens and liberates both heart and intellect, permitting such inner growth that the apparently mundane actually takes on the quality of the infinite. Muslim teachings embrace life as a test of one's submission to God. Dervishes of certain Sufi orders practice whirling, a form of physically active meditation. Baháʼí Faith In the teachings of the Baháʼí Faith, meditation is a primary tool for spiritual development, involving reflection on the words of God. While prayer and meditation are linked, where meditation happens generally in a prayerful attitude, prayer is seen specifically as turning toward God, and meditation is seen as a communion with one's self where one focuses on the divine. In Baháʼí teachings the purpose of meditation is to strengthen one's understanding of the words of God, and to make one's soul more susceptible to their potentially transformative power, more receptive to the need for both prayer and meditation to bring about and maintain a spiritual communion with God. Bahá'u'lláh, the founder of the religion, never specified any particular form of meditation, and thus each person is free to choose their own form. However, he did state that Baháʼís should read a passage of the Baháʼí writings twice a day, once in the morning, and once in the evening, and meditate on it. He also encouraged people to reflect on one's actions and worth at the end of each day. During the Nineteen Day Fast, a period of the year during which Baháʼís adhere to a sunrise-to-sunset fast, they meditate and pray to reinvigorate their spiritual forces. Modern spirituality Modern dissemination in the West Meditation has spread in the West since the late 19th century, accompanying increased travel and communication among cultures worldwide. Most prominent has been the transmission of Asian-derived practices to the West. In addition, interest in some Western-based meditative practices has been revived, and these have been disseminated to a limited extent to Asian countries. Ideas about Eastern meditation had begun "seeping into American popular culture even before the American Revolution through the various sects of European occult Christianity", and such ideas "came pouring in [to America] during the era of the transcendentalists, especially between the 1840s and the 1880s." The following decades saw further spread of these ideas to America: More recently, in the 1960s, another surge in Western interest in meditative practices began. The rise of communist political power in Asia led to many Asian spiritual teachers taking refuge in Western countries, oftentimes as refugees. In addition to spiritual forms of meditation, secular forms of meditation have taken root. Rather than focusing on spiritual growth, secular meditation emphasizes stress reduction, relaxation and self-improvement.Encyclopedia of Psychology and Religion by David A. Leeming, Kathryn Madden, Stanton Marlan 2009 ISBN page 559 The 2012 US National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) (34,525 subjects) found 8% of US adults used meditation, with lifetime and 12-month prevalence of meditation use of 5.2% and 4.1% respectively. In the 2017 NHIS survey, meditation use among workers was 10% (up from 8% in 2002). Mantra meditation, with the use of a japa mala and especially with focus on the Hare Krishna maha-mantra, is a central practice of the Gaudiya Vaishnava faith tradition and the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), also known as the Hare Krishna movement. Other popular New Religious Movements include the Ramakrishna Mission, Vedanta Society, Divine Light Mission, Chinmaya Mission, Osho, Sahaja Yoga, Transcendental Meditation, Oneness University, Brahma Kumaris, Vihangam Yoga and Heartfulness Meditation (Sahaj Marg). New Age New Age meditations are often influenced by Eastern philosophy, mysticism, yoga, Hinduism and Buddhism, yet may contain some degree of Western influence. In the West, meditation found its mainstream roots through the social revolution of the 1960s and 1970s, when many of the youth of the day rebelled against traditional religion as a reaction against what some perceived as the failure of Christianity to provide spiritual and ethical guidance. New Age meditation as practised by the early hippies is regarded for its techniques of blanking out the mind and releasing oneself from conscious thinking. This is often aided by repetitive chanting of a mantra, or focusing on an object. New Age meditation evolved into a range of purposes and practices, from serenity and balance to access to other realms of consciousness to the concentration of energy in group meditation to the supreme goal of samadhi, as in the ancient yogic practice of meditation. Forms and techniques Classifications In the West, meditation techniques have sometimes been thought of in two broad categories: focused (or concentrative) meditation and open monitoring (or mindfulness) meditation. Direction of mental attention... A practitioner can focus intensively on one particular object (so-called concentrative meditation), on all mental events that enter the field of awareness (so-called mindfulness meditation), or both specific focal points and the field of awareness. Focused methods include paying attention to the breath, to an idea or feeling (such as mettā (loving-kindness)), to a kōan, or to a mantra (such as in transcendental meditation), and single point meditation."Single-pointed concentration (samadhi) is a meditative power that is useful in either of these two types of meditation. However, in order to develop samadhi itself we must cultivate principally concentration meditation. In terms of practice, this means that we must choose an object of concentration and then meditate single-pointedly on it every day until the power of samadhi is attained." Open monitoring methods include mindfulness, shikantaza and other awareness states. Practices using both methods include vipassana (which uses anapanasati as a preparation), and samatha (calm-abiding). In "No thought" methods, "the practitioner is fully alert, aware, and in control of their faculties but does not experience any unwanted thought activity." This is in contrast to the common meditative approaches of being detached from, and non-judgmental of, thoughts, but not of aiming for thoughts to cease. In the meditation practice of the Sahaja yoga spiritual movement, the focus is on thoughts ceasing. Clear light yoga also aims at a state of no mental content, as does the no thought (wu nian) state taught by Huineng, and the teaching of Yaoshan Weiyan. One proposal is that transcendental meditation and possibly other techniques be grouped as an "automatic self-transcending" set of techniques. Other typologies include dividing meditation into concentrative, generative, receptive and reflective practices. Frequency The Transcendental Meditation technique recommends practice of 20 minutes twice per day. Some techniques suggest less time, especially when starting meditation, and Richard Davidson has quoted research saying benefits can be achieved with a practice of only 8 minutes per day. Research shows improvement in meditation time with simple oral and video training. Some meditators practice for much longer, particularly when on a course or retreat. Some meditators find practice best in the hours before dawn. Posture Asanas and positions such as the full-lotus, half-lotus, Burmese, Seiza, and kneeling positions are popular in Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism, although other postures such as sitting, supine (lying), and standing are also used. Meditation is also sometimes done while walking, known as kinhin, while doing a simple task mindfully, known as samu or while lying down known as savasana. Use of prayer beads Some religions have traditions of using prayer beads as tools in devotional meditation.The everything Buddhism book by Jacky Sach 2003 p. 175 Most prayer beads and Christian rosaries consist of pearls or beads linked together by a thread. The Roman Catholic rosary is a string of beads containing five sets with ten small beads. The Hindu japa mala has 108 beads (the figure 108 in itself having spiritual significance), as well as those used in Gaudiya Vaishnavism, the Hare Krishna tradition, Jainism and Buddhist prayer beads.Meditation and Mantras by Vishnu Devananda 1999 pp. 82–83 Each bead is counted once as a person recites a mantra until the person has gone all the way around the mala. The Muslim misbaha has 99 beads. There is also quite a variance when it comes to materials used for beads. Beads made from seeds of rudraksha trees are considered sacred by devotees of Shiva, while followers of Vishnu revere the wood that comes from the tulsi plant. Striking the meditator The Buddhist literature has many stories of Enlightenment being attained through disciples being struck by their masters. According to T. Griffith Foulk, the encouragement stick was an integral part of the Zen practice: Using a narrative Neuroscientist and long-time meditator Richard Davidson has expressed the view that having a narrative can help maintenance of daily practice. For instance he himself prostrates to the teachings, and meditates "not primarily for my benefit, but for the benefit of others". Guided meditation Guided meditation is a form of meditation which utilizes a number of different techniques to achieve or enhance the meditative state. It may simply be meditation done under the guidance of a trained practitioner or teacher, or it may be through the use of imagery, music, and other techniques. The session can be either in person, via media comprising music or verbal instruction, or a combination of both.Grocke, D., and Wigram, T., Receptive methods in music therapy: Techniques and clinical applications for music therapy clinicians, educators, and students. London, England: Jessica Kingsley, 2007. The most common form is a combination of meditation music and receptive music therapy, guided imagery, relaxation, mindfulness, and journaling.Newham, P., Guided Meditation: Principles and Practice. London; Tigers Eye, 2005. Because of the different combinations used under the one term it can be difficult to attribute positive or negative outcomes to any of the various techniques. Furthermore, the term is frequently used interchangeably with "guided imagery" and sometimes with "creative visualization" in popular psychology and self-help literature. It is less commonly used in scholarly and scientific publications. Consequently, guided meditation cannot be understood as a single technique but rather multiple techniques that are integral to its practice.Post-White J. 2002. Clinical indication for use of imagery in oncology practice. In Voice Massage, Scripts for Guided Imagery, Edwards D.M (Ed.). Oncology Nursing Society: Pittsburgh, PA.Luebert K, Dahme B, Hasenbring M. 2001. The effectiveness of relaxation training in reducing treatment- related symptoms and improving emotional adjustment in acute non-surgical cancer treatment: A meta-analytical review. Psycho-Oncology, Vol. 10: pp490–502. Guided meditation as an aggregate or synthesis of techniques includes meditation music, receptive music therapy, guided imagery, relaxation, meditative praxis, and self-reflective diary-keeping or journaling. All of which have been shown to have therapeutic benefits when employed as an adjunct to primary strategies. Benefits include lower levels of stress, reducing asthmatic episodes, physical pain, insomnia, episodic anger, negative or irrational thinking, and anxiety, as well as improving coping skills, focus, and a general feeling of well-being.LeónPizarro C., Gich I., Barthe E., Rovirosa A., Farrús B., Casas F., Verger E., Biete A., Craven Bartle J., Sierra J., Arcusa A., A randomized trial of the effect of training in relaxation and guided imagery techniques in improving psychological and quality-of-life indices for gynecologic and breast brachytherapy patients. Psycho-oncology, Vol. 16, No. 11, 2007, pp971-979. Secular applications Psychotherapy Carl Jung (1875–1961) was an early western explorer of eastern religious practices.C. G. Jung, "Forward to Suzuki's An Introduction to Zen Buddhism", (1939), Collected Works v.11. He clearly advocated ways to increase the conscious awareness of an individual. Yet he expressed some caution concerning a westerner's direct immersion in eastern practices without some prior appreciation of the differing spiritual and cultural contexts.V. Walter Odajnyk, Gathering the Light. A psychology of meditation (Shambhala 1993), pp. 18-21. Also Erich Fromm (1900–1980) later explored spiritual practices of the east. Clinical applications The US National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health states that "Meditation is a mind and body practice that has a long history of use for increasing calmness and physical relaxation, improving psychological balance, coping with illness, and enhancing overall health and well-being." A 2014 review found that practice of mindfulness meditation for two to six months by people undergoing long-term psychiatric or medical therapy could produce small improvements in anxiety, pain, or depression. In 2017, the American Heart Association issued a scientific statement that meditation may be a reasonable adjunct practice to help reduce the risk of cardiovascular diseases, with the qualification that meditation needs to be better defined in higher-quality clinical research of these disorders. Recent findings have also found evidence of meditation effecting migraines in adults. Mindfulness meditation may allow for a decrease in migraine episodes, and a drop in migraine medication usage. Low-quality evidence indicates that meditation may help with irritable bowel syndrome, insomnia, cognitive decline in the elderly, and post-traumatic stress disorder. Researchers have found that participating in mindfulness meditation can aid insomnia patients by improving sleep quality and total wake time. Mindfulness meditation is not a treatment for insomnia patients, but it can provide support in addition to their treatment options. Meditation in the workplace A 2010 review of the literature on spirituality and performance in organizations found an increase in corporate meditation programs. As of 2016 around a quarter of U.S. employers were using stress reduction initiatives. The goal was to help reduce stress and improve reactions to stress. Aetna now offers its program to its customers. Google also implements mindfulness, offering more than a dozen meditation courses, with the most prominent one, "Search Inside Yourself", having been implemented since 2007. General Mills offers the Mindful Leadership Program Series, a course which uses a combination of mindfulness meditation, yoga and dialogue with the intention of developing the mind's capacity to pay attention. Sound-based meditation Herbert Benson of Harvard Medical School conducted a series of clinical tests on meditators from various disciplines, including the Transcendental Meditation technique and Tibetan Buddhism. In 1975, Benson published a book titled The Relaxation Response where he outlined his own version of meditation for relaxation. Also in the 1970s, the American psychologist Patricia Carrington developed a similar technique called Clinically Standardized Meditation (CSM). In Norway, another sound-based method called Acem Meditation developed a psychology of meditation and has been the subject of several scientific studies. Biofeedback has been used by many researchers since the 1950s in an effort to enter deeper states of mind. Effects Research on the processes and effects of meditation is a subfield of neurological research. Modern scientific techniques, such as fMRI and EEG, were used to observe neurological responses during meditation. Concerns have been raised on the quality of meditation research, including the particular characteristics of individuals who tend to participate. Meditation lowers heart rate, oxygen consumption, breathing frequency, stress hormones, lactate levels, and sympathetic nervous system activity (associated with the fight-or-flight response), along with a modest decline in blood pressure. However, those who have meditated for two or three years were found to already have low blood pressure. During meditation, the oxygen consumption decrease averages 10 to 20 percent over the first three minutes. During sleep for example, oxygen consumption decreases around 8 percent over four or five hours. For meditators who have practiced for years, breath rate can drop to three or four breaths per minute and brain waves slow from alpha waves seen in normal relaxation to much slower delta and theta waves. Since the 1970s, clinical psychology and psychiatry have developed meditation techniques for numerous psychological conditions. Mindfulness practice is employed in psychology to alleviate mental and physical conditions, such as reducing depression, stress, and anxiety. Mindfulness is also used in the treatment of drug addiction, although the quality of research has been poor. Studies demonstrate that meditation has a moderate effect to reduce pain. There is insufficient evidence for any effect of meditation on positive mood, attention, eating habits, sleep, or body weight. Moreover, a 2015 study, including subjective and objective reports and brain scans, has shown that meditation can improve controlling attention, as well as self-awareness. A 2017 systematic review and meta-analysis of the effects of meditation on empathy, compassion, and prosocial behaviors found that meditation practices had small to medium effects on self-reported and observable outcomes, concluding that such practices can "improve positive prosocial emotions and behaviors". However, a meta-review published on Nature showed that the evidence is very weak and "that the effects of meditation on compassion were only significant when compared to passive control groups suggests that other forms of active interventions (like watching a nature video) might produce similar outcomes to meditation". Potential adverse effects Meditation has been correlated with unpleasant experiences in some people. In some cases, it has also been linked to psychosis in a few individuals. In one study, published in 2019, of 1,232 regular meditators with at least two months of meditation experience, about a quarter reported having had particularly unpleasant meditation-related experiences (such as anxiety, fear, distorted emotions or thoughts, altered sense of self or the world), which they thought may have been caused by their meditation practice. Meditators with high levels of repetitive negative thinking and those who only engage in deconstructive meditation were more likely to report unpleasant side effects. Adverse effects were less frequently reported in women and religious meditators. Difficult experiences encountered in meditation are mentioned in traditional sources; and some may be considered to be just an expected part of the process: for example: seven stages of purification mentioned in Theravāda Buddhism, or possible “unwholesome or frightening visions” mentioned in a practical manual on vipassanā meditation. See also Autogenic training Entheogen Full Catastrophe Living Headspace (company) Hypnosis Immanence Mechanisms of mindfulness meditation Mushin (mental state) Narrative identity Psychedelic experience Psychonautics Psychology of religion Satipatthana (Four Foundations of Mindfulness) Sensory deprivation ThetaHealing Notes References Sources Printed sources Austin, James H. (1999) Zen and the Brain: Toward an Understanding of Meditation and Consciousness, Cambridge: MIT Press, 1999, Azeemi, Khwaja Shamsuddin Azeemi (2005) Muraqaba: The Art and Science of Sufi Meditation. Houston: Plato, 2005, Bennett-Goleman, T. (2001) Emotional Alchemy: How the Mind Can Heal the Heart, Harmony Books, Benson, Herbert and Miriam Z. Klipper. (2000 [1972]). The Relaxation Response. Expanded Updated edition. Harper. (NB: Bond, Ospina et al., 2009, has substantial overlap with the full report by Ospina, Bond et al., 2007, listed below. Overlap includes the first 6 authors of this paper, and the equivalence of Table 3 on p. 134 in this paper with Table B1 on p. 281 in the full report) Hayes, S. C.; Strosahl, K. D.; Wilson, K. G. (1999) Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. New York: Guilford Press. Metzner, R. (2005) Psychedelic, Psychoactive and Addictive Drugs and States of Consciousness. In Mind-Altering Drugs: The Science of Subjective Experience, Chap. 2. Mitch Earlywine, ed. Oxford University Press. MirAhmadi, As Sayed Nurjan (2005) Healing Power of Sufi Meditation. Islamic Supreme Council of America. Nirmalananda Giri, Swami (2007) Om Yoga: Its Theory and Practice In-depth study of the classical meditation method of the Bhagavad Gita, Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, and the Upanishads. Shalif, Ilan et al. (1989) Focusing on the Emotions of Daily Life (Tel-Aviv: Etext Archives, 2008) ; Reprinted as chapter 1 (pp. 5–10) in (the book was republished in 2008: ) Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, Smith, Fritz Frederick (1986): Inner Bridges: A Guide to Energy Movement and Body Structure, Humanics Ltd. Partners, . Tart, Charles T., editor. Altered States of Consciousness (1969) Trungpa, C. (1973) Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism, Shambhala South Asia Editions, Boston, Massachusetts. Trungpa, C. (1984) Shambhala: The Sacred Path of the Warrior, Shambhala Dragon Editions, Boston, Massachusetts. Erhard Vogel. (2001) Journey Into Your Center, Nataraja Publications, Wenner, Melinda. "Brain Scans Reveal Why Meditation Works." LiveScience.com. 30 June 2007. Web-sources Further reading Ajahn Brahm, Mindfulness Bliss and Beyond. Cooper, David. A. The Art of Meditation: A Complete Guide. Easwaran, Eknath. Meditation (see article). new edition: Passage Meditation. . The Mantram Handbook Glickman, Marshall (2002) Beyond the Breath: Extraordinary Mindfulness Through Whole-Body Vipassana. Goenka, S. N. Meditation Now: Inner Peace through Inner Wisdom, Hart, William. Art of Living, Vipassana Meditation, , Krishnamurti, Jiddu. This Light in Oneself: True Meditation, 1999, Shambhala Publications. Heller, Rick. Secular Meditation: 32 Practices for Cultivating Inner Peace, Compassion, and Joy – A Guide from the Humanist Community at Harvard, 2015, New World Library. Levin, Michal. Meditation, Path to the Deepest Self, Dorling Kindersley, 2002. Long, Barry. Meditation: A Foundation Course – A Book of Ten Lessons. Meditation for Beginners without Religion – Meditation for Beginners. Meiche, Michele. Meditation for Everyday Living. Monaghan, Patricia and Eleanor G. Viereck. Meditation: The Complete Guide. Oldstone-Moore, Jennifer. Understanding Confucianism, Duncan Baird, 2003. . Shankarananda, Swami. Happy For No Good Reason, Shaktipat Press, 2004. Wood, Ernest. Concentration – An Approach to Meditation. Theosophical Publishing House 1949. . Yogananda, Paramahansa. Autobiography of a Yogi. External links Articles containing video clips Concepts in the philosophy of mind Concepts in the philosophy of science History of psychology Mind–body interventions Personal development Religion articles needing expert attention Religious practices Spiritual practice Silence Yoga

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4

MPEG-4

MPEG-4 is a method of defining compression of audio and visual (AV) digital data. It was introduced in late 1998 and designated a standard for a group of audio and video coding formats and related technology agreed upon by the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) (ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11) under the formal standard ISO/IEC 14496 – Coding of audio-visual objects. Uses of MPEG-4 include compression of AV data for Internet video and CD distribution, voice (telephone, videophone) and broadcast television applications. The MPEG-4 standard was developed by a group led by Touradj Ebrahimi (later the JPEG president) and Fernando Pereira. Background MPEG-4 absorbs many of the features of MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 and other related standards, adding new features such as (extended) VRML support for 3D rendering, object-oriented composite files (including audio, video and VRML objects), support for externally specified Digital Rights Management and various types of interactivity. AAC (Advanced Audio Coding) was standardized as an adjunct to MPEG-2 (as Part 7) before MPEG-4 was issued. MPEG-4 is still an evolving standard and is divided into a number of parts. Companies promoting MPEG-4 compatibility do not always clearly state which "part" level compatibility they are referring to. The key parts to be aware of are MPEG-4 Part 2 (including Advanced Simple Profile, used by codecs such as DivX, Xvid, Nero Digital and 3ivx and by QuickTime 6) and MPEG-4 part 10 (MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 or Advanced Video Coding, used by the x264 encoder, Nero Digital AVC, QuickTime 7, and high-definition video media like Blu-ray Disc). Most of the features included in MPEG-4 are left to individual developers to decide whether or not to implement. This means that there are probably no complete implementations of the entire MPEG-4 set of standards. To deal with this, the standard includes the concept of "profiles" and "levels", allowing a specific set of capabilities to be defined in a manner appropriate for a subset of applications. Initially, MPEG-4 was aimed primarily at low-bit-rate video communications; however, its scope as a multimedia coding standard was later expanded. MPEG-4 is efficient across a variety of bit rates ranging from a few kilobits per second to tens of megabits per second. MPEG-4 provides the following functions: Improved coding efficiency over MPEG-2 Ability to encode mixed media data (video, audio, speech) Error resilience to enable robust transmission Ability to interact with the audio-visual scene generated at the receiver Overview MPEG-4 provides a series of technologies for developers, for various service-providers and for end users: MPEG-4 enables different software and hardware developers to create multimedia objects possessing better abilities of adaptability and flexibility to improve the quality of such services and technologies as digital television, animation graphics, the World Wide Web and their extensions. Data network providers can use MPEG-4 for data transparency. With the help of standard procedures, MPEG-4 data can be interpreted and transformed into other signal types compatible with any available network. The MPEG-4 format provides end users with a wide range of interaction with various animated objects. Standardized Digital Rights Management signaling, otherwise known in the MPEG community as Intellectual Property Management and Protection (IPMP). The MPEG-4 format can perform various functions, among which might be the following: Multiplexes and synchronizes data, associated with media objects, in such a way that they can be efficiently transported further via network channels. Interaction with the audio-visual scene, which is formed on the side of the receiver. Profiles and Levels MPEG-4 provides a large and rich set of tools for encoding. Subsets of the MPEG-4 tool sets have been provided for use in specific applications. These subsets, called 'Profiles', limit the size of the tool set a decoder is required to implement. In order to restrict computational complexity, one or more 'Levels' are set for each Profile. A Profile and Level combination allows: A codec builder to implement only the subset of the standard needed, while maintaining interworking with other MPEG-4 devices that implement the same combination. Checking whether MPEG-4 devices comply with the standard, referred to as conformance testing. MPEG-4 Parts MPEG-4 consists of several standards—termed "parts"—including the following (each part covers a certain aspect of the whole specification): Profiles are also defined within the individual "parts", so an implementation of a part is ordinarily not an implementation of an entire part. MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-7 and MPEG-21 are other suites of MPEG standards. MPEG-4 Levels The low profile levels are part of the MPEG-4 video encoding/decoding constraints and are compatible with the older ITU H.261 standard, also compatible with former analog TV standards for broadcast and records (such as NTSC or PAL video). The ASP profile in its highest level is suitable for most usual DVD medias and players or for many online video sites, but not for Blu-ray records or online HD video contents. More advanced profiles for HD media have been defined later in the AVC profile, which is functionally identical to the ITU H.264 standard but are now also integrated in MPEG-4 Part 10 (see H.264/MPEG-4 AVC for the list of defined levels in this AVC profile). Licensing MPEG-4 contains patented technologies, the use of which requires licensing in countries that acknowledge software algorithm patents. Over two dozen companies claim to have patents covering MPEG-4. MPEG LA licenses patents required for MPEG-4 Part 2 Visual from a wide range of companies (audio is licensed separately) and lists all of its licensors and licensees on the site. New licenses for MPEG-4 System patents are under development and no new licenses are being offered while holders of its old MPEG-4 Systems license are still covered under the terms of that license for the patents listed (MPEG LA – Patent List). The majority of patents used for the MPEG-4 Visual format are held by three Japanese companies: Mitsubishi Electric (255 patents), Hitachi (206 patents), and Panasonic (200 patents). See also MPEG MPEG-4 Structured Audio MPEG-4 SLS ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29 References External links Overview of the MPEG-4 Standard at the MPEG Official Website JM MPEG-4 AVC /H.264 Reference Code OpenIPMP: Open Source DRM Project for MPEG-4 Audio codecs ISO/IEC standards Video codecs Videotelephony

20064

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maritime%20archaeology

Maritime archaeology

Maritime archaeology (also known as marine archaeology) is a discipline within archaeology as a whole that specifically studies human interaction with the sea, lakes and rivers through the study of associated physical remains, be they vessels, shore-side facilities, port-related structures, cargoes, human remains and submerged landscapes. A specialty within maritime archaeology is nautical archaeology, which studies ship construction and use. As with archaeology as a whole, maritime archaeology can be practised within the historical, industrial, or prehistoric periods. An associated discipline, and again one that lies within archaeology itself, is underwater archaeology, which studies the past through any submerged remains be they of maritime interest or not. An example from the prehistoric era would be the remains of submerged settlements or deposits now lying under water despite having been dry land when sea levels were lower. The study of submerged aircraft lost in lakes, rivers or in the sea is an example from the historical, industrial or modern era. Another example are the remains of discovered and potential medieval bridges connecting the islands on the lake with the mainland. Many specialist sub-disciplines within the broader maritime and underwater archaeological categories have emerged in recent years. Maritime archaeological sites often result from shipwrecks or sometimes seismic activity, and thus represent a moment in time rather than a slow deposition of material accumulated over a period of years, as is the case with port-related structures (such as piers, wharves, docks and jetties) where objects are lost or thrown off structures over extended periods of time. This fact has led to shipwrecks often being described in the media and in popular accounts as 'time capsules'. Archaeological material in the sea or in other underwater environments is typically subject to different factors than artifacts on land. However, as with terrestrial archaeology, what survives to be investigated by modern archaeologists can often be a tiny fraction of the material originally deposited. A feature of maritime archaeology is that despite all the material that is lost, there are occasional rare examples of substantial survival, from which a great deal can be learned, due to the difficulties often experienced in accessing the sites. There are those in the archaeology community who see maritime archaeology as a separate discipline with its own concerns (such as shipwrecks) and requiring the specialized skills of the underwater archaeologist. Others value an integrated approach, stressing that nautical activity has economic and social links to communities on land and that archaeology is archaeology no matter where the study is conducted. All that is required is the mastering of skills specific to the environment in which the work occurs. Integrating land and sea Before the industrial era, travel by water was often easier than over land. As a result, marine channels, navigable rivers and sea crossings formed the trade routes of historic and ancient civilisations. For example, the Mediterranean Sea was known to the Romans as the inner sea because the Roman empire spread around its coasts. The historic record as well as the remains of harbours, ships and cargoes, testify to the volume of trade that crossed it. Later, nations with a strong maritime culture such as the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Denmark, Portugal and Spain were able to establish colonies on other continents. Wars were fought at sea over the control of important resources. The material cultural remains that are discovered by maritime archaeologists along former trade routes can be combined with historical documents and material cultural remains found on land to understand the economic, social and political environment of the past. Of late maritime archaeologists have been examining the submerged cultural remains of China, India, Korea and other Asian nations. Preservation of material underwater There are significant differences in the survival of archaeological material depending on whether a site is wet or dry, on the nature of the chemical environment, on the presence of biological organisms and on the dynamic forces present. Thus rocky coastlines, especially in shallow water, are typically inimical to the survival of artifacts, which can be dispersed, smashed or ground by the effect of currents and surf, possibly (but not always) leaving an artifact pattern but little if any wreck structure. Saltwater is particularly inimical to iron artefacts including metal shipwrecks, and sea organisms will readily consume organic material such as wooden shipwrecks. On the other hand, out of all the thousands of potential archaeological sites destroyed or grossly eroded by such natural processes, occasionally sites survive with exceptional preservation of a related collection of artifacts. An example of such a collection is . Survival in this instance is largely due to the remains being buried in sediment Of the many examples where the sea bed provides an extremely hostile environment for submerged evidence of history, one of the most notable, , though a relatively young wreck and in deep water so calcium-starved that concretion does not occur, appears strong and relatively intact, though indications are that it has already incurred irreversible degradation of her steel and iron hull. As such degradation inevitably continues, data will be forever lost, objects' context will be destroyed and the bulk of the wreck will over centuries completely deteriorate on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean. Comparative evidence shows that all iron and steel ships, especially those in a highly oxygenated environment, continue to degrade and will continue to do so until only their engines and other machinery project much above the sea-floor. Where it remains even after the passage of time, the iron or steel hull is often fragile with no remaining metal within the layer of concretion and corrosion products. , having been found in the 1970s, was subjected to a program of attempted in situ preservation, for example, but deterioration of the vessel progressed at such a rate that the rescue of her turret was undertaken lest nothing be saved from the wreck. Some wrecks, lost to natural obstacles to navigation, are at risk of being smashed by subsequent wrecks sunk by the same hazard, or are deliberately destroyed because they present a hazard to navigation. Even in deep water, commercial activities such as pipe-laying operations and deep sea trawling can place a wreck at risk. Such a wreck is the Mardi Gras shipwreck sunk in the Gulf of Mexico in of water. The shipwreck lay forgotten at the bottom of the sea until it was discovered in 2002 by an oilfield inspection crew working for the Okeanos Gas Gathering Company (OGGC). Large pipelines can crush sites and render some of their remnants inaccessible as pipe is dropped from the ocean surface to the substrate thousands of feet below. Trawl nets snag and tear superstructures and separate artifacts from their context. The wrecks, and other archaeological sites that have been preserved have generally survived because the dynamic nature of the sea bed can result in artifacts becoming rapidly buried in sediments. These sediments then provide an anaerobic environment which protects from further degradation. Wet environments, whether on land in the form of peat bogs and wells, or underwater are particularly important for the survival of organic material, such as wood, leather, fabric and horn. Cold and absence of light also aid survival of artifacts, because there is little energy available for either organic activity or chemical reactions. Salt water provides for greater organic activity than freshwater, and in particular, the shipworm, Teredo navalis, lives only in salt water, so some of the best preservation in the absence of sediments has been found in the cold, dark waters of the Great Lakes in North America and in the (low salinity) Baltic Sea (where Vasa was preserved). While the land surface is continuously reused by societies, the sea bed was largely inaccessible until the advent of submarines, scuba equipment and remotely operated underwater vehicles (ROVs) in the twentieth century. Salvagers have operated in much earlier times, but much of the material was beyond the reach of anyone. Thus Mary Rose was subject to salvage from the sixteenth century and later, but a very large amount of material, buried in the sediments, remained to be found by maritime archaeologists of the twentieth century. While preservation in situ is not assured, material that has survived underwater and is then recovered to land is typically in an unstable state and can only be preserved using highly specialised conservation processes. While the wooden structure of Mary Rose and the individual artifacts have been undergoing conservation since their recovery, provides an example of a relatively recent (metal) wreck for which extensive conservation has been necessary to preserve the hull. While the hull remains intact, its machinery remains inoperable. The engine of that was recovered in 1985 from a saline environment after over a century underwater is presently considered somewhat anomalous, in that after two decades of treatment it can now be turned over by hand. A challenge for the modern archaeologist is to consider whether in-situ preservation, or recovery and conservation on land is the preferable option; or to face the fact that preservation in any form, other than as an archaeological record is not feasible. A site that has been discovered has typically been subjected to disturbance of the very factors that caused its survival in the first place, for example, when a covering of sediment has been removed by storms or the action of man. Active monitoring and deliberate protection may mitigate further rapid destruction making in situ preservation an option, but long-term survival can never be guaranteed. For very many sites, the costs are too great for either active measures to ensure in situ preservation or to provide for satisfactory conservation on recovery. Even the cost of proper and complete archaeological investigation may be too great to enable this to occur within a timescale that ensures that an archaeological record is made before data is inevitably lost. Submerged sites Pre-historic landscapes Maritime archaeology studies prehistorical objects and sites that are, because of changes in climate and geology, now underwater. Bodies of water, fresh and saline, have been important sources of food for people for as long as we have existed. It should be no surprise that ancient villages were located at the water's edge. Since the last ice age sea level has risen as much as . Therefore, a great deal of the record of human activity throughout the Ice Age is now to be found under water. The flooding of the area now known as the Black Sea (when a land bridge, where the Bosporus is now, collapsed under the pressure of rising water in the Mediterranean Sea) submerged a great deal of human activity that had been gathered round what had been an enormous, fresh-water lake. Significant cave art sites off the coast of western Europe such as the Grotto Cosquer can be reached only by diving, because the cave entrances are underwater, though the upper portions of the caves themselves are not flooded. Historic sites Throughout history, seismic events have at times caused submergence of human settlements. The remains of such catastrophes exist all over the world, and sites such as Alexandria and Port Royal now form important archaeological sites. As with shipwrecks, archaeological research can follow multiple themes, including evidence of the final catastrophe, the structures and landscape before the catastrophe and the culture and economy of which it formed a part. Unlike the wrecking of a ship, the destruction of a town by a seismic event can take place over many years and there may be evidence for several phases of damage, sometimes with rebuilding in between. Coastal and foreshore Not all maritime sites are underwater. There are many structures at the margin of land and water that provide evidence of the human societies of the past. Some are deliberately created for access - such as bridges and walkways. Other structures remain from exploitation of resources, such as dams and fish traps. Nautical remains include early harbours and places where ships were built or repaired. At the end of their life, ships were often beached. Valuable or easily accessed timber has often been salvaged leaving just a few frames and bottom planking. Archaeological sites can also be found on the foreshore today that would have been on dry land when they were constructed. An example of such a site is Seahenge, a Bronze Age timber circle. Ships and shipwrecks The archaeology of shipwrecks can be divided into a three-tier hierarchy, of which the first tier considers the wrecking process itself: how does a ship break up, how does a ship sink to the bottom, and how do the remains of the ship, cargo and the surrounding environment evolve over time? The second tier studies the ship as a machine, both in itself and in a military or economic system. The third tier consists of the archaeology of maritime cultures, in which nautical technology, naval warfare, trade and shipboard societies are studied. Some consider this to be the most important tier. Ships and boats are not necessarily wrecked: some are deliberately abandoned, scuttled or beached. Many such abandoned vessels have been extensively salvaged. Bronze Age The earliest boats discovered date from the Bronze Age and are constructed of hollowed out logs or sewn planks. Vessels have been discovered where they have been preserved in sediments underwater or in waterlogged land sites, such as the discovery of a canoe near St Botolphs. Examples of sewn-plank boats include those found at North Ferriby and the Dover Bronze Age Boat which is now displayed at Dover Museum. These may be an evolution from boats made of sewn hides, but it is highly unlikely that hide boats could have survived. Ships wrecked in the sea have probably not survived, although remains of cargo (particularly bronze material) have been discovered, such as those at the Salcombe B site. A close collection of artefacts on the sea bed may imply that artefacts were from a ship, even if there are no remains of the actual vessel. Late Bronze Age ships, such as the Uluburun Shipwreck have been discovered in the Mediterranean, constructed of edge joined planks. This shipbuilding technology continued through the classical period. Maritime archaeology by region Pacific An example of maritime archaeology in the Pacific ocean, is the discovery of the wreck of Two Brothers, discovered in 2008 by a team of marine archaeologists working on an expedition for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The identity of the ship was not immediately known so it was called the "Shark Island Whaler"; the ship's identification as Two Brothers was announced by NOAA on February 11, 2011, the 188th anniversary of her sinking. The wreck is the first discovery of a wrecked Nantucket whaling ship. Nine historic trade ships carrying ceramics dating back to the 10th century until the 19th century were excavated under Swedish engineer Sten Sjöstrand in the South China Sea. Royal Nanhai (circa 1460), found in 1995 Nanyang (circa 1380), found in 1995 Xuande (circa 1540), found in 1995 Longquan (circa 1400), found in 1996 Turiang (circa 1370), found in 1996 Singtai (circa 1550), found in 1998 Desaru (circa 1830), found in 2001 Tanjong Simpang (AD 960- 1127), found in 2001 Wanli (early 17th century), found in 2003 Mediterranean area In the Mediterranean area, maritime archaeologists have investigated several ancient cultures. Notable early Iron Age shipwrecks include two Phoenician ships of c. 750 BC that foundered off Gaza with cargoes of wine in amphoras. The crew of the U.S. Navy deep submergence research submarine NR-1 discovered the sites in 1997. In 1999 a team led by Robert Ballard and Harvard University archaeology Professor Lawrence Stager investigated the wrecks. Extensive research has been carried out on the Mediterranean and Aegean coastlines of Turkey. Complete excavations have been performed on several wrecks from the Classical, Hellenistic, Byzantine, and Ottoman periods. Maritime archaeological studies in Italy illuminate the naval and maritime activities of the Etruscans, Greek colonists, and Romans. After the 2nd century BC, the Roman fleet ruled the Mediterranean and actively suppressed piracy. During this Pax Romana, seaborne trade increased significantly throughout the region. Though sailing was the safest, fastest, and most efficient method of transportation in the ancient world, some fractional percentage of voyages ended in shipwreck. With the significantly increased sea traffic during the Roman era came a corresponding increase in shipwrecks. These wrecks and their cargo remains offer glimpses through time of the economy, culture, and politics of the ancient world. Particularly useful to archaeologists are studies of amphoras, the ceramic shipping containers used in the Mediterranean region from the 15th century BC through the Medieval period. In addition to many discoveries in the sea, some wrecks have been examined in lakes. Most notable are Caligula's pleasure barges in Lake Nemi, Italy. The Nemi ships and other shipwreck sites occasionally yield objects of unique artistic value. For instance, the Antikythera wreck contained a staggering collection of marble and bronze statues including the Antikythera Youth. Discovered in 1900 by Greek sponge divers, the ship probably sank in the 1st century BC and may have been dispatched by the Roman general, Sulla, to carry booty back to Rome. The sponge divers also recovered from the wreck the famous Antikythera mechanism, believed to be an astronomical calculator. Further examples of fabulous works of art recovered from the sea floor are the two "bronzi" found in Riace (Calabria), Italy. In the cases of Antikythera and Riace, however, the artifacts were recovered without the direct participation of maritime archaeologists. Recent studies in the Sarno river (near Pompeii) show other interesting elements of ancient life. The Sarno projects suggests that on the Tyrrhenian shore there were little towns with palafittes, similar to ancient Venice. In the same area, the submerged town of Puteoli (Pozzuoli, close to Naples) contains the "portus Julius" created by Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa in 37 BC, later sunk due to bradyseism. The sea floor elsewhere in the Mediterranean holds countless archaeological sites. In Israel, Herod the Great's port at Caesarea Maritima has been extensively studied. Other finds are consistent with some passages of the Bible (like the so-called Jesus boat, which appears to have been in use during the first century AD). Australia Maritime archaeology in Australia commenced in the 1970s with the advent of Jeremy Green due to concerns expressed by academics and politicians with the rampant destruction of the Dutch and British East India ships lost on the west coast. As Commonwealth legislation was enacted and enforced after 1976 and as States enacted their own legislation the sub-discipline spread throughout Australia concentrating initially on shipwrecks due to on-going funding by both the States and the Commonwealth under their shipwreck legislation. Studies now include as an element of underwater archaeology, as a whole, the study of submerged indigenous sites. Nautical Archaeology, (the specialised study of boat and ship construction) is also practised in the region. Often the sites or relics studied in Australia as in the rest of the world are not inundated. The study of historic submerged aircraft, better known as a sub-discipline of aviation archaeology, underwater aviation archaeology is also practised in the region. In some states maritime and underwater archaeology is practised out of Museums and in others out of cultural heritage management units, and all practitioners operate under the aegis of the Australasian Institute for Maritime Archaeology (AIMA). See also Australasian Underwater Cultural Heritage Database Maritime archaeology of East Africa Nautical Archaeology Society Maritime Archaeology Trust Lighthouse Archaeological Maritime Program (LAMP) RPM Nautical Foundation Sea Research Society Institute of Nautical Archaeology UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage is an international treaty, fighting the increasing looting and destruction of underwater cultural heritage. It regulates heritage protection and facilitates State cooperation; it does, however, not regulate ownership of cultural property. Submerged historic and pre-historic sites Bouldnor Cliff Alexandria Port Royal Maritime Heritage Trail - Battle of Saipan Port Julius at Puteoli Coastal and foreshore archaeology Seahenge Ships and boats Antikythera c 80-50 BC, includes the astronomical computer, the Antikythera mechanism Cape Gelidonya – Late Bronze Age shipwreck, c. 1200 BC City of Adelaide (1864) – 19th century clipper, Scotland North Ferriby – site of discovery of Bronze Age sewn plank boats dated by radiocarbon to between 1890 BC to 1700 BC Belle shipwreck – French explorer La Salle's ship, lost in 1686 off Texas Batavia shipwreck – Dutch East Indies ship, lost in 1629 off Western Australia Hunley – the first submarine to sink an enemy ship, lost off Charleston, South Carolina, in 1864 Half Moon (shipwreck) – A racing sailboat which sank in 1930 near Miami, Florida, United States - and one of the sites in the Florida Maritime Heritage Trail Ma'agan Michael Ship – A 5th century BC boat discovered off the coast of Israel Madrague de Giens c 75-60 BC, Roman merchantman sunk of the coast of La Madrague de Giens, east of Toulon Nineteenth century boat discovered at Leamington Wharf, Union Canal SS Xantho – Iron-hulled steamship, lost in 1872 off Western Australia. Its historic engine was raised in 1985 and can now be turned over by hand Uluburun – Late Bronze Age shipwreck, 14th century BC Condura Croatica – 11th century, port of Nin, Croatia Queen Anne's Revenge – Blackbeard's flagship, 18th century frigate, Beaufort, NC. References External links UK resource, with access to information on more than 45,000 wrecks, mapped thematically for a wide variety of search criteria (US) (US) Affiliated with Texas University Underwater archaeology Maritime history

20069

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morihei%20Ueshiba

Morihei Ueshiba

was a Japanese martial artist and founder of the martial art of aikido. He is often referred to as "the founder" or , "Great Teacher". The son of a landowner from Tanabe, Ueshiba studied a number of martial arts in his youth, and served in the Japanese Army during the Russo-Japanese War. After being discharged in 1907, he moved to Hokkaidō as the head of a pioneer settlement; here he met and studied with Takeda Sōkaku, the founder of Daitō-ryū Aiki-jūjutsu. On leaving Hokkaido in 1919, Ueshiba joined the Ōmoto-kyō movement, a Shinto sect, in Ayabe, where he served as a martial arts instructor and opened his first dojo. He accompanied the head of the Ōmoto-kyō group, Onisaburo Deguchi, on an expedition to Mongolia in 1924, where they were captured by Chinese troops and returned to Japan. The following year, he had a profound spiritual experience, stating that, "a golden spirit sprang up from the ground, veiled my body, and changed my body into a golden one." After this experience, his martial arts skill appeared to be greatly increased. Ueshiba moved to Tokyo in 1926, where he set up what would become the Aikikai Hombu Dojo. By now he was comparatively famous in martial arts circles, and taught at this dojo and others around Japan, including in several military academies. In the aftermath of World War II the Hombu dojo was temporarily closed, but Ueshiba had by this point left Tokyo and retired to Iwama, and he continued training at the dojo he had set up there. From the end of the war until the 1960s, he worked to promote aikido throughout Japan and abroad. He died from liver cancer in 1969. After Ueshiba's death, aikido continued to be promulgated by his students (many of whom became noted martial artists in their own right). It is now practiced around the world. Tanabe, 1883–1912 Morihei Ueshiba was born in Nishinotani village (now part of the city of Tanabe), Wakayama Prefecture, Japan, on December 14, 1883, the fourth child (and only son) born to Yoroku Ueshiba and his wife Yuki. The young Ueshiba was raised in a somewhat privileged setting. His father Yoroku was a wealthy gentleman farmer and minor politician, being an elected member of the Nishinotani village council for 22 consecutive years. His mother Yuki was from the Itokawa clan, a prominent local family who could trace their lineage back to the Heian period. Ueshiba was a rather weak, sickly child and bookish in his inclinations. At a young age his father encouraged him to take up sumo wrestling and swimming and entertained him with stories of his great-grandfather Kichiemon, who was considered a very strong samurai in his era. The need for such strength was further emphasized when the young Ueshiba witnessed his father being attacked by followers of a competing politician. A major influence on Ueshiba's early education was his elementary schoolteacher Tasaburo Nasu, who was a Shinto priest and who introduced Ueshiba to the religion. At the age of six Ueshiba was sent to study at the Jizōderu Temple, but had little interest in the rote learning of Confucian education. However, his schoolmaster Mitsujo Fujimoto was also a priest of Shingon Buddhism, and taught the young Ueshiba some of the esoteric chants and ritual observances of the sect, which Ueshiba found intriguing. His interest in Buddhism was sufficiently great that his mother considered enrolling him in the priesthood, but his father Yoroku vetoed the idea. Ueshiba went to Tanabe Higher Elementary School and then to Tanabe Prefectural Middle School, but left formal education in his early teens, enrolling instead at a private abacus academy, the Yoshida Institute, to study accountancy. On graduating from the academy, he worked at a local tax office for a few months, but the job did not suit him and in 1901 he left for Tokyo, funded by his father. Ueshiba Trading, the stationery business which he opened there, was short-lived; unhappy with life in the capital, he returned to Tanabe less than a year later after suffering a bout of beri-beri. Shortly thereafter he married his childhood acquaintance Hatsu Itokawa. In 1903, Ueshiba was called up for military service. He failed the initial physical examination, being shorter than the regulation . To overcome this, he stretched his spine by attaching heavy weights to his legs and suspending himself from tree branches; when he re-took the physical exam he had increased his height by the necessary half-inch to pass. He was assigned to the Osaka Fourth Division, 37th Regiment, and was promoted to corporal of the 61st Wakayama regiment by the following year; after serving on the front lines during the Russo-Japanese War he was promoted to sergeant. He was discharged in 1907, and again returned to his father's farm in Tanabe. Here he befriended the writer and philosopher Minakata Kumagusu, becoming involved with Minakata's opposition to the Meiji government's Shrine Consolidation Policy. He and his wife had their first child, a daughter named Matsuko, in 1911. Ueshiba studied several martial arts during his early life, and was renowned for his physical strength during his youth. During his sojourn in Tokyo he studied Kitō-ryū jujutsu under Takisaburo Tobari, and briefly enrolled in a school teaching Shinkage-ryū. His training in Gotō-ha Yagyū-ryu under Masakatsu Nakai started in 1903 and continued until 1908, though was sporadic due to his military service, yet he was granted a Menkyo Kaiden (certificate of "Total Transmission") in 1908. In 1901 he received some instruction from Tozawa Tokusaburōin in Tenjin Shin'yō-ryū jujutsu and he studied judo with Kiyoichi Takagi in Tanabe in 1911, after his father had a dojo built on the family compound to encourage his son's training. In 1907, after his return from the war, he was also presented with a certificate of enlightenment (shingon inkyo) by his childhood teacher Mitsujo Fujimoto. Hokkaidō, 1912–1920 In the early part of the 20th century, the prefectural government of Hokkaidō, Japan's northernmost island, were offering various grants and incentives for mainland Japanese groups willing to relocate there. At the time, Hokkaidō was still largely unsettled by the Japanese, being occupied primarily by the indigenous Ainu. In 1910, Ueshiba travelled to Hokkaidō in the company of his acquaintance Denzaburo Kurahashi, who had lived on the northern island before. His intent was to scout out a propitious location for a new settlement, and he found the site at Shirataki suitable for his plans. Despite the hardships he suffered on this journey (which included getting lost in snowstorms several times and an incident in which he nearly drowned in a freezing river), Ueshiba returned to Tanabe filled with enthusiasm for the project, and began recruiting families to join him. He became the leader of the Kishū Settlement Group, a collective of eighty-five pioneers who intended to settle in the Shirataki district and live as farmers; the group founded the village of Yubetsu (later Shirataki village) in August, 1912. Much of the funding for this project came from Ueshiba's father and his brothers-in-law Zenzo and Koshiro Inoue. Zenzo's son Noriaki was also a member of the settlement group. Poor soil conditions and bad weather led to crop failures during the first three years of the project, but the group still managed to cultivate mint and farm livestock. The burgeoning timber industry provided a boost to the settlement's economy, and by 1918 there were over 500 families residing there. A fire in 1917 razed the entire village, leading to the departure of around twenty families. Ueshiba was attending a meeting over railway construction around 50 miles away, but on learning of the fire travelled back the entire distance on foot. He was elected to the village council that year, and took a prominent role in leading the reconstruction efforts. In the summer of 1918, Hatsu gave birth to their first son, Takemori. The young Ueshiba met Takeda Sōkaku, the founder of Daitō-ryū Aiki-jūjutsu, at the Hisada Inn in Engaru, in March 1915. Ueshiba was deeply impressed with Takeda's martial art, and despite being on an important mission for his village at the time, abandoned his journey to spend the next month studying with Takeda. He requested formal instruction and began studying Takeda's style of jūjutsu in earnest, going so far as to construct a dojo at his home and inviting his new teacher to be a permanent house guest. He received a kyōju dairi certificate, a teaching license, for the system from Takeda in 1922, when Takeda visited him in Ayabe. Takeda also gave him a Yagyū Shinkage-ryū sword transmission scroll. Ueshiba then became a representative of Daitō-ryū, toured with Takeda as a teaching assistant and taught the system to others. The relationship between Ueshiba and Takeda was a complicated one. Ueshiba was an extremely dedicated student, dutifully attending to his teacher's needs and displaying great respect. However, Takeda overshadowed him throughout his early martial arts career, and Ueshiba's own students recorded the need to address what they referred to as "the Takeda problem". Ayabe, 1920–1927 In November 1919, Ueshiba learned that his father Yoroku was ill, and was not expected to survive. Leaving most of his possessions to Takeda, Ueshiba left Shirataki with the apparent intention of returning to Tanabe to visit his ailing parent. En route he made a detour to Ayabe, near Kyoto, intending to visit Onisaburo Deguchi, the spiritual leader of the Ōmoto-kyō religion (Ueshiba's nephew Noriaki Inoue had already joined the religion and may have recommended it to his uncle). Ueshiba stayed at the Ōmoto-kyō headquarters for several days, and met with Deguchi, who told him that, "There is nothing to worry about with your father". On his return to Tanabe, Ueshiba found that Yoroku had died. Criticised by family and friends for arriving too late to see his father, Ueshiba went into the mountains with a sword and practised solo sword exercises for several days; this almost led to his arrest when the police were informed of a sword-wielding madman on the loose. Within a few months, Ueshiba was back in Ayabe, having decided to become a full-time student of Ōmoto-kyō. In 1920 he moved his entire family, including his mother, to the Ōmoto compound; at the same time he also purchased enough rice to feed himself and his family for several years. That same year, Deguchi asked Ueshiba to become the group's martial arts instructor, and a dojo—the first of several that Ueshiba was to lead—was constructed on the centre's grounds. Ueshiba also taught Takeda's Daitō-ryū in neighbouring Hyōgo Prefecture during this period. His second son, Kuniharu, was born in 1920 in Ayabe, but died from illness the same year, along with three-year-old Takemori. Takeda visited Ueshiba in Ayabe to provide instruction, although he was not a follower of Ōmoto and did not get along with Deguchi, which led to a cooling of the relationship between him and Ueshiba. Ueshiba continued to teach his martial art under the name "Daitō-ryū Aiki-jūjutsu", at the behest of his teacher. However, Deguchi encouraged Ueshiba to create his own style of martial arts, "Ueshiba-ryū", and sent many Ōmoto followers to study at the dojo. He also brought Ueshiba into the highest levels of the group's bureaucracy, making Ueshiba his executive assistant and putting him in charge of the Showa Seinenkai (Ōmoto-kyō's national youth organisation) and the Ōmoto Shobotai, a volunteer fire service. His close relationship with Deguchi introduced Ueshiba to various members of Japan's far-right; members of the ultranationalist group the Sakurakai would hold meetings at Ueshiba's dojo, and he developed a friendship with the philosopher Shūmei Ōkawa during this period, as well as meeting with Nisshō Inoue and Kozaburō Tachibana. Deguchi also offered Ueshiba's services as a bodyguard to Kingoro Hashimoto, the Sakurakai's founder. Ueshiba's commitment to the goal of world peace, stressed by many biographers, must be viewed in the light of these relationships and his Ōmoto-kyō beliefs. His association with the extreme right-wing is understandable when one considers that Ōmoto-kyō's view of world peace was of a benevolent dictatorship by the Emperor of Japan, with other nations being subjugated under Japanese rule. In 1921, in an event known as the , the Japanese authorities raided the compound, destroying the main buildings on the site and arresting Deguchi on charges of lèse-majesté. Ueshiba's dojo was undamaged and over the following two years he worked closely with Deguchi to reconstruct the group's centre, becoming heavily involved in farming work and serving as the group's "Caretaker of Forms", a role which placed him in charge of overseeing Ōmoto's move towards self-sufficiency. His son Kisshomaru was born in the summer of 1921. Three years later, in 1924, Deguchi led a small group of Ōmoto-kyō disciples, including Ueshiba, on a journey to Mongolia at the invitation of retired naval captain Yutaro Yano and his associates within the ultra-nationalist Black Dragon Society. Deguchi's intent was to establish a new religious kingdom in Mongolia, and to this end he had distributed propaganda suggesting that he was the reincarnation of Genghis Khan. Allied with the Mongolian bandit Lu Zhankui, Deguchi's group were arrested in Tongliao by the Chinese authorities—fortunately for Ueshiba, whilst Lu and his men were executed by firing squad, the Japanese group were released into the custody of the Japanese consul. They were returned under guard to Japan, where Deguchi was imprisoned for breaking the terms of his bail. During this expedition Ueshiba was given the Chinese alias Wang Shou-gao, rendered in Japanese as "Moritaka" – he was reportedly very taken with this name and continued to use it intermittently for the rest of his life. After returning to Ayabe, Ueshiba began a regimen of spiritual training, regularly retreating to the mountains or performing misogi in the Nachi Falls. As his prowess as a martial artist increased, his fame began to spread. He was challenged by many established martial artists, some of whom later became his students after being defeated by him. In the autumn of 1925 he was asked to give a demonstration of his art in Tokyo, at the behest of Admiral Isamu Takeshita; one of the spectators was Yamamoto Gonnohyōe, who requested that Ueshiba stay in the capital to instruct the Imperial Guard in his martial art. After a couple of weeks, however, Ueshiba took issue with several government officials who voiced concerns about his connections to Deguchi; he cancelled the training and returned to Ayabe. Tokyo, 1927–1942 In 1926 Takeshita invited Ueshiba to visit Tokyo again. Ueshiba relented and returned to the capital, but while residing there was stricken with a serious illness. Deguchi visited his ailing student and, concerned for his health, commanded Ueshiba to return to Ayabe. The appeal of returning increased after Ueshiba was questioned by the police following his meeting with Deguchi; the authorities were keeping the Ōmoto-kyō leader under close surveillance. Angered at the treatment he had received, Ueshiba went back to Ayabe again. Six months later, this time with Deguchi's blessing, he and his family moved permanently to Tokyo. This move allowed Ueshiba to teach politicians, high-ranking military personnel, and members of the Imperial household; suddenly he was no longer an obscure provincial martial artist, but a sensei to some of Japan's most important citizens. Arriving in October 1927, the Ueshiba family set up home in the Shirokane district. The building proved too small to house the growing number of aikido students, and so the Ueshibas moved to larger premises, first in Mita district, then in Takanawa, and finally to a purpose-built hall in Shinjuku. This last location, originally named the Kobukan (), would eventually become the Aikikai Hombu Dojo. During its construction, Ueshiba rented a property nearby, where he was visited by Kanō Jigorō, the founder of judo. During this period, Ueshiba was invited to teach at a number of military institutes, due to his close personal relationships with key figures in the military (among them Sadao Araki, the Japanese Minister of War). He accepted an invitation from Admiral Sankichi Takahashi to be the martial arts instructor at the Imperial Japanese Naval Academy, and also taught at the Nakano Spy School, although aikido was later judged to be too technical for the students there and karate was adopted instead. He also became a visiting instructor at the Imperial Japanese Army Academy after being challenged by (and defeating) General Makoto Miura, another student of Takeda Sōkaku's Daitō-ryū. Takeda himself met Ueshiba for the last time around 1935, while Ueshiba was teaching at the Osaka headquarters of the Asahi Shimbun newspaper. Frustrated by the appearance of his teacher, who was openly critical of Ueshiba's martial arts and who appeared intent on taking over the classes there, Ueshiba left Osaka during the night, bowing to the residence in which Takeda was staying and thereafter avoiding all contact with him. Between 1940 and 1942 he made several visits to Manchukuo (Japanese occupied Manchuria) where he was the principal martial arts instructor at Kenkoku University. Whilst in Manchuria, he met and defeated the sumo wrestler Tenryū Saburō during a demonstration. The "Second Ōmoto Incident" in 1935 saw another government crackdown on Deguchi's sect, in which the Ayabe compound was destroyed and most of the group's leaders imprisoned. Although he had relocated to Tokyo, Ueshiba had retained links with the Ōmoto-kyō group (he had in fact helped Deguchi to establish a paramilitary branch of the sect only three years earlier) and expected to be arrested as one of its senior members. However, he had a good relationship with the local police commissioner Kenji Tomita and the chief of police Gīchi Morita, both of whom had been his students. As a result, although he was taken in for interrogation, he was released without charge on Morita's authority. In 1932, Ueshiba's daughter Matsuko was married to the swordsman Kiyoshi Nakakura, who was adopted as Ueshiba's heir under the name Morihiro Ueshiba. The marriage ended after a few years, and Nakakura left the family in 1937. Ueshiba later designated his son Kisshomaru as the heir to his martial art. The 1930s saw Japan's invasion of mainland Asia and increased military activity in Europe. Ueshiba was concerned about the prospect of war, and became involved in a number of efforts to try and forestall the conflict that would eventually become World War II. He was part of a group, along with Shūmei Ōkawa and several wealthy Japanese backers, that tried to broker a deal with Harry Chandler to export aviation fuel from the United States to Japan (in contravention of the oil embargo that was currently in force), although this effort ultimately failed. In 1941 Ueshiba also undertook a secret diplomatic mission to China at the behest of Prince Fumimaro Konoe. The intended goal was a meeting with Chiang Kai-shek to establish peace talks, but Ueshiba was unable to meet with the Chinese leader, arriving too late to fulfil his mission. Iwama, 1942–1969 From 1935 onwards, Ueshiba had been purchasing land in Iwama in Ibaraki Prefecture, and by the early 1940s had acquired around of farmland there. In 1942, disenchanted with the war-mongering and political manoeuvring in the capital, he left Tokyo and moved to Iwama permanently, settling in a small farmer's cottage. Here he founded the Aiki Shuren Dojo, also known as the Iwama dojo, and the Aiki Shrine, a devotional shrine to the "Great Spirit of Aiki". During this time he travelled extensively in Japan, particularly in the Kansai region, teaching his aikido. Despite the prohibition on the teaching of martial arts after World War II, Ueshiba and his students continued to practice in secret at the Iwama dojo; the Hombu dojo in Tokyo was in any case being used as a refugee centre for citizens displaced by the severe firebombing. It was during this period that Ueshiba met and befriended Koun Nakanishi, an expert in kotodama. The study of kotodama was to become one of Ueshiba's passions in later life, and Nakanishi's work inspired Ueshiba's concept of takemusu aiki. The rural nature of his new home in Iwama allowed Ueshiba to concentrate on the second great passion of his life: farming. He had been born into a farming family and spent much of his life cultivating the land, from his settlement days in Hokkaidō to his work in Ayabe trying to make the Ōmoto-kyō compound self-sufficient. He viewed farming as a logical complement to martial arts; both were physically demanding and required single-minded dedication. Not only did his farming activities provide a useful cover for martial arts training under the government's restrictions, it also provided food for Ueshiba, his students and other local families at a time when food shortages were commonplace. The government prohibition (on aikido, at least) was lifted in 1948 with the creation of the Aiki Foundation, established by the Japanese Ministry of Education with permission from the Occupation forces. The Hombu dojo re-opened the following year. After the war Ueshiba effectively retired from aikido. He delegated most of the work of running the Hombu dojo and the Aiki Federation to his son Kisshomaru, and instead chose to spend much of his time in prayer, meditation, calligraphy and farming. He still travelled extensively to promote aikido, even visiting Hawaii in 1961. He also appeared in a television documentary on aikido: NTV's The Master of Aikido, broadcast in January 1960. Ueshiba maintained links with the Japanese nationalist movement even in later life; his student Kanshu Sunadomari reported that Ueshiba temporarily sheltered Mikami Taku, one of the naval officers involved in the May 15 Incident, at Iwama. In 1969, Ueshiba became ill. He led his last training session on March 10, and was taken to hospital where he was diagnosed with cancer of the liver. He died suddenly on April 26, 1969. His body was buried at Kozan-ji Temple Tanabe-shi Wakayama Japan, and he was given the posthumous Buddhist title "Aiki-in Moritake En'yū Daidōshi" (); parts of his hair were enshrined at Ayabe, Iwama and Kumano. Two months later, his wife Hatsu ( Ueshiba Hatsu, née Itokawa Hatsu; 1881–1969) also died. Development of aikido Aikido—usually translated as the Way of Unifying Spirit or the Way of Spiritual Harmony—is a fighting system that focuses on throws, pins and joint locks together with some striking techniques. It emphasises protecting the opponent and promotes spiritual and social development. The technical curriculum of aikido was derived from the teachings of Takeda Sōkaku; the basic techniques of aikido stem from his Daitō-ryū system. In the earlier years of his teaching, from the 1920s to the mid-1930s, Ueshiba taught the Daitō-ryū Aiki-jūjutsu system; his early students' documents bear the term Daitō-ryū. Indeed, Ueshiba trained one of the future highest grade earners in Daitō-ryū, Takuma Hisa, in the art before Takeda took charge of Hisa's training. The early form of training under Ueshiba was noticeably different from later forms of aikido. It had a larger curriculum, increased use of strikes to vital points (atemi) and a greater use of weapons. The schools of aikido developed by Ueshiba's students from the pre-war period tend to reflect the harder style of the early training. These students included Kenji Tomiki (who founded the Shodokan Aikido sometimes called Tomiki-ryū), Noriaki Inoue (who founded Shin'ei Taidō), Minoru Mochizuki (who founded Yoseikan Budo) and Gozo Shioda (who founded Yoshinkan Aikido). Many of these styles are therefore considered "pre-war styles", although some of these teachers continued to train with Ueshiba in the years after World War II. During his lifetime, Ueshiba had three spiritual experiences that impacted greatly on his understanding of the martial arts. The first occurred in 1925, after Ueshiba had defeated a naval officer's bokken (wooden katana) attacks unarmed and without hurting the officer. Ueshiba then walked to his garden, where he had the following realisation: His second experience occurred in 1940 when engaged in the ritual purification process of misogi. His third experience was in 1942 during the worst fighting of World War II, when Ueshiba had a vision of the "Great Spirit of Peace". After these events, Ueshiba seemed to slowly grow away from Takeda, and he began to change his art. These changes are reflected in the differing names with which he referred to his system, first as aiki-jūjutsu, then Ueshiba-ryū, Asahi-ryū, and aiki budō. In 1942, when Ueshiba's group joined the Dai Nippon Butoku Kai, the martial art that Ueshiba developed finally came to be known as aikido. As Ueshiba grew older, more skilled, and more spiritual in his outlook, his art also changed and became softer and more gentle. Martial techniques became less important, and more focus was given to the control of ki. In his own expression of the art there was a greater emphasis on what is referred to as kokyū-nage, or "breath throws" which are soft and blending, utilizing the opponent's movement in order to throw them. Ueshiba regularly practiced cold water misogi, as well as other spiritual and religious rites, and viewed his studies of aikido as part of this spiritual training. Over the years, Ueshiba trained a large number of students, many of whom later became famous teachers in their own right and developed their own styles of aikido. Some of them were uchi-deshi, live-in students. Ueshiba placed many demands on his uchi-deshi, expecting them to attend him at all times, act as training partners (even in the middle of the night), arrange his travel plans, massage and bathe him, and assist with household chores. There were roughly four generations of students, comprising the pre-war students (training 1921–1935), students who trained during the Second World War (c.1936–1945), the post-war students in Iwama (c.1946–1955) and the students who trained with Ueshiba during his final years (c.1956–c.1969). As a result of Ueshiba's martial development throughout his life, students from each of these generations tend to have markedly different approaches to aikido. These variations are compounded by the fact that few students trained with Ueshiba for a protracted period; only Yoichiro Inoue, Kenji Tomiki, Gozo Shioda, Morihiro Saito, Tsutomu Yukawa and Mitsugi Saotome studied directly under Ueshiba for more than five or six years. After the war, Ueshiba and the Hombu Dojo dispatched some of their students to various other countries, resulting in aikido spreading around the world. Honors Medal of Honor (Purple Ribbon) (Japan), 1960 Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette, 1964 Order of the Sacred Treasure (Japan), 1968 Works Morihei Ueshiba, The Secret Teachings of Aikido (2008), Kodansha International, Morihei Ueshiba, Budo: Teachings of the Founder of Aikido (1996), Kodansha International, Morihei Ueshiba, The Essence of Aikido: Spiritual Teachings of Morihei Ueshiba (1998), Kodansha International, Morihei Ueshiba, The Art of Peace (2007), Shambhala, - selection from Morihei's talks, poems, calligraphy and oral tradition, including excerpt from Budo, Aikido: The Spiritual Dimension, and Aiki Shinzui compiled and translated by John Stevens References 1883 births 1969 deaths Deaths from cancer in Japan Deaths from liver cancer Japanese aikidoka Japanese Shintoists Martial arts school founders People from Tanabe, Wakayama Recipients of the Medal with Purple Ribbon Recipients of the Order of the Rising Sun, 4th class 20th-century philanthropists Imperial Japanese Army soldiers Japanese military personnel of the Russo-Japanese War

20070

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory%20address%20register

Memory address register

In a computer, the memory address register (MAR) is the CPU register that either stores the memory address from which data will be fetched to the CPU, or the address to which data will be sent and stored. In other words, this register is used to access data and instructions from memory during the execution phase of instruction. MAR holds the memory location of data that needs to be accessed. When reading from memory, data addressed by MAR is fed into the MDR (memory data register) and then used by the CPU. When writing to memory, the CPU writes data from MDR to the memory location whose address is stored in MAR. MAR, which is found inside the CPU, goes either to the RAM (random-access memory) or cache. The memory address register is half of a minimal interface between a microprogram and computer storage; the other half is a memory data register. In general, MAR is a parallel load register that contains the next memory address to be manipulated. For example, the next address to be read or written. References Digital registers

20072

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microassembler

Microassembler

A microassembler is a computer program that helps prepare a microprogram, called firmware, to control the low level operation of a computer in much the same way an assembler helps prepare higher level code for a processor. The difference is that the microprogram is usually only developed by the processor manufacturer and works intimately with the computer hardware. On a microprogrammed computer the microprogram implements the operations of the instruction set in which any normal program (including both application programs and operating systems) is written. The use of a microprogram allows the manufacturer to fix certain mistakes, including working around hardware design errors, without modifying the hardware. Another means of employing microassembler-generated microprograms is in allowing the same hardware to run different instruction sets. After it is assembled, the microprogram is then loaded to a control store to become part of the logic of a CPU's control unit. Some microassemblers are more generalized and are not targeted at a single computer architecture. For example, through the use of macro-assembler-like capabilities, Digital Equipment Corporation used their MICRO2 microassembler for a very wide range of computer architectures and implementations. If a given computer implementation supports a writeable control store, the microassembler is usually provided to customers as a means of writing customized microcode. In the process of microcode assembly it is helpful to verify the microprogram with emulation tools before distribution. Nowadays, microcoding has experienced a revival, since it is possible to correct and optimize the firmware of processing units already manufactured or sold, in order to adapt to specific operating systems or to fix hardware bugs. However, a commonly usable microassembler for today's CPUs is not available to manipulate the microcode. Unfortunately, knowledge of a processor's microcode is usually considered proprietary information so it is difficult to obtain information about how to modify it. External links Assemblers

20074

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine%20pistol

Machine pistol

A machine pistol is an autoloading pistol capable of fully automatic fire. It can also be used to describe a stockless handgun-style submachine gun. The term is a calque of Maschinenpistole, the German word for submachine guns. Machine pistols were developed during World War I and originally issued to German artillery crews who needed a self-defense weapon that is lighter than a rifle but more powerful than a standard semi-automatic pistol. This concept would eventually lead to the development of the personal defense weapon or PDW. Today, machine pistols are considered special-purpose weapons with limited utility, with their original niche being filled with either the PDW, carbines, or simply more modern semi-automatic sidearms. Contributing to their already-fringe use, without a shoulder stock and training, machine pistols can be difficult to control for all but the best shooters. The Austrians introduced the world's first machine pistol, the Steyr Repetierpistole M1912/P16, during World War I. The Germans also experimented with machine pistols, by converting various types of semi-automatic pistols to full-auto, leading to the development of the first practical submachine guns. During World War II, machine pistol development was widely disregarded in favor of submachine gun mass-production. After the war, machine pistols development was limited and only a handful of manufacturers would develop new designs, with varying degrees of success. History World War I During World War I, a machine pistol version of the Steyr M1912 called the Repetierpistole M1912/P16 was produced. It used a 16-round fixed magazine loaded via 8 round stripper clips, a detachable shoulder stock and a rather large exposed semi-auto/full-auto selector switch on the right side of the frame above the trigger (down = semi & up = full). It fired the 9×23mm Steyr cartridge, with a full-auto rate-of-fire of about 800 to 1,000 rounds per minute (RPM). It weighed about 2.6 pounds. Introduced in 1916, it is considered one of the world's first full-auto capable pistols. Only 960 M1912/P16 were made. 1920s–1930s The Mauser C96 was introduced in 1896, it being one of the first commercially successful and practical semi-automatic pistols. During World War I, the Germans experimented with machine pistols by converting both 7.63mm Mauser and 9 mm Parabellum semi-automatic C96 pistols to full-auto. In the late 1920s, Spanish gunmakers expanded upon this idea by introducing select fire copies of the C96 with 20 round detachable magazines. In the early 1930s, Mauser engineers finally followed suit, and introduced the Model 1932 or Model 712 Schnellfeuer variant, which also included 20 round detachable magazines and a select fire mechanism allowing for fully automatic fire at a rate of 1,000 RPM. World War II During World War II, machine pistol development was more or less ignored as the major powers were focused on mass-producing submachine guns. Mauser Model 1932 or Model 712 Schnellfeuer variant was used mainly by Waffen-SS personnel. 1950s–1960s The 9×18mm Makarov Stechkin automatic pistol (APS) is a Russian select-fire machine pistol introduced into the Russian army in 1951. Like the other common Russian army pistol of this era, the Makarov, the Stechkin uses a simple unlocked blowback mechanism and the double action trigger. What makes the Stechkin APS a machine pistol is that it has an automatic fire mode, which is selected using the safety lever. In burst or automatic fire, the pistol should be fitted with the wooden shoulder stock; otherwise, the weapon quickly becomes uncontrollable. The Stechkin was intended as a sidearm for artillery soldiers and tank crews, but in practice, it ended up earning a strong following in the ranks of political and criminal police forces. Many KGB and GRU operatives favored the Stechkin for its firepower and 20-round magazine. Moving on, the Škorpion vz. 61 is a Czechoslovak 7.65 mm or .32 ACP machine pistol developed in 1959 and produced from 1961 to 1979. Although it was developed for use with security and special forces, the weapon was also accepted into service with the Czechoslovak Army, as a personal sidearm for lower-ranking army staff, vehicle drivers, armored vehicle personnel and special forces. The Skorpion's lower-powered .32 ACP cartridge, coupled with a rate-of-fire limiting device housed in the grip (which allows a reasonable rate of 850 RPM with a relatively light bolt), also makes it easier to control in full-auto than the more common 9 mm Parabellum designs. Currently the weapon is in use with the armed forces of several countries as a sidearm. The Škorpion was also license-built in Yugoslavia, designated M84. The Beretta M951R, was based on the 9 mm Parabellum Beretta M1951 pistol and produced during the 1960s in response to a request made by the Italian special forces. The primary difference between the M951R and the original M1951 lay in the fire selector lever mounted on the right side of the weapon's frame, enabling either semi-automatic or continuous fire – labelled "SEM" and "AUT", respectively. Additionally, the weapon has a heavier slide, a folding wooden forward grip, an extended barrel and an extended magazine, increasing the capacity to 10 rounds. It is reported that Inglis manufactured or converted Inglis-made Hi-Powers which were reportedly used by the SAS during the Cold War, as the British Army were using them before adopting the L9A1 version of the Hi-Power in 1966. 1970s–1980s The MAC-10 and MAC-11 were 1970s blowback designed weapons with the magazine carried in the pistol grip and a select-fire switch. The .45 ACP MAC-10 had a rate of fire of 1,145 RPM, and the 9×19mm version 1,090 RPM. The MAC-11 could fire 1,200 RPM with its lighter .380 ACP cartridges. These guns were designed by Gordon Ingram and Military Armament Corporation in the US. The weapons were used in special operations and clandestine applications in Vietnam and by Brazilian anti-terrorist units, most people fitting it with a silencer using its threaded barrel. While some sources call the MAC-10 and MAC-11 machine pistols, the guns are also referred to as compact submachine guns. Since it is difficult to control machine pistols when they are fired in full automatic mode, some manufacturers developed an "intermittent-fire" setting that fires a burst of three rounds instead of a continuous stream. The first of these guns is the Heckler & Koch VP70, the 70 designating the year of origin; 1970. That is a 9 mm Parabellum, 18-round, double action only, select fire capable polymer frame pistol. It is the first polymer framed pistol, predating the Glock 17. The stock incorporates the semi-auto/three round burst selector, therefore it will only fire a three-round burst with the stock attached. Cyclic rounds per minute for the three-round bursts is 2,200 RPM. Despite the VP70's potential, it was never adopted by the Bundeswehr. In 1976, a shortened version of the 9 mm Parabellum Heckler & Koch MP5 was introduced; the MP5K (K from the German Kurz = "short") was designed for close quarters battle use by clandestine operations and special services. The MP5K does not have a shoulder stock, and the bolt and receiver were shortened at the rear. The resultant lighter bolt led to a higher rate of fire than the standard MP5 (900-1000 RPM vs. 800). The barrel, cocking handle and its cover were shortened and a vertical foregrip was used to replace the standard handguard. The barrel ends at the base of the front sight, which prevents the use of any sort of muzzle device. Another popular machine pistol using the three shot burst system is the 9 mm Parabellum Beretta Model 93R. Introduced in 1979 the Beretta Model 93R, it is a select-fire machine pistol meant for police and military use. It offered extra firepower in a smaller package and is suited for concealed carry purposes such as VIP protection, or for close quarters maneuvers such as room-to-room searches. A selector switch and the foldable foregrip allows the pistol to fire three-round bursts with each trigger pull for a cyclic rate of 1100 rounds per minute. The designers limited it to three round bursts for ease of control. A 20-round magazine and a metal shoulder stock may also be fitted. The Stechkin APS made a comeback in the late 1970s, when Russian Spetsnaz special forces units in Afghanistan used the suppressor-equipped APB variant for clandestine missions in enemy territory, such as during the Soviet–Afghan War. The 9 mm Parabellum Micro Uzi is a scaled-down version of the Uzi submachine gun, first introduced in 1983. It is 460 mm (18.11 inches) long with the stock extended, and just 250 mm (9.84 inches) long with the stock folded. Its barrel length is 117 mm and its muzzle velocity is 350 m/s. Used by the Israeli Isayeret and the US Secret Service, Micro-Uzis are available in open bolt or closed bolt versions. The weapon has an additional tungsten weight on the bolt to slow the rate of fire, which would otherwise make such a lightweight weapon uncontrollable. The 9 mm Parabellum Glock 18 is a select-fire variant of the Glock 17, developed in 1986 at the request of the Austrian counter-terrorist unit EKO Cobra. This machine pistol has a lever-type select-fire switch, installed on the left side, at the rear of the serrated portion of the slide (selector lever in the bottom position for continuous fire, top setting for single fire). The firearm is typically used with an extended 33-round capacity magazine and may be fired with or without a shoulder stock. The pistol's rate of fire in fully automatic mode is approximately 1,100–1,200 RPM. 1990s–2000s Introduced in 1992, the Steyr TMP (Taktische Maschinenpistole "tactical machine pistol") is a select-fire 9×19mm Parabellum machine pistol manufactured by Steyr Mannlicher of Austria. The magazines come in 15-, 20-, 25-, or 30-round detachable box types. A suppressor can also be fitted. Also introduced in 1992, the 9 mm Parabellum CZ 75 AUTOMATIC is the full-auto version of the CZ75. It has a longer barrel with three vent ports. This machine pistol has a horizontal rail in front of the trigger guard through which a spare 16- or 20-round magazine can be attached and be used as a fore-grip for better control during full automatic firing. During the 1990s, the Russian Stechkin APS was once again put into service, as a weapon for VIP bodyguards and for anti-terrorist hostage rescue teams that needed the capability for full automatic fire in emergencies. Developed in the 1990s and 2000s, the personal defense weapon (PDW), a compact submachine gun-like firearm which can fire armor-piercing, higher-powered ammunition, began to replace the machine pistol as a self-defense side arm for artillery crews, tank crews, and helicopter pilots. Introduced in 2001, the Heckler & Koch MP7 is often called a machine pistol, despite it being a PDW. The MP7 uses a short-stroke piston gas system as used on H&K's G36 and HK416 assault rifles, in place of a blowback system traditionally seen on machine pistols. The MP7 uses 20-, 30- and 40-round magazines and fires 4.6×30mm ammunition which can penetrate soft body armor. Due to the heavy use of polymers in its construction, the MP7 is much lighter than older designs, only with an empty 20-round magazine. Comparison with compact submachine guns The dividing line between machine pistols and compact submachine guns is, to say the least, hard to draw. The term "submachine gun" usually refers to magazine-fed, fully automatic carbines designed to fire pistol cartridges, while the term "machine pistol" usually refers to a fully automatic handgun based weapons. However, many weapons fall into both categories. An example of this is the Škorpion vz. 61, often called a submachine gun. However, it is small enough to be carried in a pistol holster and so is also often referred to as a machine pistol. The MAC-10 and MAC-11 are compact and have been placed in both classes due to their sizes. The Steyr TMP (Tactical Machine Pistol) is also referred to as a compact submachine gun. Likewise, the German Heckler & Koch MP5K falls in both categories. PDWs such as the Heckler & Koch MP7 are also often called machine pistols. The difference is also blurred by the fact that several languages use what would be literally translated as "machine pistol" as the term for submachine guns; for example the "MP" in MP 40 stands for Maschinenpistole. Criticisms Machine pistols are considered a special purpose weapon with limited utility. Due to their small size and high rate of fire, machine pistols are ludicrously difficult to control accurately. As a result, most machine pistols are fitted with a detachable shoulder stock. Some, such as the Heckler & Koch VP70, will only fire in semi-automatic when the stock is removed because the select-fire mechanism is incorporated into the stock. The VP70 introduced a three-round-burst limiter in the same way to improve controllability. The Beretta 93R not only uses a detachable shoulder stock and a three-round-burst limiter, but also a folding forward hand-grip to improve controllability in full auto. The MAC-10 and MAC-11 use suppressors to reduce muzzle climb, while other designs use a combination of burst limiters, forward hand-grips, ported barrels and muzzle brakes. Gunsite, a US firearms training facility, decided against teaching machine pistol firing when it was founded in 1976. Facility experts believed that it is "a slob's weapon, useful only by half-trained or poorly motivated troops"; they claimed that the machine pistol "hits no harder than a pistol and is no more portable than a rifle." Nevertheless, even the critics from Gunsite concede that the machine pistol is useful for a few situations, such as boarding an enemy boat in low light or when repelling boarders in a naval situation. In the 1970s, International Association of Chiefs of Police weapons researcher David Steele criticized the MAC-10's accuracy when he hyperbolically described the MAC series as "fit only for combat in a phone booth". Walt Rauch notes that "... despite the 50 to 70 years of bad press that has accrued to the concept of shooting a hand-held machine pistol", in which critics contend that the weapon will "spray bullets indiscriminately all over the area", he believes that the 2000s-era models such as the Glock 18 are controllable and accurate in full-auto shooting. Leroy Thompson states that "...machine pistols were reasonably good for use from within a vehicle or for issue to VIP [bodyguard] drivers to give them a marginally more effective weapon during an evacuation under fire". However, he also stated that machine pistols are "...(h)ard to control in full-auto fire", which means that there is nothing that a machine pistol "...can do that other weapons available today can't do more efficiently." See also Personal defense weapon Submachine gun References Further reading Mullin, Timothy J. The Fighting Submachine Gun, Machine Pistol, and Shotgun. Boulder: Paladin Press, 1999. Gotz, Hans Dieter. German Military Rifles and Machine Pistols, 1871–1945, Schiffer Publishing, Ltd. West Chester, Pennsylvania, 1990. Henrotin, Gerard Full-auto Conversion for Browning Pistols, HLebooks.com (downloadable ebook), 2003. Police weapons Personal weapons

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin%20Luther%20King%20Jr.

Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist who became the most visible spokesman and leader in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968. An African American church leader and the son of early civil rights activist and minister Martin Luther King Sr., King advanced civil rights for people of color in the United States through nonviolence and civil disobedience, inspired by his Christian beliefs and the nonviolent activism of Mahatma Gandhi. His role in leading the cause of civil rights in the South differed in style from the previous accomodationist stances represented by Booker T. Washington and black-and-tan faction leader Perry Wilbon Howard II. King participated in and led marches for the right to vote, desegregation, labor rights, and other civil rights. He oversaw the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott and later became the first president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). As president of the SCLC, he led the unsuccessful Albany Movement in Albany, Georgia, and helped organize some of the nonviolent 1963 protests in Birmingham, Alabama. King was one of the leaders of the 1963 March on Washington, where he delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. The civil rights movement achieved pivotal legislative gains in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. The SCLC put into practice the tactics of nonviolent protest with some success by strategically choosing the methods and places in which protests were carried out. There were several dramatic stand-offs with segregationist authorities, who sometimes turned violent. Several times King would be jailed. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director J. Edgar Hoover considered King a radical and made him an object of the FBI's COINTELPRO from 1963, forward. FBI agents investigated him for possible communist ties, spied on his personal life and secretly recorded him, and in 1964, mailed King a threatening anonymous letter, which he interpreted as an attempt to make him commit suicide. On October 14, 1964, King won the Nobel Peace Prize for combating racial inequality through nonviolent resistance. In 1965, he helped organize two of the three Selma to Montgomery marches. In his final years, he expanded his focus to include opposition towards poverty, capitalism, and the Vietnam War. In 1968, King was planning a national occupation of Washington, D.C., to be called the Poor People's Campaign, when he was assassinated on April 4 in Memphis, Tennessee. His death was followed by national mourning, as well as anger leading to riots in many U.S. cities. King was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977 and the Congressional Gold Medal in 2003. Martin Luther King Jr. Day was established as a holiday in cities and states throughout the United States beginning in 1971; the holiday was enacted at the federal level by legislation signed by President Ronald Reagan in 1986. Hundreds of streets in the U.S. have been renamed in his honor, and the most populous county in Washington State was rededicated for him. The Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., was dedicated in 2011. Early life and education Birth King was born Michael King Jr. on January 15, 1929, in Atlanta, Georgia, the second of three children to Michael King and Alberta King ( Williams). King had an older sister, Christine King Farris, and a younger brother, Alfred Daniel "A.D." King. King's maternal grandfather Adam Daniel Williams, who was a minister in rural Georgia, moved to Atlanta in 1893, and became pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in the following year. Williams was of African-Irish descent. Williams married Jennie Celeste Parks. King, Sr. was born to sharecroppers, James Albert and Delia King of Stockbridge, Georgia. In his adolescent years, King Sr. left his parents' farm and walked to Atlanta where he attained a high school education, and enrolled in Morehouse College to study for entry to the ministry. King Sr. and Alberta began dating in 1920, and married on November 25, 1926. Until Jennie's death in 1941, they lived together on the second floor of her parent's two-story Victorian house, where King was born. Shortly after marrying Alberta, King Sr. became assistant pastor of the Ebenezer church. Senior pastor Williams died in the spring of 1931 and that fall, King Sr. took the role, where he would in time raise the attendance from six hundred to several thousand. In 1934, the church sent King Sr. on a multinational trip, including to Berlin for the meeting of the Congress of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA). He also visited sites in Germany associated with the Reformation leader, Martin Luther. While there, King Sr. and the BWA delegates witnessed the rise of Nazism. In reaction, the BWA issued a resolution stating, "This Congress deplores and condemns as a violation of the law of God the Heavenly Father, all racial animosity, and every form of oppression or unfair discrimination toward the Jews, toward coloured people, or toward subject races in any part of the world." On returning home in August 1934, King Sr. changed his name to Martin Luther King, and his son's name to Martin Luther King Jr. Early childhood At his childhood home, King and his two siblings would read aloud the Bible as instructed by their father. After dinners there, King's grandmother Jennie, whom he affectionately referred to as "Mama", would tell lively stories from the Bible to her grandchildren. King's father would regularly use whippings to discipline his children. At times, King Sr. would also have his children whip each other. King's father later remarked, "[King] was the most peculiar child whenever you whipped him. He'd stand there, and the tears would run down, and he'd never cry." Once when King witnessed his brother A.D. emotionally upset his sister Christine, he took a telephone and knocked out A.D. with it. When he and his brother were playing at their home, A.D. slid from a banister and hit into their grandmother, Jennie, causing her to fall down unresponsive. King, believing her dead, blamed himself and attempted suicide by jumping from a second-story window. Upon hearing that his grandmother was alive, King rose and left the ground where he had fallen. King became friends with a white boy whose father owned a business across the street from his family's home. In September 1935, when the boys were about six years old, they started school. King had to attend a school for black children, Younge Street Elementary School, while his close playmate went to a separate school for white children only. Soon afterwards, the parents of the white boy stopped allowing King to play with their son, stating to him "we are white, and you are colored". When King relayed the happenings to his parents, they had a long discussion with him about the history of slavery and racism in America. Upon learning of the hatred, violence and oppression that black people had faced in the U.S., King would later state that he was "determined to hate every white person". His parents instructed him that it was his Christian duty to love everyone. King witnessed his father stand up against segregation and various forms of discrimination. Once, when stopped by a police officer who referred to King Sr. as "boy", King's father responded sharply that King was a boy but he was a man. When King's father took him into a shoe store in downtown Atlanta, the clerk told them they needed to sit in the back. King's father refused, stating "we'll either buy shoes sitting here or we won't buy any shoes at all", before taking King and leaving the store. He told King afterward, "I don't care how long I have to live with this system, I will never accept it." In 1936, King's father led hundreds of African Americans in a civil rights march to the city hall in Atlanta, to protest voting rights discrimination. King later remarked that King Sr. was "a real father" to him. King memorized and sang hymns, and stated verses from the Bible, by the time he was five years old. Over the next year, he began to go to church events with his mother and sing hymns while she played piano. His favorite hymn to sing was "I Want to Be More and More Like Jesus"; he moved attendees with his singing. King later became a member of the junior choir in his church. King enjoyed opera, and played the piano. As he grew up, King garnered a large vocabulary from reading dictionaries and consistently used his expanding lexicon. He got into physical altercations with boys in his neighborhood, but oftentimes used his knowledge of words to stymie fights. King showed a lack of interest in grammar and spelling, a trait that he carried throughout his life. In 1939, King sang as a member of his church choir in slave costume, for the all-white audience at the Atlanta premiere of the film Gone with the Wind. In September 1940, at the age of 11, King was enrolled at the Atlanta University Laboratory School for the seventh grade. While there, King took violin and piano lessons, and showed keen interest in his history and English classes. On May 18, 1941, when King had sneaked away from studying at home to watch a parade, King was informed that something had happened to his maternal grandmother. Upon returning home, he found out that she had suffered a heart attack and died while being transported to a hospital. He took the death very hard and believed that his deception of going to see the parade may have been responsible for God taking her. King jumped out of a second-story window at his home, but again survived an attempt to kill himself. His father instructed him in his bedroom that King should not blame himself for her death, and that she had been called home to God as part of God's plan that could not be changed. King struggled with this, and could not fully believe that his parents knew where his grandmother had gone. Shortly thereafter, King's father decided to move the family to a two-story brick home on a hill that overlooked downtown Atlanta. Adolescence In his adolescent years, he initially felt resentment against whites due to the "racial humiliation" that he, his family, and his neighbors often had to endure in the segregated South. In 1942, when King was 13 years old, he became the youngest assistant manager of a newspaper delivery station for the Atlanta Journal. That year, King skipped the ninth grade and was enrolled in Booker T. Washington High School, where he maintained a B-plus average. The high school was the only one in the city for African-American students. It had been formed after local black leaders, including King's grandfather (Williams), urged the city government of Atlanta to create it. While King was brought up in a Baptist home, King grew skeptical of some of Christianity's claims as he entered adolescence. He began to question the literalist teachings preached at his father's church. At the age of 13, he denied the bodily resurrection of Jesus during Sunday school. King said that he found himself unable to identify with the emotional displays and gestures from congregants frequent at his church, and doubted if he would ever attain personal satisfaction from religion. He later stated of this point in his life, "doubts began to spring forth unrelentingly." In high school, King became known for his public-speaking ability, with a voice that had grown into an orotund baritone. He proceeded to join the school's debate team. King continued to be most drawn to history and English, and chose English and sociology to be his main subjects while at the school. King maintained an abundant vocabulary. But, he relied on his sister, Christine, to help him with his spelling, while King assisted her with math. They studied in this manner routinely until Christine's graduation from high school. King also developed an interest in fashion, commonly adorning himself in well polished patent leather shoes and tweed suits, which gained him the nickname "Tweed" or "Tweedie" among his friends. He further grew a liking for flirting with girls and dancing. His brother A. D. later remarked, "He kept flitting from chick to chick, and I decided I couldn't keep up with him. Especially since he was crazy about dances, and just about the best jitterbug in town." On April 13, 1944, in his junior year, King gave his first public speech during an oratorical contest, sponsored by the Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World in Dublin, Georgia. In his speech he stated, "black America still wears chains. The finest negro is at the mercy of the meanest white man. Even winners of our highest honors face the class color bar." King was selected as the winner of the contest. On the ride home to Atlanta by bus, he and his teacher were ordered by the driver to stand so that white passengers could sit down. The driver of the bus called King a "black son-of-a-bitch". King initially refused but complied after his teacher told him that he would be breaking the law if he did not follow the directions of the driver. As all the seats were occupied, he and his teacher were forced to stand on the rest of the drive back to Atlanta. Later King wrote of the incident, saying "That night will never leave my memory. It was the angriest I have ever been in my life." Morehouse College During King's junior year in high school, Morehouse College—an all-male historically black college that King's father and maternal grandfather had attended—began accepting high school juniors who passed the school's entrance examination. As World War II was underway many black college students had been enlisted in the war, decreasing the numbers of students at Morehouse College. So, the university aimed to increase their student numbers by allowing junior high school students to apply. In 1944, at the age of 15, King passed the entrance examination and was enrolled at the university for the school season that autumn. In the summer before King started his freshman year at Morehouse, he boarded a train with his friend—Emmett "Weasel" Proctor—and a group of other Morehouse College students to work in Simsbury, Connecticut at the tobacco farm of Cullman Brothers Tobacco (a cigar business). This was King's first trip outside of the segregated south into the integrated north. In a June 1944 letter to his father King wrote about the differences that struck him between the two parts of the country, "On our way here we saw some things I had never anticipated to see. After we passed Washington there was no discrimination at all. The white people here are very nice. We go to any place we want to and sit any where we want to." The students worked at the farm to be able to provide for their educational costs at Morehouse College, as the farm had partnered with the college to allot their salaries towards the university's tuition, housing, and other fees. On weekdays King and the other students worked in the fields, picking tobacco from 7:00am till at least 5:00pm, enduring temperatures above 100°F, to earn roughly USD$4 per day. On Friday evenings, King and the other students visited downtown Simsbury to get milkshakes and watch movies, and on Saturdays they would travel to Hartford, Connecticut to see theatre performances, shop and eat in restaurants. On each Sunday they would go to Hartford to attend church services, at a church filled with white congregants. King wrote to his parents about the lack of segregation in Connecticut, relaying how he was amazed they could go to "one of the finest restaurants in Hartford" and that "Negroes and whites go to the same church". He played freshman football there. The summer before his last year at Morehouse, in 1947, the 18-year-old King chose to enter the ministry. Throughout his time in college, King studied under the mentorship of its president, Baptist minister Benjamin Mays, who he would later credit with being his "spiritual mentor." King had concluded that the church offered the most assuring way to answer "an inner urge to serve humanity." His "inner urge" had begun developing, and he made peace with the Baptist Church, as he believed he would be a "rational" minister with sermons that were "a respectful force for ideas, even social protest." King graduated from Morehouse with a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in sociology in 1948, aged nineteen. Religious education, ministry, marriage and family Crozer Theological Seminary King enrolled in Crozer Theological Seminary in Upland, Pennsylvania. King's father fully supported his decision to continue his education and made arrangements for King to work with prominent Crozer alum, J. Pius Barbour, a family friend who pastored at Calvary Baptist Church in nearby Chester, Pennsylvania. King became known as one of the "Sons of Calvary", an honor he shared with William Augustus Jones Jr. and Samuel D. Proctor who both went on to become well-known preachers in the black church. While attending Crozer, King was joined by Walter McCall, a former classmate at Morehouse. At Crozer, King was elected president of the student body. The African-American students of Crozer for the most part conducted their social activity on Edwards Street. King became fond of the street because a classmate had an aunt who prepared collard greens for them, which they both relished. King once reproved another student for keeping beer in his room, saying they had shared responsibility as African Americans to bear "the burdens of the Negro race." For a time, he was interested in Walter Rauschenbusch's "social gospel." In his third year at Crozer, King became romantically involved with the white daughter of an immigrant German woman who worked as a cook in the cafeteria. The woman had been involved with a professor prior to her relationship with King. King planned to marry her, but friends advised against it, saying that an interracial marriage would provoke animosity from both blacks and whites, potentially damaging his chances of ever pastoring a church in the South. King tearfully told a friend that he could not endure his mother's pain over the marriage and broke the relationship off six months later. He continued to have lingering feelings toward the woman he left; one friend was quoted as saying, "He never recovered." King graduated with a Bachelor of Divinity (B.Div.) degree in 1951. He applied to University of Edinburgh to do his doctorate in the School of Divinity. An offer was made by Edinburgh but he chose Boston instead. Boston University In 1951, King began doctoral studies in systematic theology at Boston University. While pursuing doctoral studies, King worked as an assistant minister at Boston's historic Twelfth Baptist Church with William Hunter Hester. Hester was an old friend of King's father and was an important influence on King. In Boston, King befriended a small cadre of local ministers his age, and sometimes guest pastored at their churches, including Michael Haynes, associate pastor at Twelfth Baptist Church in Roxbury (and younger brother of jazz drummer Roy Haynes). The young men often held bull sessions in their various apartments, discussing theology, sermon style, and social issues. King attended philosophy classes at Harvard University as an audit student in 1952 and 1953. At the age of 25 in 1954, King was called as pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama. King received his Ph.D. degree on June 5, 1955, with a dissertation (initially supervised by Edgar S. Brightman and, upon the latter's death, by Lotan Harold DeWolf) titled A Comparison of the Conceptions of God in the Thinking of Paul Tillich and Henry Nelson Wieman. An academic inquiry in October 1991 concluded that portions of his doctoral dissertation had been plagiarized and he had acted improperly. However, its finding, the committee said that 'no thought should be given to the revocation of Dr. King's doctoral degree,' an action that the panel said would serve no purpose." The committee found that the dissertation still "makes an intelligent contribution to scholarship." A letter is now attached to the copy of King's dissertation held in the university library, noting that numerous passages were included without the appropriate quotations and citations of sources. Significant debate exists on how to interpret King's plagiarism. Marriage and family While studying at Boston University, he asked a friend from Atlanta named Mary Powell, who was a student at the New England Conservatory of Music, if she knew any nice Southern girls. Powell asked fellow student Coretta Scott if she was interested in meeting a Southern friend studying divinity. Scott was not interested in dating preachers but eventually agreed to allow Martin to telephone her based on Powell's description and vouching. On their first phone call, King told Scott "I am like Napoleon at Waterloo before your charms," to which she replied, "You haven't even met me." They went out for dates in his green Chevy. After the second date, King was certain Scott possessed the qualities he sought in a wife. She had been an activist at Antioch in undergrad, where Carol and Rod Serling were schoolmates. King married Coretta Scott on June 18, 1953, on the lawn of her parents' house in her hometown of Heiberger, Alabama. They became the parents of four children: Yolanda King (1955–2007), Martin Luther King III (b. 1957), Dexter Scott King (b. 1961), and Bernice King (b. 1963). During their marriage, King limited Coretta's role in the civil rights movement, expecting her to be a housewife and mother. In December 1959, after being based in Montgomery for five years, King announced his return to Atlanta at the request of the SCLC. In Atlanta, King served until his death as co-pastor with his father at the Ebenezer Baptist Church, and helped expand the Civil Rights Movement across the South. Activism and organizational leadership Montgomery bus boycott, 1955 The Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, where King was called to be minister in 1954, was influential in the Montgomery, Alabama, African-American community. As the church's pastor, he became known for his oratorical preaching in Montgomery and the surrounding region. In March 1955, Claudette Colvin—a fifteen-year-old black schoolgirl in Montgomery—refused to give up her bus seat to a white man in violation of Jim Crow laws, local laws in the Southern United States that enforced racial segregation. King was on the committee from the Birmingham African-American community that looked into the case; E. D. Nixon and Clifford Durr decided to wait for a better case to pursue because the incident involved a minor. Nine months later on December 1, 1955, a similar incident occurred when Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a city bus. The two incidents led to the Montgomery bus boycott, which was urged and planned by Nixon and led by King. King was in his twenties, and had just taken up his clerical role. The other ministers asked him to take a leadership role simply because his relative newness to community leadership made it easier for him to speak out. King was hesitant about taking the role, but decided to do so if no one else wanted it. The boycott lasted for 385 days, and the situation became so tense that King's house was bombed. King was arrested and jailed during this campaign, which overnight drew the attention of national media, and greatly increased King's public stature. The controversy ended when the United States District Court issued a ruling in Browder v. Gayle that prohibited racial segregation on all Montgomery public buses. Blacks resumed riding the buses again, and were able to sit in the front with full legal authorization. King's role in the bus boycott transformed him into a national figure and the best-known spokesman of the civil rights movement. Southern Christian Leadership Conference In 1957, King, Ralph Abernathy, Fred Shuttlesworth, Joseph Lowery, and other civil rights activists founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). The group was created to harness the moral authority and organizing power of black churches to conduct nonviolent protests in the service of civil rights reform. The group was inspired by the crusades of evangelist Billy Graham, who befriended King, as well as the national organizing of the group In Friendship, founded by King allies Stanley Levison and Ella Baker. King led the SCLC until his death. The SCLC's 1957 Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom was the first time King addressed a national audience. Other civil rights leaders involved in the SCLC with King included: James Bevel, Allen Johnson, Curtis W. Harris, Walter E. Fauntroy, C. T. Vivian, Andrew Young, The Freedom Singers, Cleveland Robinson, Randolph Blackwell, Annie Bell Robinson Devine, Charles Kenzie Steele, Alfred Daniel Williams King, Benjamin Hooks, Aaron Henry and Bayard Rustin. The Common Society Harry Wachtel joined King's legal advisor Clarence B. Jones in defending four ministers of the SCLC in the libel case New York Times Co. v. Sullivan; the case was litigated in reference to the newspaper advertisement "Heed Their Rising Voices". Wachtel founded a tax-exempt fund to cover the suit's expenses and assist the nonviolent civil rights movement through a more effective means of fundraising. This organization was named the "Gandhi Society for Human Rights." King served as honorary president for the group. He was displeased with the pace that President Kennedy was using to address the issue of segregation. In 1962, King and the Gandhi Society produced a document that called on the President to follow in the footsteps of Abraham Lincoln and issue an executive order to deliver a blow for civil rights as a kind of Second Emancipation Proclamation. Kennedy did not execute the order. The FBI was under written directive from Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy when it began tapping King's telephone line in the fall of 1963. Kennedy was concerned that public allegations of communists in the SCLC would derail the administration's civil rights initiatives. He warned King to discontinue these associations and later felt compelled to issue the written directive that authorized the FBI to wiretap King and other SCLC leaders. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover feared the civil rights movement and investigated the allegations of communist infiltration. When no evidence emerged to support this, the FBI used the incidental details caught on tape over the next five years in attempts to force King out of his leadership position in the COINTELPRO program. King believed that organized, nonviolent protest against the system of southern segregation known as Jim Crow laws would lead to extensive media coverage of the struggle for black equality and voting rights. Journalistic accounts and televised footage of the daily deprivation and indignities suffered by southern blacks, and of segregationist violence and harassment of civil rights workers and marchers, produced a wave of sympathetic public opinion that convinced the majority of Americans that the civil rights movement was the most important issue in American politics in the early 1960s. King organized and led marches for blacks' right to vote, desegregation, labor rights, and other basic civil rights. Most of these rights were successfully enacted into the law of the United States with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. The SCLC put into practice the tactics of nonviolent protest with great success by strategically choosing the methods and places in which protests were carried out. There were often dramatic stand-offs with segregationist authorities, who sometimes turned violent. Survived knife attack, 1958 On September 20, 1958, King was signing copies of his book Stride Toward Freedom in Blumstein's department store in Harlem when he narrowly escaped death. Izola Curry—a mentally ill black woman who thought that King was conspiring against her with communists—stabbed him in the chest with a letter opener, which nearly impinged on the aorta. King received first aid by police officers Al Howard and Philip Romano. King underwent emergency surgery with three doctors: Aubre de Lambert Maynard, Emil Naclerio and John W. V. Cordice; he remained hospitalized for several weeks. Curry was later found mentally incompetent to stand trial. Atlanta sit-ins, prison sentence, and the 1960 elections Georgia governor Ernest Vandiver expressed open hostility towards King's return to his hometown in late 1959. He claimed that "wherever M. L. King, Jr., has been there has followed in his wake a wave of crimes", and vowed to keep King under surveillance. On May 4, 1960, several months after his return, King drove writer Lillian Smith to Emory University when police stopped them. King was cited for "driving without a license" because he had not yet been issued a Georgia license. King's Alabama license was still valid, and Georgia law did not mandate any time limit for issuing a local license. King paid a fine but was apparently unaware that his lawyer agreed to a plea deal that also included a probationary sentence. Meanwhile, the Atlanta Student Movement had been acting to desegregate businesses and public spaces in the city, organizing the Atlanta sit-ins from March 1960 onwards. In August the movement asked King to participate in a mass October sit-in, timed to highlight how 1960's Presidential election campaign had ignored civil rights. The coordinated day of action took place on October 19. King participated in a sit-in at the restaurant inside Rich's, Atlanta's largest department store, and was among the many arrested that day. The authorities released everyone over the next few days, except for King. Invoking his probationary plea deal, judge J. Oscar Mitchell sentenced King on October 25 to four months of hard labor. Before dawn the next day, King was taken from his county jail cell and transported to a maximum-security state prison. The arrest and harsh sentence drew nationwide attention. Many feared for King's safety, as he started a prison sentence with people convicted of violent crimes, many of them White and hostile to his activism. Both Presidential candidates were asked to weigh in, at a time when both parties were courting the support of Southern Whites and their political leadership including Governor Vandiver. Nixon, with whom King had a closer relationship prior to the sit-in, declined to make a statement despite a personal visit from Jackie Robinson requesting his intervention. Nixon's opponent John F. Kennedy called the governor (a Democrat) directly, enlisted his brother Robert to exert more pressure on state authorities, and also, at the personal request of Sargent Shriver, made a phone call to King's wife to express his sympathy and offer his help. The pressure from Kennedy and others proved effective, and King was released two days later. King's father decided to openly endorse Kennedy's candidacy for the November 8 election which he narrowly won. After the October 19 sit-ins and following unrest, a 30-day truce was declared in Atlanta for desegregation negotiations. However, the negotiations failed and sit-ins and boycotts resumed in full swing for several months. On March 7, 1961, a group of Black elders including King notified student leaders that a deal had been reached: the city's lunch counters would desegregate in fall 1961, in conjunction with the court-mandated desegregation of schools. Many students were disappointed at the compromise. In a large meeting March 10 at Warren Memorial Methodist Church, the audience was hostile and frustrated towards the elders and the compromise. King then gave an impassioned speech calling participants to resist the "cancerous disease of disunity," and helping to calm tensions. Albany Movement, 1961 The Albany Movement was a desegregation coalition formed in Albany, Georgia, in November 1961. In December, King and the SCLC became involved. The movement mobilized thousands of citizens for a broad-front nonviolent attack on every aspect of segregation within the city and attracted nationwide attention. When King first visited on December 15, 1961, he "had planned to stay a day or so and return home after giving counsel." The following day he was swept up in a mass arrest of peaceful demonstrators, and he declined bail until the city made concessions. According to King, "that agreement was dishonored and violated by the city" after he left town. King returned in July 1962 and was given the option of forty-five days in jail or a $178 fine (); he chose jail. Three days into his sentence, Police Chief Laurie Pritchett discreetly arranged for King's fine to be paid and ordered his release. "We had witnessed persons being kicked off lunch counter stools ... ejected from churches ... and thrown into jail ... But for the first time, we witnessed being kicked out of jail." It was later acknowledged by the King Center that Billy Graham was the one who bailed King out of jail during this time. After nearly a year of intense activism with few tangible results, the movement began to deteriorate. King requested a halt to all demonstrations and a "Day of Penance" to promote nonviolence and maintain the moral high ground. Divisions within the black community and the canny, low-key response by local government defeated efforts. Though the Albany effort proved a key lesson in tactics for King and the national civil rights movement, the national media was highly critical of King's role in the defeat, and the SCLC's lack of results contributed to a growing gulf between the organization and the more radical SNCC. After Albany, King sought to choose engagements for the SCLC in which he could control the circumstances, rather than entering into pre-existing situations. Birmingham campaign, 1963 In April 1963, the SCLC began a campaign against racial segregation and economic injustice in Birmingham, Alabama. The campaign used nonviolent but intentionally confrontational tactics, developed in part by Wyatt Tee Walker. Black people in Birmingham, organizing with the SCLC, occupied public spaces with marches and sit-ins, openly violating laws that they considered unjust. King's intent was to provoke mass arrests and "create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation." The campaign's early volunteers did not succeed in shutting down the city, or in drawing media attention to the police's actions. Over the concerns of an uncertain King, SCLC strategist James Bevel changed the course of the campaign by recruiting children and young adults to join in the demonstrations. Newsweek called this strategy a Children's Crusade. During the protests, the Birmingham Police Department, led by Eugene "Bull" Connor, used high-pressure water jets and police dogs against protesters, including children. Footage of the police response was broadcast on national television news and dominated the nation's attention, shocking many white Americans and consolidating black Americans behind the movement. Not all of the demonstrators were peaceful, despite the avowed intentions of the SCLC. In some cases, bystanders attacked the police, who responded with force. King and the SCLC were criticized for putting children in harm's way. But the campaign was a success: Connor lost his job, the "Jim Crow" signs came down, and public places became more open to blacks. King's reputation improved immensely. King was arrested and jailed early in the campaign—his 13th arrest out of 29. From his cell, he composed the now-famous "Letter from Birmingham Jail" that responds to calls on the movement to pursue legal channels for social change. The letter has been described as "one of the most important historical documents penned by a modern political prisoner". King argues that the crisis of racism is too urgent, and the current system too entrenched: "We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed." He points out that the Boston Tea Party, a celebrated act of rebellion in the American colonies, was illegal civil disobedience, and that, conversely, "everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was 'legal'." Walter Reuther, president of the United Auto Workers, arranged for $160,000 to bail out King and his fellow protestors. March on Washington, 1963 King, representing the SCLC, was among the leaders of the "Big Six" civil rights organizations who were instrumental in the organization of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, which took place on August 28, 1963. The other leaders and organizations comprising the Big Six were Roy Wilkins from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; Whitney Young, National Urban League; A. Philip Randolph, Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters; John Lewis, SNCC; and James L. Farmer Jr., of the Congress of Racial Equality. Bayard Rustin's open homosexuality, support of socialism, and his former ties to the Communist Party USA caused many white and African-American leaders to demand King distance himself from Rustin, which King agreed to do. However, he did collaborate in the 1963 March on Washington, for which Rustin was the primary logistical and strategic organizer. For King, this role was another which courted controversy, since he was one of the key figures who acceded to the wishes of United States President John F. Kennedy in changing the focus of the march. Kennedy initially opposed the march outright, because he was concerned it would negatively impact the drive for passage of civil rights legislation. However, the organizers were firm that the march would proceed. With the march going forward, the Kennedys decided it was important to work to ensure its success. President Kennedy was concerned the turnout would be less than 100,000. Therefore, he enlisted the aid of additional church leaders and Walter Reuther, president of the United Automobile Workers, to help mobilize demonstrators for the cause. The march originally was conceived as an event to dramatize the desperate condition of blacks in the southern U.S. and an opportunity to place organizers' concerns and grievances squarely before the seat of power in the nation's capital. Organizers intended to denounce the federal government for its failure to safeguard the civil rights and physical safety of civil rights workers and blacks. The group acquiesced to presidential pressure and influence, and the event ultimately took on a far less strident tone. As a result, some civil rights activists felt it presented an inaccurate, sanitized pageant of racial harmony; Malcolm X called it the "Farce on Washington", and the Nation of Islam forbade its members from attending the march. The march made specific demands: an end to racial segregation in public schools; meaningful civil rights legislation, including a law prohibiting racial discrimination in employment; protection of civil rights workers from police brutality; a $2 minimum wage for all workers (); and self-government for Washington, D.C., then governed by congressional committee. Despite tensions, the march was a resounding success. More than a quarter of a million people of diverse ethnicities attended the event, sprawling from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial onto the National Mall and around the reflecting pool. At the time, it was the largest gathering of protesters in Washington, D.C.'s history. I (We) Have a Dream King delivered a 17-minute speech, later known as "I Have a Dream". In the speech's most famous passagein which he departed from his prepared text, possibly at the prompting of Mahalia Jackson, who shouted behind him, "Tell them about the dream!"King said: "I Have a Dream" came to be regarded as one of the finest speeches in the history of American oratory. The March, and especially King's speech, helped put civil rights at the top of the agenda of reformers in the United States and facilitated passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The original typewritten copy of the speech, including King's handwritten notes on it, was discovered in 1984 to be in the hands of George Raveling, the first African-American basketball coach of the University of Iowa. In 1963, Raveling, then 26 years old, was standing near the podium, and immediately after the oration, impulsively asked King if he could have his copy of the speech, and he got it. St. Augustine, Florida, 1964 In March 1964, King and the SCLC joined forces with Robert Hayling's then-controversial movement in St. Augustine, Florida. Hayling's group had been affiliated with the NAACP but was forced out of the organization for advocating armed self-defense alongside nonviolent tactics. However, the pacifist SCLC accepted them. King and the SCLC worked to bring white Northern activists to St. Augustine, including a delegation of rabbis and the 72-year-old mother of the governor of Massachusetts, all of whom were arrested. During June, the movement marched nightly through the city, "often facing counter demonstrations by the Klan, and provoking violence that garnered national media attention." Hundreds of the marchers were arrested and jailed. During the course of this movement, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed. Biddeford, Maine, 1964 On May 7, 1964, King spoke at Saint Francis College's "The Negro and the Quest for Identity," in Biddeford, Maine. This was a symposium that brought many civil rights leaders together such as Dorothy Day and Roy Wilkins. King spoke about how "We must get rid of the idea of superior and inferior races," through nonviolent tactics. New York City, 1964 On February 6, 1964, King delivered the inaugural speech of a lecture series initiated at the New School called "The American Race Crisis." In August 2013, almost 50 years later, the school discovered an audiotape with 15 minutes of a question-and-answer session that followed King's address. In these remarks, King referred to a conversation he had recently had with Jawaharlal Nehru in which he compared the sad condition of many African Americans to that of India's untouchables. The original speech recording is part of a collection of audio tapes in the Amherst College Archives & Special Collections in 1989. Dr. King's speech had been rebroadcast on Amherst's student-run radio station, WAMF (now WAMH). The tape was digitized in the fall of 2015 and shared with The New School Archives. In his March 18, 1964 interview by Robert Penn Warren, King compared his activism to his father's, citing his training in non-violence as a key difference. He also discusses the next phase of the civil rights movement and integration. Selma voting rights movement and "Bloody Sunday", 1965 In December 1964, King and the SCLC joined forces with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Selma, Alabama, where the SNCC had been working on voter registration for several months. A local judge issued an injunction that barred any gathering of three or more people affiliated with the SNCC, SCLC, DCVL, or any of 41 named civil rights leaders. This injunction temporarily halted civil rights activity until King defied it by speaking at Brown Chapel on January 2, 1965. During the 1965 march to Montgomery, Alabama, violence by state police and others against the peaceful marchers resulted in much publicity, which made racism in Alabama visible nationwide. Acting on James Bevel's call for a march from Selma to Montgomery, Bevel and other SCLC members, in partial collaboration with SNCC, attempted to organize a march to the state's capital. The first attempt to march on March 7, 1965, at which King was not present, was aborted because of mob and police violence against the demonstrators. This day has become known as Bloody Sunday and was a major turning point in the effort to gain public support for the civil rights movement. It was the clearest demonstration up to that time of the dramatic potential of King and Bevel's nonviolence strategy. On March 5, King met with officials in the Johnson Administration in order to request an injunction against any prosecution of the demonstrators. He did not attend the march due to church duties, but he later wrote, "If I had any idea that the state troopers would use the kind of brutality they did, I would have felt compelled to give up my church duties altogether to lead the line." Footage of police brutality against the protesters was broadcast extensively and aroused national public outrage. King next attempted to organize a march for March 9. The SCLC petitioned for an injunction in federal court against the State of Alabama; this was denied and the judge issued an order blocking the march until after a hearing. Nonetheless, King led marchers on March 9 to the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, then held a short prayer session before turning the marchers around and asking them to disperse so as not to violate the court order. The unexpected ending of this second march aroused the surprise and anger of many within the local movement. Meanwhile, on March 11 King cried at the news of Johnson supporting a voting rights bill on television in Marie Foster's living room. The march finally went ahead fully on March 25, 1965. At the conclusion of the march on the steps of the state capitol, King delivered a speech that became known as "How Long, Not Long." In it, King stated that equal rights for African Americans could not be far away, "because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice" and "you shall reap what you sow". Chicago open housing movement, 1966 In 1966, after several successes in the south, King, Bevel, and others in the civil rights organizations took the movement to the North, with Chicago as their first destination. King and Ralph Abernathy, both from the middle class, moved into a building at 1550 S. Hamlin Avenue, in the slums of North Lawndale on Chicago's West Side, as an educational experience and to demonstrate their support and empathy for the poor. The SCLC formed a coalition with CCCO, Coordinating Council of Community Organizations, an organization founded by Albert Raby, and the combined organizations' efforts were fostered under the aegis of the Chicago Freedom Movement. During that spring, several white couple/black couple tests of real estate offices uncovered racial steering: discriminatory processing of housing requests by couples who were exact matches in income, background, number of children, and other attributes. Several larger marches were planned and executed: in Bogan, Belmont Cragin, Jefferson Park, Evergreen Park (a suburb southwest of Chicago), Gage Park, Marquette Park, and others. King later stated and Abernathy wrote that the movement received a worse reception in Chicago than in the South. Marches, especially the one through Marquette Park on August 5, 1966, were met by thrown bottles and screaming throngs. Rioting seemed very possible. King's beliefs militated against his staging a violent event, and he negotiated an agreement with Mayor Richard J. Daley to cancel a march in order to avoid the violence that he feared would result. King was hit by a brick during one march, but continued to lead marches in the face of personal danger. When King and his allies returned to the South, they left Jesse Jackson, a seminary student who had previously joined the movement in the South, in charge of their organization. Jackson continued their struggle for civil rights by organizing the Operation Breadbasket movement that targeted chain stores that did not deal fairly with blacks. A 1967 CIA document declassified in 2017 downplayed King's role in the "black militant situation" in Chicago, with a source stating that King "sought at least constructive, positive projects." Opposition to the Vietnam War King was long opposed to American involvement in the Vietnam War, but at first avoided the topic in public speeches in order to avoid the interference with civil rights goals that criticism of President Johnson's policies might have created. At the urging of SCLC's former Director of Direct Action and now the head of the Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam, James Bevel, and inspired by the outspokenness of Muhammad Ali, King eventually agreed to publicly oppose the war as opposition was growing among the American public. During an April 4, 1967, appearance at the New York City Riverside Church—exactly one year before his death—King delivered a speech titled "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence." He spoke strongly against the U.S.'s role in the war, arguing that the U.S. was in Vietnam "to occupy it as an American colony" and calling the U.S. government "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today." He connected the war with economic injustice, arguing that the country needed serious moral change: King opposed the Vietnam War because it took money and resources that could have been spent on social welfare at home. The United States Congress was spending more and more on the military and less and less on anti-poverty programs at the same time. He summed up this aspect by saying, "A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death." He stated that North Vietnam "did not begin to send in any large number of supplies or men until American forces had arrived in the tens of thousands", and accused the U.S. of having killed a million Vietnamese, "mostly children." King also criticized American opposition to North Vietnam's land reforms. King's opposition cost him significant support among white allies, including President Johnson, Billy Graham, union leaders and powerful publishers. "The press is being stacked against me", King said, complaining of what he described as a double standard that applauded his nonviolence at home, but deplored it when applied "toward little brown Vietnamese children." Life magazine called the speech "demagogic slander that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi", and The Washington Post declared that King had "diminished his usefulness to his cause, his country, his people." The "Beyond Vietnam" speech reflected King's evolving political advocacy in his later years, which paralleled the teachings of the progressive Highlander Research and Education Center, with which he was affiliated. King began to speak of the need for fundamental changes in the political and economic life of the nation, and more frequently expressed his opposition to the war and his desire to see a redistribution of resources to correct racial and economic injustice. He guarded his language in public to avoid being linked to communism by his enemies, but in private he sometimes spoke of his support for social democracy and democratic socialism. In a 1952 letter to Coretta Scott, he said: "I imagine you already know that I am much more socialistic in my economic theory than capitalistic ..." In one speech, he stated that "something is wrong with capitalism" and claimed, "There must be a better distribution of wealth, and maybe America must move toward a democratic socialism." King had read Marx while at Morehouse, but while he rejected "traditional capitalism", he rejected communism because of its "materialistic interpretation of history" that denied religion, its "ethical relativism", and its "political totalitarianism." King stated in "Beyond Vietnam" that "true compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar ... it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring." King quoted a United States official who said that from Vietnam to Latin America, the country was "on the wrong side of a world revolution." King condemned America's "alliance with the landed gentry of Latin America", and said that the U.S. should support "the shirtless and barefoot people" in the Third World rather than suppressing their attempts at revolution. King's stance on Vietnam encouraged Allard K. Lowenstein, William Sloane Coffin and Norman Thomas, with the support of anti-war Democrats, to attempt to persuade King to run against President Johnson in the 1968 United States presidential election. King contemplated but ultimately decided against the proposal on the grounds that he felt uneasy with politics and considered himself better suited for his morally unambiguous role as an activist. On April 15, 1967, King participated and spoke at an anti-war march from Manhattan's Central Park to the United Nations. The march was organized by the Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam and initiated by its chairman, James Bevel. At the U.N. King brought up issues of civil rights and the draft: Seeing an opportunity to unite civil rights activists and anti-war activists, Bevel convinced King to become even more active in the anti-war effort. Despite his growing public opposition towards the Vietnam War, King was not fond of the hippie culture which developed from the anti-war movement. In his 1967 Massey Lecture, King stated: On January 13, 1968 (the day after President Johnson's State of the Union Address), King called for a large march on Washington against "one of history's most cruel and senseless wars." Correspondence with Thích Nhất Hạnh Thích Nhất Hạnh was an influential Vietnamese Buddhist who taught at Princeton University and Columbia University. He had written a letter to Martin Luther King Jr. in 1965 entitled: "In Search of the Enemy of Man". It was during his 1966 stay in the US that Nhất Hạnh met with King and urged him to publicly denounce the Vietnam War. In 1967, King gave a famous speech at the Riverside Church in New York City, his first to publicly question the U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Later that year, King nominated Nhất Hạnh for the 1967 Nobel Peace Prize. In his nomination, King said, "I do not personally know of anyone more worthy of [this prize] than this gentle monk from Vietnam. His ideas for peace, if applied, would build a monument to ecumenism, to world brotherhood, to humanity". Poor People's Campaign, 1968 In 1968, King and the SCLC organized the "Poor People's Campaign" to address issues of economic justice. King traveled the country to assemble "a multiracial army of the poor" that would march on Washington to engage in nonviolent civil disobedience at the Capitol until Congress created an "economic bill of rights" for poor Americans. The campaign was preceded by King's final book, Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? which laid out his view of how to address social issues and poverty. King quoted from Henry George and George's book, Progress and Poverty, particularly in support of a guaranteed basic income. The campaign culminated in a march on Washington, D.C., demanding economic aid to the poorest communities of the United States. King and the SCLC called on the government to invest in rebuilding America's cities. He felt that Congress had shown "hostility to the poor" by spending "military funds with alacrity and generosity." He contrasted this with the situation faced by poor Americans, claiming that Congress had merely provided "poverty funds with miserliness." His vision was for change that was more revolutionary than mere reform: he cited systematic flaws of "racism, poverty, militarism and materialism", and argued that "reconstruction of society itself is the real issue to be faced." The Poor People's Campaign was controversial even within the civil rights movement. Rustin resigned from the march, stating that the goals of the campaign were too broad, that its demands were unrealizable, and that he thought that these campaigns would accelerate the backlash and repression on the poor and the black. Assassination and aftermath On March 29, 1968, King went to Memphis, Tennessee, in support of the black sanitary public works employees, who were represented by AFSCME Local 1733. The workers had been on strike since March 12 for higher wages and better treatment. In one incident, black street repairmen received pay for two hours when they were sent home because of bad weather, but white employees were paid for the full day. On April 3, King addressed a rally and delivered his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" address at Mason Temple, the world headquarters of the Church of God in Christ. King's flight to Memphis had been delayed by a bomb threat against his plane. In the prophetic peroration of the last speech of his life, in reference to the bomb threat, King said the following: King was booked in Room 306 at the Lorraine Motel (owned by Walter Bailey) in Memphis. Ralph Abernathy, who was present at the assassination, testified to the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations that King and his entourage stayed at Room 306 so often that it was known as the "King-Abernathy suite." According to Jesse Jackson, who was present, King's last words on the balcony before his assassination were spoken to musician Ben Branch, who was scheduled to perform that night at an event King was attending: "Ben, make sure you play 'Take My Hand, Precious Lord' in the meeting tonight. Play it real pretty." King was fatally shot by James Earl Ray at 6:01 p.m., Thursday, April 4, 1968, as he stood on the motel's second-floor balcony. The bullet entered through his right cheek, smashing his jaw, then traveled down his spinal cord before lodging in his shoulder. Abernathy heard the shot from inside the motel room and ran to the balcony to find King on the floor. Jackson stated after the shooting that he cradled King's head as King lay on the balcony, but this account was disputed by other colleagues of King; Jackson later changed his statement to say that he had "reached out" for King. After emergency chest surgery, King died at St. Joseph's Hospital at 7:05 p.m. According to biographer Taylor Branch, King's autopsy revealed that though only 39 years old, he "had the heart of a 60 year old", which Branch attributed to the stress of 13 years in the civil rights movement. King was initially interred in South View Cemetery in South Atlanta, but in 1977 his remains were transferred to a tomb on the site of the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park. Aftermath The assassination led to a nationwide wave of race riots in Washington, D.C., Chicago, Baltimore, Louisville, Kansas City, and dozens of other cities. Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy was on his way to Indianapolis for a campaign rally when he was informed of King's death. He gave a short, improvised speech to the gathering of supporters informing them of the tragedy and urging them to continue King's ideal of nonviolence. The following day, he delivered a prepared response in Cleveland. James Farmer Jr. and other civil rights leaders also called for non-violent action, while the more militant Stokely Carmichael called for a more forceful response. The city of Memphis quickly settled the strike on terms favorable to the sanitation workers. The plan to set up a shantytown in Washington, D.C., was carried out soon after the April 4 assassination. Criticism of King's plan was subdued in the wake of his death, and the SCLC received an unprecedented wave of donations for the purpose of carrying it out. The campaign officially began in Memphis, on May 2, at the hotel where King was murdered. Thousands of demonstrators arrived on the National Mall and stayed for six weeks, establishing a camp they called "Resurrection City." President Lyndon B. Johnson tried to quell the riots by making several telephone calls to civil rights leaders, mayors and governors across the United States and told politicians that they should warn the police against the unwarranted use of force. But his efforts didn't work out: "I'm not getting through," Johnson told his aides. "They're all holing up like generals in a dugout getting ready to watch a war." Johnson declared April 7 a national day of mourning for the civil rights leader. Vice President Hubert Humphrey attended King's funeral on behalf of the President, as there were fears that Johnson's presence might incite protests and perhaps violence. At his widow's request, King's last sermon at Ebenezer Baptist Church was played at the funeral, a recording of his "Drum Major" sermon, given on February 4, 1968. In that sermon, King made a request that at his funeral no mention of his awards and honors be made, but that it be said that he tried to "feed the hungry", "clothe the naked", "be right on the [Vietnam] war question", and "love and serve humanity." His good friend Mahalia Jackson sang his favorite hymn, "Take My Hand, Precious Lord", at the funeral. The assassination helped to spur the enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1968. Two months after King's death, James Earl Ray—who was on the loose from a previous prison escape—was captured at London Heathrow Airport while trying to leave England on a false Canadian passport. He was using the alias Ramon George Sneyd on his way to white-ruled Rhodesia. Ray was quickly extradited to Tennessee and charged with King's murder. He confessed to the assassination on March 10, 1969, though he recanted this confession three days later. On the advice of his attorney Percy Foreman, Ray pleaded guilty to avoid a trial conviction and thus the possibility of receiving the death penalty. He was sentenced to a 99-year prison term. Ray later claimed a man he met in Montreal, Quebec, with the alias "Raoul" was involved and that the assassination was the result of a conspiracy. He spent the remainder of his life attempting, unsuccessfully, to withdraw his guilty plea and secure the trial he never had. Ray died in 1998 at age 70. Allegations of conspiracy Ray's lawyers maintained he was a scapegoat similar to the way that John F. Kennedy's assassin Lee Harvey Oswald is seen by conspiracy theorists. Supporters of this assertion said that Ray's confession was given under pressure and that he had been threatened with the death penalty. They admitted that Ray was a thief and burglar, but claimed that he had no record of committing violent crimes with a weapon. However, prison records in different U.S. cities have shown that he was incarcerated on numerous occasions for charges of armed robbery. In a 2008 interview with CNN, Jerry Ray, the younger brother of James Earl Ray, claimed that James was smart and was sometimes able to get away with armed robbery. Jerry Ray said that he had assisted his brother on one such robbery. "I never been with nobody as bold as he is," Jerry said. "He just walked in and put that gun on somebody, it was just like it's an everyday thing." Those suspecting a conspiracy in the assassination point to the two successive ballistics tests which proved that a rifle similar to Ray's Remington Gamemaster had been the murder weapon. Those tests did not implicate Ray's specific rifle. Witnesses near King at the moment of his death said that the shot came from another location. They said that it came from behind thick shrubbery near the boarding house—which had been cut away in the days following the assassination—and not from the boarding house window. However, Ray's fingerprints were found on various objects (a rifle, a pair of binoculars, articles of clothing, a newspaper) that were left in the bathroom where it was determined the gunfire came from. An examination of the rifle containing Ray's fingerprints determined that at least one shot was fired from the firearm at the time of the assassination. In 1997, King's son Dexter Scott King met with Ray, and publicly supported Ray's efforts to obtain a new trial. Two years later, King's widow Coretta Scott King and the couple's children won a wrongful death claim against Loyd Jowers and "other unknown co-conspirators." Jowers claimed to have received $100,000 to arrange King's assassination. The jury of six whites and six blacks found in favor of the King family, finding Jowers to be complicit in a conspiracy against King and that government agencies were party to the assassination.  William F. Pepper represented the King family in the trial. In 2000, the U.S. Department of Justice completed the investigation into Jowers' claims but did not find evidence to support allegations about conspiracy. The investigation report recommended no further investigation unless some new reliable facts are presented. A sister of Jowers admitted that he had fabricated the story so he could make $300,000 from selling the story, and she in turn corroborated his story in order to get some money to pay her income tax. In 2002, The New York Times reported that a church minister, Ronald Denton Wilson, claimed his father, Henry Clay Wilson—not James Earl Ray—assassinated King. He stated, "It wasn't a racist thing; he thought Martin Luther King was connected with communism, and he wanted to get him out of the way." Wilson provided no evidence to back up his claims. King researchers David Garrow and Gerald Posner disagreed with William F. Pepper's claims that the government killed King. In 2003, Pepper published a book about the long investigation and trial, as well as his representation of James Earl Ray in his bid for a trial, laying out the evidence and criticizing other accounts. King's friend and colleague, James Bevel, also disputed the argument that Ray acted alone, stating, "There is no way a ten-cent white boy could develop a plan to kill a million-dollar black man." In 2004, Jesse Jackson stated: Legacy South Africa King's legacy includes influences on the Black Consciousness Movement and civil rights movement in South Africa. King's work was cited by, and served as, an inspiration for South African leader Albert Lutuli, who fought for racial justice in his country during apartheid and was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. United Kingdom King influenced Irish politician and activist John Hume. Hume, the former leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, cited King's legacy as quintessential to the Northern Irish civil rights movement and the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, calling him "one of my great heroes of the century." In the United Kingdom, The Northumbria and Newcastle Universities Martin Luther King Peace Committee exists to honor King's legacy, as represented by his final visit to the UK to receive an honorary degree from Newcastle University in 1967. The Peace Committee operates out of the chaplaincies of the city's two universities, Northumbria and Newcastle, both of which remain centres for the study of Martin Luther King and the US civil rights movement. Inspired by King's vision, it undertakes a range of activities across the UK as it seeks to "build cultures of peace." In 2017, Newcastle University unveiled a bronze statue of King to celebrate the 50th anniversary of his honorary doctorate ceremony. The Students Union also voted to rename their bar Luthers. United States King has become a national icon in the history of American liberalism and American progressivism. His main legacy was to secure progress on civil rights in the U.S. Just days after King's assassination, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1968. Title VIII of the Act, commonly known as the Fair Housing Act, prohibited discrimination in housing and housing-related transactions on the basis of race, religion, or national origin (later expanded to include sex, familial status, and disability). This legislation was seen as a tribute to King's struggle in his final years to combat residential discrimination in the U.S. The day following King's assassination, school teacher Jane Elliott conducted her first "Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes" exercise with her class of elementary school students in Riceville, Iowa. Her purpose was to help them understand King's death as it related to racism, something they little understood as they lived in a predominantly white community. King's wife Coretta Scott King followed in her husband's footsteps and was active in matters of social justice and civil rights until her death in 2006. The same year that Martin Luther King was assassinated, she established the King Center in Atlanta, Georgia, dedicated to preserving his legacy and the work of championing nonviolent conflict resolution and tolerance worldwide. Their son, Dexter King, serves as the center's chairman. Daughter Yolanda King, who died in 2007, was a motivational speaker, author and founder of Higher Ground Productions, an organization specializing in diversity training. Even within the King family, members disagree about his religious and political views about gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. King's widow Coretta publicly said that she believed her husband would have supported gay rights. However, his youngest child, Bernice King, has said publicly that he would have been opposed to gay marriage. On February 4, 1968, at the Ebenezer Baptist Church, in speaking about how he wished to be remembered after his death, King stated: Martin Luther King Jr. was among hundreds of artists whose material was destroyed in the 2008 Universal Studios fire. Martin Luther King Jr. Day Beginning in 1971, cities such as St. Louis, Missouri, and states established annual holidays to honor King. At the White House Rose Garden on November 2, 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed a bill creating a federal holiday to honor King. Observed for the first time on January 20, 1986, it is called Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Following President George H. W. Bush's 1992 proclamation, the holiday is observed on the third Monday of January each year, near the time of King's birthday. On January 17, 2000, for the first time, Martin Luther King Jr. Day was officially observed in all fifty U.S. states. Arizona (1992), New Hampshire (1999) and Utah (2000) were the last three states to recognize the holiday. Utah previously celebrated the holiday at the same time but under the name Human Rights Day. Veneration Martin Luther King Jr. was canonized by Archbishop Timothy Paul of the Holy Christian Orthodox Church (not in communion with the Eastern Orthodox Church) on September 9, 2016 in the Christian Cathedral in Springfield, Massachusetts, his feast day is April 4, the date of his assassination. King is honored with a Lesser Feast on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America on April 4 or January 15. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America commemorates King liturgically on the anniversary of his birth, January 15. Ideas, influences, and political stances Christianity As a Christian minister, King's main influence was Jesus Christ and the Christian gospels, which he would almost always quote in his religious meetings, speeches at church, and in public discourses. King's faith was strongly based in Jesus' commandment of loving your neighbor as yourself, loving God above all, and loving your enemies, praying for them and blessing them. His nonviolent thought was also based in the injunction to turn the other cheek in the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus' teaching of putting the sword back into its place (Matthew 26:52). In his famous Letter from Birmingham Jail, King urged action consistent with what he describes as Jesus' "extremist" love, and also quoted numerous other Christian pacifist authors, which was very usual for him. In another sermon, he stated: King's private writings show that he rejected biblical literalism; he described the Bible as "mythological," doubted that Jesus was born of a virgin and did not believe that the story of Jonah and the whale was true. The Measure of a Man In 1959, King published a short book called The Measure of a Man, which contained his sermons "What is Man?" and "The Dimensions of a Complete Life". The sermons argued for man's need for God's love and criticized the racial injustices of Western civilization. Nonviolence Veteran African-American civil rights activist Bayard Rustin was King's first regular advisor on nonviolence. King was also advised by the white activists Harris Wofford and Glenn Smiley. Rustin and Smiley came from the Christian pacifist tradition, and Wofford and Rustin both studied Mahatma Gandhi's teachings. Rustin had applied nonviolence with the Journey of Reconciliation campaign in the 1940s, and Wofford had been promoting Gandhism to Southern blacks since the early 1950s. King had initially known little about Gandhi and rarely used the term "nonviolence" during his early years of activism in the early 1950s. King initially believed in and practiced self-defense, even obtaining guns in his household as a means of defense against possible attackers. The pacifists guided King by showing him the alternative of nonviolent resistance, arguing that this would be a better means to accomplish his goals of civil rights than self-defense. King then vowed to no longer personally use arms. In the aftermath of the boycott, King wrote Stride Toward Freedom, which included the chapter Pilgrimage to Nonviolence. King outlined his understanding of nonviolence, which seeks to win an opponent to friendship, rather than to humiliate or defeat him. The chapter draws from an address by Wofford, with Rustin and Stanley Levison also providing guidance and ghostwriting. King was inspired by Gandhi and his success with nonviolent activism, and as a theology student, King described Gandhi as being one of the "individuals who greatly reveal the working of the Spirit of God". King had "for a long time ... wanted to take a trip to India." With assistance from Harris Wofford, the American Friends Service Committee, and other supporters, he was able to fund the journey in April 1959. The trip to India affected King, deepening his understanding of nonviolent resistance and his commitment to America's struggle for civil rights. In a radio address made during his final evening in India, King reflected, "Since being in India, I am more convinced than ever before that the method of nonviolent resistance is the most potent weapon available to oppressed people in their struggle for justice and human dignity." King's admiration of Gandhi's nonviolence did not diminish in later years. He went so far as to hold up his example when receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, hailing the "successful precedent" of using nonviolence "in a magnificent way by Mohandas K. Gandhi to challenge the might of the British Empire ... He struggled only with the weapons of truth, soul force, non-injury and courage." Another influence for King's nonviolent method was Henry David Thoreau's essay On Civil Disobedience and its theme of refusing to cooperate with an evil system. He also was greatly influenced by the works of Protestant theologians Reinhold Niebuhr and Paul Tillich, and said that Walter Rauschenbusch's Christianity and the Social Crisis left an "indelible imprint" on his thinking by giving him a theological grounding for his social concerns. King was moved by Rauschenbusch's vision of Christians spreading social unrest in "perpetual but friendly conflict" with the state, simultaneously critiquing it and calling it to act as an instrument of justice. However, he was apparently unaware of the American tradition of Christian pacifism exemplified by Adin Ballou and William Lloyd Garrison. King frequently referred to Jesus' Sermon on the Mount as central for his work. King also sometimes used the concept of "agape" (brotherly Christian love). However, after 1960, he ceased employing it in his writings. Even after renouncing his personal use of guns, King had a complex relationship with the phenomenon of self-defense in the movement. He publicly discouraged it as a widespread practice, but acknowledged that it was sometimes necessary. Throughout his career King was frequently protected by other civil rights activists who carried arms, such as Colonel Stone Johnson, Robert Hayling, and the Deacons for Defense and Justice. Criticism within the movement King was criticized by other black leaders during the course of his participation in the civil rights movement. This included opposition by more militant thinkers such as Nation of Islam member Malcolm X. Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee founder Ella Baker regarded King as a charismatic media figure who lost touch with the grassroots of the movement as he became close to elite figures like Nelson Rockefeller. Stokely Carmichael, a protege of Baker's, became a black separatist and disagreed with King's plea for racial integration because he considered it an insult to a uniquely African-American culture. Activism and involvement with Native Americans King was an avid supporter of Native American rights. Native Americans were also active supporters of King's civil rights movement which included the active participation of Native Americans. In fact, the Native American Rights Fund (NARF) was patterned after the NAACP's Legal Defense and Education Fund. The National Indian Youth Council (NIYC) was especially supportive in King's campaigns especially the Poor People's Campaign in 1968. In King's book Why We Can't Wait he writes: Our nation was born in genocide when it embraced the doctrine that the original American, the Indian, was an inferior race. Even before there were large numbers of Negroes on our shores, the scar of racial hatred had already disfigured colonial society. From the sixteenth century forward, blood flowed in battles over racial supremacy. We are perhaps the only nation which tried as a matter of national policy to wipe out its indigenous population. Moreover, we elevated that tragic experience into a noble crusade. Indeed, even today we have not permitted ourselves to reject or to feel remorse for this shameful episode. Our literature, our films, our drama, our folklore all exalt it. King assisted Native American people in south Alabama in the late 1950s. At that time the remaining Creek in Alabama were trying to completely desegregate schools in their area. The South had many egregious racial problems: In this case, light-complexioned Native children were allowed to ride school buses to previously all white schools, while dark-skinned Native children from the same band were barred from riding the same buses. Tribal leaders, upon hearing of King's desegregation campaign in Birmingham, Alabama, contacted him for assistance. He promptly responded and through his intervention the problem was quickly resolved. In September 1959, King flew from Los Angeles, California, to Tucson, Arizona. After giving a speech at the University of Arizona on the ideals of using nonviolent methods in creating social change. He put into words his belief that one must not use force in this struggle "but match the violence of his opponents with his suffering." King then went to Southside Presbyterian, a predominantly Native American church, and was fascinated by their photos. On the spur of the moment, King wanted to go to an Indian Reservation to meet the people so Casper Glenn took King to the Papago Indian Reservation. At the reservation King met with all the tribal leaders, and others on the reservation then ate with them. King then visited another Presbyterian church near the reservation, and preached there attracting a Native American crowd. He later returned to Old Pueblo in March 1962 where he preached again to a Native American congregation, and then went on to give another speech at the University of Arizona. King would continue to attract the attention of Native Americans throughout the civil rights movement. During the 1963 March on Washington there was a sizable Native American contingent, including many from South Dakota, and many from the Navajo nation. Native Americans were also active participants in the Poor People's Campaign in 1968. King was a major inspiration along with the civil rights movement which inspired the Native American rights movement of the 1960s and many of its leaders. John Echohawk a member of the Pawnee tribe and the executive director and one of the founders of the Native American Rights Fund stated: Inspired by Dr. King, who was advancing the civil rights agenda of equality under the laws of this country, we thought that we could also use the laws to advance our Indianship, to live as tribes in our territories governed by our own laws under the principles of tribal sovereignty that had been with us ever since 1831. We believed that we could fight for a policy of self-determination that was consistent with U.S. law and that we could govern our own affairs, define our own ways and continue to survive in this society. Politics As the leader of the SCLC, King maintained a policy of not publicly endorsing a U.S. political party or candidate: "I feel someone must remain in the position of non-alignment, so that he can look objectively at both parties and be the conscience of both—not the servant or master of either." In a 1958 interview, he expressed his view that neither party was perfect, saying, "I don't think the Republican party is a party full of the almighty God nor is the Democratic party. They both have weaknesses ... And I'm not inextricably bound to either party." King did praise Democratic Senator Paul Douglas of Illinois as being the "greatest of all senators" because of his fierce advocacy for civil rights causes over the years. King critiqued both parties' performance on promoting racial equality: Although King never publicly supported a political party or candidate for president, in a letter to a civil rights supporter in October 1956 he said that he had not decided whether he would vote for Adlai Stevenson II or Dwight D. Eisenhower at the 1956 presidential election, but that "In the past, I always voted the Democratic ticket." In his autobiography, King says that in 1960 he privately voted for Democratic candidate John F. Kennedy: "I felt that Kennedy would make the best president. I never came out with an endorsement. My father did, but I never made one." King adds that he likely would have made an exception to his non-endorsement policy for a second Kennedy term, saying "Had President Kennedy lived, I would probably have endorsed him in 1964." In 1964, King urged his supporters "and all people of goodwill" to vote against Republican Senator Barry Goldwater for president, saying that his election "would be a tragedy, and certainly suicidal almost, for the nation and the world." King supported the ideals of democratic socialism, although he was reluctant to speak directly of this support due to the anti-communist sentiment being projected throughout the United States at the time, and the association of socialism with communism. King believed that capitalism could not adequately provide the necessities of many American people, particularly the African-American community. Compensation King stated that black Americans, as well as other disadvantaged Americans, should be compensated for historical wrongs. In an interview conducted for Playboy in 1965, he said that granting black Americans only equality could not realistically close the economic gap between them and whites. King said that he did not seek a full restitution of wages lost to slavery, which he believed impossible, but proposed a government compensatory program of $50 billion over ten years to all disadvantaged groups. He posited that "the money spent would be more than amply justified by the benefits that would accrue to the nation through a spectacular decline in school dropouts, family breakups, crime rates, illegitimacy, swollen relief rolls, rioting and other social evils." He presented this idea as an application of the common law regarding settlement of unpaid labor, but clarified that he felt that the money should not be spent exclusively on blacks. He stated, "It should benefit the disadvantaged of all races." Television Actress Nichelle Nichols planned to leave the science-fiction television series Star Trek in 1967 after its first season, wanting to return to musical theater. She changed her mind after talking to King who was a fan of the show. King explained that her character signified a future of greater racial harmony and cooperation. King told Nichols, "You are our image of where we're going, you're 300 years from now, and that means that's where we are and it takes place now. Keep doing what you're doing, you are our inspiration." As Nichols recounted, "Star Trek was one of the only shows that [King] and his wife Coretta would allow their little children to watch. And I thanked him and I told him I was leaving the show. All the smile came off his face. And he said, 'Don't you understand for the first time we're seen as we should be seen. You don't have a black role. You have an equal role.' For his part, the series' creator, Gene Roddenberry, was deeply moved upon learning of King's support. State surveillance and coercion FBI surveillance and wiretapping FBI director J. Edgar Hoover personally ordered surveillance of King, with the intent to undermine his power as a civil rights leader. The Church Committee, a 1975 investigation by the U.S. Congress, found that "From December 1963 until his death in 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was the target of an intensive campaign by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to 'neutralize' him as an effective civil rights leader." In the fall of 1963, the FBI received authorization from Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy to proceed with wiretapping of King's phone lines, purportedly due to his association with Stanley Levison. The Bureau informed President John F. Kennedy. He and his brother unsuccessfully tried to persuade King to dissociate himself from Levison, a New York lawyer who had been involved with Communist Party USA. Although Robert Kennedy only gave written approval for limited wiretapping of King's telephone lines "on a trial basis, for a month or so", Hoover extended the clearance so his men were "unshackled" to look for evidence in any areas of King's life they deemed worthy. The Bureau placed wiretaps on the home and office phone lines of both Levison and King, and bugged King's rooms in hotels as he traveled across the country. In 1967, Hoover listed the SCLC as a black nationalist hate group, with the instructions: "No opportunity should be missed to exploit through counterintelligence techniques the organizational and personal conflicts of the leaderships of the groups ... to insure [sic] the targeted group is disrupted, ridiculed, or discredited." NSA monitoring of King's communications In a secret operation code-named "Minaret", the National Security Agency monitored the communications of leading Americans, including King, who were critical of the U.S. war in Vietnam. A review by the NSA itself concluded that Minaret was "disreputable if not outright illegal." Allegations of communism For years, Hoover had been suspicious of potential influence of communists in social movements such as labor unions and civil rights. Hoover directed the FBI to track King in 1957, and the SCLC when it was established. Due to the relationship between King and Stanley Levison, the FBI feared Levison was working as an "agent of influence" over King, in spite of its own reports in 1963 that Levison had left the Party and was no longer associated in business dealings with them. Another King lieutenant, Jack O'Dell, was also linked to the Communist Party by sworn testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Despite the extensive surveillance conducted, by 1976 the FBI had acknowledged that it had not obtained any evidence that King himself or the SCLC were actually involved with any communist organizations. For his part, King adamantly denied having any connections to communism. In a 1965 Playboy interview, he stated that "there are as many Communists in this freedom movement as there are Eskimos in Florida." He argued that Hoover was "following the path of appeasement of political powers in the South" and that his concern for communist infiltration of the civil rights movement was meant to "aid and abet the salacious claims of southern racists and the extreme right-wing elements." Hoover did not believe King's pledge of innocence and replied by saying that King was "the most notorious liar in the country." After King gave his "I Have A Dream" speech during the March on Washington on August 28, 1963, the FBI described King as "the most dangerous and effective Negro leader in the country." It alleged that he was "knowingly, willingly and regularly cooperating with and taking guidance from communists." The attempts to prove that King was a communist was related to the feeling of many segregationists that blacks in the South were content with the status quo, but had been stirred up by "communists" and "outside agitators." As context, the civil rights movement in 1950s and '60s arose from activism within the black community dating back to before World War I. King said that "the Negro revolution is a genuine revolution, born from the same womb that produces all massive social upheavals—the womb of intolerable conditions and unendurable situations." CIA surveillance CIA files declassified in 2017 revealed that the agency was investigating possible links between King and Communism after a Washington Post article dated November 4, 1964, claimed he was invited to the Soviet Union and that Ralph Abernathy, as spokesman for King, refused to comment on the source of the invitation. Mail belonging to King and other civil rights activists was intercepted by the CIA program HTLINGUAL. Allegations of adultery The FBI having concluded that King was dangerous due to communist infiltration, attempts to discredit King began through revelations regarding his private life. FBI surveillance of King, some of it since made public, attempted to demonstrate that he also had numerous extramarital affairs. Lyndon B. Johnson once said that King was a "hypocritical preacher". In his 1989 autobiography And the Walls Came Tumbling Down, Ralph Abernathy stated that King had a "weakness for women", although they "all understood and believed in the biblical prohibition against sex outside of marriage. It was just that he had a particularly difficult time with that temptation." In a later interview, Abernathy said that he only wrote the term "womanizing", that he did not specifically say King had extramarital sex and that the infidelities King had were emotional rather than sexual. Abernathy criticized the media for sensationalizing the statements he wrote about King's affairs, such as the allegation that he admitted in his book that King had a sexual affair the night before he was assassinated. In his original wording, Abernathy had stated that he saw King coming out of his room with a woman when he awoke the next morning and later said that "he may have been in there discussing and debating and trying to get her to go along with the movement, I don't know...the Sanitation Worker's Strike." In his 1986 book Bearing the Cross, David Garrow wrote about a number of extramarital affairs, including one woman King saw almost daily. According to Garrow, "that relationship ... increasingly became the emotional centerpiece of King's life, but it did not eliminate the incidental couplings ... of King's travels." He alleged that King explained his extramarital affairs as "a form of anxiety reduction." Garrow asserted that King's supposed promiscuity caused him "painful and at times overwhelming guilt." King's wife Coretta appeared to have accepted his affairs with equanimity, saying once that "all that other business just doesn't have a place in the very high-level relationship we enjoyed." Shortly after Bearing the Cross was released, civil rights author Howell Raines gave the book a positive review but opined that Garrow's allegations about King's sex life were "sensational" and stated that Garrow was "amassing facts rather than analyzing them." The FBI distributed reports regarding such affairs to the executive branch, friendly reporters, potential coalition partners and funding sources of the SCLC, and King's family. The bureau also sent anonymous letters to King threatening to reveal information if he did not cease his civil rights work. The FBI–King suicide letter sent to King just before he received the Nobel Peace Prize read, in part: The American public, the church organizations that have been helping—Protestants, Catholics and Jews will know you for what you are—an evil beast. So will others who have backed you. You are done. King, there is only one thing left for you to do. You know what it is. You have just 34 days in which to do (this exact number has been selected for a specific reason, it has definite practical significant ). You are done. There is but one way out for you. You better take it before your filthy fraudulent self is bared to the nation. The letter was accompanied by a tape recording—excerpted from FBI wiretaps—of several of King's extramarital liaisons. King interpreted this package as an attempt to drive him to suicide, although William Sullivan, head of the Domestic Intelligence Division at the time, argued that it may have only been intended to "convince Dr. King to resign from the SCLC." King refused to give in to the FBI's threats. In 1977, Judge John Lewis Smith Jr. ordered all known copies of the recorded audiotapes and written transcripts resulting from the FBI's electronic surveillance of King between 1963 and 1968 to be held in the National Archives and sealed from public access until 2027. In May 2019, an FBI file emerged on which a handwritten note alleged that King "looked on, laughed and offered advice" as one of his friends raped a woman. Expert professional historians of the period who have examined this notional evidence have dismissed it as highly unreliable. David Garrow, author of an earlier biography of King, wrote that "the suggestion... that he either actively tolerated or personally employed violence against any woman, even while drunk, poses so fundamental a challenge to his historical stature as to require the most complete and extensive historical review possible". Garrow's reliance on a handwritten note addended to a typed report is considered poor scholarship by several other authorities. The Professor of American Studies at the University of Nottingham, Peter Ling, pointed out that Garrow was excessively credulous, if not naive, in accepting the accuracy of FBI reports during a period when the FBI was undertaking a massive operation to attempt to discredit King as part of its COINTELPRO activities. Garrow had earlier referred to Ling's work on King, widely considered authoritative, as "thoughtful, perceptive, and thoroughly well-informed". Experts in 20th-century American history, including Distinguished Professor of Political Science Jeanne Theoharis, the professors Barbara Ransby of the University of Illinois at Chicago, Nathan Connolly of Johns Hopkins University and Professor Emeritus of History Glenda Gilmore of Yale University have expressed reservations about Garrow's scholarship. Theoharis commented "Most scholars I know would penalize graduate students for doing this." It is not the first time the care and rigor of Garrow's work has been called into serious question. Clayborne Carson, Martin Luther King biographer and overseer of the Dr. King records at Stanford University states that he came to the opposite conclusion of Garrow saying "None of this is new. Garrow is talking about a recently added summary of a transcript of a 1964 recording from the Willard Hotel that others, including Mrs. King, have said they did not hear Martin's voice on it. The added summary was four layers removed from the actual recording. This supposedly new information comes from an anonymous source in a single paragraph in an FBI report. You have to ask how could anyone conclude King looked at a rape from an audio recording in a room where he was not present." Carson bases his position of Coretta Scott King's memoirs where she states "I set up our reel-to-reel recorder and listened. I have read scores of reports talking about the scurrilous activities of my husband but once again, there was nothing at all incriminating on the tape. It was a social event with people laughing and telling dirty jokes. But I did not hear Martin's voice on it, and there was nothing about sex or anything else resembling the lies J. Edgar and the FBI were spreading." The tapes that could confirm or refute the allegation are scheduled to be declassified in 2027. Police observation during the assassination A fire station was located across from the Lorraine Motel, next to the boarding house in which James Earl Ray was staying. Police officers were stationed in the fire station to keep King under surveillance. Agents were watching King at the time he was shot. Immediately following the shooting, officers rushed out of the station to the motel. Marrell McCollough, an undercover police officer, was the first person to administer first aid to King. The antagonism between King and the FBI, the lack of an all points bulletin to find the killer, and the police presence nearby led to speculation that the FBI was involved in the assassination. Awards and recognition King was awarded at least fifty honorary degrees from colleges and universities. On October 14, 1964, King became the (at the time) youngest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, which was awarded to him for leading nonviolent resistance to racial prejudice in the U.S. In 1965, he was awarded the American Liberties Medallion by the American Jewish Committee for his "exceptional advancement of the principles of human liberty." In his acceptance remarks, King said, "Freedom is one thing. You have it all or you are not free." In 1957, he was awarded the Spingarn Medal from the NAACP. Two years later, he won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for his book Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story. In 1966, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America awarded King the Margaret Sanger Award for "his courageous resistance to bigotry and his lifelong dedication to the advancement of social justice and human dignity." Also in 1966, King was elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In November 1967, he made a 24-hour trip to the United Kingdom to receive an honorary degree from Newcastle University, being the first African American to be so honored by Newcastle. In a moving impromptu acceptance speech, he said There are three urgent and indeed great problems that we face not only in the United States of America but all over the world today. That is the problem of racism, the problem of poverty and the problem of war. In addition to being nominated for three Grammy Awards, the civil-rights leader posthumously won for Best Spoken Word Recording in 1971 for "Why I Oppose The War In Vietnam". In 1977, the Presidential Medal of Freedom was posthumously awarded to King by President Jimmy Carter. The citation read: Martin Luther King Jr. was the conscience of his generation. He gazed upon the great wall of segregation and saw that the power of love could bring it down. From the pain and exhaustion of his fight to fulfill the promises of our founding fathers for our humblest citizens, he wrung his eloquent statement of his dream for America. He made our nation stronger because he made it better. His dream sustains us yet. King and his wife were also awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 2004. King was second in Gallup's List of Most Widely Admired People of the 20th Century. In 1963, he was named Time Person of the Year, and, in 2000, he was voted sixth in an online "Person of the Century" poll by the same magazine. King placed third in the Greatest American contest conducted by the Discovery Channel and AOL. Five-dollar bill On April 20, 2016, Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew announced that the $5, $10, and $20 bills would all undergo redesign prior to 2020. Lew said that while Lincoln would remain on the front of the $5 bill, the reverse would be redesigned to depict various historical events that had occurred at the Lincoln Memorial. Among the planned designs are images from King's "I Have a Dream" speech and the 1939 concert by opera singer Marian Anderson. Works Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story (1958) The Measure of a Man (1959) Strength to Love (1963) Why We Can't Wait (1964) Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? (1967) The Trumpet of Conscience (1968) A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King Jr. (1986) The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr. (1998), ed. Clayborne Carson "All Labor Has Dignity" (2011) ed. Michael Honey "Thou, Dear God": Prayers That Open Hearts and Spirits. Collection of King's prayers. (2011), ed. Lewis Baldwin MLK: A Celebration in Word and Image (2011). Photographed by Bob Adelman, introduced by Charles Johnson See also Civil rights movement in popular culture Equality before the law List of civil rights leaders List of peace activists List of streets named after Martin Luther King Jr. Memorials to Martin Luther King Jr. Post–civil rights era in African-American history Sermons and speeches of Martin Luther King Jr. United States labor law Violence begets violence Portrait made by Columbus P. Knox References Notes Citations Sources Garrow, David. Bearing the Cross: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (1989). Pulitzer Prize. "James L. Bevel, The Strategist of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement", a 1984 paper by Randall Kryn, published with a 1988 addendum by Kryn in Prof. David Garrow's We Shall Overcome, Volume II (Carlson Publishing Company, 1989). Further reading King, Martin Luther Jr. (1986), Testament of Hope. The essential writings and speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr. (San Francisco: Harper & Row), edited by J. M. Washington; reissued by Harper in 1992 as I Have a Dream: Writings and Speeches That Changed the World. Kirk, John A., ed. (2007). Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement: Controversies and Debates. pp. 224. Schulke, Flip; McPhee, Penelope (1986). King Remembered, Foreword by Jesse Jackson. . Waldschmidt-Nelson, Britta (2012). Dreams and Nightmares: Martin Luther King Jr. Malcolm X, and the Struggle for Black Equality. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida. . External links The King Center FBI file on Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Nobel Peace Prize, Civil Rights Digital Library The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute, Stanford University Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. at Buffalo, digital collection of King's visit and speech in Buffalo, New York on November 9, 1967, from the University at Buffalo Libraries BBC Face to Face interview with Martin Luther King and John Freeman, broadcast October 29, 1961. including the Nobel Lecture, December 11, 1964 The quest for peace and justice Martin Luther King, Jr. Collected Papers held by the Swarthmore College Peace Collection 1929 births 1968 deaths 20th-century African-American activists 20th-century American male writers 20th-century Baptist ministers 1968 murders in the United States Activists for African-American civil rights Activists from Atlanta Activists from Montgomery, Alabama African-American Baptist ministers African-American theologians African-American writers American anti-racism activists American anti–Vietnam War activists American Christian pacifists American Christian socialists American Christian Zionists American clergy of Irish descent American democratic socialists American dissidents American human rights activists American humanitarians American male non-fiction writers American members of the clergy convicted of crimes American Nobel laureates American prisoners and detainees American saints American social democrats Anglican saints Articles containing video clips Assassinated American civil rights activists Assassinated religious leaders Baptist ministers from the United States Baptist writers Baptists from Alabama Baptists from Georgia (U.S. state) Boston University School of Theology alumni Burials in Georgia (U.S. state) Civil rights movement Clergy from Atlanta COINTELPRO targets Congressional Gold Medal recipients Crozer Theological Seminary alumni Critics of Marxism Deaths by firearm in Tennessee Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Gandhians Grammy Award winners Male murder victims Martyrdom Montgomery bus boycott Morehouse College alumni Murdered African-American people Native Americans' rights activists Nobel Peace Prize laureates Liberalism in the United States Nonviolence advocates People celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendar People from Atlanta People involved in plagiarism controversies People murdered in Tennessee Political prisoners Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients Prisoners and detainees of Alabama Prisoners and detainees of Florida Prisoners and detainees of Georgia (U.S. state) Selma to Montgomery marches Spingarn Medal winners Stabbing attacks in the United States Stabbing survivors Time Person of the Year Writers from Georgia (U.S. state) Writers from Montgomery, Alabama Google Doodles Non-Indian Gandhians

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MLK%20%28disambiguation%29

MLK (disambiguation)

MLK are the initials of Martin Luther King Jr. (1929–1968). MLK or mlk may also refer to: MLK, Milk MLK, the Northwest Semitic spelling of Malik (king). MLK, the Phoenician spelling of the deity Moloch Transportation MLK, IATA airport code for Malta Airport (Montana), USA MLK, ICAO airline code for Nigeria's Millennium Air, see List of airline codes (M) MLK, on List of Amtrak stations, for Moses Lake, Washington, USA MLK, station code for Mooroolbark railway station, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia MLK Jr. station (Capital MetroRail), in Austin, Texas, USA MLK Jr. station (DART), in Dallas, Texas, USA People Manohar Lal Khattar, Chief minister of Haryana; Indian politician Mary Louise Kelly, NPR reporter Martin Luther King Sr. Martin Luther King III Other "MLK" (song), from the 1984 U2 album The Unforgettable Fire M.L.K.: Misery Loves Kompany (Tech N9ne album), 2007 album by Tech N9ne Ilwana language (ISO 639 code: mlk) Marxist–Leninist Struggle League, (MLK) in native Swedish See also Martin Luther King (disambiguation) List of streets named after Martin Luther King Jr.

20079

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin%20Luther%20King%20%28disambiguation%29

Martin Luther King (disambiguation)

Martin Luther King Jr. (1929–1968) was a minister and civil rights activist. Martin Luther King may also refer to: People Martin Luther King Sr. (1899–1984), Baptist minister and father of Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King III (born 1957), son of Martin Luther King Jr. and a former head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference Places Martin Luther King station (disambiguation), stations of the name Martin Luther King Street, see List of streets named after Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. East Busway Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard (disambiguation) Martin Luther King Jr. Drive (disambiguation) Martin Luther King Jr. Expressway (disambiguation) Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway (disambiguation) Martin Luther King Jr. Way (disambiguation) Martin Luther King School Martin Luther King High School (disambiguation) Martin Luther King Middle School (disambiguation) Lycée Martin Luther King (disambiguation) Others Bust of Martin Luther King (disambiguation) Statue of Martin Luther King (disambiguation) See also Martin Luther King Jr. Day Martin Luther (disambiguation) MLK (disambiguation)

20080

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marino%20Marini%20%28sculptor%29

Marino Marini (sculptor)

Marino Marini (27 February 1901 – 6 August 1980) was an Italian sculptor. Biography He attended the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence in 1917. Although he never abandoned painting, Marini devoted himself primarily to sculpture from about 1922. From this time his work was influenced by Etruscan art and the sculpture of Arturo Martini. Marini succeeded Martini as professor at the Scuola d’Arte di Villa Reale in Monza, near Milan, in 1929, a position he retained until 1940. During this period, Marini traveled frequently to Paris, where he associated with Massimo Campigli, Giorgio de Chirico, Alberto Magnelli, and Filippo Tibertelli de Pisis. In 1936 he moved to Tenero-Locarno, in Ticino Canton, Switzerland; during the following few years the artist often visited Zürich and Basel, where he became a friend of Alberto Giacometti, Germaine Richier, and Fritz Wotruba. In 1936, he received the Prize of the Quadriennale of Rome. In 1938, he married Mercedes Pedrazzini. He accepted a professorship in sculpture at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera, Milan, in 1940. In 1943, he went into exile in Switzerland, exhibiting in Basel, Bern, and Zurich. In 1946, the artist settled permanently in Milan. He is buried at Cimitero Comunale of Pistoia, Toscana, Italy. Career He participated in the 'Twentieth-Century Italian Art' show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 1944. Curt Valentin began exhibiting Marini's work at his Buchholz Gallery in New York in 1950, on which occasion the sculptor visited the city and met Jean Arp, Max Beckmann, Alexander Calder, Lyonel Feininger, and Jacques Lipchitz. On his return to Europe, he stopped in London, where the Hanover Gallery had organized a solo show of his work, and there met Henry Moore. In 1951 a Marini exhibition traveled from the Kestner-Gesellschaft Hannover to the Kunstverein in Hamburg and the Haus der Kunst of Munich. He was awarded the Grand Prize for Sculpture at the Venice Biennale in 1952 and the Feltrinelli Prize at the Accademia dei Lincei in Rome in 1954. One of his monumental sculptures was installed in The Hague in 1959. Retrospectives of Marini's work took place at the Kunsthaus Zürich in 1962 and at the Palazzo Venezia in Rome in 1966. His paintings were exhibited for the first time at Toninelli Arte Moderna in Milan in 1963–64. In 1973 a permanent installation of his work opened at the Galleria d’Arte Moderna in Milan, and in 1978 a Marini show was presented at the National Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo. There is a museum dedicated to his work in Florence in the former church of San Pancrazio. His work may also be found in museums such as the Civic Gallery of Modern Art in Milan, the Tate Collection, The Angel of the City at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, the Norton Simon Museum, Museum de Fundatie and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C. Work Marini developed several themes in sculpture: equestrian, Pomonas (nudes), portraits, and circus figures. He drew on traditions of Etruscan and Northern European sculpture in developing these themes. His aim was to develop mythical images by interpreting classical themes in light of modern concerns and techniques. Marini is particularly famous for his series of stylised equestrian statues, which feature a man with outstretched arms on a horse. The evolution of the horse and rider as a subject in Marini's works reflects the artist's response to the changing context of the modern world. This theme appeared in his work in 1936. At first the proportions of horse and rider are slender and both are "poised, formal, and calm." By the next year the horse is depicted rearing and the rider gesturing. By 1940 the forms are simpler and more archaic in spirit; the proportions squatter. After World War II, in the late 1940s, the horse is planted, immobile, with neck extended, ears pinned back, mouth open. An example, in the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice, is "The Angel of the City," depicting "affirmation and charged strength associated explicitly with sexual potency." In later works, the rider is, increasingly, oblivious of his mount, "involved in his own visions or anxieties." In the artist's final work, the rider is unseated as the horse falls to the ground in an "apocalyptic image of lost control" which parallels Marini's growing despair for the future of the world. References Bibliography Emilio Greco, Poesie con 5 disegni, Edizioni Fiumara, Milano, 1952 (100 esemplari numerati) External links Museo Marino Marini, Piazza San Pancrazio, Florence, Italy Authentification of works Marino Marini Foundation, Pistoia, Italy The Angel of the City Available Paintings, Works on Paper & Biography Galerie Ludorff, Düsseldorf, Germany example of an etching "Horses, Part 1", 18 December 2009 "il Museo Marino Marini", Michael Thurin Exhibition Catalogues Marini, Marino. "Sculture, Opere Su Carta." (Galleria Pieter Coray, Lugano: Kent Fine Art, New York. Milano: Electa, 1991. 1901 births 1980 deaths People from Pistoia 20th-century Italian sculptors 20th-century male artists Italian male sculptors Modern sculptors Brera Academy faculty Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class)

20087

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modular%20arithmetic

Modular arithmetic

In mathematics, modular arithmetic is a system of arithmetic for integers, where numbers "wrap around" when reaching a certain value, called the modulus. The modern approach to modular arithmetic was developed by Carl Friedrich Gauss in his book Disquisitiones Arithmeticae, published in 1801. A familiar use of modular arithmetic is in the 12-hour clock, in which the day is divided into two 12-hour periods. If the time is 7:00 now, then 8 hours later it will be 3:00. Simple addition would result in , but clocks "wrap around" every 12 hours. Because the hour number starts over after it reaches 12, this is arithmetic modulo 12. In terms of the definition below, 15 is congruent to 3 modulo 12, so "15:00" on a 24-hour clock is displayed "3:00" on a 12-hour clock. Congruence Given an integer , called a modulus, two integers and are said to be congruent modulo , if is a divisor of their difference (i.e., if there is an integer such that ). Congruence modulo is a congruence relation, meaning that it is an equivalence relation that is compatible with the operations of addition, subtraction, and multiplication. Congruence modulo is denoted: The parentheses mean that applies to the entire equation, not just to the right-hand side (here ). This notation is not to be confused with the notation (without parentheses), which refers to the modulo operation. Indeed, denotes the unique integer such that and (i.e., the remainder of when divided by ). The congruence relation may be rewritten as explicitly showing its relationship with Euclidean division. However, the here need not be the remainder of the division of by Instead, what the statement asserts is that and have the same remainder when divided by . That is, where is the common remainder. Subtracting these two expressions, we recover the previous relation: by setting Examples In modulus 12, one can assert that: because , which is a multiple of 12. Another way to express this is to say that both 38 and 14 have the same remainder 2, when divided by 12. The definition of congruence also applies to negative values. For example: Properties The congruence relation satisfies all the conditions of an equivalence relation: Reflexivity: Symmetry: if for all , , and . Transitivity: If and , then If and or if then: for any integer (compatibility with translation) for any integer (compatibility with scaling) (compatibility with addition) (compatibility with subtraction) (compatibility with multiplication) for any non-negative integer (compatibility with exponentiation) , for any polynomial with integer coefficients (compatibility with polynomial evaluation) If , then it is generally false that . However, the following is true: If where is Euler's totient function, then —provided that is coprime with . For cancellation of common terms, we have the following rules: If , where is any integer, then If and is coprime with , then If , then The modular multiplicative inverse is defined by the following rules: Existence: there exists an integer denoted such that if and only if is coprime with . This integer is called a modular multiplicative inverse of modulo . If and exists, then (compatibility with multiplicative inverse, and, if , uniqueness modulo ) If and is coprime to , then the solution to this linear congruence is given by The multiplicative inverse may be efficiently computed by solving Bézout's equation for —using the Extended Euclidean algorithm. In particular, if is a prime number, then is coprime with for every such that ; thus a multiplicative inverse exists for all that is not congruent to zero modulo . Some of the more advanced properties of congruence relations are the following: Fermat's little theorem: If is prime and does not divide , then . Euler's theorem: If and are coprime, then , where is Euler's totient function A simple consequence of Fermat's little theorem is that if is prime, then is the multiplicative inverse of . More generally, from Euler's theorem, if and are coprime, then . Another simple consequence is that if where is Euler's totient function, then provided is coprime with . Wilson's theorem: is prime if and only if . Chinese remainder theorem: For any , and coprime , , there exists a unique such that and . In fact, where is the inverse of modulo and is the inverse of modulo . Lagrange's theorem: The congruence , where is prime, and is a polynomial with integer coefficients such that , has at most roots. Primitive root modulo : A number is a primitive root modulo if, for every integer coprime to , there is an integer such that . A primitive root modulo exists if and only if is equal to or , where is an odd prime number and is a positive integer. If a primitive root modulo exists, then there are exactly such primitive roots, where is the Euler's totient function. Quadratic residue: An integer is a quadratic residue modulo , if there exists an integer such that . Euler's criterion asserts that, if is an odd prime, and is not a multiple of , then is a quadratic residue modulo if and only if Congruence classes Like any congruence relation, congruence modulo is an equivalence relation, and the equivalence class of the integer , denoted by , is the set }. This set, consisting of all the integers congruent to  modulo , is called the congruence class, residue class, or simply residue of the integer modulo . When the modulus is known from the context, that residue may also be denoted . Residue systems Each residue class modulo may be represented by any one of its members, although we usually represent each residue class by the smallest nonnegative integer which belongs to that class (since this is the proper remainder which results from division). Any two members of different residue classes modulo are incongruent modulo . Furthermore, every integer belongs to one and only one residue class modulo . The set of integers } is called the least residue system modulo . Any set of integers, no two of which are congruent modulo , is called a complete residue system modulo . The least residue system is a complete residue system, and a complete residue system is simply a set containing precisely one representative of each residue class modulo . For example. the least residue system modulo 4 is {0, 1, 2, 3}. Some other complete residue systems modulo 4 include: {1, 2, 3, 4} {13, 14, 15, 16} {−2, −1, 0, 1} {−13, 4, 17, 18} {−5, 0, 6, 21} {27, 32, 37, 42} Some sets which are not complete residue systems modulo 4 are: {−5, 0, 6, 22}, since 6 is congruent to 22 modulo 4. {5, 15}, since a complete residue system modulo 4 must have exactly 4 incongruent residue classes. Reduced residue systems Given the Euler's totient function , any set of integers that are relatively prime to and mutually incongruent under modulus is called a reduced residue system modulo . The set {5,15} from above, for example, is an instance of a reduced residue system modulo 4. Integers modulo n The set of all congruence classes of the integers for a modulus is called the ring of integers modulo , and is denoted , , or . The notation is, however, not recommended because it can be confused with the set of -adic integers. The ring is fundamental to various branches of mathematics (see below). The set is defined for n > 0 as: (When , is not an empty set; rather, it is isomorphic to , since }.) We define addition, subtraction, and multiplication on by the following rules: The verification that this is a proper definition uses the properties given before. In this way, becomes a commutative ring. For example, in the ring , we have as in the arithmetic for the 24-hour clock. We use the notation because this is the quotient ring of by the ideal , a set containing all integers divisible by , where is the singleton set }. Thus is a field when is a maximal ideal (i.e., when is prime). This can also be constructed from the group under the addition operation alone. The residue class is the group coset of in the quotient group , a cyclic group. Rather than excluding the special case , it is more useful to include (which, as mentioned before, is isomorphic to the ring of integers). In fact, this inclusion is useful when discussing the characteristic of a ring. The ring of integers modulo is a finite field if and only if is prime (this ensures that every nonzero element has a multiplicative inverse). If is a prime power with k > 1, there exists a unique (up to isomorphism) finite field with elements, but this is not , which fails to be a field because it has zero-divisors. The multiplicative subgroup of integers modulo n is denoted by . This consists of (where a is coprime to n), which are precisely the classes possessing a multiplicative inverse. This forms a commutative group under multiplication, with order . Applications In theoretical mathematics, modular arithmetic is one of the foundations of number theory, touching on almost every aspect of its study, and it is also used extensively in group theory, ring theory, knot theory, and abstract algebra. In applied mathematics, it is used in computer algebra, cryptography, computer science, chemistry and the visual and musical arts. A very practical application is to calculate checksums within serial number identifiers. For example, International Standard Book Number (ISBN) uses modulo 11 (for 10 digit ISBN) or modulo 10 (for 13 digit ISBN) arithmetic for error detection. Likewise, International Bank Account Numbers (IBANs), for example, make use of modulo 97 arithmetic to spot user input errors in bank account numbers. In chemistry, the last digit of the CAS registry number (a unique identifying number for each chemical compound) is a check digit, which is calculated by taking the last digit of the first two parts of the CAS registry number times 1, the previous digit times 2, the previous digit times 3 etc., adding all these up and computing the sum modulo 10. In cryptography, modular arithmetic directly underpins public key systems such as RSA and Diffie–Hellman, and provides finite fields which underlie elliptic curves, and is used in a variety of symmetric key algorithms including Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), International Data Encryption Algorithm (IDEA), and RC4. RSA and Diffie–Hellman use modular exponentiation. In computer algebra, modular arithmetic is commonly used to limit the size of integer coefficients in intermediate calculations and data. It is used in polynomial factorization, a problem for which all known efficient algorithms use modular arithmetic. It is used by the most efficient implementations of polynomial greatest common divisor, exact linear algebra and Gröbner basis algorithms over the integers and the rational numbers. As posted on Fidonet in the 1980s and archived at Rosetta Code, modular arithmetic was used to disprove Euler's sum of powers conjecture on a Sinclair QL microcomputer using just one-fourth of the integer precision used by a CDC 6600 supercomputer to disprove it two decades earlier via a brute force search. In computer science, modular arithmetic is often applied in bitwise operations and other operations involving fixed-width, cyclic data structures. The modulo operation, as implemented in many programming languages and calculators, is an application of modular arithmetic that is often used in this context. The logical operator XOR sums 2 bits, modulo 2. In music, arithmetic modulo 12 is used in the consideration of the system of twelve-tone equal temperament, where octave and enharmonic equivalency occurs (that is, pitches in a 1:2 or 2:1 ratio are equivalent, and C-sharp is considered the same as D-flat). The method of casting out nines offers a quick check of decimal arithmetic computations performed by hand. It is based on modular arithmetic modulo 9, and specifically on the crucial property that 10 ≡ 1 (mod 9). Arithmetic modulo 7 is used in algorithms that determine the day of the week for a given date. In particular, Zeller's congruence and the Doomsday algorithm make heavy use of modulo-7 arithmetic. More generally, modular arithmetic also has application in disciplines such as law (e.g., apportionment), economics (e.g., game theory) and other areas of the social sciences, where proportional division and allocation of resources plays a central part of the analysis. Computational complexity Since modular arithmetic has such a wide range of applications, it is important to know how hard it is to solve a system of congruences. A linear system of congruences can be solved in polynomial time with a form of Gaussian elimination, for details see linear congruence theorem. Algorithms, such as Montgomery reduction, also exist to allow simple arithmetic operations, such as multiplication and exponentiation modulo , to be performed efficiently on large numbers. Some operations, like finding a discrete logarithm or a quadratic congruence appear to be as hard as integer factorization and thus are a starting point for cryptographic algorithms and encryption. These problems might be NP-intermediate. Solving a system of non-linear modular arithmetic equations is NP-complete. Example implementations Below are three reasonably fast C functions, two for performing modular multiplication and one for modular exponentiation on unsigned integers not larger than 63 bits, without overflow of the transient operations. An algorithmic way to compute : uint64_t mul_mod(uint64_t a, uint64_t b, uint64_t m) { if (!((a | b) & (0xFFFFFFFFULL << 32))) return a * b % m; uint64_t d = 0, mp2 = m >> 1; int i; if (a >= m) a %= m; if (b >= m) b %= m; for (i = 0; i < 64; ++i) { d = (d > mp2) ? (d << 1) - m : d << 1; if (a & 0x8000000000000000ULL) d += b; if (d >= m) d -= m; a <<= 1; } return d; } On computer architectures where an extended precision format with at least 64 bits of mantissa is available (such as the long double type of most x86 C compilers), the following routine is , by employing the trick that, by hardware, floating-point multiplication results in the most significant bits of the product kept, while integer multiplication results in the least significant bits kept: uint64_t mul_mod(uint64_t a, uint64_t b, uint64_t m) { long double x; uint64_t c; int64_t r; if (a >= m) a %= m; if (b >= m) b %= m; x = a; c = x * b / m; r = (int64_t)(a * b - c * m) % (int64_t)m; return r < 0 ? r + m : r; } Below is a C function for performing modular exponentiation, that uses the function implemented above. An algorithmic way to compute : uint64_t pow_mod(uint64_t a, uint64_t b, uint64_t m) { uint64_t r = m==1?0:1; while (b > 0) { if (b & 1) r = mul_mod(r, a, m); b = b >> 1; a = mul_mod(a, a, m); } return r; } However, for all above routines to work, must not exceed 63 bits. See also Boolean ring Circular buffer Division (mathematics) Finite field Legendre symbol Modular exponentiation Modulo (mathematics) Multiplicative group of integers modulo n Pisano period (Fibonacci sequences modulo n) Primitive root modulo n Quadratic reciprocity Quadratic residue Rational reconstruction (mathematics) Reduced residue system Serial number arithmetic (a special case of modular arithmetic) Two-element Boolean algebra Topics relating to the group theory behind modular arithmetic: Cyclic group Multiplicative group of integers modulo n Other important theorems relating to modular arithmetic: Carmichael's theorem Chinese remainder theorem Euler's theorem Fermat's little theorem (a special case of Euler's theorem) Lagrange's theorem Thue's lemma Notes References John L. Berggren. "modular arithmetic". Encyclopædia Britannica. . See in particular chapters 5 and 6 for a review of basic modular arithmetic. Maarten Bullynck "Modular Arithmetic before C.F. Gauss. Systematisations and discussions on remainder problems in 18th-century Germany" Thomas H. Cormen, Charles E. Leiserson, Ronald L. Rivest, and Clifford Stein. Introduction to Algorithms, Second Edition. MIT Press and McGraw-Hill, 2001. . Section 31.3: Modular arithmetic, pp. 862–868. Anthony Gioia, Number Theory, an Introduction Reprint (2001) Dover. . External links In this modular art article, one can learn more about applications of modular arithmetic in art. An article on modular arithmetic on the GIMPS wiki Modular Arithmetic and patterns in addition and multiplication tables Finite rings Group theory Articles with example C code

20088

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myriad

Myriad

A myriad (from Ancient Greek ) is technically the number 10,000 (ten thousand); in that sense, the term is used in English almost exclusively for literal translations from Greek, Latin or Sinospheric languages (Chinese, Japanese, Korean), or when talking about ancient Greek numerals. More generally, a myriad may be used in colloquial vernaculars to imply an indefinitely large number. History The Aegean numerals of the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations included a single unit to denote tens of thousands. It was written with a symbol composed of a circle with four dashes 𐄫. In Classical Greek numerals, a myriad was written as a capital mu: Μ, as lower case letters did not exist in Ancient Greece. To distinguish this numeral from letters, it was sometimes given an overbar: . Multiples were written above this sign, so that for example would equal 4,582×10,000 or 45,820,000. The etymology of the word myriad itself is uncertain: it has been variously connected to PIE *meu- ("damp") in reference to the waves of the sea and to Greek myrmex (, "ant") in reference to their swarms. The largest number named in Ancient Greek was the myriad myriad (written ) or hundred million. In his Sand Reckoner, Archimedes of Syracuse used this quantity as the basis for a numeration system of large powers of ten, which he used to count grains of sand. Usage In English, myriad is most commonly used to mean "some large but unspecified number". It may be either an adjective or a noun: both "there are myriad people outside" and "there is a myriad of people outside" are in use. (There are small differences: the former could imply that it is a diverse group of people; the latter does not usually but could possibly indicate a group of exactly ten thousand.) The Merriam-Webster Dictionary notes that confusion over the use of myriad as a noun "seems to reflect a mistaken belief that the word was originally and is still properly only an adjective ... however, the noun is in fact the older form, dating to the 16th century. The noun myriad has appeared in the works of such writers as Milton (plural 'myriads') and Thoreau ('a myriad of'), and it continues to occur frequently in reputable English." "Myriad" is also infrequently used in English as the specific number 10,000. Owing to the possible confusion with the generic meaning of "large quantity", however, this is generally restricted to translation of other languages like ancient Greek, Chinese, and Hindi where numbers may be grouped into sets of 10,000 (myriads). Such use permits the translator to remain closer to the original text and avoid repeated and unwieldy mentions of "tens of thousands": for example, "the original number of the crews supplied by the several nations I find to have been twenty-four myriads" and "What is the distance between one bridge and another? Twelve myriads of parasangs". Europe Most European languages include variations of "myriad" with similar meanings to the English word. Additionally, the prefix myria- indicating multiplication times ten thousand (×104), was part of the original metric system adopted by France in 1795. Although it was not retained after the 11th CGPM conference in 1960, myriameter is sometimes still encountered as a translation of the Scandinavian mile (Swedish & Norwegian: mil) of , or in some classifications of wavelengths as the adjective myriametric. The myriagramme (10 kg) was a French approximation of the avoirdupois quartier of and the myriaton appears in Isaac Asimov's Foundation novel trilogy. In Modern Greek, the word "myriad" is rarely used to denote 10,000, but a million is ekatommyrio (, lit. 'hundred myriad') and a thousand million is disekatommyrio (, lit. 'twice hundred myriad'). Asia In East Asia, the traditional numeral systems of China, Korea, and Japan are all decimal-based but grouped into ten thousands rather than thousands. The character for myriad is in traditional script and in simplified form in both mainland China and Japan. The pronunciation varies within China and abroad: wàn (Mandarin), wan5 (Hakka), bān (Minnan), maan6 (Cantonese), man (Japanese and Korean), and vạn (Vietnamese). Because of this grouping into fours, higher orders of numbers are provided by the powers of 10,000 rather than 1,000: In China, 10,0002 was in ancient texts but is now called and sometimes written as 1,0000,0000; 10,0003 is 1,0000,0000,0000 or ; 10,0004 is 1,0000,0000,0000,0000 or ; and so on. Conversely, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean generally do not have native words for powers of one thousand: what is called "one million" in English is "100" (100 myriad) in the Sinosphere, and "one billion" in English is "" (ten myllion) or "" (ten myriad myriad) in the Sinosphere. Unusually, Vietnam employs its former translation of , một triệu, to mean 1,000,000 rather than the Chinese figure. Similarly, the PRC government has adapted the word to mean the scientific prefix mega-, but transliterations are used instead for giga-, tera-, and other larger prefixes. This has caused confusion in areas closely related to the PRC such as Hong Kong and Macau, where is still largely used to mean 10,0003. and are also frequently employed colloquially in expressions, clichés, and chengyu (idioms) in the senses of "vast", "numerous", "numberless", and "infinite". A skeleton key is a ("myriad-use key"), the emperor was the "lord of myriad chariots" (), the Great Wall is called ("Myriad-mile Long Wall"), Zhu Xi's statement ("the moon reflects in myriad rivers") had the sense of supporting greater empiricism in Chinese philosophy, and Ha Qiongwen's popular 1959 propaganda poster , meaning "Long live Chairman Mao", literally reads as "[May] Chairman Mao [live to be] 10,000 years old". A similar term is the Old Turkic word tümän, whose variant forms remain in use for "ten thousand" among modern Mongolian, Turkish and Hungarian. According to Sir Gerard Clauson (1891–1974), it was likely borrowed from Tokharian, which may have been borrowed in turn from Old Chinese. See also Indian numbering system, which includes the lakh (10 myriad) -yllion, a proposed system which uses the myriad as one of its basic number names Tumen (unit), Turkic for "myriad" Names of large numbers Power of 10 References Integers Units of amount 10000 (number)

20089

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohamed%20Al-Fayed

Mohamed Al-Fayed

Mohamed Al-Fayed (; ; born Mohamed Fayed, 27 January 1929) is an Egyptian-born businessman whose residence and chief business interests have been in the United Kingdom since the late 1960s. Fayed's business interests include ownership of Hôtel Ritz Paris and formerly Harrods department store and Fulham F.C., both in London. Fayed's son, from his first marriage to Samira Khashoggi from 1954 to 1956, Dodi, was in a romantic relationship with Diana, Princess of Wales, when they both died in a car crash in Paris in 1997. Fayed married Finnish socialite and former model Heini Wathén in 1985, with whom he also has four children: Jasmine, Karim, Camilla, and Omar. In 2013, Fayed's wealth was estimated at US$1.4 billion, ranking his wealth at no. 1,031 in the world. Early life He was born Mohamed Fayed in Roshdy, Alexandria, Egypt, the eldest son of an Egyptian primary school teacher. His year of birth has been disputed. alfayed.com used to claim he was born in 1933, but the Department of Trade found his year of birth was 1929. alfayed.com rewrote "1933" to "1929" in 2011. Fayed has five sons and daughters and four siblings: Ali, Salah, Soaad, and Safia. Ali and Salah have been his business colleagues. He was married for two years, from 1954 to 1956, to Samira Khashoggi. Fayed worked with his wife's brother, Saudi Arabian arms dealer and businessman Adnan Khashoggi. Some time in the early 1970s, he began using "Al-Fayed" rather than "Fayed". His brothers Ali and Salah began to follow suit at the time of their acquisition of the House of Fraser in the 1980s, though by the late 1980s, both had reverted to calling themselves simply "Fayed". Some have assumed that Fayed's addition of "Al-" to his name was to imply aristocratic origins, like "de" in French or "von" in German, though Al- does not have the same social connotations in Arabic. This assumption led to Private Eye magazine nicknaming him the "Phoney Pharaoh". United Kingdom Early business dealings Fayed and his brothers founded a shipping company in Egypt before moving its headquarters to Genoa, Italy with offices in London. Around 1964 Fayed entered a close relationship with Haitian leader François Duvalier, known as 'Papa Doc', and became interested in the construction of a Fayed-Duvalier oil refinery in Haiti. He also associated with the geologist George de Mohrenschildt. Fayed terminated his stay in Haiti six months later when a sample of "crude oil" provided by Haitian associates proved to be low-grade molasses. It was then that Fayed moved to England where he lived in central London. In the mid 1960s, Fayed met the ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Rashid Bin Saeed Al Maktoum who entrusted Fayed with helping transform Dubai, where he set up IMS (International Marine Services) in 1968. Fayed introduced British companies like the Costain Group (of which he became a director and 30% shareholder), Bernard Sunley & Sons and Taylor Woodrow to the emirate to carry out the required construction work. He also became a financial adviser to the then Sultan of Brunei Omar Ali Saifuddien III, in 1966. He briefly joined the board of the mining conglomerate Lonrho in 1975 but left after a disagreement. In 1979, Fayed bought The Ritz hotel in Paris, France for US$30 million. In 1984, Fayed and his brothers purchased a 30% stake in House of Fraser, a group that included the famous London store Harrods, from Roland 'Tiny' Rowland, the head of Lonrho. In 1985, he and his brothers bought the remaining 70% of House of Fraser for £615m. Rowland claimed the Fayed brothers lied about their background and wealth and he put pressure on the government to investigate them. A Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) inquiry into the Fayeds was launched. The DTI's subsequent report was critical, but no action was taken against the Fayeds, and while many believed the contents of the report, others felt it was politically motivated. In 1998, Rowland accused Fayed of stealing papers and jewels from his Harrods safe deposit box. Fayed was arrested, but the charges were dropped. Rowland died in 1998. Fayed settled the dispute with a payment to his widow; he also sued the Metropolitan Police for false arrest in 2002, but lost the case. In 1994, House of Fraser went public, but Fayed retained the private ownership of Harrods. He re-launched the humorous magazine Punch in 1996 but it folded again in 2002. Al-Fayed applied for British citizenship twice – once in 1994 and once in 1999 - both unsuccessfully. It was suggested that the feud with Rowland contributed to Fayed being refused British citizenship the first time. Cash-for-questions In 1994, in what became known as the cash-for-questions affair, Fayed revealed the names of MPs he had paid to ask questions in parliament on his behalf, but who had failed to declare their fees. It saw the Conservative MPs Neil Hamilton and Tim Smith leave the government in disgrace, and a Committee on Standards in Public Life established to prevent such corruption occurring again. Fayed also revealed that the cabinet minister Jonathan Aitken had stayed for free at the Ritz Hotel in Paris at the same time as a group of Saudi arms dealers, leading to Aitken's subsequent unsuccessful libel case and imprisonment for perjury. During this period, from 1988 to February 1998, Al-Fayed's spokesman was Michael Cole, a former BBC journalist, although Cole's PR work for Al-Fayed did not cease in 1998. Hamilton lost a subsequent libel action against Al-Fayed in December 1999 and a subsequent appeal against the verdict in December 2000. The former MP has always denied that he was paid by Al-Fayed for asking questions in parliament. Hamilton's libel action related to a Channel 4 Dispatches documentary broadcast on 16 January 1997 in which Al-Fayed made claims that the MP had received up to £110,000 in cash and received other gratuities for asking parliamentary questions. Hamilton's basis for his appeal was that the original verdict was invalid because Al-Fayed had paid £10,000 for documents stolen from the dustbins of Hamilton's legal representatives by Benjamin Pell. In 2003, Fayed moved from Surrey, UK to Switzerland, alleging a breach in an agreement with the British tax authority. In 2005, he moved back to Britain, saying that he "regards Britain as home". He moored a yacht called the Sokar in Monaco prior to selling it in 2014. Sale of Harrods After denials that Harrods was for sale, it was sold to Qatar Holdings, the sovereign wealth fund of the country of Qatar, on 10 May 2010. A fortnight previously, Fayed had stated that "People approach us from Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar. Fair enough. But I put two fingers up to them. It is not for sale. This is not Marks and Spencer or Sainsbury's. It is a special place that gives people pleasure. There is only one Mecca." Harrods was sold for £1.5 billion. Fayed later revealed in an interview that he decided to sell Harrods following the difficulty in getting his dividend approved by the trustee of the Harrods pension fund. Fayed said "I'm here every day, I can't take my profit because I have to take a permission of those bloody idiots. I say is this right? Is this logic? Somebody like me? I run a business and I need to take bloody fucking trustee's permission to take my profit". Fayed was appointed honorary chairman of Harrods, a position he was scheduled to hold for at least six months. Scotland real estate In 1972, Fayed purchased the Balnagown estate in Easter Ross, Northern Scotland. From an initial 4.8 hectares (12 acres), Al-Fayed has since built the estate up to 26,300 hectares (65,000 acres). Al-Fayed has invested more than £20 million in the estate, restored the 14th century pink Balnagown Castle, and created a tourist accommodation business. The Highlands of Scotland tourist board awarded Al-Fayed the Freedom of the Highlands in 2002, in recognition of his "outstanding contribution and commitment to the Highlands." As an Egyptian with links to Scotland, Al-Fayed was intrigued enough to fund a 2008 reprint of the 15th-century chronicle Scotichronicon by Walter Bower. The Scotichronicon describes how Scota, a sister of the Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamen, fled her family and landed in Scotland, bringing with her the Stone of Scone. According to the chronicle, Scotland was later named in her honour. The tale is disputed by modern historians. Al-Fayed later declared that "The Scots are originally Egyptians and that's the truth." In 2009, Al-Fayed revealed that he was a supporter of Scottish independence from the United Kingdom, announcing to the Scots that "It's time for you to waken up and detach yourselves from the English and their terrible politicians...whatever help is needed for Scotland to regain its independence, I will provide it...when you Scots regain your freedom, I am ready to be your president." Charity Fayed set up the Al Fayed Charitable Foundation in 1987 aiming to help children with life-limiting conditions and children living in poverty. The charity works mainly with charities and hospices for disabled and neglected children in the UK, Thailand and Mongolia. Some of the charities with which it works include Francis House Hospice in Manchester, Great Ormond Street Hospital and ChildLine. In 1998, Al Fayed bought Princess Diana's old boarding school in Kent and helped found the New School at West Heath for children with additional needs and mental health problems. In 2011, Mohamed Al-Fayed's daughter Camilla, who has worked as an ambassador for the charity for eight years, opened the newly refurbished Zoe’s Place baby hospice in West Derby, Liverpool. Fulham F.C. Al-Fayed bought west London professional football club Fulham F.C.for £6.25 million in 1997. The purchase was made via Bill Muddyman's Muddyman Group. His long-term aim was that Fulham would become a Premier League side within five years. In 2001, Fulham took the First Division (now Football League Championship) under manager Jean Tigana, winning 100 points and scoring over 100 goals in the season. This meant that Al-Fayed had achieved his Premier League aim a year ahead of schedule. By 2002, Fulham were competing in European football, winning the Intertoto Cup and challenging in the UEFA Cup. Fulham reached the final of the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League and continued to play in the Premier League throughout Al-Fayed's tenure as owner, which ended in 2013. Fulham temporarily left Craven Cottage while it was being upgraded to meet modern safety standards. There were fears that the club would not return to the Cottage after it was revealed that Al-Fayed had sold the first right to build on the ground to a property development firm. Fulham lost a legal case against former manager Tigana in 2004 after Al-Fayed had wrongly alleged that Tigana had overpaid more than £7m for new players and had negotiated transfers in secret. In 2009, Al-Fayed said that he was in favour of a wage cap for footballers, and criticised the management of The Football Association and Premier League as "run by donkeys who don't understand business, who are dazzled by money." A statue of the American entertainer Michael Jackson was unveiled by Al-Fayed in April 2011 at Craven Cottage. In 1999 Jackson had attended a league game against Wigan Athletic at the stadium. Following criticism of the statue, Al-Fayed said "If some stupid fans don't understand and appreciate such a gift this guy gave to the world they can go to hell. I don't want them to be fans." The statue was taken down by the club's new owners in 2013; Al-Fayed blamed the club's subsequent relegation from the Premier League on the 'bad luck' brought by its removal. Al-Fayed then donated the statue to the National Football Museum. In March 2019, the statue was removed from the museum due to the backlash against Jackson caused by the accusations against him in the documentary Leaving Neverland. Under Al-Fayed Fulham F.C. was owned by Mafco Holdings, based in the tax haven of Bermuda and in turn owned by Al-Fayed and his family. By 2011, Al-Fayed had lent Fulham F.C. £187 million in interest free loans. In July 2013, it was announced that Al-Fayed had sold the club to Pakistani American businessman Shahid Khan, who owns the NFL's Jacksonville Jaguars. Business interests Al-Fayed's business interests include: Hôtel Ritz Paris Balnagowan Castle & Estates, Scottish Highlands HJW Geospatial Turnbull & Asser 75 Rockefeller Plaza, New York City – built in 1947, originally the Esso Building, later the Time Warner Building; is owned by Al-Fayed and managed and leased by RXR Realty Al-Fayed's major business purchases have included: Ritz Hotel Paris (1979, ) House of Fraser Group, including Harrods (1985, £615 million; sold 2010, £1.5 billion). Fulham Football Club (1997, £30 million; sold 2013). After the death of Wallis Simpson, Fayed took over the lease of the Villa Windsor in Paris, the former home of the Duchess of Windsor and her husband, the Duke of Windsor, previously Edward VIII. Death of Dodi Fayed Background and relationship with Diana Lady Diana Spencer was born in 1961, and married the heir to the British throne, Charles, Prince of Wales, in 1981, becoming the Princess of Wales. Diana was an international celebrity and a frequent visitor to Harrods in the 1980s. Al-Fayed and Dodi first met Diana and Charles when they were introduced at a polo tournament in July 1986, that had been sponsored by Harrods. Diana and Charles divorced in 1996. Diana was hosted by Al-Fayed in the south of France in mid-1997, with her sons, Princes William and Harry. For the holiday, Fayed bought a 195 ft yacht, the Jonikal (later renamed the Sokar). Dodi and Diana later began a private cruise on the Jonikal and paparazzi photographs of the couple in an embrace were published. Diana's friend, the journalist Richard Kay, confirmed that Diana was involved in "her first serious romance" since her divorce. Dodi and Diana went on a second private cruise on the Jonikal in the third week of August, and returned from Sardinia to Paris on 30 August. The couple privately dined at the Ritz later that day, after the behaviour of the press caused them to cancel a restaurant reservation, they then planned to spend the night at Dodi's apartment near the Arc de Triomphe. In an attempt to deceive the paparazzi, a decoy car left the front of the hotel, while Diana and Dodi departed at speed in a Mercedes-Benz S280 driven by chauffeur Henri Paul from the rear of the hotel. Five minutes later, the car crashed in the Pont de l'Alma tunnel. Dodi and Paul died at this location. Diana died afterwards in hospital. Fayed arrived in Paris a day later and viewed Dodi's body, which was finally returned to the United Kingdom for an Islamic funeral. Conspiracy theories From February 1998, Al-Fayed maintained that the crash was a result of a conspiracy, and later contended that the crash was orchestrated by MI6 on the instructions of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. His claims that the crash was a result of a conspiracy were dismissed by a French judicial investigation, but Fayed appealed against this verdict. A libel action was brought against Al-Fayed by Neil Hamilton (see above). The British Operation Paget, a Metropolitan police inquiry that concluded in 2006, also found no evidence of a conspiracy. To Operation Paget, Al-Fayed made 175 "conspiracy claims". An inquest headed by Lord Justice Scott Baker into the deaths of Diana and Dodi began at the Royal Courts of Justice, London, on 2 October 2007 and lasted for six months. It was a continuation of the original inquest that had begun in 2004. At the Scott Baker inquest Fayed accused the Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince of Wales, Lady Sarah McCorquodale, her sister, and numerous others, of plotting to kill the Princess of Wales. Their motive, he claimed, was that they could not tolerate the idea of the Princess marrying a Muslim. Al-Fayed first claimed that the Princess was pregnant to the Daily Express in May 2001, and that he was the only person who had been told of this news. Witnesses at the inquest who said the Princess was not pregnant, and could not have been, were part of the conspiracy according to Al-Fayed. Fayed's testimony at the inquest was roundly condemned in the press as being farcical. Members of the British Government's Intelligence and Security Committee accused Fayed of turning the inquest into a 'circus' and called for it to be ended maturely. Lawyers representing Al-Fayed later accepted at the inquest that there was no direct evidence that either the Duke of Edinburgh or MI6 had been involved in any murder conspiracy involving Diana or Dodi. A few days before Al-Fayed's appearance, John Macnamara, a former senior detective at Scotland Yard and Al-Fayed's investigator for five years from 1997, was forced to admit on 14 February 2008 that he had no evidence to suggest foul play, except for the assertions Al-Fayed had made to him. His admissions also related to the lack of evidence for Al-Fayed's claims about the alleged pregnancy of the Princess and the couple's supposed engagement. The jury verdict, given on 7 April 2008, was that Diana and Dodi had been "unlawfully killed" through the grossly negligent driving of chauffeur Henri Paul, who was intoxicated, and the pursuing vehicles. Lawyers for Al-Fayed also accepted that there was no evidence to support the assertion that Diana was illegally embalmed in order to cover up a pregnancy, a "pregnancy" that they accepted could not be established by any medical evidence. They also accepted that there was no evidence to support the assertion the French emergency and medical services had played any role in a conspiracy to harm Diana. Following the Baker inquest, Al-Fayed said that he was abandoning his campaign to prove that Diana and Dodi were murdered in a conspiracy, and said that he would accept the verdict of the jury. Journalist Dominic Lawson wrote in The Independent in 2008 wrote that al-Fayed sought to concoct "a conspiracy to cover up the true circumstances" of fatalities caused by the crash "involving an intoxicated and over-excited driver (an employee of Mohamed Fayed's Paris Ritz)". He "had remarkable success in persuading elements of the tabloid press, notably the Daily Express, to give the conspiracy a fair wind." Al-Fayed financially supported Unlawful Killing (2011), a documentary film presenting his version of events. The film was not formally released as a result of the potential for libel suits. Sexual harassment allegations Al-Fayed has been accused by multiple women of sexual harassment and assault. Young women applying for employment at Harrods were often submitted to HIV tests and gynaecological examinations. These women were then selected to spend the weekend with Al-Fayed in Paris. In her profile of Al-Fayed for Vanity Fair, Maureen Orth described how according to former employees "Fayed regularly walked the store on the lookout for young, attractive women to work in his office. Those who rebuffed him would often be subjected to crude, humiliating comments about their appearance or dress...A dozen ex-employees I spoke with said that Fayed would chase secretaries around the office and sometimes try to stuff money down women's blouses". Al-Fayed was interviewed under caution by the Metropolitan Police after an allegation of sexual assault against a 15-year-old schoolgirl in October 2008. The case was dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service, after they found that there was no realistic chance of conviction due to conflicting statements. In December 1997, the ITV current affairs programme, The Big Story broadcast testimonies from a number of former Harrods employees who all spoke of how women were routinely sexually harassed by Al-Fayed in similar ways. A December 2017 episode of Channel 4's Dispatches programme alleged that Al-Fayed had sexually harassed three Harrods employees, and attempted to "groom" them. One of the women was aged 17 at the time. Cheska Hill-Wood waived her right to anonymity to be interviewed for the programme. The programme alleged Al-Fayed targeted young employees over a 13-year period. References Bibliography External links Al-Fayed Charitable Foundation 1929 births Living people Egyptian conspiracy theorists Egyptian billionaires 20th-century Egyptian businesspeople Egyptian emigrants to England Egyptian emigrants to Switzerland Egyptian Muslims Egyptian football chairmen and investors Egyptian expatriates in Monaco El Fayed family Fulham F.C. directors and chairmen Hoteliers House of Fraser People from Alexandria Harrods

20090

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmite

Marmite

Marmite ( ) is a savoury food spread made from yeast extract that was invented by German scientist Justus von Liebig and originally made in the United Kingdom. It is a by-product of beer brewing (see Lees (fermentation)) and is currently produced by British company Unilever. The product is notable as a vegan source of B vitamins, including supplemental vitamin B12. A traditional use is to spread it very thinly on buttered toast. Marmite is a sticky, dark brown paste with a distinctive, salty, powerful flavour and matching heady aroma. This distinctive taste is represented in the marketing slogan: "Love it or hate it." Such is its prominence in British popular culture that the product's name is often used as a metaphor for something that is an acquired taste or tends to polarise opinion. Marmite is commonly used as a flavouring, as it is particularly rich in umami due to its very high levels of glutamate (1960 mg/100g). The image on the jar shows a marmite (), a French term for a large, covered earthenware or metal cooking pot. Marmite was originally supplied in earthenware pots but since the 1920s has been sold in glass jars. Marmite's distinctive bulbous jars are supplied to Unilever by the German glass manufacturer Gerresheimer. Similar products include the Australian Vegemite (whose name is derived from that of Marmite), the Swiss Cenovis, the Brazilian Cenovit and the German Vitam-R. Marmite in New Zealand has been manufactured since 1919 under licence, but with a different recipe; that product is the only one sold as Marmite in Australasia and the Pacific Islands, whereas elsewhere in the world the British version predominates. History The product that was to become Marmite was invented during the late 19th century when German scientist Justus von Liebig discovered that brewer's yeast could be concentrated, bottled and eaten. During 1902, the Marmite Food Extract Company was formed in Burton upon Trent, Staffordshire, England with Marmite as its main product and Burton as the site of the first factory. The by-product yeast needed for the paste was supplied by Bass Brewery. By 1907, the product had become successful enough to warrant construction of a second factory at Camberwell Green in London. By 1912, the discovery of vitamins was a boost for Marmite, as the spread is a rich source of the vitamin B complex; with the vitamin B1 deficiency beriberi being common during World War I, the spread became more popular. British troops during World War I were issued Marmite as part of their rations. During the 1930s, Marmite was used by the English scientist Lucy Wills to successfully treat a form of anaemia in mill workers in Bombay. She later identified folic acid as the active ingredient. Marmite was used to treat malnutrition by Suriya-Mal workers during the 1934–5 malaria epidemic in Sri Lanka. Housewives were encouraged to spread Marmite thinly and to "use it sparingly just now" because of limited rations of the product. During 1990, Marmite Limited, which had become a subsidiary of Bovril Limited, was bought by CPC International Inc, which changed its name to Best Foods Inc during 1998. Best Foods Inc subsequently merged with Unilever during 2000, and Marmite is now a trademark owned by Unilever. Similar products There are a number of similar yeast products available in other countries; these products are not directly connected to the original Marmite recipe and brand. The Australian product Vegemite was developed in early 1920s by Cyril Callister for Fred Walker and Co. due to shortages of Marmite exports to Australia as a result of the First World War. It is now distributed in many countries, and AussieMite is sold in Australia. Other products include OzeMite, which is made by Dick Smith Foods; Cenovit, a Brazilian spread; Vitam-R, a German spread; Cenovis, a Swiss spread; and Vegex, an autolyzed yeast product available in the United States since 1913. In the United Kingdom own-brand yeast extract, very similar to Marmite, is sold by Sainsbury's, Tesco and Aldi. Usage Marmite has traditionally been eaten as a savoury spread on bread, toast, savoury biscuits or crackers, and other similar baked products. Owing to its concentrated taste, it is often spread very thinly in combination with butter or margarine. It can be made into a savoury hot drink by adding one teaspoon to a mug of hot water, much like Oxo or Bovril. It is also commonly used to enrich casseroles and stews. Marmite is often paired with cheese—for example, in a cheese sandwich or a cheese-flavoured biscuit such as Mini Cheddars. In the UK, Starbucks offers a cheese and Marmite panini. There are Marmite-flavored varieties of Walkers Crisps, and of some brands of rice cakes and biscuits. Marmite has also been used as an ingredient in cocktails, including the Marmite Cocktail and the Marmite Gold Rush. Celebrity chefs have created signature Marmite-flavored recipes: Nigella Lawson has one for Marmite spaghetti, and Heston Blumenthal has one for Marmite consommé. In 2020, Marmite launched a campaign on Instagram—“The Great Marmite Experiment”—-encouraging people to share their Marmite-flavored recipes. The many entries in response included roast potatoes, beef Wellington and cookies. In Malaysia, Singapore and Hong Kong, Marmite is enjoyed stirred into congee (rice porridge), and in an intensely savory Malaysian dish (local Chinese dish) called Marmite Chicken, consisting of fried pieces of chicken tossed in a Marmite sauce. Manufacture While the process is secret, the general method for making yeast extract on a commercial scale is to add salt to a suspension of yeast, making the solution hypertonic, which results in the cells shrivelling; this triggers autolysis, during which the yeast self-destructs. The dying yeast cells are then heated to complete their breakdown, and since yeast cells have thick cell walls which would detract from the smoothness of the end product, the husks are sieved out. As with other yeast extracts, Marmite contains free glutamic acid, the monosodium salt of which being monosodium glutamate. Currently, the main ingredients of Marmite are glutamic acid-rich yeast extract, with lesser quantities of salt, vegetable extract, spice extracts and celery extracts, although the precise composition is a trade secret. Vitamins added for food fortification include riboflavin, folic acid, and Vitamin B12. Vitamin B12 is not naturally found in yeast extract, but is very important for vegans who are at risk of deficiency. Nutritional information Marmite is rich in B vitamins including thiamin (B1), riboflavin (B2), niacin (B3), folic acid (B9). Vitamin B12 is only available through artificial enrichment; riboflavin and folic acid are added on top of the naturally-occurring amount. The sodium content of the spread is high and has caused concern, although it is the amount per serving rather than the percentage in bulk Marmite that is relevant. The main ingredient of Marmite is yeast extract, which contains a high concentration of glutamic acid. Marmite is not gluten free, as it is made with wheat, and although it is thoroughly washed, it may contain small quantities of gluten. Marmite should be avoided if a person takes a MAOI antidepressant, such as phenelzine (Nardil) or tranylcypromine (Parnate), as yeast extracts interact adversely with these types of medications due to their tyramine content. Storage Marmite should be stored in the dark and kept cool, but should not be refrigerated. The "best before" date is given as guidance for the loss of vitamins rather than safety. Marketing Marmite's publicity campaigns initially emphasised the spread's healthy nature, extolling it as "The growing up spread you never grow out of". The first major Marmite advertising campaign began during the 1930s, with characters whose faces incorporated the word "good". Soon afterwards, the increasing awareness of vitamins was used in Marmite advertising, with slogans proclaiming that "A small quantity added to the daily diet will ensure you and your family are taking sufficient vitamin B to keep nerves, brain, and digestion in proper working order". During the 1980s, the spread was advertised with the slogan "My mate, Marmite", chanted in television commercials by an army platoon. The spread had been a standard vitamin supplement for British-based German POWs during the Second World War. By the 1990s Marmite's distinctive and powerful flavour had earned it as many detractors as it had fans, and it was known for producing a polarised "love/hate" reaction amongst consumers. For many years television advertisements for Marmite featured the song "Low Rider" by the band War with the lyrics changed to the phrase "My Mate, Marmite". Marmite began a "Love it or Hate it" campaign during October 1996, and this resulted in the inventing of the phrase "Marmite effect" or "Marmite reaction" for anything which provoked controversy. On 22 April 2010, Unilever threatened legal action against the British National Party for using a jar of Marmite and the "love it or hate it" slogan in a party political broadcast. Availability worldwide Because of the local product named Marmite, European Marmite is sold by the name "Our Mate" in Australia and New Zealand. New Zealand Marmite uses the name "NZ-Mite" elsewhere. A similar product with the same name, albeit manufactured by Sanitarium is available in Australia and New Zealand. Denmark In Denmark, food safety legislation dictates that foodstuffs that contain added vitamins can only be sold by retailers which have been licensed by the Veterinary and Food Administration. During May 2011, the company that imports the product to Denmark revealed that it was not licensed and had therefore stopped selling the product: this resulted in widespread but inaccurate reports by the British media that Marmite had been banned by the Danish authorities. The Danish Veterinary and Food Administration stated during 2015 that Marmite had not been banned in the country, but that fortified foods need to be tested for safety and approved before they can be marketed in the country. The issue was resolved in 2016, after the completion of a 2014 supplier-requested test. Canada On 24 January 2014, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency was noted, in a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation story, as preparing to stop the sale of Marmite, as well as Vegemite and Ovaltine, in Canada because they were enriched with vitamins and minerals which were not listed by Canadian food regulations. The agency said the products were not a health hazard. The CFIA later specified that these specific items had been seized because they were not the versions that are formulated for sale in Canada and which satisfied all Canadian food regulations. Canadian versions of Marmite and the other products would still be permitted to be sold in Canada. South Africa Marmite is manufactured by licence in South Africa by Pioneer Foods in its traditional form. South Africa also produces a bottled, long-life Marmite-flavoured Cheese Spread, which is extremely popular in that country. It is light in texture and contains a hint of Marmite, making in more palatable to Marmite novices. . In addition, Lancewood, a major dairy producer in South Africa, manufactures a fresh Full-cream Cheese Spread, flavoured with Marmite, especially for those who prefer fresh dairy over the long-life variety. Also immensely popular in South African baking corners, is a sweet and savoury tea cake that is topped with a hint of Marmite-butter and grated cheese. Special editions During 2002 a 100th anniversary jar was released. During February 2007, Marmite produced a limited edition Guinness Marmite of 300,000 250g jars of their yeast extract with 30% Guinness yeast, giving it a noticeable hint of "Guinness" flavour. During January 2008 Champagne Marmite was released for Valentine's Day, with a limited-edition production of 600,000 units initially released exclusively to Selfridges of London. The product had 0.3% champagne added to the recipe, and a modified heart-shaped label with "I love you" in place of the logo. During 2009, a limited edition Marston's Pedigree Marmite was initiated to celebrate the 2009 Ashes Cricket test series. During March 2010, a "super-strength" version of Marmite was released, called Marmite XO (XO standing for "extra old"). Marmite XO is matured for 28 days, which four times longer than usual. The original Marmite XO's cap was black, and has a black and gold label. In July 2019, Marmite XO returned due to popular demand. The 2019 version has an off-white cap as opposed to the original black. During April 2012, a special edition jar in commemoration of the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II was released. With the product renamed "Ma'amite," the redesigned label featured a colour scheme based upon the Union Jack; the marmite and spoon logo replaced by a gold crown, and with a red rather than yellow cap. The front label also declares "Made with 100% British Yeast". Coinciding with the 110th anniversary of the brand, production was limited to 300,000 jars. For Christmas 2012 a gold limited edition was begun, containing edible gold-coloured flecks. Marmite chocolate is also available. During 2015, Marmite Summer of Love Special Edition featured a flower power themed label. This special edition's blend had a lighter taste made using 100% Lager yeast. See also Ambient food Cenovis Guinness Yeast Extract List of spreads Nutritional yeast Promite Twiglets Marmite (New Zealand) Lees_(fermentation) References External links Brand name condiments British condiments Food brands of the United Kingdom Food paste Products introduced in 1902 Umami enhancers Unilever brands Vegan cuisine Yeast extract spreads

20092

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mabon%20ap%20Modron

Mabon ap Modron

Mabon ap Modron is a prominent figure from Welsh literature and mythology, the son of Modron and a member of Arthur's war band. Both he and his mother were likely deities in origin, descending from a divine mother–son pair. He is often equated with the Demetian hero Pryderi fab Pwyll, and may be associated with the minor Arthurian character Mabon ab Mellt. Etymology His name is related to the Romano-British god Maponos, whose name means "Great Son"; Modron, in turn, is likely related to the Gaulish goddess Dea Matrona. The name Mabon is derived from the Common Brittonic and Gaulish deity name Maponos "Great Son", from the Proto-Celtic root *makwo- "son". Similarly, Modron is derived from the name of the Brittonic and Gaulish deity Mātronā, meaning "Great Mother", from Proto-Celtic *mātīr "mother". Role in Welsh tradition Culhwch ac Olwen Culhwch's father, King Cilydd, the son of Celyddon, loses his wife Goleuddydd after a difficult childbirth. When he remarries, the young Culhwch rejects his stepmother's attempt to pair him with his new stepsister. Offended, the new queen puts a curse on him so that he can marry no one besides the beautiful Olwen, daughter of the giant Ysbaddaden. Though he has never seen her, Culhwch becomes infatuated with her, but his father warns him that he will never find her without the aid of his famous cousin Arthur. The young man immediately sets off to seek his kinsman. He finds him at his court in Celliwig in Cornwall and asks for support and assistance. Cai is the first knight to volunteer to assist Culhwch in his quest, promising to stand by his side until Olwen is found. A further five knights join them in their mission. They travel onwards until they come across the "fairest of the castles of the world", and meet Ysbaddaden's shepherd brother, Custennin. They learn that the castle belongs to Ysbaddaden, that he stripped Custennin of his lands and murdered the shepherd's twenty-three children out of cruelty. Custennin sets up a meeting between Culhwch and Olwen, and the maiden agrees to lead Culhwch and his companions to Ysbadadden's castle. Cai pledges to protect the twenty-fourth son, Goreu, with his life. The knights attack the castle by stealth, killing the nine porters and the nine watchdogs, and enter the giant's hall. Upon their arrival, Ysbaddaden attempts to kill Culhwch with a poison dart, but is outwitted and wounded, first by Bedwyr, then by the enchanter Menw, and finally by Culhwch himself. Eventually, Ysbaddaden relents, and agrees to give Culhwch his daughter on the condition that he completes a number of impossible tasks (anoethau), including hunting the Twrch Trwyth and recovering the exalted prisoner, Mabon son of Modron, the only man able to hunt the dog Drudwyn, in turn the only dog who can track the Twrch Trwyth. Arthur and his men learn that Mabon was stolen from his mother's arms when he was three nights old, and question the world's oldest and wisest animals about his whereabouts, until they are led to the salmon of Llyn Llyw, the oldest animal of them all. The enormous salmon carries Arthur's men Cei and Bedwyr downstream to Mabon's prison in Gloucester; they hear him through the walls, singing a lamentation for his fate. The rest of Arthur's men launch an assault on the front of the prison, while Cei and Bedwyr sneak in the back and rescue Mabon. He subsequently plays a key role in the hunt for the Twrch Trwyth. Other appearances One of the earliest direct reference to Mabon can be found in the tenth century poem Pa Gur, in which Arthur recounts the feats and achievements of his knights so as to gain entrance to a fortress guarded by Glewlwyd Gafaelfawr, the eponymous porter. The poem relates that Mabon fab Mydron (a misspelling of Modron) is one of Arthur's followers, and is described as a "servant to Uther Pendragon". A second figure, Mabon fab Mellt, is described as having "stained the grass with blood". He further appears in the medieval tale The Dream of Rhonabwy, in which he fights alongside Arthur at the Battle of Badon and is described as one of the king's chief advisors. Mabon is almost certainly related to the continental Arthurian figures Mabonagrain, Mabuz, Nabon le Noir and Maboun. References Arthurian characters Welsh gods Welsh mythology Uther Pendragon

20097

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwave

Microwave

Microwave is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths ranging from about one meter to one millimeter corresponding to frequencies between 300 MHz and 300 GHz respectively. Different sources define different frequency ranges as microwaves; the above broad definition includes both UHF and EHF (millimeter wave) bands. A more common definition in radio-frequency engineering is the range between 1 and 100 GHz (wavelengths between 0.3 m and 3 mm). In all cases, microwaves include the entire SHF band (3 to 30 GHz, or 10 to 1 cm) at minimum. Frequencies in the microwave range are often referred to by their IEEE radar band designations: S, C, X, Ku, K, or Ka band, or by similar NATO or EU designations. The prefix in microwave is not meant to suggest a wavelength in the micrometer range. Rather, it indicates that microwaves are "small" (having shorter wavelengths), compared to the radio waves used prior to microwave technology. The boundaries between far infrared, terahertz radiation, microwaves, and ultra-high-frequency radio waves are fairly arbitrary and are used variously between different fields of study. Microwaves travel by line-of-sight; unlike lower frequency radio waves they do not diffract around hills, follow the earth's surface as ground waves, or reflect from the ionosphere, so terrestrial microwave communication links are limited by the visual horizon to about . At the high end of the band, they are absorbed by gases in the atmosphere, limiting practical communication distances to around a kilometer. Microwaves are widely used in modern technology, for example in point-to-point communication links, wireless networks, microwave radio relay networks, radar, satellite and spacecraft communication, medical diathermy and cancer treatment, remote sensing, radio astronomy, particle accelerators, spectroscopy, industrial heating, collision avoidance systems, garage door openers and keyless entry systems, and for cooking food in microwave ovens. Electromagnetic spectrum Microwaves occupy a place in the electromagnetic spectrum with frequency above ordinary radio waves, and below infrared light: In descriptions of the electromagnetic spectrum, some sources classify microwaves as radio waves, a subset of the radio wave band; while others classify microwaves and radio waves as distinct types of radiation. This is an arbitrary distinction. Propagation Microwaves travel solely by line-of-sight paths; unlike lower frequency radio waves, they do not travel as ground waves which follow the contour of the Earth, or reflect off the ionosphere (skywaves). Although at the low end of the band they can pass through building walls enough for useful reception, usually rights of way cleared to the first Fresnel zone are required. Therefore, on the surface of the Earth, microwave communication links are limited by the visual horizon to about . Microwaves are absorbed by moisture in the atmosphere, and the attenuation increases with frequency, becoming a significant factor (rain fade) at the high end of the band. Beginning at about 40 GHz, atmospheric gases also begin to absorb microwaves, so above this frequency microwave transmission is limited to a few kilometers. A spectral band structure causes absorption peaks at specific frequencies (see graph at right). Above 100 GHz, the absorption of electromagnetic radiation by Earth's atmosphere is so great that it is in effect opaque, until the atmosphere becomes transparent again in the so-called infrared and optical window frequency ranges. Troposcatter In a microwave beam directed at an angle into the sky, a small amount of the power will be randomly scattered as the beam passes through the troposphere. A sensitive receiver beyond the horizon with a high gain antenna focused on that area of the troposphere can pick up the signal. This technique has been used at frequencies between 0.45 and 5 GHz in tropospheric scatter (troposcatter) communication systems to communicate beyond the horizon, at distances up to 300 km. Antennas The short wavelengths of microwaves allow omnidirectional antennas for portable devices to be made very small, from 1 to 20 centimeters long, so microwave frequencies are widely used for wireless devices such as cell phones, cordless phones, and wireless LANs (Wi-Fi) access for laptops, and Bluetooth earphones. Antennas used include short whip antennas, rubber ducky antennas, sleeve dipoles, patch antennas, and increasingly the printed circuit inverted F antenna (PIFA) used in cell phones. Their short wavelength also allows narrow beams of microwaves to be produced by conveniently small high gain antennas from a half meter to 5 meters in diameter. Therefore, beams of microwaves are used for point-to-point communication links, and for radar. An advantage of narrow beams is that they do not interfere with nearby equipment using the same frequency, allowing frequency reuse by nearby transmitters. Parabolic ("dish") antennas are the most widely used directive antennas at microwave frequencies, but horn antennas, slot antennas and dielectric lens antennas are also used. Flat microstrip antennas are being increasingly used in consumer devices. Another directive antenna practical at microwave frequencies is the phased array, a computer-controlled array of antennas that produces a beam that can be electronically steered in different directions. At microwave frequencies, the transmission lines which are used to carry lower frequency radio waves to and from antennas, such as coaxial cable and parallel wire lines, have excessive power losses, so when low attenuation is required microwaves are carried by metal pipes called waveguides. Due to the high cost and maintenance requirements of waveguide runs, in many microwave antennas the output stage of the transmitter or the RF front end of the receiver is located at the antenna. Design and analysis The term microwave also has a more technical meaning in electromagnetics and circuit theory. Apparatus and techniques may be described qualitatively as "microwave" when the wavelengths of signals are roughly the same as the dimensions of the circuit, so that lumped-element circuit theory is inaccurate, and instead distributed circuit elements and transmission-line theory are more useful methods for design and analysis. As a consequence, practical microwave circuits tend to move away from the discrete resistors, capacitors, and inductors used with lower-frequency radio waves. Open-wire and coaxial transmission lines used at lower frequencies are replaced by waveguides and stripline, and lumped-element tuned circuits are replaced by cavity resonators or resonant stubs. In turn, at even higher frequencies, where the wavelength of the electromagnetic waves becomes small in comparison to the size of the structures used to process them, microwave techniques become inadequate, and the methods of optics are used. Microwave sources High-power microwave sources use specialized vacuum tubes to generate microwaves. These devices operate on different principles from low-frequency vacuum tubes, using the ballistic motion of electrons in a vacuum under the influence of controlling electric or magnetic fields, and include the magnetron (used in microwave ovens), klystron, traveling-wave tube (TWT), and gyrotron. These devices work in the density modulated mode, rather than the current modulated mode. This means that they work on the basis of clumps of electrons flying ballistically through them, rather than using a continuous stream of electrons. Low-power microwave sources use solid-state devices such as the field-effect transistor (at least at lower frequencies), tunnel diodes, Gunn diodes, and IMPATT diodes. Low-power sources are available as benchtop instruments, rackmount instruments, embeddable modules and in card-level formats. A maser is a solid state device which amplifies microwaves using similar principles to the laser, which amplifies higher frequency light waves. All warm objects emit low level microwave black-body radiation, depending on their temperature, so in meteorology and remote sensing, microwave radiometers are used to measure the temperature of objects or terrain. The sun and other astronomical radio sources such as Cassiopeia A emit low level microwave radiation which carries information about their makeup, which is studied by radio astronomers using receivers called radio telescopes. The cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR), for example, is a weak microwave noise filling empty space which is a major source of information on cosmology's Big Bang theory of the origin of the Universe. Microwave uses Microwave technology is extensively used for point-to-point telecommunications (i.e. non-broadcast uses). Microwaves are especially suitable for this use since they are more easily focused into narrower beams than radio waves, allowing frequency reuse; their comparatively higher frequencies allow broad bandwidth and high data transmission rates, and antenna sizes are smaller than at lower frequencies because antenna size is inversely proportional to the transmitted frequency. Microwaves are used in spacecraft communication, and much of the world's data, TV, and telephone communications are transmitted long distances by microwaves between ground stations and communications satellites. Microwaves are also employed in microwave ovens and in radar technology. Communication Before the advent of fiber-optic transmission, most long-distance telephone calls were carried via networks of microwave radio relay links run by carriers such as AT&T Long Lines. Starting in the early 1950s, frequency-division multiplexing was used to send up to 5,400 telephone channels on each microwave radio channel, with as many as ten radio channels combined into one antenna for the hop to the next site, up to 70 km away. Wireless LAN protocols, such as Bluetooth and the IEEE 802.11 specifications used for Wi-Fi, also use microwaves in the 2.4 GHz ISM band, although 802.11a uses ISM band and U-NII frequencies in the 5 GHz range. Licensed long-range (up to about 25 km) Wireless Internet Access services have been used for almost a decade in many countries in the 3.5–4.0 GHz range. The FCC recently carved out spectrum for carriers that wish to offer services in this range in the U.S. — with emphasis on 3.65 GHz. Dozens of service providers across the country are securing or have already received licenses from the FCC to operate in this band. The WIMAX service offerings that can be carried on the 3.65 GHz band will give business customers another option for connectivity. Metropolitan area network (MAN) protocols, such as WiMAX (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access) are based on standards such as IEEE 802.16, designed to operate between 2 and 11 GHz. Commercial implementations are in the 2.3 GHz, 2.5 GHz, 3.5 GHz and 5.8 GHz ranges. Mobile Broadband Wireless Access (MBWA) protocols based on standards specifications such as IEEE 802.20 or ATIS/ANSI HC-SDMA (such as iBurst) operate between 1.6 and 2.3 GHz to give mobility and in-building penetration characteristics similar to mobile phones but with vastly greater spectral efficiency. Some mobile phone networks, like GSM, use the low-microwave/high-UHF frequencies around 1.8 and 1.9 GHz in the Americas and elsewhere, respectively. DVB-SH and S-DMB use 1.452 to 1.492 GHz, while proprietary/incompatible satellite radio in the U.S. uses around 2.3 GHz for DARS. Microwave radio is used in broadcasting and telecommunication transmissions because, due to their short wavelength, highly directional antennas are smaller and therefore more practical than they would be at longer wavelengths (lower frequencies). There is also more bandwidth in the microwave spectrum than in the rest of the radio spectrum; the usable bandwidth below 300 MHz is less than 300 MHz while many GHz can be used above 300 MHz. Typically, microwaves are used in television news to transmit a signal from a remote location to a television station from a specially equipped van. See broadcast auxiliary service (BAS), remote pickup unit (RPU), and studio/transmitter link (STL). Most satellite communications systems operate in the C, X, Ka, or Ku bands of the microwave spectrum. These frequencies allow large bandwidth while avoiding the crowded UHF frequencies and staying below the atmospheric absorption of EHF frequencies. Satellite TV either operates in the C band for the traditional large dish fixed satellite service or Ku band for direct-broadcast satellite. Military communications run primarily over X or Ku-band links, with Ka band being used for Milstar. Navigation Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) including the Chinese Beidou, the American Global Positioning System (introduced in 1978) and the Russian GLONASS broadcast navigational signals in various bands between about 1.2 GHz and 1.6 GHz. Radar Radar is a radiolocation technique in which a beam of radio waves emitted by a transmitter bounces off an object and returns to a receiver, allowing the location, range, speed, and other characteristics of the object to be determined. The short wavelength of microwaves causes large reflections from objects the size of motor vehicles, ships and aircraft. Also, at these wavelengths, the high gain antennas such as parabolic antennas which are required to produce the narrow beamwidths needed to accurately locate objects are conveniently small, allowing them to be rapidly turned to scan for objects. Therefore, microwave frequencies are the main frequencies used in radar. Microwave radar is widely used for applications such as air traffic control, weather forecasting, navigation of ships, and speed limit enforcement. Long-distance radars use the lower microwave frequencies since at the upper end of the band atmospheric absorption limits the range, but millimeter waves are used for short-range radar such as collision avoidance systems. Radio astronomy Microwaves emitted by astronomical radio sources; planets, stars, galaxies, and nebulas are studied in radio astronomy with large dish antennas called radio telescopes. In addition to receiving naturally occurring microwave radiation, radio telescopes have been used in active radar experiments to bounce microwaves off planets in the solar system, to determine the distance to the Moon or map the invisible surface of Venus through cloud cover. A recently completed microwave radio telescope is the Atacama Large Millimeter Array, located at more than 5,000 meters (16,597 ft) altitude in Chile, observes the universe in the millimetre and submillimetre wavelength ranges. The world's largest ground-based astronomy project to date, it consists of more than 66 dishes and was built in an international collaboration by Europe, North America, East Asia and Chile. A major recent focus of microwave radio astronomy has been mapping the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR) discovered in 1964 by radio astronomers Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson. This faint background radiation, which fills the universe and is almost the same in all directions, is "relic radiation" from the Big Bang, and is one of the few sources of information about conditions in the early universe. Due to the expansion and thus cooling of the Universe, the originally high-energy radiation has been shifted into the microwave region of the radio spectrum. Sufficiently sensitive radio telescopes can detect the CMBR as a faint signal that is not associated with any star, galaxy, or other object. Heating and power application A microwave oven passes microwave radiation at a frequency near through food, causing dielectric heating primarily by absorption of the energy in water. Microwave ovens became common kitchen appliances in Western countries in the late 1970s, following the development of less expensive cavity magnetrons. Water in the liquid state possesses many molecular interactions that broaden the absorption peak. In the vapor phase, isolated water molecules absorb at around 22 GHz, almost ten times the frequency of the microwave oven. Microwave heating is used in industrial processes for drying and curing products. Many semiconductor processing techniques use microwaves to generate plasma for such purposes as reactive ion etching and plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD). Microwaves are used in stellarators and tokamak experimental fusion reactors to help break down the gas into a plasma, and heat it to very high temperatures. The frequency is tuned to the cyclotron resonance of the electrons in the magnetic field, anywhere between 2–200 GHz, hence it is often referred to as Electron Cyclotron Resonance Heating (ECRH). The upcoming ITER thermonuclear reactor will use up to 20 MW of 170 GHz microwaves. Microwaves can be used to transmit power over long distances, and post-World War 2 research was done to examine possibilities. NASA worked in the 1970s and early 1980s to research the possibilities of using solar power satellite (SPS) systems with large solar arrays that would beam power down to the Earth's surface via microwaves. Less-than-lethal weaponry exists that uses millimeter waves to heat a thin layer of human skin to an intolerable temperature so as to make the targeted person move away. A two-second burst of the 95 GHz focused beam heats the skin to a temperature of at a depth of . The United States Air Force and Marines are currently using this type of active denial system in fixed installations. Spectroscopy Microwave radiation is used in electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR or ESR) spectroscopy, typically in the X-band region (~9 GHz) in conjunction typically with magnetic fields of 0.3 T. This technique provides information on unpaired electrons in chemical systems, such as free radicals or transition metal ions such as Cu(II). Microwave radiation is also used to perform rotational spectroscopy and can be combined with electrochemistry as in microwave enhanced electrochemistry. Microwave frequency bands Bands of frequencies in the microwave spectrum are designated by letters. Unfortunately, there are several incompatible band designation systems, and even within a system the frequency ranges corresponding to some of the letters vary somewhat between different application fields. The letter system had its origin in World War 2 in a top secret U.S. classification of bands used in radar sets; this is the origin of the oldest letter system, the IEEE radar bands. One set of microwave frequency bands designations by the Radio Society of Great Britain (RSGB), is tabulated below: Other definitions exist. The term P band is sometimes used for UHF frequencies below the L band but is now obsolete per IEEE Std 521. When radars were first developed at K band during World War 2, it was not known that there was a nearby absorption band (due to water vapor and oxygen in the atmosphere). To avoid this problem, the original K band was split into a lower band, Ku, and upper band, Ka. Microwave frequency measurement Microwave frequency can be measured by either electronic or mechanical techniques. Frequency counters or high frequency heterodyne systems can be used. Here the unknown frequency is compared with harmonics of a known lower frequency by use of a low-frequency generator, a harmonic generator and a mixer. The accuracy of the measurement is limited by the accuracy and stability of the reference source. Mechanical methods require a tunable resonator such as an absorption wavemeter, which has a known relation between a physical dimension and frequency. In a laboratory setting, Lecher lines can be used to directly measure the wavelength on a transmission line made of parallel wires, the frequency can then be calculated. A similar technique is to use a slotted waveguide or slotted coaxial line to directly measure the wavelength. These devices consist of a probe introduced into the line through a longitudinal slot so that the probe is free to travel up and down the line. Slotted lines are primarily intended for measurement of the voltage standing wave ratio on the line. However, provided a standing wave is present, they may also be used to measure the distance between the nodes, which is equal to half the wavelength. The precision of this method is limited by the determination of the nodal locations. Effects on health Microwaves are non-ionizing radiation, which means that microwave photons do not contain sufficient energy to ionize molecules or break chemical bonds, or cause DNA damage, as ionizing radiation such as x-rays or ultraviolet can. The word "radiation" refers to energy radiating from a source and not to radioactivity. The main effect of absorption of microwaves is to heat materials; the electromagnetic fields cause polar molecules to vibrate. It has not been shown conclusively that microwaves (or other non-ionizing electromagnetic radiation) have significant adverse biological effects at low levels. Some, but not all, studies suggest that long-term exposure may have a carcinogenic effect. During World War 2, it was observed that individuals in the radiation path of radar installations experienced clicks and buzzing sounds in response to microwave radiation. Research by NASA in the 1970s has shown this to be caused by thermal expansion in parts of the inner ear. In 1955 Dr. James Lovelock was able to reanimate rats chilled to 0-1 °C using microwave diathermy. When injury from exposure to microwaves occurs, it usually results from dielectric heating induced in the body. Exposure to microwave radiation can produce cataracts by this mechanism, because the microwave heating denatures proteins in the crystalline lens of the eye (in the same way that heat turns egg whites white and opaque). The lens and cornea of the eye are especially vulnerable because they contain no blood vessels that can carry away heat. Exposure to heavy doses of microwave radiation (as from an oven that has been tampered with to allow operation even with the door open) can produce heat damage in other tissues as well, up to and including serious burns that may not be immediately evident because of the tendency for microwaves to heat deeper tissues with higher moisture content. Eleanor R. Adair conducted microwave health research by exposing herself, animals and humans to microwave levels that made them feel warm or even start to sweat and feel quite uncomfortable. She found no adverse health effects other than heat. History Hertzian optics Microwaves were first generated in the 1890s in some of the earliest radio experiments by physicists who thought of them as a form of "invisible light". James Clerk Maxwell in his 1873 theory of electromagnetism, now called Maxwell's equations, had predicted that a coupled electric field and magnetic field could travel through space as an electromagnetic wave, and proposed that light consisted of electromagnetic waves of short wavelength. In 1888, German physicist Heinrich Hertz was the first to demonstrate the existence of radio waves using a primitive spark gap radio transmitter. Hertz and the other early radio researchers were interested in exploring the similarities between radio waves and light waves, to test Maxwell's theory. They concentrated on producing short wavelength radio waves in the UHF and microwave ranges, with which they could duplicate classic optics experiments in their laboratories, using quasioptical components such as prisms and lenses made of paraffin, sulfur and pitch and wire diffraction gratings, to refract and diffract radio waves like light rays. Hertz produced waves up to 450 MHz; his directional 450 MHz transmitter consisted of a 26 cm brass rod dipole antenna with a spark gap between the ends, suspended at the focal line of a parabolic antenna made of a curved zinc sheet, powered by high voltage pulses from an induction coil. His historic experiments demonstrated that radio waves like light exhibited refraction, diffraction, polarization, interference and standing waves, proving that radio waves and light waves were both forms of Maxwell's electromagnetic waves. Beginning in 1894 Indian physicist Jagadish Chandra Bose performed the first experiments with microwaves. He was the first person to produce millimeter waves, generating frequencies up to 60 GHz (5 millimeter) using a 3 mm metal ball spark oscillator. Bose also invented waveguide, horn antennas, and semiconductor crystal detectors for use in his experiments. Independently in 1894, Oliver Lodge and Augusto Righi experimented with 1.5 and 12 GHz microwaves respectively, generated by small metal ball spark resonators. Russian physicist Pyotr Lebedev in 1895 generated 50 GHz millimeter waves. In 1897 Lord Rayleigh solved the mathematical boundary-value problem of electromagnetic waves propagating through conducting tubes and dielectric rods of arbitrary shape. which gave the modes and cutoff frequency of microwaves propagating through a waveguide. However, since microwaves were limited to line of sight paths, they could not communicate beyond the visual horizon, and the low power of the spark transmitters then in use limited their practical range to a few miles. The subsequent development of radio communication after 1896 employed lower frequencies, which could travel beyond the horizon as ground waves and by reflecting off the ionosphere as skywaves, and microwave frequencies were not further explored at this time. First microwave communication experiments Practical use of microwave frequencies did not occur until the 1940s and 1950s due to a lack of adequate sources, since the triode vacuum tube (valve) electronic oscillator used in radio transmitters could not produce frequencies above a few hundred megahertz due to excessive electron transit time and interelectrode capacitance. By the 1930s, the first low-power microwave vacuum tubes had been developed using new principles; the Barkhausen-Kurz tube and the split-anode magnetron. These could generate a few watts of power at frequencies up to a few gigahertz and were used in the first experiments in communication with microwaves. In 1931 an Anglo-French consortium headed by Andre C. Clavier demonstrated the first experimental microwave relay link, across the English Channel between Dover, UK and Calais, France. The system transmitted telephony, telegraph and facsimile data over bidirectional 1.7 GHz beams with a power of one-half watt, produced by miniature Barkhausen-Kurz tubes at the focus of metal dishes. A word was needed to distinguish these new shorter wavelengths, which had previously been lumped into the "short wave" band, which meant all waves shorter than 200 meters. The terms quasi-optical waves and ultrashort waves were used briefly, but did not catch on. The first usage of the word micro-wave apparently occurred in 1931. Radar The development of radar, mainly in secrecy, before and during World War 2, resulted in the technological advances which made microwaves practical. Wavelengths in the centimeter range were required to give the small radar antennas which were compact enough to fit on aircraft a narrow enough beamwidth to localize enemy aircraft. It was found that conventional transmission lines used to carry radio waves had excessive power losses at microwave frequencies, and George Southworth at Bell Labs and Wilmer Barrow at MIT independently invented waveguide in 1936. Barrow invented the horn antenna in 1938 as a means to efficiently radiate microwaves into or out of a waveguide. In a microwave receiver, a nonlinear component was needed that would act as a detector and mixer at these frequencies, as vacuum tubes had too much capacitance. To fill this need researchers resurrected an obsolete technology, the point contact crystal detector (cat whisker detector) which was used as a demodulator in crystal radios around the turn of the century before vacuum tube receivers. The low capacitance of semiconductor junctions allowed them to function at microwave frequencies. The first modern silicon and germanium diodes were developed as microwave detectors in the 1930s, and the principles of semiconductor physics learned during their development led to semiconductor electronics after the war. The first powerful sources of microwaves were invented at the beginning of World War 2: the klystron tube by Russell and Sigurd Varian at Stanford University in 1937, and the cavity magnetron tube by John Randall and Harry Boot at Birmingham University, UK in 1940. Ten centimeter (3 GHz) microwave radar was in use on British warplanes in late 1941 and proved to be a game changer. Britain's 1940 decision to share its microwave technology with its US ally (the Tizard Mission) significantly shortened the war. The MIT Radiation Laboratory established secretly at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1940 to research radar, produced much of the theoretical knowledge necessary to use microwaves. The first microwave relay systems were developed by the Allied military near the end of the war and used for secure battlefield communication networks in the European theater. Post World War 2 After World War 2, microwaves were rapidly exploited commercially. Due to their high frequency they had a very large information-carrying capacity (bandwidth); a single microwave beam could carry tens of thousands of phone calls. In the 1950s and 60s transcontinental microwave relay networks were built in the US and Europe to exchange telephone calls between cities and distribute television programs. In the new television broadcasting industry, from the 1940s microwave dishes were used to transmit backhaul video feeds from mobile production trucks back to the studio, allowing the first remote TV broadcasts. The first communications satellites were launched in the 1960s, which relayed telephone calls and television between widely separated points on Earth using microwave beams. In 1964, Arno Penzias and Robert Woodrow Wilson while investigating noise in a satellite horn antenna at Bell Labs, Holmdel, New Jersey discovered cosmic microwave background radiation. Microwave radar became the central technology used in air traffic control, maritime navigation, anti-aircraft defense, ballistic missile detection, and later many other uses. Radar and satellite communication motivated the development of modern microwave antennas; the parabolic antenna (the most common type), cassegrain antenna, lens antenna, slot antenna, and phased array. The ability of short waves to quickly heat materials and cook food had been investigated in the 1930s by I. F. Mouromtseff at Westinghouse, and at the 1933 Chicago World's Fair demonstrated cooking meals with a 60 MHz radio transmitter. In 1945 Percy Spencer, an engineer working on radar at Raytheon, noticed that microwave radiation from a magnetron oscillator melted a candy bar in his pocket. He investigated cooking with microwaves and invented the microwave oven, consisting of a magnetron feeding microwaves into a closed metal cavity containing food, which was patented by Raytheon on 8 October 1945. Due to their expense microwave ovens were initially used in institutional kitchens, but by 1986 roughly 25% of households in the U.S. owned one. Microwave heating became widely used as an industrial process in industries such as plastics fabrication, and as a medical therapy to kill cancer cells in microwave hyperthermy. The traveling wave tube (TWT) developed in 1943 by Rudolph Kompfner and John Pierce provided a high-power tunable source of microwaves up to 50 GHz, and became the most widely used microwave tube (besides the ubiquitous magnetron used in microwave ovens). The gyrotron tube family developed in Russia could produce megawatts of power up into millimeter wave frequencies and is used in industrial heating and plasma research, and to power particle accelerators and nuclear fusion reactors. Solid state microwave devices The development of semiconductor electronics in the 1950s led to the first solid state microwave devices which worked by a new principle; negative resistance (some of the prewar microwave tubes had also used negative resistance). The feedback oscillator and two-port amplifiers which were used at lower frequencies became unstable at microwave frequencies, and negative resistance oscillators and amplifiers based on one-port devices like diodes worked better. The tunnel diode invented in 1957 by Japanese physicist Leo Esaki could produce a few milliwatts of microwave power. Its invention set off a search for better negative resistance semiconductor devices for use as microwave oscillators, resulting in the invention of the IMPATT diode in 1956 by W.T. Read and Ralph L. Johnston and the Gunn diode in 1962 by J. B. Gunn. Diodes are the most widely used microwave sources today. Two low-noise solid state negative resistance microwave amplifiers were developed; the ruby maser invented in 1953 by Charles H. Townes, James P. Gordon, and H. J. Zeiger, and the varactor parametric amplifier developed in 1956 by Marion Hines. These were used for low noise microwave receivers in radio telescopes and satellite ground stations. The maser led to the development of atomic clocks, which keep time using a precise microwave frequency emitted by atoms undergoing an electron transition between two energy levels. Negative resistance amplifier circuits required the invention of new nonreciprocal waveguide components, such as circulators, isolators, and directional couplers. In 1969 Kurokawa derived mathematical conditions for stability in negative resistance circuits which formed the basis of microwave oscillator design. Microwave integrated circuits Prior to the 1970s microwave devices and circuits were bulky and expensive, so microwave frequencies were generally limited to the output stage of transmitters and the RF front end of receivers, and signals were heterodyned to a lower intermediate frequency for processing. The period from the 1970s to the present has seen the development of tiny inexpensive active solid-state microwave components which can be mounted on circuit boards, allowing circuits to perform significant signal processing at microwave frequencies. This has made possible satellite television, cable television, GPS devices, and modern wireless devices, such as smartphones, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth which connect to networks using microwaves. Microstrip, a type of transmission line usable at microwave frequencies, was invented with printed circuits in the 1950s. The ability to cheaply fabricate a wide range of shapes on printed circuit boards allowed microstrip versions of capacitors, inductors, resonant stubs, splitters, directional couplers, diplexers, filters and antennas to be made, thus allowing compact microwave circuits to be constructed. Transistors that operated at microwave frequencies were developed in the 1970s. The semiconductor gallium arsenide (GaAs) has a much higher electron mobility than silicon, so devices fabricated with this material can operate at 4 times the frequency of similar devices of silicon. Beginning in the 1970s GaAs was used to make the first microwave transistors, and it has dominated microwave semiconductors ever since. MESFETs (metal-semiconductor field-effect transistors), fast GaAs field effect transistors using Schottky junctions for the gate, were developed starting in 1968 and have reached cutoff frequencies of 100 GHz, and are now the most widely used active microwave devices. Another family of transistors with a higher frequency limit is the HEMT (high electron mobility transistor), a field effect transistor made with two different semiconductors, AlGaAs and GaAs, using heterojunction technology, and the similar HBT (heterojunction bipolar transistor). GaAs can be made semi-insulating, allowing it to be used as a substrate on which circuits containing passive components, as well as transistors, can be fabricated by lithography. By 1976 this led to the first integrated circuits (ICs) which functioned at microwave frequencies, called monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMIC). The word "monolithic" was added to distinguish these from microstrip PCB circuits, which were called "microwave integrated circuits" (MIC). Since then silicon MMICs have also been developed. Today MMICs have become the workhorses of both analog and digital high-frequency electronics, enabling the production of single-chip microwave receivers, broadband amplifiers, modems, and microprocessors. See also Block upconverter (BUC) Cosmic microwave background Electron cyclotron resonance International Microwave Power Institute Low-noise block converter (LNB) Maser Microwave auditory effect Microwave cavity Microwave chemistry Microwave radio relay Microwave transmission Rain fade RF switch matrix The Thing (listening device) References External links EM Talk, Microwave Engineering Tutorials and Tools Millimeter Wave and Microwave Waveguide dimension chart. Electromagnetic spectrum Radio technology

20101

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary

Mary

Mary may refer to: People Mary (name), a feminine given name (includes a list of people with the name) Religious contexts New Testament people named Mary, overview article linking to many of those below Mary, mother of Jesus, also called the Blessed Virgin Mary Mary Magdalene, devoted follower of Jesus Mary of Bethany, follower of Jesus, considered by Western medieval tradition to be the same person as Mary Magdalene Mary (mother of James the Less) Mary of Clopas, follower of Jesus Mary, mother of John Mark Mary of Egypt, patron saint of penitents Mary of Rome, a New Testament woman Mary, mother of Zechariah and sister of Moses and Aaron; mostly known by the Hebrew name: Miriam Mary the Jewess one of the reputed founders of alchemy, referred to by Zosimus. Mary 2.0, Roman Catholic women's movement Maryam (surah) "Mary", 19th surah (chapter) of the Qur'an Royalty Mary, Countess of Blois (1200–1241), daughter of Walter of Avesnes and Margaret of Blois Mary of Burgundy (1457–1482), daughter of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy Mary, Crown Princess of Denmark (born 1972), wife of Crown Prince Frederik Mary I of England (1516–1558), aka "Bloody Mary", Queen of England and Ireland Mary II of England (1662–1694), Queen of England, Scotland, and Ireland Mary of Guelders (c. 1434–1463), daughter of Arnold, Duke of Guelders Mary of Guise (1515–1560), Queen Consort of James V of Scotland and mother of Mary, Queen of Scots Mary of Hungary, daughter of Louis I the Great of Hungary Mary of Modena (1658–1718), Queen Consort of King James II of England and VII of Scotland Mary I of Portugal, daughter of King Joseph I of Portugal Mary II of Portugal, daughter of the future King Pedro IV Mary, Queen of Scots (1542–1587), mother of James I of England Mary of Teck (1867–1953), Queen Consort of George V of the United Kingdom Mary of Woodstock (1278–1332), daughter of Edward I of England Others A pseudonym for Communist Party USA activist Williana Burroughs (1882–1945), used in the 1920s Mary (conjoined twin) (2000–2000), pseudonym of Rosie Attard, subject of a 2001 legal case Mary (slave) (died 1838), an American teenage slave executed for murder Places Mary Province, in southeast Turkmenistan Mary District, in Mary Province Mary, Turkmenistan, capital city of the province, located in Mary District Mary International Airport Mary, Saône-et-Loire, France Mary River (disambiguation) Mary's Point, New Brunswick, Canada Arts and entertainment Film Mary (1931 film), an Alfred Hitchcock film Mary (1994 film), an Australian documentary Mary (2005 film), a film directed by Abel Ferrara about an actress playing Mary Magdalene Mary (2019 film), an American horror film Television Mary (1978 TV series), a variety series Mary (1985 TV series), a sitcom Fictional characters Mary, a character in Total Drama Presents: The Ridonculous Race, a Canadian animated series Mary, a character in the Marvel Comics Star Wars series and a love interest of Luke Skywalker Mary, a character played by Drew Barrymore in the 2009 American romantic comedy-drama movie He's Just Not That Into You Mary Conner, a character in the American sitcom television series Roseanne Mary Jensen, the main character played by Cameron Diaz in the 1998 American romantic comedy movie There's Something About Mary Mary Melody, a character in the Tiny Toon Adventures animated television series Mary Test, the older twin sister of Susan Test in the American animated series Johnny Test Lady Mary Talbot (née Crawley), a character in Downton Abbey, played by Michelle Dockery Music Albums Mary (Mary J. Blige album), 1999 Mary (Mary Travers album), 1971 Mary (Sarkodie album), 2015 Songs "Mary", Russian-language art song by Alexander Egorovich Varlamov "Mary" (Monique Brumby song), a 1996 song from Thylacine Mary (Sarah Slean song), a track on the 2004 album Day One by Sarah Slean Mary (Scissor Sisters song), a 2004 song by American rock band Scissor Sisters Mary (Supergrass song), a 1999 song by British band Supergrass "Mary", a song by Kings of Leon on the album Come Around Sundown "Mary", a song by The 4 of Us on the album Songs for the Tempted "Mary", a song by Tori Amos on the album Tales of a Librarian "Mary", a song by John Cale from the album Shifty Adventures in Nookie Wood "Mary", a song by Oingo Boingo on Boingo "Mary", a song by Robert Fripp on Exposure "Mary", a song by Sarah McLachlan on the album Fumbling Towards Ecstasy "Mary", a song by Buffy Sainte-Marie on Illuminations "Mary", a song by Sublime on the album Robbin' the Hood "Mary", a song by The Subways on the album Young for Eternity "Mary", a song by Pete Townshend written for the concept album Lifehouse "Mary", a song by Dune Rats on The Kids Will Know It's Bullshit "Mary Is a Grand Old Name", a song by George M. Cohan from Forty-five Minutes from Broadway "Mary (I'm in Love with You)", a song written by J. Fred Coots and Ozzie Nelson Novels Mary (Nabokov novel), by Vladimir Nabokov Mary: A Fiction, a 1788 novel by Mary Wollstonecraft Ships and boats Mary (HBC vessel), operated by the HBC from 1737–1749, see Hudson's Bay Company vessels , the proposed naval name and designation for a motorboat that was never acquired Other uses Mary (crater), a lunar impact crater Mary (elephant), an elephant from the Sparks World Famous Shows circus Mary (programming language) Mary 2.0, Roman Catholic women's movement See also Islas Marías (Mary Islands), Mexico Mari (disambiguation) Maria (disambiguation) Marie (disambiguation) Marius (disambiguation) Maryam (surah) "Mary", 19th surah (chapter) of the Qur'an Mery (disambiguation) Miss Mary (disambiguation)

20102

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manasseh

Manasseh

Manasseh may refer to: Places Manasseh Hills, in northern Israel People (surname) Ezekiel Saleh Manasseh (died 1944), Singaporean rice and opium merchant and hotelier Jacob Manasseh (died 1832), Ottoman rabbi Leonard Manasseh (1916–2017), British architect People (given name) Manasseh (tribal patriarch), first son of Joseph Manasseh of Judah, king of Judah in the 7th century BC Manasseh II, hypothetical Jewish ruler of the Khazars in the 9th century BC Manasseh Azure, freelance journalist in Accra, Ghana Manasseh Masseh Lopes (1755–1831), British politician Manasseh Rundial, South Sudanese politician Manasseh Sogavare (born 1955), Solomon Islands politician and Prime Minister See also Manasses Manasse (surname)

20108

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mick%20Doohan

Mick Doohan

Michael Sydney Doohan (born 4 June 1965) is an Australian former Grand Prix motorcycle road racing World Champion, who won five consecutive 500 cc World Championships. Biography Originally from the Gold Coast, Queensland, Doohan attended St Joseph's College, Gregory Terrace and Aspley State High School, Brisbane. He raced in Australian Superbikes in the late 1980s, and also won both races as Superbike World Championship visited Oran Park in as well as the second leg of the Japanese round held earlier in the year. In a break-out season he also won the final Australian motorcycle Grand Prix to be held in the TT format at Mount Panorama before the race became a round of the World Championship the following year and moved to Phillip Island. He is one of the few 500 cc or MotoGP World Champions to have won a Superbike World Championship race. He made his Grand Prix debut for Honda on an NSR 500 cc two-stroke motorcycle in 1989. Late in the 1990 season Doohan claimed his first victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix on his way to third in the championship. In 1991, he was paired with his fellow Australian Wayne Gardner on a Honda RVF750 superbike and won the Suzuka 8 Hours endurance race. He competed successfully throughout the early 1990s and appeared to be on his way to winning his first world championship when he was seriously injured in a practice crash before the 1992 Dutch TT. He suffered permanent and serious damage to his right leg due to medical complications and, at one stage, faced amputation of the leg. At the time, Doohan was 65 points in the lead of the championship, but could not compete for eight weeks after the crash. After an arduous recovery, he returned to racing for the final two races but could not prevent Yamaha rider Wayne Rainey from winning his third consecutive title (by four points from Doohan). In 1993 he struggled with the healing of his leg and the ability to race the Honda at elite level, stating later that in that year it was all he could do to just keep his ride at Honda. It was also during this time he switched to a left thumb-operated rear brake, as his right foot is no longer able to perform this function. In 1994 however, he won his first 500 cc World Championship. Thereafter, until 1998, he dominated the class, winning five consecutive 500 cc World Championships. In 1997, his most successful year, Doohan won 12 out of 15 races, finished second in another two, and crashed out of the final race of the season at his home GP while leading by more than six seconds. In June 1996, Doohan was inducted as a Member of the Order of Australia for his contribution to the sport of motor racing. Despite up to eight rivals on non-factory HRC Honda motorcycles Doohan's margin of superiority over them was such that in many races Doohan would build a comfortable lead and then ride well within his limits to cruise to victory. Although pure riding skill clearly played a large part in his success, the ability of his chief race engineer, Jeremy Burgess, to perfect the suspension and geometry of a racing motorcycle may have given him an advantage over his rivals. Between 1994 and 1998 the bike was said not to have had many changes, with Honda engineers reportedly becoming frustrated at Doohan's reluctance to try innovations such as electronic shifting (it was only when Rossi came to Honda in 2000 that Honda engineers had their head with Rossi willing to try more innovations). One notable trait of Doohan's post-crash riding style was the use of a thumb-operated rear brake developed during 1993 owing to the reduced range of motion in his ankle. This was operated by a "nudge" bar similar to a personal water craft throttle, but mounted on the left handlebar. In 1999 Doohan had another accident, this time in a very wet qualifying session for the Spanish Grand Prix. He again broke his leg in several places and subsequently announced his retirement. Jeremy Burgess, Doohan's chief engineer for his entire career, later became Valentino Rossi's chief engineer. After Doohan retired he went to work as a roving adviser to Honda's Grand Prix race effort. At the conclusion of the 2004 season, Doohan and Honda parted company. In June 2011, Doohan made an appearance at the Isle of Man TT. Doohan completed a parade lap, and was most enamored by the thrill and spectacle of the Snaefell Mountain Course. He then went on to pay tribute to his former Honda racing teammate, Joey Dunlop. Court case On 8 August 2006, Doohan appeared in Darwin Magistrates Court to face charges over a weekend fracas at a strip club. He was fined $2,500 after pleading guilty to assaulting a bouncer and failing to leave a licensed premise. No conviction was recorded. Marriage Doohan married Selina Sines, his partner of eleven years, on Tuesday 21 March 2006, on Hamilton Island; the couple have two children, including racing driver and Red Bull junior Jack Doohan. Formula One After his success in Grand Prix motorcycle racing he got a chance to test a Formula One race car, the Williams FW19, at Circuit de Catalunya (in Spain) in April 1998. He found the car difficult to drive and crashed against a guard rail. Targa Tasmania Tarmac Rally In 2001, Doohan drove a Mercedes Benz CLK55 AMG works rally car with his co-driver Mark Stacey in the 2001 Targa Tasmania rally. He was in thirteenth place on day three when he crashed the car; he and Stacey were uninjured after the incident. Doohan's Motocoaster Doohan helped design an Intamin Motorbike Launch Roller Coaster, named Mick Doohan's Motocoaster. The ride is located at Dreamworld on the Gold Coast, Queensland. Honours Doohan was made a Member of the Order of Australia in 1996 and received an Australian Sports Medal in 2000. He was awarded the "Key to the City" by the City of Gold Coast in 1997. He was inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in 2009. The first turn at Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit is named after him. In 2009 as part of the Q150 celebrations, Doohan was announced as one of the Q150 Icons of Queensland for his role as a "sports legend". Career statistics Superbike World Championship Races by year (key) (Races in bold indicate pole position, races in italics indicate fastest lap) Grand Prix motorcycle racing By season By class Races by year (key) (Races in bold indicate pole position, races in italics indicate fastest lap) See also Daijiro Kato Nicky Hayden Motorcycle sport References External links The Age article on Doohan 1965 births Living people Motorcycle racers from Brisbane 500cc World Championship riders Superbike World Championship riders Australian people of Irish descent Members of the Order of Australia Recipients of the Australian Sports Medal Sport Australia Hall of Fame inductees

20113

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile%20Suit%20Gundam

Mobile Suit Gundam

Mobile Suit Gundam, known in Japan as , is an anime television series, produced and animated by Nippon Sunrise. Created and directed by Yoshiyuki Tomino, it premiered in Japan on Nagoya Broadcasting Network and its affiliated ANN stations on April 7, 1979, and lasted until January 26, 1980, spanning 43 episodes. It was the first Gundam series, which has subsequently been adapted into numerous sequels and spin-offs. Set in the futuristic calendar year "Universal Century" 0079, the plot focuses on the war between the Principality of Zeon and the Earth Federation, with the latter unveiling a new giant robot known as the RX-78-2 Gundam piloted by the teenage civilian mechanic Amuro Ray. In 1981, the series was re-edited for theatrical release and split into three films. The characters were designed by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko, and Kunio Okawara was responsible for the mechanical designs, including the eponymous giant robot, the RX-78-2 Gundam. The first film was released on February 22, 1981. Tomino himself also wrote a trilogy of novels that retell the events of the series. Two manga adaptations of the series have also been written by two manga artists. Despite initial low ratings that caused the series' cancellation, the popularity of Gundam saw a boost from the introduction of Bandai's Gunpla models in 1980 and from reruns and the theatrical release of the anime, leading to the creation of a prolific and lucrative media and toy franchise. The series is famous for revolutionizing the giant robot genre due to the handling of mobile suits as weapons of war, as well as the portrayal of their pilots as ordinary soldiers. This aspects contrasted with the previous style of portraying hero pilots and their giant super hero robots. Plot Set in a fictional universe (Universal Century year 0079 according to the Gundam Calendar), the Principality of Zeon has declared independence from the Earth Federation, and subsequently launched a war of independence called the One Year War. The conflict has directly affected every continent on Earth, also nearly every space colony and lunar settlement. Zeon, though smaller, has the tactical upper hand through their use of a new type of humanoid weapons called mobile suits. After half of all humanity perishes in the conflict, the war settled into a bitter stalemate lasting over 8 months. The story begins with a newly deployed Federation warship, the White Base, arriving at the secret research base located at the Side 7 colony to pick up the Federation's newest weapon. However, they are closely followed by Zeon forces. A Zeon reconnaissance team member disobeys mission orders and attacks the colony, killing most of the Federation crew and civilians in the process. Out of desperation, young Amuro Ray accidentally finds the Federation's new prototype arsenal—the RX-78 Gundam, and manages to beat back Zeon forces. Scrambling everything they can, the White Base sets out with her newly formed crew of civilian recruits and refugees in her journey to survive. On their journey, the White Base members often encounter the Zeon Lieutenant Commander Char Aznable. Although Char antagonizes Amuro in battle, he takes advantage of their position as Federation members to have them kill members from Zeon's Zabi family as part of his revenge scheme. Amuro also meets ensign Lalah Sune with whom he falls in love, but accidentally kills when facing Char. When the Federation Forces invade the Fortress of A Baoa Qu to defeat the Zeon forces, Amuro engages on a final one-on-one duel against Char due to both blaming the other for Lalah's death. Having realized he forgot his true enemy, Char stops fighting to kill the last surviving Zabi member, Kycilia Zabi. Amuro then reunites with his comrades as the war reaches its end. Production The "Mobile Suits" of the show were inspired by the powered armor from the novel Starship Troopers from 1959. Mobile suits were conceptualized as human-like robots which would not only appeal to children. Yoshiyuki Tomino's original plot for the anime was considerably much more grim, with Amuro dying halfway through the series, and the crew of the White Base having to ally with Char (who is given a red Gundam), but finally having to battle him after he takes control of the Principality of Zeon. The original concept found expression in a series of novels written by Tomino soon after the show's conclusion, and elements of the storyline weaved themselves into Zeta Gundam and Char's Counterattack. In previous series Tomino worked in, villains were alien agents. Mobile Suit Gundam was the first of his work which featured humans as antagonists. The director commented he wanted to tell a story about war. He aimed to expose thoroughly starting with Japanese aggression in Manchuria in 1939. Tomino did not allow for changes to history and wanted to use the story to make viewers confront the tragic realities of war. The director was unwilling to discuss the message of his work, expecting the viewers to reach their own conclusion. Additionally, he commented he "packed his frustrations" when making Gundam. Tomino met mechanical designer Kunio Okawara when he first worked in two television series from Sunrise. Tomino liked Okawara's work and asked him to collaborate with him in his upcoming project. Originally, the anime would be called "Gunboy" but it was renamed Mobile Suit Gundam. The White Base, the mothership of the protagonist crew members, is designed with a 3 plane view method by Kunio Okawara, however, it is not specially designed for the anime series Gundam, it was actually a salvaged design from the anime Invincible Steel Man Daitarn 3. The idea of having a space carrier from Tomino is partly inspired by the earlier science fiction anime Space Battleship Yamato, which he claimed to be a fan of. It was intended to be in a more realistic black color, but was changed to white by the order of Sunrise, who similarly ordered the main mecha, Gundam, changed from a grayish white to white, red, blue and yellow. Director Tomino showed great disgust in the color change, also noticing the unrealistic non-aerodynamic design of it after the show was on air, said in an interview that such design would never appear in the real world, since it would be a sitting duck from fighter aircraft. Tomino still held a grudge 10 years after the show aired and stated in an interview in Newtype 1989 April issue that the imaginary enemies of Gundam are Sunrise, sponsors and television stations. Tomino compares the machines with religious history in Japan, most notably the worship of Buddha statues located in temples. The relationship between the pilot and the mobile suit has also been compared with the Formula One drivers who rely on machines to achieve a goal. In order to give the mechas fast movements, most of the fights were situated in space where there was low gravity. This led to the creation of space colonies as a common setting. In order to explain how a person as young as Amuro could pilot the Gundam, the team came up with the idea of Newtypes. Media Anime In February 1980, Mobile Suit Gundam was aired in Italy, the first country to broadcast the show outside Japan. Mobile Suit Gundam was also later aired by the anime satellite television network, Animax, across Japan, with the series continuing to be aired on the network currently, and later its respective networks worldwide, including Hong Kong, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and other regions. Hoping to capitalize on the success of Gundam Wing from the previous year, Bandai Entertainment released a heavily edited and English-dubbed version of Mobile Suit Gundam, premiering on Cartoon Network's Toonami weekday afternoon after-school action programming block across the United States on Monday, July 23, 2001. The series did not do as well as Wing but the ratings were high enough for the whole series to be aired and to spawn an enormous toy line. Due to 9-11, Cartoon Network, like many other American TV stations, began pulling, and editing, war-themed content and violent programming, resulting in the cancellation of the series. However, the series finale was shown as part of Toonami's "New Year's Eve-il" special on December 31, 2001. On Saturday, June 8, 2002, the series was given another chance by Cartoon Network on their late-night Adult Swim block, starting over from the first episode, but it was again pulled before completing its run because of low ratings. On May 30, 2006, Bandai Entertainment re-released the English dub of the TV series in a 10 volume DVD set. There was no Japanese audio track included, apparently because Yoshiyuki Tomino felt that the original mono mix was in too poor of a condition to use. However, in 2007 the original series was released on DVD in Japan, which sold over 100,000 copies within a month's time from December 21, 2007 to January 21, 2008. Only one episode out of the 43 episodes ("Cucuruz Doan's Island") had never been dubbed nor aired. This was at the request of Yoshiyuki Tomino, as he felt that it was not on par with the other episodes, resulting in the episode becoming a "lost episode" of sorts. Despite this, the episode was included on Japanese DVD and Blu-ray releases, and was dubbed in Italian in the early 1980s. At the 2010 New York Comic Con/New York Anime Festival, Bandai Entertainment announced that they would re-release Mobile Suit Gundam with both the original Japanese audio and the English dub. Bandai released Gundam in two sets in the summer of 2011. The first set was released on September 13, 2011. Following the closure in 2012 of Bandai Entertainment, the series went out of print. At their New York Comic-Con 2014 panel, Sunrise announced their plans to re-release all of the Gundam series on home video in North America, starting with the original series. They would be distributed via Right Stuf Inc.. They released the series on Blu-ray and DVD in October 2015. On July 25, 2015, British anime distributor Anime Limited announced they would release Mobile Suit Gundam in cooperation with Sunrise for the first time in the UK on DVD and Blu-ray. Novel In 1979, before the end of the anime, Yoshiyuki Tomino himself created the first novelizations of the original Gundam anime series. The novels, issued as a series of three books, allowed him to depict his story in a more sophisticated, adult, and detailed fashion. Along with this adaptation came several major changes to the story. For example, Amuro is already a member of the Federation military at the time of the initial Zeon attack on Side 7, and the main characters in the Federation serve on the White Base-class ships Pegasus and Pegasus II rather than the Pegasus-class White Base. Additionally, the war continues well into the year UC 0080 in the novels, whereas it concludes at the beginning of that year in the anime series. In the novel Amuro Ray is killed in the final attack against the Zeonic stronghold of A Baoa Qu when his RX-78-3 is pierced through the torso by a Rick Dom's beam bazooka. This occurs as Char's unit attempts to warn him about Gihren's intention to destroy the fortress and take the Federation's offensive fleet along with it. Char and the crew of Pegasus II (White Base), along with handpicked men under Kycilia Zabi's command, make a deep penetrating attack against the Side 3 and together kill Gihren Zabi, after which Kycilia is killed by Char. Tomino later lamented that had he known that anime ending would be different and that another series would be made, he would not have killed off Amuro in the novels. The three novels were translated into English by Frederik Schodt and published by Del Rey Books in September 1990. At the time, there were no officially recognized romanizations of character and mecha names, and a variety of different spellings were being used in the English-language fan community. In the original three novels, therefore, Mr. Schodt wrote the name "Char" as "Sha." "Sha" is a transliteration of the Japanese pronunciation, although Mr. Tomino later publicly confirmed at Anime Expo New York 2002 that the name was originally based on the French name Charles Aznavour, a popular French-language singer. (The 2004 edition of the English translation revealed that Schodt felt that the "Char" rendering "seemed too close" to Aznavour's name.) He also rendered "Zaku" as "Zak," and (after consulting with Mr. Tomino) "Jion" as "Zeon," instead of "Zion," which was in use in some circles. Some North American fans, already attached to particular spellings, took great umbrage at Schodt's renditions, forgetting that in the original Japanese most character and mecha names are written in katakana, and that there were, therefore, no "official spellings." Many years later, when the Gundam series was finally licensed in North America, the rights holders came up with a unified list of "official spellings" for English-language material, and some of these spellings include Schodt's renditions, as well as the renditions to which certain North American fans were attached. In 2004, Frederik Schodt revised his original translation of the books, which had been out of print for nearly a decade. What had been a three volume set in the 1990 Del Rey edition was re-released by Stone Bridge Press as one single volume of 476 pages (with a vastly improved cover design), titled Mobile Suit Gundam: Awakening, Escalation, Confrontation. Since the rights holders in Japan by this time had created a unified (although still evolving) list of romanized character and mecha names, Schodt was able to use it, and Amuro's rival in the novel thus became "Char" and not "Sha"; the popular Zeon Mobile Suit, similarly, became "Zaku," and not "Zak". Compilation films Following the success of the Mobile Suit Gundam TV series, in 1981 Tomino reworked the footage into three separate compilation films. The first two films, Mobile Suit Gundam and Mobile Suit Gundam: Soldiers of Sorrow, were released in 1981. The third film, Mobile Suit Gundam: Encounters in Space, was released in 1982. Each of the three films is largely composed of old footage from the TV series, however Tomino felt that some things could be changed for the better. Tomino removed several aspects of the show which he felt were still too super robot-esque for the real robot series he intended Gundam to be, such as the Gundam Hammer weapon. The G-Armor upgrade parts were also completely removed and replaced in the narrative by the more realistic Core Booster support fighters, and Hayato receives a RX-77 Guncannon at Jaburo to replace the disadvantaged RX-75 Guntank. The third film also includes a substantial amount of new footage expanding on the battles of Solomon and A Baoa Qu. The first Gundam film, upon release on 22 February 1981, drew a large crowd of 15,000 people at its premiere, leading to concerns from police and media that it could lead to social unrest from a riotous crowd. The event is considered a turning point in the history of anime, referred to as "the day that anime changed" according to Asahi Shimbun newspaper. The first film grossed , and Gundam II grossed . Mobile Suit Gundam III: Encounters in Space was 1982's fourth highest-grossing Japanese film, with a distribution income of and a total box office gross of . Collectively, the trilogy grossed at the Japanese box office. In 1998, the three compilation films were first released directly to VHS subtitled into English as part of Bandai's AnimeVillage releases, which makes them among the first Gundam works released in English. A year later, Bandai released an English dub of three compilation films in 1999. Featuring the voice of Michael Lindsay as Amuro Ray, and Steve Blum as Char Aznable. Due to the dub mispronouncing the word Gundam as "Gun-dam", and the Principality of Zeon being called the "Duchy of Zeon", Sunrise prevented it from being re-released after its debut on VHS. The films were released again in North America on May 7, 2002 in DVD format, available separately or in a boxed set. These are also available only with re-done Japanese audio with English subtitles, the DVDs identical to the 20th anniversary release of the film compilation in Japan. The original Japanese voice cast members rerecorded their lines with the exception of those who were deceased. The 20th anniversary release was digitally remastered and many of the sound effects were replaced, most notably the futuristic gun sounds being replaced by louder machine gun sound effects. Also, the music soundtrack, while not remixed was rearranged and in some cases removed from some scenes. The vocal songs are rearranged also, especially in the closing credits of the second and third films. Bandai Visual has announced the re-release of the Mobile Suit Gundam films on DVD from new HD masters and with the original, theatrical, mono audio mix. This boxed set was released in Japan on December 21, 2007. On May 18, 2010, Bandai Entertainment re-released the 20th anniversary version of the trilogy under their Anime Legends label. As with the TV series, the films were re-released in North America under Sunrise themselves with distribution from Right Stuf Inc. The trilogy of films were distributed on DVD in the United Kingdom by Beez Entertainment in 2005 in Japanese and with a selection of subtitle tracks including English. Anime Ltd. has since acquired the UK license and has released a limited edition Blu-ray box set of the film trilogy (limited to 500 units) as an exclusive, sold only on their AllTheAnime.com store. It was released on March 27, 2017, in Japanese with English subtitles only. A animated film adaptation based on the "Cucuruz Doan's Island" episode titled is slated for release in 2022. Manga There have been three manga series based on Mobile Suit Gundam. One was written by Yū Okazaki between 1979 and 1980 and compiled into two volumes. Another is Mobile Suit Gundam 0079 by Kazuhisa Kondo. It was published in Dengeki Comics from 1993 to 2005 in a total of twelve tankōbon volumes. Viz Media published its first nine volumes in English between 2000 and 2003. The third manga is Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin by anime character designer Yoshikazu Yasuhiko. It was published from June 2001 to June 2011 in Kadokawa Shoten's Gundam Ace magazine and collected in a total of 23 tankōbon volumes. The series was first released in English by Viz Media but was dropped before it was completed; it was then released by Vertical Publishing from March 2013 to December 2015. Besides adaptations, there is a popular parody yonkoma manga titled Mobile Suit Gundam-san, which was written and drawn by Hideki Ohwada and serialized in Kadokawa Shoten's Gundam Ace magazine since 2001. This manga was adapted into an anime in 2014. Ohwada also created a spinoff manga, , which follows Yoshiyuki Tomino and the Sunrise staff as they work to make the television series and the compilation films. This series was serialized in Kadokawa Shoten's Gundam Ace magazine from 2009 to 2011 and compiled in the Gundam-san tankōbon starting in Volume 5. The manga was also collected in two tankōbon volumes released on January 24, 2014. Video games (For the list below, only video games featuring mobile suits that appeared in the One Year War, or related variations) There have been many video games based on or with mobile suits from the original Gundam series. Of these, the following have been released in North America: Gundam Battle Assault, Gundam Battle Assault 2 Gundam Side Story 0079: Rise From the Ashes Mobile Suit Gundam: Journey to Jaburo Mobile Suit Gundam: Zeonic Front Mobile Suit Gundam: Federation vs. Zeon Mobile Suit Gundam: Encounters in Space Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam vs. Zeta Gundam Mobile Suit Gundam: Crossfire (Mobile Suit Gundam: Target in Sight in Japan and Australia) MS Saga: A New Dawn (Mobile Suit Gundam: True Odyssey in Japan) Dynasty Warriors: Gundam, Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 2, Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3 (Gundam Musou in Japan) Dynasty Warriors: Gundam Reborn (PlayStation 3 only) Games that have been unreleased in countries outside Japan include: Gundam 0079 The War for Earth Mobile Suit Gundam (1993 arcade game) Mobile Suit Gundam: Bonds of the Battlefield Mobile Suit Gundam: Spirits of Zeon ~Dual Stars of Carnage~ Mobile Suit Gundam: Spirit of Zeon ~Memory of Soldier~Quiz Mobile Suit Gundam: MonsenshiMobile Suit Gundam Giren's Greed: Blood of Zeon Mobile Suit Gundam: Lost War Chronicles Mobile Suit Gundam: Climax UCMobile Suit Gundam: The One Year WarMobile Suit Gundam: Path of the Soldiers (also referred to as Ace Pilot) Gundam Battle (series) SD Gundam G-Generation (series) SD Gundam SCAD Hammers Mobile Suit Gundam: Operation: Troy Kidō Senshi Gundam: Senjō no Kizuna Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam vs. GundamReception, influence & legacyGundam was not popular when it first aired, and in fact came close to being cancelled. The series was originally set to run for 52 episodes but was cut down to 39 by the show's sponsors, which included Clover (the original toymakers for the series). However, the staff was able to negotiate a one-month extension to end the series with 43 episodes. When Bandai bought the copyrights to build plastic models for the show's mecha, which was a relatively new market compared to the old Chogokin series Clover was making, things changed completely. With the introduction of their line of Gundam models, the popularity of the show began to soar. The models sold very well, the show began to do very well in reruns and its theatrical compilation was a huge success. Audiences were expecting another Super Robot TV show, and instead found Gundam, the first work of anime in an entirely new genre: the Real Robot genre. The Anime ranked #2 on Wizard's Anime Magazine on their "Top 50 Anime released in North America", and is regarded as changing the concept of Japanese robot anime and the turning point of history in Japan. Despite being released in 1979, the original Gundam series is still remembered and recognized within the anime fan community. The series revolutionized mecha anime, introducing the new Real Robot genre, and over the years became synonymous with the entire genre for many. As a result, for example, parodies of mecha genre commonly feature homages to Mobile Suit Gundam, thanks to its immediate recognizability. The series was the first winner of the Animage Anime Grand Prix prize, in 1979 and the first half of 1980. In the top 100 anime from Animage, Gundam was twenty-fourth. The magazine Wizard listed the series as the second best anime of all time. By the end of 2007, each episode of the original TV series averaged a sales figure of 80,928 copies, including all of the different formats it was published in (VHS, LD, DVD, etc.). The first DVD box set sold over 100,000 copies in the first month of release, from December 21, 2007 to January 21, 2008. As part of the 30th Anniversary of the Gundam series, the company officially announced a project on March 11, 2009 called Real-G, a plan to build a 1:1 real size scale Gundam in Japan. It was completed in July 2009 and displayed in a Tokyo park then taken down later. The 18-meter tall statue was reconstructed in Shizuoka Prefecture and was taken down in March 2011. In August 2011 it was dismantled only to reopen in Odaiba, Tokyo on April 19, 2012. It stood Odaiba along with a gift shop called "Gundam Front Tokyo" until it was dismantled in March 2016. Most of the series' critical response has been owed to the setting and characters. John Oppliger observes that the characters of Amuro Ray, to whom the young Japanese of that time could easily relate, and Char Aznable, who was "simply [...] fascinating", made a major contribution to the series' popularity. He also concludes that "in many respects First Gundam stands for the nostalgic identifying values of everything that anime itself represents". The series has been praised by Anime News Network for the way it portrays war with Amuro facing traumatic moments as a result of killing enemy soldiers in his becoming of a soldier. The series is also notable for having humans from a different race as antagonists rather than evil creatures. However, the animation has been noted to have notoriously aged when compared with series seen in the 2000s. Mecha anime creator Shoji Kawamori attended Keio University in the same years as Macross screenwriter Hiroshi Ōnogi and character designer Haruhiko Mikimoto, where they had a Mobile Suit Gundam fan club called "Gunsight One", a name they would use years later as the call sign of the bridge of the SDF-1 spaceship from their first Macross anime television series. In fact, The Super Dimension Fortress Macross mecha anime series was inspired by Gundam in several aspects during its early development. Guillermo del Toro has cited the series as an influence on Pacific Rim. American musician Richie Kotzen, former guitarist from Poison and Mr. Big, released an album called Ai Senshi ZxR in 2006 in Japan. The album consisted of covered music from the Gundam series and original songs. American musician Andrew W.K. also released an album called Gundam Rock on September 9, 2009, in Japan. The album consists of covered music from the Gundam series to celebrate its 30th Anniversary. Background research The background research of Mobile Suit Gundam is well praised in its field. The positions in which the colonies (sides) are located in orbit are called Lagrangian points, and are real world solutions to the three-body problem. The colonies (sides) are based on the O'Neill cylinder design for space habitats.Gundam SF World The Gundam franchise was a major contributing factor to the fame of the O'Neil cylinder in Japan. Gundam-themed rides "Gundam the Ride: A Baoa Qu" was an amusement park attraction at the Fuji-Q Highland Amusement Park located in Fujiyoshida, Yamanashi, Japan. It was a dark ride for the park. Gundam the Ride, which opened to the public on July 20, 2000, was based on Mobile Suit Gundam. Set during the final chaotic Battle of A Baoa Qu, Gundam the Ride places its riders in an Escape Launch Shuttle about to leave the battleship Suruga. The animation of Gundam the Ride used mostly computer graphics, however, all human characters were hand-drawn cel animation, similar to the style current Gundam video games are done in. All of the character designs for Gundam the Ride were done by Haruhiko Mikimoto. The ride's characters make a cameo appearance in the video game "Encounters in Space" while the player (playing as Amuro Ray in his Gundam) is making his way through the Dolos. The ride closed on January 8, 2007 and replaced with "Gundam Crisis Attraction" The main feature of this attraction is a full size 1:1 Gundam model, lying flat inside the venue. Instead of sitting in a movable cockpit and watching a CG movie, it requires participants to carry handheld devices throughout the attraction to find certain pieces of information, similar to a scavenger hunt, in order to activate the Gundam. The interior of the attraction is a mock-up of a Federation ship, and employees remain in-character inside of the ride. See also Bildungsroman Gundam Gundam model Gundam (fictional robot) Super Dimension Fortress Macross (1982) Genesis Climber Mospeada (1983) Super Dimension Cavalry Southern Cross'' (1984) Notes References External links Official Website: Anime Mobile Suit Gundam MOVIE-Mobile Suit Gundam I (EN,CN,HK,TW,KR,FR,DE Sub) via YouTube Mobile Suit Gundam MOVIE-Mobile Suit Gundam II: Soldiers of Sorrow (EN,CN,HK,TW,KR,FR,DE Sub) via YouTube Mobile Suit Gundam MOVIE-Mobile Suit Gundam III: Encounters in Space (EN,CN,HK,TW,KR,FR,DE Sub) via YouTube 1979 anime television series debuts 1981 anime films 1982 anime films Akita Shoten manga Animated space adventure television series Anime with original screenplays Anti-war works Bandai Entertainment anime titles Dengeki Comics Military science fiction Sunrise (company) Fiction about telepathy Toonami Vertical (publisher) titles

20119

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methodism

Methodism

Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine, practice and belief derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother Charles Wesley were also significant early leaders in the movement. They were named Methodists for "the methodical way in which they carried out their Christian faith". Methodism originated as a revival movement within the 18th-century Church of England and became a separate denomination after Wesley's death. The movement spread throughout the British Empire, the United States, and beyond because of vigorous missionary work, today claiming approximately 80 million adherents worldwide. Wesleyan theology, which is upheld by the Methodist Churches, focuses on sanctification and the transforming effect of faith on the character of a Christian. Distinguishing doctrines include the new birth, assurance, imparted righteousness, the possibility of entire sanctification, and the works of piety. Scripture is considered as a primary authority, but Methodists also look to Christian tradition, including the historic creeds. Most Methodists teach that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died for all of humanity and that salvation is available for all. This is an Arminian doctrine, as opposed to the Calvinist position that God has pre-ordained the salvation of a select group of people. However, Whitefield and several other early leaders of the movement were considered Calvinistic Methodists and held to the Calvinist position. In addition to evangelism, Methodism emphasises charity and support for the sick, the poor, and the afflicted through the works of mercy. These ideals, collectively known as the Social Gospel, are put into practice by the establishment of hospitals, orphanages, soup kitchens, and schools to follow Christ's command to spread the gospel and serve all people. The movement has a wide variety of forms of worship, ranging from high church to low church in liturgical usage, in addition to tent revivals, brush arbor revivals and camp meetings held at certain times of the year. Denominations that descend from the British Methodist tradition are generally less ritualistic, while American Methodism is more so, the United Methodist Church in particular. Methodism is known for its rich musical tradition, and Charles Wesley was instrumental in writing much of the hymnody of Methodism. Early Methodists were drawn from all levels of society, including the aristocracy, but the Methodist preachers took the message to labourers and criminals who tended to be left outside organized religion at that time. In Britain, the Methodist Church had a major effect in the early decades of the developing working class (1760–1820). In the United States, it became the religion of many slaves who later formed black churches in the Methodist tradition. Methodists are historically known for their adherence to the doctrine of nonconformity to the world, reflected by their traditional standards of a commitment to teetotalism, proscription of gambling, regular attendance at class meetings, and weekly observance of the Friday fast. Origins The Methodist revival began in England with a group of men, including John Wesley (1703–1791) and his younger brother Charles (1707–1788), as a movement within the Church of England in the 18th century. The Wesley brothers founded the "Holy Club" at the University of Oxford, where John was a fellow and later a lecturer at Lincoln College. The club met weekly and they systematically set about living a holy life. They were accustomed to receiving Communion every week, fasting regularly, abstaining from most forms of amusement and luxury and frequently visited the sick and the poor, as well as prisoners. The fellowship were branded as "Methodist" by their fellow students because of the way they used "rule" and "method" to go about their religious affairs. John, who was leader of the club, took the attempted mockery and turned it into a title of honour. In 1735, at the invitation of the founder of the Georgia Colony, General James Oglethorpe, both John and Charles Wesley set out for America to be ministers to the colonists and missionaries to the Native Americans. Unsuccessful in their work, the brothers returned to England conscious of their lack of genuine Christian faith. They looked for help to Peter Boehler and other members of the Moravian Church. At a Moravian service in Aldersgate on 24 May 1738, John experienced what has come to be called his evangelical conversion, when he felt his "heart strangely warmed". He records in his journal: "I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death." Charles had reported a similar experience a few days previously. Considered a pivotal moment, Daniel L. Burnett writes: "The significance of [John] Wesley's Aldersgate Experience is monumental ... Without it the names of Wesley and Methodism would likely be nothing more than obscure footnotes in the pages of church history." The Wesley brothers immediately began to preach salvation by faith to individuals and groups, in houses, in religious societies, and in the few churches which had not closed their doors to evangelical preachers. John Wesley came under the influence of the Dutch theologian Jacobus Arminius (1560–1609). Arminius had rejected the Calvinist teaching that God had pre-ordained an elect number of people to eternal bliss while others perished eternally. Conversely, George Whitefield (1714–1770), Howell Harris (1714–1773), and Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon (1707–1791) were notable for being Calvinistic Methodists. George Whitefield, returning from his own mission in Georgia, joined the Wesley brothers in what was rapidly to become a national crusade. Whitefield, who had been a fellow student of the Wesleys and prominent member of the Holy Club at Oxford, became well-known for his unorthodox, itinerant ministry, in which he was dedicated to open-air preaching—reaching crowds of thousands. A key step in the development of John Wesley's ministry was, like Whitefield, to preach in fields, collieries and churchyards to those who did not regularly attend parish church services. Accordingly, many Methodist converts were those disconnected from the Church of England; Wesley remained a cleric of the Established Church and insisted that Methodists attend their local parish church as well as Methodist meetings because only an ordained pastor could perform the sacraments of baptism and communion. Faced with growing evangelistic and pastoral responsibilities, Wesley and Whitefield appointed lay preachers and leaders. Methodist preachers focused particularly on evangelising people who had been "neglected" by the established Church of England. Wesley and his assistant preachers organized the new converts into Methodist societies. These societies were divided into groups called classes—intimate meetings where individuals were encouraged to confess their sins to one another and to build each other up. They also took part in love feasts which allowed for the sharing of testimony, a key feature of early Methodism. Growth in numbers and increasing hostility impressed upon the revival converts a deep sense of their corporate identity. Three teachings that Methodists saw as the foundation of Christian faith were: People are all, by nature, "dead in sin". They are justified by faith alone. Faith produces inward and outward holiness. Wesley's organisational skills soon established him as the primary leader of the movement. Whitefield was a Calvinist, whereas Wesley was an outspoken opponent of the doctrine of predestination. Wesley argued (against Calvinist doctrine) that Christians could enjoy a second blessing—entire sanctification (Christian perfection) in this life: loving God and their neighbours, meekness and lowliness of heart and abstaining from all appearance of evil. These differences put strains on the alliance between Whitefield and Wesley, with Wesley becoming quite hostile toward Whitefield in what had been previously very close relations. Whitefield consistently begged Wesley not to let theological differences sever their friendship and, in time their friendship was restored, though this was seen by many of Whitefield's followers to be a doctrinal compromise. Many clergy in the established church feared that new doctrines promulgated by the Methodists, such as the necessity of a new birth for salvation—the first work of grace, of justification by faith and of the constant and sustained action of the Holy Spirit upon the believer's soul, would produce ill effects upon weak minds. Theophilus Evans, an early critic of the movement, even wrote that it was "the natural Tendency of their Behaviour, in Voice and Gesture and horrid Expressions, to make People mad". In one of his prints, William Hogarth likewise attacked Methodists as "enthusiasts" full of "Credulity, Superstition, and Fanaticism". Other attacks against the Methodists were physically violent—Wesley was nearly murdered by a mob at Wednesbury in 1743. The Methodists responded vigorously to their critics and thrived despite the attacks against them. Initially, the Methodists merely sought reform within the Church of England (Anglicanism), but the movement gradually departed from that Church. George Whitefield's preference for extemporaneous prayer rather than the fixed forms of prayer in the Book of Common Prayer, in addition to his insistence on the necessity of the New Birth, set him at odds with Anglican clergy. As Methodist societies multiplied, and elements of an ecclesiastical system were, one after another, adopted, the breach between John Wesley and the Church of England gradually widened. In 1784, Wesley responded to the shortage of priests in the American colonies due to the American Revolutionary War by ordaining preachers for America with power to administer the sacraments. Wesley's actions precipitated the split between American Methodists and the Church of England (which held that only bishops could ordain persons to ministry). With regard to the position of Methodism within Christendom, "John Wesley once noted that what God had achieved in the development of Methodism was no mere human endeavor but the work of God. As such it would be preserved by God so long as history remained." Calling it "the grand depositum" of the Methodist faith, Wesley specifically taught that the propagation of the doctrine of entire sanctification was the reason that God raised up the Methodists in the world. In light of this, Methodists traditionally promote the motto "Holiness unto the Lord". The influence of Whitefield and Lady Huntingdon on the Church of England was a factor in the founding of the Free Church of England in 1844. At the time of Wesley's death there were over 500 Methodist preachers in British colonies and the United States. Total membership of the Methodist societies in Britain was recorded as 56,000 in 1791, rising to 360,000 in 1836 and 1,463,000 by the national census of 1851. Early Methodism experienced a radical and spiritual phase that allowed women authority in church leadership. The role of the woman preacher emerged from the sense that the home should be a place of community care and should foster personal growth. Methodist women formed a community that cared for the vulnerable, extending the role of mothering beyond physical care. Women were encouraged to testify their faith. However the centrality of women's role sharply diminished after 1790 as Methodist churches became more structured and more male dominated. The Wesleyan Education Committee, which existed from 1838 to 1902, has documented the Methodist Church's involvement in the education of children. At first most effort was placed in creating Sunday Schools but in 1836 the British Methodist Conference gave its blessing to the creation of "Weekday schools". Methodism spread throughout the British Empire and, mostly through Whitefield's preaching during what historians call the First Great Awakening, in colonial America. After Whitefield's death in 1770, however, American Methodism entered a more lasting Wesleyan and Arminian phase of development. Theology Many Methodist bodies, such as the African Methodist Episcopal Church and the United Methodist Church, base their doctrinal standards on the Articles of Religion, John Wesley's abridgment of the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England that excised its Calvinist features. Some Methodist denominations also publish catechisms, which concisely summarise Christian doctrine. Methodists generally accept the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed as declarations of shared Christian faith. Methodism also affirms the traditional Christian belief in the triune Godhead (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) as well as the orthodox understanding of the person of Jesus Christ as God incarnate who is both fully divine and fully human. Methodism emphasizes doctrines that indicate the power of the Holy Spirit to strengthen the faith of believers and to transform their personal lives. Methodism is broadly evangelical in doctrine and is characterized by Wesleyan theology; John Wesley is studied by Methodists for his interpretation of church practice and doctrine. At its heart, the theology of John Wesley stressed the life of Christian holiness: to love God with all one's heart, mind, soul and strength and to love one's neighbour as oneself. One popular expression of Methodist doctrine is in the hymns of Charles Wesley. Since enthusiastic congregational singing was a part of the early evangelical movement, Wesleyan theology took root and spread through this channel. Martin V. Clarke, who documented the history of Methodist hymnody, states: Theologically and doctrinally, the content of the hymns has traditionally been a primary vehicle for expressing Methodism's emphasis on salvation for all, social holiness, and personal commitment, while particular hymns and the communal act of participating in hymn singing have been key elements in the spiritual lives of Methodists. Salvation Wesleyan Methodists identify with the Arminian conception of free will, as opposed to the theological determinism of absolute predestination. Methodism teaches that salvation is initiated when one chooses to respond to God, who draws the individual near to him (the Wesleyan doctrine of prevenient grace), thus teaching synergism. Methodists interpret Scripture as teaching that the saving work of Jesus Christ is for all people (unlimited atonement) but effective only to those who respond and believe, in accordance with the Reformation principles of sola gratia (grace alone) and sola fide (faith alone). John Wesley taught four key points fundamental to Methodism: A person is free not only to reject salvation but also to accept it by an act of free will. All people who are obedient to the gospel according to the measure of knowledge given them will be saved. The Holy Spirit assures a Christian that they are justified by faith in Jesus (assurance of faith). Christians in this life are capable of Christian perfection and are commanded by God to pursue it. After the first work of grace (the new birth), Methodist soteriology emphasizes the importance of the pursuit of holiness in salvation, a concept best summarized in a quote by Methodist evangelist Phoebe Palmer who stated that "justification would have ended with me had I refused to be holy." Thus, for Methodists, "true faith...cannot subsist without works". Methodism, inclusive of the holiness movement, thus teaches that "justification [is made] conditional on obedience and progress in sanctification", emphasizing "a deep reliance upon Christ not only in coming to faith, but in remaining in the faith". John Wesley taught that the keeping of the moral law contained in the Ten Commandments, as well as engaging in the works of piety and the works of mercy, were "indispensable for our sanctification". Methodists also believe in the second work of grace—Christian perfection, also known as entire sanctification, which removes original sin and makes the believer holy. John Wesley explained, "entire sanctification, or Christian perfection, is neither more nor less than pure love; love expelling sin, and governing both the heart and life of a child of God. The Refiner's fire purges out all that is contrary to love." Methodist churches teach that apostasy can occur through a loss of faith or through sinning. If a person backslides but later decides to return to God, he or she must confess his or her sins and be entirely sanctified again (the Arminian doctrine of conditional security). Sacraments Methodists hold that sacraments are sacred acts of divine institution. Methodism has inherited its liturgy from Anglicanism, although American Methodist theology tends to have a stronger "sacramental emphasis" than that held by evangelical Anglicans. In common with most Protestants, Methodists recognize two sacraments as being instituted by Christ: Baptism and Holy Communion (also called the Lord's Supper). Most Methodist churches practice infant baptism, in anticipation of a response to be made later (confirmation), as well as believer's baptism. The Catechism for the Use of the People Called Methodists states that, "[in Holy Communion] Jesus Christ is present with his worshipping people and gives himself to them as their Lord and Saviour". In the United Methodist Church, the explanation of how Christ's presence is made manifest in the elements (bread and wine) is described as a "Holy Mystery". Methodist churches generally recognize sacraments to be a means of grace. John Wesley held that God also imparted grace by other established means such as public and private prayer, Scripture reading, study and preaching, public worship, and fasting; these constitute the works of piety. Wesley considered means of grace to be "outward signs, words, or actions ... to be the ordinary channels whereby [God] might convey to men, preventing [i.e., preparing], justifying or sanctifying grace". Specifically Methodist means, such as the class meetings, provided his chief examples for these prudential means of grace. Sources of teaching American Methodist theologian Albert Outler, in assessing John Wesley's own practices of theological reflection, proposes a methodology termed the "Wesleyan Quadrilateral". Wesley's Quadrilateral is referred to in Methodism as "our theological guidelines" and is taught to its ministers (clergy) in seminary as the primary approach to interpreting Scripture and gaining guidance for moral questions and dilemmas faced in daily living. Traditionally, Methodists declare the Bible (Old and New Testaments) to be the only divinely inspired Scripture and the primary source of authority for Christians. The historic Methodist understanding of Scripture is based on the superstructure of Wesleyan covenant theology. Methodists also make use of tradition, drawing primarily from the teachings of the Church Fathers, as a source of authority. Tradition may serve as a lens through which Scripture is interpreted. Theological discourse for Methodists almost always makes use of Scripture read inside the wider theological tradition of Christianity. John Wesley himself contended that a part of the theological method would involve experiential faith. In other words, truth would be vivified in personal experience of Christians (overall, not individually), if it were really truth. And every doctrine must be able to be defended rationally. He did not divorce faith from reason. By reason, one asks questions of faith and seeks to understand God's action and will. Tradition, experience and reason, however, were subject always to Scripture, Wesley argued, because only there is the Word of God revealed "so far as it is necessary for our salvation." Prayer, worship, and liturgy Early Methodism was known for its "almost monastic rigors, its living by rule, [and] its canonical hours of prayer". It inherited from its Anglican patrimony the rubrics of reciting the Daily Office, which Methodist Christians were expected to pray. The first prayer book of Methodism, The Sunday Service of the Methodists with other occasional Services thus included the canonical hours of both Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer; these two fixed prayer times were observed everyday in early Christianity, individually on weekdays and corporately on the Lord's Day. Later Methodist liturgical books, such as the Methodist Worship Book (1999) provide for Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer to be prayed daily; the United Methodist Church encourages its communicants to pray the canonical hours as "one of the essential practices" of being a disciple of Jesus. Some Methodist religious orders publish the Daily Office to be used for that community, for example, The Book of Offices and Services of The Order of Saint Luke contains the canonical hours to be prayed traditionally at seven fixed prayer times: Lauds (6 am), Terce (9 am), Sext (12 pm), None (3 pm), Vespers (6 pm), Compline (9 pm) and Vigil (12 am). With respect to public worship, Methodism was endowed by the Wesley brothers with worship characterised by a twofold practice: the ritual liturgy of the Book of Common Prayer on the one hand and the non-ritualistic preaching service on the other. This twofold practice became distinctive of Methodism because worship in the Church of England was based, by law, solely on the Book of Common Prayer and worship in the Nonconformist churches was almost exclusively that of "services of the word", i.e. preaching services, with Holy Communion being observed infrequently. John Wesley's influence meant that, in Methodism, the two practices were combined, a situation which remains characteristic of the denomination. The Lovefeast, traditionally practiced quarterly, was another practice that characterized early Methodism as John Wesley taught that it was an apostolic ordinance. Worship, hymnology, devotional and liturgical practices in Methodism were also influenced by Lutheran Pietism and, in turn, Methodist worship became influential in the Holiness movement. In America, the United Methodist Church and Free Methodist Church, as well as the Primitive Methodist Church and Wesleyan Methodist Church, have a wide variety of forms of worship, ranging from high church to low church in liturgical usage. When the Methodists in America were separated from the Church of England because of the American Revolution, John Wesley himself provided a revised version of the Book of Common Prayer called The Sunday Service of the Methodists; With Other Occasional Services (1784). Today, the primary liturgical books of the United Methodist Church are The United Methodist Hymnal and The United Methodist Book of Worship (1992). Congregations employ its liturgy and rituals as optional resources, but their use is not mandatory. These books contain the liturgies of the church that are generally derived from Wesley's Sunday Service and from the 20th-century liturgical renewal movement. The British Methodist Church is less ordered or liturgical in worship, but makes use of the Methodist Worship Book (similar to the Church of England's Common Worship), containing worship services (liturgies) and rubrics for the celebration of other rites, such as marriage. The Worship Book is also ultimately derived from Wesley's Sunday Service. A unique feature of American Methodism has been the observance of the season of Kingdomtide, encompassing the last 13 weeks before Advent, thus dividing the long season after Pentecost into two distinct segments. During Kingdomtide, Methodist liturgy has traditionally emphasised charitable work and alleviating the suffering of the poor. A second distinctive liturgical feature of Methodism is the use of Covenant Services. Although practice varies between different national churches, most Methodist churches annually follow the call of John Wesley for a renewal of their covenant with God. It is common, at least in British Methodism, for each congregation to normally hold an annual Covenant Service on the first convenient Sunday of the year, and Wesley's covenant prayer is still used, with minor modification, in the order of service: As John Wesley advocated outdoor evangelism, revival services are a traditional worship practice of Methodism that are often held in churches, as well as at camp meetings, brush arbor revivals, and tent revivals. Membership Traditionally, Methodist connexions descending from the tradition of the Methodist Episcopal Church have a probationary period of six months before an individual is admitted into church membership as a full member of a congregation. Given the wide attendance at Methodist revival meetings, many people started to attend Methodist services of worship regularly, though they had not yet committed to membership. When they made that commitment, becoming a probationer was the first step and during this period, probationers "receive additional instruction and provide evidence of the seriousness of their faith and willingness to abide by church discipline before being accepted into full membership." In addition to this, to be a probationary member of a Methodist congregation, a person traditionally requires an "earnest desire to be saved from [one's] sins". In the historic Methodist system, probationers were eligible to become members of class meetings, where they could be further discipled in their faith. Catechisms such as The Probationer's Handbook, authored by minister Stephen O. Garrison, have been used by probationers to learn the Methodist faith. After six months, probationers were examined before the Leaders and Stewards' Meeting (which consisted of Class Leaders and Stewards) where they were to provide "satisfactory assurance both of the correctness of his faith and of his willingness to observe and keep the rules of the church." If probationers were able to do this, they were admitted as full members of the congregation by the pastor. Full members of a Methodist congregation "were obligated to attend worship services on a regular basis" and "were to abide by certain moral precepts, especially as they related to substance use, gambling, divorce, and immoral pastimes." This practice continues in certain Methodist connexions, such as the Lumber River Conference of the Holiness Methodist Church, in which probationers must be examined by the pastor, class leader, and board for full membership, in addition to being baptized. The same structure is found in the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, which teaches: The pastor and class leader are to ensure that "that all persons on probation be instructed in the Rules and Doctrines of The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church before they are admitted to Full Membership" and that "probationers are expected to conform to the rules and usages of the Church, and to show evidence of their desire for fellowship in the Church". After the six-month probation period, "A probationer may be admitted to full membership, provided he/she has served out his/her probation, has been baptized, recommended at the Leaders' Meeting, and, if none has been held according to law, recommended by the Leader, and, on examination by the Pastor before the Church as required in ¶600 has given satisfactory assurance both of the correctness of his/her faith, and of his/her wilingess to observe and keep the rules of our Church." The Allegheny Wesleyan Methodist Connection admits to associate membership, by vote of the congregation, those who give affirmation to two questions: "1) Does the Lord now forgive your sins? 2) Will you acquaint yourself with the discipline of our connection and earnestly endeavor to govern your life by its rules as God shall give you understanding?" Probationers who wish to become full members are examined by the Advisory Board before being received as such through four vows (on the New Birth, Entire Sanctification, Outward Holiness, and assent to the Articles of Religion) and a covenant. In the United Methodist Church, the process of becoming a professing member of a congregation is done through the taking membership vows (normatively in the rite of confirmation) after a period of instruction and receiving the sacrament of baptism. It is the practice of certain Methodist connexions that when people become members of a congregation, they are offered the Right Hand of Fellowship. Methodists traditionally celebrate the Covenant Renewal Service as the watchnight service annually on New Year's Eve, in which members renew their covenant with God and the Church. Lifestyle Early Methodists wore plain dress, with Methodist clergy condemning "high headdresses, ruffles, laces, gold, and 'costly apparel' in general". John Wesley recommended that Methodists annually read his thoughts On Dress; in that sermon, John Wesley expressed his desire for Methodists: "Let me see, before I die, a Methodist congregation, full as plain dressed as a Quaker congregation". The 1858 Discipline of the Wesleyan Methodist Connection thus stated that "we would ... enjoin on all who fear God plain dress". Peter Cartwright, a Methodist revivalist, stated that in addition to wearing plain dress, the early Methodists distinguished themselves from other members of society by fasting once a week, abstaining from alcohol (teetotalism), and devoutly observing the Sabbath. Methodist circuit riders were known for practicing the spiritual discipline of mortifying the flesh as they "arose well before dawn for solitary prayer; they remained on their knees without food or drink or physical comforts sometimes for hours on end". The early Methodists did not participate in, and condemned, "worldly habits" including "playing cards, racing horses, gambling, attending the theater, dancing (both in frolics and balls), and cockfighting". In Methodism, fasting is considered one of the works of piety. The Directions Given to Band Societies (25 December 1744) by John Wesley mandate fasting and abstinence from meat on all Fridays of the year (in remembrance of the crucifixion of Jesus). Wesley himself also fasted before receiving Holy Communion "for the purpose of focusing his attention on God," and asked other Methodists to do the same. Over time, many of these practices were gradually relaxed in mainline Methodism, although practices such as teetotalism and fasting are still very much encouraged, in addition to the current prohibition of gambling; denominations of the conservative holiness movement, such as the Allegheny Wesleyan Methodist Connection and Bible Methodist Connection of Churches, continue to reflect the spirit of the historic Methodist practice of wearing plain dress, encouraging members in "abstaining from the wearing of extravagant hairstyles, jewelry—to include rings, and expensive clothing for any reason". The General Rules of the Methodist Church in America, which are among the doctrinal standards of many Methodist Churches, promote first-day Sabbatarianism as they require "attending upon all the ordinances of God" including "the public worship of God" and prohibit "profaning the day of the Lord, either by doing ordinary work therein or by buying or selling". Contemporary Methodist denominations Methodism is a worldwide movement and Methodist churches are present on all populated continents. Although Methodism is declining in Great Britain and North America, it is growing in other places—at a rapid pace in, for example, South Korea. There is no single Methodist Church with universal juridical authority; Methodists belong to multiple independent denominations or "connexions". The great majority of Methodists are members of denominations which are part of the World Methodist Council, an international association of 80 Methodist, Wesleyan, and related uniting denominations, representing about 80 million people. Europe Methodism is prevalent in the English-speaking world but it is also organized in mainland Europe, largely due to missionary activity of British and American Methodists. British missionaries were primarily responsible for establishing Methodism across Ireland and Italy. Today the United Methodist Church (UMC)—a large denomination based in the United States—has a presence in Albania, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Sweden, Switzerland, and Ukraine. Collectively the European and Eurasian regions of the UMC constitute a little over 100,000 Methodists (). Other smaller Methodist denominations exist in Europe. Great Britain The original body founded as a result of Wesley's work came to be known as the Wesleyan Methodist Church. Schisms within the original church, and independent revivals, led to the formation of a number of separate denominations calling themselves "Methodist". The largest of these were the Primitive Methodists, deriving from a revival at Mow Cop in Staffordshire; the Bible Christians; and the Methodist New Connexion. The original church adopted the name "Wesleyan Methodist" to distinguish it from these bodies. In 1907, a union of smaller groups with the Methodist New Connexion and Bible Christian Church brought about the United Methodist Church (Great Britain), then the three major streams of British Methodism united in 1932 to form the present Methodist Church of Great Britain. The fourth-largest denomination in the country, the Methodist Church of Great Britain has about 202,000 members in 4,650 congregations. Early Methodism was particularly prominent in Devon and Cornwall, which were key centers of activity by the Bible Christian faction of Methodists. The Bible Christians produced many preachers, and sent many missionaries to Australia. Methodism also grew rapidly in the old mill towns of Yorkshire and Lancashire, where the preachers stressed that the working classes were equal to the upper classes in the eyes of God. In Wales, three elements separately welcomed Methodism: Welsh-speaking, English-speaking, and Calvinistic. British Methodists, in particular the Primitive Methodists, took a leading role in the temperance movement of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Methodists saw alcoholic beverages, and alcoholism, as the root of many social ills and tried to persuade people to abstain from these. Temperance appealed strongly to the Methodist doctrines of sanctification and perfection. To this day, alcohol remains banned in Methodist premises, however this restriction no longer applies to domestic occasions in private homes (i.e. the minister may have a drink at home in the manse). The choice to consume alcohol is now a personal decision for any member. British Methodism does not have bishops; however, it has always been characterised by a strong central organisation, the Connexion, which holds an annual Conference (the church retains the 18th-century spelling connexion for many purposes). The Connexion is divided into Districts in the charge of the chair (who may be male or female). Methodist districts often correspond approximately, in geographical terms, to counties—as do Church of England dioceses. The districts are divided into circuits governed by the Circuit Meeting and led and administrated principally by a superintendent minister. Ministers are appointed to Circuits rather than to individual churches, although some large inner-city churches, known as "central halls", are designated as circuits in themselves—of these Westminster Central Hall, opposite Westminster Abbey in central London, is the best known. Most circuits have fewer ministers than churches, and the majority of services are led by lay local preachers, or by supernumerary ministers (ministers who have retired, called supernumerary because they are not counted for official purposes in the numbers of ministers for the circuit in which they are listed). The superintendent and other ministers are assisted in the leadership and administration of the Circuit by circuit stewards– laypeople with particular skills who, who with the ministers, collectively form what is normally known as the Circuit Leadership Team. The Methodist Council also helps to run a number of schools, including two public schools in East Anglia: Culford School and the Leys School. It helps to promote an all round education with a strong Christian ethos. Other Methodist denominations in Britain include: The Salvation Army, founded by Methodist minister William Booth in 1865; the Free Methodist Church, a holiness church; the Church of the Nazarene; the Wesleyan Reform Union, an early secession from the Wesleyan Methodist Church; and the Independent Methodist Connexion. Ireland John Wesley visited Ireland on at least twenty-four occasions and established classes and societies. The Methodist Church in Ireland () today operates across both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland on an all-Ireland basis. , there are around 50,000 Methodists across Ireland. The biggest concentration–13,171–is in Belfast, with 2,614 in Dublin. , it is the fourth-largest denomination in Northern Ireland, with Methodists accounting for 3% of the population. Eric Gallagher was the President of the Church in the 1970s, becoming a well-known figure in Irish politics. He was one of the group of Protestant churchmen who met with Provisional IRA officers in Feakle, County Clare to try to broker peace. The meeting was unsuccessful due to a Garda raid on the hotel. Italy The Italian Methodist Church () is a small Protestant community in Italy, with around 7,000 members. Since 1975, it is in a formal covenant of partnership with the Waldensian Church, with a total of 45,000 members. Waldensians are a Protestant movement which started in Lyon, France, in the late 1170s. Italian Methodism has its origins in the Italian Free Church, British Wesleyan Methodist Missionary Society, and the American Methodist Episcopal Mission. These movements flowered in the second half of the 19th century in the new climate of political and religious freedom that was established with the end of the Papal States and unification of Italy in 1870. Bertrand M. Tipple, minister of the American Methodist Church in Rome, founded a college there in 1914. In April 2016, the World Methodist Council opened an Ecumenical Office in Rome. Methodist leaders and the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis, jointly dedicated the new office. It helps facilitate Methodist relationships with the wider Church, especially the Roman Catholic Church. Nordic and Baltic countries The "Nordic and Baltic Area" of the United Methodist Church covers the Nordic countries (Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland) and the Baltic countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania). Methodism was introduced to the Nordic countries in the late 19th century. Today the United Methodist Church in Norway () is the largest annual meeting in the region with 10,684 members in total (). The United Methodist Church in Sweden () joined the Uniting Church in Sweden in 2011. France The French Methodist movement was founded in the 1820s by Charles Cook in the village of Congénies in Languedoc near Nîmes and Montpellier. The most important chapel of department was built in 1869, where there had been a Quaker community since the 18th century. Sixteen Methodist congregations voted to join the Reformed Church of France in 1938. In the 1980s, missionary work of a Methodist church in Agen led to new initiatives in Fleurance and Mont de Marsan. Methodism exists today in France under various names. The best-known is the Union of Evangelical Methodist Churches () or UEEM. It is an autonomous regional conference of the United Methodist Church and is the fruit of a fusion in 2005 between the "Methodist Church of France" and the "Union of Methodist Churches". , the UEEM has around 1,200 members and 30 ministers. Germany In Germany, Switzerland and Austria, Evangelisch-methodistische Kirche is the name of the United Methodist Church. The German part of the church had about 52,031 members . Members are organized into three annual conferences: north, east and south. All three annual conferences belong to the Germany Central Conference. Methodism is most prevalent in southern Saxony and around Stuttgart. A Methodist missionary returning from Britain introduced (British) Methodism to Germany in 1830, initially in the region of Württemberg. Methodism was also spread in Germany through the missionary work of the Methodist Episcopal Church which began in 1849 in Bremen, soon spreading to Saxony and other parts of Germany. Other Methodist missionaries of the Evangelical Association went near Stuttgart (Württemberg) in 1850. Further Methodist missionaries of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ worked in Franconia and other parts of Germany from 1869 until 1905. So Methodism has four roots in Germany. Early opposition towards Methodism was partly rooted in theological differences — northern and eastern regions of Germany were predominantly Lutheran and Reformed, and Methodists were dismissed as fanatics. Methodism was also hindered by its unfamiliar church structure (Connectionalism), which was more centralised than the hierarchical polity in the Lutheran and Reformed churches. After World War I, the 1919 Weimar Constitution allowed Methodists to worship freely and many new chapels were established. In 1936, German Methodists elected their first bishop. Hungary The first Methodist mission in Hungary was established in 1898 in Bácska, in a then mostly German-speaking town of Verbász (since 1918 part of the Serbian province of Vojvodina). In 1905 a Methodist mission was established also in Budapest. In 1974, a group later known as the Hungarian Evangelical Fellowship seceded from the Hungarian Methodist Church over the question of interference by the communist state. , the United Methodist Church in Hungary, known locally as the Hungarian Methodist Church (), has 453 professing members in 30 congregations. It runs two student homes, two homes for the elderly, the Forray Methodist High School, the Wesley Scouts and the Methodist Library and Archives. The church has a special ministry among the Roma. The seceding Hungarian Evangelical Fellowship () also remains Methodist in its organisation and theology. It has eight full congregations and several mission groups, and runs a range of charitable organisations: hostels and soup kitchens for the homeless, a non-denominational theological college, a dozen schools of various kinds, and four old people's homes. Today there are a dozen Methodist/Wesleyan churches and mission organisations in Hungary, but all Methodist churches lost official church status under new legislation passed in 2011, when the number of officially recognized churches in the country fell to 14. However, the list of recognized churches was lengthened to 32 at the end of February 2012. This gave recognition to Hungarian Methodist Church and the Salvation Army, which was banned in Hungary in 1949 but had returned in 1990, but not to the Hungarian Evangelical Fellowship. The legislation has been strongly criticised by the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe as discriminatory. The Hungarian Methodist Church, the Salvation Army and the Church of the Nazarene and other Wesleyan groups formed the Wesley Theological Alliance for theological and publishing purposes in 1998. Today the Alliance has 10 Wesleyan member churches and organisations. The Hungarian Evangelical Fellowship does not belong to it and has its own publishing arm. Russia The Methodist Church established several strongholds in Russia—Saint Petersburg in the west and the Vladivostok region in the east, with big Methodist centres right in the middle, in Moscow and Ekaterinburg (former Sverdlovsk). Methodists began their work in the west among Swedish immigrants in 1881 and started their work in the east in 1910. On 26 June 2009, Methodists celebrated the 120th year since Methodism arrived in Czarist Russia by erecting a new Methodist centre in Saint Petersburg. A Methodist presence was continued in Russia for 14 years after the Russian Revolution of 1917 through the efforts of Deaconess Anna Eklund. In 1939, political antagonism stymied the work of the Church and Deaconess Anna Eklund was coerced to return to her native Finland. After 1989, the Soviet Union allowed greatly increased religious freedoms and this continued after the USSR's collapse in 1991. During the 1990s, Methodism experienced a powerful wave of revival in the nation. Three sites in particular carried the torch—Samara, Moscow and Ekaterinburg. , the United Methodist Church in Eurasia comprised 116 congregations, each with a native pastor. There are currently 48 students enrolled in residential and extension degree programs at the United Methodist Seminary in Moscow. Caribbean Methodism came to the Caribbean in 1760 when the planter, lawyer and Speaker of the Antiguan House of Assembly, Nathaniel Gilbert (c. 1719–1774), returned to his sugar estate home in Antigua. A Methodist revival spread in the British West Indies due to the work of British missionaries. Missionaries established societies which would later become the Methodist Church in the Caribbean and the Americas (MCCA). The MCCA has about 62,000 members in over 700 congregations, ministered by 168 pastors. There are smaller Methodist denominations that have seceded from the parent church. Antigua The story is often told that in 1755, Nathaniel Gilbert, while convalescing, read a treatise of John Wesley, An Appeal to Men of Reason and Religion sent to him by his brother Francis. As a result of having read this book Gilbert, two years later, journeyed to England with three of his slaves and there in a drawing room meeting arranged in Wandsworth on 15 January 1759, met the preacher John Wesley. He returned to the Caribbean that same year and on his subsequent return began to preach to his slaves in Antigua. When Nathaniel Gilbert died in 1774 his work in Antigua was continued by his brother Francis Gilbert to approximately 200 Methodists. However, within a year Francis took ill and had to return to Britain and the work was carried on by Sophia Campbell ("a Negress") and Mary Alley ("a Mulatto"), two devoted women who kept the flock together with class and prayer meetings as best as they could. On 2 April 1778, John Baxter, a local preacher and skilled shipwright from Chatham in Kent, England, landed at English harbour in Antigua (now called Nelson's Dockyard) where he was offered a post at the naval dockyard. Baxter was a Methodist and had heard of the work of the Gilberts and their need for a new preacher. He began preaching and meeting with the Methodist leaders, and within a year the Methodist community had grown to 600 persons. By 1783, the first Methodist chapel was built in Antigua, with John Baxter as the local preacher, its wooden structure seating some 2,000 people. St. Bart's In 1785, William Turton (1761–1817) a Barbadian son of a planter, met John Baxter in Antigua, and later, as layman, assisted in the Methodist work in the Swedish colony of St. Bartholomew from 1796. In 1786, the missionary endeavour in the Caribbean was officially recognized by the Methodist Conference in England, and that same year Thomas Coke, having been made Superintendent of the church two years previously in America by Wesley, was travelling to Nova Scotia, but weather forced his ship to Antigua. Jamaica In 1818 Edward Fraser (1798 – Aft. 1850), a privileged Barbadian slave, moved to Bermuda and subsequently met the new minister James Dunbar. The Nova Scotia Methodist Minister noted young Fraser's sincerity and commitment to his congregation and encouraged him by appointing him as assistant. By 1827 Fraser assisted in building a new chapel. He was later freed and admitted to the Methodist Ministry to serve in Antigua and Jamaica. Barbados Following William J. Shrewsbury's preaching in the 1820s, Sarah Ann Gill (1779–1866), a free-born black woman, used civil disobedience in an attempt to thwart magistrate rulings that prevented parishioners holding prayer meetings. In hopes of building a new chapel, she paid an extraordinary £1,700-0s–0d and ended up having militia appointed by the Governor to protect her home from demolition. In 1884 an attempt was made at autonomy with the formation of two West Indian Conferences, however by 1903 the venture had failed. It was not until the 1960s that another attempt was made at autonomy. This second attempt resulted in the emergence of the Methodist Church in the Caribbean and the Americas in May 1967. Francis Godson (1864–1953), a Methodist minister, who having served briefly in several of the Caribbean islands, eventually immersed himself in helping those in hardship of the First World War in Barbados. He was later appointed to the Legislative Council of Barbados, and fought for the rights of pensioners. He was later followed by renowned Barbadian Augustus Rawle Parkinson (1864–1932), who also was the first principal of the Wesley Hall School, Bridgetown in Barbados (which celebrated its 125th anniversary in September 2009). In more recent times in Barbados, Victor Alphonso Cooke (born 1930) and Lawrence Vernon Harcourt Lewis (born 1932) are strong influences on the Methodist Church on the island. Their contemporary and late member of the Dalkeith Methodist Church, was the former secretary of the University of the West Indies, consultant of the Canadian Training Aid Programme and a man of letters – Francis Woodbine Blackman (1922–2010). It was his research and published works that enlightened much of this information on Caribbean Methodism. Africa Most Methodist denominations in Africa follow the British Methodist tradition and see the Methodist Church of Great Britain as their mother church. Originally modelled on the British structure, since independence most of these churches have adopted an episcopal model. Nigeria The Nigerian Methodist Church is one of the largest Methodist denominations in the world and one of the largest Christian churches in Nigeria, with around two million members in 2000 congregations. It has seen exponential growth since the turn of the millennium. Christianity was established in Nigeria with the arrival in 1842 of a Wesleyan Methodist missionary. He had come in response to the request for missionaries by the ex-slaves who returned to Nigeria from Sierra Leone. From the mission stations established in Badagry and Abeokuta, the Methodist church spread to various parts of the country west of the River Niger and part of the north. In 1893 missionaries of the Primitive Methodist Church arrived from Fernando Po, an island off the southern coast of Nigeria. From there the Methodist Church spread to other parts of the country, east of the River Niger and also to parts of the north. The church west of the River Niger and part of the north was known as the Western Nigeria District and east of the Niger and another part of the north as the Eastern Nigeria District. Both existed independently of each other until 1962 when they constituted the Conference of Methodist Church Nigeria. The conference is composed of seven districts. The church has continued to spread into new areas and has established a department for evangelism and appointed a director of evangelism. An episcopal system adopted in 1976 was not fully accepted by all sections of the church until the two sides came together and resolved to end the disagreement. A new constitution was ratified in 1990. The system is still episcopal but the points which caused discontent were amended to be acceptable to both sides. Today, the Nigerian Methodist Church has a prelate, eight archbishops and 44 bishops. Ghana Methodist Church Ghana is one of the largest Methodist denominations, with around 800,000 members in 2,905 congregations, ministered by 700 pastors. It has fraternal links with the British Methodist and United Methodist churches worldwide. Methodism in Ghana came into existence as a result of the missionary activities of the Wesleyan Methodist Church, inaugurated with the arrival of Joseph Rhodes Dunwell to the Gold Coast in 1835. Like the mother church, the Methodist Church in Ghana was established by people of Protestant background. Roman Catholic and Anglican missionaries came to the Gold Coast from the 15th century. A school was established in Cape Coast by the Anglicans during the time of Philip Quaque, a Ghanaian priest. Those who came out of this school had Bible copies and study supplied by the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge. A member of the resulting Bible study groups, William De-Graft, requested Bibles through Captain Potter of the ship Congo. Not only were Bibles sent, but also a Methodist missionary. In the first eight years of the Church's life, 11 out of 21 missionaries who worked in the Gold Coast died. Thomas Birch Freeman, who arrived at the Gold Coast in 1838 was a pioneer of missionary expansion. Between 1838 and 1857 he carried Methodism from the coastal areas to Kumasi in the Asante hinterland of the Gold Coast. He also established Methodist Societies in Badagry and AbeoKuta in Nigeria with the assistance of William De-Graft. By 1854, the church was organized into circuits constituting a district with T. B. Freeman as chairman. Freeman was replaced in 1856 by William West. The district was divided and extended to include areas in the then Gold Coast and Nigeria by the synod in 1878, a move confirmed at the British Conference. The district were Gold Coast District, with T.R. Picot as chairman and Yoruba and Popo District, with John Milum as chairman. Methodist evangelisation of northern Gold Coast began in 1910. After a long period of conflict with the colonial government, missionary work was established in 1955. Paul Adu was the first indigenous missionary to northern Gold Coast. In July 1961, the Methodist Church in Ghana became autonomous, and was called the Methodist Church Ghana, based on a deed of foundation, part of the church's Constitution and Standing Orders. Southern Africa The Methodist Church operates across South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland, with a limited presence in Zimbabwe and Mozambique. It is a member church of the World Methodist Council. Methodism in Southern Africa began as a result of lay Christian work by an Irish soldier of the English Regiment, John Irwin, who was stationed at the Cape and began to hold prayer meetings as early as 1795. The first Methodist lay preacher at the Cape, George Middlemiss, was a soldier of the 72nd regiment of the British Army stationed at the Cape in 1805. This foundation paved the way for missionary work by Methodist missionary societies from Great Britain, many of whom sent missionaries with the 1820 English settlers to the Western and Eastern Cape. Among the most notable of the early missionaries were Barnabas Shaw and William Shaw. The largest group was the Wesleyan Methodist Church, but there were a number of others that joined together to form the Methodist Church of South Africa, later known as the Methodist Church of Southern Africa. The Methodist Church of Southern Africa is the largest mainline Protestant denomination in South Africa—7.3% of the South African population recorded their religious affiliation as 'Methodist' in the last national census. Asia China Methodism was brought to China in the autumn of 1847 by the Methodist Episcopal Church. The first missionaries sent out were Judson Dwight Collins and Moses Clark White, who sailed from Boston 15 April 1847, and reached Foochow 6 September. They were followed by Henry Hickok and Robert Samuel Maclay, who arrived 15 April 1848. In 1857, it baptised the first convert in connection with its labours. In August 1856, a brick built church, called the "Church of the True God" (真神堂), the first substantial church building erected at Foochow by Protestant Missions, was dedicated to the worship of God. In the winter of the same year another brick built church, located on the hill in the suburbs on the south bank of the Min, was finished and dedicated, called the "Church of Heavenly Peace" (天安堂). In 1862, the number of members was 87. The Foochow Conference was organized by Isaac W. Wiley on 6 December 1867, by which time the number of members and probationers had reached 2,011. Hok Chau 周學 (also known as Lai-Tong Chau, 周勵堂) was the first Chinese ordained minister of the South China District of the Methodist Church (incumbent 1877–1916). Benjamin Hobson (1816–1873), a medical missionary sent by the London Missionary Society in 1839, set up a highly successful Wai Ai Clinic (惠愛醫館) Liang Fa (Leung Fat in Cantonese, 梁發, 1789–1855, ordained by the London Missionary Society), Hok Chau and others worked there. Liang (age 63) baptized Chau (quite young) in 1852. The Methodist Church based in Britain sent missionary George Piercy to China. In 1851, Piercy went to Guangzhou (Canton), where he worked in a trading company. In 1853, he started a church in Guangzhou. In 1877, Chau was ordained by the Methodist Church, where he pastored for 39 years. In 1867, the mission sent out the first missionaries to Central China, who began work at Kiukiang. In 1869, missionaries were also sent to the capital city Peking, where they laid the foundations of the work of the North China Mission. In November 1880, the West China Mission was established in Sichuan Province. In 1896, the work in the Hinghua prefecture (modern-day Putian) and surrounding regions was also organized as a Mission Conference. In 1947, the Methodist Church in the Republic of China celebrated its centenary. In 1949, however, the Methodist Church moved to Taiwan with the Kuomintang government. On 21 June 1953, Taipei Methodist Church was erected, then local churches and chapels with a baptized membership numbering over 2,500. Various types of educational, medical and social services are provided (including Tunghai University). In 1972, the Methodist Church in the Republic of China became autonomous, and the first bishop was installed in 1986. India Methodism came to India twice, in 1817 and in 1856, according to P. Dayanandan who has done extensive research on the subject. Thomas Coke and six other missionaries set sail for India on New Year's Day in 1814. Coke, then 66, died en route. Rev. James Lynch was the one who finally arrived in Madras in 1817 at a place called Black Town (Broadway), later known as George Town. Lynch conducted the first Methodist missionary service on 2 March 1817, in a stable. The first Methodist church was dedicated in 1819 at Royapettah. A chapel at Broadway (Black Town) was later built and dedicated on 25 April 1822. This church was rebuilt in 1844 since the earlier structure was collapsing. At this time there were about 100 Methodist members in all of Madras, and they were either Europeans or Eurasians (European and Indian descent). Among names associated with the founding period of Methodism in India are Elijah Hoole and Thomas Cryer, who came as missionaries to Madras. In 1857, the Methodist Episcopal Church started its work in India, and with prominent evangelists like William Taylor the Emmanuel Methodist Church, Vepery, was born in 1874. The evangelist James Mills Thoburn established the Thoburn Memorial Church in Calcutta in 1873 and the Calcutta Boys' School in 1877. In 1947, the Wesleyan Methodist Church in India merged with Presbyterians, Anglicans and other Protestant churches to form the Church of South India while the American Methodist Church remained affiliated as the Methodist Church in Southern Asia (MCSA) to the mother church in USA- the United Methodist Church until 1981, when by an enabling act the Methodist Church in India (MCI) became an autonomous church in India. Today, the Methodist Church in India is governed by the General Conference of the Methodist Church of India headed by six Bishops, with headquarters at Methodist Centre, 21 YMCA Road, Mumbai, India. Malaysia and Singapore Missionaries from Britain, North America, and Australia founded Methodist churches in many Commonwealth countries. These are now independent and many of them are stronger than the former "mother" churches. In addition to the churches, these missionaries often also founded schools to serve the local community. A good example of such schools are the Methodist Boys' School in Kuala Lumpur, Methodist Girls' School and Methodist Boys' School in George Town, and Anglo-Chinese School, Methodist Girls' School, Paya Lebar Methodist Girls School and Fairfield Methodist Schools in Singapore. Philippines Methodism in the Philippines began shortly after the United States acquired the Philippines in 1898 as a result the Spanish–American War. On 21 June 1898, after the Battle of Manila Bay but before the Treaty of Paris, executives of the American Mission Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church expressed their desire to join other Protestant denominations in starting mission work in the islands and to enter into a Comity Agreement that would facilitate the establishment of such missions. The first Protestant worship service was conducted on 28 August 1898 by an American military chaplain named George C. Stull. Stull was an ordained Methodist minister from the Montana Annual Conference of The Methodist Episcopal Church (later part of the United Methodist Church after 1968). Methodist and Wesleyan traditions in the Philippines are shared by three of the largest mainline Protestant churches in the country: The United Methodist Church in the Philippines, Iglesia Evangelica Metodista En Las Islas Filipinas ("Evangelical Methodist Church in the Philippine Islands", abbreviated IEMELIF), and The United Church of Christ in the Philippines. There are also evangelical Protestant churches in the country of the Methodist tradition like the Wesleyan Church of the Philippines, the Free Methodist Church of the Philippines, and the Church of the Nazarene. There are also the IEMELIF Reform Movement (IRM), The Wesleyan (Pilgrim Holiness) Church of the Philippines, the Philippine Bible Methodist Church, Inc., the Pentecostal Free Methodist Church, Inc., the Fundamental Christian Methodist Church, The Reformed Methodist Church, Inc., The Methodist Church of the Living Bread, Inc., and the Wesley Evangelical Methodist Church & Mission, Inc. There are three episcopal areas of the United Methodist Church in the Philippines: the Baguio Episcopal Area, Davao Episcopal Area and Manila Episcopal Area. A call for autonomy from groups within the United Methodist Church in the Philippines was discussed at several conferences led mostly by episcopal candidates. This led to the establishment of the Ang Iglesia Metodista sa Pilipinas ("The Methodist Church in the Philippines") in 2010, led by Bishop Lito C. Tangonan, George Buenaventura, Chita Milan and Atty. Joe Frank E. Zuñiga. The group finally declared full autonomy and legal incorporation with the Securities and Exchange Commission was approved on 7 December 2011 with papers held by present procurators. It now has 126 local churches in Metro Manila, Palawan, Bataan, Zambales, Pangasinan, Bulacan, Aurora, Nueva Ecija, as well as parts of Pampanga and Cavite. Tangonan was consecrated as the denomination's first Presiding Bishop on 17 March 2012. South Korea The Korean Methodist Church (KMC) is one of the largest churches in South Korea with around 1.5 million members and 8,306 ministers. Methodism in Korea grew out of British and American mission work which began in the late 19th century. The first missionary sent out was Robert Samuel Maclay of the Methodist Episcopal Church, who sailed from Japan in 1884 and was given the authority of medical and schooling permission from emperor Gojong. The Korean church became fully autonomous in 1930, retaining affiliation with Methodist churches in America and later the United Methodist Church. The church experienced rapid growth in membership throughout most of the 20th century—in spite of the Korean War—before stabilizing in the 1990s. The KMC is a member of the World Methodist Council and hosted the first Asia Methodist Convention in 2001. There are many Korean-language Methodist churches in North America catering to Korean-speaking immigrants, not all of which are named as Methodist. Americas Brazil The Methodist Church in Brazil was founded by American missionaries in 1867 after an initial unsuccessful founding in 1835. It has grown steadily since, becoming autonomous in 1930. In the 1970s it ordained its first woman minister. In 1975 it also founded the first Methodist university in Latin America, the Methodist University of Piracicaba. , the Brazilian Methodist Church is divided into eight annual conferences with 162,000 members. Canada The father of Methodism in Canada was William Black (1760–1834) who began preaching in settlements along the Petitcodiac River of New Brunswick in 1781. A few years afterwards, Methodist Episcopal circuit riders from the U.S. state of New York began to arrive in Canada West at Niagara, and the north shore of Lake Erie in 1786, and at the Kingston region on the northeast shore of Lake Ontario in the early 1790s. At the time the region was part of British North America and became part of Upper Canada after the Constitutional Act of 1791. Upper and Lower Canada were both parts of the New York Episcopal Methodist Conference until 1810 when they were transferred to the newly formed Genesee Conference. Reverend Major George Neal began to preach in Niagara in October 1786 and was ordained in 1810 by Bishop Philip Asbury, at the Lyons, New York Methodist Conference. He was Canada's first saddlebag preacher and travelled from Lake Ontario to Detroit for 50 years preaching the gospel. The spread of Methodism in the Canadas was seriously disrupted by the War of 1812 but quickly gained lost ground after the Treaty of Ghent was signed in 1815. In 1817, the British Wesleyans arrived in the Canadas from the Maritimes but by 1820 had agreed, with the Episcopal Methodists, to confine their work to Lower Canada (present-day Quebec) while the latter would confine themselves to Upper Canada (present-day Ontario). In the summer of 1818, the first place of public worship was erected for the Wesleyan Methodists in York, later Toronto. The chapel for the First Methodist Church was built on the corner of King Street and Jordan Street, the entire cost of the building was $250, an amount that took the congregation three years to raise. In 1828, Upper Canadian Methodists were permitted by the General Conference in the United States to form an independent Canadian Conference and, in 1833, the Canadian Conference merged with the British Wesleyans to form the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Canada. In 1884, most Canadian Methodists were brought under the umbrella of the Methodist Church, Canada. During the 19th century, Methodism played a large role in the culture and political affairs of Toronto. The city became known for being very puritanical with strict limits on the sale of alcohol and a rigorous enforcement of the Lord's Day Act. In 1925, the Methodist Church, Canada and most Presbyterian congregations (then by far the largest Protestant communion in Canada), most Congregational Union of Ontario and Quebec congregations, Union Churches in Western Canada, and the American Presbyterian Church in Montreal merged to form the United Church of Canada. In 1968, the Evangelical United Brethren Church's Canadian congregations joined after their American counterparts joined the United Methodist Church. Mexico The Methodist Church came to Mexico in 1872, with the arrival of two Methodist commissioners from the United States to observe the possibilities of evangelistic work in México. In December 1872, Bishop Gilbert Haven arrived to Mexico City, and he was ordered by M. D. William Butler to go to México. Bishop John C. Keener arrived from the Methodist Episcopal Church, South in January 1873. In 1874, M. D. William Butler established the first Protestant Methodist school of México, in Puebla. The school was founded under the name "Instituto Metodista Mexicano". Today the school is called "Instituto Mexicano Madero". It is still a Methodist school, and it is one of the most elite, selective, expensive and prestigious private schools in the country, with two campuses in Puebla State, and one in Oaxaca. A few years later the principal of the school created a Methodist university. On 18 January 1885, the first Annual Conference of the United Episcopal Church of México was established. United States Wesley came to believe that the New Testament evidence did not leave the power of ordination to the priesthood in the hands of bishops but that other priests could ordain. In 1784, he ordained preachers for Scotland, England, and America, with power to administer the sacraments (this was a major reason for Methodism's final split from the Church of England after Wesley's death). At that time, Wesley sent Thomas Coke to America. Francis Asbury founded the Methodist Episcopal Church at the Baltimore Christmas Conference in 1784; Coke (already ordained in the Church of England) ordained Asbury deacon, elder, and bishop each on three successive days. Circuit riders, many of whom were laymen, travelled by horseback to preach the gospel and establish churches in many places. One of the most famous circuit riders was Robert Strawbridge who lived in the vicinity of Carroll County, Maryland, soon after arriving in the Colonies around 1760. The First Great Awakening was a religious movement in the 1730s and 1740s, beginning in New Jersey, then spreading to New England, and eventually south into Virginia and North Carolina. George Whitefield played a major role, traveling across the colonies and preaching in a dramatic and emotional style, accepting everyone as his audience. The new style of sermons and the way people practiced their faith breathed new life into religion in America. People became passionately and emotionally involved in their religion, rather than passively listening to intellectual discourse in a detached manner. People began to study the Bible at home. The effect was akin to the individualistic trends present in Europe during the Protestant Reformation. The Second Great Awakening was a nationwide wave of revivals, from 1790 to 1840. In New England, the renewed interest in religion inspired a wave of social activism among Yankees; Methodism grew and established several colleges, notably Boston University. In the "burned over district" of western New York, the spirit of revival burned brightly. Methodism saw the emergence of a Holiness movement. In the west, especially at Cane Ridge, Kentucky, and in Tennessee, the revival strengthened the Methodists and the Baptists. Methodism grew rapidly in the Second Great Awakening, becoming the nation's largest denomination by 1820. From 58,000 members in 1790, it reached 258,000 in 1820 and 1,661,000 in 1860, growing by a factor of 28.6 in 70 years, while the total American population grew by a factor of eight. Other denominations also used revivals, but the Methodists grew fastest of all because "they combined popular appeal with efficient organization under the command of missionary bishops." Methodism attracted German immigrants, and the first German Methodist Church was erected in Cincinnati, Ohio. Disputes over slavery placed the church in difficulty in the first half of the 19th century, with the northern church leaders fearful of a split with the South, and reluctant to take a stand. The Wesleyan Methodist Connexion (later renamed the Wesleyan Methodist Church) and the Free Methodist Churches were formed by staunch abolitionists, and the Free Methodists were especially active in the Underground Railroad, which helped to free the slaves. In 1962, the Evangelical Wesleyan Church separated from the Free Methodist Church. In 1968 the Wesleyan Methodist Church and Pilgrim Holiness Church merged to form the Wesleyan Church; a significant amount dissented from this decision resulting in the independence of the Allegheny Wesleyan Methodist Connection and the formation of the Bible Methodist Connection of Churches, both of which fall within the conservative holiness movement. In a much larger split, in 1845 at Louisville, the churches of the slaveholding states left the Methodist Episcopal Church and formed The Methodist Episcopal Church, South. The northern and southern branches were reunited in 1939, when slavery was no longer an issue. In this merger also joined the Methodist Protestant Church. Some southerners, conservative in theology, opposed the merger, and formed the Southern Methodist Church in 1940. The Third Great Awakening from 1858 to 1908 saw enormous growth in Methodist membership, and a proliferation of institutions such as colleges (e.g., Morningside College). Methodists were often involved in the Missionary Awakening and the Social Gospel Movement. The awakening in so many cities in 1858 started the movement, but in the North it was interrupted by the Civil War. In the South, on the other hand, the Civil War stimulated revivals, especially in Lee's army. In 1914–1917 many Methodist ministers made strong pleas for world peace. President Woodrow Wilson (a Presbyterian), promised "a war to end all wars," using language of a future peace that had been a watchword for the postmillennial movement. In the 1930s many Methodists favored isolationist policies. Thus in 1936, Methodist Bishop James Baker, of the San Francisco Conference, released a poll of ministers showing 56% opposed warfare. However, the Methodist Federation did call for a boycott of Japan, which had invaded China and was disrupting missionary activity there. In Chicago, 62 local African Methodist Episcopal churches voted their support for the Roosevelt administration's policy, while opposing any plan to send American troops overseas to fight. When war came in 1941, the vast majority of Methodists strongly supported the national war effort, but there were also a few (673) conscientious objectors. The United Methodist Church (UMC) was formed in 1968 as a result of a merger between the Evangelical United Brethren Church (EUB) and The Methodist Church. The former church had resulted from mergers of several groups of German Methodist heritage; however, there was no longer any need or desire to worship in the German language. The latter church was a result of union between the Methodist Protestant Church and the northern and southern factions of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The merged church had approximately nine million members as of the late 1990s. While United Methodist Church in America membership has been declining, associated groups in developing countries are growing rapidly. Prior to the merge that led to the formation of the United Methodist Church, the Evangelical Methodist Church entered into a schism with the Methodist Church, citing modernism in its parent body as the reason for the departure in 1946. American Methodist churches are generally organized on a connectional model, related, but not identical to that used in Britain. Pastors are assigned to congregations by bishops, distinguishing it from presbyterian government. Methodist denominations typically give lay members representation at regional and national Conferences at which the business of the church is conducted, making it different from most episcopal government. This connectional organizational model differs further from the congregational model, for example of Baptist, and Congregationalist Churches, among others. In addition to the United Methodist Church, there are over 40 other denominations that descend from John Wesley's Methodist movement. Some, such as the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the Free Methodists and the Wesleyan Church (formerly Wesleyan Methodist), are explicitly Methodist. There are also independent Methodist churches, many of which are affiliated with the Association of Independent Methodists. Others do not call themselves Methodist, but grew out of the Methodist movement: for example, The Salvation Army and the Church of the Nazarene. Some of the charismatic or Pentecostal churches such as the Pentecostal Holiness Church and the Assemblies of God USA also have roots in or draw from Wesleyan thought. The Holiness Revival was primarily among people of Methodist persuasion, who felt that the church had once again become apathetic, losing the Wesleyan zeal. Some important events of this revival were the writings of Phoebe Palmer during the mid-1800s, the establishment of the first of many holiness camp meetings at Vineland, New Jersey in 1867, and the founding of Asbury College, (1890), and other similar institutions in the U.S. around the turn of the 20th century. In 2020, United Methodists announced a plan to split the denomination over the issue of same-sex marriage. Oceania Methodism is particularly widespread in some Pacific Island nations, such as Fiji, Samoa and Tonga. Australia In the 19th century there were annual conferences in each Australasian colony (including New Zealand). Various branches of Methodism in Australia merged during the 20 years from 1881. The Methodist Church of Australasia was formed on 1 January 1902 when five Methodist denominations in Australia – the Wesleyan Methodist Church, the Primitive Methodists, the Bible Christian Church, the United Methodist Free and the Methodist New Connexion Churches came together. In polity it largely followed the Wesleyan Methodist Church. In 1945 Kingsley Ridgway offered himself as a Melbourne-based "field representative" for a possible Australian branch of the Wesleyan Methodist Church of America, after meeting an American serviceman who was a member of that denomination. The Wesleyan Methodist Church of Australia was founded on his work. The Methodist Church of Australasia merged with the majority of the Presbyterian Church of Australia and the Congregational Union of Australia in 1977, becoming the Uniting Church. The Wesleyan Methodist Church of Australia and some independent congregations chose not to join the union. Wesley Mission in Pitt Street, Sydney, the largest parish in the Uniting Church, remains strongly in the Wesleyan tradition. There are many local churches named after John Wesley. From the mid-1980s a number of independent Methodist churches were founded by missionaries and other members from the Methodist Churches of Malaysia and Singapore. Some of these came together to form what is now known as the Chinese Methodist Church in Australia in 1993, and it held its first full Annual Conference in 2002. Since the 2000s many independent Methodist churches have also been established or grown by Tongan immigrants. Fiji As a result of the early efforts of missionaries, most of the natives of the Fiji Islands were converted to Methodism in the 1840s and 1850s. According to the 2007 census, 34.6% of the population (including almost two-thirds of ethnic Fijians), are adherants of Methodism, making Fiji one of the most Methodist nations. The Methodist Church of Fiji and Rotuma, the largest religious denomination, is an important social force along with the traditional chiefly system. In the past, the church once called for a theocracy and fueled anti-Hindu sentiment. New Zealand In June 1823 Wesleydale, the first Wesleyan Methodist mission in New Zealand, was established at Kaeo. The Methodist Church of New Zealand, which is directly descended from the 19th-century missionaries, was the fourth-most common Christian denomination recorded in the 2018 New Zealand census. Since the early 1990s, missionaries and other Methodists from Malaysia and Singapore established Methodist churches around major urban areas in New Zealand. These congregations came together to form the Chinese Methodist Church in New Zealand (CMCNZ) in 2003. Samoan Islands The Methodist Church is the third largest denomination throughout the Samoan Islands, in both Samoa and American Samoa. In 1868, Piula Theological College was established in Lufilufi on the north coast of Upolu island in Samoa and serves as the main headquarters of the Methodist church in the country. The college includes the historic Piula Monastery as well as Piula Cave Pool, a natural spring situated beneath the church by the sea. Tonga Methodism had a particular resonance with the inhabitants of Tonga. In the 1830s Wesleyan missionaries converted paramount chief Taufa'ahau Tupou who in turn converted fellow islanders. Today, Methodism is represented on the island by the Free Church of Tonga and the Free Wesleyan Church, which is the largest church in Tonga. 48% of Tongans adhered to Methodist churches. The royal family of the country are prominent members of the Free Wesleyan Church, and the late king was a lay preacher. Tongan Methodist minister Sione 'Amanaki Havea developed coconut theology, which tailors theology to a Pacific Islands context. Ecumenical relations Many Methodists have been involved in the ecumenical movement, which has sought to unite the fractured denominations of Christianity. Because Methodism grew out of the Church of England, a denomination from which neither of the Wesley brothers seceded, some Methodist scholars and historians, such as Rupert E. Davies, have regarded their 'movement' more as a preaching order within wider Christian life than as a church, comparing them with the Franciscans, who formed a religious order within the medieval European church and not a separate denomination. Certainly, Methodists have been deeply involved in early examples of church union, especially the United Church of Canada and the Church of South India. Also, a disproportionate number of Methodists take part in inter-faith dialogue. For example, Wesley Ariarajah, a long-serving director of the World Council of Churches' sub-unit on "Dialogue with People of Living Faiths and Ideologies" is a Methodist. In October 1999, an executive committee of the World Methodist Council resolved to explore the possibility of its member churches becoming associated with the doctrinal agreement which had been reached by the Catholic Church and Lutheran World Federation (LWF). In May 2006, the International Methodist–Catholic Dialogue Commission completed its most recent report, entitled "The Grace Given You in Christ: Catholics and Methodists Reflect Further on the Church," and submitted the text to Methodist and Catholic authorities. In July of the same year, in Seoul, South Korea, the Member Churches of the World Methodist Council (WMC) voted to approve and sign a "Methodist Statement of Association" with the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, the agreement which was reached and officially accepted in 1999 by the Catholic Church and the Lutheran World Federation and which proclaimed that: "Together we confess: By grace alone, in faith in Christ's saving work and not because of any merit on our part, we are accepted by God and receive the Holy Spirit, who renews our hearts while equipping and calling us to good works... as sinners our new life is solely due to the forgiving and renewing mercy that God imparts as a gift and we receive in faith, and never can merit in any way," affirming "fundamental doctrinal agreement" concerning justification between the Catholic Church, the LWF, and the World Methodist Council. This is not to say there is perfect agreement between the three denominational traditions; while Catholics and Methodists believe that salvation involves cooperation between God and man, Lutherans believe that God brings about the salvation of individuals without any cooperation on their part. Commenting on the ongoing dialogues with Catholic Church leaders, Ken Howcroft, Methodist minister and the Ecumenical Officer for the Methodist Church of Great Britain, noted that "these conversations have been immensely fruitful." Methodists are increasingly recognizing that the 15 centuries prior to the Reformation constitute a shared history with Catholics, and are gaining new appreciation for neglected aspects of the Catholic tradition. There are, however, important unresolved doctrinal differences separating Roman Catholicism and Methodism, which include "the nature and validity of the ministry of those who preside at the Eucharist [Holy Communion], the precise meaning of the Eucharist as the sacramental 'memorial' of Christ's saving death and resurrection, the particular way in which Christ is present in Holy Communion, and the link between eucharistic communion and ecclesial communion. In the 1960s, the Methodist Church of Great Britain made ecumenical overtures to the Church of England, aimed at denominational union. Formally, these failed when they were rejected by the Church of England's General Synod in 1972; conversations and co-operation continued, however, leading in 2003 to the signing of a covenant between the two churches. From the 1970s onward, the Methodist Church also started several Local Ecumenical Projects (LEPs, later renamed Local Ecumenical Partnerships) with local neighbouring denominations, which involved sharing churches, schools and in some cases ministers. In many towns and villages Methodists are involved in LEPs which are sometimes with Anglican or Baptist churches, but most commonly Methodist and United Reformed Church. In terms of belief, practice and churchmanship, many Methodists see themselves as closer to the United Reformed Church (another Nonconformist church) than to the Church of England. In the 1990s and early 21st century, the British Methodist Church was involved in the Scottish Church Initiative for Union, seeking greater unity with the established and Presbyterian Church of Scotland, the Scottish Episcopal Church and the United Reformed Church in Scotland. The Methodist Church of Great Britain is a member of several ecumenical organisations, including the World Council of Churches, the Conference of European Churches, the Community of Protestant Churches in Europe, Churches Together in Britain and Ireland, Churches Together in England, Action of Churches Together in Scotland and Cytûn (Wales). Methodist denominations in the United States have also strengthened ties with other Christian traditions. In April 2005, bishops in the United Methodist Church approved A Proposal for Interim Eucharistic Sharing. This document was the first step toward full communion with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). The ELCA approved this same document in August 2005. At the 2008 General Conference, the United Methodist Church approved full communion with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The UMC is also in dialogue with the Episcopal Church for full communion. The two denominations are working on a document called "Confessing Our Faith Together". See also List of Methodists List of Methodist theologians List of Methodist churches List of Methodist denominations Saints in Methodism Notes References Further reading Abraham, William J. and James E. Kirby (eds.) (2009) The Oxford Handbook of Methodist Studies. 780pp; historiography; excerpt World Borgen, Ole E. (1985) John Wesley on the Sacraments: a Theological Study. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Francis Asbury Press, cop. 1972. 307 p. Copplestone, J. Tremayne. (1973) History of Methodist Missions, vol. 4: Twentieth-Century Perspectives. 1288 pp; comprehensive world coverage for US Methodist missions – online Cracknell, Kenneth and White, Susan J. (2005) An Introduction to World Methodism, Cambridge University Press, . Forster, DA and Bentley, W (eds.) (2008) What are we thinking? Reflections on Church and Society from Southern African Methodists. Methodist Publishing House, Cape Town. Forster, DA and Bentley, W (eds.) (2008) Methodism in Southern Africa: A celebration of Wesleyan Mission AcadSA Publishers, Kempton Park. Harmon, Nolan B. (ed.) (2 vol. 1974) The Encyclopedia of World Methodism, Nashville: Abingdon Press, . 2640pp Heitzenrater, Richard P. (1994) Wesley and the People Called Methodists, Nashville: Abingdon Press, Hempton, David (2005) Methodism: Empire of the Spirit, Yale University Press, Wilson, Kenneth. Methodist Theology. London: T & T Clark International, 2011 (Doing Theology). Yrigoyen Jr, Charles, and Susan E. Warrick. Historical dictionary of Methodism (2nd ed. Scarecrow Press, 2013) Great Britain Brooks, Alan. (2010) West End Methodism: The Story of Hinde Street, London: Northway Publications, 400pp. Davies, Rupert & Rupp, Gordon. (1965) A History of the Methodist Church in Great Britain: Vol 1, Epworth Press Davies, Rupert & George, A. Raymond & Rupp, Gordon. (1978) A History of the Methodist Church in Great Britain: Vol 2, Epworth Press Davies, Rupert & George, A. Raymond & Rupp, Gordon. (1983) A History of the Methodist Church in Great Britain: Vol 3, Epworth Press Davies, Rupert & George, A. Raymond & Rupp, Gordon. (1988) A History of the Methodist Church in Great Britain: Vol 4, Epworth Press Dowson, Jean and Hutchinson, John. (2003) John Wesley: His Life, Times and Legacy [CD-ROM], Methodist Publishing House, TB214 Edwards, Maldwyn. (1944) Methodism and England: A study of Methodism in its social and political aspects during the period 1850–1932 Halevy, Elie, and Bernard Semmel. (1971) The Birth of Methodism in England Hempton, David. (1984) Methodism and Politics in British Society, 1750–1850, Stanford University Press, Jones, David Ceri et al. (2012) The Elect Methodists: Calvinistic Methodism in England and Wales, 1735–1811 Kent, John. (2002) Wesley and the Wesleyans, Cambridge University Press, Madden, Lionel. (2003) Methodism in Wales: A Short History of the Wesley Tradition, Gomer Press. Milburn, Geoffrey & Batty, Margaret (eds.) (1995) Workaday Preachers: The Story of Methodist Local Preaching, Methodist Publishing House Stigant, P. (1971) "Wesleyan Methodism and working-class radicalism in the north, 1792–1821." Northern History, Vol 6 (1) pp: 98–116. Thompson, Edward Palmer. (1963) The making of the English working class – a famous classic stressing the role of Methodism. Turner, John Munsey. (2003) John Wesley: The Evangelical Revival and the Rise of Methodism in England Turner, John M. (1997) Modern Methodism in England, 1932–1996 Warner, Wellman J. (1930) The Wesleyan Movement in the Industrial Revolution, London: Longmans, Green. Vickers, John A, ed. (2000) A Dictionary of Methodism in Britain and Ireland, Epworth Press. African Americans Campbell, James T. (1995) Songs of Zion: The African Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States and South Africa, Oxford University Press, George, Carol V.R. (1973) Segregated Sabbaths: Richard Allen and the Rise of Independent Black Churches, 1760–1840, New York: Oxford University Press, LCCN 73076908 Montgomery, William G. (1993) Under Their Own Vine and Fig Tree: The African-American Church in the South, 1865–1900, Louisiana State University Press, Walker, Clarence E. (1982) A Rock in a Weary Land: The African Methodist Episcopal Church During the Civil War and Reconstruction, Louisiana State University Press, Wills, David W. and Newman, Richard (eds.) (1982) Black Apostles at Home and Abroad: Afro-American and the Christian Mission from the Revolution to Reconstruction, Boston, MA: G. K. Hall, United States Cameron, Richard M. (ed.) (1961) Methodism and Society in Historical Perspective, 4 vol., New York: Abingdon Press Lyerly, Cynthia Lynn (1998) Methodism and the Southern Mind, 1770–1810, Religion in America Series, Oxford University Press, Meyer, Donald (1988) The Protestant Search for Political Realism, 1919–1941, Wesleyan University Press, Schmidt, Jean Miller (1999) Grace Sufficient: A History of Women in American Methodism, 1760–1939, Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press Sweet, William Warren (1954) Methodism in American History, Revision of 1953, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 472 p. Wigger, John H. (1998) Taking Heaven by Storm: Methodism and the Rise of Popular Christianity in America, Oxford University Press, – pp. ix & 269 focus on 1770–1910 Canada Rawlyk, G.A. (1994) The Canada Fire: Radical Evangelicalism in British North America, 1775–1812, Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, Semple, Neil (1996) The Lord's Dominion: The History of Canadian Methodism, Buffalo: McGill-Queen's University Press, Primary sources Richey, Russell E., Rowe, Kenneth E. and Schmidt, Jean Miller (eds.) (2000) The Methodist Experience in America: a sourcebook, Nashville: Abingdon Press, . 756 p. of original documents Sweet, William Warren (ed.) (1946) Religion on the American Frontier: Vol. 4, The Methodists,1783–1840: A Collection of Source Materials, New York: H. Holt & Co., – 800 p. of documents regarding the American frontier The Archive of the Methodist Missionary Society is held at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London. http://www.soas.ac.uk/library/archives/ External links Methodist History Bookmarks World Methodist Council (Official Website) List of Member Churches World Methodist Evangelical Institute (Official Website) Christian movements Christian terminology

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mancala

Mancala

The mancala games are a family of two-player turn-based strategy board games played with small stones, beans, or seeds and rows of holes or pits in the earth, a board or other playing surface. The objective is usually to capture all or some set of the opponent's pieces. Versions of the game date back to the 7th century and evidence suggests the game existed in Ancient Egypt. It is among the oldest known games to still be widely played today. Names and variants The name is a classification or type of game, rather than any specific game. Some of the most popular mancala games (with regard to distribution area, the numbers of players and tournaments, and publications) are: Alemungula or gebeta (ገበጣ)– played in Sudan and Ethiopia. Ali Guli Mane or Pallanguzhi – played in Southern India. Bao la Kiswahili – played in most of East Africa including Kenya, Tanzania, Comoros, Malawi, as well as some areas of DR Congo and Burundi. Congklak (a.k.a congkak, congka, tjongklak, jongklak) – played in Malay Archipelago by Malay (i.e. Malay people). Dakon (or ) – played in Indonesian archipelago (especially in Java island). Gebeta (Tigrigna: ገበጣ) – Ethiopian and Eritrea (especially in Tigrai). Hoyito – played in the Dominican Republic. Igisoro - played in Rwanda. Kalah – North American variation, the most popular variant in the Western world. Lamlameta – played in Ethiopia. Ô ăn quan - played in Vietnam. Omanu Guntalu (in Telugu) – played in rural areas of Telangana, India. Opón ayò – among the Yorubas of Nigeria. Oware (awalé, awélé, awari) – Ashanti, but played world-wide with close variants played throughout West Africa (e.g., ayo by Yorubas and ishe by Igalas) and in the Caribbean. Sungka – It was first described by the Jesuit priest Father José Sanchez in his dictionary of the Bisaya language (Cebuano) in 1692 manuscript as kunggit. Father José Sanchez who had arrived on the Philippines in 1643 wrote that at the game was played with seashells on a wooden, boat-like board. The Aklanon people still call the game kunggit. Toguz korgool or Toguz kumalak – played in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. Vwela – played by the nyemba (lucazi) people distributed between Southern Angola, Northern East Namibia and Zambia. They differ from other mancala types in that the player's store is included in the placing of the seeds. The most common type has seven holes for each player, in addition to the player store holes. This version has identical rules throughout its range. But there are also numerous variations with the number of holes and rules by region. Sometimes more than one version can be played in a single locality. Although more than 800 names of traditional mancala games are known, some names denote the same game, while some names are used for more than one game. Almost 200 modern invented versions have also been described. History Evidence of the game was uncovered in Israel in the city of Gedera in an excavated Roman bathhouse where pottery boards and rock cuts were unearthed dating back to between the 2nd and 3rd century AD. Among other early evidence of the game are fragments of a pottery board and several rock cuts found in Aksumite areas in Matara (in Eritrea) and Yeha (in Ethiopia), which are dated by archaeologists to between the 6th and 7th centuries AD; the game may have been mentioned by Giyorgis of Segla in his 14th century Ge'ez text Mysteries of Heaven and Earth, where he refers to a game called qarqis, a term used in Ge'ez to refer to both Gebet'a (mancala) and Sant'araz (modern sent'erazh, Ethiopian chess). The games existed in especially eastern Europe. In the Baltic area, it was once very popular ("Bohnenspiel"); in Bosnia, where it is called Ban-Ban and still played today; Serbia; and Greece ("Mandoli", Cyclades). Two mancala tables from the early 18th century are to be found in Weikersheim Castle in southern Germany. In western Europe, it never caught on, but was documented by Oxford University orientalist Thomas Hyde. The United States has a larger mancala-playing population. A traditional mancala game called Warra was still played in Louisiana in the early 20th century, and a commercial version called Kalah became popular in the 1940s. In Cape Verde, mancala is known as "ouril". It is played in the Islands and was brought to the United States by Cape Verdean immigrants. It is played to this day in Cape Verdean communities in New England. Recent studies of mancala rules have given insight into the distribution of mancala. This distribution has been linked to migration routes, which may go back several hundred years. Etymology The word mancala () is a tool noun derived from an Arabic root naqala () meaning "to move". No one game exists with the name mancala; the name is a classification or type of game. This word is used in Syria, Lebanon, and Egypt but is not consistently applied to any one game; it was applied to backgammon in the ancient Near East. Mancala first appeared in Africa. General gameplay Most mancala games share a common general gameplay. Players begin by placing a certain number of seeds, prescribed for the particular game, in each of the pits on the game board. A player may count their stones to plot the game. A turn consists of removing all seeds from a pit, "sowing" the seeds (placing one in each of the following pits in sequence) and capturing based on the state of the board. The object of the game is to plant the most seeds in the bank. This leads to the English phrase "count and capture" sometimes used to describe the gameplay. Although the details differ greatly, this general sequence applies to all games. If playing in capture mode, once a player ends their turn in an empty pit on their own side, they capture the opponent's pieces directly across. Once captured, the player gets to put the seeds in their own bank. After capturing, the opponent forfeits a turn. Equipment Equipment is typically a board, constructed of various materials, with a series of holes arranged in rows, usually two or four. The materials include clay and other shapeable materials. Some games are more often played with holes dug in the earth, or carved in stone. The holes may be referred to as "depressions", "pits", or "houses". Sometimes, large holes on the ends of the board called stores, are used for holding the pieces. Playing pieces are seeds, beans, stones, cowry shells, half-marbles or other small undifferentiated counters that are placed in and transferred about the holes during play. Board configurations vary among different games but also within variations of a given game; for example Endodoi is played on boards from 2×6 to 2×10. The largest is Tchouba (Mozambique) with a board of 160 (4×40) holes requiring 320 seeds; and En Gehé (Tanzania), played on longer rows with up to 50 pits (a total of 2×50=100) and using 400 seeds. The most minimalistic variants are Nano-Wari and Micro-Wari, created by the Bulgarian ethnologue Assia Popova. The Nano-Wari board has eight seeds in just two pits; Micro-Wari has a total of four seeds in four pits. With a two-rank board, players usually are considered to control their respective sides of the board, although moves often are made into the opponent's side. With a four-rank board, players control an inner row and an outer row, and a player's seeds will remain in these closest two rows unless the opponent captured them. Objective The objective of most two- and three-row mancala games is to capture more stones than the opponent; in four-row games, one usually seeks to leave the opponent with no legal move or sometimes to capture all counters in their front row. At the beginning of a player's turn, they select a hole with seeds that will be sown around the board. This selection is often limited to holes on the current player's side of the board, as well as holes with a certain minimum number of seeds. In a process known as sowing, all the seeds from a hole are dropped one by one into subsequent holes in a motion wrapping around the board. Sowing is an apt name for this activity, since not only are many games traditionally played with seeds but placing seeds one at a time in different holes reflects the physical act of sowing. If the sowing action stops after dropping the last seed, the game is considered a single lap game. Multiple laps or relay sowing is a frequent feature of mancala games, although not universal. When relay sowing, if the last seed during sowing lands in an occupied hole, all the contents of that hole, including the last sown seed, are immediately re-sown from the hole. The process usually will continue until sowing ends in an empty hole. Another common way to receive "multiple laps" is when the final seed sown lands in your designated hole. Many games from the Indian subcontinent use pussakanawa laps. These are like standard multilaps, but instead of continuing the movement with the contents of the last hole filled, a player continues with the next hole. A pussakanawa lap move will then end when a lap ends just prior to an empty hole. If a player ends his stone with a point move he gets a "free turn". Capturing Depending on the last hole sown in a lap, a player may capture stones from the board. The exact requirements for capture, as well as what is done with captured stones, vary considerably among games. Typically, a capture requires sowing to end in a hole with a certain number of stones, ending across the board from stones in specific configurations or landing in an empty hole adjacent to an opponent's hole that contains one or more pieces. Another common way of capturing is to capture the stones that reach a certain number of seeds at any moment. Also, several games include the notion of capturing holes, and thus all seeds sown on a captured hole belong at the end of the game to the player who captured it. Psychology Like other board games, mancala games have led to psychological studies. Retschitzki has studied the cognitive processes used by awalé players. Some of Restchitzki's results on memory and problem solving have recently been simulated by Fernand Gobet with the CHREST computer model. De Voogt has studied the psychology of Bao playing. In popular culture Mancala was used as a minigame in the multiplayer online game Club Penguin. It is also one of the games featured in Nintendo’s Clubhouse Games: 51 Worldwide Classics. See also Abstract strategy games Tak List of mancala games References Further reading Deledicq, A. & A. Popova (1977). Wari et solo. Le jeu de calcul Africain. Paris: Cedic. Murray, H.J.R. (1952). A History of Board-Games other than Chess. Oxford at the Clarendon Press. Voogt, A.J. de (1997). Mancala Board Games. British Museum Press: London. Traditional board games

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maastricht

Maastricht

Maastricht ( , , ; ; ; ) is a city and a municipality in the southeastern Netherlands. It is the capital and largest city of the province of Limburg. Maastricht is located on both sides of the Meuse (), at the point where the Jeker joins it. Mount Saint Peter (Sint-Pietersberg) is largely situated within the city's municipal borders. Maastricht is adjacent to the border with Belgium. It is part of the Meuse-Rhine Euroregion, a metropolis with a population of about 3.9 million, which includes the nearby German and Belgian cities of Aachen, Liège and Hasselt. Maastricht developed from a Roman settlement (Trajectum ad Mosam) to a medieval religious centre. In the 16th century it became a garrison town and in the 19th century an early industrial centre. Today, the city is a thriving cultural and regional hub. It became well known through the Maastricht Treaty and as the birthplace of the euro. Maastricht has 1677 national heritage buildings (rijksmonumenten), the second highest number in the Netherlands, after Amsterdam. The city is visited by tourists for shopping and recreation, and has a large international student population. History Toponymy Maastricht is mentioned in ancient documents as [Ad] Treiectinsem [urbem] ab. 575, Treiectensis in 634, Triecto, Triectu in 7th century, Triiect in 768–781, Traiecto in 945, Masetrieth in 1051. The place name Maastricht is an Old Dutch compound Masa- (> Maas "the Meuse river") + Old Dutch *treiekt, itself borrowed from Gallo-Romance *TRA(I)ECTU cf. its Walloon name li trek, from Classical Latin trajectus ("ford, passage, place to cross a river") with the later addition of Maas "Meuse" to avoid the confusion with the -trecht of Utrecht having exactly the same original form and etymology. The Latin name first appears in medieval documents and it is not known whether was Maastricht's name during Roman times. A resident of Maastricht is referred to as Maastrichtenaar whilst in the local dialect it is either Mestreechteneer or, colloquially, Sjeng (derived from the formerly popular French name Jean). Early history Neanderthal remains have been found to the west of Maastricht (Belvédère excavations). Of a later date are Palaeolithic remains, between 8,000 and 25,000 years old. Celts lived here around 500 BC, at a spot where the river Meuse was shallow and therefore easy to cross. It is not known when the Romans arrived in Maastricht, or whether the settlement was founded by them. The Romans built a bridge across the Meuse in the 1st century AD, during the reign of Augustus Caesar. The bridge was an important link in the main road between Bavay and Cologne. Roman Maastricht was probably relatively small. Remains of the Roman road, the bridge, a religious shrine, a Roman bath, a granary, some houses and the 4th-century castrum walls and gates, have been excavated. Fragments of provincial Roman sculptures, as well as coins, jewellery, glass, pottery and other objects from Roman Maastricht are on display in the exhibition space of the city's public library (Centre Céramique). According to legend, the Armenian-born Saint Servatius, Bishop of Tongeren, died in Maastricht in 384 where he was interred along the Roman road, outside the castrum. According to Gregory of Tours bishop Monulph was to have built around 570 the first stone church on the grave of Servatius, the present-day Basilica of Saint Servatius. The city remained an early Christian diocese until it lost the distinction to nearby Liège in the 8th or 9th century. Middle Ages In the early Middle Ages Maastricht was part of the heartland of the Carolingian Empire along with Aachen and the area around Liège. The town was an important centre for trade and manufacturing. Merovingian coins minted in Maastricht have been found in places throughout Europe. In 881 the town was plundered by the Vikings. In the 10th century it briefly became the capital of the duchy of Lower Lorraine. During the 12th century the town flourished culturally. The provosts of the church of Saint Servatius held important positions in the Holy Roman Empire during this era. The two collegiate churches were largely rebuilt and redecorated. Maastricht Romanesque stone sculpture and silversmithing are regarded as highlights of Mosan art. Maastricht painters were praised by Wolfram von Eschenbach in his Parzival. Around the same time, the poet Henric van Veldeke wrote a legend of Saint Servatius, one of the earliest works in Dutch literature. The two main churches acquired a wealth of relics and the septennial Maastricht Pilgrimage became a major event. Unlike most Dutch towns, Maastricht did not receive city rights at a certain date. These developed gradually during its long history. In 1204 the city's dual authority was formalised in a treaty, with the prince-bishops of Liège and the dukes of Brabant holding joint sovereignty over the city. Soon afterwards the first ring of medieval walls were built. In 1275, the old Roman bridge collapsed under the weight of a procession, killing 400 people. A replacement, funded by church indulgences, was built slightly to the north and survives until today, the Sint Servaasbrug. Throughout the Middle Ages, the city remained a centre for trade and manufacturing principally of wool and leather but gradually economic decline set in. After a brief period of economic prosperity around 1500, the city's economy suffered during the wars of religion of the 16th and 17th centuries, and recovery did not happen until the industrial revolution in the early 19th century. 16th to 18th centuries The important strategic location of Maastricht resulted in the construction of an impressive array of fortifications around the city during this period. The Spanish and Dutch garrisons became an important factor in the city's economy. In 1579 the city was sacked by the Spanish army led by the Duke of Parma (Siege of Maastricht, 1579). For over fifty years the Spanish crown took over the role previously held by the dukes of Brabant in the joint sovereignty over Maastricht. In 1632 the city was conquered by Prince Frederick Henry of Orange and the Dutch States General replaced the Spanish crown in the joint government of Maastricht. Another Siege of Maastricht (1673) took place during the Franco-Dutch War. In June 1673, Louis XIV laid siege to the city because French supply lines were being threatened. During this siege, Vauban, the famous French military engineer, developed a new tactic in order to break down the strong fortifications surrounding Maastricht. His systematic approach remained the standard method of attacking fortresses until the 20th century. On 25 June 1673, while preparing to storm the city, captain-lieutenant Charles de Batz de Castelmore, also known as the comte d'Artagnan, was killed by a musket shot outside the Tongerse Poort. This event was embellished in Alexandre Dumas' novel The Vicomte de Bragelonne, part of the D'Artagnan Romances. French troops occupied Maastricht from 1673 to 1678. In 1748 the French again conquered the city at what is known as the Second French Siege of Maastricht, during the War of Austrian Succession. The French took the city for the last time in 1794, when the condominium was dissolved and Maastricht was annexed to the First French Empire (1794–1814). For twenty years Maastricht remained the capital of the French département of Meuse-Inférieure. 19th and early 20th century After the Napoleonic era, Maastricht became part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1815. It was made the capital of the newly formed Province of Limburg (1815–1839). When the southern provinces of the newly formed kingdom seceded in 1830, the Dutch garrison in Maastricht remained loyal to the Dutch king, William I, even when most of the inhabitants of the town and the surrounding area sided with the Belgian revolutionaries. In 1831, arbitration by the Great Powers allocated the city to the Netherlands. However, neither the Dutch nor the Belgians agreed to this and the arrangement was not implemented until the 1839 Treaty of London. During this period of isolation Maastricht developed into an early industrial town. Because of its eccentric location in the southeastern Netherlands, and its geographical and cultural proximity to Belgium and Germany, integration of Maastricht and Limburg into the Netherlands did not come about easily. Maastricht retained a distinctly non-Dutch appearance during much of the 19th century and it was not until the First World War that the city was forced to look northwards. Like the rest of the Netherlands, Maastricht remained neutral during World War I. However, being wedged between Germany and Belgium, it received large numbers of refugees, putting a strain on the city's resources. Early in World War II, the city was taken by the Germans by surprise during the Battle of Maastricht of May 1940. On 13 and 14 September 1944 it was the first Dutch city to be liberated by Allied forces of the US Old Hickory Division. The three Meuse bridges were destroyed or severely damaged during the war. As elsewhere in the Netherlands, the majority of Maastricht Jews died in Nazi concentration camps. After World War II During the latter half of the century, traditional industries (such as Maastricht's potteries) declined and the city's economy shifted to a service economy. Maastricht University was founded in 1976. Several European institutions found their base in Maastricht. In 1981 and 1991 European Councils were held in Maastricht, the latter one resulting a year later in the signing of the Maastricht Treaty, leading to the creation of the European Union and the euro. Since 1988, The European Fine Art Fair, regarded as the world's leading art fair, annually draws in some of the wealthiest art collectors. In recent years, Maastricht launched several campaigns against drug-dealing in an attempt to stop foreign buyers taking advantage of the liberal Dutch legislation and causing trouble in the downtown area. Since the 1990s, large parts of the city have been refurbished, including the areas around the main railway station and the Maasboulevard promenade along the Meuse, the Entre Deux and Mosae Forum shopping centres, as well as some of the main shopping streets. A prestigious quarter designed by international architects and including the new Bonnefanten Museum, a public library, and a theatre was built on the grounds of the former Société Céramique factory near the town centre. Further large-scale projects, such as the redevelopment of the area around the A2 motorway, the Sphinx Quarter and the Belvédère area are under construction. Geography Neighbourhoods Maastricht consists of five districts (stadsdelen) and 44 neighbourhoods (wijken). Each neighbourhood has a number which corresponds to its postal code. Maastricht Centrum (Binnenstad, Jekerkwartier, Kommelkwartier, Statenkwartier, Boschstraatkwartier, Sint Maartenspoort, Wyck-Céramique) South-West (Villapark, Jekerdal, Biesland, Campagne, Wolder, Sint Pieter) North-West (Brusselsepoort, Mariaberg, Belfort, Pottenberg, Malpertuis, Caberg, Malberg, Dousberg-Hazendans, Daalhof, Boschpoort, Bosscherveld, Frontenkwartier, Belvédère, Lanakerveld) North-East (Beatrixhaven, Borgharen, Itteren, Meerssenhoven, Wyckerpoort, Wittevrouwenveld, Nazareth, Limmel, Amby) South-East (Randwyck, Heugem, Heugemerveld, Scharn, Heer, De Heeg, Vroendaal) The neighbourhoods of Itteren, Borgharen, Limmel, Amby, Heer, Heugem, Scharn, Oud-Caberg, Sint Pieter and Wolder all used to be separate municipalities or villages until they were annexed by the city of Maastricht in the course of the 20th century. Neighbouring municipalities The outlying areas of the following municipalities are bordering the municipality of Maastricht directly. Clockwise from north-east to north-west: (B = Situated in Belgium) Border Maastricht's city limits has an international border with Belgium. Most of it borders Belgium's Flemish region, but a small part to the south also has a border with Wallonia. Both countries are part of Europe's Schengen Area thus are open without border controls. Climate Maastricht features the same climate as most of the Netherlands (Cfb, Oceanic climate), however, due to its more inland location in between hills, summers tend to be warmer (especially in the Meuse valley, which lies 70 metres lower than the meteorological station) and winters a bit colder, although the difference is only noticeable on just a few days a year. The highest temperature recorded was on 25 July 2019 at . Demographics Historical population Inhabitants by nationality Inhabitants by country of birth Languages Maastricht is a city of linguistic diversity, partly as a result of its location at the crossroads of multiple language areas and its international student population. Dutch is the national language and the language of elementary and secondary education (excluding international institutions) as well as administration. Dutch in Maastricht is often spoken with a distinctive Limburgish accent, which should not be confused with the Limburgish language. Limburgish (or Limburgian) is the overlapping term of the tonal dialects spoken in the Dutch and the Belgian provinces of Limburg. The Maastrichtian dialect (Mestreechs) is only one of many variants of Limburgish. It is characterised by stretched vowels and some French influence on its vocabulary. In recent years the Maastricht dialect has been in decline (see dialect levelling) and a language switch to Standard Dutch has been noted. French used to be the language of education in Maastricht. In the 18th century the language occupied a powerful position as the judicial and cultural language, and it was used throughout the following century by the upper classes. Between 1851 and 1892 a Francophone newspaper (Le Courrier de la Meuse) was published in Maastricht. The language is often part of secondary school curricula. Many proper names and some street names are French and the language has left many traces in the local dialect. German, like French, is often part of secondary school curricula. Due to Maastricht's geographic proximity to Germany and the great number of German students in the city, German is widely spoken. English has become an important language in education. At Maastricht University and Hogeschool Zuyd it is the language of instruction for many courses. Many foreign students and expatriates use English as a lingua franca. English is also a mandatory subject in Dutch elementary and secondary schools. Religion In 2010–2014, 69.8% of the population of Maastricht regarded themselves as religious. 60.4% of the total population stated an affiliation with the Roman Catholic Church. 13.9% attended a religious ceremony at least once a month. Economy Private companies based in Maastricht Sappi – South African Pulp and Paper Industry Royal Mosa – ceramic tiles O-I Manufacturing;– previously Kristalunie Maastricht; glass BASF – previously Ten Horn; pigments Mondi – packaging Rubber Resources/Elgi Rubber – previously Vredestein; rubber recycling Radium Foams – Talalay products Hewlett-Packard – previously Indigo, manufacturer of electronic data systems Vodafone – mobile phone company Q-Park – international operator of parking garages DHL – international express mail services Teleperformance – contact center services Mercedes-Benz – customer contact centre for Europe VGZ – health insurance, customer contact centre Pie Medical Imaging – cardiovascular quantitative analysis software Esaote (former Pie Medical Equipment) – manufacturer of medical and veterinary diagnostic equipment BioPartner Centre Maastricht – life sciences spin-off companies Public institutions Since the 1980s, a number of European and international institutions have made Maastricht their base. They provide an increasing number of employment opportunities for expats living in the Maastricht area. Administration of the Dutch province of Limburg Meuse-Rhine Euroregion Limburg Development Company LIOF RHCL and SHCL – archives of the province of Limburg Eurocontrol – The European Organisation for the Safety of Air Navigation European Journalism Centre European Institute of Public Administration (EIPA) European Centre for Development Policy Management (ECDPM) European centre for work and society (ECWS) Maastricht Centre for Transatlantic Studies (MCTS) Expert Centre for Sustainable Business and Development Cooperation (ECSAD) Council of European Municipalities and Regions (REGR) European Centre for Digital Communication (EC/DC) UNU-MERIT Maastricht Research School of Economics of TEchnology and ORganization (METEOR) Research Institute for Knowledge Systems (RIKS) Cicero Foundation (CF) Culture and tourism Sights of Maastricht Maastricht is known in the Netherlands and beyond for its lively squares, narrow streets, and historic buildings. The city has 1,677 national heritage buildings (rijksmonumenten), more than any Dutch city outside Amsterdam. In addition to that there are 3,500 locally listed buildings (gemeentelijke monumenten). The entire city centre is a conservation area (beschermd stadsgezicht) and largely traffic-free. The tourist information office (VVV) is located in the basement of Dinghuis, a late-medieval courthouse overlooking Grote Staat. Maastricht's main sights include: Meuse () river, with several parks and promenades along the river, and some interesting bridges: Sint Servaasbrug, partly from the 13th century; the oldest bridge in the Netherlands; Hoge Brug ("High Bridge"), a modern pedestrian bridge designed by René Greisch. City fortifications, including: Remnants of the first and second medieval city wall and several towers (13th and 14th centuries); Helpoort ("Hell's Gate"), an imposing gate with two towers, built around 1230, the oldest city gate in the Netherlands; Wycker Waterpoort, a medieval gate in Wyck, used for accessing the city from the Meuse, demolished in the 19th century but rebuilt shortly afterwards; Hoge Fronten (or: Linie van Du Moulin), remnants of 17th- and 18th-century fortifications, including a number of well-preserved bastions, couvrefaces, lunettes and dry moats; Fort Sint-Pieter, an early 18th-century fortress on the flanks of Mount Saint Peter, offering guided tours and panoramic views of the city; and Fort Willem I, an early 19th-century fortress on the Caberg elevation; Casemates, an underground network of tunnels, built as sheltered emplacements for guns and cannons. These connected tunnels built of brick and limestone run for around fourteen kilometres underneath the city's fortifications. Guided tours are available. Binnenstad: inner-city pedestrianized district with popular shopping streets Grote and Kleine Staat, high-end shopping streets Stokstraat and Maastrichter Smedenstraat, and two indoor shopping centres. Several main sights in Maastricht as well as a large number of cafés, pubs and restaurants are centred around the three main squares in Binnenstad: Vrijthof, the largest and possibly best-known square in Maastricht, with many well-known pubs and restaurants (including two - one former - gentlemen's clubs). Other sights include: Basilica of Saint Servatius, a predominantly Romanesque church with an imposing westwork and important 12th and 13th-century sculptures; most notably the westwork interior figurative capitals, the westwork reredo, and the sculpted South Portal. The tomb of Saint Servatius in the crypt is a favoured place of pilgrimage. The church has an important church treasury; Sint-Janskerk, a Gothic church dedicated to Saint John the Baptist, the city's main Protestant church since 1632, adjacent to the Basilica of Saint Servatius, with a distinctive limestone tower painted red; Spaans Gouvernement ("Spanish Government Building"), a 16th-century former canon's house, later used as a residence for the Brabant and Habsburg rulers, now housing the Fotomuseum aan het Vrijthof; Hoofdwacht, an 18th-century military guard house, built in the style of the Dutch Baroque, used for exhibitions; Generaalshuis ("General's House"), a Neoclassical mansion, now the city's main theater (Theater aan het Vrijthof). Onze Lieve Vrouweplein, a tree-lined square with a number of pavement cafes. Main sights: Basilica of Our Lady, a partly 11th-century church, one of the Netherlands' most significant Romanesque buildings with an imposing Mosan westwork and an important church treasury. Perhaps best known for the shrine of Our Lady, Star of the Sea in an adjacent Gothic chapel; Derlon Museumkelder, a permanent exhibition of ancient Roman remains in the basement of Hotel Derlon. Markt, the town's historic market square. Sights include: The Town Hall, built in the 17th century by Pieter Post and considered one of the highlights of Dutch Baroque architecture. Nearby is Dinghuis, the late medieval town hall and courthouse with an early Renaissance façade; Mosae Forum, a shopping centre and civic building designed by Jo Coenen and Bruno Albert in the early 2000s. Inside the Mosae Forum parking garage is a small exhibition of Citroën miniature cars; Entre Deux, a rebuilt shopping centre in Postmodern style, which has won several international awards. It includes a bookstore located inside a former 13th-century Dominican church. In 2008, British newspaper The Guardian proclaimed this the world's most beautiful bookshop. Jekerkwartier, a neighbourhood named after the small river Jeker, which pops up between old houses and remnants of city walls. The western part of the neighbourhood (named the Maastricht Latin Quarter) is dominated by university buildings and (performing) arts schools. Sights include: several churches and monasteries: the 13th-century First Franciscan Monastery, the 17th-century "Veiled Sisters" and Bonnefanten monasteries, and the 18th-century Second Franciscan Monastery and Walloon and Lutheran churches; Maastricht Natural History Museum, a small museum of natural history in a former monastery; Grote Looiersstraat ("Great Tanners' Street"), a former canal that was filled in during the 19th century, lined with elegant houses, the city's poorhouse (now part of the university library) and Sint-Maartenshofje, a typically Dutch hofje. Kommelkwartier, Statenkwartier and Boschstraatkwartier, three relatively quiet inner city neighbourhoods with several monasteries, university buildings and industrial heritage building: Crosier Monastery in Kommelkwartier, a well-preserved Gothic monastery, now a five-star hotel; Sint-Matthiaskerk, a 14th-century parish church dedicated to Saint Matthew; Sphinx Quarter, an upcoming neighbourhood and cultural hotspot in the north of the city centre. Several of the industrial buildings of the former Sphinx glass, crystal and ceramics factories have been transformed for new uses; Bassin, a restored early 19th-century inner harbor surrounded by industrial heritage buildings, re-used as cultural venues, bars and restaurants. Wyck, the old quarter on the right bank of the river Meuse. Saint Martin's Church, a Gothic Revival church designed by Pierre Cuypers in 1856; Rechtstraat and Hoogbrugstraat are the oldest streets in Wyck with many historic buildings and a mix of specialty shops, art galleries and restaurants; Stationsstraat and Wycker Brugstraat are elegant streets with the majority of the buildings dating from the late 19th century. At the east end of Stationsstraat stands the Maastricht railway station from 1913. Céramique, a modern neighbourhood on the site of the former Société Céramique potteries, including a park along the river Meuse (Charles Eyckpark) and a showcase of architectural highlights: Wiebengahal, one of the few remaining industrial buildings in the neighbourhood and an early example of modernist architecture in the Netherlands, dating from 1912; Bonnefanten Museum by Aldo Rossi, featuring a landmark rocket-shaped tower; Centre Céramique, a public library and exhibition space by Jo Coenen; La Fortezza, a red brick office and apartment building by Mario Botta; Siza Tower, a residential tower clad with zinc and white marble, by Álvaro Siza Vieira; Other buildings in Céramique by MBM, Cruz y Ortiz, Luigi Snozzi, Aurelio Galfetti, Herman Hertzberger, Wiel Arets, Hubert-Jan Henket, Charles Vandenhove and Bob Van Reeth. Sint-Pietersberg ("Mount Saint Peter"): modest hill and nature reserve south of the city, peaking at above sea level. It serves as Maastricht's main recreation area and a viewing point. The main sights include: Fort Sint-Pieter, an early 18th-century military fortress fully restored in recent years; Caves of Maastricht aka Grotten Sint-Pietersberg, an underground network of man-made tunnels ("caves") in limestone quarries. Guided tours are available; ENCI Quarry: a former quarry and nature reserve with several lakes, accessible via a spectacular staircase with viewing platforms; Slavante, a 19th-century former gentlemen's club on the site of a Franciscan monastery (of which parts are still standing), now a popular hang-out, offering panoramic views over the Meuse valley; Lichtenberg, a ruined medieval castle keep and an adjacent 18th-century farmstead; D'n Observant ("The Observer"), an artificial hilltop, made with the spoils of a nearby quarry, now a nature reserve. Museums in Maastricht Bonnefanten Museum is the foremost museum for old masters and contemporary fine art in the province of Limburg. The collection features medieval sculpture (The Virgin and Child with St. Anne), early Italian painting (Giovanni del Biondo, Domenico di Michelino, Jacopo del Casentino, Sano di Pietro, Pietro Nelli), Southern Netherlandish and German Renaissance painting (Colijn de Coter, Roelandt Savery, Pieter Coecke van Aelst, Pieter Brueghel the Younger, Lucas Cranach the Elder), and contemporary art (Sol LeWitt, Robert Mangold, Richard Serra, Luciano Fabro, Marcel Broodthaers, Joseph Beuys, Neo Rauch, Gilbert and George, Peter Doig, Gary Hume, Grayson Perry, Luc Tuymans, Ai Weiwei). The Treasury of the Basilica of Saint Servatius includes religious artifacts from the 4th to 20th centuries, notably those related to Saint Servatius. Highlights include the shrine, the key and the crosier of Saint Servatius, and the reliquary bust donated by Alexander Farnese, Duke of Parma. The Treasury of the Basilica of Our Lady contains religious art, textiles, reliquaries, liturgical vessels and other artifacts from the Middle Ages and later periods. Derlon Museumkelder is a preserved archeological site in the basement of a hotel with Roman and pre-Roman remains. The Maastricht Natural History Museum exhibits collections relating to the geology, paleontology and flora and fauna of Limburg. Highlights in the collection are several fragment of skeletons of Mosasaurs found in a quarry in Mount Saint Peter. Fotomuseum aan het Vrijthof is a local museum of photography housed in the 16th-century Spanish Government building, featuring some period rooms and temporary exhibitions of photographers. Events and festivals Dies natalis, birthday of the University of Maastricht, with procession of university faculty to St. John's Church where honorary degrees are awarded. Carnival (Maastrichtian: Vastelaovend) - a traditional three-day festival in the southern part of the Netherlands; in Maastricht mainly outdoors with typical Zaate Herremeniekes (February/March). The European Fine Art Fair (TEFAF), the world's leading art and antiques fair (March). Amstel Gold Race, an international cycling race which starts in Maastricht (usually April). KunstTour, an annual art festival (May). European Model United Nations (EuroMUN), an annual international conference in May. Stadsprocessie, religious procession with reliquaries of local saints (first Sunday after 13 May). Pilgrimage of the Relics (Dutch: Heiligdomsvaart), pilgrimage with relics display and processions dating from the Middle Ages (May/June; once in 7 years; next: 2025). Giants' Parade (Dutch: Reuzenstoet), parade of processional giants, mainly from Belgium and France (June; once in 5 years; next: 2024). Maastrichts Mooiste, an annual running and walking event (June). Fashionclash, international fashion event throughout the city (June). Vrijthof concerts by André Rieu and the Johann Strauss Orchestra (July/August). Preuvenemint, a large culinary event held on the Vrijthof square (August). Inkom, the traditional opening of the academic year and introduction for new students of Maastricht University (August). Musica Sacra, a festival of religious (classical) music (September). Nederlandse Dansdagen (Netherlands Dance Days), a modern dance festival (October). Jazz Maastricht, a jazz festival formerly known as Jeker Jazz (autumn). 11de van de 11de (the 11th of the 11th), the official start of the carnival season (11 November). Jumping Indoor Maastricht, an international concours hippique (showjumping) (November). Magic Maastricht (Magisch Maastricht), a winter-themed funfair and Christmas market held on Vrijthof square and other locations throughout the city (December/January). Furthermore, the Maastricht Exposition and Congress Centre (MECC) hosts many events throughout the year. Nature Parks There are several city parks and recreational areas in Maastricht: Stadspark, the main public park in Maastricht, partly 19th-century, with remnants of the medieval city walls, a branch of the Jeker river, a mini-zoo and several public sculptures (e.g. the statue of d'Artagnan in Aldenhofpark, a 20th-century extension of Stadspark). Other extensions of the park are called Kempland, Henri Hermanspark, Monseigneur Nolenspark and Waldeckpark. From 2014 onwards, the grounds of the former Tapijn military barracks will be gradually added to the park; Jekerpark, a new park along the river Jeker, separated from Stadspark by a busy road; Frontenpark, a new park west of the city centre, incorporating parts of the fortifications of Maastricht from the 17th to 19th centuries; Charles Eykpark, a modern park between the public library and Bonnefanten Museum on the east bank of the Meuse river, designed in the late 1990s by Swedish landscape architect Gunnar Martinsson. Griendpark, a modern park on the east bank of the river with an inline-skating and skateboarding course. Geusseltpark in eastern Maastricht and J.J. van de Vennepark in western Maastricht, both with elaborate sports facilities. Natural areas The Meuse river and its green banks in outlying areas. In the northern areas around Itteren and Borgharen 'new nature' is being created in combination with river protection measures and gravel mining. Pietersplas, an artificial lake between Maastricht and Gronsveld that was the result of gravel pits on the banks of the Meuse river. There is a beach on the northern slope of the lake and a marina near Castle Hoogenweerth. The eastern riverbed between Pietersplas and the provincial government building is a nature reserve (Kleine Weerd). The Jeker Valley, along the river Jeker, starts near the city centre in Stadspark and leads via Jekerpark to an area with green meadows, fertile fields, some vineyards on the slopes of Cannerberg, several water mills and Château Neercanne, and continues further south into Belgium. The green flanks of Mount Saint Peter, including many footpaths. Dousberg and Zouwdal, a modest hill and valley surrounded by urban development on the western edge of the city, partly in Belgium. A large part of the hill is now in use as an international golf course (Golfclub Maastricht). Landgoederenzone, an extended area in the northeast of Maastricht (partly in Meerssen) consisting of around fifteen country estates, such as Severen, Geusselt, Bethlehem, Mariënwaard, Kruisdonk, Vaeshartelt, Meerssenhoven, Borgharen and Hartelstein. Some of the castles, villas and stately homes are surrounded by industrial areas or quarries. Bike paths through agricultural areas in several outlying quarters (like "Biesland" and "Wolder"). Sports In football, Maastricht is represented by MVV Maastricht (Dutch: Maatschappelijke Voetbal Vereniging Maastricht), who (as of the 2016–2017 season) play in the Dutch first division of the national competition (which is the second league after the Eredivisie league). MVV's home is the Geusselt stadium near the A2 highway. Maastricht is also home to the Maastricht Wildcats, an American Football League team and member of the AFBN (American Football Bond Nederland). Since 1998, Maastricht has been the traditional starting place of the annual Amstel Gold Race, the only Dutch cycling classic. For several years the race also finished in Maastricht, but since 2002 the finale has been in the municipality of Valkenburg. Tom Dumoulin was born in Maastricht. Since 2000, Maastricht has been the first city in the Netherlands with a Lacrosse team. The Student Sport Association "Maaslax" is closely linked to Maastricht University and a member of the NLB (Nederlandse Lacrosse Bond). Politics City council The municipal government of Maastricht consists of a city council, a mayor and a number of aldermen. The city council, a 39-member legislative body directly elected for four years, appoints the aldermen on the basis of a coalition agreement between two or more parties after each election. The 2006 municipal elections in the Netherlands were, as often, dominated by national politics and led to a shift from right to left throughout the country. In Maastricht, the traditional broad governing coalition of Christian Democrats (CDA), Labour (PvdA), Greens (GreenLeft) and Liberals (VVD) was replaced by a centre-left coalition of Labour, Christian Democrats and Greens. Two Labour aldermen were appointed, along with one Christian Democrat and one Green alderman. Due to internal disagreements, one of the VVD council members left the party in 2005 and formed a new liberal group in 2006 (Liberalen Maastricht). The other opposition parties in the current city council are the Socialist Party (SP), the Democrats (D66) and two local parties (Stadsbelangen Mestreech (SBM) and the Seniorenpartij). Aldermen and mayors The aldermen and the mayor make up the executive branch of the municipal government. After the previous mayor, Gerd Leers (CDA), decided to step down in January 2010 following the 'Bulgarian Villa' affair, an affair concerning a holiday villa project in Byala, Bulgaria, in which the mayor was alleged to have been involved in shady deals to raise the value of villas he had ownership of. Up until 1 July 2015 the mayor of Maastricht was Onno Hoes, a Liberal (VVD), the only male mayor in the country, who officially was married to a male person. In 2013 Hoes was the subject of some political commotion, after facts had been disclosed about intimate affairs with several other male persons. The affair had no consequences for his political career. Because of a new affair in 2014 Hoes eventually stepped down. Since 1 July 2015 the current mayor of Maastricht has been Annemarie Penn-te Strake. Penn is independent and serves no political party, although her husband is a former chairman of the Maastricht Seniorenpartij. She has served for the Dutch judicial system for many years in many different positions. During her tenure as mayor she still serves as attorney general. Cannabis One controversial issue which has dominated Maastricht politics for many years and which has also affected national and international politics, is the city's approach to soft drugs. Under the pragmatic Dutch soft drug policy, a policy of non-enforcement, individuals may buy and use cannabis from 'coffeeshops' (cannabis bars) under certain conditions. Maastricht, like many other border towns, has seen a growing influx of 'drug tourists', mainly young people from Belgium, France and Germany, who provide a large amount of revenue for the coffeeshops (around 13) in the city centre. The city government, most notably ex-mayor Leers, have been actively promoting drug policy reform in order to deal with its negative side effects. One of the proposals, known as the 'Coffee Corner Plan', proposed by then-mayor Leers and supported unanimously by the city council in 2008, was to relocate the coffeeshops from the city centre to the outskirts of the town (in some cases near the national Dutch-Belgian border). The purpose of this plan was to reduce the impact of drug tourism on the city centre, such as parking problems and the illegal sale of hard drugs in the vicinity of the coffeeshops, and to monitor the sale and use of cannabis more closely in areas away from the crowded city centre. The Coffee Corner Plan, however, has met with fierce opposition from neighbouring municipalities (some in Belgium) and from members of the Dutch and Belgian parliament. The plan has been the subject of various legal challenges and has not been carried out up to this date (2014). On 16 December 2010, the Court of Justice of the European Union upheld a local Maastricht ban on the sale of cannabis to foreign tourists, restricting entrance to coffeeshops to residents of Maastricht. The ban did not affect scientific or medical usage. In 2011, the Dutch government introduced a similar national system, the wietpas ("cannabis pass"), restricting access to Dutch coffeeshops to residents of the Netherlands. After protests from local mayors about the difficulty of implementing the issuing of wietpasses, Dutch parliament in 2012 agreed to replace the pass by any proof of residency. The new system has led to a slight reduction in drug tourism to cannabis shops in Maastricht but at the same time to an increase of drug dealing on the street. Transport By car Maastricht is served by the A2 and A79 motorways. The city can be reached from Brussels and Cologne in approximately one hour and from Amsterdam in about two and a half hours. The A2 motorway runs through Maastricht in a double-decked tunnel. Before 2016, the A2 motorway ran through the city; heavily congested, it caused air pollution in the urban area. Construction of a two-level tunnel designed to solve these problems started in 2011 and was opened (in stages) by December 2016. In spite of several large underground car parks, parking in the city centre forms a major problem during weekends and bank holidays because of the large numbers of visitors. Parking fees are deliberately high to encourage visitors to use public transport or park and ride facilities away from the centre. By train Maastricht is served by three rail operators, all of which call at the main Maastricht railway station near the centre and two of which call at the smaller Maastricht Randwyck, near the business and university district. Only Arriva also calls at Maastricht Noord, which opened in 2013. Intercity trains northwards to Amsterdam, Eindhoven, Den Bosch and Utrecht are operated by Dutch Railways. The National Railway Company of Belgium runs south to Liège in Belgium. The line to Heerlen, Valkenburg and Kerkrade is operated by Arriva. The former railway to Aachen was closed down in the 1980s. A small section of the old westbound railway to Hasselt (Belgium) was restored in recent years and will be used as a modern tramline, scheduled to open in 2023. By tram The Dutch and Flemish governments reached an agreement in 2014 to build a new tram route, the Hasselt – Maastricht tramway, as part of the larger Spartacus scheme. It was scheduled to take three years, from 2015 to 2018, and to cost €283 million. However, the planning process has been heavily delayed, and as of 2018, construction has not yet started. The tram is now scheduled to be operating in 2024. When completed, the tram will carry passengers from the city centre of Maastricht to the city centre of Hasselt in 30 minutes. It will be operated by the Flemish transport company De Lijn, with 2 scheduled stops in Maastricht and another 10 in Flanders. By bus Regular bus lines connect the city centre, outer areas, business districts and railway stations. The regional Arriva bus network extends to most parts of South Limburg and Aachen (Germany). Regional buses by De Lijn connect Maastricht with Hasselt, Tongeren and Maasmechelen, and one bus connects Maastricht with Liège, operated by TEC. Various bus companies such as Flixbus and Eurolines provide intercity bus services from Maastricht to many European destinations. By air Maastricht is served by the nearby Maastricht Aachen Airport , in nearby Beek, and it is informally referred to by that name. The airport is located about north of the city centre. The airport is served by Corendon Dutch Airlines and Ryanair which operate scheduled flights to destinations around the Mediterranean, the Canary Islands, North-Africa and also London Stansted Airport from March 2022. There are also charter flights to Lourdes which are operated by Enter Air. By boat Maastricht has a river port (Beatrixhaven) and is connected by water with Belgium and the rest of the Netherlands through the river Meuse, the Juliana Canal, the Albert Canal and the Zuid-Willemsvaart. Although there are no regular boat connections to other cities, various organized boat trips for tourists connect Maastricht with Belgium cities such as Liège. Distances to other cities These distances are as the crow flies and so do not represent actual overland distances. Liège: south Aachen: east Eindhoven: north-west Düsseldorf: north-east Cologne: east Brussels: west Antwerp: north-west Bonn: south-east Charleroi: south-west Luxembourg City: south Ghent: west Utrecht: north-west Rotterdam: north-west Amsterdam: north-west Lille: west Frankfurt am Main: south-east Groningen: north Strasbourg: south-east Paris: south-west Hannover: north-east Stuttgart: south-east Basel: south-east London: north-west Zürich: south-east Education Secondary education Bernard Lievegoedschool (Anthroposophical education) Bonnefantencollege Porta Mosana College Sint-Maartenscollege United World College Maastricht Tertiary education Maastricht University (Dutch: Universiteit Maastricht or UM) including: University College Maastricht Maastricht School of Management Teikyo University (Maastricht campus closed in 2007) Zuyd University of Applied Sciences (Dutch: Hogeschool Zuyd, also has departments in Sittard and Heerlen) including: Academy for Dramatic Arts Maastricht (Dutch: Toneelacademie Maastricht) School of Fine Arts Maastricht (Dutch: Academie Beeldende Kunsten Maastricht) Maastricht Academy of Music (Dutch: Conservatorium Maastricht) Academy of architecture Teachers training college Faculty of International Business and Communication Maastricht Hotel Management School Other Jan Van Eyck Academie - post-academic art institute Berlitz Language School Maastricht Talenacademie Nederland International relations Twin towns Maastricht is twinned with: Notable people Born in Maastricht Jean-Eugène-Charles Alberti (1777 – after 1843) – painter Henri Arends (1921–1993) – conductor Doris Baaten (born 1956) – voice actress Mieke de Boer (born 1980) – female darts player Alphons Boosten (1893–1951) – architect Theo Bovens (born 1959) – politician Joseph Bruyère (born 1948) – Belgian cyclist Jean-Baptiste Coclers (1696–1772) – painter Louis Bernard Coclers (1740–1817) – painter Peter Debye (1884–1966) – Nobel prize winning chemist Tom Dumoulin (born 1990) – cyclist, Giro d'Italia winner Pierre Essers (born 1959) – footballer Robin Frijns (born 1991) - Racing Driver Hendrick Fromantiou (1633/4 – after 1693) – still life painter Joop Haex (1911–2002) – politician André Henri Constant van Hasselt (1806–1874) – French-writing poet Hubert Hermans (born 1937) – psychologist and creator of Dialogical Self Theory Pieter van den Hoogenband (born 1978) – swimmer and a triple Olympic champion Pierre Kemp (1886–1967) – poet Sjeng Kerbusch (1947–1991) – behavior geneticist Mathieu Kessels (1784–1836) – sculptor Lambert of Maastricht (c. 636 – c. 705) – bishop, saint Eric van der Luer (born 1965) – footballer, football manager Pierre Lyonnet (1708–1789) – naturalist, cryptographer, engraver Félix de Mérode (1791–1857) – politician, writer Jan Pieter Minckeleers (1748–1824) – scientist and inventor of coal gas lighting Bram Moszkowicz (born 1960) – ex-barrister Benny Neyman (1951–2008) – singer of popular songs Tom Nijssen (born 1964) – tennis player Jacques Ogg (born 1948) – harpsichordist Henrietta d'Oultremont (1792–1864) – second wife of William I of the Netherlands Jan Peumans (born 1951) – Belgian politician Guido Pieters (born 1948) – film director Dick Raaymakers (1930–2013) – composer, theater maker Prince Rajcomar (born 1985) – football player Louis Regout (1861–1915) – politician André Rieu (born 1949) – violinist, conductor and composer Fred Rompelberg (born 1945) – cyclist, former world record holder Louis Rutten (1884-1946) – Dutch geologist Henri Sarolea (1844–1900) – railway entrepreneur and contractor Bryan Smeets (born 1992) - Football player Hubert Soudant (born 1946) – conductor Victor de Stuers (1843–1916) – politician, monument conservationist Jac. P. Thijsse (1865–1945) – botanist, conservationist Frans Timmermans (born 1961) – politician Johann Friedrich August Tischbein (1750–1812) – portrait painter Maxime Verhagen (born 1956) – politician Hubert Vos (1855–1935) – painter Ad Wijnands (born 1959) – cyclist, Tour de France stage winner Jeroen Willems (1962–2012) – actor, singer Henri Winkelman (1876–1952) – general Danny Wintjens (born 1983) – football goalkeeper Boudewijn Zenden (born 1976) – football player Kim Zwarts (born 1955) – photographer Residing in Maastricht Jo Bonfrere (born 1946) – football player Willy Brokamp (born 1946) – football player Jeroen Brouwers (born 1940) – writer, journalist Gondulph of Maastricht (c. 524 – c. 607) – bishop, saint Theo Hiddema (born 1944) – lawyer Willem Hofhuizen (1915–1986) – painter Monulph of Maastricht (6th century) – bishop, saint Max Moszkowicz (born 1926) – lawyer Servatius of Maastricht (4th century – 384?) – bishop, saint Jan van Steffeswert (15th/16th century) – sculptor, wood carver Aert van Tricht (15th/16th century) – metal caster Henric van Veldeke (12th century) – poet, hagiographer Local anthem In 2002 the municipal government officially adopted a local anthem (Limburgish (Maastrichtian variant): Mestreechs Volksleed, ) composed of lyrics in Maastrichtian. The theme was originally written by Ciprian Porumbescu (1853–1883). Gallery See also Jewish inhabitants of Maastricht Maastricht Treaty Treaty of Maastricht (1843) The Maastrichtian Age, which marks the end of the Cretaceous Period and Mesozoic Era of geological time References Notes Literature Bibliography External links Maastricht city portal Maastricht municipality website Maastricht in Roman times Webpage about Maastricht fortifications Webpage about the 1673 siege Maastricht tourism website Belgium–Netherlands border crossings Cities in the Netherlands Municipalities of Limburg (Netherlands) Populated places in Limburg (Netherlands) Provincial capitals of the Netherlands Roman sites in the Netherlands South Limburg (Netherlands) Vauban fortifications

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.%20C.%20Escher

M. C. Escher

Maurits Cornelis Escher (; 17 June 1898 – 27 March 1972) was a Dutch graphic artist who made mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints. Despite wide popular interest, Escher was for most of his life neglected in the art world, even in his native Netherlands. He was 70 before a retrospective exhibition was held. In the late twentieth century, he became more widely appreciated, and in the twenty-first century he has been celebrated in exhibitions around the world. His work features mathematical objects and operations including impossible objects, explorations of infinity, reflection, symmetry, perspective, truncated and stellated polyhedra, hyperbolic geometry, and tessellations. Although Escher believed he had no mathematical ability, he interacted with the mathematicians George Pólya, Roger Penrose, Harold Coxeter and crystallographer Friedrich Haag, and conducted his own research into tessellation. Early in his career, he drew inspiration from nature, making studies of insects, landscapes, and plants such as lichens, all of which he used as details in his artworks. He traveled in Italy and Spain, sketching buildings, townscapes, architecture and the tilings of the Alhambra and the Mezquita of Cordoba, and became steadily more interested in their mathematical structure. Escher's art became well known among scientists and mathematicians, and in popular culture, especially after it was featured by Martin Gardner in his April 1966 Mathematical Games column in Scientific American. Apart from being used in a variety of technical papers, his work has appeared on the covers of many books and albums. He was one of the major inspirations of Douglas Hofstadter's Pulitzer Prize-winning 1979 book Gödel, Escher, Bach. Early life Maurits Cornelis Escher was born on 17 June 1898 in Leeuwarden, Friesland, the Netherlands, in a house that forms part of the Princessehof Ceramics Museum today. He was the youngest son of the civil engineer George Arnold Escher and his second wife, Sara Gleichman. In 1903, the family moved to Arnhem, where he attended primary and secondary school until 1918. Known to his friends and family as "Mauk", he was a sickly child and was placed in a special school at the age of seven; he failed the second grade. Although he excelled at drawing, his grades were generally poor. He took carpentry and piano lessons until he was thirteen years old. In 1918, he went to the Technical College of Delft. From 1919 to 1922, Escher attended the Haarlem School of Architecture and Decorative Arts, learning drawing and the art of making woodcuts. He briefly studied architecture, but he failed a number of subjects (due partly to a persistent skin infection) and switched to decorative arts, studying under the graphic artist Samuel Jessurun de Mesquita. Study journeys In 1922, an important year of his life, Escher traveled through Italy, visiting Florence, San Gimignano, Volterra, Siena, and Ravello. In the same year, he traveled through Spain, visiting Madrid, Toledo, and Granada. He was impressed by the Italian countryside and, in Granada, by the Moorish architecture of the fourteenth-century Alhambra. The intricate decorative designs of the Alhambra, based on geometrical symmetries featuring interlocking repetitive patterns in the coloured tiles or sculpted into the walls and ceilings, triggered his interest in the mathematics of tessellation and became a powerful influence on his work. Escher returned to Italy and lived in Rome from 1923 to 1935. While in Italy, Escher met Jetta Umiker – a Swiss woman, like himself attracted to Italy – whom he married in 1924. The couple settled in Rome where their first son, Giorgio (George) Arnaldo Escher, named after his grandfather, was born. Escher and Jetta later had two more sons – Arthur and Jan. He travelled frequently, visiting (among other places) Viterbo in 1926, the Abruzzi in 1927 and 1929, Corsica in 1928 and 1933, Calabria in 1930, the Amalfi coast in 1931 and 1934, and Gargano and Sicily in 1932 and 1935. The townscapes and landscapes of these places feature prominently in his artworks. In May and June 1936, Escher travelled back to Spain, revisiting the Alhambra and spending days at a time making detailed drawings of its mosaic patterns. It was here that he became fascinated, to the point of obsession, with tessellation, explaining: The sketches he made in the Alhambra formed a major source for his work from that time on. He also studied the architecture of the Mezquita, the Moorish mosque of Cordoba. This turned out to be the last of his long study journeys; after 1937, his artworks were created in his studio rather than in the field. His art correspondingly changed sharply from being mainly observational, with a strong emphasis on the realistic details of things seen in nature and architecture, to being the product of his geometric analysis and his visual imagination. All the same, even his early work already shows his interest in the nature of space, the unusual, perspective, and multiple points of view. Later life In 1935, the political climate in Italy under Mussolini became unacceptable to Escher. He had no interest in politics, finding it impossible to involve himself with any ideals other than the expressions of his own concepts through his own particular medium, but he was averse to fanaticism and hypocrisy. When his eldest son, George, was forced at the age of nine to wear a Ballila uniform in school, the family left Italy and moved to Château-d'Œx, Switzerland, where they remained for two years. The Netherlands post office had Escher design a semi-postal stamp for the "Air Fund" (Dutch: Het Nationaal Luchtvaartfonds) in 1935, and again in 1949 he designed Dutch stamps. These were for the 75th anniversary of the Universal Postal Union; a different design was used by Surinam and the Netherlands Antilles for the same commemoration. Escher, who had been very fond of and inspired by the landscapes in Italy, was decidedly unhappy in Switzerland. In 1937 the family moved again, to Uccle (Ukkel), a suburb of Brussels, Belgium. World War II forced them to move in January 1941, this time to Baarn, Netherlands, where Escher lived until 1970. Most of Escher's best-known works date from this period. The sometimes cloudy, cold, and wet weather of the Netherlands allowed him to focus intently on his work. After 1953, Escher lectured widely. A planned series of lectures in North America in 1962 was cancelled after an illness, and he stopped creating artworks for a time, but the illustrations and text for the lectures were later published as part of the book Escher on Escher. He was awarded the Knighthood of the Order of Orange-Nassau in 1955; he was later made an Officer in 1967. In July 1969 he finished his last work, a large woodcut with threefold rotational symmetry called Snakes, in which snakes wind through a pattern of linked rings. These shrink to infinity toward both the center and the edge of a circle. It was exceptionally elaborate, being printed using three blocks, each rotated three times about the center of the image and precisely aligned to avoid gaps and overlaps, for a total of nine print operations for each finished print. The image encapsulates Escher's love of symmetry; of interlocking patterns; and, at the end of his life, of his approach to infinity. The care that Escher took in creating and printing this woodcut can be seen in a video recording. Escher moved to the Rosa Spier Huis in Laren in 1970, an artists' retirement home in which he had his own studio. He died in a hospital in Hilversum on 27 March 1972, aged 73. He is buried at the New Cemetery in Baarn. Mathematically inspired work Escher's work is inescapably mathematical. This has caused a disconnect between his full-on popular fame and the lack of esteem with which he has been viewed in the art world. His originality and mastery of graphic techniques are respected, but his works have been thought too intellectual and insufficiently lyrical. Movements such as conceptual art have, to a degree, reversed the art world's attitude to intellectuality and lyricism, but this did not rehabilitate Escher, because traditional critics still disliked his narrative themes and his use of perspective. However, these same qualities made his work highly attractive to the public. Escher is not the first artist to explore mathematical themes: Parmigianino (1503–1540) had explored spherical geometry and reflection in his 1524 Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror, depicting his own image in a curved mirror, while William Hogarth's 1754 Satire on False Perspective foreshadows Escher's playful exploration of errors in perspective. Another early artistic forerunner is Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778), whose dark "fantastical" prints such as The Drawbridge in his Carceri ("Prisons") sequence depict perspectives of complex architecture with many stairs and ramps, peopled by walking figures. Only with 20th century movements such as Cubism, De Stijl, Dadaism, and Surrealism did mainstream art start to explore Escher-like ways of looking at the world with multiple simultaneous viewpoints. However, although Escher had much in common with, for example, Magritte's surrealism, he did not make contact with any of these movements. Tessellation In his early years Escher sketched landscapes and nature. He also sketched insects such as ants, bees, grasshoppers, and mantises, which appeared frequently in his later work. His early love of Roman and Italian landscapes and of nature created an interest in tessellation, which he called Regular Division of the Plane; this became the title of his 1958 book, complete with reproductions of a series of woodcuts based on tessellations of the plane, in which he described the systematic buildup of mathematical designs in his artworks. He wrote, "Mathematicians have opened the gate leading to an extensive domain". After his 1936 journey to the Alhambra and to La Mezquita, Cordoba, where he sketched the Moorish architecture and the tessellated mosaic decorations, Escher began to explore the properties and possibilities of tessellation using geometric grids as the basis for his sketches. He then extended these to form complex interlocking designs, for example with animals such as birds, fish, and reptiles. One of his first attempts at a tessellation was his pencil, India ink, and watercolour Study of Regular Division of the Plane with Reptiles (1939), constructed on a hexagonal grid. The heads of the red, green, and white reptiles meet at a vertex; the tails, legs, and sides of the animals interlock exactly. It was used as the basis for his 1943 lithograph Reptiles. His first study of mathematics began with papers by George Pólya and by the crystallographer Friedrich Haag on plane symmetry groups, sent to him by his brother Berend, a geologist. He carefully studied the 17 canonical wallpaper groups and created periodic tilings with 43 drawings of different types of symmetry. From this point on, he developed a mathematical approach to expressions of symmetry in his artworks using his own notation. Starting in 1937, he created woodcuts based on the 17 groups. His Metamorphosis I (1937) began a series of designs that told a story through the use of pictures. In Metamorphosis I, he transformed convex polygons into regular patterns in a plane to form a human motif. He extended the approach in his piece Metamorphosis III, which is four metres long. In 1941 and 1942 Escher summarised his findings for his own artistic use in a sketchbook, which he labeled (following Haag) Regelmatige vlakverdeling in asymmetrische congruente veelhoeken ("Regular division of the plane with asymmetric congruent polygons"). The mathematician Doris Schattschneider unequivocally described this notebook as recording "a methodical investigation that can only be termed mathematical research." She defined the research questions he was following as Geometries Although Escher did not have mathematical training – his understanding of mathematics was largely visual and intuitive – his art had a strong mathematical component, and several of the worlds that he drew were built around impossible objects. After 1924 Escher turned to sketching landscapes in Italy and Corsica with irregular perspectives that are impossible in natural form. His first print of an impossible reality was Still Life and Street (1937); impossible stairs and multiple visual and gravitational perspectives feature in popular works such as Relativity (1953). House of Stairs (1951) attracted the interest of the mathematician Roger Penrose and his father, the biologist Lionel Penrose. In 1956, they published a paper, "Impossible Objects: A Special Type of Visual Illusion" and later sent Escher a copy. Escher replied, admiring the Penroses' continuously rising flights of steps, and enclosed a print of Ascending and Descending (1960). The paper also contained the tribar or Penrose triangle, which Escher used repeatedly in his lithograph of a building that appears to function as a perpetual motion machine, Waterfall (1961). Escher was interested enough in Hieronymus Bosch's 1500 triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights to re-create part of its right-hand panel, Hell, as a lithograph in 1935. He reused the figure of a Mediaeval woman in a two-pointed headdress and a long gown in his lithograph Belvedere in 1958; the image is, like many of his other "extraordinary invented places", peopled with "jesters, knaves, and contemplators". Thus, Escher not only was interested in possible or impossible geometry but was, in his own words, a "reality enthusiast"; he combined "formal astonishment with a vivid and idiosyncratic vision". Escher worked primarily in the media of lithographs and woodcuts, although the few mezzotints he made are considered to be masterpieces of the technique. In his graphic art, he portrayed mathematical relationships among shapes, figures, and space. Integrated into his prints were mirror images of cones, spheres, cubes, rings, and spirals. Escher was also fascinated by mathematical objects such as the Möbius strip, which has only one surface. His wood engraving Möbius Strip II (1963) depicts a chain of ants marching forever over what, at any one place, are the two opposite faces of the object—which are seen on inspection to be parts of the strip's single surface. In Escher's own words: The mathematical influence in his work became prominent after 1936, when, having boldly asked the Adria Shipping Company if he could sail with them as travelling artist in return for making drawings of their ships, they surprisingly agreed, and he sailed the Mediterranean, becoming interested in order and symmetry. Escher described this journey, including his repeat visit to the Alhambra, as "the richest source of inspiration I have ever tapped". Escher's interest in curvilinear perspective was encouraged by his friend and "kindred spirit", the art historian and artist Albert Flocon, in another example of constructive mutual influence. Flocon identified Escher as a "thinking artist" alongside Piero della Francesca, Leonardo da Vinci, Albrecht Dürer, Wenzel Jamnitzer, Abraham Bosse, Girard Desargues, and Père Nicon. Flocon was delighted by Escher's Grafiek en tekeningen ("Graphics in Drawing"), which he read in 1959. This stimulated Flocon and André Barre to correspond with Escher and to write the book La Perspective curviligne ("Curvilinear perspective"). Platonic and other solids Escher often incorporated three-dimensional objects such as the Platonic solids such as spheres, tetrahedrons, and cubes into his works, as well as mathematical objects such as cylinders and stellated polyhedra. In the print Reptiles, he combined two- and three-dimensional images. In one of his papers, Escher emphasized the importance of dimensionality: Escher's artwork is especially well-liked by mathematicians such as Doris Schattschneider and scientists such as Roger Penrose, who enjoy his use of polyhedra and geometric distortions. For example, in Gravitation, animals climb around a stellated dodecahedron. The two towers of Waterfall impossible building are topped with compound polyhedra, one a compound of three cubes, the other a stellated rhombic dodecahedron now known as Escher's solid. Escher had used this solid in his 1948 woodcut Stars, which also contains all five of the Platonic solids and various stellated solids, representing stars; the central solid is animated by chameleons climbing through the frame as it whirls in space. Escher possessed a 6 cm refracting telescope and was a keen-enough amateur astronomer to have recorded observations of binary stars. Levels of reality Escher's artistic expression was created from images in his mind, rather than directly from observations and travels to other countries. His interest in the multiple levels of reality in art is seen in works such as Drawing Hands (1948), where two hands are shown, each drawing the other. The critic Steven Poole commented that Infinity and hyperbolic geometry In 1954 the International Congress of Mathematicians met in Amsterdam, and N. G. de Bruin organised a display of Escher's work at the Stedelijk Museum for the participants. Both Roger Penrose and H. S. M. Coxeter were deeply impressed with Escher's intuitive grasp of mathematics. Inspired by Relativity, Penrose devised his tribar, and his father, Lionel Penrose, devised an endless staircase. Roger Penrose sent sketches of both objects to Escher, and the cycle of invention was closed when Escher then created the perpetual motion machine of Waterfall and the endless march of the monk-figures of Ascending and Descending. In 1957 Coxeter obtained Escher's permission to use two of his drawings in his paper "Crystal symmetry and its generalizations". He sent Escher a copy of the paper; Escher recorded that Coxeter's figure of a hyperbolic tessellation "gave me quite a shock": the infinite regular repetition of the tiles in the hyperbolic plane, growing rapidly smaller towards the edge of the circle, was precisely what he wanted to allow him to represent infinity on a two-dimensional plane. Escher carefully studied Coxeter's figure, marking it up to analyse the successively smaller circles with which (he deduced) it had been constructed. He then constructed a diagram, which he sent to Coxeter, showing his analysis; Coxeter confirmed it was correct, but disappointed Escher with his highly technical reply. All the same, Escher persisted with hyperbolic tiling, which he called "Coxetering". Among the results were the series of wood engravings Circle Limit I–IV. In 1959, Coxeter published his finding that these works were extraordinarily accurate: "Escher got it absolutely right to the millimeter". Legacy Escher's special way of thinking and rich graphics have had a continuous influence in mathematics and art, as well as in popular culture. In art collections The Escher intellectual property is controlled by the M.C. Escher Company, while exhibitions of his artworks are managed separately by the M.C. Escher Foundation. The primary institutional collections of original works by M.C. Escher are the Escher Museum in The Hague; the National Gallery of Art (Washington, DC); the National Gallery of Canada (Ottawa); the Israel Museum (Jerusalem); and the Huis ten Bosch (Nagasaki, Japan). Exhibitions Despite wide popular interest, Escher was for a long time somewhat neglected in the art world; even in his native Netherlands, he was 70 before a retrospective exhibition was held. In the twenty-first century, major exhibitions have been held in cities around the world. An exhibition of his work in Rio de Janeiro attracted more than 573,000 visitors in 2011; its daily visitor count of 9,677 made it the most visited museum exhibition of the year, anywhere in the world. No major exhibition of Escher's work was held in Britain until 2015, when the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art ran one in Edinburgh from June to September 2015, moving in October 2015 to the Dulwich Picture Gallery, London. The exhibition poster is based on Hand with Reflecting Sphere, 1935, which shows Escher in his house reflected in a handheld sphere, thus illustrating the artist, his interest in levels of reality in art (e.g., is the hand in the foreground more real than the reflected one?), perspective, and spherical geometry. The exhibition moved to Italy in 2015–2016, attracting over 500,000 visitors in Rome and Bologna, and then Milan. In mathematics and science Doris Schattschneider identifies eleven strands of mathematical and scientific research anticipated or directly inspired by Escher. These are the classification of regular tilings using the edge relationships of tiles: two-color and two-motif tilings (counterchange symmetry or antisymmetry); color symmetry (in crystallography); metamorphosis or topological change; covering surfaces with symmetric patterns; Escher's algorithm (for generating patterns using decorated squares); creating tile shapes; local versus global definitions of regularity; symmetry of a tiling induced by the symmetry of a tile; orderliness not induced by symmetry groups; the filling of the central void in Escher's lithograph Print Gallery by H. Lenstra and B. de Smit. The Pulitzer Prize-winning 1979 book Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter discusses the ideas of self-reference and strange loops expressed in Escher's art. The asteroid 4444 Escher was named in Escher's honor in 1985. In popular culture Escher's fame in popular culture grew when his work was featured by Martin Gardner in his April 1966 "Mathematical Games" column in Scientific American. Escher's works have appeared on many album covers including The Scaffold's 1969 L the P with Ascending and Descending; Mott the Hoople's eponymous 1969 record with Reptiles, Beaver & Krause's 1970 In A Wild Sanctuary with Three Worlds; and Mandrake Memorial's 1970 Puzzle with House of Stairs and (inside) Curl Up. His works have similarly been used on many book covers, including some editions of Edwin Abbott's Flatland, which used Three Spheres; E. H. Gombrich's Meditations on a Hobby Horse with Horseman; Pamela Hall's Heads You Lose with Plane Filling 1; Patrick A. Horton's Mastering the Power of Story with Drawing Hands; Erich Gamma et al.'s Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-oriented software with Swans; and Arthur Markman's Knowledge Representation with Reptiles. The "World of Escher" markets posters, neckties, T-shirts, and jigsaw puzzles of Escher's artworks. Both Austria and the Netherlands have issued postage stamps commemorating the artist and his works. See also Victor Vasarely Escher sentences, named after works like Ascending and Descending Notes References Further reading Books Media Escher, M. C. The Fantastic World of M. C. Escher, Video collection of examples of the development of his art, and interviews, Director, Michele Emmer. Phoenix Films & Video Adventures in Perception (1973) External links — physical replicas of some of Escher's "impossible" designs Copyright issue regarding Escher from the Artquest Artlaw archive. M. C. Escher Correspondence at the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario. 1898 births 1972 deaths 20th-century Dutch artists Burials in Utrecht (province) Delft University of Technology alumni Dutch draughtsmen Dutch engravers Dutch illustrators Dutch male artists Dutch printmakers Dutch stamp designers Knights of the Order of Orange-Nassau Mathematical artists Modern printmakers Officers of the Order of Orange-Nassau People from Leeuwarden People from Château-d'Œx

20129

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shang-Chi

Shang-Chi

Shang-Chi ( ), also known as the Master of Kung Fu and Brother Hand, is a superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character was created by writer Steve Englehart and artist Jim Starlin, debuting in Special Marvel Edition #15 (December 1973) in the Bronze Age of Comic Books, and starring in his own solo title until 1983. Shang-Chi is proficient in numerous unarmed and weaponry-based wushu styles, including the use of the gùn, nunchaku, and jian. Shang-Chi was spun off from novelist Sax Rohmer's licensed property as the unknown son of fictional villain Dr. Fu Manchu. In later editions, his connection to Dr. Fu Manchu was underplayed after Marvel lost the comic book rights to the latter's character; to get around this problem, the publisher eventually started calling Shang-Chi's father Zheng Zu. Shang-Chi made his live-action debut in the Marvel Cinematic Universe film Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021), where he is portrayed by Simu Liu. Publication history In the early 1970s, writer Steve Englehart and artist Jim Starlin approached DC Comics to adapt the television series Kung Fu into a comic book, as DC's parent company, Warner Communications, owned the rights to the series. DC Comics, however, was not interested in their pitch, believing the show's and the martial arts genre popularity would phase out quickly. The duo then approached Marvel Comics with the idea to create a kung fu-focused original comic. Editor-in-chief Roy Thomas agreed, but only if they would include the Sax Rohmer's pulp villain Dr. Fu Manchu, as Marvel had previously acquired the comic book rights to the character, and made their protagonist half-white. Englehart and Starlin agreed. They developed Shang-Chi, a master of kung fu, who was introduced as a previously unknown son of Dr. Fu Manchu. Though an original character himself, many of Shang-Chi's supporting characters (most notably Dr. Fu Manchu, Sir Denis Nayland Smith, Dr. James Petrie and Fah Lo Suee) were Rohmer creations. No characters from the Kung Fu television series were included in the comic series, though the character Lu Sun, in an early issue, bears a strong resemblance to Kwai Chang Caine with the addition of a moustache. With artist Paul Gulacy, Shang-Chi's visual appearance was modeled after that of Bruce Lee. According to Englehart, his name was influenced by his study of the I-Ching, composed of 升 (shēng), meaning "ascending", and chi, meaning vital energy. Shang-Chi first appeared in Special Marvel Edition #15 (December 1973). He appeared again in issue #16, and with issue #17 (April 1974) the title was renamed to The Hands of Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu. Amidst the martial arts craze in the United States in the 1970s, the book became very popular, surviving until issue #125 (June 1983), a solid run that included four Giant-Size issues and one Annual. Special Collector's Edition #1 (1975) cover-titled as "Savage Fists of Kung Fu" reprinted stories from The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #1–2; The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu Special #1; and Special Marvel Edition #15. The character did several crossovers with other Marvel martial artists, including the White Tiger, Iron Fist and the Daughters of the Dragon (Colleen Wing and Misty Knight). He appeared regularly in The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu. Shang-Chi had two more short series: the Master of Kung Fu: Bleeding Black one-shot issue (1990) and the MAX miniseries Master of Kung Fu: Hellfire Apocalypse (2002) with artist Paul Gulacy on art again. The character had two stories in the comics anthology series Marvel Comics Presents, including one by Moench that ran in the series' first eight issues in 1988, and co-starred in the Moon Knight Special (1992). In 1995, Shang-Chi would be one of the revival titles produced by Milestone Media, according to writer Dwayne McDuffie, the title would show Shang-Chi using firearms, inspired by gun fu style by Hong Kong filmmaker John Woo; however, according to McDuffie, the proposal was cancelled after the departure of editor-in-chief Tom DeFalco and the death of Mark Gruenwald the following year. In 1997 a story arc starring Shang-Chi ran in Journey into Mystery #514–516, and was intended to lead into a miniseries for the character in 1998. In 2017, after a 34-year gap, Shang-Chi once again starred in Master of Kung Fus 126th issue as part of the Marvel Legacy relaunch, written by mixed martial artist CM Punk and illustrated by Dalibor Talajic. Although spun out of licensed properties, Shang-Chi is a Marvel-owned character and has been firmly established as a part of the Marvel Universe with guest appearances in numerous other titles, such as Marvel Team-Up, Marvel Two-in-One, Marvel Knights and X-Men. Most of the original licensed characters in the supporting cast have been either phased out or renamed in the more recent series and stories. In some of his modern appearances, mention is made of his villainous father either in cryptic terms or using a variety of new names, due to Marvel no longer having the rights to Dr. Fu Manchu. In 2010's Secret Avengers #6–10, writer Ed Brubaker officially sidestepped the entire issue via a storyline where the Shadow Council resurrects a zombified version of Dr. Fu Manchu, only to discover that "Dr. Fu Manchu" was only an alias and that Shang-Chi's father real name was Zheng Zu, an ancient Chinese sorcerer who discovered the secret to immortality. Similarly, Shang-Chi's half sister Fah Lo Suee was later renamed Zheng Bao Yu in 2013's The Fearless Defenders #8 while Smith and Petrie have not appeared in any Marvel properties since the end of the Master of Kung Fu series in 1983. Shang-Chi returned as a main character in the 2007 Heroes for Hire comic book. He, along with other Asian and Asian American superheroes, became a main character in Greg Pak's Agents of Atlas series in 2019. In 2015, Shang-Chi starred in the Master of Kung Fu revival in the Secret Wars storyline. Written by Haden Blackman and illustrated by Taljic, the four-issue series is a wuxia-inspired story that takes place in the Battleworld domain of K'un-Lun and centered around Shang-Chi in his fight to overthrow his despotic father, Emperor Zheng Zu. In 2020, Shang-Chi starred in a self-titled five issue miniseries written by American Born Chinese author Gene Luen Yang with art by Dike Ruan and Philip Tan. Initially set for a June 2020 release, the first issue was delayed to September due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Shang-Chi starred in a new ongoing series by Yang and Ruan in 2021, with Bernard To replacing Ruan by the 9th issue. Following the release of the Marvel Cinematic Universe film Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021), Yang incorporated several concepts introduced in the movie into the Shang-Chi mythos, including the character Jiang Li as Shang-Chi's real mother, who was based off Shang-Chi's mother Ying Li, retconning Shang-Chi's white American mother and his mixed-race heritage; the heavenly realm Ta Lo, which was previously introduced by writers Mark Gruenwald, Ralph Macchio and artist Keith Pollard in Thor #310 (1980) ; and the Ten Rings weapons. In March 2021, the one-shot The Legend of Shang-Chi was published, by Alyssa Wong (script) and Andie Tong (art). Fictional character biography Master of Kung Fu Shang-Chi was born in Henan Province, China, and is the son of Dr. Fu Manchu. Shang-Chi was trained from infancy in the martial arts by his father and his tutors. Believing his father was a benevolent humanitarian, Shang-Chi is sent on a mission to London to murder Dr. James Petrie, who his father claimed was a threat to peace. After assassinating Petrie, Shang-Chi encounters Dr. Fu Manchu's archenemy Sir Denis Nayland Smith, who tells Shang-Chi his father's true nature. Realizing Smith is telling the truth, Shang-Chi escapes from Dr. Fu Manchu's Manhattan headquarters, telling his father they are now enemies and vowing to put an end to his evil schemes. Shang-Chi subsequently fights his adoptive brother Midnight, who was sent by their father to kill Shang-Chi for his defection, and then encounters Smith's aide-de-camp and MI-6 agent Black Jack Tarr, sent by Smith to apprehend Shang-Chi. After several encounters and coming to trust one another, Shang-Chi becomes an ally of Sir Denis Nayland Smith and MI-6. Together with Smith, Tarr, fellow MI-6 agents Clive Reston and Leiko Wu (his eventual love interest), and Dr. Petrie, Shang-Chi goes on many adventures and missions, usually thwarting his father's plans for world domination. Shang-Chi occasionally encounters his half-sister Fah Lo Suee, who leads her own faction of the Si-Fan but opposes her attempts to co-opt him into her own schemes to usurp their father's criminal empire. With Smith, Tarr, Reston, Wu and Petrie, Shang-Chi forms Freelance Restorations, Ltd, an independent spy agency based in Stormhaven Castle, Scotland. After many skirmishes and battles, Shang-Chi witnesses the death of Fu Manchu. Soon after his father's death, a guilt-ridden Shang-Chi quits Freelance Restorations, severs all ties with his former allies, forsakes his life as an adventurer, and retires to a village in remote Yang-Tin, China, to live as a fisherman. Return Some time later, Shang-Chi returns from China and rejoins Tarr, Reston, and Wu. They battle Argus' terrorist group that aims to cause the United States to act more aggressively against all terrorists. Argus has Wu tortured, cutting off her hand. Shang-Chi and the others rescue Wu, but Shang-Chi imbibes a dose of a slow-acting poison. He is cured by Dr. Fu Manchu's elixir vitae. After his father is revealed to still be alive, Shang-Chi assists his old allies, who have rejoined MI-6, against Dr. Fu Manchu and his previously unknown half-brother Moving Shadow. The mission results in his father's Hellfire weapon being destroyed and Moving Shadow's death at Dr. Fu Manchu's hand for his failure in killing Shang-Chi. Heroes for Hire As a member of the restored Heroes for Hire, Shang-Chi puts his strength of character at the service of their teammates. Humbug, turning against the heroes, tried to double-cross both his friends and the "Earth Hive" of insects, joining the Hive. Shang-Chi refuses to kill Humbug until he finds Humbug has no qualms about torturing the Tarantula if it means less suffering for Colleen. Shang-Chi snaps his neck and leaves with the catatonic Tarantula, ashamed of becoming a soulless murderer. Still working for MI-6, Shang-Chi collaborates with Pete Wisdom of MI-13 in facing the Welsh dragon, which has become a human crime lord. He becomes the tutor of a young Earth-616 Killraven. Heroic Age In the "Shadowland" storyline, Shang-Chi is one of the heroes fighting the Hand's ninjas. He later works together with Spider-Man against Mister Negative and temporarily takes Mister Negative's powers until Shang-Chi is brought back to normal by Spider-Man. In Secret Avengers, Steve Rogers tracks Shang-Chi down to help turn back the Shadow Council, which has partially resurrected Shang-Chi's father and employed the Hai-Dai, a squad of assassins, to hunt Shang-Chi down. Beast reveals to Shang-Chi and the Secret Avengers Dr. Fu Manchu is really an ancient sorcerer named Zheng Zu. When Shang-Chi and Rogers meet with John Steele and the Shadow Council for the prisoner exchange, Rogers is overpowered by Steele and Shang-Chi is captured. While Zheng Zu prepares to sacrifice Shang-Chi to complete his resurrection, the Avengers and Moon Knight drop in on the him and the Shadow Council. The Prince of Orphans disrupts the ritual, resulting in Zheng Zu's death and Shang-Chi's rescue. Shang-Chi subsequently joins the Secret Avengers, but leaves the team following the defeat of Arnim Zola 4.2.3. Per the instructions of the new Madame Web, Shang-Chi has begun training Spider-Man in kung fu. Under Shang-Chi's tutelage, Spider-Man develops his own martial arts style, the "Way of the Spider". During the events of Spider-Island, Shang-Chi and other inhabitants of Manhattan are infected by the Spider-Virus, giving him the same powers and abilities as Spider-Man. Shang-Chi is also plagued by recurring nightmares of himself as a spider attacking innocent civilians. People with spider-powers run amok in the city. When he sees Iron Fist and other heroes fighting Spider-Man impostors and Peter Parker nearby, Shang-Chi protects Parker and confirms Spider-Man's identity to the other heroes. Meanwhile, the Bride of Nine Spiders attacks and abducts her teammates in the Immortal Weapons. Shang-Chi attempts to stop the Bride of Nine Spiders from abducting Iron Fist with his newly acquired powers, but is unsuccessful. Shang-Chi learns from Silver Sable that she has found possible locations in Manhattan for the Bride of Nine Spiders' lair. Although Shang-Chi defeats the Bride of Nine Spiders and frees Iron Fist, he discovers the real culprit: the demon Ai Apaec, who seeks to feed off the Immortal Weapons. Shang-Chi fights Ai Apeac and mutates into a spider during the battle as a result of his infection, but Iron Fist uses his chi force to cure Shang-Chi. After making sure Iron Fist and the rest of the Immortal Weapons are evacuated, Shang-Chi collapses the mansion hideout on Ai Apeac, leaving him immobilized for the Avengers to put back into custody. Shang-Chi and the Immortal Weapons arrive to join the heroes during the final stand against the Spider Queen. Marvel NOW! During the Marvel NOW! relaunch, Shang-Chi joins the Avengers after being recruited by Captain America and Iron Man. During the events of Infinity, Shang-Chi and the Avengers join the Galactic Council to fight against the Builders and their crusade against all life in the universe. When several allies were captured by the enemy, Shang forms a rescue team with the Black Widow, Spider-Woman and Manifold. Wielding a pair of energy projecting gauntlets, Shang's timely intervention prevented his friends from being vaporized by an Aleph. After the Builders' defeat, the Avengers return to Earth with their new Galactic Council allies to face off against an even bigger threat back home – Thanos. Shang is sent along with the Black Widow and Manifold the infiltrate the Peak and shut down Thanos' first line of defense; however, the team is intercepted by the Black Dwarf and his guards. As Manifold returned to grab reinforcements, Shang and Natasha managed to defeat the entire security force, save the general who proved to be too much for even the Master of Kung Fu. The combined might of Gladiator, Ronan the Accuser and other Council members eventually made short work of the Black Dwarf and allows Shang and the infiltration team to complete their mission. With the threat of both the Builders and Thanos thwarted, Shang-Chi is sent to Madripoor along with the Black Widow, the Falcon, and Wolverine to stop a full-scale riot that has broken throughout out the island nation. Shang-Chi infiltrates a temple housed by the Hand but is too late to stop the Hand's new leader, the Gorgon, from completing a ritual which raises the island out of the water up upon the head of a massive dragon. When the dragon begins to take flight, Shang-Chi quickly takes out all of the present Hand ninjas at the temple and challenges the Gorgon. Despite a valiant effort, Shang-Chi is defeated by the Gorgon, who throws Shang-Chi from the edge of the dragon's head several hundred feet above the ground. Shang-Chi is rescued by the Chinese intelligence-gathering agency S.P.E.A.R and is taken to their air-bound base, the Circle, to recuperate. Shang-Chi, along with the Avengers and S.P.E.A.R.'s superhuman response team the Ascendants, go to Shanghai to defend the city from the dragon and the Hand's forces. Using Pym Particles supplied to him by S.P.E.A.R. director Xian Zheng, Shang Chi grows to the size of a giant and defeats the dragon in combat, but not before enacting payback by tearing off the Hand's temple (with a screaming Gorgon still trapped inside) from the dragon's head and throwing it several miles away. When the Illuminati were exposed to have tampered with the mind of Captain America and attempting to destroy worlds threatening Earth as part of the Incursions as seen in the Time Runs Out storyline, Shang-Chi joined a faction of the Avengers led by Sunspot. Sunspot's Avengers, having taken control over A.I.M., discovered that "Incursion points" (points where an Incursion world that is about to hit Earth can be seen) were causing a massive number of physical mutations among those who stumbled upon the locations. Sending Shang-Chi to an Incursion point in Japan, Shang-Chi was exposed to cosmic-level radiation that transformed Shang-Chi into a mutate capable of creating duplicates of himself. After capturing Crossbones for a mission, Shang-Chi is informed by Captain America about his former lover Leiko Wu's murder at the hands of Razor Fist while working undercover for MI-6 in one of London's triads. Shang-Chi travels to London for Leiko's funeral and while wondering around Chinatown, he is attacked by unknown assailants, one whom reveals that the crime lord the White Dragon was behind the murder. Shang-Chi is approached by triad clan leader and former enemy Skull-Crusher who offers him a truce; Chao Sima alleges he and Leiko became lovers while she was working undercover and had planned to defect from MI-6 for him. With help from Skull-Crusher and the newly arrived Daughters of the Dragon and the Sons of the Tiger, Shang-Chi confirms that Razor Fist was hired by the White Dragon to kill Leiko due to her involvement with his rival Skull-Crusher and discovers that the White Dragon has access to Mao Shan Pai, a powerful Chinese black magic. Shang-Chi and Skull-Crusher infiltrate the White Dragon's estate, where they discover a room displaying the decapitated heads of missing triad leaders. The two of them fight the White Dragon but are captured by Shang-Chi's brother, Midnight Sun, who reveals himself to be the true mastermind behind the White Dragon. With the Mao Shan Pai spellbook taken by the White Dragon's men, M'Nai plans to use its magic to give him power and influence over the triad clans, finally fulfilling Zheng Zu's legacy. Needing the heads of the clan leaders in order to complete the ritual, Midnight Sun beheads the White Dragon and Skull-Crusher and proceeds to cast the spell. Instead of giving him power, the spell resurrects Leiko from Chao's spilled blood. Since Skull-Crusher made her the leader of his clan before her death, Chao's death violated the ritual and resurrected Leiko to punish Midnight Sun. Shang-Chi is able to knock out Midnight Sun during their fight while Leiko brutally maims Razor Fist. Leiko uses her newfound powers to summon the dead spirits of Skull-Crusher, the White Dragon and the other dead triad leaders, who drag Midnight Sun into their realm. When Leiko attempts to execute Razor Fist, Shang-Chi pleads with his former lover to stop; while he is able to get Leiko to spare Razor Fist, he is unable to bring her back to her normal self. Black Jack Tarr (now director of MI-6) and his men raid the estate; Razor Fist and the White Dragon's men are arrested while Leiko escapes. Before leaving London, Shang-Chi leaves a photo of him and Leiko at her grave, which is later taken by Leiko after he leaves. The Protectors Shang-Chi joins several other Asian American superheroes (the Hulk (Amadeus Cho), Silk, Ms. Marvel, Jimmy Woo, and S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Jake Oh) for a fundraiser in Flushing, Queens. Later, while the group is spending the night out in Koreatown, Manhattan, they are ambushed by the alien Prince Regent Phalkan and his small army from Seknarf Seven. Shang-Chi and his allies briefly fight off the invaders before they and a large group of bystanders are teleported near Seknarf Seven, where Phalkan demands that the group offer a few people for food within a time limit. Dubbing their group "the Protectors", Woo rallies the group and bystanders into working together to escape, while Shang-Chi leads an attack with Silk and Ms. Marvel. The Protectors are eventually able to free themselves and defeat Phalkan and his forces with the help of the bystanders. The Alpha Flight Space Program arrives to rescue the Protectors and bystanders and arrest Phalkan, who Sasquatch reveals was exiled from Seknarf Seven for treason. "Secret Empire" During the 2017 "Secret Empire" storyline, Shang-Chi is found to have been a prisoner of HYDRA in Madripoor following HYDRA's takeover of the United States. After the Hive and the Gorgon are defeated, the Tony Stark A.I. finds him and he states that he does not have the Cosmic Cube shard anymore. A flashback revealed that Emma Frost took the Cosmic Cube shard from him when he was unconscious. Shang-Chi was later seen with the Underground when they and other American superheroes are fighting HYDRA's forces in Washington, D.C. Domino Seeking a way to fight her ability-stealing adversary Topaz, Domino approaches Shang-Chi (who was referred to her by his Protectors teammate Amadeus Cho) at his retreat in Lantau Island for training. After a long training session, the two spend a romantic night out in Hong Kong, only to be ambushed at a night club by a large group of Shang-Chi's enemies, led by Midnight Sun and including Razor Fist, Shen Kuei, Shockwave, Death-Hand, Shadow Stalker, Tiger-Claw and others. Domino and Shang-Chi defeat them with relative ease. The two are eventually confronted by Topaz who Domino defeats using Shang-Chi's teachings. Despite Shang-Chi's pleas for mercy, Domino kills Topaz. Disappointed, Shang-Chi breaks up with Domino and dismisses her as his student. War of the Realms In the 2019 "War of the Realms" storyline, after taking part in a demonstration for Jimmy Woo's Pan-Asian School for the Unusually Gifted in Mumbai, Shang-Chi and the Protectors are offered membership to Woo's Agents of Atlas. Shang-Chi and the others are suddenly alerted by the news of Malekith's invasion of Earth; most of the New Agents of Atlas head to Seoul while Ms. Marvel joins Jake Oh and the Champions in New York. Shang-Chi and the others defend Seoul from Malekith's ally Queen Sindr and her Fire Goblin forces from Muspelheim with help from the Korean heroes White Fox, Crescent, Io and Luna Snow. After Sindr threatens to summon a volcano in the middle of the city and kill millions of innocents, Brawn teleports Atlas and their new allies away from the battle, allowing Sindr to peacefully annex South Korea. Brawn eventually summons the Chinese heroes the Sword Master and Aero, Filipina heroine Wave, and the Hawaiian Goddess of Fire and Volcanoes Pele from Shanghai to help assist in the fight against Sindr. The newly summoned heroes are less than pleased for being taken out of their previous battle, but Pele quickly puts a stop to the infighting, warning the group that Sindr plans to melt the polar ice caps if they do not work together. After formulating a plan, Brawn confronts Sindr and her forces directly while Aero, Wave and Luna use Sindr's Black Bifrost to travel to the Arctic to decrease its temperature; Shang-Chi and the others are teleported to Atlas' ally the Monkey King of the Ascendants in Northern China where Shang-Chi begins training the remaining members for their final fight. As planned by Brawn, the Queen of Cinders arrives in Northern China with a captured Brawn, only to be taken by surprise by Shang-Chi and the others, who defeat Sindr with Shang-Chi's training, although Pele (who is revealed to have been M-41 Zu, a mystically enhanced Atlas android) and the Monkey King sacrifice themselves in the process. Despite given the chance to surrender, Sindr flees using the Black Bifrost, only for Shang-Chi and the others to follow her with Brawn's teleporter, where they help Captain Marvel defeat her and her remaining forces at the Great Wall of China near Beijing. Shang-Chi is later shown fighting the remaining Fire Goblins alongside Wolverine, Hawkeye, and the Warriors Three in Shanghai. After Malekith's defeat, Shang-Chi is seen with the other Agents in Shanghai looking on while the captured Fire Goblins are escorted back to Muspelheim. New Agents of Atlas Shortly after the "War of the Realms" storyline, Shang-Chi encounters the Sword Master in New York City, who is searching for his missing father. Noticing the upstart hero's inexperience and recklessness, Shang takes Lin Lie under his wing to improve his skills. While Shang-Chi and the Sword Master are continuing their training in Flushing, they are interrupted when white lights begin engulfing the city. The two, who are reunited with the other Atlas agents and Giant-Man discover the cities they were in (along with other Asian, Pacific and predominantly Asian cities outside of Asia) have been merged and connected together with portals. Tech mogul Mike Nguyen of the Big Nguyen Company reveals himself to be behind the newly merged city, "Pan", which he states for 24 hours would allow every citizen to easily explore each other's respective cities without any political and economic restrictions. Sometime later, Shang-Chi and the Sword Master are confronted by Ares, who attempts to take Lin Lie's Fuxi sword. Shang-Chi makes a compromise to Ares: in exchange for Shang-Chi and the Sword Master helping him, Ares would help find Lin Lie's missing father. Ares accepts, explaining that his drakon son Ismenios had been abducted and that he wished to use the sword to kill Ismenios' kidnapper, who Ares believes to be another god. Using Pan Portals, the three are able to track Ismenios to a temple in Madripoor, where they encounter Davi Naka, the Mother Goddess of Madripoor. Naka reveals that Ismenios attempted to plunder Atlantis's treasure hoard during the absence of its sea serpent guardian, but was caught by Namor. Due to her duty to protect all dragons, Naka rescued Ismenios from Namor's wrath and imprisoned the young drakon in her temple for his protection and to placate the king. Naka further warns the group that despite her efforts, Namor is still outraged over the disappearance of his dragon and implores them to find her. Amadeus later approaches Shang-Chi and tasks him with locating Jimmy Woo, who has not contacted the team since Pan's creation. Along with Crescent, Shang-Chi infiltrates Woo's office in the Pan-Asian School for the Unusually Gifted in the Mumbai sector of Pan, where he discovers a photograph of Woo and Nguyen together. Shang-Chi and Crescent discover a secret tunnel in Woo's office that takes them to the Atlas Foundation's headquarters in the Pan sector of San Francisco, where they confront Woo and the Atlas Foundation's dragon adviser Mr. Lao, who introduces himself to the Atlas agents. Concurrently, the other Agents find Atlantis' missing sea serpent imprisoned in Nguyen's personal tower, where her magical scales are being harvested to power Pan's portals. Woo and Lao order the team to immediately release her while Nguyen argues that doing so would disrupt Pan's portals. Before a decision can be made, Namor emerges from the waters off of Pan's coast to reclaim his stolen dragon, kickstarting a war between Pan and Atlantis. Atlantis Attacks In the 2020 "Atlantis Attacks" storyline, Shang-Chi and the other New Agents of Atlas are summoned by Brawn during his confrontation with Namor. Namor warns the group to return Atlantis' dragon in a day or else face the wrath of Atlantis before retreating. After the skirmish, Shang-Chi and the other New Agents are introduced to the original Agents of Atlas by Woo. When Woo sends Namora, Venus, Aero and Wave to Atlantis for a diplomatic mission, Brawn discretely orders Shang-Chi and the Sword Master to spy on Namora, due to her familial ties with Namor. The dragon is eventually released from captivity, but upon arriving home she unexpectedly goes berserk and attacks the underwater kingdom. Witnessing the destruction caused by the dragon, Shang-Chi relays to Amadeus that Atlantis' scientists discovered an implant embedded in the dragon's scales to be the source of her behavior and that Namor believes Amadeus to be behind the sabotage, prompting the king to resume his attack on Pan. When Amadeus is forcibly transformed into the Hulk and put under Nguyen's control with Sirena tech in a last ditch effort to destroy Atlantis, Shang-Chi is able to remove the device from Amadeus, freeing him from Nguyen's control and reverting him back into Brawn. After the conflict, Shang-Chi admonishes Woo for using the team as his pawns and subsequently quits. Brothers and Sisters Yearning for an ordinary life, Shang-Chi relocates to San Francisco's Chinatown but crosses paths with Leiko, who had rejoined MI-6. When Leiko informs him that his father's organization might be active again, they are attacked by unknown assailants but are rescued by Brother Sabre and Sister Dagger, who reveal themselves to be Shang-Chi's half-siblings. The two reveal to Shang-Chi that he has been chosen by Zheng Zu's spirit as the next Supreme Commander of the Five Weapons Society, a secret organization created by their father centuries ago; it is also revealed to Shang-Chi that the Honan retreat he was raised in was the House of the Deadly Hand, one of the Society's five houses, and that he was its designated champion, Brother Hand. Sabre and Dagger ask their half-brother to return to their family and reclaim his rightful place as leader of the Society from its illegitimate leader Sister Hammer, who usurped control from the previous Commander, Brother Staff, and sent Staff's Warriors to kill Shang-Chi to consolidate her rule. Realizing that Hammer is his long-lost full sister, Shi-Hua, Shang-Chi vows to save her from his father's cult. Shang-Chi arrives at the House of the Deadly Staff in London, where he and Shi-Hua surprisingly have a tearful reunion. Shi-Hua explains to Shang-Chi the history of the Five Weapons Society and its five houses, which had gone through many names, including the Si-Fan, the Golden Dawn and Hai Dai; Shi-Hua reveals that she had been sent to the House of the Deadly Hammer in Russia as its Champion following their separation. Shang-Chi reveals the truth of their father's nature and attempts to convince Shi-Hua to leave the Society, but is rebuked. Mistakenly believing that Shang-Chi murdered Zheng Zu, Shi-Hua is outraged that their father's spirit would choose Shang-Chi over her to succeed him and reveals that she can only be legitimized as the Society's Supreme Commander by killing Shang-Chi. Shang-Chi realizes that his sister had poisoned him and begins to succumb to its effects. Instead of dying, Shang-Chi awakens in one of the House's laboratory, whose panicked scientists unleash a swarm of jiangshi to kill him. Shang-Chi is grievously wounded by a jiangshi and, before losing consciousness, he is rescued by Sabre and Dagger. While recuperating at the House of the Deadly Dagger in France, Shang-Chi is provided with a new ceremonial uniform and trains with Sabre and Dagger (who reveal their birth names to be Takeshi and Esme, respectively, to him) to prepare against Shi-Hua's jiangshi, which are powered by spirit energy and an "unavenged grievance". Shang-Chi notices that his wound has begun turning his flesh to resemble a jiangshi's, making him realize that he is slowly turning into one. A dilapidated spirit beckons Shang-Chi to the House's shrine room. Believing him to be his father, Shang-Chi uncovers a shrine dedicated to Zheng Zu's younger brother, Zheng Yi, and a mysterious map. The spirit reveals himself to be Yi and disappears before explaining anything else. Guided by the map, Shang-Chi and his siblings are directed to Yi's tomb in Henan, where Yi's spirit appears to him in full flesh. Shang-Chi requests Yi's guidance in stopping Shi-Hua and her jiangshi and to heal his festering wound inflicted by the jiangshi. Instead, Yi's spirit tells Shang-Chi to stop running away from his family, otherwise he would lose his way like his father and that his wounds would lead to something greater. Yi also reveals that Zu did not steal his life essence for immortality, but willingly gave it when Zu tried to save him from dying. When Shi-Hua and her jiangshi army attack London, Shang-Chi and his siblings arrive as back-up for Leiko and MI-6, providing them with paper amulets to purify the jiangshi. Shang-Chi begins to succumb to his wound and partially transforms into a jiangshi, allowing Shi-Hua to control his body to attack Takeshi and Esme. When Shang-Chi starts resisting, Shi-Hua plants a microchip containing her unavenged grievance on him to put him under her complete control. Instead of resisting, Shang-Chi calms himself, which transports the two to an astral plane where they witness memories of Shi-Hua's harsh upbringing by their father at the House of the Deadly Hand in Russia. Realizing that her anger is at Zheng Zu rather than Shang-Chi, Shi-Hua stops her assault, causing the jiangshi to collapse and Shang-Chi's wounds to heal. However, Shi-Hua blames Shang-Chi for robbing her of her life's purpose and flees before Leiko can apprehend her. On the day of the Lunar New Year, Shang-Chi is named the new Supreme Commander of the Five Weapons Society and with Takeshi and Esme at his side, Shang-Chi vows to keep the Society free of Zheng Zu's influence and to use it to protect all humankind. After the ceremony, Shang-Chi is visited by Zheng Zu's spirit, who congratulates him and comments that he is destined to become like him, unsettling Shang-Chi. Enter the Phoenix During the "Enter the Phoenix" storyline, Shang-Chi is chosen by the Phoenix Force to participate in her tournament alongside many other superheroes and supervillains to decide her next host. Along with the other champions, Shang-Chi is empowered by a spark of the Phoenix's cosmic fire and wins his first match against Hyperion, who is unable to control the Phoenix's power and immediately surrenders without fighting. For his next match, Shang-Chi is pitted against Captain America, who plans to throw the match and help train Shang-Chi into controlling the Phoenix, as he believes Shang-Chi is the ideal choice for the entity's next avatar. Before Shang-Chi can land the final blow, he vows to not use his powers to take another life, causing the Phoenix to intervene and eliminate him from the tournament, giving Captain America the win. Shang-Chi vs. the Marvel Universe As the new Supreme Commander of the Five Weapons Society, Shang-Chi finds himself struggling with balancing his loyalties between the superhero community and his family obligations. Sister Dagger and Brother Sabre become increasingly frustrated with the new direction Shang-Chi has for the Society while his newfound involvement with his father's criminal empire puts his superhero allies on edge. After establishing a new House of the Deadly Hand in New York City's Chinatown to serve as the Society's main headquarters, Shang-Chi is reunited with his exiled mutant half-sister Zheng Zhilan, who rejoins their family as the new Sister Staff, and his biological mother Jiang Li, who had been previously trapped in the Negative Zone for years. After Brother Sabre steals a Cosmic Cube from Captain America without Shang-Chi's knowledge to help his former lover Lady Iron Fan escape Captain America's custody, the Avengers, Spider-Man and Mister Fantastic confront Shang-Chi and the Society to reclaim the Cube. Shang-Chi realizes the truth when Brother Sabre discreetly uses the Cube's power to help Shang-Chi defeat Thor and relinquishes the Cube along with Takeshi as a prisoner to the Avengers. Despite Spider-Man and Jiang Li reassuring him, Shang-Chi's relationship with his siblings becomes strained while his former allies remain unconvinced of his conviction. Unbeknownst to Shang-Chi, these events are being orchestrated by an old enemy of Zheng Zu, who conspires with Zhilan, Lady Iron Fan and former Society allies King Wild Man and the Red Dot Collective to bring an end to Shang-Chi's rule. Ta Lo While spending time with his mother at the New House of the Deadly Hand, Jiang Li reveals her past to Shang-Chi, including her history as a Qilin Rider from the mystical dimension of Ta-Lo and how she met and married his father. Shang-Chi and Jiang Li are ambushed by Zhilan, Red Dot, King Wild Man, Lady Iron Fan and their henchmen; Jiang Li uses her psionic abilities to detect that they are being led by her father, Chieftain Xin. Zhilan reveals that her betrayal is a ruse and helps Shang-Chi and the Society defeat the would-be assassins. Jiang Li explains to Shang-Chi the circumstances surrounding her disappearance and Xin's hatred towards Zu and his bloodline. Unfortunately, the assassins take Jiang Li hostage and escape though a portal created by Xin to Qilin Island. Shang-Chi offers his life for his mother's to Xin, who agrees, but Xin reneges on the deal by leaving Jiang Li behind in Ta Lo when arriving at their meeting spot in Hawaii and attempts to murder Shang-Chi and his sisters. When Shang-Chi proves too difficult to defeat in combat, Xin resorts to creating several taotie from Shang-Chi's blood to hunt down anyone who possesses the bloodline of Zheng Zu. Powers and abilities Although it has never been determined exactly how extensive Shang-Chi's fighting skills are, he has beaten numerous superhuman opponents. Shang-Chi is classed as an athlete but he is one of the best non-superhumans in martial arts and has dedicated much of his life to the art, being referred to by some as the greatest empty-hand fighter and practitioner of kung fu alive, with even Ares acknowledging him as one of the few mortals who can hold their own against a god without the use of magic. In addition, Shang-Chi has battled superpowered foes like Ben Grimm of the Fantastic Four in hand-to-hand combat and proved a formidable opponent. Many of his physical abilities seem to stem from his mastery of chi, which often allows him to surpass physical limitations of normal athletes. He has also demonstrated the ability to dodge and catch bullets from machine guns and sniper rifles, and is able to deflect gunshots with his bracers. Shang-Chi is also highly trained in concentration and meditation, and is an expert in various hand weapons including swords, staffs, kali sticks, nunchaku, and shuriken. Due to his martial arts prowess, Shang-Chi is a highly sought out teacher and has mentored many characters in kung fu and hand-to-hand combat. Some of Shang-Chi's most prominent students and sparring partners have included Captain America, Spider-Man, and Wolverine. He is also very in tune with the chi emitted by all living beings, to the point where he was able to detect the psionically masked Jean Grey by sensing her energy. During his time with the Avengers, Shang-Chi was given special equipment by Tony Stark. This included a pair of gauntlets that allowed him to focus his chi in ways that increased his strength and a pair of repulsor-powered nunchaku. Even without such equipment, his mastery of ki enables him to challenge powerful foes like the Builders or even gamma mutates. Originally having no superpowers, Shang-Chi has temporarily gained superpowers on several occasions. During the events of Spider-Island, he briefly gained the same powers and abilities as Spider-Man after being infected by the Spider-Virus. After mutating into a giant spider, he was cured of his infection by Iron Fist's chi, although at the cost of him losing his spider-powers. In Avengers World Shang-Chi briefly used Pym Particles to grow to immense size. Following exposure to the cosmic radiation from the Incursions, Shang-Chi was able to create an unlimited number of duplicates of himself. In the Secret Wars storyline from the Battleworld continuity, Shang-Chi is able to use nine of the 10 techniques of the Ten Rings school, which are based on the powers of the Mandarin's 10 rings from the mainstream continuity. Shang-Chi later learns and masters his student Kitten's technique of intangibility and develops a new technique that turns his opponents into stone. Other versions "Secret Wars" (2015) In the 2015 "Secret Wars" storyline, a version of Shang-Chi resides in the wuxia-inspired K'un-Lun region of Battleworld. In this continuity, he is the exiled son of Emperor Zheng Zu, Master of the Ten Rings, a ruthless martial arts school that uses mystical powers and techniques based on the powers of the Mandarin's ten rings from the mainstream continuity. Shang-Chi is wanted for the murder of Lord Tuan, the master of the Iron Fist school, the main rivals of the Ten Rings school. A drunk vagabond, Shang-Chi is approached by Kitten to help teach her and her group of fellow outcasts who had been exiled from each of their respective schools the techniques of the Ten Rings. Ashamed by his upbringing, Shang-Chi coldly refuses and insults the group, outraging their leader, Callisto, who informs the emperor of Shang-Chi's whereabouts. The gang's hideout raided by K'un Lun's sheriff and Tuan's student Rand-K'ai, the emperor's assassin Red Sai of the Red Hand school and Ten Rings enforcer Laughing Skull but after Laughing Skull kills outcast Cy against Rand-K'ai's orders, Shang-Chi helps the group escape with the Nightbringer technique. A guilt ridden Shang-Chi agrees to take the outcasts as his pupils, dubbing their new school The Lowest Caste. Shang-Chi returns from his exile to represent the Lowest Caste for the tournament held every thirteen years to decide which participating master would be the next ruler of K'un-Lun. Zu allows Shang-Chi to participate but alters the rules so Shang-Chi would have to defeat every representative before facing him in the Thirteen Chambers. After defeating Namor, Drew, Karnak, Lady Mandarin, Ava, Creed, Spector and T'Challa in consecutive matches, Shang-Chi encounters Rand-K'ai and Red Sai in the penultimate match of the Thirteen Chambers. During the fight, Red Sai confesses that Zu had sent her to assassinate his rival Tuan but ultimately failed. To spare his lover and her students from the emperor's wrath, Shang-Chi killed Tuan; Zu implicated and exiled his son for the murder to cover his own involvement. After the truth is revealed, Red Sai and Rand-K'ai let Shang-Chi pass so that he could defeat his father. During the fight between Shang-Chi and Zheng Zu, Zu attempts to kill his son with the Spectral Touch technique, only for the move to pass through him due to Shang-Chi learning Kitten's technique to become intangible. Shang-Chi proceeds to use nine of the Ten Ring techniques against his father and ultimately defeats him with The Gorgon's Eye''', which turns him into stone. With Zu's defeat, Shang-Chi becomes the new emperor of K'un-Lun. "House of M" In the alternate timeline of the "House of M" storyline, Shang-Chi never realizes his father's evil doings before his death at Magneto's hands. This causes him to become consumed with a desire for vengeance. In this reality, Shang-Chi is the head of the Dragons criminal organization, alongside Colleen Wing, the Swordsman, Mantis, Zaran the Weapons Master and Machete. The Dragons later resolved their rivalry against Luke Cage's gang, but were eventually captured in a trap created by both the Kingpin's assassins and Thunderbird's agents. The Dragons and the Wolfpack were freed by Luke Cage, in which Shang-Chi's gang join the Avengers in their battle against the Brotherhood. Marvel Apes In this simian version of the Marvel Universe, Shang-Chi and his father work as a subversive organization, trying to get the local sentients to work in peace and not in animalistic domination. The Avengers (Ape-vengers) murder him for this 'weak-minded' sentiment. Marvel Zombies In the Marvel Zombies continuity, Shang-Chi is turned into a zombie during a multi-hero effort to rescue surviving civilians. In a mid-Manhattan battle, detailed in Ultimate Fantastic Four #23, he and dozens of other zombie-heroes attempt to consume the last batch of humans. These humans are defended by that universe's Magneto and the Ultimate Fantastic Four. During a successful rescue attempt, Thing sends Shang-Chi flying through the air with one punch. Shang-Chi is then seen attacking Magneto once again, but he is cut in half by the Master of Magnetism. A different Shang-Chi appears in Marvel Zombies Return in an alternate universe where he is unaffected by the zombie outbreak. The zombie Wolverine finds him in an underground fight club, engaging with other infamous martial artists. The flesh-hungry mutant slashes him to death. Ultimate Marvel In the Ultimate Marvel universe, Shang-Chi first appeared in Ultimate Marvel Team-Up #15. He is the son of an international crime lord. Trained from birth to become a living weapon, he became the world's greatest martial artist and being a noble spirit, he eventually came to renounce his father's empire. Seeking to get away from his father's reach, he emigrated to New York where he worked as a floor sweeper at Wu's Fish Market in Chinatown. Feeling that the denizens of New York's Chinatown needed someone to protect them, he and his friend Danny Rand were drawn into the gang war between the Kingpin and Hammerhead after the latter targeted him to win over the Chinatown gangs to his cause. The conflict climaxed when Shang-Chi, Danny Rand, Spider-Man, the Black Cat, the Moon Knight and Elektra ambushed Hammerhead's penthouse, where a battle royale ensued. It ended with an unconscious Elektra, Hammerhead and Moon Knight. The gang members were then arrested by the police. The martial arts warrior disguised himself as a costumed criminal in order to take down the Kingpin. The Kingpin discovered his plan and threatened to kill the hero, but he was rescued by Daredevil, who then recruited him as a part of his team to take down the Kingpin. After the Kingpin's identity is leaked to the New York Police Department, Shang-Chi and the team disbanded and went their separate ways. Earth-13584 In A.I.M.'s pocket dimension of Earth-13584, Shang-Chi appears as a member of Spider-Man's gang. In other media Film Marvel Cinematic Universe According to Margaret Loesch, former president and CEO of Marvel Productions, in the 1980s Stan Lee considered Brandon Lee for the role of Shang-Chi and met with the actor and his mother Linda Lee to discuss a potential movie or television series starring the character. In 2001, Stephen Norrington announced his intentions to direct a Shang-Chi film entitled The Hands of Shang-Chi. By 2003, the film was in development at DreamWorks Pictures with Yuen Woo-Ping replacing Norrington as director and Bruce C. McKenna hired to write the screenplay. Ang Lee joined the project as a producer in 2004, but the film did not materialize after that point and the rights to the character reverted to Marvel. In 2006, Shang-Chi was chosen as one of the many properties in Marvel Studios' new film deal with Paramount Pictures, along with Captain America, Nick Fury, Doctor Strange, Hawkeye, Power Pack, the Black Panther and Cloak and Dagger. In December 2018, Marvel Studios hired David Callaham to write the screenplay for a Shang-Chi film set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. In March 2019, Destin Daniel Cretton was hired to direct. Guntis Sics, the sound mixer on Thor: Ragnarok, revealed in an interview that filming will take place in Australia. At San Diego Comic-Con 2019, Simu Liu was announced to portray the character in the film Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. Originally set for a February 2021 release, the film's release date was moved to May due to the COVID-19 pandemic putting production on hold. The film was eventually released on September 3, 2021. Video games Shang-Chi appears as an unlockable playable character in Marvel Future Fight. Shang-Chi appears as a card in Marvel Duel. Shang-Chi appears as an unlockable playable character in Marvel Contest of Champions. Shang-Chi appears as an unlockable playable character in Marvel Strike Force. Shang-Chi appears as an unlockable playable character in Marvel Puzzle Quest. Shang-Chi appears as an unlockable playable character in Marvel Super War, voiced by Kaiji Tang. Shang-Chi appears as a purchasable outfit in Fortnite Battle Royale. Books Shang-Chi appears in a Little Golden Book written by Michael Chen. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings: Who Guards My Sleep by Marie Chow.World Of Reading -This is Shang-Chi. Disney Book Publishing Inc., 2021. ISBN 1-36806-997-5 Board games Shang-Chi appears in Marvel United, published by CMON Limited. Collected editions Shang-Chi: Master of Kung Fu (collects Shang-Chi: Master of Kung Fu #1–6), 144 pages, May 2003, Deadly Hands of Kung Fu: Out of the Past (collects Deadly Hands of Kung Fu (vol. 2) #1–4 and The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #1, 32–33), 160 pages, November 4, 2014, Master of Kung Fu: Battleworld (collects Master of Kung Fu (vol. 2) #1–4 and Ronin #2), 112 pages, January 2016, Shang-Chi: Master of Kung Fu Omnibus Vol. 1 collects Special Marvel Edition #15–16, Master of Kung Fu #17–37, Giant-Size Master of Kung Fu #1–4, Giant-Size Spider-Man #2 and material from Iron Man Annual #4, 696 pages, June 14, 2016, Vol. 2 collects Master of Kung Fu #38–70 and Master of Kung Fu Annual #1, 664 pages, September 20, 2016, Vol. 3 collects Master of Kung Fu #71–101 and What If? #16, 696 pages, March 14, 2017, Vol. 4 collects Master of Kung Fu #102–125, Marvel Comics Presents #1–8 and Master of Kung Fu: Bleeding Black #1, 748 pages, October 17, 2017, Deadly Hands of Kung Fu Omnibus Vol. 1 collects The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #1–18, The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu Special Album Edition and The Deadliest Heroes of Kung Fu, 1,152 pages, November 15, 2016, Vol. 2 collects The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #19–33 and material from Bizarre Adventures #25, 1,000 pages, June 20, 2017 Epic CollectionMaster of Kung Fu Epic Collection: Weapon of the Soul collects Special Marvel Edition #15–16, Master of Kung Fu #17–28, Giant-Size Master of Kung Fu #1–4, Giant-Size Spider-Man #2 and Iron Man Annual #4 480, March 14, 2018 Master of Kung Fu Epic Collection: Fight Without Pity collects Master of Kung Fu #29–53; Master of Kung Fu Annual #1, June 26, 2019 Master of Kung Fu Epic Collection: Traitors to the Crown collects Master of Kung Fu #54–79, TBA Shang-Chi: Earth's Mightiest Martial Artist collects X-Men (vol. 2) #62-64, Heroes for Hire (vol. 1) #18-19, Shadowland: Spider-Man #1, Secret Avengers (vol. 1) #18, Avengers (vol. 5) #11 April 13, 2021 Shang-Chi by Gene Luen Yang Brothers and Sisters collects Shang-Chi (vol. 1) #1–5, April 13, 2021 Shang-Chi Marvel-Verse collects Wolverine: First Class #9, Marvel Adventures Spider-Man #2, Free Comic Book Day 2011 #1, Master of Kung Fu #126, The Legend of Shang-Chi'' #1, June 8, 2021 Notes References External links Character close up – Shang-Chi at Marvel.com Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu at Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on February 15, 2016 Avengers (comics) characters Characters created by Jim Starlin Characters created by Steve Englehart Chinese superheroes Comics characters introduced in 1973 Fictional martial arts trainers Fictional Shaolin kung fu practitioners Marvel Comics adapted into films Marvel Comics film characters Marvel Comics male superheroes Marvel Comics martial artists

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marv%20Albert

Marv Albert

Marv Albert (born Marvin Philip Aufrichtig; June 12, 1941) is an American retired sportscaster. Honored for his work as a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame, he was commonly referred to as "the voice of basketball". From 1967 to 2004, he was also known as "the voice of the New York Knicks". Albert worked for Turner Sports as the lead announcer for NBA games on TNT until his retirement at the end of the 2020–21 season. In addition to working extensively in both professional and college basketball, he has experience calling a variety of other sports, such as American football, ice hockey, horse racing, boxing, and tennis. Albert has called the play-by-play of eight Super Bowls, nine NBA Finals, and seven Stanley Cup Finals. He has also called the Wimbledon Tennis Championships for TNT with Jim Courier and Mary Carillo and has worked as a co-host and reporter for two World Series (1986 and 1988). Albert hails from a family of broadcasters. His brothers, Al and Steve Albert, and a son, Kenny, are also play-by-play sports commentators. In 2015, Albert was inducted into the broadcasting Hall of Fame. Early life Albert was born to a Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York City, where he went to Abraham Lincoln High School. His family members owned a grocery store on Brighton Beach Avenue between 3rd and 4th Streets known as Aufrichtig. He attended Syracuse University's Newhouse School of Public Communications from 1960 through 1963. In 1962, he served as the voice of the AAA Syracuse Chiefs. He graduated from New York University in 1965. Broadcasting career National Basketball Association After getting his start by being a ball boy for the New York Knicks, Albert worked his first Knicks game as a broadcaster on January 27, 1963, on WCBS Radio. He was filling in for his mentor, Marty Glickman, who was away in Europe. The game was against the Celtics at the Boston Garden. Beginning in 1967 and lasting 37 years, Albert served as the voice of the New York Knicks on radio and television before being let go by James L. Dolan, the chairman of the MSG Network and Cablevision, after Albert criticized the team's poor play on-air in 2004. It was said that Albert's high salary was also a factor. His son, Kenny Albert, has been a part-time play-by-play announcer for the Knicks since 2009, filling in whenever the elder Albert's successor, Mike Breen, is unavailable. NBC Sports Albert was the lead play-by-play broadcaster for the NBA on NBC for most of its run from 1990 to 2002, calling every NBA Finals during that timeframe except for 1998, 1999, and 2000, which were called by Bob Costas in the wake of Albert's arrest for sexual assault. Albert resumed his previous position for the 2000–2001 season and called Game 4 of the 2002 NBA Finals, which was the final NBA telecast on NBC. During his time on NBC, Albert continued as the lead play-by-play man for the New York Knicks on local MSG Network telecasts and began calling national games for TNT in 1999, as well. When he regained the lead broadcaster position on NBC, he continued to call play-by-play for both networks until the end of NBC's coverage in 2002. TNT Albert continued to be the lead play-by-play announcer for National Basketball Association games on TNT, a position he assumed in 1999. Indeed, TNT had become his primary commitment ever since his longtime employer NBC lost the NBA broadcasting rights in 2002 to ABC and ESPN, which may have played a role in his departure from the Knicks' broadcast booth. The Knicks reportedly wanted Albert to accept a salary commensurate with his reduced Knicks schedule but also weren't happy about Albert making what Knicks management felt were overly critical comments about their team despite their losing record. In basketball, his most famous call is his simple "Yes!" for a basket, rendered in many variations of volume and length depending on the situation. On April 17, 2002, shortly after calling a game between the Indiana Pacers and Philadelphia 76ers on TNT, both Albert and color analyst Mike Fratello were injured in a limo accident in Trenton, New Jersey. Albert sustained facial lacerations, a concussion, and a sprained ankle. The 2002 NBA Playoffs was set to begin two days later, with Albert scheduled to call multiple games that week. Bob Costas filled in for those games, and Albert returned to call Game 1 of the Western Conference Semifinals between the Dallas Mavericks and Sacramento Kings. On May 15, 2021, it was reported that Albert had planned on retiring following the 2021 NBA playoffs. The news became official two days later. The last game Albert called was Game 6 of the 2021 NBA Eastern Conference Finals, between the Milwaukee Bucks and Atlanta Hawks. New Jersey Nets (YES) In 2005, Albert officially became the lead play-by-play man for the New Jersey Nets franchise started calling their games on the YES Network, often teaming with Brooklyn native and NBA veteran Mark Jackson. With that, the Nets had employed all three Albert brothers during the franchise's history; Al started his broadcast career with the Nets during their ABA days, while Steve called Nets games during the late 1970s and 1980s. Beginning with the 2008–09 season, Albert was also paired with his TNT broadcast colleague Mike Fratello on the YES Network. However, with the Nets' struggles in the 2009–10 season, Nets management relegated Albert to secondary play-by-play. Since then, Ian Eagle has taken over the broadcasts. In 2011, Albert left the YES Network to join CBS Sports for NFL and NCAA tournament coverage. Other basketball-related ventures Albert hosts a basketball-focused interview show on NBA TV, which also airs on YES. Albert also hosted Dazzling Dunks and Basketball Bloopers VHS tape by NBA Entertainment in 1988. Since 2003, Albert has also been providing the play-by-play voice on the NBA Live video-game series from EA Sports, a role he fulfilled until NBA Live 10. From 2011 to 2015, Albert announced NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship tournament games, the result of longtime tournament broadcaster CBS handing off some of its coverage to Turner Sports. In February 2016, Albert and Turner Sports announced that he would no longer call NCAA Tournament basketball games, stating that calling four games in one day during the first round, and a total of six matches in three days during the first two rounds, was too much for his 74-year-old voice to handle. Albert said that he "felt it was the wiser move to go primarily NBA at this stage." Outside basketball New York Rangers In addition to the Knicks, Albert had a lengthy tenure (beginning in 1965) calling the games of another Madison Square Garden tenant, the New York Rangers. He handled the radio call of the Rangers' Stanley Cup-clinching victory in 1994. He also famously coined the nickname "Red Light" for radio analyst Sal Messina, a former Rangers goaltender. His signature play-by-play phrase was "kick save and a beauty." Over his years as the Rangers' broadcaster, Albert missed a large number of games for other commitments. Many other broadcasters filled in, including several who later served long stints for other NHL teams, including Howie Rose, Mike Emrick, and John Kelly, as well as Albert's brothers Al and Steve. It was Albert's absence from Game 7 of the Rangers–Devils Conference Championship game that led to Rose's famed Matteau, Matteau, Matteau call. Albert left the Rangers after the 1994–95 season. At the same time, Rose took the job as a play-by-play announcer of the New York Islanders. Albert's son, Kenny, replaced him and has been the radio voice of the Rangers ever since. Kenny also calls NHL and Olympic ice hockey for NBC Sports and has served as the national radio voice of the Stanley Cup Finals since 2016. New York Giants From 1973 to 1976, Albert called radio broadcasts of New York Giants football games, succeeding Marty Glickman after the latter defected to the New York Jets. Monday Night Football Albert was also the lead play-by-play voice of the Westwood One radio network's NFL coverage from the 2002 to the 2009 seasons, calling Monday Night Football as well as numerous playoff games and every Super Bowl from 2003 to 2010. On June 4, 2010, it was announced that Albert was leaving his NFL on Westwood One duties. He was succeeded by Kevin Harlan. NFL on CBS On June 6, 2011, it was announced Albert was joining CBS Sports to call play-by-play for The NFL on CBS. Albert was usually teamed with Rich Gannon on broadcasts. On May 29, 2014, Albert stepped down from calling The NFL on CBS to focus more on his basketball duties for TNT and CBS. Other network duties Other NBC Sports duties included play-by-play announcing for the NFL (by 1983, Albert was the No. 2 play-by-play man behind Dick Enberg, usually alternating the secondary NFL role year to year with Don Criqui), college basketball (teaming with Bucky Waters on Big East/ECAC games), horse racing, boxing (often working with Ferdie Pacheco and subsequently, Sugar Ray Leonard when NBC relaunched boxing under the Premier Boxing Champions umbrella), NHL All-Star Games (Albert called the NHL All-Star Game with John Davidson on NBC from 1990 to 1994), and Major League Baseball, as well as hosting baseball studio and pre-game shows (including NBC's coverage of the 1986 and 1988 World Series alongside Bob Costas). He also spent 13 years as the sports director of the network's flagship station, WNBC-TV, in New York. Albert also called regular-season and playoff NHL games for the syndicated NHL Network in the 1976–77 season, and, from 2000 to 2002, he helped call TNT's coverage of the Wimbledon Championships tennis tournament. In popular culture Albert made 53 guest appearances on David Letterman's late-night talk show for NBC and CBS. Each time Albert appeared, he brought with him a group of clips featuring sports bloopers and outstanding plays, which he narrated and dubbed the "Albert Achievement Awards." The music accompanying the bloopers was "12th Street Rag." Albert was placed as No. 14 on David J. Halberstam's list of Top 50 All-Time Network Television Sports Announcers on Yahoo! Sports. He appears on "Perfect Sense, Part II", on Roger Waters' 1992 album, Amused to Death, commentating on a military attack in the manner of a sports report. Albert's voice is imitated in the popular video game NBA Jam. The announcer was modeled on Albert, although there is no mention of Albert in the game and the announcer was actually voiced by Tim Kitzrow. Honors and awards Cable ACE Award – six times. Curt Gowdy Media Award – awarded by the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, 1997. American Sportscasters Association Sportscaster of the Year (Play-by-Play) – 1996. Emmy Award – for national sports: five times; for New York: three times. Nassau County Sports Hall of Fame – inducted in 2006. National Jewish Museum Sports Hall of Fame – inducted in 1992. New York State Sportscaster of the Year – twenty times. National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame – inducted in 2014. WAER Hall of Fame – inducted in 2017. Sexual assault Albert was accused of sexually assaulting a 42-year-old woman named Vanessa Perhach in 1997. Perhach accused Albert of throwing her onto a bed, biting her, then forcing her to perform oral sex after a February 12, 1997, argument in his Pentagon City hotel room. DNA testing linked Albert to genetic material taken from the bite marks and from semen in Perhach's underwear. During the trial, testimony was presented from another woman, Patricia Masden, who told the jury Albert had bitten her on two different occasions in 1993 and 1994 in Miami and Dallas hotels respectively, which she viewed as unwanted sexual advances. Masden claimed that in Dallas, Albert called her to help him send a fax from his hotel room, where she found him wearing "white panties and garter belt". Albert maintained that Perhach had requested he bite her and denied her accusation that he had asked her to bring another man into their sexual affair. He described the recorded conversation of hers with the police on the night of the incident as "an Academy Award performance". After tests proved that the bite marks were his, he pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault and battery charges, while the sodomy charge was dropped. Albert was given a 12-month suspended sentence. Consequently, NBC – for which Albert worked for over 20 years – fired him shortly before the 1997–98 NBA season began on NBA on NBC. Bob Costas took over for Albert on the basketball side in the 1997–98 season. NBC rehired Albert fewer than two years later. Albert's final NFL broadcast for NBC was the Baltimore Ravens-New York Giants game alongside Randy Cross and Len Berman. Tom Hammond would eventually move up to the #2 team (behind Dick Enberg, Paul Maguire, and Phil Simms), while Dan Hicks would primarily call games with Hammond's old partner, Jim Kelly. Broadcasting partners John Andariese Butch Beard Bill Chadwick Chip Cipolla Doug Collins Cris Collinsworth John Davidson Boomer Esiason Mike Fratello Walt Frazier Rich Gannon Richie Guerin Matt Guokas Grant Hill Sam Huff Magic Johnson Steve "Snapper" Jones Steve Kerr Dick Lynch Paul Maguire Kevin McHale Sal Messina Reggie Miller Earl Monroe Ferdie Pacheco Bill Parcells Cal Ramsey Bob Trumpy Jeff Van Gundy Bill Walton Bucky Waters Chris Webber Sam Wyche References External links Albert on 'Cuse Conversations Podcast in 2021 1941 births Living people Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni American horse racing announcers American radio sports announcers American television sports announcers Boxing commentators College basketball announcers in the United States Jewish American sportspeople Major League Baseball broadcasters National Basketball Association broadcasters National Football League announcers National Hockey League broadcasters NBC Sports New Jersey Nets announcers New York Giants announcers New York Knicks announcers New York Rangers announcers New York (state) television reporters Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development alumni Olympic Games broadcasters S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications alumni Sportspeople from Brooklyn Television anchors from New York City Tennis commentators 21st-century American Jews

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota%20Vikings

Minnesota Vikings

The Minnesota Vikings are a professional American football team based in Minneapolis. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) North division. Founded in 1960 as an expansion team, the team began play the following year. They are named after the Vikings of ancient Scandinavia, reflecting the prominent Scandinavian American culture of Minnesota. The team plays its home games at U.S. Bank Stadium in the Downtown East section of Minneapolis. The Vikings have an all-time overall record of , the highest regular season and combined winning percentage among NFL franchises who have not won a Super Bowl, in addition the most playoff runs, division titles, and (tied with the Buffalo Bills) Super Bowl appearances. They also have the most conference championship appearances of non-winning Super Bowl teams, with them being one of three (along with the Pittsburgh Steelers and Los Angeles Rams) to appear in a conference championship every decade since the 1970s. The only NFL franchise with winning regular season and combined records to not win a Super Bowl, the Vikings hold the NFL franchise record for most playoff losses in league history at 30. History Professional football in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul area (the "Twin Cities") began with the Minneapolis Marines/Red Jackets, an NFL team that played intermittently in the 1920s and 1930s. However, a new professional team in the area did not surface again until August 1959, when Minnesota businessmen Bill Boyer, H.P. Skoglund, and Max Winter were awarded a franchise in the new American Football League (AFL). Five months later, in January 1960, after significant pressure from the NFL, the ownership group, along with Bernard H. Ridder Jr., reneged on its agreement with the AFL and then was awarded the National Football League's 14th franchise, with play to begin in 1961. Ole Haugsrud was added to the NFL team ownership because, in the 1920s, when he sold his Duluth Eskimos team back to the league, the agreement allowed him 10 percent of any future Minnesota team. The teams from Ole Haugsrud's high school, Central High School in Superior, Wisconsin, were also called the Vikings and had a similar purple-and-yellow color scheme. From the team's first season in 1961 to 1981, the team called Metropolitan Stadium in suburban Bloomington home. The Vikings conducted summer training camp at Bemidji State University from 1961 to 1965. In 1966, the team moved to their training camp to Minnesota State University in Mankato. The training camp at Minnesota State was one of the longest continuously running training camp events in the NFL and is remembered as part of the golden era history of the team. The Vikings played their home games at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome in Minneapolis from 1982 to 2013. The Vikings played their last game at the Metrodome on December 29, 2013, defeating the Detroit Lions 14–13 to end the season. Since the team's first season in 1961, the Vikings have had one of the highest winning percentages in the NFL. As of 2019, they have won at least three games in every season except in 1962, and are one of only seven NFL teams to win at least 15 games in a regular season. The Vikings have won one NFL Championship, in 1969, before the league's merger with the American Football League (AFL) in 1970. Since the merger, the team has qualified for the playoffs 28 times, third-most in the league (trailing only the Dallas Cowboys and Pittsburgh Steelers). The team played in Super Bowls IV, VIII, IX and XI, but failed to win any of them. In addition, they have lost in their last six NFC Championship Game appearances, stretching back to 1978. The Vikings have 15 members in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. 1960s The team was officially named the Minnesota Vikings on September 27, 1960; the name is partly meant to reflect Minnesota's place as a center of Scandinavian American culture. From the start, the Vikings embraced an energetic marketing program that produced first-year season ticket sales of nearly 26,000 and an average home attendance of 34,586, about 85 percent of Metropolitan Stadium's capacity of 40,800. Eventually, the capacity of Met Stadium was increased to 47,900. Bert Rose, former public relations director for the Los Angeles Rams, was appointed the team's first general manager. The search for the first head coach saw the team court then-Northwestern University head coach Ara Parseghian, who, according to Minneapolis Star writer Jim Klobuchar—the Vikings' first beat reporter for that newspaper—visited team management in the Twin Cities under the condition that his visit was to be kept secret from his current employer. His cover was blown by local columnist Sid Hartman, who reported the visit and forced Parseghian to issue denials. Philadelphia Eagles assistant Nick Skorich and a man with Minnesota ties who was working in the CFL, Bud Grant, were also candidates until a different Eagle, quarterback Norm Van Brocklin, was hired on January 18, 1961. Van Brocklin had just finished his career as a player on a high note, having defeated the Green Bay Packers in the 1960 NFL Championship Game. As a new franchise, the Vikings had the first overall selection in the 1961 NFL Draft, and they picked running back Tommy Mason of Tulane. They also took a young quarterback from the University of Georgia named Fran Tarkenton in the third round. Notable veterans acquired in the offseason were George Shaw and Hugh McElhenny. The Vikings won their first regular-season game, defeating the Chicago Bears 37–13 on Opening Day 1961; Tarkenton came off the bench to throw four touchdown passes and run for another to lead the upset. Reality set in as the expansion team lost its next seven games on their way to a 3–11 record. The losing continued throughout much of the 1960s as the Vikings had a combined record of 32 wins, 59 losses, and 7 ties in their first seven seasons with only one winning season (8–5–1 in 1964). On March 7, 1967, quarterback Fran Tarkenton was traded to the New York Giants for a first-round and second-round draft choice in 1967, a first-round choice in 1968 and a second-round choice in 1969. With the picks, Minnesota selected Clinton Jones and Bob Grim in 1967, Ron Yary in 1968 and Ed White in 1969. On March 10, 1967, the Vikings hired new head coach Bud Grant to replace Van Brocklin, who had resigned on February 11, 1967. Grant came to the Vikings from the Canadian Football League as head coach for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, whom he led to four Grey Cup Championships in 10 years. Replacing Tarkenton at quarterback was eight-year CFL veteran and Grey Cup champion Joe Kapp. During the late 1960s, the Vikings built a powerful defense known as the Purple People Eaters, led by Alan Page, Carl Eller, Gary Larsen, and Jim Marshall. In 1968, that stingy defense earned the Vikings their first Central Division title and their first playoff berth. In 1969, the Vikings secured a 12–2 record. The team had 12 straight regular-season victories after a season-opening loss to the New York Giants, which was the longest single-season winning streak in 35 years. The Vikings defeated the Cleveland Browns 27–7 in the last pre-merger NFL Championship Game on January 4, 1970, at Metropolitan Stadium. The Vikings became the first modern NFL expansion team to win an NFL Championship Game, and earned a berth in Super Bowl IV; however, the heavily favored Vikings lost that game to the Kansas City Chiefs, 23–7. The team MVP that season was Joe Kapp, who threw for seven touchdowns against the Baltimore Colts – still an all-time NFL record; however, Kapp refused to accept the award, stating, "There is not one most valuable Viking... there are 40 most valuable Vikings!" 1970s The team continued to dominate in 1970 (moving into the newly formed NFC Central) and 1971, reaching the playoffs behind the stubborn "Purple People Eaters" defensive line. In 1971, Alan Page won the NFL Most Valuable Player Award given by the Associated Press. He was the first defensive player to win the award. On January 27, 1972, the Vikings traded Norm Snead, Bob Grim, Vince Clements and first-round draft picks in 1972 and 1973 to the New York Giants to reacquire the popular Fran Tarkenton. While the acquisitions of Tarkenton and wide receiver John Gilliam improved the passing attack, the running game was inconsistent and the Vikings finished with a disappointing 7–7 record. The Vikings addressed the problem by drafting running back Chuck Foreman with their first pick in the 1973 Draft. Co-owner Bill Boyer died on February 19, 1973 and was replaced on the team's board of directors by his son-in-law Jack Steele. The Vikings won their first nine games of 1973 and finished the season with a 12–2 record. They then advanced to their second Super Bowl in franchise history, Super Bowl VIII, against the Miami Dolphins at Rice Stadium in Houston, Texas; however, the Dolphins prevailed, 24–7. The Vikings won the Central Division again in 1974 with a 10–4 record. In the playoffs they built on their cold-weather reputation, defeating both the St. Louis Cardinals 30–14 and the Los Angeles Rams 14–10 in frozen Metropolitan Stadium. The Vikings played in their second straight Super Bowl, Super Bowl IX (3rd overall), losing to the Pittsburgh Steelers, 16–6, at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans on January 12, 1975. Led by Tarkenton and running back Chuck Foreman, the 1975 Vikings got off to a 10–0 start and easily won another division title. However, the Vikings lost to the Dallas Cowboys in the playoffs, 17–14, on a controversial touchdown pass from the Cowboys' quarterback Roger Staubach to wide receiver Drew Pearson that became known as the Hail Mary. The touchdown was controversial because many felt that Pearson pushed off on Vikings defensive back Nate Wright, committing pass interference. As the Metropolitan Stadium crowd was stunned to learn that no penalty was called, debris was thrown on the field for several minutes. A Corby's Whiskey bottle struck game official Armen Terzian, rendering him unconscious. The Vikings played in Super Bowl XI, their third Super Bowl (fourth overall) in four years, against the Oakland Raiders at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, on January 9, 1977. The Vikings, however, lost 32–14. In 1977, the Vikings again won the Central Division with a 9–5 record and advanced to their 4th NFC Championship Game in 5 years, but were defeated by the eventual Super Bowl Champion Cowboys, 23–6, at Texas Stadium. By 1978, age was taking its toll on the Vikings, but they still made the playoffs with an 8–7–1 record. There was no more playoff magic as the Rams finally defeated the Vikings, 34–10 in Los Angeles after having lost in their previous four playoff matchups (in 1969, '74, '76 and '77). Quarterback Fran Tarkenton retired following the season holding league passer records in attempts (6,467), completions (3,686), yards (47,003), and touchdowns (342). In December 1979, ground was broken for construction of the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome in downtown Minneapolis. 1980s On May 15, 1981, the Vikings moved into a new facility in suburban Eden Prairie that housed the team's offices, locker room and practice fields. The complex was named "Winter Park" after Max Winter, one of the Vikings' founders, who served as the team's president from 1965 to 1987. The Vikings played their final game at Metropolitan Stadium on December 20 to conclude the 1981 NFL season by losing to the Kansas City Chiefs, 10–6. The Vikings played their first game at the Metrodome in a preseason matchup against the Seattle Seahawks on August 21, 1982, in a game Minnesota won, 7–3. The first touchdown in the new facility was scored by Joe Senser on an 11-yard pass from Tommy Kramer. The first regular-season game in the Metrodome was the 1982 opener on September 12, when the Vikings defeated Tampa Bay, 17–10. Rickey Young scored the first regular-season touchdown in the facility on a 3-yard run in the 2nd quarter. That year the defense led by Joey Browner began a dominant 10-year run as a premier NFL defensive back. The Vikings beat the St. Louis Cardinals 28–10 on August 6, 1983, at Wembley Stadium in London in the first international game in the NFL. On January 27, 1984, Bud Grant retired as head coach of the Vikings. With a career regular-season record of 151–87–5 (.632) in 17 seasons with Minnesota, Grant led the franchise to 12 playoff appearances, 11 division titles, and four Super Bowls. Les Steckel, who was an offensive assistant with the Vikings for 5 seasons, was then named the 3rd head coach in franchise history. Steckel, who came to the Vikings in 1979 after working as an assistant with the 49ers, was the youngest head coach in the NFL in 1984 at age 38. However, the Vikings lost a franchise-worst 13 games. After the season Steckel was fired, and on December 18, 1984, Bud Grant came out of retirement and was rehired as the head coach of the Vikings. On January 6, 1986, following the 1985 season, Bud Grant re-retired, this time permanently, as head coach of the Vikings. At the time of his retirement he held the 6th best winning record for a coach in NFL history with 168 career wins, including playoffs. In 18 seasons, he led the Vikings to a 158–96–5 regular-season record. Longtime Vikings assistant coach Jerry Burns was named the fourth head coach in team history on January 7, 1986. He served as the Vikings' offensive coordinator from 1968 to 1985, when the team won 11 division titles and played in four Super Bowls. In his first season, the Vikings, led by the NFL Comeback Player of the Year Tommy Kramer, went 9–7, their first winning record in four years. On August 2, 1986, Fran Tarkenton was the first player who played the majority of his career with the Vikings to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Following the strike-shortened 1987 season, the 8–7 Vikings, who had finished 8–4 in regular games but 0–3 using strike-replacement players, pulled two upsets in the playoffs. They defeated the 12–3 New Orleans Saints 44–10 at the Louisiana Superdome in the Wild Card game. The following week, in the Divisional Playoff game, they beat the 13–2 San Francisco 49ers 36–24 at Candlestick Park. During that game, Anthony Carter set the all-time record for most receiving yards in a playoff game with 227 yards. The Vikings played the Washington Redskins in the NFC Championship Game on January 17, 1988, at RFK Stadium. Trailing 17–10, the Vikings drove to the Redskins' 6-yard line with a little over a minute left in the game, but failed to get the ball into the end zone. The Vikings' hopes of a Super Bowl ended when Darrin Nelson dropped a pass from Wade Wilson on fourth down at the goal line. On October 12, 1989, the Vikings acquired Herschel Walker from Dallas. The final result of the trade gave the Vikings Walker, third-round choice Mike Jones, fifth-round choice Reggie Thornton and 10th-round choice Pat Newman in 1990 and a third-round choice Jake Reed in 1991. Dallas received Issiac Holt, David Howard, Darrin Nelson, Jesse Solomon, Alex Stewart, a first-, second- and a sixth-round choice in 1990, first- and second-round choices in 1991 and a first-, second- and third-round choice in 1992. Two of those selections turned into Emmitt Smith and Darren Woodson. Walker's performance fell short of expectations in his three seasons with the Vikings, while the Cowboys rode their draft picks to three Super Bowl victories in the early-to-mid-1990s. 1990s On December 3, 1991, Jerry Burns announced his retirement effective at the end of the 1991 season. In six seasons as head coach of the Vikings, Burns compiled a career record of 52–43 (.547). He also led Minnesota to three playoff appearances, including a division title and an NFC Championship Game. Dennis Green was later named the fifth head coach in team history, after turning around a struggling Stanford University football program as head coach from 1989 to 1991. In his 10 seasons as the coach of the Vikings, Green won four NFC Central division titles, had eight playoff appearances, two NFC Championship Game appearances and an all-time record of 97–62. The Vikings therefore had the fifth highest winning percentage among all NFL teams during the regular season in the 1990s. 1998 1998 was a year to remember for the franchise. With a spectacular offense led by quarterback Randall Cunningham (who replaced an injured Brad Johnson), running back Robert Smith, veteran wide receiver Cris Carter, and explosive rookie Randy Moss, the Vikings set a then-NFL record by scoring a total of 556 points, never scoring fewer than 24 in a game. The Vikings finished the season 15–1, their only loss was to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 27–24 in Week 9. In the playoffs, the Vikings rolled past the Arizona Cardinals 41–21, and came into the Metrodome heavily favored for their NFC title showdown with the Atlanta Falcons, who had gone 14–2 in the regular season. After kicker Gary Anderson, who had just completed the first perfect regular season in NFL history (not missing a single extra point or field goal attempt the entire year), missed a 38-yard field goal attempt with just over 2 minutes remaining, the Falcons' ensuing drive tied the game. This led to a controversial decision by head coach Dennis Green to run out the clock and let the game go to overtime. Though the Vikings won the coin toss, Atlanta went on to win it 30–27 in overtime on Morten Andersen's 38-yard field goal. The Vikings became the first 15–1 team to fail to reach the Super Bowl. The Falcons lost Super Bowl XXXIII to John Elway and the Denver Broncos. 1999 Cunningham resumed duties again in 1999, but after a lukewarm 2–4 start, Jeff George replaced him as starting quarterback. He finished the season with an 8–2 record, and led the Vikings into the postseason once again, with an overall team record of 10–6. Minnesota beat Dallas in the Wild Card game 27–10, and faced playoff newcomer Kurt Warner and the St. Louis Rams in the Divisional matchup. The game was a shootout that Minnesota led 17–14 at halftime, but the Rams outscored Minnesota 35–20 in the second half to win 49–37. St. Louis would go on to win Super Bowl XXXIV. 2000s The Vikings entered the decade by winning the divisional championship and an appearance in the NFC Championship game, where they were defeated 41–0 by the New York Giants. The following season, they struggled by posting a 5–11 record in 2001. The team made the playoffs again in 2004, but did not win a divisional title again until 2008. Since the merger, the 2000s became the decade with the fewest playoff berths for the franchise. 2000 In 2000, the Vikings went 11–5. The Vikings were 11–2 after 14 weeks, but slumped briefly, losing their last three to the Rams, Packers and Colts while starting quarterback Daunte Culpepper was hampered by injury. Nonetheless, the Vikings made the playoffs for the fifth straight year. After easily beating the Saints in the Divisional game 34–16, they traveled to New York City to face the Giants in the NFC Championship Game. Though they were the road team, the Vikings were favored to win the game (since most considered their 11–2 record with Culpepper more indicative than their 0–3 record when he was out); instead, the Vikings were defeated 41–0, their worst defeat in playoff history. Robert Smith, who ran for 1,521 yards that season, retired at the end of the year after only playing eight NFL seasons. 2001–2005 In 2001, after a disappointing 5–11 season, the Vikings bought out the contract of Dennis Green, despite his successful coaching tenure with the team. Mike Tice coached the final game of 2001, losing to the Ravens 19–3. Tice was named the permanent coach after the season, but he would not lead the Vikings back to the playoffs until 2004. In 2002, as part of the league's realignment with the addition of the Houston Texans, the Vikings and their other traditional NFC Central rivals became part of the newly formed NFC North. During the 2003 season, the Vikings came close to getting into the playoffs. However, the Arizona Cardinals completed a game-winning touchdown on 4th-and-28 with 0:00 left, knocking the Vikings out of the playoffs. The moment of Arizona's touchdown was actually the first moment the entire season in which the Vikings hadn't led their division. The Vikings became the second team in football history to miss the playoffs after getting off to a 6–0 start, following the 1978 Washington Redskins. In 2004, Daunte Culpepper amassed MVP-like statistics, throwing for 4,717 passing yards (leading the NFL), 39 passing touchdowns (a Viking record), and 5,123 total yards (an NFL record). In the wild card game, the Vikings defeated the rival Green Bay Packers at Lambeau Field in their first-ever playoff meeting, 31–17. In doing so, the Vikings became the second team in NFL history to have a .500 record (8–8) in the regular season and win a playoff game (The St. Louis Rams did the same thing only a day earlier). In the divisional round, the Vikings were defeated by the eventual NFC champion Philadelphia Eagles. On March 2, 2005, Vikings wide receiver Randy Moss was traded to the Oakland Raiders for linebacker Napoleon Harris and the Raiders' first-round draft pick. After struggling to a disappointing 2–5 start to the 2005 season, Vikings lost quarterback Daunte Culpepper to a season-ending knee injury. This injury was a very significant part to this Minnesota Vikings team due to the fact they also lost Moss. The dynamic duo from years earlier was now gone and a new leader would eventually emerge. The Vikings finished the 2005 season with a 9–7 record. However, this season would be more notable for off-the-field events. In October, 17 team members were part of a party of about 90 that went out on a pleasure cruise on local Lake Minnetonka. The incident erupted into scandal when media reported that a number of the players had performed sex acts and that prostitutes had been flown in. Four players were ultimately charged with misdemeanors related to the party. Mike Tice was let go after the 2005 season and was replaced by Brad Childress. This was one of many significant front office moves made by the new ownership team, led by Zygi Wilf. 2006–2008 Minnesota began the 2006 season 4–2 (with Childress becoming the first Vikings coach to start his career 2–0), but finished the year at 6–10, receiving the 7th pick in the NFL Draft; with it, the Vikings selected Adrian Peterson out of the University of Oklahoma. Peterson's first career touchdown was a 60-yard screen pass against the Atlanta Falcons in his first career game. When the Vikings played the Chicago Bears in Week 6, Peterson broke the record for single-game All-Purpose (rushing, receiving, kick returning) yards (361 total yards, 224 rushing). In Week 9, Peterson broke the NFL single-game rushing record set by Jamal Lewis in 2003 by rushing for 296 yards against the San Diego Chargers. Despite a strong push in the middle of the season, winning five straight games, the Vikings lost their final two games to finish the season at 8–8 and missed the playoffs. In Week 13 of the 2008 season against the Bears, Gus Frerotte hooked up with Bernard Berrian and set the record for longest play in franchise history with a 99-yard touchdown pass. In the 2009 season, Adrian Peterson led the NFL with 1760 rushing yards, breaking the franchise record. The Vikings clinched the NFC North championship for the first time after defeating the New York Giants 20–19 in Week 17, when kicker Ryan Longwell made the game-winning field goal. Peterson had 19 carries for 109 yards and added a touchdown during the game. On January 4, 2009, the Vikings hosted the Philadelphia Eagles for the Wild Card round, their first home playoff game in eight years. The Eagles led the Viking 16–14 at halftime and, coming off a 44–6 victory over the Dallas Cowboys, went on to defeat the Vikings 26–14. Since 2006, the Vikings have been known especially for their strong run defense (#1 in the NFL in 2006, 2007, and 2008; they are the first NFL team to accomplish this since the AFL–NFL merger in 1970), anchored by the Williams Wall consisting of defensive tackle Kevin Williams and nose tackle Pat Williams (no relation). With the addition of sack-leader Jared Allen in 2008, the dominant front four began being called by several nicknames, including "Thunder and Plunder" and "Shock and AWE" (an acronym of their surname initials). 2009 On August 18, 2009, after months of speculation and negotiations, twice-retired veteran quarterback Brett Favre, who until 2007 had played 16 years for division archrival Green Bay Packers, signed a two-year, $25 million deal with the Vikings. On October 5, 2009, the Vikings hosted the Green Bay Packers as Favre played his former team for the first time. With a 30–23 victory on Monday Night Football, the Vikings moved to a 4–0 record. Favre became the first quarterback in NFL history to defeat all 32 current teams as a starter. Over 21.8 million viewers tuned in to watch the game, beating the previous record for a cable television program set by a game between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Dallas Cowboys in 2008 (18.6 million viewers). The Vikings beat the New York Giants, 44–7, in Week 17 to help the team clinch the second seed in the conference and a first-round-bye with an Eagles loss later that same day. The Vikings ended the regular season with a 12–4 record, their best record since 2000 and the first 11-plus win season since their record-setting 1998 campaign. The Vikings played the Dallas Cowboys in the divisional round on January 17, 2010, and won the game by a score of 34–3, advancing the Vikings to the NFC Championship game, the ninth in franchise history. This would also be the first NFC Championship game for the team since the 2000 season. Minnesota would travel to New Orleans the following week to face the top-seeded Saints in the first conference championship game held at the Superdome. Despite out-gaining the Saints on offense by nearly a twofold margin, the Vikings were severely hindered by five turnovers, including a Favre interception in the final minute of the fourth quarter in Saints territory. They were ousted in overtime, 31–28, as the Saints won the coin toss and kicked a 40-yard field goal on the first possession of overtime. 2010s The Vikings performed similarly in the 2010s, only making the playoffs four times and going 2–4 in those games. Additionally, there was inconsistency at the quarterback position, with thirteen quarterbacks starting at least one game for the team during this decade. Despite their performance, the team performed better in the regular season overall after the 2013 season, including an NFC Championship appearance in 2017. 2010–2013 In the first week of the 2010 NFL regular season, the Vikings played the defending Super Bowl champions, the New Orleans Saints. The Vikings lost 14–9. In Week 2, the Vikings played the Miami Dolphins and lost 14–10. The Vikings defeated the Detroit Lions 24–10 in the third week of the season. After a week four bye-week, the Vikings received star wide receiver Randy Moss in a trade with the New England Patriots. Even with the addition of Moss, the Vikings lost to the New York Jets 29–20 in Week 5. The Vikings won a crucial victory against another struggling team in the form of the Dallas Cowboys 24–21, but in Week 7 the Vikings lost to the arch-rival Green Bay Packers 28–24. In Week 9, the Vikings played the Arizona Cardinals at home and won 27–24 in overtime, coming back from a 24–10 deficit in the final four minutes of regulation. Favre threw for a career-high 446 passing yards. The Vikings then went on to face the Chicago Bears, but were defeated, and then went on to be blown out 31–3 at home by the Packers the following game. Head coach Brad Childress was fired the following Monday. With Leslie Frazier filling in for the fired Childress, the Vikings won two games in a row. One against the Washington Redskins on the road, and a blowout win over the Buffalo Bills at home. After a winter storm dropped nearly of snow in the Minneapolis/St Paul area the Saturday before the Vikings December 12 home game versus the New York Giants and gusts drove snow removers off the dome's roof overnight, several panels were damaged as the weight of the snow caused the roof to collapse. After viewing the damage, Vikings management and the NFL decided to move the game to Monday and play it at Ford Field in Detroit, Michigan. Because of ongoing repairs to the roof of the Metrodome, the Vikings played their December 20 game versus the Chicago Bears at TCF Bank Stadium. Favre threw the final touchdown pass of his career (to Percy Harvin) in this game. The game was played 29 years to the day after the last outdoor game at old Met Stadium. On December 26, the NFL announced that the game versus the Philadelphia Eagles was being postponed to Tuesday, December 28, 2010, because of blizzard conditions. This marks the third consecutive venue or date change for a Vikings game and was the first NFL game played on a Tuesday since 1964. The Vikings proceeded to upset the dynamic Eagles offense, led by a resurgent Michael Vick, 24–14 with rookie Joe Webb at the helm. The Vikings finished the season 6–10 with a 20–13 loss against the Detroit Lions. The 2010–11 season was a step down for the Minnesota Vikings. After coming within a few plays of Super Bowl XLIV, Minnesota ended the 2010 season with a 6–10 record and a last place finish in the NFC North for the first time since 1990. During the season, the Vikings had many distractions, including trading for Randy Moss and then waiving him only a month later, Brett Favre's NFL investigation for allegedly sending inappropriate text messages to Jets' employee Jenn Sterger while he was with the team in 2008, the Metrodome's collapse and resulting venue changes, and finally head coach Brad Childress' firing on November 22 following a 31–3 loss at the hands of the rival Green Bay Packers. After serving as the interim head coach for the final six games of the season (finishing with a 3–3 record), defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier was officially named the head coach on January 3, 2011, after signing a three-year contract. On January 17, Brett Favre retired for the third, and officially last, time, leaving the team in search of a long-term replacement at the quarterback position. Wasting no time after being appointed head coach, Frazier began to restructure the team's coaching staff, including letting go of offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell and hiring Mike Singletary as linebackers coach and Bill Musgrave as the new offensive coordinator. Their first-round draft pick was Christian Ponder, a quarterback from Florida State University. The team finished with a 3–13 record, tied with the 1984 Vikings for the second-worst record in franchise history. During the 2012 NFL Draft, the team selected USC lineman Matt Kalil with the 4th overall pick after a trade with the Cleveland Browns, and Notre Dame safety Harrison Smith in the first round. Both players were instrumental in helping the Vikings reach the playoffs for the 27th time in franchise history, as was fellow draftee, sixth-round kicker Blair Walsh. After beating the Packers in the final game of 2012 to reach the playoffs as the NFC's sixth seed, the Vikings lost 24–10 to the Packers in the rematch at Lambeau Field in the Wild Card round. The team was forced to play backup Joe Webb during the game after Ponder was sidelined due to an arm injury sustained from the previous week. Peterson was later named the league's MVP, after rushing for 2,097 yards, the second most rushing yards in a season in NFL history. In the 2013 season, the Vikings finished with five wins, ten losses, and one tie, with no road wins. Notable moments include acquired free agent Matt Cassel outplaying Christian Ponder at the quarterback position and the defense allowing a league-worst 480 points, coming within four points of matching the franchise's worst set in 1984. This was also the last season played at the Metrodome as a new stadium deal was reached. Leslie Frazier was fired after the regular season ended. 2014–2019 The team hired former Cincinnati Bengals defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer to replace Leslie Frazier as head coach on January 16, 2014. Former Cleveland Browns offensive coordinator Norv Turner replaced Bill Musgrave, and George Edwards replaced Alan Williams as defensive coordinator. In the 2014 NFL Draft, the Vikings selected Anthony Barr, a linebacker out of UCLA, and Teddy Bridgewater, a quarterback out of the University of Louisville. Bridgewater would later lose the starting job to Matt Cassel only to become the starter for the Vikings when Cassel was lost to a season-ending foot injury in week 3. Star running back Adrian Peterson only played in one regular-season game due to his ongoing child abuse trial, with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell placing Peterson on the Commissioner's Exempt List indefinitely. On April 16, 2015, the league released a statement issuing Peterson's reinstatement to occur on April 17, 2015. The Vikings concluded their season with seven wins and nine losses, winning only one game against a divisional opponent, although Bridgewater set a franchise record for wins by a rookie starting quarterback. On January 3, 2016, the Vikings beat divisional rival Green Bay 20–13 to win the NFC North for the first time since 2009. The Vikings, led by their top 5 defense, ended the 2015 season with an 11–5 record, and a #3 seed in the playoffs. However, they lost to the Seattle Seahawks 10–9 after Blair Walsh missed a 27-yard field goal in the third coldest game in NFL playoff history. The Vikings were responsible for a historic milestone in the late rounds of the 2016 NFL draft. Their sixth-round selection, German wide receiver Moritz Böhringer, was the first European player ever to be drafted by an NFL team without having previously played at any level in North America. After Teddy Bridgewater went down with a knee injury in the preseason of 2016, the Vikings traded their 2017 first round pick and a conditional fourth round pick to the Philadelphia Eagles for quarterback Sam Bradford, who threw for 20 touchdowns, 5 interceptions, 3,877 yards, and while starting the season a league best 5–0, completed the season 3–8 for a season total of 8–8. Following the knee injury, the Vikings declined to pick up the fifth-year option on Bridgewater. Running back Adrian Peterson went down to injury in Week 2 against the Green Bay Packers with a torn meniscus and was placed on the Injured Reserve until Week 15. On February 28, 2017, the Vikings announced they would not exercise Peterson's 2017 contract option which made him a free agent. Had they exercised the option, Peterson would be owed $18 million for the 2017 season. On April 25, 2017, the New Orleans Saints signed Peterson to a 2-year, $7 million contract, ending his tenure with the Vikings since his debut in 2007 as a rookie. He holds several Vikings records including most career rushing touchdowns, career rushing yards, and most rushing yards in a season. In the summer of 2017, the Vikings ownership announced they would end the 52-year annual tradition of summer training camp in Mankato at Minnesota State University, Mankato as they built a large new headquarters building, training facility and area property development in Eagan on the site of the former Northwest Airlines offices completed in the spring of 2018 in time for the 2018 summer training camp that July. The Vikings won the NFC North for the second time in three years in 2017, finishing with a 13–3 record that saw them go into the playoffs as the number 2 seed in the NFC. In the divisional round, they came up against the New Orleans Saints. With less than 10 seconds remaining in the game and trailing by a single point, the Vikings lined up on 3rd-and-10 on their own 39-yard line. Quarterback Case Keenum threw the ball to wide receiver Stefon Diggs inside field goal range near the right sideline, giving the receiver a chance to get out of bounds with just enough time for a game-winning field goal attempt; however, safety Marcus Williams missed his attempted tackle, allowing Diggs to run down the sideline unopposed for the first walk-off game-winning touchdown in NFL playoff history. On KFAN 100.3, radio announcer Paul Allen called the play the 'Minneapolis Miracle'. The Vikings went on to the NFC Championship for the opportunity to play in Super Bowl LII in their own stadium, only to lose 38–7 to the eventual Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles. On March 15, 2018, quarterback Kirk Cousins signed a three-year fully guaranteed $84 million contract with the Vikings. The signing made Cousins the highest paid football player at the time. On September 22, 2019, the Vikings defeated the Oakland Raiders for their 500th win as a franchise, with an overall record of 500-427-11 at that point. The team finished the 2019 season at 10–6, clinching a wild card spot. The Vikings went on to pull an upset victory in the wild card round against the New Orleans Saints 26–20 in overtime. The victory advanced the team to the divisional round, where they lost to the eventual NFC Champions San Francisco 49ers 10–27. 2020s The Vikings recorded two straight losing seasons in 2020 and 2021. 2020–2021 After falling to the New Orleans Saints on Christmas Day, the Minnesota Vikings were eliminated from the 2020 playoffs. The Vikings finished 7–9 in 2020, the first losing season since 2014 and only the second under Zimmer. In 2021, the Vikings missed the playoffs for the second straight season after a 37–10 loss to the Green Bay Packers in Week 17. After a 31–17 win over the Chicago Bears in Week 18 to finish the season 8–9, the team fired head coach Mike Zimmer and general manager Rick Spielman on January 10, 2022. 2022–present On January 26, 2022, the Vikings hired Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, former Vice President of Football Operations at the Cleveland Browns and Director of R&D at the San Francisco 49ers, to be the team's new General Manager. After the Los Angeles Rams won Super Bowl LVI on February 13, 2022, the Vikings subsequently named then-Rams Offensive Coordinator Kevin O'Connell as their franchise's 10th head coach on February 16. Logo and uniforms The Vikings' trademark horned helmet and purple-and-gold uniforms were designed by Los Angeles Examiner cartoonist Karl Hubenthal. Bert Rose and Norm Van Brocklin both knew Hubenthal from their days with the Los Angeles Rams organization. Hubenthal also designed the original Norseman logo. From the team's debut in 1961 to 1995, the Vikings' logos and uniforms essentially remained the same. Reflecting Minnesota's Scandinavian cultural heritage, one of the team's two primary logos consists of a profile of a blond Norseman, while the other consists of a white Viking horn. The team's helmet is purple with a Viking horn logo on each side. Each horn is outlined in gold. The horn logo was slightly revised in 2006. The original uniform design consisted of white pants, gold trim, and either purple or white jerseys. On the jersey's sleeves was the Northwestern stripe pattern in white with gold trim. For the white uniform the stripes were purple with gold trim as well. From 1962 to 1964, the Vikings wore purple pants with their white jerseys (The Vikings, with their current uniform, still wear, purple pants with yellow and white trim). In 1969, the design for the white uniforms had changed to a completely different stripe pattern, which was over the shoulders, then the purple ones, which were around the sleeve cuff. These unique shoulder stripes were first worn in 1969, the year they went to their first Super Bowl. There have also been minor changes to the uniform design throughout the years, such as changing the color of the face mask from gray to white in 1980, and then to purple in 1985. In addition, the Norseman logo was added to the sleeves in 1996, and the purple jersey stripes were toned down with that change; the TV numbers, previously located on the jersey sleeves, moved up to the shoulders as well that year. The Vikings continued to wear black shoes until Les Steckel became head coach in 1984; they were the last NFL team to make the change from black to white shoes. In 2006, the team returned to black shoes for the first time since the 1983 season. The Vikings tweaked their Norseman logo, which involved updating the shading, altering the shape and base of the horns, thickening the mustache and face, making the gold tones brighter, and shortening the braid. The new logo was unveiled on February 14, 2013. On March 28, the team reported that new uniforms will be unveiled on April 25. On April 25, 2013, the Minnesota Vikings unveiled the club's new uniforms during its annual NFL Draft party. From 1969 through 1973, the Vikings had an alternate purple jersey without stripes for warm-weather games. The team's uniforms were redesigned in 2006, the first significant change in the franchise's 46-year history. Although the team colors remained the same, trim lines were added to the outside shoulders and sleeves, and the sides of the jerseys and pants. In addition, the horn on the helmet was slightly more defined. Included in the new design are both white and purple pants, the purple pants have not been regularly used since 2007, but resurfaced twice in 2010. The team wore black armbands for the last four games in 1978 in memory of Jack "Jocko" Nelson, an assistant coach who died during the season. In 1985 the team wore a 25 years patch on their jerseys. In 1989, they wore a "40 for 60" patch honoring the 1969 NFL championship team. They wore a 35 years patch in 1995, 40 years in 2000 and 45 years in 2005. They also wore patches in 1999 for assistant coach Chip Myers who died in the offseason and in 2001 for Korey Stringer. The Vikings, like other teams, wore NFL 50th and 75th-anniversary patches in 1969 and 1994. They also wore "TS" decals on their helmets in memory of Tony Sparano in the 2018 NFL season, their offensive-line coach who died before the season started. All-purple uniforms On October 11, 1964, for a home game against the Detroit Lions, the Vikings decided to wear their road uniform of white jerseys and purple pants; however, the Lions mistakenly only brought their white jerseys to Minnesota. The game began with both teams wearing white, but it proved too confusing, and ahead of the second quarter, the Vikings changed into their purple jerseys; however, they did not change their pants, resulting in the first time the Vikings wore all-purple for a game. It was not until 43 years later, on December 17, 2007 (a Monday Night Football game against the Chicago Bears) that the Vikings again donned both purple jerseys and purple pants—the first time they wore all-purple intentionally. They repeated this three years later, the wearing all-purple for the November 7, 2010 home game against the Arizona Cardinals. The NFL introduced "Color Rush" uniforms for all 32 teams in the 2016 season, specifically for Thursday Night Football games. The Vikings had an all-purple uniform with gold numbers and stripes on the pants, which made its only appearance in Week 13 at home to the Dallas Cowboys. In the 2019 season, the Vikings wore their old Color Rush uniforms against the Washington Redskins. For this game, they called them "Primetime Purple." In the playoffs of the 2019 season, the Vikings had worn all purple again against the New Orleans Saints; however, instead of the regular alternates, they wore the regular home uniforms with the away purple pants. Team culture Mascots After several failed attempts at developing an official team-owned mascot, the Vikings finally introduced Viktor the Viking during the 2007 Vikings' season. Team officials had long indicated that they were after a mascot concept that would primarily appeal to the team's younger fan base. Viktor the Viking, a muscle-bound, blond-haired and mustachioed character, wears a Vikings' #1 jersey and an oversized Vikings helmet with protruding horns and a small yellow nose guard. From 1970 to 1992, truck driver Hub Meeds dressed as a Viking and served as the team mascot. Meeds asked to become the mascot after being accidentally let onto the field by security during Super Bowl IV in New Orleans. From 1994 to 2015, the team mascot was Ragnar (played by Joseph Juranitch) and was based on the legendary Viking Ragnar Lodbrok. Juranitch admits to being somewhat of an eccentric—he holds the current world record for fastest time shaving a beard with an axe, but hasn't shaved his beard since he won the Ragnar job among 3,000 applicants. Ragnar drove onto the field at the beginning of a game dressed in Viking garb, on a motorcycle, while a cheerleader used to ride a snowmobile. Although never one to shy away from confrontations with opposing players, notably Chad "Ochocinco" Johnson, he had a soft spot for Brett Favre while the quarterback started for the rival Green Bay Packers. In 2015, the Vikings announced that they were not able to reach a new contract agreement with Juranitch which he wanted $20,000 per game, and released him. Another mascot associated with the Vikings was "Vikadontis Rex", a purple foam dinosaur. Vikadontis was the official mascot of the Minnesota Vikings Children's Fund and took part in the 1995 Celebrity Mascot Olympics. Vikadontis was retired starting with the 2000 season. The team also had an NFL Huddles mascot in the mid-1980s, (somewhat similar to Viktor the Viking). Krazy George Henderson was also employed as a cheerleader from 1982 to 1985. Fight song "Skol, Vikings" is the fight song of the Minnesota Vikings. It was introduced around the time the team was founded in 1961. It is always played whenever the team scores a touchdown, field goal or safety, at the end of each half, and upon victory. The song "Purple and Gold" was recorded in 2010 by Minneapolis native Prince to be used as a fight song for the Minnesota Vikings. Rivalries The Vikings have rivalries with all three of the other NFC North teams, but due to geographic and cultural proximity, their foremost rival is the Green Bay Packers. Some sources cite this rivalry as the biggest overall in the NFC North apart from the Packers–Bears rivalry (which dates back several more decades to 1920). The Vikings have developed a heated NFC rivalry with the New Orleans Saints. The Vikings lead the overall series 23–13, including 4–1 in the playoffs. The rivalry with the Dallas Cowboys is a historical rivalry that was hottest in the 1970s. The Vikings most played playoff opponent is the Cowboys. Dallas leads the series 18-15 overall and 4–3 in the playoffs. Helga hats Vikings fans are known to dress up in "Helga hats", purple hats with white horns and blonde braids, mimicking the helmets popularly believed to have been worn by Viking warriors. The original Helga Hats are still hand assembled in the Twin Cities area. Vikings horn During home games, the Vikings' Gjallarhorn is played during its pre-game ceremonies, a tradition that started in 2007. The ceremony has been an opportunity to honor past Viking greats (most notably Randy Moss) along with Minnesota-related folks (such as the Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs men's ice hockey team when they won the NCAA hockey championship). The first horn broke right before the playing of the 2016 playoff game in Minnesota versus the Seattle Seahawks, owing to below-zero temperatures (at the time, the Vikings were playing at Huntington Bank Stadium, an outdoor stadium) that cracked it. Both the first and second horns were created by Todd Johnson, a general manager at a music store. Skol Chant The Skol Chant is a cheer that is used in U.S. Bank Stadium for Minnesota Vikings games. It involves fans clapping their hands above their heads and yelling "Skol", in response to the beat of a drum. The chant is a modified take on the Viking War Cry used at the Iceland national football team's games and popularized by Iceland supporters at UEFA Euro 2016. Skol (written "skål" in Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish and "skál" in Faroese and Icelandic or "skaal" in archaic spellings or transliteration of any of those languages) is the Danish–Norwegian–Swedish word for "cheers" or "good health", a salute or a toast, as to an admired person or group. Players Current roster Retired numbers † = Posthumous Pro Football Hall of Famers Italics = played only a minor portion of their career with the Vikings, and are recognized primarily based upon achievements with other teams Ring of Honor 25th Anniversary Team (1985) Fran Tarkenton QB, #10 Bill Brown RB, #30 Chuck Foreman RB, #44 Ahmad Rashād WR, #28 Sammy White WR, #85 Stu Voigt TE, #83 Ron Yary T, #73 Grady Alderman T, #67 Ed White G, #62 Milt Sunde G, #64 Mick Tingelhoff C, #53 Jim Marshall DE, #70 Alan Page DT, #88 Gary Larsen DT, #77 Carl Eller DE, #81 Matt Blair OLB, #59 Scott Studwell ILB, #55 Jeff Siemon ILB, #50 Roy Winston OLB, #60 Bobby Bryant CB, #20 Ed Sharockman CB, #45 Paul Krause S, #22 Karl Kassulke S, #29 Fred Cox K, #14 Greg Coleman P, #8 Bud Grant HC 40th Anniversary Team (2000) Fran Tarkenton QB, #10 Chuck Foreman RB, #44 Robert Smith RB, #26 Ahmad Rashād WR, #28 Cris Carter WR, #80 Steve Jordan TE, #83 Ron Yary OT, #73 Randall McDaniel OG, #64 Mick Tingelhoff C, #53 Ed White OG, #62 Tim Irwin OT, #76 Jim Marshall DE, #70 Alan Page DT, #88 John Randle DT, #93 Carl Eller DE, #81 Matt Blair LB, #59 Scott Studwell LB, #55 Jeff Siemon LB, #50 Bobby Bryant CB, #20 Carl Lee CB, #39 Paul Krause S, #22 Joey Browner S, #47 Greg Coleman P, #8 Fred Cox K, #14 Darrin Nelson KR, #20 Bill Brown ST, #30 50 Greatest Vikings (2010) In connection with the team's 50th anniversary, the Vikings announced a group of 50 top players on December 19, 2010. Bold indicates those elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Grady Alderman OT, #67 Jared Allen DE, #69 Matt Birk C, #75/78 Matt Blair LB, #59 Bill Brown RB, #30 Joey Browner S, #47 Bobby Bryant CB, #20 Anthony Carter WR, #81 Cris Carter WR, #80 Fred Cox K, #14 Daunte Culpepper QB, #11 Chris Doleman DE/LB, #56 Carl Eller DE, #81 Chuck Foreman RB, #44 John Gilliam WR, #42 Bud Grant Coach Wally Hilgenberg LB, #58 Steve Hutchinson G #76 Tim Irwin OT, #76 Steve Jordan TE, #83 Tommy Kramer QB, #9 Paul Krause S, #22 Gary Larsen DT, #77 Carl Lee CB, #39 Jim Marshall DE, #70 Randall McDaniel G, #64 Keith Millard DT, #75 Randy Moss WR, #84 Dave Osborn RB, #41 Alan Page DT, #88 Adrian Peterson RB, #28 John Randle DT, #93 Ahmad Rashād WR, #28 Ed Sharockman CB, #45 Jeff Siemon LB, #50 Robert Smith RB, #20/26 Scott Studwell LB, #55 Doug Sutherland DT, #69 Fran Tarkenton QB, #10 Henry Thomas DT, #97 Mick Tingelhoff C, #53 Stu Voigt TE, #83 Gene Washington WR, #84 Ed White G, #62 Sammy White WR, #85 Kevin Williams DT, #93 Antoine Winfield CB, #26 Roy Winston LB, #60 Ron Yary OT, #73 Gary Zimmerman OT, #65 All-Mall of America Field Team (2013) In 2013, in recognition of their final season at the Metrodome, the Vikings organized a fan vote to determine the best players at each position to play for the team in their time at the stadium. They named 12 players on offense, 11 on defense, four special teams players and a head coach. Bold indicates those elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Offense QB – #11 Daunte Culpepper, 1999–2005 RB – #28 Adrian Peterson, 2007–2013 RB – #26 Robert Smith, 1993–2000 WR – #81 Anthony Carter, 1985–1993 WR – #80 Cris Carter, 1990–2001 WR – #84 Randy Moss, 1998–2004, 2010 TE – #83 Steve Jordan, 1982–1994 OT – #76 Tim Irwin, 1981–1993 OT – #65 Gary Zimmerman, 1986–1992 OG – #76 Steve Hutchinson, 2006–2011 OG – #64 Randall McDaniel, 1988–1999 C – #78 Matt Birk, 1998–2008 Defense DE – #69 Jared Allen, 2008–2013 DE – #56 Chris Doleman, 1985–1993, 1999 DT – #93 John Randle, 1990–2000 DT – #93 Kevin Williams, 2003–2013 LB – #52 Chad Greenway, 2006–2013 LB – #58 Ed McDaniel, 1992–2001 LB – #55 Scott Studwell, 1977–1990 CB – #39 Carl Lee, 1983–1993 CB – #26 Antoine Winfield, 2004–2012 S – #24 Robert Griffith, 1994–2001 S – #47 Joey Browner, 1983–1991 Special teams K – #8 Ryan Longwell, 2006–2011 P – #5/#4 Chris Kluwe, 2005–2012 KR – #12 Percy Harvin (WR), 2009–2012 ST – #81 Chris Walsh (WR), 1994–2002 Head coach HC – Dennis Green, 1992–2001 Coaches Head coaches Current staff Radio and television The Vikings' flagship radio station is KFXN-FM (100.3), which uses the branding "KFAN" based on its former calls on 1130 AM before a format flip between the AM and FM stations before the 2011 season; 1130 AM also continues to broadcast game play-by-play as KTLK. The games are also heard on the "KFAN Radio Network" in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, South Dakota, and North Dakota, as well as many other outlets. Paul Allen has been the play-by-play announcer since the 2002 NFL season with Pete Bercich filling in as analyst, who began his first season in 2007. Telecasts of preseason games not shown on national networks are aired on KMSP (Channel 9) in the Twin Cities with a simulcast of KFAN's radio broadcast while Fox Sports North shows a tape delay later. Radio affiliates Minnesota Iowa North Dakota South Dakota Wisconsin Source: See also Pro Football Hall of Fame List of Minnesota Vikings seasons List of Minnesota Vikings starting quarterbacks List of Minnesota Vikings head coaches List of Minnesota Vikings first-round draft picks Minnesota Vikings draft history List of Minnesota Vikings broadcasters Notes References External links Minnesota Vikings at the National Football League official website 1961 establishments in Minnesota National Football League teams American football teams established in 1961 Sports in Minneapolis Sports teams in Minnesota

20142

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixmaster%20Morris

Mixmaster Morris

Mixmaster Morris (born Morris Gould, 30 December 1965) is an English ambient DJ and underground musician. Famous for his, "It's time to lie down and be counted" quote, relating specifically to ambient music, Morris stated "It's exactly what you need if you have a busy and stressful life". Life and career Morris Gould was born in Brighton, Sussex, England, but grew up in Lincolnshire and was educated at Millfield in Somerset, and King's College London. At 15 he founded a punk rock band, The Ripchords, whose sole release, an eponymous EP with four tracks, was championed by the BBC Radio One DJ John Peel. After leaving university, he began working as a DJ in 1985 with his "Mongolian Hip Hop Show" on pirate radio station Network 21 in London – the handle Mixmaster Morris was suggested by the station director. After a year of managing a club called "The Gift" in New Cross, which had been founded by Keith Gallagher and named after a Velvet Underground song, Morris began releasing material as The Irresistible Force in 1987 in collaboration with singer-songwriter Des de Moor. He became involved with the emerging UK acid house scene, after organising Madhouse at The Fridge, Brixton in 1988 – which was the subject of a piece by Peel in The Observer. A show with the band Psychic TV led to him becoming full-time DJ with The Shamen, and touring with them on their 'Synergy' tours for nearly two years. The first release as The Irresistible Force was the single, "I Want To" (1988), but success came with the first album, Flying High, released in 1992 on Rising High Records. In 1994, Morris released the second album Global Chillage which featured a holographic sleeve, and was released in the US on Astralwerks. After a period of legal problems, the third album It's Tomorrow Already came out on Ninja Tune. In 1990, he made one of the first chillout compilations, Give Peace a Dance 2: The Ambient Collection for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, followed by the series Chillout or Die for Rising High Records. A mix tape for Mixmag shared with Alex Patterson was also released as a CD. The Morning After became his first major-label mix album, followed by Abstract Funk Theory for Obsessive. Through the 1990s he was a regular DJ in the chill out room at Return to the Source parties in London, around the UK and abroad. In 2003 he released the mix CD God Bless the Chilled for the Return to the Source Ambient Meditations series. He has produced many remixes since 1985, including Coldcut's "Autumn Leaves". This remix was nominated by Norman Cook as his favourite chillout track on BBC Television. His mix for INXS was a Top 20 hit in the UK. Other early remixes were of Lloyd Cole, Dave Howard Singers, Bang Bang Machine, Stump, Higher Intelligence Agency, Sven Väth and Rising High Collective. In the early 1990s his key residencies were alongside the Detroit masters at Lost, Megatripolis at London's Heaven, and also the Tribal Gathering parties. He became known for wearing holographic suits, produced by the company Spacetime, which he modelled for Vogue magazine. Throughout the decade, Morris wrote about electronic music for the NME, Mixmag, and i-D. He was resident on Kiss FM for several years, and then a regular on Solid Steel, the Ninja Tune syndicated radio show. He made his film debut in Modulations (Caipirinha Films), and his music was used in a number of other films including Groove and Hey Happy. Morris has played in over fifty countries at nightclubs and parties, and particularly music festivals such as the Full Moon parties in the Mojave Desert, Glastonbury Festival, Rainbow 2000 and Mother SOS in Japan, Chillits in Northern California, and Berlin's Love Parade. He also ran the downtempo night Nubient in Brixton. In 1995, he played at the first The Big Chill festival, and then became a resident for the next 16 years. He also collaborated with the German musician Pete Namlook under the name Dreamfish, recording two albums. Also with SF-based musician Jonah Sharp and Haruomi Hosono of Yellow Magic Orchestra he made the album Quiet Logic for the Japanese label Daisyworld. In 1998 he joined the UK's Ninja Tune record label, with whom he toured as a DJ and made three releases. 1999 saw him win 'Best Chillout DJ' at the Ibiza DJ Awards at Pacha, Ibiza, and in 2001 he won the title for a second time, becoming the first DJ to achieve this. He has appeared in many lists of the world's top DJ's including the Ministry of Sound book The Annual and 2003's DJs by Lopez, and URB Magazine'''s Top 100 DJ list. Morris records regular radio shows for the Japanese internet radio station Samurai FM. In 2006 he started a new club at the Big Chill House in Kings Cross, London, and did a guest mix for BBC Radio 1's The Blue Room show. His essay about jazz was published in the book, Crossfade, and he made a one-off appearance reading it aloud. In March 2007, together with Coldcut, he organised a tribute show to the writer and philosopher Robert Anton Wilson, which they performed at the Queen Elizabeth Hall. He also played in Goa for the first time with The Big Chill, and started a new residency at The Prince in Brixton. In May 2008 Morris undertook an ambient mix on BBC Radio 1, and put a The Irresistible Force band together to play at The Big Chill festival. In 2009, he compiled a podcast for Tate Britain to accompany their Altermodern exhibition, and opened a new AV night called MMMTV in Camden. The mix CD, Calm Down My Selector was released in January by Wakyo Records, and he made a tour of Japan to promote it. In 2010, he won another Ibiza DJ Award, for the third time. In October that year, he was announced as Head of A+R for Apollo Records. 2011 saw him rejoin Bestival as part of their "Ambient Forest" team. 2017 saw Morris continue to stay at the top of the psybient/downtempo movement and charts, especially mixcloud where he held top positions in most categories relating to ambient music for the full year. 2017 also saw the triumphant return of Mixmaster Morris with his acclaimed release "Kira Kira", a lush soundscape that was received well by many publications and listeners and earned a spot in "Extreme Chill's" top twenty of 2017 along with releases by Brian Eno and Steve Roach. Discography Flying High – Rising High Records (1992) Global Chillage – Rising High Records (1994) It's Tomorrow Already – Ninja Tune (1998) Kira Kira'' – Liquid Sound Design (2017) See also List of ambient music artists References Citations General references * External links 1965 births Living people People educated at Millfield Alumni of King's College London English DJs Astralwerks artists Ambient musicians Chill-out musicians Trip hop musicians Ninja Tune artists People from Brighton Progressive house musicians Electronic dance music DJs

20143

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manx%20language

Manx language

Manx ( or , pronounced or or ), also known as Manx Gaelic or Manks, is a Goidelic language of the insular Celtic branch of the Celtic language family, itself a branch of the Indo-European language family. Manx is the historical language of the Manx people. Although few children have Manx as a first language on the Isle of Man, there has been a steady increase in the number of speakers since the death of Ned Maddrell in 1974. Maddrell was considered to be the last speaker who grew up in a Manx-speaking community environment. Despite this, the language has never fallen completely out of use, with a minority having some knowledge of it as a heritage language, and it is still an important part of the island's culture and cultural heritage. Manx is often cited as a good example of language revival efforts; in 2015, around 1,800 people had varying levels of second-language conversational ability. Since the late 20th century, Manx has become more visible on the island, with increased signage, radio broadcasts and a Manx-medium primary school. The revival of Manx has been made easier because the language was well recorded: for example, the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer had been translated into Manx, and audio recordings had been made of native speakers. Names of the language In Manx In Manx, the language is called Gaelg or Gailck, a word which shares the same etymology as the word "Gaelic". The sister languages of Irish and Scottish Gaelic use Gaeilge (dialect variants Gaoluinn, Gaedhlag, Gaelge, and Gaelic) and Gàidhlig, respectively, for their languages. As with Irish and Scottish, the form with the definite article is frequently used in Manx: y Ghaelg or y Ghailck (Irish an Ghaeilge, Scottish a' Ghàidhlig). To distinguish it from the two other forms of Gaelic, the phrases Gaelg/Gailck Vannin (Gaelic of Mann) and Gaelg/Gailck Vanninnagh (Manx Gaelic) also are used. In addition, the nickname "Çhengey ny Mayrey" (the mother tongue/tongue of the mother, lit. the mother's tongue) is occasionally used. In English The language is usually referred to in English as "Manx". The term "Manx Gaelic" is often used, for example when discussing the relationship between the three Goidelic languages (Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx) or to avoid confusion with Anglo-Manx, the form of English spoken on the island. Scottish Gaelic is often referred to in English as simply "Gaelic," but this is less common with Manx and Irish. A feature of Anglo-Manx deriving from Gaelic is the use of the definite article, e.g. "the Manx," "the Gaelic," in ways not generally seen in standard English. The word "Manx" is frequently spelled "Manks" in historical sources, particularly those written by natives of the island; the word means "Mannish," and originates from the Old Norse Mannisk. The name of the island, Man, is frequently spelled "Mann." It is sometimes accompanied by a footnote explaining that it is a two-syllable word, with the stress on the first syllable, "MAN-en." The island is named after the Irish god Manannán mac Lir, thus Ellan Vannin (Irish Oileán Mhannanáin) "Mannanán's Island." History Manx is a Goidelic language, closely related to Irish and Scottish Gaelic. On the whole it is partially mutually intelligible with these, and native speakers of one find it easy to gain passive, and even spoken, competency in the other two. It has been suggested that a little-documented Brythonic language (i.e. related to modern Welsh, Cornish and Breton) may have been spoken on the Isle of Man before the arrival of Christian missionaries from Ireland in the early Middle Ages. However, there is little surviving evidence about the language spoken on Man at that time. The basis of the modern Manx language is Primitive Irish (like modern Irish and Scottish Gaelic). The Island either lends its name to, or takes its name from Manannán, the Brythonic and Gaelic sea god who is said in myth to have once ruled the island. Primitive Irish is first attested in Ogham inscriptions from the 4th century AD. These writings have been found throughout Ireland and the west coast of Great Britain. Primitive Irish transitioned into Old Irish through the 5th century. Old Irish, dating from the 6th century, used the Latin script and is attested primarily in marginalia to Latin manuscripts, but there are no extant examples from the Isle of Man. Latin was used for ecclesiastical records from the establishment of Christianity in the Isle of Man in the fifth century AD. Many lexical items concerning religion, writing and record keeping entered Manx at this time. The Isle of Man was conquered by Norse Vikings in the ninth century. Although there is some evidence in the form of runic inscriptions that Norse was used by some of these settlers, the Vikings who settled around the Irish Sea and West Coast of Scotland soon became Gaelic speaking Norse-Gaels. During the 9th century AD, the Gaelic of the inhabitants of the Isle of Man, like those Scotland and the North of Ireland, may have been significantly influenced by Norse speakers. While Norse had very little impact on the Manx language overall, a small number of modern place names on Mann are Norse in origin, e.g. Laxey (Laksaa) and Ramsey (Rhumsaa). Other Norse legacies in Manx include loanwords and personal names. By the 10th century, it is supposed that Middle Irish had emerged and was spoken throughout Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man. The island came under Scottish rule in 1266, and alternated between Scottish and English rule until finally becoming the feudal possession of the Stanley family in 1405. It is likely that up until this point, except for scholarly knowledge of Latin and courtly use of Anglo-Norman, that Manx was the only language spoken on the island. Since the establishment of the Stanleys on the Isle of Man, first Anglo-Norman, and later, the English language have been the chief external factors in the development of Manx, until the twentieth century, when in Manx speakers became able to access Irish and Scottish Gaelic media. Manx had diverged considerably from the Gaelic languages of Scotland and Ireland between 1400 and 1900. The seventeenth century Plantation of Ulster, the decline of Irish in Leinster and extinction of Galloway Gaelic led to the geographic isolation of Manx from other dialects of Gaelic. The development of a separate orthography also led Manx to diverge from Irish and Scottish Gaelic. In the 17th century, some university students left the Isle of Man to attend school in England. At the same time, teaching in English was required in schools founded by governor Isaac Barrow. Barrow also promoted the use of English in churches; he considered that it was a superior language for reading the Bible; however, because the majority of ministers were monolingual Manx speakers, his views had little practical impact. Thomas Wilson began his tenure as Bishop of Mann in 1698 and was succeeded by Mark Hildesley. Both men held positive views of Manx; Wilson was the first person to publish a book in Manx, a translation of The Principles and Duties of Christianity (Coyrie Sodjey), and Hildesley successfully promoted the use of Manx as the language of instruction in schools. The New Testament was first published in Manx in 1767. In the late 18th century, nearly every school was teaching in English. This decline continued into the 19th century, as English gradually became the primary language spoken on the Isle of Man. In 1848, J. G. Cumming wrote, "there are ... few persons (perhaps none of the young) who speak no English." Henry Jenner estimated in 1874 that about 30% of the population habitually spoke Manx (12,340 out of a population of 41,084). According to official census figures, 9.1% of the population claimed to speak Manx in 1901; in 1921 the percentage was only 1.1%. Since the language was used by so few people, it had low linguistic "prestige", and parents tended to not teach Manx to their children, thinking it would be useless to them compared with English. Revival Following the decline in the use of Manx during the nineteenth century, (The Manx Language Society) was founded in 1899. By the middle of the twentieth century, only a few elderly native speakers remained (the last of them, Ned Maddrell, died on 27 December 1974), but by then a scholarly revival had begun and a few people had started teaching it in schools. The Manx Language Unit was formed in 1992, consisting of three members and headed by Manx Language Officer Brian Stowell, a language activist and fluent speaker, "which was put in charge of all aspects of Manx language teaching and accreditation in schools." This led to an increased interest in studying the Manx language and encouraged a renewed sense of ethnic identity. The revival of Manx has been aided by the recording work done in the twentieth century by researchers. Most notably, the Irish Folklore Commission was sent in with recording equipment in 1948 by Éamon de Valera. Also important in preserving the Manx language was work conducted by the late Brian Stowell, who is considered personally responsible for the current revival of the Manx language. The Manx Language Strategy was released in 2017, outlining a five-year plan for the language's continued revitalisation. Culture Vannin employs a Manx Language Development Officer (Manx: Yn Greinneyder) to encourage and facilitate the use of the language. In 2009, UNESCO's Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger declared Manx an extinct language, despite the presence of hundreds of speakers on the Isle of Man. Since then, UNESCO's classification of the language has changed to "critically endangered". In the 2011 census, 1,823 out of 80,398 Isle of Man residents, or 2.27% of the population, claimed to have knowledge of Manx, an increase of 134 people from the 2001 census. These were spread roughly uniformly over the island: in Douglas 566 people professed an ability to speak, read or write Manx; 179 in Peel, 146 in Onchan, and 149 in Ramsey. Traditional Manx given names are once again becoming common on the island, especially Moirrey and Voirrey (Mary, properly pronounced similarly to the Scottish Moira, but often mispronounced as Moiree/Voiree when used as a given name by non-Manx speakers), Illiam (William), Orry (from the Manx king Godred Crovan of Norse origin), Breeshey (also Breesha) (Bridget), Aalish (also Ealish) (Alice), Juan (Jack), Ean (Ian), Joney (John), Fenella (Fionnuala), Pherick (Patrick) and Freya (from the Norse goddess) remain popular. Number of speakers by year Literature Because Manx has never had a large number of speakers, it has never been practical to produce large amounts of written literature. However, a body of oral literature did exist. The "Fianna" tales and others like them are known, including the Manx ballad Fin as Oshin, commemorating Finn MacCool and Ossian. With the coming of Protestantism, Manx spoken tales slowly disappeared, while a tradition of carvals - religious songs or carols - developed with religious sanction. As far as is known, there was no distinctively Manx written literature before the Reformation. By that time, any presumed literary link with Ireland and Scotland, such as through Irish-trained priests, had been lost. The first published literature in Manx was The Principles and Duties of Christianity (Coyrie Sodjey), translated by Bishop of Sodor and Man Thomas Wilson. The Book of Common Prayer was translated by John Phillips, the Welsh-born Anglican Bishop of Sodor and Man from 1605 to 1633. The early Manx script has some similarities with orthographical systems found occasionally in Scotland and in Ireland for the transliteration of Gaelic, such as the Book of the Dean of Lismore, as well as some extensive texts based on English and Scottish English orthographical practices of the time. Little secular Manx literature has been preserved. The New Testament was first published in 1767. When the Anglican church authorities started to produce written literature in the Manx language in the 18th century, the system developed by John Philips was further "anglicised"; the one feature retained from Welsh orthography was the use of to represent schwa (e.g. "horse" and "help" as well as (e.g. "knowledge"), though it is also used to represent , as in English (e.g. "John" (vocative), "fish"). Other works produced in the 18th and 19th centuries include catechisms, hymn books and religious tracts. A translation of Paradise Lost was made in 1796. A considerable amount of secular literature has been produced in the 20th and 21st centuries as part of the language revival. In 2006, the first full-length novel in Manx, Dunveryssyn yn Tooder-Folley (The Vampire Murders) was published by Brian Stowell, after being serialised in the press. There is an increasing amount of literature available in the language, and recent publications include Manx versions of the Gruffalo and Gruffalo's Child. In 2019 Rob Teare translated Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's The Little Prince into Manx. Official recognition Manx is not officially recognised by any national or regional government, although its contribution to Manx culture and tradition is acknowledged by some governmental and non-governmental bodies. For example: The Standing Orders of the House of Keys provide that: "The proceedings of the House shall be in English; but if a Member at any point pronounces a customary term or sentence in Manx Gaelic or any other language, the Speaker may call upon the Member for a translation." An example was at the sitting on 12 February 2019, when an MHK used the expression boghtnid, stated to mean "nonsense". Manx is used in the annual Tynwald ceremony and Manx words are used in official Tynwald publications. For the purpose of strengthening its contribution to local culture and community, Manx is recognised under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages and in the framework of the British-Irish Council. Manx is taught as a second language at all of the island's primary and secondary schools. The lessons are optional and instruction is provided by the Department of Education's Manx Language Team which teach up to A Level standard. The Bunscoill Ghaelgagh, a primary school at St John's, has 67 children, as of September 2016, who receive nearly all of their education through the medium of the language. Children who have attended the school have the opportunity to receive some of their secondary education through the language at Queen Elizabeth II High School in Peel. The playgroup organisation Mooinjer Veggey, which operates the , runs a series of preschool groups that introduce the language. The Isle of Man comprised the one site for the Manx language in the Atlas Linguarum Europae, a project that compared dialects and languages across all countries in Europe. Learning the language There are an increasing number of resources available for those wanting to learn the language. The Manx Language Development Officer for Culture Vannin manages the Learnmanx.com website which has a wide variety of resources. These include mobile apps a new podcast in Manx, the 1000 words-in-Manx challenge and the Video-a-day in Manx series. The most recent development on the adult language front is the creation of a new on-line course, Say Something in Manx SaySomethingin which has been created in conjunction with the Say Something in Welsh SaySomethingin It is hoped that this will be the main way on-line learners will access the language from now on. 2016 also saw the launch of a new dictionary for learners published by Culture Vannin. Media Two weekly programmes in Manx are available on medium wave on Manx Radio: Traa dy liooar on Monday and Jamys Jeheiney on Friday. The news in Manx is available on-line from Manx Radio, who have three other weekly programmes that use the language: Clare ny Gael; Shiaght Laa and Moghrey Jedoonee. Several news readers on Manx Radio also use a good deal of incidental Manx. The Isle of Man Examiner has a monthly bilingual column in Manx. The first film to be made in Manx – the 22-minute-long Ny Kirree fo Niaghtey (The Sheep [plural] Under the Snow) – premiered in 1983 and was entered for the 5th Celtic Film and Television Festival in Cardiff in 1984. It was directed by Shorys Y Creayrie (George Broderick) for Foillan Films of Laxey, and is about the background to an early 18th-century folk song. In 2013, a short film, Solace in Wicca, was produced with financial assistance from Culture Vannin, CinemaNX and Isle of Man Film. A series of short cartoons about the life of Cuchulain which were produced by BBC Northern Ireland are available as are a series of cartoons on Manx mythology. Most significant is a 13-part DVD series Manx translation of the award-winning series Friends and Heroes. Signage Bilingual road, street, village and town boundary signs are common throughout the Isle of Man. All other road signs are in English only. Business signage in Manx is gradually being introduced but is not mandated by law; however, the 1985 Tynwald Report on the use of Manx states that signage should be bilingual except where a Manx phrase is the norm. The Manx Bible The Bible was first produced in Manx by a group of Anglican clergymen on the island. The Gospel of Matthew was printed in 1748. The four Gospels were produced in 1763 and (the New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ) in 1767 by the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge (SPCK). In 1772 the Old Testament was translated from Hebrew and printed, together with the Books of Wisdom of Solomon and Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) from the Apocrypha. (The Holy Bible) of the Old and New Testaments was published as one book by the SPCK in 1775. The bicentenary was celebrated on the Isle of Man in 1975 and included a set of stamps from the Isle of Man Post Office. This 1775 edition effectively fixed the modern orthography of Manx Gaelic, which has changed little since. Jenner claims that some bowdlerisation had occurred in the translation, e.g. the occupation of Rahab the prostitute is rendered as , a hostess or female inn-keeper. There was a translation of the (Psalms of David) in metre in Manx by the Rev John Clague, vicar of Rushen, which was printed with the Book of Common Prayer of 1768. Bishop Hildesley required that these Metrical Psalms were to be sung in churches. These were reprinted by the Manx Language Society in 1905. The British and Foreign Bible Society (BFBS) published the (New Testament) in 1810 and reprinted it in 1824. (the Holy Bible) of the Old Testament and New Testament (without the two books of the Apocrypha) was first printed as a whole in 1819. BFBS last printed anything on paper in Manx in 1936 when it reprinted (the Gospel of St John); this was reprinted by (The Manx Gaelic Society) in 1968. The Manx Bible was republished by Shearwater Press in July 1979 as (Manx Family Bible), which was a reproduction of the BFBS 1819 Bible. Since 2014 the BFBS 1936 Manx Gospel of John has been available online on YouVersion and Bibles.org. Church Manx was used in some churches into the late 19th century. Although church services in Manx were once fairly common, they occur infrequently now. Yn Çheshaght Ghailckagh, the Manx Language Society, hold an annual Christmas service at locations around the island. Classification and dialects Manx is one of the three descendants of Old Irish (via Middle Irish and early Modern Gaelic), and is closely related to Irish and Scottish Gaelic. It shares a number of developments in phonology, vocabulary and grammar with Irish and Scottish Gaelic (in some cases only with dialects of these) and shows a number of unique changes. There are two attested historical dialects of Manx, Northern Manx and Southern Manx. A third dialect may have existed in-between, around Douglas. Similarities and differences with Irish and Scottish Gaelic Manx shares with Scottish Gaelic the partial loss of contrastive palatalisation of labial consonants; thus while in Irish the velarised consonants contrast phonemically with palatalised , in Scottish Gaelic and Manx, the phonemic contrast has been lost to some extent. A consequence of this phonemic merger is that Middle Irish unstressed word-final (spelled -(a)ibh, -(a)imh in Irish and Gaelic) has merged with (-(e)abh, -(e)amh) in Manx; both have become , spelled -oo or -u(e). Examples include ("to stand"; Irish ), ("religion"; Irish ), ("fainting"; Early Modern Irish , lit. in clouds), and ("on you (plural)"; Irish ). Medial and final *bh and *mh have become and in general in Manx, thus shiu 'you PL', Scottish and Irish Gaelic sibh (siph in Northern Irish, sib in South Connacht Irish; Lewis Gàidhlig has the variant siù, besides the more general sibh), -bh in final consonant clusters, e.g. Manx sharroo 'bitter', Scottish searbh , Northern and Western Irish searbh , Southern Irish searbh , between vowels, e.g. Manx awin 'river', Scottish abhainn , Irish abhainn , word-finally in monosyllables, e.g. Manx laaue 'hand', Scottish làmh , Northern Irish , Western Irish lámh , Southern Irish , at the end of stressed syllables (see further below), as in sourey 'summer', Scotland and Ireland samhradh, Scottish , Northern Irish , Western and Southern Irish . In all this Manx is most like Northern Irish. Rare retentions of the older pronunciation of "bh" include Divlyn, Divlin 'Dublin', Middle Irish Duibhlinn , also written Duibhlinn in Modern Irish and Scots Gaelic. Moreover, similarly to Munster Irish, historical bh and mh (nasalised ) tend to be lost in the middle or at the end of a word in Manx, either with compensatory lengthening or vocalisation as u resulting in diphthongisation with the preceding vowel. For example, Manx ("winter") and ("mountains") correspond to Irish and (Southern Irish dialect spelling and pronunciation gíre () and sléte ()). Another similarity to Munster Irish is the development of the Old Irish diphthongs before velarised consonants (spelled ao in Irish and Scottish Gaelic) to in many words, as in ("carpenter") and ("narrow") (spelled and in Irish and Scottish, and pronounced virtually the same in Munster). Like western and northern dialects of Irish (cf. Irish phonology) and most dialects of Scottish Gaelic, Manx has changed the historical consonant clusters to . For example, Middle Irish ("mockery") and ("women") have become and respectively in Manx. The affrication of to is also common to Manx, northern Irish, and Scottish Gaelic. Also like northern and western dialects of Irish, as well as like southern dialects of Scottish Gaelic (e.g. Arran, Kintyre), the unstressed word-final syllable of Middle Irish (spelled -(a)idh and -(a)igh) has developed to in Manx, where it is spelled -ee, as in ("buy"; cf. Irish ) and ("apparatus"; cf. Gaelic ). Another property Manx shares with Ulster Irish and some dialects of Scottish Gaelic is that rather than appears in unstressed syllables before (in Manx spelling, agh), for example ("straight") (Irish ), ("to remember") (Gaelic ). Like southern and western varieties of Irish and northern varieties of Scottish Gaelic, but unlike the geographically closer varieties of Ulster Irish and Arran and Kintyre Gaelic, Manx shows vowel lengthening or diphthongisation before the Old Irish fortis and lenis sonorants. For example, ("children") , ("brown") , ("butter") correspond to Irish/Scottish Gaelic , , and respectively, which have long vowels or diphthongs in western and southern Irish and in the Scottish Gaelic dialects of the Outer Hebrides and Skye, thus western Irish , Southern Irish/Northern Scottish , , ), but short vowels and 'long' consonants in northern Irish, Arran, and Kintyre, , and . Another similarity with southern Irish is the treatment of Middle Irish word-final unstressed , spelled -(e)adh in Irish and Scottish Gaelic. In nouns (including verbal nouns), this became in Manx, as it did in southern Irish, e.g. ("war") , ("to praise") ; cf. Irish and , pronounced and in southern Irish. In finite verb forms before full nouns (as opposed to pronouns) became in Manx, as in southern Irish, e.g. ("would praise"), cf. Irish , pronounced in southern Irish. Dialects Linguistic analysis of the last few dozen native speakers reveals a number of dialectal differences between the northern and the southern parts of the island. Northern Manx was reflected by speakers from towns and villages from Maughold in the northeast of the island to Peel on the west coast. Southern Manx was used by speakers from the sheading of Rushen. It is possible that written Manx represents a 'midlands' dialect of Douglas and surrounding areas. In Southern Manx, older á and in some cases ó became . In Northern Manx the same happened, but á sometimes remained as well. For example, ("day", cf. Irish ) was in the south but or in the north. Old ó is always in both dialects, e.g. ("young", cf. Irish ) is in both dialects. In many words before rt, rd and rg, and in one or two other words á, lengthened a and ó have become , as in paayrt 'part' , ard 'high' , jiarg 'red' , argid 'money, silver' and aarey 'gold GEN' . In Northern Manx, older (e)a before nn in the same syllable is diphthongised, while in Southern Manx it is lengthened but remains a monophthong. For example, ("head", cf. Irish ) is in the north but in the south. Words with ua and in some cases ao in Irish and Scottish are spelled with eay in Manx. In Northern Manx, this sound was , while in Southern Manx it was , , or . For example, ("wind", cf. Irish ) is in the north and in the south, while ("coal", cf. Irish ) is in the north and , , or in the south. In both the north and the south, there is a tendency to insert a short sound before a word-final in monosyllabic words, as in for ("whole") and for ("woman"). This phenomenon is known as pre-occlusion. In Southern Manx, however, there is pre-occlusion of before and of before , as in for ("walking") and for ("ship"). These forms are generally pronounced without pre-occlusion in the north. Preocclusion of before , on the other hand, is more common in the north, as in ("heavy"), which is in the north but or in the south. This feature is also found in Cornish. Southern Manx tended to lose word-initial before , while Northern Manx usually preserved it, e.g. ("glen") is in the north and in the south, and ("knee") is in the north and in the south. Phrases Some simple conversational words and phrases: Orthography The Manx orthography is unlike that of Irish and Scottish Gaelic, both of which use similar spelling systems derived from written Early Modern Irish, alt. Classical Irish, which was the language of the educated Gaelic elite of both Ireland and Scotland (where it is called Classical Gaelic) until the mid-19th century. In general, these orthographies retain spelling and derivation from older Gaelic, which means that there is not in a one-to-one system. Both systems use only 18 letters to represent around 50 phonemes. While Manx in effect uses the English spelling system, except for and , the 24 letters used in its orthography likewise covers a similar range of phonemes, and therefore many digraphs and trigraphs are used. The Manx orthography was developed by people who were unaware of traditional Gaelic orthography, as they had learned literacy in Welsh and English (the initial development in the 16th century), then only English (later developments). Therefore, the orthography is based on early Modern English pronunciation, and to a small extent Welsh, rather than from a pan-Gaelic point of view. The result is an inconsistent and only partially phonemic spelling system, in a similar way as spelling in English. T. F. O'Rahilly expressed the opinion that Gaelic in the Isle of Man was saddled with an inadequate spelling which is neither traditional nor phonetic; if the traditional Gaelic orthography had been preserved, the close kinship that exists between Manx Gaelic and Scottish Gaelic would be obvious to all at first sight. There is no evidence of Gaelic script having been used on the island. Cedilla Manx uses relatively few diacritics, but a cedilla is often (but not exclusively) used to differentiate between the two pronunciations of ch: Çhiarn (), meaning lord, is pronounced with the palato-alveolar affricate , as in the English "church" Chamoo (), meaning nor or neither, is pronounced with the velar fricative , as in the Scottish pronunciation of the word "loch" (), a sound which is commonly represented by gh at the ends of words in Manx (as it often is in the English of Ireland). Examples The following examples are taken from Broderick 1984–86, 1:178–79 and 1:350–53. The first example is from a speaker of Northern Manx, the second from Ned Maddrell, a speaker of Southern Manx. Gaelic versions of the Lord's Prayer The Lord's Prayer has been translated into all the Goidelic tongues. Although the wordings are not completely cognate, they demonstrate the different orthographies. The standard version of the Lord's Prayer in Manx Ayr ain t'ayns niau, Casherick dy row dt'ennym. Dy jig dty reeriaght. Dt'aigney dy row jeant er y thalloo, myr t'ayns niau. Cur dooin nyn arran jiu as gagh laa, as leih dooin nyn loghtyn, myr ta shin leih dauesyn ta jannoo loghtyn nyn 'oi. As ny leeid shin ayns miolagh, agh livrey shin veih olk: Son lhiats y reeriaght, as y phooar, as y ghloyr, son dy bragh as dy bragh. Amen. Manx version of 1713 (with long s) Ayr Ain, t'ayns Niau; Caſherick dy rou dt'ennym; Di jig dty Reereeaght; Dt'aigney dy rou jeant er y Talloo myr ta ayns Niau; Cur dooin nyn Arran jiu as gagh laa; As leih dooin nyn Loghtyn, myr ta ſhin leih daueſyn ta janoo loghtyn ny noi ſhin; As ny leeid ſhin ayns Miolagh; Agh livrey ſhin veih olk; Son liats y Reereeaght y Phooar as y Ghloyr, ſon dy bragh as dy bragh. Amen The prayer in Old Irish A athair fil hi nimib, Noemthar thainm. Tost do flaithius. Did do toil i talmain amail ata in nim. Tabair dun indiu ar sasad lathi. Ocus log dun ar fiachu amail logmaitne diar fhechemnaib. Ocus nis lecea sind i n-amus n-dofulachtai. Acht ron soer o cech ulc. Amen ropfir. The Prayer in modern Irish Ár n-Athair, atá ar neamh: go naofar d'ainm (alt. go naomhaíthear t'ainm). Go dtaga do ríocht (alt. go dtagaidh do ríocht). Go ndéantar do thoil ar an talamh (alt. ar an dtalamh), mar dhéantar ar neamh. Ár n-arán laethúil tabhair dúinn inniu, agus maith dúinn ár bhfiacha (alt. ár gcionta), mar mhaithimid dár bhféichiúna féin (alt. mar a mhaithimíd dóibh a chiontaíonn inár n-aghaidh). Agus ná lig sinn i gcathú (alt. i gcathaíbh), ach saor sinn ó olc (alt. ón olc). Óir is leatsa an Ríocht agus an Chumhacht agus an Ghlóir, trí shaol na saol (alt. le saol na saol / go síoraí). Amen (alt. Áiméan). The Prayer in Scottish Gaelic Ar n-Athair a tha air nèamh, Gu naomhaichear d' ainm. Thigeadh do rìoghachd. Dèanar do thoil air an talamh, mar a nithear air nèamh. Tabhair dhuinn an-diugh ar n-aran làitheil. Agus maith dhuinn ar fiachan, amhail a mhaitheas sinne dar luchd-fiach. Agus na leig ann am buaireadh sinn; ach saor sinn o olc: oir is leatsa an rìoghachd, agus a' chumhachd, agus a' ghlòir, gu sìorraidh. Amen. Spelling to sound correspondences Vowels Consonants Phonology Consonants The consonant phonemes of Manx are as follows: The voiceless plosives are pronounced with aspiration. The dental, postalveolar and palato-velar plosives are affricated to in many contexts. Manx has an optional process of lenition of plosives between vowels, whereby voiced plosives and voiceless fricatives become voiced fricatives and voiceless plosives become either voiced plosives or voiced fricatives. This process introduces the allophones to the series of voiced fricatives in Manx. The voiced fricative may be further lenited to , and may disappear altogether. Examples include: Voiceless plosive to voiced plosive > : "flag, rag" > : "sin" Voiceless plosive to voiced fricative > : "cup" > : "boat" > : "tooth" Voiced plosive to voiced fricative > : "horse" > : "face" > : "prayer" > > : "stick" > : "born" Voiceless fricative to voiced fricative > or : "married" > : "stand" > : "easy" > > : "beginning" > : "live" > > ∅: "past" Another optional process of Manx phonology is pre-occlusion, the insertion of a very short plosive consonant before a sonorant consonant. In Manx, this applies to stressed monosyllabic words (i.e. words one syllable long). The inserted consonant is homorganic with the following sonorant, which means it has the same place of articulation. Long vowels are often shortened before pre-occluded sounds. Examples include: > : > "heavy" > : > "head" > : > "birds" > : > "ship" > : > "walking" The trill is realised as a one- or two-contact flap at the beginning of syllable, and as a stronger trill when preceded by another consonant in the same syllable. At the end of a syllable, can be pronounced either as a strong trill or, more frequently, as a weak fricative , which may vocalise to a nonsyllabic or disappear altogether. This vocalisation may be due to the influence of Manx English, which is itself a non-rhotic accent. Examples of the pronunciation of include: "snare" "bread" "big" Vowels The vowel phonemes of Manx are as follows: The status of and as separate phonemes is debatable, but is suggested by the allophony of certain words such as "is", "women", and so on. An alternative analysis is that Manx has the following system, where the vowels and have allophones ranging from through to . As with Irish and Scottish Gaelic, there is a large amount of vowel allophony, such as that of . This depends mainly on the 'broad' and 'slender' status of the neighbouring consonants: When stressed, is realised as . Manx has a relatively large number of diphthongs, all of them falling: Stress Stress generally falls on the first syllable of a word in Manx, but in many cases, stress is attracted to a long vowel in the second syllable. Examples include: "sprite" "busy" "royal" "advantage" Morphology Initial consonant mutations Like all modern Celtic languages, Manx shows initial consonant mutations, which are processes by which the initial consonant of a word is altered according to its morphological and/or syntactic environment. Manx has two mutations: lenition and eclipsis, found on nouns and verbs in a variety of environments; adjectives can undergo lenition but not eclipsis. In the late spoken language of the 20th century the system was breaking down, with speakers frequently failing to use mutation in environments where it was called for, and occasionally using it in environments where it was not called for. In the corpus of the late spoken language, there is also one example of the eclipsis (nasalisation) of : the sentence ("I have found the lamb"), where ng is pronounced . However, probably this was a mis-transcription; the verbal noun in this case is not "get, fetch", but rather "find". Nouns Manx nouns display gender, number and sometimes case, for instance, for feminine "foot". Pronouns In addition to regular forms, personal pronouns also have emphatic versions. Verbs Manx verbs generally form their finite forms by means of periphrasis: inflected forms of the auxiliary verbs "to be" or "to do" are combined with the verbal noun of the main verb. Only the future, conditional, preterite, and imperative can be formed directly by inflecting the main verb, but even in these tenses, the periphrastic formation is more common in Late Spoken Manx. The fully inflected forms of the regular verb "to throw" are as follows. In addition to the forms below, a past participle may be formed using : "thrown". 1.^ First person singular, making the use of a following subject pronoun redundant 2.^ First person plural, making the use of a following subject pronoun redundant 3.^ Used with all other persons, meaning an accompanying subject must be stated, e.g. "he will throw", "they will throw" There are a few peculiarities when a verb begins with a vowel, i.e. the addition of in the preterite and in the future and conditional dependent. Below is the conjugation of "to grow". There is a small number of irregular verbs, the most irregular of all being "be". Prepositions Like the other Insular Celtic languages, Manx has so-called inflected prepositions, contractions of a preposition with a pronominal direct object, as the following common prepositions show. Note the sometimes identical form of the uninflected preposition and its third person singular masculine inflected form. form of the uninflected preposition and its third person singular masculine inflected form. Numbers Number are traditionally vigesimal in Manx, e.g. "twenty", "forty" ("two twenties"), "sixty" ("three twenties"). Syntax Like most Insular Celtic languages, Manx uses verb–subject–object word order: the inflected verb of a sentence precedes the subject, which itself precedes the direct object. However, as noted above, most finite verbs are formed periphrastically, using an auxiliary verb in conjunction with the verbal noun. In this case, only the auxiliary verb precedes the subject, while the verbal noun comes after the subject. The auxiliary verb may be a modal verb rather than a form of ("be") or ("do"). Particles like the negative ("not") precede the inflected verb. Examples: When the auxiliary verb is a form of ("do"), the direct object precedes the verbal noun and is connected to it with the particle : As in Irish (cf. Irish syntax#The forms meaning "to be"), there are two ways of expressing "to be" in Manx: with the substantive verb , and with the copula. The substantive verb is used when the predicate is an adjective, adverb, or prepositional phrase. Examples: Where the predicate is a noun, it must be converted to a prepositional phrase headed by the preposition ("in") + possessive pronoun (agreeing with the subject) in order for the substantive verb to be grammatical: Otherwise, the copula is used when the predicate is a noun. The copula itself takes the form or in the present tense, but it is often omitted in affirmative statements: In questions and negative sentences, the present tense of the copula is : Vocabulary Manx vocabulary is predominantly of Goidelic origin, derived from Old Irish and closely related to words in Irish and Scottish Gaelic. However, Manx itself, as well as the languages from which it is derived, borrowed words from other languages as well, especially Latin, Old Norse, French (particularly Anglo-Norman), and English (both Middle English and Modern English). The following table shows a selection of nouns from the Swadesh list and indicates their pronunciations and etymologies. See Celtic Swadesh lists for the complete list in all the Celtic languages. Loanwords Foreign loanwords are primarily Norse and English, with a smaller number coming from French. Some examples of Norse loanwords are garey ("garden", from garðr, "enclosure") and sker meaning a sea rock (from sker, compare with skjær and sker). Examples of French loanwords are danjeyr ("danger", from danger) and vondeish ("advantage", from avantage). English loanwords were common in late (pre-revival) Manx, e.g. boy ("boy"), badjer ("badger"), rather than the more usual Gaelic guilley and brock. Henry Jenner, on asking someone what he was doing, was told Ta mee smokal pipe ("I am smoking a pipe"), and that "[he] certainly considered that he was talking Manx, and not English, in saying it." In more recent years, there has been a reaction against such borrowing, resulting in coinages for technical vocabulary. Despite this, calques exist in Manx, not necessarily obvious to its speakers. Some religious terms come ultimately from Latin, Greek and Hebrew, e.g. casherick (holy), from the Latin consecrātus; mooinjer (people) from the Latin monasterium (originally a monastery; agglish (church) from the Greek ἐκκλησία (ekklesia, literally meaning assembly) and abb (abbot) from the Hebrew "אבא" (abba, meaning "father"). These did not necessarily come directly into Manx, but via Old Irish. In more recent times, ulpan has been borrowed from modern Hebrew. Many Irish and English loanwords also have a classical origin, e.g. çhellveeish (Irish teilefís) and çhellvane meaning television and telephone respectively. Foreign language words (usually known via English) are used occasionally especially for ethnic food, e.g. chorizo, spaghetti. To fill gaps in recorded Manx vocabulary, revivalists have referred to modern Irish and Scottish Gaelic for words and inspiration. Going in the other direction, Manx Gaelic has influenced Manx English (Anglo-Manx). Common words and phrases in Anglo-Manx originating in the language include tholtan (the "th" is pronounced as a "t") meaning a ruined farmhouse, quaaltagh meaning a first-foot, keeill meaning a church (especially an old one), cammag, traa-dy-liooar meaning "time enough", and Tynwald (tinvaal), which is ultimately of Norse origin, but comes via Manx. It is suggested that the House of Keys takes its name from Kiare as Feed (four and twenty), which is the number of its sitting members. Comparative vocabulary examples See also Cornish, another revived Celtic language. Irish language revival List of Celtic-language media List of revived languages List of television channels in Celtic languages Notes References External links Percentage of resident population with a knowledge of Manx Gaelic A bit of Manx Gaelic history Manx language, alphabet and pronunciation at Omniglot Information about the language isle-of-man.com language section Manx dictionaries via Multidict Online Manx Lessons with MP3 recordings Bilingual Bible in Manx and English by the Manx Language Project Manx: Bringing a language back from the dead Media article about the Manx revival Manx free online course Languages of the United Kingdom Goidelic languages Languages of Europe Endangered Celtic languages Language Verb–subject–object languages Language revival Articles containing video clips

20144

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcomanni

Marcomanni

The Marcomanni were a Germanic people that established a powerful kingdom north of the Danube, somewhere near modern Bohemia, during the peak of power of the nearby Roman Empire. According to Tacitus and Strabo, they were Suebian. Origin It is believed their name may derive from the Proto-Germanic forms of the word "march" (meaning "frontier, border", as in the Welsh marches and the kingdom of Mercia) and the word "men", *Markōmanniz, which would have been rendered in Latinised form as Marcomanni. The Marcomanni first appear in historical records as confederates of the Suebi of Ariovistus fighting against Julius Caesar in Gaul (now France) after they had crossed the Rhine from what is now southern Germany. The exact position of their lands at the time is not known. The fact that their name existed before the Romans had territory near the Danube or Rhine raises the question of which border they lived near to explain their name. Their name may echo an earlier demarcation between the northern Germanic tribes of the Jastorf cultural circle and those of the maximum expansion of the Celts during the earlier and later Iron Age of La Tène dominance throughout Europe. Findings in the archaeological record show that they had pressed north with some influence as far as into Jutland, but they mostly remained separated in the south and settled in oppida over what is now Thuringia and Saxony along the Hercynian Forest, intrinsically connected to the major trade roads that went into the more evolved centres of Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia, which were then all still Celtic regions. It has been suggested that they may have lived near the confluence of Rhine and the Main Rivers in areas that had been inhabited but left deserted by the Helvetii and Taurisci. However, the historian Florus reports that Drusus erected a mound of their spoils during his campaign of 12–9 BC after he had defeated the Tencteri and Chatti, and before next turning to Cherusci, Suevi, and Sicambri. That suggests that they were not close to any obvious border at the time. According to the accounts of Tacitus (Germ. 42), Paterculus (2.108), Pliny the Elder, and Strabo (vii. p. 290) they eventually moved into the large area that had been occupied by the Boii, specifically in a region already called Baiohaemum, where their allies and fellow Suevi lived, the Quadi. It was described as being within the Hercynian Forest and was possibly in the region of modern Bohemia, but that is not certain. By 6 BC, their king, Maroboduus, had established a powerful kingdom there that Augustus perceived as a threat to the Roman Empire. Before he could act, however, the revolt in Illyria intervened. Eventually, Maroboduus was deposed and exiled by Catualda (AD 19). Catualda was, in turn, deposed by Vibilius of the Hermunduri that year and succeeded by the Quadian Vannius. Around 50 AD, Vannius was himself also deposed by Vibilius, in co-ordination with his nephews Vangio and Sido. In the late first century, Tacitus mentions (Germania I.42) the Marcomanni as being under kings appointed by Rome. Marcomannic Wars In the second century AD, the Marcomanni entered into a confederation with other peoples, including the Quadi, Vandals, and Sarmatians, against the Roman Empire. It was probably driven by movements of larger tribes, like the Goths. According to the historian Eutropius, the forces of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius battled against the Marcomannic confederation for three years at the fortress of Carnuntum, in Pannonia. Eutropius compared the war and Aurelius's success against the Marcomanni and their allies to the Punic Wars. The comparison was apt in that the war marked a turning point, had significant Roman defeats, and caused the death of two Praetorian Guard commanders. The war began in 166, when the Marcomanni overwhelmed the defences between Vindobona and Carnuntum, penetrated along the border between the provinces of Pannonia and Noricum, laid waste to Flavia Solva, and could be stopped only shortly before Aquileia, on the Adriatic Sea. The war lasted until Aurelius's death in 180. It would prove to be only a limited success for Rome since the Danube River remained the frontier of the empire until the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Later history The Christianisation of the Marcomanni, at least into a Roman orthodox form of Christianity, seems to have occurred under their queen, Fritigil, the wife of an unnamed king, in the mid-4th century. She corresponded with Ambrose of Milan to bring about the conversion. That was the last clear evidence of the Marcomanni having a polity, which was possibly now on the Roman side of the Danube. Soon afterward, the Pannonian and Danubian area went into a long period of turmoil. After crossing the Rhine in 406 and the Pyrenees in 409, a group of Suevi that had migrated with Vandals and Alans, established itself in the Roman province of Gallaecia (modern Galicia and northern Portugal), where it was considered foederati and founded the Suebi kingdom of Gallaecia. The Suevi were probably a mix of Suevian groups from the area north of Danube and Pannonian basin such as the Marcomanni, Quadi and Buri. There, Hermeric swore fealty to the emperor in 410. Bracara Augusta, the modern city of Braga in Portugal, had been the capital of Roman Gallaecia and now became the capital of the Suebic Kingdom. The Danubian area, meanwhile, became the core of Attila the Hunnic Empire, and within it seem to have been many Suebians. One group of them managed to reform into an independent group after the Battle of Nedao in 454, like many other groups that emerged from Attila's confederation. Those Suevi eventually came into conflict with the Ostrogoths, who had lost at Nadao. Jordanes, the historian of the Goths, reported (Getica 280) that after the Battle of Bolia, the Ostrogoths attacked the Suevi (ruled by a man named Hunimund, who also seemingly led an attack on Passau) by crossing the Danube when it was frozen and going into a high Alpine area held by the confederates of the Suevi at the time, the Alamanni. (He said that several streams start in the area and enter the Danube.) The region held by those Suevi was described as having Bavarians to the east, Franks to the west, Burgundians to the south, and Thuringians to the north. The text seems to indicate that the Suevi had moved into the Alamannic area but that Suevi were seen as distinct from both Alamanni and Bavarians. Thay was also the first mention of Bavarians, who are also often proposed to have had Marcomanni in their ancestry. According to historians such as Herwig Wolfram: The Marcomanni and the Quadi gave up their special names after crossing the Danube, in fact both the emigrants and the groups remaining in Pannonia became Suebi again. The Pannonian Suebi became subjects of the Huns. After the battle at the Nadao they set up their kingdom, and when it fell, they came, successively under Herulian and Longobard rule, south of the Danube under Gothic rule, and eventually again under Longobard rule. There is a runic alphabet called the Marcomannic runes, but they are not believed to be related to the Marcomanni. Kings Maroboduus, c. 9 BC – 18 AD Catualda, 18 – 20 Vannius, 20 – c. 50 Vangio and Sido, c. 50 – ? Ballomar, c. 166? – 172 or 178? Attalus, c. 260/2 Fritigil, mid-4th century, queen See also History of Portugal History of Spain Irminones List of ancient Germanic peoples Migrations period Timeline of Germanic kingdoms References Classical sources Caesar De Bello Gallico, at The Latin Library Tacitus Germania, at The Latin Library Tacitus Annales, at The Latin Library External links Early Germanic peoples Suebi

20145

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maroboduus

Maroboduus

Maroboduus (d. AD 37) was a king of the Marcomanni, who were a Germanic Suebian people. He spent part of his youth in Rome, and returning, found his people under pressure from invasions by the Roman empire between the Rhine and Elbe. He led them into the forests of Bohemia, near to the Quadi who already lived nearby, and established a large alliance. Name The name "Maroboduus" can be broken down into two Celtic elements, māro- meaning "great" (cf. Welsh mawr, Irish mór), and bodwos meaning "raven" (cf. Irish badhbh).;; Biography Maroboduus was born into a noble family of the Marcomanni. As a young man, he lived in Italy and enjoyed the favour of the Emperor Augustus. The Marcomanni had been beaten utterly by the Romans in 10 BC. About 9 BC, Maroboduus returned to Germania and became ruler of his people. To deal with the threat of Roman expansion into the Rhine-Danube basin, he led the Marcomanni to the area later known as Bohemia to be outside the range of the Roman influence. There, he took the title of king and organized a confederation of several neighboring Germanic tribes. He was the first documented ruler of Bohemia with a government. Augustus planned in 6 AD to destroy the kingdom of Maroboduus, which he considered to be too dangerous for the Romans. The future emperor Tiberius commanded 12 legions to attack the Marcomanni, but the outbreak of a revolt in Illyria, and the need for troops there, forced Tiberius to conclude a treaty with Maroboduus and to recognize him as king. War with Arminius and death His rivalry with Arminius, the Cheruscan leader who inflicted the devastating defeat at the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest on the Romans under Publius Quinctilius Varus in 9 AD, prevented a concerted attack on Roman territory across the Rhine in the north (by Arminius) and in the Danube basin in the south (by Maroboduus). However, according to the first-century AD historian Marcus Velleius Paterculus, Arminius sent Varus's head to Maroboduus, but the king of the Marcomanni sent it to Augustus. In the revenge war of Tiberius and Germanicus against the Cherusci, Maroboduus stayed neutral. In 17 AD, war broke out between Arminius and Maroboduus, and after an indecisive battle, Maroboduus withdrew into the hilly forests of Bohemia, in 18 AD. In the next year, Catualda, a young Marcomannic nobleman living in exile among the Gutones, returned, perhaps by a subversive Roman intervention, and defeated Maroboduus. The deposed king had to flee to Italy, and Tiberius detained him 18 years in Ravenna. There, Maroboduus died in 37 AD. Catualda was, in turn, defeated by the Hermunduri Vibilius, after which the realm was ruled by the Quadian Vannius. Vannius was himself also deposed by Vibilius, in coordination with his nephews Vangio and Sido, who then ruled as Roman client kings. References Further reading Peter Kehne: Marbod. In: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde, vol. 19 (2001), p. 258-262. Tacitus, Annals, Book 1 & Book 2. External links Gaulish English Dictionary 37 deaths Germanic warriors Marcomannic rulers 1st-century BC births

20146

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muon

Muon

The muon (; from the Greek letter mu (μ) used to represent it) is an elementary particle similar to the electron, with an electric charge of −1 e and a spin of 1/2, but with a much greater mass. It is classified as a lepton. As with other leptons, the muon is not known to have any sub-structure – that is, it is not thought to be composed of any simpler particles. The muon is an unstable subatomic particle with a mean lifetime of , much longer than many other subatomic particles. As with the decay of the non-elementary neutron (with a lifetime around 15 minutes), muon decay is slow (by subatomic standards) because the decay is mediated only by the weak interaction (rather than the more powerful strong interaction or electromagnetic interaction), and because the mass difference between the muon and the set of its decay products is small, providing few kinetic degrees of freedom for decay. Muon decay almost always produces at least three particles, which must include an electron of the same charge as the muon and two types of neutrinos. Like all elementary particles, the muon has a corresponding antiparticle of opposite charge (+1 e) but equal mass and spin: the antimuon (also called a positive muon). Muons are denoted by and antimuons by . Formerly, muons were called "mu mesons, but are not classified as mesons by modern particle physicists (see ), and that name is no longer used by the physics community. Muons have a mass of , which is approximately 207 times that of the electron, m. More precisely, it is . Due to their greater mass, muons accelerate more slowly than electrons in electromagnetic fields, and emit less bremsstrahlung (deceleration radiation). This allows muons of a given energy to penetrate far deeper into matter because the deceleration of electrons and muons is primarily due to energy loss by the bremsstrahlung mechanism. For example, so-called "secondary muons", created by cosmic rays hitting the atmosphere, can penetrate the atmosphere and reach Earth's land surface and even into deep mines. Because muons have a greater mass and energy than the decay energy of radioactivity, they are not produced by radioactive decay. However they are produced in great amounts in high-energy interactions in normal matter, in certain particle accelerator experiments with hadrons, and in cosmic ray interactions with matter. These interactions usually produce pi mesons initially, which almost always decay to muons. As with the other charged leptons, the muon has an associated muon neutrino, denoted by , which differs from the electron neutrino and participates in different nuclear reactions. History Muons were discovered by Carl D. Anderson and Seth Neddermeyer at Caltech in 1936, while studying cosmic radiation. Anderson noticed particles that curved differently from electrons and other known particles when passed through a magnetic field. They were negatively charged but curved less sharply than electrons, but more sharply than protons, for particles of the same velocity. It was assumed that the magnitude of their negative electric charge was equal to that of the electron, and so to account for the difference in curvature, it was supposed that their mass was greater than an electron but smaller than a proton. Thus Anderson initially called the new particle a mesotron, adopting the prefix meso- from the Greek word for "mid-". The existence of the muon was confirmed in 1937 by J. C. Street and E. C. Stevenson's cloud chamber experiment. A particle with a mass in the meson range had been predicted before the discovery of any mesons, by theorist Hideki Yukawa: It seems natural to modify the theory of Heisenberg and Fermi in the following way. The transition of a heavy particle from neutron state to proton state is not always accompanied by the emission of light particles. The transition is sometimes taken up by another heavy particle. Because of its mass, the mu meson was initially thought to be Yukawa's particle and some scientists, including Niels Bohr, originally named it the yukon. Yukawa's predicted particle, the pi meson, was finally identified in 1947 (again from cosmic ray interactions), and was shown to differ from the mu meson by having the properties of a particle that mediated the nuclear force. With two particles now known with the intermediate mass, the more general term meson was adopted to refer to any such particle within the correct mass range between electrons and nucleons. Further, in order to differentiate between the two different types of mesons after the second meson was discovered, the initial mesotron particle was renamed the mu meson (the Greek letter μ [mu] corresponds to m), and the new 1947 meson (Yukawa's particle) was named the pi meson. As more types of mesons were discovered in accelerator experiments later, it was eventually found that the mu meson significantly differed not only from the pi meson (of about the same mass), but also from all other types of mesons. The difference, in part, was that mu mesons did not interact with the nuclear force, as pi mesons did (and were required to do, in Yukawa's theory). Newer mesons also showed evidence of behaving like the pi meson in nuclear interactions, but not like the mu meson. Also, the mu meson's decay products included both a neutrino and an antineutrino, rather than just one or the other, as was observed in the decay of other charged mesons. In the eventual Standard Model of particle physics codified in the 1970s, all mesons other than the mu meson were understood to be hadrons – that is, particles made of quarks – and thus subject to the nuclear force. In the quark model, a meson was no longer defined by mass (for some had been discovered that were very massive – more than nucleons), but instead were particles composed of exactly two quarks (a quark and antiquark), unlike the baryons, which are defined as particles composed of three quarks (protons and neutrons were the lightest baryons). Mu mesons, however, had shown themselves to be fundamental particles (leptons) like electrons, with no quark structure. Thus, mu "mesons" were not mesons at all, in the new sense and use of the term meson used with the quark model of particle structure. With this change in definition, the term mu meson was abandoned, and replaced whenever possible with the modern term muon, making the term "mu meson" only a historical footnote. In the new quark model, other types of mesons sometimes continued to be referred to in shorter terminology (e.g., pion for pi meson), but in the case of the muon, it retained the shorter name and was never again properly referred to by older "mu meson" terminology. The eventual recognition of the muon as a simple "heavy electron", with no role at all in the nuclear interaction, seemed so incongruous and surprising at the time, that Nobel laureate I. I. Rabi famously quipped, "Who ordered that?" In the Rossi–Hall experiment (1941), muons were used to observe the time dilation (or, alternatively, length contraction) predicted by special relativity, for the first time. Muon sources Muons arriving on the Earth's surface are created indirectly as decay products of collisions of cosmic rays with particles of the Earth's atmosphere. When a cosmic ray proton impacts atomic nuclei in the upper atmosphere, pions are created. These decay within a relatively short distance (meters) into muons (their preferred decay product), and muon neutrinos. The muons from these high-energy cosmic rays generally continue in about the same direction as the original proton, at a velocity near the speed of light. Although their lifetime without relativistic effects would allow a half-survival distance of only about 456 meters at most (as seen from Earth) the time dilation effect of special relativity (from the viewpoint of the Earth) allows cosmic ray secondary muons to survive the flight to the Earth's surface, since in the Earth frame the muons have a longer half-life due to their velocity. From the viewpoint (inertial frame) of the muon, on the other hand, it is the length contraction effect of special relativity which allows this penetration, since in the muon frame its lifetime is unaffected, but the length contraction causes distances through the atmosphere and Earth to be far shorter than these distances in the Earth rest-frame. Both effects are equally valid ways of explaining the fast muon's unusual survival over distances. Since muons are unusually penetrative of ordinary matter, like neutrinos, they are also detectable deep underground (700 meters at the Soudan 2 detector) and underwater, where they form a major part of the natural background ionizing radiation. Like cosmic rays, as noted, this secondary muon radiation is also directional. The same nuclear reaction described above (i.e. hadron-hadron impacts to produce pion beams, which then quickly decay to muon beams over short distances) is used by particle physicists to produce muon beams, such as the beam used for the muon g−2 experiment. Muon decay Muons are unstable elementary particles and are heavier than electrons and neutrinos but lighter than all other matter particles. They decay via the weak interaction. Because leptonic family numbers are conserved in the absence of an extremely unlikely immediate neutrino oscillation, one of the product neutrinos of muon decay must be a muon-type neutrino and the other an electron-type antineutrino (antimuon decay produces the corresponding antiparticles, as detailed below). Because charge must be conserved, one of the products of muon decay is always an electron of the same charge as the muon (a positron if it is a positive muon). Thus all muons decay to at least an electron, and two neutrinos. Sometimes, besides these necessary products, additional other particles that have no net charge and spin of zero (e.g., a pair of photons, or an electron-positron pair), are produced. The dominant muon decay mode (sometimes called the Michel decay after Louis Michel) is the simplest possible: the muon decays to an electron, an electron antineutrino, and a muon neutrino. Antimuons, in mirror fashion, most often decay to the corresponding antiparticles: a positron, an electron neutrino, and a muon antineutrino. In formulaic terms, these two decays are: → + → + The mean lifetime, , of the (positive) muon is . The equality of the muon and antimuon lifetimes has been established to better than one part in 104. Prohibited decays Certain neutrino-less decay modes are kinematically allowed but are, for all practical purposes, forbidden in the Standard Model, even given that neutrinos have mass and oscillate. Examples forbidden by lepton flavour conservation are: → + and → + + . To be precise: in the Standard Model with neutrino mass, a decay like → + is technically possible, for example by neutrino oscillation of a virtual muon neutrino into an electron neutrino, but such a decay is astronomically unlikely and therefore should be experimentally unobservable: Less than one in 1050 muon decays should produce such a decay. Observation of such decay modes would constitute clear evidence for theories beyond the Standard Model. Upper limits for the branching fractions of such decay modes were measured in many experiments starting more than years ago. The current upper limit for the → + branching fraction was measured 2009–2013 in the MEG experiment and is . Theoretical decay rate The muon decay width which follows from Fermi's golden rule has dimension of energy, and must be proportional to the square of the amplitude, and thus the square of Fermi's coupling constant (), with over-all dimension of inverse fourth power of energy. By dimensional analysis, this leads to Sargent's rule of fifth-power dependence on , where , and: is the fraction of the maximum energy transmitted to the electron. The decay distributions of the electron in muon decays have been parameterised using the so-called Michel parameters. The values of these four parameters are predicted unambiguously in the Standard Model of particle physics, thus muon decays represent a good test of the spacetime structure of the weak interaction. No deviation from the Standard Model predictions has yet been found. For the decay of the muon, the expected decay distribution for the Standard Model values of Michel parameters is where is the angle between the muon's polarization vector and the decay-electron momentum vector, and is the fraction of muons that are forward-polarized. Integrating this expression over electron energy gives the angular distribution of the daughter electrons: The electron energy distribution integrated over the polar angle (valid for ) is Because the direction the electron is emitted in (a polar vector) is preferentially aligned opposite the muon spin (an axial vector), the decay is an example of non-conservation of parity by the weak interaction. This is essentially the same experimental signature as used by the original demonstration. More generally in the Standard Model, all charged leptons decay via the weak interaction and likewise violate parity symmetry. Muonic atoms The muon was the first elementary particle discovered that does not appear in ordinary atoms. Negative muon atoms Negative muons can, however, form muonic atoms (previously called mu-mesic atoms), by replacing an electron in ordinary atoms. Muonic hydrogen atoms are much smaller than typical hydrogen atoms because the much larger mass of the muon gives it a much more localized ground-state wavefunction than is observed for the electron. In multi-electron atoms, when only one of the electrons is replaced by a muon, the size of the atom continues to be determined by the other electrons, and the atomic size is nearly unchanged. However, in such cases the orbital of the muon continues to be smaller and far closer to the nucleus than the atomic orbitals of the electrons. Muonic helium is created by substituting a muon for one of the electrons in helium-4. The muon orbits much closer to the nucleus, so muonic helium can therefore be regarded like an isotope of helium whose nucleus consists of two neutrons, two protons and a muon, with a single electron outside. Colloquially, it could be called "helium 4.1", since the mass of the muon is slightly greater than 0.1 amu. Chemically, muonic helium, possessing an unpaired valence electron, can bond with other atoms, and behaves more like a hydrogen atom than an inert helium atom. Muonic heavy hydrogen atoms with a negative muon may undergo nuclear fusion in the process of muon-catalyzed fusion, after the muon may leave the new atom to induce fusion in another hydrogen molecule. This process continues until the negative muon is captured by a helium nucleus, and cannot escape until it decays. Negative muons bound to conventional atoms can be captured (muon capture) through the weak force by protons in nuclei, in a sort of electron-capture-like process. When this happens, nuclear transmutation results: The proton becomes a neutron and a muon neutrino is emitted. Positive muon atoms A positive muon, when stopped in ordinary matter, cannot be captured by a proton since the two positive charges can only repel. The positive muon is also not attracted to the nucleus of atoms. Instead, it binds a random electron and with this electron forms an exotic atom known as muonium (mu) atom. In this atom, the muon acts as the nucleus. The positive muon, in this context, can be considered a pseudo-isotope of hydrogen with one ninth of the mass of the proton. Because the mass of the electron is much smaller than the mass of both the proton and the muon, the reduced mass of muonium, and hence its Bohr radius, is very close to that of hydrogen. Therefore this bound muon-electron pair can be treated to a first approximation as a short-lived "atom" that behaves chemically like the isotopes of hydrogen (protium, deuterium and tritium). Both positive and negative muons can be part of a short-lived pi-mu atom consisting of a muon and an oppositely charged pion. These atoms were observed in the 1970s in experiments at Brookhaven and Fermilab. Use in measurement of the proton charge radius The experimental technique that is expected to provide the most precise determination of the root-mean-square charge radius of the proton is the measurement of the frequency of photons (precise "color" of light) emitted or absorbed by atomic transitions in muonic hydrogen. This form of hydrogen atom is composed of a negatively charged muon bound to a proton. The muon is particularly well suited for this purpose because its much larger mass results in a much more compact bound state and hence a larger probability for it to be found inside the proton in muonic hydrogen compared to the electron in atomic hydrogen. The Lamb shift in muonic hydrogen was measured by driving the muon from a 2s state up to an excited 2p state using a laser. The frequency of the photons required to induce two such (slightly different) transitions were reported in 2014 to be 50 and 55 THz which, according to present theories of quantum electrodynamics (QED), yield an appropriately averaged value of for the charge radius of the proton. The internationally accepted value of the proton's charge radius is based on a suitable average of results from older measurements of effects caused by the nonzero size of the proton on scattering of electrons by nuclei and the light spectrum (photon energies) from excited atomic hydrogen. The official value updated in 2014 is (see orders of magnitude for comparison to other sizes). The expected precision of this result is inferior to that from muonic hydrogen by about a factor of fifteen, yet they disagree by about 5.6 times the nominal uncertainty in the difference (a discrepancy called 5.6  in scientific notation). A conference of the world experts on this topic led to the decision to exclude the muon result from influencing the official 2014 value, in order to avoid hiding the mysterious discrepancy. This "proton radius puzzle" remained unresolved as of late 2015, and has attracted much attention, in part because of the possibility that both measurements are valid, which would imply the influence of some "new physics". Anomalous magnetic dipole moment The anomalous magnetic dipole moment is the difference between the experimentally observed value of the magnetic dipole moment and the theoretical value predicted by the Dirac equation. The measurement and prediction of this value is very important in the precision tests of QED. The E821 experiment at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) and the Muon g-2 experiment at Fermilab studied the precession of the muon spin in a constant external magnetic field as the muons circulated in a confining storage ring. The Muon g-2 collaboration reported in 2021: . The prediction for the value of the muon anomalous magnetic moment includes three parts: μSM = μQED + μEW + μhad. The difference between the g-factors of the muon and the electron is due to their difference in mass. Because of the muon's larger mass, contributions to the theoretical calculation of its anomalous magnetic dipole moment from Standard Model weak interactions and from contributions involving hadrons are important at the current level of precision, whereas these effects are not important for the electron. The muon's anomalous magnetic dipole moment is also sensitive to contributions from new physics beyond the Standard Model, such as supersymmetry. For this reason, the muon's anomalous magnetic moment is normally used as a probe for new physics beyond the Standard Model rather than as a test of QED. Muon g−2, a new experiment at Fermilab using the E821 magnet improved the precision of this measurement. In 2020 an international team of 170 physicists calculated the most accurate prediction for the theoretical value of the muon's anomalous magnetic moment. In 2021, the Fermilab National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL) Muon g−2 Experiment presented their first results of a new experimental average which increased the difference between experiment and theory to 4.2 standard deviations. Electric dipole moment The current experimental limit on the muon electric dipole moment, |dμ| < 1.9 × 10−19 e·cm set by the E821 experiment at the Brookhaven Laboratory, is orders of magnitude above the Standard Model prediction. The observation of a non-zero muon electric dipole moment would provide an additional source of CP violation. An improvement in sensitivity by two orders of magnitude over the Brookhaven limit is expected from the experiments at Fermilab. Muon radiography and tomography Since muons are much more deeply penetrating than X-rays or gamma rays, muon imaging can be used with much thicker material or, with cosmic ray sources, larger objects. One example is commercial muon tomography used to image entire cargo containers to detect shielded nuclear material, as well as explosives or other contraband. The technique of muon transmission radiography based on cosmic ray sources was first used in the 1950s to measure the depth of the overburden of a tunnel in Australia and in the 1960s to search for possible hidden chambers in the Pyramid of Chephren in Giza. In 2017, the discovery of a large void (with a length of 30 metres minimum) by observation of cosmic-ray muons was reported. In 2003, the scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory developed a new imaging technique: muon scattering tomography. With muon scattering tomography, both incoming and outgoing trajectories for each particle are reconstructed, such as with sealed aluminum drift tubes. Since the development of this technique, several companies have started to use it. In August 2014, Decision Sciences International Corporation announced it had been awarded a contract by Toshiba for use of its muon tracking detectors in reclaiming the Fukushima nuclear complex. The Fukushima Daiichi Tracker (FDT) was proposed to make a few months of muon measurements to show the distribution of the reactor cores. In December 2014, Tepco reported that they would be using two different muon imaging techniques at Fukushima, "muon scanning method" on Unit 1 (the most badly damaged, where the fuel may have left the reactor vessel) and "muon scattering method" on Unit 2. The International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning IRID in Japan and the High Energy Accelerator Research Organization KEK call the method they developed for Unit 1 the "muon permeation method"; 1,200 optical fibers for wavelength conversion light up when muons come into contact with them. After a month of data collection, it is hoped to reveal the location and amount of fuel debris still inside the reactor. The measurements began in February 2015. See also Muonic atoms Muon spin spectroscopy Muon-catalyzed fusion Muon tomography Comet (experiment), searching for the elusive coherent neutrino-less conversion of a muon to an electron in J-PARC Mu2e, an experiment to detect neutrinoless conversion of muons to electrons List of particles References Further reading External links Leptons

20149

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike%20Muuss

Mike Muuss

Michael John Muuss (October 16, 1958 – November 20, 2000) was the American author of the freeware network tool ping. Career A graduate of Johns Hopkins University, Muuss was a senior scientist specializing in geometric solid modeling, ray-tracing, MIMD architectures and digital computer networks at the United States Army Research Laboratory at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland when he died. He wrote a number of software packages (including BRL-CAD) and network tools (including ttcp and the concept of the default route or "default gateway") and contributed to many others (including BIND). However, the thousand-line ping, which he wrote in December 1983 while working at the Ballistic Research Laboratory, is the program for which he is most remembered. Due to its usefulness, ping has been implemented on a large number of operating systems, initially Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) and Unix, but later others including Windows and Mac OS X. In 1993, the USENIX Association gave a Lifetime Achievement Award (Flame) to the Computer Systems Research Group at University of California, Berkeley, honoring 180 individuals, including Muuss, who contributed to the CSRG's 4.4BSD-Lite release. Muuss is mentioned in two books, The Cuckoo's Egg () and Cyberpunk: Outlaws and Hackers on the Computer Frontier (), for his role in tracking down crackers. He also is mentioned in Peter Salus's A Quarter Century of UNIX. Muuss died in an automobile collision on Interstate 95 on November 20, 2000. The Michael J. Muuss Research Award, set up by friends and family of Muuss, memorializes him at Johns Hopkins University. See also Heterogeneous Element Processor References External links Mike Muuss's home page The Story of the PING Program The Story of the TTCP Program ICMP As A Diagnostic Tool? An Early UseNet Post by Mike Muuss Discussing Ping's history BRL-CAD 1958 births 2000 deaths People from Iowa City, Iowa Road incident deaths in Maryland Accidental deaths in Maryland American computer programmers

20150

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maus%20%28disambiguation%29

Maus (disambiguation)

Maus is a series of Pulitzer Prize-winning books in the 'graphic novel' style, written by Art Spiegelman. Maus may also refer to: Maus, the German word for mouse Maus (band), an Icelandic rock band Maus Castle, a castle in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany MAUS mine, an Italian designed anti-personnel scatter mine Maus Frères (Maus Brothers), Swiss holding company Die Sendung mit der Maus, a children's television show from Germany Panzer VIII Maus, a German World War II super-heavy tank DarkMaus, a video game People with the name August Maus (1915–1996), German U-boat commander Codey Maus (born 1985), Canadian curler Guido Maus (born 1964), Belgian-born American art curator and collector Jacques Maus (1905–unknown), Belgian bob-sledder Jeanette Maus (1981–2021), American actress and producer John Maus (born 1980), American musician and composer John Joseph Maus (1943–2011), American singer, songwriter and guitarist, known as John Walker of The Walker Brothers John R. Maus, pilot of Northwest Airlines Flight 255 Julius Maus (1906–1934), German cyclist Marcela Maus, American immunologist Octave Maus (1856–1919), Belgian art critic, writer, and lawyer Rodger Maus (1932–2017), American art director See also Mau (disambiguation) Maws (disambiguation) Herbert De Maus Die Fledermaus (The Bat), a comic operetta in three acts by Johann Strauss II

20151

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mousse

Mousse

A mousse (; ; "foam") is a soft prepared food that incorporates air bubbles to give it a light and airy texture. It can range from light and fluffy to creamy and thick, depending on preparation techniques. A mousse may be sweet or savory. Sweet mousses are typically made with whipped egg whites, whipped cream, or both, and flavored with one or more of chocolate, coffee, caramel, puréed fruits, or various herbs and spices, such as mint or vanilla. In the case of some chocolate mousses, egg yolks are often stirred into melted chocolate to give the final product a richer mouthfeel. Mousses are also typically chilled before being served, which gives them a denser texture. Additionally, mousses are often frozen into silicone molds and unmolded to give the mousse a defined shape. Sweetened mousse is served as a dessert, or used as an airy cake filling. It is sometimes stabilized with gelatin. Savory mousses can be made from meat, fish, shellfish, foie gras, cheese, or vegetables. Hot mousses often get their light texture from the addition of beaten egg whites. History Various desserts consisting of whipped cream in pyramidal shapes with coffee, liqueurs, chocolate, fruits, and so on either in the mixture or poured on top were called crème en mousse 'cream in a foam', crème mousseuse 'foamy cream', mousse 'foam', and so on, as early as 1768. Modern mousses are a continuation of this tradition. Savoury mousse Fish mousse with brown bread and butter was a popular meal of American cuisine, and is still sometimes made as a party dip, although it's not as common as it was in the 1950s. Gallery See also Foam (culinary) Bavarian cream Fruit whip Flourless chocolate cake Mousseline sauce Parfait (food) References French desserts

20152

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milwaukee%20Brewers

Milwaukee Brewers

The Milwaukee Brewers are an American professional baseball team based in Milwaukee. They compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) Central division. The Brewers are named for the city's association with the brewing industry. Since 2001, they have played their home games at American Family Field, which has a seating capacity of 41,900. The team was founded in 1969 as the Seattle Pilots, an expansion team of the American League (AL), in Seattle, Washington. The Pilots played their home games at Sick's Stadium. After only one season, the team relocated to Milwaukee, becoming known as the Brewers and playing their home games at Milwaukee County Stadium. In 1998, the Brewers joined the National League. They are the only franchise to play in four different divisions since the advent of divisional play in Major League Baseball in 1969. They are also one of two current MLB franchises to switch leagues in the modern era (1900–present), the other being the Houston Astros. The Brewers' only World Series appearance came in , and they are one of only six current MLB teams that have never won the World Series. After winning the 1982 American League Championship Series (ALCS) against the California Angels, the Brewers faced off against the St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series, losing 4–3. In 2011, the Brewers defeated the Arizona Diamondbacks to win the 2011 National League Division Series (NLDS), 3–2, but lost in the National League Championship Series (NLCS) to the eventual World Series champion Cardinals, 4–2. In 2018, the Brewers swept the Colorado Rockies in the NLDS, 3–0, but lost the NLCS to the Los Angeles Dodgers, 4–3. From 1969 through 2021, the Brewers' overall win–loss record is 4,037–4,315 (). History Originating as an expansion team in 1969, in Seattle, Washington, as the Seattle Pilots, the club played for one season in the American League West Division before being acquired in bankruptcy court by Bud Selig, who then moved the team to Milwaukee. They would continue to play in the West Division for two more years. Before the beginning of the 1972 season the Brewers agreed to switch over to the American League East to make room for the Texas Rangers who, as the Washington Senators, had relocated from Washington, DC. Beginning in 1994, due to divisional realignment, the Brewers moved to the newly created American League Central division. In all, the Brewers were part of the American League from their creation in 1969 through the 1997 season, after which they moved to the National League Central Division. Milwaukee had previously been a National League city when its team was the Milwaukee Braves (1953–1965). It had also been an American League city, albeit briefly, when the original Milwaukee Brewers became an AL charter team in 1901 before moving to St. Louis to become the Browns the following season. Between 1902 and 1952, Milwaukee was home to the Milwaukee Brewers of the American Association (AAA) and the Milwaukee Bears of the Negro National League. Both clubs played at Borchert Field. In 1981, Milwaukee won the American League East Division in the second half of the strike-shortened season. In the playoffs, they lost the divisional series to the New York Yankees, three games to two. In 1982, Milwaukee won the American League East Division and the American League Pennant, earning their only World Series appearance to date as the Brewers. In the Series, they lost to the St. Louis Cardinals four games to three. In 2008, for the first time in the 26 years since their World Series appearance, the Brewers advanced to postseason play by winning the National League wild card. They were eliminated in the National League Division Series by the eventual World Series champion Philadelphia Phillies. On September 23, 2011, the Milwaukee Brewers clinched their first division title in 29 years. They won the National League Division Series in five games over the Arizona Diamondbacks, but lost the National League Championship Series to the eventual World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals in six games. In 2018, the Brewers clinched a spot in the post-season for the first time since 2011 with a 2–1 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals on September 26, 2018. On September 29, they tied with the Cubs for first place in the National League Central, with a record of 95–67; at the end of the day on September 30, the Cubs and Brewers were still tied. This tie was broken on October 1, when the Brewers defeated the Cubs 3–1 in the NL Central tiebreaker to improve to 96–67 and win the division by one game. They went on to defeat the Colorado Rockies 3–0 to win the NLDS, but in the following NLCS, they lost out to the Los Angeles Dodgers in 7 games. In 2019, the Brewers returned to the postseason and made an appearance in the National League Wild Card Game, where they were defeated by the eventual World Series champion Washington Nationals 4–3. In 2020, the club made the postseason for a third consecutive year, making the expanded Playoffs as the 8th seed losing both games to the eventual champion Dodgers. In 2021, Giannis Antetokounmpo became a minority owner of the Brewers. In 2021, the Brewers clinched the NL Central title with a 95-67 record. However, they lost to the eventual World Series champions Atlanta Braves in 4 games in the NLDS. Uniforms 1970–1977 The first Brewers uniforms were "hand-me-downs" from the Seattle Pilots. Because the move to Milwaukee received final approval less than a week before the start of the season, there was no time to order new uniforms. Selig had originally planned to change the Brewers' colors to navy blue and red in honor of the minor league American Association's Milwaukee Brewers (and are the colors of the Braves), but was forced to simply remove the Seattle markings from the Pilots' blue-and-gold uniforms and sew "BREWERS" on the front. However, the outline of the Pilots' logo remained visible. The uniforms had unique striping on the sleeves left over from the Pilots days. The cap was an updated version of the Milwaukee Braves cap: solid blue, with a yellow block "M" on the front. Ultimately, it was decided to keep blue and gold as the team colors, and they have remained so ever since (even though the team darkened the shades of both colors in 1994). The Brewers finally got their own flannel design in 1971, but only for their home jerseys. This design was essentially the same as the one used in 1970, but with blue and yellow piping on the sleeves and collar. Meanwhile, the road jerseys did not add the trim around the collar and kept the wide-banded striping on the sleeves from the Pilots era. Additionally, player numbers were added to the front of both jerseys for 1971. In 1972, the Brewers entered the double-knit era with uniforms based upon their flannels: all white with "BREWERS" on the front and blue and yellow trim on the sleeves, neck, waistband and down the side of the pants; the uniform took on the form of a pullover jersey and an elastic waistband. The road uniforms remained blue, although a darker shade than those of 1970 and '71. In 1974, a yellow-paneled cap was added to the road uniforms, and the "sanitation sock" on the road uniforms were also changed from white to yellow. This is the uniform that Hank Aaron wore with the club in his final seasons and that Robin Yount wore in his first. During this period, the logo of the club was the Beer Barrel Man, which had been used by the previous minor league Brewers since at least the 1940s. The Brewers mascot, Bernie Brewer (a man with a large yellow mustache wearing a Brewers hat) was introduced in 1973. 1978–1993 The Brewers unveiled new uniforms for the 1978 season. The uniforms continued to use the pullover jersey/beltless pants combo, and featured pinstripes with a solid-blue collar and waistband. The road uniforms continued to be powder blue, but for the first time the city name, "Milwaukee", graced the chest in an upward slant in script form (It was the first time "Milwaukee" appeared on any MLB jersey; the Braves never displayed the city name on their road jerseys during their 13 seasons in the city). In addition, this season saw the introduction of the logo that was to define the club: "M" and "B" in the shape of a baseball glove. The logo was designed by Tom Meindel, an art history student at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. The home cap was solid blue, and the road cap was blue with a yellow front panel. Additionally, their batting helmets had a white front panel. The club wore these uniforms in their pennant-winning season of 1982. Only minor changes were made until 1990; the color of the road uniforms changed to gray in 1985 while the blue-yellow-blue road cap and white-paneled batting helmets were abandoned at the same time. In 1990, the Brewers made significant modifications to their uniforms, switching from pullover to button-down jerseys (the last American League team to do so; four National League teams still wore pullovers in 1990). Their individual uniforms showed other changes as well; at home, the blue piping was removed and the block lettered "BREWERS" was changed to a script version with a tail similar to the script used on road uniforms, while those outfits had their piping changed from blue-yellow-blue to blue-yellow. The road jerseys were the first uniforms in franchise history to feature player names on the back, introduced in the first year of this uniform set; names were added to the home jerseys beginning in 1993, the last year of this set. 1994–1999 In 1994, to commemorate the Brewers' 25th year in Milwaukee, the team completely redesigned their uniforms. The ball-in-glove logo was removed and replaced with a stylized interlocking "M" and "B" set on a pair of crossed bats and a diamond background. The royal blue changed to navy blue, while the yellow changed to a metallic gold. Forest green was added as a third color. The jerseys swapped pinstripes for retro-themed piping around the collar, buttons, and sleeves, following a trend that was popular in the 1990s. The uniforms' lettering had the same style of letters as the new cap logo with heavily stylized "BREWERS" lettering on the home jerseys and "MILWAUKEE" on the road grays. For the first time, an alternative jersey was introduced. It was navy blue with the home "BREWERS" lettering on the front and featured the Brewers' logo on the lower left side. On all three jerseys, the first and last letters were larger than the rest. The caps featured the interlocking "MB" logo (without the bats or diamond) on both the home and away versions. The home cap was completely navy blue, while the away cap featured a navy blue crown and a forest green bill. In 1997, the uniforms were slightly modified, with the main logo being removed from the caps and replaced with an "M". All navy caps were worn with both the home and away uniforms; the home hats featured a white "M" and the road caps had a gold "M." The green socks that had previously been worn on the road were changed to navy blue. The blue alternate jersey placed the player's number on the lower left side instead of the logo, and numbers were also added to the lower left side of the white and gray jerseys. Also, all letters were made the same size. 2000–2019 Before the 2000 season, to coincide with the anticipated opening of Miller Park, the Brewers changed their uniforms again. The block letters on the front were replaced with "Brewers" in a flowing script, and green was removed as the third color. The cap logo was a script "M", similar in style to the Miller logo, with a head of barley underlining it, symbolizing Milwaukee's beer-making industry. The home uniforms also featured a patch on the left sleeve consisting of the cap logo with a gold outline of the state of Wisconsin behind it, showing the Brewers statewide appeal. The road uniforms were grey and featured the same script "Brewers" on the front, with a simple patch on the left sleeve bearing a script "Milwaukee". There was also an alternate navy blue jersey that had the same features as the home jersey. The debut of the new uniforms was supposed to coincide with the opening of Miller Park, but a crane collapse in July 1999 which killed three workers and damaged the incomplete stadium delayed its opening until 2001. In 2006, the Brewers introduced Retro Sundays, when the Brewers would wear uniforms featuring the "ball-in-glove" logo. The uniforms are similar to the uniforms worn from 1978 to 1989, but with some modern modifications, such as the uniforms having a button-down front instead of being a pullover jersey, displaying players' last names on the backs of the jerseys, and a "ball-in-glove" logo patch on the left sleeve. In 2007, the Retro day was changed from Sunday to Friday, though they may also be worn outside of those days if a starting pitcher chooses the retro uniforms to wear during his start. In 2010, the Brewers debuted a new alternate road jersey which, like the other alternate jersey, is navy blue, but bears a script "Milwaukee" on the front. In 2013, a gold alternate jersey with "Brewers" on the front was introduced, as well. During the off-season before the 2013 season, the Brewers allowed fans to design their own Milwaukee Brewers uniforms. Three finalists were chosen, which fans were given the opportunity to vote for their favorite through the Brewers website. The winning uniform was designed by Ben Peters of Richfield, Minnesota, and was worn by the Brewers for two spring training games. In 2016, the Brewers replaced their road navy and home gold alternates with a new navy alternate jersey. The uniform is similar to the previous road navy alternate but with yellow replacing gold as the trim color, and is paired with a navy cap featuring the "ball-and-glove" logo. From 2017 to 2019, both alternate navy uniforms were used for both home and away games, and each were worn more often than the traditional white and gray tops. 2020–present On November 18, 2019, the Brewers published "Glove Story", a series of videos and written work showcasing the new branding of the team, with a uniform unveiling event at Miller Park occurring the same evening. The look throws back to past iterations of designs used for the team, with a modernized version of the classic "ball-in-glove" logo being the centerpiece of the new identity. The navy blue from the previous logo and uniform set was retained, but the metallic gold was replaced with mustard gold, and royal blue was returned to the team's color scheme for the first time since 1993. The set included a cream home uniform with "Brewers" and numbers in stylized block letters (a nod to Milwaukee's "Cream City" nickname), a home alternate pinstriped white uniform which shares the same features as the cream uniforms, a grey road uniform with "Milwaukee" and numbers in stylized block letters, and a road alternate navy uniform with "Milwaukee" in script letters and numbers in stylized block letters. The home sleeve patch features a navy baseball with stylized barley seams, while the road sleeve patch features the gold Wisconsin map with Cream City bricks and a baseball to represent Milwaukee's location. The road alternates are paired with a navy cap with gold front panels; all other uniforms are paired with the all-navy cap. Achievements Awards Four Brewers have won the MLB Most Valuable Player Award during their careers with the team: Rollie Fingers (1981), Robin Yount (1982 and 1989), Ryan Braun (2011), and Christian Yelich (2018). Three pitchers have won the Cy Young Award: Rollie Fingers (1981), Pete Vuckovich (1982), and Corbin Burnes (2021). Three players have been named Rookie of the Year: Pat Listach (1992), Ryan Braun (2007), and Devin Williams (2020). Two Brewers have won the Hank Aaron Award: Prince Fielder (2007) and Christian Yelich (2018 and 2019). Dave Parker (1990) is the only Brewer to have won the Edgar Martínez Award. Four players have been recognized with top relief pitcher honors. Rollie Fingers (1981) and John Axford (2011) won the Rolaids Relief Man Award, and Josh Hader (2018, 2019, and 2021) and Devin Williams (2020) won the Trevor Hoffman NL Reliever of the Year Award. Cecil Cooper (1983) is the only Brewer to win the Roberto Clemente Award. Six Brewers have won the Rawlings Gold Glove Award, two have won the Wilson Defensive Player of the Year Award, and ten have won the Silver Slugger Award. Sixty-nine Brewers have been selected to play in the Major League Baseball All-Star Game, and five have been named to All-MLB Teams. Hall of Famers Eight Brewers have been inducted in the Baseball Hall of Fame after spending some or all of their careers with the team. Robin Yount is the only member to have played his entire career with Milwaukee. Ford C. Frick Award recipients One Brewers broadcaster has won the Ford C. Frick Award. Retired numbers The Brewers have retired five uniform numbers in honor of former players and team personnel. This ensures that the number will be associated with one person of particular importance to the team. Additionally, the number 42 has been retired throughout professional baseball in honor of Jackie Robinson. Though not retired, the number 17 has not been issued since Jim Gantner's retirement in 1992. Gantner, however, later wore the number from 1996 to 1997 when he returned as the Brewers' first base coach. Wisconsin Athletic Hall of Fame Nine individuals associated with the Brewers have been inducted in the Wisconsin Athletic Hall of Fame. Season-by-season results Franchise leaders These are records of players with the best performance in distinct statistical categories during their career with the Brewers. Batting Pitching Roster Managers Through 53 seasons of play, the Brewers franchise has employed 19 managers. The records of the last five managers are shown below. Minor league affiliations The Milwaukee Brewers farm system consists of eight minor league affiliates. Radio and television The Brewers' flagship radio station is WTMJ (620 AM/103.3 FM). Bob Uecker, a winner of the Ford C. Frick Award from the Baseball Hall of Fame, joined the Brewers in 1970, when the team moved from Seattle, and has been with the team ever since. Alongside Uecker are Jeff Levering and Lane Grindle. Levering joined the team's radio broadcast in 2015 as a fill-in for Uecker on select road games and Grindle joined the team in 2016, replacing Joe Block, who had left to join the Pittsburgh Pirates after the 2015 season. Block replaced Cory Provus who had left to become the Minnesota Twins lead broadcaster on radio after the 2011 season. Provus, formerly of WGN radio in Chicago, replaced Jim Powell, who left Milwaukee for the Atlanta Braves radio network. Powell in turn replaced Pat Hughes, who departed to do play-by-play for the Cubs on WGN in 1996. The Brewers radio broadcasts usually feature a 2-2-2-1-2 format where Uecker does solo play-by-play for the first, middle and last 2 innings, while Levering does innings 3-4 and 7, and both doing analysis throughout and varied presentation for extra innings games. Starting with the 2014 season Uecker cut back on the number of road games he works due to health concerns, mainly involving West Coast trips and distant road games in Colorado and Atlanta; Block handled the play-by-play, with former Brewer and Met Darryl Hamilton on color for the first series at Atlanta. Select daytime home games were formerly broadcast in Spanish over Waukesha-licensed ESPN Deportes Radio affiliate WRRD (1510), with Jaime Cano serving as play-by-play announcer. In 2017 the station was purchased by another party which instituted an English-language talk format, effectively ending that arrangement. Most of the team's television broadcasts are aired on Bally Sports Wisconsin. Brian Anderson, who has worked on The Golf Channel, took over as the Brewers' play-by-play announcer for the 2007 season. He replaced Daron Sutton, who joined the Arizona Diamondbacks. The color commentator is Bill Schroeder, a former major league catcher who played six of his eight seasons for the Brewers. As of 2014 Schroeder is in his 20th season as the Brewers' color commentator. The 2010 season was the first year where all of Fox Sports Wisconsin's games were broadcast in high definition. Anderson (who also is a part of TBS playoff coverage) also provided play-by-play for the 2011 NLCS due to Ernie Johnson stepping aside for the year due to a medical situation with his son. Since 2014, as Anderson's Turner Sports duties have increased along with the addition of NCAA college basketball and NBA on TNT play-by-play duties, Wisconsin Badgers football and men's college basketball radio announcer Matt Lepay has served as play-by-play man on days when Anderson has other assignments for Turner Sports. From 2007 to 2011, the Brewers and FSN Wisconsin subcontracted to Weigel Broadcasting a package of 15 games and one spring training game over-the-air on WMLW-CA (then-Channel 41/58.2) in Milwaukee each season with FSN Wisconsin producing the telecasts and Weigel selling air time for each of those games and additional games added depending on weather postponements and pennant race standings (WMLW-CA games would air on the outstate FSN Wisconsin network for the remainder of the state). The deal was ended before the 2012 season in order to facilitate full-season HD coverage on FSN Wisconsin and distribution complications, along with the addition of a "Plus" channel for Milwaukee Bucks play-by-play conflict situations. Weigel continues to air a few Sunday home broadcasts per year with Spanish language play-by-play on Telemundo affiliate WYTU-LD (Channels 63/58.4), which produces their own broadcasts using FSN's camera positions with Hector Molina on play-by-play and bilingual WDJT sports anchor Kevin Holden on color. Five of the six major network television stations in Milwaukee, along with WMLW-CA, have carried game broadcasts over the years, with WTMJ-TV being the original broadcaster in the 1970s. WVTV carried the team for the bulk of the 1980s and early 1990s, with WCGV-TV following from 1994 until 2004, and WISN-TV carrying select Sunday games at the beginning of the 2000s. WITI is the only station not to have carried local coverage of the team through its history (though former WITI sports anchor and current Bucks play-by-play man Jim Paschke was the team's TV announcer during its time with WVTV and portions of WCGV's coverage contract), although it has aired national games from CBS and Fox involving the Brewers through the years. References External links Milwaukee Brewers at ESPN Milwaukee Brewers at FOX Sports Major League Baseball teams Cactus League Baseball in Milwaukee Baseball teams established in 1969

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal%20Expos

Montreal Expos

The Montreal Expos () were a Canadian professional baseball team based in Montreal, Quebec. The Expos were the first Major League Baseball (MLB) franchise located outside the United States. They played in the National League (NL) East division from 1969 until 2004. Following the 2004 season, the franchise relocated to Washington, D.C., and became the Washington Nationals. Immediately after the minor league Triple-A Montreal Royals folded in 1960, political leaders in Montreal sought an MLB franchise, and when the National League evaluated expansion candidates for the 1969 season, it awarded a team to Montreal. Named after the Expo 67 World's Fair, the Expos originally played at Jarry Park Stadium before moving to Olympic Stadium in 1977. The Expos failed to post a winning record in any of their first ten seasons. The team won its only division title in the strike-shortened season, but lost the 1981 National League Championship Series (NLCS) to the Los Angeles Dodgers. The team was sold in 1991 by its majority, founding owner, Charles Bronfman, to a consortium headed by Claude Brochu. Felipe Alou was promoted to the team's field manager in 1992, becoming MLB's first Dominican-born manager. He led the team to four winning seasons, including , where the Expos had the best record in baseball before a players' strike ended the season. Alou became the Expos leader in games managed (1,409). The aftermath of the 1994 strike initiated a downward spiral as the Expos chose to sell off their best players, and attendance and interest in the team declined. Following a failed attempt to disband the Expos, Major League Baseball purchased the team prior to the 2002 season after the club failed to secure funding for a new ballpark. In their final two seasons, the team played 22 home games each year at Hiram Bithorn Stadium in San Juan, Puerto Rico. On September 29, 2004, MLB announced the franchise would relocate to Washington, D.C. for the season, and the Expos played their final home game in Montreal. The Expos posted an all-time record of 2,753 wins, 2,943 losses and 4 ties during their 36 years in Montreal. Vladimir Guerrero led the franchise in both home runs and batting average, and Steve Rogers in wins and strikeouts. Three pitchers threw four no-hitters: Bill Stoneman (twice), Charlie Lea, and Dennis Martínez, who pitched the 13th official perfect game in Major League Baseball history. The Expos retired four numbers in Montreal, and nine former members have been elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame, with Gary Carter, Andre Dawson and Tim Raines' plaques depicting them with Expos caps. History Founding (1960–1968) Professional baseball in Montreal dates back to 1890 when teams briefly played in the International Association. A second attempt at hosting a pro team failed in 1895. The Montreal Royals of the Eastern League were subsequently founded in 1897 and played 20 seasons. The Royals were revived in 1928 and were purchased by the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1939 to serve as one of their Triple-A affiliates. Under Dodgers' management, the Royals won seven International League championships and three Junior World Series titles between 1941 and 1958. In 1946, Jackie Robinson joined the Royals and led the team to a Junior World Series title in advance of his breaking baseball's colour barrier one year later. By the late 1950s, the Royals' championship years were past, and faced with declining attendance, the team was sold and relocated following the 1960 season as the Dodgers reduced the number of teams they maintained at the AAA level. Almost immediately upon the Royals' demise, Montreal mayor Jean Drapeau and city executive committee chairman Gerry Snyder began their campaign for a Major League Baseball (MLB) team. The city, which had previously been considered a leading candidate to acquire the St. Louis Browns if the team had relocated in 1933, was too late to submit its candidacy for a team as part of the National League's (NL) 1962 expansion but presented its bid to the league's owners at the winter meetings in 1967. Aiding Montreal's bid was the fact that Walter O'Malley, who owned the Dodgers and formerly oversaw the Montreal Royals, was the chairman of the NL's expansion committee. On May 27, 1968, National League president Warren Giles announced the league would add expansion teams in San Diego and Montreal at a cost of US$10 million each. With the franchise secured, Snyder built an ownership group of six partners led by financier Jean-Louis Lévesque and Seagram heir Charles Bronfman. Lévesque was originally tapped as chairman and the public face of the ownership group since he was a francophone. However, he bowed out, and Bronfman took over as chairman. The new group was faced with the immediate problem of finding a suitable facility in which to play for at least two years. Drapeau had promised the NL that a domed stadium–thought to be a must due to Montreal's cold weather in April, October and sometimes September–would be built by 1971. However, Snyder's successor as executive committee chairman, Lucien Saulnier, told Bronfman that Drapeau could not make such a guarantee on his own authority. As 1968 dragged on without movement from the city on a facility, Bronfman and his group threatened to walk away. While they had more than enough money between them to pay the first installment of the expansion fee, they wanted assurances that a park would be built before proceeding any further with the effort. Delorimier Stadium, which hosted the Royals, was rejected even as a temporary facility; it could not be expanded beyond its 20,000-seat capacity because it was in a residential area. The Autostade, home of the Canadian Football League's Montreal Alouettes, was ruled out due to the prohibitive cost of expanding it and adding a dome, as well as doubts that the city even had the right to make the needed renovations to the federally-owned facility. By August 1968, the NL owners had grown increasingly concerned about the unresolved stadium question, putting the franchise's future in doubt. There were rumours of awarding the franchise to Buffalo, New York instead, whose War Memorial Stadium was ready to host a team. League president Warren Giles was reassured of Montreal's viability when shown a 3,000-seat community field in the centrally located Jarry Park that Drapeau proposed expanding to 30,000 seats as a temporary home for the Expos, at a cost of over C$1 million. Several options for a team name were considered: "Royals" was a popular option with fans in honour of the minor-league Royals, but the name had already been taken by the Kansas City Royals. Other names considered included "Voyageurs" and "Nationals". The team settled on "Expos", a name with the same spelling in French and English, in recognition of the recently concluded Expo 67 World's Fair. Less than a year after the city was awarded a team, the Expos took to the field to begin the season. Jarry Park years (1969–1976) With Gene Mauch as their inaugural manager, the Expos made their debut on April 8, 1969: an 11–10 victory over the New York Mets at Shea Stadium. The team played its first home game—and the first Major League game outside the United States—on April 14; it was an 8–7 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals before 29,184 fans at Jarry Park Stadium. Three days later, on April 17, in just the team's ninth game played in their history up to that point, Bill Stoneman pitched the first no-hitter in Expos history with a 7–0 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies. The excitement of the early-season heroics quickly gave way to the realities of being an expansion team as the Expos struggled for much of their inaugural season. Montreal tied their expansion cousins, the San Diego Padres for the worst record in the NL with a record of 52–110. The team fared little better in the following seasons; the Expos went 73–89 in and 71–90 in . The team's best player, and first star, in its early seasons was Rusty Staub. Acquired from the Houston Astros in a trade prior to the Expos' inaugural season, he led the Expos with 30 home runs in 1970 and, owing to his red hair, was nicknamed Le Grand Orange. Staub was Montreal's lone representative at the Major League Baseball All-Star Game in the team's first three seasons, and endeared himself to the local fans by learning French. Also popular was pitcher Claude Raymond, who completed his Major League career with Montreal in 1972 and was the team's first French-Canadian star. Pitcher Carl Morton, who posted an 18–11 record in 1970, was the first player in franchise history to be named National League Rookie of the Year. Bill Stoneman threw his second no-hitter, and the first pitched outside the United States, in a 7–0 win over the Mets in Montreal on October 2, 1972. The team failed to post a winning season in its first ten years and finished fifth or sixth in the six-team NL East eight times. Attendance declined as the initial excitement of having a team wore off. It recovered briefly in as the Expos mounted an unsuccessful charge at the NL East pennant, before declining sharply in and beyond. By , attendance had dropped to just over 600,000 fans over the course of the season, less than half of what the Expos drew in their inaugural season. The on-field performance was not the only concern for the Expos. Jarry Park was only intended to serve as a temporary home until 1971 at the latest. Even allowing for this, it left much to be desired as a baseball venue. The grandstands were completely exposed to the elements, forcing the Expos to postpone a number of early-season games. Additionally, the sun set directly in the face of first basemen, forcing delays. Due to numerous delays and cost overruns with its intended replacement, Olympic Stadium, the Expos were forced to stay in Jarry until 1976. The team's future was also placed in doubt following an angry speech by Bronfman in which he threatened to relocate his family and the Seagram company outside Quebec if the separatist Parti Québécois (PQ) won a majority government in the 1976 Quebec election. The Parti Québécois did win the election; however, Bronfman and the Expos remained in Quebec. The Big O and Blue Monday (1977–1981) For the season, the Expos moved into their new ballpark, Olympic Stadium, six years later than originally scheduled. For a time in the 1976–77 offseason, however, it appeared that the Expos would have to play at least the early part of the season at Jarry Park due to delays in securing a lease for Olympic Stadium. The team broke off negotiations not long after the PQ's landslide victory in the 1976 provincial election. Negotiations dragged out through the winter, leading the Expos to begin selling 1977 season tickets under the assumption they would have to play at Jarry. However, an agreement was finally reached in early 1977. A total of 57,592 fans attended Montreal's opening day 7–2 loss to Philadelphia. The new facility was a significant upgrade, although weather-related issues created by Montreal's harsh climate persisted until the stadium's roof was installed in 1987. Over the years, the stadium became notorious for its poor playing conditions. Players were frequently at risk for injury due to thin padding on the outfield fences, as well as the original artificial turf that remained in place for over two decades. Ultimately, the park became viewed as a white elephant. On the field, the Expos continued to fare poorly; the team won 75 games in 1977, and 76 in . Though the losing seasons mounted, the Expos built a solid core of players, led by Gary Carter, who went on to become one of baseball's best hitting catchers, pitcher Steve Rogers and outfielders Andre Dawson and Tim Raines. They supplemented their young roster with veteran acquisitions such as future Hall of Famer Tony Pérez, and in 1977, the Expos also hired Dick Williams as the team's manager. Williams had developed a reputation for nurturing young talent; he had managed a young Boston Red Sox team to the American League pennant in and the Oakland Athletics to back-to-back World Series titles in 1972 and 1973. In , Montreal had its first winning season in franchise history; in mid-July, the Expos led the NL East by 6.5 games, before finishing second to the Pittsburgh Pirates by two games with a 95–65 record. The fans responded: Montreal drew two million fans for the first time in franchise history and it was the first of five consecutive seasons that the team was in the top-four of National League attendance. Though they won five fewer games in , the Expos finished merely one game behind the Philadelphia Phillies for the division lead. In both seasons, the Expos were in the hunt for the division title into the last weekend of the season before losing to the ultimate World Series champion. In , Charlie Lea pitched the third no-hitter in franchise history. He defeated the San Francisco Giants by a 4–0 score on May 10, 1981. The Expos were in third place in the NL East with a 30–25 record when the season was halted for two months by a players' strike. By the time the strike ended, 713 games had been lost and could not possibly be made up. Major League Baseball chose to adopt a split-season schedule, which gave the Expos a fresh start in the second half of the season. With the team languishing near the .500 mark in post-strike play, the club fired Williams and replaced him with scouting director Jim Fanning. The team continued to struggle, though, and had a 19–19 record with 15 games left to play. Montreal won 11 of the remaining games and finished in first place, a game ahead of the Pittsburgh Pirates, thereby qualifying for the franchise's first post-season berth. Terry Francona caught the final out – a fly ball hit by Dave Kingman – to seal a 5–4 victory over the New York Mets in the clinching game. In the 1981 National League Division Series, the Expos faced the first-half winners, the defending world champion Phillies. Montreal won the first two games, at Olympic Stadium, by identical 3–1 scores before dropping the following two games in Philadelphia. In the deciding fifth game, Montreal's Steve Rogers faced Steve Carlton in a pitchers' duel. Rogers pitched a complete-game shutout as Montreal advanced to the 1981 National League Championship Series with a 3–0 win. Facing the Los Angeles Dodgers, Montreal split the first two games of the best-of-five series in Los Angeles before returning home for the final three games. Montreal won game three, but failed in their first attempt to close out the series by losing game four and set up a deciding fifth game. The deciding game, postponed by a day due to rain, was played October 19, 1981, in near-freezing temperatures. The game was tied at 1 entering the ninth inning when Fanning opted to have his top starter, Steve Rogers, come out of the bullpen to pitch. Rogers retired the first two batters before facing Rick Monday. What followed was the defining moment in Expos history: on a 3–1 count, Rogers hung a sinking fastball that Monday hit over the centrefield fence for the game-winning and series-clinching home run. The moment, and game, became known to Expos fans as "Blue Monday". The dramatic loss was a bitter defeat for a franchise who by that time had been adopted as Canada's most popular baseball team. "The team of the '80s" (1982–1988) By the end of the 1979 season, the Expos had earned a reputation for having one of the strongest player development systems in baseball; the team had stockpiled young talent throughout its roster including four starting pitchers below the age of 23, and was hailed as "the team of the '80s". When Montreal hosted the 1982 Major League Baseball All-Star Game on July 13, 1982, Expos fans voted four of their own into the starting lineup: Carter, Dawson, Raines and Rogers, while Al Oliver was named as a reserve. It was only the second time since 1969 the host team had four starters. The National League claimed a 4–1 victory in front of 59,057 fans in the first All-Star Game held outside the United States; Rogers was the winning pitcher. Baseball historian and author Jonah Keri argued in his book Up, Up and Away that "no one at the stadium could know it then, but baseball in Montreal peaked that night at the Big O." The Expos were widely predicted to win the NL East in ; Sports Illustrated, Baseball Digest and The Sporting News were among the publications that favoured Montreal. However, the team disappointed. Montreal finished third in the division with 86 wins. The Expos replaced Fanning with Bill Virdon in , and under their new manager, led the division in mid-July. However, the team faded down the stretch and finished with an 82–80 record. The Expos won more games between 1979 and 1983 than any other team in the NL East, but had only one postseason appearance to show for it. Hoping to turn the team's fortunes around, the Expos signed 42-year-old veteran Pete Rose, who was second all-time in base hits to Ty Cobb, to a one-year contract in . Rose reached a career milestone in Montreal's home opener by recording the 4,000th hit of his career in a 5–1 victory over Philadelphia on April 13. Though players and management had praised the acquisition of Rose and predicted he would help the team win the division, he was ineffective for Montreal. Rose batted only .259 and failed to hit a home run in 95 games before he was traded back to his original team, Cincinnati, and Montreal finished with a losing record on the season. Montreal's failed 1984 season resulted in a 31 percent decrease in attendance at the same time salaries were escalating throughout baseball. As a consequence, the Expos completed a major trade following the season, sending Gary Carter to the New York Mets on December 10, 1984, in exchange for four players. In trading Carter, the Expos gave up a team icon who, like Rusty Staub before him, endeared himself to the fans by learning French and being one of the most accessible players on the team. The trade came one year after Bronfman had called the seven-year, US$12.6 million contract Carter signed in 1981 "the biggest mistake he had made in his life". The economics of Major League Baseball also resulted in the departure of Andre Dawson following the season. Throughout that off-season, MLB owners colluded at the behest of Commissioner Peter Ueberroth to drive salaries for free agents down. Dawson, who should have been one of the most valuable free agents on the market that year, discovered that not only was there little interest in signing him, but that the Expos were publicly commenting about his knee problems in an effort to further drive interest down. Angered by these actions, Dawson walked into the Chicago Cubs' training camp with a signed, blank contract. The Cubs agreed to sign Dawson to a one-year, $500,000 contract, less than half of his previous salary. Dawson hit 49 home runs and drove in 137 runs in , attaining the honour of NL Most Valuable Player. Tim Raines was also affected by collusion: after receiving no offer worth more than the $1.5 million he earned in 1986, Raines returned to the Expos on a three-year, $5 million contract. He had one of the best seasons of his career in 1987, leading the NL with 123 runs (in 139 games), stealing 50 bases, batting .330 and hitting 18 home runs. He was also named the most valuable player of the 1987 Major League Baseball All-Star Game, as he drove in the game's only two runs with a triple in the 13th inning. Raines was ultimately traded to the Chicago White Sox in 1990. "El Presidente, El Perfecto!" (1989–1993) On the field, the Expos won just four games more than they lost between 1986 and 1991 as the organization set about rebuilding its development system and acquiring a new generation of players. The team struggled to attract free agents to Montreal, and Bronfman had grown disillusioned with both the business of baseball and the challenge of drawing fans to Olympic Stadium for a middling ball club. He hoped to take one more chance at winning a title, however, and in , the Expos made a push for a division title by acquiring starting pitcher and pending free agent Mark Langston from the Seattle Mariners. The price would ultimately prove to be a high one as the Expos gave up future Hall of Famer Randy Johnson and two other pitchers. The trade helped propel the Expos to first place in the NL East by the All-Star break. They held the top spot into August before Langston and the team collapsed. The Expos finished fourth in the division with an 81–81 record, and Langston left Montreal as a free agent. Bronfman grew increasingly uneasy about the reckless spending of his fellow team owners, increased strife with the players, and overall direction of MLB. According to then-team president Claude Brochu, the team's late-season decline in 1989 proved too much for Bronfman, who asked him to seek a buyer for the team. Bronfman hoped to sell the team for around $50 million, but both he and Brochu found it impossible to find a local businessman willing to take primary ownership of the team. Groups from American cities were interested, however. One group offered to buy the club for $135 million and relocate it to Miami; however, Bronfman viewed a relocation as a last resort. Robert E. Rich Jr. offered to buy the club for $100 million and relocate it to Buffalo at their recently built Pilot Field, but received the same response. Instead, Brochu opted to lead a group himself. The city and the province agreed to fund $33 million of the $100 million sales price Bronfman had settled on, after which he and partner Jacques Ménard convinced 11 other Canadian businesses and businessmen—such as Bell Canada, Desjardins Group, the Jean Coutu Group and Loblaw Companies—to buy minority stakes. The sale was completed on November 29, 1990. However, many of the investors Brochu cajoled into joining the partnership made it clear that they considered their investments to be the equivalent of charitable donations, and were not interested in providing additional funding. With a new ownership group in place, the Expos traded Tim Raines to the Chicago White Sox in a five-player deal. General manager David Dombrowski fired manager Buck Rodgers, who had managed the team since 1985, after the team started the 1991 season with a 20–29 record, replacing him with Tom Runnells. Mark Gardner pitched nine no-hit innings in a July 26, game before losing 1–0 in the 10th inning to the Los Angeles Dodgers. Two days later, also in Los Angeles, Dennis Martínez achieved a rare feat, throwing the 13th official perfect game in Major League Baseball history (based on MLB's 1991 redefinition of a perfect game), winning 2–0. Dave Van Horne's iconic call of "El Presidente, El Perfecto!" following the final out became a hallmark of Expos lore. Martinez's catcher, Ron Hassey, also caught Len Barker's perfect game ten years earlier and remains the only player to catch two perfect games in MLB history. The euphoria of the pitching feats did not last, as the Expos were rendered homeless for the final month of the season after a 50-ton beam collapsed from Olympic Stadium's structure and fell nine metres onto a public concourse hours before a motocross event on September 13. The Expos hinted that they would have to open the 1992 season elsewhere unless Olympic Stadium was certified safe. While the stadium itself was given a clean bill of health by engineers in November, it took longer to get one for the roof since it had been badly ripped in a June windstorm. Ultimately, it was decided to keep the roof closed at all times; it had only been opened 88 times in a little more than four years. The Expos finished 1991 with a 71–90 record, sixth in the NL East, and drew fewer than one million fans for the first time since 1976. However, the foundation of the Expos' future was establishing their places in MLB: Larry Walker, Marquis Grissom and Delino DeShields had made their debuts the season prior, and the team acquired Moisés Alou in a trade with Pittsburgh. Moises' father Felipe, who had been a long time employee of the Expos, was promoted to manager during the season and became the first native of the Dominican Republic to manage a Major League Baseball team. In , DeShields was sent to Los Angeles in exchange for Pedro Martínez; the deal was initially pilloried by the Montreal Gazette and other local publications as a move designed to save money rather than improve the ball club. Nonetheless, the Expos improved on the field; they won 87 games in 1992, 94 in 1993 and finished second in the NL East both seasons. 1994 and the players' strike The Expos were recognized as having a strong team entering the season, but their hopes of winning the division were significantly impacted by realignment, as the three-time defending West Division champion Atlanta Braves were shifted to the East. Atlanta opened the season with 13 wins in 14 games, and quickly opened up an -game lead on Montreal. By late June, the Expos had moved to games back when they hosted the Braves. Montreal won two out of three games in the series, including a late-game victory in the opener over future-Hall-of-Fame pitcher Greg Maddux that the players viewed as the turning point of their season. Montreal then embarked on a west coast road trip in which they won the final five games and entered the All-Star break in first place. The Expos pulled away from the Braves after the break; between July 18 and August 11, Montreal won 20 games and lost only three. For the second time in team history, five players were named all-stars: Moisés Alou, Wil Cordero, Darrin Fletcher, Marquis Grissom and Ken Hill. An offense led by Marquis Grissom, Moises Alou, Larry Walker and Wil Cordero scored more than 5 runs per game. With a record of 74–40, on pace for a 106-win season as the pitching staff with Butch Henry, Ken Hill, Jeff Fassero and a young Pedro Martinez put up the National League's best ERA. The Expos had the best record in baseball on the morning of August 12, when MLB's players went on strike. The season began without a collective bargaining agreement as MLB's owners could not agree on how to share revenue between teams. Many teams were unwilling to agree to revenue sharing unless a salary cap was put in place, something which the Major League Baseball Players' Association (MLBPA) adamantly opposed. Unable to come to an agreement, the owners attempted to unilaterally force their system into effect, prompting the players to walk out. Most of the players believed they would be back on the field by Labour Day (celebrated on the same date in the U.S. as Labor Day) at the latest. On September 14, following a month of fruitless negotiations, the remainder of the season was cancelled. The franchise would never reach the playoffs as the Expos again. From Brochu's perspective, a salary cap was not a major concern for the Expos as they could not afford to spend the maximum value of any negotiated cap. But when the strike ended eight months later, by the order of United States federal judge Sonia Sotomayor, the failure to implement strong revenue sharing was a major blow to the Expos. The team had already built a reputation as a penny-pinching organization (Larry Walker once complained in the media that the team asked the players to buy their own vitamins), with the second-lowest payroll in MLB in 1994. Following the strike, the team initiated a fire sale of players: Ken Hill, John Wetteland and Marquis Grissom were traded while Larry Walker was allowed to leave as a free agent. Moisés Alou, Pedro Martínez and Mel Rojas would eventually follow. In his book, My Turn At Bat, Brochu argued that the fire sale was the only viable option, since his partners in the ownership group were not interested in financing the team's losses. Brochu estimated that had he tried to keep the 1994 team together, the Expos would have lost $25 million in 1995, which would have pushed the franchise to the edge of bankruptcy. He claimed that he would have certainly kept Hill, Wetteland, Grissom and Walker had the partners been willing to put up the money necessary to keep them in Montreal. When Brochu told general manager Kevin Malone that Hill, Wetteland, Grissom and Walker all had to go, Malone tried to persuade Brochu to keep at least one of them. It was to no avail; Brochu told Malone that they all had to be off the roster by the deadline for salary arbitration—even though this made it all but impossible to get any leverage in possible deals. As a result, the Expos got almost nothing in return. Decline (1995–2000) The strike and ensuing fire sale left fans in Montreal livid. The Expos finished last in the NL East in , and average game attendance fell by nearly 26%, from 24,543 to 18,189. Interest in the Expos continued to decline in the years that followed; they would never average more than 20,000 fans per game in a season again during their tenure in Montreal. While noting the Atlanta Braves went on to win 11 consecutive NL East titles following the strike, Jonah Keri expressed the viewpoint of the fans as it related to Brochu and the team's owners: "Expos fans couldn't help but wonder if that could have been them celebrating every year ... had Brochu convinced the team's cheapskate owners to spend a few damn dollars, or taken a leap of faith that short-term financial pain would lead to long-term success." The media, meanwhile, had taken to calling the Expos a "Triple-A team" as the team seemed to enter a period where they would develop players only to move them on to other organizations. In spite of a sharp decline in attendance, Brochu claimed the Expos turned a small profit in 1995. While ticket sales increased in other markets in the seasons following the strike, though, Montreal's fan base continued to erode. Even with the loss of most of their best players, the Expos were competitive in , achieving second place in the NL East with an 88–74 record. The team fared poorly in the following five seasons, however, finishing with a losing record in each year and no higher than fourth in the division. Individually, Pedro Martínez became the first native of the Dominican Republic—and only Expo—to win the National League Cy Young Award. He won the award in after recording an 18–7 record with an earned run average (ERA) of 1.90. One week after he was announced as the NL Cy Young winner, Martínez was traded to the Boston Red Sox as part of another salary purge. As the 1990s wore on, interest in the Expos dwindled to the point that they were barely part of Montreal's sports landscape. Alou recalled in the latter part of the decade, an old friend of his who owned a team in the Dominican Republic came to Montreal for a visit and couldn't find any downtown store that sold Expos caps, nor did he see anyone wearing an Expos cap during his weeklong stay in the city. When he took a taxi to a game at Olympic Stadium, the driver couldn't find the entrance, and there were no signs anywhere touting games. According to Alou's friend, with such lackluster marketing, it was no surprise that the Expos couldn't attract any fans. Keri later wrote that the Expos would not have been in this position had a better-financed "champion" with the resources and the patience to shepherd the team through the 1990s bought the team. Brochu attempted to convince his partners that the only long-term solution to keep the Expos in Montreal was to replace Olympic Stadium. In addition to being poorly located—far from population centres, restaurants, and bars—fans perceived it as cavernous and unsafe. Additionally, free agents were letting it be known they were not willing to play for the Expos because of Olympic Stadium's poor playing conditions. A proposed 35,000-seat downtown facility, to be called Labatt Park, was announced in 1997 with a budgeted cost of $250 million and an anticipated opening date of 2001. It would have been a retro-classic park with a facade reminiscent of historic Bonaventure Station. According to a Montreal Gazette editorial supporting the new park, Brochu's threat to move the team unless Olympic Stadium was replaced was "simple logic." Brochu sought $150 million in funding from the provincial government, but Premier Lucien Bouchard refused, saying he could not authorize public funding for a stadium when the province was being forced to close hospitals and had still not paid the Olympic Stadium debt. Many members of the consortium instead favoured selling the team. Hoping to pressure a sale, some members began to feed anonymous tips to the French press to make internal discord between Brochu and his partners public. Attendance continued to fall, decreasing by 39 percent in to an average of 11,295 spectators per game. It was the first of five consecutive seasons in which Montreal drew fewer than one million fans. One of the few bright spots of this time was the blossoming of Vladimir Guerrero into a star; he made four consecutive All-Star Games from 1999 to 2002, each time as the Expos' sole representative. Guerrero would eventually be elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2018. By 1999, the partners publicly began to question Brochu's fitness to lead the organization and he was criticized by the media. Brochu was also accused of having a secret deal with MLB commissioner Bud Selig to relocate the Expos to Washington, D. C., charges he denied in a spring press conference held to answer the accusations of his partners. Brochu's rebuttals fell on deaf ears as fans sided with the consortium's smear campaign against Brochu. He was ultimately replaced as managing general partner by American art dealer Jeffrey Loria, who was initially hailed as the franchise's saviour. Loria had originally bid for the team in 1991, but Brochu and Ménard had balked at his demand for controlling interest. Failed contraction and relocation (2001–2004) When Loria took control, he let it be known that Brochu's low-budget approach—or as he called it, "business as usual"—was over. He promised to rebuild the Expos with "a winning attitude and winning players" in an effort to bring the team back to where it had been only six years earlier. To that end, he drafted a new partnership agreement that gave him the right to call for cash investments in exchange for team equity—an option that had been unavailable to Brochu. Most of the minority partners, though, continued to treat their participation as a public-relations gesture and remained uninterested in investing additional money. When Loria issued a cash call in May 2000, the only other partners to increase their contributions were Coutu, Loblaw, and Stephen Bronfman. Rather than contribute more money, the minority partners proposed trading Guererro. Loria instantly vetoed this suggestion. As Loria increased his own financial contribution over the next two years, most of the other partners failed to do likewise, which resulted in Loria raising his share in the franchise to 92 percent. Speaking in retrospect, one of the minority partners, Mark Routtenberg, said that he was both "fooled" and "used" by Loria, and called him a carpetbagger. The team payroll for 2000 increased to $33 million, nearly double the $17.9 million from the previous season. However, Loria's options for rebuilding the team were somewhat limited. He discovered that he needed to improve the team immediately in order to win back the fans' trust, rather than relying on long-term improvements via the draft. Even with the team's renewed willingness to spend more on talent, most elite players were reluctant to play in Montreal, given the franchise's uncertain future and Olympic Stadium's poor playing conditions. As a result, most of the increased payroll came from the signings of free agent pitchers Graeme Lloyd and Hideki Irabu, as well as a three-way trade with the Rangers and Blue Jays that brought Rangers first baseman Lee Stevens to Montreal. These moves failed to translate into on-field success: Lloyd missed the entire season due to arthroscopic surgery, Irabu posted a 7.24 ERA, and Stevens only batted .265. The Expos lost 95 games. Interest in the team continued to decline, as both fans and businesses were unwilling to lend their support to a noncompetitive team. Loria continued to pursue the construction of a new ballpark. He sought support from Major League Baseball, the Quebec government, and architectural firm HOK Sport for a cheaper and re-designed version of Labatt Park that eschewed the retro-classic concept in favour of a more modern design with curved contours and glass. HOK and MLB both thought Loria's proposed design was structurally unsound. More seriously, although Loria had been led to believe that Ménard had convinced the provincial government to contribute funding, in reality no agreement had been reached. To bolster the team's finances, Loria tried to renegotiate the Expos' broadcasting deals, which were far less valuable than that of any other team. He broke off negotiations with The Sports Network, the largest English-language cable sports network in Canada, when it only offered the Expos $5,000 per game. Even allowing for the Expos' greatly reduced home territory compared to that of the Blue Jays (see below), TSN's offer was still a pittance compared to the $200,000 it paid the Blue Jays at the time. Loria had similar issues with prospective radio partners; the only interested parties would only air Expos games as part of a brokerage agreement in which the team paid for the airtime. The Alouettes and Canadiens had similar arrangements, which was considered highly unusual for the time. Although the team continued its French radio coverage on the Telemedia network—whose flagship, CKAC, had carried the Expos since 1973—the Expos were unable to reach an agreement for English radio broadcasts. This resulted in the end of the Expos' longtime run on CIQC (formerly CFCF), which had been the Expos' English radio outlet for all but four years of their existence. No television coverage was available in either language. This left English-speaking fans relying on Internet audiocasts. Local fans accused Loria and his stepson, David Samson, of sabotage. In truth, though, according to longtime Montreal sportscaster Mitch Melnick, there was no anglophone radio for the 2000 season "because nobody wanted to pay for it." Years later, Samson said that he had initially hoped that if the Expos got off to a hot start, local broadcasters would initiate new negotiations, but further discussions never materialized. Dave Van Horne, the team's English-language play-by-play announcer since the team's inception, left at the season's end to work for the Florida Marlins. In , the Expos drew only 642,748 fans, one of the smallest totals in MLB in decades. The minority partners, whose interest was now reduced to a combined seven percent, became convinced that Loria had planned his moves to force them out. When pleas to Selig and MLB officials fell on deaf ears, the group became convinced that Selig and Loria had conspired to force the Expos out of Montreal. At the same time, MLB took steps to vote on contraction of the leagues, with the Expos and the Minnesota Twins slated for elimination. On November 6, 2001, MLB's owners voted 28–2 in favour of contraction, with only the Expos and Twins opposed. Initial plans called for the Expos and Twins to play a lame-duck season in before their franchises were revoked. Both teams were saved following a legal challenge filed in Minnesota that forced MLB to honour the Twins' lease with the Metrodome, as well as challenges by the MLBPA. As MLB was unable to find another candidate team to eliminate, the immediate threat for the Expos diminished, as MLB needed to keep an even number of teams to maintain its schedule. Shortly afterward, Loria sold the Expos to MLB and used the money he received from the sale to purchase the Florida Marlins from John Henry, who had recently purchased the Boston Red Sox. As a result of the transaction, Loria turned a significant profit on his initial $16 million investment – MLB bought the Expos from him for $120 million and gave him a $38.5 million interest free loan to complete the purchase of the Marlins. Following the sale, Loria took virtually everything of value with him to Miami, including the Expos' computers and scouting reports. His departure also marked the final end of the proposed Labatt Park, though any realistic chance of the park being built ended when the Bouchard government repeated its previous refusal to commit any public money to the project. MLB formed Expos Baseball L.P., a partnership of the other 29 clubs, to operate the team. It appointed former Anaheim Angels president Tony Tavares as team president to oversee business operations and oversee a future move of the team, and Mets assistant general manager Omar Minaya as vice-president, general manager and operating head of the franchise. MLB's chief disciplinarian Frank Robinson was appointed as the team's manager. Minaya, the first Latino general manager in baseball history, inherited a difficult situation. He was hired only 72 hours before the start of spring training, and there were only six other employees in baseball operations; most of the others had either followed Loria to the Marlins or taken jobs with other clubs. As the Expos began what many assumed at the time to be their final season in 2002, the mood in the Olympic Stadium for the home opener – a victory over the Marlins – was ugly. Montreal's home opener drew 34,000 fans, many of which came not only to say "goodbye" to the franchise, but also to express their disgust and anger at Loria. Loria's minority partners, who had gone from collectively owning 76 percent of the Expos to less than seven percent of the Marlins, filed a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) lawsuit against Major League Baseball, Selig and Loria. The partners contended that Loria and the commissioner's office had conspired to deprive them of their shares by issuing cash calls, and thus deliberately undermined the franchise's future in Montreal. The partners were ultimately unsuccessful in their suit, as it was dismissed in 2005 after an arbitration panel rejected their claims. On the field, the 2002 Expos exceeded expectations and were in playoff contention for much of the season. As they were owned by the other teams, including their direct competitors, the Expos did not have any flexibility to increase their payroll for a last-ditch post season drive. Operating under the belief that the Expos were playing their last season in Montreal, Minaya completed a blockbuster trade with the Cleveland Indians in late June to make a final run at bringing post-season success to the city, acquiring Bartolo Colón, one of baseball's top pitchers, in exchange for several star prospects and without increasing payroll. Remembering how the Seattle Mariners had revived a stalled bid for what became Safeco Field with a playoff run in 1995, Minaya believed that if the Expos made the playoffs, the renewed public and private sector support would lead to a viable owner stepping forward who would keep the team in Montreal. Minaya made several smaller moves, but the team lost its early-season momentum; they went seven games under .500 in July and August. The Expos finished with an 83–79 record – their first winning season since 1996 – but finished second in the NL East, 19 games out of both the division lead and the wild card. The Expos franchise was saved by a new collective bargaining agreement between the owners and players that forbade contraction until at least 2006. Speculation of contraction was replaced by rumours of relocation, as it was obvious MLB did not intend to keep the team in Montreal. While MLB was not ready to relocate the Expos right away, in it sought to increase revenues by having the team play 22 of its 81 home games in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The Expos again found themselves in contention for the playoffs: on August 29, the team was tied with four other clubs for the National League Wild Card spot. When MLB's rosters expanded on September 1, Selig announced that the Expos would not be recalling any additional players from the minor leagues: the other owners had decided against spending a few extra thousand dollars, a small fraction of the team's $35 million payroll, to bolster the team. Several players, including relief pitcher Eric Knott, were sent back to the minors due to budget constraints. The team faded again, finishing 18 games out of first in the East and eight games out of the wild card spot. Later, Minaya said that the denial of the September call-ups was "a message to the players" and "a momentum killer." Keri later wrote that MLB's refusal to authorize the September call-ups eroded what goodwill the Expos still had among the Montreal fanbase. After the season, Guererro was lost to free agency, while staff ace Javier Vázquez was traded to the Yankees. The final season of the Montreal Expos came in , and was again split between Montreal and San Juan. The team never recovered from an April win-loss record of 5–19, and finished the season with a 67–95 record, the second-worst record in the National League. On September 29, 2004, Major League Baseball announced that the franchise would relocate to Washington, D.C. for the season. That same night, the team played its final game in Montreal: a 9–1 loss to the Florida Marlins before 31,395 fans. The team then played its final games as the Expos on the road, ending on October 3 against the New York Mets, the team they had faced in the franchise's inaugural game in 1969. In the Expos' last-ever game, the New York Mets defeated Montreal 8–1 at Shea Stadium. Jamey Carroll scored the last Expos run and Endy Chávez became the final Expos batter in history when he grounded out in the top of the ninth to end the game. The team ended their 36-year run with an all-time record of 2,753 wins, 2,943 losses and 4 ties. The last active former Montreal Expos player in the major leagues was Bartolo Colón, who played what is likely his last game with the Texas Rangers in 2018. Colón played half a season with the Expos in 2002. The Washington Nationals occasionally wear Expos throwback uniforms. The Nationals won the 2019 World Series, the franchise's first title in its 51 seasons, under manager Dave Martinez, who had played with the Expos from 1988 to 1991. Team identity The Expos logo consists of the stylized letters "eb", which stands for "Expos Baseball". When taken as a whole, the logo forms a large "M", representing "Montreal". In 1972, the Telemedia radio network brought in Jacques Doucet and Claude Raymond to serve as the Expos' French language broadcast team. They were asked by the Carling O'Keefe brewery, the title sponsor for the French-language broadcasts, to create a French language glossary of baseball terminology. Previously, particularly in the Montreal Royals days, French broadcasters would use English for baseball concepts that didn't have a French equivalent. Through their efforts, a French language baseball lexicon was created: words like "home run" became "" and "hit" became "". A knuckleball became "", literally "butterfly ball". Youppi! The Expos introduced their first mascot during the 1978 season. Called "Souki", the mascot resembled Mr. Met with a futuristic looking uniform but was met with such a negative reaction that the team immediately retired it after one season; Souki was once attacked by a father of children frightened by it. Seeking a replacement, the Expos found a design for a mascot similar to the Phillie Phanatic in the inventory of an American mascot company that had gone bankrupt. The mascot was designed by Bonnie Erickson, who created the Phanatic as well as several Muppets characters, including Miss Piggy. The team named the new mascot "Youppi!", which is French for "Yippee!" Unlike Souki, Youppi! was immediately popular with fans upon its introduction in 1979, particularly children, and the mascot became a fixture at children's hospitals during its 25 years as the Expos mascot. Youppi! made history in 1989 when he became the first mascot in Major League history to be ejected from a ballgame. The incident occurred during the 11th inning of a game against Los Angeles when Youppi was dancing and parading on top of the Dodgers' dugout. LA's manager, Tommy Lasorda complained to the umpires who ordered the mascot out of the game. Youppi! was eventually allowed to return with the condition that he remain away from the Dodgers' dugout. The game, coincidentally, was the longest in Expos history as Los Angeles won 1–0 in 22 innings. The relocation of the Expos to Washington left Youppi! in limbo. Several organizations expressed interest in taking over the character, including other Montreal sports teams. After a year in storage, the mascot was sold to the National Hockey League's Montreal Canadiens. The Canadiens claim Youppi! is the first mascot in professional sports to change leagues; he made his re-debut with the Canadiens on October 18, 2005. Relationship with the Toronto Blue Jays The Toronto Blue Jays joined the American League as an expansion franchise in 1977, and one year later, met the Expos for the first time in an exhibition contest, the first of an annual series that became known as the Pearson Cup. The Expos won that first game, 5–4, in front of 20,221 fans on June 29. Eight annual exhibitions (except for 1981 due to the strike) were played between 1978 and 1986 as each team won three games with two contests ending as ties. The teams did not meet again until 1997 with the advent of interleague play, and the first regular season meetings between the two. The games boosted attendance in both Montreal and Toronto, but the two teams failed to develop a serious rivalry. John McHale, then president of the Expos, was a strong proponent of adding a second Major League team in Toronto. The Expos remained Canada's most popular team until their mid-1980s downturn coincided with the Blue Jays' rise, culminating in the Jays' first American League East pennant in 1985. At the same time, the Blue Jays grew perturbed that the Expos were able to air their games in several markets in southern Ontario—such as Windsor, Belleville, and Toronto itself. The Jays lobbied MLB to designate southern Ontario as their exclusive home television territory. Bronfman opposed the request, as he feared that shutting the Expos out of Canada's largest and most lucrative television market would limit the team's fan base. As a part of the territorial changes, MLB allowed the Expos to air 15 games in the Jays' television market for free, and purchase the rights to air additional games. For the remainder of their existence, the Expos only had full broadcast rights in Quebec and Atlantic Canada. The loss of viewership in southern Ontario diminished the Expos' ability to attract sponsors and corporate partners. Indeed, Keri later wrote that the Expos miscalculated when they considered the Blue Jays an ally rather than a potential threat, and missed a chance to cement their right to air their games across Canada. Keri added that the loss of this revenue stream, along with "many other poor business decisions" over the years, made it difficult for the Expos to be viable in Montreal. Longtime Expos play-by-play broadcaster Dave Van Horne later argued that the loss of badly-needed corporate support "really started a long, downward spiral" for the team. Regardless of their disagreements over television rights, when the Blue Jays reached the 1992 World Series, the team honoured Bronfman's contributions in bringing Major League Baseball to the country by having him throw the ceremonial first pitch for the first World Series game played in Canada. However, and while Blue Jays president Paul Godfrey again acknowledged the Expos' role in his own team's existence, Godfrey nonetheless voted with the other teams to support contracting the Expos in 2001 and relocating them in 2004: "I know if it wasn't for the success of the Expos in those early years there would not be major-league baseball in Toronto. That wasn't an emotional or a baseball vote. It was a business decision." The Blue Jays' failure to stand with their fellow Canadian team offended many Expos fans. Ten years after the Expos relocated to Washington, a two-game exhibition series between the Toronto Blue Jays and New York Mets was held at the Olympic Stadium to conclude the spring training schedule prior to the season. For the Blue Jays, the series was intended, in part, to increase the team's following in Quebec. For others, the goal was to demonstrate that Montreal had an interest in returning to Major League Baseball. Former Expos player Warren Cromartie, who leads the Montreal Baseball Project, was among the organizers. The series was a success: 96,350 fans, frequently chanting "Lets go Expos!" and "We want baseball!" attended the two games. The Blue Jays returned for a two-game series in , against the Cincinnati Reds, which was attended by 96,545 fans. The success of the series' bolstered the Montreal Baseball Project's efforts: retiring commissioner Bud Selig was impressed by the fans in 2014 and said the city would be an "excellent candidate" for a new team. His replacement, Rob Manfred, echoed those comments in 2015. Olympic Stadium again hosted two spring training games prior to the beginning of the 2016 season between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Boston Red Sox, with a combined attendance of over 106,000 fans; since 2014, the Blue Jays have made it an annual tradition to host two spring training games in Montreal before the start of each season. In 2018, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. of the Blue Jays hit a game-winning home run against the St. Louis Cardinals in an exhibition game to the delight of the Montreal crowd. Players Retired numbers National Baseball Hall of Fame Nine people who represented the Expos organization have subsequently gone on to gain election to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. Gary Carter was inducted in 2003 and was the first player whose Hall of Fame plaque depicted him with an Expos cap. The Hall's choice for his plaque logo followed initial statements by Carter that he preferred to be enshrined as a New York Met, with whom he won the 1986 World Series. He accepted the Hall's decision with grace, stating: "The fact I played 11 years in Montreal and the fact that the majority of my statistics and accomplishments were achieved there, it would be wrong, probably, to do it any other way." Andre Dawson became the second depicted as an Expos player when he was elected in 2010. Although he had played the majority of his 21-year career with Montreal, Dawson also preferred his plaque to display a different logo: when the decision was made, he publicly expressed his disappointment, saying it was "a little gut-wrenching" to find out he would not go in as a Chicago Cub. Dawson's reluctance to be enshrined as an Expos player stemmed, in part, from the breakdown of his relationship with the team during MLB's collusion scandal of 1986–87, when he claims the team not only "threw him out" of Montreal, but tried to prevent other teams from signing him as a free agent. The third player with an Expos logo on his Hall of Fame plaque is Tim Raines, who was inducted in 2017, his final year of eligibility. On January 24, 2018, the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum announced Vladimir Guerrero as an inductee into the Hall of Fame. Guerrero played eight of his 16 seasons with the Expos, being named to the MLB All-Star Game three times and winning the Silver Slugger Award three times while with the team. Nearly half of his career 2,590 hits were with Montreal (1,215), while having 234 of his 449 home runs and 702 of his 1,496 RBIs with the Expos in 1,004 games. Guerrero announced his Hall of Fame plaque will display him wearing an Angels cap. For the five other inductees, their time in Montreal played lesser roles in their careers. Manager Dick Williams was a member of the Expos between 1977 and 1981 as part of a 21-year managerial career in which he took three different teams to the World Series. Tony Pérez played three years with the Expos but was primarily known for being a member of Cincinnati's "Big Red Machine" teams of the 1970s. Pitchers Pedro Martínez (1994–97) and Randy Johnson (1988–89), who both played in Montreal early in their careers but spent the majority of their playing days elsewhere, were both elected to the Hall in 2015. Frank Robinson managed the team from 2002 to 2006 (spanning the franchise's move to Washington), but was elected based on his accomplishments as a player, including being the first player to win Most Valuable Player honours in both the AL and NL, a triple crown in 1966, and a rookie-record of 38 home runs while winning the NL Rookie of the Year award. Longtime broadcaster Dave Van Horne was named the recipient of the Ford C. Frick Award in 2011. The award is presented by the National Baseball Hall of Fame to honour broadcasters who make "major contributions to baseball". When the Washington Nationals unveiled their "Ring of Honor" at Nationals Park in 2010, the franchise recognized its roots in Montreal. The ring was created to honour Hall-of-Fame players associated with Washington, D.C., baseball or the Montreal-Washington franchise, later expanded to include anyone who has made a significant contribution to the game of baseball in Washington, D.C. Two Expos players – Gary Carter and Andre Dawson – were named among the inaugural members. Frank Robinson was added to the Ring of Honor in 2015, as was Tim Raines in 2017. Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame Montreal Expos Hall of Fame The team created the Montreal Expos Hall of Fame to celebrate the franchise's 25th season in 1993. Charles Bronfman was inducted as its inaugural member. In a pre-game ceremony on August 14, 1993, a circular patch on the right field wall was unveiled with Bronfman's name, the number 83 (which he used to wear during spring training), and the words "FONDATEUR / FOUNDER". A total of 23 people were honoured by the club. Expos records The players listed here represent the statistical leaders for the franchise's time in Montreal only. For the record holders of the franchise overall, see List of Washington Nationals team records. No-hitters and cycles Three pitchers in Expos history threw no-hitters. Bill Stoneman threw the first during the team's inaugural 1969 season. He threw a second no-hitter in 1972. Charlie Lea threw the third, nine years later in 1981. A decade after that, on July 28, 1991, Dennis Martínez threw the 13th official perfect game in Major League Baseball history. Two other pitchers threw no-hitters in shortened games which, after a 1992 rule change, were no longer recognized by MLB as official no-hitters. David Palmer pitched a perfect five innings in a rain-shortened game against the St. Louis Cardinals on April 22, 1984. Pascual Pérez threw a five-inning no-hitter on September 24, 1988, against the Philadelphia Phillies. Six batters hit for the cycle in Montreal's history. Tim Foli was the first to do it in 1976, and Vladimir Guerrero was the last to do so, in 2003. See also List of Montreal Expos broadcasters References Footnotes General External links Encore Baseball Montréal (French and English) – Encore Baseball Montréal is a non-profit organization that aims to be the voice of baseball fans in order to maintain interest in baseball in the province of Quebec ExposNation.com – Registered Non-profit organisation seeking to promote the Montreal market as a viable baseball market, by creating awareness of a fan base in the region. History of the Expos Sports E-Cyclopedia Major League Baseball Comes to Canada CBC Digital Archives Montreal Expos / Washington Nationals Franchise Record at Baseball Reference | colspan = 3 align = center | National League Eastern Division Champions |- | width = 30% align = center | Preceded by:Philadelphia Phillies | width = 40% align = center | 1981 | width = 30% align = center | Succeeded by:St. Louis Cardinals Ex Defunct baseball teams in Canada Baseball teams established in 1969 Sports clubs disestablished in 2004 1969 establishments in Quebec 2004 disestablishments in Quebec Defunct Major League Baseball teams Defunct brands

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metallocene

Metallocene

A metallocene is a compound typically consisting of two cyclopentadienyl anions (, abbreviated Cp) bound to a metal center (M) in the oxidation state II, with the resulting general formula Closely related to the metallocenes are the metallocene derivatives, e.g. titanocene dichloride, vanadocene dichloride. Certain metallocenes and their derivatives exhibit catalytic properties, although metallocenes are rarely used industrially. Cationic group 4 metallocene derivatives related to [Cp2ZrCH3]+ catalyze olefin polymerization. Some metallocenes consist of metal plus two cyclooctatetraenide anions (, abbreviated cot2−), namely the lanthanocenes and the actinocenes (uranocene and others). Metallocenes are a subset of a broader class of compounds called sandwich compounds. In the structure shown at right, the two pentagons are the cyclopentadienyl anions with circles inside them indicating they are aromatically stabilized. Here they are shown in a staggered conformation. History The first metallocene to be classified was ferrocene, and was discovered simultaneously in 1951 by Kealy and Pauson, and Miller et al. Kealy and Pauson were attempting to synthesize fulvalene through the oxidation of a cyclopentadienyl salt with anhydrous FeCl3 but obtained instead the substance C10H10Fe At the same time, Miller et al reported the same iron product from a reaction of cyclopentadiene with iron in the presence of aluminum, potassium, or molybdenum oxides. The structure of "C10H10Fe" was determined by Geoffrey Wilkinson et al. and by Ernst Otto Fischer et al. These two were awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1973 for their work on sandwich compounds, including the structural determination of ferrocene. They determined that the carbon atoms of the cyclopentadienyl (Cp) ligand contributed equally to the bonding and that bonding occurred due to the metal and the in the of the Cp ligands. This complex is now known as ferrocene, and the group of transition metal dicyclopentadienyl compounds is known as metallocenes. Metallocenes have the general formula Fischer et al. first prepared the ferrocene derivatives involving Co and Ni. Often derived from substituted derivatives of cyclopentadienide, metallocenes of many elements have been prepared. One of the very earliest commercial manufacturers of metallocenes was Arapahoe Chemicals in Boulder, Colorado Definition The general name metallocene is derived from ferrocene, (C5H5)2Fe or Cp2Fe, systematically named According to the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry definition, a metallocene contains a transition metal and two cyclopentadienyl ligands coordinated in a sandwich structure, i.e., the two cyclopentadienyl anions are on parallel planes with equal bond lengths and strengths. Using the nomenclature of "hapticity", the equivalent bonding of all 5 carbon atoms of a cyclopentadienyl ring is denoted as η5, pronounced "pentahapto". There are exceptions, such as uranocene, which has two cyclooctatetraene rings sandwiching a uranium atom. In metallocene names, the prefix before the ending indicates what metallic element is between the Cp groups. For example, in ferrocene, iron(II), ferrous iron is present. In contrast to the more strict definition proposed by International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, which requires a d-block metal and a sandwich structure, the term metallocene and thus the denotation , is applied in the chemical literature also to non-transition metal compounds, such as barocene (Cp2Ba), or structures where the aromatic rings are not parallel, such as found in manganocene or titanocene dichloride (Cp2TiCl2). Some metallocene complexes of actinides have been reported where there are three cyclopentadienyl ligands for a monometallic complex, all three of them bound η5. Classification There are many (η5-C5H5)–metal complexes and they can be classified by the following formulas: Metallocene complexes can also be classified by type: Parallel Multi-decker Half-sandwich compound Bent metallocene or tilted More than two Cp ligands Synthesis Three main routes are normally employed in the formation of these types of compounds: Using a metal salt and cyclopentadienyl reagents Sodium cyclopentadienide (NaCp) is the preferred reagent for these types of reactions. It is most easily obtained by the reaction of molten sodium and dicyclopentadiene. Traditionally, the starting point is the cracking of dicyclopentadiene, the dimer of cyclopentadiene. Cyclopentadiene is deprotonated by strong bases or alkali metals. MCl2 + 2 NaC5H5 → (C5H5)2M + 2 NaCl (M = V, Cr, Mn, Fe, Co; solvent = THF, DME, NH3) CrCl3 + 3 NaC5H5 → [(C5H5)2Cr] +  "C10H10" + 3 NaCl NaCp acts as a reducing agent and a ligand in this reaction. Using a metal and cyclopentadiene This technique provides using metal atoms in the gas phase rather than the solid metal. The highly reactive atoms or molecules are generated at a high temperature under vacuum and brought together with chosen reactants on a cold surface. M + C5H6 → MC5H5 +  H2 (M = Li, Na, K) M + 2 C5H6 → [(C5H5)2M] + H2 (M = Mg, Fe) Using cyclopentadienyl reagents A variety of reagents have been developed that transfer Cp to metals. Once popular was thallium cyclopentadienide. It reacts with metal halides to give thallium chloride, which is poorly soluble, and the cyclopentadienyl complex. Trialkyltin derivatives of Cp− have also been used. Many other methods have been developed. Chromocene can be prepared from chromium hexacarbonyl by direct reaction with cyclopentadiene in the presence of diethylamine; in this case, the formal deprotonation of the cyclopentadiene is followed by reduction of the resulting protons to hydrogen gas, facilitating the oxidation of the metal centre. Cr(CO)6 + 2 C5H6 → Cr(C5H5)2 + 6 CO + H2 Metallocenes generally have high thermal stability. Ferrocene can be sublimed in air at over 100 °C with no decomposition; metallocenes are generally purified in the laboratory by vacuum sublimation. Industrially, sublimation is not practical so metallocenes are isolated by crystallization or produced as part of a hydrocarbon solution. For Group IV metallocenes, donor solvents like ether or THF are distinctly undesirable for polyolefin catalysis. Charge-neutral metallocenes are soluble in common organic solvents. Alkyl substitution on the metallocene increases the solubility in hydrocarbon solvents. Structure A structural trend for the series MCp2 involves the variation of the M-C bonds, which elongate as the valence electron count deviates from 18. In metallocenes of the type (C5R5)2M, the cyclopentadienyl rings rotate with very low barriers. Single crystal X-ray diffraction studies reveal both eclipsed or staggered rotamers. For non-substituted metallocenes the energy difference between the staggered and eclipsed conformations is only a few kJ/mol. Crystals of ferrocene and osmocene exhibit eclipsed conformations at low temperatures, whereas in the related bis(pentamethylcyclopentadienyl) complexes the rings usually crystallize in a staggered conformation, apparently to minimize steric hindrance between the methyl groups. Spectroscopic properties Vibrational (infrared and Raman) spectroscopy of metallocenes Infrared and Raman spectroscopies have proved to be important in the analysis of cyclic polyenyl metal sandwich species, with particular use in elucidating covalent or ionic M–ring bonds and distinguishing between central and coordinated rings. Some typical spectral bands and assignments of iron group metallocenes are shown in the following table: NMR (1H and 13C) spectroscopy of metallocenes Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is the most applied tool in the study of metal sandwich compounds and organometallic species, giving information on nuclear structures in solution, as liquids, gases, and in the solid state. 1H NMR chemical shifts for paramagnetic organotransition-metal compounds is usually observed between 25 and 40 ppm, but this range is much more narrow for diamagnetic metallocene complexes, with chemical shifts usually observed between 3 and 7 ppm. Mass spectrometry of metallocenes Mass spectrometry of metallocene complexes has been very well studied and the effect of the metal on the fragmentation of the organic moiety has received considerable attention and the identification of metal-containing fragments is often facilitated by the isotope distribution of the metal. The three major fragments observed in mass spectrometry are the molecular ion peak, [C10H10M]+, and fragment ions, [C5H5M]+ and M+. Derivatives After the discovery of ferrocene, the synthesis and characterization of derivatives of metallocene and other sandwich compounds attracted researchers’ interests. Metallocenophanes Metallocenophanes feature linking of the cyclopentadienyl or polyarenyl rings by the introduction of one or more heteroannular bridges. Some of these compounds undergo thermal ring-opening polymerizations to give soluble high molecular weight polymers with transition metals in the polymer backbone. Ansa-metallocenes are derivatives of metallocenes with an intramolecular bridge between the two cyclopentadienyl rings. Polynuclear and heterobimetallic metallocenes Ferrocene derivatives: biferrocenophanes have been studied for their mixed valence properties. Upon one-electron oxidation of a compound with two or more equivalent ferrocene moieties, the electron vacancy could be localized on one ferrocene unit or completely delocalized. Ruthenocene derivatives: in the solid state biruthenocene is disordered and adopts the transoid conformation with the mutual orientation of Cp rings depending on the intermolecular interactions. Vanadocene and rhodocene derivatives: vanadocene complexes have been used as starting materials for the synthesis of heterobimetallic complexes. The 18 valence electron ions [Cp2Rh]+ are very stable, unlike the neutral monomers Cp2Rh which dimerize immediately at room temperature and they have been observed in matrix isolation. Multi-decker sandwich compounds Triple-decker complexes are composed of three Cp anions and two metal cations in alternating order. The first triple-decker sandwich complex, , was reported in 1972. Many examples have been reported subsequently, often with boron-containing rings. Metallocenium cations The most famous example is ferrocenium, , the blue iron(III) complex derived from oxidation of orange iron(II) ferrocene (few metallocene anions are known). Applications Many derivatives of early metal metallocenes are active catalysts for olefin polymerization. Unlike traditional and still dominant heterogeneous Ziegler–Natta catalysts, metallocene catalysts are homogeneous. Early metal metallocene derivatives, e.g. Tebbe's reagent, Petasis reagent, and Schwartz's reagent are useful in specialized organic synthetic operations. Potential applications The ferrocene/ferrocenium biosensor has been discussed for determining the levels of glucose in a sample electrochemically through a series of connected redox cycles. Metallocene dihalides [Cp2MX2] (M = Ti, Mo, Nb) exhibit anti-tumor properties, although none have proceeded far in clinical trials. See also Jemmis mno rules Actinocenes f-block metallocene References Additional references

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus%20Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus ( ; 26 April 121 – 17 March 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 and a Stoic philosopher. He was the last of the rulers known as the Five Good Emperors (a term coined some 13 centuries later by Niccolò Machiavelli), and the second to last emperor of the Pax Romana, (27 BC to AD 180), preceeding his son Commodus in an age of relative peace and stability for the Roman Empire. He served as Roman consul in 140, 145, and 161. Marcus was born during the reign of Hadrian to the emperor's nephew, the praetor Marcus Annius Verus, and the heiress Domitia Calvilla. His father died when he was three, and his mother and grandfather raised him. After Hadrian's adoptive son, Aelius Caesar, died in 138, the emperor adopted Marcus's uncle Antoninus Pius as his new heir. In turn, Antoninus adopted Marcus and Lucius, the son of Aelius. Hadrian died that year, and Antoninus became emperor. Now heir to the throne, Marcus studied Greek and Latin under tutors such as Herodes Atticus and Marcus Cornelius Fronto. He married Antoninus's daughter Faustina in 145. After Antoninus died in 161, Marcus acceded to the throne alongside his adoptive brother, who reigned under the name Lucius Verus. Under Marcus's rule, the Roman Empire witnessed heavy military conflict. In the East, the Romans fought successfully with a revitalized Parthian Empire and the rebel Kingdom of Armenia. Marcus defeated the Marcomanni, Quadi, and Sarmatian Iazyges in the Marcomannic Wars; however, these and other Germanic peoples began to represent a troubling reality for the Empire. He modified the silver purity of the Roman currency, the denarius. The persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire appears to have increased during Marcus's reign, but his involvement in this is unknown. The Antonine Plague broke out in 165 or 166 and devastated the population of the Roman Empire, causing the deaths of five to ten million people. Lucius Verus may have died from the plague in 169. Unlike some of his predecessors, Marcus chose not to adopt an heir. His children included Lucilla, who married Lucius, and Commodus, whose succession after Marcus has been a subject of debate among both contemporary and modern historians. The Column and Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius still stand in Rome, where they were erected in celebration of his military victories. Meditations, the writings of "the philosopher" – as contemporary biographers called Marcus – are a significant source of the modern understanding of ancient Stoic philosophy. They have been praised by fellow writers, philosophers, monarchs, and politicians centuries after his death. Sources The major sources depicting the life and rule of Marcus are patchy and frequently unreliable. The most important group of sources, the biographies contained in the Historia Augusta, claimed to be written by a group of authors at the turn of the 4th century AD, but it is believed they were in fact written by a single author (referred to here as 'the biographer') from about AD 395. The later biographies and the biographies of subordinate emperors and usurpers are unreliable, but the earlier biographies, derived primarily from now-lost earlier sources (Marius Maximus or Ignotus), are much more accurate. For Marcus's life and rule, the biographies of Hadrian, Antoninus, Marcus, and Lucius are largely reliable, but those of Aelius Verus and Avidius Cassius are not. A body of correspondence between Marcus's tutor Fronto and various Antonine officials survives in a series of patchy manuscripts, covering the period from c. 138 to 166. Marcus's own Meditations offer a window on his inner life, but are largely undateable and make few specific references to worldly affairs. The main narrative source for the period is Cassius Dio, a Greek senator from Bithynian Nicaea who wrote a history of Rome from its founding to 229 in eighty books. Dio is vital for the military history of the period, but his senatorial prejudices and strong opposition to imperial expansion obscure his perspective. Some other literary sources provide specific details: the writings of the physician Galen on the habits of the Antonine elite, the orations of Aelius Aristides on the temper of the times, and the constitutions preserved in the Digest and Codex Justinianeus on Marcus's legal work. Inscriptions and coin finds supplement the literary sources. Early life Name Marcus was born in Rome on 26 April 121. His name at birth was supposedly Marcus Annius Verus, but some sources assign this name to him upon his father's death and unofficial adoption by his grandfather, upon his coming of age, or at the time of his marriage. He may have been known as Marcus Annius Catilius Severus, at birth or some point in his youth, or Marcus Catilius Severus Annius Verus. Upon his adoption by Antoninus as heir to the throne, he was known as Marcus Aelius Aurelius Verus Caesar and, upon his ascension, he was Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus until his death; Epiphanius of Salamis, in his chronology of the Roman emperors included in his On Weights and Measures, calls him Marcus Aurelius Verus. Family origins Marcus's paternal family was of Roman Italo-Hispanic origins. His father was Marcus Annius Verus (III). The gens Annia was of Italian origins (with legendary claims of descendance from Numa Pompilius) and a branch of it moved to Ucubi, a small town south east of Córdoba in Iberian Baetica. This branch of the Aurelii based in Roman Spain, the Annii Veri, rose to prominence in Rome in the late 1st century AD. Marcus's great-grandfather Marcus Annius Verus (I) was a senator and (according to the Historia Augusta) ex-praetor; his grandfather Marcus Annius Verus (II) was made patrician in 73–74. Through his grandmother Rupilia, Marcus was a member of the Nerva-Antonine dynasty; the emperor Trajan's sororal niece Salonia Matidia was the mother of Rupilia and her half-sister, Hadrian's wife Sabina. Marcus's mother, Domitia Lucilla Minor (also known as Domitia Calvilla), was the daughter of the Roman patrician P. Calvisius Tullus and inherited a great fortune (described at length in one of Pliny's letters) from her parents and grandparents. Her inheritance included large brickworks on the outskirts of Rome – a profitable enterprise in an era when the city was experiencing a construction boom – and the Horti Domitia Calvillae (or Lucillae), a villa on the Caelian hill of Rome. Marcus himself was born and raised in the Horti and referred to the Caelian hill as 'My Caelian'. The adoptive family of Marcus was of Roman Italo-Gallic origins: the gens Aurelia, into which Marcus was adopted at the age of 17, was a Sabine gens; Antoninus Pius, his adoptive father, came from the Aurelii Fulvi, a branch of the Aurelii based in Roman Gaul. Childhood Marcus's sister, Annia Cornificia Faustina, was probably born in 122 or 123. His father probably died in 124, when Marcus was three years old during his praetorship. Though he can hardly have known his father, Marcus wrote in his Meditations that he had learned 'modesty and manliness' from his memories of his father and the man's posthumous reputation. His mother Lucilla did not remarry and, following prevailing aristocratic customs, probably did not spend much time with her son. Instead, Marcus was in the care of 'nurses', and was raised after his father's death by his grandfather Marcus Annius Verus (II), who had always retained the legal authority of patria potestas over his son and grandson. Technically this was not an adoption, the creation of a new and different patria potestas. Lucius Catilius Severus, described as Marcus's maternal great-grandfather, also participated in his upbringing; he was probably the elder Domitia Lucilla's stepfather. Marcus was raised in his parents' home on the Caelian Hill, an upscale area with few public buildings but many aristocratic villas. Marcus's grandfather owned a palace beside the Lateran, where he would spend much of his childhood. Marcus thanks his grandfather for teaching him 'good character and avoidance of bad temper'. He was less fond of the mistress his grandfather took and lived with after the death of his wife Rupilia. Marcus was grateful that he did not have to live with her longer than he did. From a young age, Marcus displayed enthusiasm for wrestling and boxing. Marcus trained in wrestling as a youth and into his teenage years, learned to fight in armour and led a dance troupe called the College of the Salii. They performed ritual dances dedicated to Mars, the god of war, while dressed in arcane armour, carrying shields and weapons. Marcus was educated at home, in line with contemporary aristocratic trends; he thanks Catilius Severus for encouraging him to avoid public schools. One of his teachers, Diognetus, a painting master, proved particularly influential; he seems to have introduced Marcus Aurelius to the philosophic way of life. In April 132, at the behest of Diognetus, Marcus took up the dress and habits of the philosopher: he studied while wearing a rough Greek cloak, and would sleep on the ground until his mother convinced him to sleep on a bed. A new set of tutors – the Homeric scholar Alexander of Cotiaeum along with Trosius Aper and Tuticius Proculus, teachers of Latin – took over Marcus's education in about 132 or 133. Marcus thanks Alexander for his training in literary styling. Alexander's influence – an emphasis on matter over style and careful wording, with the occasional Homeric quotation – has been detected in Marcus's Meditations. Succession to Hadrian In late 136, Hadrian almost died from a hemorrhage. Convalescent in his villa at Tivoli, he selected Lucius Ceionius Commodus, Marcus's intended father-in-law, as his successor and adopted son, according to the biographer 'against the wishes of everyone'. While his motives are not certain, it would appear that his goal was to eventually place the then-too-young Marcus on the throne. As part of his adoption, Commodus took the name, Lucius Aelius Caesar. His health was so poor that, during a ceremony to mark his becoming heir to the throne, he was too weak to lift a large shield on his own. After a brief stationing on the Danube frontier, Aelius returned to Rome to make an address to the Senate on the first day of 138. However, the night before the scheduled speech, he grew ill and died of a hemorrhage later in the day. On 24 January 138, Hadrian selected Aurelius Antoninus, the husband of Marcus's aunt Faustina the Elder, as his new successor. As part of Hadrian's terms, Antoninus, in turn, adopted Marcus and Lucius Commodus, the son of Lucius Aelius. Marcus became M. Aelius Aurelius Verus, and Lucius became L. Aelius Aurelius Commodus. At Hadrian's request, Antoninus's daughter Faustina was betrothed to Lucius. Marcus reportedly greeted the news that Hadrian had become his adoptive grandfather with sadness, instead of joy. Only with reluctance did he move from his mother's house on the Caelian to Hadrian's private home. At some time in 138, Hadrian requested in the senate that Marcus be exempt from the law barring him from becoming quaestor before his twenty-fourth birthday. The senate complied, and Marcus served under Antoninus, the consul for 139. Marcus's adoption diverted him from the typical career path of his class. If not for his adoption, he probably would have become triumvir monetalis, a highly regarded post involving token administration of the state mint; after that, he could have served as tribune with a legion, becoming the legion's nominal second-in-command. Marcus probably would have opted for travel and further education instead. As it was, Marcus was set apart from his fellow citizens. Nonetheless, his biographer attests that his character remained unaffected: 'He still showed the same respect to his relations as he had when he was an ordinary citizen, and he was as thrifty and careful of his possessions as he had been when he lived in a private household'. After a series of suicide attempts, all thwarted by Antoninus, Hadrian left for Baiae, a seaside resort on the Campanian coast. His condition did not improve, and he abandoned the diet prescribed by his doctors, indulging himself in food and drink. He sent for Antoninus, who was at his side when he died on 10 July 138. His remains were buried quietly at Puteoli. The succession to Antoninus was peaceful and stable: Antoninus kept Hadrian's nominees in office and appeased the senate, respecting its privileges and commuting the death sentences of men charged in Hadrian's last days. For his dutiful behaviour, Antoninus was asked to accept the name 'Pius'. Heir to Antoninus Pius (138–145) Immediately after Hadrian's death, Antoninus approached Marcus and requested that his marriage arrangements be amended: Marcus's betrothal to Ceionia Fabia would be annulled, and he would be betrothed to Faustina, Antoninus's daughter, instead. Faustina's betrothal to Ceionia's brother Lucius Commodus would also have to be annulled. Marcus consented to Antoninus's proposal. He was made consul for 140 with Antoninus as his colleague, and was appointed as a seviri, one of the knights' six commanders, at the order's annual parade on 15 July 139. As the heir apparent, Marcus became princeps iuventutis, head of the equestrian order. He now took the name Marcus Aelius Aurelius Verus Caesar. Marcus would later caution himself against taking the name too seriously: 'See that you do not turn into a Caesar; do not be dipped into the purple dye – for that can happen'. At the senate's request, Marcus joined all the priestly colleges (pontifices, augures, quindecimviri sacris faciundis, septemviri epulonum, etc.); direct evidence for membership, however, is available only for the Arval Brethren. Antoninus demanded that Marcus reside in the House of Tiberius, the imperial palace on the Palatine, and take up the habits of his new station, the aulicum fastigium or 'pomp of the court', against Marcus's objections. Marcus would struggle to reconcile the life of the court with his philosophic yearnings. He told himself it was an attainable goal – 'Where life is possible, then it is possible to live the right life; life is possible in a palace, so it is possible to live the right life in a palace' – but he found it difficult nonetheless. He would criticize himself in the Meditations for 'abusing court life' in front of company. As quaestor, Marcus would have had little real administrative work to do. He would read imperial letters to the senate when Antoninus was absent and would do secretarial work for the senators. But he felt drowned in paperwork and complained to his tutor, Marcus Cornelius Fronto: 'I am so out of breath from dictating nearly thirty letters'. He was being 'fitted for ruling the state', in the words of his biographer. He was required to make a speech to the assembled senators as well, making oratorical training essential for the job. On 1 January 145, Marcus was made consul a second time. Fronto urged him in a letter to have plenty of sleep 'so that you may come into the Senate with a good colour and read your speech with a strong voice'. Marcus had complained of an illness in an earlier letter: 'As far as my strength is concerned, I am beginning to get it back; and there is no trace of the pain in my chest. But that ulcer [...] I am having treatment and taking care not to do anything that interferes with it'. Never particularly healthy or strong, Marcus was praised by Cassius Dio, writing of his later years, for behaving dutifully in spite of his various illnesses. In April 145, Marcus married Faustina, legally his sister, as had been planned since 138. Little is specifically known of the ceremony, but the biographer calls it 'noteworthy'. Coins were issued with the heads of the couple, and Antoninus, as Pontifex Maximus, would have officiated. Marcus makes no apparent reference to the marriage in his surviving letters, and only sparing references to Faustina. Fronto and further education After taking the toga virilis in 136, Marcus probably began his training in oratory. He had three tutors in Greek (Aninus Macer, Caninius Celer, and Herodes Atticus) and one in Latin (Marcus Cornelius Fronto). The latter two were the most esteemed orators of their time, but probably did not become his tutors until his adoption by Antoninus in 138. The preponderance of Greek tutors indicates the importance of the Greek language to the aristocracy of Rome. This was the age of the Second Sophistic, a renaissance in Greek letters. Although educated in Rome, in his Meditations, Marcus would write his inmost thoughts in Greek. Atticus was controversial: an enormously rich Athenian (probably the richest man in the eastern half of the empire), he was quick to anger and resented by his fellow Athenians for his patronizing manner. Atticus was an inveterate opponent of Stoicism and philosophic pretensions. He thought the Stoics' desire for apatheia was foolish: they would live a 'sluggish, enervated life', he said. In spite of the influence of Atticus, Marcus would later become a Stoic. He would not mention Herodes at all in his Meditations, in spite of the fact that they would come into contact many times over the following decades. Fronto was highly esteemed: in the self-consciously antiquarian world of Latin letters, he was thought of as second only to Cicero, perhaps even an alternative to him. He did not care much for Atticus, though Marcus was eventually to put the pair on speaking terms. Fronto exercised a complete mastery of Latin, capable of tracing expressions through the literature, producing obscure synonyms, and challenging minor improprieties in word choice. A significant amount of the correspondence between Fronto and Marcus has survived. The pair were very close, using intimate language such as 'Farewell my Fronto, wherever you are, my most sweet love and delight. How is it between you and me? I love you and you are not here' in their correspondence. Marcus spent time with Fronto's wife and daughter, both named Cratia, and they enjoyed light conversation. He wrote Fronto a letter on his birthday, claiming to love him as he loved himself, and calling on the gods to ensure that every word he learnt of literature, he would learn 'from the lips of Fronto'. His prayers for Fronto's health were more than conventional, because Fronto was frequently ill; at times, he seems to be an almost constant invalid, always suffering – about one-quarter of the surviving letters deal with the man's sicknesses. Marcus asks that Fronto's pain be inflicted on himself, 'of my own accord with every kind of discomfort'. Fronto never became Marcus's full-time teacher and continued his career as an advocate. One notorious case brought him into conflict with Atticus. Marcus pleaded with Fronto, first with 'advice', then as a 'favour', not to attack Atticus; he had already asked Atticus to refrain from making the first blows. Fronto replied that he was surprised to discover Marcus counted Atticus as a friend (perhaps Atticus was not yet Marcus's tutor), and allowed that Marcus might be correct, but nonetheless affirmed his intent to win the case by any means necessary: '[T]he charges are frightful and must be spoken of as frightful. Those in particular that refer to the beating and robbing I will describe so that they savour of gall and bile. If I happen to call him an uneducated little Greek it will not mean war to the death'. The outcome of the trial is unknown. By the age of twenty-five (between April 146 and April 147), Marcus had grown disaffected with his studies in jurisprudence, and showed some signs of general malaise. His master, he writes to Fronto, was an unpleasant blowhard, and had made 'a hit at' him: 'It is easy to sit yawning next to a judge, he says, but to be a judge is noble work'. Marcus had grown tired of his exercises, of taking positions in imaginary debates. When he criticized the insincerity of conventional language, Fronto took to defend it. In any case, Marcus's formal education was now over. He had kept his teachers on good terms, following them devotedly. It 'affected his health adversely', his biographer writes, to have devoted so much effort to his studies. It was the only thing the biographer could find fault with in Marcus's entire boyhood. Fronto had warned Marcus against the study of philosophy early on: 'It is better never to have touched the teaching of philosophy...than to have tasted it superficially, with the edge of the lips, as the saying is'. He disdained philosophy and philosophers and looked down on Marcus's sessions with Apollonius of Chalcedon and others in this circle. Fronto put an uncharitable interpretation of Marcus's 'conversion to philosophy': 'In the fashion of the young, tired of boring work', Marcus had turned to philosophy to escape the constant exercises of oratorical training. Marcus kept in close touch with Fronto, but would ignore Fronto's scruples. Apollonius may have introduced Marcus to Stoic philosophy, but Quintus Junius Rusticus would have the strongest influence on the boy. He was the man Fronto recognized as having 'wooed Marcus away' from oratory. He was older than Fronto and twenty years older than Marcus. As the grandson of Arulenus Rusticus, one of the martyrs to the tyranny of Domitian (r. 81–96), he was heir to the tradition of 'Stoic Opposition' to the 'bad emperors' of the 1st century; the true successor of Seneca (as opposed to Fronto, the false one). Marcus thanks Rusticus for teaching him 'not to be led astray into enthusiasm for rhetoric, for writing on speculative themes, for discoursing on moralizing texts.... To avoid oratory, poetry, and 'fine writing''. Philostratus describes how even when Marcus was an old man, in the latter part of his reign, he studied under Sextus of Chaeronea: The Emperor Marcus was an eager disciple of Sextus the Boeotian philosopher, being often in his company and frequenting his house. Lucius, who had just come to Rome, asked the Emperor, whom he met on his way, where he was going to and on what errand, and Marcus answered, ' it is good even for an old man to learn; I am now on my way to Sextus the philosopher to learn what I do not yet know.' And Lucius, raising his hand to heaven, said, ' O Zeus, the king of the Romans in his old age takes up his tablets and goes to school.' Births and deaths On 30 November 147, Faustina gave birth to a girl named Domitia Faustina. She was the first of at least thirteen children (including two sets of twins) that Faustina would bear over the next twenty-three years. The next day, 1 December, Antoninus gave Marcus the tribunician power and the imperium – authority over the armies and provinces of the emperor. As tribune, he had the right to bring one measure before the senate after the four Antoninus could introduce. His tribunician powers would be renewed with Antoninus's on 10 December 147. The first mention of Domitia in Marcus's letters reveals her as a sickly infant. 'Caesar to Fronto. If the gods are willing we seem to have a hope of recovery. The diarrhea has stopped, the little attacks of fever have been driven away. But the emaciation is still extreme and there is still quite a bit of coughing'. He and Faustina, Marcus wrote, had been 'pretty occupied' with the girl's care. Domitia would die in 151. In 149, Faustina gave birth again, to twin sons. Contemporary coinage commemorates the event, with crossed cornucopiae beneath portrait busts of the two small boys, and the legend temporum felicitas, 'the happiness of the times'. They did not survive long. Before the end of the year, another family coin was issued: it shows only a tiny girl, Domitia Faustina, and one boy baby. Then another: the girl alone. The infants were buried in the Mausoleum of Hadrian, where their epitaphs survive. They were called Titus Aurelius Antoninus and Tiberius Aelius Aurelius. Marcus steadied himself: 'One man prays: 'How I may not lose my little child', but you must pray: 'How I may not be afraid to lose him'. He quoted from the Iliad what he called the 'briefest and most familiar saying...enough to dispel sorrow and fear': leaves, the wind scatters some on the face of the ground; like unto them are the children of men. – Iliad vi.146 Another daughter was born on 7 March 150, Annia Aurelia Galeria Lucilla. At some time between 155 and 161, probably soon after 155, Marcus's mother Domitia Lucilla died. Faustina probably had another daughter in 151, but the child, Annia Galeria Aurelia Faustina, might not have been born until 153. Another son, Tiberius Aelius Antoninus, was born in 152. A coin issue celebrates fecunditati Augustae, 'to Augusta's fertility', depicting two girls and an infant. The boy did not survive long, as evidenced by coins from 156, only depicting the two girls. He might have died in 152, the same year as Marcus's sister Cornificia. By 28 March 158, when Marcus replied, another of his children was dead. Marcus thanked the temple synod, 'even though this turned out otherwise'. The child's name is unknown. In 159 and 160, Faustina gave birth to daughters: Fadilla and Cornificia, named respectively after Faustina's and Marcus's dead sisters. Antoninus Pius's last years Lucius started his political career as a quaestor in 153. He was consul in 154, and was consul again with Marcus in 161. Lucius had no other titles, except that of 'son of Augustus'. Lucius had a markedly different personality from Marcus: he enjoyed sports of all kinds, but especially hunting and wrestling; he took obvious pleasure in the circus games and gladiatorial fights. He did not marry until 164. In 156, Antoninus turned 70. He found it difficult to keep himself upright without stays. He started nibbling on dry bread to give him the strength to stay awake through his morning receptions. As Antoninus aged, Marcus would take on more administrative duties, more still when he became the praetorian prefect (an office that was as much secretarial as military) when Marcus Gavius Maximus died in 156 or 157. In 160, Marcus and Lucius were designated joint consuls for the following year. Antoninus may have already been ill. Two days before his death, the biographer reports, Antoninus was at his ancestral estate at Lorium, in Etruria, about 19 kilometres (12 mi) from Rome. He ate Alpine cheese at dinner quite greedily. In the night he vomited; he had a fever the next day. The day after that, 7 March 161, he summoned the imperial council, and passed the state and his daughter to Marcus. The emperor gave the keynote to his life in the last word that he uttered when the tribune of the night-watch came to ask the password – 'aequanimitas' (equanimity). He then turned over, as if going to sleep, and died. His death closed out the longest reign since Augustus, surpassing Tiberius by a couple of months. Emperor Accession of Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus (161) After Antoninus died in 161, Marcus was effectively sole ruler of the Empire. The formalities of the position would follow. The senate would soon grant him the name Augustus and the title imperator, and he would soon be formally elected as Pontifex maximus, chief priest of the official cults. Marcus made some show of resistance: the biographer writes that he was 'compelled' to take imperial power. This may have been a genuine horror imperii, 'fear of imperial power'. Marcus, with his preference for the philosophic life, found the imperial office unappealing. His training as a Stoic however, had made the choice clear to him that it was his duty. Although Marcus showed no personal affection for Hadrian (significantly, he does not thank him in the first book of his Meditations), he presumably believed it his duty to enact the man's succession plans. Thus, although the Senate planned to confirm Marcus alone, he refused to take office unless Lucius received equal powers. The Senate accepted, granting Lucius the imperium, the tribunician power, and the title Augustus. Marcus became, in official titulature, Imperator Caesar Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus; Lucius, forgoing his name Commodus and taking Marcus's family name Verus, became Imperator Caesar Lucius Aurelius Verus Augustus. It was the first time that Rome was ruled by two emperors. In spite of their nominal equality, Marcus held more auctoritas, or 'authority', than Lucius. He had been consul once more than Lucius, he had shared in Antoninus's rule, and he alone was Pontifex maximus. It would have been clear to the public which emperor was the more senior. As the biographer wrote, 'Verus obeyed Marcus...as a lieutenant obeys a proconsul or a governor obeys the emperor'. Immediately after their Senate confirmation, the emperors proceeded to the Castra Praetoria, the camp of the Praetorian Guard. Lucius addressed the assembled troops, which then acclaimed the pair as imperatores. Then, like every new emperor since Claudius, Lucius promised the troops a special donativum. This donative, however, was twice the size of those past: 20,000 sesterces (5,000 denarii) per capita, with more to officers. In return for this bounty, equivalent to several years' pay, the troops swore an oath to protect the emperors. The ceremony was perhaps not entirely necessary, given that Marcus's accession had been peaceful and unopposed, but it was good insurance against later military troubles. Upon his accession he also devalued the Roman currency. He decreased the silver purity of the denarius from 83.5% to 79% – the silver weight dropping from to . Antoninus's funeral ceremonies were, in the words of the biographer, 'elaborate'. If his funeral followed those of his predecessors, his body would have been cremated on a pyre at the Campus Martius, and his spirit would have been seen as ascending to the gods' home in the heavens. Marcus and Lucius nominated their father for deification. In contrast to their behaviour during Antoninus's campaign to deify Hadrian, the senate did not oppose the emperors' wishes. A flamen, or cultic priest, was appointed to minister the cult of the deified Divus Antoninus. Antoninus's remains were laid to rest in Hadrian's mausoleum, beside the remains of Marcus's children and of Hadrian himself. The temple he had dedicated to his wife, Diva Faustina, became the Temple of Antoninus and Faustina. It survives as the church of San Lorenzo in Miranda. In accordance with his will, Antoninus's fortune passed on to Faustina. (Marcus had little need of his wife's fortune. Indeed, at his accession, Marcus transferred part of his mother's estate to his nephew, Ummius Quadratus.) Faustina was three months pregnant at her husband's accession. During the pregnancy she dreamed of giving birth to two serpents, one fiercer than the other. On 31 August, she gave birth at Lanuvium to twins: T. Aurelius Fulvus Antoninus and Lucius Aurelius Commodus. Aside from the fact that the twins shared Caligula's birthday, the omens were favorable, and the astrologers drew positive horoscopes for the children. The births were celebrated on the imperial coinage. Early rule Soon after the emperors' accession, Marcus's eleven-year-old daughter, Annia Lucilla, was betrothed to Lucius (in spite of the fact that he was, formally, her uncle). At the ceremonies commemorating the event, new provisions were made for the support of poor children, along the lines of earlier imperial foundations. Marcus and Lucius proved popular with the people of Rome, who strongly approved of their civiliter ('lacking pomp') behaviour. The emperors permitted free speech, evidenced by the fact that the comedy writer Marullus was able to criticize them without suffering retribution. As the biographer wrote, 'No one missed the lenient ways of Pius'. Marcus replaced a number of the empire's major officials. The ab epistulis Sextus Caecilius Crescens Volusianus, in charge of the imperial correspondence, was replaced with Titus Varius Clemens. Clemens was from the frontier province of Pannonia and had served in the war in Mauretania. Recently, he had served as procurator of five provinces. He was a man suited for a time of military crisis. Lucius Volusius Maecianus, Marcus's former tutor, had been prefectural governor of Egypt at Marcus's accession. Maecianus was recalled, made senator, and appointed prefect of the treasury (aerarium Saturni). He was made consul soon after. Fronto's son-in-law, Gaius Aufidius Victorinus, was appointed governor of Germania Superior. Fronto returned to his Roman townhouse at dawn on 28 March, having left his home in Cirta as soon as news of his pupils' accession reached him. He sent a note to the imperial freedman Charilas, asking if he could call on the emperors. Fronto would later explain that he had not dared to write the emperors directly. The tutor was immensely proud of his students. Reflecting on the speech he had written on taking his consulship in 143, when he had praised the young Marcus, Fronto was ebullient: 'There was then an outstanding natural ability in you; there is now perfected excellence. There was then a crop of growing corn; there is now a ripe, gathered harvest. What I was hoping for then, I have now. The hope has become a reality.' Fronto called on Marcus alone; neither thought to invite Lucius. Lucius was less esteemed by Fronto than his brother, as his interests were on a lower level. Lucius asked Fronto to adjudicate in a dispute he and his friend Calpurnius were having on the relative merits of two actors. Marcus told Fronto of his reading – Coelius and a little Cicero – and his family. His daughters were in Rome with their great-great-aunt Matidia; Marcus thought the evening air of the country was too cold for them. He asked Fronto for 'some particularly eloquent reading matter, something of your own, or Cato, or Cicero, or Sallust or Gracchus – or some poet, for I need distraction, especially in this kind of way, by reading something that will uplift and diffuse my pressing anxieties.' Marcus's early reign proceeded smoothly; he was able to give himself wholly to philosophy and the pursuit of popular affection. Soon, however, he would find he had many anxieties. It would mean the end of the felicitas temporum ('happy times') that the coinage of 161 had proclaimed. In either autumn 161 or spring 162, the Tiber overflowed its banks, flooding much of Rome. It drowned many animals, leaving the city in famine. Marcus and Lucius gave the crisis their personal attention. In other times of famine, the emperors are said to have provided for the Italian communities out of the Roman granaries. Fronto's letters continued through Marcus's early reign. Fronto felt that, because of Marcus's prominence and public duties, lessons were more important now than they had ever been before. He believed Marcus was 'beginning to feel the wish to be eloquent once more, in spite of having for a time lost interest in eloquence'. Fronto would again remind his pupil of the tension between his role and his philosophic pretensions: 'Suppose, Caesar, that you can attain to the wisdom of Cleanthes and Zeno, yet, against your will, not the philosopher's woolen cape'. The early days of Marcus's reign were the happiest of Fronto's life: Marcus was beloved by the people of Rome, an excellent emperor, a fond pupil, and perhaps most importantly, as eloquent as could be wished. Marcus had displayed rhetorical skill in his speech to the senate after an earthquake at Cyzicus. It had conveyed the drama of the disaster, and the senate had been awed: 'Not more suddenly or violently was the city stirred by the earthquake than the minds of your hearers by your speech'. Fronto was hugely pleased. War with Parthia (161–166) On his deathbed, Antoninus spoke of nothing but the state and the foreign kings who had wronged him. One of those kings, Vologases IV of Parthia, made his move in late summer or early autumn 161. Vologases entered the Kingdom of Armenia (then a Roman client state), expelled its king and installed his own – Pacorus, an Arsacid like himself. The governor of Cappadocia, the frontline in all Armenian conflicts, was Marcus Sedatius Severianus, a Gaul with much experience in military matters. Convinced by the prophet Alexander of Abonutichus that he could defeat the Parthians easily and win glory for himself, Severianus led a legion (perhaps the IX Hispana) into Armenia, but was trapped by the great Parthian general Chosrhoes at Elegeia, a town just beyond the Cappadocian frontiers, high up past the headwaters of the Euphrates. After Severianus made some unsuccessful efforts to engage Chosrhoes, he committed suicide, and his legion was massacred. The campaign had lasted only three days. There was threat of war on other frontiers as well – in Britain, and in Raetia and Upper Germany, where the Chatti of the Taunus mountains had recently crossed over the limes. Marcus was unprepared. Antoninus seems to have given him no military experience; the biographer writes that Marcus spent the whole of Antoninus's twenty-three-year reign at his emperor's side and not in the provinces, where most previous emperors had spent their early careers. More bad news arrived: the Syrian governor's army had been defeated by the Parthians, and retreated in disarray. Reinforcements were dispatched for the Parthian frontier. P. Julius Geminius Marcianus, an African senator commanding X Gemina at Vindobona (Vienna), left for Cappadocia with detachments from the Danubian legions. Three full legions were also sent east: I Minervia from Bonn in Upper Germany, II Adiutrix from Aquincum, and V Macedonica from Troesmis. The northern frontiers were strategically weakened; frontier governors were told to avoid conflict wherever possible. M. Annius Libo, Marcus's first cousin, was sent to replace the Syrian governor. His first consulship was in 161, so he was probably in his early thirties, and as a patrician, he lacked military experience. Marcus had chosen a reliable man rather than a talented one. Marcus took a four-day public holiday at Alsium, a resort town on the coast of Etruria. He was too anxious to relax. Writing to Fronto, he declared that he would not speak about his holiday. Fronto replied: 'What? Do I not know that you went to Alsium with the intention of devoting yourself to games, joking, and complete leisure for four whole days?' He encouraged Marcus to rest, calling on the example of his predecessors (Antoninus had enjoyed exercise in the palaestra, fishing, and comedy), going so far as to write up a fable about the gods' division of the day between morning and evening – Marcus had apparently been spending most of his evenings on judicial matters instead of at leisure. Marcus could not take Fronto's advice. 'I have duties hanging over me that can hardly be begged off', he wrote back. Marcus Aurelius put on Fronto's voice to chastise himself: ''Much good has my advice done you', you will say!' He had rested, and would rest often, but 'this devotion to duty! Who knows better than you how demanding it is!' Fronto sent Marcus a selection of reading material, and, to settle his unease over the course of the Parthian war, a long and considered letter, full of historical references. In modern editions of Fronto's works, it is labeled De bello Parthico (On the Parthian War). There had been reverses in Rome's past, Fronto writes, but in the end, Romans had always prevailed over their enemies: 'Always and everywhere [Mars] has changed our troubles into successes and our terrors into triumphs'. Over the winter of 161–162, news that a rebellion was brewing in Syria arrived and it was decided that Lucius should direct the Parthian war in person. He was stronger and healthier than Marcus, the argument went, and thus more suited to military activity. Lucius's biographer suggests ulterior motives: to restrain Lucius's debaucheries, to make him thrifty, to reform his morals by the terror of war, and to realize that he was an emperor. Whatever the case, the senate gave its assent, and, in the summer of 162, Lucius left. Marcus would remain in Rome, as the city 'demanded the presence of an emperor'. Lucius spent most of the campaign in Antioch, though he wintered at Laodicea and summered at Daphne, a resort just outside Antioch. Critics declaimed Lucius's luxurious lifestyle, saying that he had taken to gambling, would 'dice the whole night through', and enjoyed the company of actors. Libo died early in the war; perhaps Lucius had murdered him. In the middle of the war, perhaps in autumn 163 or early 164, Lucius made a trip to Ephesus to be married to Marcus's daughter Lucilla. Marcus moved up the date; perhaps he had already heard of Lucius's mistress Panthea. Lucilla's thirteenth birthday was in March 163; whatever the date of her marriage, she was not yet fifteen. Lucilla was accompanied by her mother Faustina and Lucius's uncle (his father's half-brother) M. Vettulenus Civica Barbarus, who was made comes Augusti, 'companion of the emperors'. Marcus may have wanted Civica to watch over Lucius, the job Libo had failed at. Marcus may have planned to accompany them all the way to Smyrna (the biographer says he told the senate he would), but this did not happen. He only accompanied the group as far as Brundisium, where they boarded a ship for the east. He returned to Rome immediately thereafter, and sent out special instructions to his proconsuls not to give the group any official reception. The Armenian capital Artaxata was captured in 163. At the end of the year, Lucius took the title Armeniacus, despite having never seen combat; Marcus declined to accept the title until the following year. When Lucius was hailed as imperator again, however, Marcus did not hesitate to take the Imperator II with him. Occupied Armenia was reconstructed on Roman terms. In 164, a new capital, Kaine Polis ('New City'), replaced Artaxata. A new king was installed: a Roman senator of consular rank and Arsacid descent, Gaius Julius Sohaemus. He may not even have been crowned in Armenia; the ceremony may have taken place in Antioch, or even Ephesus. Sohaemus was hailed on the imperial coinage of 164 under the legend : Lucius sat on a throne with his staff while Sohaemus stood before him, saluting the emperor. In 163, the Parthians intervened in Osroene, a Roman client in upper Mesopotamia centred on Edessa, and installed their own king on its throne. In response, Roman forces were moved downstream, to cross the Euphrates at a more southerly point. Before the end of 163, however, Roman forces had moved north to occupy Dausara and Nicephorium on the northern, Parthian bank. Soon after the conquest of the north bank of the Euphrates, other Roman forces moved on Osroene from Armenia, taking Anthemusia, a town southwest of Edessa. In 165, Roman forces moved on Mesopotamia. Edessa was re-occupied, and Mannus, the king deposed by the Parthians, was re-installed. The Parthians retreated to Nisibis, but this too was besieged and captured. The Parthian army dispersed in the Tigris. A second force, under Avidius Cassius and the III Gallica, moved down the Euphrates, and fought a major battle at Dura. By the end of the year, Cassius's army had reached the twin metropolises of Mesopotamia: Seleucia on the right bank of the Tigris and Ctesiphon on the left. Ctesiphon was taken and its royal palace set to flame. The citizens of Seleucia, still largely Greek (the city had been commissioned and settled as a capital of the Seleucid Empire, one of Alexander the Great's successor kingdoms), opened its gates to the invaders. The city was sacked nonetheless, leaving a black mark on Lucius's reputation. Excuses were sought, or invented: the official version had it that the Seleucids broke faith first. Cassius's army, although suffering from a shortage of supplies and the effects of a plague contracted in Seleucia, made it back to Roman territory safely. Lucius took the title Parthicus Maximus, and he and Marcus were hailed as imperatores again, earning the title 'imp. III'. Cassius's army returned to the field in 166, crossing over the Tigris into Media. Lucius took the title 'Medicus', and the emperors were again hailed as imperatores, becoming 'imp. IV' in imperial titulature. Marcus took the Parthicus Maximus now, after another tactful delay. On 12 October of that year, Marcus proclaimed two of his sons, Annius and Commodus, as his heirs. War with Germanic tribes (166–180) During the early 160s, Fronto's son-in-law Victorinus was stationed as a legate in Germany. He was there with his wife and children (another child had stayed with Fronto and his wife in Rome). The condition on the northern frontier looked grave. A frontier post had been destroyed, and it looked like all the peoples of central and northern Europe were in turmoil. There was corruption among the officers: Victorinus had to ask for the resignation of a legionary legate who was taking bribes. Experienced governors had been replaced by friends and relatives of the imperial family. Lucius Dasumius Tullius Tuscus, a distant relative of Hadrian, was in Upper Pannonia, succeeding the experienced Marcus Nonius Macrinus. Lower Pannonia was under the obscure Tiberius Haterius Saturnius. Marcus Servilius Fabianus Maximus was shuffled from Lower Moesia to Upper Moesia when Marcus Iallius Bassus had joined Lucius in Antioch. Lower Moesia was filled by Pontius Laelianus's son. The Dacias were still divided in three, governed by a praetorian senator and two procurators. The peace could not hold long; Lower Pannonia did not even have a legion. Starting in the 160s, Germanic tribes, and other nomadic people launched raids along the northern border, particularly into Gaul and across the Danube. This new impetus westwards was probably due to attacks from tribes further east. A first invasion by the Chatti in the province of Germania Superior was repulsed in 162. Far more dangerous was the invasion of 166, when the Marcomanni of Bohemia, clients of the Roman Empire since AD 19, crossed the Danube together with the Lombards and other Germanic tribes. Soon thereafter, the Iranian Sarmatian Iazyges attacked between the Danube and the Theiss rivers. The Costoboci, coming from the Carpathian area, invaded Moesia, Macedonia, and Greece. After a long struggle, Marcus managed to push back the invaders. Numerous members of Germanic tribes settled in frontier regions like Dacia, Pannonia, Germany, and Italy itself. This was not a new thing, but this time the numbers of settlers required the creation of two new frontier provinces on the left shore of the Danube, Sarmatia and Marcomannia, including today's Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary. Some Germanic tribes who settled in Ravenna revolted and managed to seize possession of the city. For this reason, Marcus decided not only against bringing more barbarians into Italy, but even banished those who had previously been brought there. Legal and administrative work Like many emperors, Marcus spent most of his time addressing matters of law such as petitions and hearing disputes, but unlike many of his predecessors, he was already proficient in imperial administration when he assumed power. He took great care in the theory and practice of legislation. Professional jurists called him 'an emperor most skilled in the law' and 'a most prudent and conscientiously just emperor'. He showed marked interest in three areas of the law: the manumission of slaves, the guardianship of orphans and minors, and the choice of city councillors (decuriones). Marcus showed a great deal of respect to the Roman Senate and routinely asked them for permission to spend money even though he did not need to do so as the absolute ruler of the Empire. In one speech, Marcus himself reminded the Senate that the imperial palace where he lived was not truly his possession but theirs. In 168, he revalued the denarius, increasing the silver purity from 79% to 82% – the actual silver weight increasing from . However, two years later he reverted to the previous values because of the military crises facing the empire. Trade with Han China and outbreak of plague A possible contact with Han China occurred in 166 when a Roman traveller visited the Han court, claiming to be an ambassador representing a certain Andun (Chinese: 安 敦), ruler of Daqin, who can be identified either with Marcus or his predecessor Antoninus. In addition to Republican-era Roman glasswares found at Guangzhou along the South China Sea, Roman golden medallions made during the reign of Antoninus and perhaps even Marcus have been found at Óc Eo, Vietnam, then part of the Kingdom of Funan near the Chinese province of Jiaozhi (in northern Vietnam). This may have been the port city of Kattigara, described by Ptolemy (c. 150) as being visited by a Greek sailor named Alexander and lying beyond the Golden Chersonese (i.e. Malay Peninsula). Roman coins from the reigns of Tiberius to Aurelian have been found in Xi'an, China (site of the Han capital Chang'an), although the far greater amount of Roman coins in India suggests the Roman maritime trade for purchasing Chinese silk was centred there, not in China or even the overland Silk Road running through Persia. The Antonine Plague started in Mesopotamia in 165 or 166 at the end of Lucius's campaign against the Parthians. It may have continued into the reign of Commodus. Galen, who was in Rome when the plague spread to the city in 166, mentioned that 'fever, diarrhoea, and inflammation of the pharynx, along with dry or pustular eruptions of the skin after nine days' were among the symptoms. It is believed that the plague was smallpox. In the view of historian Rafe de Crespigny, the plagues afflicting the Eastern Han empire of China during the reigns of Emperor Huan of Han (r. 146–168) and Emperor Ling of Han (r. 168–189), which struck in 151, 161, 171, 173, 179, 182, and 185, were perhaps connected to the plague in Rome. Raoul McLaughlin writes that the travel of Roman subjects to the Han Chinese court in 166 may have started a new era of Roman–Far East trade. However, it was also a 'harbinger of something much more ominous'. According to McLaughlin, the disease caused 'irreparable' damage to the Roman maritime trade in the Indian Ocean as proven by the archaeological record spanning from Egypt to India, as well as significantly decreased Roman commercial activity in Southeast Asia. Death and succession (180) Marcus died at the age of 58 on 17 March 180 of unknown causes in his military quarters near the city of Sirmium in Pannonia (modern Sremska Mitrovica). He was immediately deified and his ashes were returned to Rome, where they rested in Hadrian's mausoleum (modern Castel Sant'Angelo) until the Visigoth sack of the city in 410. His campaigns against Germans and Sarmatians were also commemorated by a column and a temple built in Rome. Some scholars consider his death to be the end of the Pax Romana. Marcus was succeeded by his son Commodus, whom he had named Caesar in 166 and with whom he had jointly ruled since 177. Biological sons of the emperor, if there were any, were considered heirs; however, it was only the second time that a "non-adoptive" son had succeeded his father, the only other having been a century earlier when Vespasian was succeeded by his son Titus. Historians have criticized the succession to Commodus, citing Commodus's erratic behaviour and lack of political and military acumen. At the end of his history of Marcus's reign, Cassius Dio wrote an encomium to the emperor, and described the transition to Commodus in his own lifetime with sorrow: [Marcus] did not meet with the good fortune that he deserved, for he was not strong in body and was involved in a multitude of troubles throughout practically his entire reign. But for my part, I admire him all the more for this very reason, that amid unusual and extraordinary difficulties he both survived himself and preserved the empire. Just one thing prevented him from being completely happy, namely, that after rearing and educating his son in the best possible way he was vastly disappointed in him. This matter must be our next topic; for our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust, as affairs did for the Romans of that day. –Dio lxxi. 36.3–4 Dio adds that from Marcus's first days as counsellor to Antoninus to his final days as emperor of Rome, "he remained the same [person] and did not change in the least." Michael Grant, in The Climax of Rome, writes of Commodus: The youth turned out to be very erratic, or at least so anti-traditional that disaster was inevitable. But whether or not Marcus ought to have known this to be so, the rejections of his son's claims in favour of someone else would almost certainly have involved one of the civil wars which were to proliferate so disastrously around future successions. Attitude towards Christians In the first two centuries of the Christian era, it was local Roman officials who were largely responsible for the persecution of Christians. In the second century, the emperors treated Christianity as a local problem to be dealt with by their subordinates. The number and severity of persecutions of Christians in various locations of the empire seemingly increased during the reign of Marcus. The extent to which Marcus himself directed, encouraged, or was aware of these persecutions is unclear and much debated by historians. The early Christian apologist, Justin Martyr, includes within his First Apology (written between AD 140 and 150) a letter from Marcus Aurelius to the Roman senate (prior to his reign) describing a battlefield incident in which Marcus believed Christian prayer had saved his army from thirst when "water poured from heaven," after which, "immediately we recognized the presence of God." Marcus goes on to request the senate desist from earlier courses of Christian persecution by Rome. However, this letter was one of three from Roman emperors included by Martyr, two of which (including the Aurelius letter) are regarded as spurious. Marriage and children Marcus and his cousin-wife Faustina had at least 14 children during their 30-year marriage, including two sets of twins. One son and four daughters outlived their father. Their children included: Domitia Faustina (147–151) Titus Aelius Antoninus (149) Titus Aelius Aurelius (149) Annia Aurelia Galeria Lucilla (150–182), married her father's co-ruler Lucius Verus, then Tiberius Claudius Pompeianus, had issue from both marriages Annia Galeria Aurelia Faustina (born 151), married Gnaeus Claudius Severus, had a son Tiberius Aelius Antoninus (born 152, died before 156) Unknown child (died before 158) Annia Aurelia Fadilla (born 159), married Marcus Peducaeus Plautius Quintillus, had issue Annia Cornificia Faustina Minor (born 160), married Marcus Petronius Sura Mamertinus, had a son Titus Aurelius Fulvus Antoninus (161–165), elder twin brother of Commodus Lucius Aurelius Commodus Antoninus (Commodus) (161–192), twin brother of Titus Aurelius Fulvus Antoninus, later emperor, married Bruttia Crispina, no issue Marcus Annius Verus Caesar (162–169) Hadrianus Vibia Aurelia Sabina (170– died before 217), married Lucius Antistius Burrus, no issue Writings While on campaign between 170 and 180, Marcus wrote his Meditations in Greek as a source for his own guidance and self-improvement. The original title of this work, if it had one, is unknown. 'Meditations' – as well as other titles including 'To Himself' – were adopted later. He had a logical mind, and his notes were representative of Stoic philosophy and spirituality. Meditations is still revered as a literary monument to a government of service and duty. According to Hays, the book was a favourite of Christina of Sweden, Frederick the Great, John Stuart Mill, Matthew Arnold, and Goethe, and is admired by modern figures such as Wen Jiabao and Bill Clinton. It has been considered by many commentators to be one of the greatest works of philosophy. It is not known how widely Marcus's writings were circulated after his death. There are stray references in the ancient literature to the popularity of his precepts, and Julian the Apostate was well aware of his reputation as a philosopher, though he does not specifically mention Meditations. It survived in the scholarly traditions of the Eastern Church, and the first surviving quotes of the book, as well as the first known reference of it by name ('Marcus's writings to himself') are from Arethas of Caesarea in the 10th century and in the Byzantine Suda (perhaps inserted by Arethas himself). It was first published in 1558 in Zurich by Wilhelm Xylander (né Holzmann), from a manuscript reportedly lost shortly afterwards. The oldest surviving complete manuscript copy is in the Vatican library and dates to the 14th century. Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius The Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius in Rome is the only Roman equestrian statue which has survived into the modern period. This may be due to it being wrongly identified during the Middle Ages as a depiction of the Christian emperor Constantine the Great, and spared the destruction which statues of pagan figures suffered. Crafted of bronze in circa 175, it stands and is now located in the Capitoline Museums of Rome. The emperor's hand is outstretched in an act of clemency offered to a bested enemy, while his weary facial expression due to the stress of leading Rome into nearly constant battles perhaps represents a break with the classical tradition of sculpture. Column of Marcus Aurelius Marcus's victory column, established in Rome either in his last few years of life or after his reign and completed in 193, was built to commemorate his victory over the Sarmatians and Germanic tribes in 176. A spiral of carved reliefs wraps around the column, showing scenes from his military campaigns. A statue of Marcus had stood atop the column but disappeared during the Middle Ages. It was replaced with a statue of Saint Paul in 1589 by Pope Sixtus V. The column of Marcus and the column of Trajan are often compared by scholars given how they are both Doric in style, had a pedestal at the base, had sculpted friezes depicting their respective military victories, and a statue on top. Legacy and reputation Marcus acquired the reputation of a philosopher king within his lifetime, and the title would remain after his death; both Dio and the biographer call him 'the philosopher'. Christians such as Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, and Eusebius also gave him the title. The latter went so far as to call him "more philanthropic and philosophic" than Antoninus and Hadrian, and set him against the persecuting emperors Domitian and Nero to make the contrast bolder. The historian Herodian wrote:Alone of the emperors, he gave proof of his learning not by mere words or knowledge of philosophical doctrines but by his blameless character and temperate way of life. Iain King explains that Marcus's legacy was tragic: [The emperor's] Stoic philosophy – which is about self-restraint, duty, and respect for others – was so abjectly abandoned by the imperial line he anointed on his death. In popular culture In the 1965 epic drama The Fall of The Roman Empire, Alec Guinness portrays Marcus Aurelius. The film is noteworthy for using quotes from 'Meditations'. In the 1991 film The Silence of the Lambs, Marcus Aurelius is mentioned in a note by Hannibal Lecter written on the Buffalo Bill case file he had given back to Clarice Starling as having posed the question, and what was written stated : " First principles, Clarice. Simplicity. Read Marcus Aurelius. Of each particular thing ask: what is it in itself? What is its nature? What does he do, this man you seek?". In the 2000 film Gladiator, Richard Harris portrays Marcus Aurelius in a fictionalized version. In the 2017 docu-drama miniseries Roman Empire, John Bach portrays Marcus Aurelius. See also List of Roman emperors Notes Citations All citations to the Historia Augusta are to individual biographies, and are marked with a HA. Citations to the works of Fronto are cross-referenced to C.R. Haines's Loeb edition. Bibliography Ancient Aristides, Aelius. Orationes (in Latin). Trapp, Michael B. Orations. 1: Orationes 1–2. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2017. . Victor, Aurelius. De Caesaribus (in Latin). Bird, H.W. De Caesaribus. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1994. . Dio, Cassius. Roman History (in Greek). Cary, Earnest, trans. Roman History. 9 vols. Loeb ed. London: Heinemann, 1914–27. . Online at LacusCurtius. Digest (in Latin). Scott, S.P., trans. The Digest or Pandects in The Civil Law. 17 vols. Cincinnati: Central Trust Company, 1932. . Online at the Constitution Society. Epiphanius of Salamis. On Weights and Measures (in Latin). Dean, James Elmer, ed. Epiphanius' Treatise on Weights and Measures – The Syriac Version. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1935. . Fronto, Marcus Cornelius. The Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto: With Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Lucius Verus, Antoninus Pius, and Various Friends (in Latin). Haines, Charles Reginald, trans. The Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto: With Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Lucius Verus, Antoninus Pius, and Various Friends. 2 vols. Loeb ed. London: Heinemann, 1920. . Online at the Internet Archive: Vol. 1, 2. Gellius, Aulus. Noctes Atticae (Attic Nights). Rolfe, J.C., trans. The Attic nights of Aulus Gellius. 3 vols. Loeb ed. London: Heinemann, 1927–28. (Vol. 1), (Vol. 2), (Vol. 3). Vols. 1 and 2 online at LacusCurtius. Herodian. Ab Excessu Divi Marci (History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius, in Latin). Echols, Edward C., trans. Herodian of Antioch's History of the Roman empire: From the death of Marcus Aurelius to the accession of Gordian III. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1961. . Online at Tertullian and Livius. Lucian. Fowler, F.G.; Fowler, H.W., trans. The works of Lucian of Samosata. Oxford: Clarendon P., 1949. . Alexander (in Latin). Translation online at Tertullian. Translations (from Latin) of Historia Quomodo Conscribenda (The Way to Write History), Imagines (A Portrait–Study), and Pro Imaginibus (Defence of the 'Portrait–Study) online at Sacred Texts, based on the Gutenberg e-text. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. Meditations. Farquharson, A.S.L., trans. Meditations. New York: Knopf, 1946, rept. 1992. . Scriptores Historiae Augustae (Authors of the Historia Augusta). Historia Augusta (Augustan History). Magie, David, trans. Historia Augusta. 3 vols. Loeb ed. London: Heinemann, 1921–32. Online at LacusCurtius. Magie, David; Birley, Anthony R. Lives of the later Caesars. London: The Folio Society, 2005. . Themistius. Orationes (in Latin). Penella, Robert J. The private orations of Themistius. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. . Modern Ackermann, Marsha E.; Schroeder, Michael J.; Terry, Jancie J.; Lo Upshur, Jiu-Hwa; Whitters, Mark F. Encyclopedia of World History, Ackerman-Schroeder-Terry-Hwa Lo, 2008: Encyclopedia of World History. New York: Facts on File, 2008. . Adams, Geoff W. Marcus Aurelius in the Historia Augusta and Beyond. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2013. . An, Jiayao. 'When Glass Was Treasured in China'. Annette L. Juliano and Judith A. Lerner (eds), Nomads, Traders, and Holy Men Along China's Silk Road, 79–94. Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2002. . Astarita, Maria L. Avidio Cassio (in Italian). Rome: Edizione di Storia e Letteratura, 1983. . Ball, Warwick. Rome in the East: The Transformation of an Empire, 2nd edition. London: Routledge, 2016. . Barnes, Timothy D. 'Hadrian and Lucius Verus'. Journal of Roman Studies 57:1–2 (1967): 65–79. . . Barnes, Timothy D. 'Legislation against the Christians'. Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 58 (1968): 32–50. . . Barnes, Timothy D. 'Some Persons in the Historia Augusta', Phoenix 26:2 (1972): 140–82. . . Birley, Anthony R. Marcus Aurelius: a biography. London: Routledge, 1966, rev. 1987. . Birley, Anthony R. 'Hadrian to the Antonines'. In The Cambridge Ancient History Volume 11, The High Empire, AD 70–192, edited by Alan Bowman, Peter Garnsey, and Dominic Rathbone, 132–94. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. . Bowman, John L. A Reference Guide to Stoicism. Bloomington, IN: Author House, 2014. . Bury, John Bagnell. The Student's Roman Empire: A History of the Roman Empire from Its Foundation to the Death of Marcus Aurelius (27 B.C.–180 A.D.). New York: Harper, 1893. . Champlin, Edward. 'The Chronology of Fronto'. Journal of Roman Studies 64 (1974): 136–59. . . Champlin, Edward. Fronto and Antonine Rome. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1980. . Collins, Desmond. Background to Archaeology: Britain in its European Setting. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Archive, 1973. . De Crespigny, Rafe. A Biographical Dictionary of Later Han to the Three Kingdoms (23–220 AD). Boston: Brill, 2007. . Duncan-Jones, Richard. Structure and Scale in the Roman Economy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. . 'Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius'. Musei Capitolini. Gagarin, Michael. The Oxford encyclopedia of ancient Greece and Rome. Volume 7, Temples – Zoology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. . Giacosa, Giorgio. Women of the Caesars: their lives and portraits on coins. Translated from Italian by R. Ross Holloway. Milan: Edizioni Arte e Moneta, 1977. . Gilliam, J. F. 'The Plague under Marcus Aurelius'. American Journal of Philology 82.3 (1961): 225–51. . . Gnecchi, Francesco. I medaglioni Romani, 3 Vols, Milan, 1912. . Grant, Michael. The Antonines: the Roman Empire in transition. London: Routledge, 2016. . Grant, Michael. The Climax Of Rome. London: Orion, 2011. . Haas, Charles. The Antonine plague (in French). Bulletin de l'Académie Nationale de Médecine. Académie nationale de médecine. 190 (2006): 1093–98. . Hadot, Pierre. The inner citadel: the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998. . Hays, Gregory. Meditations. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2003. . Irvine, William B. A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy. Oxford University Press, 2009. . Kemezis, Adam M. Greek Narratives of the Roman Empire under the Severans: Cassius Dio, Philostratus and Herodian. Cambridge University Press, 2014. . Kleiner, Fred S. Gardner's art through the ages. Volume II: the western perspective. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning, 2008. . Le Bohec, Yann. The Imperial Roman Army. Routledge, 2013. . Levick, Barbara M. Faustina I and II: Imperial Women of the Golden Age. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. . Magill, Frank N. Dictionary of World Biography. London: Routledge, 2003. . Mattingly, Harold; Sydenham, Edward A. The Roman imperial coinage. Vol. III, Antoninus Pius to Commodus. London: Spink & Son, 1930. . Mellor, Ronald, review of Edward Champlin's Fronto and Antonine Rome, American Journal of Philology 103:4 (1982). Merrony, Mark. The Plight of Rome in the Fifth Century AD. London: Routledge, 2017. . McLaughlin, Raoul. Rome and the Distant East: Trade Routes to the Ancient Lands of Arabia, India, and China. London & New York: Continuum, 2010. . McLynn, Frank. Marcus Aurelius: A Life. New York: Da Capo Press, 2009. . McLynn, Frank. Marcus Aurelius: Warrior, Philosopher, Emperor. London: Bodley Head, 2009. . Millar, Fergus. The Roman Near East, 31 B.C.–A.D. 337. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993. . Pulleyblank, Edwin G.; Leslie, D. D.; Gardiner, K. H. J. 'The Roman Empire as Known to Han China'. Journal of the American Oriental Society, 1999. 119 (1). . . Reed, J. Eugene. The Lives of the Roman Emperors and Their Associates from Julius Cæsar (B.C. 100) to Agustulus (A.D. 476). Philadelphia, PA: Gebbie & Company, 1883. Robertson, D. How to Think Like a Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius . New York: St. Martin's Press, 2019. Rohrbacher, David. The Play of Allusion in the Historia Augusta. Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press, 2016. . Sánchez, Jorge Pisa. Breve historia de Hispania: La fascinante historia de Hispania, desde Viriato hasta el esplendor con los emperadores Trajano y Adriano. Los protagonistas, la cultura, la religión y el desarrollo económico y social de una de las provincias más ricas del Imperio romano [Brief history of Hispania: the fascinating history of Hispania, from Viriato to the splendor with the Emperors Trajan and Hadrian. The protagonists, culture, religion, and the economic and social development of one of the richest provinces of the Roman Empire]. (in Spanish) Ediciones Nowtilus S.L., 2010. . Stephens, William O. Marcus Aurelius: A Guide for the Perplexed. London: Continuum, 2012. . Stertz, Stephen A. 'Marcus Aurelius as Ideal Emperor in Late-Antique Greek Thought'. The Classical World 70:7 (1977): 433–39. . . Syme, Ronald. 'The Ummidii'. Historia 17:1 (1968): 72–105. . Van Ackeren, Marcel. A Companion to Marcus Aurelius. New York: Malden, MA : Wiley-Blackwell, 2012. . . Young, Gary K. Rome's Eastern Trade: International Commerce and Imperial Policy 31 BC – AD 305. London: Routledge, 2003. . Yü, Ying-shih. 'Han Foreign Relations', in Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe (eds), The Cambridge History of China: Volume 1, The Ch'in and Han Empires, 221 BC–AD 220, 377–462. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. . External links Marcus Aurelius at the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy 121 births 180 deaths 2nd-century philosophers 2nd-century Roman emperors Aelii Ancient Roman adoptees Annii Augurs of the Roman Empire Marcus Burials at the Castel Sant'Angelo Cultural critics Deified Roman emperors Glycon cult Hellenistic writers Imperial Roman consuls Moneyers of ancient Rome Moral philosophers Nerva–Antonine dynasty Philosophers of ethics and morality Philosophers of law Philosophers of mind Philosophers of Roman Italy Philosophy writers Political philosophers Roman philhellenes Ancient Roman philosophers Roman-era Stoic philosophers Social critics Social philosophers Stoic philosophers Stoicism Greek-language writers Roman pharaohs

20158

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria%20Eleonora%20of%20Brandenburg

Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg

Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg (11 November 1599 – 28 March 1655) was a German princess and Queen of Sweden as the consort of King Gustav II Adolph (Gustavus Adolphus). She was a daughter of John Sigismund, Elector of Brandenburg, and Anna, Duchess of Prussia, daughter of Albert Frederick, Duke of Prussia. In 1620, Maria Eleonora married Gustavus Adolphus with her mother's consent, but against the will of her brother George William, Elector of Brandenburg, who had just succeeded her father. She bore her husband a daughter, Christina in 1626. Engagement In 1616, the 22-year-old Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden started looking for a Protestant bride. He had since 1613 tried to get his mother's permission to marry the noblewoman Ebba Brahe, but this was not allowed, and he had to give up his wishes to marry her, though he continued to be in love with her. He received reports with the most flattering descriptions of the physical and mental qualities of the beautiful 17-year-old princess Maria Eleonora. Elector John Sigismund was favorably inclined towards the Swedish king, but he had become very infirm after an apoplectic stroke in the autumn of 1617. His determined Prussian wife showed a strong dislike for this Swedish suitor, because Prussia was a Polish fief and the Polish King Sigismund III Vasa still resented his loss of Sweden to Gustavus Adolphus' father Charles IX. Maria Eleonora had additional suitors in the young William of Orange (?), Wladislaw Vasa of Poland, Adolf Friedrich of Mecklenburg and even the future Charles I of England. Maria Eleonora's brother George William was flattered by the offer of the British Crown Prince and proposed their younger sister Catherine (1602–1644) as a more suitable wife for the Swedish king. Maria Eleonora, however, seems to have had a preference for Gustavus Adolphus. For him it was a matter of honour to acquire the hand of Maria Eleonora and none other. He had the rooms of his castle in Stockholm redecorated and started making preparations to leave for Berlin to press his suit in person, when a letter arrived from Maria Eleonora's mother to his mother. The Electress demanded in no uncertain terms that the Queen Dowager should prevent her son's journey, as "being prejudicial to Brandenburg's interests in view of the state of war existing between Sweden and Poland". Her husband, she wrote, was "so enfeebled in will by illness that he could be persuaded to agree to anything, even if it tended to the destruction of the country". It was a rebuff that verged on an insult. Marriage and children The Elector John Sigismund, Maria Eleonora's father, died on 23 December 1619, and the prospect of a Swedish marriage seemed gone with him. In the spring of 1620, however, stubborn Gustavus Adolphus arrived in Berlin. The Electress Dowager maintained an attitude of reserve and even refused to grant the Swedish king a personal meeting with Maria Eleonora. All those who were present, however, noticed the princess's interest in the young king. Afterwards, Gustavus Adolphus made a round of other Protestant German courts with the professed intention of inspecting a few matrimonial alternatives. On his return to Berlin, the Electress Dowager seems to have become completely captivated by the charming Swedish king. After plighting his troth to Maria Eleonora, Gustavus Adolphus hurried back to Sweden to make arrangements for the reception of his bride. The new Elector, George William, who resided in Prussia, was appalled when he heard of his mother's independent action. He wrote to Gustavus Adolphus to refuse his consent to the marriage until Sweden and Poland had settled their differences. It was the Electress Dowager, however, who, in accordance with Hohenzollern family custom, had the last word in bestowing her daughter's hand in marriage. She sent Maria Eleonora to territory outside of George William's reach and concluded the marriage negotiations herself. Anna of Prussia provided herself with a selection of objects of value from the exchequer before she joined Maria Eleonora in Brunswick. A detachment of the Swedish fleet took the women over to Kalmar, where Gustavus Adolphus was impatiently awaiting them. The wedding took place in Stockholm on 25 November 1620. A comedy was performed based on the history of Olof Skötkonung. Gustavus Adolphus - in his own words - finally "had a Brandenburg lady in his marriage bed". Anna of Prussia actually stayed with her daughter in Sweden for several years after the marriage. Gustavus Adolphus shared Maria Eleonora's interest in architecture and her love of music, while she was sentimentally devoted to her husband. Often, she lamented that she never had her hero for herself. Foreign ambassadors found her gracious and beautiful and she had good taste, although her character showed some extravagant traits. Maria Eleonora had a definite liking for entertainment and sweetmeats, and she soon succumbed to the current fashionable craze for buffoons and dwarfs. She spoke French, the court language of the age, but never bothered to learn to write German or Swedish correctly. Within six months of their marriage, Gustavus Adolphus left to command the siege of Riga, leaving Maria Eleonora in the early stages of her first pregnancy. She lived exclusively in the company of her German ladies-in-waiting and had difficulty in adapting herself to the Swedish people, countryside and climate. She disliked the bad roads, sombre forests and wooded houses, roofed with turf. She also pined for her husband. A year after their wedding she had a miscarriage and became seriously ill. She was tempestuous, excessive, neurotic and jealous. She was often given to harsh language, and she did not spare her husband, even when strangers were present. Her emotional life lacked balance, and everything Maria Eleonora undertook on her own initiative needed careful watching. Soon Gustavus Adolphus' intimates knew that his married life was a source of grief and anxiety. In the autumn of 1623 Maria Eleonora gave birth to a daughter, but the baby died the next year. At that time, the only surviving male heirs were the hated king of Poland and his sons. With Gustavus Adolphus risking his life in battles, an heir to the throne was anxiously awaited. In the autumn Maria Eleonora was pregnant for a third time. In May 1625 she was in good spirits and insisted on accompanying her husband on the royal yacht to review the fleet. There seemed to be no danger, as the warships were moored just opposite the castle, but a sudden storm nearly capsized the yacht. The queen was hurried back to the castle, but when she got there she was heard to exclaim: "Jesus, I cannot feel my child!" Shortly afterwards the longed-for son was stillborn. Birth of Christina With the renewal of the war with Poland, Gustavus Adolphus had to leave his wife again. It is likely that she gave way to depression and grief, as we know she did in 1627, and it is probably for this reason that the king let his queen join him in Livonia after the Poles had been defeated in January 1626. By April, Maria Eleonora found she was again pregnant. No risks were taken this time and the astrologers predicted the birth of a son and heir. During a lull in the warfare, Gustavus Adolphus hurried back to Stockholm to await the arrival of the baby. The birth was a difficult one. On 7 December, a baby was born with a fleece (lanugo), which enveloped it from its head to its knees, leaving only its face, arms and lower part of its legs free. Moreover, it had a large nose and was covered with hair. Thus, it was assumed the baby was a boy, and so the King was told. Closer inspection, however, determined that the baby was a girl. Gustavus Adolphus' half-sister Catherine informed him that the child was a girl. She "carried the baby in her arms to the king in a condition for him to see and to know and realise for himself what she dared not tell him". Gustavus Adolphus remarked: "She is going to be clever, for she has taken us all in." His disappointment did not last long, and he decided that she would be called Christina after his mother. He gave orders for the birth to be announced with all the solemnity usually accorded to the arrival of a male heir. This seems to indicate that Gustavus Adolphus, at the age of 33, had little hope of having other children. Maria Eleonora's state of health seems to be the most likely explanation for this. Her later portraits and actions, however, do not indicate that she was physically fragile. Shortly after the birth, Maria Eleonora was in no condition to be told the truth about the baby's sex, and the king and court waited several days before breaking the news to her. She screamed: "Instead of a son, I am given a daughter, dark and ugly, with a great nose and black eyes. Take her from me, I will not have such a monster!" She may have suffered from a post-natal depression. In her agitated state, the queen tried to injure the child. In Christina's early childhood, she repeatedly met with accidents. Once a beam fell mysteriously upon the cradle. Another time, she fell from a flight of stairs, apparently by accident. On another occasion the nursemaid was blamed for dropping the baby onto a stone floor, injuring a shoulder that ever afterwards remained a little crooked. In the year after Christina's birth, Maria Eleonora was described as being in a state of hysteria owing to her husband's absences. In 1632 Gustavus Adolphus described his wife as being "a very sick woman". There was some excuse for her; she had lost three babies and still felt herself an isolated foreigner in a hostile land, even more so after 1627 when her brother joined Sweden's enemies. Meanwhile, her husband's life was constantly in danger when he was on campaign. In 1627 Gustavus Adolphus was both ill and wounded. Two years later he had a narrow escape at Stuhm. Gustavus Adolphus was devoted to his daughter and tried to raise Christina like a boy. At the age of two, she clapped her hands and laughed with joy when the great cannons of Kalmar Castle boomed out the royal salute. Afterwards, Gustavus Adolphus often took his daughter with him to military reviews. Maria Eleonora showed little affection for her daughter and was not allowed any influence in Christina's upbringing. The princess was placed in the care of Gustavus Adolphus' half-sister Catherine and the Chancellor Axel Oxenstierna. In 1630 Gustavus Adolphus concluded that Habsburg designs for Baltic supremacy threatened Sweden's very existence and also its religious freedom. Before he left to join the Thirty Years War, he discussed a possible regency with members of the government and admitted to them that his wife was "a miserable woman". Even so, Gustavus Adolphus could not bring himself to nominate a regency council in which her name did not appear. To Axel Oxenstierna, he confessed: "If anything happens to me, my family will merit your pity [..], the mother lacking in common sense, the daughter a minor - hopeless, if they rule, and dangerous, if others come to rule over them." Issue Widowhood During the next two years Gustavus Adolphus marched across a devastated Germany, conquering Pomerania and Mecklenburg. In early November 1632 he went to Erfurt to say goodbye to Maria Eleonora, who had been in Germany since the previous winter. In the Battle of Lützen, the 37-year-old Gustavus Adolphus was shot in the back. He fell and was dragged for some distance by his horse. He managed to free himself from the stirrup, but while lying on the ground "The Lion of the North" was killed by another shot through his head. By nightfall both armies were exhausted, but Bernard of Saxe-Weimar and the Swedes had captured all the Imperial artillery and were in possession of the key position. The king's body was found lying face downwards in the mud, plundered of everything but his shirt. Maria Eleonora was not included in the regency government during the minority of her daughter, as the council of the state did not consider her suitable as regent. The king had never actually left any instructions that she should not be included in the case of a minor regency, but they supported their grounds for excluding her by the claim that the late king had said to them that she should never be entrusted with matters of state, though he never left any papers to confirm this. When she was informed that the regency government had been formed in May 1633 and that she had been excluded from it, Maria Eleonora was reportedly offended, and pointed out that her late mother-in-law, Christina of Holstein-Gottorp, had served as regent during the minority of her late spouse. In reply, however, the representative of the regency council, Gabriel Gustafsson Oxenstierna, responded that her information of the regency of queen dowager Christina was highly exaggerated, and that Sweden actually had no tradition to include queen dowagers in minor regencies. This was in fact a lie: not only had the queen dowager Christina in fact been regent, but king Gustav I of Sweden had proclaimed his queen Margaret Leijonhufvud regent in case of a minor regency in 1544, and John III of Sweden had provided for such a regency for both his first queen, Catherine Jagiellon, as well as for his second, Gunilla Bielke. Maria Eleonora, however, accepted the response, and declared that she would satisfied to entrust politics to others and to be in control of the custody of her daughter. In 1633 Maria Eleonora returned to Sweden with the embalmed body of her husband. In Nyköping, 7-year-old Queen Christina came in solemn procession to the ship to receive her mother. Later she wrote: "I embraced the queen my mother, she drowned me with her tears and practically smothered me in her arms." For more than a year Maria Eleonora condemned Christina to a mourning seclusion in rooms draped with black and lit by candles day and night, from which every ray of light was excluded. She made her daughter sleep with her in a bed over which her father's heart was hung in a golden casket. Things were made worse by Maria Eleonora's continual weeping. Christina, who also was somewhat malformed with one shoulder higher than the other, also detested her mother's dwarfs and buffoons. She became seriously ill; an ulcer appeared on her left breast, causing her terrible pain and a high fever until it burst. In the summer of 1634 the funeral procession finally wound its way to Stockholm. Queen Christina later wrote about her mother: "She carried out her role of mourning to perfection." Maria Eleonora had plunged into a prolonged period of emotional dysregulation due to grief. She found it more difficult than ever to conceal her dislike of Swedish "rocks and mountains, the freezing air, and all the rest of it". During the rest of her life she preserved the memory of her husband, weeping for hours and even days on end. When the regency council tried to separate Christina from her mother, Maria Eleonora wept and protested so bitterly that nothing was done. Relationship with Queen Christina In 1636 Maria Eleonora was taken to Gripsholm castle and officially lost her parental rights to her daughter, because at times she was completely out of her mind. In 1639 a letter written by her and intended for Sweden's archenemy, the King Christian IV of Denmark, was intercepted. After a summons, Maria Eleonora appeared at her daughter's court in a flood of tears in the summer of 1640. Queen Christina, 13 years old, reasoned with her mother and dissuaded her from taking up residence at Nyköping near Denmark. Afterwards, Maria Eleonora returned to Gripsholm. To undertake one of her periodic fasts, she retired to the seclusion of her own apartment, accompanied by only one of her ladies-in-waiting, Anna Sofia von Bülow. Maria Eleonora wrote regularly to her daughter Christina. She and her German court wanted to leave their exile at Gripsholm castle. Christina replied tactfully, knowing that the Council would not permit the queen mother any leave. Eventually her mother asked to leave Sweden altogether. Christina invited her to Stockholm, attempting to persuade her to stay in the country. At night the two ladies let themselves down from a window and were rowed in a boat to the other side of the nearby lake, where a carriage was waiting for them. They drove to Nyköping, where they boarded a Danish ship. King Christian IV had intended the ship to take her home to Brandenburg, but she convinced the captain to bring her to Denmark instead. She was well received by the Danish king, but Maria Eleonora wanted to go home to Brandenburg. The electoral prince there demanded financial compensation from Sweden, where on the contrary the Council expected to withdraw her appanage as well as her properties. Finally the teenage Christina succeeded in negotiating a certain alimony for her mother, adding to this from her own purse. In Denmark, Maria Eleonora became the guest of King Christian IV. The Elector George William refused to receive his sister in Brandenburg, so Maria Eleonora had to wait until his death in December that year before her nephew gave her permission to visit Brandenburg. Still, the new Elector insisted that Sweden should provide for his aunt's upkeep. She received a small pension of 30,000 écus a year. After a while Maria Eleonora surprisingly started to long for Sweden, and in 1648 she returned. Queen Christina went to meet her mother's ship. It was delayed by a storm and the young queen slept in the open for two nights and contracted a fever, which kept her in bed for some days. In October 1650 Maria Eleonora attended her daughter's postponed coronation ceremony. Christina then bought the newly erected castle Makalös ("Unequalled") for her, close to the royal castle in Stockholm. It would have been enormously expensive, but Christina never paid. Instead she handed it back in 1652. In June 1654, Christina shocked everyone when she decided to abdicate in favour of her cousin Charles Gustav. Maria Eleonora had grave doubts about her daughter's abdication and its possible effect upon her own finances. Christina and Charles Gustav visited her at Nyköping in April 1654 and promised the Queen Dowager that she would be provided for. Christina abdicated June 5, 1654. Maria Eleonora died in March 1655. At that time, ex-Queen Christina was living in Brussels; she converted to Catholicism in December 1655. Ancestry References Further reading External links Biography of Maria Eleonore of Brandenburg ThePeerage entry on Maria Eleonore |- 1599 births 1655 deaths Maria Eleanor House of Hohenzollern Burials at Riddarholmen Church

20161

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maze

Maze

A maze is a path or collection of paths, typically from an entrance to a goal. The word is used to refer both to branching tour puzzles through which the solver must find a route, and to simpler non-branching ("unicursal") patterns that lead unambiguously through a convoluted layout to a goal. (The term "labyrinth" is generally synonymous with "maze", but can also connote specifically a unicursal pattern.) The pathways and walls in a maze are typically fixed, but puzzles in which the walls and paths can change during the game are also categorised as mazes or tour puzzles. Construction Mazes have been built with walls and rooms, with hedges, turf, corn stalks, straw bales, books, paving stones of contrasting colors or designs, and brick, or in fields of crops such as corn or, indeed, maize. Maize mazes can be very large; they are usually only kept for one growing season, so they can be different every year, and are promoted as seasonal tourist attractions. Indoors, mirror mazes are another form of maze, in which many of the apparent pathways are imaginary routes seen through multiple reflections in mirrors. Another type of maze consists of a set of rooms linked by doors (so a passageway is just another room in this definition). Players enter at one spot, and exit at another, or the idea may be to reach a certain spot in the maze. Mazes can also be printed or drawn on paper to be followed by a pencil or fingertip. Mazes can be built with snow. Generation Maze generation is the act of designing the layout of passages and walls within a maze. There are many different approaches to generating mazes, with various maze generation algorithms for building them, either by hand or automatically by computer. There are two main mechanisms used to generate mazes. In "carving passages", one marks out the network of available routes. In building a maze by "adding walls", one lays out a set of obstructions within an open area. Most mazes drawn on paper are done by drawing the walls, with the spaces in between the markings composing the passages. Solution Maze solving is the act of finding a route through the maze from the start to finish. Some maze solving methods are designed to be used inside the maze by a traveler with no prior knowledge of the maze, whereas others are designed to be used by a person or computer program that can see the whole maze at once. The mathematician Leonhard Euler was one of the first to analyze plane mazes mathematically, and in doing so made the first significant contributions to the branch of mathematics known as topology. Mazes containing no loops are known as "standard", or "perfect" mazes, and are equivalent to a tree in graph theory. Thus many maze solving algorithms are closely related to graph theory. Intuitively, if one pulled and stretched out the paths in the maze in the proper way, the result could be made to resemble a tree. Psychology experiments Mazes are often used in psychology experiments to study spatial navigation and learning. Such experiments typically use rats or mice. Examples are: Barnes maze Morris water maze Oasis maze Radial arm maze Elevated plus maze T-maze Types Ball-in-a-maze puzzles Dexterity puzzles which involve navigating a ball through a maze or labyrinth. Block maze A maze in which the player must complete or clear the maze pathway by positioning blocks. Blocks may slide into place or be added. Fractal maze A maze containing holes inside which the maze is indefinitely repeated at a smaller scale. Hamilton maze A maze in which the goal is to find the unique Hamiltonian cycle. Linear or railroad maze A maze in which the paths are laid out like a railroad with switches and crossovers. Solvers are constrained to moving only forward. Often, a railroad maze will have a single track for entrance and exit. Logic mazes These are like standard mazes except they use rules other than "don't cross the lines" to restrict motion. Loops and traps maze A maze that features one-way doors. The doors can lead to the correct path or create traps that divert you from the correct path and lead you to the starting point. The player may not return through a door through which he has entered, so dead ends may be created. The path is a series of loops interrupted by doors. Through the use of reciprocal doors, (These are doors that open automatically on one side when you open them on the other side.) The correct path can intersect the incorrect path on a single plane. A graphical variant of this maze type is an arrow maze. Number maze A maze in which numbers are used to determine jumps that form a pathway, allowing the maze to criss-cross itself many times. Picture maze A standard maze that forms a picture when solved. Turf mazes and mizmazes A pattern like a long rope folded up, without any junctions or crossings. Gallery Publications Numerous mazes of different kinds have been drawn, painted, published in books and periodicals, used in advertising, in software, and sold as art. In the 1970s there occurred a publishing "maze craze" in which numerous books, and some magazines, were commercially available in nationwide outlets and devoted exclusively to mazes of a complexity that was able to challenge adults as well as children (for whom simple maze puzzles have long been provided both before, during, and since the 1970s "craze"). Some of the best-selling books in the 1970s and early 1980s included those produced by Vladimir Koziakin, Rick and Glory Brightfield, Dave Phillips, Larry Evans, and Greg Bright. Koziakin's works were predominantly of the standard two-dimensional "trace a line between the walls" variety. The works of the Brightfields had a similar two-dimensional form but used a variety of graphics-oriented "path obscuring" techniques. Although the routing was comparable to or simpler than Koziakin's mazes, the Brightfields' mazes did not allow the various pathway options to be discerned easily by the roving eye as it glanced about. Greg Bright's works went beyond the standard published forms of the time by including "weave" mazes in which illustrated pathways can cross over and under each other. Bright's works also offered examples of extremely complex patterns of routing and optical illusions for the solver to work through. What Bright termed "mutually accessible centers" (The Great Maze Book, 1973) also called "braid" mazes, allowed a proliferation of paths flowing in spiral patterns from a central nexus and, rather than relying on "dead ends" to hinder progress, instead relied on an overabundance of pathway choices. Rather than have a single solution to the maze, Bright's routing often offered multiple equally valid routes from start to finish, with no loss of complexity or diminishment of solver difficulties because the result was that it became difficult for a solver to definitively "rule out" a particular pathway as unproductive. Some of Bright's innovative mazes had no "dead ends", although some clearly had looping sections (or "islands") that would cause careless explorers to keep looping back again and again to pathways they had already travelled. The books of Larry Evans focused on 3-D structures, often with realistic perspective and architectural themes, and Bernard Myers (Supermazes No. 1) produced similar illustrations. Both Greg Bright (The Hole Maze Book) and Dave Phillips (The World's Most Difficult Maze) published maze books in which the sides of pages could be crossed over and in which holes could allow the pathways to cross from one page to another, and one side of a page to the other, thus enhancing the 3-D routing capacity of 2-D printed illustrations. Adrian Fisher is both the most prolific contemporary author on mazes, and also one of the leading maze designers. His book The Amazing Book of Mazes (2006) contains examples and photographs of numerous methods of maze construction, several of which have been pioneered by Fisher; The Art of the Maze (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1990) contains a substantial history of the subject, whilst Mazes and Labyrinths (Shire Publications, 2004) is a useful introduction to the subject. A recent book by Galen Wadzinski (The Ultimate Maze Book) offers formalized rules for more recent innovations that involve single-directional pathways, 3-D simulating illustrations, "key" and "ordered stop" mazes in which items must be collected or visited in particular orders to add to the difficulties of routing (such restrictions on pathway traveling and re-use are important in a printed book in which the limited amount of space on a printed page would otherwise place clear limits on the number of choices and pathways that can be contained within a single maze). Although these innovations are not all entirely new with Wadzinski, the book marks a significant advancement in published maze puzzles, offering expansions on the traditional puzzles that seem to have been fully informed by various video game innovations and designs, and adds new levels of challenge and complexity in both the design and the goals offered to the puzzle-solver in a printed format. Public attractions Asia Dubai Gardens Shopping Mall, Dubai (world's largest indoor maze) India Bhulbhulayia Japan Hikimi no Meiro, Kiso, Nagano, Japan Kyodai Meiro Palladium, Nikkō, Tochigi, Japan Sendai Hi-Land, Sendai, Miyagi, Japan Shirahama Energy Land, Shirahama, Wakayama, Japan Pacific New Zealand Amazing Maze n' Maize The Great Maze at Puzzling World Europe Austria Schönbrunn Palace, Vienna, has a large hedge maze in its gardens. Swarovski Crystal World, Wattens, Tyrol, has a hand-shaped hedge maze in its gardens. Belgium Loppem Castle maze Denmark Samsø Labyrinten (The world's largest permanent maze, 60.000 m2) Germany Hortus Vitalis – Der Irrgarten, Bad Salzuflen (hedge maze) Greece Labyrinth Park near Hersonissos, Crete (extends to approximately 1.300 m2) Italy Castello di Masino, Caravino 10010, Torino, Italia , Chiusi, Tuscany (see Pliny's Italian labyrinth) Villa Pisani, Stra, near Venice () The labyrinth of Franco Maria Ricci at Fontanellato () Netherlands Waterlabyrinth, Nijmegen, designed by Klaus van de Locht, 1981 () Doolhof Ruurlo, Ruurlo, designed by Daniel Marot, based on the design for Hampton Court Maze () Portugal Parque do Arnado, Ponte de Lima, District of Viana do Castelo Parque de São Roque, District of Porto Forest Reserve of Pinhal da Paz, São Miguel Island, Azores Spain Alcázar of Seville, Seville Corn Laberynth in the Camino de Santiago, León Parc del laberint d'Horta, Barcelona, () Parc de la Torreblanca, Esplugues de Llobregat () Parque de El Capricho, Madrid Laberinto de Villapresente, Cantabria. With 5,625qm, it is the largest maze in Spain. Parque de Tentegorra, Murcia Royal Palace of La Granja de San Ildefonso, Segovia () United Kingdom Blake House Craft Centre, Braintree, Essex, England (Open July–September) Carnfunnock Country Park, Northern Ireland. A hedge maze in the shape of Northern Ireland and winner of 1985 Design a Maze competition. Castlewellan, Northern Ireland, world's largest permanent hedge maze Chatsworth House garden maze, planted with 1,209 yews. Cliveden House Originally laid out in 1894, the maze was restored and re-opened to the public in 2011, consisting of 1100 Yew trees. Crystal Palace Park, South London. Laid out in the 1870s, this is the largest maze in London. Glendurgan Garden, Cornwall. A cherry laurel hedge maze created in 1833. Hampton Court Maze. A famous historic maze in the Palace gardens. Hever Castle Maze, Hever, Kent. Yew tree maze and a splashing water maze Hoo Hill Maze, Shefford, Bedfordshire, England Norwich Cathedral, Norfolk, England. A labyrinth in the Cloister Garth. Laid to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of HM Queen Elizabeth II in 2002. Richings Park Amazing Maize Maze, Richings Park, near Heathrow, England (Open July–September) Saffron Walden, an Essex town with its historic Bridge End Gardens hedge maze and the England's largest turf maze Saltwell Park, Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, England. A yew-tree maze restored to its original condition in 2005 and open to the public during park opening hours. Somerleyton Hall, Suffolk, England. A yew hedge maze designed and planted in 1846 by William Nesfield. Traquair House, Peeblesshire, Scotland. A beech tree hedge maze designed by John Schofield. York Maze. Located near RAF Elvington and constructed using maize (Dalek corn) plants, the maze was created to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who. North America Canada In 2012, the Kraay Family Farm in Alberta, Canada created the world's largest QR code in the form of a massive corn maze, popularly known as The Edmonton Corn Maze. United States The Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado, which inspired Stephen King's novel The Shining (1977) but did not sport a hedge maze (despite one's being famously depicted in the 1980 film adaption), in November 2014 publicized an international design competition requesting entrants to propose designs to plant a 10,100-square-foot hedge maze, using 1,600 to 2,000 Alpine Currant hedge bushes, on the hotel's front lawn. On 31 January, the judges selected Jesse Alfaro's Evans, Colorado construction company. Dole Pineapple Plantation, Oahu. Tanglewood Music Center Hedge Maze, Lenox and Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Mazes are a popular attraction at Renaissance Festivals across the United States. South Africa Chartwell Castle in Johannesburg claims to have the biggest known uninterrupted hedgerow maze in the Southern world, with over 900 conifers. It covers about 6000 sq.m. (approximately 1.5 acres), which is around 5 times bigger than The Hampton Court Maze. The center is about 12m × 12m. The maze was designed and laid out by Conrad Penny. South America Brazil Labirinto Verde, Nova Petrópolis, (Circular hedge maze built in 1989; Latitude 29°22'32.71"S Longitude 51°06'43.68"W) In popular culture Television Both Nubeluz and American Gladiators, from Peru and the United States respectively, featured a giant life-size maze used in competition. The object on both programs was for the contestants to find their way from the entrance to the exit as quickly as possible. On Nubeluz, the contestants took turns running through the maze and had a maximum of 1 minute to reach the exit; on American Gladiators, both contestants ran through the maze simultaneously and were given 45 seconds to find the correct solution. The giant maze was part of the game rotation on both programs concurrently, and was also retired from both programs simultaneously. The Shining The film adaptation of Stephen King's 1977 novel, The Shining (1980), includes a harrowing scene featuring Jack Torrance and Danny Torrance in an ominous hedge maze. See also Celtic maze Crop circle Stone labyrinths of Bolshoi Zayatsky Island References Further reading Ettore Selli, "Labirinti Vegetali, la guida completa alle architetture verdi dei cinque continenti", Ed. Pendragon, 2020; ISBN 9788833642222 The definitive guide to British Mazes. Includes External links Labyrinth Society official web page Garden features Puzzles

20162

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mammoth

Mammoth

A mammoth is any species of the extinct elephantid genus Mammuthus, one of the many genera that make up the order of trunked mammals called proboscideans. The various species of mammoth were commonly equipped with long, curved tusks and, in northern species, a covering of long hair. They lived from the Pliocene epoch (from around 5 million years ago) into the Holocene at about 4,000 years ago, and various species existed in Africa, Europe, Asia, and North America. They were members of the family Elephantidae, which also contains the two genera of modern elephants and their ancestors. Mammoths are more closely related to living Asian elephants than African Elephants. The oldest representative of Mammuthus, the South African mammoth (M. subplanifrons), appeared around 5 million years ago during the early Pliocene in what is now southern and eastern Africa. Descendant species of these mammoths moved north and continued to propagate into numerous subsequent species, eventually covering most of Eurasia before extending into the Americas at least 600,000 years ago. The last species to emerge, the woolly mammoth (M. primigenius), developed about 400,000 years ago in East Asia, with some surviving on Russia's Wrangel Island in the Arctic Ocean, as well as possibly the Taymyr Peninsula on mainland Siberia, until as recently as roughly 3,700 to 4,000 years ago, still extant during the construction of the Great Pyramid of ancient Egypt. Evolution The earliest known proboscideans, the clade that contains the elephants, existed about 55 million years ago around the Tethys Sea area. The closest relatives of the Proboscidea are the sirenians and the hyraxes. The family Elephantidae is known to have existed six million years ago in Africa, and includes the living elephants and the mammoths. Among many now extinct clades, the mastodon is only a distant relative of the mammoths, and part of the separate Mammutidae family, which diverged 25 million years before the mammoths evolved. The following cladogram shows the placement of the genus Mammuthus among other proboscideans, based on hyoid characteristics: Since many remains of each species of mammoth are known from several localities, it is possible to reconstruct the evolutionary history of the genus through morphological studies. Mammoth species can be identified from the number of enamel ridges on their molars; the primitive species had few ridges, and the amount increased gradually as new species evolved and replaced the former ones. At the same time, the crowns of the teeth became longer, and the skulls become higher from top to bottom and shorter from the back to the front over time to accommodate this. The first known members of the genus Mammuthus are the African species Mammuthus subplanifrons from the Pliocene and Mammuthus africanavus from the Pleistocene. The former is thought to be the ancestor of later forms. Mammoths entered Europe around 3 million years ago; the earliest known type has been named M. rumanus, which spread across Europe and China. Only its molars are known, which show it had 8–10 enamel ridges. A population evolved 12–14 ridges and split off from and replaced the earlier type, becoming M. meridionalis. In turn, this species was replaced by the steppe mammoth, M. trogontherii, with 18–20 ridges, which evolved in East Asia ca. 1.8 million years ago. Steppe mammoth populations replaced M. meridionalis in Europe between 1 and 0.7 million years ago. The Columbian mammoth, M. columbi, evolved from a population of M. trogontherii that had entered North America over 1 million years ago. Mammoths derived from M. trogontherii evolved molars with 26 ridges between 800,000 and 400,000 years ago in Siberia, becoming the woolly mammoth, M. primigenius. The woolly mammoth would replace the steppe mammoth in Europe during the late Middle Pleistocene around 200,000 years ago. A 2011 genetic study showed that two examined specimens of the Columbian mammoth were grouped within a subclade of woolly mammoths. This suggests that the two populations interbred and produced fertile offspring. It also suggested that a North American form known as "M. jeffersonii" may be a hybrid between the two species. By the late Pleistocene, mammoths in continental Eurasia had undergone a major transformation, including a shortening and heightening of the cranium and mandible, increase in molar hypsodonty index, increase in plate number, and thinning of dental enamel. Due to this change in physical appearance, it became customary to group European mammoths separately into distinguishable clusters: Early Pleistocene – Mammuthus meridionalis Middle Pleistocene – Mammuthus trogontherii Late Pleistocene – Mammuthus primigenius There is speculation as to what caused this variation within the three chronospecies. Variations in environment, climate change, and migration surely played roles in the evolutionary process of the mammoths. Take M. primigenius for example: Woolly mammoths lived in opened grassland biomes. The cool steppe-tundra of the Northern Hemisphere was the ideal place for mammoths to thrive because of the resources it supplied. With occasional warmings during the ice age, climate would change the landscape, and resources available to the mammoths altered accordingly. In February 2021, scientists reported that DNA from million-year old mammoth remains had become the oldest ever sequenced. Etymology and early observations The word mammoth was first used in Europe during the early 17th century, when referring to maimanto tusks discovered in Siberia. John Bell, who was on the Ob River in 1722, said that mammoth tusks were well known in the area. They were called "mammon's horn" and were often found in washed-out river banks. Some local people claimed to have seen a living mammoth, but they came out only at night and always disappeared under water when detected. He bought one and presented it to Hans Sloan who pronounced it an elephant's tooth. The folklore of some native peoples of Siberia, who would routinely find mammoth bones, and sometimes frozen mammoth bodies, in eroding river banks, had various interesting explanations for these finds. Among the Khanty people of the Irtysh River basin, a belief existed that the mammoth was some kind of a water spirit. According to other Khanty, the mammoth was a creature that lived underground, burrowing its tunnels as it went, and would die if it accidentally came to the surface. The concept of the mammoth as an underground creature was known to the Chinese, who received some mammoth ivory from the Siberian natives; accordingly, the creature was known in China as yǐn shǔ 隐鼠, "the hidden rodent". Thomas Jefferson, who famously had a keen interest in paleontology, is partially responsible for transforming the word mammoth from a noun describing the prehistoric elephant to an adjective describing anything of surprisingly large size. The first recorded use of the word as an adjective was in a description of a large wheel of cheese (the "Cheshire Mammoth Cheese") given to Jefferson in 1802. Description Like their modern relatives, mammoths were quite large. The largest known species reached heights in the region of at the shoulder and weights of up to , while exceptionally large males may have exceeded . However, most species of mammoth were only about as large as a modern Asian elephant (which are about 2.5 m to 3 m high at the shoulder, and rarely exceeding 5 tonnes). Both sexes bore tusks. A first, small set appeared at about the age of six months, and these were replaced at about 18 months by the permanent set. Growth of the permanent set was at a rate of about per year. Based on studies of their close relatives, the modern elephants, mammoths probably had a gestation period of 22 months, resulting in a single calf being born. Their social structure was probably the same as that of African and Asian elephants, with females living in herds headed by a matriarch, whilst bulls lived solitary lives or formed loose groups after sexual maturity. Scientists discovered and studied the remains of a mammoth calf, and found that fat greatly influenced its form, and enabled it to store large amounts of nutrients necessary for survival in temperatures as low as . The fat also allowed the mammoths to increase their muscle mass, allowing the mammoths to fight against enemies and live longer. Woolly mammoths evolved a suite of adaptations for arctic life, including morphological traits such as small ears and tails to minimize heat loss, a thick layer of subcutaneous fat, long thick fur, and numerous sebaceous glands for insulation , as well as a large brown-fat hump like deposit behind the neck that may have functioned as a heat source and fat reservoir during winter. Diet Depending on the species or race of mammoth, the diet differed somewhat depending on location, although all mammoths ate similar things. For the Columbian mammoth, M. columbi, the diet was mainly grazing. American Columbian mammoths fed primarily on cactus leaves, trees, and shrubs. These assumptions were based on mammoth feces and mammoth teeth. Mammoths, like modern day elephants, have hypsodont molars. These features also allowed mammoths to live an expansive life because of the availability of grasses and trees. For the Mongochen mammoth, its diet consisted of herbs, grasses, larch, and shrubs, and possibly alder. These inferences were made through the observation of mammoth feces, which scientists observed contained non-arboreal pollen and moss spores. European mammoths had a major diet of C3 carbon fixation plants. This was determined by examining the isotopic data from the European mammoth teeth. The arctic tundra and steppe where the mammoths lived appears to have been dominated by forbs, not grass. There were richer in protein and easier to digest than grasses and wooden plants, which came to dominate the areas when the climate became wetter and warmer. This could have been a major contributor to why the arctic megafauna went extinct. The Yamal baby mammoth Lyuba, found in 2007 in the Yamal Peninsula in Western Siberia, suggests that baby mammoths, as do modern baby elephants, ate the dung of adult animals. The evidence to show this is that the dentition (teeth) of the baby mammoth had not yet fully developed to chew grass. Furthermore, there was an abundance of ascospores of coprophilous fungi from the pollen spectrum of the baby's mother. Coprophilous fungi are fungi that grow on animal dung and disperse spores in nearby vegetation, which the baby mammoth would then consume. Spores might have gotten into its stomach while grazing for the first few times. Coprophagy may be an adaptation, serving to populate the infant's gut with the needed microbiome for digestion. Mammoths alive in the Arctic during the Last Glacial Maximum consumed mainly forbs, such as Artemisia; graminoids were only a minor part of their diet. Extinction The woolly mammoth (M. primigenius) was the last species of the genus. Most populations of the woolly mammoth in North America and Eurasia, as well as all the Columbian mammoths (M. columbi) in North America, died out around the time of the last glacial retreat, as part of a mass extinction of megafauna in northern Eurasia and the Americas. Until recently, the last woolly mammoths were generally assumed to have vanished from Europe and southern Siberia about 12,000 years ago, but new findings show some were still present there about 10,000 years ago. Slightly later, the woolly mammoths also disappeared from continental northern Siberia. A small population survived on St. Paul Island, Alaska, up until 3750 BC, and the small mammoths of Wrangel Island survived until about 2000 BC Recent eDNA research of sediments indicates mammoths survived in north central Siberia at least as late as 2000 BC, in continental northeast Siberia until at least 5300 BC, and until at least 6600 BC in North America. The warming trend (Holocene) that occurred 12,000 years ago, accompanied by a glacial retreat and rising sea levels, has been suggested as a contributing factor. Forests replaced open woodlands and grasslands across the continent. The available habitat would have been reduced for some megafaunal species, such as the mammoth. However, such climate changes were nothing new; numerous very similar warming episodes had occurred previously within the ice age of the last several million years without producing comparable megafaunal extinctions, so climate alone is unlikely to have played a decisive role. The spread of advanced human hunters through northern Eurasia and the Americas around the time of the extinctions, however, was a new development, and thus might have contributed significantly. Whether the general mammoth population died out for climatic reasons or due to overhunting by humans is controversial. During the transition from the Late Pleistocene epoch to the Holocene epoch, there was shrinkage of the distribution of the mammoth because progressive warming at the end of the Pleistocene epoch changed the mammoth's environment. The mammoth steppe was a periglacial landscape with rich herb and grass vegetation that disappeared along with the mammoth because of environmental changes in the climate. Mammoths had moved to isolated spots in Eurasia, where they disappeared completely. Also, it is thought that Late Paleolithic and Mesolithic human hunters might have affected the size of the last mammoth populations in Europe. There is evidence to suggest that humans did cause the mammoth extinction, although there is no definitive proof. It was found that humans living south of a mammoth steppe learned to adapt themselves to the harsher climates north of the steppe, where mammoths resided. It was concluded that if humans could survive the harsh north climate of that particular mammoth steppe then it was possible humans could hunt (and eventually extinguish) mammoths everywhere. Another hypothesis suggests mammoths fell victim to an infectious disease. A combination of climate change and hunting by humans may be a possible explanation for their extinction. Homo erectus is known to have consumed mammoth meat as early as 1.8 million years ago, though this may mean only successful scavenging, rather than actual hunting. Later humans show greater evidence for hunting mammoths; mammoth bones at a 50,000-year-old site in South Britain suggest that Neanderthals butchered the animals, while various sites in Eastern Europe dating from 15,000 to 44,000 years old suggest humans (probably Homo sapiens) built dwellings using mammoth bones (the age of some of the earlier structures suggests that Neanderthals began the practice). However, the American Institute of Biological Sciences notes that bones of dead elephants, left on the ground and subsequently trampled by other elephants, tend to bear marks resembling butchery marks, which have allegedly been misinterpreted as such by archaeologists. In 2021, a study using ancient environmental DNA concluded that the extinction of the mammoth was primarily caused by dramatic vegetation changes at the end of the Last Glacial Maximum, due to a changed climate and precipitation regime. During the Last Glacial Maximum, the Arctic would have had a homogeneous flora consisting of mammoth steppe-associated plants, supporting a unique community of grazing mammals, including the mammoth. Increased precipitation following the end of the LGM caused caused a significant paludification of the steppe, which has been linked to a general decrease in species diversity of the region's former inhabitants, and not just mammoths. In addition, the study found mammoths to have persisted on the mainland for far longer than previously thought, with their shrinking distribution roughly tracking the shrinkage of the mammoth steppe; their final mainland refugium, the Taymyr Peninsula, was roughly concurrent with the Wrangel population. The close relationship between decreasing mammoth populations and steppe, as well as the lack of a sudden decline that would be associated with the human overkill hypothesis, indicates that humans and mammoths may have coexisted for millennia, and thus humans may have only played a minor role in the species' extinction. Many hypotheses also seek to explain the regional extinction of mammoths in specific areas. Scientists have speculated that the mammoths of Saint Paul Island (Alaska), an isolated enclave where mammoths survived until about 8,000 years ago, died out as the island shrank by 80–90% when sea levels rose, eventually making it too small to support a viable population. Similarly, genome sequences of the Wrangel Island mammoths indicate a sharp decline in genetic diversity, though the extent to which this played a role in their extinction is still unclear. Another hypothesis, said to be the cause of mammoth extinction in Siberia, comes from the idea that many may have drowned. While traveling to the Northern River, many of these mammoths broke through the ice and drowned. This also explains bones remains in the Arctic Coast and some of the New Siberian Islands. Dwarfing occurred with the pygmy mammoth on the outer Channel Islands of California, but at an earlier period. Those animals were very likely killed by early Paleo-Native Americans, and habitat loss caused by a rising sea level that split Santa Rosae into the outer Channel Islands. Mammoth-elephant hybrid One proposed scientific use of this preserved genetic material is to recreate living mammoths. This has long been discussed theoretically but has only recently become the subject of formal effort due to advances in molecular biology techniques and cloning of mammals. According to one research team, a mammoth cannot be recreated, but they will try to eventually grow in an "artificial womb" a hybrid elephant with some woolly mammoth traits.<ref>De-extinction and Conservation. Gregory E. Kaebnick, and Bruce Jennings. The Hastings Center Report. 26 July 2017</ref> Comparative genomics shows that the mammoth genome matches 99% of the elephant genome, so some researchers aim to engineer an elephant with some mammoth genes that code for the external appearance and traits of a mammoth. The outcome would be an elephant-mammoth hybrid with no more than 1% mammoth genes. Other projects are working on gradually adding mammoth genes to elephant cells in vitro. See also Genesis 2.0'', a documentary Ivory trade La Brea tar pits List of mammoths The Mammoth Site in Hot Springs, South Dakota Niederweningen Mammoth Museum Pleistocene Park Waco Mammoth National Monument References Further reading Cenozoic mammals of Africa Cenozoic mammals of Asia Cenozoic mammals of Europe Cenozoic mammals of North America Holocene extinctions Pleistocene proboscideans Prehistoric elephants Taxa named by Joshua Brookes Zanclean first appearances

20165

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIPS

MIPS

MIPS may refer to: Technology Million instructions per second, a measure of a computer's central processing unit performance MIPS architecture, a RISC instruction set architecture Multiband Imaging Photometer for Spitzer, an instrument on the Spitzer Space Telescope Multi-directional Impact Protection System, a helmet safety technology Stanford MIPS, a research project MIPS-X, a follow-on project to the Stanford MIPS Molecularly imprinted polymer Organizations Maharana Institute of Professional Studies, an institution in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India Mansehra International Public School and College in Mansehra, Pakistan MIPS Technologies, formerly MIPS Computer Systems, the developer of the MIPS architecture Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Science (MIPS) in Parkville, Victoria Munich Information Center for Protein Sequences, a genomics research center in Germany Other Material input per unit of service, an economic efficiency indicator Menards Infiniti Pro Series, a former name of an Indy Pro Series automobile race Monthly income preferred stock, a financial instrument MIPS, a rabbit in Super Mario 64 Minimum Ionizing Particles, a term widely used in experimental particle physics Merit-based Incentive Payment System, a part of the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 See also MIP (disambiguation)

20167

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican%20cuisine

Mexican cuisine

Mexican cuisine consists of the cooking cuisines and traditions of the modern country of Mexico. Its earliest roots lie in Mesoamerican cuisine. Its ingredients and methods begin with the first agricultural communities such as the Maya who domesticated maize, created the standard process of maize nixtamalization, and established their foodways (Maya cuisine). Successive waves of other Mesoamerican groups brought with them their own cooking methods. These included: the Olmec, Teotihuacanos, Toltec, Huastec, Zapotec, Mixtec, Otomi, Purépecha, Totonac, Mazatec, Mazahua, and Nahua. With the Mexica formation of the multi-ethnic Triple Alliance (Aztec Empire), culinary foodways became infused (Aztec cuisine). Today's food staples are native to the land and include: corn (maize), beans, squash, amaranth, chia, avocados, tomatoes, tomatillos, cacao, vanilla, agave, turkey, spirulina, sweet potato, cactus, and chili pepper. Its history over the centuries has resulted in regional cuisines based on local conditions, including Baja Med, Chiapas, Veracruz, Oaxacan, and the American cuisines of New Mexican and Tex-Mex. After the Spanish Conquest of the Aztec empire and the rest of Mesoamerica, Spaniards introduced a number of other foods, the most important of which were meats from domesticated animals (beef, pork, chicken, goat, and sheep), dairy products (especially cheese and milk), rice, sugar, olive oil and various fruits and vegetables. Various cooking styles and recipes were also introduced from Spain both throughout the colonial period and by Spanish immigrants who continued to arrive following independence. Spanish influence in Mexican cuisine is also noticeable in its sweets such as: alfajores, alfeniques, borrachitos and churros. Asian and African influences were also introduced during this era as a result of African slavery in New Spain and the Manila-Acapulco Galleons. Mexican cuisine is an important aspect of the culture, social structure and popular traditions of Mexico. The most important example of this connection is the use of mole for special occasions and holidays, particularly in the South and Central regions of the country. For this reason and others, traditional Mexican cuisine was inscribed in 2010 on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO. Basic elements Mexican cuisine is a complex and ancient cuisine, with techniques and skills developed over thousands of years of history. It is created mostly with ingredients native to Mexico, as well as those brought over by the Spanish conquistadors, with some new influences since then. Mexican cuisine has been influenced by its proximity to the US-Mexican border. For example, burritos were thought to have been invented for easier transportation of beans by wrapping them in tortillas for field labor. Modifications like these brought Mexican cuisine to the United States, where states like Arizona further adapted burritos by deep frying them, creating the modern chimichanga. In addition to staples, such as corn and chile peppers, native ingredients include tomatoes, squashes, avocados, cocoa and vanilla, as well as ingredients not generally used in other cuisines, such as edible flowers, vegetables like huauzontle and papaloquelite, or small criollo avocados, whose skin is edible. Chocolate originated in Mexico and was prized by the Aztecs. It remains an important ingredient in Mexican cookery. Vegetables play an important role in Mexican cuisine. Common vegetables include zucchini, cauliflower, corn, potatoes, spinach, Swiss chard, mushrooms, jitomate (red tomato), green tomato, etc. Other traditional vegetable ingredients include Chili pepper, huitlacoche (corn fungus), huauzontle, and nopal (cactus pads) to name a few. European contributions include pork, chicken, beef, cheese, herbs and spices, as well as some fruits. Tropical fruits, many of which are indigenous to Mexico and the Americas, such as guava, prickly pear, sapote, mangoes, bananas, pineapple and cherimoya (custard apple) are popular, especially in the center and south of the country. Edible insects have been enjoyed in Mexico for millennia. Entemophagy or insect-eating is becoming increasingly popular outside of poor and rural areas for its unique flavors, sustainability, and connection to pre-Hispanic heritage. Popular species include chapulines (grasshoppers or crickets), escamoles (ant larvae), cumiles (stink bugs) and (water bug eggs). Corn Despite the introduction of wheat and rice to Mexico, corn is the most commonly consumed starch in almost all areas of the country and serves as the main ingredient in many local recipes (e.g. corn tortillas, atole, pozole, menudo, tamal). While it is eaten fresh, most corn is dried, nixtamalized and ground into a dough called masa. This dough is used both fresh and fermented to make a wide variety of dishes from drinks (atole, pozole, etc.) to tamales, sopes, and much more. However, the most common way to eat corn in Mexico is in the form of a tortilla, which accompanies almost every dish. Tortillas are made of corn in most of the country, but other versions exist, such as wheat in the north or plantain, yuca and wild greens in Oaxaca. Chili peppers The other basic ingredient in all parts of Mexico is the chile pepper. Mexican food has a reputation for being very spicy, but it has a wide range of flavors and while many spices are used for cooking, not all are spicy. Many dishes also have subtle flavors. Chiles are indigenous to Mexico and their use dates back thousands of years. They are used for their flavors and not just their heat, with Mexico using the widest variety. If a savory dish or snack does not contain chile pepper, hot sauce is usually added, and chile pepper is often added to fresh fruit and sweets. The importance of the chile goes back to the Mesoamerican period, where it was considered to be as much of a staple as corn and beans. In the 16th century, Bartolomé de las Casas wrote that without chiles, the indigenous people did not think they were eating. Even today, most Mexicans believe that their national identity would be at a loss without chiles and the many varieties of sauces and salsas created using chiles as their base. Many dishes in Mexico are defined by their sauces and the chiles those sauces contain (which are usually very spicy), rather than the meat or vegetable that the sauce covers. These dishes include entomatada (in tomato sauce), adobo or adobados, pipians and moles. A hominy soup called pozole is defined as white, green or red depending on the chile sauce used or omitted. Tamales are differentiated by the filling which is again defined by the sauce (red or green chile pepper strips or mole). Dishes without a sauce are rarely eaten without a salsa or without fresh or pickled chiles. This includes street foods, such as tacos, tortas, soup, sopes, tlacoyos, tlayudas, gorditas and sincronizadas. For most dishes, it is the type of chile used that gives it its main flavor. Chipotle, smoked-dried jalapeño pepper, is very common in Mexican cuisine. Spanish contributions Together with Mesoamerica, Spain is the second basis of Mexican cuisine, contributing in two fundamental ways: Firstly, they brought with them old world staples and ingredients which did not exist in the Americas such as sugar, wheat, rice, onions, garlic, limes, oil, dairy products, pork, beef and many others. Secondly they brought various culinary traditions from the Iberian peninsula which have become prevalent in Mexico. Equally, the discovery of the incorporation of New World ingredients to Spanish cuisine has led to many shared foods such as chorizo which uses paprika. Spanish cuisine was in turn heavily influenced by its Moorish heritage and this created one of the earliest instances of the world's greatest Fusion cuisines. The Spanish also introduced the technique of frying in pork fat. Today, the main meats found in Mexico are pork, chicken, beef, goat, and sheep. Seafood and fish are also popular, especially along the coasts, and the way of cooking it commonly has Spanish origin such as Huachinango a la vizcaina. Cheesemaking in Mexico has evolved its own specialties, although uniquely Spanish cheese such as Manchego is also typical of Mexico. It is an important economic activity, especially in the north, and is frequently done at home. The main cheese-making areas are Chihuahua, Oaxaca, Querétaro, and Chiapas. Goat cheese is still made, but it is not as popular and is harder to find in stores. Churros are a common snack originating in Spain and because sugar cane was brought to the Americas through Spanish colonization, all of Mexico's sweets have a Hispanic origin, often with a Muslim heritage such as Alfeñiques. Food and society Home cooking In most of Mexico, especially in rural areas, much of the food is consumed in the home. Cooking for the family is usually considered to be women's work, and this includes cooking for celebrations as well. Traditionally girls have been considered ready to marry when they can cook, and cooking is considered a main talent for housewives. The main meal of the day in Mexico is the "comida", meaning 'meal' in Spanish. This refers to dinner or supper. It sometimes begins with soup, often chicken broth with pasta or a "dry soup", which is pasta or rice flavored with onions, garlic or vegetables. The main course is meat served in a cooked sauce with salsa on the side, accompanied with beans and tortillas and often with a fruit drink. In the evening, it is common to eat leftovers from the comida or sweet bread accompanied by coffee or chocolate. Breakfast can consist of meat in broth (such as pancita), tacos, enchiladas or meat with eggs. This is usually served with beans, tortillas, and coffee or juice. Food and festivals Mexican cuisine is elaborate and often tied to symbolism and festivals, which is one reason it was named as an example of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO. Many of the foods of Mexico are complicated because of their relation to the social structure of the country. Food preparation, especially for family and social events, is considered to be an investment in order to maintain social relationships. Even the idea of flavor is considered to be social, with meals prepared for certain dinners and certain occasions when they are considered the most tasty. The ability to cook well, called "sazón" (lit. seasoning) is considered to be a gift generally gained from experience and a sense of commitment to the diners. For the Day of the Dead festival, foods such as tamales and mole are set out on altars and it is believed that the visiting dead relatives eat the essence of the food. If eaten afterwards by the living it is considered to be tasteless. In central Mexico, the main festival foods are mole, barbacoa, carnitas and mixiotes. They are often prepared to feed hundreds of guests, requiring groups of cooks. The cooking is part of the social custom meant to bind families and communities. Mexican regional home cooking is completely different from the food served in most Mexican restaurants outside Mexico, which is usually some variety of Tex-Mex. The original versions of Mexican dishes are vastly different from their Tex-Mex variation. Some of Mexico's traditional foods involved complex or long cooking processes, including cooking underground (such as cochinita pibil). Before industrialization, traditional women spent several hours a day boiling dried corn then grinding it on a metate to make the dough for tortillas, cooking them one-by-one on a comal griddle. In some areas, tortillas are still made this way. Sauces and salsas were also ground in a mortar called a molcajete. Today, blenders are more often used, though the texture is a bit different. Most people in Mexico would say that those made with a molcajete taste better, but few do this now. The most important food for festivals and other special occasions is mole, especially mole poblano in the center of the country. Mole is served at Christmas, Easter, Day of the Dead and at birthdays, baptisms, weddings and funerals, and tends to be eaten only for special occasions because it is such a complex and time-consuming dish. While still dominant in this way, other foods have become acceptable for these occasions, such as barbacoa, carnitas and mixiotes, especially since the 1980s. This may have been because of economic crises at that time, allowing for the substitution of these cheaper foods, or the fact that they can be bought ready-made or may already be made as part of the family business. Another important festive food is the tamale, also known as tamal in Spanish. This is a filled cornmeal dumpling, steamed in a wrapping (usually a corn husk or banana leaf) and one of the basic staples in most regions of Mexico. It has its origins in the pre-Hispanic era and today is found in many varieties in all of Mexico. Like mole, it is complicated to prepare and best done in large amounts. Tamales are associated with certain celebrations such as Candlemas. They are wrapped in corn husks in the highlands and desert areas of Mexico and in banana leaves in the tropics. Street food Mexican street food can include tacos, quesadillas, pambazos, tamales, huaraches, alambres, al pastor, and food not suitable to cook at home, including barbacoa, carnitas, and since many homes in Mexico do not have or make use of ovens, roasted chicken. One attraction of street food in Mexico is the satisfaction of hunger or craving without all the social and emotional connotation of eating at home, although longtime customers can have something of a friendship/familial relationship with a chosen vendor. Tacos are the top-rated and most well-known street Mexican food. It is made up of meat or other fillings wrapped in a tortilla often served with cheese added. Vegetarian fillings include mushrooms, potatoes, rice, or beans. The best known of Mexico's street foods is the taco, whose origin is based on the pre-Hispanic custom of picking up other foods with tortillas as utensils were not used. The origin of the word is in dispute, with some saying it is derived from Nahuatl and others from various Spanish phrases. It possible the term taco comes from the term tlaco or tlacatl, which means middle or half in nahuatl. Tacos are not eaten as the main meal; they are generally eaten before midday or late in the evening. Just about any other foodstuff can be wrapped in a tortilla, and in Mexico, it varies from rice, to meat (plain or in sauce), to cream, to vegetables, to cheese, or simply to plain chile peppers or fresh salsa. Preferred fillings vary from region to region with pork generally found more often in the center and south, beef in the north, seafood along the coasts, and chicken and lamb in most of the country. Another popular street food, especially in Mexico City and the surrounding area is the torta. It consists of a roll of some type, stuffed with several ingredients. This has its origins in the 19th century, when the French introduced a number of new kinds of bread. The torta began by splitting the roll and adding beans. Today, refried beans can still be found on many kinds of tortas. In Mexico City, the most common roll used for tortas is called telera, a relatively flat roll with two splits on the upper surface. In Puebla, the preferred bread is called a cemita, as is the sandwich. In both areas, the bread is stuffed with various fillings, especially if it is a hot sandwich, with beans, cream (mayonnaise is rare) and some kind of hot chile pepper. The influence of American fast food on Mexican street food grew during the late 20th century. One example of this is the invention of the Sonoran hot dog in the late 1980s. The frankfurters are usually boiled then wrapped in bacon and fried. They are served in a bolillo-style bun, typically topped by a combination of pinto beans, diced tomatoes, onions and jalapeño peppers, and other condiments. Along the US-Mexican border, specifically dense areas like Tijuana, Mexican vendors sell food such as fruit melanged with Tajin spice to people crossing the border via carts. In recent years, these food carts have been threatened by tightened border security at the port of entry. Both the US and the Mexican governments have proposed a project that would widen the streets at the border, allowing for more people to pass through the border, although widening them would decimate neighboring mercados that rely on the business of travelers. Besides food, street vendors also sell various kinds of drinks (including , , and ) and treats (such as , , and ). Most tamale stands sell as a standard accompaniment. History Pre-Hispanic period Around 7000 BCE, the indigenous peoples of Mexico and Central America hunted game and gathered plants, including wild chili peppers. Corn was not yet cultivated, so one main source of calories was roasted agave hearts. By 1200 BCE, corn was domesticated and a process called nixtamalization, or treatment with lye, was developed to soften corn for grinding and improve its nutritional value. This allowed the creation of tortillas and other kinds of flat breads. The indigenous peoples of Mesoamerica have numerous stories about the origin of corn, usually related to being a gift of one or more gods, such as Quetzalcoatl. The other staple was beans, eaten with corn and some other plants as a complementary protein. Other protein sources included amaranth, domesticated turkey, insects such as grasshoppers, beetles and ant larvae, iguanas, and turtle eggs on the coastlines. Vegetables included squash and their seeds; chilacayote; jicama, a kind of sweet potato; and edible flowers, especially those of squash. The chile pepper was used as food, ritual and as medicine. When the Spanish arrived, the Aztecs had sophisticated agricultural techniques and an abundance of food, which was the base of their economy. It allowed them to expand an empire, bringing in tribute which consisted mostly of foods the Aztecs could not grow themselves. According to Bernardino de Sahagún, the Nahua peoples of central Mexico ate corn, beans, turkey, fish, small game, insects and a wide variety of fruits, vegetables, pulses, seeds, tubers, wild mushrooms, plants and herbs that they collected or cultivated. Modern Period After the Conquest, the Spanish introduced a variety of foodstuffs and cooking techniques, like frying, to the New World. Regional cuisines remained varied, with native staples more prevalent in the rural southern areas and Spanish foods taking root in the more sparsely populated northern region. European style wheat bread was initially met unfavorably with Moctezuma's emissaries who reportedly described it as tasting of "dried maize stalks". On the Spanish side, Bernal Díaz del Castillo complained about the "maize cake" rations on campaign. The cuisine of Spain is a Mediterranean cuisine influenced by its Arab period composed of a number of staples such as Olive oil and rice. Spanish settlers introduced these staples to the region, although some continued to be imported such as wine, brandy, nuts, olives, spices and capers. They introduced domesticated animals, such as pigs, cows, chickens, goats and sheep for meat and milk, raising the consumption of protein. Cheese became the most important dairy product. The Spanish brought rice to Mexico, along with sugar cane, used extensively creation of many kinds of sweets, especially local fruits in syrup. A sugar-based candy craft called alfeñique was imported and is now used for the Day of the Dead. Over time ingredients like olive oil, rice, onions, garlic, oregano, coriander, cinnamon, cloves became incorporated with native ingredients and cooking techniques. One of the main avenues for the mixing of the two cuisines was in convents. Despite the influence of Spanish culture, Mexican cuisine has maintained its base of corn, beans and chili peppers. Natives continued to be reliant on maize; it was less expensive than the wheat favored by European settlers, it was easier to cultivate and produced higher yields. European control over the land grew stronger with the founding of wheat farms. In 18th century Mexico City, wheat was baked into leaved rolls called pan frances or pan espanol, but only two bakers were allowed to bake this style of bread and they worked on consignment to the viceroy and the archbishop. Large ring loaves of choice flour known as pan floreado were available for wealthy "Creoles". Other styles of bread used lower-quality wheat and maize to produce pan comun, pambazo and cemita. Pozole is mentioned in the 16th century Florentine Codex by Bernardino de Sahagún. In the eighteenth century, an Italian Capuchin friar, Ilarione da Bergamo, included descriptions of food in his travelogue. He noted that tortillas were eaten not only by the poor, by the upper class as well. He described lunch fare as pork products like chorizo and ham being eaten between tortillas, with a piquant red chili sauce. For drink pulque, as well as corn-based atole, and for those who could afford it chocolate-based drinks were consumed twice a day. According to de Bergamo's account neither coffee nor wine are consumed, and evening meals ended with a small portion of beans in a thick soup instead, "served to set the stage for drinking water". During the 19th century, Mexico experienced an influx of various immigrants, including French, Lebanese, German, Chinese and Italian, which have had some effect on the food. During the French intervention in Mexico, French food became popular with the upper classes. An influence on these new trends came from chef Tudor, who was brought to Mexico by the Emperor Maximilian of Habsburg. One lasting evidence of this is the variety of breads and sweet breads, such as bolillos, conchas and much more, which can be found in Mexican bakeries. The Germans brought beer brewing techniques and the Chinese added their cuisine to certain areas of the country. This led to Mexico characterizing its cuisine more by its relation to popular traditions rather than on particular cooking techniques. Since the 20th century, there has been an interchange of food influences between Mexico and the United States. Mexican cooking was of course still practiced in what is now the Southwest United States after the Mexican–American War, but Diana Kennedy, in her book The Cuisines of Mexico (published in 1972), drew a sharp distinction between Mexican food and Tex-Mex. Tex-Mex food was developed from Mexican and Anglo influences, and was traced to the late 19th century in Texas. It still continues to develop with flour tortillas becoming popular north of the border only in the latter 20th century. From north to south, much of the influence has been related to food industrialization, as well as the greater availability overall of food, especially after the Mexican Revolution. One other very visible sign of influence from the United States is the appearance of fast foods, such as hamburgers, hot dogs and pizza. In the latter 20th century, international influence in Mexico has led to interest and development of haute cuisine. In Mexico, many professional chefs are trained in French or international cuisine, but the use of Mexican staples and flavors is still favored, including the simple foods of traditional markets. It is not unusual to see some quesadillas or small tacos among the other hors d'oeuvres at fancy dinner parties in Mexico. Professional cookery in Mexico is growing and includes an emphasis on traditional methods and ingredients. In the cities, there is interest in publishing and preserving what is authentic Mexican food. This movement is traceable to 1982 with the Mexican Culinary Circle of Mexico City. It was created by a group of women chefs and other culinary experts as a reaction to the fear of traditions being lost with the increasing introduction of foreign techniques and foods. In 2010, Mexico's cuisine was recognized by UNESCO as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. In contemporary times, various world cuisines have become popular in Mexico, thus adopting a Mexican fusion. For example, sushi in Mexico is often made by using a variety of sauces based on mango and tamarind, and very often served with serrano-chili blended soy sauce, or complemented with vinegar, habanero peppers, and chipotle peppers. Beverages Corn in Mexico is not only eaten, but also drunk as a beverage. Corn is the base of a hot drink called atole, which is then flavored with fruit, chocolate, rice or other flavors. Fermented corn is the base of a cold drink, which goes by different names and varieties, such as tejuino, pozol and others. Aguas frescas are flavored drinks usually made from fruit, water and sugar. Beverages also include hibiscus iced tea, one made from tamarind and one from rice called "horchata". One variant of coffee is café de olla, which is coffee brewed with cinnamon and raw sugar. Many of the most popular beverages can be found sold by street vendors and juice bars in Mexico. Chocolate played an important part in the history of Mexican cuisine. The word "chocolate" originated from Mexico's Aztec cuisine, derived from the Nahuatl word xocolatl. Chocolate was first drunk rather than eaten. It was also used for religious rituals. The Maya civilization grew cacao trees and used the cacao seeds it produced to make a frothy, bitter drink. The drink, called xocoatl, was often flavored with vanilla, chile pepper, and achiote. Alcoholic beverages from Mexico include tequila, pulque, aguardiente, mezcal and charanda. Wine, rum and beer are also produced. The most common alcoholic beverage consumed with food in Mexico is beer, followed by tequila. A classic margarita, a popular cocktail, is composed of tequila, cointreau and lime juice. Rompope is believed to have been originally made in the convents of the city of Puebla, Mexico. The word rompope is a derivation of the word rompon, which is used to describe the Spanish version of eggnog that came to Mexico. A popular Soft drink from Mexico is Sangria Señorial a sangria-flavored, non-alcoholic beverage. Sangria is a Spanish drink that was introduced by Spaniards, as was Horchata and Agua de Jamaica. Regional cuisines Chiapas Similar to other regions in Mexico, corn is a dietary staple and other indigenous foods remain strong in the cuisine as well. Along with a chile called simojovel, used nowhere else in the country, the cuisine is also distinguished by the use of herbs, such as chipilín and hierba santa. Like in Oaxaca, tamales are usually wrapped in banana leaves (or sometimes with the leaves of hoja santa), but often chipilín is incorporated into the dough. As in the Yucatán Peninsula, boiled corn is drunk as a beverage called pozol, but here it is usually flavored with all-natural cacao. Another beverage (which can be served hot or cold) typical from this region is Tascalate, which is made of powdered maize, cocoa beans, achiote (annatto), chilies, pine nuts and cinnamon. The favored meats are beef, pork and chicken (introduced by the Spanish), especially in the highlands, which favors the raising of livestock. The livestock industry has also prompted the making of cheese, mostly done on ranches and in small cooperatives, with the best known from Ocosingo, Rayón and Pijijiapan. Meat and cheese dishes are frequently accompanied by vegetables, such as squash, chayote, and carrots. Mexico City The main feature of Mexico City cooking is that it has been influenced by those of the other regions of Mexico, as well as a number of foreign influences. This is because Mexico City has been a center for migration of people from all over Mexico since pre-Hispanic times. Most of the ingredients of this area's cooking are not grown in situ, but imported from all of the country (such as tropical fruits). Street cuisine is very popular, with taco stands, and lunch counters on every street. Popular foods in the city include barbacoa (a specialty of the central highlands), birria (from western Mexico), cabrito (from the north), carnitas (originally from Michoacán), mole sauces (from Puebla and central Mexico), tacos with many different fillings, and large sub-like sandwiches called tortas, usually served at specialized shops called 'Torterías'. This is also the area where most of Mexico's haute cuisine can be found. There are eateries that specialize in pre-Hispanic food, including dishes with insects. Northern Mexico The foods eaten in what is now the north of Mexico have differed from those in the south since the pre-Hispanic era. Here, the indigenous people were hunter-gatherers with limited agriculture and settlements because of the arid land. When the Europeans arrived, they found much of the land in this area suitable for raising cattle, goats and sheep. This led to the dominance of meat, especially beef, in the region, and some of the most popular dishes include machaca, arrachera and cabrito. The region's distinctive cooking technique is grilling, as ranch culture has promoted outdoor cooking done by men. The ranch culture has also prompted cheese production and the north produces the widest varieties of cheese in Mexico. These include queso fresco (fresh farmer's cheese), ranchero (similar to Monterey Jack), cuajada (a mildly sweet, creamy curd of fresh milk), requesón (similar to cottage cheese or ricotta), Chihuahua's creamy semi-soft queso menonita, and fifty-six varieties of asadero (smoked cheese). Another important aspect of northern cuisine is the presence of wheat, especially in the use of flour tortillas. The area has at least forty different types of flour tortillas. The main reason for this is that much of the land supports wheat production, introduced by the Spanish. These large tortillas allowed for the creation of burritos, usually filled with machaca in Sonora, which eventually gained popularity in the Southwest United States. The variety of foodstuffs in the north is not as varied as in the south of Mexico, because of the mostly desert climate. Much of the cuisine of this area is dependent on food preservation techniques, namely dehydration and canning. Dried foods include meat, chiles, squash, peas, corn, lentils, beans and dried fruit. A number of these are also canned. Preservation techniques change the flavor of foods; for example, many chiles are less hot after drying. In Northeastern Mexico, during the Spanish colonial period, Nuevo León was founded and settled by Spanish families of Jewish origin (Crypto-Jews). They contributed to the regional cuisine with dishes, such as Pan de Semita or "Semitic Bread" (a type of bread made without leavening), and cabrito or "baby goat", which is the typical food of Monterrey and the state of Nuevo León, as well as some regions of Coahuila. The north has seen waves of immigration by the Chinese, Mormons, and Mennonites, who have influenced the cuisines in areas, such as Chihuahua and Baja California. Most recently, Baja Med cuisine has emerged in Ensenada and elsewhere in Baja California, combining Mexican and Mediterranean flavors. Oaxaca The cooking of Oaxaca remained more intact after the conquest, as the Spanish took the area with less fighting and less disruption of the economy and food production systems. However, it was the first area to experience the mixing of foods and cooking styles, while central Mexico was still recuperating. Despite its size, the state has a wide variety of ecosystems and a wide variety of native foods. Vegetables are grown in the central valley, seafood is abundant on the coast and the area bordering Veracruz grows tropical fruits. Much of the state's cooking is influenced by that of the Mixtec and, to a lesser extent, the Zapotec. Later in the colonial period, Oaxaca lost its position as a major food supplier and the area's cooking returned to a more indigenous style, keeping only a small number of foodstuffs, such as chicken and pork. It also adapted mozzarella, brought by the Spanish, and modified it to what is now known as Oaxaca cheese. One major feature of Oaxacan cuisine is its seven mole varieties, second only to mole poblano in popularity. The seven are Negro (black), Amarillo (yellow), Coloradito (little red), Mancha Manteles (table cloth stainer), Chichilo (smoky stew), Rojo (red), and Verde (green). Corn is the staple food in the region. Tortillas are called blandas and are a part of every meal. Corn is also used to make empanadas, tamales and more. Black beans are favored, often served in soup or as a sauce for enfrijoladas. Oaxaca's regional chile peppers include pasilla oaxaqueña (red, hot and smoky), along with amarillos (yellow), chilhuacles, chilcostles and costeños. These, along with herbs, such as hoja santa, give the food its unique taste. Another important aspect of Oaxacan cuisine is chocolate, generally consumed as a beverage. It is frequently hand ground and combined with almonds, cinnamon and other ingredients. Veracruz The cuisine of Veracruz is a mix of indigenous, Afro-Mexican and Spanish. The indigenous contribution is in the use of corn as a staple, as well as vanilla (native to the state) and herbs called acuyo and hoja santa. It is also supplemented by a wide variety of tropical fruits, such as papaya, mamey and zapote, along with the introduction of citrus fruit and pineapple by the Spanish. The Spanish also introduced European herbs, such as parsley, thyme, marjoram, bay laurel, cilantro and others, which characterize much of the state's cooking. They are found in the best known dish of the region Huachinango a la veracruzana, a red snapper dish. The African influence is from the importation of slaves through the Caribbean, who brought foods with them, which had been introduced earlier to Africa by the Portuguese. As it borders the Gulf coast, seafood figures prominently in most of the state. The state's role as a gateway to Mexico has meant that the dietary staple of corn is less evident than in other parts of Mexico, with rice as a heavy favorite. Corn dishes include garnachas (a kind of corn cake), which are readily available especially in the mountain areas, where indigenous influence is strongest. Anthropologist and restauranteur Raquel Torres Cerdán has worked to preserve and record many of the foods of indigenous peoples of the region. Western Mexico West of Mexico City is the Pacific coast and the states of Michoacán, Jalisco and Colima. The cuisine of Michoacan is based on the Purepecha culture which still dominates most of the state. The area has a large network of rivers and lakes providing fish. Its use of corn is perhaps the most varied. While atole is drunk in most parts of Mexico, it is made with more different flavors in Michoacán, including blackberry, cascabel chili and more. Tamales come in different shapes, wrapped in corn husks. These include those folded into polyhedrons called corundas and can vary in name if the filling is different. In the Bajío area, tamales are often served with a meat stew called , which is flavored with cactus fruit. The main Spanish contributions to Michoacán cuisine are rice, pork and spices. One of the best-known dishes from the state is morisquesta, which is a sausage and rice dish, closely followed by carnitas, which is deep-fried (confit technique) pork. The latter can be found in many parts of Mexico, often claimed to be authentically Michoacán. Other important ingredients in the cuisine include wheat (where bread symbolizes fertility) found in breads and pastries. Another is sugar, giving rise to a wide variety of desserts and sweets, such as fruit jellies and ice cream, mostly associated with the town of Tocumbo. The town of Cotija has a cheese named after it. The local alcoholic beverage is charanda, which is made with fermented sugar cane. The cuisine of the states of Jalisco and Colima is noted for dishes, such as birria, chilayo, menudo and pork dishes. Jalisco's cuisine is known for tequila with the liquor produced only in certain areas allowed to use the name. The cultural and gastronomic center of the area is Guadalajara, an area where both agriculture and cattle raising have thrived. The best-known dish from the area is birria, a stew of goat, beef, mutton or pork with chiles and spices. An important street food is tortas ahogadas, where the torta (sandwich) is drowned in a chile sauce. Near Guadalajara is the town of Tonalá, known for its pozole, a hominy stew, reportedly said in the 16th century, to have been originally created with human flesh for ritual use. The area which makes tequila surrounds the city. A popular local drink is tejuino, made from fermented corn. Bionico is also a popular dessert in the Guadalajara area. On the Pacific coast, seafood is common, generally cooked with European spices along with chile, and is often served with a spicy salsa. Favored fish varieties include marlin, swordfish, snapper, tuna, shrimp and octopus. Tropical fruits are also important. The cuisine of the Baja California Peninsula is especially heavy on seafood, with the widest variety. It also features a mild green chile pepper, as well as dates, especially in sweets. Yucatán The food of the Yucatán peninsula is distinct from the rest of the country. It is based primarily on Mayan food with influences from the Caribbean, Central Mexican, European (especially French) and Middle Eastern cultures. As in other areas of Mexico, corn is the basic staple, as both a liquid and a solid food. One common way of consuming corn, especially by the poor, is a thin drink or gruel of white corn called by such names as pozol or keyem. One of the main spices in the region is the annatto seed, called achiote in Spanish. It gives food a reddish color and a slightly peppery smell with a hint of nutmeg. Recados are seasoning pastes, based on achiote (recado rojo) or a mixture of habanero and chirmole both used on chicken and pork. Recado rojo is used for the area's best-known dish, cochinita pibil. Pibil refers to the cooking method (from the Mayan word píib, meaning "buried") in which foods are wrapped, generally in banana leaves, and cooked in a pit oven. Various meats are cooked this way. Habaneros are another distinctive ingredient, but they are generally served as (or part of) condiments on the side rather than integrated into the dishes. A prominent feature of Yucatán cooking is the use of bitter oranges, which gives Yucatán food the tangy element that characterizes it. Bitter orange is used as a seasoning for broth, to marinate meat and its juice (watered down with sugar) is used as a refreshing beverage. Honey was used long before the arrival of the Spanish to sweeten foods and to make a ritual alcoholic drink called balché. Today, a honey liquor called xtabentun is still made and consumed in the region. The coastal areas feature several seafood dishes, based on fish like the Mero, a variety of grunt and Esmedregal, which is fried and served with a spicy salsa based on the x'catic pepper and achiote paste. Other dishes include conch fillet (usually served raw, just marinated in lime juice), coconut flavored shrimp and lagoon snails. Traditionally, some dishes are served as entrées, such as the brazo de reina (a type of tamale made from chaya) and papadzules (egg tacos seasoned in a pumpkin seed gravy). Street food in the area usually consists of Cochinita Pibil Tacos, Lebanese-based kibbeh, shawarma tacos, snacks made from hardened corn dough called piedras, and fruit-flavored ices. Lime soup made of chicken or some other meat such as pork or beef, lime juice and served with tortilla chips. Panucho made with a refried tortilla that is stuffed with refried black beans and topped with chopped cabbage, pulled chicken or turkey, tomato, pickled red onion, avocado, and pickled jalapeño pepper. Mexican food outside Mexico Mexican cuisine is offered in a few fine restaurants in Europe and the United States. Sometimes landrace corn from Mexico is imported and ground on the premises. United States Mexican food in the United States is based on the food of Native Americans and Hispanos in the Southwestern United States and Northern Mexico. Mexican foods that originate in the United States often come from the Southwestern region, breakfast burritos and red or green chile come from New Mexican cuisine, likewise chili con carne and chimichangas are examples of Tex-Mex. With the growing ethnic Mexican-American population in the United States, more authentic Mexican food is gradually appearing in the United States. Most large American cities host a Mexican diaspora due to proximity and immigration, and Mexican restaurants and food trucks are generally easy to find in the continental states. One reason is that Mexican immigrants use food as a means of combating homesickness, and for their descendants, it is a symbol of ethnicity. Alternatively, with more Americans experiencing Mexican food in Mexico, there is a growing demand for more authentic flavors. Korean tacos are a Korean-Mexican fusion dish popular in a number of urban areas in the United States and Canada. Korean tacos originated in Los Angeles. See also Tex-Mex Aztec cuisine Diana Kennedy Latin American cuisine List of Mexican dishes List of restaurants in Mexico List of Mexican restaurants Moctezuma's Table Alejandro Ruiz Olmedo Enrique Olvera Carmen Ramírez Degollado Carlos Gaytan (born 1970), Mexican chef Ancient Maya cuisine Mexican cuisine in the United States Indigenous cuisine of the Americas Spanish cuisine References Bibliography Pilcher, Jeffrey M. Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food (Oxford University Press, 2012) online review Pilcher, Jeffrey M. Que Vivan Los Tamales! Food and the Making of Mexican National Identity (1998) External links Latin American cuisine Mesoamerican cuisine North American cuisine

20170

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIPS%20architecture

MIPS architecture

MIPS (Microprocessor without Interlocked Pipelined Stages) is a family of reduced instruction set computer (RISC) instruction set architectures (ISA) developed by MIPS Computer Systems, now MIPS Technologies, based in the United States. There are multiple versions of MIPS: including MIPS I, II, III, IV, and V; as well as five releases of MIPS32/64 (for 32- and 64-bit implementations, respectively). The early MIPS architectures were 32-bit; 64-bit versions were developed later. As of April 2017, the current version of MIPS is MIPS32/64 Release 6. MIPS32/64 primarily differs from MIPS I–V by defining the privileged kernel mode System Control Coprocessor in addition to the user mode architecture. The MIPS architecture has several optional extensions. MIPS-3D which is a simple set of floating-point SIMD instructions dedicated to common 3D tasks, MDMX (MaDMaX) which is a more extensive integer SIMD instruction set using the 64-bit floating-point registers, MIPS16e which adds compression to the instruction stream to make programs take up less room, and MIPS MT, which adds multithreading capability. Computer architecture courses in universities and technical schools often study the MIPS architecture. The architecture greatly influenced later RISC architectures such as Alpha. In March 2021, MIPS announced that the development of the MIPS architecture had ended as the company is making the transition to RISC-V. History The first version of the MIPS architecture was designed by MIPS Computer Systems for its R2000 microprocessor, the first MIPS implementation. Both MIPS and the R2000 were introduced together in 1985. When MIPS II was introduced, MIPS was renamed MIPS I to distinguish it from the new version. MIPS Computer Systems' R6000 microprocessor (1989) was the first MIPS II implementation. Designed for servers, the R6000 was fabricated and sold by Bipolar Integrated Technology, but was a commercial failure. During the mid-1990s, many new 32-bit MIPS processors for embedded systems were MIPS II implementations because the introduction of the 64-bit MIPS III architecture in 1991 left MIPS II as the newest 32-bit MIPS architecture until MIPS32 was introduced in 1999. MIPS Computer Systems' R4000 microprocessor (1991) was the first MIPS III implementation. It was designed for use in personal, workstation, and server computers. MIPS Computer Systems aggressively promoted the MIPS architecture and R4000, establishing the Advanced Computing Environment (ACE) consortium to advance its Advanced RISC Computing (ARC) standard, which aimed to establish MIPS as the dominant personal computing platform. ARC found little success in personal computers, but the R4000 (and the R4400 derivative) were widely used in workstation and server computers, especially by its largest user, Silicon Graphics. Other uses of the R4000 included high-end embedded systems and supercomputers. MIPS III was eventually implemented by a number of embedded microprocessors. Quantum Effect Design's R4600 (1993) and its derivatives was widely used in high-end embedded systems and low-end workstations and servers. MIPS Technologies' R4200 (1994), was designed for embedded systems, laptop, and personal computers. A derivative, the R4300i, fabricated by NEC Electronics, was used in the Nintendo 64 game console. The Nintendo 64, along with the PlayStation, were among the highest volume users of MIPS architecture processors in the mid-1990s. The first MIPS IV implementation was the MIPS Technologies R8000 microprocessor chipset (1994). The design of the R8000 began at Silicon Graphics, Inc. and it was only used in high-end workstations and servers for scientific and technical applications where high performance on large floating-point workloads was important. Later implementations were the MIPS Technologies R10000 (1996) and the Quantum Effect Devices R5000 (1996) and RM7000 (1998). The R10000, fabricated and sold by NEC Electronics and Toshiba, and its derivatives were used by NEC, Pyramid Technology, Silicon Graphics, and Tandem Computers (among others) in workstations, servers, and supercomputers. The R5000 and R7000 found use in high-end embedded systems, personal computers, and low-end workstations and servers. A derivative of the R5000 from Toshiba, the R5900, was used in Sony Computer Entertainment's Emotion Engine, which powered its PlayStation 2 game console. Announced on October 21, 1996, at the Microprocessor Forum 1996 alongside the MIPS Digital Media Extensions (MDMX) extension, MIPS V was designed to improve the performance of 3D graphics transformations. In the mid-1990s, a major use of non-embedded MIPS microprocessors were graphics workstations from Silicon Graphics. MIPS V was completed by the integer-only MDMX extension to provide a complete system for improving the performance of 3D graphics applications. MIPS V implementations were never introduced. On May 12, 1997, Silicon Graphics announced the H1 ("Beast") and H2 ("Capitan") microprocessors. The former was to have been the first MIPS V implementation, and was due to be introduced in the first half of 1999. The H1 and H2 projects were later combined and eventually canceled in 1998. While there have not been any MIPS V implementations, MIPS64 Release 1 (1999) was based on MIPS V and retains all of its features as an optional Coprocessor 1 (FPU) feature called Paired-Single. When MIPS Technologies was spun-out of Silicon Graphics in 1998, it refocused on the embedded market. Through MIPS V, each successive version was a strict superset of the previous version, but this property was found to be a problem, and the architecture definition was changed to define a 32-bit and a 64-bit architecture: MIPS32 and MIPS64. Both were introduced in 1999. MIPS32 is based on MIPS II with some additional features from MIPS III, MIPS IV, and MIPS V; MIPS64 is based on MIPS V. NEC, Toshiba and SiByte (later acquired by Broadcom) each obtained licenses for MIPS64 as soon as it was announced. Philips, LSI Logic, IDT, Raza Microelectronics, Inc., Cavium, Loongson Technology and Ingenic Semiconductor have since joined them. MIPS32/MIPS64 Release 5 was announced on December 6, 2012. Release 4 was skipped because the number four is perceived as unlucky in many Asian cultures. In December 2018, Wave Computing, the new owner of the MIPS architecture, announced that MIPS ISA would be open-sourced in a program dubbed the MIPS Open initiative. The program was intended to open up access to the most recent versions of both the 32-bit and 64-bit designs making them available without any licensing or royalty fees as well as granting participants licenses to existing MIPS patents. In March 2019, one version of the architecture was made available under a royalty-free license, but later that year the program was shut down again. In March 2021, Wave Computing announced that the development of the MIPS architecture has ceased. The company has joined the RISC-V foundation and future processor designs will be based on the RISC-V architecture. In spite of this, some licensees such as Longsoon continue with new extension of MIPS-compatible ISAs on their own. Design MIPS is a modular architecture supporting up to four coprocessors (CP0/1/2/3). In MIPS terminology, CP0 is the System Control Coprocessor (an essential part of the processor that is implementation-defined in MIPS I–V), CP1 is an optional floating-point unit (FPU) and CP2/3 are optional implementation-defined coprocessors (MIPS III removed CP3 and reused its opcodes for other purposes). For example, in the PlayStation video game console, CP2 is the Geometry Transformation Engine (GTE), which accelerates the processing of geometry in 3D computer graphics. Versions MIPS I MIPS is a load/store architecture (also known as a register-register architecture); except for the load/store instructions used to access memory, all instructions operate on the registers. Registers MIPS I has thirty-two 32-bit general-purpose registers (GPR). Register $0 is hardwired to zero and writes to it are discarded. Register $31 is the link register. For integer multiplication and division instructions, which run asynchronously from other instructions, a pair of 32-bit registers, HI and LO, are provided. There is a small set of instructions for copying data between the general-purpose registers and the HI/LO registers. The program counter has 32 bits. The two low-order bits always contain zero since MIPS I instructions are 32 bits long and are aligned to their natural word boundaries. Instruction formats Instructions are divided into three types: R (register), I (immediate), and J (jump). Every instruction starts with a 6-bit opcode. In addition to the opcode, R-type instructions specify three registers, a shift amount field, and a function field; I-type instructions specify two registers and a 16-bit immediate value; J-type instructions follow the opcode with a 26-bit jump target. The following are the three formats used for the core instruction set: CPU instructions MIPS I has instructions that load and store 8-bit bytes, 16-bit halfwords, and 32-bit words. Only one addressing mode is supported: base + displacement. Since MIPS I is a 32-bit architecture, loading quantities fewer than 32 bits requires the datum to be either signed- or zero-extended to 32 bits. The load instructions suffixed by "unsigned" perform zero extension; otherwise sign extension is performed. Load instructions source the base from the contents of a GPR (rs) and write the result to another GPR (rt). Store instructions source the base from the contents of a GPR (rs) and the store data from another GPR (rt). All load and store instructions compute the memory address by summing the base with the sign-extended 16-bit immediate. MIPS I requires all memory accesses to be aligned to their natural word boundaries, otherwise an exception is signaled. To support efficient unaligned memory accesses, there are load/store word instructions suffixed by "left" or "right". All load instructions are followed by a load delay slot. The instruction in the load delay slot cannot use the data loaded by the load instruction. The load delay slot can be filled with an instruction that is not dependent on the load; a nop is substituted if such an instruction cannot be found. MIPS I has instructions to perform addition and subtraction. These instructions source their operands from two GPRs (rs and rt), and write the result to a third GPR (rd). Alternatively, addition can source one of the operands from a 16-bit immediate (which is sign-extended to 32 bits). The instructions for addition and subtraction have two variants: by default, an exception is signaled if the result overflows; instructions with the "unsigned" suffix do not signal an exception. The overflow check interprets the result as a 32-bit two's complement integer. MIPS I has instructions to perform bitwise logical AND, OR, XOR, and NOR. These instructions source their operands from two GPRs and write the result to a third GPR. The AND, OR, and XOR instructions can alternatively source one of the operands from a 16-bit immediate (which is zero-extended to 32 bits). The Set on relation instructions write one or zero to the destination register if the specified relation is true or false. These instructions source their operands from two GPRs or one GPR and a 16-bit immediate (which is sign-extended to 32 bits), and write the result to a third GPR. By default, the operands are interpreted as signed integers. The variants of these instructions that are suffixed with "unsigned" interpret the operands as unsigned integers (even those that source an operand from the sign-extended 16-bit immediate). The Load Immediate Upper instruction copies the 16-bit immediate into the high-order 16 bits of a GPR. It is used in conjunction with the Or Immediate instruction to load a 32-bit immediate into a register. MIPS I has instructions to perform left and right logical shifts and right arithmetic shifts. The operand is obtained from a GPR (rt), and the result is written to another GPR (rd). The shift distance is obtained from either a GPR (rs) or a 5-bit "shift amount" (the "sa" field). MIPS I has instructions for signed and unsigned integer multiplication and division. These instructions source their operands from two GPRs and write their results to a pair of 32-bit registers called HI and LO, since they may execute separately from (and concurrently with) the other CPU instructions. For multiplication, the high- and low-order halves of the 64-bit product is written to HI and LO (respectively). For division, the quotient is written to LO and the remainder to HI. To access the results, a pair of instructions (Move from HI and Move from LO) is provided to copy the contents of HI or LO to a GPR. These instructions are interlocked: reads of HI and LO do not proceed past an unfinished arithmetic instruction that will write to HI and LO. Another pair of instructions (Move to HI or Move to LO) copies the contents of a GPR to HI and LO. These instructions are used to restore HI and LO to their original state after exception handling. Instructions that read HI or LO must be separated by two instructions that do not write to HI or LO. All MIPS I control flow instructions are followed by a branch delay slot. Unless the branch delay slot is filled by an instruction performing useful work, an nop is substituted. MIPS I branch instructions compare the contents of a GPR (rs) against zero or another GPR (rt) as signed integers and branch if the specified condition is true. Control is transferred to the address computed by shifting the 16-bit offset left by two bits, sign-extending the 18-bit result, and adding the 32-bit sign-extended result to the sum of the program counter (instruction address) and 810. Jumps have two versions: absolute and register-indirect. Absolute jumps ("Jump" and "Jump and Link") compute the address control is transferred to by shifting the 26-bit instr_index left by two bits and concatenating the 28-bit result with the four high-order bits of the address of the instruction in the branch delay slot. Register-indirect jumps transfer control to the instruction at the address sourced from a GPR (rs). The address sourced from the GPR must be word-aligned, else an exception is signaled after the instruction in the branch delay slot is executed. Branch and jump instructions that link (except for "Jump and Link Register") save the return address to GPR 31. The "Jump and Link Register" instruction permits the return address to be saved to any writable GPR. MIPS I has two instructions for software to signal an exception: System Call and Breakpoint. System Call is used by user mode software to make kernel calls; and Breakpoint is used to transfer control to a debugger via the kernel's exception handler. Both instructions have a 20-bit Code field that can contain operating environment-specific information for the exception handler. MIPS has 32 floating-point registers. Two registers are paired for double precision numbers. Odd numbered registers cannot be used for arithmetic or branching, just as part of a double precision register pair, resulting in 16 usable registers for most instructions (moves/copies and loads/stores were not affected). Single precision is denoted by the .s suffix, while double precision is denoted by the .d suffix. MIPS II MIPS II removed the load delay slot and added several sets of instructions. For shared-memory multiprocessing, the Synchronize Shared Memory, Load Linked Word, and Store Conditional Word instructions were added. A set of Trap-on-Condition instructions were added. These instructions caused an exception if the evaluated condition is true. All existing branch instructions were given branch-likely versions that executed the instruction in the branch delay slot only if the branch is taken. These instructions improve performance in certain cases by allowing useful instructions to fill the branch delay slot. Doubleword load and store instructions for COP1–3 were added. Consistent with other memory access instructions, these loads and stores required the doubleword to be naturally aligned. The instruction set for the floating point coprocessor also had several instructions added to it. An IEEE 754-compliant floating-point square root instruction was added. It supported both single- and double-precision operands. A set of instructions that converted single- and double-precision floating-point numbers to 32-bit words were added. These complemented the existing conversion instructions by allowing the IEEE rounding mode to be specified by the instruction instead of the Floating Point Control and Status Register. MIPS III MIPS III is a backwards-compatible extension of MIPS II that added support for 64-bit memory addressing and integer operations. The 64-bit data type is called a doubleword, and MIPS III extended the general-purpose registers, HI/LO registers, and program counter to 64 bits to support it. New instructions were added to load and store doublewords, to perform integer addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and shift operations on them, and to move doubleword between the GPRs and HI/LO registers. Existing instructions originally defined to operate on 32-bit words were redefined, where necessary, to sign-extend the 32-bit results to permit words and doublewords to be treated identically by most instructions. Among those instructions redefined was Load Word. In MIPS III it sign-extends words to 64 bits. To complement Load Word, a version that zero-extends was added. The R instruction format's inability to specify the full shift distance for 64-bit shifts (its 5-bit shift amount field is too narrow to specify the shift distance for doublewords) required MIPS III to provide three 64-bit versions of each MIPS I shift instruction. The first version is a 64-bit version of the original shift instructions, used to specify constant shift distances of 0–31 bits. The second version is similar to the first, but adds 3210 the shift amount field's value so that constant shift distances of 32–64 bits can be specified. The third version obtains the shift distance from the six low-order bits of a GPR. MIPS III added a supervisor privilege level in between the existing kernel and user privilege levels. This feature only affected the implementation-defined System Control Processor (Coprocessor 0). MIPS III removed the Coprocessor 3 (CP3) support instructions, and reused its opcodes for the new doubleword instructions. The remaining coprocessors gained instructions to move doublewords between coprocessor registers and the GPRs. The floating general registers (FGRs) were extended to 64 bits and the requirement for instructions to use even-numbered register only was removed. This is incompatible with earlier versions of the architecture; a bit in the floating-point control/status register is used to operate the MIPS III floating-point unit (FPU) in a MIPS I- and II-compatible mode. The floating-point control registers were not extended for compatibility. The only new floating-point instructions added were those to copy doublewords between the CPU and FPU convert single- and double-precision floating-point numbers into doubleword integers and vice versa. MIPS IV MIPS IV is the fourth version of the architecture. It is a superset of MIPS III and is compatible with all existing versions of MIPS. MIPS IV was designed to mainly improve floating-point (FP) performance. To improve access to operands, an indexed addressing mode (base + index, both sourced from GPRs) for FP loads and stores was added, as were prefetch instructions for performing memory prefetching and specifying cache hints (these supported both the base + offset and base + index addressing modes). MIPS IV added several features to improve instruction-level parallelism. To alleviate the bottleneck caused by a single condition bit, seven condition code bits were added to the floating-point control and status register, bringing the total to eight. FP comparison and branch instructions were redefined so they could specify which condition bit was written or read (respectively); and the delay slot in between an FP branch that read the condition bit written to by a prior FP comparison was removed. Support for partial predication was added in the form of conditional move instructions for both GPRs and FPRs; and an implementation could choose between having precise or imprecise exceptions for IEEE 754 traps. MIPS IV added several new FP arithmetic instructions for both single- and double-precision FPNs: fused-multiply add or subtract, reciprocal, and reciprocal square-root. The FP fused-multiply add or subtract instructions perform either one or two roundings (it is implementation-defined), to exceed or meet IEEE 754 accuracy requirements (respectively). The FP reciprocal and reciprocal square-root instructions do not comply with IEEE 754 accuracy requirements, and produce results that differ from the required accuracy by one or two units of last place (it is implementation defined). These instructions serve applications where instruction latency is more important than accuracy. MIPS V MIPS V added a new data type, the Paired Single (PS), which consisted of two single-precision (32-bit) floating-point numbers stored in the existing 64-bit floating-point registers. Variants of existing floating-point instructions for arithmetic, compare and conditional move were added to operate on this data type in a SIMD fashion. New instructions were added for loading, rearranging and converting PS data. It was the first instruction set to exploit floating-point SIMD with existing resources. MIPS32/MIPS64 The first release of MIPS32, based on MIPS II, added conditional moves, prefetch instructions, and other features from the R4000 and R5000 families of 64-bit processors. The first release of MIPS64 adds a MIPS32 mode to run 32-bit code. The MUL and MADD (multiply-add) instructions, previously available in some implementations, were added to the MIPS32 and MIPS64 specifications, as were cache control instructions. MIPS32/MIPS64 Release 6 in 2014 added the following: a new family of branches with no delay slot: unconditional branches (BC) and branch-and-link (BALC) with a 26-bit offset, conditional branch on zero/non-zero with a 21-bit offset, full set of signed and unsigned conditional branches compare between two registers (e.g. BGTUC) or a register against zero (e.g. BGTZC), full set of branch-and-link which compare a register against zero (e.g. BGTZALC). index jump instructions with no delay slot designed to support large absolute addresses. instructions to load 16-bit immediates at bit position 16, 32 or 48, allowing to easily generate large constants. PC-relative load instructions, as well as address generation with large (PC-relative) offsets. bit-reversal and byte-alignment instructions (previously only available with the DSP extension). multiply and divide instructions redefined so that they use a single register for their result). instructions generating truth values now generate all zeroes or all ones instead of just clearing/setting the 0-bit, instructions using a truth value now only interpret all-zeroes as false instead of just looking at the 0-bit. Removed infrequently used instructions: some conditional moves branch likely instructions (deprecated in previous releases). integer overflow trapping instructions with 16-bit immediate integer accumulator instructions (together HI/LO registers, moved to the DSP Application-Specific Extension) unaligned load instructions (LWL and LWR), (requiring that most ordinary loads and stores support misaligned access, possibly via trapping and with the addition of a new instruction (BALIGN)) Reorganized the instruction encoding, freeing space for future expansions. microMIPS The microMIPS32/64 architectures are supersets of the MIPS32 and MIPS64 architectures (respectively) designed to replace the MIPS16e ASE. A disadvantage of MIPS16e is that it requires a mode switch before any of its 16-bit instructions can be processed. microMIPS adds versions of the most-frequently used 32-bit instructions that are encoded as 16-bit instructions. This allows programs to intermix 16- and 32-bit instructions without having to switch modes. microMIPS was introduced alongside of MIPS32/64 Release 3, and each subsequent release of MIPS32/64 has a corresponding microMIPS32/64 version. A processor may implement microMIPS32/64 or both microMIPS32/64 and its corresponding MIPS32/64 subset. Starting with MIPS32/64 Release 6, support for MIPS16e ended, and microMIPS is the only form of code compression in MIPS. Application-specific extensions The base MIPS32 and MIPS64 architectures can be supplemented with a number of optional architectural extensions, which are collectively referred to as application-specific extensions (ASEs). These ASEs provide features that improve the efficiency and performance of certain workloads, such as digital signal processing. MIPS MCU Enhancements for microcontroller applications. The MCU ASE (application-specific extension) has been developed to extend the interrupt controller support, reduce the interrupt latency and enhance the I/O peripheral control function typically required in microcontroller system designs. Separate priority and vector generation Supports up to 256 interrupts in EIC (External Interrupt Controller) mode and eight hardware interrupt pins Provides 16-bit vector offset address Pre-fetching of the interrupt exception vector Automated Interrupt Prologue – adds hardware to save and update system status before the interrupt handling routine Automated Interrupt Epilogue – restores the system state previously stored in the stack for returning from the interrupt. Interrupt Chaining – supports the service of pending interrupts without the need to exit the initial interrupt routine, saving the cycles required to store and restore multiple active interrupts Supports speculative pre-fetching of the interrupt vector address. Reduces the number of interrupt service cycles by overlapping memory accesses with pipeline flushes and exception prioritization Includes atomic bit set/clear instructions which enables bits within an I/O register that are normally used to monitor or control external peripheral functions to be modified without interruption, ensuring the action is performed securely. MIPS16 MIPS16 is an Application-Specific Extension for MIPS I through to V designed by LSI Logic and MIPS Technologies, announced on October 21, 1996, alongside its first implementation, the LSI Logic TinyRISC processor. MIPS16 was subsequently licensed by NEC Electronics, Philips Semiconductors, and Toshiba (among others); and implemented as an extension to the MIPS I, II, an III architectures. MIPS16 decreases the size of application by up to 40% by using 16-bit instructions instead of 32-bit instructions' and also improves power efficiency, the instruction cache hit rate, and is equivalent in performance to its base architecture. It is supported by hardware and software development tools from MIPS Technologies and other providers. MIPS16e is an improved version of MIPS16 first supported by MIPS32 and MIPS64 Release 1. MIPS16e2 is an improved version of MIPS16 that is supported by MIPS32 and MIPS64 (up to Release 5). Release 6 replaced it with microMIPS. MIPS Digital Signal Processing (DSP) The DSP ASE is an optional extension to the MIPS32/MIPS64 Release 2 and newer instruction sets which can be used to accelerate a large range of "media" computations—particularly audio and video. The DSP module comprises a set of instructions and state in the integer pipeline and requires minimal additional logic to implement in MIPS processor cores. Revision 2 of the ASE was introduced in the second half of 2006. This revision adds extra instructions to the original ASE, but is otherwise backwards-compatible with it. Unlike the bulk of the MIPS architecture, it's a fairly irregular set of operations, many chosen for a particular relevance to some key algorithm. Its main novel features (vs original MIPS32): Saturating arithmetic (when a calculation overflows, deliver the representable number closest to the non-overflowed answer). Fixed-point arithmetic on signed 32- and 16-bit fixed-point fractions with a range of -1 to +1 (these are widely called "Q31" and "Q15"). The existing integer multiplication and multiply-accumulate instructions, which deliver results into a double-size accumulator (called "hi/lo" and 64 bits on MIPS32 CPUs). The DSP ASE adds three more accumulators, and some different flavours of multiply-accumulate. SIMD instructions operating on 4 x unsigned bytes or 2 x 16-bit values packed into a 32-bit register (the 64-bit variant of the DSP ASE supports larger vectors, too). SIMD operations are basic arithmetic, shifts and some multiply-accumulate type operations. MIPS SIMD architecture (MSA) Instruction set extensions designed to accelerate multimedia. 32 vector registers of 16 x 8-bit, 8 x 16-bit, 4 x 32-bit, and 2 x 64 bit vector elements Efficient vector parallel arithmetic operations on integer, fixed-point and floating-point data Operations on absolute value operands Rounding and saturation options available Full precision multiply and multiply-add Conversions between integer, floating-point, and fixed-point data Complete set of vector-level compare and branch instructions with no condition flag Vector (1D) and array (2D) shuffle operations Typed load and store instructions for endian-independent operation IEEE Standard for Floating-Point Arithmetic 754-2008 compliant Element precise floating-point exception signaling Pre-defined scalable extensions for chips with more gates/transistors Accelerates compute-intensive applications in conjunction with leveraging generic compiler support Software-programmable solution for consumer electronics applications or functions not covered by dedicated hardware Emerging data mining, feature extraction, image and video processing, and human-computer interaction applications High-performance scientific computing MIPS virtualization Hardware supported virtualization technology. MIPS multi-threading Each multi-threaded MIPS core can support up to two VPEs (Virtual Processing Elements) which share a single pipeline as well as other hardware resources. However, since each VPE includes a complete copy of the processor state as seen by the software system, each VPE appears as a complete standalone processor to an SMP Linux operating system. For more fine-grained thread processing applications, each VPE is capable of supporting up to nine TCs allocated across two VPEs. The TCs share a common execution unit but each has its own program counter and core register files so that each can handle a thread from the software. The MIPS MT architecture also allows the allocation of processor cycles to threads, and sets the relative thread priorities with an optional Quality of Service (QoS) manager block. This enables two prioritization mechanisms that determine the flow of information across the bus. The first mechanism allows the user to prioritize one thread over another. The second mechanism is used to allocate a specified ratio of the cycles to specific threads over time. The combined use of both mechanisms allows effective allocation of bandwidth to the set of threads, and better control of latencies. In real-time systems, system-level determinism is very critical, and the QoS block facilitates improvement of the predictability of a system. Hardware designers of advanced systems may replace the standard QoS block provided by MIPS Technologies with one that is specifically tuned for their application. SmartMIPS SmartMIPS is an Application-Specific Extension (ASE) designed by Gemplus International and MIPS Technologies to improve performance and reduce memory consumption for smart card software. It is supported by MIPS32 only, since smart cards do not require the capabilities of MIPS64 processors. Few smart cards use SmartMIPS. MIPS Digital Media eXtension (MDMX) Multimedia application accelerations that were common in the 1990s on RISC and CISC systems. MIPS-3D Additional instructions for improving the performance of 3D graphics applications Calling conventions MIPS has had several calling conventions, especially on the 32-bit platform. The O32 ABI is the most commonly-used ABI, owing to its status as the original System V ABI for MIPS. It is strictly stack-based, with only four registers $a0-$a3 available to pass arguments. Space on the stack is reserved in case the callee needs to save its arguments, but the registers are not stored there by the caller. The return value is stored in register $v0; a second return value may be stored in $v1. The ABI took shape in 1990 and was last updated in 1994. This perceived slowness, along with an antique floating-point model with only 16 registers, has encouraged the proliferation of many other calling conventions. It is only defined for 32-bit MIPS, but GCC has created a 64-bit variation called O64. For 64-bit, the N64 ABI by Silicon Graphics is most commonly used. The most important improvement is that eight registers are now available for argument passing; it also increases the number of floating-point registers to 32. There is also an ILP32 version called N32, which uses 32-bit pointers for smaller code, analogous to the x32 ABI. Both run under the 64-bit mode of the CPU. The N32 and N64 ABIs pass the first eight arguments to a function in the registers $a0-$a7; subsequent arguments are passed on the stack. The return value (or a pointer to it) is stored in the registers $v0; a second return value may be stored in $v1. In both the N32 and N64 ABIs all registers are considered to be 64-bits wide. A few attempts have been made to replace O32 with a 32-bit ABI that resembles N32 more. A 1995 conference came up with MIPS EABI, for which the 32-bit version was quite similar. EABI inspired MIPS Technologies to propose a more radical "NUBI" ABI additionally reuse argument registers for the return value. MIPS EABI is supported by GCC but not LLVM, and neither supports NUBI. For all of O32 and N32/N64, the return address is stored in a $ra register. This is automatically set with the use of the JAL (jump and link) or JALR (jump and link register) instructions. The function prologue of a (non-leaf) MIPS subroutine pushes the return address (in $ra) to the stack. On both O32 and N32/N64 the stack grows downwards, but the N32/N64 ABIs require 64-bit alignment for all stack entries. The frame pointer ($30) is optional and in practice rarely used except when the stack allocation in a function is determined at runtime, for example, by calling alloca(). For N32 and N64, the return address is typically stored 8 bytes before the stack pointer although this may be optional. For the N32 and N64 ABIs, a function must preserve the $S0-$s7 registers, the global pointer ($gp or $28), the stack pointer ($sp or $29) and the frame pointer ($30). The O32 ABI is the same except the calling function is required to save the $gp register instead of the called function. For multi-threaded code, the thread local storage pointer is typically stored in special hardware register $29 and is accessed by using the mfhw (move from hardware) instruction. At least one vendor is known to store this information in the $k0 register which is normally reserved for kernel use, but this is not standard. The $k0 and $k1 registers ($26–$27) are reserved for kernel use and should not be used by applications since these registers can be changed at any time by the kernel due to interrupts, context switches or other events. Registers that are preserved across a call are registers that (by convention) will not be changed by a system call or procedure (function) call. For example, $s-registers must be saved to the stack by a procedure that needs to use them, and $sp and $fp are always incremented by constants, and decremented back after the procedure is done with them (and the memory they point to). By contrast, $ra is changed automatically by any normal function call (ones that use jal), and $t-registers must be saved by the program before any procedure call (if the program needs the values inside them after the call). The userspace calling convention of position-independent code on Linux additionally requires that when a function is called the $t9 register must contain the address of that function. This convention dates back to the System V ABI supplement for MIPS. Uses MIPS processors are used in embedded systems such as residential gateways and routers. Originally, MIPS was designed for general-purpose computing. During the 1980s and 1990s, MIPS processors for personal, workstation, and server computers were used by many companies such as Digital Equipment Corporation, MIPS Computer Systems, NEC, Pyramid Technology, SiCortex, Siemens Nixdorf, Silicon Graphics, and Tandem Computers. Historically, video game consoles such as the Nintendo 64, Sony PlayStation, PlayStation 2, and PlayStation Portable used MIPS processors. MIPS processors also used to be popular in supercomputers during the 1990s, but all such systems have dropped off the TOP500 list. These uses were complemented by embedded applications at first, but during the 1990s, MIPS became a major presence in the embedded processor market, and by the 2000s, most MIPS processors were for these applications. In the mid- to late-1990s, it was estimated that one in three RISC microprocessors produced was a MIPS processor. By the late 2010s, MIPS machines were still commonly used in embedded markets, including automotive, wireless router, LTE modems (mainly via MediaTek), and microcontrollers (for example the Microchip Technology PIC32M). They have mostly faded out of the personal, server, and application space. Simulators Open Virtual Platforms (OVP) includes the freely available for non-commercial use simulator OVPsim, a library of models of processors, peripherals and platforms, and APIs which enable users to develop their own models. The models in the library are open source, written in C, and include the MIPS 4K, 24K, 34K, 74K, 1004K, 1074K, M14K, microAptiv, interAptiv, proAptiv 32-bit cores and the MIPS 64-bit 5K range of cores. These models are created and maintained by Imperas and in partnership with MIPS Technologies have been tested and assigned the MIPS-Verified mark. Sample MIPS-based platforms include both bare metal environments and platforms for booting unmodified Linux binary images. These platforms–emulators are available as source or binaries and are fast, free for non-commercial usage, and are easy to use. OVPsim is developed and maintained by Imperas and is very fast (hundreds of million of instructions per second), and built to handle multicore homogeneous and heterogeneous architectures and systems. There is a freely available MIPS32 simulator (earlier versions simulated only the R2000/R3000) called SPIM for use in education. EduMIPS64 is a GPL graphical cross-platform MIPS64 CPU simulator, written in Java/Swing. It supports a wide subset of the MIPS64 ISA and allows the user to graphically see what happens in the pipeline when an assembly program is run by the CPU. MARS is another GUI-based MIPS emulator designed for use in education, specifically for use with Hennessy's Computer Organization and Design. WebMIPS is a browser-based MIPS simulator with visual representation of a generic, pipelined processor. This simulator is quite useful for register tracking during step by step execution. QtMips provides simple 5-stages pipeline visualization as well as cache principle visualization for basic computer architectures courses. Windows, Linux, macOS and online version is available. More advanced free emulators are available from the GXemul (formerly known as the mips64emul project) and QEMU projects. These emulate the various MIPS III and IV microprocessors in addition to entire computer systems which use them. Commercial simulators are available especially for the embedded use of MIPS processors, for example Wind River Simics (MIPS 4Kc and 5Kc, PMC RM9000, QED RM7000, Broadcom/Netlogic ec4400, Cavium Octeon I), Imperas (all MIPS32 and MIPS64 cores), VaST Systems (R3000, R4000), and CoWare (the MIPS4KE, MIPS24K, MIPS25Kf and MIPS34K). The Creator simulatoris portable and allows the user to learn various assembly languages of different processors (Creator has examples with an implementation of MIPS32 and RISC-V instructions). WepSIM is a browser-based simulator where a subset of MIPS instructions are micro-programmed. This simulator is very useful in order to learn how a CPU works (microprogramming, MIPS routines, traps, interruptions, system calls, etc.). See also DLX List of MIPS architecture processors MIPS architecture processors Pipeline (computing) Prpl Foundation References Further reading External links MIPS Processors Online MIPS emulator MIPS Instructions - MIPS Instruction Set Advanced RISC Computing Computer-related introductions in 1985 Instruction set architectures MIPS Technologies

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder

Murder

Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or valid excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. This state of mind may, depending upon the jurisdiction, distinguish murder from other forms of unlawful homicide, such as manslaughter. Manslaughter is killing committed in the absence of malice, brought about by reasonable provocation, or diminished capacity. Involuntary manslaughter, where it is recognized, is a killing that lacks all but the most attenuated guilty intent, recklessness. Most societies consider murder to be an extremely serious crime, and thus that a person convicted of murder should receive harsh punishments for the purposes of retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, or incapacitation. In most countries, a person convicted of murder generally faces a long-term prison sentence, a life sentence, or capital punishment. Etymology The modern English word "murder" descends from the Proto-Indo-European *mŕ̥-trom which meant "killing", a noun derived from *mer- "to die". Proto-Germanic in fact had two nouns derived from this word, later merging into the modern English noun: *murþrą "death, killing, murder" (directly from Proto-Indo-European*mŕ̥-trom), whence Old English morðor "secret or unlawful killing of a person, murder; mortal sin, crime; punishment, torment, misery"; and *murþrijô "murderer; homicide" (from the verb *murþrijaną "to murder"), giving Old English myrþra "homicide, murder; murderer". There was a third word for "murder" in Proto-Germanic, continuing Proto-Indo-European *mr̥tós "dead" (compare Latin mors), giving Proto-Germanic *murþą "death, killing, murder" and Old English morþ "death, crime, murder" (compare German Mord). The -d- first attested in Middle English mordre, mourdre, murder, murdre could have been influenced by Old French murdre, itself derived from the Germanic noun via Frankish *murþra (compare Old High German murdreo, murdiro), though the same sound development can be seen with burden (from burthen). The alternative murther (attested up to the 19th century) springs directly from the Old English forms. Middle English mordre is a verb from Anglo-Saxon myrðrian from Proto-Germanic *murþrijaną, or, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, from the noun. Use of the term In many countries, in news reports, out of concern for being accused of defamation, journalists are generally careful not to identify a suspect as a murderer until the suspect is convicted of murder in a court of law. After arrest, for example, journalists may instead write that the person was "arrested on suspicion of murder", or, after a prosecutor files charges, as an "accused murderer". Opponents of abortion consider abortion a form of murder. In some countries, a fetus is a legal person who can be murdered, and killing a pregnant woman is considered a double homicide. Definition The eighteenth-century English jurist William Blackstone (citing Edward Coke), in his Commentaries on the Laws of England set out the common law definition of murder, which by this definition occurs The elements of common law murder are: unlawful killing through criminal act or omission of a human by another human with malice aforethought. Unlawful – This distinguishes murder from killings that are done within the boundaries of law, such as capital punishment, justified self-defense, or the killing of enemy combatants by lawful combatants as well as causing collateral damage to non-combatants during a war. Killing – At common law life ended with cardiopulmonary arrest – the total and irreversible cessation of blood circulation and respiration. With advances in medical technology courts have adopted irreversible cessation of all brain function as marking the end of life. Criminal act or omission – Killing can be committed by an act or an omission. Of a human – This element presents the issue of when life begins. At common law, a fetus was not a human being. Life began when the fetus passed through the vagina and took its first breath. By another human – In early common law, suicide was considered murder. The requirement that the person killed be someone other than the perpetrator excluded suicide from the definition of murder. With malice aforethought – Originally malice aforethought carried its everyday meaning – a deliberate and premeditated (prior intent) killing of another motivated by ill will. Murder necessarily required that an appreciable time pass between the formation and execution of the intent to kill. The courts broadened the scope of murder by eliminating the requirement of actual premeditation and deliberation as well as true malice. All that was required for malice aforethought to exist is that the perpetrator act with one of the four states of mind that constitutes "malice". The four states of mind recognized as constituting "malice" are: Under state of mind (i), intent to kill, the deadly weapon rule applies. Thus, if the defendant intentionally uses a deadly weapon or instrument against the victim, such use authorizes a permissive inference of intent to kill. Examples of deadly weapons and instruments include but are not limited to guns, knives, deadly toxins or chemicals or gases and even vehicles when intentionally used to harm one or more victims. Under state of mind (iii), an "abandoned and malignant heart", the killing must result from the defendant's conduct involving a reckless indifference to human life and a conscious disregard of an unreasonable risk of death or serious bodily injury. In Australian jurisdictions, the unreasonable risk must amount to a foreseen probability of death (or grievous bodily harm in most states), as opposed to possibility. Under state of mind (iv), the felony-murder doctrine, the felony committed must be an inherently dangerous felony, such as burglary, arson, rape, robbery or kidnapping. Importantly, the underlying felony cannot be a lesser included offense such as assault, otherwise all criminal homicides would be murder as all are felonies. In Spanish criminal law, murder takes place when any of these requirements concur: Treachery (the use of means to avoid risk for the aggressor or to ensure that the crime goes unpunished), price or reward (financial gain) or viciousness (deliberately increasing the pain of the victim). After the last reform of the Spanish Criminal Code, in force since July 1, 2015, another circumstance that turns homicide into murder is the desire to facilitate the commission of another crime or to prevent it from being discovered. As with most legal terms, the precise definition of murder varies between jurisdictions and is usually codified in some form of legislation. Even when the legal distinction between murder and manslaughter is clear, it is not unknown for a jury to find a murder defendant guilty of the lesser offense. The jury might sympathize with the defendant (e.g. in a crime of passion, or in the case of a bullied victim who kills their tormentor), and the jury may wish to protect the defendant from a sentence of life imprisonment or execution. Degrees of murder Some jurisdictions divide murder by degrees. The distinction between first- and second-degree murder exists, for example, in Canadian murder law and U.S. murder law. The most common division is between first- and second-degree murder. Generally, second-degree murder is common law murder, and first-degree is an aggravated form. The aggravating factors of first-degree murder depend on the jurisdiction, but may include a specific intent to kill, premeditation, or deliberation. In some, murders committed by acts such as strangulation, poisoning, or lying in wait are also treated as first-degree murder. A few states in the U.S. further distinguish third-degree murder, but they differ significantly in which kinds of murders they classify as second-degree versus third-degree. For example, Minnesota defines third-degree murder as depraved-heart murder, whereas Florida defines third-degree murder as felony murder (except when the underlying felony is specifically listed in the definition of first-degree murder). Some jurisdictions also distinguish premeditated murder. This is the crime of wrongfully and intentionally causing the death of another human being (also known as murder) after rationally considering the timing or method of doing so, in order to either increase the likelihood of success, or to evade detection or apprehension. State laws in the United States vary as to definitions of "premeditation". In some states, premeditation may be construed as taking place mere seconds before the murder. Premeditated murder is one of the most serious forms of homicide, and is punished more severely than manslaughter or other types of homicide, often with a life sentence without the possibility of parole, or in some countries, the death penalty. In the U.S, federal law () criminalizes premeditated murder, felony murder and second-degree murder committed under situations where federal jurisdiction applies. In Canada, the criminal code classifies murder as either first- or second-degree. The former type of murder is often called premeditated murder, although premeditation is not the only way murder can be classified as first-degree. Common law According to Blackstone, English common law identified murder as a public wrong. According to common law, murder is considered to be malum in se, that is, an act which is evil within itself. An act such as murder is wrong or evil by its very nature, and it is the very nature of the act which does not require any specific detailing or definition in the law to consider murder a crime. Some jurisdictions still take a common law view of murder. In such jurisdictions, what is considered to be murder is defined by precedent case law or previous decisions of the courts of law. However, although the common law is by nature flexible and adaptable, in the interests both of certainty and of securing convictions, most common law jurisdictions have codified their criminal law and now have statutory definitions of murder. Exclusions General Although laws vary by country, there are circumstances of exclusion that are common in many legal systems. The killing of enemy combatants who have not surrendered, when committed by lawful combatants in accordance with lawful orders in war, is generally not considered murder. Illicit killings within a war may constitute murder or homicidal war crimes; see Laws of war. Self-defense: acting in self-defense or in defense of another person is generally accepted as legal justification for killing a person in situations that would otherwise have been murder. However, a self-defense killing might be considered manslaughter if the killer established control of the situation before the killing took place. In the case of self-defense, it is called a "justifiable homicide". Unlawful killings without malice or intent are considered manslaughter. In many common law countries, provocation is a partial defense to a charge of murder which acts by converting what would otherwise have been murder into manslaughter (this is voluntary manslaughter, which is more severe than involuntary manslaughter). Accidental killings are considered homicides. Depending on the circumstances, these may or may not be considered criminal offenses; they are often considered manslaughter. Suicide does not constitute murder in most societies. Assisting a suicide, however, may be considered murder in some circumstances. Specific to certain countries Capital punishment: some countries practice the death penalty. Capital punishment may be ordered by a legitimate court of law as the result of a conviction in a criminal trial with due process for a serious crime. The 47 member states of the Council of Europe are prohibited from using the death penalty. Euthanasia, doctor-assisted suicide: the administration of lethal drugs by a doctor to a terminally ill patient, if the intention is solely to alleviate pain, in many jurisdictions it is seen as a special case (see the doctrine of double effect and the case of Dr John Bodkin Adams). Killing to prevent the theft of one's property may be legal, depending on the jurisdiction. In 2013, a jury in south Texas acquitted a man who killed a sex worker who attempted to run away with his money. Killing an intruder who is found by an owner to be in the owner's home (having entered unlawfully): legal in most US states (see Castle doctrine). Killing to prevent specific forms of aggravated rape or sexual assault – killing of attacker by the potential victim or by witnesses to the scene; legal in parts of the US and in various other countries. In some countries, the killing of a woman or girl in specific circumstances (e.g., when she commits adultery and is killed by her husband or other family members, known as honor killing) is not considered murder. In the United States, in some states and in federal jurisdiction, a killing by a police officer is excluded from prosecution if the officer believes they are being threatened with deadly force by the victim. This may include such actions by the victim as reaching into a glove compartment or pocket for license and registration, if the officer thinks that the victim might be reaching for a gun. Victim All jurisdictions require that the victim be a natural person; that is, a human being who was still alive before being murdered. In other words, under the law one cannot murder a corpse, a corporation, a non-human animal, or any other non-human organism such as a plant or bacterium. California's murder statute, penal code section 187, expressly mentioned a fetus as being capable of being killed, and was interpreted by the Supreme Court of California in 1994 as not requiring any proof of the viability of the fetus as a prerequisite to a murder conviction. This holding has two implications. Firstly, a defendant in California can be convicted of murder for killing a fetus which the mother herself could have terminated without committing a crime. And secondly, as stated by Justice Stanley Mosk in his dissent, because women carrying nonviable fetuses may not be visibly pregnant, it may be possible for a defendant to be convicted of intentionally murdering a person they did not know existed. Mitigating circumstances Some countries allow conditions that "affect the balance of the mind" to be regarded as mitigating circumstances. This means that a person may be found guilty of "manslaughter" on the basis of "diminished responsibility" rather than being found guilty of murder, if it can be proved that the killer was suffering from a condition that affected their judgment at the time. Depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and medication side-effects are examples of conditions that may be taken into account when assessing responsibility. Insanity Mental disorder may apply to a wide range of disorders including psychosis caused by schizophrenia and dementia, and excuse the person from the need to undergo the stress of a trial as to liability. Usually, sociopathy and other personality disorders are not legally considered insanity, because of the belief they are the result of free will in many societies. In some jurisdictions, following the pre-trial hearing to determine the extent of the disorder, the defense of "not guilty by reason of insanity" may be used to get a not guilty verdict. This defense has two elements: That the defendant had a serious mental illness, disease, or defect That the defendant's mental condition, at the time of the killing, rendered the perpetrator unable to determine right from wrong, or that what they were doing was wrong Under New York law, for example: Under the French Penal Code: Those who successfully argue a defense based on a mental disorder are usually referred to mandatory clinical treatment until they are certified safe to be released back into the community, rather than prison. A criminal defendant is often presented with the option of pleading "not guilty by reason of insanity". Thus, a finding of insanity results in a not-guilty verdict, although the defendant is placed in a state treatment facility where they could be kept for years or even decades. Postpartum depression Postpartum depression (also known as post-natal depression) is recognized in some countries as a mitigating factor in cases of infanticide. According to Susan Friedman, "Two dozen nations have infanticide laws that decrease the penalty for mothers who kill their children of up to one year of age. The United States does not have such a law, but mentally ill mothers may plead not guilty by reason of insanity." In the law of the Republic of Ireland, infanticide was made a separate crime from murder in 1949, applicable for the mother of a baby under one year old where "the balance of her mind was disturbed by reason of her not having fully recovered from the effect of giving birth to the child or by reason of the effect of lactation consequent upon the birth of the child". Since independence, death sentences for murder in such cases had always been commuted; the new act was intended "to eliminate all the terrible ritual of the black cap and the solemn words of the judge pronouncing sentence of death in those cases ... where it is clear to the Court and to everybody, except perhaps the unfortunate accused, that the sentence will never be carried out." In Russia, murder of a newborn child by the mother has been a separate crime since 1996. Unintentional For a killing to be considered murder in nine out of fifty states in the US, there normally needs to be an element of intent. A defendant may argue that they took precautions not to kill, that the death could not have been anticipated, or was unavoidable. As a general rule, manslaughter constitutes reckless killing, but manslaughter also includes criminally negligent (i.e. grossly negligent) homicide. Unintentional killing that results from an involuntary action generally cannot constitute murder. After examining the evidence, a judge or jury (depending on the jurisdiction) would determine whether the killing was intentional or unintentional. Diminished capacity In jurisdictions using the Uniform Penal Code, such as California, diminished capacity may be a defense. For example, Dan White used this defense to obtain a manslaughter conviction, instead of murder, in the assassination of Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk. Afterward, California amended its penal code to provide "As a matter of public policy there shall be no defense of diminished capacity, diminished responsibility, or irresistible impulse in a criminal action...." Aggravating circumstances Murder with specified aggravating circumstances is often punished more harshly. Depending on the jurisdiction, such circumstances may include: Premeditation Poisoning Murder of a child Murder of a police officer, judge, firefighter or witness to a crime Murder of a pregnant woman Crime committed for pay or other reward, such as contract killing Exceptional brutality or cruelty Methods which are dangerous to the public, e.g. explosion, arson, shooting in a crowd etc. Murder for a political cause Murder committed in order to conceal another crime or facilitate its commission. Hate crimes, which occur when a perpetrator targets a victim because of their perceived membership in a certain social group. Treachery (e.g. Heimtücke in German law) In the United States and Canada, these murders are referred to as first-degree or aggravated murders. Murder, under English criminal law, always carries a mandatory life sentence, but is not classified into degrees. Penalties for murder committed under aggravating circumstances are often higher, under English law, than the 15-year minimum non-parole period that otherwise serves as a starting point for a murder committed by an adult. Felony murder rule A legal doctrine in some common law jurisdictions broadens the crime of murder: when an offender kills in the commission of a dangerous crime, (regardless of intent), he or she is guilty of murder. The felony murder rule is often justified by its supporters as a means of preventing dangerous felonies, but the case of Ryan Holle shows it can be used very widely. Year-and-a-day rule In some common law jurisdictions, a defendant accused of murder is not guilty if the victim survives for longer than one year and one day after the attack. This reflects the likelihood that if the victim dies, other factors will have contributed to the cause of death, breaking the chain of causation; and also means that the responsible person does not have a charge of murder "hanging over their head indefinitely". Subject to any statute of limitations, the accused could still be charged with an offense reflecting the seriousness of the initial assault. With advances in modern medicine, most countries have abandoned a fixed time period and test causation on the facts of the case. This is known as "delayed death" and cases where this was applied or was attempted to be applied go back to at least 1966. In England and Wales, the "year-and-a-day rule" was abolished by the Law Reform (Year and a Day Rule) Act 1996. However, if death occurs three years or more after the original attack then prosecution can take place only with the attorney-general's approval. In the United States, many jurisdictions have abolished the rule as well. Abolition of the rule has been accomplished by enactment of statutory criminal codes, which had the effect of displacing the common-law definitions of crimes and corresponding defenses. In 2001 the Supreme Court of the United States held that retroactive application of a state supreme court decision abolishing the year-and-a-day rule did not violate the Ex Post Facto Clause of Article I of the United States Constitution. The potential effect of fully abolishing the rule can be seen in the case of 74-year-old William Barnes, charged with the murder of a Philadelphia police officer Walter T. Barclay Jr., who he had shot nearly 41 years previously. Barnes had served 16 years in prison for attempting to murder Barkley, but when the policeman died on August 19, 2007, this was alleged to be from complications of the wounds suffered from the shooting – and Barnes was charged with his murder. He was acquitted on May 24, 2010. Contributing factors According to Morall, the motivations for murder fit into the following 4 categories: Lust: The murderer seeks to kill rivals to obtain objects of their sexual desire Love: The murderer seeks to "mercy kill" a loved one with a major deformity or an incurable illness. Loathing: The murderer seeks to kill a loathed person (such as an abusive parent) or members of a loathed group or culture. Loot: The murderer seeks some form of financial gain. Morall argues that a motive alone is insufficient to explain criminal killing, as people can experience those impulse without killing. Morall insists risk factors that may increase the chance that somebody will commit a murder include: Testosterone, the primary male sex hormone, is correlated with competitive and assertive behaviour. Reduction in serotonin increases likelihood of impulsive hostile behaviour. Alteration in the breakdown of glucose appears to affect mood and behaviour. Hyperglycemia and Hypoglycemia can both lead to aggression. Consumption of alcohol can lead to reduced self control. Environmental pollutants circulating in the body are linked to heightened aggression. Malnutrition from eating too much junk food can provoke aggressive behaviour and even murder. Certain personality disorders are associated with an increased homicide rate, most notably narcissistic, anti-social, and histrionic personality disorders and those associated with psychopathology. Some aspects of homicides, including the genetic relations or proximity between murderers and their victims, (as in the Cinderella effect), may potentially be explained by the evolution theory or evolutionary psychology. Several studies have shown that there is a correlation between murder rates and poverty. A 2000 study showed that regions of the state of São Paulo in Brazil with lower income also had higher rates of murder. Religious attitudes Abrahamic context In the Abrahamic religions, the first ever murder was committed by Cain against his brother Abel out of jealousy. In the past, certain types of homicide were lawful and justified. Georg Oesterdiekhoff wrote: In many such societies the redress was not via a legal system, but by blood revenge, although there might also be a form of payment that could be made instead—such as the weregild which in early Germanic society could be paid to the victim's family in lieu of their right of revenge. One of the oldest-known prohibitions against murder appears in the Sumerian Code of Ur-Nammu written sometime between 2100 and 2050 BC. The code states, "If a man commits a murder, that man must be killed." Judeo-Christian standard In Judeo-Christian traditions, the prohibition against murder is one of the Ten Commandments given by God to Moses in (Exodus: 20v13) and (Deuteronomy 5v17). The Vulgate and subsequent early English translations of the Bible used the term secretly killeth his neighbour or smiteth his neighbour secretly rather than murder for the Latin clam percusserit proximum. Later editions such as Young's Literal Translation and the World English Bible have translated the Latin occides simply as murder rather than the alternatives of kill, assassinate, fall upon, or slay. In Islam In Islam according to the Qur'an, one of the greatest sins is to kill a human being who has committed no fault. "Do not take a ˹human˺ life—made sacred by Allah—except with ˹legal˺ right." "That is why We ordained for the Children of Israel that whoever takes a life—unless as a punishment for murder or mischief in the land—it will be as if they killed all of humanity; and whoever saves a life, it will be as if they saved all of humanity." "˹They are˺ those who do not invoke any other god besides Allah, nor take a ˹human˺ life—made sacred by Allah—except with ˹legal˺ right,1 nor commit fornication. And whoever does ˹any of˺ this will face the penalty." Historical attitudes The term assassin derives from Hashshashin, a militant Ismaili Shi'ite sect, active from the 8th to 14th centuries. This mystic secret society killed members of the Abbasid, Fatimid, Seljuq and Crusader elite for political and religious reasons. The Thuggee cult that plagued India was devoted to Kali, the goddess of death and destruction. According to some estimates the Thuggees murdered 1 million people between 1740 and 1840. The Aztecs believed that without regular offerings of blood the sun god Huitzilopochtli would withdraw his support for them and destroy the world as they knew it. According to Ross Hassig, author of Aztec Warfare, "between 10,000 and 80,400 persons" were sacrificed in the 1487 re-consecration of the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan. Slavery Southern slave codes did make willful killing of a slave illegal in most cases. For example, the 1860 Mississippi case of Oliver v. State charged the defendant with murdering his own slave. In 1811, the wealthy white planter Arthur Hodge was hanged for murdering several of his slaves on his plantation in the Virgin Islands. Honor killings in Corsica In Corsica, vendetta was a social code that required Corsicans to kill anyone who wronged their family honor. Between 1821 and 1852, no fewer than 4,300 murders were perpetrated in Corsica. Incidence The World Health Organization reported in October 2002 that a person is murdered every 60 seconds. An estimated 520,000 people were murdered in 2000 around the globe. Another study estimated the worldwide murder rate at 456,300 in 2010 with a 35% increase since 1990. Two-fifths of them were young people between the ages of 10 and 29 who were killed by other young people. Because murder is the least likely crime to go unreported, statistics of murder are seen as a bellwether of overall crime rates. Murder rates vary greatly among countries and societies around the world. In the Western world, murder rates in most countries have declined significantly during the 20th century and are now between 1 and 4 cases per 100,000 people per year. Latin America and the Caribbean, the region with the highest murder rate in the world, experienced more than 2.5 million murders between 2000 and 2017. Murder rates by varies countries Murder rates in jurisdictions such as Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Iceland, Switzerland, Italy, Spain and Germany are among the lowest in the world, around 0.3–1 cases per 100,000 people per year; the rate of the United States is among the highest of developed countries, around 4.5 in 2014, with rates in larger cities sometimes over 40 per 100,000. The top ten highest murder rates are in Honduras (91.6 per 100,000), El Salvador, Ivory Coast, Venezuela, Belize, Jamaica, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guatemala, Saint Kitts and Nevis and Zambia. (UNODC, 2011 – full table here). The following absolute murder counts per-country are not comparable because they are not adjusted by each country's total population. Nonetheless, they are included here for reference, with 2010 used as the base year (they may or may not include justifiable homicide, depending on the jurisdiction). There were 52,260 murders in Brazil, consecutively elevating the record set in 2009. Over half a million people were shot to death in Brazil between 1979 and 2003. 33,335 murder cases were registered across India, approximately 17,000 murders in Colombia (the murder rate was 38 per 100,000 people, in 2008 murders went down to 15,000), approximately 16,000 murders in South Africa, approximately 15,000 murders in the United States, approximately 26,000 murders in Mexico, about 8,000 murders committed in Russia, approximately 13,000 murders in Venezuela, approximately 4,000 murders in El Salvador, approximately 1,400 murders in Jamaica, approximately 550 murders in Canada and approximately 470 murders in Trinidad and Tobago. Pakistan reported 12,580 murders. Murder in the United States In the United States, 666,160 people were killed between 1960 and 1996. Approximately 90% of murders in the US are committed by males. Between 1976 and 2005, 23.5% of all murder victims and 64.8% of victims murdered by intimate partners were female. For women in the US, homicide is the leading cause of death in the workplace. In the US, murder is the leading cause of death for African American males aged 15 to 34. Between 1976 and 2008, African Americans were victims of 329,825 homicides. In 2006, Federal Bureau of Investigation's Supplementary Homicide Report indicated that nearly half of the 14,990 murder victims that year were Black (7421). In the year 2007, there were 3,221 black victims and 3,587 white victims of non-negligent homicides. While 2,905 of the black victims were killed by a black offender, 2,918 of the white victims were killed by white offenders. There were 566 white victims of black offenders and 245 black victims of white offenders. The "white" category in the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) includes non-black Hispanics. Murder demographics are affected by the improvement of trauma care, which has resulted in reduced lethality of violent assaults – thus the murder rate may not necessarily indicate the overall level of social violence. Workplace homicide, which tripled during the 1980s, is the fastest growing category of murder in America. Development of murder rates over time in different countries is often used by both supporters and opponents of capital punishment and gun control. Using properly filtered data, it is possible to make the case for or against either of these issues. For example, one could look at murder rates in the United States from 1950 to 2000, and notice that those rates went up sharply shortly after a moratorium on death sentences was effectively imposed in the late 1960s. This fact has been used to argue that capital punishment serves as a deterrent and, as such, it is morally justified. Capital punishment opponents frequently counter that the United States has much higher murder rates than Canada and most European Union countries, although all those countries have abolished the death penalty. Overall, the global pattern is too complex, and on average, the influence of both these factors may not be significant and could be more social, economic, and cultural. Despite the immense improvements in forensics in the past few decades, the fraction of murders solved has decreased in the United States, from 90% in 1960 to 61% in 2007. Solved murder rates in major U.S. cities varied in 2007 from 36% in Boston, Massachusetts to 76% in San Jose, California. Major factors affecting the arrest rate include witness cooperation and the number of people assigned to investigate the case. History of murder rates According to scholar Pieter Spierenburg homicide rates per 100,000 in Europe have fallen over the centuries, from 35 per 100,000 in medieval times, to 20 in 1500 AD, 5 in 1700, to below two per 100,000 in 1900. In the United States, murder rates have been higher and have fluctuated. They fell below 2 per 100,000 by 1900, rose during the first half of the century, dropped in the years following World War II, and bottomed out at 4.0 in 1957 before rising again. The rate stayed in 9 to 10 range most of the period from 1972 to 1994, before falling to 5 in present times. The increase since 1957 would have been even greater if not for the significant improvements in medical techniques and emergency response times, which mean that more and more attempted homicide victims survive. According to one estimate, if the lethality levels of criminal assaults of 1964 still applied in 1993, the country would have seen the murder rate of around 26 per 100,000, almost triple the actually observed rate of 9.5 per 100,000. A similar, but less pronounced pattern has been seen in major European countries as well. The murder rate in the United Kingdom fell to 1 per 100,000 by the beginning of the 20th century and as low as 0.62 per 100,000 in 1960, and was at 1.28 per 100,000 . The murder rate in France (excluding Corsica) bottomed out after World War II at less than 0.4 per 100,000, quadrupling to 1.6 per 100,000 since then. The specific factors driving this dynamics in murder rates are complex and not universally agreed upon. Much of the raise in the U.S. murder rate during the first half of the 20th century is generally thought to be attributed to gang violence associated with Prohibition. Since most murders are committed by young males, the near simultaneous low in the murder rates of major developed countries circa 1960 can be attributed to low birth rates during the Great Depression and World War II. Causes of further moves are more controversial. Some of the more exotic factors claimed to affect murder rates include the availability of abortion and the likelihood of chronic exposure to lead during childhood (due to the use of leaded paint in houses and tetraethyllead as a gasoline additive in internal combustion engines). Investigation The success rate of criminal investigations into murders (the clearance rate) tends to be relatively high for murder compared to other crimes, due to its seriousness. In the United States, the clearance rate was 62.6% in 2004. See also Lists related to murder Lists of murders List of types of killing Axe murder List of unsolved deaths Related topics Child murder Culpable homicide Depraved-heart murder Double murder Execution-style murder Letting die Mass murder Misdemeanor murder Murder conviction without a body Seven laws of Noah Stigmatized property Thrill killing Capital murder Assassination, the murder of a prominent person, such as a head of state or head of government. Murder laws by country Australia Brazil Canada China Cuba Denmark England and Wales Finland France Germany Hong Kong India Israel Italy Netherlands Northern Ireland Norway Peru Portugal Romania Russia Sweden Switzerland United States Notes References Bibliography Lord Mustill on the Common Law concerning murder Sir Edward Coke Co. Inst., Pt. III, ch.7, p. 50 External links Introduction and Updated Information on the Seville Statement on Violence The Seville Statement Atlas of United States Mortality – U.S. Centers for Disease Control Cezanne's depiction of "The Murder" – National Museums Liverpool Crimes Crimes against humanity Violent crime Violence

20174

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariner%20program

Mariner program

The Mariner program was conducted by the American space agency NASA to explore other planets. Between 1962 and late 1973, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) designed and built 10 robotic interplanetary probes named Mariner to explore the inner Solar System - visiting the planets Venus, Mars and Mercury for the first time, and returning to Venus and Mars for additional close observations. The program included a number of firsts, including the first planetary flyby, the first planetary orbiter, and the first gravity assist maneuver. Of the 10 vehicles in the Mariner series, seven were successful, forming the starting point for many subsequent NASA/JPL space probe programs. The planned Mariner Jupiter-Saturn vehicles were adapted into the Voyager program, while the Viking program orbiters were enlarged versions of the Mariner 9 spacecraft. Later Mariner-based spacecraft include Galileo and Magellan, while the second-generation Mariner Mark II series evolved into the Cassini–Huygens probe. The total cost of the Mariner program was approximately $554 million. Early concept The Mariner program began in 1960 with a series of JPL mission studies for small-scale, frequent exploration of the nearest planets. They were to take advantage of the soon-to-be-available Atlas launch vehicles as well as the developing capability of JPL’s Deep Space Instrumentation Facility (later named the Deep Space Network), a global network of ground stations designed to communicate with spacecraft in deep space. The name of the Mariner program was decided in "May 1960-at the suggestion of Edgar M. Cortright" to have the "planetary mission probes ... patterned after nautical terms, to convey 'the impression of travel to great distances and remote lands.'" That "decision was the basis for naming Mariner, Ranger, Surveyor, and Viking probes." Each spacecraft was to carry solar panels that would be pointed toward the Sun and a dish antenna that would be pointed at Earth. Each would also carry a host of scientific instruments. Some of the instruments, such as cameras, would need to be pointed at the target body it was studying. Other instruments were non-directional and studied phenomena such as magnetic fields and charged particles. JPL engineers proposed to make the Mariners “three-axis-stabilized,” meaning that unlike other space probes they would not spin. Each of the Mariner projects was designed to have two spacecraft launched on separate rockets, in case of difficulties with the nearly untried launch vehicles. Mariner 1, Mariner 3, and Mariner 8 were in fact lost during launch, but their backups were successful. No Mariners were lost in later flight to their destination planets or before completing their scientific missions. Basic layout All Mariner spacecraft were based on a hexagonal or octagonal bus, which housed all of the electronics, and to which all components were attached, such as antennae, cameras, propulsion, and power sources. Mariner 2 was based on the Ranger Lunar probe. All of the Mariners launched after Mariner 2 had four solar panels for power, except for Mariner 10, which had two. Additionally, all except Mariner 1, Mariner 2 and Mariner 5 had TV cameras. The first five Mariners were launched on Atlas-Agena rockets, while the last five used the Atlas-Centaur. All Mariner-based probes after Mariner 10 used the Titan IIIE, Titan IV unmanned rockets or the Space Shuttle with a solid-fueled Inertial Upper Stage and multiple planetary flybys. Mariners The Mariners were all relatively small robotic explorers, each launched on an Atlas rocket with either an Agena or Centaur upper-stage booster, and weighing less than half a ton (without onboard rocket propellant). Each of their missions was completed within a few months to a year or two, though one of them outlived its original mission and continued to send useful scientific data for three years. Mariners 1 and 2 Mariner 1 (P-37) and Mariner 2 (P-38) were two deep-space probes making up NASA's Mariner-R project. The primary goal of the project was to develop and launch two spacecraft sequentially to the near vicinity of Venus, receive communications from the spacecraft and to perform radiometric temperature measurements of the planet. A secondary objective was to make interplanetary magnetic field and/or particle measurements on the way to, and in the vicinity of, Venus. Mariner 1 (designated Mariner R-1) was launched on July 22, 1962, but was destroyed approximately 5 minutes after liftoff by the Air Force Range Safety Officer when its malfunctioning Atlas-Agena rocket went off course. Mariner 2 (designated Mariner R-2) was launched on August 27, 1962, sending it on a 3½-month flight to Venus. The mission was a success, and Mariner 2 became the first spacecraft to have flown by another planet. On the way it measured for the first time the solar wind, a constant stream of charged particles flowing outward from the Sun. It also measured interplanetary dust, which turned out to be more scarce than predicted. In addition, Mariner 2 detected high-energy charged particles coming from the Sun, including several brief solar flares, as well as cosmic rays from outside the solar system. As it flew by Venus on December 14, 1962, Mariner 2 scanned the planet with infrared and microwave radiometers, revealing that Venus has cool clouds and an extremely hot surface (because the bright, opaque clouds hide the planet’s surface, Mariner 2 was not outfitted with a camera). Mission: Venus flyby Mass: 203 kg (446 lb) Sensors: microwave and infrared radiometers, cosmic dust, solar plasma and high-energy radiation, magnetic fields Status: Mariner 1 – Destroyed shortly after liftoff. Mariner 2 – Defunct after successful mission, occupies a heliocentric orbit. Mariners 3 and 4 Sisterships Mariner 3 and Mariner 4 were Mars flyby missions. Mariner 3 was launched on November 5, 1964, but the shroud encasing the spacecraft atop its rocket failed to open properly and Mariner 3 did not get to Mars. Mariner 4, launched on November 28, 1964, was the first successful flyby of the planet Mars and gave the first glimpse of Mars at close range. The spacecraft flew past Mars on July 14, 1965, collecting the first close-up photographs of another planet. The pictures, played back from a small tape recorder over a long period, showed lunar-type impact craters (just beginning to be photographed at close range from the Moon), some of them touched with frost in the chill Martian evening. The Mariner 4 spacecraft, expected to survive some-thing more than the eight months to Mars encounter, actually lasted about three years in solar orbit, continuing long-term studies of the solar wind environment and making coordinated measurements with Mariner 5, a sister ship launched to Venus in 1967. Mission: Mars flyby Mass: 261 kg (575 lb) Sensors: camera with digital tape recorder (about 20 pictures), cosmic dust, solar plasma, trapped radiation, cosmic rays, magnetic fields, radio occultation and celestial mechanics Status: Mariner 3 – Malfunctioned. Derelict in heliocentric orbit. Mariner 4 – Communications lost after bombardment by micrometeoroids. Derelict in heliocentric orbit. Mariner 5 The Mariner 5 spacecraft was launched to Venus on June 14, 1967 and arrived in the vicinity of the planet in October 1967. It carried a complement of experiments to probe Venus' atmosphere with radio waves, scan its brightness in ultraviolet light, and sample the solar particles and magnetic field fluctuations above the planet. Mission: Venus flyby Mass: 245 kg (540 lb) Sensors: ultraviolet photometer, cosmic dust, solar plasma, trapped radiation, cosmic rays, magnetic fields, radio occultation and celestial mechanics Status: Mariner 5 – Defunct. Now in heliocentric orbit. Mariners 6 and 7 Mariners 6 and 7 were identical teammates in a two-spacecraft mission to Mars. Mariner 6 was launched on February 24, 1969, followed by Mariner 7 on March 21, 1969. They flew over the equator and southern hemisphere of the planet Mars. They analyzed atmosphere and surface with remote sensors as well as recording and relaying hundreds of pictures. By chance, both flew over cratered regions and missed both the giant northern volcanoes and the equatorial grand canyon discovered later. Their approach pictures did, however, show the dark features long seen from Earth, but no canals. Mission: Mars flybys Mass 413 kg (908 lb) Sensors: wide- and narrow-angle cameras with digital tape recorder, infrared spectrometer and radiometer, ultraviolet spectrometer, radio occultation and celestial mechanics. Status: Both Mariner 6 and Mariner 7 are now defunct and are in a heliocentric orbit. Mariners 8 and 9 Mariner 8 and Mariner 9 were identical sister craft designed to map the Martian surface simultaneously, but Mariner 8 was lost in a launch vehicle failure. Mariner 9 was launched in May 1971 and became the first artificial satellite of Mars. Its launch mass was nearly doubled by the onboard rocket propellant needed to thrust it into orbit around Mars, but otherwise it closely resembled its predecessors. It entered Martian orbit in November 1971 and began photographing the surface and analyzing the atmosphere with its infrared and ultraviolet instruments. Since 1969, Mariner spacecraft operations such as science sequencing and pointing had been programmable, using simple flight computers with limited memory, and the spacecraft used a digital tape-recorder rather than film to store images and other science data. The spacecraft was thus able to wait until the storm abated, the dust settled and the surface was clearly visible before compiling its global mosaic of high-quality images of the surface of Mars. It also provided the first closeup pictures of Mars’ two small, irregular moons, Phobos and Deimos. Mission: orbit Mars Mass 998 kg (2,200 lb) Sensors: wide- and narrow-angle cameras with digital tape recorder, infrared spectrometer and radiometer, ultraviolet spectrometer, radio occultation and celestial mechanics Status: Mariner 8 – Destroyed in a launch vehicle failure. Mariner 9 – Shut off. In Areocentric (Mars) orbit until at least 2022 when it is projected to fall out of orbit and into the Martian atmosphere. Mariner 10 The Mariner 10 spacecraft launched on November 3, 1973 and was the first to use a gravity assist trajectory, accelerating as it entered the gravitational influence of Venus, then being flung by the planet's gravity onto a slightly different course to reach Mercury. It was also the first spacecraft to encounter two planets at close range, and for 33 years the only spacecraft to photograph Mercury in closeup. Here a fortuitous gravity assist enabled the spacecraft to return at six-month intervals for close mapping passes over the planet, covering half the globe (Mercury’s slow rotation left the other half always in the dark when Mariner returned). Mission: plasma, charged particles, magnetic fields, radio occultation and celestial mechanics Status: Mariner 10 – Defunct. Now in a heliocentric orbit. Mariner Jupiter-Saturn Mariner Jupiter-Saturn was approved in 1972 after the cancellation of the Grand Tour program, which proposed visiting all the outer planets with multiple spacecraft. The Mariner Jupiter-Saturn program proposed two Mariner-derived probes that would perform a scaled back mission involving flybys of only the two gas giants, though designers at JPL built the craft with the intention that further encounters past Saturn would be an option. Trajectories were chosen to allow one probe to visit Jupiter and Saturn first, and perform a flyby of Saturn's moon Titan to gather information about the moon's substantial atmosphere. The other probe would arrive at Jupiter and Saturn later, and its trajectory would enable it to continue on to Uranus and Neptune assuming the first probe accomplished all its objectives, or be redirected to perform a Titan flyby if necessary. The program's name was changed to Voyager just before launch in 1977, and after Voyager 1 successfully completed its Titan encounter, Voyager 2 went on to visit the two ice giants. See also Exploration of Mars Mariner Mark II Mariner (crater) Pioneer program Tom Krimigis Notes References Missions to Mars Missions to Mercury Missions to Venus

20175

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariner%204

Mariner 4

Mariner 4 (together with Mariner 3 known as Mariner-Mars 1964) was the fourth in a series of spacecraft intended for planetary exploration in a flyby mode. It was designed to conduct closeup scientific observations of Mars and to transmit these observations to Earth. Launched on November 28, 1964, Mariner 4 performed the first successful flyby of the planet Mars, returning the first close-up pictures of the Martian surface. It captured the first images of another planet ever returned from deep space; their depiction of a cratered, dead planet largely changed the scientific community's view of life on Mars. Other mission objectives were to perform field and particle measurements in interplanetary space in the vicinity of Mars and to provide experience in and knowledge of the engineering capabilities for interplanetary flights of long duration. On December 21, 1967, communications with Mariner 4 were terminated. Spacecraft and subsystems The Mariner 4 spacecraft consisted of an octagonal magnesium frame, across a diagonal and high. Four solar panels were attached to the top of the frame with an end-to-end span of , including solar pressure vanes which extended from the ends. A elliptical high-gain parabolic antenna was mounted at the top of the frame as well. An omnidirectional low-gain antenna was mounted on a tall mast next to the high-gain antenna. The overall height of the spacecraft was . The octagonal frame housed the electronic equipment, cabling, midcourse propulsion system, and attitude control gas supplies and regulators. The scientific instruments included: A helium magnetometer, mounted on the waveguide leading to the omnidirectional antenna, to measure the magnitude and other characteristics of the interplanetary and planetary magnetic fields. An ionization chamber/Geiger counter, mounted on the waveguide leading to the omnidirectional antenna nearer the body of the spacecraft, to measure the charged-particle intensity and distribution in interplanetary space and in the vicinity of Mars. A trapped radiation detector, mounted on the body with counter-axes pointing 70° and 135° from the solar direction, to measure the intensity and direction of low-energy particles. A cosmic ray telescope, mounted inside the body pointing in anti-solar direction, to measure the direction and energy spectrum of protons and alpha particles. A solar plasma probe, mounted on the body pointing 10° from the solar direction, to measure the very low energy charged particle flux from the Sun. A cosmic dust detector, mounted on the body with microphone plate approximately perpendicular to the plane of orbit, to measure the momentum, distribution, density, and direction of cosmic dust. A television camera, mounted on a scan platform at the bottom center of the spacecraft, to obtain closeup pictures of the surface of Mars. This subsystem consisted of 4 parts, a Cassegrain telescope with a 1.05° by 1.05° field of view, a shutter and red/green filter assembly with 0.08 and 0.20 second exposure times, a slow scan vidicon tube which translated the optical image into an electrical video signal, and the electronic systems required to convert the analogue signal into a digital bitstream for transmission. The electric power for the instruments and the radio transmitter of Mariner 4 was supplied by 28,224 solar cells contained in the four solar panels, which could provide 310 watts at the distance of Mars. A rechargeable 1200 W·h silver-zinc battery was also used for maneuvers and backup. Monopropellant hydrazine was used for propulsion, via a four-jet vane vector control motor, with thrust, installed on one of the sides of the octagonal structure. The space probe's attitude control was provided by 12 cold nitrogen gas jets mounted on the ends of the solar panels and three gyros. Solar pressure vanes, each with an area of , were attached to the tips of the solar panels. Positional information was provided by four Sun sensors, and a sensor for either the Earth, Mars, or the star Canopus, depending on the time in its spaceflight. Mariner 4 was the first space probe that needed a star for a navigational reference object, since earlier missions, which remained near either the Earth, the Moon, or the planet Venus, had sighted onto either the bright face of the home planet or the brightly lit target. During this flight, both the Earth and Mars would be too dim to lock onto. Another bright source at a wide angle away from the Sun was needed and Canopus filled this requirement. Subsequently, Canopus was used as a reference point in many following missions. The telecommunications equipment on Mariner 4 consisted of dual S-band transmitters (with either a seven-watt triode cavity amplifier or a ten watt traveling-wave tube amplifier) and a single radio receiver which together could send and receive data via the low- and high-gain antennas at 8⅓ or 33⅓ bits per second. Data could also be stored onto a magnetic tape recorder with a capacity of 5.24 million bits for later transmission. All electronic operations were controlled by a command subsystem which could process any of 29 direct command words or three quantitative word commands for mid-course maneuvers. The central computer and sequencer operated stored time-sequence commands using a 38.4 kHz synchronization frequency as a time reference. Temperature control was achieved through the use of adjustable louvers mounted on six of the electronics assemblies, plus multilayer insulating blankets, polished aluminum shields, and surface treatments. Other measurements that could be made included: Radio occultation Celestial mechanics based on precision tracking Mission profile Launch After Mariner 3 was a total loss due to failure of the payload shroud to jettison, JPL engineers suggested that there had been a malfunction caused during separation of the metal fairing exterior from the fiberglass inner lining due to pressure differences between the inner and outer part of the shroud and that this could have caused the spring-loaded separation mechanism to become tangled and fail to detach properly. Testing at JPL confirmed this failure mode and an effort was made to develop a new, all-metal fairing. The downside of this was that the new fairing would be significantly heavier and reduce the Atlas-Agena's lift capacity. Convair and Lockheed-Martin had to make several performance enhancements to the booster to wring more power out of it. Despite fears that the work could not be completed before the 1964 Mars window closed, the new shroud was ready by November. After launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 12, the protective shroud covering Mariner 4 was jettisoned and the Agena-D/Mariner 4 combination separated from the Atlas-D booster at 14:27:23 UTC on November 28, 1964. The Agena's first burn took place from 14:28:14 to 14:30:38. The initial burn put the spacecraft into an Earth parking orbit and the second burn from 15:02:53 to 15:04:28 injected the craft into a Mars transfer orbit. Mariner 4 separated from the Agena at 15:07:09 and began cruise mode operations. The solar panels deployed and the scan platform was unlatched at 15:15:00. Sun acquisition occurred 16 minutes later. Lock on Canopus After Sun acquisition, the Canopus star tracker went searching for Canopus. The star tracker was set to respond to any object more than one-eighth as, and less than eight times as bright as Canopus. Including Canopus, there were seven such objects visible to the sensor. It took more than a day of "star-hopping" to find Canopus, as the sensor locked on to other stars instead: a stray light pattern from the near Earth, Alderamin, Regulus, Naos, and Gamma Velorum were acquired before Canopus. A consistent problem that plagued the spacecraft during the early portion of its mission was that roll error signal transients would occur frequently and on occasion would cause loss of the Canopus star lock. The first attempt at a midcourse maneuver was aborted by a loss of lock shortly after the gyros began spinup. Canopus lock was lost six times within a period of less than three weeks after launch and each time a sequence of radio commands would be required to reacquire the star. After a study of the problem, the investigators concluded that the behavior was due to small dust particles that were being released from the spacecraft by some means and were drifting through the star sensor field-of-view. Sunlight scattered from the particles then appeared as illumination equivalent to that from a bright star. This would cause a roll error transient as the object passed through the field-of-view while the sensor was locked onto Canopus. When the object was bright enough that it exceeded the high gate limits at eight times the Canopus intensity, the spacecraft would automatically disacquire Canopus and initiate a roll search for a new star. Finally, a radio command was sent on December 17, 1964, that removed the high gate limit. There was no further loss of Canopus lock, although roll transients occurred 38 more times before encounter with Mars. Midcourse maneuver The 7½ month flight of Mariner 4 involved one midcourse maneuver on December 5, 1964. The maneuver was initially scheduled for December 4, but due to a loss of lock with Canopus, it was postponed. The maneuver was successfully completed on December 5; it consisted of a negative pitch turn of 39.16 degrees, a positive roll turn of 156.08 degrees, and a thrusting time of 20.07 seconds. The turns aimed the motor of the spacecraft back in the general direction of Earth, as the motor was initially pointed along the direction of flight. Both the pitch and roll changes were completed with better than 1% accuracy, the velocity change with about 2.5% accuracy. After the maneuver, Mariner 4 was on course for Mars as planned. Data transmission rate reduced On January 5, 1965, 36 days after launch and from Earth, Mariner 4 reduced its rate of transmission of scientific data from 33 1/3 to 8 1/2 bits per second. This was the first autonomous action the spacecraft had taken since the midcourse maneuver. Mars flyby The Mariner 4 spacecraft flew by Mars on July 14 and 15, 1965. Its closest approach was from the Martian surface at 01:00:57 UT July 15, 1965 (8:00:57 p.m. EST July 14), its distance to Earth was , its speed was relative to Mars, relative to Earth. Planetary science mode was turned on at 15:41:49 UT on July 14. The camera sequence started at 00:18:36 UT on July 15 (7:18:49 p.m. EST on July 14) and 21 pictures using alternate red and green filters, plus 21 lines of a 22nd picture were taken. The images covered a discontinuous swath of Mars starting near 40° N, 170° E, down to about 35° S, 200° E, and then across to the terminator at 50° S, 255° E, representing about 1% of the planet's surface. The images taken during the flyby were stored in the on-board tape recorder. At 02:19:11 UT, Mariner 4 passed behind Mars as seen from Earth and the radio signal ceased. The signal was reacquired at 03:13:04 UT when the spacecraft reappeared. Cruise mode was then re-established. Transmission of the taped images to Earth began about 8.5 hours after signal reacquisition and continued until August 3. All images were transmitted twice to ensure no data was missing or corrupt. Each individual photograph took approximately six hours to be transmitted back to Earth. The spacecraft performed all programmed activities successfully and returned useful data from launch until 22:05:07 UT on October 1, 1965, when the long distance to Earth () and the imprecise antenna orientation led to a temporary loss of communication with the spacecraft until 1967. First image hand drawn The on-board tape recorder used on Mariner 4 was a spare, not originally intended for the Mariner 4 flight. Between the failure of Mariner 3, the fact that the Mariner 4 recorder was a spare, and some error readings suggesting an issue with the tape-recorder, it was determined that the team would test the camera function definitively. This eventually led to the first digital image being hand-drawn. While waiting for the image data to be computer processed, the team used a pastel set from an art supply store to hand-color (paint-by-numbers style) a numerical printout of the raw pixels. The resulting image provided early verification that the camera was functioning. The hand-drawn image compared favorably with the processed image when it became available. Micrometeoroid hits and end of communications Data acquisition resumed in late 1967. The cosmic dust detector registered 17 hits in a 15-minute span on September 15, part of an apparent micrometeoroid shower that temporarily changed the spacecraft attitude and probably slightly damaged its thermal shield. Later it was speculated that Mariner 4 passed through debris of D/1895 Q1 (D/Swift), and even made a flyby of that comet's possibly shattered nucleus at . On December 7 the gas supply in the attitude control system was exhausted, and between December 10 and 11, a total of 83 micrometeoroid hits were recorded which caused perturbation of the spacecraft's attitude and degradation of the signal strength. On December 21, 1967, communications with Mariner 4 were terminated. The spacecraft is now derelict in an exterior heliocentric orbit. Results The total data returned by the mission was 5.2 million bits (about 634 kB). All instruments operated successfully with the exception of a part of the ionization chamber, namely the Geiger–Müller tube, which failed in February 1965. In addition, the plasma probe had its performance degraded by a resistor failure on December 8, 1964, but experimenters were able to recalibrate the instrument and still interpret the data. The images returned showed a Moon-like cratered terrain, which scientists did not expect, although amateur astronomer Donald Cyr had predicted craters. Later missions showed that the craters were not typical for Mars, but only for the more ancient region imaged by Mariner 4. A surface atmospheric pressure of and daytime temperatures of were estimated. No magnetic field or Martian radiation belts or, again surprisingly, surface water was detected. Bruce C. Murray used photographs from Mariner 4 to elucidate Mars' geologic history. Images of craters and measurements of a thin atmosphere—much thinner than expected—indicating a relatively inactive planet exposed to the harshness of space, generally dissipated hopes of finding intelligent life on Mars. Life on Mars had been the subject of speculation and science fiction for centuries. If there was life on Mars, after Mariner 4 most concluded it would probably be smaller, simpler forms. Others concluded that a search for life on Earth at kilometer resolution, using several thousand photographs, did not reveal a sign of life on the vast majority of these photographs; thus, based on the 22 photographs taken by Mariner 4, one could not conclude there was no intelligent life on Mars. The solar wind was measured, and compared with simultaneous records from Mariner 5 which went to Venus. The total cost of the Mariner 4 mission is estimated at $83.2 million (equivalent to $ million in ). Total research, development, launch, and support costs for the Mariner series of spacecraft (Mariners 1 through 10) was approximately $554 million (equivalent to $ billion in ). See also Exploration of Mars List of missions to Mars Mariner (crater) Space exploration Space probe REX (New Horizons) (Radio occultation for atmosphere data at Pluto in 2015, on New Horizons spacecraft) References External links Mariner 4 Mission Profile by NASA's Solar System Exploration Space Flight Operations Plan Mariner Mars '64 (PDF) Processed images and mosaics from the Mariner 4 mission to Mars Ted Stryk's Mariner 4 page Mariner 4 photos Derelict satellites in heliocentric orbit Missions to Mars Mariner program Spacecraft launched in 1964 Derelict space probes Spacecraft launched by Atlas-Agena rockets de:Mariner#Mariner 3 und 4

20180

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical%20ensemble

Musical ensemble

A musical ensemble, also known as a music group or musical group, is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music, with the ensemble typically known by a distinct name. Some music ensembles consist solely of instrumentalists, such as the jazz quartet or the orchestra. Other music ensembles consist solely of singers, such as choirs and doo wop groups. In both popular music and classical music, there are ensembles in which both instrumentalists and singers perform, such as the rock band or the Baroque chamber group for basso continuo (harpsichord and cello) and one or more singers. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families (such as piano, strings, and wind instruments) or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles (e.g., string quartet) or wind ensembles (e.g., wind quintet). Some ensembles blend the sounds of a variety of instrument families, such as the orchestra, which uses a string section, brass instruments, woodwinds and percussion instruments, or the concert band, which uses brass, woodwinds and percussion. In jazz ensembles or combos, the instruments typically include wind instruments (one or more saxophones, trumpets, etc.), one or two chordal "comping" instruments (electric guitar, piano, or Hammond organ), a bass instrument (bass guitar or double bass), and a drummer or percussionist. Jazz ensembles may be solely instrumental, or they may consist of a group of instruments accompanying one or more singers. In rock and pop ensembles, usually called rock bands or pop bands, there are usually guitars and keyboards (piano, electric piano, Hammond organ, synthesizer, etc.), one or more singers, and a rhythm section made up of a bass guitar and drum kit. Music ensembles typically have a leader. In jazz bands, rock and pop groups and similar ensembles, this is the band leader. In classical music, orchestras, concert bands and choirs are led by a conductor. In orchestra, the concertmaster (principal first violin player) is the instrumentalist leader of the orchestra. In orchestras, the individual sections also have leaders, typically called the "principal" of the section (e.g., the leader of the viola section is called the "principal viola"). Conductors are also used in jazz big bands and in some very large rock or pop ensembles (e.g., a rock concert that includes a string section, a horn section and a choir which are accompanying a rock band's performance). Classical chamber music In Western classical music, smaller ensembles are called chamber music ensembles. The terms duo, trio, quartet, quintet, sextet, septet, octet, nonet and decet describe groups of two up to ten musicians, respectively. A group of eleven musicians, such as found in The Carnival of the Animals, is called an undecet, and a group of twelve is called a duodecet (see Latin numerical prefixes). A soloist playing unaccompanied (e.g., a pianist playing a solo piano piece or a cellist playing a Bach suite for unaccompanied cello) is not an ensemble because it only contains one musician. Four parts Strings A string quartet consists of two violins, a viola and a cello. There is a vast body of music written for string quartets, as it is seen as an important genre in classical music. Wind A woodwind quartet usually features a flute, an oboe, a clarinet and a bassoon. A brass quartet features two trumpets, a trombone and a tuba. A saxophone quartet consists of a soprano saxophone, an alto saxophone, a tenor saxophone, and a baritone saxophone. Five parts The string quintet is a common type of group. It is similar to the string quartet, but with an additional viola, cello, or more rarely, the addition of a double bass. Terms such as "piano quintet" or "clarinet quintet" frequently refer to a string quartet plus a fifth instrument. Mozart's Clarinet Quintet is similarly a piece written for an ensemble consisting of two violins, a viola, a cello and a clarinet, the last being the exceptional addition to a "normal" string quartet. Some other quintets in classical music are the wind quintet, usually consisting of flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon and horn; the brass quintet, consisting of two trumpets, one horn, a trombone and a tuba; and the reed quintet, consisting of an oboe, a soprano clarinet, a saxophone, a bass clarinet, and a bassoon. Six or more instruments Classical chamber ensembles of six (sextet), seven (septet), or eight musicians (octet) are fairly common; use of latinate terms for larger groups is rare, except for the nonet (nine musicians). In most cases, a larger classical group is referred to as an orchestra of some type or a concert band. A small orchestra with fifteen to thirty members (violins, violas, four cellos, two or three double basses, and several woodwind or brass instruments) is called a chamber orchestra. A sinfonietta usually denotes a somewhat smaller orchestra (though still not a chamber orchestra). Larger orchestras are called symphony orchestras (see below) or philharmonic orchestras. A pops orchestra is an orchestra that mainly performs light classical music (often in abbreviated, simplified arrangements) and orchestral arrangements and medleys of popular jazz, music theater, or pop music songs. A string orchestra has only string instruments, i.e., violins, violas, cellos and double basses. A symphony orchestra is an ensemble usually comprising at least thirty musicians; the number of players is typically between fifty and ninety-five and may exceed one hundred. A symphony orchestra is divided into families of instruments. In the string family, there are sections of violins (I and II), violas, cellos (often eight), and basses (often from six to eight). The standard woodwind section consists of flutes (one doubling piccolo), oboes (one doubling English horn), soprano clarinets (one doubling bass clarinet), and bassoons (one doubling contrabassoon). The standard brass section consists of horns, trumpets, trombones, and tuba. The percussion section includes the timpani, bass drum, snare drum, and any other percussion instruments called for in a score (e.g., triangle, glockenspiel, chimes, cymbals, wood blocks, etc.). In Baroque music (1600–1750) and music from the early Classical period music (1750–1820), the percussion parts in orchestral works may only include timpani. A concert band is a large classical ensemble generally made up of between 40 and 70 musicians from the woodwind, brass, and percussion families, along with the double bass. The concert band has a larger number and variety of wind instruments than the symphony orchestra, but does not have a string section (although a single double bass is common in concert bands). The woodwind section of a concert band consists of piccolo, flutes, oboes (one doubling English horn), bassoons (one doubling contrabassoon), soprano clarinets (one doubling E clarinet, one doubling alto clarinet), bass clarinets (one doubling contrabass clarinet or contra-alto clarinet), alto saxophones (one doubling soprano saxophone), tenor saxophone, and baritone saxophone. The brass section consists of horns, trumpets or cornets, trombones, euphoniums, and tubas. The percussion section consists of the timpani, bass drum, snare drum, and any other percussion instruments called for in a score (e.g., triangle, glockenspiel, chimes, cymbals, wood blocks, etc.). When orchestras perform baroque music (from the 17th century and early 18th century), they may also use a harpsichord or pipe organ, playing the continuo part. When orchestras perform Romantic-era music (from the 19th century), they may also use harps or unusual instruments such as the wind machine or cannons. When orchestras perform music from the 20th century or the 21st century, occasionally instruments such as electric guitar, theremin, or even an electronic synthesizer may be used. Jazz ensembles Three parts In jazz, there are several types of trios. One type of jazz trio is formed with a piano player, a bass player and a drummer. Another type of jazz trio that became popular in the 1950s and 1960s is the organ trio, which is composed of a Hammond organ player, a drummer, and a third instrumentalist (either a saxophone player or an electric jazz guitarist). In organ trios, the Hammond organ player performs the bass line on the organ bass pedals while simultaneously playing chords or lead lines on the keyboard manuals. Other types of trios include the "drummer-less" trio, which consists of a piano player, a double bassist, and a horn (saxophone or trumpet) or guitar player; and the jazz trio with a horn player (saxophone or trumpet), double bass player, and a drummer. In the latter type of trio, the lack of a chordal instrument means that the horn player and the bassist have to imply the changing harmonies with their improvised lines. Four parts Jazz quartets typically add a horn (the generic jazz name for saxophones, trombones, trumpets, or any other wind or brass instrument commonly associated with jazz) to one of the jazz trios described above. Slightly larger jazz ensembles, such as quintets (five instruments) or sextets (six instruments) typically add other soloing instruments to the basic quartet formation, such as different types of saxophones (e.g., alto saxophone, tenor saxophone, etc.) or an additional chordal instrument. Larger ensembles The lineup of larger jazz ensembles can vary considerably, depending on the style of jazz being performed. In a 1920s-style dixieland jazz band, a larger ensemble would be formed by adding a banjo player, woodwind instruments, as with the clarinet, or additional horns (saxophones, trumpets, trombones) to one of the smaller groups. In a 1930s-style Swing big band, a larger ensemble is formed by adding "sections" of like instruments, such as a saxophone section, a trumpet section and a trombone section, which perform arranged "horn lines" to accompany the ensemble. Some Swing bands also added a string section for a lush sound. In a 1970s-style jazz fusion ensemble, a larger ensemble is often formed by adding additional percussionists or sometimes a saxophone player, who would "double" or "triple" (meaning that they would also be proficient at the clarinet, flute or both). Larger jazz ensembles are also formed by the addition of other soloing instruments. Rock and pop bands Two parts Two-member rock and pop bands are relatively rare. Examples of two-member bands are the Carpenters, Sleaford Mods, Japandroids, Pet Shop Boys, Flight of the Conchords, Death from Above 1979, Middle Class Rut, the Pity Party, the White Stripes, Big Business, Two Gallants, Lightning Bolt, the Ting Tings, the Black Box Revelation, the Black Keys, Twenty One Pilots, Tenacious D, Simon and Garfunkel, Hall & Oates, Johnossi, the Pack A.D., Air Supply and Royal Blood. When electronic sequencers became widely available in the 1980s, this made it easier for two-member bands to add in musical elements that the two band members were not able to perform. Sequencers allowed bands to pre-program some elements of their performance, such as an electronic drum part and a synth-bass line. Two-member pop music bands such as Soft Cell, Blancmange, Yazoo and Erasure used pre-programmed sequencers. W.A.S.P. guitarist Doug Blair is also known for his work in the non-notable two-piece progressive rock band signal2noise, where he acts as the lead guitarist and bassist at the same time, thanks to a special custom instrument he invented (an electric guitar with five regular guitar strings paired with three bass guitar strings). Three parts The smallest ensemble that is commonly used in rock music is the trio format. In a hard-rock or blues-rock band, or heavy metal rock group, a "power trio" format is often used, which consists of an electric guitar player, an electric bass guitar player and a drummer, and typically one or more of these musicians also sing (sometimes all three members will sing, e.g. Bee Gees or Alkaline Trio). Some well-known power trios with the guitarist on lead vocals are the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble, Nirvana, Violent Femmes, Gov't Mule, Green Day, the Minutemen, Triumph, Shellac, Sublime, Chevelle, Glass Harp, Icebird, Muse, the Jam, Short Stack, and ZZ Top. A handful of others with the bassist on vocals include Primus, Motörhead, the Police, the Melvins, MxPx, Blue Cheer, Rush, the Presidents of the United States of America, Venom, and Cream. Some power trios feature two lead vocalists. For example, in the band blink-182 vocals are split between bassist Mark Hoppus and guitarist Tom DeLonge, or in the band Dinosaur Jr., guitarist J. Mascis is the primary songwriter and vocalist, but bassist Lou Barlow writes some songs and sings as well. An alternative to the power trio are organ trios formed with an electric guitarist, a drummer and a keyboardist. Although organ trios are most commonly associated with 1950s and 1960s jazz organ trio groups such as those led by organist Jimmy Smith, there are also organ trios in rock-oriented styles, such as jazz-rock fusion and Grateful Dead-influenced jam bands such as Medeski Martin & Wood. In organ trios, the keyboard player typically plays a Hammond organ or similar instrument, which permits the keyboard player to perform bass lines, chords, and lead lines, one example being hard rock band Zebra. A variant of the organ trio are trios formed with an electric bassist, a drummer and an electronic keyboardist (playing synthesizers) such as the progressive rock band Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Triumvirat, and Atomic Rooster. Another variation is to have a vocalist, a guitarist and a drummer, an example being Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Another variation is two guitars, a bassist, and a drum machine, examples including Magic Wands and Big Black. A power trio with the guitarist on lead vocals is a popular record company lineup, as the guitarist and singer will usually be the songwriter. Therefore, the label only has to present one "face" to the public. The backing band may or may not be featured in publicity. If the backup band is not marketed as an integral part of the group, this gives the record company more flexibility to replace band members or use substitute musicians. This lineup often leads to songs that are fairly simple and accessible, as the frontman (or frontwoman) will have to sing and play guitar at the same time. Four parts The four-piece band is the most common configuration in rock and pop music. A common formation would be a vocalist, electric guitarist, bass guitarist, and a drummer (e.g. the Who, the Monkees, Led Zeppelin, Queen, Ramones, Sex Pistols, Red Hot Chili Peppers, R.E.M., Blur, the Smiths, Echo and the Bunnymen, the Stone Roses, Creed, Black Sabbath, Van Halen, Rage Against the Machine, Gym Class Heroes, the Stooges, Joy Division, and U2.) Instrumentally, these bands can be considered as trios. This format is popular with new bands, as there are only two instruments that need tuning, the melody and chords formula prevalent with their material is easy to learn, four members are commonplace to work with, the roles are clearly defined and generally are: instrumental melody line, rhythm section which plays the chords or countermelody, and vocals on top. In some early rock bands, keyboardists were used, performing on piano (e.g. the Seeds and the Doors) with a guitarist, singer, drummer and keyboardist. Some bands will have a guitarist, bassist, drummer, and keyboard player (for example, Talking Heads, Gerry and the Pacemakers, Small Faces, King Crimson, the Guess Who, Pink Floyd, Queen, Coldplay, the Killers and Blind Faith). Some bands will have the bassist on lead vocals, such as Thin Lizzy, the Chameleons, Skillet, Pink Floyd, Motörhead, NOFX, +44, Slayer, the All-American Rejects or even the lead guitarist, such as Death, Dire Straits, Megadeth and Creedence Clearwater Revival. Some bands, such as the Beatles, Dire Straits and Metallica have a lead guitarist, a rhythm guitarist and a bassist that all sing lead and backing vocals, that also play keyboards regularly, as well as a drummer. Five parts Five-piece bands have existed in rock music since the development of the genre. The Beach Boys, the Rolling Stones (until 1993), Aerosmith, Def Leppard, AC/DC, Oasis, Pearl Jam, Guns N' Roses, Radiohead, the Strokes, the Yardbirds, 311 and the Hives are examples of the common vocalist, lead guitar, rhythm guitar, bass, and drums lineup whilst other bands such as Judas Priest have two guitarists who equally share lead and rhythm parts. An alternative to the five-member lineup replaces the rhythm guitarist with a keyboard–synthesizer player (examples being the bands Journey, Elbow, Dream Theater, Genesis, Jethro Tull, the Zombies, the Animals, Bon Jovi, Yes, Fleetwood Mac, Marilyn Manson and Deep Purple, all of which consist of a vocalist, guitarist, bassist, keyboardist, and a drummer) or with a turntablist such as Deftones, Hed PE, Incubus or Limp Bizkit. Alternatives include a keyboardist, guitarist, drummer, bassist, and saxophonist, such as the Sonics, the Dave Clark Five, and Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs. Another alternative is three guitarists, a bassist and a drummer, such as Foo Fighters, Radiohead, and the Byrds. Some five-person bands feature two guitarists, a keyboardist, a bassist and a drummer, with one or more of these musicians (typically one of the guitarists) handling lead vocals on top of their instrument (examples being Children of Bodom, Styx, Sturm und Drang, Relient K, Ensiferum, the Cars and the current line up of Status Quo). In some cases, typically in cover bands, one musician plays either rhythm guitar or keyboards, depending on the song (one notable band being Firewind, with Bob Katsionis handling this particular role). Other times, the vocalist will bring another musical "voice" to the table, most commonly a harmonica or percussion; Mick Jagger, for example, played harmonica and percussion instruments like maracas and tambourine whilst singing at the same time. Keith Relf of the Yardbirds played harmonica frequently, though not often while also singing. Ozzy Osbourne was also known to play the harmonica on some occasions (i.e. "The Wizard" by Black Sabbath). Vocalist Robert Brown of lesser known steampunk band Abney Park plays harmonica, accordion, and darbuka in addition to mandolin. Flutes are also commonly used by vocalists, most notably Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull and Ray Thomas of the Moody Blues, though these are difficult to play while singing at the same time. A less common lineup is to have lead vocals, two guitarists of varying types and two drummers, e.g. Adam and the Ants. Larger rock ensembles Larger bands are quite common and have long been a part of rock and pop music, in part due to the influence of the "singer accompanied with orchestra" model inherited from popular big-band jazz and swing and popularized by Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald. To create larger ensembles, rock bands often add an additional guitarist, an additional keyboardist, additional percussionists or second drummer, an entire horn section, and even a flautist. An example of a six-member rock band is Toto with a lead vocalist, guitarist, bassist, two keyboard players, and drummer. The American heavy metal band Slipknot is composed of nine members, with a vocalist, two guitarists, a drummer, a bassist, two custom percussionists/backing vocalists, a turntablist, and a sampler/keyboardist. In larger groups (such as the Band), instrumentalists could play multiple instruments, which enabled the ensemble to create a wider variety of instrument combinations. More modern examples of such a band are Arcade Fire and Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. More rarely, rock or pop groups will be accompanied in concerts by a full or partial symphony orchestra, where lush string-orchestra arrangements are used to flesh out the sound of slow ballads. Some groups have a large number of members that all play the same instrument, such as guitar, banjo, keyboard, ocarinas, drums, recorders, accordions, horns or strings. Electronic music groups Electronic music groups typically use electronic musical instruments such as synthesizers, sequencers, samplers and electronic drums to produce music. The production technique of music programming is also widely used in electronic music. Examples include Kraftwerk, Daft Punk, the Chemical Brothers, Faithless and Apollo 440. Electronic dance music groups usually consist of two to three members, and are mainly producers, DJs and remixers, whose work is solely produced in a studio or with the use of a digital audio workstation. Examples include Basement Jaxx, Flip & Fill, Tin Tin Out, the Chainsmokers, Cheat Codes, Cash Cash and Major Lazer. Role of women Women have a high prominence in many popular music styles as singers. However, professional women instrumentalists are uncommon in popular music, especially in rock genres such as heavy metal. "[P]laying in a band is largely a male homosocial activity, that is, learning to play in a band is largely a peer-based... experience, shaped by existing sex-segregated friendship networks." As well, rock music "...is often defined as a form of male rebellion vis-à-vis female bedroom culture." In popular music, there has been a gendered "distinction between public (male) and private (female) participation" in music. "[S]everal scholars have argued that men exclude women from bands or from the bands' rehearsals, recordings, performances, and other social activities." "Women are mainly regarded as passive and private consumers of allegedly slick, prefabricated – hence, inferior – pop music..., excluding them from participating as high status rock musicians." One of the reasons that there are rarely mixed gender bands is that "bands operate as tight-knit units in which homosocial solidarity – social bonds between people of the same sex... – plays a crucial role." In the 1960s pop music scene, "[s]inging was sometimes an acceptable pastime for a girl, but playing an instrument...simply wasn't done." "The rebellion of rock music was largely a male rebellion; the women—often, in the 1950s and '60s, girls in their teens—in rock usually sang songs as personæ utterly dependent on their macho boyfriends..." Philip Auslander says that "Although there were many women in rock by the late 1960s, most performed only as singers, a traditionally feminine position in popular music." Though some women played instruments in American all-female garage rock bands, none of these bands achieved more than regional success. So they "did not provide viable templates for women's on-going participation in rock". In relation to the gender composition of heavy metal bands, it has been said that "[h]eavy metal performers are almost exclusively male" "...[a]t least until the mid-1980s" apart from "...exceptions such as Girlschool". However, "...now [in the 2010s] maybe more than ever–strong metal women have put up their dukes and got down to it," "carv[ing] out a considerable place for [them]selves". When Suzi Quatro emerged in 1973, "no other prominent female musician worked in rock simultaneously as a singer, instrumentalist, songwriter, and bandleader." According to Auslander, she was "kicking down the male door in rock and roll and proving that a female musician ... and this is a point I am extremely concerned about ... could play as well if not better than the boys". Other western musical ensembles A choir is a group of voices. By analogy, sometimes a group of similar instruments in a symphony orchestra are referred to as a choir. For example, the woodwind instruments of a symphony orchestra could be called the woodwind choir. A group that plays popular music or military music is usually called a band; a drum and bugle corps is a type of the latter. These bands perform a wide range of music, ranging from arrangements of jazz orchestral, or popular music to military-style marches. Drum corps perform on brass and percussion instruments only. Drum and Bugle Corps incorporate costumes, hats, and pageantry in their performances. Other band types include: Brass bands: groups consisting of around 30 brass and percussion players; Jug bands; Mexican Mariachi groups typically consist of at least two violins, two trumpets, one Spanish guitar, one vihuela (a high-pitched, five-string guitar), and one Guitarrón (a Mexican acoustic bass that is roughly guitar-shaped), and one or more singers. Mexican banda groups Marching bands and military bands, dating back to the Ottoman military bands. String bands See also All-female band Boy band Girl group Live band karaoke Music industry Percussion ensemble Musical collective References External links Bands and Musician Listing Vivre Musicale

20181

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marienburg

Marienburg

Marienburg may refer to: Historical German names Ordensburg Marienburg (Malbork Castle), the large brick castle built by the Teutonic Knights Malbork, Poland, site of the Ordensburg Marienburg, formerly Marienburg (Royal Prussia/Crown of the Kingdom of Poland 1466-1772), Marienburg in Westpreußen and during World War II (1773-1945), Nazi Stalag XX-B (prisoner-of-war camp) for enlisted men Alūksne, Latvia Feldioara, Romania Places Germany Marienburg Castle, Ostalbkreis, a castle in Niederalfingen near Aalen, Germany Marienburg Castle, Hanover, a castle in Hanover district, residence of the Prince of Hanover Marienburg Castle, Hildesheim, a castle in Hildesheim, Lower Saxony Marienburg Castle, Leutesdorf, Germany, a small baroque castle in Rhineland-Palatinate. Köln-Marienburg, a district of Rodenkirchen in the city of Cologne Marienburg (Mosel), a former Augustinian monastery built near the ruins of a Roman fortress in Zell an der Mosel near Trier, Germany Marienburg, Bishopric of Würzburg, a fortress on the River Main, just opposite Würzburg, was sacked by Gustavus Adolphus in 1631. Elsewhere Marienburg (Switzerland), castle and former college in the canton of St Gallen, Switzerland Marienburg, Papua New Guinea - a town in the East Sepik province of Papua New Guinea Marienburg, Suriname - a village and former sugar plantation in Suriname Fictional places Marienburg (Warhammer), a fictional city in the Warhammer Fantasy world See also Siege of Marienburg (disambiguation) Treaty of Marienburg Marienberg Marienborg, summer residence of Denmark's Prime Minister

20182

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military%20of%20Afghanistan

Military of Afghanistan

The military of Afghanistan () originated in 1709 when the Hotaki dynasty was established in Kandahar followed by the Durrani Empire. The Afghan military was re-organized with assistance from the British in 1880, when the country was ruled by Amir Abdur Rahman Khan. It was modernized during King Amanullah Khan's rule in the early 20th century, and then during King Zahir Shah's forty-year rule; the Soviet Union supplied almost all weapons, training and military needs between the 1950s and 1970s. From 1978 to 1992, the Soviet-backed Afghan Armed Forces engaged in heavy fighting with the multi-national mujahideen groups who were then backed by the United States, Pakistan and others. After President Najibullah's resignation in 1992 and the end of Soviet support, the Afghan military dissolved into portions controlled by different factions. This era was followed by the Taliban regime, whose leaders were trained and influenced by the Pakistan Armed Forces. After the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 and the formation of the Afghan Interim Administration, new military units were created. They were trained by NATO-member states, primarily by the United States. The Afghan Armed Forces operated independently but received some air support from the U.S. Air Force. As a major non-NATO ally, Afghanistan continued to receive billions of dollars in military assistance from the United States up until mid-2021. With the Taliban takover of Afghanistan in August 2021, the Islamic Republic Armed Forces are effectively dissolved, with the former insurgents becoming the country's new military. Remnants of the disbanded Afghan National Army regrouped as the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan to wage guerrilla warfare against the Emirate. Origins Afghans have served in the militaries of the Ghaznavids (963–1187), Ghurids (1148–1215), Delhi Sultanate (1206–1527), Mughals (1526–1858) and the Persian army. The current Afghan military traces its origin to the early 18th century when the Hotaki dynasty rose to power in Kandahar and defeated the Persian Safavid Empire at the Battle of Gulnabad in 1722. When Ahmad Shah Durrani formed the Durrani Empire in 1747, his Afghan army fought a number of wars in the Punjab region of Hindustan during the 18th to the 19th century. One of the famous battles was the 1761 Battle of Panipat in which the Afghans invaded and won a pyrrhic victory against the Maratha Empire. The Afghans then engaged multiple wars with the Sikh Empire, the Afghan–Sikh Wars saw major territorial losses for the Afghans. During the First Anglo-Afghan War, British India invaded Afghanistan in 1838 but withdrew in 1842. During the three years a number of battles took place in different parts of Afghanistan. Traditionally, Afghan governments relied on three military institutions: the regular army, tribal levies, and community militias. The regular army was sustained by the state and commanded by government leaders. The tribal or regional levies - irregular forces - had part-time soldiers provided by tribal or regional chieftains. The chiefs received tax breaks, land ownership, cash payments, or other privileges in return. The community militia included all available able-bodied members of the community, mobilized to fight, probably only in exceptional circumstances, for common causes under community leaders. Combining these three institutions created a formidable force whose components supplemented each other's strengths and minimized their weaknesses. At the outbreak of the Second Anglo-Afghan War (1878–80) the regular army was about 50,000 strong and consisted of 62 infantry and 16 cavalry regiments, with 324 guns mostly organized in horse and mountain artillery batteries. Jalali writes that '..although Amir Shir Ali Khan (1863–78) is widely credited for founding the modern Afghan Army, it was only under Abdur Rahman that it became a viable and effective institution.' The Library of Congress Country Study for Afghanistan states: Abdur Rahman was the creator of the modern Afghan state. When he came to the throne [in 1880], the army was virtually nonexistent. With the assistance of a liberal financial loan from the British, plus their aid in the form of weapons, ammunition, and other military supplies, he began a 20-year task of creating a respectable regular force by instituting measures that formed the long-term basis of the military system. These included increasing the equalization of military obligation by setting up a system known as the hasht nafari (whereby one man in every eight between the ages of 20 and 40 took his turn at military service); constructing an arsenal in Kabul to reduce dependence on foreign sources for small arms and other ordnance; introducing supervised training courses; organizing troops into divisions, brigades, and regiments, including battalions of artillery; developing pay schedules; and introducing an elementary (and harsh) disciplinary system. 20th century Soviet aid After the Third Anglo-Afghan War ended, the reforming Amanullah Khan did not see the need for a large army, instead deciding to rely on Afghanistan's historical martial qualities. This resulted in neglect, cutbacks, recruitment problems, and finally an army unable to quell the 1929 uprising that cost him his throne. However, under his reign, the Afghan Air Force was formed in 1924. The Afghan Armed Forces were expanded during King Zahir Shah's reign, reaching a strength of 70,000 in 1933. Adamec writes that the army was 60,000 strong in 1936, and included two corps in Kabul; three divisions in the Southern Province; one division Household troops (Guard Division); one artillery division; and two independent mixed divisions. Total divisions were 13 plus the artillery division. Following the Second World War, Afghanistan briefly received continued military support from the British government under the Lancaster Plan from 1945 to 1947, until the partition of India transformed British priorities. Afghanistan declined to join the 1955 United States-sponsored Baghdad Pact; this rebuff did not stop the United States from continuing its low-level aid program, but it was reluctant to provide Afghanistan with military assistance, so Daoud turned to the Soviet Union and its allies, and in 1955 he received approximately US$25 million of military aid. During the 1950s and 1960s, Afghanistan purchased moderate quantities of Soviet weapons. It was mainly Sukhoi Su-7, MiG-21 fighter jets, T-34 and Iosif Stalin tanks, SU-76 self-propelled guns, GAZ-69 4x4 light trucks of jeep class (in many versions), ZIL-157 military trucks, Katyusha multiple rocket launchers, and BTR-40 and BTR-152 armored personnel carriers. Also included were PPSh-41 and RPK machine guns. In addition, the Soviet Union and its allies began construction of military airfields in Bagram, Mazar-e-Sharif, and Shindand. By the 1960s, Soviet assistance started to improve the structure, armament, training, and command and control arrangements for the military. The Afghan Armed Forces reached a strength of 98,000 (90,000 soldiers and 8,000 airmen) by this period. After the exile of King Zahir Shah in 1973, President Daud Khan forged stronger ties with the Soviets by signing two highly controversial military aid packages for his nation in 1973 and 1975. Between 1973 and 1978, Afghanistan obtained more sophisticated Soviet weapons such as Mi-4 and Mi-8 helicopters, Sukhoi Su-22 and Il-28 jets. A great many T-55, T-62, and PT-76 tanks arrived and huge amounts of AKM assault rifles were ordered. Armored vehicles delivered in the 1970s also included ZIL-135s, BMP-1s, BRDM-1s, BTR-60s, UAZ-469, and GAZ-66 as well as large quantities of small arms and artillery. The Afghan Armed Forces and police continued to receive up-to-date Soviet weapons, as well as training by the KGB and Soviet Armed Forces, for another three years. Due to problems with local political parties in his country, President Daud Khan decided to distance himself from the Soviets in 1976. He made Afghanistan's ties closer to the Greater Middle East and the United States instead. By the time Daoud visited the Soviet Union again in April 1977, the Soviets were aware of his purge of the left that began in 1975, his removal of Soviet advisers from some Afghan military units, and his diversification of Afghan military training (especially to nations like India and Egypt, where they could be trained with Soviet weapons but not by Soviets). In April 1978 there was a coup, known as the Saur Revolution, orchestrated by members of the government loyal to the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA). This led to a full-scale Soviet invasion in December 1979, led by the 40th Army and the Airborne Forces. In 1981 the total strength of the Afghan Armed Forces was around 85,000 troops according to The New York Times. The Afghan Army had around 35–40,000 soldiers, mostly conscripts; the Air Force had around 7,000 personnel; and the total of all military personnel was around 87,000 in 1984. Throughout the 1980s, the Afghan Armed Forces was heavily involved in fighting against the multi-national mujahiddin rebel groups who were largely backed by the United States and trained by the Pakistan Armed Forces. The rebel groups were fighting to force the Soviet Union to withdraw from Afghanistan as well as to remove the Soviet-backed government of President Mohammad Najibullah. Due to large number of defectors, the Afghan Armed Forces in 1985 were reduced to no more than about 47,000, the actual figure probably being lower. The Air Force had over 150 combat aircraft with about 7,000 officers who were supported by up to 5,000 Cuban Revolutionary Air and Air Defense Force and Czechoslovak Air Force advisers. Under the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (1978–1992), weapon deliveries by the Soviets were increased and included Mi-24 helicopters, MiG-23 fighter aircraft, ZSU-23-4 "Shilka" and ZSU-57-2 anti-aircraft self-propelled mounts, MT-LB armored personnel carriers, BM-27 "Uragan" and BM-21 "Grad" multiple-launch rocket systems and FROG-7 and Scud launchers. Some of the weapons that were not damaged during the decades of wars are still being used today. Weapons supplies were made available to the mujahideen rebel groups through numerous countries; the United States purchased all of Israel's captured Soviet weapons clandestinely, and then funnelled the weapons to the mujahideen rebels, while Egypt upgraded their own Army's weapons, and sent the older weapons to the mujahideen, Turkey sold its World War II stockpiles to the warlords, and the British and Swiss provided Blowpipe missiles and Oerlikon anti-aircraft guns respectively, after they were found to be poor models for their own forces. China provided the most relevant weapons, likely due to their own experience with guerrilla warfare, and kept meticulous record of all the shipments. Following the Soviet withdrawal in 1989 the mujahiddin rebel attacks continued and grew in intensity. For several years the Afghan Armed Forces had actually increased their effectiveness past levels ever achieved during the Soviet military presence. The eleven-year Siege of Khost ended with the city's fall in March 1991. But the government was dealt a major blow when Abdul Rashid Dostum, a leading general, switched allegiances to the mujahideen forces in 1992 and together they captured the city of Kabul. By 1992 the Army fragmented into regional militias under local warlords because of the fall of the Soviet Union which stopped supplying the Afghan Armed Forces and later in 1992 when the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan government lost power. After the fall of Najibullah's regime in 1992, the various Afghan political parties began to assemble their own more formal armed forces. By February 1992 Massoud's Jamiat-i-Islami had a central force reported at six battalions strong, plus additional second tier units, "the bulk of the army, ..made up of regional battalions, subordinate to local commanders of the Supervisory Council." On 16 January 1993 Jane's Defence Weekly reported that "a special assembly of 1335 delegates elected from across Afghanistan" had both elected Professor Burhanuddin Rabbani as President of the Islamic State of Afghanistan for two years, and agreed to "establish a regular army with soldiers mostly drawn from Mojahedin groups." Pakistan had offered training assistance. However, a Civil War started between the various warlords, including Ahmad Shah Massoud, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Abdul Rashid Dostum, Abdul Ali Mazari, Jalaluddin Haqqani, Ismail Khan, Atta Muhammad Nur, Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, Mohammad Nabi Mohammadi, Mohammad Yunus Khalis, Gul Agha Sherzai and many others. They received logistics support from foreign powers including Russia, Pakistan, India, Iran, China, France and others. First Taliban Government period When the Taliban took power in 1996, the local warlords and their followers fled Kabul to the north of the country. With the backing and support of Pakistan, the Taliban solidified their own state military forces.Al-Qaeda was also training its fighters in the Taliban controlled territory, including their high-quality 055 Brigade. The Taliban forces possessed over 400 T-54/55 and T-62 tanks and more than 200 Armoured personnel carriers. The Afghan Air Force under the Taliban maintained five supersonic MIG-21MFs and 10 Sukhoi-22 fighter-bombers. In 1995, during the 1995 Airstan incident, a Taliban fighter plane captured a Russian transport. They also held six Mil Mi-8 helicopters, five Mi-35s, five L-39Cs, six Antonov An-12, 25 An-26, a dozen An-24/32, an IL-18, and a Yakovlev. U.S. war in Afghanistan 2002 - 2021 After the formation of the Karzai administration in late 2001, the Afghan armed forces was gradually reestablished by the United States and its allies. They assumed their current form from May 2002. Over two decades, 2001–2021, the United States spent an estimated $83 billion on the Afghan military through the Afghanistan Security Forces Fund and an additional $36 billion to support the Afghan government. Initially, a new land force, the Afghan National Army (ANA), was created, along with an air arm, the Afghan National Army Air Corps, as part of the army. The army later included Commandos and Special Forces. The ANA Air Corps later split off to become an independent branch, the Afghan Air Force. Training was managed initially by the U.S. Office of Military Cooperation, followed by other U.S. organizations and then Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan, and was finally run by the Resolute Support Mission. The President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan was the Commander-in-Chief of the Afghan Armed Forces, who were administratively controlled through the Ministry of Defence. Before the Fall of Kabul, they had major bases and small outposts all across Afghanistan, including in the provinces of Badakhshan, Balkh, Helmand, Herat, Kabul, Kandahar, Nangarhar and Parwan, as well as in the cities of Kunduz, Ghazni, Gardez, Khost, Fayzabad, Farah and Zaranj. The Afghan Air Force was relatively capable before and during the 1980s but by late 2001, the number of operational aircraft available was minimal. The United States and its allies quickly eliminated the remaining strength and ability of the Taliban to operate aircraft in the opening stages of their intervention. With the occupation of airbases by American forces it became clear how destitute the Air Force had become since the withdrawal of the Soviet Union. Most aircraft were only remnants rusting away for a decade or more. Many others were relocated to neighboring countries for storage purposes or sold cheaply. The AAF was reduced to a very small force while the country was torn by civil war. It was gradually strengthened by CSTC-A's NATO-led multinational Combined Air Power Transition Force. By 2006, more than 60,000 former militiamen from around the country were disarmed. In 2007, it was reported that the DDR programmes had dismantled 274 paramilitary organizations, reintegrated over 62,000 militia members into civilian life, and recovered more than 84,000 weapons, including heavy weapons. But The New York Times also reported a rise in hoarded weapons and a growing Taliban threat, even in the north of the country. Commandos were established in 2007, later growing from a battalion to a brigade. The aim of Disbandment of Illegal Armed Groups programme was to ban all illegal armed groups in all provinces of the country. Approximately 2,000 such groups have been identified; most of them surrendered to the Afghan government or joined the new armed forces. The NATO-trained Afghan National Army grew to a size of 31 Kandaks, or Battalions, at one point 28 of which were announced as combat ready. Seven regional corps headquarters were created. The National Military Academy of Afghanistan was built to provide future officers, modeled after the United States Military Academy. The Marshal Fahim National Defense University is located in Kabul province and consists of a headquarters building, classrooms, dining facility, library, and medical clinic. In addition to this, an $80 million central command center was built next to the Hamid Karzai International Airport. In 2012, Afghanistan became a major non-NATO ally of the United States. Sizable numbers of Afghan officers are sent to be trained in India either at the Indian Military Academy in Dehradun, the National Defence Academy near Pune or the Officers Training Academy in Chennai. The Indian Military Academy which has been in existence since 1932, provides a 4-year degree to army officers, while the National Defence Academy is a tri-service college provides a 3-year degree after which officers undergo a 1-year specialization in their respective service colleges. The Officers Training Academy on the other hand provides a 49-week course to Graduate officer candidates. In 2014 the number of Afghan officers in training in India was nearly 1,100. The total manpower of the Afghan Armed Forces was approximately 186,000 as of 2021. It was around 164,000 in May 2011. The United States was also largely responsible for the growth of the Afghan Air Force, as part of the Combined Air Power Transition Force, from four aircraft at the end of 2001 to about 100 as of 2011. Types include Lockheed C-130 Hercules and Pilatus PC-12 transport aircraft, as well as Mi-17 troop-carrying helicopters and Mil Mi-35 attack helicopters. The aircrew are being trained by an American team. Eventually the air force had over 200 refurbished aircraft, which includes A-29 Super Tucano attack aircraft, Lockheed C-130 Hercules and Pilatus PC-12s military transport aircraft, as well as UH-60A Black Hawk, Mil Mi-17, and other types of helicopters. It also included trainers such as Aero L-39 Albatros and Cessna 182s. The manpower of the Afghan Air Force was around 7,000, which includes over 450 pilots. It also had a small number of female pilots. Taliban government since mid-2021 As of 15 August 2021, what remained of the Ghani government's armed forces were left leaderless and dispersed due to the 2021 Taliban offensive and the Fall of Kabul to the Taliban. Some have since partly regrouped as the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan. As Afghan forces accepted the circumstances of the Doha Agreement and the withdrawal of United States troops from Afghanistan, they understood that American close air support and other strategic assets would no longer be available to support them in combat situations against the Taliban, and they became more willing to surrender to the attacking Taliban forces. Other Afghans allied with the Afghan government looked for ways to maneuver themselves into better positions, having accepted the impending collapse of the government. The Taliban extended their control over the provinces through a series of negotiated surrenders. After Kunduz province was captured, a days long negotiation between the tribes and the Taliban resulted in a surrender of the government-controlled base to the Taliban. Similar negotiations in Herat saw a wave of resignations in the provincial government, and then the same in Helmand and Ghazni. Outgunned, Afghan special forces based in Kandahar fled. Police officers in Kandahar complained that they had not been paid for six months. In early September 2021 the Taliban announced a new interim government. Among the appointees was Molvi Mohammad Yaqoob, Defence Minister, son of ex-Taliban leader Mullah Omar; Mullah Mohammed Fazil Mazloom Akhund, deputy to the Defence Minister; and Qari Farseehuddin, a Tajik, listed as Army Chief. the Islamic Emirate Army is subdivided into eight corps, mostly superseding the previous corps of the Afghan National Army. They are listed below. In November 2021 Mohammad Yaqub Mujahid, Acting Minister of Defense, announced the new names and of the corps. Badri 313 Battalion, reported as operating in Kabul, is the only unit of the Taliban's armed forces that had the numerical designation 313. Notes References Self published English version of originally "Persian" work; see translator's note. 288 pp.; £35.00. Due to its 'simplicity, which matched low technology and basic organization found among the human resources available' the Taliban's army from 1996 to 2001 was perhaps the most successful national army for Afghanistan (p. 121). External links How are the Taliban Organized? - some details on the Military Commission. "the biggest and most significant Taliban commission." "The Taliban deputy chief, Mullah Yaqoob Umari, heads that commission with three deputies — Maulawi Sadar Ibrahim, Maulawi Abul Qayum Zakir, and Qari Fasihuddin. All three are prominent military commanders. Fasihuddin is the senior commander for nine northern provinces and is of Tajik ethnicity." Soviet foreign aid

20185

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorcycle%20sport

Motorcycle sport

Motorcycle sport is a broad field that encompasses all sporting aspects of motorcycling. The disciplines are not all races or timed-speed events, as several disciplines test a competitor's various riding skills. Motorcycle racing Motorcycle racing (also known as moto racing and motorbike racing) is a motorcycle sport involving racing motorcycles. Motorcycle racing can be divided into two categories, tarmac-based road disciplines and off-road. Track racing Track racing is a motorcycle sport where teams or individuals race opponents around an oval track. There are differing variants, with each variant racing on a different surface type. Rally A road rally is a navigation event on public roads whereby competitors must visit a number of checkpoints in diverse geographical locations while still obeying road traffic laws (not to be confused with car rallies such as WRC). Speedway Speedway is a motorcycle sport in which the motorcycles have one gear and no brakes. Other Motorcycle sports Land speed Land speed is where a single rider accelerates over a 1 to long straight track (usually on dry lake beds) and is timed for top speed through a trap at the end of the run. The rider must exceed the previous top speed record for that class or type of bike for their name to be placed on the record books. See— for an example. Enduro Enduro is not exactly racing, because the main objective is to traverse a series of checkpoints, arriving exactly "on time" in accordance with your beginning time and the time it is supposed to take to arrive at each checkpoint. The courses are usually run over thick wooded terrain, sometimes with large obstacles such as logs, ditches, and sudden drops. Freestyle Motocross A competition based upon points for acrobatic ability on an MX bike over jumps. This activity evolved from Motocross a continuing popular form of racing at both the Amateur and Professional levels. Trials Known in the US as Observed Trials, it is not racing, but a sport nevertheless. Trials is a test of skill on a motorcycle whereby the rider attempts to traverse an observed section without placing a foot on the ground (and traditionally, although not always, without ceasing forward motion). The winner is the rider with the least penalty points. Time and observation Time and observation trials are trials with a time limit. The person who completes the route the quickest sets the "standard time" and all other competitors must finish within a certain amount of time of the standard time to be counted as a finisher (they received penalty points for every minute after the quickest finisher). This is combined with the penalty points accrued from the observed sections to arrive at a winner, who is not alway the quickest rider or the rider who lost the less marks on observation but the rider who balanced these competing demands the best. One of the most famous time and observation trials is the "Scott" trial held annually in North Yorkshire. Indoor trials Indoor trials held in stadiums (not necessarily with a roof) which by their very nature use man-made artificial sections in contrast to outdoor trials which rely heavily on the natural terrain. Long distance trials Long Distance Trials (often shortened to 'LDT') in the UK are events for road-registered motorcycles. A course of typically 80 to 120 miles is plotted by the organiser, taking in roads, lanes and Byways Open to All Traffic (known as BOATs). The event is not a race and riders are required to follow the course by using a RoadBook compiled by the organiser. Motorcycle Gymkhana Similar to car Autocross, Motorcycle Gymkhana is a motorcycle time trial sport round cones on a paved area. The winner is the competitor who completes the course in the shortest time. Time penalties are incurred by putting a foot down, hitting a cone, or going outside the designated area. Motoball (Motorcycle Polo) Similar to football, but all players (except goalkeepers) are riding motorcycles, and the ball is much bigger. Motorcycle Polo first began as an officially organized sport in the mid-1930s. In France, there are organized motoball competitions, and the sport was included in the inaugural Goodwill Games. Hill Climbs In the United States the completions are usually held on off-road courses, where one competitor at a time attempts to ride up a very steep hill, often 45 degrees or more. In some cases, few riders actually complete the course and results are judged on the distance that they manage to achieve. Of those that do complete the course, the rider to reach the top with the shortest elapsed time wins. The motorcycle of choice in the early decades was the Harley-Davidson 45 cubic inch model due to its high torque at low rpms, similar to farm engines. For years the national competitions was held at Mount Garfield near Muskegon, Michigan. In other countries, notably the United Kingdom, completions mostly take place on tarmac courses, occasionally closed public roads, with the machines used for competition being similar to those used for other road disciplines. References External links Sanctioning bodies Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM) – World governing body Motorcycling Australia (MA) – Australian Governing Body Auto Cycle Union – UK governing body American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) – US governing body Motorcycle Federation of Japan (MFJ) – Japan governing body Motosport South Africa (MSA) – South African governing body Federation Francaise de moto (FFM) – French governing body MCUI Southern Centre – "governing body of motor cycle sport in Leinster, Munster and Connacht" (i.e., Republic of Ireland) Championship Cup Series – Sanctioning body for Sportsman Level motorcycle road racing in the United States

20187

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marina%20Tsvetaeva

Marina Tsvetaeva

Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva (; 31 August 1941) was a Russian poet. Her work is considered among some of the greatest in twentieth century Russian literature. She lived through and wrote of the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Moscow famine that followed it. In an attempt to save her daughter Irina from starvation, she placed her in a state orphanage in 1919, where she died of hunger. Tsvetaeva left Russia in 1922 and lived with her family in increasing poverty in Paris, Berlin and Prague before returning to Moscow in 1939. Her husband Sergei Efron and their daughter Ariadna (Alya) were arrested on espionage charges in 1941; her husband was executed. Tsvetaeva committed suicide in 1941. As a lyrical poet, her passion and daring linguistic experimentation mark her as a striking chronicler of her times and the depths of the human condition. Early years Marina Tsvetaeva was born in Moscow, the daughter of Ivan Vladimirovich Tsvetaev, a professor of Fine Art at the University of Moscow, who later founded the Alexander III Museum of Fine Arts (known from 1937 as the Pushkin Museum). (The Tsvetaev family name evokes association with flowers – the Russian word цвет (tsvet) means "color" or "flower".) Tsvetaeva's mother, , Ivan's second wife, was a concert pianist, highly literate, with German and Polish ancestry. Growing up in considerable material comfort, Tsvetaeva would later come to identify herself with the Polish aristocracy. Tsvetaeva's two half-siblings, Valeria and Andrei, were the children of Ivan's deceased first wife, Varvara Dmitrievna Ilovaiskaya, daughter of the historian Dmitry Ilovaisky. Tsvetaeva's only full sister, Anastasia, was born in 1894. The children quarrelled frequently and occasionally violently. There was considerable tension between Tsvetaeva's mother and Varvara's children, and Tsvetaeva's father maintained close contact with Varvara's family. Tsvetaeva's father was kind, but deeply wrapped up in his studies and distant from his family. He was also still deeply in love with his first wife; he would never get over her. Maria Tsvetaeva had had a love affair before her marriage, from which she never recovered. Maria Tsvetaeva disapproved of Marina's poetic inclination; she wanted her daughter to become a pianist, holding the opinion that her poetry was poor. In 1902, Tsvetaeva's mother contracted tuberculosis. A change in climate was believed to help cure the disease, and so the family travelled abroad until shortly before her death in 1906, when Tsvetaeva was 14. They lived for a while by the sea at Nervi, near Genoa. There, away from the rigid constraints of a bourgeois Muscovite life, Tsvetaeva was able for the first time to run free, climb cliffs, and vent her imagination in childhood games. There were many Russian émigré revolutionaries residing at that time in Nervi, who may have had some influence on the young Tsvetaeva. In June 1904, Tsvetaeva was sent to school in Lausanne. Changes in the Tsvetaev residence led to several changes in school, and during the course of her travels she acquired the Italian, French, and German languages. She gave up the strict musical studies that her mother had imposed and turned to poetry. She wrote "With a mother like her, I had only one choice: to become a poet". In 1908, aged 16, Tsvetaeva studied literary history at the Sorbonne. During this time, a major revolutionary change was occurring within Russian poetry: the flowering of the Russian symbolist movement, and this movement was to colour most of her later work. It was not the theory which was to attract her, but the poetry and the gravity which writers such as Andrei Bely and Alexander Blok were capable of generating. Her own first collection of poems, Vecherny Albom (Evening Album), self-published in 1910, promoted her considerable reputation as a poet. It was well received, although her early poetry was held to be insipid compared to her later work. It attracted the attention of the poet and critic Maximilian Voloshin, whom Tsvetaeva described after his death in A Living Word About a Living Man. Voloshin came to see Tsvetaeva and soon became her friend and mentor. Family and career She began spending time at Voloshin's home in the Black Sea resort of Koktebel ("Blue Height"), which was a well-known haven for writers, poets and artists. She became enamoured of the work of Alexander Blok and Anna Akhmatova, although she never met Blok and did not meet Akhmatova until the 1940s. Describing the Koktebel community, the émigré Viktoria Schweitzer wrote: "Here inspiration was born." At Koktebel, Tsvetaeva met Sergei Yakovlevich Efron, a 17-year-old cadet in the Officers' Academy. She was 19, he 18: they fell in love and were married in 1912, the same year as her father's project, the Alexander III Museum of Fine Arts, was ceremonially opened, an event attended by Tsar Nicholas II. Tsvetaeva's love for Efron was intense; however, this did not preclude her from having affairs, including one with Osip Mandelstam, which she celebrated in a collection of poems called Mileposts. At around the same time, she became involved in an affair with the poet Sophia Parnok, who was 7 years older than Tsvetaeva, an affair that caused her husband great grief. The two women fell deeply in love, and the relationship profoundly affected both women's writings. She deals with the ambiguous and tempestuous nature of this relationship in a cycle of poems which at times she called The Girlfriend, and at other times The Mistake. Tsvetaeva and her husband spent summers in the Crimea until the revolution, and had two daughters: Ariadna, or Alya (born 1912) and Irina (born 1917). In 1914, Efron volunteered for the front and by 1917 he was an officer stationed in Moscow with the 56th Reserve. Tsvetaeva was a close witness of the Russian Revolution, which she rejected. On trains, she came into contact with ordinary Russian people and was shocked by the mood of anger and violence. She wrote in her journal: "In the air of the compartment hung only three axe-like words: bourgeois, Junkers, leeches." After the 1917 Revolution, Efron joined the White Army, and Marina returned to Moscow hoping to be reunited with her husband. She was trapped in Moscow for five years, where there was a terrible famine. She wrote six plays in verse and narrative poems. Between 1917 and 1922 she wrote the epic verse cycle Lebedinyi stan (The Encampment of the Swans) about the civil war, glorifying those who fought against the communists. The cycle of poems in the style of a diary or journal begins on the day of Tsar Nicholas II's abdication in March 1917, and ends late in 1920, when the anti-communist White Army was finally defeated. The 'swans' of the title refers to the volunteers in the White Army, in which her husband was fighting as an officer. In 1922, she published a long pro-imperial verse fairy tale, Tsar-devitsa ("Tsar-Maiden"). The Moscow famine was to exact a toll on Tsvetaeva. With no immediate family to turn to, she had no way to support herself or her daughters. In 1919, she placed both her daughters in a state orphanage, mistakenly believing that they would be better fed there. Alya became ill, and Tsvetaeva removed her, but Irina died there of starvation in 1920. The child's death caused Tsvetaeva great grief and regret. In one letter, she wrote, "God punished me." During these years, Tsvetaeva maintained a close and intense friendship with the actress Sofia Evgenievna Holliday, for whom she wrote a number of plays. Many years later, she would write the novella "Povest o Sonechke" about her relationship with Holliday. Exile Berlin and Prague In May 1922, Tsvetaeva and Ariadna left Soviet Russia and were reunited in Berlin with Efron, whom she had thought had been killed by the Bolsheviks. There she published the collections Separation, Poems to Blok, and the poem The Tsar Maiden, much of her poetry appeared in Moscow and Berlin, consolidating her reputation. In August 1922, the family moved to Prague. Living in unremitting poverty, unable to afford living accommodation in Prague itself, with Efron studying politics and sociology at the Charles University and living in hostels, Tsvetaeva and Ariadna found rooms in a village outside the city. She writes "we are devoured by coal, gas, the milkman, the baker...the only meat we eat is horsemeat". When offered an opportunity to earn money by reading her poetry, she describes having to beg a simple dress from a friend to replace the one she had been living in. Tsvetaeva began a passionate affair with , a former military officer, a liaison which became widely known throughout émigré circles. Efron was devastated. Her break-up with Rodziewicz in 1923 was almost certainly the inspiration for her The Poem of the End and "The Poem of the Mountain". At about the same time, Tsvetaeva began correspondence with poet Rainer Maria Rilke and novelist Boris Pasternak. Tsvetaeva and Pasternak were not to meet for nearly twenty years, but maintained friendship until Tsvetaeva's return to Russia. In summer 1924, Efron and Tsvetaeva left Prague for the suburbs, living for a while in Jíloviště, before moving on to Všenory, where Tsvetaeva completed "The Poem of the End", and was to conceive their son, Georgy, whom she was to later nickname 'Mur'. Tsvetaeva wanted to name him Boris (after Pasternak); Efron insisted on Georgy. He was to be a most difficult child but Tsvetaeva loved him obsessively. With Efron now rarely free from tuberculosis, their daughter Ariadna was relegated to the role of mother's helper and confidante, and consequently felt robbed of much of her childhood. In Berlin, before settling in Paris, Tsvetaeva wrote some of her greatest verse, including Remeslo ("Craft", 1923) and Posle Rossii ("After Russia", 1928). Reflecting a life in poverty and exiled, the work holds great nostalgia for Russia and its folk history, while experimenting with verse forms. Paris In 1925, the family settled in Paris, where they would live for the next 14 years. At about this time Tsvetaeva contracted tuberculosis. Tsvetaeva received a small stipend from the Czechoslovak government, which gave financial support to artists and writers who had lived in Czechoslovakia. In addition, she tried to make whatever she could from readings and sales of her work. She turned more and more to writing prose because she found it made more money than poetry. Tsvetaeva did not feel at all at home in Paris's predominantly ex-bourgeois circle of Russian émigré writers. Although she had written passionately pro-'White' poems during the Revolution, her fellow émigrés thought that she was insufficiently anti-Soviet, and that her criticism of the Soviet régime was altogether too nebulous. She was particularly criticised for writing an admiring letter to the Soviet poet Vladimir Mayakovsky. In the wake of this letter, the émigré paper Posledniye Novosti, to which Tsvetaeva had been a frequent contributor, refused point-blank to publish any more of her work. She found solace in her correspondence with other writers, including Boris Pasternak, Rainer Maria Rilke, the Czech poet Anna Tesková, the critics D. S. Mirsky and Aleksandr Bakhrakh, and the Georgian émigré princess Salomea Andronikova, who became her main source of financial support. Her poetry and critical prose of the time, including her autobiographical prose works of 1934–7, is of lasting literary importance. "Consumed by the daily round", resenting the domesticity that left her no time for solitude or writing, her émigré milieu regarded Tsvetaeva as a crude sort who ignored social graces. Describing her misery, she wrote to Tesková "In Paris, with rare personal exceptions, everyone hates me, they write all sorts of nasty things, leave me out in all sorts of nasty ways, and so on". To Pasternak she complained "They don't like poetry and what am I apart from that, not poetry but that from which it is made. [I am] an inhospitable hostess. A young woman in an old dress." She began to look back at even the Prague times with nostalgia and resent her exiled state more deeply. Meanwhile, Tsvetaeva's husband was developing Soviet sympathies and was homesick for Russia. Eventually, he began working for the NKVD, the forerunner of the KGB. Alya shared his views, and increasingly turned against her mother. In 1937, she returned to the Soviet Union. Later that year, Efron too had to return to the USSR. The French police had implicated him in the murder of the former Soviet defector Ignace Reiss in September 1937, on a country lane near Lausanne, Switzerland. After Efron's escape, the police interrogated Tsvetaeva, but she seemed confused by their questions and ended up reading them some French translations of her poetry. The police concluded that she was deranged and knew nothing of the murder. Later it was learned that Efron possibly had also taken part in the assassination of Trotsky's son in 1936. Tsvetaeva does not seem to have known that her husband was a spy, nor the extent to which he was compromised. However, she was held responsible for his actions and was ostracised in Paris because of the implication that he was involved with the NKVD. World War II had made Europe as unsafe and hostile as the USSR. In 1939, she became lonely and alarmed by the rise of fascism, which she attacked in Stikhi k Chekhii ("Verses to Czechia" 1938–39). Last years: Return to the Soviet Union In 1939, she and her son returned to Moscow, unaware of the reception she would receive. In Stalin's USSR, anyone who had lived abroad was suspect, as was anyone who had been among the intelligentsia before the Revolution. Tsvetaeva's sister had been arrested before Tsvetaeva's return; although Anastasia survived the Stalin years, the sisters never saw each other again. Tsvetaeva found that all doors had closed to her. She got bits of work translating poetry, but otherwise the established Soviet writers refused to help her, and chose to ignore her plight; Nikolai Aseev, whom she had hoped would assist, shied away, fearful for his life and position. Efron and Alya were arrested on espionage charges in 1941, Efron was sentenced to death. Alya's fiancé was actually an NKVD agent who had been assigned to spy on the family. Efron was shot in 1941; Alya served over eight years in prison. Both were exonerated after Stalin's death. In 1941, Tsvetaeva and her son were evacuated to Yelabuga (Elabuga), while most families of the Union of Soviet Writers were evacuated to Chistopol. Tsvetaeva had no means of support in Yelabuga, and on 24 August 1941 she left for Chistopol desperately seeking a job. On 26 August, Marina Tsvetaeva and poet Valentin Parnakh applied to the Soviet of Literature Fund asking for a job at the LitFund's canteen. Parnakh was accepted as a doorman, while Tsvetaeva's application for a permission to live in Chistopol was turned down and she had to return to Yelabuga on 28 August. On 31 August 1941, while living in Yelabuga, Tsvetaeva hanged herself. She left a note for her son Mur: "Forgive me, but to go on would be worse. I am gravely ill, this is not me anymore. I love you passionately. Do understand that I could not live anymore. Tell Papa and Alya, if you ever see them, that I loved them to the last moment and explain to them that I found myself in a trap." Tsvetaeva was buried in Yelabuga cemetery on 2 September 1941, but the exact location of her grave remains unknown. Her son Georgy volunteered for the Eastern Front of World War II and died in battle in 1944. Her daughter Ariadna spent 16 years in Soviet prison camps and exile and was released in 1955. Ariadna wrote a memoir of her family; an English-language edition was published in 2009. She died in 1975. In the town of Yelabuga, the Tsvetaeva house is now a museum and a monument stands to her. The apartment in Moscow where she lived from 1914 to 1922 is now a house-museum. Much of her poetry was republished in the Soviet Union after 1961, and her passionate, articulate and precise work, with its daring linguistic experimentation, brought her increasing recognition as a major poet. A minor planet, 3511 Tsvetaeva, discovered in 1982 by Soviet astronomer Lyudmila Karachkina, is named after her. In 1989, in Gdynia, Poland, a special-purpose ship was built for the Russian Academy of Sciences and named Marina Tsvetaeva in her honor. From 2007, the ship served as a tourist vessel to the polar regions for Aurora Expeditions. In 2011, she was renamed and is currently operated by Oceanwide Expeditions as a tourist vessel in the polar regions. Work Tsvetaeva's poetry was admired by poets such as Valery Bryusov, Maximilian Voloshin, Osip Mandelstam, Boris Pasternak, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Anna Akhmatova. Later, that recognition was also expressed by the poet Joseph Brodsky, pre-eminent among Tsvetaeva's champions. Tsvetaeva was primarily a lyrical poet, and her lyrical voice remains clearly audible in her narrative poetry. Brodsky said of her work: "Represented on a graph, Tsvetaeva's work would exhibit a curve – or rather, a straight line – rising at almost a right angle because of her constant effort to raise the pitch a note higher, an idea higher (or, more precisely, an octave and a faith higher.) She always carried everything she has to say to its conceivable and expressible end. In both her poetry and her prose, nothing remains hanging or leaves a feeling of ambivalence. Tsvetaeva is the unique case in which the paramount spiritual experience of an epoch (for us, the sense of ambivalence, of contradictoriness in the nature of human existence) served not as the object of expression but as its means, by which it was transformed into the material of art." Critic Annie Finch describes the engaging, heart-felt nature of the work. "Tsvetaeva is such a warm poet, so unbridled in her passion, so completely vulnerable in her love poetry, whether to her female lover Sofie Parnak, to Boris Pasternak. [...] Tsvetaeva throws her poetic brilliance on the altar of her heart’s experience with the faith of a true romantic, a priestess of lived emotion. And she stayed true to that faith to the tragic end of her life. Tsvetaeva's lyric poems fill ten collections; the uncollected lyrics would add at least another volume. Her first two collections indicate their subject matter in their titles: Evening Album (Vecherniy albom, 1910) and The Magic Lantern (Volshebnyi fonar, 1912). The poems are vignettes of a tranquil childhood and youth in a professorial, middle-class home in Moscow, and display considerable grasp of the formal elements of style. The full range of Tsvetaeva's talent developed quickly, and was undoubtedly influenced by the contacts she had made at Koktebel, and was made evident in two new collections: Mileposts (Versty, 1921) and Mileposts: Book One (Versty, Vypusk I, 1922). Three elements of Tsvetaeva's mature style emerge in the Mileposts collections. First, Tsvetaeva dates her poems and publishes them chronologically. The poems in Mileposts: Book One, for example, were written in 1916 and resolve themselves as a versified journal. Secondly, there are cycles of poems which fall into a regular chronological sequence among the single poems, evidence that certain themes demanded further expression and development. One cycle announces the theme of Mileposts: Book One as a whole: the "Poems of Moscow." Two other cycles are dedicated to poets, the "Poems to Akhmatova" and the "Poems to Blok", which again reappear in a separate volume, Poems to Blok (Stikhi k Bloku, 1922). Thirdly, the Mileposts collections demonstrate the dramatic quality of Tsvetaeva's work, and her ability to assume the guise of multiple dramatis personae within them. The collection Separation (Razluka, 1922) was to contain Tsvetaeva's first long verse narrative, "On a Red Steed" ("Na krasnom kone"). The poem is a prologue to three more verse-narratives written between 1920 and 1922. All four narrative poems draw on folkloric plots. Tsvetaeva acknowledges her sources in the titles of the very long works, The Maiden Tsar: A Fairy-tale Poem (Tsar-devitsa: Poema-skazka, 1922) and "The Swain", subtitled "A Fairytale" ("Molodets: skazka", 1924). The fourth folklore-style poem is "Byways" ("Pereulochki", published in 1923 in the collection Remeslo), and it is the first poem which may be deemed incomprehensible in that it is fundamentally a soundscape of language. The collection Psyche (Psikheya, 1923) contains one of Tsvetaeva's best-known cycles "Insomnia" (Bessonnitsa) and the poem The Swans' Encampment (Lebedinyi stan, Stikhi 1917–1921, published in 1957) which celebrates the White Army. The topic of hell Tsvetaeva was so infatuated by the subject that she was looking for the topic in other poets writings and even used their lines as a base for her narrative, for example: Emigrant Subsequently, as an émigré, Tsvetaeva's last two collections of lyrics were published by émigré presses, Craft (Remeslo, 1923) in Berlin and After Russia (Posle Rossii, 1928) in Paris. There then followed the twenty-three lyrical "Berlin" poems, the pantheistic "Trees" ("Derev'ya"), "Wires" ("Provoda") and "Pairs" ("Dvoe"), and the tragic "Poets" ("Poety"). "After Russia" contains the poem "In Praise of the Rich", in which Tsvetaeva's oppositional tone is merged with her proclivity for ruthless satire. Eschatological topics In 1924, Tsvetaeva wrote "Poem of the End", which details a walk around Prague and across its bridges; the walk is about the final walk she will take with her lover Konstantin Rodzevich. In it, everything is foretold: in the first few lines (translated by Elaine Feinstein), the future is already written: A single post, a point of rusting tin in the sky marks the fated place we move to, he and I Again, further poems foretell future developments. Principal among these is the voice of the classically oriented Tsvetaeva heard in cycles "The Sibyl", "Phaedra", and "Ariadne". Tsvetaeva's beloved, ill-starred heroines recur in two verse plays, Theseus-Ariadne (Tezei-Ariadna, 1927) and Phaedra (Fedra, 1928). These plays form the first two parts of an incomplete trilogy Aphrodite's Rage. Satire The satirist in Tsvetaeva plays second fiddle only to the poet-lyricist. Several satirical poems, moreover, are among Tsvetaeva's best-known works: "The Train of Life" ("Poezd zhizni") and "The Floorcleaners' Song" ("Poloterskaya"), both included in After Russia, and The Ratcatcher (Krysolov, 1925–1926), a long, folkloric narrative. The target of Tsvetaeva's satire is everything petty and petty bourgeois. Unleashed against such dull creature comforts is the vengeful, unearthly energy of workers both manual and creative. In her notebook, Tsvetaeva writes of "The Floorcleaners' Song": "Overall movement: the floorcleaners ferret out a house's hidden things, they scrub a fire into the door... What do they flush out? Coziness, warmth, tidiness, order... Smells: incense, piety. Bygones. Yesterday... The growing force of their threat is far stronger than the climax." The Ratcatcher poem, which Tsvetaeva describes as a lyrical satire, is loosely based on the legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. The Ratcatcher, which is also known as The Pied Piper, is considered by some to be the finest of Tsvetaeva's work. It was also partially an act of homage to Heinrich Heine's poem Die Wanderratten. The Ratcatcher appeared initially, in serial format, in the émigré journal in 1925–1926 whilst still being written. It was not to appear in the Soviet Union until after the death of Joseph Stalin in 1956. Its hero is the Pied Piper of Hamelin who saves a town from hordes of rats and then leads the town's children away too, in retribution for the citizens' ingratitude. As in the other folkloric narratives, The Ratcatcher's story line emerges indirectly through numerous speaking voices which shift from invective, to extended lyrical flights, to pathos. Tsvetaeva's last ten years of exile, from 1928 when "After Russia" appeared until her return in 1939 to the Soviet Union, were principally a "prose decade", though this would almost certainly be by dint of economic necessity rather than one of choice. Translators Translators of Tsvetaeva's work into English include Elaine Feinstein and David McDuff. Nina Kossman translated many of Tsvetaeva's long (narrative) poems, as well as her lyrical poems; they are collected in three books, Poem of the End (bilingual edition published by Ardis in 1998, by Overlook in 2004, and by Shearsman Books in 2021), In the Inmost Hour of the Soul (Humana Press, 1989), and Other Shepherds (Poets & Traitors Press, 2020). Robin Kemball translated the cycle The Demesne of the Swans, published as a separate (bilingual) book by Ardis in 1980. J. Marin King translated a great deal of Tsvetaeva's prose into English, compiled in a book called A Captive Spirit. Tsvetaeva scholar Angela Livingstone has translated a number of Tsvetaeva's essays on art and writing, compiled in a book called Art in the Light of Conscience. Livingstone's translation of Tsvetaeva's "The Ratcatcher" was published as a separate book. Mary Jane White has translated the early cycle "Miles" in a book called "Starry Sky to Starry Sky", as well as Tsvetaeva's elegy for Rilke, "New Year's", (Adastra Press 16 Reservation Road, Easthampton, MA 01027 USA) and "Poem of the End" (The Hudson Review, Winter 2009; and in the anthology Poets Translate Poets, Syracuse U. Press 2013) and "Poem of the Hill", (New England Review, Summer 2008) and Tsvetaeva's 1914–1915 cycle of love poems to Sophia Parnok. In 2002, Yale University Press published Jamey Gambrell's translation of post-revolutionary prose, entitled Earthly Signs: Moscow Diaries, 1917–1922, with notes on poetic and linguistic aspects of Tsvetaeva's prose, and endnotes for the text itself. Cultural influence 2017: Zerkalo ("Mirror"), American magazine in MN for the Russian-speaking readers. It was a special publication to the 125th Anniversary of the Russian poet Marina Tsvetaeva, where the article "Marina Tsvetaeva in America" was written by Dr. Uli Zislin, the founder and director of the Washington Museum of Russian Poetry and Music, Sep/Oct 2017. Music and songs The Soviet composer Dmitri Shostakovich set six of Tsvetaeva's poems to music. Later the Russian-Tatar composer Sofia Gubaidulina wrote an Hommage à Marina Tsvetayeva featuring her poems. Her poem "Mne Nravitsya..." ("I like that..."), was performed by Alla Pugacheva in the film The Irony of Fate. In 2003, the opera Marina: A Captive Spirit, based on Tsvetaeva's life and work, premiered from American Opera Projects in New York with music by Deborah Drattell and libretto by poet Annie Finch. The production was directed by Anne Bogart and the part of Tsvetaeva was sung by Lauren Flanigan. The poetry by Tsvetaeva was set to music and frequently performed as songs by Elena Frolova, Larisa Novoseltseva, Zlata Razdolina and other Russian bards. In 2019, American composer Mark Abel wrote Four Poems of Marina Tsvetaeva, the first classical song cycle of the poet in an English translation. Soprano Hila Plitmann recorded the piece for Abel’s album The Cave of Wondrous Voice. Tribute On 8 October 2015, Google Doodle commemorated her 123rd birthday. Translations into English Selected Poems, trans. Elaine Feinstein. (Oxford University Press, 1971; 2nd ed., 1981; 3rd ed., 1986; 4th ed., 1993; 5th ed., 1999; 6th ed. 2009 as Bride of Ice: New Selected Poems) The Demesne of the Swans, trans. Robin Kemball (bilingual edition, Ardis, 1980) ISBN 978-0882334936 Marina Tsvetayeva: Selected Poems, trans. David McDuff. (Bloodaxe Books, 1987) "Starry Sky to Starry Sky (Miles)", trans. Mary Jane White. (Holy Cow! Press, 1988), (paper) and (cloth) In the Inmost Hour of the Soul: Poems by Marina Tsvetayeva , trans. Nina Kossman (Humana Press, 1989) Black Earth, trans. Elaine Feinstein (The Delos Press and The Menard Press, 1992) ISBN I-874320-00-4 and ISBN I-874320-05-5 (signed ed.) "After Russia", trans. Michael Nayden (Ardis, 1992). A Captive Spirit: Selected Prose, trans. J. Marin King (Vintage Books, 1994) Poem of the End: Selected Narrative and Lyrical Poems , trans. Nina Kossman (Ardis / Overlook, 1998, 2004) ; Poem of the End: Six Narrative Poems, trans. Nina Kossman (Shearsman Books, 2021) ISBN 978-1-84861-778-0) The Ratcatcher: A Lyrical Satire, trans. Angela Livingstone (Northwestern University, 2000) Letters: Summer 1926 (Boris Pasternak, Marina Tsvetayeva, Rainer Maria Rilke) (New York Review Books, 2001) Earthly Signs: Moscow Diaries, 1917–1922, ed. & trans. Jamey Gambrell (Yale University Press, 2002) Phaedra: a drama in verse; with New Year's Letter and other long poems, trans. Angela Livingstone (Angel Classics, 2012) "To You – in 10 Decades", trans. by Alexander Givental and Elysee Wilson-Egolf (Sumizdat 2012) Moscow in the Plague Year, translated by Christopher Whyte (180 poems written between November 1918 and May 1920) (Archipelago Press, New York, 2014), 268pp, Milestones (1922), translated by Christopher Whyte (Bristol, Shearsman Books, 2015), 122p, After Russia: The First Notebook, translated by Christopher Whyte (Bristol, Shearsman Books, 2017), 141 pp, {{ISBN|978}} 1 84861 549 6 After Russia: The Second Notebook, translated by Christopher Whyte (Bristol, Shearsman Books, 2018) 121 pp, {{ISBN|978}} 1 84861 551 9 "Poem of the End" in "From A Terrace in Prague, A Prague Poetry Anthology", trans. Mary Jane White, ed. Stephan Delbos (Univerzita Karlova v Praze, 2011) Further reading Schweitzer, Viktoria Tsvetaeva (1993) Mandelstam, Nadezhda Hope Against Hope Mandelstam, Nadezhda Hope Abandoned Pasternak, Boris An Essay in Autobiography References External links . One of the most famous Tsvetaeva's poem performed by Alla Pugacheva. Another version. . Dramatic reading in English with artistic video. Includes download link. "Marina Tsvetaeva, Poet of the extreme" by Belinda Cooke from South magazine #31, April 2005. Republished online in the Poetry Library's Poetry Magazines site. A small site dedicated to Tsvetaeva Poetic translations into English Marina Tsvetaeva biography at Carcanet Press, English language publisher of Tsvetaeva's Bride of Ice and Marina Tsvetaeva: Selected Poems, translated by Elaine Feinstein. Heritage of Marina Tsvetayeva, a resource in English with a more extensive version in Russian. Тоска по родине / Nostalgia and four more poems from the book "To You – in 10 Decades", translated by Alexander Givental and Elysee Wilson-Egolf and provided by Sumizdat, the publisher. "She Means It When She Rhymes: Marina Tsvetaeva: Selected Poems." Review from Thumbscrew #17, Winter 2000/1, of works translated by Elaine Feinstein. The Poems by Marina Tsvetaeva 1892 births 1941 suicides 20th-century Russian women writers Poets of the Russian Empire Soviet emigrants to Germany German emigrants to Czechoslovakia Diarists of the Russian Empire Women poets of the Russian Empire Suicides by hanging in the Soviet Union University of Paris alumni Women diarists Writers from Moscow LGBT poets from Russia 20th-century Russian poets 20th-century Russian diarists Soviet diarists 20th-century LGBT people Soviet women poets

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matilda%20of%20Tuscany

Matilda of Tuscany

Matilda of Tuscany ( , , ; – 24 July 1115), was a member of the House of Canossa (also known as the Attonids) and one of the most powerful nobles in Italy in the second half of the eleventh century. She ruled as a feudal margravine and, as a relative of the imperial Salian dynasty, she brokered a settlement in the so-called Investiture Controversy. In this extensive conflict with the emerging reform Papacy over the relationship between spiritual (sacerdotium) and secular (regnum) power, Pope Gregory VII dismissed and excommunicated the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV in 1076. At the same time, she came into possession of a substantial territory that included present-day Lombardy, Emilia, the Romagna and Tuscany, and made the Canossa Castle, in the Apennines south of Reggio, the centre of her domains. In January 1077, Henry IV was, after his famous penitential walk in front of the Canossa () Castle, accepted back into the church community by the Pope. The understanding between the King and the Pope was short-lived, however. In the conflicts with Henry IV that arose a little later, Matilda put all her military and material resources into the service of the Papacy from 1080. Her court became a refuge for many displaced persons during the turmoil of the investiture dispute and experienced a cultural boom. Even after Pope Gregory VII's death in 1085, Matilda remained an important pillar of the Reform Church. Between 1081 and 1098, the Canossa rule fell into a major crisis due to the grueling disputes with Henry IV. The historical record is sparse for this time. A turning point resulted from a coalition of Matilda with the southern German dukes, who were in opposition to Henry IV. After Henry IV's retreat in 1097 past the Alps to the empire's north, a power vacuum developed in Italy. The struggle between and changed the social and rulership structure of the Italian cities permanently and gave them space for emancipation from foreign rule and communal development. From autumn 1098 Matilda was able to regain many of her lost domains. Until the end she tried to bring the cities under her control. After 1098, she increasingly used the opportunities offered to her to consolidate her rule again. In her final years she was worried about her own memory, which is why the childless Matilda focused her donation activity on the Polirone Abbey rather than find a suitable heir. Sometimes called ("the Great Countess") or Matilda of Canossa after her ancestral castle of Canossa, Matilda was one of the most important figures of the Italian Middle Ages. She lived in a period of constant battles, intrigues and excommunications, and was able to demonstrate an innate leadership ability, even during difficult times. Between 6 and 11 May 1111, Matilda was reportedly crowned Imperial Vicar and Vice-Queen of Italy by Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor at the Castle of Bianello (Quattro Castella, Reggio Emilia), following the account of Donizo. With her death, the House of Canossa became extinct in 1115. Popes and emperors fought over their rich inheritance, called the "Matildine domains", well into the 13th century. Matilda became a myth in Italy, which found its expression in numerous artistic, musical and literary designs as well as miracle stories and legends. This legacy reached its peak during the Counter-Reformation and the Baroque Period. Pope Urban VIII had Matilda's body transferred to Rome in 1630, where she was the first woman to be buried in Saint Peter's Basillica. Origins of the House of Canossa Matilda came from the noble House of Canossa, also named the Attonids, although these names were only invented by later generations. The oldest proven ancestor of the House of Canossa was the nobleman Sigifred, who lived in the first third of the 10th century and came from the County of Lucca. He probably increased his sphere of influence in the area around Parma and probably also in the foothills of the Apennines. His son Adalbert-Atto was able to bring several castles in the foothills of the Apennines under his control in the politically fragmented region and built in the southwest of the mountains of Reggio Emilia the Canossa Castle, who effectively became in a defensive fortress. King Lothair II of Italy died unexpectedly in 950, whereupon Berengar of Ivrea wanted to take power in Italy. After a short imprisonment, Lothair's widow Queen Adelaide found refuge with Adalbert-Atto in Canossa Castle. King Otto I of East Francia then intervened in Italy himself and married Adelaide in 951. This resulted in a close bond between the House of Canossa and the Ottonian dynasty. Adalbert-Atto appeared in Otto I's documents as an advocate and was able to establish contacts with the Papacy for the first time in the wake of the Ottonians. Adalbert-Atto also received from Otto I the Counties of Reggio and Modena. In 977 at the latest, the County of Mantua was added to his domains. Adalbert-Atto's son and Matilda's grandfather Tedald continued their close ties to the Ottonian rulers from 988. In 996 he is listed as dux et marchio (Duke and Margrave) in a document. This title was adopted by all subsequent rulers of the House of Canossa. An inheritance dispute among the three sons of Tedald could be prevented. The rise of the family reached the climax under Matilda's father Boniface. The three successive Canossa rulers (Adalbert-Atto, Tedald and Boniface) instituted monasteries for their expansion of rule. The founded monasteries (Brescello, Polirone, Santa Maria di Felonica) were established in places of transport and strategic importance for the administrative consolidation of their large estates, and used three family saints (Genesius, Apollonius and Simeon) to stabilize the House of Canossa's power structure and sought to exert influence on convents that had been in existence for a long time (Abbey of Nonantola). The transfer of monasteries to local bishops and the promotion of spiritual institutions also enlarged their network of alliances. The appearance as the guardian of order consolidated their position along the Via Aemilia. Historian Arnaldo Tincani was able to prove the considerable number of 120 farms in the Canossa estate near the Po river. Birth and early years Boniface of Canossa worked closely with the Salian Conrad II, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Germany. He received the Margraviate of Tuscany in 1027 and thereby considerably increased his paternal domains. Boniface rose to be the most powerful person between the middle Po and the northern border of the Patrimonium Petri (Patrimony of Saint Peter). Emperor Conrad II wanted to tie his most powerful vassal in south of the Alps to his inner circle in the long term through a marriage. On the occasion of the wedding of Conrad II's son Henry with Gunhilda of Denmark in 1036 at the city of Nijmegen, Boniface met Beatrice of Lorraine, niece and foster daughter of Empress Gisela of Swabia. One year later, in June 1037, Boniface and Beatrice celebrated their marriage in high style, keeping court at Marengo for three months afterwards. In the marriage, Beatrice brought important assets in Lorraine: the Château of Briey and the Lordships of Stenay, Mouzay, Juvigny, Longlier and Orval, all the northern part of her paternal family's ancestral lands. As the daughter of Duke Frederick II of Upper Lorraine and Matilda of Swabia, she and her sister Sophia were raised in the imperial court by their aunt Empress Gisela (her mother's sister) after the deaths of their parents. For Boniface, the marriage to the much-younger Beatrice, a close relative of the Emperor, brought him not only prestige but also the prospect to finally have an heir; his first marriage with Richilda (died after February 1036), daughter of Giselbert II, Count Palatine of Bergamo, produced only one daughter, born and died in 1014. Boniface and Beatrice had three children, one son, Frederick (named after his maternal grandfather) and two daughters, Beatrice (named after her own mother) and Matilda (named after her maternal grandmother). Matilda, probably born around 1046, was the youngest child. Matilda's birthplace and exact date of birth are unknown. Italian scholars have been arguing about her place of birth for centuries. According to Francesco Maria Fiorentini, a doctor and scholar of the 17th century, she was born in Lucca, an assumption reinforced by a miniature in the early twelfth-century Vita Mathildis by the monk Donizo (or, in Italian, Donizone), where Matilda is referred to as 'Resplendent Matilda' (Mathildis Lucens): since the Latin word lucens is similar to lucensis (of/from Lucca), this may also be a reference to Matilda's birth place. By the other hand, for Benedictine scholar Camillo Affarosi, Canossa was the place of birth. Lino Lionello Ghirardini and Paolo Golinelli both advocated Mantua as her birth place. A recent publication by Michèle Kahn Spike also favors Mantua, as it was the center for Boniface's court at the time. In addition, Ferrara or the small Tuscan town of San Miniato were also discussed as possible birth places. According to Elke Goez, the sources cannot prove that there was a permanent household for Boniface of Canossa in either Mantua or any other place. Matilda must have spent her early years around her mother. Renowned for her learning, she was literate in Latin, as well as reputed to speak German and French. The extent of Matilda's education in military matters is debated. It has been asserted that she was taught strategy, tactics, riding and wielding weapons, but recent scholarship challenges these claims. Boniface of Canossa was a feared and hated prince for some small vassals throughout his life. On 7 May 1052 he was ambushed while hunting in the forest of San Martino dall'Argine near Mantua and killed. Following the death of their father, Matilda's brother, Frederick, inherited the family lands and titles under the regency of their mother, who managed to hold the family patrimony together and also made important contacts with leading figures in the Church renewal movement and developed into an increasingly important pillar of the reform of the Papacy. Matilda's older sister, Beatrice, died the next year (before 17 December 1053), making Matilda heiress presumptive to Frederick's personal holdings. In mid-1054, determined to safeguard the interests of her children as well as her own, Beatrice of Lorraine married Godfrey the Bearded, a distant kinsman who had been stripped of the Duchy of Upper Lorraine after openly rebelling against Emperor Henry III. Emperor Henry III was enraged by his cousin Beatrice's unauthorised union with his most vigorous adversary and took the opportunity to have her arrested, along with Matilda, when he marched south to attend a synod in Florence on Pentecost in 1055. Frederick's rather suspicious death soon thereafter made Matilda the last member of the House of Canossa. Mother and daughter were taken to Germany, but Godfrey the Bearded successfully avoided capture. Unable to defeat him, Henry III sought a rapprochement. The Emperor's early death in October 1056, which brought to throne the underage Henry IV, seems to have accelerated the negotiations and the restoration of the previous balance of power. Godfrey the Bearded was reconciled with the imperial family and recognized as Margrave of Tuscany in December, while Beatrice and Matilda were released. By the time she and her mother returned to Italy, in the company of Pope Victor II, Matilda was formally acknowledged as sole heiress to the greatest territorial lordship in the southern part of the Empire. In June 1057 the Pope held a synod in Florence; he was present during the infamous capture of Beatrice and Matilda, and with the deliberated choice of location of the synod also made it clear that the House of Canossa had returned to Italy, strengthened at the side of the Pope and had been completely rehabilitated; with Henry IV being a minor, the reform Papacy sought the protection of the powerful House of Canossa. According to Donizo, the Panegyric biographer of Matilda and her ancestors, she was familiar with both French and German due to her origins and living conditions. Matilda's mother and stepfather thus became heavily involved in the series of disputed papal elections during their regency, supporting the Gregorian Reforms. Godfrey the Bearded's brother Frederick became Pope Stephen IX, while both of the following two popes, Nicholas II and Alexander II, had been Tuscan bishops. Matilda made her first journey to Rome with her family in the entourage of Nicholas II in 1059. Godfrey and Beatrice actively assisted them in dealing with antipopes, while the adolescent Matilda's role remains unclear. A contemporary account of her stepfather's 1067 expedition against Prince Richard I of Capua on behalf of the papacy mentions Matilda's participation in the campaign, describing it as the "first service that the most excellent daughter of Boniface offered to the blessed prince of the apostles". First marriage: Godfrey the Hunchback Possibly taking advantage of the minority of Henry IV, Beatrice and Godfrey the Bearded wanted to consolidate the connection between the Houses of Lorraine and Canossa in the long term by marrying their two children. Around 1055, Matilda and her stepbrother Godfrey the Hunchback (son of Godfrey the Bearded from his first marriage) were betrothed. In May 1069, as Godfrey the Bearded lay dying in Verdun, Beatrice and Matilda hastened to reach Lorraine, anxious to ensure a smooth transition of power. Matilda was present at her stepfather's deathbed, and on that occasion she is for the first time clearly mentioned as the wife of her stepbrother. After the death of Godfrey the Bearded on 30 December, the newlyweds stayed in Lorraine while Beatrice returned to Italy alone. Matilda became pregnant in 1070; Godfrey the Hunchback seems to have informed the Salian imperial court about this event: in a charter from Henry IV dated 9 May 1071, Godfrey or his heirs are mentioned. Matilda gave birth to a daughter, named Beatrice after her maternal grandmother, but the child died a few weeks after the birth before 29 August 1071. Matilda and Godfrey the Hunchback's marriage proved a failure after a short time; the death of their only child and Godfrey's physical deformity may have helped fuel deep animosity between the spouses. By the end of 1071, Matilda had left her husband and returned to Italy, where her stay in Mantua on 19 January 1072 can be proven: there she and her mother issued a deed of donation for the Monastery of Sant'Andrea. Godfrey the Hunchback fiercely protested the separation and demanded that Matilda come back to him, which she repeatedly refused. In early 1072 he descended into Italy and visited several places in Tuscany, determined not only to enforce the marriage, but to lay claim to these areas as Matilda's husband. During this time, Matilda stayed in Lucca; there's no evidence that the couple met: only in a single document dated 18 August 1073 in Mantua for a donation for the Monastery of San Paolo in Parma, Matilda named Godfrey the Hunchback as her husband. In his efforts to restore his marital bond, Godfrey the Hunchback sought the help of both Matilda's mother and her ally, the newly elected Pope Gregory VII, promising military aid to the latter. However, Matilda's resolution was unshakable, and in the summer of 1073 Godfrey the Hunchback returned to Lorraine alone, losing all hope for a reconciliation by 1074. Matilda wanted to enter in a monastery as a nun, and during 1073–1074 she tried in vain to obtain the dissolution of her marriage with the Pope; however Gregory VII needed Godfrey the Hunchback as an ally and was therefore not interested in a divorce. At the same time he hoped for Matilda's help with his crusade plans. Rather than supporting the Pope as promised in exchange for preserve his marriage, Godfrey the Hunchback turned his attention to imperial affairs. Meanwhile, the conflict later known as the Investiture Controversy was brewing between Gregory VII and Henry IV, with both men claiming the right to appoint bishops and abbots within the Empire. Matilda and Godfrey the Hunchback soon found themselves on opposing sides of the dispute, leading to a further deterioration of their difficult relationship. German chroniclers, writing of the synod held at Worms in January 1076, even suggested that Godfrey the Hunchback inspired Henry IV's allegation of a licentious affair between Gregory VII and Matilda. Matilda and her husband continued to live separately until Godfrey the Hunchback was assassinated in Vlaardingen, near Antwerp on 26 February 1076. Having been accused of adultery with the Pope the previous month, Matilda was suspected of ordering her estranged husband's death. She couldn't have known about the proceedings at the Synod of Worms at the time, however, since the news took three months to reach the Pope himself, and it is more likely that Godfrey the Hunchback was killed at the instigation of an enemy nearer to him. Matilda made no spiritual gifts either for Godfrey the Hunchback or for their infant daughter; however, her mother Beatrice in 1071 donated property to the Abbey of Frassinoro for the salvation of her granddaughter's soul and granted twelve farms "for the health and life of my beloved daughter Matilda" (pro incolomitate et anima Matilde dilecte filie mee). Co-rulership with her mother Beatrice Matilda's bold decision to repudiate her husband came at a cost, but ensured her independence. Beatrice started preparing Matilda for rule as head of the House of Canossa by holding court jointly with her and, eventually, encouraging her to issue charters on her own as countess (comitissa) and duchess (ducatrix). Both mother and daughter tried to be present throughout their territory. In what is now Emilia-Romagna their position was much more stable than in the southern Apennines, where they couldn't get their followers behind them despite rich donations. They therefore tried to act as guardians of justice and public order. Matilda's participation is mentioned in seven of the sixteen placitum held by Beatrice. Supported by judges, Matilda had already held placitum placita alone. On 7 June 1072 Matilda and her mother presided over the court in favor of the Abbey of San Salvatore in Monte Amiata. On 8 February 1073, Matilda went to Lucca without her mother and presided over the court alone, where she made a donation in favor of the local Monastery of San Salvatore e Santa Giustina. At the instigation of the abbess Eritha, the monastery possessions in Lucca and Villanova near Serchio were secured by the King's ban (Königsbann). For the next six months Matilda's residence is not known, while her mother took part in the ceremony of enthronement of Pope Gregory VII. Matilda was introduced by her mother to numerous personalities in church reform, especially Pope Gregory VII himself. She had already met the future Pope, then Archdeacon Hildebrand, in the 1060s. After his election as Pope, she met him for the first time during 9–17 March 1074. With Matilda and Beatrice, the Pope developed a special relationship of trust in the period that followed. However, Beatrice died on 18 April 1076. On 27 August 1077 Matilda donated her town of Scanello and other estates to the extent of 600 mansus near the court to Bishop Landulf and the chapter of Pisa Cathedral as a soul device (Seelgerät) for herself and her parents. The deaths of both her husband and mother within two months of difference considerably augmented Matilda's power; she was now the undisputed heir of all her parents' allodial lands. Her inheritance would have been threatened had Godfrey the Hunchback survived her mother, but she now enjoyed the privileged status of a widow. It seemed unlikely, however, that Emperor Henry IV would formally invest her with the margraviate. Personal rule Matilda's role during the Investiture Controversy State of Matilda's domains after her accession to power After the death of her mother, Matilda took over her immense paternal inheritance, contrary to the provisions of the Salic and Lombard law currently in force in the Kingdom of Italy, according to which Emperor Henry IV would have been the legal heir. A lending under imperial law was of secondary importance for the House of Canossa in view of Henry IV's minority and close cooperation with the reform Papacy. Between 1076 and 1080, Matilda travelled to Lorraine to lay claim to her husband's estate in Verdun, which he had willed (along with the rest of his patrimony) to his sister Ida's son, Godfrey of Bouillon. Godfrey of Bouillon also disputed her rights to Stenay and Mosay, which her mother had received as dowry. The quarrel between aunt and nephew over the episcopal County of Verdun was eventually settled by Theoderic, Bishop of Verdun, who enjoyed the right to nominate the counts. He easily found in favor of Matilda, as such verdict happened to please both Pope Gregory VII and King Henry IV. Matilda then proceeded to enfeoff Verdun to her husband's pro-reform cousin, Albert III of Namur. The deep animosity between Matilda and her nephew is thought to have prevented her from travelling to Jerusalem during the First Crusade, led by him in the late 1090s. Efforts to achieve a balance between King and Pope Matilda was a second cousin of Henry IV through their respective grandmothers, sisters Matilda of Swabia and Empress Gisela. Because of her family ties to the Salian dynasty, she was suitable for a mediator role between the Emperor and the Holy See. Matilda's mother died at the time when the conflict between King Henry IV and Pope Gregory VII was escalating. Matilda and Beatrice were among Gregory VII's closest confidants. From the beginning he took both into his confidence and let them know about his plans against the Roman-German king. The disagreement between Pope Gregory VII and King Henry IV culminated in the aftermath of the synod of Worms on 24 January 1076; together with the Archbishops Siegfried of Mainz and Udo of Trier and another 24 bishops, the king formulated drastic accusations against Gregory VII. The allegations included Gregory VII's election (which was described as illegitimate), the government of the Church through a "women's senate" and that "he shared a table with a strange woman and housed her, more familiar than necessary." The contempt was so immense that Matilda was not even called by name. The Pope responded on 15 February 1076 with the excommunication of the king, releasing all his subjects from the oath of allegiance to him and providing the perfect reason for rebellion against his rule. These measures had a tremendous effect on contemporaries, like the words of the chronicler Bonizo of Sutri show: "When the news of the banishment of the king reached the ears of the people, our whole world trembled". Insubordinate southern German princes gathered in Trebur, awaiting the Pope. Matilda's first military endeavor, as well as the first major task altogether as ruler, turned out to be protecting the Pope during his perilous journey north. Gregory VII could rely on nobody else; as the sole heiress to the House of Canossa patrimony, Matilda controlled all the Apennine passes and nearly all the rest that connected central Italy to the north. The Lombard bishops, who were also excommunicated for taking part in the synod and whose sees bordered Matilda's domain, were keen to capture the Pope. Gregory VII was aware of the danger, and recorded that all his advisors except Matilda counselled him against travelling to Trebur. Henry IV had other plans, however. He decided to descend into Italy and intercept Gregory VII, who was thus delayed. The German princes held a council by themselves and informed the King that he had to submit to the Pope within a year or be replaced. Henry IV's predecessors had dealt easily with troublesome pontiffs — they had simply deposed them, and the excommunicated Lombard bishops rejoiced at this prospect. When Matilda heard about Henry IV's approach, she urged Gregory VII to take refuge in the Canossa Castle, her family's eponymous stronghold. The Pope took her advice. It soon became clear that the intention behind Henry's walk to Canossa was to show penance. By 25 January 1077, the king stood barefoot in the snow before the gates of Matilda's castle, accompanied by his wife Bertha of Savoy, their infant son Conrad and Bertha's mother, the powerful Margravine Adelaide of Susa (Matilda's second cousin; Adelaide's grandmother was Prangarda, sister of Tedald of Canossa, Matilda's paternal grandfather). Since Matilda's castle became the setting for the reconciliation between the Emperor and the Pope, she must have been very closely involved in the negotiations. The King remained there, in a penitent's robe, barefoot and without a sign of authority, despite the winter cold, until 28 January, when Matilda convinced the Pope to see him. Matilda and Adelaide brokered a deal between the men. Henry IV was taken back into the Church, with both Matilda and Adelaide acting as sponsors and formally swearing to the agreement. For Matilda, the days in Canossa were a challenge. All those arriving had to be accommodated and looked after appropriately. She had to take care of the procurement and storage of food and fodder, and the supplies in the middle of winter. After the ban was dissolved, Henry IV stayed in the Po Valley for several months and demonstratively devoted himself to his rulership. Pope Gregory VII stayed in Matilda's castles for the next few months. Henry IV and Matilda never met again in person after the Canossa days. From 1077 to 1080 Matilda followed the usual activities of her rule. In addition to a few donations for the dioceses of Lucca and Mantua, court documents were in dominance. Disputes with Henry IV In 1079, Matilda gave the Pope all her domains (the so-called Terre Matildiche), in open defiance of Henry IV's claims both as the overlord of some of those domains, and as one of her close relatives. One year later, the fortunes of Papacy and Empire turned again: at the Roman synod of Lent in early March 1080 Henry IV was again excommunicated by Gregory VII. The Pope combined the anathem with a warning: if the king didn't submit to the Papal authority by 1 August he should be dethroned. However, unlike the first ban, the German bishops and princes stood behind Henry IV. In Brixen on 25 June 1080, seven German, one Burgundian and 20 Italian bishops decided to depose Gregory VII and nominated Archbishop Guibert of Ravenna as Pope, who took the name of Clement III. The break between the Empire and the Papacy also escalated the relationship between Henry IV and Matilda. In September 1080 the Margravine stood on behalf of Bishop Gratianus of Ferrara to court. Marquis Azzo d'Este, Counts Ugo and Ubert, Albert (son of Count Boso), Paganus di Corsina, Fulcus de Rovereto, Gerardo di Corviago, Petrus de Ermengarda and Ugo Armatus all met there. Matilda swore there to maintain the upcoming fight against Henry IV. On 15 October 1080 at Volta Mantovana, the imperial troops defeated the army of Matilda and Gregory VII in battle. Some Tuscan nobles took advantage of the uncertainty and positioned themselves against Matilda; few places remained faithful to her. In a donation of 9 December 1080 to the Modenese monastery of San Prospero, only a few local followers are named. Matilda, however, did not surrender. While Gregory VII was forced into exile, she, retaining control over all the western passes in the Apennines, could force Henry IV to approach Rome via Ravenna; even with this route open, the Emperor would find it hard to besiege Rome with a hostile territory at his back. In December 1080 the citizens of Lucca, then the capital of Tuscany, had revolted and driven out her ally Bishop Anselm. She is believed to have commissioned the renowned Ponte della Maddalena where the Via Francigena crosses the river Serchio at Borgo a Mozzano just north of Lucca. Henry IV crossed the Alps in the spring of 1081. He gave up his previous reluctance towards his cousin Matilda and honored the city of Lucca for their transfer to the royal side. On 23 June 1081, the king issued the citizens of Lucca a comprehensive privilege in the army camp outside Rome. By granting special urban rights, the king intended to weaken Matilda's rule. In July 1081 at a synod in Lucca, Henry IV —on account of her 1079 donation to the Church—) imposed Imperial ban upon Matilda and all her domains were forfeit, although this wasn't enough to eliminate her as a source of trouble, for she retained substantial allodial holdings. The consequences for Matilda, however, were relatively minor in Italy, but she suffered losses in her far-away Lorraine possessions. On 1 June 1085, Henry IV gave Matilda's domains Stenay and Mosay to Bishop Dietrich of Verdun. Matilda remained Pope Gregory VII's chief intermediary for communication with northern Europe even as he lost control of Rome and was holed up in the Castel Sant'Angelo. After Henry IV caught hold of the Pope's seal, Matilda wrote to supporters in Germany only to trust papal messages that came through her. A guerrilla war developed which Matilda waged from her castles in the Apennines. In 1082 she was apparently insolvent. Therefore she could no longer bind her vassals to her with generous gifts or fiefs. But even in dire straits, she did not let up in her zeal for the reform papacy. Although her mother was also a supporter of church reform, she had distanced herself from Gregory VII's revolutionary goals, where these endangered the foundations of her rule structures. In this setting, mother and daughter differ significantly from one another. Matilda had the church treasure of the Apollonius monastery built near Canossa Castle meltdown; precious metal vessels and other treasures from Nonantola Abbey were also melted down. She even sold her Allod city of Donceel to the Abbey of Saint-Jacques in Liège. All the proceeds were made available to the Pope. The royal side then accused her of plundering churches and monasteries. Pisa and Lucca sided with Henry IV. As a result, Matilda lost two of her most important pillars of power in Tuscany. She had to stand by and watch as anti-Gregorian bishops were installed in several places. Henry IV's control of Rome enabled him to enthrone Antipope Clement III, who, in turn, crowned him Emperor. After this, Henry IV returned to Germany, leaving it to his allies to attempt Matilda's dispossession. These attempts foundered after Matilda (with help of the city of Bologna) defeated them at Sorbara near Modena on 2 July 1084. In the battle, Matilda was able to capture Bishop Bernardo of Parma hostage. By 1085 Archbishop Tedaldo of Milan and the Bishops Gandolfo of Reggio Emilia and Bernardo of Parma, all members of the pro-imperial party, were dead. Matilda took this opportunity and filled the Bishoprics sees in Modena, Reggio, and Pistoia with church reformers again. Gregory VII died on 25 May 1085, and Matilda's forces, with those of Prince Jordan I of Capua (her off and on again enemy), took to the field in support of a new pope, Victor III. In 1087, Matilda led an expedition to Rome in an attempt to install Victor III, but the strength of the imperial counterattack soon convinced the Pope to withdraw from the city. On his third expedition to Italy, Henry IV besieged Mantua and attacked Matilda's sphere of influence. In April 1091 he was able to take the city after an eleven-month's siege. In the following months, the Emperor achieved further successes against the vassals of the Margravine. In the summer of 1091, he managed to get the entire north area of the Po with the Counties of Mantua, Brescia and Verona under his control. In 1092 Henry IV was able to conquer most of the Counties of Modena and Reggio. The Monastery of San Benedetto in Polirone suffered severe damages in the course of the military conflict so that on 5 October 1092 Matilda gave the monastery the churches of San Prospero, San Donino in Monte Uille, and San Gregorio in Antognano to compensate. Matilda had a meeting with her few remaining faithful allies in the late summer of 1092 at Carpineti, with the majority of them were in favor of peace. Only the hermit Johannes from Marola strongly advocated a continuation of the fight against the Emperor. Thereupon Matilda implored her followers not to give up the fight. The imperial army began to siege Canossa in the autumn of 1092, but withdrew after a sudden failure of the besieged; after this defeat, Henry IV's influence in Italy was never recovered. In the 1090s Henry IV got increasingly on the defensive. A coalition of the southern German princes had prevented him from returning to the empire over the Alpine passes. For several years the Emperor remained inactive in the area around Verona. In the spring of 1093, Conrad, his eldest son and heir to the throne, fell from him. With the support of Matilda along with the Patarene-minded cities of northern Italy (Cremona, Lodi, Milan and Piacenza), the prince rebelled against his father. Sources close to the Emperor saw the reason for the rebellion of the son against his father as Matilda's influence on Conrad, but contemporary sources don't reveal any closer contact between the two before the rebellion. A little later, Conrad was taken prisoner by his father but with Matilda's help, he was freed. With the support of the Margravine, Conrad crowned King of Italy by Archbishop Anselm III of Milan before 4 December 1093. Together with the Pope, Matilda organized the marriage of King Conrad with Maximilla, daughter of King Roger I of Sicily. This was intended to win the support of the Normans of southern Italy against Henry IV. Conrad's initiatives to expand his rule in northern Italy probably led to tensions with Matilda, and for this, he didn't find any more support for his rule. After 22 October 1097, his political activity was virtually ended, being only mentioned his death in the summer of 1101 from a fever. In 1094 Henry IV's second wife, the Rurikid princess Eupraxia of Kiev (renamed Adelaide after her marriage), escaped from her imprisonment at the monastery of San Zeno and spread serious allegations against him. Henry IV then had her arrested in Verona. With the help of Matilda, Adelaide was able to escape again and find refuge with her. At the beginning of March 1095 Pope Urban II called the Council of Piacenza under the protection of Matilda. There Adelaide appeared and made a public confession about Henry IV "because of the unheard-of atrocities of fornication which she had endured with her husband": she accused Henry IV of forcing her to participate in orgies, and, according to some later accounts, of attempting a black mass on her naked body. Thanks to these scandals and division within the Imperial family, the prestige and power of Henry IV was increasingly weakened. After the synod, Matilda no longer had any contact with Adelaide. Second marriage: Welf V of Bavaria In 1088 Matilda was facing a new attempt at invasion by Henry IV, and decided to pre-empt it by means of a political marriage. In 1089 Matilda (in her early forties) married Welf V, heir to the Duchy of Bavaria and who was probably fifteen to seventeen years old, but none of the contemporary sources goes into the great age difference. The marriage was probably concluded at the instigation of Pope Urban II in order to politically isolate Henry IV. According to historian Elke Goez, the union of northern and southern Alpine opponents of the Salian dynasty initially had no military significance, because Welf V didn't appear in northern Italy with troops. In Matilda's documents, no Swabian names are listed in the subsequent period, so that Welf V could have moved to Italy alone or with a small entourage. According to the Rosenberg Annals, he even came across the Alps disguised as a pilgrim. Matilda's motive for this marriage, despite the large age difference and the political alliance —her new husband was a member of the Welf dynasty, who were important supporters of the Papacy from the 11th to the 15th centuries in their conflict with the German emperors (see Guelphs and Ghibellines)—, may also have been the hope for offspring: late pregnancy was quite possible, as the example of Constance of Sicily shows. Cosmas of Prague (writing in the early twelfth century), included a letter in his Chronica Boemorum, which he claimed that Matilda sent to her future husband, but which is now thought to be spurious: Not for feminine lightness or recklessness, but for the good of all my kingdom, I send you this letter: agreeing to it, you take with it myself and the rule over the whole of Lombardy. I'll give you so many cities, so many castles and noble palaces, so much gold and silver, that you will have a famous name, if you endear yourself to me; do not reproof me for boldness because I first address you with the proposal. It's reason for both male and female to desire a legitimate union, and it makes no difference whether the man or the woman broaches the first line of love, sofar as an indissoluble marriage is sought. Goodbye. After this, Matilda sent an army of thousands to the border of Lombardy to escort her bridegroom, welcomed him with honors, and after the marriage (mid-1089), she organized 120 days of wedding festivities, with such splendor that any other medieval ruler's pale in comparison. Cosmas also reports that for two nights after the wedding, Welf V, fearing witchcraft, refused to share the marital bed. The third day, Matilda appeared naked on a table especially prepared on sawhorses, and told him that everything is in front of you and there is no hidden malice. But the Duke was dumbfounded; Matilda, furious, slapped him and spat in his face, taunting him: Get out of here, monster, you don't deserve our kingdom, you vile thing, viler than a worm or a rotten seaweed, don't let me see you again, or you'll die a miserable death.... Despite the reportedly bad beginning of their marriage, Welf V is documented at least three times as Matilda's consort. By the spring of 1095 the couple were separated: in April 1095 Welf V had signed Matilda's donation charter for Piadena, but a next diploma dated 21 May 1095 was already issued by Matilda alone. Welf V's name no longer appears in any of the Mathildic documents. As a father-in-law, Welf IV tried to reconcile the couple; he was primarily concerned with the possible inheritance of the childless Matilda. The couple was never divorced, nor was the marriage declared invalid. Henry IV's final defeat and new room for maneuvers for Matilda With the de facto end of Matilda's marriage, Henry IV regained his capacity to act. Welf IV switched to the imperial side. The Emperor locked in Verona was finally able to return to the north of the Alps in 1097. After that he never returned to Italy, and it would have been 13 years before his son and namesake set foot on Italian soil for the first time. With the assistance of the French armies heading off to the First Crusade, Matilda was finally able to restore Pope Urban II to Rome. She ordered or led successful expeditions against Ferrara (1101), Parma (1104), Prato (1107) and Mantua (1114). In 11th century Italy, the rise of the cities began, in interaction with the overarching conflict. They soon succeeded in establishing their own territories. In Lucca, Pavia and Pisa, consuls appeared as early as the 1080s, which are considered to be signs of the legal independence of the "communities". Pisa sought its advantage in changing alliances with the Salian dynasty and the House of Canossa. Lucca remained completely closed to the Margravine from 1081. It was not until Allucione de Luca's marriage to the daughter of the royal judge Flaipert that she gained new opportunities to influence. Flaipert had already been one of the most important advisors of the House of Canossa since the times of Matilda's mother. Allucione was a vassal of Count Fuidi, with whom Matilda worked closely. Mantua had to make considerable concessions in June 1090; the inhabitants of the city and the suburbs were freed from all "unjustified" oppression and all rights and property in Sacca, Sustante and Corte Carpaneta were confirmed. After 1096 the balance of power slowly began to change again in favor of the Margravine. Matilda resumed her donations to ecclesiastical and social institutions in Lombardy, Emilia and Tuscany. In the summer of 1099 and 1100 her route first led to Lucca and Pisa. There it can be detected again in the summer of 1105, 1107 and 1111. In early summer of 1099 she gave the Monastery of San Ponziano a piece of land for the establishment of a hospital. With this donation, Matilda resumed her relations with Lucca. After 1090 Matilda accentuated the consensual rule. After the profound crises, she was no longer able to make political decisions on her own. She held meetings with spiritual and secular nobles in Tuscany and also in her home countries of Emilia. She had to take into account the ideas of her loyal friends and come to an agreement with them. In her role as the most important guarantor of the law, she increasingly lost importance in relation to the bishops. They repeatedly asked the Margravine to put an end to grievances. As a result, the bishops expanded their position within the episcopal cities and in the surrounding area. After 1100 Matilda had to repeatedly protect churches from her own subjects. The accommodation requirements had also been reduced. Court culture and rulership The court had developed since the 12th century to a central institution of royal and princely power. The most important tasks were the visualization of the rule through festivals, art and literature. The term "court" can be understood as "presence with the ruler". In contrast to the Brunswick court of the Guelphs, Matilda's court offices cannot be verified. Scholars such as Anselm of Lucca, Heribert of Reggio and Johannes of Mantua were around the Margravine. Matilda encouraged some of them to write their works: for example, Bishop Anselm of Lucca wrote a psalter at her request and Johannes of Mantua a commentary on the Song of Songs and a reflection on the life of Virgin Mary. Works were dedicated or presented to Matilda, such as the Liber de anulo et baculo of Rangerius of Lucca, the Orationes sive meditationes of Anselm of Canterbury, the Vita Mathildis of Donizo, the miracle reports of Ubald of Mantua and the Liber ad amicum of Bonizo of Sutri. Matilda contributed to the distribution of the books intended for her by making copies. More works were dedicated only to Henry IV among their direct contemporaries. As a result, the Margravine's court temporarily became the most important non-royal spiritual center of the Salian period. It also served as a contact point for displaced Gregorians in the church political disputes. Historian Paolo Golinelli interpreted the repeated admission of high-ranking refugees and their care as an act of charity. As the last political expellee, she granted asylum for a long time to Archbishop Conrad I of Salzburg, the pioneer of the canon reform. This brought her into close contact with this reform movement. Matilda regularly sought the advice of learned lawyers when making court decisions. A large number of legal advisors are named in their documents. There are 42 causidici, 29 iudices sacri palatii, 44 iudices, 8 legis doctores and 42 advocati. According to historian Elke Goez, Matilda's court can be described as "a focal point for the use of learned jurists in the case law by lay princes". Matilda encouraged these scholars and drew them to her court. According to Goez, the administration of justice was not a scholarly end in itself, but served to increase the efficiency of rulership. Goez sees a legitimation deficit as the most important trigger for the Margravine's intensive administration of justice, since Matilda was never formally enfeoffed by the king. In Tuscany in particular, an intensive administration of justice can be documented with almost 30 placitum. Matilda's involvement in the founding of the Bolognese School of Law, which has been suspected again and again, is viewed by Elke Goez as unlikely. According to chronicler Burchard of Ursperg, the alleged founder of this school, Irnerius, produced an authentic text of the Roman legal sources on behalf of Margravine Matilda. According to historian Johannes Fried, this can at best affect the referring to the Vulgate version of the Digest, and even that is considered unlikely. The role of this scholar in Matilda's environment is controversial. According to historian Wulf Eckart Voss, Irnerius had been a legal advisor since 1100. In an analysis of the documentary mentions, however, Gundula Grebner came to the conclusion that this scholar should not be classified in the circle of Matilda, but in Henry V's. Until well into the 14th century, medieval rule was exercised through Itinerant court practice. There was neither a capital nor did the rulers of the House of Canossa have a preferred place of residence. Rule in the High Middle Ages was based on presence. Matilda's domains comprised most of what is now the dual province of Emilia-Romagna and part of Tuscany. She traveled in her domains in all seasons, and was never alone in this. There were always a number of advisors, clergy and armed men in their vicinity that could not be precisely estimated. She maintained a special relationship of trust with Bishop Anselm of Lucca, who was her closest advisor until his death in May 1086. In the later years of her life, cardinal legates often stayed in her vicinity. They arranged for communication with the Pope. The Margravine had a close relationship with the cardinal legates Bernard degli Uberti and Bonsignore of Reggio. In view of the rigors of travel domination, according to Elke Goez's judgment, she must have been athletic, persistent and capable. The distant possessions brought a considerable administrative burden and were often threatened with takeover by rivals. Therefore Matilda had to count on local confidants, in whose recruitment she was supported by Pope Gregory VII. In a rulership without a permanent residence, the visualization of rulership and the representation of rank were of great importance. From Matilda's reign there are 139 documents (74 of which are original), four letters and 115 lost documents (Deperdita). The largest proportion of the number of documents are donations to ecclesiastical recipients (45) and court documents (35). In terms of the spatial distribution of the documentary tradition, Northern Italy predominates (82). Tuscany and the neighboring regions (49) are less affected, while Lorraine has only five documents. There is thus a unique tradition for a princess of the High Middle Ages; a comparable number of documents only come back for the time being Henry the Lion five decades later. At least 18 of Matilda's documents were sealed. At the time, this was unusual for lay princes in imperial Italy. There were very few women who had their own seal: the Margravine had two seals of different pictorial types —one shows a female bust with loose, falling hair, while the second seal from the year 1100 is an antique gem and not a portrait of Matilda and Godfrey the Hunchback or Welf V. Matilda's chancellery for issuing the diplomas on their own can be excluded with high probability. To consolidate her rule and as an expression of the understanding of rule, Matilda referred in her title to her powerful father; it was called filia quondam magni Bonifatii ducis. The castles in their domain and high church festivals also served to visualize the rule. Matilda celebrated Easter as the most important act of power representation in Pisa in 1074. Matilda's pictorial representations also belong in this context, some of which are controversial, however. The statue of the so-called Bonissima on the Palazzo Comunale, the cathedral square of Modena, was probably made in the 1130s at the earliest. The Margravine's mosaic in the church of Polirone was also made after her death. Matilda had her ancestors put in splendid coffins. However, she didn't succeed in bringing together all the remains of her ancestors to create a central point of reference for rule and memory: her grandfather remained buried in Brescello, while the remains of her father were kept in Mantua and those of her mother in Pisa. Their withdrawal would have meant a political retreat and the loss of Pisa and Mantua. By using the written form, Matilda supplemented the presence of the immediate presence of power in all parts of her sphere of influence. In her great courts she used the script to increase the income from her lands. Scripture-based administration was still a very unusual means of realizing rule for lay princes in the 11th century. In the years from 1081 to 1098, however, the rule of the House of Canossa was in a crisis. The documentary and letter transmission is largely suspended for this period. A total of only 17 pieces have survived, not a single document from eight years. After this finding Matilda wasn't in Tuscany for almost twenty years. However, from autumn 1098 she was able to regain a large part of her lost territories. This increased interest in receiving certificates from her. 94 documents have survived from its last 20 years. Matilda tried to consolidate her rule with the increased use of writing. After the death of her mother (18 April 1076), she often provided her documents with the phrase "Matilda Dei gratia si quid est" ("Matilda, by God's grace, if she is something"). The personal combination of symbol (cross) and text was unique in the personal execution of the certificates. By referring to the immediacy of God, she wanted to legitimize her contestable position. There is no consensus in research about the meaning of the qualifying suffix "si quid est". This formulation, which can be found in 38 original and 31 copiously handed down texts by the Margravine, ultimately remains as puzzling as it is singular in terms of tradition. One possible explanation for their use is that Matilda was never formally enfeoffed with the Margraviate of Tuscany by the king. Like her mother, Matilda carried out all kinds of legal transactions without mentioning her husbands and thus with full independence. Both princesses took over the official titles of their husbands, but refrained from masculinizing their titles. Patronage of churches and hospitals After the discovery of contemporary diplomas, Elke Goez refuted the widespread notion that the Margravine had given churches and monasteries rich gifts at all times of her life. Very few donations were initially made. Already one year after the death of her mother, Matilda lost influence on the inner-city monasteries in Tuscany and thus an important pillar of her rule. The issuing of deeds for monasteries concentrated on convents that were located in Matilda's immediate sphere of influence in northern and central Italy or Lorraine. The main exception to this was Montecassino. Among the most important of her numerous donations to monasteries and churches were those to Fonte Avellana, Farfa, Montecassino, Vallombrosa, Nonantola and Polirone. In this way she secured the financing of the old church buildings. She often stipulated that the proceeds from the donated land should be used to build churches in the center of the episcopal cities. This money was an important contribution to the funds for the expansion and decoration of the churches of San Pietro in Mantua, Santa Maria Assunta e San Geminiano of Modena, Santa Maria Assunta of Parma, San Martino of Lucca, Santa Maria Assunta of Pisa and Santa Maria Assunta of Volterra. Matilda supported the construction of Pisa Cathedral with several donations (in 1083, 1100 and 1103). Her name should be permanently associated with the cathedral building project. They released Nonantola from paying tithes to the Bishop of Modena; the funds thus freed up could be used for the monastery buildings. In Modena, with her participation, she secured the continued construction of the cathedral. Matilda acted as mediator in the dispute between cathedral canons and citizens about the remains of Saint Geminianus. The festive consecration could take place in 1106, with the Relatio fundationis cathedralis Mutinae recording these processes. Matilda is presented as a political authority: she is present with an army, gives support, recommends receiving the Pope and reappears for the ordination, during which she dedicates immeasurable gifts to the patron. Numerous examples show that Matilda made donations to bishops who were loyal to the Gregorian reforms. In May 1109 she gave land in the area of Ferrara to the Gregorian Bishop Landolfo of Ferrara in San Cesario sul Panaro and in June of the same year possessions in the vicinity of Ficarolo. The Bishop Wido of Ferrara, however, was hostile to Pope Gregory VII and had written De scismate Hildebrandi against him. The siege of Ferrara undertaken by Matilda in 1101 led to the expulsion of the schismatic bishop. On the other hand, nothing is known of Matilda's sponsorship of nunneries. Their only relevant intervention concerned the Benedictine nuns of San Sisto of Piacenza, whom they chased out of the monastery for their immoral behavior and replaced with monks. Matilda founded and sponsored numerous hospitals to care for the poor and pilgrims. For the hospitals, she selected municipal institutions and important Apennine passes. The welfare institutions not only fulfilled charitable tasks, but were also important for the legitimation and consolidation of the margravial rule. Some churches traditionally said to have been founded by Matilda include: Sant'Andrea Apostolo of Vitriola in Montefiorino (Modena); Sant'Anselmo in Pieve di Coriano (Province of Mantua); San Giovanni Decollato in Pescarolo ed Uniti (Cremona); Santa Maria Assunta in Monteveglio (Bologna); San Martino in Barisano near Forlì; San Zeno in Cerea (Verona) and San Salvaro in Legnago (Verona). Adoption of Guido Guidi around 1099 In the later years of her life, Matilda was increasingly faced with the question of who should take over the House of Canossa's inheritance. She could no longer have children of her own, and apparently for this reason she adopted Guido Guerra, member of the Guidi family, who were one of her main supporters in Florence (although in a genealogically strictly way, the Margravine's feudal heirs were the House of Savoy, descendants of Prangarda of Canossa, Matilda's paternal great-aunt). On 12 November 1099, he was referred to in a diploma as Matilda's adopted son (adoptivus filius domine comitisse Matilde). With his consent, Matilda renewed and expanded a donation from her ancestors to the Brescello monastery. However, this is the only time that Guido had the title of adoptive son (adoptivus filius) in a document that was considered to be authentic. At that time there were an unusually large number of vassals in Matilda's environment. In March 1100, the Margravine and Guido Guerra took part in a meeting of abbots of the Vallombrosians Order, which they both sponsored. On 19 November 1103 they gave the monastery of Vallombrosa possessions on both sides of the Vicano and half of the castle of Magnale with the town of Pagiano. After Matilda had bequeathed her property to the Apostolic See in 1102 (so-called second "Matildine Donation"), Guido withdrew from her. With the donation he lost hope of the inheritance. However, he signed three more documents with Matilda for the Abbey of Polirone. From these sources, Elke Goez, for example, concludes that Guido Guerra was adopted by Matilda. According to her, the Margravine must have consulted with her loyal followers beforehand and reached a consensus for this far-reaching political decision. Ultimately, pragmatic reasons were decisive: Matilda needed a political and economic administrator for Tuscany. The Guidi family estates in the north and east of Florence were also a useful addition to the House of Canossa possessions. Guido Guerra hoped that Matilda's adoption would not only give him the inheritance, but also an increase in rank. He also hoped for support in the dispute between the Guidi and the Cadolinger families for supremacy in Tuscany. The Cadolinger were named after one of their ancestors, Count Cadalo, who was attested from 952 to 986; they died out in 1113. Paolo Golinelli doubts this reconstruction of the events. He thinks that Guido Guerra held an important position among the Margravine's vassals, but was not adopted by her. This is supported by the fact that after 1108 he only appeared once as a witness in one of their documents, namely in a document dated 6 May 1115, which Matilda granted in favor of the Abbey of Polirone while she was on her deathbed at Bondeno di Roncore. Matildine Donation On 17 November 1102 Matilda donated her property to the Apostolic See at Canossa Castle in the presence of the Cardinal Legate Bernardo of San Crisogono. This is a renewal of the donation, as the first diploma was allegedly lost. Matilda had initially transferred all of her property to the Apostolic See in the Holy Cross Chapel of the Lateran before Pope Gregory VII. Most research has dated this first donation to the years between 1077 and 1080. Paolo Golinelli spoke out for the period between 1077 and 1081. Werner Goez placed the first donation in the years 1074 and 1075, when Matilda's presence in Rome can be proven. At the second donation, despite the importance of the event, very few witnesses were present. With Atto from Montebaranzone and Bonusvicinus from Canossa, the diploma was attested by two people of no recognizable rank who are not mentioned in any other certificate. The Matildine Donation caused a sensation in the 12th century and has also received a lot of attention in research. The entire tradition of the document comes from the curia. According to Paolo Golinelli, the donation of 1102 is a forgery from the 1130s; in reality, Matilda made Henry V her only heir in 1110/11. Even Johannes Laudage in his study of the contemporary sources, thought that the Matildine Donation was spurious. Elke and Werner Goez, on the other hand, viewed the second donation diploma from November 1102 as authentic in their document edition. Bernd Schneidmüller and Elke Goez believe that a diploma was issued about the renewed transfer of the Terre Matildiche out of curial fear of the Welfs. Welf IV died in November 1101. His eldest son and successor Welf V had rulership rights over the House of Canossa domains through his marriage to Matilda. Therefore, reference was made to an earlier award of the inheritance before Matilda's second marriage. Otherwise, given the spouse's considerable influence, their consent should have been obtained. Werner Goez explains with different ideas about the legal implications of the process that Matilda often had her own property even after 1102 without recognizing any consideration for Rome's rights. Goez observed that the donation is only mentioned in Matildine documents that were created under the influence of papal legates. Matilda didn't want a complete waiver of all other real estates and usable rights and perhaps did not notice how far the consequences of the formulation of the second Matildine Donation went. Last years and death In the last phase of her life, Matilda pursued the plan to strengthen the Abbey of Polirone. The Church of Gonzaga freed them in 1101 from the malos sacerdotes fornicarios et adulteros ("wicked, unchaste and adulterous priests") and gave them to the monks of Polirone. The Gonzaga clergy were charged with violating the duty of celibacy. One of the main evils that the church reformers acted against. In the same year she gave the Abbey of Polirone a poor house that she had built in Mantua; she thus withdrew it from the monks of the monastery of Sant'Andrea in Mantua who had been accused of simony. The Abbey of Polirone received a total of twelve donations in the last five years of Matilda's life. So she transferred her property in Villola (16 kilometers southeast of Mantua) and the Insula Sancti Benedicti (island in the Po, today on the south bank in the area of San Benedetto Po) to this monastery. The Abbey thus rose to become the official monastery of the House of Canossa, with Matilda choosing it as her burial place. The monks used Matilda's generous donations to rebuild the entire Abbey and the main church. Matilda wanted to secure her memory not only through gifts, but also through written memories. Polirone was given a very valuable Gospel manuscript. The book, preserved today in New York, contains a liber vitae, a memorial book, in which all important donors and benefactors of the monastery are listed. This document also deals with Matilda's memorial. The Gospel manuscript was commissioned by the Margravine herself. It is not clear whether the codex originated in Polirone or was sent there as a gift from Matilda. It is the only larger surviving memorial from a Cluniac monastery in northern Italy. Paolo Golinelli emphasized that, through Matilda's favor, Polirone also became a base where reform forces gathered. Henry V had been in diplomatic contact with Matilda since 1109. He emphasized his blood relationship with the Margravine and demonstratively cultivated the connection. At his coronation as Emperor in 1111, disputes over the investiture question broke out again. Henry V captured Pope Paschal II and some of the cardinals in St. Peter's Basilica and forced his imperial coronation. When Matilda found out about this, she asked for the release of two Cardinals, Bernard of Parma and Bonsignore of Reggio, who were close to her. Henry V complied with her request and released both cardinals. Matilda did nothing to get the Pope and the other cardinals free. On the way back from the Rome train, Henry V visited the Margravine during 6–11 May 1111 at Castle of Bianello in Quattro Castella, Reggio Emilia. Matilda then achieved the solution from the imperial ban imposed to her. According to the unique testimony of her biographer Donizo, Henry V transferred to Matilda the rule of Liguria and crowned her Imperial Vicar and Vice-Queen of Italy. At this meeting he also concluded a firm agreement (firmum foedus) with her, which was mentioned only by Donizo and whose details are unknown. This agreement has been undisputedly interpreted in German historical studies since Wilhelm von Giesebrecht as an inheritance treaty, while Italian historians like Luigi Simeoni and Werner Goez repeatedly questioned this. Elke Goez, on the other hand, assumed a mutual agreement with benefits from both sides: Matilda, whose health was weakened, probably waived her further support for Pope Paschal II with a view to a good understanding with the Emperor. Paolo Golinelli thinks that Matilda recognized Henry V as the heir to her domains and only after this, the imperial ban against Matilda was lifted and she recovered the possessions in the northern Italian parts of the formerly powerful House of Canossa with the exception of Tuscany. Donizo imaginatively embellished this process with the title of Vice-Queen. Some researchers see in the agreement with Henry V a turning away from the ideals of the so-called Gregorian reform, but Enrico Spagnesi emphasizes that Matilda had by no means given up her church reform-minded policy. A short time after her meeting with Henry V, Matilda retired to Montebaranzone near Prignano sulla Secchia. In Mantua in the summer of 1114 the rumor that she had died sparked jubilation. The Mantuans strived for autonomy and demanded admission to the margravial Rivalta Castle located five kilometers west of Mantua. When the citizens found out that Matilda was still alive, they burned the castle down. Rivalta Castle symbolized the hated power of the Margravine. Donizo, in turn, used this incident as an instrument to illustrate the chaotic conditions that the sheer rumor of Matilda's death could trigger. The Margravine guaranteed peace and security for the population, and was able to recapture Mantua. In April 1115, the aging Margravine gave the Church of San Michele in Mantua the rights and income of the Pacengo court. This documented legal transaction proves their intention to win over an important spiritual community in Mantua. Matilda often visited the town of Bondeno di Roncore (today Bondanazzo), in the district of Reggiolo, Reggio Emilia, just in the middle of the Po valley, where she owned a small castle, which she often visited between 1106 and 1115. During a stay there, she fell seriously ill, so that she could finally no longer leave the castle. In the last months of her life, the sick Margravine was no longer able to travel strenuously. According to Vito Fumagalli, she stayed in the Polirone area not only because of her illness: the House of Canossa had largely been ousted from its previous position of power at the beginning of the 12th century. In her final hours the Bishop of Reggio, Cardinal Bonsignore, stayed at her deathbed and gave her the sacraments of death. On the night of 24 July 1115, Matilda died of sudden cardiac arrest at the age of 69. After her death in 1116 Henry V succeeded in taking possession of the Terre Matildiche without any apparent resistance from the curia. The once loyal subjects of the Margravine accepted the Emperor as their new master without resistance; for example, powerful vassals such as Arduin de Palude, Sasso of Bibianello, Count Albert of Sabbioneta, Ariald of Melegnano, Opizo of Gonzaga and many others came to the Emperor and accept it as their overlord. Matilda was at first buried in the Abbey of San Benedetto in Polirone, located in the town of San Benedetto Po; then, in 1633, at the behest of Pope Urban VIII, her body was moved to Rome and placed in Castel Sant'Angelo. Finally, in 1645 her remains were definitely deposited in the Vatican, where they now lie in St. Peter's Basilica. She is one of only six women who have the honor of being buried in the Basilica, the others being Queen Christina of Sweden, Maria Clementina Sobieska (wife of James Francis Edward Stuart), St. Petronilla, Queen Charlotte of Cyprus and Agnesina Colonna Caetani. A memorial tomb for Matilda, commissioned by Pope Urban VIII and designed by Gianlorenzo Bernini with the statues being created by sculptor Andrea Bolgi, marks her burial place in St Peter's and is often called the Honor and Glory of Italy. Legacy High and Late Middle Ages Between 1111 and 1115 Donizo wrote the chronicle De principibus Canusinis in Latin hexameters, im which he tells the story of the House of Canossa, especially Matilda. Since the first edition by Sebastian Tengnagel, it has been called Vita Mathildis. This work is the main source to the Margravine's life. The Vita Mathildis consists of two parts. The first part is dedicated to the early members of the House of Canossa, the second deals exclusively with Matilda. Donizo was a monk in the monastery of Sant'Apollonio; with the Vita Mathildis he wanted to secure eternal memory of the Margravine. Donizo has most likely coordinated his Vita with Matilda in terms of content, including the book illumination, down to the smallest detail. Shortly before the work was handed over, Matilda died. Text and images on the family history of the House of Canossa served to glorify Matilda, were important for the public staging of the family and were intended to guarantee eternal memory. Positive events were highlighted, negative events were skipped. The Vita Mathildis stands at the beginning of a new literary genre. With the early Guelph tradition, it establishes medieval family history. The house and reform monasteries, sponsored by Guelph and Canossa women, attempted to organize the memories of the community of relatives and thereby "to express awareness of the present and an orientation towards the present" in the memory of one's own past. Eugenio Riversi considers the memory of the family epoch, especially the commemoration of the anniversaries of the dead, to be one of the characteristic elements in Donizo's work. Bonizo of Sutri gave Matilda his Liber ad amicum. In it he compared her to her glorification with biblical women. After an assassination attempt on him in 1090, however, his attitude changed, as he didn't feel sufficiently supported by the Margravine. In his Liber de vita christiana he took the view that domination by women was harmful; as examples he named Cleopatra and the Merovingian Queen Fredegund. Rangerius of Lucca also distanced himself from Matilda when she didn't position herself against Henry V in 1111. Out of bitterness, he didn't dedicated his Liber de anulo et baculo to Matilda but John of Gaeta, later Pope Gelasius II. Violent criticism of Matilda is related to the Investiture Controversy and relates to specific events. Thus the Vita Heinrici IV. imperatoris blames her for the rebellion of Conrad against his father Henry IV. The Milanese chronicler Landulfus Senior made a polemical statement in the 11th century: he accused Matilda of having ordered the murder of her first husband. She is also said to have incited Pope Gregory VII to excommunicate the king. Landulf's polemics were directed against Matilda's Patarian partisans for the archbishop's chair in Milan. Matilda's tomb was converted into a mausoleum before the middle of the 12th century. For Paolo Golinelli, this early design of the grave is the beginning of the Margravine's myth. In the course of the 12th century two opposing developments occurred: Matilda's person was mystified, at the same time historical memory of the House of Canossa declined. In the 13th century, Matilda's guilty feelings about the murder of her first husband became a popular topic. The Gesta episcoporum Halberstadensium took it up: Matilda confessed to Pope Gregory VII her participation in the murder of her husband, whereupon the pontiff released her from the crime. Through this act of leniency, Matilda felt obliged to donate her property to the Holy See. In the 14th century there was a lack of clarity about the historical facts about Matilda. Only the name of the Margravine, her reputation as a virtuous woman, her many donations to churches and hospitals and the transfer of her goods to the Holy See were present. Knowledge of the conflicts between Henry IV and Gregory VII was forgotten. Because of their connection to the Guidi family gave her little attention in the Florentine chronicles as the Guidi were mortal enemies of Florence. In the Nuova Cronica wrote by Giovanni Villani in 1306, Matilda was a decent and pious person. She is described there as product of a secret marriage between a Byzantine princess with an Italian knight. She also didn't consummate the marriage with Welf V; instead, she decided to live her life chaste and with pious works. Early modern times In the 15th century, Matilda's marriage to Welf V disappeared from chronicles and narrative literature. Numerous families in Italy tried rather to claim Matilda as their ancestor and to derive their power from her. Giovanni Battista Panetti wanted to prove the Margravine's belonging to the House of Este in his Historia comitissae Mathildis. He claimed that Matilda was married to Albert Azzo II d'Este, the grandfather of Welf V. In his epic Orlando Furioso, poet Ludovico Ariosto also mentioned Matilda's alleged relationship with the House of Este; Giovanni Battista Giraldi also assumed a marriage between Matilda and Albert Azzo II and mentioned Ariosto as reference. Many more generations followed this tradition, and only the Este archivist Ludovico Antonio Muratori was the one able to dismiss the alleged relationship of Matilda and the House of Este in the 18th century. Nevertheless, he did not draw a more realistic picture of the Margravine; for him she was an Amazon queen. In Mantua, Matilda was also linked by marriage with the House of Gonzaga. Giulio Dal Pozzo underpinned the claims of the Malaspina family of descent from Matilda in his work Meraviglie Heroiche del Sesso Donnesco Memorabili nella Duchessa Matilda Marchesana Malaspina, Contessa di Canossa, written in 1678. Dante's Divine Comedy made a significant contribution to Matilda's myth: she has been posited by some critics as the origin of the mysterious "Matelda" who appears to Dante gathering flowers in the earthly paradise in Dante's Purgatorio; whether Dante is referring to the Margravine, Mechthild of Magdeburg or Mechtilde of Hackeborn is still a matter of dispute. In the 15th century, Matilda was stylized by Giovanni Sabadino degli Arienti and Jacopo Filippo Foresti as a warrior for God and the Church. Matilda reached the climax of the positive assessment in the time of the Counter-Reformation and in the Baroque; she should serve as a symbol of the triumph of the church over all adversaries for everyone to see. In the dispute between Catholics and Protestants in the 16th century, two opposing judgments were received. From a Catholic perspective, Matilda was glorified for supporting the Pope; for the Protestants, she was responsible for the humiliation of Henry IV in Canossa and was denigrated as a "pope whore", as in the biography of Henry IV by Johann Stumpf. In the historiography of the 18th century (Ludovico Antonio Muratori, Girolamo Tiraboschi) Matilda was the symbol of the new Italian nobility, who wanted to create a pan-Italian identity. Contemporary representations (Saverio Dalla Rosa) presented her as the Pope's protector. In addition to the upscale literature, numerous regional legends and miracle stories in particular contributed to Matilda's subsequent stylization. She was transfigured relatively early from the benefactress of numerous churches and monasteries to the sole monastery and church donor of the entire Apennine landscape. Around 100 churches are attributed to Matilda, this developed from the 12th century. Numerous miracles are also associated with the Margravine. She is said to have asked the Pope to bless the Branciana fountain; according to a legend, women can get pregnant after a single drink from the well. According to another legend, Matilda should prefer to stay at the Savignano Castle; there one should see the princess galloping in the sky on full moon nights on a white horse. According to a legend from Montebaranzone, she brought justice to a poor widow and her twelve-year-old son. Numerous legends also surround about Matilda's marriages: she is said to have had up to seven husbands and, as a young girl, fell in love with Henry IV. Modern times In the 19th century, which was enthusiastic about the Middle Ages, the Margravine's myth was renewed. The remains of Canossa Castle were rediscovered and Matilda's whereabouts became popular travel destinations. In addition, Dante's praise for Matelda came back into the spotlight. One of the first German pilgrims to Canossa was the poet August von Platen-Hallermünde. In 1839 Heinrich Heine published the poem Auf dem Schloßhof zu Canossa steht der deutsche Kaiser Heinrich ("The German Emperor Henry stands in the courtyard of Canossa"), in which it says: "Peep out of the window above / Two figures, and the moonlight / Gregory's bald head flickers / And the breasts of Mathildis". In the era of the Risorgimento, the struggle for national unification was in the foreground in Italy. Matilda was instrumentalized for daily political events. Silvio Pellico stood up for the political unity of Italy, and he designed a play called Mathilde. Antonio Bresciani Borsa wrote a historical novel La contessa Matilde di Canossa e Isabella di Groniga (1858). The work was very successful in its time and saw Italian editions in 1858, 1867, 1876 and 1891. French (1850 and 1862), German (1868) and English (1875) translations were also published. The Matilda's myth lives on in Italy to the present day. The Matildines were a Catholic women's association founded in Reggio Emilia in 1918, similar to the Azzione Cattolica. The organization wanted to bring together young people from the province who wanted to work with the church hierarchy to spread the Christian faith. The Matildines revered the Margravine as a pious, strong, and steadfast daughter of St. Peter. After the World War II, numerous biographies and novels were written in Italy on Matilda and Canossa. Maria Bellonci published the story Trafitto a Canossa ("Tormented in Canossa"), Laura Mancinelli the novel Il principe scalzo. Local historical publications honor her as the founder of churches and castles in the regions of Reggio Emilia, Mantua, Modena, Parma, Lucca and Casentino. Quattro Castella is named after the four Canusinian castles on the four hills at the foot of the Apennines. Bianello is the only castle that is still in use. A large number of communities on the northern and southern Apennines traces their origins and their heyday back to Matilda's epoch. Numerous citizens' initiatives in Italy organize removals under the motto "Matilda and her time". Emilian circles applied for Matilda's beatification in 1988 without success. The place Quattro Castella had its name changed to Canossa out of reverence for Matilda. Since 1955 the Corteo Storico Matildico in Bianello Castle has been a reminiscent display of Matilda's meeting with Henry V and reported coronation as Vicar and Vice-Queen; the event has taken place every year since then, usually on the last Sunday of May. The organizer is the municipality of Quattro Castella, which has owned the castle since 2000. The ruins on the hills of Quattro Castella have been the subject of a petition for UNESCO World Heritage. Research history Matilda receives a lot of attention in Italian history. Matildine Congresses were held in 1963, 1970 and 1977. On the occasion of the 900th anniversary of the Walk of Canossa, the Istituto Superiore di Studi Matildici was founded in Italy in 1977 and inaugurated in May 1979. The institute is dedicated to the research of all notable citizens of Canossa and publishes a magazine called Annali Canossani. In Italy, Ovidio Capitani was one of the best experts on Canossa history in the 20th century. According to his judgment in 1978, Matilda's policy was "tutto legato al passato", completely tied to the past, i.e. outdated and inflexible in the face of a changing time. Vito Fumagalli presented several national historical studies on the Margraves of Canossa; he saw the causes of the Canossa's power in rich and centralized allodial goods, in a strategic network of fortifications, and in the support of the Salian rulers. In 1998, a year after his death, Fumagalli's biography of Matilda was published. Of the Italian medievalists, Paolo Golinelli has dealt most intensively with Matilda in the past three decades. In 1991 he published a biography of Matilda, which appeared in 1998 in a German translation. On the occasion of the 900th return of Matilda's meeting with her allies in Carpineti, a financially supported congress was held in October 1992 by the province of Reggio Emilia. The rule of the House of Canossa and the various problems of rule in northern Italy of the 10th and 11th centuries were dealt with. The contributions to this conference were edited by Paolo Golinelli. An international congress in Reggio Emilia in September 1997 was devoted to her afterlife in cultural and literary terms. The aim of the conference was to find out why Matilda attracted such interest in posterity. Thematically, arts and crafts, tourism and folklore have been dealt with until recently. Most of the contributions were devoted to the genealogical attempts of the northern Italian nobility to link Matilda in the early modern period. Golinelli published the anthology in 1999. As an important result of this conference it turned out that goods and family relationships have been ascribed to her that have not been historically proven. In German history, Alfred Overmann's dissertation formed the starting point for studying the history of the margravine. Since 1893 Overmann placed his investigation about Matilda in several Regest publications. The work was reprinted in 1965 and published in 1980 in an Italian translation. In the last few decades Werner and Elke Goez in particular have dealt with Matilda. From 1986 the couple worked together on the scientific edition of their documents. More than 90 archives and libraries in six countries were visited. The edition was created in 1998 in the series Diplomata, which the Monumenta Germaniae Historica published. In addition to numerous individual studies on Matilda, Elke Goez published a biography of Matilda's mother Beatrice (1995) and emerged as the author of a history of Italy in the Middle Ages (2010). In 2012 she presented a biography of Matilda. The 900th year of Henry IV's death in 2006 brought Matilda into the spotlight in the exhibitions in Paderborn (2006) and Mantua (2008). The 900th anniversary of her death in 2015 was the occasion for various initiatives in Italy and sessions at the International Medieval Congress at Leeds. The 21st Congresso Internazionale di Studi Langobardi took place in October of the same year. This resulted in two conference volumes. In Williamsburg from February to April 2015, an exhibition took place at the Muscarelle Museum of Art, the first in the United States on Matilda. Popular culture In the arts, the story of Matilda and Henry IV is the main plot device in Luigi Pirandello's play Enrico IV, and the Margravine is the main historical character in Kathleen McGowan's novel The Book of Love (Simon & Schuster, 2009). Matilda is a featured figure on Judy Chicago's installation piece The Dinner Party, being represented as one of the 999 names on the Heritage Floor, along some other contemporaries like her second cousin Adelaide of Susa. In the grand strategy role-playing video game Crusader Kings III, Matilda is a playable character for the Rags to Riches chapter. Notes See also House of Canossa March of Tuscany Terre Matildiche References Sources External links Women's Biography: Matilda of Tuscany, countess of Tuscany, duchess of Lorraine, contains several letters to and from Matilda. Margraves of Tuscany 11th-century Italian women Women in medieval European warfare 1040s births 1115 deaths Year of birth uncertain Burials at St. Peter's Basilica Italian countesses House of Canossa Duchesses of Lorraine People from Lombardy 11th-century Italian nobility 12th-century Italian nobility 11th-century women rulers 12th-century women rulers Women in 11th-century warfare Women in war in Italy 12th-century Italian women Imperial vicars Investiture Controversy

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia ( Mesopotamíā; ; , or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the Fertile Crescent. Mesopotamia occupies modern Iraq. The historical region includes also the head of the Persian Gulf and southeast Turkey, west Iran, northeastern Syria and northern Kuwait. The Sumerians and Akkadians (including Assyrians and Babylonians) dominated Mesopotamia from the beginning of written history () to the fall of Babylon in 539 BC, when it was conquered by the Achaemenid Empire. It fell to Alexander the Great in 332 BC, and after his death, it became part of the Greek Seleucid Empire. Later the Arameans dominated major parts of Mesopotamia (). Around 150 BC, Mesopotamia was under the control of the Parthian Empire. Mesopotamia became a battleground between the Romans and Parthians, with western parts of Mesopotamia coming under ephemeral Roman control. In 226 AD, the eastern regions of Mesopotamia fell to the Sassanid Persians. The division of Mesopotamia between Roman (Byzantine from 395 AD) and Sassanid Empires lasted until the 7th century Muslim conquest of Persia of the Sasanian Empire and Muslim conquest of the Levant from Byzantines. A number of primarily neo-Assyrian and Christian native Mesopotamian states existed between the 1st century BC and 3rd century AD, including Adiabene, Osroene, and Hatra. Mesopotamia is the site of the earliest developments of the Neolithic Revolution from around 10,000 BC. It has been identified as having "inspired some of the most important developments in human history, including the invention of the wheel, the planting of the first cereal crops, and the development of cursive script, mathematics, astronomy, and agriculture". It has been known as one of the earliest civilizations to ever exist in the world. Etymology The regional toponym Mesopotamia (, '[land] between rivers'; or ; ; “(land) between the (two) rivers") comes from the ancient Greek root words (, 'middle') and (, 'river') and translates to '(land) between rivers', likely being a calque of the older Aramaic term, with the Aramaic term itself likely being a calque of the Akkadian birit narim. It is used throughout the Greek Septuagint () to translate the Hebrew and Aramaic equivalent Naharaim. An even earlier Greek usage of the name Mesopotamia is evident from The Anabasis of Alexander, which was written in the late 2nd century AD but specifically refers to sources from the time of Alexander the Great. In the Anabasis, Mesopotamia was used to designate the land east of the Euphrates in north Syria. The term Ārām Nahrīn () (, ) was used multiple times in the Old Testament of the Bible to describe "Aram between the (two) rivers". The Akkadian term corresponded to a similar geographical concept. Later, the term Mesopotamia was more generally applied to all the lands between the Euphrates and the Tigris, thereby incorporating not only parts of Syria but also almost all of Iraq and southeastern Turkey. The neighbouring steppes to the west of the Euphrates and the western part of the Zagros Mountains are also often included under the wider term Mesopotamia. A further distinction is usually made between Northern or Upper Mesopotamia and Southern or Lower Mesopotamia. Upper Mesopotamia, also known as the Jazira, is the area between the Euphrates and the Tigris from their sources down to Baghdad. Lower Mesopotamia is the area from Baghdad to the Persian Gulf and includes Kuwait and parts of western Iran. In modern academic usage, the term Mesopotamia often also has a chronological connotation. It is usually used to designate the area until the Muslim conquests, with names like Syria, Jazira, and Iraq being used to describe the region after that date. It has been argued that these later euphemisms are Eurocentric terms attributed to the region in the midst of various 19th-century Western encroachments. Geography Mesopotamia encompasses the land between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, both of which have their headwaters in the Taurus Mountains. Both rivers are fed by numerous tributaries, and the entire river system drains a vast mountainous region. Overland routes in Mesopotamia usually follow the Euphrates because the banks of the Tigris are frequently steep and difficult. The climate of the region is semi-arid with a vast desert expanse in the north which gives way to a region of marshes, lagoons, mudflats, and reed banks in the south. In the extreme south, the Euphrates and the Tigris unite and empty into the Persian Gulf. The arid environment ranges from the northern areas of rain-fed agriculture to the south where irrigation of agriculture is essential if a surplus energy returned on energy invested (EROEI) is to be obtained. This irrigation is aided by a high water table and by melting snows from the high peaks of the northern Zagros Mountains and from the Armenian Highlands, the source of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers that give the region its name. The usefulness of irrigation depends upon the ability to mobilize sufficient labor for the construction and maintenance of canals, and this, from the earliest period, has assisted the development of urban settlements and centralized systems of political authority. Agriculture throughout the region has been supplemented by nomadic pastoralism, where tent-dwelling nomads herded sheep and goats (and later camels) from the river pastures in the dry summer months, out into seasonal grazing lands on the desert fringe in the wet winter season. The area is generally lacking in building stone, precious metals, and timber, and so historically has relied upon long-distance trade of agricultural products to secure these items from outlying areas. In the marshlands to the south of the area, a complex water-borne fishing culture has existed since prehistoric times and has added to the cultural mix. Periodic breakdowns in the cultural system have occurred for a number of reasons. The demands for labor has from time to time led to population increases that push the limits of the ecological carrying capacity, and should a period of climatic instability ensue, collapsing central government and declining populations can occur. Alternatively, military vulnerability to invasion from marginal hill tribes or nomadic pastoralists has led to periods of trade collapse and neglect of irrigation systems. Equally, centripetal tendencies amongst city-states have meant that central authority over the whole region, when imposed, has tended to be ephemeral, and localism has fragmented power into tribal or smaller regional units. These trends have continued to the present day in Iraq. History The prehistory of the Ancient Near East begins in the Lower Paleolithic period. Therein, writing emerged with a pictographic script in the Uruk IV period (), and the documented record of actual historical events — and the ancient history of lower Mesopotamia — commenced in the mid-third millennium BC with cuneiform records of early dynastic kings. This entire history ends with either the arrival of the Achaemenid Empire in the late 6th century BC or with the Muslim conquest and the establishment of the Caliphate in the late 7th century AD, from which point the region came to be known as Iraq. In the long span of this period, Mesopotamia housed some of the world's most ancient highly developed, and socially complex states. The region was one of the four riverine civilizations where writing was invented, along with the Nile valley in Ancient Egypt, the Indus Valley Civilization in the Indian subcontinent, and the Yellow River in Ancient China. Mesopotamia housed historically important cities such as Uruk, Nippur, Nineveh, Assur and Babylon, as well as major territorial states such as the city of Eridu, the Akkadian kingdoms, the Third Dynasty of Ur, and the various Assyrian empires. Some of the important historical Mesopotamian leaders were Ur-Nammu (king of Ur), Sargon of Akkad (who established the Akkadian Empire), Hammurabi (who established the Old Babylonian state), Ashur-uballit I and Tiglath-Pileser I (who established the Assyrian Empire). Scientists analysed DNA from the 8,000-year-old remains of early farmers found at an ancient graveyard in Germany. They compared the genetic signatures to those of modern populations and found similarities with the DNA of people living in today's Turkey and Iraq. Periodization Pre- and protohistory Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (10,000–8700 BC) Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (8700–6800 BC) Jarmo (7500–5000 BC) Hassuna (~6000 BC–? BC), Samarra (~5700–4900 BC) and Halaf cultures (~6000–5300 BC) cultures Ubaid period (~6500–4000 BC) Uruk period (~4000–3100 BC) Jemdet Nasr period (~3100–2900 BC) Early Bronze Age Early Dynastic period (~2900–2350 BC) Akkadian Empire (~2350–2100 BC) Third Dynasty of Ur (2112–2004 BC) Early Assyrian kingdom (24th to 18th century BC) Middle Bronze Age Isin-Larsa period (19th to 18th century BC) First Babylonian dynasty (18th to 17th century BC) Minoan eruption () Late Bronze Age Old Assyrian period (16th to 11th century BC) Middle Assyrian period () Kassites in Babylon, () Late Bronze Age collapse (12th to 11th century BC) Iron Age Syro-Hittite states (11th to 7th century BC) Neo-Assyrian Empire (10th to 7th century BC) Neo-Babylonian Empire (7th to 6th century BC) Classical antiquity Persian Babylonia, Achaemenid Assyria (6th to 4th century BC) Seleucid Mesopotamia (4th to 3rd century BC) Parthian Babylonia (3rd century BC to 3rd century AD) Osroene (2nd century BC to 3rd century AD) Adiabene (1st to 2nd century AD) Hatra (1st to 2nd century AD) Roman Mesopotamia (2nd to 7th centuries AD), Roman Assyria (2nd century AD) Late Antiquity Palmyrene Empire (3nd century AD) Asōristān (3rd to 7th century AD) Euphratensis (mid-4th century AD to 7th century AD) Muslim conquest (mid-7th century AD) Language and writing The earliest language written in Mesopotamia was Sumerian, an agglutinative language isolate. Along with Sumerian, Semitic languages were also spoken in early Mesopotamia. Subartuan, a language of the Zagros possibly related to the Hurro-Urartuan language family, is attested in personal names, rivers and mountains and in various crafts. Akkadian came to be the dominant language during the Akkadian Empire and the Assyrian empires, but Sumerian was retained for administrative, religious, literary and scientific purposes. Different varieties of Akkadian were used until the end of the Neo-Babylonian period. Old Aramaic, which had already become common in Mesopotamia, then became the official provincial administration language of first the Neo-Assyrian Empire, and then the Achaemenid Empire: the official lect is called Imperial Aramaic. Akkadian fell into disuse, but both it and Sumerian were still used in temples for some centuries. The last Akkadian texts date from the late 1st century AD. Early in Mesopotamia's history (around the mid-4th millennium BC) cuneiform was invented for the Sumerian language. Cuneiform literally means "wedge-shaped", due to the triangular tip of the stylus used for impressing signs on wet clay. The standardized form of each cuneiform sign appears to have been developed from pictograms. The earliest texts (7 archaic tablets) come from the É, a temple dedicated to the goddess Inanna at Uruk, from a building labeled as Temple C by its excavators. The early logographic system of cuneiform script took many years to master. Thus, only a limited number of individuals were hired as scribes to be trained in its use. It was not until the widespread use of a syllabic script was adopted under Sargon's rule that significant portions of the Mesopotamian population became literate. Massive archives of texts were recovered from the archaeological contexts of Old Babylonian scribal schools, through which literacy was disseminated. Akkadian gradually replaced Sumerian as the spoken language of Mesopotamia somewhere around the turn of the 3rd and the 2nd millennium BC (the exact dating being a matter of debate), but Sumerian continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary, and scientific language in Mesopotamia until the 1st century AD. Literature Libraries were extant in towns and temples during the Babylonian Empire. An old Sumerian proverb averred that "he who would excel in the school of the scribes must rise with the dawn." Women as well as men learned to read and write, and for the Semitic Babylonians, this involved knowledge of the extinct Sumerian language, and a complicated and extensive syllabary. A considerable amount of Babylonian literature was translated from Sumerian originals, and the language of religion and law long continued to be the old agglutinative language of Sumer. Vocabularies, grammars, and interlinear translations were compiled for the use of students, as well as commentaries on the older texts and explanations of obscure words and phrases. The characters of the syllabary were all arranged and named, and elaborate lists were drawn up. Many Babylonian literary works are still studied today. One of the most famous of these was the Epic of Gilgamesh, in twelve books, translated from the original Sumerian by a certain Sîn-lēqi-unninni, and arranged upon an astronomical principle. Each division contains the story of a single adventure in the career of Gilgamesh. The whole story is a composite product, although it is probable that some of the stories are artificially attached to the central figure. Science and technology Mathematics Mesopotamian mathematics and science was based on a sexagesimal (base 60) numeral system. This is the source of the 60-minute hour, the 24-hour day, and the 360-degree circle. The Sumerian calendar was lunisolar, with three seven-day weeks of a lunar month. This form of mathematics was instrumental in early map-making. The Babylonians also had theorems on how to measure the area of several shapes and solids. They measured the circumference of a circle as three times the diameter and the area as one-twelfth the square of the circumference, which would be correct if were fixed at 3. The volume of a cylinder was taken as the product of the area of the base and the height; however, the volume of the frustum of a cone or a square pyramid was incorrectly taken as the product of the height and half the sum of the bases. Also, there was a recent discovery in which a tablet used as 25/8 (3.125 instead of 3.14159~). The Babylonians are also known for the Babylonian mile, which was a measure of distance equal to about seven modern miles (11 km). This measurement for distances eventually was converted to a time-mile used for measuring the travel of the Sun, therefore, representing time. Astronomy From Sumerian times, temple priesthoods had attempted to associate current events with certain positions of the planets and stars. This continued to Assyrian times, when Limmu lists were created as a year by year association of events with planetary positions, which, when they have survived to the present day, allow accurate associations of relative with absolute dating for establishing the history of Mesopotamia. The Babylonian astronomers were very adept at mathematics and could predict eclipses and solstices. Scholars thought that everything had some purpose in astronomy. Most of these related to religion and omens. Mesopotamian astronomers worked out a 12-month calendar based on the cycles of the moon. They divided the year into two seasons: summer and winter. The origins of astronomy as well as astrology date from this time. During the 8th and 7th centuries BC, Babylonian astronomers developed a new approach to astronomy. They began studying philosophy dealing with the ideal nature of the early universe and began employing an internal logic within their predictive planetary systems. This was an important contribution to astronomy and the philosophy of science and some scholars have thus referred to this new approach as the first scientific revolution. This new approach to astronomy was adopted and further developed in Greek and Hellenistic astronomy. In Seleucid and Parthian times, the astronomical reports were thoroughly scientific; how much earlier their advanced knowledge and methods were developed is uncertain. The Babylonian development of methods for predicting the motions of the planets is considered to be a major episode in the history of astronomy. The only Greek-Babylonian astronomer known to have supported a heliocentric model of planetary motion was Seleucus of Seleucia (b. 190 BC). Seleucus is known from the writings of Plutarch. He supported Aristarchus of Samos' heliocentric theory where the Earth rotated around its own axis which in turn revolved around the Sun. According to Plutarch, Seleucus even proved the heliocentric system, but it is not known what arguments he used (except that he correctly theorized on tides as a result of Moon's attraction). Babylonian astronomy served as the basis for much of Greek, classical Indian, Sassanian, Byzantine, Syrian, medieval Islamic, Central Asian, and Western European astronomy. Medicine The oldest Babylonian texts on medicine date back to the Old Babylonian period in the first half of the 2nd millennium BC. The most extensive Babylonian medical text, however, is the Diagnostic Handbook written by the ummânū, or chief scholar, Esagil-kin-apli of Borsippa, during the reign of the Babylonian king Adad-apla-iddina (1069-1046 BC). Along with contemporary Egyptian medicine, the Babylonians introduced the concepts of diagnosis, prognosis, physical examination, enemas, and prescriptions. In addition, the Diagnostic Handbook introduced the methods of therapy and aetiology and the use of empiricism, logic, and rationality in diagnosis, prognosis and therapy. The text contains a list of medical symptoms and often detailed empirical observations along with logical rules used in combining observed symptoms on the body of a patient with its diagnosis and prognosis. The symptoms and diseases of a patient were treated through therapeutic means such as bandages, creams and pills. If a patient could not be cured physically, the Babylonian physicians often relied on exorcism to cleanse the patient from any curses. Esagil-kin-apli's Diagnostic Handbook was based on a logical set of axioms and assumptions, including the modern view that through the examination and inspection of the symptoms of a patient, it is possible to determine the patient's disease, its aetiology, its future development, and the chances of the patient's recovery. Esagil-kin-apli discovered a variety of illnesses and diseases and described their symptoms in his Diagnostic Handbook. These include the symptoms for many varieties of epilepsy and related ailments along with their diagnosis and prognosis. Technology Mesopotamian people invented many technologies including metal and copper-working, glass and lamp making, textile weaving, flood control, water storage, and irrigation. They were also one of the first Bronze Age societies in the world. They developed from copper, bronze, and gold on to iron. Palaces were decorated with hundreds of kilograms of these very expensive metals. Also, copper, bronze, and iron were used for armor as well as for different weapons such as swords, daggers, spears, and maces. According to a recent hypothesis, the Archimedes' screw may have been used by Sennacherib, King of Assyria, for the water systems at the Hanging Gardens of Babylon and Nineveh in the 7th century BC, although mainstream scholarship holds it to be a Greek invention of later times. Later, during the Parthian or Sasanian periods, the Baghdad Battery, which may have been the world's first battery, was created in Mesopotamia. Religion and philosophy The Ancient Mesopotamian religion was the first recorded. Mesopotamians believed that the world was a flat disc, surrounded by a huge, holed space, and above that, heaven. They also believed that water was everywhere, the top, bottom and sides, and that the universe was born from this enormous sea. In addition, Mesopotamian religion was polytheistic. Although the beliefs described above were held in common among Mesopotamians, there were also regional variations. The Sumerian word for universe is an-ki, which refers to the god An and the goddess Ki. Their son was Enlil, the air god. They believed that Enlil was the most powerful god. He was the chief god of the pantheon. Philosophy The numerous civilizations of the area influenced the Abrahamic religions, especially the Hebrew Bible; its cultural values and literary influence are especially evident in the Book of Genesis. Giorgio Buccellati believes that the origins of philosophy can be traced back to early Mesopotamian wisdom, which embodied certain philosophies of life, particularly ethics, in the forms of dialectic, dialogues, epic poetry, folklore, hymns, lyrics, prose works, and proverbs. Babylonian reason and rationality developed beyond empirical observation. The earliest form of logic was developed by the Babylonians, notably in the rigorous nonergodic nature of their social systems. Babylonian thought was axiomatic and is comparable to the "ordinary logic" described by John Maynard Keynes. Babylonian thought was also based on an open-systems ontology which is compatible with ergodic axioms. Logic was employed to some extent in Babylonian astronomy and medicine. Babylonian thought had a considerable influence on early Ancient Greek and Hellenistic philosophy. In particular, the Babylonian text Dialogue of Pessimism contains similarities to the agonistic thought of the Sophists, the Heraclitean doctrine of dialectic, and the dialogs of Plato, as well as a precursor to the Socratic method. The Ionian philosopher Thales was influenced by Babylonian cosmological ideas. Culture Festivals Ancient Mesopotamians had ceremonies each month. The theme of the rituals and festivals for each month was determined by at least six important factors: The Lunar phase (a waxing moon meant abundance and growth, while a waning moon was associated with decline, conservation, and festivals of the Underworld) The phase of the annual agricultural cycle Equinoxes and solstices The local mythos and its divine Patrons The success of the reigning Monarch The Akitu, or New Year Festival (first full moon after spring equinox) Commemoration of specific historical events (founding, military victories, temple holidays, etc.) Music Some songs were written for the gods but many were written to describe important events. Although music and songs amused kings, they were also enjoyed by ordinary people who liked to sing and dance in their homes or in the marketplaces. Songs were sung to children who passed them on to their children. Thus songs were passed on through many generations as an oral tradition until writing was more universal. These songs provided a means of passing on through the centuries highly important information about historical events. The Oud (Arabic:العود) is a small, stringed musical instrument used by the Mesopotamians. The oldest pictorial record of the Oud dates back to the Uruk period in Southern Mesopotamia over 5000 years ago. It is on a cylinder seal currently housed at the British Museum and acquired by Dr. Dominique Collon. The image depicts a female crouching with her instruments upon a boat, playing right-handed. This instrument appears hundreds of times throughout Mesopotamian history and again in ancient Egypt from the 18th dynasty onwards in long- and short-neck varieties. The oud is regarded as a precursor to the European lute. Its name is derived from the Arabic word العود al-‘ūd 'the wood', which is probably the name of the tree from which the oud was made. (The Arabic name, with the definite article, is the source of the word 'lute'.) Games Hunting was popular among Assyrian kings. Boxing and wrestling feature frequently in art, and some form of polo was probably popular, with men sitting on the shoulders of other men rather than on horses. They also played majore, a game similar to the sport rugby, but played with a ball made of wood. They also played a board game similar to senet and backgammon, now known as the "Royal Game of Ur". Family life Mesopotamia, as shown by successive law codes, those of Urukagina, Lipit Ishtar and Hammurabi, across its history became more and more a patriarchal society, one in which the men were far more powerful than the women. For example, during the earliest Sumerian period, the "en", or high priest of male gods was originally a woman, that of female goddesses, a man. Thorkild Jacobsen, as well as many others, has suggested that early Mesopotamian society was ruled by a "council of elders" in which men and women were equally represented, but that over time, as the status of women fell, that of men increased. As for schooling, only royal offspring and sons of the rich and professionals, such as scribes, physicians, temple administrators, went to school. Most boys were taught their father's trade or were apprenticed out to learn a trade. Girls had to stay home with their mothers to learn housekeeping and cooking, and to look after the younger children. Some children would help with crushing grain or cleaning birds. Unusually for that time in history, women in Mesopotamia had rights. They could own property and, if they had good reason, get a divorce. Burials Hundreds of graves have been excavated in parts of Mesopotamia, revealing information about Mesopotamian burial habits. In the city of Ur, most people were buried in family graves under their houses, along with some possessions. A few have been found wrapped in mats and carpets. Deceased children were put in big "jars" which were placed in the family chapel. Other remains have been found buried in common city graveyards. 17 graves have been found with very precious objects in them. It is assumed that these were royal graves. Rich of various periods, have been discovered to have sought burial in Bahrein, identified with Sumerian Dilmun. Economy Sumerian temples functioned as banks and developed the first large-scale system of loans and credit, but the Babylonians developed the earliest system of commercial banking. It was comparable in some ways to modern post-Keynesian economics, but with a more "anything goes" approach. Agriculture Irrigated agriculture spread southwards from the Zagros foothills with the Samara and Hadji Muhammed culture, from about 5,000 BC. In the early period down to Ur III temples owned up to one third of the available land, declining over time as royal and other private holdings increased in frequency. The word Ensi was used to describe the official who organized the work of all facets of temple agriculture. Villeins are known to have worked most frequently within agriculture, especially in the grounds of temples or palaces. The geography of southern Mesopotamia is such that agriculture is possible only with irrigation and with good drainage, a fact which had a profound effect on the evolution of early Mesopotamian civilization. The need for irrigation led the Sumerians, and later the Akkadians, to build their cities along the Tigris and Euphrates and the branches of these rivers. Major cities, such as Ur and Uruk, took root on tributaries of the Euphrates, while others, notably Lagash, were built on branches of the Tigris. The rivers provided the further benefits of fish (used both for food and fertilizer), reeds, and clay (for building materials). With irrigation, the food supply in Mesopotamia was comparable to that of the Canadian prairies. The Tigris and Euphrates River valleys form the northeastern portion of the Fertile Crescent, which also included the Jordan River valley and that of the Nile. Although land nearer to the rivers was fertile and good for crops, portions of land farther from the water were dry and largely uninhabitable. Thus the development of irrigation became very important for settlers of Mesopotamia. Other Mesopotamian innovations include the control of water by dams and the use of aqueducts. Early settlers of fertile land in Mesopotamia used wooden plows to soften the soil before planting crops such as barley, onions, grapes, turnips, and apples. Mesopotamian settlers were some of the first people to make beer and wine. As a result of the skill involved in farming in the Mesopotamian region, farmers did not generally depend on slaves to complete farm work for them, but there were some exceptions. There were too many risks involved to make slavery practical (i.e. the escape/mutiny of the slaves). Although the rivers sustained life, they also destroyed it by frequent floods that ravaged entire cities. The unpredictable Mesopotamian weather was often hard on farmers; crops were often ruined so backup sources of food such as cows and lambs were also kept. Over time the southernmost parts of Sumerian Mesopotamia suffered from increased salinity of the soils, leading to a slow urban decline and a centring of power in Akkad, further north. Trade Mesopotamian trade with the Indus Valley civilisation flourished as early as the third millennium BC. Starting in the 4th millennium BC, Mesopotamian civilizations also traded with ancient Egypt (see Egypt–Mesopotamia relations). For much of history, Mesopotamia served as a trade nexus - east-west between Central Asia and the Mediterranean world (part of the Silk Road), as well as north–south between the Eastern Europe and Baghdad (Volga trade route). Vasco da Gama's pioneering (1497-1499) of the sea route between India and Europe and the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 impacted on this nexus. Government The geography of Mesopotamia had a profound impact on the political development of the region. Among the rivers and streams, the Sumerian people built the first cities along with irrigation canals which were separated by vast stretches of open desert or swamp where nomadic tribes roamed. Communication among the isolated cities was difficult and, at times, dangerous. Thus, each Sumerian city became a city-state, independent of the others and protective of its independence. At times one city would try to conquer and unify the region, but such efforts were resisted and failed for centuries. As a result, the political history of Sumer is one of almost constant warfare. Eventually Sumer was unified by Eannatum, but the unification was tenuous and failed to last as the Akkadians conquered Sumer in 2331 BC only a generation later. The Akkadian Empire was the first successful empire to last beyond a generation and see the peaceful succession of kings. The empire was relatively short-lived, as the Babylonians conquered them within only a few generations. Kings The Mesopotamians believed their kings and queens were descended from the City of Gods, but, unlike the ancient Egyptians, they never believed their kings were real gods. Most kings named themselves "king of the universe" or "great king". Another common name was "shepherd", as kings had to look after their people. Power When Assyria grew into an empire, it was divided into smaller parts, called provinces. Each of these were named after their main cities, like Nineveh, Samaria, Damascus, and Arpad. They all had their own governor who had to make sure everyone paid their taxes. Governors also had to call up soldiers to war and supply workers when a temple was built. He was also responsible for enforcing the laws. In this way, it was easier to keep control of a large empire. Although Babylon was quite a small state in Sumer, it grew tremendously throughout the time of Hammurabi's rule. He was known as "the lawmaker" and created the Code of Hammurabi, and soon Babylon became one of the main cities in Mesopotamia. It was later called Babylonia, which meant "the gateway of the gods." It also became one of history's greatest centers of learning. Warfare With the end of the Uruk phase, walled cities grew and many isolated Ubaid villages were abandoned indicating a rise in communal violence. An early king Lugalbanda was supposed to have built the white walls around the city. As city-states began to grow, their spheres of influence overlapped, creating arguments between other city-states, especially over land and canals. These arguments were recorded in tablets several hundreds of years before any major war—the first recording of a war occurred around 3200 BC but was not common until about 2500 BC. An Early Dynastic II king (Ensi) of Uruk in Sumer, Gilgamesh (c. 2600 BC), was commended for military exploits against Humbaba guardian of the Cedar Mountain, and was later celebrated in many later poems and songs in which he was claimed to be two-thirds god and only one-third human. The later Stele of the Vultures at the end of the Early Dynastic III period (2600–2350 BC), commemorating the victory of Eannatum of Lagash over the neighbouring rival city of Umma is the oldest monument in the world that celebrates a massacre. From this point forwards, warfare was incorporated into the Mesopotamian political system. At times a neutral city may act as an arbitrator for the two rival cities. This helped to form unions between cities, leading to regional states. When empires were created, they went to war more with foreign countries. King Sargon, for example, conquered all the cities of Sumer, some cities in Mari, and then went to war with northern Syria. Many Assyrian and Babylonian palace walls were decorated with the pictures of the successful fights and the enemy either desperately escaping or hiding amongst reeds. Laws City-states of Mesopotamia created the first law codes, drawn from legal precedence and decisions made by kings. The codes of Urukagina and Lipit Ishtar have been found. The most renowned of these was that of Hammurabi, as mentioned above, who was posthumously famous for his set of laws, the Code of Hammurabi (created c. 1780 BC), which is one of the earliest sets of laws found and one of the best preserved examples of this type of document from ancient Mesopotamia. He codified over 200 laws for Mesopotamia. Examination of the laws show a progressive weakening of the rights of women, and increasing severity in the treatment of slaves. Art The art of Mesopotamia rivalled that of Ancient Egypt as the most grand, sophisticated and elaborate in western Eurasia from the 4th millennium BC until the Persian Achaemenid Empire conquered the region in the 6th century BC. The main emphasis was on various, very durable, forms of sculpture in stone and clay; little painting has survived, but what has suggests that painting was mainly used for geometrical and plant-based decorative schemes, though most sculpture was also painted. The Protoliterate period, dominated by Uruk, saw the production of sophisticated works like the Warka Vase and cylinder seals. The Guennol Lioness is an outstanding small limestone figure from Elam of about 3000–2800 BC, part man and part lion. A little later there are a number of figures of large-eyed priests and worshippers, mostly in alabaster and up to a foot high, who attended temple cult images of the deity, but very few of these have survived. Sculptures from the Sumerian and Akkadian period generally had large, staring eyes, and long beards on the men. Many masterpieces have also been found at the Royal Cemetery at Ur (c. 2650 BC), including the two figures of a Ram in a Thicket, the Copper Bull and a bull's head on one of the Lyres of Ur. From the many subsequent periods before the ascendency of the Neo-Assyrian Empire Mesopotamian art survives in a number of forms: cylinder seals, relatively small figures in the round, and reliefs of various sizes, including cheap plaques of moulded pottery for the home, some religious and some apparently not. The Burney Relief is an unusual elaborate and relatively large (20 x 15 inches) terracotta plaque of a naked winged goddess with the feet of a bird of prey, and attendant owls and lions. It comes from the 18th or 19th centuries BC, and may also be moulded. Stone stelae, votive offerings, or ones probably commemorating victories and showing feasts, are also found from temples, which unlike more official ones lack inscriptions that would explain them; the fragmentary Stele of the Vultures is an early example of the inscribed type, and the Assyrian Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III a large and solid late one. The conquest of the whole of Mesopotamia and much surrounding territory by the Assyrians created a larger and wealthier state than the region had known before, and very grandiose art in palaces and public places, no doubt partly intended to match the splendour of the art of the neighbouring Egyptian empire. The Assyrians developed a style of extremely large schemes of very finely detailed narrative low reliefs in stone for palaces, with scenes of war or hunting; the British Museum has an outstanding collection. They produced very little sculpture in the round, except for colossal guardian figures, often the human-headed lamassu, which are sculpted in high relief on two sides of a rectangular block, with the heads effectively in the round (and also five legs, so that both views seem complete). Even before dominating the region they had continued the cylinder seal tradition with designs which are often exceptionally energetic and refined. Architecture The study of ancient Mesopotamian architecture is based on available archaeological evidence, pictorial representation of buildings, and texts on building practices. Scholarly literature usually concentrates on temples, palaces, city walls and gates, and other monumental buildings, but occasionally one finds works on residential architecture as well. Archaeological surface surveys also allowed for the study of urban form in early Mesopotamian cities. Brick is the dominant material, as the material was freely available locally, whereas building stone had to be brought a considerable distance to most cities. The ziggurat is the most distinctive form, and cities often had large gateways, of which the Ishtar Gate from Neo-Babylonian Babylon, decorated with beasts in polychrome brick, is the most famous, now largely in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin. The most notable architectural remains from early Mesopotamia are the temple complexes at Uruk from the 4th millennium BC, temples and palaces from the Early Dynastic period sites in the Diyala River valley such as Khafajah and Tell Asmar, the Third Dynasty of Ur remains at Nippur (Sanctuary of Enlil) and Ur (Sanctuary of Nanna), Middle Bronze Age remains at Syrian-Turkish sites of Ebla, Mari, Alalakh, Aleppo and Kultepe, Late Bronze Age palaces at Hattusa, Ugarit, Ashur and Nuzi, Iron Age palaces and temples at Assyrian (Kalhu/Nimrud, Khorsabad, Nineveh), Babylonian (Babylon), Urartian (Tushpa/Van, Kalesi, Cavustepe, Ayanis, Armavir, Erebuni, Bastam) and Neo-Hittite sites (Karkamis, Tell Halaf, Karatepe). Houses are mostly known from Old Babylonian remains at Nippur and Ur. Among the textual sources on building construction and associated rituals are Gudea's cylinders from the late 3rd millennium are notable, as well as the Assyrian and Babylonian royal inscriptions from the Iron Age. See also References Further reading Algaze, Guillermo, 2008 Ancient Mesopotamia at the Dawn of Civilization: the Evolution of an Urban Landscape. University of Chicago Press. Atlas de la Mésopotamie et du Proche-Orient ancien, Brepols, 1996 . Benoit, Agnès; 2003. Art et archéologie : les civilisations du Proche-Orient ancien, Manuels de l'Ecole du Louvre. Bottéro, Jean; 1987. Mésopotamie. L'écriture, la raison et les dieux, Gallimard, coll. « Folio Histoire », . Edzard, Dietz Otto; 2004. Geschichte Mesopotamiens. Von den Sumerern bis zu Alexander dem Großen, München, Frankfort, Henri, The Art and Architecture of the Ancient Orient, Pelican History of Art, 4th ed 1970, Penguin (now Yale History of Art), Hrouda, Barthel and Rene Pfeilschifter; 2005. Mesopotamien. Die antiken Kulturen zwischen Euphrat und Tigris. München 2005 (4. Aufl.), Joannès, Francis; 2001. Dictionnaire de la civilisation mésopotamienne, Robert Laffont. Korn, Wolfgang; 2004. Mesopotamien – Wiege der Zivilisation. 6000 Jahre Hochkulturen an Euphrat und Tigris, Stuttgart, Kuhrt, Amélie; 1995. The Ancient Near East: c. 3000–330 B.C. 2 Vols. Routledge: London and New York. Liverani, Mario; 1991. Antico Oriente: storia, società, economia. Editori Laterza: Roma. Matthews, Roger; 2005. The early prehistory of Mesopotamia – 500,000 to 4,500 BC, Turnhout 2005, Oppenheim, A. Leo; 1964. Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a dead civilization. The University of Chicago Press: Chicago and London. Revised edition completed by Erica Reiner, 1977. Pollock, Susan; 1999. Ancient Mesopotamia: the Eden that never was. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. Postgate, J. Nicholas; 1992. Early Mesopotamia: Society and Economy at the dawn of history. Routledge: London and New York. Roux, Georges; 1964. Ancient Iraq, Penguin Books. Silver, Morris; 2007. Redistribution and Markets in the Economy of Ancient Mesopotamia: Updating Polanyi, Antiguo Oriente 5: 89–112. Snell, Daniel (ed.); 2005. A Companion to the Ancient Near East. Malden, MA : Blackwell Pub, 2005. Van de Mieroop, Marc; 2004. A history of the ancient Near East. ca 3000–323 BC. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. External links Ancient Mesopotamia – timeline, definition, and articles at World History Encyclopedia Mesopotamia – introduction to Mesopotamia from the British Museum By Nile and Tigris, a narrative of journeys in Egypt and Mesopotamia on behalf of the British museum between the years 1886 and 1913, by Sir E.A. Wallis Budge, 1920 (a searchable facsimile at the University of Georgia Libraries; DjVu & layered PDF format) A Dweller in Mesopotamia, being the adventures of an official artist in the Garden of Eden, by Donald Maxwell, 1921 (a searchable facsimile at the University of Georgia Libraries; DjVu &   format) Mesopotamian Archaeology, by Percy S.P. Handcock, 1912 (a searchable facsimile at the University of Georgia Libraries; DjVu &   format) Mesopotamia, 1920 Ancient history of Iraq Ancient Near East Ancient Syria Civilizations Eastern Mediterranean Geography of Iran Geography of Iraq Geography of Kuwait Geography of Syria Geography of Turkey Geography of the Middle East Geography of Western Asia Historical regions History of the Middle East History of Western Asia Iraq Levant Near East Persian Gulf

20192

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miranda%20Richardson

Miranda Richardson

Miranda Jane Richardson (born 3 March 1958) is an English actress. <ref>I doubted whether I, as an Englishwoman, could do a believable Irish accent. How we made The Crying Game''', 26 Sep, 2021</ref> She made her film debut playing Ruth Ellis in Dance with a Stranger (1985) and went on to receive Academy Award nominations for Damage (1992) and Tom & Viv (1994). A seven-time BAFTA Award nominee, she won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for Damage. She has also been nominated for seven Golden Globe Awards, winning twice for Enchanted April (1992) and the TV film Fatherland (1994). In 1996, one critic asserted that she is "the greatest actress of our time in any medium" after she appeared in Orlando at the Edinburgh International Festival. After graduating from the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, Richardson began her career in 1979 and made her West End debut in the 1981 play Moving, before being nominated for the 1987 Olivier Award for Best Actress for A Lie of the Mind. Her television credits include Blackadder (1986–1989), A Dance to the Music of Time (1997), Merlin (1998), The Lost Prince (2003), Gideon's Daughter (2006), the sitcom The Life and Times of Vivienne Vyle (2007), and Rubicon (2010). She was nominated for the 2015 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Narrator for Operation Orangutan. Her other films include Empire of the Sun (1987), The Crying Game (1992), The Apostle (1997), Sleepy Hollow (1999), Chicken Run (2000), The Hours (2002), Spider (2002), Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005), The Young Victoria (2009), Made in Dagenham (2010), Belle (2013), and Stronger (2017). Early life Richardson was born in Southport, Lancashire, to Marian Georgina (née Townsend), a housewife, and William Alan Richardson, a marketing executive, and was their second daughter. She recalls that there was “a cinema about 50 yards from my house. So Saturday mornings were spent with The ABC Minors: the Saturday cinema club with the theme song set to the tune of Blaze Away by Abe Holzmann, a red ball bouncing over the lyrics so you could sing along. As I got older, I would go to the cinema by myself to watch matinees of westerns and historical Technicolor dramas.” Career Theatre Richardson enrolled at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, where she studied alongside Daniel Day-Lewis and Jenny Seagrove, having started out with juvenile performances in Cinderella and Lord Arthur Savile's Crime at the Southport Dramatic Club. Richardson has enjoyed a successful and extensive theatre career, first joining Manchester Library Theatre in 1979 as an assistant stage manager, followed by a number of appearances in repertory theatre. Her London stage debut was in Moving at the Queen's Theatre in 1981. She found recognition in the West End for a series of stage performances, ultimately receiving an Olivier Award nomination for her performance in A Lie of the Mind, and, in 1996, one critic asserted that she is "the greatest actress of our time in any medium" after she appeared in Orlando at the Edinburgh Festival. She returned to the London stage in May 2009 to play the lead role in Wallace Shawn's new play, Grasses of a Thousand Colours at the Royal Court Theatre. Richardson has said that she prefers new works rather than the classics because of the history which goes with them. Film and television In 1985, Richardson made her film debut as Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in the United Kingdom, in the biographical drama Dance with a Stranger. Around the same time, Richardson played a comedic Queen Elizabeth I, aka Queenie, in the British television comedy Blackadder II. Following Dance with a Stranger, Richardson turned down numerous parts in which her character was unstable or disreputable, including the Glenn Close role in Fatal Attraction. In this period, she appeared in Empire of the Sun (1987). In an episode of the TV series The Storyteller ("The Three Ravens", 1988), she played a witch. Meanwhile, she had returned in guest roles in one episode each in Blackadder the Third (1987) and Blackadder Goes Forth (1989). She returned to play Queenie in the Christmas special Blackadder's Christmas Carol (1988) and, later, a special edition for the millennium Blackadder: Back and Forth. As Hilde in ‘’The Master Builder’’ (1988). Her portrayal of a troubled theatre goer in Secret Friends (BBC 2, 1990) was described as "a miniature tour de force... Miranda Richardson's finest hour, all in ten minutes" (The Sunday Times). Other television roles include Pamela Flitton in A Dance to the Music of Time (1997), Miss Gilchrist in St. Ives (1998), Bettina the interior decorator in Absolutely Fabulous, Queen Elspeth, Snow White's stepmother, in Snow White: The Fairest of Them All (2001), and Queen Mary in The Lost Prince (2003). Richardson has appeared in a number of high-profile supporting roles in film, including Vanessa Bell in The Hours, Lady Van Tassel in Sleepy Hollow and Patsy Carpenter in The Evening Star. She also won acclaim for her performances in The Crying Game and Enchanted April, for which she won a Golden Globe. She received Academy Award nominations for her performances in Damage and Tom & Viv. Her film credits also include Kansas City (1996), The Apostle (1997) and Wah-Wah (2005). In 2002, she performed a triple-role in the thriller Spider. Richardson also appeared as Queen Rosalind of Denmark in The Prince and Me and as the ballet mistress Madame Giry in the film version of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical The Phantom of the Opera (2004). In 2005, she appeared in the role of Rita Skeeter, the toxic Daily Prophet journalist in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. She also did the voice for Corky in The Adventures of Bottle Top Bill and His Best Friend Corky (2005), an Australian animated series for children. In 2006, she appeared in Gideon's Daughter. She played Mrs. Claus in the film Fred Claus (2007). Richardson appeared in the BBC sitcom, The Life and Times of Vivienne Vyle. She appeared as a guest in A Taste of My Life. In 2008, Richardson was cast in a leading role in original AMC pilot, Rubicon. She plays Katherine Rhumor, a New York socialite who finds herself drawn into the central intrigue of a think tank after the death of her husband. Additionally, she played Labour politician Barbara Castle in the British film Made in Dagenham. In 2014, Richardson was cast as Queen Ulla in Maleficent, where she was to play the titular character's aunt, but her role was cut from the film during post-production. In 2015, she played Sybil Birling in Helen Edmundson's BBC One adaptation of J. B. Priestley's An Inspector Calls''. Personal life Richardson's hobbies include dog walking, gardening and falconry, and she started playing the cello in 2013. She trains a falcon named Cassiopeia. Filmography Awards and nominations References External links 1958 births Alumni of Bristol Old Vic Theatre School Audiobook narrators Best Supporting Actress BAFTA Award winners Best Musical or Comedy Actress Golden Globe (film) winners Best Supporting Actress Golden Globe (television) winners English film actresses English stage actresses English television actresses English radio actresses English voice actresses Living people People from Southport 20th-century English actresses 21st-century English actresses Actresses from Lancashire

20193

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mecklenburg

Mecklenburg

Mecklenburg (; ) is a historical region in northern Germany comprising the western and larger part of the federal-state Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. The largest cities of the region are Rostock, Schwerin, Neubrandenburg, Wismar and Güstrow. The name Mecklenburg derives from a castle named Mikilenburg (Old Saxon for "big castle", hence its translation into New Latin and Greek as ), located between the cities of Schwerin and Wismar. In Slavic languages it was known as Veligrad, which also means "big castle". It was the ancestral seat of the House of Mecklenburg; for a time the area was divided into Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Mecklenburg-Strelitz among the same dynasty. Linguistically Mecklenburgers retain and use many features of Low German vocabulary or phonology. The adjective for the region is Mecklenburgian (); inhabitants are called Mecklenburgians (). Geography Mecklenburg is known for its mostly flat countryside. Much of the terrain is boggy, with ponds, marshes and fields as common features, with small forests interspersed. The terrain changes as one moves north towards the Baltic Sea. Under the peat of Mecklenburg are sometimes found deposits of ancient lava flows. Traditionally, at least in the countryside, the stone from these flows is cut and used in the construction of homes, often in joint use with cement, brick and wood, forming a unique look to the exterior of country houses. Mecklenburg has productive farming, but the land is most suitable for grazing for livestock. List of urban centers in Mecklenburg History Early history Mecklenburg is the site of many prehistoric dolmen tombs. Its earliest organised inhabitants may have had Celtic origins. By no later than 100 BC the area had been populated by pre-Christian Germanic peoples. The traditional symbol of Mecklenburg, the grinning steer's head (Low German: Ossenkopp, lit.: 'oxen's head', with osse being a synonym for steer and bull in Middle Low German), with an attached hide, and a crown above, may have originated from this period. It represents what early peoples would have worn, i.e. a steers's head as a helmet, with the hide hanging down the back to protect the neck from the sun, and overall as a way to instill fear in the enemy. From the 7th through the 12th centuries, Germanic Mecklenburg was ruled by Western Slavic overlords, newly arrived from the steppes. Among them were the Obotrites and other tribes that Frankish sources referred to as "Wends". The 11th-century founder of the Mecklenburger dynasty of Dukes and later Grand Dukes, which lasted until 1918, was Nyklot of the Obotrites. In the late 12th century, Henry the Lion, Duke of the Saxons, reconquered the region, took oaths from its local lords, and Christianized its people, in a precursor to the Northern Crusades. From the 12th to 14th centuries, large numbers of Germans and Flemings settled the area (Ostsiedlung), importing German law and improved agricultural techniques. The Wends who survived all warfare and devastation of the centuries before, including invasions of and expeditions into Saxony, Denmark and Liutizic areas as well as internal conflicts, were assimilated in the centuries thereafter. However, elements of certain names and words used in Mecklenburg speak to the lingering Slavic influence. An example would be the city of Schwerin, which was originally called Zuarin in Slavic. Another example is the town of Bresegard, the 'gard' portion of the town name deriving from the Slavic word 'grad', meaning city or town. Since the 12th century, the territory remained stable and relatively independent of its neighbours; one of the few German territories for which this is true. During the reformation the Duke in Schwerin would convert to Protestantism and so would follow the Duchy of Mecklenburg in 1549. History, 1621–1933 Like many German territories, Mecklenburg was sometimes partitioned and re-partitioned among different members of the ruling dynasty. In 1621 it was divided into the two duchies of Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Mecklenburg-Güstrow. With the extinction of the Güstrow line in 1701, the Güstrow lands were redivided, part going to the Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, and part going to the new line of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. In 1815, the two Mecklenburgian duchies were raised to Grand Duchies, the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin and the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, and subsequently existed separately as such in Germany under enlightened but absolute rule (constitutions being granted on the eve of World War I) until the revolution of 1918. Life in Mecklenburg could be quite harsh. Practices such as having to ask for permission from the Grand Duke to get married, or having to apply for permission to emigrate, would linger late into the history of Mecklenburg (i.e. 1918), long after such practices had been abandoned in other German areas. Even as late as the later half of the 19th century the Grand Duke personally owned half of the countryside. The last Duke abdicated in 1918, as monarchies fell throughout Europe. The Duke's ruling house reigned in Mecklenburg uninterrupted (except for two years) from its incorporation into the Holy Roman Empire until 1918. From 1918 to 1933, the duchies were free states in the Weimar Republic. Traditionally Mecklenburg has always been one of the poorer German regions. The reasons for this may be varied, but one factor stands out: agriculturally the land is poor and can not produce at the same level as other parts of Germany. The two Mecklenburgs made attempts at being independent states after 1918, but eventually failed as their dependence on the rest of the German lands became apparent. History since 1934 After three centuries of partition, Mecklenburg was united on 1 January 1934 by the German government. During World War II the Wehrmacht assigned Mecklenburg and Pomerania to Wehrkreis II under the command of General der Infanterie Werner Kienitz, with the headquarters at Stettin. Mecklenburg was assigned to an Area headquartered at Schwerin, which was responsible for military units in Schwerin, Rostock, Parchim, and Neustrelitz. After World War II, the Soviet government occupying eastern Germany merged Mecklenburg with the smaller neighbouring region of Western Pomerania (German Vorpommern) to form the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Mecklenburg contributed about two-thirds of the geographical size of the new state and the majority of its population. Also, the new state became temporary or permanent home for many refugees expelled from former German territories seized by the Soviet Union and Poland after the war. The Soviets changed the name from "Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania" to "Mecklenburg" in 1947. In 1952, the East German government ended the independent existence of Mecklenburg, creating three districts ("Bezirke") out of its territory: Rostock, Schwerin and Neubrandenburg. During German reunification in 1990, the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern was revived, and is now one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany. Coat of arms of the duchies of Mecklenburg The House of Mecklenburg was founded by Niklot, prince of the Obotrites, Chizzini and Circipani on the Baltic Sea, who died in 1160. His Christian progeny was recognized as prince of the Holy Roman Empire 1170 and Duke of Mecklenburg 8 July 1348. On 27 February 1658 the ducal house divided in two branches: Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Mecklenburg-Strelitz. The flag of both Mecklenburg duchies is traditionally made of the colours blue, yellow and red. The sequence however changed more than once in the past 300 years. In 1813 the duchies used yellow-red-blue. 23 December 1863 for Schwerin and 4 January 1864 for Strelitz blue-yellow-red was ordered. Mecklenburg-Schwerin however used white instead of yellow for flags on sea by law of 24 March 1855. Siebmachers Wappenbuch gives therefore (?) blue-white-red for Schwerin and blue-yellow-red for Strelitz. According to this source, the grand ducal house of Schwerin used a flag of 3.75 to 5.625 M with the middle arms on a white quadrant (1.75 M) in the middle. The middle arms show the shield of Mecklenburg as arranged in the 17th century. The county of Schwerin in the middle and in the quartering Mecklenburg (bull's head with hide), Rostock (griffin), principality of Schwerin (griffin surmounting green rectangle), Ratzeburg (cross surmounted by crown), Stargard (arm with hand holding ring) and Wenden (bull's head). The shield is supported by a bull and a griffin and surmounted by a royal crown. The dukes of Strelitz used according to Siebmachers the blue-yellow-red flag with just the (oval) shield of Mecklenburg in the yellow band. Ströhl in 1897 and Bulgaria, show another arrangement: The grand-duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin flows a flag (4:5) with the arms of the figures from the shield of arms. The former Schwerin standard with the white quadrant is now ascribed to the grand dukes of Strelitz. Ströhl mentions a flag for the grand ducal house by law of 23 December 1863 with the middle arms in the yellow band. And he mentions a special sea flag, the same but with a white middle band. 'Berühmte Fahnen' shows furthermore a standard for grand duchess Alexandra of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, princess of Hannover (1882–1963), showing her shield and that of Mecklenburg joined by the order of the Wendic Crown in a white oval. On sea the yellow band in her flag was of course white. The princes (dukes) of Mecklenburg-Schwerin had according to this source their own standard, showing the griffin of Rostock. Economy Agriculture A flat landscape, Mecklenburg is known for its farmlands - which produces quinoa, wheat, barley and maize – and its husbandry. Notably, the region is known for its cattle and Mecklenburger horse bred. Recently, with the upheavals and environmental disruptions created by globalisation, German peasants have been concerned about the introduction of potentially invasive species such as the Greater rhea and the Asian hornet. Tourism Mecklenburg faces a huge increase in tourism since German reunification in 1990, particularly with its beaches and seaside resorts at the Baltic Sea ("German Riviera", Warnemünde, Boltenhagen, Heiligendamm, Kühlungsborn, Rerik and others), the Mecklenburg Lakeland (Mecklenburgische Seenplatte) and the Mecklenburg Switzerland (Mecklenburgische Schweiz) with their pristine nature, the old Hanseatic towns of Rostock, Greifswald, Stralsund and Wismar (the latter two being World Heritage) well known for their medieval Brick Gothic buildings, and the former royal residences of Schwerin, Güstrow, Ludwigslust and Neustrelitz. Notable Mecklenburgers Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher, Prussian army leader Michael Buddrus (born 1957), historian Jan Ullrich, cyclist Gottlob Frege, logician Siegfried Marcus, automobile pioneer Heinrich Schliemann, classical archaeologist Johannes Gillhoff, teacher, author of book on Mecklenburg emigrants to the US Fritz Reuter, poet and novelist Ludwig Jacoby, (1813–1874), born in Altstrelitz, an author and Methodist clergyman, commissioned as a missionary to St. Louis, Missouri, by the founder of the German Methodist Church in America, William Nast (1807–1899). Jacoby founded the first Methodist Church West of the Mississippi River, originally known as Bethel Church, now known as Memorial United Methodist Church, in St. Louis in 1841. Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, (1744–1818), wife of George III of the United Kingdom and grandmother of Queen Victoria. Charlotte, North Carolina, USA and the county in which it lies were named in her honour, as was Charlottesville, Virginia, US. See also Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin Duchy of Mecklenburg-Strelitz List of Dukes and Grand Dukes of Mecklenburg Mecklenburg County, North Carolina Mecklenburg County, Virginia References Literature External links Government portal of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania Virtual State Museum of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania Duchies of the Holy Roman Empire Former states and territories of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania

20196

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March%2010

March 10

Events Pre-1600 241 BC – First Punic War: Battle of the Aegates: The Romans sink the Carthaginian fleet bringing the First Punic War to an end. 298 – Roman Emperor Maximian concludes his campaign in North Africa and makes a triumphal entry into Carthage. 947 – The Later Han is founded by Liu Zhiyuan. He declares himself emperor. 1496 – After establishing city of Santo Domingo, Christopher Columbus departs for Spain, leaving his brother in command. 1535 – Spaniard Fray Tomás de Berlanga, the fourth Bishop of Panama, discovers the Galápagos Islands by chance on his way to Peru. 1601–1900 1607 – Susenyos I defeats the combined armies of Yaqob and Abuna Petros II at the Battle of Gol in Gojjam, making him Emperor of Ethiopia. 1629 – Charles I dissolves the Parliament of England, beginning the eleven-year period known as the Personal Rule. 1661 – French "Sun King" Louis XIV begins his personal rule of France after the death of his premier, the Cardinal Mazarin. 1735 – An agreement between Nader Shah and Russia is signed near Ganja, Azerbaijan and Russian troops are withdrawn from occupied territories. 1762 – French Huguenot Jean Calas, who had been wrongly convicted of killing his son, dies after being tortured by authorities; the event inspired Voltaire to begin a campaign for religious tolerance and legal reform. 1814 – Emperor Napoleon I is defeated at the Battle of Laon in France. 1830 – The Royal Netherlands East Indies Army is created. 1831 – The French Foreign Legion is created by Louis Philippe, the King of France, from the foreign regiments of the Kingdom of France. 1848 – The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is ratified by the United States Senate, ending the Mexican–American War. 1861 – El Hadj Umar Tall seizes the city of Ségou, destroying the Bamana Empire of Mali. 1873 – The first Azerbaijani play, The Adventures of the Vizier of the Khan of Lenkaran, prepared by Akhundov, is performed by Hassan-bey Zardabi and dramatist and Najaf-bey Vezirov. 1876 – The first successful test of a telephone is made by Alexander Graham Bell. 1891 – Almon Strowger patents the Strowger switch, a device which led to the automation of telephone circuit switching. 1901–present 1906 – The Courrières mine disaster, Europe's worst ever, kills 1099 miners in northern France. 1909 – By signing the Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909, Thailand relinquishes its sovereignty over the Malay states of Kedah, Kelantan, Perlis and Terengganu, which become British protectorates. 1922 – Mahatma Gandhi is arrested in India, tried for sedition, and sentenced to six years in prison, only to be released after nearly two years for an appendicitis operation. 1933 – The Long Beach earthquake affects the Greater Los Angeles Area, leaving around 108 people dead. 1944 – Greek Civil War: The Political Committee of National Liberation is established in Greece by the National Liberation Front. 1945 – World War II: The U.S. Army Air Force firebombs Tokyo, and the resulting conflagration kills more than 100,000 people, mostly civilians. 1949 – Mildred Gillars ("Axis Sally") is convicted of treason. 1952 – Fulgencio Batista leads a successful coup in Cuba. 1959 – Tibetan uprising: Fearing an abduction attempt by China, thousands of Tibetans surround the Dalai Lama's palace to prevent his removal. 1966 – Military Prime Minister of South Vietnam Nguyễn Cao Kỳ sacks rival General Nguyễn Chánh Thi, precipitating large-scale civil and military dissension in parts of the nation. 1969 – In Memphis, Tennessee, James Earl Ray pleads guilty to assassinating Martin Luther King Jr. He later unsuccessfully attempts to recant. 1970 – Vietnam War: Captain Ernest Medina is charged by the U.S. military with My Lai war crimes. 1975 – Vietnam War: Ho Chi Minh Campaign: North Vietnamese troops attack Ban Mê Thuột in the South on their way to capturing Saigon in the final push for victory over South Vietnam. 1977 – Astronomers discover the rings of Uranus. 1990 – In Haiti, Prosper Avril is ousted 18 months after seizing power in a coup. 2000 – The Dot-com bubble peaks with the NASDAQ Composite stock market index reaching 5,048.62. 2006 – The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter arrives at Mars. 2017 – The impeachment of President Park Geun-hye of South Korea in response to a major political scandal is unanimously upheld by the country's Constitutional Court, ending her presidency. 2019 – Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302, a Boeing 737 MAX, crashes, leading to all 737 MAX aircraft being grounded worldwide. Births Pre-1600 1452 – Ferdinand II, king of Castile and León (d. 1516) 1503 – Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1564) 1536 – Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk, English politician, Earl Marshal of the United Kingdom (d. 1572) 1601–1900 1604 – Johann Rudolf Glauber, German-Dutch alchemist and chemist (d. 1670) 1628 – François Girardon, French sculptor (d. 1715) 1628 – Marcello Malpighi, Italian physician and biologist (d. 1694) 1653 – John Benbow, Royal Navy admiral (d. 1702) 1656 – Giacomo Serpotta, Italian Rococo sculptor (d. 1732) 1709 – Georg Wilhelm Steller, German botanist, zoologist, physician, and explorer (d. 1746) 1749 – Lorenzo Da Ponte, Italian-American priest and poet (d. 1838) 1769 – Joseph Williamson, English businessman and philanthropist (d. 1840) 1772 – Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel, German poet and critic (d. 1829) 1777 – Louis Hersent, French painter (d. 1860) 1787 – Francisco de Paula Martínez de la Rosa y Berdejo, Spanish playwright and politician, Prime Minister of Spain (d. 1862) 1787 – William Etty, English painter and academic (d. 1849) 1788 – Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff, German author, poet, playwright, and critic (d. 1857) 1788 – Edward Hodges Baily, English sculptor (d. 1867) 1789 – Manuel de la Peña y Peña, Mexican lawyer and 20th President (1847) (d. 1850) 1795 – Joseph Légaré, Canadian painter and glazier, artist, seigneur and political figure (d. 1855) 1810 – Samuel Ferguson, Irish poet and lawyer (d. 1886) 1843 – Evelyn Abbott, English classical scholar (d. 1901) 1844 – Pablo de Sarasate, Spanish violinist and composer (d. 1908) 1844 – Marie Euphrosyne Spartali, British Pre-Raphaelite painter (d. 1927) 1845 – Alexander III of Russia (d. 1894) 1846 – Edward Baker Lincoln, American son of Abraham Lincoln (d. 1850) 1849 – Hallie Quinn Brown, African-American educator, writer and activist (d. 1949) 1850 – Spencer Gore, English tennis player and cricketer (d. 1906) 1853 – Thomas Mackenzie, Scottish-New Zealand cartographer and politician, 18th Prime Minister of New Zealand (d. 1930) 1867 – Hector Guimard, French-American architect (d. 1942) 1867 – Lillian Wald, American nurse, humanitarian, and author, founded the Henry Street Settlement (d. 1940) 1870 – David Riazanov, Russian theorist and politician (d. 1938) 1873 – Jakob Wassermann, German-Austrian soldier and author (d. 1934) 1876 – Anna Hyatt Huntington, American sculptor (d. 1973) 1877 – Pascual Ortiz Rubio, Mexican diplomat and president (1930-1932) (d. 1963) 1881 – Jessie Boswell, English painter (d. 1956) 1888 – Barry Fitzgerald, Irish actor (d. 1961) 1890 – Albert Ogilvie, Australian politician, 28th Premier of Tasmania (d. 1939) 1892 – Arthur Honegger, French composer and educator (d. 1955) 1892 – Gregory La Cava, American director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 1952) 1896 – Frederick Coulton Waugh, British cartoonist, painter, teacher and author (d. 1973) 1900 – Violet Brown, Jamaican supercentenarian, oldest Jamaican ever (d. 2017) 1900 – Pandelis Pouliopoulos, Greek lawyer and politician (d. 1943) 1901 – Michel Seuphor, Belgian painter (d. 1999) 1901–present 1903 – Bix Beiderbecke, American cornet player, pianist, and composer (d. 1931) 1903 – Edward Bawden, British artist and illustrator (d. 1989) 1903 – Clare Boothe Luce, American playwright, journalist, and diplomat, United States Ambassador to Italy (d. 1987) 1915 – Harry Bertoia, Italian-American sculptor and furniture designer (d. 1978) 1915 – Joža Horvat, Croatian writer (d. 2012) 1917 – David Hare, American Surrealist artist, sculptor, photographer and painter (d. 1992) 1918 – Günther Rall, German general and pilot (d. 2009) 1919 – Leonor Oyarzún, Chilean socialite, First Lady of Chile from 1990 to 1994 (d. 2022). 1920 – Alfred Peet, Dutch-American businessman, founded Peet's Coffee & Tea (d. 2007) 1923 – Val Logsdon Fitch, American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2015) 1924 – Judith Jones, American literary and cookbook editor (d. 2017) 1925 – Bob Lanier, American lawyer, banker, and politician, Mayor of Houston (d. 2014) 1926 – Marques Haynes, American basketball player (d. 2015) 1927 – Claude Laydu, Belgian-French actor, producer, and screenwriter (d. 2011) 1928 – Sara Montiel, Spanish actress (d. 2013) 1928 – James Earl Ray, American criminal; assassin of Martin Luther King Jr. (d. 1998) 1929 – Sam Steiger, American journalist and politician (d. 2012) 1930 – Sándor Iharos, Hungarian runner (d. 1996) 1931 – Georges Dor, Canadian author, playwright, and composer (d. 2001) 1932 – Marcia Falkender, Baroness Falkender, English politician (d. 2019) 1934 – Gergely Kulcsár, Hungarian javelin thrower (d. 2020) 1935 – Graham Farmer, Australian footballer and coach (d. 2019) 1936 – Sepp Blatter, Swiss businessman 1938 – Norman Blake, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1939 – Asghar Ali Engineer, Indian activist and author (d. 2013) 1939 – Irina Press, Ukrainian-Russian hurdler and pentathlete (d. 2004) 1940 – Chuck Norris, American actor, producer, and martial artist 1940 – David Rabe, American playwright and screenwriter 1943 – Peter Berresford Ellis, English historian and author 1945 – Katharine Houghton, American actress and playwright 1945 – Madhavrao Scindia, Indian politician, Indian Minister of Railways (d. 2001) 1946 – Gérard Garouste, French contemporary artist 1946 – Jim Valvano, American basketball player and coach (d. 1993) 1947 – Kim Campbell, Canadian lawyer and politician, Prime Minister of Canada 1947 – Tom Scholz, American rock musician 1948 – Austin Carr, American basketball player 1951 – Gloria Diaz, Filipino actress and beauty queen, Miss Universe 1969 1952 – Morgan Tsvangirai, Zimbabwean politician, Prime Minister of Zimbabwe (d. 2018) 1953 – Paul Haggis, Canadian director, producer, and screenwriter 1955 – Toshio Suzuki, Japanese race car driver 1956 – Robert Llewellyn, English actor, producer, and screenwriter 1956 – Larry Myricks, American long jumper and sprinter 1957 – Osama bin Laden, Saudi Arabian terrorist, founded al-Qaeda (d. 2011) 1958 – Garth Crooks, English footballer and sportscaster 1958 – Steve Howe, American baseball player (d. 2006) 1958 – Sharon Stone, American actress and producer 1961 – Laurel Clark, American captain, physician, and astronaut (d. 2003) 1962 – Jasmine Guy, American actress, singer, and director 1962 – Seiko Matsuda, Japanese singer-songwriter 1963 – Jeff Ament, American bass player and songwriter 1963 – Rick Rubin, American record producer 1964 – Neneh Cherry, Swedish singer-songwriter 1964 – Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex 1965 – Jillian Richardson, Canadian sprinter 1965 – Rod Woodson, American football player, coach, and sportscaster 1966 – Mike Timlin, American baseball player 1968 – Pavel Srníček, Czech footballer and coach (d. 2015) 1968 – Alma Čardžić, Bosnian singer 1971 – Jon Hamm, American actor and director 1972 – Timbaland, American rapper and producer 1973 – Jason Croker, Australian rugby league player and coach 1973 – Chris Sutton, English footballer 1973 – Mauricio Taricco, Argentinian footballer and assistant manager 1976 – Barbara Schett, Austrian tennis player 1977 – Shannon Miller American gymnast 1978 – Camille, French singer-songwriter and actress 1978 – Benjamin Burnley, American musician 1981 – Samuel Eto'o, Cameroonian footballer 1981 – Steven Reid, English-Irish footballer 1982 – Kwame Brown, American basketball player 1983 – Étienne Boulay, Canadian football player 1983 – Rafe Spall, English actor 1983 – Janet Mock, American journalist, author, and activist 1983 – Carrie Underwood, American singer-songwriter and actress 1984 – Ben May, English footballer 1987 – Martellus Bennett, American football player 1987 – Greg Eastwood, New Zealand rugby league player 1987 – Māris Štrombergs, Latvian BMX racer 1988 – Josh Hoffman, Australian-New Zealand rugby league player 1988 – Ego Nwodim, actress and repertory player on Saturday Night Live 1988 – Ivan Rakitić, Croatian football player 1992 – Neeskens Kebano, French-born Congolese international footballer 1993 – Jack Butland, English footballer 1993 – Aminata Namasia, Congolese politician 1994 – Nikita Parris, English footballer 1995 – DaeSean Hamilton, American football player 1995 – Zach LaVine, American basketball player 1995 – Sergey Mozgov, Russian ice dancer 1997 – Belinda Bencic, Swiss tennis player Deaths Pre-1600 483 – Pope Simplicius 948 – Liu Zhiyuan, Shatuo founder of the Later Han dynasty (b. 895) 1291 – Arghun, Mongol ruler in Persia (b. c.1258) 1315 – Agnes Blannbekin, Austrian mystic 1513 – John de Vere, 13th Earl of Oxford, English commander and politician, Lord High Constable of England (b. 1442) 1528 – Balthasar Hübmaier, German/Moravian Anabaptist leader 1572 – William Paulet, 1st Marquess of Winchester 1585 – Rembert Dodoens, Flemish physician and botanist (b. 1517) 1601–1900 1682 – Jacob van Ruisdael, Dutch painter and etcher (b. 1628) 1724 – Urban Hjärne, Swedish chemist, geologist, and physician (b. 1641) 1776 – Élie Catherine Fréron, French author and critic (b. 1718) 1792 – John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute, Scottish politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1713) 1826 – John Pinkerton, Scottish antiquarian, cartographer, author, numismatist and historian (b. 1758) 1832 – Muzio Clementi, Italian pianist, composer, and conductor (b. 1752) 1861 – Taras Shevchenko, Ukrainian poet, playwright, and ethnographer (b. 1814) 1872 – Giuseppe Mazzini, Italian journalist and politician (b. 1805) 1895 – Charles Frederick Worth, English-French fashion designer (b. 1825) 1897 – Savitribai Phule, Indian poet and activist (b. 1831) 1898 – Marie-Eugénie de Jésus, French nun and saint, founded the Religious of the Assumption (b. 1817) 1901–present 1910 – Karl Lueger, Austrian lawyer and politician Mayor of Vienna (b. 1844) 1910 – Carl Reinecke, German pianist, composer, and conductor (b. 1824) 1913 – Harriet Tubman, American nurse and activist (b. c.1820) 1925 – Myer Prinstein, Polish-American jumper (b. 1878) 1937 – Yevgeny Zamyatin, Russian journalist and author (b. 1884) 1940 – Mikhail Bulgakov, Russian novelist and playwright (b. 1891) 1942 – Wilbur Scoville, American pharmacist and chemist (b. 1865) 1948 – Zelda Fitzgerald, American author, visual artist, and ballet dancer (b. 1900) 1948 – Jan Masaryk, Czech soldier and politician (b. 1886) 1951 – Kijūrō Shidehara, Japanese lawyer and politician, Prime Minister of Japan (b. 1872) 1966 – Frits Zernike, Dutch physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1888) 1966 – Frank O'Connor, Irish short story writer, novelist, and poet (b. 1903) 1977 – E. Power Biggs, English-American organist and composer (b. 1906) 1985 – Konstantin Chernenko, Russian soldier and politician, Head of State of The Soviet Union (b. 1911) 1985 – Bob Nieman, American baseball player (b. 1927) 1986 – Ray Milland, Welsh-American actor and director (b. 1907) 1988 – Andy Gibb, Australian singer-songwriter and actor (b. 1958) 1992 – Giorgos Zampetas, Greek bouzouki player and composer (b. 1925) 1996 – Ross Hunter, American film producer (b. 1926) 1997 – LaVern Baker, American singer and actress (b. 1929) 1998 – Lloyd Bridges, American actor and director (b. 1913) 1999 – Oswaldo Guayasamín, Ecuadorian painter and sculptor (b. 1919) 2005 – Dave Allen, Irish-English comedian, actor, and screenwriter (b. 1936) 2007 – Ernie Ladd, American football player and wrestler (b. 1938) 2010 – Muhammad Sayyid Tantawy, Egyptian scholar and academic (b. 1928) 2010 – Corey Haim, Canadian actor (b. 1971) 2011 – Bill Blackbeard, American author and illustrator (b. 1926) 2012 – Jean Giraud, French author and illustrator (b. 1938) 2012 – Frank Sherwood Rowland, American chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1927) 2013 – Princess Lilian, Duchess of Halland, British born Swedish Princess (b.1915) 2015 – Richard Glatzer, American director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1952) 2016 – Ken Adam, German-English production designer and art director (b. 1921) 2016 – Roberto Perfumo, Argentinian footballer and sportscaster 2016 – Jovito Salonga, Filipino lawyer and politician, 14th President of the Senate of the Philippines (b. 1920) 2016 – Anita Brookner, English novelist and art historian (b. 1928) Holidays and observances Christian feast day Attala Harriet Tubman (Lutheran) John Ogilvie Macarius of Jerusalem Marie-Eugénie de Jésus Pope Simplicius Sojourner Truth (Lutheran) March 10 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Harriet Tubman Day (United States of America) Holocaust Remembrance Day (Bulgaria) Mario Day (Globally) Men's Day (Poland) National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day (United States) Székely Freedom Day (Romania) Tibetan Uprising Day (Tibetan independence movement) References External links BBC: On This Day Historical Events on March 10 Today in Canadian History Days of the year March

20197

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March%2012

March 12

Events Pre-1600 538 – Vitiges, king of the Ostrogoths ends his siege of Rome and retreats to Ravenna, leaving the city in the hands of the victorious Byzantine general, Belisarius. 1158 - German city Munich (München) is first mentioned as forum apud Munichen in the Augsburg arbitration by Holy Roman Emperor Friedrich I. 1601–1900 1622 – Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier, founders of the Society of Jesus, are canonized by the Roman Catholic Church. 1689 – James II of England landed at Kinsale, starting the Williamite War in Ireland. 1811 – Peninsular War: A day after a successful rearguard action, French Marshal Michel Ney once again successfully delays the pursuing Anglo-Portuguese force at the Battle of Redinha. 1901–present 1912 – The Girl Guides (later renamed the Girl Scouts of the USA) are founded in the United States. 1913 – The future capital of Australia is officially named Canberra. 1918 – Moscow becomes the capital of Russia again after Saint Petersburg held this status for most of the period since 1713. 1920 – The Kapp Putsch begins when the Marinebrigade Ehrhardt is ordered to march on Berlin. 1928 – In California, the St. Francis Dam fails; the resulting floods kill 431 people. 1930 – Mahatma Gandhi begins the Salt March, a 200-mile march to the sea to protest the British monopoly on salt in India. 1933 – Great Depression: Franklin D. Roosevelt addresses the nation for the first time as President of the United States. This is also the first of his "fireside chats". 1938 – Anschluss: German troops occupy and absorb Austria. 1940 – Winter War: Finland signs the Moscow Peace Treaty with the Soviet Union, ceding almost all of Finnish Karelia. 1942 – The Battle of Java ends with the surrender of the American-British-Dutch-Australian Command to the Japanese Empire in Bandung, West Java, Dutch East Indies. 1947 – Cold War: The Truman Doctrine is proclaimed to help stem the spread of Communism. 1950 – The Llandow air disaster kills 80 people when the aircraft they are travelling in crashes near Sigingstone, Wales. At the time this was the world's deadliest air disaster. 1967 – Suharto takes power from Sukarno when the People's Consultative Assembly inaugurate him as Acting President of Indonesia. 1968 – Mauritius achieves independence from the United Kingdom. 1971 – The 1971 Turkish military memorandum is sent to the Süleyman Demirel government of Turkey and the government resigns. 1989 – Sir Tim Berners-Lee submits his proposal to CERN for an information management system, which subsequently develops into the World Wide Web. 1992 – Mauritius becomes a republic while remaining a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. 1993 – Several bombs explode in Mumbai, India, killing about 300 people and injuring hundreds more. 1993 – North Korea announces that it will withdraw from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and refuses to allow inspectors access to its nuclear sites. 1999 – Former Warsaw Pact members the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland join NATO. 2003 – Zoran Đinđić, Prime Minister of Serbia, is assassinated in Belgrade. 2003 – The World Health Organization officially release a global warning of outbreaks of Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). 2004 – The President of South Korea, Roh Moo-hyun, is impeached by its National Assembly: the first such impeachment in the nation's history. 2009 – Financier Bernie Madoff pleads guilty to one of the largest frauds in Wall Street's history. 2011 – A reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant explodes and releases radioactivity into the atmosphere a day after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. 2014 – A gas explosion in the New York City neighborhood of East Harlem kills eight and injures 70 others. 2019 – In the House of Commons, the revised EU Withdrawal Bill was rejected by a margin of 149 votes. 2020 – The United States suspends travel from Europe due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Births Pre-1600 1270 – Charles, Count of Valois (d. 1325) 1515 – Caspar Othmayr, German Lutheran pastor and composer (d. 1553) 1601–1900 1607 – Paul Gerhardt, German poet and composer (d. 1676) 1613 – André Le Nôtre, French gardener and architect (d. 1700) 1626 – John Aubrey, English historian and philosopher (d. 1697) 1637 – Anne Hyde, Duchess of York and Albany (d. 1671) 1672 – Richard Steele, Irish-Welsh journalist and politician (d. 1729) 1685 – George Berkeley, Irish bishop and philosopher (d. 1753) 1710 – Thomas Arne, English composer (d. 1778) 1735 – François-Emmanuel Guignard, comte de Saint-Priest, French politician and diplomat (d. 1821) 1753 – Jean Denis, French politician, lawyer, jurist, journalist, and historian (d. 1827) 1766 – Claudius Buchanan, Scottish theologian (d. 1815) 1781 – Frederica of Baden, Queen consort to Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden (d. 1826) 1784 – William Buckland, English geologist and paleontologist; Dean of Westminster (d. 1856) 1795 – William Lyon Mackenzie, Scottish-Canadian journalist and politician, 1st Mayor of Toronto (d. 1861) 1795 – George Tyler Wood, American military officer and politician (d. 1858) 1806 – Jane Pierce, American wife of Franklin Pierce, 15th First Lady of the United States (d. 1863) 1807 – James Abbott, Indian Army officer (d. 1896) 1815 – Louis-Jules Trochu, French military leader and politician (d. 1896) 1821 – John Abbott, Canadian lawyer and politician, 3rd Prime Minister of Canada (d. 1893) 1821 – Medo Pucić, Croatian writer and politician (d. 1882) 1823 – Katsu Kaishū, Japanese statesman (d. 1899) 1824 – Gustav Kirchhoff, Russian-German physicist and academic (d. 1887) 1832 – Charles Boycott, English farmer and agent (d. 1897) 1834 – Hilary A. Herbert, Secretary of the Navy (d. 1919) 1835 – Simon Newcomb, Canadian-American astronomer and mathematician (d. 1909) 1835 – Sigismondo Savona, Maltese educator and politician (d. 1908) 1837 – Alexandre Guilmant, French organist and composer (d. 1911) 1838 – William Henry Perkin, English chemist and academic (d. 1907) 1843 – Gabriel Tarde, French sociologist and criminologist (d. 1904) 1855 – Eduard Birnbaum, Polish-born German cantor (d. 1920) 1857 – William V. Ranous, American actor and director (d. 1915) 1858 – Adolph Ochs, American publisher (d. 1935) 1859 – Ernesto Cesàro, Italian mathematician (d. 1906) 1860 – Eric Stenbock, Estonian poet and author (d. 1895) 1863 – Gabriele D'Annunzio, Italian soldier, journalist, poet, and playwright (d. 1938) 1863 – Vladimir Vernadsky, Russian and Ukrainian mineralogist and chemist (d. 1945) 1864 – W. H. R. Rivers, English anthropologist, neurologist, ethnologist, and psychiatrist (d. 1922) 1864 – Alice Tegnér, Swedish organist, composer, and educator (d. 1943) 1869 – George Forbes, New Zealand politician, 22nd Prime Minister of New Zealand (d. 1947) 1874 – Edmund Eysler, Austrian composer (d. 1949) 1877 – Wilhelm Frick, German lawyer and politician, German Federal Minister of the Interior (d. 1946) 1878 – Gemma Galgani, Italian mystic and saint (d. 1903) 1880 – Henry Drysdale Dakin, English-American chemist and academic (d. 1952) 1881 – Väinö Tanner, Finnish politician of Social Democratic Party of Finland; the Prime Minister of Finland (d. 1966) 1882 – Carlos Blanco Galindo, Bolivian politician (d. 1943) 1883 – Sándor Jávorka, Hungarian botanist (d. 1961) 1888 – Walter Hermann Bucher, German-American geologist and paleontologist (d. 1965) 1888 – Hans Knappertsbusch, German conductor (d. 1965) 1890 – Evert Taube, Swedish singer-songwriter and lute player (d. 1976) 1896 – Jesse Fuller, American singer-songwriter and musician (d. 1976) 1898 – Tian Han, Chinese playwright (d. 1968) 1898 – Luitpold Steidle, German army officer and politician (d. 1984) 1899 – Ramón Muttis, Argentine footballer (d. 1955) 1900 – Rinus van den Berge, Dutch athlete (d. 1972) 1900 – Sylvi Kekkonen, Finnish writer and wife of President of Finland Urho Kekkonen (d. 1974) 1900 – Gustavo Rojas Pinilla, 19th President of Colombia (d. 1975) 1901–present 1904 – Lyudmila Keldysh, Russian mathematician (d. 1976) 1905 – Takashi Shimura, Japanese actor (d. 1982) 1907 – Dorrit Hoffleit, American astronomer and academic (d. 2007) 1908 – Rita Angus, New Zealand painter (d. 1970) 1908 – David Marshall, Singaporean lawyer and politician, 1st Chief Minister of Singapore (d. 1995) 1909 – Petras Cvirka, Lithuanian author (d. 1947) 1910 – Masayoshi Ōhira, Japanese politician, 68th Prime Minister of Japan (d. 1980) 1910 – László Lékai, Archbishop of Esztergom and Cardinal (d. 1986) 1911 – Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, Mexican academic and politician, 49th President of Mexico (d. 1979) 1912 – Willie Hall, English international footballer (d. 1967) 1912 – Irving Layton, Romanian-Canadian poet and academic (d. 2006) 1913 – Yashwantrao Chavan, Indian politician, 5th Deputy Prime Minister of India (d. 1984) 1913 – Agathe von Trapp, Hungarian-American singer and author (d. 2010) 1915 – Alberto Burri, Italian painter and sculptor (d. 1995) 1915 – Jiří Mucha, Czech journalist (d. 1991) 1917 – Leonard Chess, American record company executive, co-founder of Chess Records (d. 1969) 1917 – Millard Kaufman, American author and screenwriter (d. 2009) 1917 – Googie Withers, Indian-Australian actress (d. 2011) 1918 – Pádraig Faulkner, Irish Fianna Fáil politician (d. 2012) 1918 – Elaine de Kooning, American painter and academic (d. 1989) 1921 – Gianni Agnelli, Italian businessman (d. 2001) 1921 – Gordon MacRae, American actor and singer (d. 1986) 1922 – Jack Kerouac, American author and poet (d. 1969) 1922 – Lane Kirkland, American sailor and union leader (d. 1999) 1923 – Hjalmar Andersen, Norwegian speed skater and cyclist (d. 2013) 1923 – Norbert Brainin, Austrian violinist (d. 2005) 1923 – Wally Schirra, American captain, pilot, and astronaut (d. 2007) 1923 – Mae Young, American wrestler (d. 2014) 1925 – Leo Esaki, Japanese physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate 1925 – Harry Harrison, American author and illustrator (d. 2012) 1926 – George Ariyoshi, American lawyer and politician, 3rd Governor of Hawaii 1926 – Arthur A. Hartman, American career diplomat (d. 2015) 1926 – John Clellon Holmes, American author and professor (d. 1988) 1926 – David Nadien, American violinist (d. 2014) 1927 – Raúl Alfonsín, Argentinian lawyer and politician, 46th President of Argentina (d. 2009) 1927 – Emmett Leith, professor of electrical engineering and co-inventor of three-dimensional holography (d. 2005) 1927 – Sudharmono, 5th Vice President of Indonesia (d. 2006) 1928 – Edward Albee, American director and playwright (d. 2016) 1929 – Win Tin, Burmese journalist and politician, co-founded the National League for Democracy (d. 2014) 1930 – Antony Acland, British former diplomat and Provost of Eton College 1931 – Józef Tischner, Polish priest and philosopher (d. 2000) 1932 – Bob Houbregs, Canadian basketball player (d. 2014) 1932 – Andrew Young, American pastor and politician, 14th United States Ambassador to the United Nations 1933 – Myrna Fahey, American actress (d. 1973) 1933 – Barbara Feldon, American actress 1934 – Francisco J. Ayala, Spanish-American evolutionary biologist and philosopher 1936 – Virginia Hamilton, American children's books author (d. 2002) 1936 – Michał Heller, Polish professor of philosophy 1936 – Eddie Sutton, American basketball player and coach (d. 2020) 1937 – Zoltán Horvath, Hungarian sabre fencer 1937 – Zurab Sotkilava, Georgian operatic tenor (d. 2017) 1938 – Vladimir Msryan, Armenian actor (d. 2010) 1938 – Johnny Rutherford, American race car driver and sportscaster 1938 – Ken Spears, American writer (d. 2020) 1938 – Juan Horacio Suárez, Argentine bishop 1938 – Ron Tutt, American drummer 1940 – Al Jarreau, American singer (d. 2017) 1941 – Josip Skoblar, former Croatian footballer 1942 – Jimmy Wynn, American baseball player (d. 2020) 1943 – Ratko Mladić, Serbian general 1944 – Erwin Mueller, former American basketball player (d. 2018) 1945 – Anne Summers, Australian feminist writer, editor, publisher and public servant 1946 – Dean Cundey, American cinematographer and film director 1946 – Liza Minnelli, American actress, singer and dancer 1946 – Frank Welker, American voice actor and singer 1947 – Peter Harry Carstensen, German educator and politician 1947 – Jan-Erik Enestam, Finland-Swedish politician 1947 – David Rigert, Soviet Olympic weightlifter 1947 – Mitt Romney, American businessman and politician, 70th Governor of Massachusetts 1948 – Virginia Bottomley, Scottish social worker and politician, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport 1948 – Kent Conrad, American politician 1948 – James Taylor, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1949 – Rob Cohen, American director, producer, and screenwriter 1949 – David Mellor, British politician 1950 – Javier Clemente, Spanish footballer and manager 1952 – André Comte-Sponville, French philosopher 1952 – Yasuhiko Okudera, former Japanese footballer 1952 – John Mitchell, English footballer, forward 1953 – Pavel Pinigin, former Soviet wrestler and Olympic champion 1954 – Anish Kapoor, Indian-English sculptor 1956 – Ove Aunli, former Norwegian cross-country skier 1956 – Stanisław Bobak, Polish ski jumper (d. 2010) 1956 – Steve Harris, English bass player and songwriter 1956 – Lesley Manville, English actress 1956 – Dale Murphy, American baseball player 1956 – Pim Verbeek, Dutch football manager (d. 2019) 1957 – Patrick Battiston, French footballer and coach 1957 – Marlon Jackson, American singer-songwriter and dancer 1957 – Andrey Lopatov, Soviet basketball player 1958 – Phil Anderson, English-Australian cyclist 1959 – Milorad Dodik, Bosnian Serb politician and president of Republika Srpska 1959 – Luenell, American comedian and actress 1959 – Michael Walter, German luger (d. 2016) 1960 – Jason Beghe, American actor 1960 – Courtney B. Vance, American actor and painter 1962 – Julia Campbell, American actress 1962 – Andreas Köpke, former German footballer 1962 – Chris Sanders, American illustrator and voice actor 1962 – Darryl Strawberry, American baseball player and minister 1963 – John Andretti, American race car driver (d. 2020) 1963 – Candy Costie, American swimmer 1963 – Joaquim Cruz, Brazilian runner and coach 1963 – Reiner Gies, German boxer 1963 – Ian Holloway, English footballer and manager 1963 – Paul Way, English golfer 1963 – Jake Weber, English actor 1964 – Dieter Eckstein, retired German footballer 1964 – Umirzak Shukeyev, Kazakh chairman of Samruk-Kazyna 1965 – Steve Finley, American baseball player 1965 – Ivari Padar, former Minister of Finance and Minister of Agriculture of the Estonian Social Democratic Party 1966 – David Daniels, American countertenor 1966 – Grant Long, American basketball player and sportscaster 1967 – Julio Dely Valdés, Panamanian footballer and manager 1968 – Tammy Duckworth, Thai-American colonel, pilot, and politician 1968 – Aaron Eckhart, American actor and producer 1969 – Graham Coxon, English singer-songwriter and guitarist 1969 – Jake Tapper, American journalist and author 1970 – Karen Bradley, British politician 1970 – Dave Eggers, American author and screenwriter 1970 – Mathias Grönberg, Swedish golfer 1970 – Rex Walters, American basketball player and coach 1971 – Isaiah Rider, American basketball player and rapper 1971 – Dragutin Topić, Serbian high jumper 1972 – Doron Sheffer, Israeli basketball player 1974 – Charles Akonnor, former Ghanaian footballer 1974 – Walid Badir, former Israeli footballer 1975 – Nicolae Grigore, former Romanian footballer 1975 – Edgaras Jankauskas, former Lithuanian footballer 1975 – Srđan Pecelj, Bosnian footballer 1976 – Deron Quint, American ice hockey defenseman 1976 – Zhao Wei, Chinese actress, film director, producer and pop singer 1977 – Michelle Burgher, track and field athlete 1977 – Ramiro Corrales, American soccer player 1977 – Amdy Faye, former Senegalese footballer 1977 – Brent Johnson, American ice hockey player 1978 – Casey Mears, American race car driver 1978 – Marco Ferreira, Portuguese footballer 1978 – Arina Tanemura, Japanese author and illustrator 1979 – Rhys Coiro, American actor 1979 – Pete Doherty, English musician, songwriter, actor, poet, writer, and artist 1979 – Jamie Dwyer, Australian field hockey player and coach 1979 – Gerard López, former Spanish footballer 1979 – Ben Sandford, New Zealand skeleton racer 1979 – Tim Wieskötter, German sprint canoer 1979 – Edwin Villafuerte, Ecuadorian goalkeeper 1980 – Césinha, Brazilian footballer 1980 – Becky Holliday, American pole vaulter 1980 – Jens Mouris, Dutch cyclist 1980 – Douglas Murray, Swedish ice hockey player 1981 – Kenta Kobayashi, Japanese wrestler and kick-boxer 1981 – Katarina Srebotnik, Slovenian tennis player 1981 – Holly Williams, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1982 – Lili Bordán, Hungarian-American actress 1982 – Samm Levine, American actor and comedian 1982 – Ilya Nikulin, Russian ice hockey player 1982 – Hisato Satō, Japanese footballer 1982 – Yūto Satō, Japanese footballer 1982 – Tobias Schweinsteiger, German footballer 1983 – Atif Aslam, Pakistani singer and actor 1984 – Shreya Ghoshal, Indian singer 1984 – Jaimie Alexander, American actress 1985 – Marco Bonanomi, Italian racing driver 1985 – Aleksandr Bukharov, Russian footballer 1985 – Ed Clancy, English track and road cyclist 1985 – Andriy Tovt, Ukrainian footballer 1986 – Martynas Andriuškevičius, Lithuanian basketball player 1986 – Oleh Dopilka, Ukrainian footballer 1986 – Danny Jones, English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and actor 1986 – Ben Offereins, Australian runner 1986 – František Rajtoral, Czech footballer (d. 2017) 1987 – Manuele Boaro, Italian cyclist 1987 – Jessica Hardy, American swimmer 1987 – Maxwell Holt, American volleyball player 1987 – Teimour Radjabov, Azerbaijani chess player 1987 – Chris Seitz, American soccer player 1987 – Vadim Shipachyov, Russian ice hockey player 1987 – Pablo Velázquez, Paraguayan footballer 1988 – Sebastian Brendel, German canoe racer 1988 – Kostas Mitroglou, Greek footballer 1988 – Cristian Chagas Tarouco, Brazilian footballer 1989 – Jordan Adéoti, French footballer 1989 – Vytautas Černiauskas, Lithuanian footballer 1989 – Tyler Clary, former American swimmer 1989 – Richard Eckersley, English footballer 1989 – Chen Jianghua, Chinese basketball player 1989 – Siim Luts, Estonian footballer 1990 – Alexander Kröckel, German skeleton racer 1990 – Irakli Kvekveskiri, Georgian footballer 1990 – Dawid Kubacki, Polish ski jumper 1990 – Matias Myttynen, Finnish ice hockey player 1990 – Ilija Nestorovski, Macedonian footballer 1990 – Milena Raičević, Montenegrin handballer 1990 – Mikko Sumusalo, Finnish footballer 1991 – Felix Kroos, German footballer 1991 – Niclas Heimann, German footballer 1991 – Leandro Fernandez, Argentine footballer 1992 – Daniele Baselli, Italian footballer 1992 – Jordan Ferri, French footballer 1992 – Ciara Mageean, Irish middle-distance runner 1992 – Jiří Skalák, Czech footballer 1993 – Shehu Abdullahi, Nigerian footballer 1993 – Amjad Attwan, Iraqi footballer 1993 – Anton Shramchenko, Belarusian footballer 1994 – Katie Archibald, Scottish track cyclist 1994 – Jerami Grant, American basketball player 1994 – Christina Grimmie, American singer-songwriter (d. 2016) 1996 – Sehrou Guirassy, French footballer 1996 – Karim Hafez, Egyptian footballer 1996 – Robert Murić, Croatian footballer 1997 – Dean Henderson, English footballer 1997 – Allan Saint-Maximin, French footballer 1997 – Felipe Vizeu, Brazilian footballer 1998 – Mecole Hardman, American football player 1998 – Daniel Samohin, Israeli figure skater 1998 – Elizaveta Ukolova, Czech figure skater 2001 – Kim Min-kyu, South Korean singer and actor Deaths Pre-1600 417 – Innocent I, pope of the Catholic Church 604 – Gregory I, pope of the Catholic Church (b. 540) 1022 – Symeon the New Theologian (b. 949) 1316 – Stefan Dragutin (b. c. 1244) 1539 – Thomas Boleyn, 1st Earl of Wiltshire, English diplomat and politician (b.1477) 1601–1900 1699 – Peder Griffenfeld, Danish politician (b. 1635) 1898 – Zachris Topelius, Finnish-Swedish journalist, historian, and author (b. 1818) 1901–present 1916 – Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach, Austrian author (b. 1830) 1925 – Sun Yat-sen, Chinese physician and politician, 1st President of the Republic of China (b. 1866) 1929 – Asa Griggs Candler, American businessman and politician, 44th Mayor of Atlanta (b. 1851) 1935 – Mihajlo Pupin, Serbian-American physicist and chemist (b. 1858) 1942 – William Henry Bragg, English physicist, chemist, and mathematician, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1862) 1943 – Gustav Vigeland, Norwegian sculptor (b. 1869) 1946 – Ferenc Szálasi, Hungarian soldier and politician, Head of State of Hungary (b. 1897) 1949 – Wilhelm Steinkopf, German chemist (b. 1879) 1954 – Marianne Weber, German sociologist and suffragist (b. 1870) 1955 – Charlie Parker, American saxophonist and composer (b. 1920) 1955 – Theodor Plievier, German author best known for his anti-war novel (b. 1892) 1957 – Josephine Hull, American actress (b. 1877) 1971 – Eugene Lindsay Opie, American physician and pathologist (b. 1873) 1973 – Frankie Frisch, American baseball player and manager (b. 1898) 1974 – George D. Sax, American banker and businessman (b. 1904) 1985 – Eugene Ormandy, Hungarian-American violinist and conductor (b. 1899) 1989 – Maurice Evans, English-American actor (b. 1901) 1991 – Ragnar Granit, Finnish-Swedish neuroscientist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1900) 1991 – William Heinesen, Faroese author, poet, and author (b. 1900) 1992 – Lucy M. Lewis, American potter (b. 1890) 1998 – Beatrice Wood, American painter and potter (b. 1893) 1999 – Yehudi Menuhin, American-Swiss violinist and conductor (b. 1916) 1999 – Bidu Sayão, Brazilian-American soprano (b. 1902) 2000 – Aleksandar Nikolić, Yugoslav basketball coach (b. 1924) 2001 – Morton Downey Jr., American singer-songwriter, actor, and talk show host (b. 1933) 2001 – Robert Ludlum, American author (b. 1927) 2001 – Victor Westhoff, Dutch botanist and academic (b. 1916) 2002 – Spyros Kyprianou, Cypriot lawyer and politician, 2nd President of Cyprus (b. 1932) 2002 – Jean-Paul Riopelle, Canadian painter and sculptor (b. 1923) 2003 – Zoran Đinđić, Serbian philosopher and politician, 6th Prime Minister of Serbia (b. 1952) 2003 – Howard Fast, American novelist and screenwriter (b. 1914) 2003 – Lynne Thigpen, American actress and singer (b. 1948) 2004 – Milton Resnick, Russian-American painter (b. 1917) 2006 – Victor Sokolov, Russian-American priest and journalist (b. 1947) 2008 – Jorge Guinzburg, Argentinian journalist and producer (b. 1949) 2008 – Lazare Ponticelli, Italian-French soldier and supercentenarian (b. 1897) 2010 – Miguel Delibes, Spanish journalist and author (b. 1920) 2011 – Nilla Pizzi, Italian singer (b. 1919) 2012 – Dick Harter, American basketball player and coach (b. 1930) 2012 – Michael Hossack, American drummer (b. 1946) 2012 – Friedhelm Konietzka, German-Swiss footballer and manager (b. 1938) 2013 – Michael Grigsby, English director and producer (b. 1936) 2013 – Ganesh Pyne, Indian painter and illustrator (b. 1937) 2014 – Věra Chytilová, Czech actress, director, and screenwriter (b. 1929) 2014 – Paul C. Donnelly, American scientist and engineer (b. 1923) 2014 – José Policarpo, Portuguese cardinal (b. 1936) 2015 – Willie Barrow, American minister and activist (b. 1924) 2015 – Michael Graves, American architect and academic, designed the Portland Building and the Humana Building (b. 1934) 2015 – Ada Jafri, Pakistani poet and author (b. 1924) 2015 – Terry Pratchett, English journalist, author, and screenwriter (b. 1948) 2016 – Rafiq Azad, Bangladeshi poet and author (b. 1942) 2016 – Felix Ibru, Nigerian architect and politician, Governor of Delta State (b. 1935) 2016 – Lloyd Shapley, American mathematician and economist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1923) 2021 – Ronald DeFeo Jr., American criminal (b. 1951) Holidays and observances Arbor Day (China) Arbor Day (Taiwan) Aztec New Year Christian feast day: Alphege Bernard of Carinola (or of Capua) Gorgonius, Peter Cubicularius and Dorotheus of Nicomedia Mura (McFeredach) Fina Maximilian of Tebessa Paul Aurelian Pope Gregory I (Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Catholic Church, and Anglican Communion) Theophanes the Confessor March 12 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) National Day (Mauritius) World Day Against Cyber Censorship Youth Day (Zambia) References External links BBC: On This Day Historical Events on March 12 Today in Canadian History Days of the year March

20199

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March%2014

March 14

Events Pre-1600 1074 – Battle of Mogyoród: Dukes Géza and Ladislaus defeat their cousin Solomon, King of Hungary, forcing him to flee to Hungary's western borderland. 1590 – Battle of Ivry: Henry of Navarre and the Huguenots defeat the forces of the Catholic League under Charles, Duke of Mayenne, during the French Wars of Religion. 1601–1900 1647 – Thirty Years' War: Bavaria, Cologne, France and Sweden sign the Truce of Ulm. 1663 – According to his own account, Otto von Guericke completes his book De Vacuo. 1674 – The Third Anglo-Dutch War: The Battle of Ronas Voe results in the Dutch East India Company ship Wapen van Rotterdam being captured with a death toll of up to 300 Dutch crew and soldiers. 1757 – Admiral Sir John Byng is executed by firing squad aboard for breach of the Articles of War. 1780 – American Revolutionary War: Spanish forces capture Fort Charlotte in Mobile, Alabama, the last British frontier post capable of threatening New Orleans. 1794 – Eli Whitney is granted a patent for the cotton gin. 1885 – The Mikado, a light opera by W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan, receives its first public performance at the Savoy Theatre in London. 1900 – The Gold Standard Act is ratified, placing the United States currency on the gold standard. 1901–present 1901 – Utah governor Heber Manning Wells has vetoed a bill that would have eased restriction on polygamy. 1903 – Pelican Island National Wildlife Refuge, the first national wildlife refuge in the US, is established by President Theodore Roosevelt. 1920 – In the second of the 1920 Schleswig plebiscites, about 80% of the population in Zone II votes to remain part of Weimar Germany. 1926 – The El Virilla train accident, Costa Rica, kills 248 people and wounds another 93 when a train falls off a bridge over the Río Virilla between Heredia and Tibás. 1931 – Alam Ara, India's first talking film, is released. 1939 – Slovakia declares independence under German pressure. 1942 – Anne Miller becomes the first American patient to be treated with penicillin, under the care of Orvan Hess and John Bumstead. 1943 – The Holocaust: The liquidation of the Kraków Ghetto is completed. 1945 – The R.A.F. drop the Grand Slam bomb in action for the first time, on a railway viaduct near Bielefeld, Germany. 1951 – Korean War: United Nations troops recapture Seoul for the second time. 1961 – A USAF B-52 bomber crashes near Yuba City, California whilst carrying nuclear weapons. 1964 – Jack Ruby is convicted of killing Lee Harvey Oswald, the assumed assassin of John F. Kennedy. 1967 – The body of U.S. President John F. Kennedy is moved to a permanent burial place at Arlington National Cemetery. 1972 – Sterling Airways Flight 296 crashes near Kalba, United Arab Emirates while on approach to Dubai International Airport, killing 112 people. 1978 – The Israel Defense Forces launch Operation Litani, a seven-day campaign to invade and occupy southern Lebanon. 1980 – LOT Flight 7 crashes during final approach near Warsaw, Poland, killing 87 people, including a 14-man American boxing team. 1982 – The South African government bombs the headquarters of the African National Congress in London. 1988 – In the Johnson South Reef Skirmish Chinese forces defeat Vietnamese forces in an altercation over control of one of the Spratly Islands. 1995 – Norman Thagard becomes the first American astronaut to ride to space on board a Russian launch vehicle. 2006 – The 2006 Chadian coup d'état attempt ends in failure. 2007 – The Nandigram violence in Nandigram, West Bengal, results in the deaths of at least 14 people. 2008 – A series of riots, protests, and demonstrations erupt in Lhasa and subsequently spread elsewhere in Tibet. 2017 – A naming ceremony for the chemical element nihonium takes place in Tokyo, with then Crown Prince Naruhito in attendance. 2019 – Cyclone Idai makes landfall near Beira, Mozambique, causing devastating floods and over 1000 deaths. Births Pre-1600 1601–1900 1638 – Johann Georg Gichtel, German mystic (d. 1710) 1790 – Ludwig Emil Grimm, German painter and engraver (d. 1863) 1800 – James Bogardus, American inventor and architect (d. 1874) 1801 – Kristjan Jaak Peterson, Estonian poet (d. 1822) 1804 – Johann Strauss I, Austrian composer and conductor (d. 1849) 1813 – Joseph P. Bradley, American lawyer and jurist (d. 1892) 1820 – Victor Emmanuel II of Italy (d. 1878) 1822 – Teresa Cristina of the Two Sicilies (d. 1889) 1823 – Théodore de Banville, French poet and critic (d. 1891) 1833 – Frederic Shields, English painter and illustrator (d. 1911) 1833 – Lucy Hobbs Taylor, American dentist and educator (d. 1910) 1835 – Giovanni Schiaparelli, Italian astronomer and historian (d. 1910) 1836 – Isabella Beeton, English author of Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management (d. 1865) 1837 – Charles Ammi Cutter, American librarian (d. 1903) 1844 – Umberto I of Italy (d. 1900) 1844 – Arthur O'Shaughnessy, English poet and herpetologist (d. 1881) 1847 – Castro Alves, Brazilian poet and playwright (d. 1871) 1853 – Ferdinand Hodler, Swiss painter (d. 1918) 1854 – Paul Ehrlich, German physician and biologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1915) 1854 – John Lane, English publisher, co-founded The Bodley Head (d. 1925) 1854 – Alexandru Macedonski, Romanian author and poet (d. 1920) 1854 – Thomas R. Marshall, American lawyer and politician, 28th Vice President of the United States of America (d. 1925) 1862 – Vilhelm Bjerknes, Norwegian physicist and meteorologist (d. 1951) 1863 – Casey Jones, American engineer (d. 1900) 1868 – Emily Murphy, Canadian jurist, author, and activist (d. 1933) 1869 – Algernon Blackwood, English author and playwright (d. 1951) 1874 – Anton Philips, Dutch businessman, co-founded Philips Electronics (d. 1951) 1879 – Albert Einstein, German-American physicist, engineer, and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1955) 1882 – Wacław Sierpiński, Polish mathematician and academic (d. 1969) 1885 – Raoul Lufbery, French-American soldier and pilot (d. 1918) 1886 – Firmin Lambot, Belgian cyclist (d. 1964) 1887 – Sylvia Beach, American-French bookseller and publisher, who founded Shakespeare and Company (d. 1962) 1898 – Reginald Marsh, French-American painter and illustrator (d. 1954) 1899 – K. C. Irving, Canadian businessman, founded Irving Oil (d. 1992) 1901–present 1901 – Sid Atkinson, South African hurdler and long jumper (d. 1977) 1903 – Adolph Gottlieb, American painter and sculptor (d. 1974) 1904 – Doris Eaton Travis, American actress and dancer (d. 2010) 1905 – Raymond Aron, French journalist, sociologist, and philosopher (d. 1983) 1906 – Ulvi Cemal Erkin, Turkish composer and educator (d. 1972) 1908 – Ed Heinemann, American designer of military aircraft (d. 1991) 1908 – Maurice Merleau-Ponty, French philosopher and academic (d. 1961) 1908 – Philip Conrad Vincent, English engineer and businessman, founded Vincent Motorcycles (d. 1979) 1911 – Akira Yoshizawa, Japanese origamist (d. 2005) 1912 – Cliff Bastin, English footballer (d. 1991) 1912 – Les Brown, American saxophonist, composer, and bandleader (d. 2001) 1912 – W. Graham Claytor, Jr. American lieutenant, lawyer, and politician, 15th United States Secretary of the Navy (d. 1994) 1912 – W. Willard Wirtz, American lawyer and politician, 10th United States Secretary of Labor (d. 2010) 1914 – Lee Hays, American singer-songwriter (d. 1981) 1914 – Bill Owen, English actor and songwriter (d. 1999) 1914 – Lee Petty, American race car driver and businessman, founded Petty Enterprises (d. 2000) 1915 – Alexander Brott, Canadian violinist, composer, and conductor (d. 2005) 1916 – Horton Foote, American author, playwright, and screenwriter (d. 2009) 1917 – Alan Smith, English lieutenant and pilot (d. 2013) 1918 – Zoia Horn, American librarian (d. 2014) 1919 – Max Shulman, American author and screenwriter (d. 1988) 1920 – Hank Ketcham, American author and cartoonist, created Dennis the Menace (d. 2001) 1920 – Dorothy Tyler-Odam, English high jumper (d. 2014) 1921 – S. Truett Cathy, American businessman, founded Chick-fil-A (d. 2014) 1921 – Ada Louise Huxtable, American author and critic (d. 2013) 1922 – Les Baxter, American pianist and composer (d. 1996) 1923 – Diane Arbus, American photographer (d. 1971) 1925 – William Clay Ford, Sr., American businessman (d. 2014) 1925 – Joseph A. Unanue, American sergeant and businessman (d. 2013) 1926 – François Morel, Canadian pianist, composer, conductor, and educator (d. 2018) 1928 – Frank Borman, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut 1928 – Félix Rodríguez de la Fuente, Spanish environmentalist (d. 1980) 1929 – Bob Goalby, American golfer 1932 – Mark Murphy, American singer-songwriter and actor (d. 2015) 1932 – Naina Yeltsina, Russian wife of Boris Yeltsin, First Lady of Russia 1933 – Michael Caine, English actor and author 1933 – Quincy Jones, American singer-songwriter, trumpet player, and producer 1934 – Eugene Cernan, American captain, pilot, and astronaut (d. 2017) 1934 – Paul Rader, American 15th General of The Salvation Army 1936 – Bob Charles, New Zealand golfer 1937 – Peter van der Merwe, South African cricketer and referee (d. 2013) 1938 – Eleanor Bron, English actress and screenwriter 1938 – Jan Crouch, American televangelist, co-founder of the Trinity Broadcasting Network (d. 2016) 1938 – John Gleeson, Australian cricketer (d. 2016) 1938 – Árpád Orbán, Hungarian footballer (d. 2008) 1939 – Raymond J. Barry, American actor 1939 – Bertrand Blier, French director and screenwriter 1939 – Yves Boisset, French director and screenwriter 1941 – Wolfgang Petersen, German-American director, producer, and screenwriter 1942 – Rita Tushingham, English actress 1943 – Anita Morris, American actress and singer (d. 1994) 1944 – Boris Brott, Canadian composer and conductor 1944 – Václav Nedomanský, Czech ice hockey player and manager 1944 – Bobby Smith, English footballer and manager 1944 – Tom Stannage, Australian historian and academic (d. 2012) 1945 – Jasper Carrott, English comedian, actor, and game show host 1945 – Michael Martin Murphey, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1945 – Walter Parazaider, American saxophonist 1946 – William Lerach, American securities and class action attorney 1946 – Wes Unseld, American basketball player, coach, and manager (d. 2020) 1947 – Roy Budd, English pianist and composer (d. 1993) 1947 – William J. Jefferson, American lawyer and politician 1947 – Jona Lewie, English singer-songwriter and keyboard player 1948 – Tom Coburn, American physician and politician (d. 2020) 1948 – Billy Crystal, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter 1948 – Theo Jansen, Dutch sculptor 1950 – Rick Dees, American actor and radio host 1951 – Jerry Greenfield, American businessman and philanthropist, co-founded Ben & Jerry's 1953 – Nick Keir, Scottish singer-songwriter (d. 2013) 1955 – Jonathan Kaufer, American director and screenwriter (d. 2013) 1956 – Indu Malhotra, Judge of the Supreme Court of India 1956 – Alexey Pajitnov, Russian video game designer and computer engineer, creator of Tetris 1956 – Butch Wynegar, American baseball player and coach 1957 – Tad Williams, American author 1958 – Albert II, Prince of Monaco 1959 – Laila Robins, American actress 1959 – Tamara Tunie, American actress 1960 – Heidi Hammel, American astronomer and academic 1960 – Kirby Puckett, American baseball player (d. 2006) 1961 – Garry Jack, Australian rugby league player and coach 1961 – Mike Lazaridis, Greek–Canadian businessman and philanthropist, founded BlackBerry Limited 1963 – Bruce Reid, Australian cricketer and coach 1965 – Kevin Brown, American baseball player and coach 1965 – Aamir Khan, Indian film actor, producer, and director 1965 – Billy Sherwood, American guitarist, songwriter, and producer 1965 – Kevin Williamson, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter 1966 – Jonas Elmer, Danish actor, director, and screenwriter 1966 – Elise Neal, American actress and producer 1968 – Megan Follows, Canadian-American actress 1969 – Larry Johnson, American basketball player and actor 1970 – Kristian Bush, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1972 – Irom Chanu Sharmila, Indian poet and activist 1973 – Rohit Shetty, Indian film director and producer 1974 – Patrick Traverse, Canadian ice hockey player 1975 – Steve Harper, English footballer and referee 1975 – Dmitri Markov, Belarusian-Australian pole vaulter 1976 – Phil Vickery, English rugby player and sportscaster 1977 – Vadims Fjodorovs, Latvian footballer and coach 1977 – Naoki Matsuda, Japanese footballer (d. 2011) 1977 – Jeremy Paul, New Zealand-Australian rugby player 1978 – Pieter van den Hoogenband, Dutch swimmer 1979 – Nicolas Anelka, French footballer and manager 1979 – Chris Klein, American actor 1979 – Sead Ramović, German-Bosnian footballer 1980 – Aaron Brown, English footballer and coach 1980 – Ben Herring, New Zealand rugby player 1981 – Bobby Jenks, American baseball player 1981 – George Wilson, American football player 1982 – Carlos Marinelli, Argentinian footballer 1982 – François Sterchele, Belgian footballer (d. 2008) 1983 – Bakhtiyar Artayev, Kazakh boxer 1986 – Elton Chigumbura, Zimbabwean cricketer 1986 – Jessica Gallagher, Australian skier and cyclist 1986 – Andy Taylor, English footballer 1988 – Stephen Curry, American basketball player 1988 – Rico Freimuth, German decathlete 1989 – Kevin Lacroix, Canadian race car driver 1990 – Joe Allen, Welsh footballer 1990 – Tamás Kádár, Hungarian footballer 1990 – Haru Kuroki, Japanese actress 1990 – Kolbeinn Sigþórsson, Icelandic footballer 1991 – Emir Bekrić, Serbian hurdler 1991 – László Szűcs, Hungarian footballer 1991 – Steven Zellner, German footballer 1993 – Philipp Ziereis, German footballer 1994 – Ansel Elgort, American actor and DJ 1996 – Batuhan Altıntaş, Turkish footballer 1997 – Simone Biles, American gymnast 2000 – Paige Rini, Canadian water skier 2008 – Abby Ryder Fortson, American actress Deaths Pre-1600 840 – Einhard, Frankish scholar 968 – Matilda of Ringelheim, Saxon queen (b. c. 896) 1555 – John Russell, 1st Earl of Bedford (b. 1485) 1601–1900 1647 – Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange (b. 1584) 1648 – Ferdinando Fairfax, 2nd Lord Fairfax of Cameron, English general and politician (b. 1584) 1696 – Jean Domat, French lawyer and jurist (b. 1625) 1748 – George Wade, Irish field marshal and politician (b. 1673) 1757 – John Byng, British admiral and politician, 11th Commodore Governor of Newfoundland (b. 1704) 1791 – Johann Salomo Semler, German historian and critic (b. 1725) 1803 – Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock, German poet (b. 1724) 1811 – Augustus FitzRoy, 3rd Duke of Grafton, English academic and politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1735) 1823 – Charles François Dumouriez, French general and politician, French Minister of War (b. 1739) 1860 – Carl Ritter von Ghega, Italian engineer, designed the Semmering railway (b. 1802) 1877 – Juan Manuel de Rosas, Argentinian general and politician, 17th Governor of Buenos Aires Province (b. 1793) 1883 – Karl Marx, German philosopher and theorist (b. 1818) 1884 – Quintino Sella, Italian economist and politician, Italian Minister of Finances (b. 1827) 1901–present 1921 – Bernard Ryan executed Irish republican (b. 1901) 1923 – Charlie Daly, Executed Irish republican (b. 1896) 1932 – George Eastman, American inventor and businessman, founded Eastman Kodak (b. 1854) 1953 – Klement Gottwald, Czechoslovak Communist politician and 14th President of Czechoslovakia (b. 1896) 1957 – Evagoras Pallikarides, Cypriot activist (b. 1938) 1965 – Marion Jones Farquhar, American tennis player (b. 1879) 1968 – Erwin Panofsky, German historian and academic (b. 1892) 1969 – Ben Shahn, Lithuanian-American painter, illustrator, and educator (b. 1898) 1973 – Howard H. Aiken, American computer scientist and engineer (b. 1900) 1973 – Chic Young, American cartoonist (b. 1901) 1975 – Susan Hayward, American actress (b. 1917) 1976 – Busby Berkeley, American director and choreographer (b. 1895) 1977 – Fannie Lou Hamer, American activist and philanthropist (b. 1917) 1980 – Mohammad Hatta, Indonesian politician, 3rd Prime Minister of Indonesia (b. 1902) 1980 – Félix Rodríguez de la Fuente, Spanish environmentalist (b. 1928) 1984 – Hovhannes Shiraz, Armenian poet (b. 1915) 1989 – Zita of Bourbon-Parma, Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary (b. 1892) 1991 – Howard Ashman, American playwright and composer (b. 1950) 1995 – William Alfred Fowler, American physicist and astronomer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1911) 1997 – Fred Zinnemann, Austrian-American director and producer (b. 1907) 1999 – Kirk Alyn, American actor (b. 1910) 1999 – John Broome, American author (b. 1913) 2003 – Jack Goldstein, Canadian-American painter (b. 1945) 2003 – Jean-Luc Lagardère, French engineer and businessman (b. 1928) 2006 – Lennart Meri, Estonian director and politician, 2nd President of Estonia (b. 1929) 2007 – Lucie Aubrac, French educator and activist (b. 1912) 2008 – Chiara Lubich, Italian activist, co-founded the Focolare Movement (b. 1920) 2010 – Peter Graves, American actor (b. 1926) 2012 – Pierre Schoendoerffer, French director and screenwriter (b. 1928) 2012 – Ċensu Tabone, Maltese general and politician, 4th President of Malta (b. 1913) 2013 – Jack Greene, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1930) 2013 – Aramais Sahakyan, Armenian poet and author (b. 1936) 2013 – Ieng Sary, Vietnamese-Cambodian politician, Cambodian Minister for Foreign Affairs (b. 1925) 2014 – Tony Benn, English politician, Postmaster General of the United Kingdom (b. 1925) 2014 – Meir Har-Zion, Israeli commander (b. 1934) 2016 – John W. Cahn, German-American metallurgist and academic (b. 1928) 2016 – Peter Maxwell Davies, English composer and conductor (b. 1934) 2016 – Suranimala Rajapaksha, Sri Lankan lawyer and politician (b. 1949) 2018 – Jim Bowen, English stand-up comedian and TV personality (b. 1937) 2018 – Marielle Franco, Brazilian politician and human rights activist (b. 1979) 2018 – Stephen Hawking, English physicist and author (b. 1942) 2018 – Liam O'Flynn, Irish uileann piper (b. 1945) 2019 – Jake Phelps, American skateboarder and Thrasher editor-in-chief (b. 1962) 2019 – Charlie Whiting, British motorsport director (b. 1952) 2019 – Haig Young, Canadian politician (b. 1928) Holidays and observances Christian feast day: Leobinus Matilda of Ringelheim March 14 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Constitution Day (Andorra) Heroes' Day (Saint Vincent and the Grenadines) Mother Tongue Day (Estonia) Nanakshahi New Year, first day of the month of Chet (Sikhism) Pi Day Summer Day (Albania) White Day on which men give gifts to women; complementary to Valentine's Day (Japan and other Asian nations) References External links BBC: On This Day Historical Events on March 14 Today in Canadian History Days of the year March

20200

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Management%20science

Management science

Management science (MS) is the broad interdisciplinary study of problem solving and decision making in human organizations, with strong links to management, economics, business, engineering, management consulting, and other fields. It uses various scientific research-based principles, strategies, and analytical methods including mathematical modeling, statistics and numerical algorithms to improve an organization's ability to enact rational and accurate management decisions by arriving at optimal or near optimal solutions to complex decision problems. Management science helps businesses to achieve goals using various scientific methods. The field was initially an outgrowth of applied mathematics, where early challenges were problems relating to the optimization of systems which could be modeled linearly, i.e., determining the optima (maximum value of profit, assembly line performance, crop yield, bandwidth, etc. or minimum of loss, risk, costs, etc.) of some objective function. Today, management science encompasses any organizational activity for which a problem is structured in mathematical form to generate managerially relevant insights. Overview Management science is concerned with a number of areas of study: Developing and applying models and concepts that may prove useful in helping to illuminate management issues and solve managerial problems. The models used can often be represented mathematically, but sometimes computer-based, visual or verbal representations are used as well or instead. Designing and developing new and better models of organizational excellence. Management science research can be done on three levels: The fundamental level lies in three mathematical disciplines: probability, optimization, and dynamical systems theory. The modeling level is about building models, analyzing them mathematically, gathering and analyzing data, implementing models on computers, solving them, experimenting with them—all this is part of management science research on the modeling level. This level is mainly instrumental, and driven mainly by statistics and econometrics. The application level, just as in any other engineering and economics disciplines, strives to make a practical impact and be a driver for change in the real world. The management scientist's mandate is to use rational, systematic, science-based techniques to inform and improve decisions of all kinds. The techniques of management science are not restricted to business applications but may be applied to military, medical, public administration, charitable groups, political groups or community groups. History The origins of management science can be traced to operations research, which became influential during World War II when the Allied forces recruited scientists of various disciplines to assist with military operations. In these early applications, the scientists used simple mathematical models to make efficient use of limited technologies and resources. The application of these models to the corporate sector became known as management science. In 1967 Stafford Beer characterized the field of management science as "the business use of operations research". Theory Some of the fields that management science involves include: Data mining Decision analysis Engineering Forecasting Game theory Industrial engineering Logistics Mathematical modeling Optimization Operational research Probability and statistics Project management Psychology Simulation Social network / Transportation forecasting models Sociology Supply chain management Management consulting as well as many others. Applications Applications of management science are abundant in industries such as airlines, manufacturing companies, service organizations, military branches, and in government. Management science has contributed insights and solutions to a vast range of problems and issues, including: scheduling airlines, both planes and crew deciding the appropriate place to site new facilities such as a warehouse or factory managing the flow of water from reservoirs identifying possible future development paths for parts of the telecommunications industry establishing the information needs of health services and appropriate systems to supply them identifying and understanding the strategies adopted by companies for their information systems Management science is also concerned with so-called soft-operational analysis, which concerns methods for strategic planning, strategic decision support, and problem structuring methods (PSM). At this level of abstraction, mathematical modeling and simulation will not suffice. Therefore, since the late 20th century, new non-quantified modelling methods have been developed, including morphological analysis and various forms of influence diagrams. See also Econometrics Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences John von Neumann Theory Prize Managerial economics Management engineering Management fad Innovation Management Organization and Methods (management) References Further reading Kenneth R. Baker, Dean H. Kropp (1985). Management Science: An Introduction to the Use of Decision Models Stafford Beer (1967). Management Science: The Business Use of Operations Research David Charles Heinze (1982). Management Science: Introductory Concepts and Applications Lee J. Krajewski, Howard E. Thompson (1981). "Management Science: Quantitative Methods in Context" Thomas W. Knowles (1989). Management science: Building and Using Models Kamlesh Mathur, Daniel Solow (1994). Management Science: The Art of Decision Making Laurence J. Moore, Sang M. Lee, Bernard W. Taylor (1993). Management Science William Thomas Morris (1968). Management Science: A Bayesian Introduction. William E. Pinney, Donald B. McWilliams (1987). Management Science: An Introduction to Quantitative Analysis for Management Gerald E. Thompson (1982). ''Management Science: An Introduction to Modern Quantitative Analysis and Decision Making. New York : McGraw-Hill Publishing Co. Management Operations research Behavioural sciences

20201

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical%20notation

Musical notation

Music notation or musical notation is any system used to visually represent aurally perceived music played with instruments or sung by the human voice through the use of written, printed, or otherwise-produced symbols, including notation for durations of absence of sound such as rests. Types and methods of notation have varied between cultures and throughout history, and much information about ancient music notation is fragmentary. Even in the same time period, such as in the 2010s, different styles of music and different cultures use different music notation methods; for example, for professional classical music performers, sheet music using staves and noteheads is the most common way of notating music, but for professional country music session musicians, the Nashville Number System is the main method. The symbols used include ancient symbols and modern symbols made upon any media such as symbols cut into stone, made in clay tablets, made using a pen on papyrus or parchment or manuscript paper; printed using a printing press (c. 1400s), a computer printer (c. 1980s) or other printing or modern copying technology. Although many ancient cultures used symbols to represent melodies and rhythms, none of them were particularly comprehensive, and this has limited today's understanding of their music. The seeds of what would eventually become modern Western notation were sown in medieval Europe, starting with the Christian church's goal for ecclesiastical uniformity. The church began notating plainchant melodies so that the same chants could be used throughout the church. Music notation developed further in the Renaissance and Baroque music eras. In the classical period (1750–1820) and the Romantic music era (1820–1900), notation continued to develop as new musical instrument technologies were developed. In the contemporary classical music of the 20th and 21st century, music notation has continued to develop, with the introduction of graphical notation by some modern composers and the use, since the 1980s, of computer-based score writer programs for notating music. Music notation has been adapted to many kinds of music, including classical music, popular music, and traditional music. History Ancient Near East The earliest form of musical notation can be found in a cuneiform tablet that was created at Nippur, in Babylonia (today's Iraq), in about 1400 BC. The tablet represents fragmentary instructions for performing music, that the music was composed in harmonies of thirds, and that it was written using a diatonic scale. A tablet from about 1250 BC shows a more developed form of notation. Although the interpretation of the notation system is still controversial, it is clear that the notation indicates the names of strings on a lyre, the tuning of which is described in other tablets. Although they are fragmentary, these tablets represent the earliest notated melodies found anywhere in the world. Ancient Greece Ancient Greek musical notation was in use from at least the 6th century BC until approximately the 4th century AD; only one complete composition (Seikilos epitaph) and a number of fragments using this notation survive. The notation for sung music consists of letter symbols for the pitches, placed above text syllables. Rhythm is indicated in a rudimentary way only, with long and short symbols. The Seikilos epitaph has been variously dated between the 2nd century BC to the 2nd century AD. Three hymns by Mesomedes of Crete exist in manuscript. The Delphic Hymns, dated to the 2nd century BC, also use this notation, but they are not completely preserved. Ancient Greek notation appears to have fallen out of use around the time of the Decline of the Western Roman Empire. Byzantine Empire Byzantine music once included music for court ceremonies, but has only survived as vocal church music within various Orthodox traditions of monodic (monophonic) chant written down in Byzantine round notation (see Macarie's anastasimatarion with the Greek text translated into Romanian and transliterated into Cyrillic script). Since the 6th century Greek theoretical categories (melos, genos, harmonia, systema) played a key role to understand and transmit Byzantine music, especially the tradition of Damascus had a strong impact on the pre-Islamic Near East comparable to the impact coming from Persian music. The earliest evidence are papyrus fragments of Greek tropologia. These fragments just present the hymn text following a modal signature or key (like "" for echos plagios protos or "" for echos devteros). Unlike Western notation, Byzantine neumes used since the 10th century were always related to modal steps (same modal degree, one degree lower, two degrees higher, etc.) in relation to such a clef or modal key (modal signatures). Originally this key or the incipit of a common melody was enough to indicate a certain melodic model given within the echos. Next to ekphonetic notation, only used in lectionaries to indicate formulas used during scriptural lessons, melodic notation developed not earlier than between the 9th and the 10th century, when a theta (), oxeia () or diple () were written under a certain syllable of the text, whenever a longer melisma was expected. This primitive form was called "theta" or "diple notation". Today, one can study the evolution of this notation in Greek monastic chant books like those of the sticherarion and the heirmologion (Chartres notation was rather used on Mount Athos and Constantinople, Coislin notation within the patriarchates of Jerusalem and Alexandria), while there was another gestic notation originally used for the asmatikon (choir book) and kontakarion (book of the soloist or monophonaris) of the Constantinopolitan cathedral rite. The earliest books which have survived, are "kondakars" in Slavonic translation which already show a notation system known as Kondakarian notation. Like the Greek alphabet notational signs are ordered left to right (though the direction could be adapted like in certain Syriac manuscripts). The question of rhythm was entirely based on cheironomia (the interpretation of so-called great signs which derived from different chant books). These great signs () indicated well-known melodic phrases given by gestures of the choirleaders of the cathedral rite. They existed once as part of an oral tradition, developed Kondakarian notation and became, during the 13th century, integrated into Byzantine round notation as a kind of universal notation system. Today the main difference between Western and Eastern neumes is that Eastern notation symbols are "differential" rather than absolute, i.e., they indicate pitch steps (rising, falling or at the same step), and the musicians know to deduce correctly, from the score and the note they are singing presently, which correct interval is meant. These step symbols themselves, or better "phonic neumes", resemble brush strokes and are colloquially called gántzoi ('hooks') in modern Greek. Notes as pitch classes or modal keys (usually memorised by modal signatures) are represented in written form only between these neumes (in manuscripts usually written in red ink). In modern notation they simply serve as an optional reminder and modal and tempo directions have been added, if necessary. In Papadic notation medial signatures usually meant a temporary change into another echos. The so-called "great signs" were once related to cheironomic signs; according to modern interpretations they are understood as embellishments and microtonal attractions (pitch changes smaller than a semitone), both essential in Byzantine chant. Since Chrysanthos of Madytos there are seven standard note names used for "solfège" (parallagē) pá, vú, ghá, dhi, ké, zō, nē, while the older practice still used the four enechemata or intonation formulas of the four echoi given by the modal signatures, the authentic or kyrioi in ascending direction, and the plagal or plagioi in descending direction (Papadic Octoechos). With exception of vú and zō they do roughly correspond to Western solmization syllables as re, mi, fa, sol, la, si, do. Byzantine music uses the eight natural, non-tempered scales whose elements were identified by Ēkhoi, "sounds", exclusively, and therefore the absolute pitch of each note may slightly vary each time, depending on the particular Ēkhos used. Byzantine notation is still used in many Orthodox Churches. Sometimes cantors also use transcriptions into Western or Kievan staff notation while adding non-notatable embellishment material from memory and "sliding" into the natural scales from experience, but even concerning modern neume editions since the reform of Chrysanthos a lot of details are only known from an oral tradition related to traditional masters and their experience. 13th-century Near East In 1252, Safi al-Din al-Urmawi developed a form of musical notation, where rhythms were represented by geometric representation. Many subsequent scholars of rhythm have sought to develop graphical geometrical notations. For example, a similar geometric system was published in 1987 by Kjell Gustafson, whose method represents a rhythm as a two-dimensional graph. Early Europe The scholar and music theorist Isidore of Seville, while writing in the early 7th century, considered that "unless sounds are held by the memory of man, they perish, because they cannot be written down." By the middle of the 9th century, however, a form of neumatic notation began to develop in monasteries in Europe as a mnemonic device for Gregorian chant, using symbols known as neumes; the earliest surviving musical notation of this type is in the Musica disciplina of Aurelian of Réôme, from about 850. There are scattered survivals from the Iberian Peninsula before this time, of a type of notation known as Visigothic neumes, but its few surviving fragments have not yet been deciphered. The problem with this notation was that it only showed melodic contours and consequently the music could not be read by someone who did not know the music already. Notation had developed far enough to notate melody, but there was still no system for notating rhythm. A mid-13th-century treatise, De Mensurabili Musica, explains a set of six rhythmic modes that were in use at the time, although it is not clear how they were formed. These rhythmic modes were all in triple time and rather limited rhythm in chant to six different repeating patterns. This was a flaw seen by German music theorist Franco of Cologne and summarised as part of his treatise Ars cantus mensurabilis (the art of measured chant, or mensural notation). He suggested that individual notes could have their own rhythms represented by the shape of the note. Not until the 14th century did something like the present system of fixed note lengths arise. The use of regular measures (bars) became commonplace by the end of the 17th century. The founder of what is now considered the standard music staff was Guido d'Arezzo, an Italian Benedictine monk who lived from about 991 until after 1033. He taught the use of solmization syllables based on a hymn to Saint John the Baptist, which begins Ut Queant Laxis and was written by the Lombard historian Paul the Deacon. The first stanza is: Ut queant laxis resonare fibris, Mira gestorum famuli tuorum, Solve polluti labii reatum, Sancte Iohannes. Guido used the first syllable of each line, Ut, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, and Si, to read notated music in terms of hexachords; they were not note names, and each could, depending on context, be applied to any note. In the 17th century, Ut was changed in most countries except France to the easily singable, open syllable Do, believed to have been taken either from the name of the Italian theorist Giovanni Battista Doni, or from the Latin word Dominus, meaning Lord. Christian monks developed the first forms of modern European musical notation in order to standardize liturgy throughout the worldwide Church, and an enormous body of religious music has been composed for it through the ages. This led directly to the emergence and development of European classical music, and its many derivatives. The Baroque style, which encompassed music, art, and architecture, was particularly encouraged by the post-Reformation Catholic Church as such forms offered a means of religious expression that was stirring and emotional, intended to stimulate religious fervor. Modern staff notation Modern music notation is used by musicians of many different genres throughout the world. The staff (or stave, in British English) consists of 5 parallel horizontal lines which acts as a framework upon which pitches are indicated by placing oval note-heads on (ie crossing) the staff lines, between the lines (ie in the spaces) or above and below the staff using small additional lines called ledger lines. Notation is read from left to right, which makes setting music for right-to-left scripts difficult. The pitch of a note is indicated by the vertical position of the note-head within the staff, and can be modified by accidentals. The duration (note length or note value) is indicated by the form of the note-head or with the addition of a note-stem plus beams or flags. A stemless hollow oval is a whole note or semibreve, a hollow rectangle or stemless hollow oval with one or two vertical lines on both sides is a double whole note or breve. A stemmed hollow oval is a half note or minim. Solid ovals always use stems, and can indicate quarter notes (crotchets) or, with added beams or flags, smaller subdivisions. Additional symbols such as dots and ties can lengthen the duration of a note. A staff of written music generally begins with a clef, which indicates the pitch-range of the staff. The treble clef or G clef was originally a letter G and it identifies the second line up on the five line staff as the note G above middle C. The bass clef or F clef identifies the second line down as the note F below middle C. While the treble and bass clef are the most widely used, other clefs, which identify middle C, are used for some instruments, such as the alto clef (for viola and alto trombone) and the tenor clef (used for some cello, bassoon, tenor trombone, and double bass music). Some instruments use mainly one clef, such as violin and flute which use treble clef, and double bass and tuba which use bass clef. Some instruments, such as piano and pipe organ, regularly use both treble and bass clefs. Following the clef, the key signature is a group of from 0 to 7 sharp (♯) or flat (♭) signs placed on the staff to indicate the key of the piece or song by specifying that certain notes are sharp or flat throughout the piece, unless otherwise indicated with accidentals added before certain notes. When a flat (♭) sign is placed before a note, the pitch of the note is lowered by one semitone. Similarly, a sharp sign (♯) raises the pitch by one semitone. For example, a sharp on the note D would raise it to D♯ while a flat would lower it to D♭. Double sharps and double flats are less common, but they are used. A double sharp is placed before a note to make it two semitones higher, a double flat - two semitones lower. A natural sign placed before a note renders that note in its "natural" form, which means that any sharp or flat applied to that note from the key signature or an accidental, is cancelled. Sometimes a courtesy accidental is used in music where it is not technically required, to remind the musician of what pitch is required. Following the key signature is the time signature. The time signature typically consists of two numbers, with one of the most common being . The top "4" indicates that there are four beats per measure (also called bar). The bottom "4" indicates that each of those beats are quarter notes. Measures divide the piece into groups of beats, and the time signatures specify those groupings. is used so often that it is also called "common time", and it may be indicated with rather than numbers. Other frequently used time signatures are (three beats per bar, with each beat being a quarter note); (two beats per bar, with each beat being a quarter note); (six beats per bar, with each beat being an eighth note) and (twelve beats per bar, with each beat being an eighth note; in practice, the eighth notes are typically put into four groups of three eighth notes. is a compound time type of time signature). Many other time signatures exist, such as , , , , , and so on. Many short classical music pieces from the classical era and songs from traditional music and popular music are in one time signature for much or all of the piece. Music from the Romantic music era and later, particularly contemporary classical music and rock music genres such as progressive rock and the hardcore punk subgenre mathcore, may use mixed meter; songs or pieces change from one meter to another, for example alternating between bars of and . Directions to the player regarding matters such as tempo (e.g., Allegro, Andante, Largo, Vif, Lent, Modérément, Presto, etc.), dynamics (pianississimo, pianissimo, piano, mezzopiano, mezzoforte, forte, fortissimo, fortississimo, etc.) appear above or below the staff. Terms indicating the musical expression or "feel" to a song or piece are indicated at the beginning of the piece and at any points where the mood changes (e.g., "Slow March", "Fast Swing", "Medium Blues", "Fougueux", "Feierlich", "Gelassen", "Piacevole", "Con slancio", "Majestic", "Hostile" etc.) For vocal music, lyrics are written near the pitches of the melody. For short pauses (breaths), retakes (retakes are indicated with a ' mark) are added. In music for ensembles, a "score" shows music for all players together, with the staves for the different instruments and/or voices stacked vertically. The conductor uses the score while leading an orchestra, concert band, choir or other large ensemble. Individual performers in an ensemble play from "parts" which contain only the music played by an individual musician. A score can be constructed from a complete set of parts and vice versa. The process was laborious and time consuming when parts were hand-copied from the score, but since the development of scorewriter computer software in the 1980s, a score stored electronically can have parts automatically prepared by the program and quickly and inexpensively printed out using a computer printer. Variations on staff notation Percussion notation conventions are varied because of the wide range of percussion instruments. Percussion instruments are generally grouped into two categories: pitched (e.g. glockenspiel or tubular bells) and non-pitched (e.g. bass drum and snare drum). The notation of non-pitched percussion instruments is less standardized. Pitched instruments use standard Western classical notation for the pitches and rhythms. In general, notation for unpitched percussion uses the five line staff, with different lines and spaces representing different drum kit instruments. Standard Western rhythmic notation is used to indicate the rhythm. Figured bass notation originated in Baroque basso continuo parts. It is also used extensively in accordion notation. The bass notes of the music are conventionally notated, along with numbers and other signs that determine which chords the harpsichordist, organist or lutenist should improvise. It does not, however, specify the exact pitches of the harmony, leaving that for the performer to improvise. A lead sheet specifies only the melody, lyrics and harmony, using one staff with chord symbols placed above and lyrics below. It is used to capture the essential elements of a popular song without specifying how the song should be arranged or performed. A chord chart or "chart" contains little or no melodic or voice-leading information at all, but provides basic harmonic information about the chord progression. Some chord charts also contain rhythmic information, indicated using slash notation for full beats and rhythmic notation for rhythms. This is the most common kind of written music used by professional session musicians playing jazz or other forms of popular music and is intended primarily for the rhythm section (usually containing piano, guitar, bass and drums). Simpler chord charts for songs may contain only the chord changes, placed above the lyrics where they occur. Such charts depend on prior knowledge of the melody, and are used as reminders in performance or informal group singing. Some chord charts intended for rhythm section accompanists contain only the chord progression. The shape note system is found in some church hymnals, sheet music, and song books, especially in the Southern United States. Instead of the customary elliptical note head, note heads of various shapes are used to show the position of the note on the major scale. Sacred Harp is one of the most popular tune books using shape notes. In various countries Korea Jeongganbo is a unique traditional musical notation system created during the time of Sejong the Great that was the first East Asian system to represent rhythm, pitch, and time. Among various kinds of Korean traditional music, Jeong-gan-bo targets a particular genre, Jeong-ak (). Jeong-gan-bo tells the pitch by writing the pitch's name down in a box called 'jeong-gan' (this is where the name comes from). One jeong-gan is one beat each, and it can be split into two, three or more to hold half beats and quarter beats, and more. This makes it easy for the reader to figure out the beat. Also, there are many markings indicating things such as ornaments. Most of these were later created by Ki-su Kim. India The Samaveda text (1200 BC – 1000 BC) contains notated melodies, and these are probably the world's oldest surviving ones. The musical notation is written usually immediately above, sometimes within, the line of Samaveda text, either in syllabic or a numerical form depending on the Samavedic Sakha (school). The Indian scholar and musical theorist Pingala (c. 200 BC), in his Chanda Sutra, used marks indicating long and short syllables to indicate meters in Sanskrit poetry. A rock inscription from circa 7th–8th century CE at Kudumiyanmalai, Tamil Nadu contains an early example of a musical notation. It was first identified and published by archaeologist/epigraphist D. R. Bhandarkar. Written in the Pallava-grantha script of the 7th century, it contains 38 horizontal lines of notations inscribed on a rectangular rock face (dimension of around 13 by 14 feet). Each line of the notation contains 64 characters (characters representing musical notes), written in groups of four notes. The basic characters for the seven notes, 'sa ri ga ma pa dha ni', are seen to be suffixed with the vowels a, i, u, e. For example, in the place of 'sa', any one of 'sa', 'si', 'su' or 'se' is used. Similarly, in place of ri, any one of 'ra', 'ri', 'ru' or 're' is used. Horizontal lines divide the notation into 7 sections. Each section contains 4 to 7 lines of notation, with a title indicating its musical 'mode'. These modes may have been popular at least from the 6th century CE and were incorporated into the Indian 'raga' system that developed later. But some of the unusual features seen in this notation have been given several non-conclusive interpretations by scholars. In the notation of Indian rāga, a solfege-like system called sargam is used. As in Western solfege, there are names for the seven basic pitches of a major scale (Shadja, Rishabha, Gandhara, Madhyama, Panchama, Dhaivata and Nishada, usually shortened to Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Dha Ni). The tonic of any scale is named Sa, and the dominant Pa. Sa is fixed in any scale, and Pa is fixed at a fifth above it (a Pythagorean fifth rather than an equal-tempered fifth). These two notes are known as achala swar ('fixed notes'). Each of the other five notes, Re, Ga, Ma, Dha and Ni, can take a 'regular' (shuddha) pitch, which is equivalent to its pitch in a standard major scale (thus, shuddha Re, the second degree of the scale, is a whole-step higher than Sa), or an altered pitch, either a half-step above or half-step below the shuddha pitch. Re, Ga, Dha and Ni all have altered partners that are a half-step lower (Komal-"flat") (thus, komal Re is a half-step higher than Sa). Ma has an altered partner that is a half-step higher (-"sharp") (thus, Ma is an augmented fourth above Sa). Re, Ga, Ma, Dha and Ni are called ('movable notes'). In the written system of Indian notation devised by Ravi Shankar, the pitches are represented by Western letters. Capital letters are used for the achala swar, and for the higher variety of all the vikrut swar. Lowercase letters are used for the lower variety of the vikrut swar. Other systems exist for non-twelve-tone equal temperament and non-Western music, such as the Indian Swaralipi. Russia Znamenny Chant is a singing tradition used in the Russian Orthodox Church which uses a "hook and banner" notation. Znamenny Chant is unison, melismatic liturgical singing that has its own specific notation, called the stolp notation. The symbols used in the stolp notation are called (, 'hooks') or (, 'signs'). Often the names of the signs are used to refer to the stolp notation. Znamenny melodies are part of a system, consisting of Eight Modes (intonation structures; called glasy); the melodies are characterized by fluency and well-balancedness . There exist several types of Znamenny Chant: the so-called Stolpovoy, Malyj (Little) and Bolshoy (Great) Znamenny Chant. Ruthenian Chant (Prostopinije) is sometimes considered a sub-division of the Znamenny Chant tradition, with the Muscovite Chant (Znamenny Chant proper) being the second branch of the same musical continuum. Znamenny Chants are not written with notes (the so-called linear notation), but with special signs, called Znamëna (Russian for "marks", "banners") or Kryuki ("hooks"), as some shapes of these signs resemble hooks. Each sign may include the following components: a large black hook or a black stroke, several smaller black 'points' and 'commas' and lines near the hook or crossing the hook. Some signs may mean only one note, some 2 to 4 notes, and some a whole melody of more than 10 notes with a complicated rhythmic structure. The stolp notation was developed in Kievan Rus' as an East Slavic refinement of the Byzantine neumatic musical notation. The most notable feature of this notation system is that it records transitions of the melody, rather than notes. The signs also represent a mood and a gradation of how this part of melody is to be sung (tempo, strength, devotion, meekness, etc.) Every sign has its own name and also features as a spiritual symbol. For example, there is a specific sign, called "little dove" (Russian: голубчик (golubchik)), which represents two rising sounds, but which is also a symbol of the Holy Ghost. Gradually the system became more and more complicated. This system was also ambiguous, so that almost no one, except the most trained and educated singers, could sing an unknown melody at sight. The signs only helped to reproduce the melody, not coding it in an unambiguous way. (See Byzantine Empire) China The earliest known examples of text referring to music in China are inscriptions on musical instruments found in the Tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng (d. 433 B.C.). Sets of 41 chimestones and 65 bells bore lengthy inscriptions concerning pitches, scales, and transposition. The bells still sound the pitches that their inscriptions refer to. Although no notated musical compositions were found, the inscriptions indicate that the system was sufficiently advanced to allow for musical notation. Two systems of pitch nomenclature existed, one for relative pitch and one for absolute pitch. For relative pitch, a solmization system was used. Gongche notation used Chinese characters for the names of the scale. Japan Japanese music is highly diversified, and therefore requires various systems of notation. In Japanese shakuhachi music, for example, glissandos and timbres are often more significant than distinct pitches, whereas taiko notation focuses on discrete strokes. Ryukyuan sanshin music uses kunkunshi, a notation system of kanji with each character corresponding to a finger position on a particular string. Indonesia Notation plays a relatively minor role in the oral traditions of Indonesia. However, in Java and Bali, several systems were devised beginning at the end of the 19th century, initially for archival purposes. Today the most widespread are cipher notations ("not angka" in the broadest sense) in which the pitches are represented with some subset of the numbers 1 to 7, with 1 corresponding to either highest note of a particular octave, as in Sundanese gamelan, or lowest, as in the kepatihan notation of Javanese gamelan. Notes in the ranges outside the central octave are represented with one or more dots above or below the each number. For the most part, these cipher notations are mainly used to notate the skeletal melody (the balungan) and vocal parts (gerongan), although transcriptions of the elaborating instrument variations are sometimes used for analysis and teaching. Drum parts are notated with a system of symbols largely based on letters representing the vocables used to learn and remember drumming patterns; these symbols are typically laid out in a grid underneath the skeletal melody for a specific or generic piece. The symbols used for drum notation (as well as the vocables represented) are highly variable from place to place and performer to performer. In addition to these current systems, two older notations used a kind of staff: the Solonese script could capture the flexible rhythms of the pesinden with a squiggle on a horizontal staff, while in Yogyakarta a ladder-like vertical staff allowed notation of the balungan by dots and also included important drum strokes. In Bali, there are a few books published of Gamelan gender wayang pieces, employing alphabetical notation in the old Balinese script. Composers and scholars both Indonesian and foreign have also mapped the slendro and pelog tuning systems of gamelan onto the western staff, with and without various symbols for microtones. The Dutch composer Ton de Leeuw also invented a three line staff for his composition Gending. However, these systems do not enjoy widespread use. In the second half of the twentieth century, Indonesian musicians and scholars extended cipher notation to other oral traditions, and a diatonic scale cipher notation has become common for notating western-related genres (church hymns, popular songs, and so forth). Unlike the cipher notation for gamelan music, which uses a "fixed Do" (that is, 1 always corresponds to the same pitch, within the natural variability of gamelan tuning), Indonesian diatonic cipher notation is "moveable-Do" notation, so scores must indicate which pitch corresponds to the number 1 (for example, "1=C"). Other systems and practices Cipher notation Cipher notation systems assigning Arabic numerals to the major scale degrees have been used at least since the Iberian organ tablatures of the 16th-century and include such exotic adaptations as Siffernotskrift. The one most widely in use today is the Chinese Jianpu, discussed in the main article. Numerals can also be assigned to different scale systems, as in the Javanese kepatihan notation described above. Solfège Solfège is a way of assigning syllables to names of the musical scale. In order, they are today: Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Ti Do (for the octave). The classic variation is: Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Si Do. The first Western system of functional names for the musical notes was introduced by Guido of Arezzo (c. 991 – after 1033), using the beginning syllables of the first six musical lines of the Latin hymn Ut queant laxis. The original sequence was Ut Re Mi Fa Sol La, where each verse started a scale note higher. "Ut" later became "Do". The equivalent syllables used in Indian music are: Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Dha Ni. See also: solfège, sargam, Kodály hand signs. Tonic sol-fa is a type of notation using the initial letters of solfège. Letter notation The notes of the 12-tone scale can be written by their letter names A–G, possibly with a trailing sharp or flat symbol, such as A or B. Tablature Tablature was first used in the Middle Ages for organ music and later in the Renaissance for lute music. In most lute tablatures, a staff is used, but instead of pitch values, the lines of the staff represent the strings of the instrument. The frets to finger are written on each line, indicated by letters or numbers. Rhythm is written separately with one or another variation of standard note values indicating the duration of the fastest moving part. Few seem to have remarked on the fact that tablature combines in one notation system both the physical and technical requirements of play (the lines and symbols on them and in relation to each other representing the actual performance actions) with the unfolding of the music itself (the lines of tablature taken horizontally represent the actual temporal unfolding of the music). In later periods, lute and guitar music was written with standard notation. Tablature caught interest again in the late 20th century for popular guitar music and other fretted instruments, being easy to transcribe and share over the internet in ASCII format. Klavar notation Klavarskribo (sometimes shortened to klavar) is a music notation system that was introduced in 1931 by the Dutchman Cornelis Pot. The name means "keyboard writing" in Esperanto. It differs from conventional music notation in a number of ways and is intended to be easily readable. Many klavar readers are from the Netherlands. Piano-roll-based notations Some chromatic systems have been created taking advantage of the layout of black and white keys of the standard piano keyboard. The "staff" is most widely referred to as "piano roll", created by extending the black and white piano keys. Chromatic staff notations Over the past three centuries, hundreds of music notation systems have been proposed as alternatives to traditional western music notation. Many of these systems seek to improve upon traditional notation by using a "chromatic staff" in which each of the 12 pitch classes has its own unique place on the staff. An example is Jacques-Daniel Rochat's Dodeka music notation. These notation systems do not require the use of standard key signatures, accidentals, or clef signs. They also represent interval relationships more consistently and accurately than traditional notation, e.g. major 3rds appear wider than minor 3rds. Many of these systems are described and illustrated in Gardner Read's "Source Book of Proposed Music Notation Reforms". Graphic notation The term 'graphic notation' refers to the contemporary use of non-traditional symbols and text to convey information about the performance of a piece of music. Practitioners include Christian Wolff, Earle Brown, Anthony Braxton, John Cage, Morton Feldman, Krzysztof Penderecki, Cornelius Cardew, and Roger Reynolds. The book Notations is another example of this kind of notation. Simplified music notation Simplified Music Notation is an alternative form of musical notation designed to make sight-reading easier. It is based on classical staff notation, but incorporates sharps and flats into the shape of the note heads. Notes such as double sharps and double flats are written at the pitch they are actually played at, but preceded by symbols called history signs that show they have been transposed. Modified Stave Notation Modified Stave Notation (MSN) is an alternative way of notating music for people who cannot easily read ordinary musical notation even if it is enlarged. Parsons code Parsons code is used to encode music so that it can be easily searched. Braille music Braille music is a complete, well developed, and internationally accepted musical notation system that has symbols and notational conventions quite independent of print music notation. It is linear in nature, similar to a printed language and different from the two-dimensional nature of standard printed music notation. To a degree Braille music resembles musical markup languages such as MusicXML or NIFF. Integer notation In integer notation, or the integer model of pitch, all pitch classes and intervals between pitch classes are designated using the numbers 0 through 11. Rap notation The standard form of rap notation is the "flow diagram", where rappers line up their lyrics underneath "beat numbers". Hip-hop scholars also make use of the same flow diagrams that rappers use: the books How to Rap and How to Rap 2 extensively use the diagrams to explain rap's triplets, flams, rests, rhyme schemes, runs of rhyme, and breaking rhyme patterns, among other techniques. Similar systems are used by musicologists Adam Krims in his book Rap Music and the Poetics of Identity and Kyle Adams in his work on rap's flow. As rap usually revolves around a strong 4/4 beat, with certain syllables aligned to the beat, all the notational systems have a similar structure: they all have four beat numbers at the top of the diagram, so that syllables can be written in-line with the beat. Music notation on computers Unicode The Musical Symbols Unicode block encodes an extensive system of formal musical notation. The Miscellaneous Symbols block has a few of the more common symbols: The Miscellaneous Symbols and Pictographs block has three emoji that may include depictions of musical notes: Software Many computer programs have been developed for creating music notation (called scorewriters or music notation software). Music may also be stored in various digital file formats for purposes other than graphic notation output. Perspectives of musical notation in composition and musical performance According to Philip Tagg and Richard Middleton, musicology and to a degree European-influenced musical practice suffer from a 'notational centricity', a methodology slanted by the characteristics of notation. A variety of 20th- and 21st-century composers have dealt with this problem, either by adapting standard Western musical notation or by using graphic notation. These include George Crumb, Luciano Berio, Krzystof Penderecki, Earl Brown, John Cage, Witold Lutoslawski, and others. See also List of musical symbols of modern notation. Hebrew cantillation Colored music notation Eye movement in music reading Guido of Arezzo, inventor of modern musical notation History of music publishing List of scorewriters Mensural notation Modal notation Music engraving, drawing music notation for the purpose of mechanical reproduction Music OCR, the application of optical character recognition to interpret sheet music Neume (plainchant notation) Pitch class Rastrum, a five-pointed writing implement used to draw parallel staff lines across a blank piece of sheet music Scorewriter Semasiography Sheet music Time unit box system, a notation system useful for polyrhythms Tongan music notation, a subset of standard music notation Tonnetz Znamenny chant Notes Sources English translation of "Kojak—50 sekunders tv-musik". Further reading External links Byzantine Music Notation. Contains a Guide to Byzantine Music Notation (neumes). CCARH—Center for Computer Assisted Research in the Humanities Information on Stanford University Course on music representation. Links page shows examples of different notations. Music Markup Language. XML-based language for music notation. Synopsis of Musical Notation Encyclopedias (An index from topics of CWN into the books of Gould, Vinci, Wanske, Stone and Read.) Gehrkens, Karl Wilson Music Notation and Terminology. Project Gutenberg. Gilbert, Nina. "Glossary of U.S. and British English musical terms." Posted 17 June 1998; updated 7 September 2000. Mathematical notation

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meir%20Kahane

Meir Kahane

Meir David HaKohen Kahane (; ; born Martin David Kahane; August 1, 1932 – November 5, 1990) was an American-born Israeli ordained Orthodox rabbi, writer, and ultra-nationalist politician who served one term in Israel's Knesset. A cofounder of the Jewish Defense League (JDL) and founder of the Israeli political party Kach, he espoused strong views against antisemitism. Kahane was an intense advocate for Jewish causes. He organized defense squads and patrols in Jewish neighborhoods, and demanded that the Soviet Union release their oppressed Jews. He supported violence against those he regarded as enemies of the Jewish people, called for immediate Jewish mass migration to Israel to avoid a potential "Holocaust" in the United States, supported the restriction of Israel's democracy to its Jewish citizens, and endorsed the annexation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In 1968, Kahane was one of the co-founders of the JDL in the United States. In 1971, he co-founded Kach ("Thus"), a new political party in Israel. That same year, he was convicted in New York for conspiracy to manufacture explosives and received a suspended sentence of five years. In Israel, he was convicted for plotting to blow up the Libyan embassy in Brussels in revenge for the massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, receiving a suspended sentence and probation. In 1984, he became a member of the Knesset, when Kach gained its only-ever seat in parliamentary elections. Kahane was boycotted across the aisles of the Knesset, and would often speak in front of an empty chamber. The Israel Broadcasting Authority similarly avoided coverage of his activities. The Central Elections Committee tried to ban Kahane from running in the 1984 elections, but this ban was overturned by the Supreme Court because there was no law to support it. In response, the Knesset approved an ad hoc law that allowed for the banning of parties that are "racist" or "undemocratic". In 1988, despite polls showing Kach gaining popularity due in part to the ongoing First Intifada, Kach was banned from entering that year's elections. Kahane publicized his "Kahanism" ideology, which he claimed was simply Torah Judaism based on Halakha (Jewish law), through published works, weekly articles, speeches, debates on college campuses and in synagogues throughout the United States, and appearances on various televised programs and radio shows. In Israel, he proposed enforcing Halakha as codified by Maimonides and hoped that Israel would eventually adopt Halakha as state law. Non-Jews wishing to dwell in Israel would have three options: remain as "resident strangers" with limited rights, leave Israel and receive compensation for their property, or be forcibly removed without compensation. While serving in the Knesset in the mid-1980s Kahane proposed numerous laws, none of which passed, to emphasize Judaism in public schools, reduce Israel's bureaucracy, forbid sexual relations between Jews and non-Jews, separate Jewish and Arab neighbourhoods, and end cultural meetings between Jewish and Arab students. Kahane was assassinated in a New York City hotel by an Egyptian-born U.S. citizen in November 1990. His legacy continues to influence militant and far-right political groups active today in Israel. Personal life Meir Kahane was born in Brooklyn, New York, to an Orthodox Jewish family. Kahane descended from a line of well-known rabbis, including his father, who was head of the Flatbush Board of Rabbis. His father, Yechezkel Shragei (Charles) Kahane (1905–1978), had studied at Polish and Czech yeshivas, and was the author of the rabbinic work Torah Yesharah. He was deeply involved in the Revisionist Zionist movement as a close friend of Ze'ev Jabotinsky. Kahane's grandfather was Nachman Kahane (1869–1937), a leading rabbinic scholar in Safed, who was the son of Baruch David Kahane (1850–1925), the author of Hibat ha-Eretz, and a disciple of Chaim Halberstam of Sanz. Baruch David was a direct descendant of Simcha Rappaport (1650–1718), of the Rappaport rabbinic family, who were allegedly able to trace their ancestry back to Eleazar ben Azariah, a 1st-century sage in the Land of Israel. Baruch David immigrated to Mandatory Palestine from Poland in 1873. As a teenager, Kahane became an ardent admirer of Jabotinsky and Peter Bergson, who were frequent guests in his parents' home. He joined the Betar (Brit Trumpeldor) youth wing of Revisionist Zionism. He was active in protests against Ernest Bevin, the British Foreign Secretary who maintained restrictions on the immigration of Jews, even Holocaust survivors, to Palestine after the end of the Second World War. In 1947, Kahane was arrested for throwing eggs and tomatoes at Bevin, who was disembarking at Pier 84 on a visit to New York. A photo of the arrest appeared in the New York Daily News. In 1954, he became the Mazkir (Secretary) of Greater New York City's 16 Bnei Akiva chapters. Kahane's formal education included Yeshiva of Flatbush for elementary school and Brooklyn Talmudical Academy for high school. Kahane received his rabbinical ordination from the Mir Yeshiva in Brooklyn, where he was especially admired by the head Rabbi Abraham Kalmanowitz. He was fully conversant in the Tanakh (Jewish Bible), the Talmud, the Midrash and Jewish law. Subsequently, Kahane earned a B.A. in political science from Brooklyn College in 1954, a Bachelor of Law – LL.B. from New York Law School, and an M.A. in International Relations from New York University. In 1956, Kahane married Libby Blum, with whom he had four children: Tzipporah, Tova, Baruch, and Binyamin. In 1966, Kahane, under the alias of Michael King and while already married, had an affair and proposed to 21-year-old model Gloria Jean D'Argenio (who used the stage name Estelle Donna Evans). Kahane sent a letter to D'Argenio in which he unilaterally ended their relationship. In response, D'Argenio jumped off the Queensboro Bridge and died of her injuries the next day. In 2008, Kahane's wife dismissed the incident as lacking proof. After D'Argenio's death, Kahane started the Estelle Donna Evans Foundation in her name. Kahane claimed D'Argenio had been his former secretary in his failed consulting operation, she had died of terminal cancer, and her "well-to-do" family had endowed the foundation. Actually the money was used to fund the JDL, including supplies for bombings and Kahane's lavish travel. Early career Pulpit rabbi In 1958, Kahane became the rabbi of the Howard Beach Jewish Center in Queens, New York City. Although the synagogue was originally Conservative, rather than strictly Orthodox, the board of directors agreed to Kahane's conditions, which included resigning from the Conservative movement's United Synagogue of America, installing a partition separating men and women during prayer, instituting traditional prayers, and maintaining a kosher kitchen. At the Jewish Center, Kahane influenced many of the synagogue's youngsters to adopt a more observant lifestyle, which often troubled parents. He trained Arlo Guthrie for his bar mitzvah. When his contract was not renewed, he soon published an article entitled "End of the Miracle of Howard Beach". That was Kahane's first article in The Jewish Press, an American Orthodox Jewish weekly for which he would continue to write for the rest of his life. Kahane also used the pen name David Sinai, and the pseudonyms Michael King, David Borac, and Martin Keene. Infiltrating the John Birch Society In the late 1950s and the early 1960s, Kahane's life of secrecy and his strong anticommunism landed him a position as a consultant with the FBI. According to his wife, Libby, his assignment was to infiltrate the anticommunist John Birch Society and report his findings to the FBI. Collaboration with Joseph Churba At some time in the late 1950s, Kahane assumed the persona of a Gentile, along with the pseudonym Michael King. Kahane began openly expressing his anticommunism. He and Joseph Churba created the July Fourth Movement, which was formed to counteract widespread opposition towards U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. Subsequently, they coauthored the book The Jewish Stake in Vietnam, an attempt to convince American Jews of the "evil of Communism". The introduction states that, "All Americans have a stake in this grim war against Communism... It is vital that Jews realize the threat to their very survival [should Communism succeed]." Churba had a major falling out with Kahane over the use of paramilitary activities, and they parted ways permanently. Churba went on to pursue his own career, joining the U.S. Air Force, writing many books on the Middle East, and eventually becoming one of Ronald Reagan's consultants. Kahane chose to fight for Jewish rights, and was willing to use extreme measures. He even attempted to acquire and grow biological weapons to use on a Soviet military installation. He began using the phrase "Never again" and conceived the Jewish Star and fist insignia, a symbol resembling that of the Black Panther Party. However, Kahane himself opposed the Black Panthers, claiming they had supported anti-Jewish riots in Massachusetts and had left-wing views. Jewish Defense League Kahane founded the Jewish Defense League (JDL) in New York City in 1968. Its self-described purpose was to protect Jews from local manifestations of anti-Semitism. The JDL said it was committed to five fundamental principles: Love of Jewry: One Jewish people, indivisible and united, from which flows the love for, and the feeling of pain of, all Jews. Dignity and Pride: Pride in and knowledge of Jewish tradition, faith, culture, land, history, strength, pain, and peoplehood. Iron: The need to both move to help Jews everywhere and to change the Jewish image through sacrifice and all necessary means—even strength, force, and violence. Discipline and Unity: The knowledge that he (or she) can and will do whatever must be done, and the unity and strength of willpower to bring this into reality. Faith in the Indestructibility of the Jewish People: Faith in the greatness and indestructibility of the Jewish people, our religion, and our Land of Israel. According to his wife Libby Kahane, the JDL favored "civil rights for blacks, but opposed black anti-Semites and racism of any form." In 1971, the JDL formed an alliance with a black rights group in what Kahane termed "a turning point in Black-Jewish relations". The Anti-Defamation League claimed that Kahane "preached a radical form of Jewish nationalism which reflected racism, violence and political extremism" that was replicated by Irv Rubin, the JDL's successor to Kahane. Terrorism and convictions A number of the JDL's members and leaders, including Kahane, were convicted of acts related to domestic terrorism. In 1971, Kahane was sentenced to a suspended five-year prison sentence for conspiring to manufacture explosives. In 1975, Kahane was arrested for leading the attack on the Soviet United Nations mission and injuring two officers, but he was released after being given summonses for disorderly conduct. Later the same year, Kahane was accused of conspiring to kidnap a Soviet diplomat, bomb the Iraqi embassy in Washington, and ship arms abroad from Israel. He was convicted of violating his probation for the 1971 bombing conviction and was sentenced to one year in prison. However, he served most of it in a hotel, with frequent unsupervised absences, because of a concession over the provision of kosher food. In a 1984 interview with Washington Post correspondent Carla Hall, Kahane admitted that the JDL "bombed the Russian [Soviet] mission in New York, the Russian cultural mission here [Washington] in 1971, the Soviet trade offices". Immigration to Israel In 1971, Kahane moved to Israel. At the time, he declared that he would focus on Jewish education. He later began gathering lists of Arab citizens of the State of Israel who were willing to emigrate for compensation, and eventually, he initiated protests that advocated the expulsion of Arabs from that country, and Israeli-occupied territories. In 1972, Jewish Defense League leaflets were distributed in Hebron, calling for the mayor to stand trial for the 1929 Hebron massacre. Kahane was arrested dozens of times. In 1971, he founded Kach, a political party that ran for the Knesset, the Israeli Parliament, during the 1973 general elections under the name "The League List". It won 12,811 votes (0.82%), just 2,857 (0.18%) short of the electoral threshold at the time (1%) for winning a Knesset seat. The party was even less successful in the 1977 elections, winning only 4,836 votes. In 1980, Kahane was arrested for the 62nd time since his emigration, and he was jailed for six months after a detention order that was based on allegations of him planning armed attacks against Palestinians in response to the killings of Jewish settlers. Kahane was held in prison in Ramla, where he wrote the book They Must Go. Kahane was banned from entering the UK in 1981. In 1981, Kahane's party again ran for the Knesset during the 1981 elections, but it did not win a seat and received only 5,128 votes. In 1984, the Israeli Central Elections Committee banned him from being a candidate on the grounds that Kach was a racist party, but the Supreme Court of Israel overturned the ban on the grounds that the committee was not authorized to ban Kahane's candidacy. The Supreme Court suggested that the Knesset pass a law excluding racist parties from future elections. The Knesset responded in 1985 by amending the "Basic Law: Knesset" to include a prohibition (paragraph 7a) against the registration of parties that explicitly or implicitly incite racism. Election to Knesset In the 1984 legislative elections, Kahane's Kach party received 25,907 votes, gaining one seat in the Knesset, which was taken by Kahane. He refused to take the standard oath of office and insisted on adding a Biblical verse from Psalms to indicate that national laws were overruled by the Torah if they conflict. Kahane's legislative proposals focused on Jewish education, an open economy, transferring the Arab population out of the Land of Israel, revoking Israeli citizenship from non-Jews, and banning Jewish-Gentile marriages and sexual relations. While his popularity in Israel grew, Kahane was boycotted in the Knesset, where his speeches were often made to an empty assembly except for the duty chairman and the transcriptionist. The Knesset revoked his Parliamentary immunity to prevent his freedom of movement in areas where his inflammatory rhetoric could cause harm. Kahane's legislative proposals and motions of no-confidence against the government were ignored or rejected. Kahane often pejoratively called other Knesset members "Hellenists," a reference to Jews who assimilated into Greek culture after Judea's occupation by Alexander the Great. In 1987, Kahane opened a yeshiva ("HaRaayon HaYehudi") with funding from US supporters to teach "the Authentic Jewish Idea". Despite the boycott, his popularity grew among the Israeli public, especially for working-class Sephardi Jews. Polls showed that Kach would have likely received anywhere from four to twelve seats in the coming November 1988 elections. In 1985, the Knesset passed an amendment to the Basic Law of Israel, barring political parties that incited to racism. The Central Elections Committee banned Kahane a second time, and he appealed to the Israeli Supreme Court. However, the Supreme Court this time ruled in favor of the committee, disqualifying Kach from running in the 1988 legislative elections. Kahane was thus the first candidate in Israel to be barred from election for racism. The move was criticized as being anti-democratic by Alan M. Dershowitz. After Kahane's election to the Knesset in 1984, the United States government attempted to revoke his U.S. citizenship, which Kahane successfully challenged in court. However, in 1987, the Knesset passed a law declaring that a Knesset member could only be an Israeli citizen. To remain eligible for office, Kahane renounced his United States citizenship, but after being banned from the Knesset for his politics, he again filed suit to get his U.S. citizenship reinstated based on the argument that he was compelled to relinquish it by the Knesset. The court rejected this argument, but he was permitted to continue travelling to the United States. Assassination In November 1990, Kahane gave a speech to an audience of mostly Orthodox Jews from Brooklyn, where he warned American Jews to emigrate to Israel before it was "too late". As a crowd gathered around Kahane in the second-floor lecture hall in Midtown Manhattan's New York Marriott East Side, Kahane was assassinated by El Sayyid Nosair, an Egyptian-born U.S. citizen. He was initially charged and acquitted of the murder. Nosair was later convicted of the murder in U.S. District Court for his involvement in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Prosecutors were able to try Nosair again for the murder because the federal indictment included the killing as part of the alleged terrorist conspiracy. He was sentenced to life imprisonment and later made a confession to federal agents. Kahane was buried on Har HaMenuchot, in Jerusalem. He was eulogized by a number of prominent supporters in both the U.S. and in Israel, including Rabbi Moshe Tendler and the Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel, Mordechai Eliyahu, who spoke of how little the people understood of Kahane's true value. Ideology Kahane argued that there was a glory in Jewish destiny, which came through the observance of the Torah and halakha (Jewish law). He also noted, "Democracy and Judaism are not the same thing." Kahane also stressed the view that a Jewish state and a Western democracy were incompatible, since Western democracy is religion-blind, and a Jewish state is religion-oriented by its very name. He also warned of the danger of non-Jewish citizens becoming a majority and voting against the Jewish character of the state: "The question is as follows: if the Arabs settle among us and make enough children to become a majority, will Israel continue to be a Jewish state? Do we have to accept that the Arab majority will decide?" "Western democracy has to be ruled out. For me, that's cut and dried: There's no question of setting up democracy in Israel, because democracy means equal rights for all, irrespective of racial or religious origins." Kahane proposed an "exchange of populations" that would continue the Jewish exodus from Arab lands: "A total of some 750,000 Jews fled Arab lands since 1948. Surely it is time for Jews, worried over the huge growth of Arabs in Israel, to consider finishing the exchange of populations that began 35 years ago." Kahane proposed a $40,000 compensation plan for Arabs who would leave voluntarily, and forcible expulsion for those who "don't want to leave". He encouraged retaliatory violence against Arabs who attacked Jews: "I approve of anybody who commits such acts of violence. Really, I don't think that we can sit back and watch Arabs throwing rocks at buses whenever they feel like it. They must understand that a bomb thrown at a Jewish bus is going to mean a bomb thrown at an Arab bus." In some of his writings, Kahane argued that Israel should never start a war for territory but that if a war were launched against Israel, Biblical territory should be annexed. However, in an interview, he defined Israel's "minimal borders" as follows: "The southern boundary goes up to El Arish, which takes in all of northern Sinai, including Yamit. To the east, the frontier runs along the western part of the East Bank of the Jordan River, hence part of what is now Jordan. Eretz Yisrael also includes part of Lebanon and certain parts of Syria, and part of Iraq, all the way to the Euphrates River." When critics suggested that following Kahane's plans would mean a perpetual war between Jews and Arabs, Kahane responded, "There will be a perpetual war. With or without Kahane." Support Shlomo Aviner stated that Kahane was a righteous man who displayed self-sacrifice for the Jewish nation and also referred to him as a "Torah hero" whose every word was rooted in Torah sources. Herbert Bomzer referred to Kahane as "truly immersed in Torah all the time." Irving M. Bunim was a strong supporter and admirer of Kahane. Shlomo Carlebach was known for declaring that the Jewish people owed a great debt to Kahane. Together, Carlebach and Kahane organized one of the first Noahide conferences in the 1980s for non-Jews wishing to accept upon themselves the Noahide laws. Musician Bob Dylan made positive comments about Kahane. In a 1971 interview for Time magazine, Dylan said, "He's a really sincere guy. He's really put it all together." According to Kahane, Dylan attended several meetings of the Jewish Defense League to find out "what we're all about", and he started to have talks with the rabbi. Subsequently, Dylan downplayed the extent of his contact with Kahane. Mordechai Eliyahu was Kahane's personal mentor, and one of Kahane's staunchest supporters. Eliyahu wrote an approbation to Kahane's Tanakh commentary, "Perush Hamacabee", where he refers to Kahane as "HaRav HaGaon" ("the rabbinic genius"), a praiseworthy title attributed to the very saintly. Eliyahu wrote, "Only the Torah way interested Kahane, which he constantly toiled over and which served as his strength... When one considers the depth and clarity of [Kahane's] works, one is astonished at how he had the time to compile such. The answer is that... all his time and thoughts were invested in Torah while other matters were secondary. Fortunate is the family that publishes his works for others to learn from." At Kahane's funeral, Eliyahu stated that Kahane was a reincarnation of a fearless biblical character. Kahane was endorsed in his bid for a Knesset seat by Zvi Yehuda Kook. In his letter of support for Kahane, Kook stated, "The presence of Rabbi Meir Kahane and his uncompromising words from the Knesset platform will undoubtedly add strength and value to the obligatory struggle on behalf of the entire Land of Israel." The announcement of Kook's support of Kahane and his letter were made available to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Yosef Mendelevitch stated, "Kahane was a representative for us. His activities made us feel good. His actions showed that Jews cared. His actions may have been controversial, but his role was very important. He was a symbol for Russian Jews." Aaron Rakeffet-Rothkoff said, "You can’t imagine the influence Kahane had on so many young people. Kahane was a talmid chacham (Torah scholar) that we all looked up to." Menachem Mendel Schneerson supported Kahane on many issues concerning Israel, including the issue of Arabs, relinquishing land, building settlements and the incorporation of Jewish law into Israeli policy. After hearing of Kahane's death, Schneerson remarked that "one of the greatest Jewish leaders in history has fallen." He later blessed Kahane's son to be successful in fulfilling his "holy father's" work. Avraham Shapira stated that Kahane was an inseparable part of Orthodox Judaism. He later openly backed Kahane's State of Judea movement. After the Kach party was outlawed, a member of the Sicarii terrorist group pledged allegiance to Kahane and his political party during a phone call. Ahron Soloveichik stated, "What Kahane said was absolutely correct, just we don’t say it because the world will criticize us, but somebody had to say it." Noach Weinberg sought to place Kahane on his staff, believing him to be just what the kiruv movement needed. Ya'akov Yosef described Kahane as one who fulfilled his role faithfully. He declared that "we must learn from his great actions in order that we learn the way of the Torah." Legacy Following Kahane's death, no leader emerged to replace him in the movement. However, the idea of transferring populations, attributed mainly to Kahane, was subsequently incorporated into the political platform of various political parties in Israel, such as Moledet (applying to Arab non-citizen residents of the West Bank) and Yisrael Beiteinu (in the form of population exchange). Two small Kahanist factions later emerged; one under the name Kach, and the other under the name Kahane chai (Hebrew: כהנא חי, literally "Kahane lives [on]"), the second one being led by his younger son, Binyamin Ze'ev Kahane. Neither one was permitted to participate in the Knesset elections by the Central Elections Committee. In 1994, following the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre of Palestinian Muslim worshippers in Hebron by Kach supporter Baruch Goldstein, in which 29 Muslim worshipers were killed, the Israeli government declared both parties to be terrorist organizations. The US State Department also added Kach and Kahane Chai to its list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations. In the 2003 Knesset elections, Herut, which had split off from the National Union list, ran with Michael Kleiner and former Kach activist Baruch Marzel taking the top two spots on the list. The joint effort narrowly missed the 1.5% barrier. In the following 2006 elections, the Jewish National Front, led by Baruch Marzel, fared better, but it also failed to pass the minimum threshold. A follower of Kahane who was involved with Kach for many years, Michael Ben-Ari, was elected to the Knesset in the 2009 elections on renewed National Union list. He stood again in the 2013 elections as the second candidate on the list of Otzma LeYisrael, but the party failed to pass the minimum threshold. In 2007, the FBI released over a thousand documents relating to its daily surveillance of Kahane since the early 1960s. In 2015, Kahane's grandson, Meir Ettinger, was detained by Israeli law enforcement. He was the alleged leader of the radical Jewish group "The Revolt". In an online "manifesto" echoing some of his grandfather's teachings, Ettinger promotes the "dispossession of gentiles" who live in Israel and the establishment of a new "kingdom of Israel", a theocracy ruled according to the Halacha. Ettinger's writings condemned Israel's government, mainstream rabbis, and the IDF, and also have denounced Christian churches as "idolatry". In 2016, Kahane's widow claimed that modern Jewish extremists in Israel do not follow the ideology of her late husband, Rabbi Meir Kahane. She justified that claim by arguing that unlike modern Jewish extremists, Rabbi Kahane had a more mature approach that did not encourage illegal activities. The prosecution argued that Arab MK Haneen Zoabi should be banned for denying the Jewish people's existence, and she was banned by the Central Elections Committee, which uses the Kahane precedent. A week later, the ruling was unanimously overturned by the Supreme Court. Attempts to ban the Strong Israel and Balad political parties by using the Kahane precedent were also overturned. In 2017, The Forward reported that some of Kahane's followers were aligning themselves with white nationalists and the alt-right. Other Kahanists declared that such moves did not reflect Kahane's teachings, and they supported that declaration by arguing that Kahane worked together with African Americans. See also Jewish fundamentalism Politics of Israel Zionist political violence Publications By Kahane (Partially under pseudonym Michael King; with Joseph Churba) The Jewish Stake in Vietnam, Crossroads, 1967 Never Again! A Program for Survival, Pyramid Books, 1972 Time to Go Home, Nash, 1972. Letters from Prison, Jewish Identity Center, 1974 Our Challenge: The Chosen Land, 1974 The Story of the Jewish Defense League, Chilton, 1975, 2nd edition, Institute for Publication of the Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane, (Brooklyn, NY), 2000 Why Be Jewish? Intermarriage, Assimilation, and Alienation, Stein & Day, 1977 Listen, Vanessa, I Am a Zionist, Institute of the Authentic Jewish Idea, 1978 They Must Go, Grosset & Dunlop, 1981 Forty Years, Institute of the Jewish Idea, 2nd edition, 1983 Uncomfortable Questions for Comfortable Jews, Lyle Stuart, 1987 Israel: Revolution or Referendum, Barricade Books (Secaucus, NJ), 1990 Or ha-ra'yon, English title: The Jewish Idea, n.p. (Jerusalem), 1992, translated from the Hebrew by Raphael Blumberg, Institute for Publication of the Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane (Jerusalem), 1996 On Jews and Judaism: Selected Articles 1961–1990, Institute for Publication of the Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane (Jerusalem), 1993 Perush ha-Makabi: al Sefer Devarim, Institute for Publication of the Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane (Jerusalem), 1993, 1995 Pirush HaMaccabee: al Sefer Shemu'el u-Nevi'im rishonim, Institute for Publication of the Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane (Jerusalem), 1994 Listen World, Listen Jew, 3rd edition, Institute for the Publication of the Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane (Jerusalem), 1995 Beyond Words, 1st edition, Institute for the Publication of the Writings of Rabbi Meir Kahane (Jerusalem), 2010. Kohen ve-navi: osef ma'amarim, ha-Makhon le-hotsa'at kitve ha-Rav Kahana (Jerusalem), 2000 Cuckooland, illustrated by Shulamith bar Itzhak (yet unpublished). About Kahane For supplementary information and insights: . Miracle Man, Yeshivat "HaRaayon HaYehudi" (Jerusalem), 2010 . . . . . . . . . References External links Words online educational resource FBI file on Meir Kahane 1932 births 1990 deaths 1990 murders in the United States 20th-century American criminals 20th-century rabbis American emigrants to Israel American Kahanists American members of the clergy convicted of crimes American Orthodox Jews American Orthodox rabbis American people of Latvian-Jewish descent Assassinated American activists Assassinated Israeli politicians Assassinated rabbis Brooklyn College alumni Burials at Har HaMenuchot Ethnic supremacy Far-right politics Israeli activists Israeli anti-communists Israeli government officials convicted of crimes Israeli Kahanists Israeli Orthodox rabbis Israeli people murdered abroad Israeli politicians convicted of crimes Israeli terrorism victims Jewish American writers Jewish anti-communists Jewish religious terrorism Kach and Kahane Chai politicians Kahanism Male murder victims Members of the 11th Knesset (1984–1988) Mir Yeshiva alumni Murdered American Jews New York Law School alumni Orthodox rabbis from New York City People murdered in New York City Philosophers of Judaism Rabbis convicted of crimes Religious Zionist Orthodox rabbis Writers from Brooklyn Writers on antisemitism Writers on Zionism

20203

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marietta%20Alboni

Marietta Alboni

Maria Anna Marzia (called Marietta) Alboni (6 March 1826 – 23 June 1894) was a renowned Italian contralto opera singer. She is considered "one of the greatest contraltos in operatic history". Biography Alboni was born at Città di Castello, in Umbria. She became a pupil of of Cesena, Emilia–Romagna, and later of the composer Gioachino Rossini, when he was 'perpetual honorary adviser' in (and then the principal of) the Liceo Musicale, now Conservatorio Giovanni Battista Martini, in Bologna. Rossini tested the humble thirteen-year-old girl himself, had her admitted to the school with special treatment, and even procured her an early engagement to tour his Stabat Mater around Northern Italy, so that she could pay for her studies. After she achieved her diploma and made a modest debut in Bologna, in 1842, as "Climene" in Pacini's Saffo, she obtained a triennial engagement thanks to Rossini's influence on the impresario Bartolomeo Merelli, Intendant at both Milan's Teatro alla Scala and Vienna's Imperial Kärntnertortheater. The favourable contract was signed by Rossini himself, "on behalf of Eustachio Alboni", father of Marietta, who was still a minor. The singer remained, throughout her life, deeply grateful to her ancient "maestro", nearly a second father to her. Her debut at Teatro alla Scala took place in December 1842 as "Neocle" in the Italian version of Le siège de Corinthe, which was followed by roles in operas by Marliani, Donizetti (as "Maffio Orsini" and "Leonora" in the Scala premiere of an Italian version of La favorite), Salvi and Pacini. In the season 1844–1845 she was engaged in the Saint Petersburg Imperial Bolshoi Kamenny Theatre; later, in 1846–47, she toured the principal cities of Central Europe, finally reaching London and Paris, where she settled permanently. In London, "she appeared in leading roles by Rossini and Donizetti (where she outshone Giulia Grisi and Jenny Lind) and also sang Cherubino (performing with Henriette Sontag)". For the 1848 London run of Les Huguenots, Meyerbeer transposed the role of the page "Urbain" 'from soprano to contralto and composed the aria "Non! – non, non, non, non, non! Vous n'avez jamais, je gage" in Act 2' for her. On 28 August 1848, she sang at a concert in Manchester's Concert Hall, sharing the stage with Lorenzo Salvi and Frédéric Chopin. She toured the United States in 1852–53, appearing there with Camilla Urso. In 1853 she wed a nobleman, Count Carlo Pepoli, of the Papal States, but she kept her maiden name for the stage. In 1863 she had to retire the first time on account of her husband's serious mental illness. He died in 1867. A year later, in 1868, Alboni would take part in the funeral of her beloved master and friend, Rossini, in the Église de la Sainte-Trinité. There she sang, alongside Adelina Patti, the leading soprano of the time, a stanza of Dies irae, "Liber scriptum", adjusted to the music of the duet "Quis est Homo" from Rossini's own Stabat Mater. Out of deference to her master, she also accepted to resume her singing career mainly in order to tour the orchestral version of the Petite messe solennelle around Europe. Rossini had once expressed his hope that she would take upon herself to perform it when he was dead. He had said that he had composed it, and especially the new section "O salutaris", just having her voice in mind. In 1872 she permanently retired from the stage with four performances of "Fidalma" in Cimarosa's Il matrimonio segreto, at the Paris Théâtre des Italiens but, in fact, she never gave up singing in private and in benefit concerts. When in 1887 the French and Italian Governments agreed upon moving the mortal remains of Rossini into the Basilica di Santa Croce in Florence, Alboni, then a sixty-one-year-old lady living in seclusion, wrote to the Italian Foreign Minister, Di Robilant, proposing that the Petite Messe Solennelle, "the last musical composition by Rossini", be performed in Santa Croce the day of the funeral, and "demanding the honour, as an Italian and a pupil of the immortal Maestro," of singing it herself in her "dear and beloved homeland". Her wish, however, never came true and she was just given the chance of being present at the exhumation ceremony in Paris. The Paris correspondent of the Rome newspaper Il Fanfulla wrote on the occasion: "photographers snapped in the same shot the greatest performer of Cenerentola and Semiramide, and what is left of the man who wrote these masterpieces". In 1877 she had remarried—to a French military officer named Charles Zieger. She died at Ville-d'Avray, near Paris, in her "Villa La Cenerentola", and was buried at Père Lachaise Cemetery. Always engaged in charity (often in memory of Maestro Rossini), she left nearly all her estate to the poor of Paris. In her will she wrote that by singing she had earned all her fortune, and on singing she would pass away, with the sweet thought that she had employed it to encourage and to console. Artistic features Alboni's voice, an exceptionally fine contralto with a seamless compass of two and one-half octaves, extending as high as the soprano range was said to possess at once power, sweetness, fullness, and extraordinary flexibility. She had no peers in passages requiring a sensitive delivery and semi-religious calmness, owing to the moving quality of her velvety tone. She possessed vivacity, grace, and charm as an actress of the comédienne type; but she was not a natural tragédienne, and her attempt at the strongly dramatic part of Norma was sometimes reported to have turned out a failure. Nevertheless, she scored a real triumph in 1850, when she made her operatic debut at the Paris Opéra performing the tragic role of "Fidès" in Meyerbeer's Le prophète, which had been created the year before by no less than Pauline Viardot. Furthermore, she was able to cope with such dramatic roles as "Azucena" and "Ulrica" in Verdi's Il trovatore and Un ballo in maschera, and even with the baritone role of "Don Carlo" in Ernani (London, 1847). Repertoire The following list of the roles performed by Marietta Alboni was drawn up by Arthur Pougin and published in his biography of the singer. It is reported here with the addition of further works and characters according to the sources stated in footnotes. Anna Bolena, by Donizetti – Anna and Smeton L'assedio di Corinto, by Rossini – Neocle Un ballo in maschera, by Verdi – Ulrica Il barbiere di Siviglia, by Rossini – Rosina La Cenerentola, by Rossini – Cenerentola Charles VI, by Halévy – Odette Consuelo, by Giovanni Battista Gordigiani – Anzoletto Così fan tutte, by Mozart – Dorabella Il crociato, by Meyerbeer – Felicia Un curioso accidente, pastiche with music by Rossini David, oratorio, by Muhlig Don Giovanni, by Mozart – Zerlina Don Pasquale, by Donizetti – Norina La donna del lago, by Rossini – Malcolm and Elena L'ebrea, by Pacini – Berenice Ernani, by Verdi – Don Carlo, Giovanna La favorite, by Donizetti – Léonor La fille du régiment, by Donizetti – Marie La gazza ladra, by Rossini – Pippo and Ninetta , cantata, by Rossini Giulietta e Romeo, by Vaccai – Romeo Il giuramento, by Mercadante – Bianca Ildegonda, by Marco Aurelio Marliani – Rizzardo L'italiana in Algeri, by Rossini – Isabella Lara, by Salvi – Mirza Linda di Chamounix, by Donizetti – Pierotto Lucrezia Borgia, by Donizetti – Maffio Orsini Luisa Miller, by Verdi – Federica Maria di Rohan, by Donizetti – Gondi Martha, by Flotow – Nancy Il matrimonio segreto, by Cimarosa – Fidalma Messiah, oratorio by Händel La pazza per amore, by Coppola – Nina Norma, by Bellini – Norma Le nozze di Figaro, by Mozart – The page (Cherubino) Oberon, by Weber – Fatima Petite messe solennelle, mass by Rossini Le prophète, by Meyerbeer – Fidès La reine de Chypre, by Halévy – Catarina Rigoletto, by Verdi – Maddalena Saffo, by Pacini – Climene Semiramide, by Rossini – Arsace La sibilla, by Pietro Torrigiani – Ismailia La sonnambula, by Bellini – Amina Stabat mater, Marian hymn, by Rossini Tancredi, by Rossini – Tancredi Il trovatore, by Verdi – Azucena Zerline, by Auber – Zerline La zingara, by Balfe – Queen of the Gypsies Les Huguenots, by Meyerbeer – The page (Urbain) References Notes Sources Rodolfo Celletti, La grana della voce. Opere, direttori e cantanti, 2nd edition (Milano, 2000). Henry Fothergill Chorley (1862), Thirty Years' Musical Recollections. Hurst & Blackett, London, Volume II, The Year 1847, 8–13. Galliano Ciliberti, "Alboni, Marietta", in S. Sadie, cited, I, p. 59 F. M. Colby and T. Williams (Eds.) (1917–1926), New International Encyclopedia (2nd Edition). Dodd, Mead & Co., The University Press, Cambridge Massachusetts. G. T. Ferris, Great Singers (New York, 1893) Arthur Pougin, Marietta Alboni (Paris, 1912; accessible for free online at gallica.bnf.fr Gallica – Bibliothèque nationale de France) Arthur Pougin, Marietta Alboni (Cesena, 2001) (translated into Italian by Michele Massarelli with additions to the original text by Lelio Burgini). Sadie, Stanley (ed.), The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, Grove (Oxford University Press), New York, 1997. External links www.coroalboni.it www.coralealboni.com Coro Lirico Città di Cesena (Italian) Operatic contraltos Italian contraltos Italian opera singers 1823 births 1894 deaths Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery People from Città di Castello 19th-century Italian singers 19th-century Italian women singers Conservatorio Giovanni Battista Martini alumni

20204

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manatee

Manatee

Manatees (family Trichechidae, genus Trichechus) are large, fully aquatic, mostly herbivorous marine mammals sometimes known as sea cows. There are three accepted living species of Trichechidae, representing three of the four living species in the order Sirenia: the Amazonian manatee (Trichechus inunguis), the West Indian manatee (Trichechus manatus), and the West African manatee (Trichechus senegalensis). They measure up to long, weigh as much as , and have paddle-like flippers. Manatees are herbivores and eat over 60 different freshwater and saltwater plants. Manatees inhabit the shallow, marshy coastal areas and rivers of the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, the Amazon basin, and West Africa. The main causes of death for manatees are human-related issues, such as habitat destruction and human objects. Their slow-moving, curious nature has led to violent collisions with propeller-driven boats and ships. Some manatees have been found with over 50 scars on them from propeller blades. Natural causes of death include adverse temperatures, predation by crocodiles on young, and disease. Etymology The etymology of the name is unclear, with connections having been made to Latin "hand" and to pre-Columbian Taíno manati "breast". The term sea cow is a reference to the species' slow, peaceful, herbivorous nature, reminiscent of that of bovines. Taxonomy Manatees are three of the four living species in the order Sirenia. The fourth is the Eastern Hemisphere's dugong. The Sirenia are thought to have evolved from four-legged land mammals more than 60 million years ago, with the closest living relatives being the Proboscidea (elephants) and Hyracoidea (hyraxes). The Amazonian's hair color is brownish gray, and it has thick wrinkled skin, often with coarse hair, or "whiskers". Photos are rare; although very little is known about this species, scientists think it is similar to West Indian manatee. Description Manatees weigh , and average in length, sometimes growing to and and females tend to be larger and heavier than males. At birth, baby manatees weigh about each. The female manatee has two teats, one under each flipper, a characteristic that was used to make early links between the manatee and elephants. The lids of manatees' small, widely spaced eyes close in a circular manner. The manatee has a large, flexible, prehensile upper lip, used to gather food and eat and for social interaction and communication. Manatees have shorter snouts than their fellow sirenians, the dugongs. Manatee adults have no incisor or canine teeth, just a set of cheek teeth, which are not clearly differentiated into molars and premolars. These teeth are repeatedly replaced throughout life, with new teeth growing at the rear as older teeth fall out from farther forward in the mouth, somewhat as elephants' teeth do. At any time, a manatee typically has no more than six teeth in each jaw of its mouth. The manatee's tail is paddle-shaped, and is the clearest visible difference between manatees and dugongs; a dugong tail is fluked, similar in shape to that of a whale. The manatee is unusual among mammals in having just six cervical vertebrae, a number that may be due to mutations in the homeotic genes. All other mammals have seven cervical vertebrae, other than the two-toed and three-toed sloths. Like the horse, the manatee has a simple stomach, but a large cecum, in which it can digest tough plant matter. Generally, the intestines are about 45 meters, unusually long for an animal of the manatee's size. Evolution Fossil remains of manatee ancestors - also known as sirenians - date back to the Early Eocene. It is thought that they reached the isolated area of the South American continent and became known as Trichechidae. In the Late Miocene, trichechids were likely restricted in South American coastal rivers and they fed on many freshwater plants. Dugongs inhabited the West Atlantic and Caribbean waters and fed on seagrass meadows instead. As the sea grasses began to grow, manatees adapted to the changing environment by growing supernumerary molars. Sea levels lowered and increased erosion and silt runoff was caused by glaciation. This increased the tooth wear of the bottom-feeding manatees. Behavior Apart from mothers with their young, or males following a receptive female, manatees are generally solitary animals. Manatees spend approximately 50% of the day sleeping submerged, surfacing for air regularly at intervals of less than 20 minutes. The remainder of the time is mostly spent grazing in shallow waters at depths of . The Florida subspecies (T. m. latirostris) has been known to live up to 60 years. Locomotion Generally, manatees swim at about . However, they have been known to swim at up to in short bursts. Intelligence and learning Manatees are capable of understanding discrimination tasks and show signs of complex associative learning. They also have good long-term memory. They demonstrate discrimination and task-learning abilities similar to dolphins and pinnipeds in acoustic and visual studies. Reproduction Manatees typically breed once every two years; generally only a single calf is born. Gestation lasts about 12 months and to wean the calf takes a further 12 to 18 months, although females may have more than one estrous cycle per year. Communication Manatees emit a wide range of sounds used in communication, especially between cows and their calves. Their ears are large internally but the external openings are small, and they are located four inches behind each eye. Adults communicate to maintain contact and during sexual and play behaviors. Taste and smell, in addition to sight, sound, and touch, may also be forms of communication. Diet Manatees are herbivores and eat over 60 different freshwater (e.g., floating hyacinth, pickerel weed, alligator weed, water lettuce, hydrilla, water celery, musk grass, mangrove leaves) and saltwater plants (e.g., sea grasses, shoal grass, manatee grass, turtle grass, widgeon grass, sea clover, and marine algae). Using their divided upper lip, an adult manatee will commonly eat up to 10%–15% of their body weight (about 50 kg) per day. Consuming such an amount requires the manatee to graze for up to seven hours a day. To be able to cope with the high levels of cellulose in their plant based diet, manatees utilize hindgut fermentation to help with the digestion process. Manatees have been known to eat small numbers of fish from nets. Feeding behavior Manatees use their flippers to "walk" along the bottom whilst they dig for plants and roots in the substrate. When plants are detected, the flippers are used to scoop the vegetation toward the manatee's lips. The manatee has prehensile lips; the upper lip pad is split into left and right sides which can move independently. The lips use seven muscles to manipulate and tear at plants. Manatees use their lips and front flippers to move the plants into the mouth. The manatee does not have front teeth, however, behind the lips, on the roof of the mouth, there are dense, ridged pads. These horny ridges, and the manatee's lower jaw, tear through ingested plant material. Dentition Manatees have four rows of teeth. There are 6 to 8 high-crowned, open-rooted molars located along each side of the upper and lower jaw giving a total of 24 to 32 flat, rough-textured teeth. Eating gritty vegetation abrades the teeth, particularly the enamel crown; however, research indicates that the enamel structure in manatee molars is weak. To compensate for this, manatee teeth are continually replaced. When anterior molars wear down, they are shed. Posterior molars erupt at the back of the row and slowly move forward to replace these like enamel crowns on a conveyor belt, similarly to elephants. This process continues throughout the manatee's lifetime. The rate at which the teeth migrate forward depends on how quickly the anterior teeth abrade. Some studies indicate that the rate is about 1 cm/month although other studies indicate 0.1 cm/month. Ecology Range and habitat Manatees inhabit the shallow, marshy coastal areas and rivers of the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico (T. manatus, West Indian manatee), the Amazon basin (T. inunguis, Amazonian manatee), and West Africa (T. senegalensis, West African manatee). West Indian manatees prefer warmer temperatures and are known to congregate in shallow waters. They frequently migrate through brackish water estuaries to freshwater springs. They cannot survive below 15 °C (60 °F). Their natural source for warmth during winter is warm, spring-fed rivers. West Indian The coast of the state of Georgia is usually the northernmost range of the West Indian manatees because their low metabolic rate does not protect them in cold water. Prolonged exposure to water below 20 °C (68 °F) can cause "cold stress syndrome" and death. Florida manatees can move freely between fresh water and salt water. Manatees have been seen as far north as Cape Cod, and in 1995 and again in 2006, one was seen in New York City and Rhode Island's Narragansett Bay. A manatee was spotted in the Wolf River harbor near the Mississippi River in downtown Memphis in 2006, and was later found dead downriver in McKellar Lake. Another manatee was found dead on a New Jersey beach in February 2020, considered especially unusual given the time of year. At the time of the manatee's discovery, the water temperature in the area was below 6.5 °C (43.7 °F). The West Indian manatee migrates into Florida rivers—such as the Crystal, the Homosassa, and the Chassahowitzka rivers, whose headsprings are 22 °C (72 °F) all year. Between November and March each year, about 600 West Indian manatees gather in the rivers in Citrus County, Florida such as the Crystal River National Wildlife Refuge. In winter, manatees often gather near the warm-water outflows of power plants along the Florida coast, instead of migrating south as they once did. Some conservationists are concerned that these manatees have become too reliant on these artificially warmed areas. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is trying to find a new way to heat the water for manatees that depended on plants that have closed. Studies suggest that Florida manatees need access to fresh water for proper regulation of water and salts in their bodies. Accurate population estimates of the Florida manatee (T. manatus) are difficult. They have been called scientifically weak because they vary widely from year to year, some areas showing increases, others decreases, and little strong evidence of increases except in two areas. Manatee counts are highly variable without an accurate way to estimate numbers: In Florida in 1996, a winter survey found 2,639 manatees; in 1997, a January survey found 2,229, and a February survey found 1,706. A statewide synoptic survey in January 2010 found 5,067 manatees living in Florida, the highest number recorded to that time. As of January 2016, the USFWS estimates the range-wide manatee population to be at least 13,000; as of January 2018, at least 6,100 are estimated to be in Florida. Population viability studies conducted in 1997 found that decreasing adult survival and eventual extinction were a probable future outcome for Florida manatees unless they got more protection. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed downgrading the manatee's status from endangered to threatened in January 2016 after more than 40 years of the manatee's being classified as on the endangered. Amazonian The freshwater Amazonian manatee (T. inunguis) inhabits the Central Amazon Basin in Brazil, eastern Perú, southeastern Colombia, but not Ecuador. It is the only exclusively freshwater manatee, and is also the smallest. Since they are unable to reduce peripheral heat loss, it is found primarily in tropical waters. West African They are found in coastal marine and estuarine habitats, and in freshwater river systems along the west coast of Africa from the Senegal River south to the Cuanza River in Angola. They live as far upriver on the Niger River as Koulikoro in Mali, 2,000 km from the coast. Predation In relation to the threat posed by humans, predation does not present a significant threat to manatees. When threatened, the manatee's response is to dive as deeply as it can, suggesting that threats have most frequently come from land dwellers such as humans rather than from other water-dwelling creatures such as caimans or sharks. Relation to humans Threats The main causes of death for manatees are human-related issues, such as habitat destruction and human objects. Natural causes of death include adverse temperatures, predation by crocodiles on young, and disease. Ship strikes Their slow-moving, curious nature, coupled with dense coastal development, has led to many violent collisions with propeller-driven boats and ships, leading frequently to maiming, disfigurement, and even death. As a result, a large proportion of manatees exhibit spiral cutting propeller scars on their backs, usually caused by larger vessels that do not have skegs in front of the propellers like the smaller outboard and inboard-outboard recreational boats have. They are now even identified by humans based on their scar patterns. Many manatees have been cut in two by large vessels like ships and tug boats, even in the highly populated lower St. Johns River's narrow channels. Some are concerned that the current situation is inhumane, with upwards of 50 scars and disfigurements from vessel strikes on a single manatee. Often, the lacerations lead to infections, which can prove fatal. Internal injuries stemming from being trapped between hulls and docks and impacts have also been fatal. Recent testing shows that manatees may be able to hear speed boats and other watercraft approaching, due to the frequency the boat makes. However, a manatee may not be able to hear the approaching boats when they are performing day-to-day activities or distractions. The manatee has a tested frequency range of 8 to 32 kilohertz. Manatees hear on a higher frequency than would be expected for such large marine mammals. Many large boats emit very low frequencies, which confuse the manatee and explain their lack of awareness around boats. The Lloyd's mirror effect results in low frequency propeller sounds not being discernible near the surface, where most accidents occur. Research indicates that when a boat has a higher frequency the manatees rapidly swim away from danger. In 2003, a population model was released by the United States Geological Survey that predicted an extremely grave situation confronting the manatee in both the Southwest and Atlantic regions where the vast majority of manatees are found. It states, According to marine mammal veterinarians: These veterinarians go on to state: One quarter of annual manatee deaths in Florida are caused by boat collisions with manatees. In 2009, of the 429 Florida manatees recorded dead, 97 were killed by commercial and recreational vessels, which broke the earlier record number of 95 set in 2002. Red tide Another cause of manatee deaths are red tides, a term used for the proliferation, or "blooms", of the microscopic marine algae Karenia brevis. This dinoflagellate produces brevetoxins that can have toxic effects on the central nervous system of animals. In 1996, a red tide was responsible for 151 manatee deaths in Florida. The bloom was present from early March to the end of April and killed approximately 15% of the known population of manatees along South Florida's western coast. Other blooms in 1982 and 2005 resulted in 37 and 44 deaths, respectively. Starvation In 2021 a massive die-off of seagrass along the Atlantic coast of Florida left manatees without enough food to eat. As a result of this ecological disaster Florida's manatees began dying at an alarming rate, largely from starvation. In early 2022 the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service began a feeding program to address the situation by distributing 3,000 pounds (1,361 kg) of lettuce per day to save the malnourished animals. Additional threats Manatees can also be crushed and isolated in water control structures (navigation locks, floodgates, etc.) and are occasionally killed by entanglement in fishing gear, such as crab pot float lines, box traps, and shark nets. While humans are allowed to swim with manatees in one area of Florida, there have been numerous charges of people harassing and disturbing the manatees. According to the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, approximately 99 manatee deaths each year are related to human activities. In January 2016, there were 43 manatee deaths in Florida alone. Conservation All three species of manatee are listed by the World Conservation Union as vulnerable to extinction. However, The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) does not consider the West Indian manatee to be "endangered" anymore, having downgraded its status to "threatened" as of March 2017. They cite improvements to habitat conditions, population growth and reductions of threats as reasoning for the change. The reclassification was met with controversy, with Florida congressman Vern Buchanan and groups such as the Save the Manatee Club and the Center for Biological Diversity expressing concerns that the change would have a detrimental effect on conservation efforts. The new classification will not affect current federal protections. West Indian manatees were originally classified as endangered with the 1967 class of endangered species. Manatee population in the United States reached a low in the 1970s, during which only a few hundred individuals lived in the nation. As of February 2016, 6,250 manatees were reported swimming in Florida's springs. It is illegal under federal and Florida law to injure or harm a manatee. There are many conservation programs that have been created to help manatees. Save the Manatee Club is a non-profit group and membership organization that works to protect manatees and their aquatic ecosystems. Founded by Bob Graham, former Florida governor, and singer/songwriter Jimmy Buffett, this is today's leading manatee conservation club. The MV Freedom Star and MV Liberty Star, ships used by NASA to tow Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Boosters back to Kennedy Space Center, were propelled only by water jets to protect the endangered manatee population that inhabits regions of the Banana River where the ships are based. Brazil outlawed hunting in 1973 in an effort to preserve the species. Deaths by boat strikes are still common. Although countries are protecting Amazonian manatees in the locations where they are endangered, as of 1994 there were no enforced laws, and the manatees were still being captured throughout their range. Captivity The oldest manatee in captivity was Snooty, at the South Florida Museum's Parker Manatee Aquarium in Bradenton, Florida. Born at the Miami Aquarium and Tackle Company on July 21, 1948, Snooty was one of the first recorded captive manatee births. Raised entirely in captivity, Snooty was never to be released into the wild. As such he was the only manatee at the aquarium, and one of only a few captive manatees in the United States that was allowed to interact with human handlers. That made him uniquely suitable for manatee research and education. Snooty died suddenly two days after his 69th birthday, July 23, 2017, when he was found in an underwater area only used to access plumbing for the exhibit life support system. The South Florida Museum's initial press release stated, “Early indications are that an access panel door that is normally bolted shut had somehow been knocked loose and that Snooty was able to swim in.” There are a number of manatee rehabilitation centers in the United States. These include three government-run critical care facilities in Florida at Lowry Park Zoo, Miami Seaquarium, and SeaWorld Orlando. After initial treatment at these facilities, the manatees are transferred to rehabilitation facilities before release. These include the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden, Columbus Zoo and Aquarium, Epcot's The Seas, South Florida Museum, and Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park. The Columbus Zoo was a founding member of the Manatee Rehabilitation Partnership in 2001. Since 1999, the zoo's Manatee Bay facility has helped rehabilitate 20 manatees. The Cincinnati Zoo has rehabilitated and released more than a dozen manatees since 1999. Manatees can also be viewed in a number of European zoos, such as the Tierpark Berlin and the Nuremberg Zoo in Germany, in ZooParc de Beauval in France, the Aquarium of Genoa in Italy and the Royal Burgers' Zoo in Arnhem, the Netherlands, where manatees have parented offspring. The River Safari at Singapore features seven of them. Guyana Since the 19th century, Georgetown, Guyana has kept West Indian manatees in its botanical garden, and later, its national park. In the 1910s and again in the 1950s, sugar estates in Guyana used manatees to keep their irrigation canals weed-free. Between the 1950s and 1970s, the Georgetown water treatment plant used manatees in their storage canals for the same purpose. Culture The manatee has been linked to folklore on mermaids. In West African folklore, they were considered sacred and thought to have been once human. Killing one was taboo and required penance. In the novel Moby-Dick, Herman Melville distinguishes manatees ("Lamatins", cf. lamatins) from small whales; stating, "I am aware that down to the present time, the fish styled Lamatins and Dugongs (Pig-fish and Sow-fish of the Coffins of Nantucket) are included by many naturalists among the whales. But as these pig-fish are a noisy, contemptible set, mostly lurking in the mouths of rivers, and feeding on wet hay, and especially as they do not spout, I deny their credentials as whales; and have presented them with their passports to quit the Kingdom of Cetology." See also Dwarf manatee Manatee of Helena References Further reading External links Save the Manatee Murie, James On the Form and Structure of the Manatee (Manatus americanus), (1872) London, Zoological Society of London Year Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission Reuters: Florida manatees may lose endangered status A website with many manatee photos USGS/SESC Sirenia Project Bibliography and Index of the Sirenia and Desmostylia – Dr. Domning's authoritative manatee research bibliography Sirenians Mammal families Extant Pleistocene first appearances Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus Taxa named by Theodore Gill

20205

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsupial

Marsupial

Marsupials are any members of the mammalian infraclass Marsupialia. All extant marsupials are endemic to Australasia, Wallacea and the Americas. A distinctive characteristic common to most of these species is that the young are carried in a pouch. Marsupials include opossums, Tasmanian devils, kangaroos, koalas, wombats, wallabies, bandicoots, and the extinct thylacine. Marsupials represent the clade originating from the last common ancestor of extant metatherians, the group containing all mammals more closely related to marsupials than to placentals. They give birth to relatively undeveloped young that often reside in a pouch located on their mothers' abdomen for a certain amount of time. Close to 70% of the 334 extant species occur on the Australian continent (the mainland, Tasmania, New Guinea and nearby islands). The remaining 30% are found in the Americas—primarily in South America, thirteen in Central America, and one species, the Virginia opossum, in North America, north of Mexico. The word marsupial comes from marsupium, the technical term for the abdominal pouch. It, in turn, is borrowed from Latin and ultimately from the ancient Greek , meaning "pouch". Taxonomy Marsupials are taxonomically identified as members of mammalian infraclass Marsupialia, first described as a family under the order Pollicata by German zoologist Johann Karl Wilhelm Illiger in his 1811 work Prodromus Systematis Mammalium et Avium. However, James Rennie, author of The Natural History of Monkeys, Opossums and Lemurs (1838), pointed out that the placement of five different groups of mammals – monkeys, lemurs, tarsiers, aye-ayes and marsupials (with the exception of kangaroos, that were placed under the order Salientia) – under a single order (Pollicata) did not appear to have a strong justification. In 1816, French zoologist George Cuvier classified all marsupials under the order Marsupialia. In 1997, researcher J. A. W. Kirsch and others accorded infraclass rank to Marsupialia. There are two primary divisions: American marsupials (Ameridelphia) and Australian marsupials (Australidelphia) of which one, the monito del monte, is actually native to South America. Classification Marsupialia is further divided as follows: – Extinct Superorder Ameridelphia Order Didelphimorphia (127 species) Family Didelphidae: opossums Order Paucituberculata (seven species) Family Caenolestidae: shrew opossums Superorder Australidelphia Order Microbiotheria (three species) Family Microbiotheriidae: monitos del monte Order †Yalkaparidontia (incertae sedis) Order Dasyuromorphia (75 species) Family †Thylacinidae: thylacine Family Dasyuridae: antechinuses, quolls, dunnarts, Tasmanian devil, and relatives Family Myrmecobiidae: numbat Order Notoryctemorphia (two species) Family Notoryctidae: marsupial moles Order Peramelemorphia (24 species) Family Thylacomyidae: bilbies Family †Chaeropodidae: pig-footed bandicoots Family Peramelidae: bandicoots and allies Order Diprotodontia (137 species) Suborder Vombatiformes Family Vombatidae: wombats Family Phascolarctidae: koalas Family Diprotodontidae: Giant wombats Family Palorchestidae: Marsupial tapirs Family Thylacoleonidae: marsupial lions Suborder Phalangeriformes Family Acrobatidae: feathertail glider and feather-tailed possum Family Burramyidae: pygmy possums Family †Ektopodontidae: sprite possums Family Petauridae: striped possum, Leadbeater's possum, yellow-bellied glider, sugar glider, mahogany glider, squirrel glider Family Phalangeridae: brushtail possums and cuscuses Family Pseudocheiridae: ringtailed possums and relatives Family Tarsipedidae: honey possum Suborder Macropodiformes Family Macropodidae: kangaroos, wallabies, and relatives Family Potoroidae: potoroos, rat kangaroos, bettongs Family Hypsiprymnodontidae: musky rat-kangaroo Family Balbaridae: basal quadrupedal kangaroos Phylogenetic relationships Comprising over 300 extant species, several attempts have been made to accurately interpret the phylogenetic relationships among the different marsupial orders. Studies differ on whether Didelphimorphia or Paucituberculata is the sister group to all other marsupials. Though the order Microbiotheria (which has only one species, the monito del monte) is found in South America, morphological similarities suggest it is closely related to Australian marsupials. Molecular analyses in 2010 and 2011 identified Microbiotheria as the sister group to all Australian marsupials. However, the relations among the four Australidelphid orders are not as well understood. The cladogram below, depicting the relationships among the various marsupial orders, is based on a 2015 phylogenetic study. DNA evidence supports a South American origin for marsupials, with Australian marsupials arising from a single Gondwanan migration of marsupials from South America, across Antarctica, to Australia. There are many small arboreal species in each group. The term "opossum" is used to refer to American species (though "possum" is a common abbreviation), while similar Australian species are properly called "possums". Anatomy Marsupials have the typical characteristics of mammals—e.g., mammary glands, three middle ear bones, and true hair. There are, however, striking differences as well as a number of anatomical features that separate them from Eutherians. In addition to the front pouch, which contains multiple teats for the sustenance of their young, marsupials have other common structural features. Ossified patellae are absent in most modern marsupials (though a small number of exceptions are reported) and epipubic bones are present. Marsupials (and monotremes) also lack a gross communication (corpus callosum) between the right and left brain hemispheres. Skull and teeth The skull has peculiarities in comparison to placental mammals. In general, the skull is relatively small and tight. Holes (foramen lacrimale) are located in the front of the orbit. The cheekbone is enlarged and extends farther to the rear. The angular extension (processus angularis) of the lower jaw is bent toward the center. Another feature is the hard palate which, in contrast to the placental mammals' foramina, always have more openings. The teeth differ from that of placental mammals, so that all taxa except wombats have a different number of incisors in the upper and lower jaws. The early marsupials had a dental formula from , that is, per quadrant; they have five (maxillary) or four (mandibular) incisors, one canine, three premolars and four molars, for a total of 50 teeth. Some taxa, such as the opossum, have the original number of teeth. In other groups the number of teeth is reduced. The dental formula for Macropodidae (kangaroos and wallabies etc.) is 3/1 – (0 or 1)/0 – 2/2 – 4/4. Marsupials in many cases have 40 to 50 teeth, significantly more than placental mammals. The second set of teeth grows in only at the 3rd premolar site and back; all teeth more anterior to that erupt initially as permanent teeth. Torso Few general characteristics describe their skeleton. In addition to unique details in the construction of the ankle, epipubic bones (ossa epubica) are observed projecting forward from the pubic bone of the pelvis. Since these are present in males and pouchless species, it is believed that they originally had nothing to do with reproduction, but served in the muscular approach to the movement of the hind limbs. This could be explained by an original feature of mammals, as these epipubic bones are also found in monotremes. Marsupial reproductive organs differ from the placental mammals. For them, the reproductive tract is doubled. The females have two uteri and two vaginas, and before birth, a birth canal forms between them, the median vagina. The males have a split or double penis lying in front of the scrotum. A pouch is present in most, but not all, species. Many marsupials have a permanent bag, whereas in others the pouch develops during gestation, as with the shrew opossum, where the young are hidden only by skin folds or in the fur of the mother. The arrangement of the pouch is variable to allow the offspring to receive maximum protection. Locomotive kangaroos have a pouch opening at the front, while many others that walk or climb on all fours have the opening in the back. Usually, only females have a pouch, but the male water opossum has a pouch that is used to accommodate his genitalia while swimming or running. General and convergences Marsupials have adapted to many habitats, reflected in the wide variety in their build. The largest living marsupial, the red kangaroo, grows up to in height and in weight, but extinct genera, such as Diprotodon, were significantly larger and heavier. The smallest members of this group are the marsupial mice, which often reach only in body length. Some species resemble placental mammals and are examples of convergent evolution. The extinct Thylacine strongly resembled the placental wolf, hence its nickname "Tasmanian wolf". The ability to glide evolved in both marsupials (as with sugar gliders) and some placental mammals (as with flying squirrels), which developed independently. Other groups such as the kangaroo, however, do not have clear placental counterparts, though they share similarities in lifestyle and ecological niches with ruminants. Reproductive system Marsupials' reproductive systems differ markedly from those of placental mammals. During embryonic development, a choriovitelline placenta forms in all marsupials. In bandicoots, an additional chorioallantoic placenta forms, although it lacks the chorionic villi found in eutherian placentas. The evolution of reproduction in marsupials, and speculation about the ancestral state of mammalian reproduction, have engaged discussion since the end of the 19th century. Both sexes possess a cloaca, which is connected to a urogenital sac used to store waste before expulsion. The bladder of marsupials functions as a site to concentrate urine and empties into the common urogenital sinus in both females and males. Male reproductive system Most male marsupials, except for macropods and marsupial moles, have a bifurcated penis, separated into two columns, so that the penis has two ends corresponding to the females' two vaginas. The penis is used only during copulation, and is separate from the urinary tract. It curves forward when erect, and when not erect, it is retracted into the body in an S-shaped curve. Neither marsupials nor monotremes possess a baculum. The shape of the glans penis varies among marsupial species. The male thylacine had a pouch that acts as a protective sheath, covering his external reproductive organs while running through thick brush. The shape of the urethral grooves of the males' genitalia is used to distinguish between Monodelphis brevicaudata, Monodelphis domestica, and Monodelphis americana. The grooves form 2 separate channels that form the ventral and dorsal folds of the erectile tissue. Several species of dasyurid marsupials can also be distinguished by their penis morphology. The only accessory sex glands marsupials possess are the prostate and bulbourethral glands. Male marsupials have 1-3 pairs of bulbourethral glands. There are no ampullae, seminal vesicles or coagulating glands. The prostate is proportionally larger in marsupials than in placental mammals. During the breeding season, the male tammar wallaby's prostate and bulbourethral gland enlarge. However, there does not appear to be any seasonal difference in the weight of the testes. Female reproductive system Female marsupials have two lateral vaginas, which lead to separate uteri, but both open externally through the same orifice. A third canal, the median vagina, is used for birth. This canal can be transitory or permanent. Some marsupial species are able to store sperm in the oviduct after mating. Marsupials give birth at a very early stage of development; after birth, newborn marsupials crawl up the bodies of their mothers and attach themselves to a teat, which is located on the underside of the mother, either inside a pouch called the marsupium, or open to the environment. Mothers often lick their fur to leave a trail of scent for the newborn to follow to increase chances of making it into the marsupium. There they remain for a number of weeks, attached to the teat. The offspring are eventually able to leave the marsupium for short periods, returning to it for warmth, protection, and nourishment. Early development Prenatal development differs between marsupials and placental mammals. Key aspects of the first stages of placental mammal embryo development, such as the inner cell mass and the process of compaction, are not found in marsupials. The cleavage stages of marsupial development are very variable between groups and aspects of marsupial early development are not yet fully understood. An early birth removes a developing marsupial from its mother's body much sooner than in placental mammals; thus marsupials have not developed a complex placenta to protect the embryo from its mother's immune system. Though early birth puts the tiny newborn marsupial at a greater environmental risk, it significantly reduces the dangers associated with long pregnancies, as there is no need to carry a large fetus to full term in bad seasons. Marsupials are extremely altricial animals, needing to be intensely cared for immediately following birth (cf. precocial). Because newborn marsupials must climb up to their mother's teats, their front limbs and facial structures are much more developed than the rest of their bodies at the time of birth. This requirement has been argued to have resulted in the limited range of locomotor adaptations in marsupials compared to placentals. Marsupials must develop grasping forepaws during their early youth, making the evolutive transition from these limbs into hooves, wings, or flippers, as some groups of placental mammals have done, more difficult. However, several marsupials do possess atypical forelimb morphologies, such as the hooved forelimbs of the pig-footed bandicoot, suggesting that the range of forelimb specialization is not as limited as assumed. An infant marsupial is known as a joey. Marsupials have a very short gestation period—usually around four to five weeks, but as low as 12 days for some species—and the joey is born in an essentially fetal state. The blind, furless, miniature newborn, the size of a jelly bean, crawls across its mother's fur to make its way into the pouch, where it latches onto a teat for food. It will not re-emerge for several months, during which time it develops fully. After this period, the joey begins to spend increasing lengths of time out of the pouch, feeding and learning survival skills. However, it returns to the pouch to sleep, and if danger threatens, it will seek refuge in its mother's pouch for safety. Joeys stay in the pouch for up to a year in some species, or until the next joey is born. A marsupial joey is unable to regulate its own body temperature and relies upon an external heat source. Until the joey is well furred and old enough to leave the pouch, a pouch temperature of must be constantly maintained. Joeys are born with "oral shields". In species without pouches or with rudimentary pouches these are more developed than in forms with well-developed pouches, implying a role in maintaining the young attached to the mother's teat. Geography In Australasia, marsupials are found in Australia, Tasmania and New Guinea; throughout the Maluku Islands, Timor and Sulawesi to the west of New Guinea, and in the Bismarck Archipelago (including the Admiralty Islands) and Solomon Islands to the east of New Guinea. In America, marsupials are found throughout South America, excluding the central/southern Andes and parts of Patagonia; and through Central America and south-central Mexico, with a single species widespread in the eastern United States and along the Pacific coast. Interaction with Europeans The first American marsupial (and marsupial in general) that a European encountered was the common opossum. Vicente Yáñez Pinzón, commander of the Niña on Christopher Columbus' first voyage in the late fifteenth century, collected a female opossum with young in her pouch off the South American coast. He presented them to the Spanish monarchs, though by then the young were lost and the female had died. The animal was noted for its strange pouch or "second belly", and how the offspring reached the pouch was a mystery. On the other hand, it was the Portuguese who first described Australasian marsupials. António Galvão, a Portuguese administrator in Ternate (1536–40), wrote a detailed account of the northern common cuscus (Phalanger orientalis): From the start of the 17th century more accounts of marsupials arrived. For instance, a 1606 record of an animal, killed on the southern coast of New Guinea, described it as "in the shape of a dog, smaller than a greyhound", with a snakelike "bare scaly tail" and hanging testicles. The meat tasted like venison, and the stomach contained ginger leaves. This description appears to closely resemble the dusky pademelon (Thylogale brunii), in which case this would be the earliest European record of a member of the kangaroo family (Macropodidae). Evolutionary history The relationships among the three extant divisions of mammals (monotremes, marsupials, and placentals) were long a matter of debate among taxonomists. Most morphological evidence comparing traits such as number and arrangement of teeth and structure of the reproductive and waste elimination systems as well as most genetic and molecular evidence favors a closer evolutionary relationship between the marsupials and placental mammals than either has with the monotremes. The ancestors of marsupials, part of a larger group called metatherians, probably split from those of placental mammals (eutherians) during the mid-Jurassic period, though no fossil evidence of metatherians themselves are known from this time. From DNA and protein analyses, the time of divergence of the two lineages has been estimated to be around 100 to 120 mya. Fossil metatherians are distinguished from eutherians by the form of their teeth; metatherians possess four pairs of molar teeth in each jaw, whereas eutherian mammals (including true placentals) never have more than three pairs. Using this criterion, the earliest known metatherian was thought to be Sinodelphys szalayi, which lived in China around 125 mya. However Sinodelphys was later reinterpreted as an early member of Eutheria. The unequivocal oldest known metatherians are now 110 million years old fossils from western North America. About 100 mya, the supercontinent Pangaea was in the process of splitting into the northern continent Laurasia and the southern continent Gondwana, with what would become China and Australia already separated by the Tethys Ocean. From there, metatherians spread westward into modern North America (still attached to Eurasia), where the earliest true marsupials are found. Marsupials are difficult to distinguish from other fossils, as they are characterized by aspects of the reproductive system which do not normally fossilize (including pouches) and by subtle changes in the bone and tooth structure that show a metatherian is part of the marsupial crown group (the most exclusive group that contains all living marsupials). The earliest definite marsupial fossil belongs to the species Peradectes minor, from the Paleocene of Montana, dated to about 65 million years ago. From their point of origin in Laurasia, marsupials spread to South America, which was possibly connected to North America at around 65 mya through a ridge that has since moved on to become the Caribbean Archipelago. Laurasian marsupials eventually died off, for not entirely clear reasons; convention has it that they disappeared due to competition with placentals, but this is no longer accepted to be the primary reason. Marsupials, Peradectes and the related Herpetotheriidae are nested within a clade of metatherians that also included a variety of Cretaceous North American taxa. In South America, the opossums evolved and developed a strong presence, and the Paleogene also saw the evolution of shrew opossums (Paucituberculata) alongside non-marsupial metatherian predators such as the borhyaenids and the saber-toothed Thylacosmilus. South American niches for mammalian carnivores were dominated by these marsupial and sparassodont metatherians, which seem to have competitively excluded South American placentals from evolving carnivory. While placental predators were absent, the metatherians did have to contend with avian (terror bird) and terrestrial crocodylomorph competition. Marsupials were excluded in turn from large herbivore niches in South America by the presence of native placental ungulates (now extinct) and xenarthrans (whose largest forms are also extinct). South America and Antarctica remained connected until 35 mya, as shown by the unique fossils found there. North and South America were disconnected until about three million years ago, when the Isthmus of Panama formed. This led to the Great American Interchange. Sparassodonts disappeared for unclear reasons – again, this has classically assumed as competition from carnivoran placentals, but the last sparassodonts co-existed with a few small carnivorans like procyonids and canines, and disappeared long before the arrival of macropredatory forms like felines, while didelphimorphs (opossums) invaded Central America, with the Virginia opossum reaching as far north as Canada. Marsupials reached Australia via Antarctica about 50 mya, shortly after Australia had split off. This suggests a single dispersion event of just one species, most likely a relative to South America's monito del monte (a microbiothere, the only New World australidelphian). This progenitor may have rafted across the widening, but still narrow, gap between Australia and Antarctica. The journey must not have been easy; South American ungulate and xenarthran remains have been found in Antarctica, but these groups did not reach Australia. In Australia, marsupials radiated into the wide variety seen today, including not only omnivorous and carnivorous forms such as were present in South America, but also into large herbivores. Modern marsupials appear to have reached the islands of New Guinea and Sulawesi relatively recently via Australia. A 2010 analysis of retroposon insertion sites in the nuclear DNA of a variety of marsupials has confirmed all living marsupials have South American ancestors. The branching sequence of marsupial orders indicated by the study puts Didelphimorphia in the most basal position, followed by Paucituberculata, then Microbiotheria, and ending with the radiation of Australian marsupials. This indicates that Australidelphia arose in South America, and reached Australia after Microbiotheria split off. In Australia, terrestrial placental mammals disappeared early in the Cenozoic (their most recent known fossils being 55 million-year-old teeth resembling those of condylarths) for reasons that are not clear, allowing marsupials to dominate the Australian ecosystem. Extant native Australian terrestrial placental mammals (such as hopping mice) are relatively recent immigrants, arriving via island hopping from Southeast Asia. Genetic analysis suggests a divergence date between the marsupials and the placentals at . The ancestral number of chromosomes has been estimated to be 2n = 14. A new hypothesis suggests that South American microbiotheres resulted from a back-dispersal from eastern Gondwana due to new cranial and post-cranial marsupial fossils from the Djarthia murgonensis from the early Eocene Tingamarra Local Fauna in Australia that indicate the Djarthia murgonensis is the most plesiomorphic, the oldest unequivocal australidelphian, and may be the ancestral morphotype of the Australian marsupial radiation. See also Marsupial lawn Metatheria Notes References Further reading Frith, H. J. and J. H. Calaby. Kangaroos. New York: Humanities Press, 1969. Hunsaker, Don. The Biology of Marsupials. New York: Academic Press, 1977. External links First marsupial genome released. Most differences between the opossom and placental mammals stem from non-coding DNA Extant Paleocene first appearances

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchester

Manchester

Manchester () is the most-populous city and metropolitan borough in North West England and Greater Manchester, England. The city has the country's fifth-largest population at 547,627 (as of 2018) and lies within the United Kingdom's second-most populous urban area, with a population of 2.7 million, third most-populous county, at around 2.8 million. It is fringed by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east. The city is surrounded by outlying towns and the neighbouring city of Salford. These two cities and the surrounding towns form a large continuous conurbation. The local authority for the city is Manchester City Council. Manchester is one of the claimants to the title of "second city of the United Kingdom". The recorded history of Manchester began with the civilian settlement associated with the Roman fort of Mamucium or Mancunium, which was established in about AD 79 on a sandstone bluff near the confluence of the rivers Medlock and Irwell. Although historically and traditionally a part of Lancashire, areas of Cheshire south of the River Mersey were incorporated into Manchester in the 20th century. The first to be included, Wythenshawe, was added to the city in 1931. Throughout the Middle Ages Manchester remained a manorial township, but began to expand "at an astonishing rate" around the turn of the 19th century. Manchester's unplanned urbanisation was brought on by a boom in textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution, and resulted in it becoming the world's first industrialised city. Manchester achieved city status in 1853. The Manchester Ship Canal opened in 1894, creating the Port of Manchester and directly linking the city to the Irish Sea, to the west. Its fortune declined after the Second World War, owing to deindustrialisation, but the IRA bombing in 1996 led to extensive investment and regeneration. Following successful redevelopment after the IRA bombing, Manchester was the host city for the 2002 Commonwealth Games. The city is notable for its architecture, culture, musical exports, media links, scientific and engineering output, social impact, sports clubs and transport connections. Manchester Liverpool Road railway station was the world's first inter-city passenger railway station. At the University of Manchester, Ernest Rutherford first split the atom in 1917, Frederic C. Williams, Tom Kilburn and Geoff Tootill developed the world's first stored-program computer in 1948, and Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov isolated the first graphene in 2004. Etymology The name Manchester originates from the Latin name Mamucium or its variant Mancunio and the citizens are still referred to as Mancunians (). These names are generally thought to represent a Latinisation of an original Brittonic name. The generally accepted etymology of this name is that it comes from Brittonic *mamm- ("breast", in reference to a "breast-like hill"). However, more recent work suggests that it could come from *mamma ("mother", in reference to a local river goddess). Both usages are preserved in Insular Celtic languages, such as mam meaning "breast" in Irish and "mother" in Welsh. The suffix -chester is from Old English ceaster ("Roman fortification", itself a loanword from Latin castra, "fort; fortified town"). History Early history The Brigantes were the major Celtic tribe in what is now known as Northern England; they had a stronghold in the locality at a sandstone outcrop on which Manchester Cathedral now stands, opposite the bank of the River Irwell. Their territory extended across the fertile lowland of what is now Salford and Stretford. Following the Roman conquest of Britain in the 1st century, General Agricola ordered the construction of a fort named Mamucium in the year 79 to ensure that Roman interests in Deva Victrix (Chester) and Eboracum (York) were protected from the Brigantes. Central Manchester has been permanently settled since this time. A stabilised fragment of foundations of the final version of the Roman fort is visible in Castlefield. The Roman habitation of Manchester probably ended around the 3rd century; its civilian settlement appears to have been abandoned by the mid-3rd century, although the fort may have supported a small garrison until the late 3rd or early 4th century. After the Roman withdrawal and Saxon conquest, the focus of settlement shifted to the confluence of the Irwell and Irk sometime before the arrival of the Normans after 1066. Much of the wider area was laid waste in the subsequent Harrying of the North. In the Domesday Book of 1086, Manchester is recorded as within the hundred of Salford and held as tenant in chief by a Norman named Roger of Poitou, later being held by the family of Grelley, lord of the manor and residents of Manchester Castle until 1215 before a Manor House was built. By 1421 Thomas de la Warre founded and constructed a collegiate church for the parish, now Manchester Cathedral; the domestic premises of the college house Chetham's School of Music and Chetham's Library. The library, which opened in 1653 and is still open to the public today, is the oldest free public reference library in the United Kingdom. Manchester is mentioned as having a market in 1282. Around the 14th century, Manchester received an influx of Flemish weavers, sometimes credited as the foundation of the region's textile industry. Manchester became an important centre for the manufacture and trade of woollens and linen, and by about 1540, had expanded to become, in John Leland's words, "The fairest, best builded, quickest, and most populous town of all Lancashire." The cathedral and Chetham's buildings are the only significant survivors of Leland's Manchester. During the English Civil War Manchester strongly favoured the Parliamentary interest. Although not long-lasting, Cromwell granted it the right to elect its own MP. Charles Worsley, who sat for the city for only a year, was later appointed Major General for Lancashire, Cheshire and Staffordshire during the Rule of the Major Generals. He was a diligent puritan, turning out ale houses and banning the celebration of Christmas; he died in 1656. Significant quantities of cotton began to be used after about 1600, firstly in linen/cotton fustians, but by around 1750 pure cotton fabrics were being produced and cotton had overtaken wool in importance. The Irwell and Mersey were made navigable by 1736, opening a route from Manchester to the sea docks on the Mersey. The Bridgewater Canal, Britain's first wholly artificial waterway, was opened in 1761, bringing coal from mines at Worsley to central Manchester. The canal was extended to the Mersey at Runcorn by 1776. The combination of competition and improved efficiency halved the cost of coal and halved the transport cost of raw cotton. Manchester became the dominant marketplace for textiles produced in the surrounding towns. A commodities exchange, opened in 1729, and numerous large warehouses, aided commerce. In 1780, Richard Arkwright began construction of Manchester's first cotton mill. In the early 1800s, John Dalton formulated his atomic theory in Manchester. Industrial Revolution Manchester was one of the centres of textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution. The great majority of cotton spinning took place in the towns of south Lancashire and north Cheshire, and Manchester was for a time the most productive centre of cotton processing. Manchester became known as the world's largest marketplace for cotton goods and was dubbed "Cottonopolis" and "Warehouse City" during the Victorian era. In Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, the term "manchester" is still used for household linen: sheets, pillow cases, towels, etc. The industrial revolution brought about huge change in Manchester and was key to the increase in Manchester's population. Manchester began expanding "at an astonishing rate" around the turn of the 19th century as people flocked to the city for work from Scotland, Wales, Ireland and other areas of England as part of a process of unplanned urbanisation brought on by the Industrial Revolution. It developed a wide range of industries, so that by 1835 "Manchester was without challenge the first and greatest industrial city in the world." Engineering firms initially made machines for the cotton trade, but diversified into general manufacture. Similarly, the chemical industry started by producing bleaches and dyes, but expanded into other areas. Commerce was supported by financial service industries such as banking and insurance. Trade, and feeding the growing population, required a large transport and distribution infrastructure: the canal system was extended, and Manchester became one end of the world's first intercity passenger railway—the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. Competition between the various forms of transport kept costs down. In 1878 the GPO (the forerunner of British Telecom) provided its first telephones to a firm in Manchester. The Manchester Ship Canal was built between 1888 and 1894, in some sections by canalisation of the Rivers Irwell and Mersey, running from Salford to Eastham Locks on the tidal Mersey. This enabled oceangoing ships to sail right into the Port of Manchester. On the canal's banks, just outside the borough, the world's first industrial estate was created at Trafford Park. Large quantities of machinery, including cotton processing plant, were exported around the world. A centre of capitalism, Manchester was once the scene of bread and labour riots, as well as calls for greater political recognition by the city's working and non-titled classes. One such gathering ended with the Peterloo massacre of 16 August 1819. The economic school of Manchester Capitalism developed there, and Manchester was the centre of the Anti-Corn Law League from 1838 onward. Manchester has a notable place in the history of Marxism and left-wing politics; being the subject of Friedrich Engels' work The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844; Engels spent much of his life in and around Manchester, and when Karl Marx visited Manchester, they met at Chetham's Library. The economics books Marx was reading at the time can be seen in the library, as can the window seat where Marx and Engels would meet. The first Trades Union Congress was held in Manchester (at the Mechanics' Institute, David Street), from 2 to 6 June 1868. Manchester was an important cradle of the Labour Party and the Suffragette Movement. At that time, it seemed a place in which anything could happen—new industrial processes, new ways of thinking (the Manchester School, promoting free trade and laissez-faire), new classes or groups in society, new religious sects, and new forms of labour organisation. It attracted educated visitors from all parts of Britain and Europe. A saying capturing this sense of innovation survives today: "What Manchester does today, the rest of the world does tomorrow." Manchester's golden age was perhaps the last quarter of the 19th century. Many of the great public buildings (including Manchester Town Hall) date from then. The city's cosmopolitan atmosphere contributed to a vibrant culture, which included the Hallé Orchestra. In 1889, when county councils were created in England, the municipal borough became a county borough with even greater autonomy. Although the Industrial Revolution brought wealth to the city, it also brought poverty and squalor to a large part of the population. Historian Simon Schama noted that "Manchester was the very best and the very worst taken to terrifying extremes, a new kind of city in the world; the chimneys of industrial suburbs greeting you with columns of smoke". An American visitor taken to Manchester's blackspots saw "wretched, defrauded, oppressed, crushed human nature, lying and bleeding fragments". The number of cotton mills in Manchester itself reached a peak of 108 in 1853. Thereafter the number began to decline and Manchester was surpassed as the largest centre of cotton spinning by Bolton in the 1850s and Oldham in the 1860s. However, this period of decline coincided with the rise of the city as the financial centre of the region. Manchester continued to process cotton, and in 1913, 65% of the world's cotton was processed in the area. The First World War interrupted access to the export markets. Cotton processing in other parts of the world increased, often on machines produced in Manchester. Manchester suffered greatly from the Great Depression and the underlying structural changes that began to supplant the old industries, including textile manufacture. Blitz Like most of the UK, the Manchester area was mobilised extensively during the Second World War. For example, casting and machining expertise at Beyer, Peacock & Company's locomotive works in Gorton was switched to bomb making; Dunlop's rubber works in Chorlton-on-Medlock made barrage balloons; and just outside the city in Trafford Park, engineers Metropolitan-Vickers made Avro Manchester and Avro Lancaster bombers and Ford built the Rolls-Royce Merlin engines to power them. Manchester was thus the target of bombing by the Luftwaffe, and by late 1940 air raids were taking place against non-military targets. The biggest took place during the Christmas Blitz on the nights of 22/23 and 24 December 1940, when an estimated of high explosives plus over 37,000 incendiary bombs were dropped. A large part of the historic city centre was destroyed, including 165 warehouses, 200 business premises, and 150 offices. 376 were killed and 30,000 houses were damaged. Manchester Cathedral, Royal Exchange and Free Trade Hall were among the buildings seriously damaged; restoration of the cathedral took 20 years. Post-Second World War Cotton processing and trading continued to fall in peacetime, and the exchange closed in 1968. By 1963 the port of Manchester was the UK's third largest, and employed over 3,000 men, but the canal was unable to handle the increasingly large container ships. Traffic declined, and the port closed in 1982. Heavy industry suffered a downturn from the 1960s and was greatly reduced under the economic policies followed by Margaret Thatcher's government after 1979. Manchester lost 150,000 jobs in manufacturing between 1961 and 1983. Regeneration began in the late 1980s, with initiatives such as the Metrolink, the Bridgewater Concert Hall, the Manchester Arena, and (in Salford) the rebranding of the port as Salford Quays. Two bids to host the Olympic Games were part of a process to raise the international profile of the city. Manchester has a history of attacks attributed to Irish Republicans, including the Manchester Martyrs of 1867, arson in 1920, a series of explosions in 1939, and two bombs in 1992. On Saturday 15 June 1996, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) carried out the 1996 Manchester bombing, the detonation of a large bomb next to a department store in the city centre. The largest to be detonated on British soil, the bomb injured over 200 people, heavily damaged nearby buildings, and broke windows away. The cost of the immediate damage was initially estimated at £50 million, but this was quickly revised upwards. The final insurance payout was over £400 million; many affected businesses never recovered from the loss of trade. Since 2000 Spurred by the investment after the 1996 bomb and aided by the XVII Commonwealth Games, the city centre has undergone extensive regeneration. New and renovated complexes such as The Printworks and Corn Exchange have become popular shopping, eating and entertainment areas. Manchester Arndale is the UK's largest city-centre shopping centre. Large city sections from the 1960s have been demolished, re-developed or modernised with the use of glass and steel. Old mills have been converted into apartments. Hulme has undergone extensive regeneration, with million-pound loft-house apartments being developed. The 47-storey, Beetham Tower was the tallest UK building outside London and the highest residential accommodation in Europe when completed in 2006. It was surpassed in 2018 by the South Tower of the Deansgate Square project, also in Manchester. In January 2007, the independent Casino Advisory Panel licensed Manchester to build the UK's only supercasino, but plans were abandoned in February 2008. On 22 May 2017, an Islamist terrorist carried out a bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in the Manchester Arena; the bomb killed 23, including the attacker, and injured over 800. It was the deadliest terrorist attack and first suicide bombing in Britain since the 7 July 2005 London bombings. It caused worldwide condemnation and changed the UK's threat level to "critical" for the first time since 2007. Since around the turn of the 21st century, Manchester has been regarded as one of the candidates for the unofficial title of second city of the United Kingdom alongside Birmingham by sections of the international press, British public, and government ministers. Manchester and Birmingham traditionally compete as front runners for this unofficial title. although whether Manchester or Birmingham is Britain's second city is disputed. Government The City of Manchester is governed by the Manchester City Council. The Greater Manchester Combined Authority, with a directly elected mayor, has responsibilities for economic strategy and transport, amongst other areas, on a Greater Manchester-wide basis. Manchester has been a member of the English Core Cities Group since its inception in 1995. The town of Manchester was granted a charter by Thomas Grelley in 1301, but lost its borough status in a court case of 1359. Until the 19th century local government was largely in the hands of manorial courts, the last of which was dissolved in 1846. From a very early time, the township of Manchester lay within the historic or ceremonial county boundaries of Lancashire. Pevsner wrote "That [neighbouring] Stretford and Salford are not administratively one with Manchester is one of the most curious anomalies of England". A stroke of a baron's pen is said to have divorced Manchester and Salford, though it was not Salford that became separated from Manchester, it was Manchester, with its humbler line of lords, that was separated from Salford. It was this separation that resulted in Salford becoming the judicial seat of Salfordshire, which included the ancient parish of Manchester. Manchester later formed its own Poor Law Union using the name "Manchester". In 1792, Commissioners—usually known as "Police Commissioners"—were established for the social improvement of Manchester. Manchester regained its borough status in 1838, and comprised the townships of Beswick, Cheetham Hill, Chorlton upon Medlock and Hulme. By 1846, with increasing population and greater industrialisation, the Borough Council had taken over the powers of the "Police Commissioners". In 1853, Manchester was granted city status. In 1885, Bradford, Harpurhey, Rusholme and parts of Moss Side and Withington townships became part of the City of Manchester. In 1889, the city became a county borough as did many larger Lancashire towns, and therefore not governed by Lancashire County Council. Between 1890 and 1933, more areas were added to the city which had been administered by Lancashire County Council, including former villages such as Burnage, Chorlton-cum-Hardy, Didsbury, Fallowfield, Levenshulme, Longsight, and Withington. In 1931, the Cheshire civil parishes of Baguley, Northenden and Northen Etchells from the south of the River Mersey were added. In 1974, by way of the Local Government Act 1972, the City of Manchester became a metropolitan district of the metropolitan county of Greater Manchester. That year, Ringway, the village where the Manchester Airport is located, was added to the city. In November 2014, it was announced that Greater Manchester would receive a new directly elected mayor. The mayor would have fiscal control over health, transport, housing and police in the area. Andy Burnham was elected as the first mayor of Greater Manchester in 2017. Geography At , northwest of London, Manchester lies in a bowl-shaped land area bordered to the north and east by the Pennines, an upland chain that runs the length of northern England, and to the south by the Cheshire Plain. Manchester is north-east of Liverpool and north-west of Sheffield, making the city the halfway point between the two. The city centre is on the east bank of the River Irwell, near its confluences with the Rivers Medlock and Irk, and is relatively low-lying, being between above sea level. The River Mersey flows through the south of Manchester. Much of the inner city, especially in the south, is flat, offering extensive views from many highrise buildings in the city of the foothills and moors of the Pennines, which can often be capped with snow in the winter months. Manchester's geographic features were highly influential in its early development as the world's first industrial city. These features are its climate, its proximity to a seaport at Liverpool, the availability of water power from its rivers, and its nearby coal reserves. The name Manchester, though officially applied only to the metropolitan district within Greater Manchester, has been applied to other, wider divisions of land, particularly across much of the Greater Manchester county and urban area. The "Manchester City Zone", "Manchester post town" and the "Manchester Congestion Charge" are all examples of this. For purposes of the Office for National Statistics, Manchester forms the most populous settlement within the Greater Manchester Urban Area, the United Kingdom's third-largest conurbation. There is a mix of high-density urban and suburban locations. The largest open space in the city, at around , is Heaton Park. Manchester is contiguous on all sides with several large settlements, except for a small section along its southern boundary with Cheshire. The M60 and M56 motorways pass through Northenden and Wythenshawe respectively in the south of Manchester. Heavy rail lines enter the city from all directions, the principal destination being Manchester Piccadilly station. Climate Manchester experiences a temperate oceanic climate (Köppen: Cfb), like much of the British Isles, with warm summers and cool winters. Summer daytime temperatures regularly top 20 Celsius, quite often reaching 25 Celsius on sunny days during July and August in particular. In more recent years, temperatures have occasionally reached over 30 Celsius. There is regular but generally light precipitation throughout the year. The city's average annual rainfall is compared to a UK average of , and its mean rain days are 140.4 per annum, compared to the UK average of 154.4. Manchester has a relatively high humidity level, and this, along with abundant soft water, was one factor that led to advancement of the textile industry in the area. Snowfalls are not common in the city because of the urban warming effect but the West Pennine Moors to the north-west, South Pennines to the north-east and Peak District to the east receive more snow, which can close roads leading out of the city. They include the A62 via Oldham and Standedge, the A57, Snake Pass, towards Sheffield, and the Pennine section of the M62. The lowest temperature ever recorded in Manchester was on 7 January 2010. Green belt Manchester lies at the centre of a green belt region extending into the wider surrounding counties. This reduces urban sprawl, prevents towns in the conurbation from further convergence, protects the identity of outlying communities, and preserves nearby countryside. It is achieved by restricting inappropriate development within the designated areas and imposing stricter conditions on permitted building. Due to being already highly urban, the city contains limited portions of protected green-belt area within greenfield throughout the borough, with minimal development opportunities, at Clayton Vale, Heaton Park, Chorlton Water Park along with the Chorlton Ees & Ivy Green nature reserve and the floodplain surrounding the River Mersey, as well as the southern area around Manchester Airport. The green belt was first drawn up in 1961. Demographics Historically the population of Manchester began to increase rapidly during the Victorian era, estimated at 354,930 for Manchester and 110,833 for Salford in 1865, and peaking at 766,311 in 1931. From then the population began to decrease rapidly, due to slum clearance and the increased building of social housing overspill estates by Manchester City Council after the Second World War such as Hattersley and Langley. The 2012 mid-year estimate for the population of Manchester was 510,700. This was an increase of 7,900, or 1.6 per cent, since the 2011 estimate. Since 2001, the population has grown by 87,900, or 20.8 per cent, making Manchester the third fastest-growing area in the 2011 census. The city experienced the greatest percentage population growth outside London, with an increase of 19 per cent to over 500,000. Manchester's population is projected to reach 532,200 by 2021, an increase of 5.8 per cent from 2011. This represents a slower rate of growth than the previous decade. The Greater Manchester Built-up Area in 2011 had an estimated population of 2,553,400. In 2012 an estimated 2,702,200 people lived in Greater Manchester. An 6,547,000 people were estimated in 2012 to live within of Manchester and 11,694,000 within . Between the beginning of July 2011 and end of June 2012 (mid-year estimate date), births exceeded deaths by 4,800. Migration (internal and international) and other changes accounted for a net increase of 3,100 people between July 2011 and June 2012. Compared with Greater Manchester and with England, Manchester has a younger population, with a particularly large 20–35 age group. There were 76,095 undergraduate and postgraduate students at Manchester Metropolitan University, the University of Manchester and Royal Northern College of Music in the 2011/2012 academic year. Since the 2001 census, the proportion of Christians in Manchester has fallen by 22 per cent from 62.4 per cent to 48.7 per cent. The proportion of those with no religious affiliation rose by 58.1 per cent from 16 per cent to 25.3 per cent, whilst the proportion of Muslims increased by 73.6 per cent from 9.1 per cent to 15.8 per cent. The size of the Jewish population in Greater Manchester is the largest in Britain outside London. Of all households in Manchester, 0.23 per cent were Same-Sex Civil Partnership households, compared with an English national average of 0.16 per cent in 2011. In terms of ethnic composition, the City of Manchester has the highest non-white proportion of any district in Greater Manchester. Statistics from the 2011 census showed that 66.7 per cent of the population was White (59.3 per cent White British, 2.4 per cent White Irish, 0.1 per cent Gypsy or Irish Traveller, 4.9 per cent Other White – although the size of mixed European and British ethnic groups is unclear, there are reportedly over 25,000 people in Greater Manchester of at least partial Italian descent alone, which represents 5.5 per cent of the population of Greater Manchester). 4.7 per cent were mixed race (1.8 per cent White and Black Caribbean, 0.9 per cent White and Black African, 1.0 per cent White and Asian, 1.0 per cent other mixed), 17.1 per cent Asian (2.3 per cent Indian, 8.5 per cent Pakistani, 1.3 per cent Bangladeshi, 2.7 per cent Chinese, 2.3 per cent other Asian), 8.6 per cent Black (5.1 per cent African, 1.6 per cent other Black), 1.9 per cent Arab and 1.2 per cent of other ethnic heritage. Kidd identifies Moss Side, Longsight, Cheetham Hill, Rusholme, as centres of population for ethnic minorities. Manchester's Irish Festival, including a St Patrick's Day parade, is one of Europe's largest. There is also a well-established Chinatown in the city with a substantial number of oriental restaurants and Chinese supermarkets. The area also attracts large numbers of Chinese students to the city who, in attending the local universities, contribute to Manchester having the third-largest Chinese population in Europe. The Manchester Larger Urban Zone, a Eurostat measure of the functional city-region approximated to local government districts, had a population of 2,539,100 in 2004. In addition to Manchester itself, the LUZ includes the remainder of the county of Greater Manchester. The Manchester LUZ is the second largest within the United Kingdom, behind that of London. Economy The Office for National Statistics does not produce economic data for the City of Manchester alone, but includes four other metropolitan boroughs, Salford, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, in an area named Greater Manchester South, which had a GVA of £34.8 billion. The economy grew relatively strongly between 2002 and 2012, when growth was 2.3 per cent above the national average. The wider metropolitan economy is the second largest in the United Kingdom. It is ranked as a beta world city by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. As the UK economy continues to recover from its 2008–2010 downturn, Manchester compares favourably according to recent figures. In 2012 it showed the strongest annual growth in business stock (5 per cent) of all core cities. The city had a relatively sharp increase in the number of business deaths, the largest increase in all the core cities, but this was offset by strong growth in new businesses, resulting in strong net growth. Manchester's civic leadership has a reputation for business acumen. It owns two of the country's four busiest airports and uses its earnings to fund local projects. Meanwhile, KPMG's competitive alternative report found that in 2012 Manchester had the 9th lowest tax cost of any industrialised city in the world, and fiscal devolution has come earlier to Manchester than to any other British city: it can keep half the extra taxes it gets from transport investment. KPMG's competitive alternative report also found that Manchester was Europe's most affordable city featured, ranking slightly better than the Dutch cities of Rotterdam and Amsterdam, which all have a cost-of-living index of less than 95. Manchester is a city of contrast, where some of the country's most deprived and most affluent neighbourhoods can be found. According to 2010 Indices of Multiple Deprivation, Manchester is the 4th most deprived local council in England. Unemployment throughout 2012–2013 averaged 11.9 per cent, which was above national average, but lower than some of the country's comparable large cities. On the other hand, Greater Manchester is home to more multi-millionaires than anywhere outside London, with the City of Manchester taking up most of the tally. In 2013 Manchester was ranked 6th in the UK for quality of life, according to a rating of the UK's 12 largest cities. Women fare better in Manchester than the rest of the country in comparative pay with men. The per hours-worked gender pay gap is 3.3 per cent compared with 11.1 per cent for Britain. 37 per cent of the working-age population in Manchester have degree-level qualifications, as opposed to an average of 33 per cent across other core cities, although its schools under-perform slightly compared with the national average. Manchester has the largest UK office market outside London, according to GVA Grimley, with a quarterly office uptake (averaged over 2010–2014) of some 250,000 square ft – equivalent to the quarterly office uptake of Leeds, Liverpool and Newcastle combined and 90,000 square feet more than the nearest rival, Birmingham. The strong office market in Manchester has been partly attributed to "northshoring", (from offshoring) which entails the relocation or alternative creation of jobs away from the overheated South to areas where office space is possibly cheaper and the workforce market less saturated. According to 2019 property investment research, Manchester is rated as No. 2 location for "Best Places To Invest in Property in the UK". This was attributed to a 5.6 per cent increase in house prices and local investment in infrastructure and in Manchester Airport. Landmarks Manchester's buildings display a variety of architectural styles, ranging from Victorian to contemporary architecture. The widespread use of red brick characterises the city, much of the architecture of which harks back to its days as a global centre for the cotton trade. Just outside the immediate city centre are a large number of former cotton mills, some of which have been left virtually untouched since their closure, while many have been redeveloped as apartment buildings and office space. Manchester Town Hall, in Albert Square, was built in the Gothic revival style and is seen as one of the most important Victorian buildings in England. Manchester also has a number of skyscrapers built in the 1960s and 1970s, the tallest being the CIS Tower near Manchester Victoria station until the Beetham Tower was completed in 2006. The latter exemplifies a new surge in high-rise building. It includes a Hilton hotel, a restaurant and apartments. The largest skyscraper is now Deansgate Square South Tower, at 201 metres (659 feet).The Green Building, opposite Oxford Road station, is a pioneering eco-friendly housing project, while the recently completed One Angel Square, is one of the most sustainable large buildings in the world. The award-winning Heaton Park in the north of the city borough is one of the largest municipal parks in Europe, covering of parkland. The city has 135 parks, gardens, and open spaces. Two large squares hold many of Manchester's public monuments. Albert Square has monuments to Prince Albert, Bishop James Fraser, Oliver Heywood, William Gladstone and John Bright. Piccadilly Gardens has monuments dedicated to Queen Victoria, Robert Peel, James Watt and the Duke of Wellington. The cenotaph in St Peter's Square is Manchester's main memorial to its war dead. Designed by Edwin Lutyens, it echoes the original on Whitehall in London. The Alan Turing Memorial in Sackville Park commemorates his role as the father of modern computing. A larger-than-life statue of Abraham Lincoln by George Gray Barnard in the eponymous Lincoln Square (having stood for many years in Platt Fields) was presented to the city by Mr and Mrs Charles Phelps Taft of Cincinnati, Ohio, to mark the part Lancashire played in the cotton famine and American Civil War of 1861–1865. A Concorde is on display near Manchester Airport. Manchester has six designated local nature reserves: Chorlton Water Park, Blackley Forest, Clayton Vale and Chorlton Ees, Ivy Green, Boggart Hole Clough and Highfield Country Park. Transport Rail Manchester Liverpool Road was the world's first purpose-built passenger and goods railway station and served as the Manchester terminus on the Liverpool & Manchester Railway – the world's first inter-city passenger railway. It is still extant and its buildings form part of the Science & Industry Museum. Two of the city's four main line termini did not survive the 1960s: Manchester Central and Manchester Exchange each closed in 1969. In addition, Manchester Mayfield station closed to passenger services in 1960; its buildings and platforms are still extant, next to Piccadilly station, but are due to be redeveloped in the 2020s. Today, the city is well served by its rail network although it is now working to capacity, and is at the centre of an extensive county-wide railway network, including the West Coast Main Line, with two mainline stations: Manchester Piccadilly and Manchester Victoria. The Manchester station group – comprising Manchester Piccadilly, Manchester Victoria, Manchester Oxford Road and Deansgate – is the third busiest in the United Kingdom, with 44.9 million passengers recorded in 2017/2018. The High Speed 2 link to Birmingham and London is also planned, which if built will include a tunnel under Manchester on the final approach into an upgraded Piccadilly station. Recent improvements in Manchester as part of the Northern Hub in the 2010s have been numerous electrification schemes into and through Manchester, redevelopment of Victoria station and construction of the Ordsall Chord directly linking Victoria and Piccadilly. Work on two new through platforms at Piccadilly and an extensive upgrade at Oxford Road had not commenced as of 2019. Manchester city centre, specifically the Castlefield Corridor, suffers from constrained rail capacity that frequently leads to delays and cancellations – a 2018 report found that all three major Manchester stations are among the top ten worst stations in the United Kingdom for punctuality, with Oxford Road deemed the worst in the country. Metrolink (tram) Manchester became the first city in the UK to acquire a modern light rail tram system when the Manchester Metrolink opened in 1992. In 2016–2017, 37.8 million passenger journeys were made on the system. The present system mostly runs on former commuter rail lines converted for light rail use, and crosses the city centre via on-street tram lines. The network consists of eight lines with 99 stops. A new line to the Trafford Centre opened in 2020. Manchester city centre is also serviced by over a dozen heavy and light rail-based park and ride sites. Bus The city has one of the most extensive bus networks outside London, with over 50 bus companies operating in the Greater Manchester region radiating from the city. In 2011, 80 per cent of public transport journeys in Greater Manchester were made by bus, amounting to 220 million passenger journeys each year. After deregulation in 1986, the bus system was taken over by GM Buses, which after privatisation was split into GM Buses North and GM Buses South. Later these were taken over by First Greater Manchester and Stagecoach Manchester. Much of the First Greater Manchester business was sold to Diamond North West and Go North West in 2019. Go North West operate a three-route zero-fare Manchester Metroshuttle, which carries 2.8 million commuters a year around Manchester's business districts. Stagecoach Manchester is the Stagecoach Group's largest subsidiary and operates around 690 buses. Air Manchester Airport serves Manchester, Northern England and North Wales. The airport is the third busiest in the United Kingdom, with over double the number of annual passengers of the next busiest non-London airport. Services cover many destinations in Europe, North America, the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia (with more destinations from Manchester than any other airport in Britain). A second runway was opened in 2001 and there have been continued terminal improvements. The airport has the highest rating available: "Category 10", encompassing an elite group of airports able to handle "Code F" aircraft, including the Airbus A380 and Boeing 747-8. From September 2010 the airport became one of only 17 airports in the world and the only UK airport other than Heathrow Airport and Gatwick Airport to operate the Airbus A380. A smaller City Airport Manchester exists to the west of Manchester city centre. It was Manchester's first municipal airport and became the site of the first air traffic control tower in the UK, and the first municipal airfield in the UK to be licensed by the Air Ministry. Today, private charter flights and general aviation use City. It also has a flight school, and both the Greater Manchester Police Air Support Unit and the North West Air Ambulance have helicopters based there. Canal An extensive canal network, including the Manchester Ship Canal, was built to carry freight from the Industrial Revolution onward; the canals are still maintained, though now largely repurposed for leisure use. In 2012, plans were approved to introduce a water taxi service between Manchester city centre and MediaCityUK at Salford Quays. This ceased to operate in June 2018, citing poor infrastructure. Cycling Cycling for transportation and leisure enjoys popularity in Manchester and the city also plays a major role in British cycle racing. Culture Music Bands that have emerged from the Manchester music scene include Van der Graaf Generator, Oasis, The Smiths, Joy Division and its successor group New Order, Buzzcocks, The Stone Roses, The Fall, The Durutti Column, 10cc, Godley & Creme, The Verve, Elbow, Doves, The Charlatans, M People, The 1975, Simply Red, Take That, Dutch Uncles, Everything Everything, Pale Waves and The Outfield. Manchester was credited as the main driving force behind British indie music of the 1980s led by The Smiths, later including The Stone Roses, Happy Mondays, Inspiral Carpets, and James. The later groups came from what became known as the "Madchester" scene that also centred on The Haçienda nightclub developed by the founder of Factory Records, Tony Wilson. Although from southern England, The Chemical Brothers subsequently formed in Manchester. Former Smiths frontman Morrissey, whose lyrics often refer to Manchester locations and culture, later found international success as a solo artist. Previously, notable Manchester acts of the 1960s include The Hollies, Herman's Hermits, and Davy Jones of the Monkees (famed in the mid-1960s for their albums and their American TV show), and the earlier Bee Gees, who grew up in Chorlton. Another notable contemporary band from near Manchester is The Courteeners consisting of Liam Fray and four close friends. Singer-songwriter Ren Harvieu is also from Greater Manchester. Its main pop music venue is Manchester Arena, voted "International Venue of the Year" in 2007 With over 21,000 seats, it is the largest arena of its type in Europe. In terms of concertgoers, it is the busiest indoor arena in the world, ahead of Madison Square Garden in New York and The O2 Arena in London, which are second and third busiest. Other venues include Manchester Apollo, Albert Hall, Victoria Warehouse and the Manchester Academy. Smaller venues include the Band on the Wall, the Night and Day Café, the Ruby Lounge, and The Deaf Institute. Manchester also has the most indie and rock music events outside London. Manchester has two symphony orchestras, the Hallé and the BBC Philharmonic, and a chamber orchestra, the Manchester Camerata. In the 1950s, the city was home to a so-called "Manchester School" of classical composers, which was composed of Harrison Birtwistle, Peter Maxwell Davies, David Ellis and Alexander Goehr. Manchester is a centre for musical education: the Royal Northern College of Music and Chetham's School of Music. Forerunners of the RNCM were the Northern School of Music (founded 1920) and the Royal Manchester College of Music (founded 1893), which merged in 1973. One of the earliest instructors and classical music pianists/conductors at the RNCM, shortly after its founding, was the Russian-born Arthur Friedheim, (1859–1932), who later had the music library at the famed Peabody Institute conservatory of music in Baltimore, Maryland, named after him. The main classical music venue was the Free Trade Hall on Peter Street until the opening in 1996 of the 2,500 seat Bridgewater Hall. Brass band music, a tradition in the north of England, is important to Manchester's musical heritage; some of the UK's leading bands, such as the CWS Manchester Band and the Fairey Band, are from Manchester and surrounding areas, and the Whit Friday brass-band contest takes place annually in the neighbouring areas of Saddleworth and Tameside. Performing arts Manchester has a thriving theatre, opera and dance scene, with a number of large performance venues, including Manchester Opera House, which feature large-scale touring shows and West End productions; the Palace Theatre; and the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester's former cotton exchange, which is the largest theatre in the round in the UK. Smaller venues include the Contact Theatre and Z-arts in Hulme. The Dancehouse on Oxford Road is dedicated to dance productions. In 2014, HOME, a new custom-built arts complex opened. Housing two theatre spaces, five cinemas and an art exhibition space, it replaced the Cornerhouse and The Library Theatre. Since 2007 the city has hosted the Manchester International Festival, a biennial international arts festival with a focus on original work, which has included major new commissions by artists, including Bjork. A government statement in 2014 announced a £78 million grant for a new "large-scale, ultra-flexible arts space" for the city. Later the council stated it had secured a further £32 million. The £110 million venue was confirmed in July 2016. The theatre, to be called The Factory, after Manchester's Factory Records, will provide a permanent home for the Manchester International Festival. It is due to open at the end of 2019. Museums and galleries Manchester's museums celebrate Manchester's Roman history, rich industrial heritage and its role in the Industrial Revolution, the textile industry, the Trade Union movement, women's suffrage and football. A reconstructed part of the Roman fort of Mamucium is open to the public in Castlefield. The Science and Industry Museum, housed in the former Liverpool Road railway station, has a large collection of steam locomotives, industrial machinery, aircraft and a replica of the world's first stored computer program (known as the Manchester Baby). The Museum of Transport displays a collection of historic buses and trams. Trafford Park in the neighbouring borough of Trafford is home to Imperial War Museum North. The Manchester Museum opened to the public in the 1880s, has notable Egyptology and natural history collections. The municipally owned Manchester Art Gallery in Mosley Street houses a permanent collection of European painting and one of Britain's main collections of Pre-Raphaelite paintings. In the south of the city, the Whitworth Art Gallery displays modern art, sculpture and textiles and was voted Museum of the Year in 2015. Other exhibition spaces and museums in Manchester include Islington Mill in Salford, the National Football Museum at Urbis, Castlefield Gallery, the Manchester Costume Gallery at Platt Fields Park, the People's History Museum and the Manchester Jewish Museum. The work of Stretford-born painter , known for "matchstick" paintings of industrial Manchester and Salford, can be seen in the City and Whitworth Manchester galleries, and at the Lowry art centre in Salford Quays (in the neighbouring borough of Salford), which devotes a large permanent exhibition to his works. Literature Manchester is a UNESCO City of Literature known for a "radical literary history". Manchester in the 19th century featured in works highlighting the changes that industrialisation had brought. They include Elizabeth Gaskell's novel Mary Barton: A Tale of Manchester Life (1848), and studies such as The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 by Friedrich Engels, while living and working here. Manchester was the meeting place of Engels and Karl Marx. The two began writing The Communist Manifesto in Chetham's Library – founded in 1653 and claiming to be the oldest public library in the English-speaking world. Elsewhere in the city, the John Rylands Library holds an extensive collection of early printing. The Rylands Library Papyrus P52, believed to be the earliest extant New Testament text, is on permanent display there. Letitia Landon's poem Manchester in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1835, records the rapid growth of the city and its cultural importance. Charles Dickens is reputed to have set his novel Hard Times in the city, and though partly modelled on Preston, it shows the influence of his friend Mrs Gaskell. Gaskell penned all her novels but Mary Barton at her home in 84 Plymouth Grove. Often her house played host to influential authors: Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Charles Eliot Norton, for example. It is now open as a literary museum. Charlotte Brontë began writing her novel Jane Eyre in 1846, while staying at lodgings in Hulme. She was accompanying her father Patrick, who was convalescing in the city after cataract surgery. She probably envisioned Manchester Cathedral churchyard as the burial place for Jane's parents and the birthplace of Jane herself. Also associated with the city is the Victorian poet and novelist Isabella Banks, famed for her 1876 novel The Manchester Man. Anglo-American author Frances Hodgson Burnett was born in the city's Cheetham Hill district in 1849, and wrote much of her classic children's novel The Secret Garden while visiting nearby Salford's Buile Hill Park. Anthony Burgess is among the 20th-century writers who made Manchester their home. He wrote here the dystopian satire A Clockwork Orange in 1962. Dame Carol Ann Duffy, Poet Laureate from 2009 to 2019, moved to the city in 1996 and lives in West Didsbury. Nightlife The night-time economy of Manchester has expanded significantly since about 1993, with investment from breweries in bars, public houses and clubs, along with active support from the local authorities. The more than 500 licensed premises in the city centre have a capacity to deal with more than visitors, with 110,000–130,000 people visiting on a typical weekend night, making Manchester the most popular city for events at 79 per thousand people. The night-time economy has a value of about £100 million. and supports 12,000 jobs. The Madchester scene of the 1980s, from which groups including The Stone Roses, the Happy Mondays, Inspiral Carpets, 808 State, James and The Charlatans emerged, was based around clubs such as The Haçienda. The period was the subject of the movie 24 Hour Party People. Many of the big clubs suffered problems with organised crime at that time; Haslam describes one where staff were so completely intimidated that free admission and drinks were demanded (and given) and drugs were openly dealt. Following a series of drug-related violent incidents, The Haçienda closed in 1997. Gay village Public houses in the Canal Street area have had an LGBTQ+ clientele since at least 1940, and now form the centre of Manchester's LGBTQ+ community. Since the opening of new bars and clubs, the area attracts 20,000 visitors each weekend and has hosted a popular festival, Manchester Pride, each August since 1995. Education There are three universities in the City of Manchester. The University of Manchester, Manchester Metropolitan University and Royal Northern College of Music. The University of Manchester is the largest full-time non-collegiate university in the United Kingdom, created in 2004 by the merger of Victoria University of Manchester, founded in 1904, and UMIST, founded in 1956 having developed from the Mechanics' Institute founded, as indicated in the university's logo, in 1824. The University of Manchester includes the Manchester Business School, which offered the first MBA course in the UK in 1965. Manchester Metropolitan University was formed as Manchester Polytechnic on the merger of three colleges in 1970. It gained university status in 1992, and in the same year absorbed Crewe and Alsager College of Higher Education in South Cheshire. The University of Law, the largest provider of vocation legal training in Europe, has a campus in the city. The three universities are grouped around Oxford Road on the southern side of the city centre, which forms Europe's largest urban higher-education precinct. Together they have a combined population of 76,025 students in higher education as of 2015, although almost 6,000 of them were based at Manchester Metropolitan University's campuses at Crewe and Alsager in Cheshire. One of Manchester's notable secondary schools is Manchester Grammar School. Established in 1515, as a free grammar school next to what is now the cathedral, it moved in 1931 to Old Hall Lane in Fallowfield, south Manchester, to accommodate the growing student body. In the post-war period, it was a direct grant grammar school (i.e. partially state funded), but it reverted to independent status in 1976 after abolition of the direct-grant system. Its previous premises are now used by Chetham's School of Music. There are three schools nearby: William Hulme's Grammar School, Withington Girls' School and Manchester High School for Girls. In 2010, the Manchester Local Education Authority was ranked last out of Greater Manchester's ten LEAs and 147th out of 150 in the country LEAs based on the percentage of pupils attaining at least five A*–C grades at General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) including maths and English (38.6 per cent compared with the national average of 50.7 per cent). The LEA also had the highest occurrence of absences: 11.11 per cent of "half-day sessions missed by pupils", well above the national average of 5.8 per cent. Of the schools in the LEA with 30 or more pupils, four had 90 per cent or more pupils achieving at least five A*–C grades at GCSE including maths and English: Manchester High School for Girls, St Bede's College, Manchester Islamic High School for Girls, and The King David High School. Three managed 25 per cent or less: Plant Hill Arts College, North Manchester High School for Boys, Brookway High School and Sports College. Sport Manchester is well known as a city of sport. Two decorated Premier League football clubs bear the city name – Manchester United and Manchester City. Manchester United play its home games at Old Trafford, in the Manchester suburb of Trafford, the largest club football ground in the United Kingdom. Manchester City's home ground is the City of Manchester Stadium (also known as the Etihad Stadium for sponsorship purposes); its former ground, Maine Road was demolished in 2003. The City of Manchester Stadium was initially built as the main athletics stadium for the 2002 Commonwealth Games and was then reconfigured into a football stadium before Manchester City's arrival. Manchester has hosted domestic, continental and international football competitions at Fallowfield Stadium, Maine Road, Old Trafford and the City of Manchester Stadium. Competitions hosted in city include the FIFA World Cup (1966), UEFA European Football Championship (1996), Olympic Football (2012), UEFA Champions League Final (2003), UEFA Cup Final (2008), four FA Cup Finals (1893, 1911, 1915, 1970) and three League Cup Finals (1977, 1978, 1984). First-class sporting facilities were built for the 2002 Commonwealth Games, including the City of Manchester Stadium, the National Squash Centre and the Manchester Aquatics Centre. Manchester has competed twice to host the Olympic Games, beaten by Atlanta for 1996 and Sydney for 2000. The National Cycling Centre includes a velodrome, BMX Arena and Mountainbike trials, and is the home of British Cycling, UCI ProTeam Team Sky and Sky Track Cycling. The Manchester Velodrome was built as a part of the bid for the 2000 games and has become a catalyst for British success in cycling. The velodrome hosted the UCI Track Cycling World Championships for a record third time in 2008. The National Indoor BMX Arena (2,000 capacity) adjacent to the velodrome opened in 2011. The Manchester Arena hosted the FINA World Swimming Championships in 2008. Manchester Cricket Club evolved into Lancashire County Cricket Club and play at Old Trafford Cricket Ground, as do Manchester Originals, a new city-based cricket team founded in 2019 which will play in the new cricket competition The Hundred, representing Lancashire and Manchester. Manchester also hosted the World Squash Championships in 2008, and also hosted the 2010 World Lacrosse Championship in July 2010. Recent sporting events hosted by Manchester include the 2013 Ashes series, 2013 Rugby League World Cup and the 2015 Rugby World Cup. Media Print The Guardian newspaper was founded in the city in 1821 as The Manchester Guardian. Until 2008, its head office was still in the city, though many of its management functions were moved to London in 1964. For many years most national newspapers had offices in Manchester: The Daily Telegraph, Daily Express, Daily Mail, Daily Mirror, The Sun. At its height, 1,500 journalists were employed, earning the city the nickname "second Fleet Street". In the 1980s the titles closed their northern offices and centred their operations in London. The main regional newspaper in the city is the Manchester Evening News, which was for over 80 years the sister publication of The Manchester Guardian. The Manchester Evening News has the largest circulation of a UK regional evening newspaper and is distributed free of charge in the city centre on Thursdays and Fridays, but paid for in the suburbs. Despite its title, it is available all day. Several local weekly free papers are distributed by the MEN group. The Metro North West is available free at Metrolink stops, rail stations and other busy locations. An attempt to launch a Northern daily newspaper, the North West Times, employing journalists made redundant by other titles, closed in 1988. Another attempt was made with the North West Enquirer, which hoped to provide a true "regional" newspaper for the North West, much in the same vein as the Yorkshire Post does for Yorkshire or The Northern Echo does for the North East; it folded in October 2006. Television Manchester has been a centre of television broadcasting since the 1950s. A number of television studios have been in operation around the city, and have since relocated to MediaCityUK in neighbouring Salford. The ITV franchise Granada Television has been based in Manchester since 1954. Now based at MediaCityUK, the company's former headquarters at Granada Studios on Quay Street with its distinctive illuminated sign were a prominent landmark on the Manchester skyline for several decades. Granada produces Coronation Street, local news and programmes for North West England. Although its influence has waned, Granada had been described as "the best commercial television company in the world". With the growth in regional television in the 1950s, Manchester became one of the BBC's three main centres in England. In 1954, the BBC opened its first regional BBC Television studio outside London, Dickenson Road Studios, in a converted Methodist chapel in Rusholme. The first edition of Top of the Pops was broadcast here on New Year's Day 1964. From 1975, BBC programmes including Mastermind, and Real Story, were made at New Broadcasting House on Oxford Road. The Cutting It series set in the city's Northern Quarter and The Street were set in Manchester as was Life on Mars. Manchester was the regional base for BBC One North West Region programmes before it relocated to MediaCityUK in nearby Salford Quays. The Manchester television channel, Channel M, owned by the Guardian Media Group operated from 2000, but closed in 2012. Manchester is also covered by two internet television channels: Quays News and Manchester.tv. The city had a new terrestrial channel from January 2014 when YourTV Manchester, which won the OFCOM licence bid in February 2013. It began its first broadcast, but in 2015, That's Manchester took over to air on 31 May and launched the freeview channel 8 service slot, before moving to channel 7 in April 2016. Radio The city has the highest number of local radio stations outside London, including BBC Radio Manchester, Hits Radio Manchester, Capital Manchester, Greatest Hits Manchester, Heart North West, Smooth North West, Gold, NMFM (North Manchester FM) and XS Manchester. Student radio stations include Fuse FM at the University of Manchester and MMU Radio at the Manchester Metropolitan University. A community radio network is coordinated by Radio Regen, with stations covering Ardwick, Longsight and Levenshulme (All FM 96.9) and Wythenshawe (Wythenshawe FM 97.2). Defunct radio stations include Sunset 102, which became Kiss 102, then Galaxy Manchester), and KFM which became Signal Cheshire (now Imagine FM). These stations and pirate radio played a significant role in the city's house music culture, the Madchester scene. International relations Manchester has formal twinning arrangements (or "friendship agreements") with several places. In addition, the British Council maintains a metropolitan centre in Manchester. Amsterdam, Netherlands (2007) Bilwi, Nicaragua Chemnitz, Germany (1983) Córdoba, Spain Faisalabad, Pakistan (1997) Los Angeles, USA (2009) Rehovot, Israel Saint Petersburg, Russia (1962) Wuhan, People's Republic of China (1986) Melbourne, Australia Manchester is home to the largest group of consuls in the UK outside London. The expansion of international trade links during the Industrial Revolution led to the introduction of the first consuls in the 1820s and since then over 800, from all parts of the world, have been based in Manchester. Manchester hosts consular services for most of the north of England. See also List of Freemen of the City of Manchester Manchester dialect Tampere References Further reading Architecture General Culture Sport External links Manchester City Council Official tourist board site 1st-century establishments in Roman Britain 79 establishments Cities in North West England Metropolitan boroughs of Greater Manchester Populated places established in the 1st century Towns in Greater Manchester

20208

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret%20Murray

Margaret Murray

Margaret Alice Murray (13 July 1863 – 13 November 1963) was an Anglo-Indian Egyptologist, archaeologist, anthropologist, historian, and folklorist. The first woman to be appointed as a lecturer in archaeology in the United Kingdom, she worked at University College London (UCL) from 1898 to 1935. She served as President of the Folklore Society from 1953 to 1955, and published widely over the course of her career. Born to a wealthy middle-class English family in Calcutta, British India, Murray divided her youth between India, Britain, and Germany, training as both a nurse and a social worker. Moving to London, in 1894 she began studying Egyptology at UCL, developing a friendship with department head Flinders Petrie, who encouraged her early academic publications and appointed her Junior Professor in 1898. In 1902–03 she took part in Petrie's excavations at Abydos, Egypt, there discovering the Osireion temple and the following season investigated the Saqqara cemetery, both of which established her reputation in Egyptology. Supplementing her UCL wage by giving public classes and lectures at the British Museum and Manchester Museum, it was at the latter in 1908 that she led the unwrapping of Khnum-nakht, one of the mummies recovered from the Tomb of the Two Brothers – the first time that a woman had publicly unwrapped a mummy. Recognising that British Egyptomania reflected the existence of a widespread public interest in Ancient Egypt, Murray wrote several books on Egyptology targeted at a general audience. Murray also became closely involved in the first-wave feminist movement, joining the Women's Social and Political Union and devoting much time to improving women's status at UCL. Unable to return to Egypt due to the First World War, she focused her research on the witch-cult hypothesis, the theory that the witch trials of Early Modern Christendom were an attempt to extinguish a surviving pre-Christian, pagan religion devoted to a Horned God. Although later academically discredited, the theory gained widespread attention and proved a significant influence on the emerging new religious movement of Wicca. From 1921 to 1931 Murray undertook excavations of prehistoric sites on Malta and Menorca and developed her interest in folkloristics. Awarded an honorary doctorate in 1927, she was appointed Assistant Professor in 1928 and retired from UCL in 1935. That year she visited Palestine to aid Petrie's excavation of Tall al-Ajjul and in 1937 she led a small excavation at Petra in Jordan. Taking on the presidency of the Folklore Society in later life, she lectured at such institutions as the University of Cambridge and City Literary Institute, and continued to publish in an independent capacity until her death. Murray's work in Egyptology and archaeology was widely acclaimed and earned her the nickname of "The Grand Old Woman of Egyptology", although after her death many of her contributions to the field were overshadowed by those of Petrie. Conversely, Murray's work in folkloristics and the history of witchcraft has been academically discredited and her methods in these areas heavily criticised. The influence of her witch-cult theory in both religion and literature has been examined by various scholars, and she herself has been dubbed the "Grandmother of Wicca". Early life Youth: 1863–93 Margaret Murray was born on 13 July 1863 in Calcutta, Bengal Presidency, then a major military city in British India. An Anglo-Indian, she lived in the city with her family: parents James and Margaret Murray, an older sister named Mary, and her paternal grandmother and great-grandmother. James Murray, born in India of English descent, was a businessman and manager of the Serampore paper mills who was thrice elected President of the Calcutta Chamber of Commerce. His wife, Margaret (née Carr), had moved to India from Britain in 1857 to work as a missionary, preaching Christianity and educating Indian women. She continued with this work after marrying James and giving birth to her two daughters. Although most of their lives were spent in the European area of Calcutta, which was walled off from the Indian sectors of the city, Murray encountered members of Indian society through her family's employment of ten Indian servants and through childhood holidays to Mussoorie. The historian Amara Thornton has suggested that Murray's Indian childhood continued to exert an influence over her throughout her life, expressing the view that Murray could be seen as having a hybrid transnational identity that was both British and Indian. During her childhood, Murray never received a formal education, and in later life expressed pride in the fact that she had never had to sit an exam before entering university. In 1870, Margaret and her sister Mary were sent to Britain, there moving in with their uncle John, a vicar, and his wife Harriet at their home in Lambourn, Berkshire. Although John provided them with a strongly Christian education and a belief in the inferiority of women, both of which she would reject, he awakened Murray's interest in archaeology through taking her to see local monuments. In 1873, the girls' mother arrived in Europe and took them with her to Bonn in Germany, where they both became fluent in German. In 1875 they returned to Calcutta, staying there till 1877. They then moved with their parents back to England, where they settled in Sydenham, South London. There, they spent much time visiting The Crystal Palace, while their father worked at his firm's London office. In 1880, they returned to Calcutta, where Margaret remained for the next seven years. She became a nurse at the Calcutta General Hospital, which was run by the Sisters of the Anglican Sisterhood of Clower, and there was involved with the hospital's attempts to deal with a cholera outbreak. In 1887, she returned to England, moving to Rugby, Warwickshire, where her uncle John had moved, now widowed. Here she took up employment as a social worker dealing with local underprivileged people. When her father retired and moved to England, she moved into his house in Bushey Heath, Hertfordshire, living with him until his death in 1891. In 1893 she then travelled to Madras, Tamil Nadu, where her sister had moved to with her new husband. Early years at University College London: 1894–1905 Encouraged by her mother and sister, Murray decided to enroll at the newly opened department of Egyptology at University College London (UCL) in Bloomsbury, Central London. Having been founded by an endowment from Amelia Edwards, one of the co-founders of the Egypt Exploration Fund (EEF), the department was run by the pioneering early archaeologist Sir William Flinders Petrie, and based in the Edwards Library of UCL's South Cloisters. Murray began her studies at UCL at age 30 in January 1894, as part of a class composed largely of other women and older men. There, she took courses in the Ancient Egyptian and Coptic languages which were taught by Francis Llewellyn Griffith and Walter Ewing Crum respectively. Murray soon got to know Petrie, becoming his copyist and illustrator and producing the drawings for the published report on his excavations at Qift, Koptos. In turn, he aided and encouraged her to write her first research paper, "The Descent of Property in the Early Periods of Egyptian History", which was published in the Proceedings of the Society for Biblical Archaeology in 1895. Becoming Petrie's de facto though unofficial assistant, Murray began to give some of the linguistic lessons in Griffith's absence. In 1898 she was appointed to the position of Junior Lecturer, responsible for teaching the linguistic courses at the Egyptology department; this made her the first female lecturer in archaeology in the United Kingdom. In this capacity, she spent two days a week at UCL, devoting the other days to caring for her ailing mother. As time went on, she came to teach courses on Ancient Egyptian history, religion, and language. Among Murray's students – to whom she referred as "the Gang" – were several who went on to produce noted contributions to Egyptology, including Reginald Engelbach, Georgina Aitken, Guy Brunton, and Myrtle Broome. She supplemented her UCL salary by teaching evening classes in Egyptology at the British Museum. At this point, Murray had no experience in field archaeology, and so during the 1902–03 field season, she travelled to Egypt to join Petrie's excavations at Abydos. Petrie and his wife, Hilda Petrie, had been excavating at the site since 1899, having taken over the archaeological investigation from French Coptic scholar Émile Amélineau. Murray at first joined as site nurse, but was subsequently taught how to excavate by Petrie and given a senior position. This led to some issues with some of the male excavators, who disliked the idea of taking orders from a woman. This experience, coupled with discussions with other female excavators (some of whom were active in the feminist movement) led Murray to adopt openly feminist viewpoints. While excavating at Abydos, Murray uncovered the Osireion, a temple devoted to the god Osiris which had been constructed by order of Pharaoh Seti I during the period of the New Kingdom. She published her site report as The Osireion at Abydos in 1904; in the report, she examined the inscriptions that had been discovered at the site to discern the purpose and use of the building. During the 1903–04 field season, Murray returned to Egypt, and at Petrie's instruction began her investigations at the Saqqara cemetery near to Cairo, which dated from the period of the Old Kingdom. Murray did not have legal permission to excavate the site, and instead spent her time transcribing the inscriptions from ten of the tombs that had been excavated during the 1860s by Auguste Mariette. She published her findings in 1905 as Saqqara Mastabas I, although would not publish translations of the inscriptions until 1937 as Saqqara Mastabas II. Both The Osireion at Abydos and Saqqara Mastabas I proved to be very influential in the Egyptological community, with Petrie recognising Murray's contribution to his own career. Feminism, the First World War, and folklore: 1905–20 On returning to London, Murray took an active role in the feminist movement, volunteering and financially donating to the cause and taking part in feminist demonstrations, protests, and marches. Joining the Women's Social and Political Union, she was present at large marches like the Mud March of 1907 and the Women's Coronation Procession of June 1911. She concealed the militancy of her actions in order to retain the image of respectability within academia. Murray also pushed the professional boundaries for women throughout her own career, and mentored other women in archaeology and throughout academia. As women could not use the men's common room, she successfully campaigned for UCL to open a common room for women, and later ensured that a larger, better-equipped room was converted for the purpose; it was later renamed the Margaret Murray Room. At UCL, she became a friend of fellow female lecturer Winifred Smith, and together they campaigned to improve the status and recognition of women in the university, with Murray becoming particularly annoyed at female staff who were afraid of upsetting or offending the male university establishment with their demands. Feeling that students should get nutritious yet affordable lunches, for many years she sat on the UCL Refectory Committee. Various museums around the United Kingdom invited Murray to advise them on their Egyptological collections, resulting in her cataloguing the Egyptian artefacts owned by the Dublin National Museum, the National Museum of Antiquities in Edinburgh, and the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, being elected a Fellow of the latter in thanks. Petrie had established connections with the Egyptological wing of Manchester Museum in Manchester, and it was there that many of his finds had been housed. Murray thus often travelled to the museum to catalogue these artefacts, and during the 1906–07 school year regularly lectured there. In 1907, Petrie excavated the Tomb of the Two Brothers, a Middle Kingdom burial of two Egyptian priests, Nakht-ankh and Khnum-nakht, and it was decided that Murray would carry out the public unwrapping of the latter's mummified body. Taking place at the museum in May 1908, it represented the first time that a woman had led a public mummy unwrapping and was attended by over 500 onlookers, attracting press attention. Murray was particularly keen to emphasise the importance that the unwrapping would have for the scholarly understanding of the Middle Kingdom and its burial practices, and lashed out against members of the public who saw it as immoral; she declared that "every vestige of ancient remains must be carefully studied and recorded without sentimentality and without fear of the outcry of the ignorant". She subsequently published a book about her analysis of the two bodies, The Tomb of the Two Brothers, which remained a key publication on Middle Kingdom mummification practices into the 21st century. Murray was dedicated to public education, hoping to infuse Egyptomania with solid scholarship about Ancient Egypt, and to this end authored a series of books aimed at a general audience. In 1905 she published Elementary Egyptian Grammar which was followed in 1911 by Elementary Coptic (Sahidic) Grammar. In 1913, she published Ancient Egyptian Legends for John Murray's "The Wisdom of the East" series. She was particularly pleased with the increased public interest in Egyptology that followed Howard Carter's discovery of the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun in 1922. From at least 1911 until his death in 1940, Murray was a close friend of the anthropologist Charles Gabriel Seligman of the London School of Economics, and together they co-authored a variety of papers on Egyptology that were aimed at an anthropological audience. Many of these dealt with subjects that Egyptological journals would not publish, such as the "Sa" sign for the uterus, and thus were published in Man, the journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute. It was at Seligman's recommendation that she was invited to become a member of the Institute in 1916. In 1914, Petrie launched the academic journal Ancient Egypt, published through his own British School of Archaeology in Egypt (BSAE), which was based at UCL. Given that he was often away from London excavating in Egypt, Murray was left to operate as de facto editor much of the time. She also published many research articles in the journal and authored many of its book reviews, particularly of the German-language publications which Petrie could not read. The outbreak of the First World War in 1914, in which the United Kingdom went to war against Germany and the Ottoman Empire, meant that Petrie and other staff members were unable to return to Egypt for excavation. Instead, Petrie and Murray spent much of the time reorganising the artefact collections that they had attained over the past decades. To aid Britain's war effort, Murray enrolled as a volunteer nurse in the Volunteer Air Detachment of the College Women's Union Society, and for several weeks was posted to Saint-Malo in France. After being taken ill herself, she was sent to recuperate in Glastonbury, Somerset, where she became interested in Glastonbury Abbey and the folklore surrounding it which connected it to the legendary figure of King Arthur and to the idea that the Holy Grail had been brought there by Joseph of Aramathea. Pursuing this interest, she published the paper "Egyptian Elements in the Grail Romance" in the journal Ancient Egypt, although few agreed with her conclusions and it was criticised for making unsubstantiated leaps with the evidence by the likes of Jessie Weston. Later life Witch-cult, Malta, and Menorca: 1921–35 Murray's interest in folklore led her to develop an interest in the witch trials of Early Modern Europe. In 1917, she published a paper in Folklore, the journal of the Folklore Society, in which she first articulated her version of the witch-cult theory, arguing that the witches persecuted in European history were actually followers of "a definite religion with beliefs, ritual, and organization as highly developed as that of any cult in the end". She followed this up with papers on the subject in the journals Man and the Scottish Historical Review. She articulated these views more fully in her 1921 book The Witch-Cult in Western Europe, published by Oxford University Press after receiving a positive peer review by Henry Balfour, and which received both criticism and support on publication. Many reviews in academic journals were critical, with historians claiming that she had distorted and misinterpreted the contemporary records that she was using, but the book was nevertheless influential. As a result of her work in this area, she was invited to provide the entry on "witchcraft" for the fourteenth edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica in 1929. She used the opportunity to propagate her own witch-cult theory, failing to mention the alternate theories proposed by other academics. Her entry would be included in the encyclopedia until 1969, becoming readily accessible to the public, and it was for this reason that her ideas on the subject had such a significant impact. It received a particularly enthusiastic reception by occultists such as Dion Fortune, Lewis Spence, Ralph Shirley, and J. W. Brodie Innes, perhaps because its claims regarding an ancient secret society chimed with similar claims common among various occult groups. Murray joined the Folklore Society in February 1927, and was elected to the society's council a month later, although she stood down in 1929. Murray reiterated her witch-cult theory in her 1933 book, The God of the Witches, which was aimed at a wider, non-academic audience. In this book, she cut out or toned down what she saw as the more unpleasant aspects of the witch-cult, such as animal and child sacrifice, and began describing the religion in more positive terms as "the Old Religion". From 1921 to 1927, Murray led archaeological excavations on Malta, assisted by Edith Guest and Gertrude Caton Thompson. She excavated the Bronze Age megalithic monuments of Santa Sofia, Santa Maria tal-Bakkari, Għar Dalam, and Borġ in-Nadur, all of which were threatened by the construction of a new aerodrome. In this she was funded by the Percy Sladen Memorial Fund. Her resulting three-volume excavation report came to be seen as an important publication within the field of Maltese archaeology. During the excavations, she had taken an interest in the island's folklore, resulting in the 1932 publication of her book Maltese Folktales, much of which was a translation of earlier stories collected by Manuel Magri and her friend Liza Galea. In 1932 Murray returned to Malta to aid in the cataloguing of the Bronze Age pottery collection held in Malta Museum, resulting in another publication, Corpus of the Bronze Age Pottery of Malta. On the basis of her work in Malta, Louis C. G. Clarke, the curator of the Cambridge Museum of Ethnology and Anthropology, invited her to lead excavations on the island of Menorca from 1930 to 1931. With the aid of Guest, she excavated the talaiotic sites of Trepucó and Sa Torreta de Tramuntana, resulting in the publication of Cambridge Excavations in Minorca. Murray also continued to publish works on Egyptology for a general audience, such as Egyptian Sculpture (1930) and Egyptian Temples (1931), which received largely positive reviews. In the summer of 1925 she led a team of volunteers to excavate Homestead Moat in Whomerle Wood near to Stevenage, Hertfordshire; she did not publish an excavation report and did not mention the event in her autobiography, with her motives for carrying out the excavation remaining unclear. In 1924, UCL promoted Murray to the position of assistant professor, and in 1927 she was awarded an honorary doctorate for her career in Egyptology. That year, Murray was tasked with guiding Mary of Teck, the Queen consort, around the Egyptology department during the latter's visit to UCL. The pressures of teaching had eased by this point, allowing Murray to spend more time travelling internationally; in 1920 she returned to Egypt and in 1929 visited South Africa, where she attended the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, whose theme was the prehistory of southern Africa. In the early 1930s she travelled to the Soviet Union, where she visited museums in Leningrad, Moscow, Kharkiv, and Kiev, and then in late 1935 she undertook a lecture tour of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Estonia. Although having reached legal retirement age in 1927, and thus unable to be offered another five-year contract, Murray was reappointed on an annual basis each year until 1935. At this point, she retired, expressing the opinion that she was glad to leave UCL, for reasons that she did not make clear. In 1933, Petrie had retired from UCL and moved to Jerusalem in Mandatory Palestine with his wife; Murray therefore took over as editor of the Ancient Egypt journal, renaming it Ancient Egypt and the East to reflect its increasing research interest in the ancient societies that surrounded and interacted with Egypt. The journal folded in 1935, perhaps due to Murray's retirement. Murray then spent some time in Jerusalem, where she aided the Petries in their excavation at Tall al-Ajjul, a Bronze Age mound south of Gaza. Petra, Cambridge, and London: 1935–53 During Murray's 1935 trip to Palestine, she had taken the opportunity to visit Petra in neighbouring Jordan. Intrigued by the site, in March and April 1937 she returned in order to carry out a small excavation in several cave dwellings at the site, subsequently writing both an excavation report and a guidebook on Petra. Back in England, from 1934 to 1940, Murray aided the cataloguing of Egyptian antiquities at Girton College, Cambridge, and also gave lectures in Egyptology at the university until 1942. Her interest in folklore more broadly continued and wrote the introduction to Lincolshire Folklore by Ethel Rudkin, within in which she discussed how superior women were as folklorists than men. During the Second World War, Murray evaded the Blitz of London by moving to Cambridge, where she volunteered for a group (probably the Army Bureau of Current Affairs or The British Way and Purpose) who educated military personnel to prepare them for post-war life. Based in the city, she embarked on research into the town's Early Modern history, examining documents stored in local parish churches, Downing College, and Ely Cathedral; she never published her findings. In 1945, she briefly became involved in the Who put Bella in the Wych Elm? murder case. After the war ended she returned to London, settling into a bedsit room in Endsleigh Street, which was close to University College London (UCL) and the Institute of Archaeology (then an independent institution, now part of UCL); she continued her involvement with the former and made use of the latter's library. On most days she visited the British Museum in order to consult their library, and twice a week she taught adult education classes on Ancient Egyptian history and religion at the City Literary Institute; upon her retirement from this position she nominated her former pupil, Veronica Seton-Williams, to replace her. Murray's interest in popularising Egyptology among the wider public continued; in 1949 she published Ancient Egyptian Religious Poetry, her second work for John Murray's "The Wisdom of the East" series. That same year she also published The Splendour That Was Egypt, in which she collated many of her UCL lectures. The book adopted a diffusionist perspective that argued that Egypt influenced Greco-Roman society and thus modern Western society. This was seen as a compromise between Petrie's belief that other societies influenced the emergence of Egyptian civilisation and Grafton Elliot Smith's highly unorthodox and heavily criticised hyperdiffusionist view that Egypt was the source of all global civilisation. The book received a mixed reception from the archaeological community. Final years: 1953–63 In 1953, Murray was appointed to the presidency of the Folklore Society following the resignation of former president Allan Gomme. The Society had initially approached John Mavrogordato for the post, but he had declined, with Murray accepting the nomination several months later. Murray remained President for two terms, until 1955. In her 1954 presidential address, "England as a Field for Folklore Research", she lamented what she saw as the English people's disinterest in their own folklore in favour of that from other nations. For the autumn 1961 issue of Folklore, the society published a festschrift to Murray to commemorate her 98th birthday. The issue contained contributions from various scholars paying tribute to her – with papers dealing with archaeology, fairies, Near Eastern religious symbols, Greek folk songs – but notably not about witchcraft, potentially because no other folklorists were willing to defend her witch-cult theory. In May 1957, Murray had championed the archaeologist T. C. Lethbridge's controversial claims that he had discovered three pre-Christian chalk hill figures on Wandlebury Hill in the Gog Magog Hills, Cambridgeshire. Privately she expressed concern about the reality of the figures. Lethbridge subsequently authored a book championing her witch-cult theory in which he sought the cult's origins in pre-Christian culture. In 1960, she donated her collection of papers – including correspondences with a wide range of individuals across the country – to the Folklore Society Archive, where it is now known as "the Murray Collection". Crippled with arthritis, Murray had moved into a home in North Finchley, north London, where she was cared for by a retired couple who were trained nurses; from here she occasionally took taxis into central London to visit the UCL library. Amid failing health, in 1962 Murray moved into the Queen Victoria Memorial Hospital in Welwyn, Hertfordshire, where she could receive 24-hour care; she lived here for the final 18 months of her life. To mark her hundredth birthday, on 13 July 1963 a group of her friends, former students, and doctors gathered for a party at nearby Ayot St. Lawrence. Two days later, her doctor drove her to UCL for a second birthday party, again attended by many of her friends, colleagues, and former students; it was the last time that she visited the university. In Man, the journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, it was noted that Murray was "the only Fellow of the Institute to [reach their centenary] within living memory, if not in its whole history". That year she published two books; one was The Genesis of Religion, in which she argued that humanity's first deities had been goddesses rather than male gods. The second was her autobiography, My First Hundred Years, which received predominantly positive reviews. She died on 13 November 1963, and her body was cremated. Murray's witch-cult hypotheses The later folklorists Caroline Oates and Juliette Wood have suggested that Murray was best known for her witch-cult theory, with biographer Margaret S. Drower expressing the view that it was her work on this subject which "perhaps more than any other, made her known to the general public". It has been claimed that Murray's was the "first feminist study of the witch trials", as well as being the first to have actually "empowered the witches" by giving the (largely female) accused both free will and a voice distinct from that of their interrogators. The theory was faulty, in part because all of her academic training was in Egyptology, with no background knowledge in European history, but also because she exhibited a "tendency to generalize wildly on the basis of very slender evidence". Oates and Wood, however, noted that Murray's interpretations of the evidence fitted within wider perspectives on the past that existed at the time, stating that "Murray was far from isolated in her method of reading ancient ritual origins into later myths". In particular, her approach was influenced by the work of the anthropologist James Frazer, who had argued for the existence of a pervasive dying-and-resurrecting god myth, and she was also influenced by the interpretative approaches of E. O. James, Karl Pearson, Herbert Fleure, and Harold Peake. Argument In The Witch-Cult in Western Europe, Murray stated that she had restricted her research to Great Britain, although made some recourse to sources from France, Flanders, and New England. She drew a division between what she termed "Operative Witchcraft", which referred to the performance of charms and spells with any purpose, and "Ritual Witchcraft", by which she meant "the ancient religion of Western Europe", a fertility-based faith that she also termed "the Dianic cult". She claimed that the cult had "very probably" once been devoted to the worship of both a male deity and a "Mother Goddess" but that "at the time when the cult is recorded the worship of the male deity appears to have superseded that of the female". In her argument, Murray claimed that the figure referred to as the Devil in the trial accounts was the witches' god, "manifest and incarnate", to whom the witches offered their prayers. She claimed that at the witches' meetings, the god would be personified, usually by a man or at times by a woman or an animal; when a human personified this entity, Murray claimed that they were usually dressed plainly, though they appeared in full costume for the witches' Sabbaths. Members joined the cult either as children or adults through what Murray called "admission ceremonies"; Murray asserted that applicants had to agree to join of their own free will, and agree to devote themselves to the service of their deity. She also claimed that in some cases, these individuals had to sign a covenant or were baptised into the faith. At the same time, she claimed that the religion was largely passed down hereditary lines. Murray described the religion as being divided into covens containing thirteen members, led by a coven officer who was often termed the "Devil" in the trial accounts, but who was accountable to a "Grand Master". According to Murray, the records of the coven were kept in a secret book, with the coven also disciplining its members, to the extent of executing those deemed traitors. Describing this witch-cult as "a joyous religion", she claimed that the two primary festivals that it celebrated were on May Eve and November Eve, although that other dates of religious observation were 1 February and 1 August, the winter and summer solstices, and Easter. She asserted that the "General Meeting of all members of the religion" were known as Sabbaths, while the more private ritual meetings were known as Esbats. The Esbats, Murray claimed, were nocturnal rites that began at midnight, and were "primarily for business, whereas the Sabbath was purely religious". At the former, magical rites were performed both for malevolent and benevolent ends. She also asserted that the Sabbath ceremonies involved the witches paying homage to the deity, renewing their "vows of fidelity and obedience" to him, and providing him with accounts of all the magical actions that they had conducted since the previous Sabbath. Once this business had been concluded, admissions to the cult or marriages were conducted, ceremonies and fertility rites took place, and then the Sabbath ended with feasting and dancing. Deeming Ritual Witchcraft to be "a fertility cult", she asserted that many of its rites were designed to ensure fertility and rain-making. She claimed that there were four types of sacrifice performed by the witches: blood-sacrifice, in which the neophyte writes their name in blood; the sacrifice of animals; the sacrifice of a non-Christian child to procure magical powers; and the sacrifice of the witches' god by fire to ensure fertility. She interpreted accounts of witches shapeshifting into various animals as being representative of a rite in which the witches dressed as specific animals which they took to be sacred. She asserted that accounts of familiars were based on the witches' use of animals, which she divided into "divining familiars" used in divination and "domestic familiars" used in other magic rites. Murray asserted that a pre-Christian fertility-based religion had survived the Christianization process in Britain, although that it came to be "practised only in certain places and among certain classes of the community". She believed that folkloric stories of fairies in Britain were based on a surviving race of dwarfs, who continued to live on the island up until the Early Modern period. She asserted that this race followed the same pagan religion as the witches, thus explaining the folkloric connection between the two. In the appendices to the book, she also alleged that Joan of Arc and Gilles de Rais were members of the witch-cult and were executed for it, a claim which has been refuted by historians, especially in the case of Joan of Arc. The later historian Ronald Hutton commented that The Witch-Cult in Western Europe "rested upon a small amount of archival research, with extensive use of printed trial records in 19th-century editions, plus early modern pamphlets and works of demonology". He also noted that the book's tone was generally "dry and clinical, and every assertion was meticulously footnoted to a source, with lavish quotation". It was not a bestseller; in its first thirty years, only 2,020 copies were sold. However, it led many people to treat Murray as an authority on the subject; in 1929, she was invited to provide the entry on "Witchcraft" for the Encyclopædia Britannica, and used it to present her interpretation of the subject as if it were universally accepted in scholarship. It remained in the encyclopedia until being replaced in 1969. Murray followed The Witch-Cult in Western Europe with The God of the Witches, published by the popular press Sampson Low in 1931; although similar in content, unlike her previous volume it was aimed at a mass market audience. The tone of the book also differed strongly from its predecessor, containing "emotionally inflated [language] and coloured with religious phraseology" and repeatedly referring to the witch-cult as "the Old Religion". In this book she also "cut out or toned down" many of the claims made in her previous volume which would have painted the cult in a bad light, such as those which discussed sex and the sacrifice of animals and children. In this book she began to refer to the witches' deity as the Horned God, and asserted that it was an entity who had been worshipped in Europe since the Palaeolithic. She further asserted that in the Bronze Age, the worship of the deity could be found throughout Europe, Asia, and parts of Africa, claiming that the depiction of various horned figures from these societies proved that. Among the evidence cited were the horned figures found at Mohenjo-Daro, which are often interpreted as depictions of Pashupati, as well as the deities Osiris and Amon in Egypt and the Minotaur of Minoan Crete. Within continental Europe, she claimed that the Horned God was represented by Pan in Greece, Cernunnos in Gaul, and in various Scandinavian rock carvings. Claiming that this divinity had been declared the Devil by the Christian authorities, she nevertheless asserted that his worship was testified in officially Christian societies right through to the Modern period, citing folkloric practices such as the Dorset Ooser and the Puck Fair as evidence of his veneration. In 1954, she published The Divine King in England, in which she greatly extended on the theory, taking influence from Frazer's The Golden Bough, an anthropological book that made the claim that societies all over the world sacrificed their kings to the deities of nature. In her book, she claimed that this practice had continued into medieval England, and that, for instance, the death of William II was really a ritual sacrifice. No academic took the book seriously, and it was ignored by many of her supporters. Academic reception Early support Upon initial publication, Murray's thesis gained a favourable reception from many readers, including some significant scholars, albeit none who were experts in the witch trials. Historians of Early Modern Britain like George Norman Clark and Christopher Hill incorporated her theories into their work, although the latter subsequently distanced himself from the theory. For the 1961 reprint of The Witch-Cult in Western Europe, the Medieval historian Steven Runciman provided a foreword in which he accepted that some of Murray's "minor details may be open to criticism", but in which he was otherwise supportive of her thesis. Her theories were recapitulated by Arno Runeberg in his 1947 book Witches, Demons and Fertility Magic as well as Pennethorne Hughes in his 1952 book Witches. As a result, the Canadian historian Elliot Rose, writing in 1962, claimed that the Murrayite interpretations of the witch trials "seem to hold, at the time of writing, an almost undisputed sway at the higher intellectual levels", being widely accepted among "educated people". Rose suggested that the reason that Murray's theory gained such support was partly because of her "imposing credentials" as a member of staff at UCL, a position that lent her theory greater legitimacy in the eyes of many readers. He further suggested that the Murrayite view was attractive to many as it confirmed "the general picture of pre-Christian Europe a reader of Frazer or [Robert] Graves would be familiar with". Similarly, Hutton suggested that the cause of the Murrayite theory's popularity was because it "appealed to so many of the emotional impulses of the age", including "the notion of the English countryside as a timeless place full of ancient secrets", the literary popularity of Pan, the widespread belief that the majority of British had remained pagan long after the process of Christianisation, and the idea that folk customs represented pagan survivals. At the same time, Hutton suggested, it seemed more plausible to many than the previously dominant rationalist idea that the witch trials were the result of mass delusion. Related to this, the folklorist Jacqueline Simpson suggested that part of the Murrayite theory's appeal was that it appeared to give a "sensible, demystifying, liberating approach to a longstanding but sterile argument" between the rationalists who denied that there had been any witches and those, like Montague Summers, who insisted that there had been a real Satanic conspiracy against Christendom in the Early Modern period replete with witches with supernatural powers. "How refreshing", noted the historian Hilda Ellis Davidson, "and exciting her first book was at that period. A new approach, and such a surprising one." Early criticism Murray's theories never received support from experts in the Early Modern witch trials, and from her early publications onward many of her ideas were challenged by those who highlighted her "factual errors and methodological failings". Indeed, the majority of scholarly reviews of her work produced during the 1920s and 1930s were largely critical. George L. Burr reviewed both of her initial books on the witch-cult for the American Historical Review. He stated that she was not acquainted with the "careful general histories by modern scholars" and criticised her for assuming that the trial accounts accurately reflected the accused witches' genuine experiences of witchcraft, regardless of whether those confessions had been obtained through torture and coercion. He also charged her with selectively using the evidence to serve her interpretation, for instance by omitting any supernatural or miraculous events that appear in the trial accounts. W. R. Halliday was highly critical in his review for Folklore, as was E. M. Loeb in his review for American Anthropologist. Soon after, one of the foremost specialists of the trial records, L'Estrange Ewen, brought out a series of books which rejected Murray's interpretation. Rose suggested that Murray's books on the witch-cult "contain an incredible number of minor errors of fact or of calculation and several inconsistencies of reasoning". He accepted that her case "could, perhaps, still be proved by somebody else, though I very much doubt it". Highlighting that there is a gap of about a thousand years between the Christianisation of Britain and the start of the witch trials there, he argues that there is no evidence for the existence of the witch-cult anywhere in the intervening period. He further criticises Murray for treating pre-Christian Britain as a socially and culturally monolithic entity, whereas in reality, it contained a diverse array of societies and religious beliefs. He also challenges Murray's claim that the majority of Britons in the Middle Ages remained pagan as "a view grounded on ignorance alone". Murray did not respond directly to the criticisms of her work, but reacted to her critics in a hostile manner; in later life she asserted that she eventually ceased reading reviews of her work, and believed that her critics were simply acting out of their own Christian prejudices to non-Christian religion. Simpson noted that despite these critical reviews, within the field of British folkloristics, Murray's theories were permitted "to pass unapproved but unchallenged, either out of politeness or because nobody was really interested enough to research the topic". As evidence, she noted that no substantial research articles on the subject of witchcraft were published in Folklore between Murray's in 1917 and Rossell Hope Robbins's in 1963. She also highlighted that when regional studies of British folklore were published in this period by folklorists like Theo Brown, Ruth Tongue, or Enid Porter, none adopted the Murrayite framework for interpreting witchcraft beliefs, thus evidencing her claim that Murray's theories were widely ignored by scholars of folkloristics. Academic rejection Murray's work was increasingly criticised following her death in 1963, with the definitive academic rejection of the Murrayite witch-cult theory occurring during the 1970s. During these decades, a variety of scholars across Europe and North America – such as Alan Macfarlane, Erik Midelfort, William Monter, Robert Muchembled, Gerhard Schormann, Bente Alver and Bengt Ankarloo – published in-depth studies of the archival records from the witch trials, leaving no doubt that those tried for witchcraft were not practitioners of a surviving pre-Christian religion. In 1971, the English historian Keith Thomas stated that on the basis of this research, there was "very little evidence to suggest that the accused witches were either devil-worshippers or members of a pagan fertility cult". He stated that Murray's conclusions were "almost totally groundless" because she ignored the systematic study of the trial accounts provided by Ewen and instead used sources very selectively to argue her point. In 1975, the historian Norman Cohn commented that Murray's "knowledge of European history, even of English history, was superficial and her grasp of historical method was non-existent", adding that her ideas were "firmly set in an exaggerated and distorted version of the Frazerian mould". That same year, the historian of religion Mircea Eliade described Murray's work as "hopelessly inadequate", containing "numberless and appalling errors". In 1996, the feminist historian Diane Purkiss stated that although Murray's thesis was "intrinsically improbable" and commanded "little or no allegiance within the modern academy", she felt that male scholars like Thomas, Cohn, and Macfarlane had unfairly adopted an androcentric approach by which they contrasted their own, male and methodologically sound interpretation against Murray's "feminised belief" about the witch-cult. Hutton stated that Murray had treated her source material with "reckless abandon", in that she had taken "vivid details of alleged witch practices" from "sources scattered across a great extent of space and time" and then declared them to be normative of the cult as a whole. Simpson outlined how Murray had selected her use of evidence very specifically, particularly by ignoring and/or rationalising any accounts of supernatural or miraculous events in the trial records, thereby distorting the events that she was describing. Thus, Simpson pointed out, Murray rationalised claims that the cloven-hoofed Devil appeared at the witches' Sabbath by stating that he was a man with a special kind of shoe, and similarly asserted that witches' claims to have flown through the air on broomsticks were actually based on their practice of either hopping along on broomsticks or smearing hallucinogenic salves onto themselves. Concurring with this assessment, the historian Jeffrey Burton Russell, writing with the independent author Brooks Alexander, stated that "Murray's use of sources, in general, is appalling". The pair went on to claim that "today, scholars are agreed that Murray was more than just wrong – she was completely and embarrassingly wrong on nearly all of her basic premises". The Italian historian Carlo Ginzburg has been cited as being willing to give "some slight support" to Murray's theory. Ginzburg stated that although her thesis had been "formulated in a wholly uncritical way" and contained "serious defects", it did contain "a kernel of truth". He stated his opinion that she was right in claiming that European witchcraft had "roots in an ancient fertility cult", something that he argued was vindicated by his work researching the benandanti, an agrarian visionary tradition recorded in the Friuli district of Northeastern Italy during the 16th and 17th centuries. Several historians and folklorists have pointed out that Ginzburg's arguments are very different to Murray's: whereas Murray argued for the existence of a pre-Christian witches' cult whose members physically met during the witches' Sabbaths, Ginzburg argued that some of the European visionary traditions that were conflated with witchcraft in the Early Modern period had their origins in pre-Christian fertility religions. Moreover, other historians have expressed criticism of Ginzburg's interpretation of the benandanti; Cohn stated that there was "nothing whatsoever" in the source material to justify the idea that the benandanti were the "survival of an age-old fertility cult". Echoing these views, Hutton commented that Ginzburg's claim that the benandanti visionary traditions were a survival from pre-Christian practices was an idea resting on "imperfect material and conceptual foundations". He added that Ginzburg's "assumption" that "what was being dreamed about in the sixteenth century had in fact been acted out in religious ceremonies" dating to "pagan times", was entirely "an inference of his own" and not one supported by the documentary evidence. Personal life On researching the history of UCL's Egyptology department, the historian Rosalind M. Janssen stated that Murray was "remembered with gratitude and immense affection by all her former students. A wise and witty teacher, two generations of Egyptologists have forever been in her debt." Alongside teaching them, Murray was known to socialise with her UCL students outside of class hours. The archaeologist Ralph Merrifield, who knew Murray through the Folklore Society, described her as a "diminutive and kindly scholar, who radiated intelligence and strength of character into extreme old age". Davidson, who also knew Murray through the Society, noted that at their meetings "she would sit near the front, a bent and seemingly guileless old lady dozing peacefully, and then in the middle of a discussion would suddenly intervene with a relevant and penetrating comment which showed that she had missed not one word of the argument". The later folklorist Juliette Wood noted that many members of the Folklore Society "remember her fondly", adding that Murray had been "especially keen to encourage younger researchers, even those who disagreed with her ideas". One of Murray's friends in the Society, E. O. James, described her as a "mine of information and a perpetual inspiration ever ready to impart her vast and varied stores of specialised knowledge without reserve, or, be it said, much if any regard for the generally accepted opinions and conclusions of the experts!" Davidson described her as being "not at all assertive ... [she] never thrust her ideas on anyone. [In relation to her witch-cult theory,] she behaved in fact rather like someone who was a fully convinced member of some unusual religious sect, or perhaps, of the Freemasons, but never on any account got into arguments about it in public." The archaeologist Glyn Daniel observed that Murray remained mentally alert into her old age, commenting that "her vigour and forthrightness and ruthless energy never deserted her". Murray never married, instead devoting her life to her work, and for this reason, Hutton drew comparisons between her and two other prominent female British scholars of the period, Jane Harrison and Jessie Weston. Murray's biographer Kathleen L. Sheppard stated that she was deeply committed to public outreach, particularly when it came to Egyptology, and that as such she "wanted to change the means by which the public obtained knowledge about Egypt's history: she wished to throw open the doors to the scientific laboratory and invite the public in". She considered travel to be one of her favourite activities, although due to restraints on her time and finances she was unable to do this regularly; her salary remained small and the revenue from her books was meagre. Raised a devout Christian by her mother, Murray had initially become a Sunday School teacher to preach the faith, but after entering the academic profession she rejected religion, gaining a reputation among other members of the Folklore Society as a noted sceptic and a rationalist. She was openly critical of organised religion, although continued to maintain a personal belief in a God of some sort, relating in her autobiography that she believed in "an unseen over-ruling Power", "which science calls Nature and religion calls God". She was also a believer and a practitioner of magic, performing curses against those she felt deserved it; in one case she cursed a fellow academic, Jaroslav Černý, when she felt that his promotion to the position of Professor of Egyptology over her friend Walter Bryan Emery was unworthy. Her curse entailed mixing up ingredients in a frying pan, and was undertaken in the presence of two colleagues. In another instance, she was claimed to have created a wax image of Kaiser Wilhelm II and then melted it during the First World War. Ruth Whitehouse argues that, given Murray's lack of mention of such incidents in her autobiography and generally rational approach, a "spirit of mischief" as opposed to "a real belief in the efficacy of the spells" may have motivated her practice of magic. Legacy In academia Hutton noted that Murray was one of the earliest women to "make a serious impact upon the world of professional scholarship", and the archaeologist Niall Finneran described her as "one of the greatest characters of post-war British archaeology". Upon her death, Daniel referred to her as "the Grand Old Woman of Egyptology", with Hutton noting that Egyptology represented "the core of her academic career". In 2014, Thornton referred to her as "one of Britain's most famous Egyptologists". However, according to the archaeologist Ruth Whitehouse, Murray's contributions to archaeology and Egyptology were often overlooked as her work was overshadowed by that of Petrie, to the extent that she was often thought of primarily as one of Petrie's assistants rather than as a scholar in her own right. By her retirement she had come to be highly regarded within the discipline, although, according to Whitehouse, Murray's reputation declined following her death, something that Whitehouse attributed to the rejection of her witch-cult theory and the general erasure of women archaeologists from the discipline's male-dominated history. In his obituary for Murray in Folklore, James noted that her death was "an event of unusual interest and importance in the annals of the Folk-Lore Society in particular as well as in the wider sphere in which her influence was felt in so many directions and disciplines". However, later academic folklorists, such as Simpson and Wood, have cited Murray and her witch-cult theory as an embarrassment to their field, and to the Folklore Society specifically. Simpson suggested that Murray's position as President of the Society was a causal factor in the mistrustful attitude that many historians held toward folkloristics as an academic discipline, as they erroneously came to believe that all folklorists endorsed Murray's ideas. Similarly, Catherine Noble stated that "Murray caused considerable damage to the study of witchcraft". In 1935, UCL introduced the Margaret Murray Prize, awarded to the student who is deemed to have produced the best dissertation in Egyptology; it continued to be presented annually into the 21st century. In 1969, UCL named one of their common rooms in her honour, but it was converted into an office in 1989. In June 1983, Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother visited the room and there was gifted a copy of Murray's My First Hundred Years. UCL also hold two busts of Murray, one kept in the Petrie Museum and the other in the library of the UCL Institute of Archaeology. This sculpture was commissioned by one of her students, Violet MacDermot, and produced by the artist Stephen Rickard. UCL also possess a watercolour painting of Murray by Winifred Brunton; formerly exhibited in the Petrie Gallery, it was later placed into the Art Collection stores. In 2013, on the 150th anniversary of Murray's birth and the 50th of her death, the UCL Institute of Archaeology's Ruth Whitehouse described Murray as "a remarkable woman" whose life was "well worth celebrating, both in the archaeological world at large and especially in UCL". The historian of archaeology Rosalind M. Janssen titled her study of Egyptology at UCL The First Hundred Years "as a tribute" to Murray. Murray's friend Margaret Stefana Drower authored a short biography of her, which was included as a chapter in the 2004 edited volume on Breaking Ground: Pioneering Women Archaeologists. In 2013, Lexington Books published The Life of Margaret Alice Murray: A Woman's Work in Archaeology, a biography of Murray authored by Kathleen L. Sheppard, then an assistant professor at Missouri University of Science and Technology; the book was based upon Sheppard's doctoral dissertation produced at the University of Oklahoma. Although characterising it as being "written in a clear and engaging manner", one reviewer noted that Sheppard's book focuses on Murray the "scientist" and as such neglects to discuss Murray's involvement in magical practices and her relationship with Wicca. In Wicca Murray's witch-cult theories provided the blueprint for the contemporary Pagan religion of Wicca, with Murray being referred to as the "Grandmother of Wicca". The Pagan studies scholar Ethan Doyle White stated that it was the theory which "formed the historical narrative around which Wicca built itself", for on its emergence in England during the 1940s and 1950s, Wicca claimed to be the survival of this witch-cult. Wicca's theological structure, revolving around a Horned God and Mother Goddess, was adopted from Murray's ideas about the ancient witch-cult, and Wiccan groups were named covens and their meetings termed esbats, both words that Murray had popularised. As with Murray's witch-cult, Wicca's practitioners entered via an initiation ceremony; Murray's claims that witches wrote down their spells in a book may have been an influence on Wicca's Book of Shadows. Wicca's early system of seasonal festivities were also based on Murray's framework. Noting that there is no evidence of Wicca existing before the publication of Murray's books, Merrifield commented that for those in 20th century Britain who wished to form their own witches' covens, "Murray may have seemed the ideal fairy godmother, and her theory became the pumpkin coach that could transport them into the realm of fantasy for which they longed". The historian Philip Heselton suggested that the New Forest coven – the oldest alleged Wiccan group – was founded circa 1935 by esotericists aware of Murray's theory and who may have believed themselves to be reincarnated witch-cult members. It was Gerald Gardner, who claimed to be an initiate of the New Forest coven, who established the tradition of Gardnerian Wicca and popularised the religion; according to Simpson, Gardner was the only member of the Folklore Society to "wholeheartedly" accept Murray's witch-cult hypothesis. The duo knew each other, with Murray writing the foreword to Gardner's 1954 book Witchcraft Today, although in that foreword she did not explicitly specify whether she believed Gardner's claim that he had discovered a survival of her witch-cult. In 2005, Noble suggested that "Murray's name might be all but forgotten today if it were not for Gerald Gardner". Murray's witch-cult theories were likely also a core influence on the non-Gardnerian Wiccan traditions that were established in Britain and Australia between 1930 and 1970 by the likes of Bob Clay-Egerton, Robert Cochrane, Charles Cardell, and Rosaleen Norton. The prominent Wiccan Doreen Valiente eagerly searched for what she believed were other surviving remnants of the Murrayite witch-cult around Britain. Valiente remained committed to a belief in Murray's witch-cult after its academic rejection, and she described Murray as "a remarkable woman". In San Francisco during the late 1960s, Murray's writings were among the sources used by Aidan A. Kelly in the creation of his Wiccan tradition, the New Reformed Orthodox Order of the Golden Dawn. In Los Angeles during the early 1970s, they were used by Zsuzsanna Budapest when she was establishing her feminist-oriented tradition of Dianic Wicca. The Murrayite witch-cult theory also provided the basis for the ideas espoused in Witchcraft and the Gay Counterculture, a 1978 book written by the American gay liberation activist Arthur Evans. Members of the Wiccan community gradually became aware of academia's rejection of the witch-cult theory. Accordingly, belief in its literal truth declined during the 1980s and 1990s, with many Wiccans instead coming to view it as a myth that conveyed metaphorical or symbolic truths. Others insisted that the historical origins of the religion did not matter and that instead Wicca was legitimated by the spiritual experiences it gave to its participants. In response, Hutton authored The Triumph of the Moon, a historical study exploring Wicca's early development; on publication in 1999 the book exerted a strong impact on the British Pagan community, further eroding belief in the Murrayite theory among Wiccans. Conversely, other practitioners clung on to the theory, treating it as an important article of faith and rejecting post-Murrayite scholarship on European witchcraft. Several prominent practitioners continued to insist that Wicca was a religion with origins stretching back to the Palaeolithic, but others rejected the validity of historical scholarship and emphasised intuition and emotion as the arbiter of truth. A few "counter-revisionist" Wiccans – among them Donald H. Frew, Jani Farrell-Roberts, and Ben Whitmore – published critiques in which they attacked post-Murrayite scholarship on matters of detail, but none defended Murray's original hypothesis completely. In literature Simpson noted that the publication of the Murray thesis in the Encyclopædia Britannica made it accessible to "journalists, film-makers popular novelists and thriller writers", who adopted it "enthusiastically". It influenced the work of Aldous Huxley and Robert Graves. Murray's ideas shaped the depiction of paganism in the work of historical novelist Rosemary Sutcliff. It was also an influence on the American horror author H. P. Lovecraft, who cited The Witch-Cult in Western Europe in his writings about the fictional cult of Cthulhu. The author Sylvia Townsend Warner cited Murray's work on the witch-cult as an influence on her 1926 novel Lolly Willowes, and sent a copy of her book to Murray in appreciation, with the two meeting for lunch shortly after. There was nevertheless some difference in their depictions of the witch-cult; whereas Murray had depicted an organised pre-Christian cult, Warner depicted a vague family tradition that was explicitly Satanic. In 1927, Warner lectured on the subject of witchcraft, exhibiting a strong influence from Murray's work. Analysing the relationship between Murray and Warner, the English literature scholar Mimi Winick characterised both as being "engaged in imagining new possibilities for women in modernity". Bibliography A bibliography of Murray's published work was published in Folklore by Wilfrid Bonser in 1961, and her friend Drower produced a posthumous limited bibliography in 2004, and another limited bibliography appeared in Kathleen L. Sheppard's 2013 biography of her. See also Johann Jakob Bachofen James Frazer René Girard Robert Graves References Footnotes Bibliography External links 1863 births 1963 deaths Writers from Kolkata Scientists from Kolkata British archaeologists British anthropologists British centenarians British Egyptologists British women anthropologists British women archaeologists Historians of witchcraft Pseudohistorians 20th-century British writers 20th-century British women writers Alumni of University College London Academics of University College London British women academics 19th-century archaeologists 20th-century archaeologists British feminists 19th-century British women writers Women centenarians British women historians Women folklorists Presidents of the Folklore Society

20209

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March%2024

March 24

March 24th is the 365th and last day of the year in many European implementations of the Julian calendar. Events Pre-1600 1199 – King Richard I of England is wounded by a crossbow bolt while fighting in France, leading to his death on April 6. 1387 – English victory over a Franco-Castilian-Flemish fleet in the Battle of Margate off the coast of Margate. 1401 – Turco-Mongol emperor Timur sacks Damascus. 1601–1900 1603 – James VI of Scotland is proclaimed King James I of England and Ireland, upon the death of Elizabeth I. 1603 – Tokugawa Ieyasu is granted the title of shōgun from Emperor Go-Yōzei, and establishes the Tokugawa shogunate in Edo, Japan. 1663 – The Province of Carolina is granted by charter to eight Lords Proprietor in reward for their assistance in restoring Charles II of England to the throne. 1720 – Count Frederick of Hesse-Kassel is elected King of Sweden by the Riksdag of the Estates, after his consort Ulrika Eleonora abdicated the throne on 29 February. 1721 – Johann Sebastian Bach dedicated six concertos to Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg-Schwedt, now commonly called the Brandenburg Concertos, BWV 1046–1051. 1765 – Great Britain passes the Quartering Act, which requires the Thirteen Colonies to house British troops. 1794 – In Kraków, Tadeusz Kościuszko announces a general uprising against Imperial Russia and the Kingdom of Prussia, and assumes the powers of the Commander in Chief of all of the Polish forces. 1829 – The Parliament of the United Kingdom passes the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829, allowing Catholics to serve in Parliament. 1832 – In Hiram, Ohio, a group of men beat and tar and feather Mormon leader Joseph Smith. 1854 – President José Gregorio Monagas abolishes slavery in Venezuela. 1860 – Sakuradamon Incident: Japanese Chief Minister (Tairō) Ii Naosuke is assassinated by rōnin samurai outside the Sakurada Gate of Edo Castle. 1869 – The last of Titokowaru's forces surrendered to the New Zealand government, ending his uprising. 1878 – The British frigate sinks, killing more than 300. 1882 – Robert Koch announces the discovery of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium responsible for tuberculosis. 1900 – Mayor of New York City Robert Anderson Van Wyck breaks ground for a new underground "Rapid Transit Railroad" that would link Manhattan and Brooklyn. 1900 – Carnegie Steel Company is formed in New Jersey; its capitalization of $160 mil. is the largest to date. 1901–present 1921 – The 1921 Women's Olympiad began in Monte Carlo, becoming the first international women's sports event. 1927 – Nanking Incident: Foreign warships bombard Nanjing, China, in defense of the foreign citizens within the city. 1934 – The Tydings–McDuffie Act is passed by the United States Congress, allowing the Philippines to become a self-governing commonwealth. 1944 – German troops massacre 335 Italian civilians in Rome. 1944 – World War II: In an event later dramatized in the movie The Great Escape, 76 Allied prisoners of war begin breaking out of the German camp Stalag Luft III. 1946 – A British Cabinet Mission arrives in India to discuss and plan for the transfer of power from the British Raj to Indian leadership. 1961 – The Quebec Board of the French Language is established. 1976 – In Argentina, the armed forces overthrow the constitutional government of President Isabel Perón and start a 7-year dictatorial period self-styled the National Reorganization Process. 1977 – Morarji Desai became the Prime Minister of India, the first Prime Minister not to belong to Indian National Congress. 1980 – El Salvadorian Archbishop Óscar Romero is assassinated while celebrating Mass in San Salvador. 1986 – The Loscoe gas explosion leads to new UK laws on landfill gas migration and gas protection on landfill sites. 1989 – In Prince William Sound in Alaska, the Exxon Valdez spills of crude oil after running aground. 1993 – Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9 is discovered by Carolyn and Eugene Shoemaker, and David Levy at the Palomar Observatory in California. 1998 – Mitchell Johnson and Andrew Golden, aged 11 and 13 respectively, fire upon teachers and students at Westside Middle School in Jonesboro, Arkansas; five people are killed and ten are wounded. 1998 – A tornado sweeps through Dantan in India, killing 250 people and injuring 3,000 others. 1998 – Dr. Rüdiger Marmulla performed the first computer-assisted Bone Segment Navigation at the University of Regensburg, Germany. 1999 – Kosovo war: NATO began attacks on Yugoslavia without United Nations Security Council (UNSC) approval, marking the first time NATO has attacked a sovereign country. 1999 – A lorry carrying margarine and flour catches fire inside the Mont Blanc Tunnel, creating an inferno that kills 38 people. 2003 – The Arab League votes 21–1 in favor of a resolution demanding an end to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. 2008 – Bhutan officially becomes a democracy, with its first ever general election. 2015 – Germanwings Flight 9525 crashes in the French Alps in an apparent pilot mass murder-suicide, killing all 150 people on board. 2018 – Syrian civil war: The Turkish Armed Forces (TAF) and Syrian National Army (SNA) take full control of Afrin District, marking the end of the Afrin offensive. 2018 – Students across the United States stage the March for Our Lives demanding gun control in response to the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting. 2019 – Jakarta MRT, a rapid transit system in Jakarta, began operation. Births Pre-1600 1103 – Yue Fei, Chinese military general (d. 1142) 1441 – Ernest, Elector of Saxony, German ruler of Saxony (d. 1486) 1494 – Georgius Agricola, German mineralogist and scholar (d. 1555) 1577 – Francis, Duke of Pomerania-Stettin, Bishop of Cammin (d. 1620) 1601–1900 1607 – Michiel de Ruyter, Dutch admiral (d. 1667) 1628 – Sophie Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg (d. 1685) 1657 – Arai Hakuseki, Japanese academic and politician (d. 1725) 1693 – John Harrison, English carpenter and clock-maker, invented the Marine chronometer (d. 1776) 1725 – Samuel Ashe, American lawyer and politician, 9th Governor of North Carolina (d. 1813) 1725 – Thomas Cushing, American lawyer and politician, 1st Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1788) 1755 – Rufus King, American lawyer and politician, United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom (d. 1827) 1762 – Marcos Portugal, Portuguese organist and composer (d. 1830) 1775 – Muthuswami Dikshitar, Indian poet and composer (d. 1835) 1782 – Orest Kiprensky, Russian-Italian painter (d. 1836) 1796 – Zulma Carraud, French author (d. 1889) 1796 – John Corry Wilson Daly, Canadian businessman and politician (d. 1878) 1803 – Egerton Ryerson, Canadian minister, educator, and politician (d. 1882) 1808 – Maria Malibran, Spanish-French soprano (d. 1836) 1809 – Mariano José de Larra, Spanish journalist and author (d. 1837) 1809 – Joseph Liouville, French mathematician and academic (d. 1882) 1816 – Pelagio Antonio de Labastida y Dávalos, Mexican politician and Roman Catholic archbishop, regent during the Second Mexican Empire (d. 1891) 1820 – Edmond Becquerel, French physicist and academic (d. 1891) 1820 – Fanny Crosby, American poet and composer (d. 1915) 1823 – Thomas Spencer Baynes, English philosopher and critic (d. 1887) 1826 – Matilda Joslyn Gage, American activist and author (d. 1898) 1828 – Horace Gray, American lawyer and jurist (d. 1902) 1829 – George Francis Train, American businessman (d. 1904) 1829 – Ignacio Zaragoza, Mexican general (d. 1862) 1830 – Robert Hamerling, Austrian poet and playwright (d. 1889) 1834 – William Morris, English textile designer, poet, and author (d. 1896) 1834 – John Wesley Powell, American soldier, geologist, and explorer (d. 1902) 1835 – Joseph Stefan, Austrian physicist, mathematician, and poet (d. 1893) 1848 – Honoré Beaugrand, Canadian journalist and politician, 18th Mayor of Montreal (d. 1906) 1850 – Silas Hocking, English minister and author (d. 1935) 1854 – Henry Lefroy, Australian politician, 11th Premier of Western Australia (d. 1930) 1855 – Andrew W. Mellon, American banker, financier, and diplomat, 49th United States Secretary of the Treasury (d. 1937) 1855 – Olive Schreiner, South African author and activist (d. 1920) 1862 – Frank Weston Benson, American painter and educator (d. 1951) 1869 – Émile Fabre, French author and playwright (d. 1955) 1871 – Alec Hurley, English music hall singer (d. 1913) 1874 – Luigi Einaudi, Italian economist and politician, 2nd President of the Italian Republic (d. 1961) 1874 – Harry Houdini, Hungarian-Jewish American magician and actor (d. 1926) 1875 – William Burns, Canadian lacrosse player (d. 1953) 1879 – Neyzen Tevfik, Turkish philosopher, poet, and composer (d. 1953) 1882 – Marcel Lalu, French gymnast (d. 1951) 1882 – George Monckton-Arundell, 8th Viscount Galway, English politician, 5th Governor-General of New Zealand (d. 1943) 1883 – Dorothy Campbell, Scottish-American golfer (d. 1945) 1884 – Peter Debye, Dutch-American physicist and chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1966) 1884 – Chika Kuroda, Japanese chemist (d. 1968) 1884 – Eugène Tisserant, French cardinal (d. 1972) 1885 – Charles Daniels, American swimmer (d. 1973) 1885 – Dimitrie Cuclin, Romanian violinist and composer (d. 1978) 1886 – Edward Weston, American photographer (d. 1958) 1886 – Robert Mallet-Stevens, French architect and designer (d. 1945) 1887 – Roscoe Arbuckle, American actor, director, and screenwriter (d. 1933) 1888 – Viktor Kingissepp, Estonian politician (d. 1922) 1889 – Albert Hill, English-Canadian runner (d. 1969) 1890 – Agnes Macphail, Canadian educator and politician (d. 1954) 1891 – Sergey Ivanovich Vavilov, Russian physicist and academic (d. 1951) 1892 – Marston Morse, American mathematician and academic (d. 1977) 1893 – Walter Baade, German astronomer and author (d. 1960) 1893 – George Sisler, American baseball player and scout (d. 1973) 1897 – Wilhelm Reich, Austrian-American psychotherapist and academic (d. 1957) 1901–present 1901 – Ub Iwerks, American animator, director, and producer, co-created Mickey Mouse (d. 1971) 1902 – Thomas E. Dewey, American lawyer and politician, 47th Governor of New York (d. 1971) 1903 – Adolf Butenandt, German biochemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1995) 1903 – Malcolm Muggeridge, English journalist, author, and scholar (d. 1990) 1905 – Pura Santillan-Castrence, Filipino author and diplomat (d. 2007) 1907 – Paul Sauvé, Canadian lawyer and politician, 17th Premier of Quebec (d. 1960) 1909 – Clyde Barrow, American criminal (d. 1934) 1909 – Richard Wurmbrand, Romanian pastor and evangelist (d. 2001) 1910 – Richard Conte, American actor, singer, and director (d. 1975) 1911 – Joseph Barbera, American animator, director, and producer, co-founded Hanna-Barbera (d. 2006) 1912 – Dorothy Height, African-American educator and activist (d. 2010) 1915 – Eugène Martin, French racing driver (d. 2006) 1916 – Donald Hamilton, Swedish-American soldier and author (d. 2006) 1916 – Harry B. Whittington, English palaeontologist and academic (d. 2010) 1917 – John Kendrew, English biochemist and crystallographer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1997) 1919 – Lawrence Ferlinghetti, American poet and publisher, co-founded City Lights Bookstore (d. 2021) 1919 – Robert Heilbroner, American economist and historian (d. 2005) 1920 – Gene Nelson, American actor, director, and screenwriter (d. 1996) 1920 – Mary Stolz, American author (d. 2006) 1921 – Franciszek Blachnicki, Polish priest (d. 1987) 1921 – Vasily Smyslov, Russian chess player (d. 2010) 1922 – Onna White, Canadian dancer and choreographer (d. 2005) 1923 – Murray Hamilton, American actor (d. 1986) 1923 – Michael Legat, English author and publisher (d. 2011) 1924 – Norman Fell, American actor (d. 1998) 1925 – Puig Aubert, German-French rugby league player and coach (d. 1994) 1926 – Desmond Connell, Irish cardinal (d. 2017) 1926 – Dario Fo, Italian playwright, actor, director, and composer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2016) 1926 – William Porter, American hurdler (d. 2000) 1927 – John Woodland Hastings, American biochemist and academic (d. 2014) 1927 – Martin Walser, German author and playwright 1928 – Byron Janis, American pianist and composer 1929 – Pat Renella, Italian-American actor (d. 2012) 1930 – David Dacko, Central African politician, 1st President of the Central African Republic (d. 2003) 1930 – Steve McQueen, American actor and producer (d. 1980) 1931 – Hanno Drechsler, German educator and politician, Mayor of Marburg (d. 2003) 1933 – Stephen De Staebler, American sculptor and educator (d. 2011) 1933 – Lee Mendelson, American television producer (d. 2019) 1936 – Don Covay, American singer-songwriter (d. 2015) 1936 – Alex Olmedo, Peruvian-American tennis player (d. 2020) 1937 – Billy Stewart, American singer and pianist (d. 1970) 1938 – David Irving, English historian and author 1940 – Bob Mackie, American fashion designer 1941 – Michael Masser, American songwriter, composer and producer (d. 2015) 1944 – R. Lee Ermey, American sergeant and actor (d. 2018) 1944 – Vojislav Koštunica, Serbian academic and politician, 8th Prime Minister of Serbia 1945 – Robert T. Bakker, American paleontologist and academic 1945 – Curtis Hanson, American director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 2016) 1945 – Patrick Malahide, English actor and screenwriter 1946 – Klaus Dinger, German guitarist and songwriter (d. 2008) 1946 – Kitty O'Neil, American stuntwoman (d. 2018) 1947 – Dennis Erickson, American football player and coach 1947 – Christine Gregoire, American lawyer and politician, 22nd Governor of Washington 1947 – Mick Jones, English footballer and coach 1947 – Alan Sugar, English businessman 1948 – Javier Diez Canseco, Peruvian sociologist and politician (d. 2013) 1948 – Jerzy Kukuczka, Polish mountaineer (d. 1989) 1948 – Lee Oskar, Jewish-Danish musician 1949 – Tabitha King, American author and poet 1949 – Ruud Krol, Dutch footballer and coach 1949 – Steve Lang, Canadian bass player (d. 2017) 1949 – Nick Lowe, English singer-songwriter, bass player, and producer 1949 – Ali Akbar Salehi, Iranian academic and politician, 36th Foreign Affairs Minister of Iran 1949 – Ranil Wickremesinghe, Sri Lankan lawyer and politician, 13th Prime Minister of Sri Lanka 1950 – Gary Wichard, American football player and agent (d. 2011) 1951 – Peter Boyle, Scottish-Australian footballer and manager (d. 2013) 1951 – Pat Bradley, American golfer 1951 – Tommy Hilfiger, American fashion designer, founded the Tommy Hilfiger Corporation 1951 – Dougie Thomson, Scottish bass player 1951 – Anna Włodarczyk, Polish long jumper and coach 1952 – Greg McCrary, American football player (d. 2013) 1953 – Anita L. Allen, African-American lawyer, philosopher, and academic 1953 – Louie Anderson, American actor and comedian (d. 2022) 1955 – Doug Jarvis, Canadian ice hockey player and coach 1955 – Pat Price, Canadian ice hockey player and coach 1956 – Steve Ballmer, American businessman 1956 – Bill Wray, American cartoonist and painter 1957 – Pierre Harvey, Canadian cyclist and skier 1957 – Pat Jarvis, Australian rugby league player 1958 – Mike Woodson, American basketball player and coach 1959 – Emmit King, American sprinter 1959 – Renaldo Nehemiah, American hurdler and football player 1959 – Derek Statham, English footballer 1960 – Jan Berglin, Swedish cartoonist 1960 – Barry Horowitz, American wrestler 1960 – Kelly Le Brock, English-American actress and model 1960 – Nena, German singer-songwriter and actress 1960 – Scott Pruett, American race car driver 1960 – Annabella Sciorra, American actress 1961 – Dean Jones, Australian cricketer and coach (d. 2020) 1961 – Yanis Varoufakis, Greek economist and politician, Greek Minister of Finance 1962 – Angèle Dubeau, Canadian violinist 1962 – Star Jones, African-American lawyer, journalist, and talk show host 1962 – Irina Meszynski, German discus thrower 1963 – Raimond van der Gouw, Dutch footballer and coach 1963 – Vadym Tyshchenko, Ukrainian footballer and manager (d. 2015) 1963 – Torsten Voss, German decathlete and bobsledder 1965 – The Undertaker, American wrestler and actor 1966 – Floyd Heard, American sprinter and coach 1967 – Diann Roffe, American skier 1968 – Minarti Timur, Indonesian badminton player 1969 – Stephan Eberharter, Austrian skier 1970 – Lara Flynn Boyle, American actress 1970 – Sharon Corr, Irish singer-songwriter and violinist 1970 – Judith Draxler, Austrian swimmer 1970 – Erica Kennedy, African-American journalist and author (d. 2012) 1970 – Mike Vanderjagt, Canadian-American football player 1971 – Tig Notaro, American comedian and actor 1972 – Christophe Dugarry, French footballer 1972 – Steve Karsay, American baseball player and coach 1973 – Jacek Bąk, Polish footballer 1973 – Philippe Boucher, Canadian ice hockey player and manager 1973 – Steve Corica, Australian footballer and coach 1973 – Jure Ivanušič, Slovenian actor, concert pianist and chansonnier 1973 – Mette Jacobsen, Danish swimmer 1973 – Glen Jakovich, Australian footballer 1973 – Jim Parsons, American actor 1974 – Alyson Hannigan, American actress 1974 – Sergey Klyugin, Russian high jumper 1974 – Tado, Filipino comedian and activist (d. 2014) 1975 – Thomas Johansson, Swedish-Monacan tennis player 1976 – Aaron Brooks, American football player 1976 – Aliou Cissé, Senegalese footballer and coach 1976 – Athanasios Kostoulas, Greek footballer 1976 – Peyton Manning, American football player and entrepreneur 1977 – Jessica Chastain, American actress 1977 – Maxim Kuznetsov, Russian ice hockey player 1977 – Darren Lockyer, Australian rugby league player and sportscaster 1978 – Michael Braun, Australian footballer and coach 1978 – Tomáš Ujfaluši, Czech footballer and manager 1978 – José Valverde, Dominican baseball player 1979 – Lake Bell, Jewish-American actress, director, and screenwriter 1979 – Norris Hopper, American baseball player 1979 – Periklis Iakovakis, Greek hurdler 1979 – Graeme Swann, English cricketer 1980 – Tassos Venetis, Greek footballer 1981 – Mike Adams, American football player 1981 – Ron Hainsey, American ice hockey player 1981 – Dirk Hayhurst, American baseball player 1981 – Mark Looms, Dutch footballer 1981 – Gary Paffett, English racing driver 1982 – Corey Hart, American baseball player 1982 – Jack Swagger, American mixed martial artist and professional wrestler 1982 – Epico Colon, Puerto Rican professional wrestler 1982 – Jimmy Hempte, Belgian footballer 1982 – Dustin McGowan, American baseball player 1983 – Luca Ceccarelli, Italian footballer 1983 – Riccardo Musetti, Italian footballer 1983 – Pierre-Alexandre Parenteau, Canadian ice hockey player 1983 – T.J. Ford, American basketball player 1984 – Benoît Assou-Ekotto, French-born Cameroonian international footballer 1984 – Chris Bosh, American basketball player 1984 – Adrian D'Souza, Indian field hockey player 1984 – Lucy Wangui Kabuu, Kenyan runner 1984 – Park Bom, South Korean singer 1984 – Philipp Petzschner, German tennis player 1985 – Lana, American wrestler and manager 1985 – Haruka Ayase, Japanese actress and singer 1987 – Ramires, Brazilian footballer 1987 – Shakib Al Hasan, Bangladeshi cricketer 1987 – Billy Jones, English footballer 1987 – Yuma Asami, Japanese actress and singer 1988 – Aiga Grabuste, Latvian heptathlete 1988 – Ryan Higgins, Zimbabwean cricketer 1988 – Matías Martínez, Argentinian footballer 1988 – Kardo Ploomipuu, Estonian swimmer 1988 – Matt Todd, New Zealand rugby union player 1989 – Aziz Shavershian, Russian-born Australian bodybuilder (d. 2011) 1990 – Starlin Castro, American baseball player 1990 – Aljur Abrenica, Filipino actor 1990 – Keisha Castle-Hughes, Australian-New Zealand actress 1990 – Lacey Evans, American wrestler 1990 – Alyssa Healy, Australian women's cricket team wicketkeeper 1991 – Nick Browne, English cricketer 1991 – Dalila Jakupovic, Slovenian tennis player 1995 – Enzo Zidane, French-Spanish footballer 1997 – Mina Myōi, Japanese singer and dancer Deaths Pre-1600 809 – Harun al-Rashid, Arab caliph (b. 763) 832 – Wulfred, archbishop of Canterbury 1284 – Hugh III of Cyprus (b. 1235) 1296 – Odon de Pins, Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller 1381 – Catherine of Vadstena, Swedish saint (b. 1332) 1394 – Constance of Castile, claimant to the throne of Castile 1396 – Walter Hilton, English mystic and saint (b. 1340) 1399 – Margaret, Duchess of Norfolk (b.c. 1320) 1443 – James Douglas, 7th Earl of Douglas (b. 1371) 1455 – Pope Nicholas V (b. 1397) 1499 – Edward Stafford, 2nd Earl of Wiltshire, English nobleman (b. 1470) 1563 – Hosokawa Harumoto, Japanese daimyō (b. 1514) 1575 – Joseph ben Ephraim Karo, Spanish-Portuguese rabbi and author (b. 1488) 1601–1900 1603 – Elizabeth I of England (b. 1533) 1653 – Samuel Scheidt, German organist and composer (b. 1587) 1684 – Pieter de Hooch, Dutch painter (b. 1629) 1684 – Elizabeth Ridgeway, English woman convicted of poisoning her husband 1773 – Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield, English politician, Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard (b. 1694) 1776 – John Harrison, English carpenter and clockmaker, invented the Marine chronometer (b. 1693) 1824 – Louis Marie de La Révellière-Lépeaux, French lawyer (b. 1753) 1838 – Abraham Hume, English floriculturist and Tory politician (b. 1748/49) 1869 – Antoine-Henri Jomini, French-Russian general (b. 1779) 1881 – Achille Ernest Oscar Joseph Delesse, French geologist and mineralogist (b. 1817) 1882 – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, American poet and educator (b. 1807) 1887 – Ivan Kramskoi, Russian painter and critic (b. 1837) 1888 – Vsevolod Garshin, Russian author (b. 1855) 1901–present 1905 – Jules Verne, French novelist, poet, and playwright (b. 1828) 1909 – John Millington Synge, Irish playwright and poet (b. 1871) 1915 – Margaret Lindsay Huggins, Anglo-Irish astronomer (b. 1848) 1915 – Karol Olszewski, Polish chemist, mathematician, and physicist (b. 1846) 1916 – Enrique Granados, Spanish pianist and composer (b. 1867) 1926 – Phan Châu Trinh, Vietnamese activist (b. 1872) 1932 – Frantz Reichel, French rugby player and hurdler (b. 1871) 1938 – Yondonwangchug, Mongolian politician (b. 1870) 1940 – Édouard Branly, French physicist and academic (b. 1844) 1944 – Orde Wingate, Indian-English general (b. 1903) 1946 – Alexander Alekhine, Russian chess player (b. 1892) 1946 – Carl Schuhmann, German gymnast, shot putter, and jumper (b. 1869) 1948 – Sigrid Hjertén, Swedish painter and illustrator (b. 1885) 1950 – James Rudolph Garfield, American lawyer and politician, 23rd United States Secretary of the Interior (b. 1865) 1951 – Lorna Hodgkinson, Australian educator and educational psychologist (b. 1887) 1953 – Mary of Teck (b. 1867) 1956 – E. T. Whittaker, British mathematician and physicist (b. 1873) 1962 – Jean Goldkette, French-American pianist and bandleader (b. 1899) 1962 – Auguste Piccard, Swiss physicist and explorer (b. 1884) 1968 – Alice Guy-Blaché, American director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1873) 1971 – Arne Jacobsen, Danish architect, designed the Radisson Blu Royal Hotel and Aarhus City Hall (b. 1902) 1971 – Arthur Metcalfe, Australian public servant (b. 1895) 1973 – Bertram Stevens, Australian accountant and politician, 25th Premier of New South Wales (b. 1889) 1976 – Bernard Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, English field marshal (b. 1887) 1978 – Park Mok-wol, influential Korean poet and academic (b. 1916) 1980 – Óscar Romero, Salvadoran archbishop (b. 1917) 1984 – Sam Jaffe, American actor (b. 1891) 1985 – Raoul Ubac, French painter, sculptor, photographer and engraver (b. 1910) 1988 – Turhan Feyzioğlu, Turkish academic and politician, 27th Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey (b. 1922) 1990 – Ray Goulding, American comedian and radio host (b. 1922) 1991 – John Kerr, Australian lawyer and politician, 18th Governor-General of Australia (b. 1914) 1993 – Albert Arlen, Australian pianist, composer, actor, and playwright (b. 1905) 1993 – John Hersey, American journalist and author (b. 1914) 1995 – Joseph Needham, English historian and academic (b. 1900) 1999 – Gertrud Scholtz-Klink, German politician (b. 1902) 1999 – Birdie Tebbetts, American baseball player and manager (b. 1912) 2001 – Muriel Young, English television host and producer (b. 1928) 2002 – César Milstein, Argentinian-English biochemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1927) 2002 – Bob Said, American race car driver and bobsledder (b. 1932) 2003 – Hans Hermann Groër, Austrian cardinal (b. 1919) 2006 – Rudra Rajasingham, Sri Lankan police officer and diplomat (b. 1926) 2007 – Shripad Narayan Pendse, Indian Marathi novelist (b. 1913) 2008 – Chalmers Alford, American guitarist (b. 1955) 2008 – Neil Aspinall, Welsh-English record producer and manager (b. 1941) 2008 – Rafael Azcona, Spanish author and screenwriter (b. 1926) 2008 – Richard Widmark, American actor (b. 1914) 2009 – George Kell, American baseball player and sportscaster (b. 1922) 2009 – Hans Klenk, German racing driver (b. 1919) 2009 – Gábor Ocskay, Hungarian ice hockey player (b. 1975) 2010 – Robert Culp, American actor (b. 1930) 2010 – Jim Marshall, American photographer (b. 1936) 2012 – Paul Callaghan, New Zealand physicist and academic (b. 1947) 2012 – Nick Noble, American singer-songwriter (b. 1926) 2013 – Barbara Anderson, New Zealand author (b. 1926) 2013 – Inge Lønning, Norwegian theologian, academic, and politician (b. 1938) 2013 – Gury Marchuk, Russian physicist, mathematician, and academic (b. 1925) 2013 – Paolo Ponzo, Italian footballer (b. 1972) 2013 – Mohamed Yousri Salama, Egyptian dentist and politician (b. 1974) 2013 – Francis Hovell-Thurlow-Cumming-Bruce, 8th Baron Thurlow, English diplomat (b. 1912) 2014 – Oleksandr Muzychko, Ukrainian activist (b. 1962) 2014 – John Rowe Townsend, English author and scholar (b. 1922) 2014 – David A. Trampier, American illustrator (b. 1954) 2015 – Yehuda Avner, English-Israeli diplomat (b. 1928) 2015 – notable deaths of the Germanwings Flight 9525 crash: Oleg Bryjak, Kazakhstani-German opera singer (b. 1960) Maria Radner, German opera singer (b. 1981) 2016 – Johan Cruyff, Dutch footballer (b. 1947) 2016 – Garry Shandling, American comedian, actor, and screenwriter (b. 1949) 2018 – Lys Assia, Swiss singer and First Winner of the Eurovision Song Contest (b. 1924) 2019 – Joseph Pilato, American film and voice actor (b. 1949) 2020 – Albert Uderzo, French comic book artist (b. 1927) 2020 – Manu Dibango, Cameroonian musician and songwriter (b. 1933) 2021 – Jessica Walter, American actress and voice artist (b. 1941) Holidays and observances Christian feast day: Catherine of Vadstena Hildelith of Barking Mac Cairthinn of Clogher Óscar Romero (Catholic Church, Anglican Communion, Lutheranism) Paul Couturier (Church of England) Walter Hilton (Church of England) March 24 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice (Argentina) International Day for the Right to the Truth Concerning Gross Human Rights Violations and for the Dignity of Victims National Tree Planting Day (Uganda) Student Day (Scientology) World Tuberculosis Day (International) References External links BBC: On This Day Historical Events on March 24 Today in Canadian History Days of the year March

20210

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March%2023

March 23

Events Pre-1600 1400 – The Trần dynasty of Vietnam is deposed, after one hundred and seventy-five years of rule, by Hồ Quý Ly, a court official. 1540 – Waltham Abbey is surrendered to King Henry VIII of England; the last religious community to be closed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. 1568 – The Peace of Longjumeau is signed, ending the second phase of the French Wars of Religion. 1601–1900 1775 – American Revolutionary War: Patrick Henry delivers his speech – "Give me liberty, or give me death!" – at St. John's Episcopal Church, Richmond, Virginia. 1801 – Tsar Paul I of Russia is struck with a sword, then strangled, and finally trampled to death inside his bedroom at St. Michael's Castle. 1806 – After traveling through the Louisiana Purchase and reaching the Pacific Ocean, explorers Lewis and Clark and their "Corps of Discovery" begin their arduous journey home. 1821 – Greek War of Independence: Battle and fall of city of Kalamata. 1839 – A massive earthquake destroys the former capital Inwa of the Konbaung dynasty, present-day Myanmar. 1848 – The ship John Wickliffe arrives at Port Chalmers carrying the first Scottish settlers for Dunedin, New Zealand. Otago province is founded. 1857 – Elisha Otis's first elevator is installed at 488 Broadway New York City. 1862 – American Civil War: The First Battle of Kernstown, Virginia, marks the start of Stonewall Jackson's Valley Campaign. Although a Confederate defeat, the engagement distracts Federal efforts to capture Richmond. 1868 – The University of California is founded in Oakland, California when the Organic Act is signed into law. 1879 – War of the Pacific: The Battle of Topáter, the first battle of the war is fought between Chile and the joint forces of Bolivia and Peru. 1885 – Sino-French War: Chinese victory in the Battle of Phu Lam Tao near Hưng Hóa, northern Vietnam. 1888 – In England, The Football League, the world's oldest professional association football league, meets for the first time. 1889 – The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community is established by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad in Qadian, British India. 1901–present 1901 – Emilio Aguinaldo, only President of the First Philippine Republic, is captured at Palanan, Isabela by the forces of General Frederick Funston. 1905 – Eleftherios Venizelos calls for Crete's union with Greece, and begins what is to be known as the Theriso revolt. 1909 – Theodore Roosevelt leaves New York for a post-presidency safari in Africa. The trip is sponsored by the Smithsonian Institution and National Geographic Society. 1913 – A tornado outbreak kills more than 240 people in the central United States, while an ongoing flood in the Ohio River watershed was killing 650 people. 1918 – First World War: On the third day of the German Spring Offensive, the 10th Battalion of the Royal West Kent Regiment is annihilated with many of the men becoming prisoners of war 1919 – In Milan, Italy, Benito Mussolini founds his Fascist political movement. 1931 – Bhagat Singh, Shivaram Rajguru and Sukhdev Thapar are hanged for the killing of a deputy superintendent of police during the Indian independence movement. 1933 – The Reichstag passes the Enabling Act of 1933, making Adolf Hitler dictator of Germany. 1935 – Signing of the Constitution of the Commonwealth of the Philippines. 1939 – The Hungarian air force attacks the headquarters of the Slovak air force in Spišská Nová Ves, killing 13 people and beginning the Slovak–Hungarian War. 1940 – The Lahore Resolution (Qarardad-e-Pakistan or Qarardad-e-Lahore) is put forward at the Annual General Convention of the All-India Muslim League. 1956 – Pakistan becomes the first Islamic republic in the world. This date is now celebrated as Republic Day in Pakistan. 1965 – NASA launches Gemini 3, the United States' first two-man space flight (crew: Gus Grissom and John Young). 1977 – The first of The Nixon Interviews (12 will be recorded over four weeks) is videotaped with British journalist David Frost interviewing former United States President Richard Nixon about the Watergate scandal and the Nixon tapes. 1978 – The first UNIFIL troops arrived in Lebanon for peacekeeping mission along the Blue Line. 1980 – Archbishop Óscar Romero of El Salvador gives his famous speech appealing to men of the El Salvadoran armed forces to stop killing the Salvadorans. 1982 – Guatemala's government, headed by Fernando Romeo Lucas García is overthrown in a military coup by right-wing General Efraín Ríos Montt. 1983 – Strategic Defense Initiative: President Ronald Reagan makes his initial proposal to develop technology to intercept enemy missiles. 1988 – Angolan and Cuban forces defeat South Africa in the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale. 1991 – The Revolutionary United Front, with support from the special forces of Charles Taylor's National Patriotic Front of Liberia, invades Sierra Leone in an attempt to overthrow Joseph Saidu Momoh, sparking the 11-year Sierra Leone Civil War. 1994 – At an election rally in Tijuana, Mexican presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio is assassinated by Mario Aburto Martínez. 1994 – A United States Air Force (USAF) F-16 aircraft collides with a USAF C-130 at Pope Air Force Base and then crashes, killing 24 United States Army soldiers on the ground. This later became known as the Green Ramp disaster. 1994 – Aeroflot Flight 593 crashed into the Kuznetsk Alatau mountain, Kemerovo Oblast, Russia, killing 75. 1996 – Taiwan holds its first direct elections and chooses Lee Teng-hui as President. 1999 – Gunmen assassinate Paraguay's Vice President Luis María Argaña. 2001 – The Russian Mir space station is disposed of, breaking up in the atmosphere before falling into the southern Pacific Ocean near Fiji. 2003 – Battle of Nasiriyah, first major conflict during the invasion of Iraq. 2008 – Official opening of Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Hyderabad, India 2009 – FedEx Express Flight 80: A McDonnell Douglas MD-11 flying from Guangzhou, China crashes at Tokyo's Narita International Airport, killing both the captain and the co-pilot. 2018 – President of Peru Pedro Pablo Kuczynski resigns from the presidency amid a mass corruption scandal before certain impeachment by the opposition-majority Congress of Peru. 2019 – The Kazakh capital of Astana was renamed to Nur-Sultan. 2019 – The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces capture the town of Baghuz in Eastern Syria, declaring military victory over the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant after four years of fighting, although the group maintains a scattered presence and sleeper cells across Syria and Iraq. 2020 – Prime Minister Boris Johnson put the United Kingdom into its first national lockdown in response to COVID-19. 2021 – A container ship runs aground and obstructs the Suez Canal for six days. Births Pre-1600 1338 – Emperor Go-Kōgon of Japan (d. 1374) 1430 – Margaret of Anjou (d. 1482) 1514 – Lorenzino de' Medici, Italian writer and assassin (d. 1548) 1599 – Thomas Selle, German composer (d. 1663) 1601–1900 1614 – Jahanara Begum, Mughal princess (d. 1681) 1643 – Mary of Jesus de León y Delgado, Spanish Dominican lay sister and mystic (d. 1731) 1699 – John Bartram, American botanist and explorer (d. 1777) 1732 – Princess Marie Adélaïde of France (d. 1800) 1749 – Pierre-Simon Laplace, French mathematician and astronomer (d. 1827) 1750 – Johannes Matthias Sperger, Austrian bassist and composer (d. 1812) 1754 – Jurij Vega, Slovene mathematician, physicist and artillery officer (d. 1802) 1769 – Augustin Daniel Belliard, French general and diplomat (d. 1832) 1769 – William Smith, English geologist and cartographer (d. 1839) 1823 – Schuyler Colfax, American journalist and politician, 17th Vice President of the United States (d. 1885) 1826 – Ludwig Minkus, Austrian violinist and composer (d. 1917) 1834 – Julius Reubke, German pianist and composer (d. 1858) 1838 – Marie Adam-Doerrer, Swiss women's rights activist and unionist (d. 1908) 1842 – Friedrich Amelung, Estonian-German historian, businessman and composer (d. 1909) 1842 – Susan Jane Cunningham, American mathematician (d. 1921) 1858 – Ludwig Quidde, German activist and politician, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1941) 1862 – Nathaniel Reed, American criminal (d. 1950) 1868 – Dietrich Eckart, German journalist and politician (d. 1923) 1869 – Calouste Gulbenkian, Turkish-Armenian businessman and philanthropist (d. 1955) 1872 – Michael Joseph Savage, Australian-New Zealand union leader and politician, 23rd Prime Minister of New Zealand (d. 1940) 1874 – Grantley Goulding, English hurdler (d. 1947) 1874 – J. C. Leyendecker, German-American painter and illustrator (d. 1951) 1876 – Ziya Gökalp, Turkish sociologist, poet and activist (d. 1924) 1876 – Thakin Kodaw Hmaing, Burmese poet, writer and political leader (d. 1964) 1878 – Franz Schreker, Austrian composer and conductor (d. 1934) 1880 – Heikki Ritavuori, Finnish lawyer and politician, Finnish Minister of the Interior (d. 1922) 1881 – Lacey Hearn, American sprinter (d. 1969) 1881 – Roger Martin du Gard, French novelist and paleographer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1958) 1881 – Hermann Staudinger, German chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1965) 1882 – Emmy Noether, Jewish German-American mathematician, physicist and academic (d. 1935) 1884 – Joseph Boxhall, English sailor (d. 1967) 1885 – Platt Adams, American jumper and politician (d. 1961) 1885 – Roque González Garza, Mexican general and acting president (1915) (d. 1962) 1886 – Frank Irons, American long jumper (d. 1942) 1887 – Josef Čapek, Czech painter and poet (d. 1945) 1887 – Rudolf Kinau, German author (d. 1975) 1887 – Juan Gris, Spanish painter and sculptor (d. 1927) 1887 – Sidney Hillman, Lithuanian-born American labor leader (d. 1946) 1891 – Po Kya, Burmese author and educationist (d. 1942) 1893 – Cedric Gibbons, Irish-American art director and production designer (d. 1960) 1893 – Gopalswamy Doraiswamy Naidu, Indian engineer and businessman (d. 1974) 1894 – Arthur Grimsdell, English international footballer and cricketer (d. 1963) 1895 – Encarnacion Alzona, Filipino historian and educator (d. 2001) 1895 – Dane Rudhyar, French-American astrologer, author and composer (d. 1985) 1898 – Louis Adamic, Slovenian-American author, translator and politician (d. 1951) 1898 – Madeleine de Bourbon-Busset, Duchess of Parma (d. 1984) 1899 – Dora Gerson, German actress and singer (d. 1943) 1900 – Erich Fromm, German psychologist and sociologist (d. 1980) 1901–present 1901 – Bon Maharaja, Indian guru and religious writer (d. 1982) 1903 – Frank Sargeson, New Zealand author (d. 1982) 1904 – Joan Crawford, American film actress (d. 1977) 1905 – Lale Andersen, German chanson singer-songwriter (d. 1972) 1907 – Daniel Bovet, Swiss-Italian pharmacologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1992) 1909 – Charles Werner, American cartoonist (d. 1997) 1910 – Jerry Cornes, English runner, colonial officer and educator (d. 2001) 1910 – Akira Kurosawa, Japanese director, producer and screenwriter (d. 1998) 1912 – Eleanor Cameron, Canadian-American author and critic (d. 1996) 1912 – Neil McCorkell, English-South African cricketer and coach (d. 2013) 1912 – Wernher von Braun, German-American physicist and engineer (d. 1977) 1913 – Abidin Dino, Turko-French painter and illustrator (d. 1993) 1914 – Milbourne Christopher, American magician and author (d. 1984) 1915 – Mary Innes-Ker, Duchess of Roxburghe (d. 2014) 1915 – Vasily Zaytsev, Russian captain (d. 1991) 1917 – Harry Cranbrook Allen, English historian (d. 1998) 1918 – Stanley Armour Dunham, American sergeant (d. 1992) 1918 – Helene Hale, American politician (d. 2013) 1918 – Naoki Kazu, Japanese football player (d.1940s) 1919 – Carl Graffunder, American architect and educator (d. 2013) 1920 – Neal Edward Smith, American pilot, lawyer and politician (d. 2021) 1920 – Tetsuharu Kawakami, Japanese baseball player and manager (d. 2013) 1921 – Donald Campbell, English race car driver (d. 1967) 1921 – Peter Lawler, Australian public servant (d. 2017) 1922 – Marty Allen, American comedian and actor (d. 2018) 1922 – Ugo Tognazzi, Italian actor (d. 1990) 1923 – Angelo Ingrassia, American soldier and judge (d. 2013) 1924 – Rodney Mims Cook, Sr., American lieutenant and politician (d. 2013) 1924 – Bette Nesmith Graham, American inventor, invented Liquid Paper (d. 1980) 1924 – Olga Kennard, English crystallographer and academic 1924 – John Madin, English architect (d. 2012) 1925 – David Watkin, English cinematographer (d. 2008) 1929 – Roger Bannister, English runner, neurologist and academic (d. 2018) 1929 – Michael Manser, English architect and engineer (d. 2016) 1929 – Mark Rydell, American actor, director and producer 1931 – Yevgeny Grishin, Russian speed skater (d. 2005) 1931 – Viktor Korchnoi, Russian chess player and author (d. 2016) 1931 – Yevdokiya Mekshilo, Russian skier (d. 2013) 1932 – Don Marshall, Canadian ice hockey player 1933 – Norman Bailey, English opera singer and educator (d. 2021) 1933 – Philip Zimbardo, American psychologist and academic 1934 – Ludvig Faddeev, Russian mathematician and physicist (d. 2017) 1935 – Barry Cryer, English comedian, actor and screenwriter 1936 – Jannis Kounellis, Greek painter and sculptor (d. 2017) 1937 – Craig Breedlove, American race car driver 1937 – Tony Burton, American actor, comedian, boxer and football player (d. 2016) 1937 – Robert Gallo, American physician and academic 1938 – Jon Finlayson, Australian actor and screenwriter (d. 2012) 1942 – Michael Haneke, Austrian director, producer and screenwriter 1942 – Jimmy Miller, American record producer and musician (d. 1994) 1942 – Walter Rodney, Guyanese historian, scholar and activist (d. 1980) 1943 – Andrew Crockett, Scottish-English economist and banker (d. 2012) 1943 – Nils-Aslak Valkeapää, Finnish singer, author and director (d. 2001) 1944 – B. P. Gavrilov, Russian rugby player (d. 2006) 1944 – Tony McPhee, English singer-songwriter and guitarist 1944 – Michael Nyman, English composer of minimalist music and pianist 1944 – Ric Ocasek, American singer-songwriter, guitarist and producer (d. 2019) 1945 – Franco Battiato, Italian singer-songwriter and director (d. 2021) 1945 – David Grisman, American mandolin player and composer 1946 – Alan Bleasdale, English screenwriter and producer 1947 – Elizabeth Ann Scarborough, American author 1948 – Wasim Bari, Pakistani cricketer 1948 – Marie Malavoy, German-Canadian educator and politician 1950 – Corinne Cléry, French actress 1950 – Phil Lanzon, English keyboard player and songwriter 1950 – Ahdaf Soueif, Egyptian author and translator 1951 – Ron Jaworski, American football player and sportscaster 1951 – Adrian Reynard, English businessman, founded Reynard Motorsport 1952 – Francesco Clemente, Italian painter and illustrator 1952 – Kent Lambert, New Zealand rugby player 1952 – Kim Stanley Robinson, American author 1952 – Rex Tillerson, American businessman, engineer and diplomat; 69th United States Secretary of State 1953 – Bo Díaz, Venezuelan baseball player (d. 1990) 1953 – Chaka Khan, American singer-songwriter 1953 – Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Indian zoologist and businesswoman 1954 – Geno Auriemma, Italian-American basketball player and coach 1954 – Kenneth Cole, American fashion designer, founded Kenneth Cole Productions 1954 – Mary Fee, Scottish Labour Party politician 1954 – Paul Price, English born, Welsh international footballer and manager 1955 – Moses Malone, American basketball player (d. 2015) 1956 – José Manuel Barroso, Portuguese academic and politician, 115th Prime Minister of Portugal 1957 – Lucio Gutiérrez, Ecuadorian politician, 52nd President of Ecuador 1957 – Robbie James, Welsh footballer and manager (d. 1998) 1957 – Amanda Plummer, American actress 1958 – Etienne De Wilde, Belgian cyclist 1958 – Bengt-Åke Gustafsson, Swedish ice hockey player and coach 1958 – Hugh Grant, Scottish business executive 1959 – Catherine Keener, American actress 1960 – Nicol Stephen, Baron Stephen, Scottish lawyer and politician, 2nd Deputy First Minister of Scotland 1961 – Roger Crisp, English philosopher and academic 1961 – Craig Green, New Zealand rugby player 1961 – Helmi Johannes, Indonesian journalist and producer 1962 – Steve Redgrave, English rower 1963 – Míchel, Spanish footballer and manager 1963 – Juan Ramón López Caro, Spanish footballer and manager 1963 – Ana Fidelia Quirot, Cuban runner 1964 – Hope Davis, American actress 1965 – Gary Whitehead, American poet and painter 1966 – Lorenzo Daniel, American sprinter 1966 – Vasilis Vouzas, Greek footballer and manager 1968 – Damon Albarn, English singer-songwriter, producer and actor 1968 – Mike Atherton, English cricketer and journalist 1968 – Fernando Hierro, Spanish footballer and manager 1968 – Pierre Palmade, French actor and screenwriter 1971 – Yasmeen Ghauri, Canadian model 1971 – Gail Porter, Scottish model and television host 1971 – Alexander Selivanov, Russian ice hockey player 1971 – Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Japanese wrestler 1972 – Jonas Björkman, Swedish-Monégasque tennis player and coach 1972 – Joe Calzaghe, Welsh boxer 1972 – Judith Godrèche, French actress and author 1973 – Jerzy Dudek, Polish footballer 1973 – Wim Eyckmans, Belgian race car driver 1973 – Jason Kidd, American basketball player and coach 1974 – Randall Park, American actor, director and screenwriter 1975 – Burak Gürpınar, Turkish drummer 1975 – Andy Turner, English footballer and manager 1976 – Chris Hoy, Scottish cyclist and race car driver 1976 – Smriti Irani, Indian actress, producer and politician, Indian Minister of Human Resource Development 1976 – Dougie Lampkin, English motorcycle racer 1976 – Michelle Monaghan, American actress 1976 – Joel Peralta, Dominican baseball player 1976 – Keri Russell, American actress 1976 – Ricardo Zonta, Brazilian race car driver 1976 – Sa Beining, Chinese host 1977 – Miklos Perlus, Canadian actor and screenwriter 1978 – Simon Gärdenfors, Swedish illustrator 1978 – Walter Samuel, Argentinian footballer 1979 – Mark Buehrle, American baseball player 1979 – Donncha O'Callaghan, Irish rugby player 1981 – Erin Crocker, American race car driver 1981 – Tony Peña, Jr., Dominican baseball player 1981 – Shelley Rudman, English bobsledder 1981 – Giuseppe Sculli, Italian footballer 1981 – Brett Young, American country music singer 1982 – José Contreras Arrau, Chilean footballer 1982 – Andrea Musacco, Italian footballer 1982 – Evgeni Striganov, Estonian ice dancer 1983 – Hakan Balta, Turkish footballer 1983 – Mo Farah, Somali-English runner 1983 – Sascha Riether, German international footballer 1983 – Jerome Thomas, English footballer 1984 – Ryan Araña, Filipino basketball player 1984 – Brandon Marshall, American football player 1985 – Maurice Jones-Drew, American football player 1985 – Bethanie Mattek-Sands, American tennis player 1986 – Patrick Bordeleau, Canadian ice hockey player 1986 – Andrea Dovizioso, Italian motorcycle racer 1986 – Brett Eldredge, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1986 – Kangana Ranaut, Indian actress 1987 – Alan Toovey, Australian footballer 1988 – Dellin Betances, American baseball player 1988 – Jason Kenny, English cyclist 1988 – Michal Neuvirth, Czech ice hockey player 1989 – Ayesha Curry, Canadian-American chef, author and television personality 1989 – Nikola Gulan, Serbian footballer 1989 – Sarah McKenna, English rugby player 1989 – Luis Fernando Silva, Mexican footballer 1990 – Jaime Alguersuari, Spanish race car driver 1990 – Robert Zickert, German footballer 1991 – Linline Matauatu, Vanuatuan beach volleyball player 1991 – Gregg Wylde, Scottish footballer 1992 – Tolga Ciğerci, German-Turkish footballer 1992 – Kyrie Irving, Australian-American basketball player 1993 – Kyle Lovett, Australian rugby league player 1993 – Aytaç Kara, Turkish footballer 1994 – Nick Powell, English footballer 1995 – Kevin Kauber, Estonian footballer 1995 – Jan Lisiecki, Canadian pianist 1995 – Ozan Tufan, Turkish footballer 1996 – Alexander Albon, Thai-British race car driver 1996 – Joel Kiviranta, Finnish ice hockey player Deaths Pre-1600 851 – Zhou Chi, Chinese historian and politician (b. 793) 1022 – Zhen Zong, Chinese emperor (b. 968) 1103 – Eudes I, duke of Burgundy (b. 1058) 1361 – Henry of Grosmont, 1st Duke of Lancaster, English politician, Lord High Steward of England (b. 1310) 1369 – Peter, king of Castile and León (b. 1334) 1483 – Yolande, duchess of Lorraine (b. 1428) 1548 – Itagaki Nobukata, Japanese samurai (b. 1489) 1555 – Julius III, pope of the Catholic Church (b. 1487) 1559 – Gelawdewos, Ethiopian emperor (b. 1521) 1596 – Henry Unton, English diplomat (b. 1557) 1601–1900 1606 – Justus Lipsius, Flemish philologist and scholar (b. 1547) 1618 – James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Abercorn, Scottish police officer and politician (b. 1575) 1629 – Francis Fane, 1st Earl of Westmorland, English landowner and politician (b. 1580) 1675 – Anthoni van Noordt, Dutch organist and composer (b. 1619) 1680 – Nicolas Fouquet, French politician (b. 1615) 1742 – Jean-Baptiste Dubos, French historian and author (b. 1670) 1747 – Claude Alexandre de Bonneval, French general (b. 1675) 1748 – Johann Gottfried Walther, German organist and composer (b. 1684) 1754 – Johann Jakob Wettstein, Swiss theologian and critic (b. 1693) 1783 – Charles Carroll, English barrister and politician (b. 1723) 1792 – Luís António Verney, Portuguese philosopher and pedagogue (b. 1713) 1801 – Paul I, Russian emperor (b. 1754) 1842 – Stendhal, French novelist (b. 1783) 1862 – Manuel Robles Pezuela, Unconstitutional Mexican interim president, 1858–1859 (b. 1817) 1883 – Arthur Macalister, Scottish-Australian politician, 2nd Premier of Queensland (b. 1818) 1884 – Henry C. Lord, American businessman (b. 1824) 1901–present 1910 – Nadar, French photographer, journalist, and author (b. 1820) 1914 – Rafqa Pietra Choboq Ar-Rayès, Lebanese saint (b. 1832) 1923 – Hovhannes Tumanyan, Armenian poet and author (b. 1869) 1927 – Paul César Helleu, French painter and etcher (b. 1859) 1931 – Shivaram Rajguru, Indian activist (b. 1908) 1931 – Bhagat Singh, Indian activist (b. 1907) 1931 – Sukhdev Thapar, Indian activist (b. 1907) 1946 – Gilbert N. Lewis, American chemist (b. 1875) 1953 – Raoul Dufy, French painter and illustrator (b. 1877) 1953 – Oskar Luts, Estonian author and playwright (b. 1887) 1955 – Arthur Bernardes, Brazilian politician, 12th President of Brazil (b. 1875) 1960 – Franklin Pierce Adams, American journalist and author (b. 1881) 1960 – Said Nursî, Turkish theologian and scholar (b. 1878) 1961 – Albert Bloch, American painter and educator (b. 1882) 1961 – Jack Russell, English cricketer (b. 1887) 1963 – Thoralf Skolem, Norwegian mathematician and logician (b. 1887) 1964 – Peter Lorre, American actor (b. 1904) 1965 – Mae Murray, American actress, dancer, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1885) 1968 – Edwin O'Connor, American journalist and author (b. 1918) 1972 – Cristóbal Balenciaga, Spanish fashion designer, founded Balenciaga (b. 1895) 1978 – Haim Ernst Wertheimer, Israeli biochemist and academic (b. 1893) 1979 – Ted Anderson, English footballer (b. 1911) 1980 – Arthur Melvin Okun, American economist and academic (b. 1928) 1981 – Beatrice Tinsley, English-New Zealand astronomer and cosmologist (b. 1941) 1981 – Mike Hailwood, English motorcyclist (b. 1940) 1985 – Richard Beeching, Baron Beeching, English physicist and engineer (b. 1913) 1985 – Peter Charanis, Greek-American scholar and educator (b. 1908) 1986 – Moshe Feinstein, American Orthodox Rabbi and posek (b. 1895) 1987 – Olev Roomet, Estonian singer and violinist (b. 1901) 1990 – John Dexter, English director and producer (b. 1925) 1991 – Margaret Atwood Judson, American historian and author (b. 1899) 1991 – Parkash Singh, Indian soldier, Victoria Cross recipient (b. 1913) 1992 – Friedrich Hayek, Austrian-German economist, philosopher, and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1899) 1992 – Ron Lapointe, Canadian ice hockey player and coach (b. 1949) 1994 – Luis Donaldo Colosio, Mexican economist and politician (b. 1950) 1994 – Giulietta Masina, Italian actress (b. 1921) 1995 – Davie Cooper, Scottish footballer and coach (b. 1956) 1999 – Luis María Argaña, Paraguayan judge and politician, Vice President of Paraguay (b. 1932) 1999 – Osmond Borradaile, Canadian director and cinematographer (b. 1898) 2001 – Rowland Evans, American journalist (b. 1921) 2001 – Margaret Jones, British archaeologist (b. 1916) 2001 – Robert Laxalt, American author (b. 1923) 2001 – David McTaggart, Canadian badminton player and environmentalist (b. 1932) 2002 – Eileen Farrell, American soprano (b. 1920) 2002 – Ben Hollioake, Australian-English cricketer (b. 1977) 2003 – Fritz Spiegl, Austrian-English flute player and journalist (b. 1926) 2004 – Rupert Hamer, Australian soldier, lawyer, and politician, 39th Premier of Victoria (b. 1916) 2006 – David B. Bleak, American sergeant, Medal of Honor recipient (b. 1932) 2006 – Desmond Doss, American soldier, Medal of Honor recipient (b. 1919) 2006 – Cindy Walker, American singer-songwriter and dancer (b. 1918) 2007 – Paul Cohen, American mathematician and theorist (b. 1934) 2007 – Eric Medlen, American race car driver (b. 1973) 2008 – Vaino Vahing, Estonian psychiatrist, author, and playwright (b. 1940) 2009 – Ghukas Chubaryan, Armenian sculptor (b. 1923) 2009 – Raúl Macías, Mexican boxer and trainer (b. 1934) 2011 – Jean Bartik, American computer scientist and engineer (b. 1924) 2011 – Rosario Morales, Puerto Rican poet and writer (b.1930) 2011 – Elizabeth Taylor, American-British actress, socialite and humanitarian (b. 1932) 2012 – Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, Somalian politician, President of Somalia (b. 1934) 2012 – Jim Duffy, American animator, director, and producer (b. 1937) 2012 – Naji Talib, Iraqi politician, 52nd Prime Minister of Iraq (b. 1917) 2012 – Lonnie Wright, American basketball and football player (b. 1945) 2013 – Boris Berezovsky, Russian-born Soviet-British mathematician and businessman (b. 1946) 2013 – Onofre Corpuz, Filipino economist, historian, and academic (b. 1926) 2013 – Virgil Trucks, American baseball player and coach (b. 1917) 2013 – Joe Weider, Canadian-American bodybuilder and publisher, co-founded the International Federation of BodyBuilding & Fitness (b. 1919) 2014 – Dave Brockie, Canadian-American singer-songwriter and bass player (b. 1963) 2014 – Jaroslav Šerých, Czech painter and illustrator (b. 1928) 2014 – Adolfo Suárez, Spanish lawyer and politician, 1st Prime Minister of Spain (b. 1932) 2015 – Gian Vittorio Baldi, Italian director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1930) 2015 – Lee Kuan Yew, Singaporean lawyer and politician, 1st Prime Minister of Singapore (b. 1923) 2015 – Bobby Lowther, American basketball player and lieutenant (b. 1923) 2015 – Lil' Chris, English singer-songwriter, actor, and television personality (b. 1990) 2016 – Joe Garagiola, Sr., American baseball player and sportscaster (b. 1926) 2016 – Ken Howard, American actor (b. 1944) 2021 – George Segal, American actor (b. 1934) Holidays and observances Christian feast day: Gregory the Illuminator (Episcopal Church) Gwinear Joseph Oriol Ottone Frangipane Rafqa Pietra Choboq Ar-Rayès (Maronite Church) Turibius of Mogrovejo Victorian, Frumentius and Companions March 23 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Day of Hungarian-Polish Friendship (Hungary and Poland) Day of the Sea (Bolivia) Family Day (South Africa) Śmigus-Dyngus (Poland, Ukraine), Polish diaspora communities) Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources Day (Azerbaijan) Pakistan Day (Pakistan) Promised Messiah Day (Ahmadiyya) World Meteorological Day References External links BBC: On This Day Historical Events on March 23 Today in Canadian History Days of the year March

20211

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March%2022

March 22

Events Pre-1600 106 – Start of the Bostran era, the calendar of the province of Arabia Petraea. 238 – Gordian I and his son Gordian II are proclaimed Roman emperors. 871 – Æthelred of Wessex is defeated by a Danish invasion army at the Battle of Marton. 1508 – Ferdinand II of Aragon commissions Amerigo Vespucci chief navigator of the Spanish Empire. 1601–1900 1621 – The Pilgrims of Plymouth Colony sign a peace treaty with Massasoit of the Wampanoags. 1622 – Jamestown massacre: Algonquians kill 347 English settlers around Jamestown, Virginia, a third of the colony's population, during the Second Anglo-Powhatan War. 1631 – The Massachusetts Bay Colony outlaws the possession of cards, dice, and gaming tables. 1638 – Anne Hutchinson is expelled from Massachusetts Bay Colony for religious dissent. 1739 – Nader Shah occupies Delhi in India and sacks the city, stealing the jewels of the Peacock Throne. 1765 – The British Parliament passes the Stamp Act that introduces a tax to be levied directly on its American colonies. 1784 – The Emerald Buddha is moved with great ceremony to its current location in Wat Phra Kaew, Thailand. 1794 – The Slave Trade Act of 1794 bans the export of slaves from the United States, and prohibits American citizens from outfitting a ship for the purpose of importing slaves. 1829 – In the London Protocol, the three protecting powers (United Kingdom, France and Russia) establish the borders of Greece. 1849 – The Austrians defeat the Piedmontese at the Battle of Novara. 1871 – In North Carolina, William Woods Holden becomes the first governor of a U.S. state to be removed from office by impeachment. 1873 – The Spanish National Assembly abolishes slavery in Puerto Rico. 1894 – The Stanley Cup ice hockey competition is held for the first time, in Montreal, Canada. 1895 – Before the Société pour L'Encouragement à l'Industrie, brothers Auguste and Louis Lumière demonstrate movie film technology publicly for the first time. 1896 – Charilaos Vasilakos wins the first modern Olympic marathon race with a time of three hours and 18 minutes. 1901–present 1906 – The first England vs France rugby union match is played at Parc des Princes in Paris. 1913 – Mystic Phan Xích Long, the self-proclaimed Emperor of Vietnam, is arrested for organising a revolt against the colonial rule of French Indochina, which was nevertheless carried out by his supporters the following day. 1916 – Yuan Shikai abdicates as Emperor of China, restoring the Republic and returning to the Presidency. 1920 – Azeri and Turkish army soldiers with participation of Kurdish gangs attack the Armenian inhabitants of Shushi (Nagorno Karabakh). 1933 – Cullen–Harrison Act: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs an amendment to the Volstead Act, legalizing the manufacture and sale of "3.2 beer" (3.2% alcohol by weight, approximately 4% alcohol by volume) and light wines. 1933 – Nazi Germany opens its first concentration camp, Dachau. 1934 – The first Masters Tournament is held at Augusta National Golf Club in Georgia. 1939 – Germany takes Memel from Lithuania. 1942 – World War II: In the Mediterranean Sea, the Royal Navy confronts Italy's Regia Marina in the Second Battle of Sirte. 1943 – World War II: The entire village of Khatyn (in what is the present-day Republic of Belarus) is burnt alive by Schutzmannschaft Battalion 118. 1945 – World War II: The city of Hildesheim, Germany is heavily damaged in a British air raid, though it had little military significance and Germany was on the verge of final defeat. 1945 – The Arab League is founded when a charter is adopted in Cairo, Egypt. 1946 – The United Kingdom grants full independence to Transjordan. 1960 – Arthur Leonard Schawlow and Charles Hard Townes receive the first patent for a laser. 1963 – The Beatles release their debut album Please Please Me. 1972 – The United States Congress sends the Equal Rights Amendment to the states for ratification. 1972 – In Eisenstadt v. Baird, the United States Supreme Court decides that unmarried persons have the right to possess contraceptives. 1975 – A fire at the Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant in Decatur, Alabama causes a dangerous reduction in cooling water levels. 1978 – Karl Wallenda of The Flying Wallendas dies after falling off a tight-rope suspended between two hotels in San Juan, Puerto Rico. 1982 – NASA's Space Shuttle Columbia is launched from the Kennedy Space Center on its third mission, STS-3. 1988 – The United States Congress votes to override President Ronald Reagan's veto of the Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987. 1992 – USAir Flight 405 crashes shortly after takeoff from New York City's LaGuardia Airport, leading to a number of studies into the effect that ice has on aircraft. 1992 – Fall of communism in Albania: The Democratic Party of Albania wins a decisive majority in the parliamentary election. 1993 – The Intel Corporation ships the first Pentium chips (80586), featuring a 60 MHz clock speed, 100+ MIPS, and a 64 bit data path. 1995 – Cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov returns to earth after setting a record of 438 days in space. 1997 – Tara Lipinski, aged 14 years and nine months, becomes the youngest women's World Figure Skating Champion. 1997 – Comet Hale–Bopp reaches its closest approach to Earth at 1.315 AU. 2004 – Ahmed Yassin, co-founder and leader of the Palestinian Sunni Islamist group Hamas, two bodyguards, and nine civilian bystanders are killed in the Gaza Strip when hit by Israeli Air Force Hellfire missiles. 2006 – Three Christian Peacemaker Team (CPT) hostages are freed by British forces in Baghdad after 118 days of captivity and the murder of their colleague from the U.S., Tom Fox. 2012 – Great Recession in Europe: Ireland returns to recession after a 0.2 percent decline in gross domestic product in the fourth quarter of 2011. 2013 – At least 37 people are killed and 200 are injured after a fire destroys a camp containing Burmese refugees near Ban Mae, Thailand. 2016 – Three suicide bombers kill 32 people and injure 316 in the 2016 Brussels bombings at the airport and at the Maelbeek/Maalbeek metro station. 2017 – A terrorist attack in London near the Houses of Parliament leaves four people dead and at least 20 injured. 2017 – Syrian civil war: 500 members of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are airlifted south of the Euphrates by United States Air Force helicopters, beginning the Battle of Tabqa. 2019 – The Special Counsel investigation on the 2016 United States presidential election concludes when Robert Mueller submits his report to the United States Attorney General. 2019 – Two buses crashed in Kitampo, a town north of Ghana's capital Accra, killing at least 50 people. 2020 – Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announces the country's largest ever self-imposed curfew, in an effort to fight the spread of COVID-19. 2020 – Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announces a national lockdown and the country's first ever self-imposed curfew, in an effort to fight the spread of COVID-19. 2021 – Ten people are killed in a mass shooting in Boulder, Colorado. Births Pre-1600 841 – Bernard Plantapilosa, Frankish son of Bernard of Septimania (d. 885) 875 – William I, Duke of Aquitaine (d. 918) 1212 – Emperor Go-Horikawa of Japan (d. 1235) 1367 – Thomas de Mowbray, 1st Duke of Norfolk, English politician, Earl Marshal of the United Kingdom (probable; d. 1399) 1394 – Ulugh Beg, Persian astronomer and mathematician (d. 1449) 1459 – Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1519) 1499 – Johann Carion, German astrologer and chronicler (d. 1537) 1503 – Antonio Francesco Grazzini, Italian author and educator (d. 1583) 1517 – Gioseffo Zarlino, Italian composer (d. 1590) 1519 – Catherine Brandon, Duchess of Suffolk, English noblewoman (d. 1580) 1582 – John Williams, Archbishop of York (d. 1650) 1599 – Anthony van Dyck, Flemish-English painter and etcher (d. 1641) 1601–1900 1609 – John II Casimir Vasa, Polish king (d. 1672) 1615 – Katherine Jones, Viscountess Ranelagh, British scientist (d. 1691) 1663 – August Hermann Francke, German clergyman, philanthropist, and scholar (d. 1727) 1684 – William Pulteney, 1st Earl of Bath, English politician, Secretary at War (d. 1764) 1712 – Edward Moore, English poet and playwright (d. 1757) 1720 – Nicolas-Henri Jardin, French architect, designed the Yellow Palace and Bernstorff Palace (d. 1799) 1723 – Charles Carroll, American lawyer and politician (d. 1783) 1728 – Anton Raphael Mengs, German painter and theorist (d. 1779) 1785 – Adam Sedgwick, English scientist (d. 1873) 1797 – William I, German Emperor (d. 1888) 1808 – Caroline Norton, English feminist, social reformer, and author (d. 1877) 1808 – David Swinson Maynard, American physician and lawyer (d. 1873) 1812 – Stephen Pearl Andrews, American author and activist (d. 1886) 1814 – Thomas Crawford, American sculptor, designed the Statue of Freedom (d. 1857) 1817 – Braxton Bragg, American general (d. 1876) 1818 – John Ainsworth Horrocks, English-Australian explorer, founded Penwortham (d. 1846) 1822 – Ahmed Cevdet Pasha, Ottoman sociologist, historian, scholar, statesman and jurist (d. 1895) 1842 – Mykola Lysenko, Ukrainian pianist, composer, and conductor (d. 1912) 1846 – Randolph Caldecott, English illustrator and painter (d. 1886) 1846 – James Timberlake, American lieutenant, police officer, and farmer (d. 1891) 1852 – Otakar Ševčík, Czech violinist and educator (d. 1934) 1852 – Hector Sévin, French cardinal (d. 1916) 1855 – Dorothy Tennant, British painter (d. 1926) 1857 – Paul Doumer, French mathematician, journalist, and politician, 14th President of France (d. 1932) 1866 – Jack Boyle, American baseball player and umpire (d. 1913) 1868 – Robert Andrews Millikan, American colonel and physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1953) 1869 – Emilio Aguinaldo, Filipino general and politician, 1st President of the Philippines (d. 1964) 1869 – Tom McInnes, Scottish-English footballer (d. 1939) 1873 – Ernest Lawson, Canadian-American painter (d. 1939) 1880 – Ernest C. Quigley, Canadian-American football player and coach (d. 1960) 1884 – Arthur H. Vandenberg, American journalist and politician (d. 1951) 1884 – Lyda Borelli, Italian actress (d. 1959) 1885 – Aryeh Levin, Polish-Lithuanian rabbi and educator (d. 1969) 1886 – August Rei, Estonian lawyer and politician, Head of State of Estonia (d. 1963) 1887 – Chico Marx, American actor (d. 1961) 1890 – George Clark, American race car driver (d. 1978) 1892 – Charlie Poole, American country banjo player (d. 1931) 1892 – Johannes Semper, Estonian poet and scholar (d. 1970) 1896 – He Long, Chinese general and politician, 1st Vice Premier of the People's Republic of China (d. 1969) 1896 – Joseph Schildkraut, Austrian-American actor (d. 1964) 1899 – Ruth Page, American ballerina and choreographer (d. 1991) 1901–present 1901 – Greta Kempton, Austrian-American painter (d. 1991) 1902 – Johannes Brinkman, Dutch architect, designed the Van Nelle Factory (d. 1949) 1902 – Madeleine Milhaud, French actress and composer (d. 2008) 1903 – Bill Holman, American cartoonist (d. 1987) 1907 – James M. Gavin, American general and diplomat, United States Ambassador to France (d. 1990) 1908 – Jack Crawford, Australian tennis player (d. 1991) 1908 – Louis L'Amour, American novelist and short story writer (d. 1988) 1909 – Gabrielle Roy, Canadian author and educator (d. 1983) 1910 – Nicholas Monsarrat, English sailor and author (d. 1979) 1912 – Wilfrid Brambell, Irish actor and performer (d. 1985) 1912 – Karl Malden, American actor (d. 2009) 1912 – Agnes Martin, Canadian-American painter and educator (d. 2004) 1912 – Leslie Johnson, English race car driver (d. 1959) 1913 – Tom McCall, American journalist and politician, 30th Governor of Oregon (d. 1983) 1913 – Lew Wasserman, American businessman and talent agent (d. 2002) 1913 – James Westerfield, American actor (d. 1971) 1914 – John Stanley, American author and illustrator (d. 1993) 1914 – Donald Stokes, Baron Stokes, English businessman (d. 2008) 1917 – Virginia Grey, American actress (d. 2004) 1917 – Irving Kaplansky, Canadian-American mathematician and academic (d. 2006) 1917 – Paul Rogers, English actor (d. 2013) 1918 – Cheddi Jagan, Guyanese politician, 4th President of Guyana (d. 1997) 1919 – Bernard Krigstein, American illustrator (d. 1990) 1920 – James Brown, American actor and singer (d. 1992) 1920 – Werner Klemperer, German-American actor (d. 2000) 1920 – Lloyd MacPhail, Canadian businessman and politician, 23rd Lieutenant Governor of Prince Edward Island (d. 1995) 1920 – Fanny Waterman, English pianist and educator, founded the Leeds International Pianoforte Competition (d. 2020) 1920 – Katsuko Saruhashi, Japanese geochemist (d. 2007) 1920 – Ross Martin, American actor (d. 1981) 1921 – Nino Manfredi, Italian actor, director, and screenwriter (d. 2004) 1922 – John J. Gilligan, American politician, 62nd Governor of Ohio (d. 2013) 1922 – Stewart Stern, American screenwriter (d. 2015) 1923 – Marcel Marceau, French mime and actor (d. 2007) 1924 – Al Neuharth, American journalist and author, founded USA Today (d. 2013) 1924 – Yevgeny Ostashev, Russian test pilot, participant in the launch of the first artificial Earth satellite (d. 1960) 1924 – Osman F. Seden, Turkish director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 1998) 1924 – Bill Wendell, American television announcer (d. 1999) 1927 – Marty Blake, American basketball player and manager (d. 2013) 1927 – Nicolas Tikhomiroff, Russian photographer (d. 2016) 1928 – Carrie Donovan, American journalist (d. 2001) 1928 – E. D. Hirsch, American author, critic, and academic 1928 – Ed Macauley, American basketball player, coach, and priest (d. 2011) 1929 – Yayoi Kusama, Japanese artist 1929 – P. Ramlee, Malaysian actor, director, singer, songwriter, composer, and producer (d. 1973) 1930 – Derek Bok, American lawyer and academic 1930 – Pat Robertson, American minister and broadcaster, founded the Christian Broadcasting Network 1930 – Stephen Sondheim, American composer and songwriter (d. 2021) 1931 – Burton Richter, American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2018) 1931 – William Shatner, Canadian actor 1931 – Leslie Thomas, Welsh journalist and author (d. 2014) 1932 – Els Borst, Dutch physician and politician, Deputy Prime Minister of the Netherlands (d. 2014) 1932 – Larry Evans, American chess player and journalist (d. 2010) 1933 – Abolhassan Banisadr, Iranian economist and politician, 1st President of Iran (d. 2021) 1934 – May Britt, Swedish actress 1934 – Sheila Cameron, English lawyer and judge 1934 – Orrin Hatch, American lawyer and politician 1935 – Galina Gavrilovna Korchuganova, Russian-born Soviet test pilot and aerobatics champion (d. 2004) 1935 – Lea Pericoli, Italian tennis player and journalist 1935 – Frank Pulli, American baseball player and umpire (d. 2013) 1935 – M. Emmet Walsh, American actor 1936 – Ron Carey, American trade union leader (d. 2008) 1936 – Roger Whittaker, Kenyan-English singer-songwriter and guitarist 1936 – Erol Büyükburç, Turkish singer-songwriter, pop music composer, and actor (d. 2015) 1937 – Angelo Badalamenti, American pianist and composer 1937 – Armin Hary, German sprinter 1937 – Jon Hassell, American trumpet player and composer (d. 2021) 1938 – Rein Etruk, Estonian chess player (d. 2012) 1940 – Dave Keon, Canadian ice hockey player 1940 – Haing S. Ngor, Cambodian-American physician and author (d. 1996) 1940 – George Edward Alcorn, Jr., American physicist and inventor 1941 – Billy Collins, American poet 1941 – Jeremy Clyde, English singer-songwriter and guitarist 1941 – Bruno Ganz, Swiss actor (d. 2019) 1941 – Cassam Uteem, Mauritian politician, 2nd President of Mauritius 1942 – Jorge Ben Jor, Brazilian singer-songwriter 1942 – Dick Pound, Canadian lawyer and academic 1943 – George Benson, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1943 – Nazem Ganjapour, Iranian footballer and manager (d. 2013) 1943 – Keith Relf, English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (d. 1976) 1945 – Eric Roth, American screenwriter and producer 1946 – Don Chaney, American basketball player and coach 1946 – Rivka Golani, Israeli viola player and composer 1946 – Rudy Rucker, American mathematician, computer scientist, and author 1946 – Harry Vanda, Dutch-Australian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer 1947 – George Ferguson, English architect and politician, 1st Mayor of Bristol 1947 – James Patterson, American author and producer 1947 – Maarten van Gent, Dutch basketball player and coach 1948 – Andrew Lloyd Webber, English composer and director 1949 – Fanny Ardant, French actress, director, and screenwriter 1949 – Brian Hanrahan, English journalist (d. 2010) 1952 – Des Browne, Scottish lawyer and politician, Secretary of State for Scotland 1953 – Kenneth Rogoff, American economist and chess grandmaster 1955 – Lena Olin, Swedish actress 1955 – Pete Sessions, American politician 1955 – Valdis Zatlers, Latvian physician and politician, 7th President of Latvia 1956 – Maria Teresa, Grand Duchess of Luxembourg (born María Teresa Mestre y Batista) 1957 – Jürgen Bucher, German footballer 1957 – Stephanie Mills, American actress and singer 1959 – Matthew Modine, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter 1960 – Tarmo Laht, Estonian architect 1960 – Lauri Vahtre, Estonian historian and politician 1961 – Simon Furman, British comic book writer 1963 – Deborah Bull, English ballerina 1963 – Susan Ann Sulley, English pop singer 1963 – Martín Vizcarra, Peruvian engineer and politician, 67th President of Peru 1964 – David Gillespie, Australian rugby league player 1966 – Pia Cayetano, Filipino lawyer and politician 1966 – Todd Ewen, Canadian ice hockey player and coach (d. 2015) 1966 – Artis Pabriks, Latvian academic and politician, 11th Minister for Defence of Latvia 1966 – António Pinto, Portuguese runner 1966 – Brian Shaw, American basketball player and coach 1967 – Mario Cipollini, Italian cyclist 1967 – Bernie Gallacher, Scottish-English footballer (d. 2011) 1970 – Andreas Johnson, Swedish singer-songwriter 1970 – Leontien van Moorsel, Dutch cyclist 1970 – Hwang Young-cho, South Korean runner 1971 – Keegan-Michael Key, American actor, comedian, and writer 1972 – Shawn Bradley, German-American basketball player, coach, and actor 1972 – Cory Lidle, American baseball player (d. 2006) 1972 – Elvis Stojko, Canadian figure skater and sportscaster 1973 – Beverley Knight, English singer-songwriter and producer 1974 – Marcus Camby, American basketball player 1974 – Philippe Clement, Belgian footballer 1974 – Geo Meneses, Mexican producer and singer 1975 – Cole Hauser, American actor and producer 1975 – Jiří Novák, Czech-Monegasque tennis player 1976 – Teun de Nooijer, Dutch field hockey player 1976 – Asako Toki, Japanese singer-songwriter 1976 – Reese Witherspoon, American actress and producer 1977 – Tom Poti, American ice hockey player 1979 – Aaron North, American guitarist 1979 – Juan Uribe, Dominican baseball player 1981 – Arne Gabius, German runner 1982 – Piá, Brazilian footballer 1982 – Enrico Gasparotto, Italian cyclist 1982 – Michael Janyk, Canadian skier 1984 – Piotr Trochowski, German footballer 1985 – Mayola Biboko, Belgian footballer 1985 – Jakob Fuglsang, Danish cyclist 1985 – Justin Masterson, American baseball player 1985 – Kelli Waite, Australian swimmer 1986 – Dexter Fowler, American baseball player 1987 – Ike Davis, American baseball player 1987 – Jairo Mora Sandoval, Costa Rican environmentalist (d. 2013) 1987 – Liam Doran, British rallycross driver 1989 – Ruben Popa, Romanian footballer 1989 – J. J. Watt, American football player Deaths Pre-1600 880 – Carloman of Bavaria, Frankish king 1144 – William of Norwich, child murder victim 1322 – Thomas, 2nd Earl of Lancaster, English politician, Lord High Steward of England (b. 1278) 1418 – Dietrich of Nieheim, German bishop and historian (b. 1345) 1421 – Thomas of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Clarence, English soldier and politician, Lord High Steward of England (b. 1388) 1454 – John Kemp, Archbishop of Canterbury 1471 – George of Poděbrady (b. 1420) 1601–1900 1544 – Johannes Magnus, Swedish archbishop and theologian (b. 1488) 1602 – Agostino Carracci, Italian painter and educator (b. 1557) 1685 – Emperor Go-Sai of Japan (b. 1638) 1687 – Jean-Baptiste Lully, Italian-French composer and conductor (b. 1632) 1758 – Jonathan Edwards, English minister, theologian, and philosopher (b. 1703) 1772 – John Canton, English physicist and academic (b. 1718) 1820 – Stephen Decatur, American commander (b. 1779) 1832 – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, German novelist, poet, playwright, and diplomat (b. 1749) 1840 – Étienne Bobillier, French mathematician and academic (b. 1798) 1864 – Konstanty Kalinowski, writer, journalist, lawyer and revolutionary (b. 1838) 1881 – Samuel Courtauld, English businessman (b. 1793) 1896 – Thomas Hughes, English lawyer and politician (b. 1822) 1901–present 1913 – Song Jiaoren, Chinese educator and politician (b. 1882) 1913 – Ruggero Oddi, Italian physiologist and anatomist (b.1864) 1924 – William Macewen, Scottish surgeon and neuroscientist (b. 1848) 1931 – James Campbell, 1st Baron Glenavy, Irish lawyer and politician (b. 1851) 1942 – Frederick Cuming, English cricketer (b. 1875) 1942 – William Donne, English captain and cricketer (b. 1875) 1945 – John Hessin Clarke, American lawyer and judge (b. 1857) 1952 – D. 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Gopalan, Indian educator and politician (b. 1904) 1978 – Karl Wallenda, German-American acrobat and tightrope walker, founded The Flying Wallendas (b. 1905) 1979 – Ben Lyon, American actor and studio executive (b. 1901) 1981 – James Elliott, American runner and coach (b. 1915) 1981 – Gil Puyat, Filipino businessman and politician, 13th President of the Senate of the Philippines (b. 1907) 1986 – Olive Deering, American actress (b. 1918) 1986 – Mark Dinning, American singer (b. 1933) 1987 – Odysseas Angelis, Greek general and politician (b. 1912) 1989 – Peta Taylor, English cricketer (b. 1912) 1990 – Gerald Bull, Canadian engineer and academic (b. 1928) 1991 – Léon Balcer, Canadian lawyer and politician, 19th Solicitor General of Canada (b. 1917) 1991 – Paul Engle, American novelist, poet, playwright, and critic (b. 1908) 1991 – Dave Guard, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1934) 1991 – Gloria Holden, English-American actress (b. 1908) 1993 – Steve Olin, American baseball player (b. 1965) 1994 – Dan Hartman, American singer-songwriter, and producer (b. 1950) 1994 – Walter Lantz, American animator, director, and producer (b. 1899) 1996 – Don Murray, American drummer (b. 1945) 1996 – Robert F. Overmyer, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut (b. 1936) 1996 – Billy Williamson, American guitarist (b. 1925) 1999 – Max Beloff, Baron Beloff, English historian and academic (b. 1913) 1999 – David Strickland, American actor (b. 1969) 2000 – Carlo Parola, Italian footballer and manager (b. 1921) 2001 – Stepas Butautas, Lithuanian basketball player and coach (b. 1925) 2001 – Sabiha Gökçen, Turkish soldier and pilot (b. 1913) 2001 – William Hanna, American animator, director, producer, and voice actor, co-founded Hanna-Barbera (b. 1910) 2001 – Robert Fletcher Shaw, Canadian businessman, academic, and civil servant (b. 1910) 2002 – Rudolf Baumgartner, Swiss violinist and conductor (b. 1917) 2003 – Terry Lloyd, English journalist (b. 1952) 2004 – Janet Akyüz Mattei, Turkish-American astronomer and academic (b. 1943) 2004 – Ahmed Yassin, Co-founded Hamas (b. 1937) 2004 – V. M. Tarkunde, Indian lawyer and civil rights activist (b. 1909) 2005 – Rod Price, English guitarist and songwriter (b. 1947) 2005 – Gemini Ganesan, Indian film actor (b. 1920) 2005 – Kenzō Tange, Japanese architect, designed the Yoyogi National Gymnasium and Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum (b. 1913) 2006 – Pierre Clostermann, French soldier, pilot, and politician (b. 1921) 2006 – Pío Leyva, Cuban singer and author (b. 1917) 2006 – Kurt von Trojan, Austrian-Australian journalist and author (b. 1937) 2007 – U. G. Krishnamurti, Indian-Italian philosopher and educator (b. 1918) 2008 – Cachao López, Cuban-American bassist and composer (b. 1918) 2010 – James Black, Scottish biologist and pharmacologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1924) 2010 – Özhan Canaydın, Turkish basketball player and businessman (b. 1943) 2011 – Artur Agostinho, Portuguese journalist (b. 1920) 2011 – Victor Bouchard, Canadian pianist and composer (b. 1926) 2012 – Joe Blanchard, American football player and wrestler (b. 1928) 2012 – John Payton, American lawyer and activist (b. 1946) 2012 – Matthew White Ridley, 4th Viscount Ridley, English academic and politician, Lord Lieutenant of Northumberland (b. 1925) 2012 – Mickey Sullivan, American baseball player and coach (b. 1932) 2012 – David Waltz, American computer scientist and academic (b. 1943) 2012 – Neil L. Whitehead, English anthropologist and author (b. 1956) 2013 – Vladimír Čech, Czech actor and politician (b. 1951) 2013 – James Nabrit, American lawyer and academic (b. 1932) 2013 – Bebo Valdés, Cuban-Swedish pianist and composer (b. 1918) 2013 – Derek Watkins, English trumpet player and composer (b. 1945) 2013 – Ray Williams, American basketball player and coach (b. 1954) 2014 – Yashwant Vithoba Chittal, Indian author (b. 1928) 2014 – Mickey Duff, Polish-English boxer and manager (b. 1929) 2014 – Thor Listau, Norwegian soldier and politician (b. 1938) 2014 – Tasos Mitsopoulos, Cypriot politician, Cypriot Minister of Defence (b. 1965) 2015 – Arkady Arkanov, Ukrainian-Russian actor and playwright (b. 1933) 2015 – Horst Buhtz, German footballer and manager (b. 1923) 2015 – Norman Scribner, American pianist, composer, and conductor (b. 1936) 2016 – Phife Dawg, American rapper (b. 1970) 2016 – Rob Ford, Canadian businessman and politician, 64th Mayor of Toronto (b. 1969) 2016 – Rita Gam, American actress (b. 1927) 2018 – Johan van Hulst, Dutch politician, academic and author, Yad Vashem recipient (b. 1911) Holidays and observances Bihar Day (Bihar, India) Christian feast day: Basil of Ancyra Blessed Clemens August Graf von Galen Darerca of Ireland Epaphroditus Jonathan Edwards (Lutheranism) Lea of Rome Nicholas Owen Paul of Narbonne March 22 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Earliest day on which Easter Sunday can fall (last in 1818, will not happen again until 2285), while April 25 is the latest. (Christianity) Emancipation Day or Día de la Abolición de la Esclavitud (Puerto Rico) World Water Day (International) References External links BBC: On This Day Historical Events on March 22 Today in Canadian History Days of the year March

20212

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aoraki%20/%20Mount%20Cook

Aoraki / Mount Cook

Aoraki / Mount Cook is the highest mountain in New Zealand. Its height, as of 2014, is listed as . It sits in the Southern Alps, the mountain range that runs the length of the South Island. A popular tourist destination, it is also a favourite challenge for mountain climbers. Aoraki / Mount Cook consists of three summits: from south to north, the Low Peak (), the Middle Peak () and the High Peak. The summits lie slightly south and east of the main divide of the Southern Alps / Kā Tiritiri o te Moana, with the Tasman Glacier to the east and the Hooker Glacier to the southwest. Location The mountain is in the Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park, in the Canterbury region. The park was established in 1953 and along with Westland National Park, Mount Aspiring National Park and Fiordland National Park forms one of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The park contains more than 140 peaks standing over and 72 named glaciers, which cover 40 percent of its . The peak is located at the northern end of the Kirikirikatata / Mount Cook Range, where it meets with the main spine of the Main Divide, forming a massif between the Hooker Valley to the southwest and the Tasman Valley east of the mountain. These two valleys provide the closest easily accessible view points of Aoraki / Mount Cook. A lookout point at the end of the Hooker Valley Track located only 10 km from the peak has views of the entire mountainside. The settlement of Mount Cook Village, also referred to as "Aoraki / Mount Cook", is a tourist centre and base camp for the mountain. It is 7 km from the end of the Tasman Glacier and 15 km south of Aoraki / Mount Cook's summit. On clear days, Aoraki / Mount Cook is visible from the West Coast as far north as Greymouth, some 150 kilometres away, and from most of State Highway 80 along Lake Pukaki and State Highway 6 south of Lake Pukaki. The near horizontal ridge connecting the mountain's three summits forms a distinctive blocky shape when viewed from an eastern or western direction. Another popular view point is from Lake Matheson on the West Coast, described as the "view of views", where on calm days, the peaks of Aoraki / Mount Cook and Mt Tasman are reflected in Lake Matheson. Local climate Aoraki / Mount Cook receives substantial orographic precipitation throughout the year, as breezy, moisture-laden westerly winds dominate all year-round, bringing rainclouds from the Tasman Sea with them. Annual precipitation around the mountain ranges varies greatly as the local climate is dominated by the eastward movement of depressions and anticyclones from across the Tasman Sea. The Aoraki / Mount Cook massif is a major obstacle to the prevailing westerly winds as they push depressions and associated cold fronts of moist air from the subtropics in the northwest against the mountain range. As the air rises towards the peaks, it expands and cools, and forms clouds. Rain and snowfall are often heaviest around the level and can last for several days if the front is slow-moving. As a result of the local weather patterns, the western slopes of Aoraki / Mount Cook can receive well over of annual precipitation, whereas the nearby Mount Cook Village, only south of the mountain receives of rain or snowfall. While the weather on the eastern side of the mountain is generally better, rain or snow can quickly become widespread on that side as well if the wind turns to the south or southeast. This brings with it a rapid drop in temperature and poor visibility, adding to the difficult climbing conditions on Aoraki / Mount Cook. Temperatures at the mountain's base in the Hooker Valley around range from to , and generally fall just over 1 °C for every 200 metres of altitude. From about and higher, semi-permanent snow and ice fields exist during winter. Winter and spring are usually less settled than summer and autumn. Anticyclones often bring days of settled weather in summer, or clear cold conditions in winter with severe frost. Naming and European discovery is the name of a person in the traditions of the Ngāi Tahu iwi; an early name for the South Island is (Aoraki's Canoe). In the past many believed it meant "Cloud Piercer", a romantic rendering of the name's components: (world, daytime, cloud, etc.) and or (day, sky, weather, etc.). Historically, the Māori name has been spelt , using the standard Māori form. Aoraki / Mount Cook became known to Māori after their arrival in New Zealand some time around the 14th century CE. The first Europeans who may have seen Aoraki / Mount Cook were members of Abel Tasman's crew, who saw a "large land uplifted high" (probably some part of the Southern Alps) while off the west coast of the South Island, just north of present-day Greymouth on 13 December 1642 during Tasman's first Pacific voyage. The English name of Mount Cook was given to the mountain in 1851 by Captain John Lort Stokes to honour Captain James Cook who surveyed and circumnavigated the islands of New Zealand in 1770. Captain Cook did not sight the mountain during his exploration. Following the settlement between Ngāi Tahu and the Crown in 1998, the name of the mountain was officially changed from Mount Cook to Aoraki / Mount Cook to incorporate its historic Māori name, Aoraki. As part of the settlement, a number of South Island placenames were amended to incorporate their original Māori name. Signifying the importance of Aoraki / Mount Cook, it is the only one of these names where the Māori name precedes the English. Under the settlement the Crown agreed to return title to Aoraki / Mount Cook to Ngāi Tahu, who would then formally gift it back to the nation. Neither transfer has yet occurred; Ngāi Tahu can decide when this will happen. Geology The Southern Alps in the South Island were formed by tectonic uplifting and pressure as the Pacific and Indo-Australian Plates collided along the island's western coast. The uplifting continues, raising Aoraki / Mount Cook an average of each year. However, erosive forces are also powerful shapers of the mountains. The severe weather is due to the mountain's jutting into powerful westerly winds of the Roaring Forties which run around approximately 45°S latitude, south of both Africa and Australia. The Southern Alps are the first obstacle the winds encounter after South America, having moved east across the Southern Ocean. The height of Aoraki / Mount Cook was established in 1881 by G. J. Roberts (from the west side) and in 1889 by T. N. Brodrick (from the Canterbury side). Their measurements agreed closely at . The height was reduced by when approximately 12–14 million cubic metres of rock and ice fell off the northern peak on 14 December 1991. Two decades of erosion of the ice cap exposed after this collapse reduced the height by another 30 m to 3724 m, as revealed by new GPS data from a University of Otago climbing expedition in November 2013. Aoraki / Mount Cook lies in the centre of the distinctive Alpine Fault, a 650 km long active fault in the Southern Alps. It is responsible for the uplift of Aoraki / Mt Cook and is believed to move every 100 to 300 years. It last moved in 1717. Surrounding forests and glaciers The average annual rainfall in the surrounding lowlands, in particular to the west, is around . This very high rainfall leads to temperate rainforests in these coastal lowlands and a reliable source of snow in the mountains to keep the glaciers flowing. These include the Tasman Glacier to the east of the mountain and the smaller Hooker Glacier immediately to its south. The vegetation in the valleys to the east, in particular the Tasman Valley, is noticeably less lush than that on the western slopes of the mountain. Forest would normally grow to about 1,300 m in this area, but a lack of soil due to scree, rock falls and the effects of glaciation prevent this in most localities around the mountain. Snow tussock and other alpine plants cling to as high as 1,900 m. Above the snowline, only lichen can be found amongst the rock, snowfields and ice that dominate the highest parts of Aoraki / Mt Cook. Climbing history The first recorded attempt on the summit was made by the Irishman Rev. William S. Green and the Swiss hotelier Emil Boss and the Swiss mountain guide Ulrich Kaufmann on 2 March 1882 via the Tasman and Linda Glaciers. They came within a few feet of the top, as did the 1890 ascent attempt by Mannering and Dixon. The first known ascent was on 25 December 1894, when New Zealanders Tom Fyfe, John Michael (Jack) Clarke and George Graham reached the summit via the Hooker Valley and the north ridge. Despite an earlier failed attempt on 20 December, the local climbers were spurred on by their desire for the first ascent to be made by New Zealand mountaineers amid reports that the American mountaineer Edward FitzGerald had his eye on the summit. The party reached the summit at approximately 1:30pm after bounding up the last leg of the mountain full of excitement at reaching the top. The route they had successfully traversed was not repeated again until the 100th ascent over 60 years later in 1955. Swiss guide Matthias Zurbriggen of FitzGerald's party made the second ascent on 14 March 1895 from the Tasman Glacier side, via the ridge that now bears his name. This is credited as the first solo ascent, although Zurbriggen was accompanied part of the way up the ridge by J Adamson. After Zurbriggen's ascent it was another ten years before the mountain was climbed again. In February 1905 Jack Clarke with four others completed the third ascent following Zurbriggen's route. Clarke therefore became the first person to do a repeat ascent. The first woman to ascend the mountain was Australian Freda Du Faur on 3 December 1910. Local guide George Bannister, a nephew of another guide, Butler Te Koeti of Ngāi Tahu, was the first Māori to successfully scale the peak in 1912. A traverse of the three peaks was first accomplished in 1913 by Freda Du Faur and guides Alec and Peter Graham. This 'grand traverse' was repeated in January 1916 by Conrad Kain, guiding the 57-year-old Mrs. Jane Thomson, considered at the time "a marvellous feat unequalled for daring in the annals of the Southern Alps". Sir Edmund Hillary made his first ascent in January 1948. In February 1948 with Ruth Adams, Harry Ayres and Mick Sullivan, Hillary made the first ascent of the South Ridge to the Low Peak In order to celebrate the life of Hillary the South Ridge was renamed as Hillary Ridge in August 2011. Aoraki / Mount Cook is a technically challenging mountain with a high level of glaciation. Its level of difficulty is often underestimated and can change dramatically depending on weather, snow and ice conditions. The climb crosses large crevasses, and involves risks of ice and rock falls, avalanches and rapidly changing weather conditions. Since the early 20th century, around 80 people have died attempting to climb the mountain, making it New Zealand's deadliest peak. The climbing season traditionally runs from November to February, and hardly a season goes by without at least one fatality. Māori history, legends and traditions According to Māori legend, Aoraki was a young boy who, along with his three brothers, were the sons of Rakinui, the Sky Father. On their voyage around the Papatūānuku, the Earth Mother, their canoe became stranded on a reef and tilted. Aoraki and his brothers climbed onto the top side of their canoe. However, the south wind froze them and turned them to stone. Their canoe became the Te Waka o Aoraki, the South Island, and their prows, the Marlborough Sounds. Aoraki, the tallest, became the highest peak, and his brothers created the Kā Tiritiri o te Moana, the Southern Alps. Ngāi Tahu, the main iwi (tribe) of New Zealand's southern region, consider Aoraki as the most sacred of the ancestors that they had descended from. Aoraki brings the iwi with its sense of community and purpose, and remains the physical form of Aoraki and the link between the worlds of the supernatural and nature. Timeline 1642 – Aoraki was possibly sighted by Abel Tasman and crew members. 1770 – Captain Cook named the Southern Alps. 1851 – Captain Stokes of the survey ship HMS Acheron gave the name Mount Cook to Aoraki. 1894 – The first ascent of Mount Cook took place on Christmas Day, by Jack Clarke, Tom Fyfe and George Graham. 1910 – Freda du Faur became the first woman to climb Mount Cook. 1913 – The first ascents of the footstool and Mt Sefton were made by Freda du Faur's climbing party. 1914 – The first fatal accident occurred, when three men were caught in avalanche on Linda Glacier. 1982 – Mark Inglis was trapped in a snow cave. 1982 – Geoff Wyatt and John Blennehasset achieved the first ski descent from the summit. 1991 – An avalanche of 10 million cubic metres of snow and rock caused 10 metres to be lost off the top of Mount Cook. Two decades of erosion of the ice cap exposed after this collapse reduced the height by another 30 m to 3,724 m, as revealed by new GPS data from a University of Otago climbing expedition in November 2013. 1998 – The Ngāi Tahu Claims Settlement Act officially recognised the original name, renaming the mountain Aoraki / Mount Cook. See also List of mountains of New Zealand by height References Further reading In Search of Ancient NZ. Hamish Campbell and Gerard Hutching. GNS/Penguin. 2011. . External links Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park homepage Women on the Summit of Mt. Cook, N.Z. Mountains of Canterbury, New Zealand Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park Extreme points of New Zealand Highest points of countries

20213

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple-image%20Network%20Graphics

Multiple-image Network Graphics

Multiple-image Network Graphics (MNG) is a graphics file format, published in 2001, for animated images. Its specification is publicly documented and there are free software reference implementations available. MNG is closely related to the PNG image format. When PNG development started in early 1995, developers decided not to incorporate support for animation, because the majority of the PNG developers felt that overloading a single file type with both still and animation features is a bad design, both for users (who have no simple way of determining to which class a given image file belongs) and for web servers (which should use a MIME type starting with image/ for stills and video/ for animations—GIF notwithstanding). However, work soon started on MNG as an animation-supporting version of PNG. Version 1.0 of the MNG specification was released on 31 January 2001. File support Support Gwenview has native MNG support. GIMP can export images as MNG files. Imagemagick can create a MNG file from a series of PNG files. With the MNG plugin, Irfanview can read a MNG file. If MPlayer is linked against libmng, it and all its graphical front-ends like Gnome MPlayer can display MNG files. Mozilla browsers and Netscape 6.0, 6.01 and 7.0 included native support for MNG until the code was removed in 2003 due to code size and little actual usage, causing complaints on the Mozilla development site. Mozilla later added support for APNG as a simpler alternative. Similarly, early versions of the Konqueror browser included MNG support but it was later dropped. MNG support was never included in Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Opera, or Safari. Server support Web servers generally don't come pre-configured to support MNG files. The MNG developers had hoped that MNG would replace GIF for animated images on the World Wide Web, just as PNG had done for still images. However, with the expiration of LZW patents and existence of alternative file formats such as APNG, Flash and SVG, combined with lack of MNG-supporting viewers and services, web usage was far less than expected. Technical details The structure of MNG files is essentially the same as that of PNG files, differing only in the slightly different signature (8A 4D 4E 47 0D 0A 1A 0A in hexadecimal, where 4D 4E 47 is ASCII for "MNG" – see Portable Network Graphics: File header) and the use of a much greater variety of chunks to support all the animation features that it provides. Images to be used in the animation are stored in the MNG file as encapsulated PNG or JNG images. Two versions of MNG of reduced complexity are also defined: MNG-LC (low complexity) and MNG-VLC (very low complexity). These allow applications to include some level of MNG support without having to implement the entire MNG specification, just as the SVG standard offers the "SVG Basic" and "SVG Tiny" subsets. MNG does not have a registered MIME media type, but video/x-mng or image/x-mng can be used. MNG animations may be included in HTML pages using the <embed> or <object> tag. MNG can either be lossy or lossless, depending whether the frames are encoded in PNG (lossless) or JNG (lossy). Alternatives The most common alternatives are Animated GIF and – up until its deprecation in 2017 – Adobe Flash, with the relative newcomer video alternative to GIF recently gaining momentum. Animated GIF images are restricted to 256 colors and are used in simple scenarios but are supported in all major web browsers. In web pages, it is possible to create pseudo-animations by writing JavaScript code that loads still PNG or JPEG images of each frame and displays them one by one for a specified time interval. Apart from requiring the user to have JavaScript support and choose not to disable it, this method can be CPU- and bandwidth-intensive for pages with more than one image, large images, or high framerates, and does not allow the animation to be saved in one image file or posted on image-based sites such as flickr or imageboards. Most web browsers support APNG, a non-standard extension to PNG for simple GIF-like animations. Another alternative is SVG images with embedded PNG or JPEG graphics, using SVG animation (if supported) or JavaScript to flip between images. Internet Explorer supports neither APNG nor SVG animation. Another approach uses CSS 3 features, notably CSS Animation, which now has some level of support in most major web browsers. CSS Sprites (providing several images as tiles in a single large image file) can be used as animations by varying which part of the large image is visible using CSS Animation or JavaScript. See also Animated Portable Network Graphics (APNG) JPEG Network Graphics (JNG) References External links MNG Home Page List of applications that support MNG images MNGzilla - A Mozilla variant with MNG support, dormant since 2007 MNG test cases (archive copy) Graphics file formats Open formats Portable Network Graphics

20215

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi%20John%20Hurt

Mississippi John Hurt

John Smith Hurt (March 8, 1893 – November 2, 1966), better known as Mississippi John Hurt, was an American country blues singer and guitarist. Raised in Avalon, Mississippi, Hurt taught himself to play the guitar around the age of nine. He worked as a sharecropper and began playing at dances and parties, singing to a melodious fingerpicked accompaniment. His first recordings, made for Okeh Records in 1928, were commercial failures, and he continued to work as a farmer. Dick Spottswood and Tom Hoskins, a blues enthusiast, located Hurt in 1963 and persuaded him to move to Washington, D.C. He was recorded by the Library of Congress in 1964. This helped further the American folk music revival, which led to the rediscovery of many other bluesmen of Hurt's era. Hurt performed on the university and coffeehouse concert circuit with other Delta blues musicians who were brought out of retirement. He also recorded several albums for Vanguard Records. Hurt returned to Mississippi, where he died, in Grenada, in 1966, aged about 73 years old. Material recorded by him has been re-released by many record labels. His songs have been recorded by Bob Dylan, Dave Van Ronk, Jerry Garcia, Beck, Doc Watson, John McCutcheon, Taj Mahal, Bruce Cockburn, David Johansen, Bill Morrissey, Gillian Welch, Josh Ritter, Chris Smither, Guthrie Thomas, Parsonsfield, and Rory Block. Biography Early years Hurt was born in Teoc, Carroll County, Mississippi, and raised in Avalon, Mississippi. He taught himself to play guitar at the age of nine, stealthily playing the guitar of a friend of his mother's, who often stayed at the Hurt home while courting a woman who lived nearby. As a youth, he played old-time music for friends and at dances. He worked as a farmhand and sharecropper into the 1920s. His fast, highly syncopated style of playing was meant for dancing. On occasion, a medicine show would come through the area. Hurt recalled that one wanted to hire him: "One of them wanted me, but I said no because I just never wanted to get away from home." In 1923, he played with the fiddle player Willie Narmour as a substitute for Narmour's regular partner, Shell Smith. First recordings When Narmour got a chance to record for Okeh Records as a prize for winning first place in a 1928 fiddle contest, he recommended Hurt to Okeh producer Tommy Rockwell. After auditioning "Monday Morning Blues" at his home, Hurt took part in two recording sessions, in Memphis and New York City (see Discography below). While in Memphis, he recalled seeing "many, many blues singers ... Lonnie Johnson, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Bessie Smith, and lots, lots more." Hurt described his first recording session as follows: Hurt attempted further negotiations with Okeh to record again, but his records were commercial failures. Okeh went out of business during the Great Depression, and Hurt returned to Avalon and obscurity, working as a sharecropper and playing at local parties and dances. Rediscovery and death Hurt's renditions of "Frankie" and "Spike Driver Blues" were included in The Anthology of American Folk Music in 1952 which generated considerable interest in locating him. When a copy of "Avalon Blues" was discovered in 1963, it led musicologist Dick Spottswood to locate Avalon in an atlas, and ask Tom Hoskins, who was traveling that way, to enquire after Hurt. When Hoskins arrived in Avalon the first person he asked directed him to Hurt's cabin. Hoskins persuaded an apprehensive Hurt to perform several songs for him, to ensure that he was genuine. Hoskins was convinced and, seeing that Hurt's guitar playing skills were still intact, encouraged him to move to Washington, D.C., and perform for a broader audience. His performance at the 1963 Newport Folk Festival caused his star to rise in the folk revival occurring at that time. He performed extensively at colleges, concert halls, and coffeehouses and appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. He also recorded three albums for Vanguard Records. Much of his repertoire was also recorded for the Library of Congress. His fans particularly liked the ragtime songs "Salty Dog" and "Candy Man" and the blues ballads "Spike Driver Blues" (a variant of "John Henry") and "Frankie". Hurt's influence spanned several music genres, including blues, spirituals, country, bluegrass, folk, and contemporary rock and roll. A soft-spoken man, his nature was reflected in the work, which consisted of a mellow mix of country, blues, and old-time music. Hurt died on November 2, 1966, of a heart attack, in hospital at Grenada, Mississippi. His last recordings had been done at a hotel in New York City in February and July of that year, and were not released until 1972 on the Vanguard LP Last Sessions. Style Hurt used a fast, syncopated fingerpicking style of guitar playing that he taught himself. He was influenced by few other musicians, among whom was an elderly, unrecorded blues singer from the area where he lived, Rufus Hanks, who played twelve-string guitar and harmonica. He also recalled listening to the country singer Jimmie Rodgers. On occasion, Hurt would use an open tuning and a slide, as he did in his arrangement of "The Ballad of Casey Jones". According to the music critic Robert Christgau, "the school of John Fahey proceeded from his finger-picking, and while he's not the only quietly conversational singer in the modern folk tradition, no one else has talked the blues with such delicacy or restraint." Tributes There is a memorial to Hurt in Avalon, Mississippi. It is parallel to RR2, the rural road on which he grew up. The American singer-songwriter Tom Paxton, who met Hurt and played on the same bill with him at the Gaslight in Greenwich Village around 1963, wrote and recorded a song about him in 1977, "Did You Hear John Hurt?", which he still frequently plays in live performances. The first track of John Fahey's 1968 solo acoustic guitar album Requia is "Requiem for John Hurt". Fahey's posthumous live album, The Great Santa Barbara Oil Slick, also features a version of the piece, entitled "Requiem for Mississippi John Hurt". Norman Greenbaum's eclectic minor hit, "Gondoliers, Shakespeares, Overseers, Playboys And Bums" refers to Mississippi John Hurt singing the blues. The British folk and blues artist Wizz Jones recorded a tribute song, "Mississippi John", for his 1977 album Magical Flight. The Delta blues artist Rory Block recorded the album Avalon: A Tribute to Mississippi John Hurt, released in 2013 as part of her "Mentor Series". The New England singer-songwriter Bill Morrissey released the Grammy-nominated album Songs of Mississippi John Hurt in 1999. In 2017, John Hurt's life story was told in the award-winning documentary series American Epic. The film featured unseen film footage of Hurt performing and being interviewed, and radically improved restorations of his 1920s recordings. Director Bernard MacMahon stated that Hurt "was the inspiration for American Epic". Hurt's life was profiled in the accompanying book, American Epic: The First Time America Heard Itself. Discography Sources for this section are as follows:. 78-rpm releases "Frankie" / "Nobody's Dirty Business" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8560), 1928 "Stack O' Lee" / "Candy Man Blues" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8654), 1928 "Blessed Be the Name" / "Praying on the Old Camp Ground" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8666), 1928 "Blue Harvest Blues" / "Spike Driver Blues" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8692), 1928 "Louis Collins" / "Got the Blues (Can't Be Satisfied)" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8724), 1928 "Ain't No Tellin'" / "Avalon Blues" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8759), 1928 Albums Folk Songs and Blues (Piedmont Records, PLP 13157), 1963 Worried Blues, live recordings (Piedmont Records, PLP 13161), 1964 Today! (Vanguard Records, VSD-79220), 1966 The Immortal Mississippi John Hurt (Vanguard Records, VSD-79248), 1967 The Best of Mississippi John Hurt, live recordings (Vanguard Records, VSD-19/20), 1970 Last Sessions (Vanguard Records, VSD-79327), 1972 Volume One of a Legacy, live recordings (Piedmont Records, CLPS 1068), 1975 Monday Morning Blues: The Library of Congress Recordings, vol. 1 (Flyright Records, FLYLP 553), 1980 Avalon Blues: The Library of Congress Recordings, vol. 2 (Heritage Records, HT-301), 1982 Satisfied, live recordings (Quicksilver Intermedia, QS 5007), 1982 The Candy Man, live recordings (Quicksilver Intermedia, QS 5042), 1982 Sacred and Secular: The Library of Congress Recordings, vol. 3 (Heritage Records, HT-320), 1988 Avalon Blues (Flyright Records, FLYCD 06), 1989 Memorial Anthology, live recordings (Genes Records, GCD 9906/7), 1993 Selected compilation albums The Original 1928 Recordings (Spokane Records, SPL 1001), 1971 1928: Stack O' Lee Blues – His First Recordings (Biograph Records, BLP C4), 1972 1928 Sessions (Yazoo Records, L 1065), 1979 Satisfying Blues (Collectables Records, VCL 5529), 1995 Avalon Blues: The Complete 1928 Okeh Recordings (Columbia Records, CK64986), 1996 Rediscovered (Vanguard Records, CD 79519), 1998 The Complete Recordings (Vanguard Records, CD 70181–2), 1998 Candy Man Blues: The Complete 1928 Sessions (Snapper Music, SBLUECD 010), 2004 American Epic: The Best of Mississippi John Hurt (Lo-Max / Sony Legacy / Third Man, TMR-459), 2017 Notes Further reading Ratcliffe, Philip R. (2011). Mississippi John Hurt: His Life, His Times, His Blues. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi. James, Steve (2018). Gaslight Memories: Mississippi John Hurt’s Influence on the 1960s Folk Scene and Beyond. Acoustic Guitar Magazine, June 2018. References External links Mississippi John Hurt Foundation, official website, includes information about the annual Mississippi John Hurt Music Festival in Avalon, Mississippi. Mississippi John Hurt Museum, official website. Mississippi John Hurt News. Website run by Hurt's grandnephew Fred Bolden, with forums and discussions open to the public. Illustrated Mississippi John Hurt discography [ Allmusic] Mississippi John Hurt's "Stackolee", Recording, sheet music, and guitar tab. 1890s births 1966 deaths American folk singers American blues guitarists American male guitarists Blues musicians from Mississippi Blues revival musicians American blues singer-songwriters Country blues musicians Country blues singers Fingerstyle guitarists Okeh Records artists People from Carroll County, Mississippi Songster musicians Vanguard Records artists 20th-century American guitarists Singer-songwriters from Mississippi Guitarists from Mississippi African-American male singer-songwriters African-American guitarists 20th-century African-American male singers

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moravia

Moravia

Moravia ( , also , ; ; ; ; ; ) is a historical region in the east of the Czech Republic and one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia. The medieval and early modern Margraviate of Moravia was a crown land of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown from 1348 to 1918, an imperial state of the Holy Roman Empire from 1004 to 1806, a crown land of the Austrian Empire from 1804 to 1867, and a part of Austria-Hungary from 1867 to 1918. Moravia was one of the five lands of Czechoslovakia founded in 1918. In 1928 it was merged with Czech Silesia, and then dissolved in 1949 during the abolition of the land system following the communist coup d'état. Its area of 22,623.41 km2 is home to more than 3 million people. The people are historically named Moravians, a subgroup of Czechs, the other group being called Bohemians. Moravia also had been home of a large German-speaking population until their expulsion in 1945. The land takes its name from the Morava river, which runs from its north to south, being its principal watercourse. Moravia's largest city and historical capital is Brno. Before being sacked by the Swedish army during the Thirty Years' War, Olomouc served as the Moravian capital, and it is still the seat of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Olomouc. Toponymy The region and former margraviate of Moravia, Morava in Czech, is named after its principal river Morava. It is theorized that the river's name is derived from Proto-Indo-European *mori: "waters", or indeed any word denoting water or a marsh. The German name for Moravia is Mähren, from the river's German name March. This could have a different etymology, as march is a term used in the Medieval times for an outlying territory, a border or a frontier (cf. English march). Geography Moravia occupies most of the eastern part of the Czech Republic. Moravian territory is naturally strongly determined, in fact, as the Morava river basin, with strong effect of mountains in the west (de facto main European continental divide) and partly in the east, where all the rivers rise. Moravia occupies an exceptional position in Central Europe. All the highlands in the west and east of this part of Europe run west–east, and therefore form a kind of filter, making north–south or south–north movement more difficult. Only Moravia with the depression of the westernmost Outer Subcarpathia, wide, between the Bohemian Massif and the Outer Western Carpathians (gripping the meridian at a constant angle of 30°), provides a comfortable connection between the Danubian and Polish regions, and this area is thus of great importance in terms of the possible migration routes of large mammals – both as regards periodically recurring seasonal migrations triggered by climatic oscillations in the prehistory, when permanent settlement started. Moravia borders Bohemia in the west, Lower Austria in the southwest, Slovakia in the southeast, Poland very shortly in the north, and Czech Silesia in the northeast. Its natural boundary is formed by the Sudetes mountains in the north, the Carpathians in the east and the Bohemian-Moravian Highlands in the west (the border runs from Králický Sněžník in the north, over Suchý vrch, across Upper Svratka Highlands and Javořice Highlands to tripoint nearby Slavonice in the south). The Thaya river meanders along the border with Austria and the tripoint of Moravia, Austria and Slovakia is at the confluence of the Thaya and Morava rivers. The northeast border with Silesia runs partly along the Moravice, Oder and Ostravice rivers. Between 1782 and 1850, Moravia (also thus known as Moravia-Silesia) also included a small portion of the former province of Silesia – the Austrian Silesia (when Frederick the Great annexed most of ancient Silesia (the land of upper and middle Oder river) to Prussia, Silesia's southernmost part remained with the Habsburgs). Today Moravia includes the South Moravian Region, the Zlín Region, vast majority of the Olomouc Region, southeastern half of the Vysočina Region and parts of the Moravian-Silesian, Pardubice and South Bohemian regions. Geologically, Moravia covers a transitive area between the Bohemian Massif and the Carpathians (from northwest to southeast), and between the Danube basin and the North European Plain (from south to northeast). Its core geomorphological features are three wide valleys, namely the Dyje-Svratka Valley (Dyjsko-svratecký úval), the Upper Morava Valley (Hornomoravský úval) and the Lower Morava Valley (Dolnomoravský úval). The first two form the westernmost part of the Outer Subcarpathia, the last is the northernmost part of the Vienna Basin. The valleys surround the low range of Central Moravian Carpathians. The highest mountains of Moravia are situated on its northern border in Hrubý Jeseník, the highest peak is Praděd (1491 m). Second highest is the massive of Králický Sněžník (1424  m) the third are the Moravian-Silesian Beskids at the very east, with Smrk (1278 m), and then south from here Javorníky (1072). The White Carpathians along the southeastern border rise up to 970 m at Velká Javořina. The spacious, but moderate Bohemian-Moravian Highlands on the west reach 837 m at Javořice. The fluvial system of Moravia is very cohesive, as the region border is similar to the watershed of the Morava river, and thus almost the entire area is drained exclusively by a single stream. Morava's far biggest tributaries are Thaya (Dyje) from the right (or west) and Bečva (east). Morava and Thaya meet at the southernmost and lowest (148 m) point of Moravia. Small peripheral parts of Moravia belong to the catchment area of Elbe, Váh and especially Oder (the northeast). The watershed line running along Moravia's border from west to north and east is part of the European Watershed. For centuries, there have been plans to build a waterway across Moravia to join the Danube and Oder river systems, using the natural route through the Moravian Gate. History Pre-history Evidence of the presence of members of the human genus, Homo, dates back more than 600,000 years in the paleontological area of Stránská skála. Attracted by suitable living conditions, early modern humans settled in the region by the Paleolithic period. The Předmostí archeological (Cro-magnon) site in Moravia is dated to between 24,000 and 27,000 years old. Caves in Moravský kras were used by mammoth hunters. Venus of Dolní Věstonice, the oldest ceramic figure in the world, was found in the excavation of Dolní Věstonice by Karel Absolon. Roman era Around 60 BC, the Celtic Volcae people withdrew from the region and were succeeded by the Germanic Quadi. Some of the events of the Marcomannic Wars took place in Moravia in AD 169–180. After the war exposed the weakness of Rome's northern frontier, half of the Roman legions (16 out of 33) were stationed along the Danube. In response to increasing numbers of Germanic settlers in frontier regions like Pannonia, Dacia, Rome established two new frontier provinces on the left shore of the Danube, Marcomannia and Sarmatia, including today's Moravia and western Slovakia. In the 2nd century AD, a Roman fortress stood on the vineyards hill known as and ("hillfort"), situated above the former village Mušov and above today's beach resort at Pasohlávky. During the reign of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, the 10th Legion was assigned to control the Germanic tribes who had been defeated in the Marcomannic Wars. In 1927, the archeologist Gnirs, with the support of president Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, began research on the site, located 80 km from Vindobona and 22 km to the south of Brno. The researchers found remnants of two masonry buildings, a praetorium and a balneum ("bath"), including a hypocaustum. The discovery of bricks with the stamp of the Legio X Gemina and coins from the period of the emperors Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius and Commodus facilitated dating of the locality. Ancient Moravia A variety of Germanic and major Slavic tribes crossed through Moravia during the Migration Period before Slavs established themselves in the 6th century AD. At the end of the 8th century, the Moravian Principality came into being in present-day south-eastern Moravia, Záhorie in south-western Slovakia and parts of Lower Austria. In 833 AD, this became the state of Great Moravia with the conquest of the Principality of Nitra (present-day Slovakia). Their first king was Mojmír I (ruled 830–846). Louis the German invaded Moravia and replaced Mojmír I with his nephew Rastiz who became St. Rastislav. St. Rastislav (846–870) tried to emancipate his land from the Carolingian influence, so he sent envoys to Rome to get missionaries to come. When Rome refused he turned to Constantinople to the Byzantine emperor Michael. The result was the mission of Saints Cyril and Methodius who translated liturgical books into Slavonic, which had lately been elevated by the Pope to the same level as Latin and Greek. Methodius became the first Moravian archbishop, the first archbishop in Slavic world, but after his death the German influence again prevailed and the disciples of Methodius were forced to flee. Great Moravia reached its greatest territorial extent in the 890s under Svatopluk I. At this time, the empire encompassed the territory of the present-day Czech Republic and Slovakia, the western part of present Hungary (Pannonia), as well as Lusatia in present-day Germany and Silesia and the upper Vistula basin in southern Poland. After Svatopluk's death in 895, the Bohemian princes defected to become vassals of the East Frankish ruler Arnulf of Carinthia, and the Moravian state ceased to exist after being overrun by invading Magyars in 907. Union with Bohemia Following the defeat of the Magyars by Emperor Otto I at the Battle of Lechfeld in 955, Otto's ally Boleslaus I, the Přemyslid ruler of Bohemia, took control over Moravia. Bolesław I Chrobry of Poland annexed Moravia in 999, and ruled it until 1019, when the Přemyslid prince Bretislaus recaptured it. Upon his father's death in 1034, Bretislaus became the ruler of Bohemia. In 1055, he decreed that Bohemia and Moravia would be inherited together by primogeniture, although he also provided that his younger sons should govern parts (quarters) of Moravia as vassals to his oldest son. Throughout the Přemyslid era, junior princes often ruled all or part of Moravia from Olomouc, Brno or Znojmo, with varying degrees of autonomy from the ruler of Bohemia. Dukes of Olomouc often acted as the "right hand" of Prague dukes and kings, while Dukes of Brno and especially those of Znojmo were much more insubordinate. Moravia reached its height of autonomy in 1182, when Emperor Frederick I elevated Conrad II Otto of Znojmo to the status of a margrave, immediately subject to the emperor, independent of Bohemia. This status was short-lived: in 1186, Conrad Otto was forced to obey the supreme rule of Bohemian duke Frederick. Three years later, Conrad Otto succeeded to Frederick as Duke of Bohemia and subsequently canceled his margrave title. Nevertheless, the margrave title was restored in 1197 when Vladislaus III of Bohemia resolved the succession dispute between him and his brother Ottokar by abdicating from the Bohemian throne and accepting Moravia as a vassal land of Bohemian (i.e., Prague) rulers. Vladislaus gradually established this land as Margraviate, slightly administratively different from Bohemia. After the Battle of Legnica, the Mongols carried their raids into Moravia. The main line of the Přemyslid dynasty became extinct in 1306, and in 1310 John of Luxembourg became Margrave of Moravia and King of Bohemia. In 1333, he made his son Charles the next Margrave of Moravia (later in 1346, Charles also became the King of Bohemia). In 1349, Charles gave Moravia to his younger brother John Henry who ruled in the margraviate until his death in 1375, after him Moravia was ruled by his oldest son Jobst of Moravia who was in 1410 elected the Holy Roman King but died in 1411 (he is buried with his father in the Church of St. Thomas in Brno – the Moravian capital from which they both ruled). Moravia and Bohemia remained within the Luxembourg dynasty of Holy Roman kings and emperors (except during the Hussite wars), until inherited by Albert II of Habsburg in 1437. After his death followed the interregnum until 1453; land (as the rest of lands of the Bohemian Crown) was administered by the landfriedens (landfrýdy). The rule of young Ladislaus the Posthumous subsisted only less than five years and subsequently (1458) the Hussite George of Poděbrady was elected as the king. He again reunited all Czech lands (then Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia, Upper & Lower Lusatia) into one-man ruled state. In 1466, Pope Paul II excommunicated George and forbade all Catholics (i.e. about 15% of population) from continuing to serve him. The Hungarian crusade followed and in 1469 Matthias Corvinus conquered Moravia and proclaimed himself (with assistance of rebelling Bohemian nobility) as the king of Bohemia. The subsequent 21-year period of a divided kingdom was decisive for the rising awareness of a specific Moravian identity, distinct from that of Bohemia. Although Moravia was reunited with Bohemia in 1490 when Vladislaus Jagiellon, king of Bohemia, also became king of Hungary, some attachment to Moravian "freedoms" and resistance to government by Prague continued until the end of independence in 1620. In 1526, Vladislaus' son Louis died in battle and the Habsburg Ferdinand I was elected as his successor. Habsburg rule (1526–1918) After the death of King Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia in 1526, Ferdinand I of Austria was elected King of Bohemia and thus ruler of the Crown of Bohemia (including Moravia). The epoch 1526–1620 was marked by increasing animosity between Catholic Habsburg kings (emperors) and the Protestant Moravian nobility (and other Crowns') estates. Moravia, like Bohemia, was a Habsburg possession until the end of World War I. In 1573 the Jesuit University of Olomouc was established; this was the first university in Moravia. The establishment of a special papal seminary, Collegium Nordicum, made the University a centre of the Catholic Reformation and effort to revive Catholicism in Central and Northern Europe. The second largest group of students were from Scandinavia. Brno and Olomouc served as Moravia's capitals until 1641. As the only city to successfully resist the Swedish invasion, Brno become the sole capital following the capture of Olomouc. The Margraviate of Moravia had, from 1348 in Olomouc and Brno, its own Diet, or parliament, zemský sněm (Landtag in German), whose deputies from 1905 onward were elected separately from the ethnically separate German and Czech constituencies. The oldest surviving theatre building in Central Europe, the Reduta Theatre, was established in 17th-century Moravia. Ottoman Turks and Tatars invaded the region in 1663, taking 12,000 captives. In 1740, Moravia was invaded by Prussian forces under Frederick the Great, and Olomouc was forced to surrender on 27 December 1741. A few months later the Prussians were repelled, mainly because of their unsuccessful siege of Brno in 1742. In 1758, Olomouc was besieged by Prussians again, but this time its defenders forced the Prussians to withdraw following the Battle of Domstadtl. In 1777, a new Moravian bishopric was established in Brno, and the Olomouc bishopric was elevated to an archbishopric. In 1782, the Margraviate of Moravia was merged with Austrian Silesia into Moravia-Silesia, with Brno as its capital. This lasted until 1850. Moravia was briefly one of 17 former crown lands of the Cisleithanian part of Austria-Hungary after 1867. According to Austro-Hungarian census of 1910 the proportion of Czechs in the population of Moravia at the time (2.622.000) was 71.8%, while the proportion of Germans was 27.6%. 20th century Following the break-up of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1918, Moravia became part of Czechoslovakia. As one of the five lands of Czechoslovakia, it had restricted autonomy. In 1928 Moravia ceased to exist as a territorial unity and was merged with Czech Silesia into the Moravian-Silesian Land (yet with the natural dominance of Moravia). By the Munich Agreement (1938), the southwestern and northern peripheries of Moravia, which had a German-speaking majority, were annexed by Nazi Germany, and during the German occupation of Czechoslovakia (1939–1945), the remnant of Moravia was an administrative unit within the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. In 1945 after the end of World War II and Allied defeat of Germany, Czechoslovakia expelled the ethnic German minority of Moravia to Germany and Austria. The Moravian-Silesian Land was restored with Moravia as part of it and towns and villages that were left by the former German inhabitants, were re-settled by Czechs, Slovaks and reemigrants. In 1949 the territorial division of Czechoslovakia was radically changed, as the Moravian-Silesian Land was abolished and Lands were replaced by "kraje" (regions), whose borders substantially differ from the historical Bohemian-Moravian border, so Moravia politically ceased to exist after more than 1100 years (833–1949) of its history. Although another administrative reform in 1960 implemented (among others) the North Moravian and the South Moravian regions (Severomoravský and Jihomoravský kraj), with capitals in Ostrava and Brno respectively, their joint area was only roughly alike the historical state and, chiefly, there was no land or federal autonomy, unlike Slovakia. After the fall of the Soviet Union and the whole Eastern Bloc, the Czechoslovak Federal Assembly condemned the cancellation of Moravian-Silesian land and expressed "firm conviction that this injustice will be corrected" in 1990. However, after the breakup of Czechoslovakia into Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993, Moravian area remained integral to the Czech territory, and the latest administrative division of Czech Republic (introduced in 2000) is similar to the administrative division of 1949. Nevertheless, the federalist or separatist movement in Moravia is completely marginal. The centuries-lasting historical Bohemian-Moravian border has been preserved up to now only by the Czech Roman Catholic Administration, as the Ecclesiastical Province of Moravia corresponds with the former Moravian-Silesian Land. The popular perception of the Bohemian-Moravian border's location is distorted by the memory of the 1960 regions (whose boundaries are still partly in use). Economy An area in South Moravia, around Hodonín and Břeclav, is part of the Viennese Basin. Petroleum and lignite are found there in abundance. The main economic centres of Moravia are Brno, Olomouc and Zlín, plus Ostrava lying directly on the Moravian–Silesian border. As well as agriculture in general, Moravia is noted for its viticulture; it contains 94% of the Czech Republic's vineyards and is at the centre of the country's wine industry. Wallachia have at least a 400-year-old tradition of slivovitz making. The Czech automotive industry also had a large role in the industry of Moravia in the 20th century; the factories of Wikov in Prostějov and Tatra in Kopřivnice produced many automobiles. Moravia is also the centre of the Czech firearm industry, as the vast majority of Czech firearms manufacturers (e.g. CZUB, Zbrojovka Brno, Czech Small Arms, Czech Weapons, ZVI, Great Gun) are found in Moravia. Almost all the well-known Czech sporting, self-defence, military and hunting firearms are made in Moravia. Meopta rifle scopes are of Moravian origin. The original Bren gun was conceived here, as were the assault rifles the CZ-805 BREN and Sa vz. 58, and the handguns CZ 75 and ZVI Kevin (also known as the "Micro Desert Eagle"). The Zlín Region hosts several aircraft manufacturers, namely Let Kunovice (also known as Aircraft Industries, a.s.), ZLIN AIRCRAFT a.s. Otrokovice (formerly known under the name Moravan Otrokovice), Evektor-Aerotechnik and Czech Sport Aircraft. Sport aircraft are also manufactured in Jihlava by Jihlavan Airplanes/Skyleader. Aircraft production in the region started in 1930s; after a period of low production post-1989, there are signs of recovery post-2010, and production is expected to grow from 2013 onwards. Machinery industry The machinery industry has been the most important industrial sector in the region, especially in South Moravia, for many decades. The main centres of machinery production are Brno (Zbrojovka Brno, Zetor, První brněnská strojírna, Siemens), Blansko (ČKD Blansko, Metra), Kuřim (TOS Kuřim), Boskovice (Minerva, Novibra) and Břeclav (Otis Elevator Company). A number of other, smaller machinery and machine parts factories, companies and workshops are spread over Moravia. Electrical industry The beginnings of the electrical industry in Moravia date back to 1918. The biggest centres of electrical production are Brno (VUES, ZPA Brno, EM Brno), Drásov, Frenštát pod Radhoštěm and Mohelnice (currently Siemens). Cities and towns Cities Brno, c. 381,000 inhabitants, former land capital and nowadays capital of South Moravian Region; industrial, judicial, educational and research centre; railway and motorway junction Ostrava, c. 288,000 inh. (central part, Moravská Ostrava, lies historically in Moravia, most of the outskirts are in Czech Silesia), capital of Moravian-Silesian Region, centre of heavy industry Olomouc, c. 101,000 inh., capital of Olomouc Region, medieval land capital, seat of Roman Catholic archbishop, cultural centre of Hanakia and Central Moravia Zlín, c. 75,000 inh., capital of Zlín Region, modern city developed after World War I by the Bata Shoes company Frýdek-Místek, c. 56,000 inh., twin-city lying directly on the old Moravian-Silesian border (the western part, Místek, is Moravian), in the industrial area around Ostrava Jihlava, c. 51,000 inh. (mostly in Moravia, northwestern periphery lies in Bohemia), capital of Vysočina Region, centre of the Moravian Highlands Prostějov, c. 44,000 inh., former centre of clothing and fashion industry, birthplace of Edmund Husserl Přerov, c. 43,000 inh., important railway hub and archeological site (Předmostí) Towns Třebíč (35,000), another centre in the Highlands, with exceptionally preserved Jewish quarter Znojmo (34,000), historical and cultural centre of southwestern Moravia Kroměříž (29,000), historical town in southern Hanakia Vsetín (26,000), centre of the Moravian Wallachia Šumperk (26,000), centre of the north of Moravia, at the foot of Hrubý Jeseník Uherské Hradiště (25,000), cultural centre of the Moravian Slovakia Břeclav (25,000), important railway hub in the very south of Moravia Hodonín (25,000), another town in the Moravian Slovakia, the birthplace of Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk Nový Jičín (23,000), historical town with hatting industry Valašské Meziříčí (22,000), centre of chemical industry in Moravian Wallachia Kopřivnice (22,000), centre of automotive industry (Tatra), south from Ostrava Vyškov (21,000), local centre at a motorway junction halfway between Brno and Olomouc Žďár nad Sázavou (21,000), industrial town in the Highlands, near the border with Bohemia Blansko (20,000), industrial town north from Brno, at the foot of the Moravian Karst People The Moravians are generally a Slavic ethnic group who speak various (generally more archaic) dialects of Czech. Before the expulsion of Germans from Moravia the Moravian German minority also referred to themselves as "Moravians" (Mährer). Those expelled and their descendants continue to identify as Moravian. Some Moravians assert that Moravian is a language distinct from Czech; however, their position is not widely supported by academics and the public. Some Moravians identify as an ethnically distinct group; the majority consider themselves to be ethnically Czech. In the census of 1991 (the first census in history in which respondents were allowed to claim Moravian nationality), 1,362,000 (13.2%) of the Czech population identified as being of Moravian nationality (or ethnicity). In some parts of Moravia (mostly in the centre and south), majority of the population identified as Moravians, rather than Czechs. In the census of 2001, the number of Moravians had decreased to 380,000 (3.7% of the country's population). In the census of 2011, this number rose to 522,474 (4.9% of the Czech population). Moravia historically had a large minority of ethnic Germans, some of whom had arrived as early as the 13th century at the behest of the Přemyslid dynasty. Germans continued to come to Moravia in waves, culminating in the 18th century. They lived in the main city centres and in the countryside along the border with Austria (stretching up to Brno) and along the border with Silesia at Jeseníky, and also in two language islands, around Jihlava and around Moravská Třebová. After the Second World War, the Czechoslovak government almost fully expelled them in retaliation for their support of Nazi Germany's invasion and dismemberment of Czechoslovakia (1938-1939) and subsequent German war crimes (1938-1945) towards the Czech, Moravian, and Jewish populations. Moravians Notable people from Moravia include (in order of birth): Anton Pilgram (1450–1516), architect, sculptor and woodcarver Jan Ámos Komenský (Comenius) (1592–1670), educator and theologian, last bishop of Unity of the Brethren Georg Joseph Camellus (1661–1706), Jesuit missionary to the Philippines, pharmacist and botanist David Zeisberger (1717–1807) Moravian missionary to the Leni Lenape, "Apostle to the Indians" Georgius Prochaska (1749–1820), ophthalmologist and physiologist František Palacký (1798–1876), historian and politician, "The Father of the Czech nation" Gregor Mendel (1822–1884), founder of genetics Ernst Mach (1838–1916), physicist and philosopher Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk (1850–1937), philosopher and politician, first president of Czechoslovakia Leoš Janáček (1854–1928), composer Sigmund Freud (1856–1939), founder of psychoanalysis Edmund Husserl (1859–1938), philosopher Alfons Mucha (1860–1939), painter Zdeňka Wiedermannová-Motyčková (1868–1915), women's rights activist Adolf Loos (1870–1933), architect, pioneer of functionalism Karl Renner (1870–1950), Austrian statesman, co-founder of Friends of Nature movement Tomáš Baťa (1876–1932), entrepreneur, founder of Bata Shoes company Joseph Schumpeter (1883–1950), economist and political scientist Marie Jeritza (1887–1982), soprano singer Hans Krebs (1888–1947), Nazi SS Brigadeführer executed for war crimes Ludvík Svoboda (1895–1979), general of I Czechoslovak Army Corps, seventh president of Czechoslovakia Klement Gottwald (1896–1953), first Czechoslovak communist president Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897–1957), composer George Placzek (1905–1955), physicist, participant in Manhattan Project Kurt Gödel (1906–1978), theoretical mathematician Oskar Schindler (1908–1974), Nazi Germany entrepreneur, saviour of almost 1,200 Jews during the WWII Jan Kubiš (1913–1942), paratrooper who assassinated Nazi despot R. Heydrich Bohumil Hrabal (1914–1997), writer Thomas J. Bata (1914–2008), entrepreneur, son of Tomáš Baťa and former head of the Bata shoe company Emil Zátopek (1922–2000), long-distance runner, multiple Olympic gold medalist Karel Reisz (1926–2002), filmmaker, pioneer of the British Free Cinema movement Milan Kundera (born 1929), writer Václav Nedomanský (born 1944), ice hockey player Karel Kryl (1944–1994), poet and protest singer-songwriter Karel Loprais (1949-2021), truck race driver, multiple winner of the Dakar Rally Ivana Trump (born 1949), socialite and business magnate, former wife of Donald Trump Ivan Lendl (born 1959), tennis player Petr Nečas (born 1964), politician, Czech Prime Minister 2010–2013 Jana Novotná (1968–2017), tennis player Jiří Šlégr (born 1971), ice hockey player, member of the Triple Gold Club Bohuslav Sobotka (born 1971), social-democratic politician, Czech Prime Minister 2014–2017 Magdalena Kožená (born 1973), mezzo-soprano Markéta Irglová (born 1988), Academy awarded singer-songwriter Petra Kvitová (born 1990), tennis player Adam Ondra (born 1993), rock climber Barbora Krejčíková (born 1996), tennis player Ethnographic regions Moravia can be divided on dialectal and lore basis into several ethnographic regions of comparable significance. In this sense, it is more heterogenous than Bohemia. Significant parts of Moravia, usually those formerly inhabited by the German speakers, are dialectally indifferent, as they have been resettled by people from various Czech (and Slovak) regions. The principal cultural regions of Moravia are: Hanakia (Haná) in the central and northern part Lachia (Lašsko) in the northeastern tip Highlands (Horácko) in the west Moravian Slovakia (Slovácko) in the southeast Moravian Wallachia (Valašsko) in the east Places of interest World Heritage Sites Gardens and Castle at Kroměříž Historic Centre of Telč Holy Trinity Column in Olomouc Jewish Quarter and St Procopius' Basilica in Třebíč Lednice-Valtice Cultural Landscape Pilgrimage Church of St John of Nepomuk at Zelená Hora Tugendhat Villa in Brno Other Hranice Abyss, the deepest known underwater cave in the world See also Extreme points of Moravia Flag of Moravia German South Moravia Moravian traditional music Notes References Further reading The Penny Cyclopaedia of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful ... (1877), volume 15. London, Charles Knight. Moravia. pp. 397–398. The New Encyclopædia Britannica (2003). Chicago, New Delhi, Paris, Seoul, Sydney, Taipei, Tokyo. Volume 8. p. 309. Moravia. . Filip, Jan (1964). The Great Moravia exhibition. ČSAV (Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences). Galuška, Luděk, Mitáček Jiří, Novotná, Lea (eds.) (2010) Treausures of Moravia: story of historical land. Brno, Moravian Museum. . National Geographic Society. Wonders of the Ancient World; National Geographic Atlas of Archaeology, Norman Hammond, consultant, Nat'l Geogr. Soc., (multiple staff authors), (Nat'l Geogr., R. H. Donnelley & Sons, Willard, OH), 1994, 1999, Reg or Deluxe Ed., 304 pp. Deluxe ed. photo (p. 248): "Venus, Dolni Věstonice, 24,000 B.C." In section titled: "The Potter's Art", pp. 246–253. Dekan, Jan (1981). Moravia Magna: The Great Moravian Empire, Its Art and Time, Minneapolis: Control Data Arts. . Hugh, Agnew (2004). The Czechs and the Lands of the Bohemian Crown.Hoower Press, Stanford. . Róna-Tas, András (1999) Hungarians & Europe in the Early Middle Ages: An Introduction to Early Hungarian History translated by Nicholas Bodoczky, Central European University Press, Budapest, . Wihoda, Martin (2015), Vladislaus Henry: The Formation of Moravian Identity. Brill Publishers . Kirschbaum, Stanislav J. (1996) A History of Slovakia: The Struggle for Survival St. Martin's Press, New York, . Constantine Porphyrogenitus De Administrando Imperio edited by Gy. Moravcsik, translated by R. J. H. Jenkins, Dumbarton Oaks Edition, Washington, D.C. (1993) Hlobil, Ivo, Daniel, Ladislav (2000), The last flowers of the middle ages: from the gothic to the renaissance in Moravia and Silesia. Olomouc/Brno, Moravian Galery, Muzeum umění Olomouc David, Jiří (2009). "Moravian estatism and provincial councils in the second half of the 17th century". Folia historica Bohemica. 1 24: 111–165. . Svoboda, Jiří A. (1999), Hunters between East and West: the paleolithic of Moravia. New York: Plenum Press, . Absolon, Karel (1949), The diluvial anthropomorphic statuettes and drawings, especially the so-called Venus statuettes, discovered in Moravia New York, Salmony 1949. . Musil, Rudolf (1971), G. Mendel's Discovery and the Development of Agricultural and Natural Sciences in Moravia. Brno, Moravian Museum. Šimsa, Martin (2009), Open-Air Museum of Rural Architecture in South-East Moravia. Strážnice, National Institute of Folk Culture. . Miller, Michael R. (2010), The Jews of Moravia in the Age of Emancipation, Cover of Rabbis and Revolution edition. Stanford University Press. . Bata, Thomas J. (1990), Bata: Shoemaker to the World. Stoddart Publishers Canada. . Procházka, Jiří (2009), "Vienna obsessa. Thesaurus Moraviae". Brno, ITEM, . External links Moravian museum official website Moravian gallery official website Moravian library official website Moravian land archive official website Province of Moravia – Czech Catholic Church – official website Welcome to the 2nd largest city of the CR Welcome to Olomouc, city of good cheer... Znojmo – City of Virtue Counties of the Holy Roman Empire Geography of Central Europe Geography of the Czech Republic Historic counties in Moravia Historical regions in the Czech Republic Historical regions Subdivisions of Austria-Hungary

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray%20Rothbard

Murray Rothbard

Murray Newton Rothbard (; March 2, 1926 – January 7, 1995) was an American heterodox economist of the Austrian School, economic historian and political theorist. Rothbard was a founder and leading theoretician of anarcho-capitalism and a central figure in the 20th-century American libertarian movement. He wrote over twenty books on political theory, history, economics, and other subjects. Rothbard argued that all services provided by the "monopoly system of the corporate state" could be provided more efficiently by the private sector and wrote that the state is "the organization of robbery systematized and writ large". He called fractional-reserve banking a form of fraud and opposed central banking. He categorically opposed all military, political, and economic interventionism in the affairs of other nations. According to his protégé Hans-Hermann Hoppe, "[t]here would be no anarcho-capitalist movement to speak of without Rothbard". Libertarian economist Jeffrey Herbener, who calls Rothbard his friend and "intellectual mentor", wrote that Rothbard received "only ostracism" from mainstream academia. Rothbard rejected mainstream economic methodologies and instead embraced the praxeology of his most important intellectual precursor, Ludwig von Mises. To promote his economic and political ideas, Rothbard joined Lew Rockwell and Burton Blumert in 1982 to establish the Mises Institute in Alabama. Life and work Education Rothbard's parents were David and Rae Rothbard, Jewish immigrants to the United States from Poland and Russia, respectively. David was a chemist. Murray attended Birch Wathen Lenox School, a private school in New York City. He later said he much preferred Birch Wathen to the "debasing and egalitarian public school system" he had attended in the Bronx. Rothbard wrote of having grown up as a "right-winger" (adherent of the "Old Right") among friends and neighbors who were "communists or fellow-travelers". He was a member of The New York Young Republican Club in his youth. Rothbard characterized his immigrant father as an individualist who embraced the American values of minimal government, free enterprise, private property and "a determination to rise by one's own merits ... "[A]ll socialism seemed to me monstrously coercive and abhorrent". Rothbard attended Columbia University, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics in 1945 and a PhD in economics in 1956. The delay in receiving his PhD was due in part to conflict with his advisor, Joseph Dorfman, and in part to Arthur Burns’s rejecting his dissertation. Burns was a longtime friend of the Rothbards and their neighbor at their Manhattan apartment building. It was only after Burns went on leave from the Columbia faculty to head President Eisenhower's Council of Economic Advisors that Rothbard's thesis was accepted and he received his doctorate. Rothbard later said that all his fellow students were extreme leftists and that he was one of only two Republicans at Columbia at the time. During the 1940s, Rothbard became acquainted with Frank Chodorov and read widely in libertarian-oriented works by Albert Jay Nock, Garet Garrett, Isabel Paterson, H. L. Mencken, and Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises. In the early 1950s, when Mises was teaching in the Wall Street division of the New York University Stern School of Business, Rothbard attended his unofficial seminar. Rothbard was greatly influenced by Mises's book Human Action. He attracted the attention of the William Volker Fund, a group that provided financial backing to promote right-wing ideologies in the 1950s and early 1960s. The Volker Fund paid Rothbard to write a textbook to explain Human Action in a form that could be used to introduce college undergraduates to Mises's views; a sample chapter he wrote on money and credit won Mises's approval. For ten years, the Volker Fund paid him a retainer as a "senior analyst". As Rothbard continued his work, he enlarged the project. The result was his book Man, Economy, and State, published in 1962. Upon its publication, Mises praised Rothbard's work effusively. Marriage, employment, and activism In 1953, Rothbard married JoAnn Beatrice Schumacher (September 17, 1928 – October 29, 1999), whom he called Joey, in New York City. JoAnn was a historian and was Rothbard's personal editor and a close adviser as well as hostess of his Rothbard Salon. They enjoyed a loving marriage and Rothbard often called her "the indispensable framework" of his life and achievements. According to Joey, the Volker Fund's patronage allowed Rothbard to work from home as a freelance theorist and pundit for the first 15 years of their marriage. The Volker Fund collapsed in 1962, leading Rothbard to seek employment from various New York academic institutions. He was offered a part-time position teaching economics to engineering students at Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute in 1966 at age 40. The institution had no economics department or economics majors and Rothbard derided its social science department as "Marxist", but Justin Raimondo writes that Rothbard liked teaching at Brooklyn Polytechnic because working only two days a week gave him freedom to contribute to developments in libertarian politics. Rothbard continued in this role until 1986. Then 60 years old, Rothbard left Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute for the Lee Business School at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), where he held the title of S.J. Hall Distinguished Professor of Economics, a chair endowed by a libertarian businessman. According to Rothbard's friend, colleague and fellow Misesian economist Hans-Hermann Hoppe, Rothbard led a "fringe existence" in academia, but he was able to attract a large number of "students and disciples" through his writings, thereby becoming "the creator and one of the principal agents of the contemporary libertarian movement". He kept his position at UNLV from 1986 until his death. Rothbard founded the Center for Libertarian Studies in 1976 and the Journal of Libertarian Studies in 1977. In 1982, he co-founded the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, and was vice president of academic affairs until 1995. Rothbard also founded the institute's Review of Austrian Economics, a heterodox economics journal later renamed the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics, in 1987. After Rothbard's death, Joey reflected on his happiness and bright spirit, saying, "he managed to make a living for 40 years without having to get up before noon. This was important to him." Rothbard was known to be a "night owl". She recalled how Rothbard would begin every day with a phone conversation with his colleague Lew Rockwell: "Gales of laughter would shake the house or apartment, as they checked in with each other. Murray thought it was the best possible way to start a day". Rothbard was irreligious and agnostic about God, describing himself as a "mixture of an agnostic and a Reform Jew". Despite identifying as an agnostic and an atheist, he was critical of the "left-libertarian hostility to religion". In Rothbard's later years, many of his friends anticipated that he would convert to Catholicism, but he never did. The New York Times obituary called Rothbard "an economist and social philosopher who fiercely defended individual freedom against government intervention". Creation of the Mises Institute As a result of the economic works of Murray Rothbard, Hans-Hermann Hoppe, Ludwig Von Mises, and other Austrian economists, the Mises Institute was founded in 1982 by Lew Rockwell, Burton Blumert, and Murray Rothbard, following a split between the Cato Institute and Rothbard, who had been one of the founders of the Cato Institute. Conflict with Ayn Rand In 1954, Rothbard, along with several other attendees of Mises's seminar, joined the circle of novelist Ayn Rand, the founder of Objectivism. He soon parted from her, writing among other things that her ideas were not as original as she proclaimed, but similar to those of Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas and Herbert Spencer. In 1958, after the publication of Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged, Rothbard wrote her a "fan letter", calling the book "an infinite treasure house" and "not merely the greatest novel ever written, [but] one of the very greatest books ever written, fiction or nonfiction". He also wrote: "[Y]ou introduced me to the whole field of natural rights and natural law philosophy", prompting him to learn "the glorious natural rights tradition". Rothbard rejoined Rand's circle for a few months, but soon broke with Rand again over various differences, including his defense of his interpretation of anarchism. Rothbard later satirized Rand's acolytes in his unpublished one-act farce Mozart Was a Red and his essay "The Sociology of the Ayn Rand Cult". He characterized Rand's circle as a "dogmatic, personality cult". His play parodies Rand (through the character Carson Sand) and her friends and is set during a visit from Keith Hackley, a fan of Sand's novel The Brow of Zeus (a play on Atlas Shrugged). Death Rothbard died of a heart attack on January 7, 1995, at the age of 68. He was buried in his wife's plot in Oakwood Cemetery, Unionville, Virginia. Ethical and philosophical views Austrian economics Rothbard was an advocate and practitioner of the Austrian School tradition of his teacher Ludwig von Mises. Like Mises, Rothbard rejected the application of the scientific method to economics and dismissed econometrics, empirical and statistical analysis and other tools of mainstream social science as outside the field (economic history might use those tools, but not Economics proper). He instead embraced praxeology, the strictly a priori methodology of Mises. Praxeology conceives of economic laws as akin to geometric or mathematical axioms: fixed, unchanging, objective and discernible through logical reasoning without the use of any empirical evidence. According to Misesian economist Hans-Hermann Hoppe, eschewing the scientific method and empiricism distinguishes the Misesian approach "from all other current economic schools", which dismiss the Misesian approach as "dogmatic and unscientific." Mark Skousen of Chapman University and the Foundation for Economic Education, a critic of mainstream economics, praises Rothbard as brilliant, his writing style persuasive, his economic arguments nuanced and logically rigorous and his Misesian methodology sound. But Skousen concedes that Rothbard was effectively "outside the discipline" of mainstream economics and that his work "fell on deaf ears" outside his ideological circles. Rothbard wrote extensively on Austrian business cycle theory and as part of this approach strongly opposed central banking, fiat money and fractional-reserve banking, advocating a gold standard and a 100% reserve requirement for banks. Polemics against mainstream economics Rothbard wrote a series of polemics in which he deprecated a number of leading modern economists. He vilified Adam Smith, calling him a "shameless plagiarist" who set economics off track, ultimately leading to the rise of Marxism. Rothbard praised Smith's contemporaries, including Richard Cantillon, Anne Robert Jacques Turgot and Étienne Bonnot de Condillac, for developing the subjective theory of value. In response to Rothbard's charge that Smith's The Wealth of Nations was largely plagiarized, David D. Friedman castigated Rothbard's scholarship and character, saying that he "was [either] deliberately dishonest or never really read the book he was criticizing". Tony Endres called Rothbard's treatment of Smith a "travesty". Rothbard was equally scathing in his criticism of John Maynard Keynes, calling him weak on economic theory and a shallow political opportunist. Rothbard also wrote more generally that Keynesian-style governmental regulation of money and credit created a "dismal monetary and banking situation". He called John Stuart Mill a "wooly man of mush" and speculated that Mill's "soft" personality led his economic thought astray. Rothbard was critical of monetarist economist Milton Friedman. In his polemic "Milton Friedman Unraveled", he called Friedman a "statist", a "favorite of the establishment", a friend of and "apologist" for Richard Nixon and a "pernicious influence" on public policy. Rothbard said that libertarians should scorn rather than celebrate Friedman's academic prestige and political influence. Noting that Rothbard has "been nasty to me and my work", Friedman responded to Rothbard's criticism by calling him a "cult builder and a dogmatist". In a memorial volume published by the Mises Institute, Rothbard's protégé and libertarian theorist Hans-Hermann Hoppe wrote that Man, Economy, and State "presented a blistering refutation of all variants of mathematical economics" and included it among Rothbard's "almost mind-boggling achievements". Hoppe lamented that, like Mises, Rothbard died without winning the Nobel Prize that Hoppe says Rothbard deserved "twice over". Although Hoppe acknowledged that Rothbard and his work were largely ignored by academia, he called Rothbard an "intellectual giant" comparable to Aristotle, John Locke, and Immanuel Kant. Disputes with other Austrian economists Although he self-identified as an Austrian economist, Rothbard's methodology was at odds with that of many other Austrians. In 1956, Rothbard deprecated the views of Austrian economist Fritz Machlup, stating that Machlup was no praxeologist and calling him instead a "positivist" who failed to represent the views of Ludwig von Mises. Rothbard stated that in fact Machlup shared the opposing positivist view associated with economist Milton Friedman. Mises and Machlup had been colleagues in 1920s Vienna before each relocated to the United States and Mises later urged his American protege Israel Kirzner to pursue his PhD studies with Machlup at Johns Hopkins University. According to libertarian economists Tyler Cowen and Richard Fink, Rothbard wrote that the term evenly rotating economy (ERE) can be used to analyze complexity in a world of change. The words ERE had been introduced by Mises as an alternative nomenclature for the mainstream economic method of static equilibrium and general equilibrium analysis. Cowen and Fink found "serious inconsistencies in both the nature of the ERE and its suggested uses". With the sole exception of Rothbard, no other economist adopted Mises' term and the concept continued to be called "equilibrium analysis". In a 2011 article critical of Rothbard's "reflexive opposition" to inflation, The Economist noted that his views are increasingly gaining influence among politicians and laypeople on the right. The article contrasted Rothbard's categorical rejection of inflationary policies with the monetary views of "sophisticated Austrian-school monetary economists such as George Selgin and Larry White", [who] follow Hayek in treating stability of nominal spending as a monetary ideal—a position "not all that different from Mr [Scott] Sumner's". According to economist Peter Boettke, Rothbard is better described as a property rights economist than as an Austrian economist. In 1988, Boettke noted that Rothbard "vehemently attacked all of the books of the younger Austrians". Ethics Although Rothbard adopted Ludwig von Mises' deductive methodology for his social theory and economics, he parted with Mises on the question of ethics. Specifically, he rejected Mises' conviction that ethical values remain subjective and opposed utilitarianism in favor of principle-based, natural law reasoning. In defense of his free market views, Mises employed utilitarian economic arguments aimed at demonstrating that interventionist policies made all of society worse off. On the other hand, Rothbard concluded that interventionist policies do in fact benefit some people, including certain government employees and beneficiaries of social programs. Therefore, unlike Mises, Rothbard argued for an objective, natural-law basis for the free market. He called this principle "self-ownership", loosely basing the idea on the writings of John Locke and also borrowing concepts from classical liberalism and the anti-imperialism of the Old Right. Rothbard accepted the labor theory of property, but rejected the Lockean proviso, arguing that if an individual mixes his labor with unowned land then he becomes the proper owner eternally and that after that time it is private property which may change hands only by trade or gift. Rothbard was a strong critic of egalitarianism. The title essay of Rothbard's 1974 book Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays held: "Equality is not in the natural order of things, and the crusade to make everyone equal in every respect (except before the law) is certain to have disastrous consequences". In it, Rothbard wrote: "At the heart of the egalitarian left is the pathological belief that there is no structure of reality; that all the world is a tabula rasa that can be changed at any moment in any desired direction by the mere exercise of human will". Anarcho-capitalism According to anarcho-capitalists, various theorists have espoused legal philosophies similar to anarcho-capitalism. However, Rothbard was the first person to use the term as in the mid-20th century he synthesized elements from the Austrian School of economics, classical liberalism and 19th-century American individualist anarchists. According to Lew Rockwell, Rothbard was the "conscience" of all the various strains of what he described as "libertarian anarchism", because their advocates (described as Rothbard's former "colleagues"), had often been personally inspired by his example. During his years at graduate school in the late 1940s, Rothbard considered whether a strict adherence to libertarian and laissez-faire principles required the abolition of the state altogether. He visited Baldy Harper, a founder of the Foundation for Economic Education, who doubted the need for any government whatsoever. Rothbard said that during this period, he was influenced by 19th-century American individualist anarchists like Lysander Spooner and Benjamin Tucker and the Belgian economist Gustave de Molinari who wrote about how such a system could work. Thus, he "combined the laissez-faire economics of Mises with the absolutist views of human rights and rejection of the state" from individualist anarchists. Rothbard began to consider himself a "private property anarchist" in 1950 and later began to use "anarcho-capitalist" to describe his political ideology. In his anarcho-capitalist model, the system of private property is upheld by private firms, such as hypothesized protection agencies, which compete in a free market and are voluntarily supported by consumers who choose to use their protective and judicial services. Anarcho-capitalists describe this as "the end of the state monopoly on force". He later came to terms that anarchism identified with socialism, and in an unpublished article wrote that individualist anarchism is different from anarcho-capitalism and other capitalist theories due to the individualist anarchists retaining the labor theory of value and socialist doctrines, suggesting a new term to identify himself: nonarchist. In Man, Economy, and State, Rothbard divides the various kinds of state intervention in three categories: "autistic intervention", which is interference with private non-economic activities; "binary intervention", which is forced exchange between individuals and the state; and "triangular intervention", which is state-mandated exchange between individuals. According to Sanford Ikeda, Rothbard's typology "eliminates the gaps and inconsistencies that appear in Mises's original formulation". Rothbard writes in Power and Market that the role of the economist in a free market is limited, but it is much larger in a government that solicits economic policy recommendations. Rothbard argues that self-interest therefore prejudices the views of many economists in favor of increased government intervention. Race, gender, and civil rights Michael O'Malley, associate professor of history at George Mason University, characterizes Rothbard's "overall tone regard[ing]" the civil rights movement and the women's suffrage movement to be "contemptuous and hostile". Rothbard criticized women's rights activists, attributing the growth of the welfare state to politically active spinsters "whose busybody inclinations were not fettered by the responsibilities of health and heart". Rothbard argued that the progressive movement, which he regarded as a noxious influence on the United States, was spearheaded by a coalition of Yankee Protestants (people from the six New England states and upstate New York who were Protestants of English descent), Jewish women and "lesbian spinsters". Rothbard called for the elimination of "the entire 'civil rights' structure" stating that it "tramples on the property rights of every American". He consistently favored repeal of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, including Title VII regarding employment discrimination, and called for overturning the Brown v. Board of Education decision on the grounds that state-mandated integration of schools violated libertarian principles. In an essay called "Right-wing Populism", Rothbard proposed a set of measures to "reach out" to the "middle and working classes", which included urging the police to crack down on "street criminals", writing that "cops must be unleashed" and "allowed to administer instant punishment, subject of course to liability when they are in error". He also advocated that the police "clear the streets of bums and vagrants." Rothbard held strong opinions about many leaders of the civil rights movement. He considered black separatist Malcolm X to be a "great black leader" and integrationist Martin Luther King Jr. to be favored by whites because he "was the major restraining force on the developing Negro revolution". In 1993 he rejected the vision of a "separate black nation", asking "does anyone really believe that ... New Africa would be content to strike out on its own, with no massive "foreign aid" from the U.S.A.?". Rothbard also suggested that opposition to Martin Luther King Jr., whom he demeaned as a "coercive integrationist", should be a litmus test for members of his "paleolibertarian" political movement. Opposition to war Like Randolph Bourne, Rothbard believed that "war is the health of the state". According to David Gordon, this was the reason for Rothbard's opposition to aggressive foreign policy. Rothbard believed that stopping new wars was necessary and that knowledge of how government had led citizens into earlier wars was important. Two essays expanded on these views "War, Peace, and the State" and "Anatomy of the State". Rothbard used insights of Vilfredo Pareto, Gaetano Mosca and Robert Michels to build a model of state personnel, goals and ideology. In an obituary for his friend, the historical revisionist Harry Elmer Barnes, Rothbard wrote: Rothbard's colleague Joseph Stromberg notes that Rothbard made two exceptions to his general condemnation of war: "the American Revolution and the War for Southern Independence, as viewed from the Confederate side". Rothbard condemned the "Northern war against slavery", saying it was inspired by "fanatical" religious faith and characterized by "a cheerful willingness to uproot institutions, to commit mayhem and mass murder, to plunder and loot and destroy, all in the name of high moral principle". He celebrated Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee and other prominent Confederates as heroes while denouncing Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant and other Union leaders for "open[ing] the Pandora's Box of genocide and the extermination of civilians" in their war against the South. Middle East conflict Rothbard's The Libertarian Forum blamed the Middle East conflict on Israeli aggression "fueled by American arms and money". Rothbard warned that the Middle East conflict would draw the United States into a world war. He was anti-Zionist and opposed United States involvement in the Middle East. Rothbard criticized the Camp David Accords for having betrayed Palestinian aspirations and opposed Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon. In his essay, "War Guilt in the Middle East", Rothbard states that Israel refused "to let these refugees return and reclaim the property taken from them". He took negative views of the two state solution for the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, saying: On the one hand there are the Palestinian Arabs, who have tilled the soil or otherwise used the land of Palestine for centuries; and on the other, there are a group of external fanatics, who come from all over the world, and who claim the entire land area as "given" to them as a collective religion or tribe at some remote or legendary time in the past. There is no way the two claims can be resolved to the satisfaction of both parties. There can be no genuine settlement, no "peace" in the face of this irrepressible conflict; there can only be either a war to the death, or an uneasy practical compromise which can satisfy no one. That is the harsh reality of the Middle East. Historical revisionism Rothbard embraced "historical revisionism" as an antidote to what he perceived to be the dominant influence exerted by corrupt "court intellectuals" over mainstream historical narratives. Rothbard wrote that these mainstream intellectuals distorted the historical record in favor of "the state" in exchange for "wealth, power, and prestige" from the state. Rothbard characterized the revisionist task as "penetrating the fog of lies and deception of the State and its Court Intellectuals, and to present to the public the true history". He was influenced by and called a champion of the historian Harry Elmer Barnes. Rothbard endorsed Barnes's revisionism on World War II, favorably citing his view that "the murder of Germans and Japanese was the overriding aim of World War II". In addition to broadly supporting his historical views, Rothbard promoted Barnes as an influence for future revisionists. Rothbard's endorsing of World War II revisionism and his association with Barnes and other Holocaust deniers have drawn criticism. Kevin D. Williamson wrote an opinion piece published by National Review which condemned Rothbard for "making common cause with the 'revisionist' historians of the Third Reich", a term he used to describe American Holocaust deniers associated with Rothbard, such as James J. Martin of the Institute for Historical Review. The piece also characterized "Rothbard and his faction" as being "culpably indulgent" of Holocaust denial, the view which "specifically denies that the Holocaust actually happened or holds that it was in some way exaggerated". In an article for Rothbard's 50th birthday, Rothbard's friend and Buffalo State College historian Ralph Raico stated that Rothbard "is the main reason that revisionism has become a crucial part of the whole libertarian position". Children's rights and parental obligations In the Ethics of Liberty, Rothbard explores issues regarding children's rights in terms of self-ownership and contract. These include support for a woman's right to abortion, condemnation of parents showing aggression towards children and opposition to the state forcing parents to care for children. He also holds children have the right to run away from parents and seek new guardians as soon as they are able to choose to do so. He argued that parents have the right to put a child out for adoption or sell the rights to the child in a voluntary contract in what Rothbard suggests will be a "flourishing free market in children". He believes that selling children as consumer goods in accord with market forces—while "superficially monstrous"—will benefit "everyone" involved in the market: "the natural parents, the children, and the foster parents purchasing". In Rothbard's view of parenthood, "the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights". Thus, Rothbard stated that parents should have the legal right to let any infant die by starvation and should be free to engage in other forms of child neglect. However, according to Rothbard, "the purely free society will have a flourishing free market in children". In a fully libertarian society, he wrote, "the existence of a free baby market will bring such 'neglect' down to a minimum". Economist Gene Callahan of Cardiff University, formerly a scholar at the Rothbard-affiliated Mises Institute, observes that Rothbard allows "the logical elegance of his legal theory" to "trump any arguments based on the moral reprehensibility of a parent idly watching her six-month-old child slowly starve to death in its crib". Retributive theory of criminal justice In The Ethics of Liberty, Rothbard advocates for a "frankly retributive theory of punishment" or a system of "a tooth (or two teeth) for a tooth". Rothbard emphasizes that all punishment must be proportional, stating that "the criminal, or invader, loses his rights to the extent that he deprived another man of his". Applying his retributive theory, Rothbard states that a thief "must pay double the extent of theft". Rothbard gives the example of a thief who stole $15,000 and says he not only would have to return the stolen money, but also provide the victim an additional $15,000, money to which the thief has forfeited his right. The thief would be "put in a [temporary] state of enslavement to his victim" if he is unable to pay him immediately. Rothbard also applies his theory to justify beating and torturing violent criminals, although the beatings are required to be proportional to the crimes for which they are being punished. Torture of criminal suspects In chapter twelve of Ethics, Rothbard turns his attention to suspects arrested by the police. He argues that police should be able to torture certain types of criminal suspects, including accused murderers, for information related to their alleged crime. Writes Rothbard: "Suppose ... police beat and torture a suspected murderer to find information (not to wring a confession, since obviously a coerced confession could never be considered valid). If the suspect turns out to be guilty, then the police should be exonerated, for then they have only ladled out to the murderer a parcel of what he deserves in return; his rights had already been forfeited by more than that extent. But if the suspect is not convicted, then that means that the police have beaten and tortured an innocent man, and that they in turn must be put into the dock for criminal assault". Gene Callahan examines this position and concludes that Rothbard rejects the widely held belief that torture is inherently wrong, no matter who the victim. Callahan goes on to state that Rothbard's scheme gives the police a strong motive to frame the suspect after having tortured him or her. Science and scientism In an essay condemning "scientism in the study of man", Rothbard rejected the application of causal determinism to human beings, arguing that the actions of human beings—as opposed to those of everything else in nature—are not determined by prior causes, but by "free will". He argued that "determinism as applied to man, is a self-contradictory thesis, since the man who employs it relies implicitly on the existence of free will". Rothbard opposed what he considered the overspecialization of the academy and sought to fuse the disciplines of economics, history, ethics and political science to create a "science of liberty". Rothbard described the moral basis for his anarcho-capitalist position in two of his books: For a New Liberty, published in 1973; and The Ethics of Liberty, published in 1982. In his Power and Market (1970), Rothbard describes how a stateless economy might function. Political activism Throughout his life, Rothbard engaged in a number of different political movements in an effort to promote his Old Right and libertarian political principles. His first political activism came in 1948, on behalf of the segregationist South Carolinian Strom Thurmond's presidential campaign. In the 1948 presidential election, Rothbard, "as a Jewish student at Columbia, horrified his peers by organizing a Students for Strom Thurmond chapter, so staunchly did he believe in states' rights". By the late 1960s, Rothbard's "long and winding yet somehow consistent road had taken him from anti-New Deal and anti-interventionist Robert A. Taft supporter into friendship with the quasi-pacifist Nebraska Republican Congressman Howard Buffett (father of Warren Buffett) then over to the League of (Adlai) Stevensonian Democrats and, by 1968, into tentative comradeship with the anarchist factions of the New Left". Rothbard advocated an alliance with the New Left anti-war movement on the grounds that the conservative movement had been completely subsumed by the statist establishment. However, Rothbard later criticized the New Left for supporting a "People's Republic" style draft. It was during this phase that he associated with Karl Hess and founded Left and Right: A Journal of Libertarian Thought with Leonard Liggio and George Resch, which existed from 1965 to 1968. From 1969 to 1984, he edited The Libertarian Forum, also initially with Hess (although Hess's involvement ended in 1971). The Libertarian Forum provided a platform for Rothbard's writing. Despite its small readership, it engaged conservatives associated with the National Review in nationwide debate. Rothbard rejected the view that Ronald Reagan's 1980 election as president was a victory for libertarian principles and he attacked Reagan's economic program in a series of Libertarian Forum articles. In 1982, Rothbard called Reagan's claims of spending cuts a "fraud" and a "hoax" and accused Reaganites of doctoring the economic statistics to give the false impression that their policies were successfully reducing inflation and unemployment. He further criticized the "myths of Reaganomics" in 1987. Rothbard criticized the "frenzied nihilism" of left-wing libertarians, but also criticized right-wing libertarians who were content to rely only on education to bring down the state; he believed that libertarians should adopt any moral tactic available to them to bring about liberty. Imbibing Randolph Bourne's idea that "war is the health of the state", Rothbard opposed all wars in his lifetime and engaged in anti-war activism. During the 1970s and 1980s, Rothbard was active in the Libertarian Party. He was frequently involved in the party's internal politics. He was one of the founders of the Cato Institute and "came up with the idea of naming this libertarian think tank after Cato's Letters, a powerful series of British newspaper essays by John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon which played a decisive influence upon America's Founding Fathers in fomenting the Revolution". From 1978 to 1983, he was associated with the Libertarian Party Radical Caucus, allying himself with Justin Raimondo, Eric Garris and Williamson Evers. He opposed the "low-tax liberalism" espoused by 1980 Libertarian Party presidential candidate Ed Clark and Cato Institute president Edward H Crane III. According to Charles Burris, "Rothbard and Crane became bitter rivals after disputes emerging from the 1980 LP presidential campaign of Ed Clark carried over to strategic direction and management of Cato". Rothbard split with the Radical Caucus at the 1983 national convention over cultural issues and aligned himself with what he called the "right-wing populist" wing of the party, notably Lew Rockwell and Ron Paul, who ran for president on the Libertarian Party ticket in 1988. Rothbard "worked closely with Lew Rockwell (joined later by his long-time friend Burton Blumert) in nurturing the Ludwig von Mises Institute, and the publication, The Rothbard-Rockwell Report; which after Rothbard's 1995 death evolved into the website, LewRockwell.com". Paleolibertarianism In 1989, Rothbard left the Libertarian Party and began building bridges to the post-Cold War anti-interventionist right, calling himself a paleolibertarian, a conservative reaction against the cultural liberalism of mainstream libertarianism. Paleolibertarianism sought to appeal to disaffected working class whites through a synthesis of cultural conservatism and libertarian economics. According to Reason, Rothbard advocated right-wing populism in part because he was frustrated that mainstream thinkers were not adopting the libertarian view and suggested that former KKK Grand Wizard David Duke and Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy were models for an "Outreach to the Rednecks" effort that could be used by a broad libertarian/paleoconservative coalition. Working together, the coalition would expose the "unholy alliance of 'corporate liberal' Big Business and media elites, who, through big government, have privileged and caused to rise up a parasitic Underclass". Rothbard blamed this "Underclass" for "looting and oppressing the bulk of the middle and working classes in America". Regarding the political program of the former Grand Wizard David Duke, Rothbard asserted that "nothing" in it that "could not also be embraced by paleoconservatives or paleolibertarians; lower taxes, dismantling the bureaucracy, slashing the welfare system, attacking affirmative action and racial set-asides, calling for equal rights for all Americans, including whites". Rothbard supported the presidential campaign of Pat Buchanan in 1992 and wrote that "with Pat Buchanan as our leader, we shall break the clock of social democracy". When Buchanan dropped out of the Republican primary race, Rothbard then shifted his interest and support to Ross Perot, who Rothbard wrote had "brought an excitement, a verve, a sense of dynamics and of open possibilities to what had threatened to be a dreary race". However, Rothbard eventually withdrew his support from Perot, and endorsed George H. W. Bush in the 1992 election. Like Buchanan, Rothbard opposed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). However, he had become disillusioned with Buchanan by 1995, believing that the latter's "commitment to protectionism was mutating into an all-round faith in economic planning and the nation state". After Rothbard's death in 1995, Lew Rockwell, president of the Mises Institute, told The New York Times that Rothbard was "the founder of right-wing anarchism". William F. Buckley Jr. wrote a critical obituary in the National Review, criticizing Rothbard's "defective judgment" and views on the Cold War. Hoppe, Rockwell, and Rothbard's other colleagues at the Mises Institute took a different view, arguing that he was one of the most important philosophers in history. Works Articles The Individualist (April and July–August 1971). Revised and published by the Center for Independent Education in 1979 (). The Mises Institute, with editorial assistance from summer fellow Candice Jackson, published a 1999 edition with the restored original text and included an index provided by Institute Member Richard Perry. (. .) "His only crime Was against the Old Guard: Milken: In the best tradition of free enterprise, he made money by serving the public." Los Angeles Times (March 3, 1992). "Anti-Buchanania: A Mini-Encyclopedia." Rothbard-Rockwell Report (May 1992), pp. 1–13. "Saint Hillary and the Religious Left." (December 1994). "The Other Side of the Coin: Free Banking in Chile." Austrian Economics Newsletter, vol. 10, no. 2. Books Man, Economy, and State. D. Van Nostrand (1962). full text. Second edition (Scholar's Edition) published in Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2004). . Full text. The Panic of 1819: Reactions and Policies. New York: Columbia University Press (1962). Full text. Republished, Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2004). . America's Great Depression. D. Van Nostrand (1973). Full text. Fifth edition published in Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2005). . Power and Market: Government and the Economy. Sheed Andrews and McMeel (1970). full text. Republished, Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2004). . For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto. Collier Books (1973). Full text; audiobook. Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute. . Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays. Libertarian Review Press (1974). Full text. Second edition, Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2000). . Conceived in Liberty (4 vol.). New Rochelle, New York: Arlington House (1975–1979). Full text. Republished, Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2012). . The Logic of Action (2 vol.). Edward Elgar Publications (1997). . Full text. Reprinted as Economic Controversies. Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2011). The Ethics of Liberty. Humanities Press (1982). New York University Press (1998). Full text; audiobook. Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute. . The Mystery of Banking. Richardson and Snyder, Dutton (1983). Full text. Republished in Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2007). . The Case Against the Fed. Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (1994). Full text. Republished in Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2007). . America's Great Depression [5th ed.]. Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (June 15, 2000). An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought (2 vol.). Edward Elgar Publishers (1995). . Vol. 1: Economic Thought Before Adam Smith. Republished in Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2009). Vol. 2: Classical Economics. Republished in Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2009). Making Economic Sense. Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2007). . Full text. The Betrayal of the American Right. Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (2007). . Full text and audiobook, narrated by Ian Temple. Despite posthumous publication in 2007, it appears in print virtually unchanged from the manuscript untouched since the 1970s. Book contributions Introduction to Capital, Interest, and Rent: Essays in the Theory of Distribution, by Frank A. Fetter. Kansas City: Sheed Andrews and McMeel (1977). Foreword to The Theory of Money and Credit, by Ludwig von Mises. Liberty Fund (1981). Full text . "Bramble Minibook" (1973). In: The Essential von Mises. Auburn, Alab: Ludwig von Mises Institute (1988). Full text. Monographs Wall Street, Banks, and American Foreign Policy. World Market Perspective (1984). Full text. Spanish translation. Republished by the Center for Libertarian Studies (1995), and the Ludwig von Mises Institute (2005). Interviews "Interview with Murray Rothbard on Man, Economy, and State, Mises, and the Future of the Austrian School" (Summer 1990). Austrian Economics Newsletter. See also American philosophy Anarcho-capitalism Criticism of the Federal Reserve Hans-Hermann Hoppe Libertarianism in the United States List of American philosophers List of peace activists Milton Friedman Notes Further reading Doherty, Brian (2007). Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement. PublicAffairs. External links Audiobooks by Rothbard at Mises Institute Murray Rothbard full bibliography at Mises.org Rothbard videos at YouTube channel of the Ludwig von Mises Institute Murray N. Rothbard Library and Resources from LewRockwell.com Rothbardiana (Italy) Murray Rothbard Institute (Belgium) 1926 births 1995 deaths 20th-century American economists 20th-century American essayists 20th-century American historians 20th-century American journalists 20th-century American male writers 20th-century American philosophers American agnostics American anarcho-capitalists American anti–Vietnam War activists Jewish American atheists American book editors American economics writers American foreign policy writers American libertarians American male essayists American male journalists American male non-fiction writers American opinion journalists American people of Polish-Jewish descent American people of Russian-Jewish descent American political journalists American political philosophers American political writers Anti-Zionism in the United States Anti-Zionist Jews Austrian School economists Birch Wathen Lenox School alumni Burials in Virginia Cato Institute people Columbia College (New York) alumni Critics of neoconservatism Critics of Objectivism (Ayn Rand) Economists from New York (state) Historians of economic thought Historians of the United States Historical revisionism Jewish agnostics Jewish American historians Jewish American social scientists Jewish anti-communists Jewish philosophers Journalists from New York (state) Libertarian economists Libertarian historians Libertarian theorists Mises Institute people New York (state) Libertarians New York (state) Republicans Non-interventionism Old Right (United States) Paleolibertarianism Philosophers from Nevada Philosophers from New York (state) Philosophy writers Polytechnic Institute of New York University faculty Right-wing populism in the United States University of Nevada, Las Vegas faculty Writers from New York City Historians from New York (state)

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel%20Brooks

Mel Brooks

Mel Brooks (born Melvin Kaminsky; June 28, 1926) is an American actor, comedian and filmmaker. With a career spanning over seven decades, he is known as a creator of broad farces and parodies widely considered to be among the best film comedies ever made. He began his career as a comic and a writer for Sid Caesar's variety show Your Show of Shows (1950–1954) alongside Woody Allen, Neil Simon and Larry Gelbart. With Carl Reiner, he created the comic character The 2000 Year Old Man. He wrote, with Buck Henry, the hit television comedy series Get Smart, which ran from 1965 to 1970. In middle age, Brooks became one of the most successful film directors of the 1970s, with many of his films being among the top 10 moneymakers of the year they were released. His best-known films include The Producers (1967), The Twelve Chairs (1970), Blazing Saddles (1974), Young Frankenstein (1974), Silent Movie (1976), High Anxiety (1977), History of the World, Part I (1981), Spaceballs (1987), and Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993). A musical adaptation of his first film, The Producers, ran on Broadway from 2001 to 2007 and was remade into a musical film in 2005. In 2001, having previously won an Emmy, a Grammy and an Oscar, he joined a small list of EGOT winners with his Tony Award wins for The Producers. He received a Kennedy Center Honor in 2009, a Hollywood Walk of Fame star in 2010, the 41st AFI Life Achievement Award in June 2013, a British Film Institute Fellowship in March 2015, a National Medal of Arts in September 2016, and a BAFTA Fellowship in February 2017. Three of his films ranked in the American Film Institute's list of the top 100 comedy films of the past 100 years (1900–2000), all of which ranked in the top 15 of the list: Blazing Saddles at number 6, The Producers at number 11, and Young Frankenstein at number 13. Brooks was married to actress Anne Bancroft from 1964 until her death in 2005. Their son Max Brooks is an actor and author, known for his novel World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War (2006). In 2021, Brooks published a memoir, All About Me!. Early life and education Brooks was born on June 28, 1926, in Brooklyn, New York City, to Kate (née Brookman) and Max Kaminsky, and grew up in Williamsburg. His father's family were Jewish people from Gdańsk, Poland; his mother's family were Jews from Kyiv, in the Pale of Settlement of the Russian Empire (present-day Ukraine). He had three older brothers: Irving, Lenny, and Bernie. His father died of kidney disease at 34 when Brooks was two years old. He has said of his father's death, "There's an outrage there. I may be angry at God, or at the world, for that. And I'm sure a lot of my comedy is based on anger and hostility. Growing up in Williamsburg, I learned to clothe it in comedy to spare myself problems—like a punch in the face." Brooks was a small, sickly boy who often was bullied and teased by his classmates because of his size. He grew up in tenement housing. At age nine, he went to a Broadway show with his uncle Joe—a taxi driver who drove the Broadway doormen back to Brooklyn for free and was given the tickets in gratitude—and saw Anything Goes with William Gaxton, Ethel Merman and Victor Moore at the Alvin Theater. After the show, he told his uncle that he was not going to work in the garment district like everyone else but was absolutely going into show business. When Brooks was 14 he gained employment as a pool tummler. Brooks kept his guests amused with his crazy antics. In a Playboy interview, he explained that one day he stood at the edge of a diving board wearing a large overcoat and two suitcases full of rocks who then announced: "Business is terrible! I can't go on!" before jumping, fully clothed into the pool. He was taught by Buddy Rich (who had also grown up in Williamsburg) how to play the drums, and started to earn money as a musician when he was 14. During his time as a drummer, he was given his first opportunity as a comedian at the age of 16, filling in for an ill MC. During his teens, he legally changed his name to Mel Brooks, influenced by his mother's maiden name Brookman, after being confused with trumpeter Max Kaminsky. Brooks graduated from Eastern District High School in January 1944 and intended to follow his older brother and enroll in Brooklyn College to study psychology. WWII service Brooks was drafted into the United States Army in 1944. After scoring highly on the Army General Classification Test, a Stanford–Binet-type IQ test, he was sent to the elite Army Specialized Training Program at the Virginia Military Institute to be taught skills such as military engineering, foreign languages, or medicine. When manpower shortages led the Army to disband the training program, Brooks returned to basic training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma in May 1944. Brooks served as a corporal in the 1104th Engineer Combat Battalion, 78th Infantry Division, defusing land mines as the Allies advanced into Nazi Germany. He participated in the Battle of the Bulge. With the end of the war in Europe, Brooks took part in organizing shows for captured Germans and American forces. Career Early career After the war, Brooks' mother had secured him a job as a clerk at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, but Brooks "got into a taxi and ordered the driver to take him to the Catskills", where he started working in various Borscht Belt resorts and nightclubs in the Catskill Mountains as a drummer and pianist. When a regular comic at one of the clubs was too sick to perform, Brooks started working as a stand-up comic, telling jokes and doing movie-star impressions. He also began acting in summer stock in Red Bank, New Jersey, and did some radio work. He eventually worked his way up to the comically aggressive job of tummler (master entertainer) at Grossinger's, one of the Borscht Belt's most famous resorts. He found more rewarding work behind the scenes, becoming a comedy writer for television. In 1949, his friend Sid Caesar hired him to write jokes for the DuMont/NBC series The Admiral Broadway Revue, paying him $50 a week. 1950s: Your Show of Shows In 1950, Caesar created the revolutionary variety comedy series Your Show of Shows and hired Brooks as a writer along with Carl Reiner, Neil Simon, Danny Simon, and head writer Mel Tolkin. The writing staff proved widely influential. Reiner, as creator of The Dick Van Dyke Show, based Morey Amsterdam's character Buddy Sorell on Brooks. Likewise, the film My Favorite Year (1982) is loosely based on Brooks's experiences as a writer on the show including an encounter with the actor Errol Flynn. Neil Simon's play Laughter on the 23rd Floor (1993) is also loosely based on the production of the show, and the character Ira Stone is based on Brooks. Your Show of Shows ended in 1954 when performer Imogene Coca left to host her own show. Caesar then created Caesar's Hour with most of the same cast and writers (including Brooks and adding Woody Allen and Larry Gelbart). It ran from 1954 until 1957. 1960s: The 2000 Year Old Man and Get Smart Brooks and co-writer Reiner had become close friends and began to casually improvise comedy routines when they were not working. Reiner played the straight-man interviewer and set Brooks up as anything from a Tibetan monk to an astronaut. As Reiner explained: "In the evening, we'd go to a party and I'd pick a character for him to play. I never told him what it was going to be." On one of these occasions, Reiner's suggestion concerned a 2000-year-old man who had witnessed the crucifixion of Jesus Christ (who "came in the store but never bought anything"), had been married several hundred times and had "over forty-two thousand children, and not one comes to visit me". At first Brooks and Reiner only performed the routine for friends but, by the late 1950s, it gained a reputation in New York City. Kenneth Tynan saw the comedy duo perform at a party in 1959 and wrote that Brooks "was the most original comic improvisor I had ever seen". In 1960, Brooks moved from New York to Hollywood. He and Reiner began performing the "2000 Year Old Man" act on The Steve Allen Show. Their performances led to the release of the comedy album 2000 Years with Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks that sold over a million copies in 1961. They eventually expanded their routine with two more albums in 1961 and 1962, a revival in 1973, a 1975 animated TV special, and a reunion album in 1998. At one point, when Brooks had financial and career struggles, the record sales from the 2000 Year Old Man were his chief source of income. Brooks adapted the 2000 Year Old Man character to create the 2500-Year-Old Brewmaster for Ballantine Beer in the 1960s. Interviewed by Dick Cavett in a series of ads, the Brewmaster (in a German accent, as opposed to the 2000 Year Old Man's Yiddish accent) said he was inside the original Trojan horse and "could've used a six-pack of fresh air". Brooks was involved in the creation of the Broadway musical All American which debuted on Broadway in 1962. He wrote the play with lyrics by Lee Adams and music by Charles Strouse. It starred Ray Bolger as a southern science professor at a large university who uses the principles of engineering on the college's football team and the team begins to win games. It was directed by Joshua Logan, who script-doctored the second act and added a gay subtext to the plot. It ran for 80 performances and received two Tony Award nominations. The animated short film The Critic (1963), a satire of arty, esoteric cinema, was conceived by Brooks and directed by Ernest Pintoff. Brooks supplied running commentary as the baffled moviegoer trying to make sense of the obscure visuals. It won the Academy Award for Animated Short Film. With comedy writer Buck Henry, Brooks created a TV comedy show titled Get Smart, about a bumbling James Bond-inspired spy. Brooks said, "I was sick of looking at all those nice sensible situation comedies. They were such distortions of life... I wanted to do a crazy, unreal comic-strip kind of thing about something besides a family. No one had ever done a show about an idiot before. I decided to be the first." Starring Don Adams as Maxwell Smart, Agent 86, the series ran from 1965 until 1970, although Brooks had little involvement after the first season. It was highly rated for most of its production and won seven Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Comedy Series in 1968 and 1969. Early work as a director For several years, Brooks toyed with a bizarre and unconventional idea about a musical comedy of Adolf Hitler. He explored the idea as a novel and a play before finally writing a script. He eventually found two producers to fund it, Joseph E. Levine and Sidney Glazier, and made his first feature film, The Producers (1968). The Producers was so brazen in its satire that major studios would not touch it, nor would many exhibitors. Brooks finally found an independent distributor who released it as an art film, a specialized attraction. At the 41st Academy Awards, Brooks won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for the film over fellow writers Stanley Kubrick and John Cassavetes. The Producers became a smash underground hit, first on the nationwide college circuit, then in revivals and on home video. It premiered to a limited audience in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on November 22, 1967, before achieving a wide release in 1968. Brooks later adapted it into a musical, which was hugely successful on Broadway and received an unprecedented 12 Tony awards. With the moderate financial success of the film The Producers, Glazier financed Brooks's next film, The Twelve Chairs (1970). Loosely based on Ilf and Petrov's 1928 Russian novel of the same name about greedy materialism in post-revolutionary Russia, it stars Ron Moody, Frank Langella and Dom DeLuise as three men individually searching for a fortune in diamonds hidden in a set of 12 antique chairs. Brooks makes a cameo appearance as an alcoholic ex-serf who "yearns for the regular beatings of yesteryear". The film was shot in Yugoslavia with a budget of $1.5 million. It received poor reviews and was not financially successful. 1970s: Success as a Hollywood director Brooks then wrote an adaptation of Oliver Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer, but was unable to sell the idea to any studio and believed that his career was over. In 1972, he met agent David Begelman, who helped him set up a deal with Warner Brothers to hire Brooks (as well as Richard Pryor, Andrew Bergman, Norman Steinberg, and Al Uger) as a script doctor for an unproduced script called Tex-X. Eventually, Brooks was hired as director for what became Blazing Saddles (1974), his third film. Blazing Saddles starred Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Harvey Korman, Slim Pickens, Madeline Kahn, Alex Karras, and Brooks himself, with cameos by Dom DeLuise and Count Basie. It had music by Brooks and John Morris, and a modest budget of $2.6 million. A satire on the Western film genre, it references older films such as Destry Rides Again (1939), High Noon (1952), Once Upon a Time in the West (1968), and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948). In a surreal sequence towards the end, it references the extravagant musicals of Busby Berkeley. Despite mixed reviews, Blazing Saddles was a success with younger audiences. It became the second-highest US grossing film of 1974, earning $119.5 million worldwide. It was nominated for three Academy Awards: Best Actress in a Supporting Role for Madeline Kahn, Best Film Editing, and Best Music, Original Song. It won the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Comedy Written Directly for the Screen; and in 2006 it was deemed "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. Brooks has said that the film "has to do with love more than anything else. I mean when that black guy rides into that Old Western town and even a little old lady says 'Up yours, nigger!', you know that his heart is broken. So it's really the story of that heart being mended." When Gene Wilder replaced Gig Young as the Waco Kid, he did so only when Brooks agreed that his next film would be an idea that Wilder had been working on: a spoof of the Universal series of Frankenstein films from several decades earlier. After the filming of Blazing Saddles was completed, Wilder and Brooks began writing the script for Young Frankenstein and shot it in the spring of 1974. It starred Wilder, Marty Feldman, Peter Boyle, Teri Garr, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman and Kenneth Mars, with Gene Hackman in a cameo role. Brooks's voice can be heard three times: as the wolf howl when the characters are on their way to the castle; as the voice of Victor Frankenstein, when the characters discover the laboratory; and as the sound of a cat when Gene Wilder accidentally throws a dart out of the window in a scene with Kenneth Mars. Composer John Morris again provided the score, and Universal monsters special effects veteran Kenneth Strickfaden worked on the film. Young Frankenstein was the third-highest-grossing film domestically of 1974, just behind Blazing Saddles. It earned $86 million worldwide and received two Academy Award nominations for Adapted Screenplay and Best Sound. It received some of the best reviews of Brooks's career. Even notoriously hard-to-please critic Pauline Kael liked it, saying: "Brooks makes a leap up as a director because, although the comedy doesn't build, he carries the story through ... [He] even has a satisfying windup, which makes this just about the only comedy of recent years that doesn't collapse." In 1975, at the height of his movie career, Brooks tried TV again with When Things Were Rotten, a Robin Hood parody that lasted only 13 episodes. Nearly 20 years later, in response to the 1991 hit film Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Brooks mounted another Robin Hood parody, Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993). It resurrected several pieces of dialogue from his TV series, and from earlier Brooks films. He followed up his two hit films with an audacious idea: the first feature-length silent comedy in four decades. Silent Movie (1976) was written by Brooks and Ron Clark, and starred Brooks in his first leading role, with Dom DeLuise, Marty Feldman, Sid Caesar, Bernadette Peters, and in cameo roles playing themselves: Paul Newman, Burt Reynolds, James Caan, Liza Minnelli, Anne Bancroft, and the normally non-speaking Marcel Marceau, who ironically uttered the film's only word of audible dialogue: "Non!" Although not as successful as Brooks' previous two films, Silent Movie was a hit, growing $36 million. Later that year, he was named number 5 on a list of the Top Ten Box Office Stars. High Anxiety (1977), Brooks' parody of the films of Alfred Hitchcock, was written by Brooks, Ron Clark, Rudy De Luca, and Barry Levinson, and was the first movie Brooks produced himself. Starring Brooks, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman, Harvey Korman, Ron Carey, Howard Morris, and Dick Van Patten, it satirizes such Hitchcock films as Vertigo, Spellbound, Psycho, The Birds, North by Northwest, Dial M for Murder and Suspicion. Brooks plays Professor Richard H. (for Harpo) Thorndyke, a Nobel Prize-winning psychologist who suffers from "high anxiety". 1980s–1990s: Later film career By 1980, Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert had referred to Mel Brooks and Woody Allen as "the two most successful comedy directors in the world today ... America's two funniest filmmakers". Released that year was the dramatic film The Elephant Man directed by David Lynch and produced by Brooks. Knowing that anyone seeing a poster reading "Mel Brooks presents The Elephant Man" would expect a comedy, he set up the company Brooksfilms. It has since produced a number of non-comedy films, including Frances (1982), The Fly (1986), and 84 Charing Cross Road (1987) starring Anthony Hopkins and Anne Bancroft—as well as comedies, including Richard Benjamin's My Favorite Year (1982), partially based on Mel Brooks's real life. Brooks sought to purchase the rights to 84 Charing Cross Road for his wife, Anne Bancroft, for many years. He also produced the comedy Fatso (1980) that Bancroft directed. In 1981, Brooks joked that the only genres that he hadn't spoofed were historical epics and Biblical spectacles. History of the World Part I was a tongue-in-cheek look at human culture from the Dawn of Man to the French Revolution. Written, produced and directed by Brooks, with narration by Orson Welles, it was another modest financial hit, earning $31 million. It received mixed critical reviews. Critic Pauline Kael, who for years had been critical of Brooks, said, "Either you get stuck thinking about the bad taste or you let yourself laugh at the obscenity in the humor as you do Buñuel's perverse dirty jokes." Brooks produced and starred in (but did not write or direct) a remake of Ernst Lubitsch's 1942 film To Be or Not to Be. His 1983 version was directed by Alan Johnson and starred Brooks, Anne Bancroft, Charles Durning, Tim Matheson, Jose Ferrer and Christopher Lloyd. It generated international publicity by featuring a controversial song on its soundtrack—"To Be or Not to Be (The Hitler Rap)"—satirizing German society in the 1940s, with Brooks playing Hitler. The second movie Brooks directed in the 1980s was Spaceballs (1987), a parody of science fiction, mainly Star Wars. It starred Bill Pullman, John Candy, Rick Moranis, Daphne Zuniga, Dick Van Patten, Joan Rivers, Dom DeLuise, and Brooks. In 1989, Brooks (with co-executive producer Alan Spencer) made another attempt at television success with the sitcom The Nutt House, featuring Brooks regulars Harvey Korman and Cloris Leachman. It was originally broadcast on NBC, but the network aired only five of the eleven produced episodes before canceling the series. During the next decade, Brooks directed Life Stinks (1991), Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993), and Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995). People magazine wrote, "Anyone in a mood for a hearty laugh couldn't do better than Robin Hood: Men in Tights, which gave fans a parody of Robin Hood, especially Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves." Like Brooks's other films, it is filled with one-liners and the occasional breaking of the fourth wall. Robin Hood: Men in Tights was Brooks's second time exploring the life of Robin Hood (the first, as mentioned above, being his 1975 TV show When Things Were Rotten). Life Stinks was a financial and critical failure, but is notable as the only film Brooks directed that is neither a parody nor a film about other films or theater. (The Twelve Chairs was a parody of the original novel.) 2000s: Musicals and television Brooks' musical adaptation of his film The Producers on the Broadway stage broke the Tony Award record with 12 wins, a record previously held for 37 years by Hello, Dolly! with 10 wins. It led to a 2005 big-screen version of the Broadway adaptation/remake with Matthew Broderick, Nathan Lane, Gary Beach, and Roger Bart reprising their stage roles, and new cast members Uma Thurman and Will Ferrell. In early April 2006, Brooks began composing the score to a Broadway musical adaptation of Young Frankenstein, which he says is "perhaps the best movie [he] ever made". The world premiere was at Seattle's Paramount Theater, between August 7, 2007, and September 1, 2007, after which it opened on Broadway at the former Lyric Theater (then the Hilton Theatre), New York, on October 11, 2007. It earned mixed reviews from the critics. In the 2000s, Brooks worked on an animated series sequel to Spaceballs called Spaceballs: The Animated Series, which premiered on September 21, 2008, on G4 TV. Brooks has also supplied vocal roles for animation. He voiced Bigweld, the master inventor, in the animated film Robots (2005), and in the later animated film Mr. Peabody & Sherman (2014) he had a cameo appearance as Albert Einstein. He returned, to voice Dracula's father, Vlad, in Hotel Transylvania 2 (2015) and Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation (2018). Brooks joked about the concept of a musical adaptation of Blazing Saddles in the final number in Young Frankenstein, in which the full company sings, "next year, Blazing Saddles!" In 2010, Brooks confirmed this, saying that the musical could be finished within a year; however, no creative team or plan has been announced. On October 18, 2021, it was announced that Brooks would write and produce History of the World Part II, a follow-up TV series to his 1981 movie. In 2021, at age 95, Brooks published a memoir, All About Me! Personal life Brooks was married to Florence Baum, a Broadway dancer, from 1953 until their divorce in 1962. They had three children: Stephanie, Nicky, and Eddie. Brooks married actress Anne Bancroft in 1964, and they remained together until her death in 2005. They met at a rehearsal for the Perry Como Variety Show in 1961, and were married three years later on August 5, 1964 at the Manhattan Marriage Bureau. Their son, Max Brooks, was born in 1972, and their grandson, Henry Michael Brooks, in 2005. In 2010, Brooks credited Bancroft as "the guiding force" behind his involvement in developing The Producers and Young Frankenstein for the musical theater, saying of an early meeting with her: "From that day, until her death ... we were glued together." Regarding religion, Brooks stated: "I'm rather secular. I'm basically Jewish. But I think I'm Jewish not because of the Jewish religion at all. I think it's the relationship with the people and the pride I have. The tribe surviving so many misfortunes, and being so brave and contributing so much knowledge to the world and showing courage."On Jewish cinema, Brooks said:"They can be anything and anywhere … if there's a tribal thing, like, the 'please God, protect us' feeling … we don't know where and how it's gonna come out. Avatar was a Jewish movie … these people on the run, chasing—and being pursued." Brooks endorsed Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, in his first-ever public endorsement of a political candidate. Filmography Discography Comedy specials 2000 Years with Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks (World Pacific Records, 1960) 2001 Years with Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks (Capitol Records, 1961) Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks at the Cannes Film Festival (Capitol Records, 1962) 2000 and Thirteen with Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks (Warner Bros. Records, 1973) The Incomplete Works Of Carl Reiner & Mel Brooks (Warner Bros. Records, 1973) Excerpts from The Complete 2000 Year Old Man (Rhino Records, 1994) The 2000 Year Old Man in the Year 2000 (Rhino Records, 1997) Soundtracks The Producers (RCA Victor, 1968) High Anxiety – Original Soundtrack (Asylum Records, 1968) Mel Brooks' History of the World Part I (Warner Bros. Records, 1981) To Be or Not To Be (Island Records, 1984) The Producers: Original Broadway Recording (Sony Classical, 2001) Honors and legacy Brooks is one of the few people who have received an Oscar, an Emmy, a Tony, and a Grammy. He won his first Grammy for Best Spoken Comedy Album in 1999 for his recording of The 2000 Year Old Man in the Year 2000 with Carl Reiner. His two other Grammys came in 2002 for Best Musical Show Album for the cast album of The Producers and for Best Long Form Music Video for the DVD "Recording the Producers – A Musical Romp with Mel Brooks". He won his first of four Emmy awards in 1967 for Outstanding Writing Achievement in Variety for a Sid Caesar special, and won Emmys in 1997, 1998, and 1999 for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series for his role of Uncle Phil on Mad About You. He won his Academy Award for Original Screenplay (Oscar) in 1968 for The Producers. He won his three Tony awards in 2001 for his work on the musical, The Producers for Best Musical, Best Original Musical Score, and Best Book of a Musical. He also won a Hugo Award and Nebula Award for Young Frankenstein. In a 2005 poll by Channel 4 to find The Comedian's Comedian, he was voted No. 50 of the top 50 comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders. The American Film Institute (AFI) lists three of Brooks's films on its AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs list: Blazing Saddles (#6), The Producers (#11), and Young Frankenstein (#13). On December 5, 2009, Brooks was one of five recipients of the 2009 Kennedy Center Honors at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC. He was inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame on April 23, 2010, with a motion pictures star located at 6712 Hollywood Boulevard. American Masters produced a biography on Brooks which premiered May 20, 2013, on PBS. The AFI presented Brooks with its highest tribute, the AFI Life Achievement Award, in June 2013. In 2014 Brooks was honored in a handprint and footprint ceremony at TCL Chinese Theatre. His concrete handprints include a six-fingered left hand as he wore a prosthetic finger when making his prints. On March 20, 2015, he received a British Film Institute Fellowship from the British Film Institute. References Further reading Adler, Bill, and Jeffrey Feinman. Mel Brooks: The Irreverent Funnyman. Chicago: Playboy Press, 1976. . Crick, Robert A. The Big Screen Comedies of Mel Brooks. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2002. . . Holtzman, William. Seesaw, a Dual Biography of Anne Bancroft and Mel Brooks. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1979. . McGilligan, Patrick. Funny Man: Mel Brooks. Harper, 2019, . Symons, Alex. Mel Brooks in the Cultural Industries: Survival and Prolonged Adaptation. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2012. . . Yacowar, Maurice. Method in Madness: The Comic Art of Mel Brooks. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1981. . . Mel Brooks, All About Me: My Remarkable Life in Show Business. New York: Ballantine, 2021. External links Mel Brooks – Box Office Data Movie Director at The Numbers Mel Brooks – Box Office Data Movie Star at The Numbers , video compilation of film clips, 5 minutes Interview with Brooks on NPR's Fresh Air (March 16, 2005) TonyAwards.com Interview with Mel Brooks at Tony Awards site Interview with Mel Brooks biographer James Robert Parish Photographs and literature Mel Brooks at Emmys.com Mel Brooks interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, July 4, 1978 Mel Brooks interview on NPR Fresh Air, December 7, 2021 Living people 1926 births 20th-century American comedians 20th-century American male actors 21st-century American comedians 21st-century American male actors Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni AFI Life Achievement Award recipients American comedy musicians American humorists American male comedians American male film actors American male television actors American male voice actors American musical theatre lyricists American people of German-Jewish descent American people of Polish-Jewish descent American people of Russian-Jewish descent American people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent American satirists American theatre managers and producers Audiobook narrators BAFTA fellows Best Original Screenplay Academy Award winners Broadway theatre producers Comedians from New York City Comedy film directors Counterculture of the 1960s Eastern District High School alumni Ethnic humour Film directors from New York City Grammy Award winners Jewish American comedians Jewish American comedy writers Jewish American male actors Jewish American military personnel Jewish American songwriters Jewish American writers Jewish comedy and humor Jewish film people Jewish male actors Jewish male comedians Kennedy Center honorees Male actors from New York City Military personnel from New York City Musicians from Brooklyn Parodists People from Williamsburg, Brooklyn Primetime Emmy Award winners Secular Jews Silent film directors Songwriters from New York (state) Tony Award winners United States Army non-commissioned officers United States Army personnel of World War II United States National Medal of Arts recipients American Jews

20219

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycoplasma%20genitalium

Mycoplasma genitalium

Mycoplasma genitalium (MG, commonly known as Mgen), is a sexually transmitted, small and pathogenic bacterium that lives on the mucous epithelial cells of the urinary and genital tracts in humans. Medical reports published in 2007 and 2015 state Mgen is becoming increasingly common. Resistance to multiple antibiotics is becoming prevalent, including to azithromycin, which until recently was the most reliable treatment. The bacteria was first isolated from the urogenital tract of humans in 1981, and was eventually identified as a new species of Mycoplasma in 1983. It can cause negative health effects in men and women. It also increases the risk factor for HIV spread with higher occurrences in those previously treated with the azithromycin antibiotics. Specifically, it causes urethritis in both men and women, and also cervicitis and pelvic inflammation in women. It presents clinically similar symptoms to that of Chlamydia trachomatis infection and has shown higher incidence rates, compared to both Chlamydia trachomatis and Neisseria gonorrhoeae infections in some populations. Its complete genome sequence was published in 1995 (size 0.58 Mbp, with 475 genes). It was regarded as a cellular unit with the smallest genome size (in Mbp) until 2003 when a new species of Archaea, namely Nanoarchaeum equitans, was sequenced (0.49 Mbp, with 540 genes). However, Mgen still has the smallest genome of any known (naturally occurring) self-replicating organism and thus is often the organism of choice in minimal genome research. The synthetic genome of Mgen named Mycoplasma genitalium JCVI-1.0 (after the research centre, J. Craig Venter Institute, where it was synthesised) was produced in 2008, becoming the first organism with a synthetic genome. In 2014, a protein was described called Protein M from M. genitalium. Signs and symptoms Infection with Mgen produces a combination of clinical symptoms, but can be asymptomatic. It causes inflammation in the urethra (urethritis) both in men and women, which is associated with mucopurulent discharge in the urinary tract, and burning while urinating. In women, it causes cervicitis and pelvic inflammatory diseases (PID), including endometritis and salpingitis. Women may also experience bleeding after sex and it is also linked with tubal factor infertility. For men, the most common signs are painful urination or a watery discharge from the penis. Polymerase chain reaction analyses indicated that it is a cause of acute non-gonococcal urethritis (NGU) and probably chronic NGU. It is strongly associated with persistent and recurring non-gonococcal urethritis (NGU) responsible for 15 percent to 20 percent of symptomatic NGU cases in men. Unlike other Mycoplasma, the infection is not associated with bacterial vaginosis. It is highly associated with the intensity of HIV infection. Some scientists are doing research to see if Mgen could play a role in the development of prostate and ovarian cancers and lymphomas in some individuals. These studies have yet to find conclusive evidence to suggest a link. Genome The genome of M. genitalium consists of 525 genes in one circular DNA of 580,070 base pairs. Scott N. Peterson and his team at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill reported the first genetic map using pulsed-field gel electrophoresis in 1991. They performed an initial study of the genome using random sequencing in 1993, by which they found 100,993 nucleotides and 390 protein-coding genes. Collaborating with researchers at the Institute for Genomic Research, which included Craig Venter, they made the complete genome sequence in 1995 using shotgun sequencing. Only 470 predicted coding regions (out of 482 protein encoding genes) were identified, including genes required for DNA replication, transcription and translation, DNA repair, cellular transport, and energy metabolism. It was the second complete bacterial genome ever sequenced, after Haemophilus influenzae. In 2006, the team at the J. Craig Venter Institute reported that only 382 genes are essential for biological functions. The small genome of M. genitalium made it the organism of choice in The Minimal Genome Project, a study to find the smallest set of genetic material necessary to sustain life. Pathophysiology There is a consistent association of M. genitalium infection and female reproductive tract syndromes. M. genitalium infection was significantly associated with increased risk of preterm birth, spontaneous abortion, cervicitis, and pelvic inflammatory disease. In addition, this pathogen may latently infect the chorionic villi tissues of pregnant women, thereby impacting pregnancy outcome. Infertility risk is also strongly associated with infection with M. genitalium, although evidence suggests it is not associated with male infertility. When M. genitalium is a co-infectious agent risk associations are stronger and statistically significant. M. genitalium is strongly associated with HIV-1. Diagnosis Recent research shows that prevalence of Mgen is currently higher than other commonly occurring STIs (Sexually Transmitted Infections). Mgen is a fastidious organism with prolonged growth durations. This makes detection of the pathogen in clinical specimens and subsequent isolation, extremely difficult. Lacking a cell wall, mycoplasma remains unaffected by commonly used antibiotics. The absence of specific serological assays leaves nucleic acid amplification tests (NAAT) as the only viable option for detection of Mgen DNA or RNA. However, samples with positive NAAT for the pathogen should be tested for macrolide resistance mutations, which are strongly correlated to azithromycin treatment failures, owing to rapid rates of mutation of the pathogen. Mutations in the 23S rRNA gene of Mgen have been linked with clinical treatment failure and high level in vitro macrolide resistance. Macrolide resistance mediating mutations have been observed in 20-50% of cases in the UK, Denmark, Sweden, Australia, and Japan. Resistance is also developing towards the second-line antimicrobials like fluoroquinolone. According to the European guidelines, the indication for commencement of diagnosis for Mgen infection are: Detection of nucleic acid (DNA and/or RNA) specific for Mgen in a clinical specimen Current partners of individuals who tested positive for Mgen should be treated with the same antimicrobial as the index patient If current partner does not attend for evaluation and testing, treatment with the same regimen as given to the index patient should be offered on epidemiological grounds On epidemiological grounds for sexual contacts in the previous 3 months; ideally, specimens for a Mgen NAAT should be collected before treatment and treatment should not be given before the result are available Screening for Mgen with a combination of detection and macrolide resistance mutations will provide the adequate information required to develop personalised antimicrobial treatments, in order to optimise patient management and control the spread of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Detection of resistance Owing to the widespread macrolide resistance, samples that are positive for Mgen should ideally be followed up with an assay capable of detecting mutations that mediate antimicrobial resistance. The European Guideline on Mgen infections, in 2016, recommended complementing the molecular detection of Mgen with an assay capable of detecting macrolide resistance-associated mutations. Treatment The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends a step-wise treatment approach for mycoplasma genitalium with doxycycline for 7 days followed immediately by a 7 day course of moxifloxacin as the preferred therapy due to high rates of macrolide resistance. If resistance assay testing is available, and the mycoplasma genitalium is sensitive to macrolides; the CDC recommends a 7 day course of doxycycline followed by a 4 day course of azithromycin. If moxifloxacin is not available; the CDC recommends as an alternative regiment, 7 days of doxycycline followed by the 4 day course of azithromycin, with a test of cure 21 days after treatment being required due to the high rate of macrolide resistance. The CDC notes that beta lactam antibiotic are not effective against mycoplasma genitalium as the organism lacks a cell wall. Treatment of Mycoplasma genitalium infections is becoming increasingly difficult due to rapidly growing antimicrobial resistance. Diagnosis and treatment is further hampered by the fact that Mycoplasma genitalium infections are not routinely tested. Studies have demonstrated that a 5-day course of azithromycin has a superior cure rate compared to a single, larger dose. Further, a single dose of azithromycin can lead to the bacteria becoming resistant to azithromycin. Among Swedish patients, doxycycline was shown to be relatively ineffective (with a cure rate of 48% for women and 38% for men); and treatment with a single dose of azithromycin is not prescribed due to it inducing antimicrobial resistance. The five-day treatment with azithromycin showed no development of antimicrobial resistance. Based on these findings, UK doctors are moving to the 5-day azithromycin regimen. Doxycycline is also still used, and moxifloxacin is used as a second-line treatment in case doxycyline and azithromycin are not able to eradicate the infection. In patients where doxycycline, azithromycin and moxifloxacin all failed, pristinamycin has been shown to still be able to eradicate the infection. History Mycoplasma genitalium was originally isolated in 1980 from urethral specimens of two male patients suffering from non-gonococcal urethritis in the genitourinary medicine (GUM) clinic at St Mary's Hospital, Paddington, London. It was reported in 1981 by a team led by Joseph G. Tully. Under electron microscopy, it appears as a flask-shaped cell with a narrow terminal portion that is crucial for its attachment to the host cell surfaces. The bacterial cell is slightly elongated somewhat like a vase, and measures 0.6-0.7 μm in length, 0.3-0.4 μm at the broadest region, and 0.06-0.08 μm at the tip. The base is broad while the tip is stretched into a narrow neck, which terminates with a cap. The terminal region has a specialised region called nap, which is absent in other Mycoplasma. Serological tests indicated that the bacterium was not related to known species of Mycoplasma. The comparison of genome sequences with other urinogenital bacteria, such as M. hominis and Ureaplasma parvum, revealed that M. genitalium is significantly different, especially in the energy-generating pathways, although it shared a core genome of ~250 protein-encoding genes. Synthetic genome On 6 October 2007, Craig Venter announced that a team of scientists led by Nobel laureate Hamilton Smith at the J. Craig Venter Institute had successfully constructed synthetic DNA with which they planned to make the first synthetic genome. Reporting in The Guardian, Venter said that they had stitched together a DNA strand containing 381 genes, consisting of 580,000 base pairs, based on the genome of M. genitalium. On 24 January 2008, they announced the successful creation of a synthetic bacterium, which they named Mycoplasma genitalium JCVI-1.0 (the name of the strain indicating J. Craig Venter Institute with its specimen number). They synthesised and assembled the complete 582,970-base pair genome of the bacterium. The final stages of synthesis involved cloning the DNA into the bacterium E. coli for nucleotide production and sequencing. This produced large fragments of approximately 144,000 base pairs or 1/4th of the whole genome. Finally, the products were cloned inside the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae to synthesize the 580,000 base pairs. The molecular size of the synthetic bacterial genome is 360,110 kilodaltons (kDa). Printed in 10-point font, the letters of the genome cover 147 pages. On 20 July 2012, Stanford University and the J. Craig Venter Institute announced successful simulation of the complete life cycle of a Mycoplasma genitalium cell, in the journal Cell. The entire organism is modeled in terms of its molecular components, integrating all cellular processes into a single model. Using object oriented programming to model the interactions of 28 categories of molecules, including DNA, RNA, proteins, and metabolites, and running on a 128-core Linux cluster, the simulation takes 10 hours for a single M. genitalium cell to divide once — about the same time the actual cell takes — and generates half a gigabyte of data. Research The discovery of Protein M, a new protein from M. genitalium, was announced in February 2014. The protein was identified during investigations on the origin of multiple myeloma, a B-cell hematologic neoplasm. To understand the long-term Mycoplasma infection, it was found that antibodies from multiple myeloma patients' blood were recognised by M. genitalium. The antibody reactivity was due to a protein never known before, and is chemically responsive to all types of human and nonhuman antibodies available. The protein is about 50 kDa in size, and composed of 556 amino acids. Future considerations Future research must focus on the development of novel antimicrobials and treatment algorithms that emphasize on dual antimicrobial therapy and AMR testing in treatment protocols. Importantly, most patients with MG are treated syndromically and this treatment is even more compromised by the emerging resistances to several antimicrobials. This also stresses the importance of evidence-based knowledge regarding the activity of novel antimicrobials against several pathogens that cause STIs. The rapid development of AMR in Mgen suggests that single-dose antimicrobial monotherapy may be inappropriate even for uncomplicated STIs. For Mgen, antimicrobial combination therapy and AMR testing, in conjunction with the development and evaluation of new classes of antimicrobials, are of utmost importance. Some of the novel antimicrobials, particularly the fluoroketolide solithromycin, might at least temporarily replace azithromycin in the treatment of Mgen. Ultimately, the only sustainable solution to control these infections might be the development of vaccines, a task that remains to be incredibly difficult with most pathogens of commonly occurring STIs, being unculturable. References External links Mycoplasma genitalium Reference Work at the UK Health Protection Agency Mycoplasma genitalium G-37 genome page Type strain of Mycoplasma genitalium at BacDive - the Bacterial Diversity Metadatabase genitalium Model organisms Organism size Sexually transmitted diseases and infections Synthetic biology Bacteria described in 1983 Pathogenic bacteria Infectious causes of cancer

20221

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehmet%20Ali%20A%C4%9Fca

Mehmet Ali Ağca

Mehmet Ali Ağca (; born 9 January 1958) is a Turkish assassin who murdered left-wing journalist Abdi İpekçi on 1 February 1979, and later shot and wounded Pope John Paul II on 13 May 1981, after escaping from a Turkish prison. After serving 19 years of imprisonment in Italy where he was visited by the Pope, he was deported to Turkey, where he served a ten-year sentence. According to his own words, he converted to the Roman Catholic Church on 13 May 2007 (the 26th anniversary of his deed). Ağca was released from prison on 18 January 2010. He described himself as a mercenary with no political orientation, although he is known to have been a member of the fascist, Islamic Turkish ultra-nationalist Grey Wolves organization and the state-sponsored Counter-Guerrilla. On 27 December 2014, 33 years after his crime, Ağca publicly arrived at the Vatican to lay white roses on the recently canonized John Paul II's tomb and said he wanted to meet Pope Francis, a request that was denied. Early life Ağca was born in the Hekimhan district, Malatya Province in Turkey. As a youth, he became a petty criminal and a member of numerous street gangs in his hometown. He became a smuggler between Turkey and Bulgaria. He claims to have received two months of training in weaponry and terrorist tactics in Syria as a member of the Marxist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine paid for by the Communist Bulgarian government, although the PFLP has denied this. Grey Wolves involvement After training, Mehmet Ali Ağca went to work for the ultranationalist Turkish organization Grey Wolves. On 1 February 1979, in Istanbul, under orders from the Grey Wolves, he murdered Abdi İpekçi, editor of the major Turkish newspaper Milliyet. After being denounced by an informant, he was caught and sentenced to life in prison. After serving six months, he escaped with the help of Abdullah Çatlı, second-in-command of the Grey Wolves, and fled to Bulgaria, which was a base of operations for the Turkish mafia. According to investigative journalist Lucy Komisar, Mehmet Ali Ağca had worked in the 1979 assassination with Abdullah Çatlı, who “then reportedly helped organize Ağca's escape from an Istanbul military prison”. According to Komisar, “some have suggested Çatlı was even involved in the Pope's assassination attempt”. According to Reuters, Ağca had "escaped with suspected help from sympathizers in the security services". Lucy Komisar added that at the scene of the Mercedes-Benz crash where Çatlı died, he was found with a passport under the name of "Mehmet Özbay" — an alias also used by Mehmet Ali Ağca. Assassination attempt on the Pope In 1979 The New York Times reported that Agca, whom it called "the self-confessed killer of an Istanbul newspaperman", had described the Pope as "the masked leader of the crusades" and threatened to shoot him if he did not cancel his planned visit to Turkey, which went ahead in late November 1979. The paper also said (on 28 November 1979) that the killing would be in revenge for the then still ongoing attack on the Grand Mosque in Mecca, which had begun on 20 November, and which he blamed on the United States or Israel. Beginning in August 1980, Ağca began criss-crossing the Mediterranean region. According to Ağca's later testimony, he met with three accomplices in Rome, one a fellow Turk and the other two Bulgarians. The operation was commanded by Zilo Vassilev, the Bulgarian military attaché in Italy. He said that he was assigned this mission by Turkish mafioso Bekir Çelenk in Bulgaria. Le Monde diplomatique, however, has alleged that the assassination attempt was organized by Abdullah Çatlı "in exchange for the sum of 3 million marks", paid by Bekir Çelenk to the Grey Wolves. According to Ağca, the plan was for him and the back-up gunman Oral Çelik to open fire in St. Peter's Square and escape to the Bulgarian embassy under the cover of the panic generated by a small explosion. On 13 May they sat in the square, writing postcards and waiting for the Pope to arrive. When the Pope passed them, Ağca fired several shots and wounded him, but was grabbed by spectators and Vatican security chief Camillo Cibin. This prevented him from finishing the assassination or escaping. Four bullets hit John Paul II, two of them lodging in his lower intestine, the others hitting his left hand and right arm. Two bystanders were also hit. Çelik panicked and fled without setting off his bomb or opening fire. The Pope survived the assassination attempt. Prison time, release, and rearrest Ağca was sentenced in July 1981 to life imprisonment in Italy for the assassination attempt. Following his shooting, Pope John Paul II asked people to "pray for my brother (Ağca), whom I have sincerely forgiven." In 1983, the pope and Ağca met and spoke privately at the prison where Ağca was being held. The Pope was also in touch with Ağca's family over the years, meeting his mother in 1987 and his brother a decade later. On 9 June 1997, Air Malta Flight 830 was hijacked by two men. After landing in Cologne, the hijackers demanded the release of Ağca. He was not released and the hijackers surrendered. After serving almost 20 years of a life sentence in prison in Italy, at the request of Pope John Paul II, Ağca was pardoned by the then Italian president Carlo Azeglio Ciampi in June 2000 and deported to Turkey. Following his extradition to Turkey, he was imprisoned for the 1979 murder of Abdi İpekçi and for two bank raids carried out in the 1970s. Ağca was arrested on 25 June and incarcerated in the Maltepe Military Prison. He fled to Bulgaria on 25 November and was sentenced to death in absentia. Ağca was extradited to Turkey in 2000 by benefiting from the Conditional Amnesty Law. This consideration granted to the ex-convict elicited strong reactions. Both cases about Ağca were merged and tried before the Kadıköy 1st High Criminal Court. The single trial concerned the hijacking of Cengiz Aydos's taxi in 1979, robbing the Yıldırım jewelry store in Kızıltoprak on 22 March 1979 and stealing money from the Fruko soda storage on 4 April 1979. On 18 January 2000, the judges dismissed the charges because of the statute of limitation on the case filed for the jewelry store robbery and for "breach of the Firearms Act" (law no. 6136). For embezzlement and money theft Ağca was sentenced to 36 years of imprisonment. Ağca's lawyers applied for their client's release under Law no. 4516 on Parole and Deferral of Penalties in December 2000. Their request was denied by the 1st High Criminal Court of Kartal. The lawyers filed an appeal against this decision, but the appeals court upheld the ruling. Ağca's life sentence was reduced to 10 years in prison for murder under a Turkish law that shortened prison sentences if served in a foreign prison. The money-laundering conviction and 36-year sentence were overturned because of the statute of limitations for robbery, which was 7 years under Turkish law. In early February 2005, during the Pope's illness, Ağca sent a letter to the Pope wishing him well and also warning him that the world would end soon. When the Pope died on 2 April 2005, Ağca's brother Adnan gave an interview in which he said that Ağca and his entire family were grieving, and that the Pope had been a great friend to them. Ağca was released on parole on 12 January 2006. Mustafa Demirbağ, his lawyer, explained his release as a combination of amnesty and penal reform: an amnesty in 2000 deducted 10 years from his time, the court then deducted his 20 years in the Italian prison based on a new article in the penal code, and so he became eligible for parole for good behavior. However, a report from the French AFP news agency stated that "The Turkish judicial authorities still haven't explained exactly which legal resources he had access to", and former Minister of Justice Hikmet Sami Türk, in government at the time of Ağca's extradition, claimed that, from a legal viewpoint, his release was a "serious mistake" at best, and that he should have not been freed before 2012. However, on 20 January 2006, the Turkish Supreme Court ruled that his time served in Italy could not be deducted from his Turkish sentence and he was again imprisoned. Later developments and release On 2 May 2008, Ağca asked to be awarded Polish citizenship as he wished to spend the final years of his life in Poland, Pope John Paul II's country of birth. Ağca stated that upon his release he wanted to visit Pope John Paul II's tomb and partner with Dan Brown on writing a book. Ağca was released from jail on 18 January 2010. He was transferred to a military hospital in order to assess if, at 52, he was still fit for compulsory military service. The military found him unfit for military service for having "antisocial personality disorder". In a statement, he announced: "I will meet you in the next three days. In the name of God Almighty, I proclaim the end of the world in this century. All the world will be destroyed, every human being will die. I am not God, I am not son of God, I am Christ eternal." The former assassin visited the tomb of John Paul II on 27 December 2014. Ağca manifested a desire to become a Catholic priest in 2016 and go to Fatima, Portugal to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Marian apparitions there (Our Lady of Fátima). Claims of external involvement in the assassination attempt In November 2010, he accused Cardinal Agostino Casaroli as the mastermind behind the assassination attempt on John Paul II in 1981. It has also been alleged that the Soviet Union's KGB ordered the assassination, because of John Paul II's support for the Solidarity labor movement in Poland. Ağca stated this during one of his interrogations before trial. However, when Ağca published his memoirs in 2013, his story changed completely, writing that the Iranian government and Ayatollah Khomeini ordered the assassination attempt on John Paul II. According to this new version of the events, Ağca received instructions and training in weapons and explosives in Iran, from Mohsen Rezai, under the orders of Ayatollah Jaffar Subhani and Ayatollah Khomeini. In his book, Ağca acknowledges that he lied previously about the Bulgarian and Soviet connection. He stayed in Sofia for about a month, but he was not in contact with any Bulgarian or other intelligence officers, he was in transit from Turkey to Western Europe, and was delayed in Sofia because his fake Indian passport was of such poor quality that on several occasions he had to bribe officials who became suspicious. So, he waited to receive a much better quality Turkish passport from the Grey Wolves: a genuine passport issued by the Turkish government to another person, Faruk Faruk Özgün, only the photo of Özgün was replaced by a photo of Ağca. When Pope John Paul II visited him in prison in Italy, on 27 December 1983 (two and a half years after the assassination attempt), Ağca recalls in his memoirs he kissed the hand of the pope, having kissed three years earlier the hand of Khomeini in Iran, and when asked, he told John Paul II that Ruhollah Khomeini ordered the assassination. The claim was subsequently dismissed by the Vatican as a lie. Cultural references Ağca's shooting of the Pope and possible KGB involvement is featured in Tom Clancy's 2002 novel, Red Rabbit, and Frederick Forsyth's novel, The Fourth Protocol. He has also been mentioned in the book, The Third Revelation, by Ralph McInerny, and was portrayed by actors Christopher Bucholz in the RAI production Attentato al papa, Sebastian Knapp in the ABC TV biopic movie Have No Fear: The Life of Pope John Paul II, Massimiliano Ubaldi in CBS' TV miniseries Pope John Paul II (both 2005) and Alkis Zanis in the 2006 Canadian TV sequel Karol: The Pope, The Man. See also Juan María Fernández y Krohn, a former Roman Catholic priest who tried to stab Pope John Paul II in 1982 Rabia Kazan, who interviewed Ali Ağca when he was in prison References External links Timeline 1958 births Living people People from Hekimhan 20th-century criminals Failed assassins Attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II Grey Wolves (organization) members History of the papacy Male murderers 1970s murders in Turkey 1979 crimes in Turkey 1979 murders in Asia 1979 murders in Europe Converts to Roman Catholicism from Islam Far-right politics in Turkey Nationalist assassins People convicted of attempted murder People convicted of robbery People imprisoned on charges of terrorism People with antisocial personality disorder Pope John Paul II Prisoners and detainees of Italy Prisoners and detainees of Turkey Recipients of Italian presidential pardons Self-declared messiahs Smugglers Turkish assassins Turkish former Muslims Turkish Roman Catholics Turkish people imprisoned abroad People sentenced to death in absentia Holy See–Turkey relations Holy See–Italy relations Italy–Turkey relations

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March%2017

March 17

Events Pre-1600 45 BC – In his last victory, Julius Caesar defeats the Pompeian forces of Titus Labienus and Pompey the Younger in the Battle of Munda. 180 – Commodus becomes sole emperor of the Roman Empire at the age of eighteen, following the death of his father, Marcus Aurelius. 455 – Petronius Maximus becomes, with support of the Roman Senate, emperor of the Western Roman Empire; he forces Licinia Eudoxia, the widow of his predecessor, Valentinian III, to marry him. 1337 – Edward, the Black Prince is made Duke of Cornwall, the first Duchy in England. 1400 – Turko-Mongol emperor Timur sacks Damascus. 1601–1900 1776 – American Revolution: The British Army evacuates Boston, ending the Siege of Boston, after George Washington and Henry Knox place artillery in positions overlooking the city. 1805 – The Italian Republic, with Napoleon as president, becomes the Kingdom of Italy, with Napoleon as King of Italy. 1824 – The Anglo-Dutch Treaty is signed in London, dividing the Malay archipelago. As a result, the Malay Peninsula is dominated by the British, while Sumatra and Java and surrounding areas are dominated by the Dutch. 1860 – The First Taranaki War begins in Taranaki, New Zealand, a major phase of the New Zealand Wars. 1861 – The Kingdom of Italy is proclaimed. 1862 – The first railway line of Finland between cities of Helsinki and Hämeenlinna was officially opened. 1891 – collides with in the Bay of Gibraltar and sinks, killing 562 of the 880 passengers on board. 1901–present 1921 – The Second Polish Republic adopts the March Constitution. 1942 – Holocaust: The first Jews from the Lvov Ghetto are gassed at the Belzec death camp in what is today eastern Poland. 1945 – The Ludendorff Bridge in Remagen, Germany, collapses, ten days after its capture. 1948 – Belgium, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom sign the Treaty of Brussels, a precursor to the North Atlantic Treaty establishing NATO. 1950 – Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley announce the creation of element 98, which they name "californium". 1957 – A plane crash in Cebu, Philippines kills Philippine President Ramon Magsaysay and 24 others. 1958 – The United States launches the first solar-powered satellite, which is also the first satellite to achieve a long-term orbit. 1960 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the National Security Council directive on the anti-Cuban covert action program that will ultimately lead to the Bay of Pigs Invasion. 1963 – Mount Agung erupts on Bali killing more than 1,100 people. 1966 – Off the coast of Spain in the Mediterranean, the submarine finds a missing American hydrogen bomb. 1968 – As a result of nerve gas testing by the U.S. Army Chemical Corps in Skull Valley, Utah, over 6,000 sheep are found dead. 1969 – Golda Meir becomes the first female Prime Minister of Israel. 1973 – The Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph Burst of Joy is taken, depicting a former prisoner of war being reunited with his family, which came to symbolize the end of United States involvement in the Vietnam War. 1979 – The Penmanshiel Tunnel collapses during engineering works, killing two workers. 1985 – Serial killer Richard Ramirez, aka the "Night Stalker", commits the first two murders in his Los Angeles murder spree. 1988 – A Colombian Boeing 727 jetliner, Avianca Flight 410, crashes into a mountainside near the Venezuelan border killing 143. 1988 – Eritrean War of Independence: The Nadew Command, an Ethiopian army corps in Eritrea, is attacked on three sides by military units of the Eritrean People's Liberation Front in the opening action of the Battle of Afabet. 1992 – Israeli Embassy attack in Buenos Aires: Car bomb attack kills 29 and injures 242. 1992 – A referendum to end apartheid in South Africa is passed 68.7% to 31.2%. 2000 – Five hundred and thirty members of the Ugandan cult Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God die in a fire, considered to be a mass murder or suicide orchestrated by leaders of the cult. Elsewhere another 248 members are later found dead. 2003 – Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Robin Cook, resigns from the British Cabinet in disagreement with government plans for the 2003 invasion of Iraq. 2004 – Unrest in Kosovo: More than 22 are killed and 200 wounded. Thirty-five Serbian Orthodox shrines in Kosovo and two mosques in Serbia are destroyed. 2016 – Rojava conflict: At a conference in Rmelan, the Movement for a Democratic Society declares the establishment of the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria. Births Pre-1600 763 – Harun al-Rashid, Abbasid caliph (d. 809) 1231 – Emperor Shijō of Japan (d. 1242) 1473 – James IV of Scotland (d. 1513) 1523 – Giovanni Francesco Commendone, Catholic cardinal (d. 1584) 1537 – Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Japanese daimyō (d. 1598) 1601–1900 1611 – Robert Douglas, Count of Skenninge, Swedish field marshal (d. 1662) 1665 – Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre, French harpsichord player and composer (d. 1729) 1676 – Thomas Boston, Scottish philosopher and theologian (d. 1732) 1686 – Jean-Baptiste Oudry, French painter and engraver (d. 1755) 1725 – Lachlan McIntosh, Scottish-American general and politician (d. 1806) 1777 – Patrick Brontë, Irish-English priest and author (d. 1861) 1777 – Roger B. Taney, American politician and jurist, 5th Chief Justice of the United States (d. 1864) 1780 – Thomas Chalmers, Scottish minister, economist, and educator (d. 1847) 1781 – Ebenezer Elliott, English poet and educator (d. 1849) 1804 – Jim Bridger, American fur trader and explorer (d. 1881) 1806 – Norbert Rillieux, African American inventor and chemical engineer (d. 1894) 1820 – Jean Ingelow, English poet and author (d. 1897) 1834 – Gottlieb Daimler, German engineer and businessman, co-founded Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft (d. 1900) 1839 – Josef Rheinberger, Liechtensteiner-German organist and composer (d. 1901) 1842 – Rosina Heikel, Finnish physician (d. 1929) 1846 – Kate Greenaway, English author and illustrator (d. 1901) 1849 – Charles F. Brush, American businessman and philanthropist, co-invented the Arc lamp (d. 1929) 1849 – Cornelia Clapp, American marine biologist (d. 1934) 1856 – Mikhail Vrubel, Russian painter (d. 1910) 1862 – Silvio Gesell, Belgian merchant and economist (d. 1930) 1864 – Joseph Baptista, Indian engineer, lawyer, and politician (d. 1930) 1866 – Pierce Butler, American lawyer and jurist (d. 1939) 1867 – Patrice Contamine de Latour, Spanish poet (d. 1926) 1877 – Edith New, English militant suffragette (d. 1951) 1877 – Otto Gross, Austrian-German psychoanalyst and philosopher (d. 1920) 1880 – Patrick Hastings, English lawyer and politician, Attorney General for England and Wales (d. 1952) 1880 – Lawrence Oates, English lieutenant and explorer (d. 1912) 1881 – Walter Rudolf Hess, Swiss physiologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1973) 1884 – Alcide Nunez, American clarinet player (d. 1934) 1885 – Ralph Rose, American track and field athlete (d. 1913) 1886 – Princess Patricia of Connaught (d. 1974) 1888 – Paul Ramadier, French lawyer and politician, Prime Minister of France (d. 1961) 1889 – Harry Clarke, Irish stained-glass artist and book illustrator (d. 1931) 1891 – Ross McLarty, Australian politician, 17th Premier of Western Australia (d. 1962) 1892 – Floyd B. Barnum, American college football coach (d. 1965) 1892 – Sayed Darwish, Egyptian singer-songwriter and producer (d. 1923) 1894 – Paul Green, American playwright and academic (d. 1981) 1895 – Lloyd Rees, Australian painter (d. 1988) 1900 – Alfred Newman, American composer and conductor (d. 1970) 1901–present 1902 – Bobby Jones, American golfer and lawyer (d. 1971) 1904 – Chaim Gross, Austrian-American sculptor and educator (d. 1991) 1905 – Lillian Yarbo, American comedienne, dancer, and singer (d. 1996) 1908 – Brigitte Helm, German-Swiss actress (d. 1996) 1907 – Jean Van Houtte, Belgian academic and politician, 50th Prime Minister of Belgium (d. 1991) 1907 – Takeo Miki, Japanese politician, 41st Prime Minister of Japan (d. 1988) 1910 – Sonny Werblin, American businessman and philanthropist (d. 1991) 1912 – Bayard Rustin, American activist (d. 1987) 1914 – Sammy Baugh, American football player and coach (d. 2008) 1915 – Robert S. Arbib Jr., American ornithologist, writer and conservationist (d. 1987) 1915 – Bill Roycroft, Australian equestrian rider (d. 2011) 1916 – Ray Ellington, English drummer and bandleader (d. 1985) 1919 – Nat King Cole, American singer, pianist, and television host (d. 1965) 1920 – Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladeshi politician, 1st President of Bangladesh (d. 1975) 1921 – Meir Amit, Israeli general and politician, 12th Israeli Minister of Communications (d. 2009) 1922 – Patrick Suppes, American psychologist and philosopher (d. 2014) 1924 – Stephen Dodgson, English composer and educator (d. 2013) 1925 – Gabriele Ferzetti, Italian actor (d. 2015) 1926 – Siegfried Lenz, Polish-German author and playwright (d. 2014) 1927 – Betty Allen, American soprano and educator (d. 2009) 1928 – William John McKeag, Canadian businessman and politician, 17th Lieutenant Governor of Manitoba (d. 2007) 1930 – Paul Horn, American-Canadian flute player and saxophonist (d. 2014) 1930 – James Irwin, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut (d. 1991) 1931 – Patricia Breslin, American actress (d. 2011) 1931 – David Peakall, English-American chemist and toxicologist (d. 2001) 1933 – Myrlie Evers-Williams, American journalist and activist 1933 – Penelope Lively, English author 1935 – Fred T. Mackenzie, American biologist and academic 1935 – Adam Wade, American singer, drummer, and actor 1936 – Ida Kleijnen, Dutch chef (d. 2019) 1936 – Ladislav Kupkovič, Slovakian composer and conductor (d. 2016) 1936 – Ken Mattingly, American admiral, pilot, and astronaut 1937 – Galina Samsova, Russian ballerina 1938 – Rudolf Nureyev, Russian-French dancer and choreographer (d. 1993) 1938 – Keith O'Brien, Northern Ireland-born Scottish cleric, theologian, and cardinal (d. 2018) 1938 – Zola Taylor, American singer (d. 2007) 1939 – Jim Gary, American sculptor (d. 2006) 1939 – Bill Graham, Canadian academic and politician, 4th Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs 1939 – Robin Knox-Johnston, English sailor and first person to perform a single-handed non-stop circumnavigation of the globe 1939 – Giovanni Trapattoni, Italian footballer and manager 1940 – Mark White, American lawyer and politician, 43rd Governor of Texas (d. 2017) 1941 – Wang Jin-pyng, Taiwanese soldier and politician 1941 – Paul Kantner, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2016) 1941 – Max Stafford-Clark, English director and academic 1942 – John Wayne Gacy, American serial killer and rapist (d. 1994) 1943 – Jeff Banks, Welsh fashion designer 1943 – Andrew Brook, Canadian philosopher, author, and academic 1944 – Pattie Boyd, English model, author, and photographer 1944 – Cito Gaston, American baseball player and manager 1944 – John Sebastian, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1945 – Michael Hayden, American general, 20th Director of the Central Intelligence Agency 1947 – Dennis Bond, English footballer, midfielder 1947 – Yury Chernavsky, Russian-American songwriter and producer 1948 – William Gibson, American-Canadian author and screenwriter 1948 – Alex MacDonald, Scottish footballer and manager 1949 – Patrick Duffy, American actor, director, and producer 1949 – Pat Rice, Irish footballer and coach 1949 – Stuart Rose, English businessman 1951 – Scott Gorham, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1951 – Craig Ramsay, Canadian ice hockey player and coach 1951 – Kurt Russell, American actor and producer 1952 – Barry Horne, English activist (d. 2001) 1953 – Filemon Lagman, Filipino activist (d. 2001) 1953 – Chuck Muncie, American football player (d. 2013) 1954 – Lesley-Anne Down, English actress 1955 – Cynthia McKinney, American activist and politician 1955 – Paul Overstreet, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1955 – Gary Sinise, American actor, director, and bass player 1956 – Patrick McDonnell, American author and illustrator 1956 – Rory McGrath, British comedian, television personality, and writer 1957 – Michael Kelly, American journalist and author (d. 2003) 1958 – Christian Clemenson, American actor 1959 – Danny Ainge, American baseball and basketball player 1959 – Paul Black, American singer-songwriter and drummer 1960 – Arye Gross, American actor 1960 – Vicki Lewis, American actress and singer 1961 – Sam Bowie, American basketball player 1961 – Dana Reeve, American actress, singer, and activist (d. 2006) 1961 – Casey Siemaszko, American actor 1962 – Carsten Almqvist, Swedish business executive 1962 – Ank Bijleveld, Dutch politician 1962 – Janet Gardner, American singer and guitarist 1962 – Clare Grogan, Scottish singer and actress 1962 – Rob Sitch, Australian actor, director, and producer 1963 – Roger Harper, Guyanese cricketer and coach 1964 – Stefano Borgonovo, Italian footballer (d. 2013) 1964 – Lee Dixon, English footballer and journalist 1964 – Rob Lowe, American actor and producer 1964 – Jacques Songo'o, Cameroonian footballer and coach 1965 – Andrew Hudson, South African cricketer 1966 – Andrew Rosindell, English journalist and politician 1967 – Jason Alchin, Australian rugby league player 1967 – Billy Corgan, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, pianist, and producer 1967 – Barry Minkow, American pastor and businessman 1968 – Eri Nitta, Japanese singer-songwriter and actress 1968 – Mathew St. Patrick, American actor and producer 1969 – Edgar Grospiron, French skier 1969 – Alexander McQueen, English fashion designer, founded own eponymous brand (d. 2010) 1970 – Patrick Lebeau, Canadian ice hockey player 1970 – Gene Ween, American singer-songwriter and guitarist 1970 – Darren Kenny, British Paralympic cyclist 1971 – Bill Mueller, American baseball player and coach 1972 – Melissa Auf der Maur, Canadian-American singer-songwriter and bass player 1972 – Torquil Campbell, English-Canadian singer-songwriter and actor 1972 – Mia Hamm, American soccer player 1973 – Rico Blanco, Filipino singer-songwriter, guitarist, producer, and actor 1973 – Caroline Corr, Irish singer and drummer 1973 – Vance Wilson, American baseball player and manager 1974 – Mark Dolan, English comedian and television host 1975 – Justin Hawkins, English singer-songwriter 1975 – Puneeth Rajkumar, Indian actor, singer, and producer 1975 – Test, Canadian-American wrestler (d. 2009) 1975 – Natalie Zea, American actress 1976 – Scott Downs, American baseball player 1976 – Stephen Gately, Irish singer-songwriter and actor (d. 2009) 1976 – Álvaro Recoba, Uruguayan footballer 1977 – Tamar Braxton, American singer-songwriter and actress 1978 – Zachery Kouwe, American journalist 1979 – Stormy Daniels (born Stephanie Gregory), American adult film actress 1979 – Andrew Ference, Canadian ice hockey player 1979 – Stephen Kramer Glickman, Canadian-American actor, director, producer, and fashion designer 1979 – Mineko Nomachi, Japanese essayist 1979 – Samoa Joe, American professional wrestler 1980 – Danny Califf, American soccer player 1980 – Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi, Pakistani tennis player 1981 – Aaron Baddeley, American-Australian golfer 1981 – Servet Çetin, Turkish footballer 1981 – Kyle Korver, American basketball player 1981 – Nicky Jam, American-Puerto-Rican singer and songwriter 1982 – Steven Pienaar, South African footballer 1983 – James Heath, English golfer 1983 – Raul Meireles, Portuguese footballer 1983 – Attila Vajda, Hungarian sprint canoeist 1984 – Ryan Rottman, American actor, producer, and screenwriter 1985 – Tuğba Karademir, Turkish-Canadian figure skater 1986 – Chris Davis, American baseball player 1986 – Edin Džeko, Bosnian footballer 1986 – Miles Kane, English singer-songwriter and guitarist 1986 – Silke Spiegelburg, German pole vaulter 1987 – Federico Fazio, Argentinian international footballer, centre back 1987 – Krisnan Inu, New Zealand rugby league player 1987 – Ryan Parent, Canadian ice hockey player 1987 – Bobby Ryan, American ice hockey player 1987 – Emmanuel Sanders, American football player 1988 – Rasmus Elm, Swedish footballer 1988 – Fraser Forster, English footballer 1988 – Grimes, Canadian artist, musician and music video director 1988 – Ryan White, Canadian ice hockey player 1989 – Shinji Kagawa, Japanese footballer 1990 – Hozier, Irish singer-songwriter and musician 1990 – Saina Nehwal, Indian badminton player 1991 – Jack De Belin, Australian rugby league player 1992 – Patrick Cantlay, American golfer 1992 – John Boyega, English actor 1993 – Matteo Bianchetti, Italian footballer 1994 – Dean Britt, Australian rugby league player 1995 – Ashley Taylor, Australian rugby league player 1997 – Katie Ledecky, American swimmer Deaths Pre-1600 45 BC – Titus Labienus, Roman general (b. 100 BC) 45 BC – Publius Attius Varus, Roman governor of Africa 180 – Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor (b. 121) 624 – Amr ibn Hishām, Arab polytheist 659 – Gertrude of Nivelles, Frankish abbess 836 – Haito, bishop of Basel 905 – Li Yu, Prince of De, prince and emperor of the Tang Dynasty 1008 – Kazan, emperor of Japan (b. 968) 1040 – Harold Harefoot, king of England 1058 – Lulach, king of Scotland 1199 – Jocelin of Glasgow, Scottish monk and bishop (b. 1130) 1267 – Pierre de Montreuil, French architect 1270 – Philip of Montfort, French knight and nobleman 1272 – Go-Saga, emperor of Japan (b. 1220) 1361 – An-Nasir Hasan, Mamluk sultan of Egypt 1394 – Louis of Enghien, French nobleman 1406 – Ibn Khaldun, Tunisian sociologist, historian, and scholar (b. 1332) 1425 – Ashikaga Yoshikazu, Japanese shōgun (b. 1407) 1516 – Giuliano de' Medici, Italian nobleman (b. 1479) 1527 – Rana Sanga, Indian ruler (b. 1482) 1565 – Alexander Ales, Scottish theologian and academic (b. 1500) 1601–1900 1611 – Sophia of Sweden, duchess of Saxe-Lauenburg (b. 1547) 1620 – John Sarkander, Polish-Moravian priest and saint (b. 1576) 1640 – Philip Massinger, English playwright (b. 1583) 1649 – Gabriel Lalemant, French missionary and saint (b. 1610) 1663 – Jerome Weston, 2nd Earl of Portland, English diplomat (b. 1605) 1680 – François de La Rochefoucauld, French author (b. 1613) 1704 – Menno van Coehoorn, Dutch soldier and engineer (b. 1641) 1715 – Gilbert Burnet, Scottish bishop and historian (b. 1643) 1741 – Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, French poet and playwright (b. 1671) 1764 – George Parker, 2nd Earl of Macclesfield, English astronomer and politician (b. 1695) 1782 – Daniel Bernoulli, Dutch-Swiss mathematician and physicist (b. 1700) 1828 – James Edward Smith, English botanist and entomologist (b. 1759) 1829 – Sophia Albertina, princess-abbess of Quedlinburg (b. 1753) 1830 – Laurent de Gouvion Saint-Cyr, French general and politician (b. 1764) 1846 – Friedrich Bessel, German astronomer, mathematician, and physicist (b. 1784) 1849 – William II, Dutch sovereign prince and king (b. 1792) 1853 – Christian Doppler, Austrian physicist and mathematician (b. 1803) 1871 – Robert Chambers, Scottish geologist and publisher, co-founded Chambers Harrap (b. 1802) 1875 – Ferdinand Laub, Czech violinist and composer (b. 1832) 1893 – Jules Ferry, French lawyer and politician, 44th Prime Minister of France (b. 1832) 1901–present 1917 – Franz Brentano, German philosopher and psychologist (b. 1838) 1926 – Aleksei Brusilov, Georgian-Russian general (b. 1853) 1940 – Philomène Belliveau, Canadian artist (b. 1854) 1946 – Dai Li, Chinese general (b. 1897) 1949 – Aleksandra Ekster, Russian-French painter and set designer (b. 1882) 1956 – Fred Allen, American actor, comedian, screenwriter, and author (b. 1894) 1956 – Irène Joliot-Curie, French physicist and chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1897) 1957 – Ramon Magsaysay, Filipino captain and politician, 7th President of the Philippines (b. 1907) 1958 – John Pius Boland, Irish tennis player and politician (b. 1870) 1958 – Bertha De Vriese, Belgian physician (b. 1877) 1961 – Susanna M. Salter, American activist and politician (b. 1860) 1965 – Amos Alonzo Stagg, American football player and coach (b. 1862) 1974 – Louis Kahn, American architect and academic, designed Jatiyo Sangsad Bhaban (b. 1901) 1976 – Luchino Visconti, Italian director and screenwriter (b. 1906) 1981 – Paul Dean, American baseball player (b. 1913) 1983 – Haldan Keffer Hartline, American physiologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1903) 1983 – Louisa E. Rhine, American botanist and parapsychologist (b. 1891) 1986 – Clarence D. Lester, African-American fighter pilot (b.1923) 1990 – Capucine, French model and actress (b. 1928) 1990 – Dinkar G. Kelkar, Indian art collector (b. 1896) 1992 – Grace Stafford, American actress (b. 1903) 1993 – Helen Hayes, American actress (b. 1900) 1994 – Charlotte Auerbach, German-Jewish Scottish folklorist, geneticist, and zoologist (b. 1899) 1994 – Mai Zetterling, Swedish-English actress and director (b. 1925) 1996 – René Clément, French director and screenwriter (b. 1913) 1996 – Terry Stafford, American singer-songwriter (b. 1941) 1997 – Jermaine Stewart, American singer-songwriter and dancer (b. 1957) 1999 – Ernest Gold, Austrian-American composer (b. 1921) 1999 – Jean Pierre-Bloch, French activist (b. 1905) 2002 – Rosetta LeNoire, American actress and producer (b. 1911) 2002 – Văn Tiến Dũng, Vietnamese general and politician, 6th Minister of Defence for Vietnam (b. 1917) 2002 – Sylvester "Pat" Weaver, American television broadcaster and producer (b. 1908) 2005 – Royce Frith, Canadian lawyer, politician, and diplomat, Canadian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom (b. 1923) 2005 – George F. Kennan, American historian and diplomat, United States Ambassador to the Soviet Union (b. 1904) 2005 – Andre Norton, American author (b. 1912) 2006 – Oleg Cassini, French-American fashion designer (b. 1913) 2006 – Ray Meyer, American basketball player and coach (b. 1913) 2006 – İstemihan Taviloğlu, Turkish composer and educator (b. 1945) 2007 – John Backus, American mathematician and computer scientist, designed Fortran (b. 1924) 2008 – Roland Arnall, French-American businessman and diplomat, 63rd United States Ambassador to the Netherlands (b. 1939) 2009 – Clodovil Hernandes, Brazilian television host and politician (b. 1937) 2010 – Alex Chilton, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (b. 1950) 2010 – Sid Fleischman, American author and screenwriter (b. 1920) 2011 – Michael Gough, English actor (b. 1916) 2011 – Ferlin Husky, American country music singer (b. 1925) 2012 – Shenouda III, pope of Alexandria (b. 1923) 2012 – Margaret Whitlam, Australian swimmer and author (b. 1919) 2013 – William B. Caldwell III, American general (b. 1925) 2013 – Lawrence Fuchs, American scholar and academic (b. 1927) 2013 – A.B.C. Whipple, American journalist and historian (b. 1918) 2014 – Marek Galiński, Polish cyclist (b. 1974) 2014 – Joseph Kerman, American musicologist and critic (b. 1924) 2014 – Rachel Lambert Mellon, American gardener, philanthropist, art collector and political patron (b. 1910) 2015 – Frank Perris, Canadian motorcycle racer (b. 1931) 2016 – Meir Dagan, Israeli general (b. 1945) 2016 – Zoltán Kamondi, Hungarian director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1960) 2018 – Mike MacDonald, Canadian comedian (b. 1954) 2018 – Phan Văn Khải, the fifth Prime Minister of Vietnam (b. 1933) 2021 – John Magufuli, the fifth President of Tanzania (b. 1959) Holidays and observances Children's Day (Bangladesh) Christian feast day: Alexius of Rome (Eastern Church) Gertrude of Nivelles John Sarkander Joseph of Arimathea (Western Church) Patrick of Ireland March 17 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Evacuation Day (Suffolk County, Massachusetts) Saint Patrick's Day, a public holiday in Ireland, Montserrat and the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, widely celebrated in the English-speaking world and to a lesser degree in other parts of the world. References Bibliography External links BBC: On This Day Historical Events on March 17 Today in Canadian History Days of the year March

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mummy

Mummy

A mummy is a dead human or an animal whose soft tissues and organs have been preserved by either intentional or accidental exposure to chemicals, extreme cold, very low humidity, or lack of air, so that the recovered body does not decay further if kept in cool and dry conditions. Some authorities restrict the use of the term to bodies deliberately embalmed with chemicals, but the use of the word to cover accidentally desiccated bodies goes back to at least 1615 AD (see the section Etymology and meaning). Mummies of humans and animals have been found on every continent, both as a result of natural preservation through unusual conditions, and as cultural artifacts. Over one million animal mummies have been found in Egypt, many of which are cats. Many of the Egyptian animal mummies are sacred ibis, and radiocarbon dating suggests the Egyptian Ibis mummies that have been analyzed were from time frame that falls between approximately 450 and 250 BC. In addition to the mummies of ancient Egypt, deliberate mummification was a feature of several ancient cultures in areas of America and Asia with very dry climates. The Spirit Cave mummies of Fallon, Nevada in North America were accurately dated at more than 9,400 years old. Before this discovery, the oldest known deliberate mummy was a child, one of the Chinchorro mummies found in the Camarones Valley, Chile, which dates around 5050 BC. The oldest known naturally mummified human corpse is a severed head dated as 6,000 years old, found in 1936 AD at the site named Inca Cueva No. 4 in South America. Etymology and meaning The English word mummy is derived from medieval Latin mumia, a borrowing of the medieval Arabic word mūmiya (مومياء) which meant an embalmed corpse, as well as the bituminous embalming substance. This word was borrowed from Persian where it meant asphalt, and is derived from the word mūm meaning wax. The meaning of "corpse preserved by desiccation" developed post-medievally. The Medieval English term "mummy" was defined as "medical preparation of the substance of mummies", rather than the entire corpse, with Richard Hakluyt in 1599 AD complaining that "these dead bodies are the Mummy which the Phisistians and Apothecaries doe against our willes make us to swallow". These substances were called mummia. The OED defines a mummy as "the body of a human being or animal embalmed (according to the ancient Egyptian or some analogous method) as a preparation for burial", citing sources from 1615 AD onward. However, Chamber's Cyclopædia and the Victorian zoologist Francis Trevelyan Buckland define a mummy as follows: "A human or animal body desiccated by exposure to sun or air. Also applied to the frozen carcase of an animal imbedded in prehistoric snow". Wasps of the genus Aleiodes are known as "mummy wasps" because they wrap their caterpillar prey as "mummies". History of mummy studies While interest in the study of mummies dates as far back as Ptolemaic Greece, most structured scientific study began at the beginning of the 20th century. Prior to this, many rediscovered mummies were sold as curiosities or for use in pseudoscientific novelties such as mummia. The first modern scientific examinations of mummies began in 1901, conducted by professors at the English-language Government School of Medicine in Cairo, Egypt. The first X-ray of a mummy came in 1903, when professors Grafton Elliot Smith and Howard Carter used the only X-ray machine in Cairo at the time to examine the mummified body of Thutmose IV. British chemist Alfred Lucas applied chemical analyses to Egyptian mummies during this same period, which returned many results about the types of substances used in embalming. Lucas also made significant contributions to the analysis of Tutankhamun in 1922. Pathological study of mummies saw varying levels of popularity throughout the 20th century. In 1992, the First World Congress on Mummy Studies was held in Puerto de la Cruz on Tenerife in the Canary Islands. More than 300 scientists attended the Congress to share nearly 100 years of collected data on mummies. The information presented at the meeting triggered a new surge of interest in the subject, with one of the major results being integration of biomedical and bioarchaeological information on mummies with existing databases. This was not possible prior to the Congress due to the unique and highly specialized techniques required to gather such data. In more recent years, CT scanning has become an invaluable tool in the study of mummification by allowing researchers to digitally "unwrap" mummies without risking damage to the body. The level of detail in such scans is so intricate that small linens used in tiny areas such as the nostrils can be digitally reconstructed in 3-D. Such modelling has been utilized to perform digital autopsies on mummies to determine cause of death and lifestyle, such as in the case of Tutankhamun. Types Mummies are typically divided into one of two distinct categories: anthropogenic or spontaneous. Anthropogenic mummies were deliberately created by the living for any number of reasons, the most common being for religious purposes. Spontaneous mummies, such as Ötzi, were created unintentionally due to natural conditions such as extremely dry heat or cold, or acidic and anaerobic conditions such as those found in bogs. While most individual mummies exclusively belong to one category or the other, there are examples of both types being connected to a single culture, such as those from the ancient Egyptian culture and the Andean cultures of South America. Some of the later well-preserved corpses of the mummification were found under Christian churches, such as the mummified vicar Nicolaus Rungius found under the St. Michael Church in Keminmaa, Finland. There are also cases that fall outside of these categories (see Incorruptibility). Egyptian mummies Until recently, it was believed that the earliest ancient Egyptian mummies were created naturally due to the environment in which they were buried. In 2014, an 11-year study by University of York, Macquarie University and University of Oxford suggested that artificial mummification occurred 1,500 years earlier than first thought. This was confirmed in 2018, when tests on a 5,600 year-old mummy in Turin revealed that it had been deliberately mummified using linen wrappings and embalming oils made from conifer resin and aromatic plant extracts. The preservation of the dead had a profound effect on ancient Egyptian religion. Mummification was an integral part of the rituals for the dead beginning as early as the 2nd dynasty (about 2800 BC). Egyptians saw the preservation of the body after death as an important step to living well in the afterlife. As Egypt gained more prosperity, burial practices became a status symbol for the wealthy as well. This cultural hierarchy lead to the creation of elaborate tombs, and more sophisticated methods of embalming. By the 4th dynasty (about 2600 BC) Egyptian embalmers began to achieve "true mummification" through a process of evisceration. Much of this early experimentation with mummification in Egypt is unknown. The few documents that directly describe the mummification process date to the Greco-Roman period. The majority of the papyri that have survived only describe the ceremonial rituals involved in embalming, not the actual surgical processes involved. A text known as The Ritual of Embalming does describe some of the practical logistics of embalming; however, there are only two known copies and each is incomplete. With regards to mummification shown in images, there are apparently also very few. The tomb of Tjay, designated TT23, is one of only two known which show the wrapping of a mummy (Riggs 2014). Another text that describes the processes being used in latter periods is Herodotus' Histories. Written in Book 2 of the Histories is one of the most detailed descriptions of the Egyptian mummification process, including the mention of using natron in order to dehydrate corpses for preservation. However, these descriptions are short and fairly vague, leaving scholars to infer the majority of the techniques that were used by studying mummies that have been unearthed. By utilizing current advancements in technology, scientists have been able to uncover a plethora of new information about the techniques used in mummification. A series of CT scans performed on a 2,400-year-old mummy in 2008 revealed a tool that was left inside the cranial cavity of the skull. The tool was a rod, made of an organic material, that was used to break apart the brain to allow it to drain out of the nose. This discovery helped to dispel the claim within Herodotus' works that the rod had been a hook made of iron. Earlier experimentation in 1994 by researchers Bob Brier and Ronald Wade supported these findings. While attempting to replicate Egyptian mummification, Brier and Wade discovered that removal of the brain was much easier when the brain was liquefied and allowed to drain with the help of gravity, as opposed to trying to pull the organ out piece-by-piece with a hook. Through various methods of study over many decades, modern Egyptologists now have an accurate understanding of how mummification was achieved in ancient Egypt. The first and most important step was to halt the process of decomposition, by removing the internal organs and washing out the body with a mix of spices and palm wine. The only organ left behind was the heart, as tradition held the heart was the seat of thought and feeling and would therefore still be needed in the afterlife. After cleansing, the body was then dried out with natron inside the empty body cavity as well as outside on the skin. The internal organs were also dried and either sealed in individual jars, or wrapped to be replaced within the body. This process typically took forty days. After dehydration, the mummy was wrapped in many layers of linen cloth. Within the layers, Egyptian priests placed small amulets to guard the decedent from evil. Once the mummy was completely wrapped, it was coated in a resin in order to keep the threat of moist air away. Resin was also applied to the coffin in order to seal it. The mummy was then sealed within its tomb, alongside the worldly goods that were believed to help aid it in the afterlife. Aspergillus niger, a hardy species of fungus capable of living in a variety of environments, has been found in the mummies of ancient Egyptian tombs and can be inhaled when they are disturbed. Mummification and rank Mummification is one of the defining customs in ancient Egyptian society for people today. The practice of preserving the human body is believed to be a quintessential feature of Egyptian life. Yet even mummification has a history of development and was accessible to different ranks of society in different ways during different periods. There were at least three different processes of mummification according to Herodotus. They range from "the most perfect" to the method employed by the "poorer classes". "Most perfect" method The most expensive process was to preserve the body by dehydration and protect against pests, such as insects. Almost all of the actions Herodotus described serve one of these two functions. First, the brain was removed from the cranium through the nose; the gray matter was discarded. Modern mummy excavations have shown that instead of an iron hook inserted through the nose as Herodotus claims, a rod was used to liquefy the brain via the cranium, which then drained out the nose by gravity. The embalmers then rinsed the skull with certain drugs that mostly cleared any residue of brain tissue and also had the effect of killing bacteria. Next, the embalmers made an incision along the flank with a sharp blade fashioned from an Ethiopian stone and removed the contents of the abdomen. Herodotus does not discuss the separate preservation of these organs and their placement either in special jars or back in the cavity, a process that was part of the most expensive embalming, according to archaeological evidence. The abdominal cavity was then rinsed with palm wine and an infusion of crushed, fragrant herbs and spices; the cavity was then filled with spices including myrrh, cassia, and, Herodotus notes, "every other sort of spice except frankincense", also to preserve the person. The body was further dehydrated by placing it in natron, a naturally occurring salt, for seventy days. Herodotus insists that the body did not stay in the natron longer than seventy days. Any shorter time and the body is not completely dehydrated; any longer, and the body is too stiff to move into position for wrapping. The embalmers then wash the body again and wrapped it with linen bandages. The bandages were covered with a gum that modern research has shown is both waterproofing agent and an antimicrobial agent. At this point, the body was given back to the family. These "perfect" mummies were then placed in wooden cases that were human-shaped. Richer people placed these wooden cases in stone sarcophagi that provided further protection. The family placed the sarcophagus in the tomb upright against the wall, according to Herodotus. Avoiding expense The second process that Herodotus describes was used by middle-class people or people who "wish to avoid expense". In this method, an oil derived from cedar trees was injected with a syringe into the abdomen. A rectal plug prevented the oil from escaping. This oil probably had the dual purpose of liquefying the internal organs but also of disinfecting the abdominal cavity. (By liquefying the organs, the family avoided the expense of canopic jars and separate preservation.) The body was then placed in natron for seventy days. At the end of this time, the body was removed and the cedar oil, now containing the liquefied organs, was drained through the rectum. With the body dehydrated, it could be returned to the family. Herodotus does not describe the process of burial of such mummies, but they were perhaps placed in a shaft tomb. Poorer people used coffins fashioned from terracotta. Inexpensive method The third and least-expensive method the embalmers offered was to clear the intestines with an unnamed liquid, injected as an enema. The body was then placed in natron for seventy days and returned to the family. Herodotus gives no further details. Christian mummies In Christian tradition, some bodies of saints are naturally conserved and venerated. Mummification in other cultures Africa In addition to the mummies of Egypt, there have been instances of mummies being discovered in other areas of the African continent. The bodies show a mix of anthropogenic and spontaneous mummification, with some being thousands of years old. Libya The mummified remains of an infant were discovered during an expedition by archaeologist Fabrizio Mori to Libya during the winter of 1958–1959 in the natural cave structure of Uan Muhuggiag. After curious deposits and cave paintings were discovered on the surfaces of the cave, expedition leaders decided to excavate. Uncovered alongside fragmented animal bone tools was the mummified body of an infant, wrapped in animal skin and wearing a necklace made of ostrich egg shell beads. Professor Tongiorgi of the University of Pisa radiocarbon-dated the infant to between 5,000 and 8,000 years old. A long incision located on the right abdominal wall, and the absence of internal organs, indicated that the body had been eviscerated post-mortem, possibly in an effort to preserve the remains. A bundle of herbs found within the body cavity also supported this conclusion. Further research revealed that the child had been around 30 months old at the time of death, though gender could not be determined due to poor preservation of the sex organs. South Africa The first mummy to be discovered in South Africa was found in the Baviaanskloof Wilderness Area by Dr. Johan Binneman in 1999. Nicknamed Moses, the mummy was estimated to be around 2,000 years old. After being linked to the indigenous Khoi culture of the region, the National Council of Khoi Chiefs of South Africa began to make legal demands that the mummy be returned shortly after the body was moved to the Albany Museum in Grahamstown. Asia The mummies of Asia are usually considered to be accidental. The decedents were buried in just the right place where the environment could act as an agent for preservation. This is particularly common in the desert areas of the Tarim Basin and Iran. Mummies have been discovered in more humid Asian climates, however these are subject to rapid decay after being removed from the grave. China Mummies from various dynasties throughout China's history have been discovered in several locations across the country. They are almost exclusively considered to be unintentional mummifications. Many areas in which mummies have been uncovered are difficult for preservation, due to their warm, moist climates. This makes the recovery of mummies a challenge, as exposure to the outside world can cause the bodies to decay in a matter of hours. An example of a Chinese mummy that was preserved despite being buried in an environment not conducive to mummification is Xin Zhui. Also known as Lady Dai, she was discovered in the early 1970s at the Mawangdui archaeological site in Changsha. She was the wife of the marquis of Dai during the Han dynasty, who was also buried with her alongside another young man often considered to be a very close relative. However, Xin Zhui's body was the only one of the three to be mummified. Her corpse was so well-preserved that surgeons from the Hunan Provincial Medical Institute were able to perform an autopsy. The exact reason why her body was so completely preserved has yet to be determined. Among the mummies discovered in China are those termed Tarim mummies because of their discovery in the Tarim Basin. The dry desert climate of the basin proved to be an excellent agent for desiccation. For this reason, over 200 Tarim mummies, which are over 4,000 years old, were excavated from a cemetery in the present-day Xinjiang region. The mummies were found buried in upside-down boats with hundreds of 13-foot-long wooden poles in the place of tombstones. DNA sequence data shows that the mummies had Haplogroup R1a (Y-DNA) characteristic of western Eurasia in the area of East-Central Europe, Central Asia and Indus Valley. This has created a stir in the Turkic-speaking Uighur population of the region, who claim the area has always belonged to their culture, while it was not until the 10th century when the Uighurs are said by scholars to have moved to the region from Central Asia. American Sinologist Victor H. Mair claims that "the earliest mummies in the Tarim Basin were exclusively Caucasoid, or Europoid" with "east Asian migrants arriving in the eastern portions of the Tarim Basin around 3,000 years ago", while Mair also notes that it was not until 842 that the Uighur peoples settled in the area. Other mummified remains have been recovered from around the Tarim Basin at sites including Qäwrighul, Yanghai, Shengjindian, Shanpula (Sampul), Zaghunluq, and Qizilchoqa. Iran As of 2012, at least eight mummified human remains have been recovered from the Douzlakh Salt Mine at Chehr Abad in northwestern Iran. Due to their salt preservation, these bodies are collectively known as Saltmen. Carbon-14 testing conducted in 2008 dated three of the bodies to around 400 BC. Later isotopic research on the other mummies returned similar dates, however, many of these individuals were found to be from a region that is not closely associated with the mine. It was during this time that researchers determined the mine suffered a major collapse, which likely caused the death of the miners. Since there is significant archaeological data that indicates the area was not actively inhabited during this time period, current consensus holds that the accident occurred during a brief period of temporary mining activity. Siberia In 1993, a team of Russian archaeologists led by Dr. Natalia Polosmak discovered the Siberian Ice Maiden, a Scytho-Siberian woman, on the Ukok Plateau in the Altai Mountains near the Mongolian border. The mummy was naturally frozen due to the severe climatic conditions of the Siberian steppe. Also known as Princess Ukok, the mummy was dressed in finely detailed clothing and wore an elaborate headdress and jewelry. Alongside her body were buried six decorated horses and a symbolic meal for her last journey. Her left arm and hand were tattooed with animal style figures, including a highly stylized deer. The Ice Maiden has been a source of some recent controversy. The mummy's skin has suffered some slight decay, and the tattoos have faded since the excavation. Some residents of the Altai Republic, formed after the breakup of the Soviet Union, have requested the return of the Ice Maiden, who is currently stored in Novosibirsk in Siberia. Another Siberian mummy, a man, was discovered much earlier in 1929. His skin was also marked with tattoos of two monsters resembling griffins, which decorated his chest, and three partially obliterated images which seem to represent two deer and a mountain goat on his left arm. Philippines Philippine mummies are called Kabayan Mummies. They are common in Igorot culture and their heritage. The mummies are found in some areas named Kabayan, Sagada and among others. The mummies are dated between the 14th and 19th centuries. Europe The European continent is home to a diverse spectrum of spontaneous and anthropogenic mummies. Some of the best-preserved mummies have come from bogs located across the region. The Capuchin monks that inhabited the area left behind hundreds of intentionally-preserved bodies that have provided insight into the customs and cultures of people from various eras. One of the oldest mummies (nicknamed Ötzi) was discovered on this continent. New mummies continue to be uncovered in Europe well into the 21st Century. Bog bodies The United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark have produced a number of bog bodies, mummies of people deposited in sphagnum bogs, apparently as a result of murder or ritual sacrifices. In such cases, the acidity of the water, low temperature and lack of oxygen combined to tan the body's skin and soft tissues. The skeleton typically disintegrates over time. Such mummies are remarkably well preserved on emerging from the bog, with skin and internal organs intact; it is even possible to determine the decedent's last meal by examining stomach contents. The Haraldskær Woman was discovered by labourers in a bog in Jutland in 1835. She was erroneously identified as an early medieval Danish queen, and for that reason was placed in a royal sarcophagus at the Saint Nicolai Church, Vejle, where she currently remains. Another bog body, also from Denmark, known as the Tollund Man was discovered in 1950. The corpse was noted for its excellent preservation of the face and feet, which appeared as if the man had recently died. Only the head of Tollund Man remains, due to the decomposition of the rest of his body, which was not preserved along with the head. Canary Islands The mummies of the Canary Islands belong to the indigenous Guanche people and date to the time before 14th Century Spanish explorers settled in the area. All deceased people within the Guanche culture were mummified during this time, though the level of care taken with embalming and burial varied depending on individual social status. Embalming was carried out by specialized groups, organized according to gender, who were considered unclean by the rest of the community. The techniques for embalming were similar to those of the ancient Egyptians; involving evisceration, preservation, and stuffing of the evacuated bodily cavities, then wrapping of the body in animal skins. Despite the successful techniques utilized by the Guanche, very few mummies remain due to looting and desecration. Czech Republic The majority of mummies recovered in the Czech Republic come from underground crypts. While there is some evidence of deliberate mummification, most sources state that desiccation occurred naturally due to unique conditions within the crypts. The Capuchin Crypt in Brno contains three hundred years of mummified remains directly below the main altar. Beginning in the 18th Century when the crypt was opened, and continuing until the practice was discontinued in 1787, the Capuchin friars of the monastery would lay the deceased on a pillow of bricks on the ground. The unique air quality and topsoil within the crypt naturally preserved the bodies over time. Approximately fifty mummies were discovered in an abandoned crypt beneath the Church of St. Procopius of Sázava in Vamberk in the mid-1980s. Workers digging a trench accidentally broke into the crypt, which began to fill with waste water. The mummies quickly began to deteriorate, though thirty-four were able to be rescued and stored temporarily at the District Museum of the Orlické Mountains until they could be returned to the monastery in 2000. The mummies range in age and social status at time of death, with at least two children and one priest. The majority of the Vamberk mummies date from the 18th century. The Klatovy catacombs currently house an exhibition of Jesuit mummies, alongside some aristocrats, that were originally interred between 1674 and 1783. In the early 1930s, the mummies were accidentally damaged during repairs, resulting in the loss of 140 bodies. The newly updated airing system preserves the thirty-eight bodies that are currently on display. Denmark Apart from several bog bodies, Denmark has also yielded several other mummies, such as the three Borum Eshøj mummies, the Skrydstrup Woman and the Egtved Girl, who were all found inside burial mounds, or tumuli. In 1875, the Borum Eshøj grave mound was uncovered, which had been built around three coffins, which belonged to a middle aged man and woman as well as a man in his early twenties. Through examination, the woman was discovered to be around 50–60 years old. She was found with several artifacts made of bronze, consisting of buttons, a belt plate, and rings, showing she was of higher class. All of the hair had been removed from the skull later when farmers had dug through the casket. Her original hairstyle is unknown. The two men wore kilts, and the younger man wore a sheath which contained a bronze dagger. All three mummies were dated to 1351–1345 BC. The Skrydstrup Woman was unearthed from a tumulus in Southern Jutland, in 1935. Carbon-14 dating showed that she had died around 1300 BC; examination also revealed that she was around 18–19 years old at the time of death, and that she had been buried in the summertime. Her hair had been drawn up in an elaborate hairstyle, which was then covered by a horse hair hairnet made by the sprang technique. She was wearing a blouse and a necklace as well as two golden earrings, showing she was of higher class. The Egtved Girl, dated to 1370 BC, was also found inside a sealed coffin within a tumulus, in 1921. She was wearing a bodice and a skirt, including a belt and bronze bracelets. Found with the girl, at her feet, were the cremated remains of a child and, by her head, a box containing some bronze pins, a hairnet, and an awl. Hungary In 1994, 265 mummified bodies were found in the crypt of a Dominican church in Vác, Hungary from the 1729–1838 period. The discovery proved to be scientifically important, and by 2006 an exhibition was established in the Museum of Natural History in Budapest. Unique to the Hungarian mummies are their elaborately decorated coffins, with no two being exactly alike. Italy The varied geography and climatology of Italy has led to many cases of spontaneous mummification. Italian mummies display the same diversity, with a conglomeration of natural and intentional mummification spread across many centuries and cultures. The oldest natural mummy in Europe was discovered in 1991 in the Ötztal Alps on the Austrian-Italian border. Nicknamed Ötzi, the mummy is a 5,300-year-old male believed to be a member of the Tamins-Carasso-Isera cultural group of South Tyrol. Despite his age, a recent DNA study conducted by Walther Parson of Innsbruck Medical University revealed Ötzi has 19 living genetic relatives. The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo were built in the 16th century by the friars of Palermo's Capuchin monastery. Originally intended to hold the deliberately mummified remains of dead friars, interment in the catacombs became a status symbol for the local population in the following centuries. Burials continued until the 1920s, with one of the final burials being that of Rosalia Lombardo. In all, the catacombs host nearly 8000 mummies. (See: Catacombe dei Cappuccini) The most recent discovery of mummies in Italy came in 2010, when sixty mummified human remains were found in the crypt of the Conversion of St Paul church in Roccapelago di Pievepelago, Italy. Built in the 15th century as a cannon hold and later converted in the 16th century, the crypt had been sealed once it had reached capacity, leaving the bodies to be protected and preserved. The crypt was reopened during restoration work on the church, revealing the diverse array of mummies inside. The bodies were quickly moved to a museum for further study. North America The mummies of North America are often steeped in controversy, as many of these bodies have been linked to still-existing native cultures. While the mummies provide a wealth of historically-significant data, native cultures and tradition often demands the remains be returned to their original resting places. This has led to many legal actions by Native American councils, leading to most museums keeping mummified remains out of the public eye. Canada Kwäday Dän Ts'ìnchi ("Long ago person found" in the Southern Tutchone language of the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations), was found in August 1999 by three First Nations hunters at the edge of a glacier in Tatshenshini-Alsek Provincial Park, British Columbia, Canada. According to the Kwäday Dän Ts'ìnchi Project, the remains are the oldest well preserved mummy discovered in North America. (The Spirit Cave mummy although not well preserved, is much older.) Initial radiocarbon tests date the mummy to around 550 years-old. Greenland In 1972, eight remarkably preserved mummies were discovered at an abandoned Inuit settlement called Qilakitsoq, in Greenland. The "Greenland Mummies" consisted of a six-month-old baby, a four-year-old boy, and six women of various ages, who died around 500 years ago. Their bodies were naturally mummified by the sub-zero temperatures and dry winds in the cave in which they were found. Mexico Intentional mummification in pre-Columbian Mexico was practiced by the Aztec culture. These bodies are collectively known as Aztec mummies. Genuine Aztec mummies were "bundled" in a woven wrap and often had their faces covered by a ceremonial mask. Public knowledge of Aztec mummies increased due to traveling exhibits and museums in the 19th and 20th centuries, though these bodies were typically naturally desiccated remains and not actually the mummies associated with Aztec culture. (See: Aztec mummy) Natural mummification has been known to occur in several places in Mexico; this includes the mummies of Guanajuato. A collection of these mummies, most of which date to the late 19th century, have been on display at El Museo de las Momias in the city of Guanajuato since 1970. The museum claims to have the smallest mummy in the world on display (a mummified fetus). It was thought that minerals in the soil had the preserving effect, however it may rather be due to the warm, arid climate. Mexican mummies are also on display in the small town of Encarnación de Díaz, Jalisco. United States Spirit Cave Man was discovered in 1940 during salvage work prior to guano mining activity that was scheduled to begin in the area. The mummy is a middle-aged male, found completely dressed and lying on a blanket made of animal skin. Radiocarbon tests in the 1990s dated the mummy to being nearly 9,000 years old. The remains were held at the Nevada State Museum, though the local Native American community began petitioning to have the remains returned and reburied in 1995. When the Bureau of Land Management did not repatriate the mummy in 2000, the Fallon Paiute-Shoshone Tribe sued under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. After DNA sequencing determined that the remains were in fact related to modern Native Americans, they were repatriated to the tribe in 2016. Oceania Mummies from the Oceania are not limited only to Australia. Discoveries of mummified remains have also been located in New Zealand, and the Torres Strait, though these mummies have been historically harder to examine and classify. Prior to the 20th Century, most literature on mummification in the region was either silent or anecdotal. However, the boom of interest generated by the scientific study of Egyptian mummification lead to more concentrated study of mummies in other cultures, including those of Oceania. Australia The aboriginal mummification traditions found in Australia are thought be related to those found in the Torres Strait islands, the inhabitants of which achieved a high level of sophisticated mummification techniques (See:Torres Strait). Australian mummies lack some of the technical ability of the Torres Strait mummies, however much of the ritual aspects of the mummification process are similar. Full-body mummification was achieved by these cultures, but not the level of artistic preservation as found on smaller islands. The reason for this seems to be for easier transport of bodies by more nomadic tribes. Torres Strait The mummies of the Torres Strait have a considerably higher level of preservation technique as well as creativity compared to those found on Australia. The process began with removal of viscera, after which the bodies were set in a seated position on a platform and either left to dry in the sun or smoked over a fire in order to aid in desiccation. In the case of smoking, some tribes would collect the fat that drained from the body to mix with ocher to create red paint that would then be smeared back on the skin of the mummy. The mummies remained on the platforms, decorated with the clothing and jewelry they wore in life, before being buried. New Zealand Some Māori tribes from New Zealand would keep mummified heads as trophies from tribal warfare. They are also known as Mokomokai. In the 19th Century, many of the trophies were acquired by Europeans who found the tattooed skin to be a phenomenal curiosity. Westerners began to offer valuable commodities in exchange for the uniquely tattooed mummified heads. The heads were later put on display in museums, 16 of which being housed across France alone. In 2010, the Rouen City Hall of France returned one of the heads to New Zealand, despite earlier protests by the Culture Ministry of France. There is also evidence that some Maori tribes may have practiced full-body mummification, though the practice is not thought to have been widespread. The discussion of Maori mummification has been historically controversial, with some experts in past decades claiming that such mummies have never existed. Contemporary science does now acknowledge the existence of full-body mummification in the culture. There is still controversy, however, as to the nature of the mummification process. Some bodies appear to be spontaneously created by the natural environment, while others exhibit signs of deliberate practices. General modern consensus tends to agree that there could be a mixture of both types of mummification, similar to that of the ancient Egyptian mummies. South America The South American continent contains some of the oldest mummies in the world, both deliberate and accidental. The bodies were preserved by the best agent for mummification: the environment. The Pacific coastal desert in Peru and Chile is one of the driest areas in the world and the dryness facilitated mummification. Rather than developing elaborate processes such as later-dynasty ancient Egyptians, the early South Americans often left their dead in naturally dry or frozen areas, though some did perform surgical preparation when mummification was intentional. Some of the reasons for intentional mummification in South America include memorialization, immortalization, and religious offerings. A large number of mummified bodies have been found in pre-Columbian cemeteries scattered around Peru. The bodies had often been wrapped for burial in finely-woven textiles. Chinchorro mummies The Chinchorro mummies are the oldest intentionally prepared mummified bodies ever found. Beginning in 5th millennium BC and continuing for an estimated 3,500 years, all human burials within the Chinchorro culture were prepared for mummification. The bodies were carefully prepared, beginning with removal of the internal organs and skin, before being left in the hot, dry climate of the Atacama Desert, which aided in desiccation. A large number of Chinchorro mummies were also prepared by skilled artisans to be preserved in a more artistic fashion, though the purpose of this practice is widely debated. Inca mummies Several naturally-preserved, unintentional mummies dating from the Incan period (1438–1532 AD) have been found in the colder regions of Argentina, Chile, and Peru. These are collectively known as "ice mummies". The first Incan ice mummy was discovered in 1954 atop El Plomo Peak in Chile, after an eruption of the nearby volcano Sabancaya melted away ice that covered the body. The Mummy of El Plomo was a male child who was presumed to be wealthy due to his well-fed bodily characteristics. He was considered to be the most well-preserved ice mummy in the world until the discovery of Mummy Juanita in 1995. Mummy Juanita was discovered near the summit of Ampato in the Peruvian section of the Andes mountains by archaeologist Johan Reinhard. Her body had been so thoroughly frozen that it had not been desiccated; much of her skin, muscle tissue, and internal organs retained their original structure. She is believed to be a ritual sacrifice, due to the close proximity of her body to the Incan capital of Cusco, as well as the fact she was wearing highly intricate clothing to indicate her special social status. Several Incan ceremonial artifacts and temporary shelters uncovered in the surrounding area seem to support this theory. More evidence that the Inca left sacrificial victims to die in the elements, and later be unintentionally preserved, came in 1999 with the discovery of the Llullaillaco mummies on the border of Argentina and Chile. The three mummies are children, two girls and one boy, who are thought to be sacrifices associated with the ancient ritual of qhapaq hucha. Recent biochemical analysis of the mummies has revealed that the victims had consumed increasing quantities of alcohol and coca, possibly in the form of chicha, in the months leading up to sacrifice. The dominant theory for the drugging reasons that, alongside ritual uses, the substances probably made the children more docile. Chewed coca leaves found inside the eldest child's mouth upon her discovery in 1999 supports this theory. The bodies of Inca emperors and wives were mummified after death. In 1533, the Spanish conquistadors of the Inca Empire viewed the mummies in the Inca capital of Cuzco. The mummies were displayed, often in lifelike positions, in the palaces of the deceased emperors and had a retinue of servants to care for them. The Spanish were impressed with the quality of the mummification which involved removal of the organs, embalming, and freeze-drying. The population revered the mummies of the Inca emperors. This reverence seemed idolatry to the Roman Catholic Spanish and in 1550 they confiscated the mummies. The mummies were taken to Lima where they were displayed in the San Andres Hospital. The mummies deteriorated in the humid climate of Lima and eventually they were either buried or destroyed by the Spanish. An attempt to find the mummies of the Inca emperors beneath the San Andres hospital in 2001 was unsuccessful. The archaeologists found a crypt, but it was empty. Possibly the mummies had been removed when the building was repaired after an earthquake. Self-mummification Monks whose bodies remain incorrupt without any traces of deliberate mummification are venerated by some Buddhists who believe they successfully were able to mortify their flesh to death. Self-mummification was practiced until the late 1800s in Japan and has been outlawed since the early 1900s. Many Mahayana Buddhist monks were reported to know their time of death and left their last testaments and their students accordingly buried them sitting in lotus position, put into a vessel with drying agents (such as wood, paper, or lime) and surrounded by bricks, to be exhumed later, usually after three years. The preserved bodies would then be decorated with paint and adorned with gold. Bodies purported to be those of self-mummified monks are exhibited in several Japanese shrines, and it has been claimed that the monks, prior to their death, stuck to a sparse diet made up of salt, nuts, seeds, roots, pine bark, and urushi tea. Modern mummies Jeremy Bentham In the 1830s, Jeremy Bentham, the founder of utilitarianism, left instructions to be followed upon his death which led to the creation of a sort of modern-day mummy. He asked that his body be displayed to illustrate how the "horror at dissection originates in ignorance"; once so displayed and lectured about, he asked that his body parts be preserved, including his skeleton (minus his skull, which despite being mis-preserved, was displayed beneath his feet until theft required it to be stored elsewhere), which were to be dressed in the clothes he usually wore and "seated in a Chair usually occupied by me when living in the attitude in which I am sitting when engaged in thought". His body, outfitted with a wax head created because of problems preparing it as Bentham requested, is on open display in the University College London. Vladimir Lenin During the early 20th century, the Russian movement of Cosmism, as represented by Nikolai Fyodorovich Fyodorov, envisioned scientific resurrection of dead people. The idea was so popular that, after Vladimir Lenin's death, Leonid Krasin and Alexander Bogdanov suggested to cryonically preserve his body and brain in order to revive him in the future. Necessary equipment was purchased abroad, but for a variety of reasons the plan was not realized. Instead his body was embalmed and placed on permanent exhibition in the Lenin Mausoleum in Moscow, where it is displayed to this day. The mausoleum itself was modeled by Alexey Shchusev on the Pyramid of Djoser and the Tomb of Cyrus. Gottfried Knoche In late 19th-century Venezuela, a German-born doctor named Gottfried Knoche conducted experiments in mummification at his laboratory in the forest near La Guaira. He developed an embalming fluid (based on an aluminum chloride compound) that mummified corpses without having to remove the internal organs. The formula for his fluid was never revealed and has not been discovered. Most of the several dozen mummies created with the fluid (including himself and his immediate family) have been lost or were severely damaged by vandals and looters. Summum In 1975, an esoteric organization by the name of Summum introduced "Modern Mummification", a service that utilizes modern techniques along with aspects of ancient methods of mummification. The first person to formally undergo Summum's process of modern mummification was the founder of Summum, Summum Bonum Amen Ra, who died in January 2008. Summum is currently considered to be the only "commercial mummification business" in the world. Alan Billis In 2010, a team led by forensic archaeologist Stephen Buckley mummified Alan Billis using techniques based on 19 years of research of 18th-dynasty Egyptian mummification. The process was filmed for television, for the documentary Mummifying Alan: Egypt's Last Secret. Billis made the decision to allow his body to be mummified after being diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2009. His body currently resides at London's Gordon Museum. Plastination Plastination is a technique used in anatomy to conserve bodies or body parts. The water and fat are replaced by certain plastics, yielding specimens that can be touched, do not smell or decay, and even retain most microscopic properties of the original sample. The technique was invented by Gunther von Hagens when working at the anatomical institute of the Heidelberg University in 1978. Von Hagens has patented the technique in several countries and is heavily involved in its promotion, especially as the creator and director of the Body Worlds traveling exhibitions, exhibiting plastinated human bodies internationally. He also founded and directs the Institute for Plastination in Heidelberg. More than 40 institutions worldwide have facilities for plastination, mainly for medical research and study, and most affiliated to the International Society for Plastination. Treatment of ancient mummies in modern times In the Middle Ages, based on a mistranslation from the Arabic term for bitumen, it was thought that mummies possessed healing properties. As a result, it became common practice to grind Egyptian mummies into a powder to be sold and used as medicine. When actual mummies became unavailable, the sun-desiccated corpses of criminals, slaves and suicidal people were substituted by mendacious merchants. Francis Bacon and Robert Boyle recommended them for healing bruises and preventing bleeding. The trade in mummies seems to have been frowned upon by Turkish authorities who ruled Egypt – several Egyptians were imprisoned for boiling mummies to make oil in 1424. However, mummies were in high demand in Europe and it was possible to buy them for the right amount of money. John Snaderson, an English tradesman who visited Egypt in the 16th century shipped six hundred pounds of mummy back to England. The practice developed into a wide-scale business that flourished until the late 16th century. Two centuries ago, mummies were still believed to have medicinal properties to stop bleeding, and were sold as pharmaceuticals in powdered form as in mellified man. Artists also made use of Egyptian mummies; a brownish pigment known as mummy brown, based on mummia (sometimes called alternatively caput mortuum, Latin for death's head), which was originally obtained by grinding human and animal Egyptian mummies. It was most popular in the 17th century, but was discontinued in the early 19th century when its composition became generally known to artists who replaced the said pigment by a totally different blend -but keeping the original name, mummia or mummy brown-yielding a similar tint and based on ground minerals (oxides and fired earths) and or blends of powdered gums and oleoresins (such as myrrh and frankincense) as well as ground bitumen. These blends appeared on the market as forgeries of powdered mummy pigment but were ultimately considered as acceptable replacements, once antique mummies were no longer permitted to be destroyed. Many thousands of mummified cats were also sent from Egypt to England to be processed for use in fertilizer. During the 19th century, following the discovery of the first tombs and artifacts in Egypt, egyptology was a huge fad in Europe, especially in Victorian England. European aristocrats would occasionally entertain themselves by purchasing mummies, having them unwrapped, and holding observation sessions. The pioneer of this kind of entertainment in Britain was Thomas Pettigrew known as "Mummy" Pettigrew due to his work. Such unrolling sessions destroyed hundreds of mummies, because the exposure to the air caused them to disintegrate. The use of mummies as fuel for locomotives was documented by Mark Twain (likely as a joke or humor), but the truth of the story remains debatable. During the American Civil War, mummy-wrapping linens were said to have been used to manufacture paper. Evidence for the reality of these claims is still equivocal. Researcher Ben Radford reports that, in her book The Mummy Congress, Heather Pringle writes: "No mummy expert has ever been able to authenticate the story ... Twain seems to be the only published source – and a rather suspect one at that". Pringle also writes that there is no evidence for the "mummy paper" either. Radford also says that many journalists have not done a good job with their research, and while it is true that mummies were often not shown respect in the 1800s, there is no evidence for this rumor. While mummies were used in medicine, some researchers have brought into question these other uses such as making paper and paint, fueling locomotives and fertilizing land. In popular culture See also Animal mummy Bodies: The Exhibition Corpse decomposition Embalming Fossil Incorruptibility List of mummies List of Egyptian mummies List of DNA-tested mummies Mummia Further reading Notes References Bibliography Books Barber, Elizabeth Wayland. 1999. The Mummies of Ürümchi. 1999. London. Pan Books. Also: W. W. Norton & Company. . Budge, E.A.Wallis. 1925. The Mummy, A Handbook of Egyptian Funerary Archaeology. Dover Publ. Inc., New York, Dover Ed. 1989, (512 pgs.) . Davis-Kimball, Jeannine, with Behan, Mona. 2002. Warrior Women: An Archaeologist's Search for History's Hidden Heroines. Warner Books, New York. First Trade Printing, 2003. . Ilkerson, Bill. 2006. Wrap-It-Up: How My Lost Child Will Survive Us All. Portland. Eye of Raw Texts. . Mallory, J. P. and Mair, Victor H. 2000. The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West. Thames & Hudson. London. 2000. . Heather Pringle. 2001. Mummy Congress: Science, Obsession, and the Everlasting Dead. Penguin Books. . Taylor, John H. 2004. Mummy: the inside story. The British Museum Press. . Online Mummies at Howstuffworks.com. The Virtual Mummy: Unwrapping a Mummy by Mouse Click Video External links Egyptian and Incan Mummification U.S. Museum to Return Ramses I Mummy to Egypt, an article from the National Geographic website Evidence that a West-East admixed population lived in the Tarim Basin as early as the early Bronze Age Mummies around the world 18 January 2016 National Geographic Interview with Prof. Ann Rosalie David on Egyptian mummies, "History of Egypt Podcast" series by Eyptologist Dominic Perry, 2020 Ancient Egyptian funerary practices Archaeology of death Egyptian artefact types

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melilla

Melilla

Melilla ( , ; ; ; ) is one of two autonomous cities of Spain, on the Morocco–Spain border. It has an area of . It was part of the Province of Málaga until 14 March 1995, when the Statute of Autonomy of Melilla was passed. Melilla is one of the special member state territories of the European Union. Movements to and from the rest of the EU and Melilla are subject to specific rules, provided for inter alia in the Accession Agreement of Spain to the Schengen Convention. As of 2019, Melilla had a population of 86,487. The population is chiefly divided between people of Iberian and Riffian extraction. There is also a small number of Sephardic Jews and Sindhi Hindus. Regarding sociolinguistics, Melilla features a diglossia between the official Spanish (strong language) and Tamazight (weak language). Melilla, like Ceuta and Spain's other territories in Africa, is subject to an irredentist claim by Greater Morocco. Name The original name (currently rendered as Rusadir) was a Punic language name, coming from the name given to the nearby Cape Three Forks. Addir meant "powerful". The name creation is similar to that of other names given in Antiquity to outlets along the north-African coast, including Rusguniae, Rusubbicari, Rusuccuru, Rusippisir, Rusigan (Rachgoun), Rusicade, Ruspina, Ruspe or Rsmlqr. Meanwhile, the etymology of the current city name (dating back to the 9th century, rendered as Melilla in Spanish) is uncertain. An active beekeeping location in the past, the name has been related to honey; this is tentatively backed up by two ancient coins featuring a bee as well as the inscriptions and . Others relate the name to "discord" or "fever" or also to an ancient Arab personality. The current Riffian language name of Melilla is Mřič or Mlilt, which means the "white one". History Ancient history It was a Phoenician and later Punic trade establishment under the name of Rusadir (Rusaddir for the Romans and Russadeiron () for the Greeks). Later Rome absorbed it as part of the Roman province of Mauretania Tingitana. Rusaddir is mentioned by Ptolemy (IV, 1) and Pliny (V, 18) who called it "oppidum et portus" (a fortified town and port). It was also cited by Mela (I, 33) as Rusicada, and by the Itinerarium Antonini. Rusaddir was said to have once been the seat of a bishop, but there is no record of any bishop of the purported see, which is not included in the Catholic Church's list of titular sees. Middle Ages As centuries passed, it was ruled by Vandal, Byzantine and Visigoth bands. The political history is similar to that of towns in the region of the Moroccan Rif and southern Spain. Local rule passed through a succession of Phoenician, Punic, Roman, Umayyad, Cordobese, Idrisid, Almoravid, Almohad, Marinid, and then Wattasid rulers. Modern times During the 15th century, the city subsumed into decadence, just like most of the rest of cities of the Kingdom of Fez located along the Mediterranean coast, eclipsed by those along the Atlantic facade. Following the completion of the conquest of the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada by the Catholic Monarchs in 1492, their Secretary started to compile information about the sorry state of the north-African coast with the prospect of a potential territorial expansion in mind, sending field agents to investigate, and subsequently reporting the Catholic Monarchs that, by early 1494, locals had expelled the authority of the Sultan of Fez and had offered to pledge service. While the 1494 Treaty of Tordesillas put Melilla and Cazaza (until then reserved to the Portuguese) under the sphere of Castile, the conquest of the city had to wait, delayed by the occupation of Naples by Charles VIII of France. The Duke of Medina Sidonia, Juan Alfonso Pérez de Guzmán promoted the seizure of the place, to be headed by , while the Catholic Monarchs, Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon endorsed the initiative, also providing the assistance of their artillery officer Francisco Ramírez de Madrid during the operation. Melilla was occupied on 17 September 1497 virtually without any violence as it, located on the border between the Kingdom of Tlemcen and the Kingdom of Fez, and as a result, it had been fought over many times and so had been left abandoned. No big-scale expansion into the Kingdom of Fez ensued, and, barring the enterprises of the Cardinal Cisneros along the coast in Mers El Kébir and Oran (in the Algerian coast), and the rock of Badis (this one in the territorial scope of the Kingdom of Fez), the imperial impetus of the Hispanic Monarchy was eventually directed elsewhere, to the Italian Wars waged against France, and, particularly since 1519, to the newly discovered continent across the Atlantic. Melilla was initially jointly administered by the House of Medina Sidonia and the Crown, and a 1498 settlement forced the former to station a 700-men garrison in Melilla and forced the latter to provide the city with a number of maravedíes and wheat fanegas. The Crown's interest in Melilla decreased during the reign of Charles V. During the 16th century, soldiers stationed in Melilla were badly remunerated, leading to many desertions. The Duke of Medina Sidonia relinquished responsibility over the garrison of the place on 7 June 1556. During the late 17th century, Alaouite sultan Ismail Ibn Sharif attempted to conquer the presidio, taking the outer fortifications in the 1680s and further unsuccessfully besieging Melilla in the 1690s. One Spanish officer reflected, "an hour in Melilla, from the point of view of merit, was worth more than thirty years of service to Spain." Late modern period The current limits of the Spanish territory around the Melilla fortress were fixed by treaties with Morocco in 1859, 1860, 1861, and 1894. In the late 19th century, as Spanish influence expanded in this area, the Crown authorized Melilla as the only centre of trade on the Rif coast between Tetuan and the Algerian frontier. The value of trade increased, with goat skins, eggs and beeswax being the principal exports, and cotton goods, tea, sugar and candles being the chief imports. Melilla's civil population in 1860 still amounted for only 375 estimated inhabitants. In a 1866 Hispano-Moroccan arrangement signed in Fes, both parts agreed to allow for the installment of a customs office near the border with Melilla, to be operated by Moroccan officials. The Treaty of Peace with Morocco that followed the 1859–60 War entailed the acquisition of a new perimeter for Melilla, bringing its area to the 12 km2 the autonomous city currently stands. Following the declaration of Melilla as free port in 1863, the population began to increase, chiefly by Sephardi Jews fleeing from Tetouan who fostered trade in and out the city. The first Jews from Tetouan probably arrived in 1864, meanwhile the first rabbi arrived in 1867 and began to operate the first synagogue, located in the Calle de San Miguel. Many Jews arrived fleeing from persecution in Morocco, instigated by Roghi Bu Hamara. Following the 1868 lifting of the veto to emigrate to Melilla from Peninsular Spain, the population further increased with Spaniards. The Jewish population, who also progressively acquired Spanish citizenship, increased to 572 in 1893. The economic opportunities created in Melilla henceforth favoured the installment of a Berber population. Views of Melilla taken from an elevated position in 1893 The first proper body of local government was the junta de arbitrios, created in 1879, and in which the military used to enjoy preponderance. The Polígono excepcional de Tiro, the first neighborhood outside the walled core (Melilla la Vieja), began construction in 1888. In 1893, Riffian tribesmen launched the First Melillan campaign to take back this area; the Spanish government sent 25,000 soldiers to defend against them. The conflict was also known as the Margallo War, after Spanish General Juan García y Margallo, who was killed in the battle, and was the Governor of Melilla. The new 1894 agreement with Morocco that followed the conflict increased trade with the hinterland, bringing the economic prosperity of the city to a new level. The total population of Melilla amounted for 10,004 inhabitants in 1896. 20th Century The turn of the new century saw however the attempts by France (based in French Algeria) to profit from their newly acquired sphere of influence in Morocco to counter the trading prowess of Melilla by fostering trade links with the Algerian cities of Ghazaouet and Oran. Melilla began to suffer from this, to which the instability brought by revolts against Muley Abdel Aziz in the hinterland also added, although after 1905 Sultan pretender El Rogui (Bou Hmara) carried out a defusing policy in the area that favoured Spain. The French occupation of Oujda in 1907, compromised the Melillan trade with that city. and the enduring instability in the Rif still threatened Melilla. Between 1909 and 1945, the modernista (Art Nouveau) style was very present in the local architecture, making the streets of Melilla a "true museum of modernista-style architecture", second only to Barcelona (in Spain), mainly stemming from the work of prolific architect Enrique Nieto. Mining companies began to enter the hinterland of Melilla by 1908. A Spanish one, the , was constituted in July 1908, shared by Clemente Fernández, Enrique Macpherson, the Count of Romanones, the and , who appointed Miguel Villanueva as chairman. Thus two mining companies under the protection of Bou Hmara, started mining lead and iron some 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) from Melilla. They started to construct a railway between the port and the mines. In October of that year the Bou Hmara's vassals revolted against him and raided the mines, which remained closed until June 1909. By July the workmen were again attacked and several were killed. Severe fighting between the Spaniards and the tribesmen followed, in the Second Melillan campaign that took place in the vicinity of Melilla. In 1910, the Spaniards restarted the mines and undertook harbor works at Mar Chica, but hostilities broke out again in 1911. On 22 July 1921, the Berbers under the leadership of Abd el Krim inflicted a grave defeat on the Spanish at the Battle of Annual. The Spanish retreated to Melilla, leaving most of the protectorate under the control of the Republic of Rif. A royal decree pursuing the creation of an ayuntamiento in Melilla was signed on 13 December 1918 but the regulation did not come into force, and thus the existing government body, the junta the arbitrios, remained in force. A "junta municipal" with a rather civil composition was created in 1927; on 10 April 1930, an ayuntamiento featuring the same membership as the junta was created, equalling to the same municipal regime as the rest of Spain on 14 April 1931, with the arrival of the first democratically elected municipal corporation on the wake of the proclamation of the Second Republic. The city was used as one of the staging grounds for the July 1936 military coup d'état that started the Spanish Civil War. In the context of the passing of the Ley de Extranjería in 1986, and following social mobilization from the Berber community, conditions for citizenship acquisition were flexibilised and allowed for the naturalisation of a substantial number of inhabitants, until then born in Melilla but without Spanish citizenship. In 1995, Melilla (which was until then just another municipality of the Province of Málaga) became an "autonomous city", as the Statute of Autonomy of Melilla was passed. On 6 November 2007, King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia visited the city, which caused a demonstration of support. The visit also sparked protests from the Moroccan government. It was the first time a Spanish monarch had visited Melilla in 80 years. Melilla (and Ceuta) have declared the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha or Feast of the Sacrifice, as an official public holiday from 2010 onward. This is the first time a non-Christian religious festival has been officially celebrated in Spain since the Reconquista. In 2018, Morocco decided to close the customs office near Melilla, in operation since the mid 19th century, without consulting the counterparty. Geography Location Melilla is located in the northwest of the African continent, in the shores of the Alboran Sea, a marginal sea of the Mediterranean, the latter's westernmost portion. The city layout is arranged in a wide semicircle around the beach and the Port of Melilla, on the eastern side of the peninsula of Cape Tres Forcas, at the foot of and around the mouth of the Río de Oro intermittent water stream, above sea level. The urban nucleus was originally a fortress, Melilla la Vieja, built on a peninsular mound about in height. The Moroccan settlement of Beni Ansar lies immediately south of Melilla. The nearest Moroccan city is Nador, and the ports of Melilla and Nador are both within the same bay; nearby is the Bou Areg Lagoon Climate Melilla has a warm Mediterranean climate influenced by its proximity to the sea, rendering much cooler summers and more precipitation than inland areas deeper into Africa. The climate, in general, is similar to the southern coast of peninsular Spain and the northern coast of Morocco, with relatively small temperature differences between seasons. Government and administration Self-government institutions The government bodies stipulated in the Statute of Autonomy are the Assembly of Melilla, the President of Melilla and the Council of Government. The assembly is a 25-member body whose members are elected through universal suffrage every 4 years in closed party lists following the schedule of local elections at the national level. Its members are called "local deputies" but they rather enjoy the status of concejales (municipal councillors). Unlike regional legislatures (and akin to municipal councils), the assembly does not enjoy right of initiative for primary legislation. The president of Melilla (who, often addressed as Mayor-President, also exerts the roles of Mayor, president of the Assembly, president of the Council of Government and representative of the city) is invested by the Assembly. After local elections, the president is invested through a qualified majority from among the leaders of the election lists, or, failing to achieve the former, the leader of the most voted list at the election is invested to the office. In case of a motion of no confidence the president can only be ousted with a qualified majority voting for an alternative assembly member. The Council of Government is the traditional collegiate executive body for parliamentary systems. Unlike the municipal government boards in the standard ayuntamientos, the members of the Council of Government (including the vice-presidents) do not need to be members of the assembly. Melilla is the city in Spain with the highest proportion of postal voting; vote buying (via mail-in ballots) is widely reported to be a common practice in the poor neighborhoods of Melilla. Court cases in this matter had involved the PP, the CPM and the PSOE. On 15 June 2019, following the May 2019 Melilla Assembly election, the regionalist and left-leaning party of Muslim and Amazigh persuasion Coalition for Melilla (CPM, 8 seats), the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE, 4 seats) and Citizens–Party of the Citizenry (Cs, 1 seat) voted in favour of the Cs' candidate (Eduardo de Castro) vis-à-vis the Presidency of the Autonomous City, ousting Juan José Imbroda, from the People's Party (PP, 10 seats), who had been in office since 2000. Administrative subdivisions Melilla is subdivided into eight districts (distritos), which are further subdivided into neighbourhoods (barrios): 1st Barrio de Medina Sidonia. Barrio del General Larrea. Barrio de Ataque Seco. 2nd Barrio Héroes de España. Barrio del General Gómez Jordana. Barrio Príncipe de Asturias. 3rd Barrio del Carmen. 4th Barrio Polígono Residencial La Paz. Barrio Hebreo-Tiro Nacional. 5th Barrio de Cristóbal Colón. Barrio de Cabrerizas. Barrio de Batería Jota. Barrio de Hernán Cortes y Las Palmeras. Barrio de Reina Regente. 6th Barrio de Concepción Arenal. Barrio Isaac Peral (Tesorillo). 7th Barrio del General Real. Polígono Industrial SEPES. Polígono Industrial Las Margaritas. Parque Empresarial La Frontera. 8th Barrio de la Libertad. Barrio del Hipódromo. Barrio de Alfonso XIII. Barrio Industrial. Barrio Virgen de la Victoria. Barrio de la Constitución. Barrio de los Pinares. Barrio de la Cañada de Hidum Economy The Gross domestic product (GDP) of the autonomous community was 1.6 billion euros in 2018, accounting for 0.1% of Spanish economic output. GDP per capita adjusted for purchasing power was 19,900 euros or 66% of the EU27 average in the same year. Melilla was the NUTS2 region with the lowest GDP per capita in Spain. Melilla does not participate in the European Union Customs Union (EUCU). There is no VAT (IVA) tax, but a local reduced-rate tax called IPSI. Preserving the status of free port, imports are free of tariffs and the only tax concerning them is the IPSI. Exports to the Customs Union (including Peninsular Spain) are however subject to the correspondent customs tariff and are taxed with the correspondent VAT. There are some special manufacturing taxes regarding electricity and transport, as well as complementary charges on tobacco and oil and fuel products. The principal industry is fishing. Cross-border commerce (legal or smuggled) and Spanish and European grants and wages are the other income sources. Melilla is regularly connected to the Iberian peninsula by air and sea traffic and is also economically connected to Morocco: most of its fruit and vegetables are imported across the border. Moroccans in the city's hinterland are attracted to it: 36,000 Moroccans cross the border daily to work, shop or trade goods. The port of Melilla offers several daily connections to Almería and Málaga. Melilla Airport offers daily flights to Almería, Málaga and Madrid. Spanish operators Air Europa and Iberia operate in Melilla's airport. Many people travelling between Europe and Morocco use the ferry links to Melilla, both for passengers and for freight. Because of this, the port and related companies form an important economic driver for the city. Water supply Melilla's water supply primarily came from a network of dug wells (which by the turn of the 21st century suffered from overexploitation and had also experienced a degradation of the water quality and the intrusion of seawater), as well as from the capture of the Río de Oro's underflow. Seeking to address the problem of water supply in Melilla, works for the construction of a desalination plant in the Aguadú cliffs, projected to produce 22,000 m3 a day, started in November 2003. The plant entered operation in March 2007. The daily operation of the plant is partially funded by the central government. Relative to the Spanish average (and similarly to the Canary and Balearic Islands), the city's population spends a comparatively larger amount of money on bottled water. Funded by the European Regional Development Fund and the , works for the expansion of the plant's production capabilities up to 30,000 m3 a day started by September 2020. Architecture The dome of the Chapel of Santiago, built in the mid-16th century by Miguel de Perea with help from Sancho de Escalante, is a rare instance of Gothic architecture in the African continent. Parallel to the urban development of Melilla in the early 20th century, the new architectural style of modernismo (irradiated from Barcelona and associated to the bourgeois class) was imported to the city, granting it a modernista architectural character, primarily through the works of the prolific Catalan architect Enrique Nieto. Accordingly, Melilla has the second most important concentration of Modernista works in Spain after Barcelona. Nieto was in charge of designing the main Synagogue, the Central Mosque and various Catholic Churches. Demographics Religion Melilla has been praised as an example of multiculturalism, being a small city in which one can find Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Buddhists represented. There is a small, autonomous, and commercially important Hindu community present in Melilla, which has fallen over the past decades as its members move to the Spanish mainland and numbers about 100 members today. Muslims may account for roughly half the population in Melilla. The Roman Catholic churches in Melilla belong to the Diocese of Málaga. Language Regarding sociolinguistics, Melilla features a diglossia with Spanish being the strong and official language, whereas Tamazight remains the weak and unofficial language, with limited written codification, and usage restricted to family and domestic relations and oral speech. Berber native speakers are usually bilingual in Spanish, whereas Spanish native speakers do not usually speak Berber. The Spanish spoken in Melilla is similar to the Andalusian variety from Cádiz, whereas the Berber variant spoken in Melilla is the Riffian language common with the neighbouring Nador area. Rather than Berber (), Berber speakers in Melilla use either the glotonym , or, when speaking Spanish, for their language. The first attempt to legislate a degree of recognition for Berber in Melilla was in 1994, in the context of the elaboration of the Statute of Autonomy, by mentioning the promotion of the linguistic and cultural pluralism (without explicitly mentioning the Berber language). The initiative went nowhere, voted down by PP and PSOE. Border dynamics Trans-border relations Melilla forms a sort of trans-border urban conurbation with limited integration together with the neighbouring Moroccan settlements, located at one of the ends of a linear succession of urban sprawl spanning southward in Morocco along the R19 road from Beni Ensar down to Nador and Selouane. The urban system features a high degree of hierarchization, specialization and division of labour, with Melilla as chief provider of services, finance and trade; Nador as an eminently industrial city whereas the rest of Moroccan settlements found themselves in a subordinate role, presenting agro-town features and operating as providers of workforce. The asymmetry, as reflected for example in the provision of healthcare, has fostered situations such as the large-scale use of the Melillan health services by Moroccan citizens, with Melilla attending a number of urgencies more than four times the standard for its population in 2018. In order to satisfy the workforce needs of Melilla (mainly in areas such as domestic service, construction and cross-border bale workers, often under informal contracts), Moroccan inhabitants of the province of Nador were granted exemptions from visa requirement to enter the autonomous city. This development in turn induced a strong flux of internal migration from other Moroccan provinces to Nador, in order to acquire the aforementioned exemption. The 'fluid' trans-border relations between Melilla and its surroundings are however not free from conflict, as they are contingent upon the 'tense' trans-national relations between Morocco and Spain. Border securitization Following the increasing influx of Algerian and Sub-Saharan irregular migrants into Ceuta and Melilla in the early 1990s, a process of border fortification in both cities ensued after 1995 in order to reduce the border permeability, a target which was attained to some degree by 1999, although peak level of fortification was reached in 2005. The Melilla's border with Morocco is secured by the Melilla border fence, a six-metre-tall double fence with watch towers; yet migrants (in groups of tens or sometimes hundreds) storm the fence and manage to cross it from time to time. Since 2005, at least 14 migrants have died trying to cross the fence. The Melilla migrant reception centre was built with a capacity of 480. In 2020 works to remove the barbed wire from the top of the fence (meanwhile raising its height up to more than 10 metres in the stretches most susceptible to breaches) were commissioned to . Morocco has been paid tens of million euros by both Spain and the European Union to outsource the EU migration control. Besides the double fence in the Spanish side of the border, there is an additional 3-metre high fence entirely made of razor wire lying on the Moroccan side as well as a moat in between. Transportation Melilla Airport is serviced by Air Nostrum, flying to the Spanish cities of Málaga, Madrid, Barcelona, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Palma de Mallorca, Granada, Badajoz, Sevilla and Almería. In April 2013, a local enterprise set up Melilla Airlines, flying from the city to Málaga. The city is linked to Málaga, Almería and Motril by ferry. Three roads connect Melilla and Morocco but require clearance through border checkpoints. Sport Melilla is a surfing destination. The city's football club, UD Melilla, plays in the third tier of Spanish football, the Segunda División B. The club was founded in 1943 and since 1945 have played at the 12,000-seater Estadio Municipal Álvarez Claro. Until the other club was dissolved in 2012, UD Melilla played the Ceuta-Melilla derby against AD Ceuta. The clubs travelled to each other via the Spanish mainland to avoid entering Morocco. The second-highest ranked club in the city are Casino del Real CF of the fourth-tier Tercera División. The football's governing institution is the Melilla Football Federation. Dispute with Morocco The government of Morocco has repeatedly called for Spain to transfer the sovereignty of Ceuta and Melilla, along with uninhabited islets such as the Alhucemas Islands, the rock of Vélez de la Gomera and the Perejil island, drawing comparisons with Spain's territorial claim to Gibraltar. In both cases, the national governments and local populations of the disputed territories reject these claims by a large majority. The Spanish position states that both Ceuta and Melilla are integral parts of Spain, and have been since the 16th century, centuries prior to Morocco's independence from France in 1956, whereas Gibraltar, being a British Overseas Territory, is not and never has been part of the United Kingdom. Both cities also have the same semi-autonomous status as the mainland region in Spain. Melilla has been under Spanish rule for longer than cities in northern Spain such as Pamplona or Tudela, and was conquered roughly in the same period as the last Muslim cities of Southern Spain such as Granada, Málaga, Ronda or Almería: Spain claims that the enclaves were established before the creation of the Kingdom of Morocco. Morocco denies these claims and maintains that the Spanish presence on or near its coast is a remnant of the colonial past which should be ended. The United Nations list of Non-Self-Governing Territories does not include these Spanish territories and the dispute remains bilaterally debated between Spain and Morocco. In 1986, Spain entered the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. However Ceuta and Melilla are not under NATO protection since Article 6 of the treaty limits the coverage to Europe and North America and islands north of the Tropic of Cancer. This contrasts wit French Algeria which was explicitly included in the treaty. Legal experts have interpreted that other articles could cover the Spanish North African cities but this take has not been tested in practice. On 21 December 2020, following the affirmations of the Moroccan Prime Minister, Saadeddine Othmani, stating that Ceuta and Melilla "are Moroccan as the [Western] Sahara [is]", Spain urgently summoned the Moroccan Ambassador to convey that Spain expects respect from all its partners to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of its country and asked for explanations about the words of Othmani. Notable people Twin towns – sister cities Melilla is twinned with: Caracas (Venezuela). Cavite City (Philippines). Ceuta (Spain). Toledo (Spain). Málaga (Spain). Montevideo (Uruguay). Motril (Spain); since January 2008. Almería (Spain). Mantua (Italy); since September 2013. Vélez-Málaga (Spain); since January 2014. Antequera (Spain); as of 2016, in process. See also European enclaves in North Africa before 1830 Melilla (Congress of Deputies constituency) References Citations Bibliography External links Postal Codes Melilla Autonomous cities of Spain Enclaves and exclaves Mediterranean port cities and towns in Spain Morocco–Spain border crossings NUTS 2 statistical regions of the European Union Port cities in Africa Special territories of the European Union States and territories established in 1995 Territorial disputes of Morocco Territorial disputes of Spain

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macaroni

Macaroni

Macaroni (, Italian: maccheroni) is dry pasta shaped like narrow tubes. Made with durum wheat, macaroni is commonly cut in short lengths; curved macaroni may be referred to as elbow macaroni. Some home machines can make macaroni shapes but, like most pasta, macaroni is usually made commercially by large-scale extrusion. The curved shape is created by different speeds of extrusion on opposite sides of the pasta tube as it comes out of the machine. The word "macaroni" is often used synonymously with elbow-shaped macaroni, as it is the variety most often used in macaroni and cheese recipes. In Italy and other countries, the noun maccheroni can refer to straight, tubular, square-ended pasta corta ("short-length pasta") or to long pasta dishes, as in maccheroni alla chitarra and frittata di maccheroni, which are prepared with long pasta like spaghetti. In the United States, federal regulations define three different shapes of dried pasta, such as spaghetti, as a "macaroni product". Etymology In Italian, maccheroni refers to elongated pasta, not necessarily in tubular form. This general meaning is still retained outside Rome and in different languages which borrowed the word. In Brazilian Portuguese, Estonian, Greek, Iranian, Russian and other Slavic languages, Arabic, Turkish, Kazakh, Azerbaijani, Uzbek, Kyrgyz, and other Turkic languages and some Italian-American dialects the word was adapted as a generic term for all varieties of pasta. Maccheroni comes from Italian maccheroni , plural form of maccherone. The many variants sometimes differ from each other because of the texture of each pasta: rigatoni and tortiglioni, for example, have ridges down their lengths, while chifferi, lumache, lumaconi, pipe, pipette, etc. refer to elbow-shaped pasta similar to macaroni in North American culture. However, the product as well as the name derive from the ancient Greek "Macaria". The academic consensus supports that the word is derived from the Greek μακαρία (makaria), a kind of barley broth which was served to commemorate the dead. In turn, that comes from μάκαρες (makares) meaning "blessed dead", and ultimately from μακάριος (makarios), collateral of μάκαρ (makar) which means "blessed, happy". However, the Italian linguist G. Alessio argues that the word can have two origins. The first is the Medieval Greek μακαρώνεια (makarōneia) "dirge" (stated in sec. XIII by James of Bulgaria), which would mean "funeral meal" and then "food to serve" during this office (see modern Eastern Thrace's μαχαρωνιά - macharōnia in the sense of "rice-based dish served at the funeral"), in which case, the term would be composed of the double root of μακάριος "blessed" and αἰωνίος (aiōnios), "eternally". The second is the Greek μακαρία "barley broth", which would have added the suffix -one. In his book Delizia! The Epic History of Italians and their Food (2007), John Dickie instead says that the word macaroni, and its earlier variants like maccheroni, "comes from maccare, meaning to pound or crush." The word first appears in English as makerouns in the 1390 Forme of Cury, which records the earliest recipe for macaroni and cheese. The word later came to be applied to overdressed dandies and was associated with foppish Italian fashions of dress and periwigs, as in the eighteenth-century British song "Yankee Doodle". Culinary use outside Italy As is the case with dishes made with other types of pasta, macaroni and cheese is a popular dish and is often made with elbow macaroni. The same dish, known simply as macaroni cheese, is also found in Great Britain, where it originated. A sweet macaroni, known as macaroni pudding, containing milk and sugar (and rather similar to a rice pudding) was also popular with the British during the Victorian era. A popular canned variety is still manufactured by Ambrosia and sold in UK supermarkets. In areas with large Chinese populations open to Western cultural influence such as Hong Kong, Macao, Malaysia and Singapore, the local Chinese have adopted macaroni as an ingredient for Chinese-style Western cuisine. In Hong Kong's cha chaan teng ("tea restaurants") and Southeast Asia's kopi tiam ("coffee shops"), macaroni is cooked in water and then rinsed to remove starch, and served in clear broth with ham or frankfurter sausages, peas, black mushrooms, and optionally eggs, reminiscent of noodle soup dishes. This is often a course for breakfast or light lunch fare. Macaroni has also been incorporated into Malay Malaysian cuisine, where it is stir-fried akin to mee goreng using Asian seasoning similar to said noodle dish (i.e. shallots, oyster sauce and chili paste). In the Philippines, it is a key ingredient in sopas, a semi-clear chicken broth often with chicken meat, pork, carrots, and other vegetables. A common variant uses milk, specifically evaporada. See also Kushari - an Egyptian dish made of rice, macaroni and lentils Macaroni art References External links http://law.justia.com/cfr/title21/21-2.0.1.1.24.html Types of pasta Italian cuisine Neapolitan cuisine

20232

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messenger%20RNA

Messenger RNA

In molecular biology, messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) is a single-stranded molecule of RNA that corresponds to the genetic sequence of a gene, and is read by a ribosome in the process of synthesizing a protein. mRNA is created during the process of transcription, where an enzyme (RNA polymerase) converts the gene into primary transcript mRNA (also known as pre-mRNA). This pre-mRNA usually still contains introns, regions that will not go on to code for the final amino acid sequence. These are removed in the process of RNA splicing, leaving only exons, regions that will encode the protein. This exon sequence constitutes mature mRNA. Mature mRNA is then read by the ribosome, and, utilising amino acids carried by transfer RNA (tRNA), the ribosome creates the protein. This process is known as translation. All of these processes form part of the central dogma of molecular biology, which describes the flow of genetic information in a biological system. As in DNA, genetic information in mRNA is contained in the sequence of nucleotides, which are arranged into codons consisting of three ribonucleotides each. Each codon codes for a specific amino acid, except the stop codons, which terminate protein synthesis. The translation of codons into amino acids requires two other types of RNA: transfer RNA, which recognizes the codon and provides the corresponding amino acid, and ribosomal RNA (rRNA), the central component of the ribosome's protein-manufacturing machinery. The idea of mRNA was first conceived by Sydney Brenner and Francis Crick on 15 April 1960 at King's College, Cambridge, while François Jacob was telling them about a recent experiment conducted by Arthur Pardee, himself, and Jacques Monod. With Crick's encouragement, Brenner and Jacob immediately set out to test this new hypothesis, and they reached out to Matthew Meselson at the California Institute of Technology. During the summer of 1960, Brenner, Jacob, and Meselson conducted an experiment in Meselson's laboratory at Caltech which established the existence of mRNA. That fall, Jacob and Monod coined the name "messenger RNA" and developed the first theoretical framework to explain its function. In February 1961, James Watson revealed that his research group was right behind them with a similar experiment in roughly the same direction; Brenner and the others agreed to Watson's request to delay publication of their research findings. As a result, the Brenner and Watson articles were published simultaneously in the same issue of Nature in May 1961, while that same month, Jacob and Monod published their theoretical framework for mRNA in the Journal of Molecular Biology. Synthesis, processing and function The brief existence of an mRNA molecule begins with transcription, and ultimately ends in degradation. During its life, an mRNA molecule may also be processed, edited, and transported prior to translation. Eukaryotic mRNA molecules often require extensive processing and transport, while prokaryotic mRNA molecules do not. A molecule of eukaryotic mRNA and the proteins surrounding it are together called a messenger RNP. Transcription Transcription is when RNA is copied from DNA. During transcription, RNA polymerase makes a copy of a gene from the DNA to mRNA as needed. This process differs slightly in eukaryotes and prokaryotes. One notable difference is that prokaryotic RNA polymerase associates with DNA-processing enzymes during transcription so that processing can proceed during transcription. Therefore, this causes the new mRNA strand to become double stranded by producing a complementary strand known as the tRNA strand, which when combined are unable to form structures from base-pairing. Moreover, the template for mRNA is the complementary strand of tRNA, which is identical in sequence to the anticodon sequence that the DNA binds to. The short-lived, unprocessed or partially processed product is termed precursor mRNA, or pre-mRNA; once completely processed, it is termed mature mRNA. Eukaryotic pre-mRNA processing Processing of mRNA differs greatly among eukaryotes, bacteria, and archaea. Non-eukaryotic mRNA is, in essence, mature upon transcription and requires no processing, except in rare cases. Eukaryotic pre-mRNA, however, requires several processing steps before its transport to the cytoplasm and its translation by the ribosome. Splicing The extensive processing of eukaryotic pre-mRNA that leads to the mature mRNA is the RNA splicing, a mechanism by which introns or outrons (non-coding regions) are removed and exons (coding regions) are joined together. 5' cap addition A 5' cap (also termed an RNA cap, an RNA 7-methylguanosine cap, or an RNA m7G cap) is a modified guanine nucleotide that has been added to the "front" or 5' end of a eukaryotic messenger RNA shortly after the start of transcription. The 5' cap consists of a terminal 7-methylguanosine residue that is linked through a 5'-5'-triphosphate bond to the first transcribed nucleotide. Its presence is critical for recognition by the ribosome and protection from RNases. Cap addition is coupled to transcription, and occurs co-transcriptionally, such that each influences the other. Shortly after the start of transcription, the 5' end of the mRNA being synthesized is bound by a cap-synthesizing complex associated with RNA polymerase. This enzymatic complex catalyzes the chemical reactions that are required for mRNA capping. Synthesis proceeds as a multi-step biochemical reaction. Editing In some instances, an mRNA will be edited, changing the nucleotide composition of that mRNA. An example in humans is the apolipoprotein B mRNA, which is edited in some tissues, but not others. The editing creates an early stop codon, which, upon translation, produces a shorter protein. Polyadenylation Polyadenylation is the covalent linkage of a polyadenylyl moiety to a messenger RNA molecule. In eukaryotic organisms most messenger RNA (mRNA) molecules are polyadenylated at the 3' end, but recent studies have shown that short stretches of uridine (oligouridylation) are also common. The poly(A) tail and the protein bound to it aid in protecting mRNA from degradation by exonucleases. Polyadenylation is also important for transcription termination, export of the mRNA from the nucleus, and translation. mRNA can also be polyadenylated in prokaryotic organisms, where poly(A) tails act to facilitate, rather than impede, exonucleolytic degradation. Polyadenylation occurs during and/or immediately after transcription of DNA into RNA. After transcription has been terminated, the mRNA chain is cleaved through the action of an endonuclease complex associated with RNA polymerase. After the mRNA has been cleaved, around 250 adenosine residues are added to the free 3' end at the cleavage site. This reaction is catalyzed by polyadenylate polymerase. Just as in alternative splicing, there can be more than one polyadenylation variant of an mRNA. Polyadenylation site mutations also occur. The primary RNA transcript of a gene is cleaved at the poly-A addition site, and 100–200 A's are added to the 3' end of the RNA. If this site is altered, an abnormally long and unstable mRNA construct will be formed. Transport Another difference between eukaryotes and prokaryotes is mRNA transport. Because eukaryotic transcription and translation is compartmentally separated, eukaryotic mRNAs must be exported from the nucleus to the cytoplasm—a process that may be regulated by different signaling pathways. Mature mRNAs are recognized by their processed modifications and then exported through the nuclear pore by binding to the cap-binding proteins CBP20 and CBP80, as well as the transcription/export complex (TREX). Multiple mRNA export pathways have been identified in eukaryotes. In spatially complex cells, some mRNAs are transported to particular subcellular destinations. In mature neurons, certain mRNA are transported from the soma to dendrites. One site of mRNA translation is at polyribosomes selectively localized beneath synapses. The mRNA for Arc/Arg3.1 is induced by synaptic activity and localizes selectively near active synapses based on signals generated by NMDA receptors. Other mRNAs also move into dendrites in response to external stimuli, such as β-actin mRNA. Upon export from the nucleus, actin mRNA associates with ZBP1 and the 40S subunit. The complex is bound by a motor protein and is transported to the target location (neurite extension) along the cytoskeleton. Eventually ZBP1 is phosphorylated by Src in order for translation to be initiated. In developing neurons, mRNAs are also transported into growing axons and especially growth cones. Many mRNAs are marked with so-called "zip codes," which target their transport to a specific location. Translation Because prokaryotic mRNA does not need to be processed or transported, translation by the ribosome can begin immediately after the end of transcription. Therefore, it can be said that prokaryotic translation is coupled to transcription and occurs co-transcriptionally. Eukaryotic mRNA that has been processed and transported to the cytoplasm (i.e., mature mRNA) can then be translated by the ribosome. Translation may occur at ribosomes free-floating in the cytoplasm, or directed to the endoplasmic reticulum by the signal recognition particle. Therefore, unlike in prokaryotes, eukaryotic translation is not directly coupled to transcription. It is even possible in some contexts that reduced mRNA levels are accompanied by increased protein levels, as has been observed for mRNA/protein levels of EEF1A1 in breast cancer. Structure Coding regions Coding regions are composed of codons, which are decoded and translated into proteins by the ribosome; in eukaryotes usually into one and in prokaryotes usually into several. Coding regions begin with the start codon and end with a stop codon. In general, the start codon is an AUG triplet and the stop codon is UAG ("amber"), UAA ("ochre"), or UGA ("opal"). The coding regions tend to be stabilised by internal base pairs, this impedes degradation. In addition to being protein-coding, portions of coding regions may serve as regulatory sequences in the pre-mRNA as exonic splicing enhancers or exonic splicing silencers. Untranslated regions Untranslated regions (UTRs) are sections of the mRNA before the start codon and after the stop codon that are not translated, termed the five prime untranslated region (5' UTR) and three prime untranslated region (3' UTR), respectively. These regions are transcribed with the coding region and thus are exonic as they are present in the mature mRNA. Several roles in gene expression have been attributed to the untranslated regions, including mRNA stability, mRNA localization, and translational efficiency. The ability of a UTR to perform these functions depends on the sequence of the UTR and can differ between mRNAs. Genetic variants in 3' UTR have also been implicated in disease susceptibility because of the change in RNA structure and protein translation. The stability of mRNAs may be controlled by the 5' UTR and/or 3' UTR due to varying affinity for RNA degrading enzymes called ribonucleases and for ancillary proteins that can promote or inhibit RNA degradation. (See also, C-rich stability element.) Translational efficiency, including sometimes the complete inhibition of translation, can be controlled by UTRs. Proteins that bind to either the 3' or 5' UTR may affect translation by influencing the ribosome's ability to bind to the mRNA. MicroRNAs bound to the 3' UTR also may affect translational efficiency or mRNA stability. Cytoplasmic localization of mRNA is thought to be a function of the 3' UTR. Proteins that are needed in a particular region of the cell can also be translated there; in such a case, the 3' UTR may contain sequences that allow the transcript to be localized to this region for translation. Some of the elements contained in untranslated regions form a characteristic secondary structure when transcribed into RNA. These structural mRNA elements are involved in regulating the mRNA. Some, such as the SECIS element, are targets for proteins to bind. One class of mRNA element, the riboswitches, directly bind small molecules, changing their fold to modify levels of transcription or translation. In these cases, the mRNA regulates itself. Poly(A) tail The 3' poly(A) tail is a long sequence of adenine nucleotides (often several hundred) added to the 3' end of the pre-mRNA. This tail promotes export from the nucleus and translation, and protects the mRNA from degradation. Monocistronic versus polycistronic mRNA An mRNA molecule is said to be monocistronic when it contains the genetic information to translate only a single protein chain (polypeptide). This is the case for most of the eukaryotic mRNAs. On the other hand, polycistronic mRNA carries several open reading frames (ORFs), each of which is translated into a polypeptide. These polypeptides usually have a related function (they often are the subunits composing a final complex protein) and their coding sequence is grouped and regulated together in a regulatory region, containing a promoter and an operator. Most of the mRNA found in bacteria and archaea is polycistronic, as is the human mitochondrial genome. Dicistronic or bicistronic mRNA encodes only two proteins. mRNA circularization In eukaryotes mRNA molecules form circular structures due to an interaction between the eIF4E and poly(A)-binding protein, which both bind to eIF4G, forming an mRNA-protein-mRNA bridge. Circularization is thought to promote cycling of ribosomes on the mRNA leading to time-efficient translation, and may also function to ensure only intact mRNA are translated (partially degraded mRNA characteristically have no m7G cap, or no poly-A tail). Other mechanisms for circularization exist, particularly in virus mRNA. Poliovirus mRNA uses a cloverleaf section towards its 5' end to bind PCBP2, which binds poly(A)-binding protein, forming the familiar mRNA-protein-mRNA circle. Barley yellow dwarf virus has binding between mRNA segments on its 5' end and 3' end (called kissing stem loops), circularizing the mRNA without any proteins involved. RNA virus genomes (the + strands of which are translated as mRNA) are also commonly circularized. During genome replication the circularization acts to enhance genome replication speeds, cycling viral RNA-dependent RNA polymerase much the same as the ribosome is hypothesized to cycle. Degradation Different mRNAs within the same cell have distinct lifetimes (stabilities). In bacterial cells, individual mRNAs can survive from seconds to more than an hour. However, the lifetime averages between 1 and 3 minutes, making bacterial mRNA much less stable than eukaryotic mRNA. In mammalian cells, mRNA lifetimes range from several minutes to days. The greater the stability of an mRNA the more protein may be produced from that mRNA. The limited lifetime of mRNA enables a cell to alter protein synthesis rapidly in response to its changing needs. There are many mechanisms that lead to the destruction of an mRNA, some of which are described below. Prokaryotic mRNA degradation In general, in prokaryotes the lifetime of mRNA is much shorter than in eukaryotes. Prokaryotes degrade messages by using a combination of ribonucleases, including endonucleases, 3' exonucleases, and 5' exonucleases. In some instances, small RNA molecules (sRNA) tens to hundreds of nucleotides long can stimulate the degradation of specific mRNAs by base-pairing with complementary sequences and facilitating ribonuclease cleavage by RNase III. It was recently shown that bacteria also have a sort of 5' cap consisting of a triphosphate on the 5' end. Removal of two of the phosphates leaves a 5' monophosphate, causing the message to be destroyed by the exonuclease RNase J, which degrades 5' to 3'. Eukaryotic mRNA turnover Inside eukaryotic cells, there is a balance between the processes of translation and mRNA decay. Messages that are being actively translated are bound by ribosomes, the eukaryotic initiation factors eIF-4E and eIF-4G, and poly(A)-binding protein. eIF-4E and eIF-4G block the decapping enzyme (DCP2), and poly(A)-binding protein blocks the exosome complex, protecting the ends of the message. The balance between translation and decay is reflected in the size and abundance of cytoplasmic structures known as P-bodies. The poly(A) tail of the mRNA is shortened by specialized exonucleases that are targeted to specific messenger RNAs by a combination of cis-regulatory sequences on the RNA and trans-acting RNA-binding proteins. Poly(A) tail removal is thought to disrupt the circular structure of the message and destabilize the cap binding complex. The message is then subject to degradation by either the exosome complex or the decapping complex. In this way, translationally inactive messages can be destroyed quickly, while active messages remain intact. The mechanism by which translation stops and the message is handed-off to decay complexes is not understood in detail. AU-rich element decay The presence of AU-rich elements in some mammalian mRNAs tends to destabilize those transcripts through the action of cellular proteins that bind these sequences and stimulate poly(A) tail removal. Loss of the poly(A) tail is thought to promote mRNA degradation by facilitating attack by both the exosome complex and the decapping complex. Rapid mRNA degradation via AU-rich elements is a critical mechanism for preventing the overproduction of potent cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor (TNF) and granulocyte-macrophage colony stimulating factor (GM-CSF). AU-rich elements also regulate the biosynthesis of proto-oncogenic transcription factors like c-Jun and c-Fos. Nonsense-mediated decay Eukaryotic messages are subject to surveillance by nonsense-mediated decay (NMD), which checks for the presence of premature stop codons (nonsense codons) in the message. These can arise via incomplete splicing, V(D)J recombination in the adaptive immune system, mutations in DNA, transcription errors, leaky scanning by the ribosome causing a frame shift, and other causes. Detection of a premature stop codon triggers mRNA degradation by 5' decapping, 3' poly(A) tail removal, or endonucleolytic cleavage. Small interfering RNA (siRNA) In metazoans, small interfering RNAs (siRNAs) processed by Dicer are incorporated into a complex known as the RNA-induced silencing complex or RISC. This complex contains an endonuclease that cleaves perfectly complementary messages to which the siRNA binds. The resulting mRNA fragments are then destroyed by exonucleases. siRNA is commonly used in laboratories to block the function of genes in cell culture. It is thought to be part of the innate immune system as a defense against double-stranded RNA viruses. MicroRNA (miRNA) MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small RNAs that typically are partially complementary to sequences in metazoan messenger RNAs. Binding of a miRNA to a message can repress translation of that message and accelerate poly(A) tail removal, thereby hastening mRNA degradation. The mechanism of action of miRNAs is the subject of active research. Other decay mechanisms There are other ways by which messages can be degraded, including non-stop decay and silencing by Piwi-interacting RNA (piRNA), among others. Applications The administration of a nucleoside-modified messenger RNA sequence can cause a cell to make a protein, which in turn could directly treat a disease or could function as a vaccine; more indirectly the protein could drive an endogenous stem cell to differentiate in a desired way. The primary challenges of RNA therapy center on delivering the RNA to the appropriate cells. Challenges include the fact that naked RNA sequences naturally degrade after preparation; they may trigger the body's immune system to attack them as an invader; and they are impermeable to the cell membrane. Once within the cell, they must then leave the cell's transport mechanism to take action within the cytoplasm, which houses the necessary ribosomes. Overcoming these challenges, mRNA as a therapeutic was first put forward in 1989 "after the development of a broadly applicable in vitro transfection technique." In the 1990s, mRNA vaccines for personalized cancer have been developed, relying on non-nucleoside modified mRNA. mRNA based therapies continue to be investigated as a method of treatment or therapy for both cancer as well as auto-immune, metabolic, and respiratory inflammatory diseases. Gene editing therapies such as CRISPR may also benefit from using mRNA to induce cells to make the desired Cas protein. Since the 2010s, RNA vaccines and other RNA therapeutics have been considered to be "a new class of drugs." The first mRNA-based vaccines received restricted authorization and were rolled out across the world during the COVID-19 pandemic by Pfizer–BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine and Moderna, for example. See also GeneCalling, an mRNA profiling technology Missense mRNA mRNA display mRNA surveillance Transcriptome, the sum of all RNA in a cell References Further reading External links RNAi Atlas: a database of RNAi libraries and their target analysis results miRSearch : Tool for finding microRNAs that target mRNA How mRNA is coded?: YouTube video What is mRNA?: theconversation.com RNA Gene expression Protein biosynthesis Molecular genetics Spliceosome RNA splicing Life sciences industry

20237

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount%20Saint%20Vincent%20University

Mount Saint Vincent University

Mount Saint Vincent University, often referred to as the Mount, is a public, primarily undergraduate, university located in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and was established in 1873. Mount Saint Vincent offers undergraduate programs in Arts, Science, Education, and Professional Studies. The Mount has 13 graduate degrees in areas including Applied Human Nutrition, School Psychology, Child and Youth Study, Education, Family Studies and Gerontology, Public Relations and Women's Studies. The Mount offers a doctorate program, a Ph.D. in Educational Studies, through a joint-initiative with St. Francis Xavier University and Acadia University. The Mount offers more than 190 courses, over 10 full undergraduate degree programs and four graduate degree, programs online. The university attracts many students in part because of its small class sizes, specialty programs, and location. The Mount has Canada Research Chairs in Gender Identity and Social Practices as well as Food Security and Policy Change. This institution is unique nationwide as it has a Chair in learning disabilities, Master of Public Relations program, Bachelor of Science in Communication Studies, and numerous other programs, faculty, and research initiatives. History Established by the Sisters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul as a women's college in 1873, the Mount was one of the few institutions of higher education for women in Canada at a time when women could not vote. The original purpose of the academy was to train novices and young sisters as teachers, but the Sisters also recognized a need to educate other young women. Over the ensuing years, the order developed a convent, schools, an orphanage, and health care facilities throughout the Halifax area, as well as across North America. Architect Charles Welsford West designed the Romanesque chapel and annex (1903–05) at Mount St. Vincent Academy (now University). He served as the Architect, Nova Scotia Public Works & Mines 1932-1950. By 1912, the Sisters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul recognized the need to offer greater opportunity through university education and adopted a plan to establish a college for young women. It was two years later in 1914 that the Sisters partnered with Dalhousie University, enabling Mount Saint Vincent to offer the first two years of a bachelor's degree program to be credited toward a Dalhousie degree. In 1925, the Nova Scotia Legislature awarded the Mount the right to grant its own degrees, making it the only independent women's college in the British Commonwealth. By 1951, degrees were offered in Arts, Secretarial Science, Music, Home Economics, Library Science, Nursing and Education. A new charter was granted in 1966 and the College became Mount Saint Vincent University, bringing forth the establishment of a Board of Governors and Senate. This was also a period of tremendous growth – with enrollment increases, new construction and new agreements. In 1967 the Mount began admitting men as students. The University continued to evolve with the expansion of programs during the 1970s and entered into several new fields, including Child Study, Public Relations, Gerontology, Tourism and Hospitality Management, Cooperative Education and Distance Education. In July 1988, the Sisters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul officially transferred ownership of the institution to the Board of Governors. Caritas Day After a fire in 1951 burned down Mount Saint Vincent’s solitary building, the people of Halifax came together to support students by providing alternative accommodations for their classes. In recognition of the generosity of their community, the Sisters of Charity established a memorial holiday in appreciation of their gesture. Caritas Day, named after the Christian virtue of charity, takes place on the last Wednesday of January of each year. No classes are held on this day, and students are encouraged to volunteer their time instead. Caritas Day is an opportunity for students and faculty alike to connect with the Sisters of Charity and come together outside of class time in a setting that is both personally and academically beneficial. Programs Mount Saint Vincent University offers over 40 undergraduate degrees in the Arts, Sciences and Professional Studies. Professional Studies programs include Applied Human Nutrition, Business Administration, Child and Youth Study, Family Studies and Gerontology, Information Technology, Public Relations, Non-profit Leadership and Tourism and Hospitality Management. All undergraduate programs are work-experience eligible, meaning any Mount student can take part in a work placement (practicum, co-op, internship) as part of their program. The Mount also offers diplomas in Business Administration and Tourism & Hospitality Management, and certificates in Accounting, Business Administration, Marketing, Proficiency in French and Non-profit Leadership. Following consolidation of post-secondary programs across Nova Scotia in the 1990s, the Mount became home to the only education program in the Halifax area. The faculty of Education is home to the only school psychology graduate program in Atlantic Canada. Graduates of this program are eligible to become registered psychologists in Nova Scotia and several other provinces in Canada. The Mount houses 16 research centres and institutes. The Department of Applied Human Nutrition has an accredited dietetic program. The University is accredited by a professional organization such as the Dietitians of Canada and the university's graduates may subsequently become registered dietitians. Mount Saint Vincent University is the only university in Canada to offer a Master of Public Relations program (MPR). The MPR program graduated its first class in October 2009. The Canadian Public Relations Society (CPRS) recognizes MSVU's MPR program for excellence in PR education in its Pathways to the Profession guide. Support Services Academic programs are supported by a wide variety of electronic and print research resources in the MSVU Library. Research services include drop-in reference assistance, research appointments and classroom workshops. January 2019 marked the 40th anniversary of the Mount's co-operative education program. It is the longest-standing nationally accredited co-op program in the Maritime Provinces, offering an optional co-op program in 1979 for students in the Bachelor of Business Administration program. Four decades later, more than 8,000 Business Administration, Public Relations, and Tourism & Hospitality Management students have taken their learning from the classroom to the workplace, completing paid work terms in industries related to their field of study (today co-op is a required part of the Public Relations and Tourism & Hospitality Management degrees). Since 2014, the Mount Co-op Office has also enabled experiential opportunities for Arts and Science students through an Arts & Science Internship Program. Mount Saint Vincent University is home to the Centre for Women in Business, a not-for-profit university business development centre (UBDC), dedicated to assisting with entrepreneurial activities both within the university and throughout Nova Scotia. Founded in 1992 by the University's Department of Business & Tourism, this remains the only UBDC in Canada with a primary focus on women. The Centre has served more than 7500 clients over the past 18 years. Art Gallery The Mount Saint Vincent University Art Gallery is located on the first floor of Seton Academic Centre. The gallery opened in 1971 as a resource to Mount Saint Vincent, communities served by the university, artists, Metro Halifax residents and art publics everywhere. Admission is always free of charge. MSVU Art Gallery reflects the University's educational aims by devoting a significant part of its activities to the representation of women as cultural subjects and producers. Its exhibitions explore various forms of cultural production, highlighting the achievements of Nova Scotian artists and themes relevant to academic programs offered by the university. Wikuom The Mount was the first Nova Scotia university to add a wikuom to its campus facilities. First raised on June 12, 2017, the wikuom is a welcoming traditional Mi'kmaq space where both Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities can gather and learn together. The Mount is also home to the Aboriginal Student Centre (ASC), which is home to ASC staff who provide academic advising, counselling and other support services to students. The ASC hosts a number of events, including the Mount's Mid-Winter Feast, Blanket Exercises, Cultural Workshops, Mini-Mount Camps, and more. Athletics Home to the Mystics, the Mount competes in the Atlantic Colleges Athletic Association (ACAA) in Women's & Men's Basketball, Women's & Men's Soccer, Cross Country and Women's Volleyball. The Mystics hold a championship titles in all sports, making them the most acclaimed team of the ACAA division. Women's Volleyball claimed the ACAA title for the 8th consecutive year, February 2019 Notable Graduates and Honorary Doctorate Recipients Notable graduates of the Mount include: Ryan Cochrane Barrie Dunn Paul D. McNair During the 1995 G7 summit, Mount Saint Vincent University awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree to Hillary Clinton. See also List of current and historical women's universities and colleges Higher education in Nova Scotia List of universities in Nova Scotia Canadian Interuniversity Sport Canadian government scientific research organizations Canadian university scientific research organizations Canadian industrial research and development organizations List of colleges and universities named after people References External links Official website Universities and colleges in Halifax, Nova Scotia Universities in Nova Scotia Catholic universities and colleges in Canada Educational institutions established in 1849 Former women's universities and colleges in Canada Catholic Church in Nova Scotia 1849 establishments in Nova Scotia Women in Nova Scotia

20239

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal%20pair

Minimal pair

In phonology, minimal pairs are pairs of words or phrases in a particular language, spoken or signed, that differ in only one phonological element, such as a phoneme, toneme or chroneme, and have distinct meanings. They are used to demonstrate that two phones are two separate phonemes in the language. Many phonologists in the middle part of the 20th century had a strong interest in developing techniques for discovering the phonemes of unknown languages, and in some cases, they set up writing systems for the languages. The major work of Kenneth Pike on the subject is Phonemics: a technique for reducing languages to writing. The minimal pair was an essential tool in the discovery process and was found by substitution or commutation tests. As an example for English vowels, the pair "let" + "lit" can be used to demonstrate that the phones (in let) and (in lit) actually represent distinct phonemes and . An example for English consonants is the minimal pair of "pat" + "bat". The following table shows other pairs demonstrating the existence of various distinct phonemes in English. All of the possible minimal pairs for any language may be set out in the same way. Phonemic differentiation may vary between different dialects of a language so a particular minimal pair in one accent may be a pair of homophones in another. That means not that one of the phonemes is absent in the homonym accent but only that it is not contrastive in the same range of contexts. Types In addition to the minimal pairs of vowels and consonants provided above, others may be found: Quantity Many languages show contrasts between long and short vowels and consonants. A distinctive difference in length is attributed by some phonologists to a unit called a chroneme. Thus, Italian has the following minimal pair that is based on long and short : However, in such a case it is not easy to decide whether a long vowel or consonant should be treated as having an added chroneme or simply as a geminate sound with phonemes. Classical Latin, German, some Italian dialects, almost all Uralic languages, Thai, and many other languages also have distinctive length in vowels. An example is the cŭ/cū minimal pair in the dialect that is spoken near Palmi (Calabria, Italy): Syntactic gemination In some languages like Italian, word-initial consonants are geminated after certain vowel-final words in the same prosodic unit. Sometimes, the phenomenon can create some syntactic-gemination-minimal-pairs: In the example, the graphical accent on dà is just a diacritical mark that does not change the pronunciation of the word itself. However, in some specific areas, like Tuscany, both phrases are pronounced and so can be distinguished only from the context. Tone Minimal pairs for tone contrasts in tone languages can be established; some writers refer to that as a contrast involving a toneme. For example, Kono distinguishes high tone and low tone on syllables: Stress Languages in which stress may occur in different positions within the word often have contrasts that can be shown in minimal pairs, as in Greek and Spanish: In English stress can determine the part of speech of a word: insult as a noun is while as a verb it is . In certain cases it can also differentiate two words: below vs billow . Juncture Anglophones can distinguish between, for example, "great ape" and "grey tape", but phonemically, the two phrases are identical: . The difference between the two phrases, which constitute a minimal pair, is said to be one of juncture. At the word boundary, a "plus juncture" /+/ has been posited and said to be the factor conditioning allophones to allow distinctivity: in this example, the phrase "great ape" has an diphthong shortened by pre-fortis clipping and, since it is not syllable-initial, a with little aspiration (variously , , , , etc., depending on dialect); meanwhile in "grey tape", the has its full length and the is aspirated . Only languages with allophonic differences associated with grammatical boundaries may have juncture as a phonological element. There is disagreement over whether or not French has phonological juncture: it seems likely that the difference between, for example, "" (some little holes) and "" (some little wheels), phonemically both , is only perceptible in slow, careful speech. Minimal sets The principle of a simple binary opposition between the two members of a minimal pair may be extended to cover a minimal set in which a number of words differ from one another in terms of one phone in a particular position in the word. For example, the vowels , , , , of Swahili are shown to be distinct by the following set of words: pata 'hinge', peta 'bend', pita 'pass', pota 'twist', puta 'thrash'. However, establishing such sets is not always straightforward and may require very complex study of multiple oppositions as expounded by, for example, Nikolai Trubetzkoy. Teaching Minimal pairs were an important part of the theory of pronunciation teaching during its development in the period of structuralist linguistics, particularly in the 1940s and 1950s, and minimal pair drills were widely used to train students to discriminate among the phonemes of the target language. These drills took the form of minimal pair word drills and minimal pair sentence drills. For example, if the focus of a lesson was on the distinction /ɪ/ versus /ɛ/, learners might be asked to signal which sound they heard as the teacher pronounced lists of words with these phonemes such as lid/led, tin/ten, or slipped/slept. Minimal pair sentence drills consisted of paired sentences such as "He slipped on the floor/He slept on the floor." Again, learners would be asked to distinguish which of the sentences they heard as the teacher read them aloud. Another use of minimal pair drills was in pair work. Here, one member of the pair would be responsible for listening to the other member read the minimal pair word or sentence aloud and would be tasked with identifying which phoneme was being produced. In this form of classroom practice, both the skills of perception and production were practiced. Later writers have criticized the approach as being artificial and lacking in relevance to language learners' needs. However, even today minimal pair listening and production drills remain a common tool for the teaching of segmental differences. Some writers have claimed that learners are likely not to hear differences between phones if the difference is not a phonemic one. One of the objectives of contrastive analysis of languages' sound systems was to identify points of likely difficulty for language learners that would arise from differences in phoneme inventories between the native language and the target language. However, experimental evidence for this claim is hard to find, and the claim should be treated with caution. In sign languages In the past, signs were considered holistic forms without internal structure. However, the discovery in the mid-20th century that minimal pairs also exist in sign languages showed that sign languages have sublexical structure. Signs consist of phonemes, which are specifications for location, movement, handshape, orientation, and non-manual elements. When signs differ in only one of these specifications, they form a minimal pair. For instance, the German Sign Language signs shoes and socks are identical in form apart from their handshapes. See also Minimal pairs in Phoneme References Bibliography Brown, G. (1990) Listening to Spoken English, Longman Celce-Murcia, M., D. Brinton and J. Goodwin (1996) Teaching Pronunciation, Cambridge University Press Fromkin, V. and Rodman, R. (1993) An Introduction to Language, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Jones, Daniel (1931) ' "" ' ['The "Word" as a phonetic entity'], Le Maître Phonétique, XXXVI, pp. 60–65. Jones, Daniel (1944) 'Chronemes and Tonemes', Acta Linguistica, IV, Copenhagen, pp. 1–10. Ladefoged, Peter (2001) Vowels and Consonants, Blackwell Ladefoged, Peter (2006) A Course in Phonetics, Thomson Lado, R. (1957) Linguistics across Cultures, University of Michigan Press Lado, R. (1961) Language Testing, Longman O'Connor, J.D. (1973) Phonetics, Penguin O'Connor, J.D and Tooley, O. (1964) 'The perceptibility of certain word-boundaries', in Abercrombie et al. (eds) In Honour of Daniel Jones, Longman, pp. 171–6. Pennington, M. (1996) Phonology in English Language Teaching, Longman Pike, Kenneth (1947) Phonemics, University of Michigan Press Roach, Peter (2009) English Phonetics and Phonology, Cambridge University Press Swadesh, M. (1934) 'The Phonemic Principle', Language vol. 10, pp. 117–29 Trubetzkoy, N., translated by C. Baltaxe(1969) Principles of Phonology, University of California Press Phonology

20242

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minestrone

Minestrone

Minestrone (; ) is a thick soup of Italian origin made with vegetables, often with the addition of pasta or rice, sometimes both. Common ingredients include beans, onions, celery, carrots, leaf vegetables, stock, parmesan cheese and tomatoes. There is no set recipe for minestrone, since it can usually be made out of whatever vegetables are at one's disposal. It can be vegetarian, contain meat, or contain an animal bone-based stock (such as chicken stock). Food author Angelo Pellegrini claimed that the base of minestrone is bean broth, and that borlotti beans (also called Roman beans) "are the beans to use for genuine minestrone". History Some of the earliest origins of minestrone soup pre-date the expansion of the Latin tribes of Rome into what became the Roman Kingdom (later Roman Republic and Empire), when the local diet was "vegetarian by necessity" and consisted mostly of vegetables, such as onions, lentils, cabbage, garlic, broad beans, mushrooms, carrots, asparagus, and turnips. During this time, the main dish of a meal would have been pulte, a simple but filling porridge of spelt flour cooked in salt water, to which whatever vegetables that were available would have been added. It was not until the 2nd century B.C., when Rome had conquered Italy and monopolized the commercial and road networks, that a huge diversity of products flooded the capital and began to change their diet, and by association, the diet of Italy, most notably with the more frequent inclusion of meats, including as a stock for soups. Spelt flour was also removed from soups, as bread had been introduced into the Roman diet by the Greeks, and pulte became a meal largely for the poor. The ancient Romans recognized the health benefits of a simple or "frugal" diet (from the Latin fruges, the common name given to cereals, vegetables and legumes) and thick vegetable soups and vegetables remained a staple. Marcus Apicius's ancient cookbook De Re Coquinaria described polus, a Roman soup dating back to 30 AD made up of farro, chickpeas, and fava beans, with onions, garlic, lard, and greens thrown in. As eating habits and ingredients changed in Italy, so did minestrone. Apicius updates the pultes and pulticulae with fancy trimmings such as cooked brains and wine. The tradition of not losing rural roots continues today, and minestrone is now known in Italy as belonging to the style of cooking called "cucina povera" (literally "poor kitchen"), meaning dishes that have rustic, rural roots, as opposed to "cucina nobile", or the cooking style of the aristocracy and nobles. Etymology The word minestrone, meaning a thick vegetable soup, is attested in English from 1871. It is from Italian minestrone, the augmentative form of minestra, "soup", or more literally, "that which is served", from minestrare, "to serve" and cognate with administer as in "to administer a remedy". Because of its unique origins and the absence of a fixed recipe, minestrone varies widely across Italy depending on traditional cooking times, ingredients, and season. Minestrone ranges from a thick and dense texture with very boiled-down vegetables, to a more brothy soup with large quantities of diced and lightly cooked vegetables; it may also include meats. In modern Italian there are three words corresponding to the English word soup: zuppa, which is used in the sense of tomato soup, or fish soup; minestra, which is used in the sense of a more substantial soup such as a vegetable soup, and also for "dry" soups, namely pasta dishes; and minestrone, which means a very substantial or large soup or stew, though the meaning has now come to be associated with this particular dish. Regional variations Minestrone alla Genovese is a variant typical of Liguria, which contains greater use of herbs, including pesto. Minestra is a variant from Malta, which prominently features kunserva (a thick tomato paste), potatoes, kohlrabi, cauliflower and sometimes spaghetti. See also Pasta e fagioli List of Italian soups List of legume dishes List of soups List of vegetable soups References Italian cuisine Maltese cuisine Italian soups Italian inventions Vegetable soups

20254

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miranda%20%28moon%29

Miranda (moon)

Miranda, also designated Uranus V, is the smallest and innermost of Uranus's five round satellites. It was discovered by Gerard Kuiper on 16 February 1948 at McDonald Observatory in Texas, and named after Miranda from William Shakespeare's play The Tempest. Like the other large moons of Uranus, Miranda orbits close to its planet's equatorial plane. Because Uranus orbits the Sun on its side, Miranda's orbit is perpendicular to the ecliptic and shares Uranus' extreme seasonal cycle. At just 470 km in diameter, Miranda is one of the smallest closely observed objects in the Solar System that might be in hydrostatic equilibrium (spherical under its own gravity). The only close-up images of Miranda are from the Voyager 2 probe, which made observations of Miranda during its Uranus flyby in January 1986. During the flyby, Miranda's southern hemisphere pointed towards the Sun, so only that part was studied. Miranda probably formed from an accretion disc that surrounded the planet shortly after its formation, and, like other large moons, it is likely differentiated, with an inner core of rock surrounded by a mantle of ice. Miranda has one of the most extreme and varied topographies of any object in the Solar System, including Verona Rupes, a 20-kilometer-high scarp that is the highest cliff in the Solar System, and chevron-shaped tectonic features called coronae. The origin and evolution of this varied geology, the most of any Uranian satellite, are still not fully understood, and multiple hypotheses exist regarding Miranda's evolution. Discovery and name Miranda was discovered on 16 February 1948 by planetary astronomer Gerard Kuiper using the McDonald Observatory's Otto Struve Telescope. Its motion around Uranus was confirmed on 1 March 1948. It was the first satellite of Uranus discovered in nearly 100 years. Kuiper elected to name the object "Miranda" after the character in Shakespeare's The Tempest, because the four previously discovered moons of Uranus, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania and Oberon, had all been named after characters of Shakespeare or Alexander Pope. However, the previous moons had been named specifically after fairies, whereas Miranda was a human. Subsequently, discovered satellites of Uranus were named after characters from Shakespeare and Pope, whether fairies or not. The moon is also designated Uranus V. Orbit Of Uranus's five round satellites, Miranda orbits closest to it, at roughly 129,000 km from the surface; about a quarter again as far as its most distant ring. Its orbital period is 34 hours, and, like that of the Moon, is synchronous with its rotation period, which means it always shows the same face to Uranus, a condition known as tidal locking. Miranda's orbital inclination (4.34°) is unusually high for a body so close to its planet- roughly ten times that of the other major Uranian satellites, and 73 times that of Oberon. The reason for this is still uncertain; there are no mean-motion resonances between the moons that could explain it, leading to the hypothesis that the moons occasionally pass through secondary resonances, which at some point in the past led to Miranda being locked for a time into a 3:1 resonance with Umbriel, before chaotic behaviour induced by the secondary resonances moved it out of it again. In the Uranian system, due to the planet's lesser degree of oblateness, and the larger relative size of its satellites, escape from a mean-motion resonance is much easier than for satellites of Jupiter or Saturn. Composition and internal structure At 1.2 g/cm3, Miranda is the least dense of Uranus's round satellites. That density suggests a composition of more than 60% water ice. Miranda's surface may be mostly water ice, though it is far rockier than its corresponding satellites in the Saturn system, indicating that heat from radioactive decay may have led to internal differentiation, allowing silicate rock and organic compounds to settle in its interior. Miranda is too small for any internal heat to have been retained over the age of the Solar System. Miranda is the least spherical of Uranus's satellites, with an equatorial diameter 3% wider than its polar diameter. Only water has been detected so far on Miranda's surface, though it has been speculated that methane, ammonia, carbon monoxide or nitrogen may also exist at 3% concentrations. These bulk properties are similar to Saturn's moon Mimas, though Mimas is smaller, less dense, and more oblate. Precisely how a body as small as Miranda could have enough internal energy to produce the myriad geological features seen on its surface is not established with certainty, though the currently favoured hypothesis is that it was driven by tidal heating during a past time when it was in 3:1 orbital resonance with Umbriel. The resonance would have increased Miranda's orbital eccentricity to 0.1, and generated tidal friction due to the varying tidal forces from Uranus. As Miranda approached Uranus, tidal force increased; as it retreated, tidal force decreased, causing flexing that would have warmed Miranda's interior by 20 K, enough to trigger melting. The period of tidal flexing could have lasted for up to 100 million years. Also, if clathrate existed within Miranda, as has been hypothesised for the satellites of Uranus, it may have acted as an insulator, since it has a lower conductivity than water, increasing Miranda's temperature still further. Miranda may have also once been in a 5:3 orbital resonance with Ariel, which would have also contributed to its internal heating. However, the maximum heating attributable to the resonance with Umbriel was likely about three times greater. Surface features Due to Uranus's near-sideways orientation, only Miranda's southern hemisphere was visible to Voyager 2 when it arrived. The observed surface has patchwork regions of broken terrain, indicating intense geological activity in Miranda's past, and is criss-crossed by huge canyons, believed to be the result of extensional tectonics; as liquid water froze beneath the surface, it expanded, causing the surface ice to split, creating graben. The canyons are hundreds of kilometers long and tens of kilometers wide. Miranda also has the largest-known cliff in the Solar System, Verona Rupes, which has a height of . Some of Miranda's terrain is possibly less than 100 million years old based on crater counts, while sizeable regions possess crater counts that indicate ancient terrain. While crater counts suggest that the majority of Miranda's surface is old, with a similar geological history to the other Uranian satellites, few of those craters are particularly large, indicating that most must have formed after a major resurfacing event in its distant past. Craters on Miranda also appear to possess softened edges, which could be the result either of ejecta or of cryovolcanism. The temperature at Miranda's south pole is roughly 85 K, a temperature at which pure water ice adopts the properties of rock. Also, the cryovolcanic material responsible for the surfacing is too viscous to have been pure liquid water, but too fluid to have been solid water. Rather, it is believed to have been a viscous, lava-like mixture of water and ammonia, which freezes at , or perhaps ethanol. Miranda's observed hemisphere contains three giant 'racetrack'-like grooved structures called coronae, each at least wide and up to deep, named Arden, Elsinore and Inverness after locations in Shakespeare's plays. Inverness is lower in altitude than the surrounding terrain (though domes and ridges are of comparable elevation), while Elsinore is higher, The relative sparsity of craters on their surfaces means they overlay the earlier cratered terrain. The coronae, which are unique to Miranda, initially defied easy explanation; one early hypothesis was that Miranda, at some time in its distant past, (prior to any of the current cratering) had been completely torn to pieces, perhaps by a massive impact, and then reassembled in a random jumble. The heavier core material fell through the crust, and the coronae formed as the water re-froze. However, the current favoured hypothesis is that they formed via extensional processes at the tops of diapirs, or upwellings of warm ice from within Miranda itself. The coronae are surrounded by rings of concentric faults with a similar low-crater count, suggesting they played a role in their formation. If the coronae formed through downwelling from a catastrophic disruption, then the concentric faults would present as compressed. If they formed through upwelling, such as by diapirism, then they would be extensional tilt blocks, and present extensional features, as current evidence suggests they do. The concentric rings would have formed as ice moved away from the heat source. The diapirs may have changed the density distribution within Miranda, which could have caused Miranda to reorient itself, similar to a process believed to have occurred at Saturn's geologically active moon Enceladus. Evidence suggests the reorientation would have been as extreme as 60 degrees from the sub-Uranian point. The positions of all the coronae require a tidal heating pattern consistent with Miranda being solid, and lacking an internal liquid ocean. It is believed through computer modelling that Miranda may have an additional corona on the unimaged hemisphere. Observation and exploration Miranda's apparent magnitude is +16.6, making it invisible to many amateur telescopes. Virtually all known information regarding its geology and geography was obtained during the flyby of Uranus made by Voyager 2 on 25 January 1986, The closest approach of Voyager 2 to Miranda was —significantly less than the distances to all other Uranian moons. Of all the Uranian satellites, Miranda had the most visible surface. The discovery team had expected Miranda to resemble Mimas, and found themselves at a loss to explain the moon's unique geography in the 24-hour window before releasing the images to the press. In 2017, as part of its Planetary Science Decadal Survey, NASA evaluated the possibility of an orbiter to return to Uranus some time in the 2020s. Uranus was the preferred destination over Neptune due to favourable planetary alignments meaning shorter flight times. See also List of geological features on Miranda References External links Miranda Profile at NASA's Solar System Exploration site Miranda page at The Nine Planets Miranda, a Moon of Uranus at Views of the Solar System Paul Schenk's 3D images and flyover videos of Miranda and other outer solar system satellites Miranda Nomenclature from the USGS Planetary Nomenclature web site 19480216 Discoveries by Gerard Kuiper Things named after Shakespearean works

20257

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars%20in%20fiction

Mars in fiction

Fictional representations of Mars have been popular for over a century. Interest in Mars has been stimulated by the planet's dramatic red color, by early scientific speculations that its surface conditions might be capable of supporting life, and by the possibility that Mars could be colonized by humans in the future. Almost as popular as stories about Mars are stories about Martians engaging in activity (frequently invasions) away from their home planet. The ideas of Mars would grow and change with new scientific discoveries changing the way Mars would be seen in the science fiction world. In the 20th century, actual spaceflights to the planet Mars, including seminal events such as the first artificial object to impact the surface of Mars in 1971, and then later the first landing of "the first mechanized device to successfully operate on Mars" in 1976 (in the Viking program by the United States), inspired a great deal of interest in Mars-related fiction. Exploration of the planet has continued in the 21st century on to the present day. Early depictions Mars has been seen as the perfect distance away from Earth to create the idea of a different life, as this allowed for early works to fuel the minds of what Mars could hold. Several early modern writers, including Athanasius Kircher (1602–1680) and Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772), hypothesized contact with Mars. The early depiction of Mars in science fiction would be significantly influenced by the works of the Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli, who in 1877 suggested the existence of the Martian canals, and the works of US astronomer Percival Lowell - Mars (1895), Mars and Its Canals (1906) and Mars as the Abode of Life (1909) - who described Mars as arid and desertified, but compatible with terrestrial life. Early science fiction about Mars often involved the first voyages to the planet, sometimes as an invasion force, more often for the purposes of exploration. By the 1930s, stories about reaching Mars had become somewhat trite and the focus shifted to Mars as an alien landscape. In the following stories, human contact and basic exploration had taken place sometime in the past; Mars is a setting rather than a goal. Later depictions Mariner 4 in July 1965 found that Mars—contrary to expectations—is heavily cratered, with a very thin atmosphere. No canals were found; while scientists did not believe that Mars was a moist planet, the lack of surface water surprised them. Science fiction had so influenced real explorations of the planet, however—Carl Sagan was among the many fans who became scientists—that after Mariner 9 in 1971–1972, craters were named after Wells, Burroughs, and other authors. The Mariner and Viking space probes confirmed that the Martian environment is extremely hostile to life. By the 1970s, the ideas of canals and ancient civilizations had to be abandoned. In the decades following Mariner and Apollo, the once-popular subgenre of realistic stories about a first expedition to Mars fell out of fashion, possibly due to the failure of the Apollo Program to continue on to Mars. The early 1990s saw a revival and re-envisioning of realistic novels about Mars expeditions. Early novels in this renaissance were Jack Williamson's novel Beachhead and Ben Bova's novel Mars (both 1992), which envisioned large-scale expeditions to Mars according to the thinking of the 1990s. These were followed by Gregory Benford's The Martian Race (1999), Geoffrey A. Landis's Mars Crossing (2000), and Robert Zubrin's First Landing (2002), which took as their starting points the smaller and more focused expedition strategies evolved in the late 1990s, mostly building on the concepts of Mars Direct. Several post-Mariner works are homages to the older phase of Mars fiction, circumventing the scientific picture of a dry and lifeless Mars with an unbreathable atmosphere through such science fiction generic staples as positing its future terraforming, or creating alternate history versions of Mars, where Burroughs' Barsoom, Bradbury's Martian Chronicles or The War of the Worlds are literal truth. Themes Colonization and terraforming Authors soon began writing stories based on the new Mars (frequently treating it as a desert planet). Most of these works feature humans struggling to tame the planet, and some of them refer to terraforming (using technology to transform a planet's environment to be Earthlike). Martian independence A common theme, particularly among American writers, is that of a Martian colony fighting for independence from Earth. It appeared already in Heinlein's Red Planet and is a major plot element in Greg Bear's Moving Mars and Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. It is also part of the plot of the movie Total Recall and the television series Babylon 5. Many video games also use this concept, such as the Red Faction and Zone of the Enders series, and Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare. A historical rebellion of Mars against Earth is also mentioned in the Star Trek series of novels, which are not considered canon. Martians The Martian is a favorite character of classical science fiction; he was frequently found away from his home planet, often invading Earth, but sometimes simply a lonely character representing alienness from his surroundings. Martians, other than human beings transplanted to Mars, became rare in fiction after Mariner, except in exercises of deliberate nostalgia – more frequently in some genres, such as comics and animation, than in written literature. See also Colonization of Mars Exploration of Mars Lists of real astronomical locations in fiction Mars (mythology) Martian canal Terraforming of Mars References Further reading External links A Hundred Years Retrospective of French Science Fiction about Mars Fiction about terrestrial planets Lists of astronomical locations in fiction

20258

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McIntosh%20%28apple%29

McIntosh (apple)

The McIntosh ( ), McIntosh Red, or colloquially the Mac, is an apple cultivar, the national apple of Canada. The fruit has red and green skin, a tart flavour, and tender white flesh, which ripens in late September. In the 20th century it was the most popular cultivar in Eastern Canada and New England, and is considered an all-purpose apple, suitable both for cooking and eating raw. Apple Inc. employee Jef Raskin named the Macintosh computer line after the fruit. John McIntosh discovered the original McIntosh sapling on his Dundela farm in Upper Canada in 1811. He and his wife cultivated it, and the family started grafting the tree and selling the fruit in 1835. In 1870, it entered commercial production, and became common in northeastern North America after 1900. While still important in production, the fruit's popularity fell in the early 21st century in the face of competition from varieties such as the Gala. According to the US Apple Association website it is one of the fifteen most popular apple cultivars in the United States. A mutant(sport) of McIntosh is McIntosh Rogers, synonyms: Red Mc Intosh, Double Red Mc Intosh. This mutant was found in Dansville, New York, USA in 1930. Description The McIntosh or McIntosh Red (nicknamed the "Mac"), is the most popular apple cultivar in eastern Canada and the northeastern United States. It is also found in Kashmir region of southeast Asia. It also sells well in eastern Europe. A spreading tree that is moderately vigorous, the McIntosh bears annually or in alternate years. The tree is hardy to at least USDA Hardiness zone 4a, or . 50% or more of its flowers die at or below. The McIntosh apple is a small- to medium-sized round fruit with a short stem. It has a red and green skin that is thick, tender, and easy to peel. Its white flesh is sometime tinged with green or pink and is juicy, tender, and firm, soon becoming soft. The flesh is easily bruised. The fruit is considered "all-purpose", suitable both for eating raw and for cooking. It is used primarily for dessert, and requires less time to cook than most cultivars. It is usually blended when used for juice. The fruit grows best in cool areas where nights are cold and autumn days are clear; otherwise, it suffers from poor colour and soft flesh, and tends to fall from the tree before harvest. It stores for two to three months in air, but is prone to scald, flesh softening, chilling sensitivity, and coprinus rot. It can become mealy when stored at temperatures below . The fruit is optimally stored in a controlled atmosphere in which temperatures are between , and air content is 1.5–4.5% oxygen and 1–5% carbon dioxide; under such conditions, the McIntosh will keep for five to eight months. Cultivation The McIntosh is most commonly cultivated in Canada, the United States, and eastern Europe. It is one of the top five apple cultivars used in cloning, and research indicates the McIntosh combines well for winter hardiness. If unsprayed, the McIntosh succumbs easily to apple scab, which may lead to entire crops being unmarketable. It has generally low susceptibility to fire blight, powdery mildew, cedar-apple rust, quince rust, and hawthorn rust. It is susceptible to fungal diseases such as Nectria canker, brown rot, black rot, race 1 of apple rust (but resists race 2). It is moderately resistant to Pezicula bark rot and Alternaria leaf blotch, and resists brown leaf spot well. The McIntosh is one of the most common cultivars used in cloning; a 1996 study found that the McIntosh was a parent in 101 of 439 cultivars selected, more than any other founding clone. It was used in over half of the Canadian cultivars selected, and was used extensively in the United States and Eastern Europe as well; rarely was it used elsewhere. Offspring of the McIntosh include: the Jersey Black hybrid the Macoun, the Newtown Pippin hybrid the Spartan, the Cortland; the Empire; the Jonamac, the Jersey Mac, the Lobo, the Melba, the Summered, the Tydeman's Red, and possibly the Paula Red. History Apple trees were introduced to Canada at the Habitation at Port-Royal (modern Port Royal, Annapolis County, Nova Scotia) as early as 1606 by French settlers. Following its introduction, apple cultivation spread inland. The McIntosh's discoverer, John McIntosh (1777 – ), left his native Mohawk Valley home in New York State in 1796 to follow his love, Dolly Irwin, who had been taken to Upper Canada by her Loyalist parents. She had died by the time he found her, but he settled as a farmer in Upper Canada. He married Hannah Doran in 1801, and they farmed along the Saint Lawrence River until 1811, when McIntosh exchanged the land he had with his brother-in-law Edward Doran for a plot in Dundela. While clearing the overgrown plot McIntosh discovered some apple seedlings on his farm. Since the crabapple was the only native apple in North America before European settlement, it must have had European origins. The Snow Apple (or Fameuse) had been popular in Lower Canada before that time; the seedlings may have sprouted from discarded fruit. Fall St Lawrence and Alexander have also been proposed, but the parentage remains unknown. He transplanted the seedlings next to his house. One of the seedlings bore particularly good fruit. The McIntosh grandchildren dubbed the fruit it produced "Granny's apple", as they often saw their grandmother taking care of the tree in the orchard. McIntosh was selling seedlings from the tree by 1820, but they did not produce fruit of the quality of the original. John McIntosh's son Allan (1815–1899) learned grafting about 1835; with this cloning the McIntoshes could maintain the distinctive properties of the fruit of the original tree. Allan and brother Sandy (1825–1906), nicknamed "Sandy the Grafter", increased production and promotion of the cultivar. Earliest sales were in 1835, and in 1836 the cultivar was renamed the "McIntosh Red"; it entered commercial production in 1870. The apple became popular after 1900, when the first sprays for apple scab were developed. A house fire damaged the original McIntosh tree in 1894; it last produced fruit in 1908, and died and fell over in 1910. Horticulturist William Tyrrell Macoun of the Central Experimental Farm in Ottawa is credited with popularizing the McIntosh in Canada. He stated the McIntosh needed "no words of praise", that it was "one of the finest appearing and best dessert apples grown". The Macoun, a hybrid of the McIntosh and Jersey Black grown by the Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, NY, was named for him in 1923. In the northeastern United States the McIntosh replaced a large number of Baldwins that were killed in a severe winter in 1933–34. In the late 1940s, Canadian ambassador to the United Nations Andrew McNaughton told Soviet Minister for Foreign Affairs Andrei Gromyko that the McIntosh Red was Canada's best apple. The McIntosh made up 40% of the Canadian apple market by the 1960s; and at least thirty varieties of McIntosh hybrid were known by 1970. Its popularity later waned in the face of competition from foreign imports; in the first decade of the 21st century, the Gala accounted for 33% of the apple market in Ontario to the McIntosh's 12%, and the Northern Spy had become the preferred apple for pies. Production remained important to Ontario, however, as of McIntoshes were produced in 2010. The original tree discovered by John McIntosh bore fruit for more than ninety years, and died in 1910. Horticulturalists from the Upper Canada Village heritage park saved cuttings from the last known first-generation McIntosh graft before it died in 2011 for producing clones. Cultural significance The McIntosh has been designated the national apple of Canada. A popular subscription funded a plaque placed from the original McIntosh tree in 1912. The Ontario Archaeological and Historic Sites Board replaced the plaque with a more descriptive one in 1962, and the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada put up another in a park nearby in 2001, by a painted mural commemorating the fruit. Apple Inc. employee Jef Raskin named the Macintosh line of personal computers after the McIntosh. He deliberately misspelled the name to avoid conflict with the hi-fi equipment manufacturer McIntosh Laboratory. Apple's attempt in 1982 to trademark the name Macintosh was nevertheless denied due to the phonetic similarity between Apple's product and the name of the hi-fi manufacturer. Apple licensed the rights to the name in 1983, and bought the trademark in 1986. In 1995 the Royal Canadian Mint commissioned Toronto artist Roger Hill to design a commemorative silver dollar for release in 1996. Mint engraver Sheldon Beveridge engraved the image of a group of three McIntoshes and a McIntosh blossom which adorn one side with a ribbon naming the variety. An inscription on the edge reads "1796 Canada Dollar 1996". Issued sheathed in a silver cardboard sleeve in a black leatherette case, 133,779 pieces of the proof were sold, as well as 58,834 pieces of the uncirculated version in a plastic capsule and silver sleeve. See also Jubilee apple Spartan (apple) Wijcik McIntosh Notes References Works cited External links Macintosh Apples, Archives of Ontario YouTube channel Ontario Plaques: John McIntosh Apple cultivars Canadian apples Cooking apples Dessert apples Juice apples

20261

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machete

Machete

A machete (; ) is a broad blade used either as an agricultural implement similar to an axe, or in combat like a long-bladed knife. The blade is typically long and usually under thick. In the Spanish language, the word is possibly a diminutive form of the word macho, which was used to refer to sledgehammers., alternatively, its origin may be machaera, the name given by the Romans to the falcata. It is the origin of the English language equivalent term matchet, though it is less commonly used. In the English-speaking Caribbean, such as Jamaica, Barbados, Guyana, and Grenada and in Trinidad and Tobago, the term cutlass is used for these agricultural tools. Uses Agriculture In various tropical and subtropical countries, the machete is frequently used to cut through rainforest undergrowth and for agricultural purposes (e.g. cutting sugar cane). Besides this, in Latin America a common use is for such household tasks as cutting large foodstuffs into pieces—much as a cleaver is used—or to perform crude cutting tasks, such as making simple wooden handles for other tools. It is common to see people using machetes for other jobs, such as splitting open coconuts, yard work, removing small branches and plants, chopping animals' food, and clearing bushes. Machetes are often considered tools and used by adults. However, many hunter–gatherer societies and cultures surviving through subsistence agriculture begin teaching babies to use sharp tools, including machetes, before their first birthdays. Warfare Because the machete is common in many tropical countries, it is often the weapon of choice for uprisings. For example, the Boricua Popular Army are unofficially called macheteros because of the machete-wielding laborers of sugar cane fields of past Puerto Rico. Many of the killings in the 1994 Rwandan genocide were performed with machetes, and they were the primary weapon used by the Interahamwe militias there. Machetes were also a distinctive tool and weapon of the Haitian Tonton Macoute. In 1762, the British captured Havana in a lengthy siege during the Seven Years' War. Volunteer militiamen led by Pepe Antonio, a Guanabacoa councilman, were issued with machetes during the unsuccessful defense of the city. The machete was also the most iconic weapon during the independence wars in that country (1868–1898), although it saw limited battlefield use. Carlos Manuel de Céspedes, owner of the sugar refinery La Demajagua near Manzanillo, freed his slaves on 10 October 1868. He proceeded to lead them, armed with machetes, in revolt against the Spanish government. The first cavalry charge using machetes as the primary weapon was carried out on 4 November 1868 by Máximo Gómez, a sergeant born in the Dominican Republic, who later became the general in chief of the Cuban Army. The machete was (and still is) a common side arm and tool for many ethnic groups in West Africa. Machetes in this role are referenced in Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart. Some countries have a name for the blow of a machete; the Spanish machetazo is sometimes used in English. In the British Virgin Islands, Grenada, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Barbados, Saint Lucia, and Trinidad and Tobago, the word planass means to hit someone with the flat of the blade of a machete or cutlass. To strike with the sharpened edge is to "chop". Throughout the Caribbean, the term 'cutlass' refers to a laborers' cutting tool. The Brazilian Army's Instruction Center on Jungle Warfare developed a machete with a blade in length and a very pronounced clip point. This machete is issued with a Bowie knife and a sharpening stone in the scabbard; collectively called a "jungle kit" (Conjunto de Selva in Portuguese); it is manufactured by Indústria de Material Bélico do Brasil (IMBEL). The machete was used as a weapon during the Mau Mau Uprising, in the Rwandan Genocide, and in South Africa, particularly in the 1980s and early 1990s when the former province of Natal was wracked by conflict between the African National Congress and the Zulu-nationalist Inkatha Freedom Party. Manufacture Both the materials used and the shape of the machete itself are important to make a good machete. In the past, the most famous manufacturer of machetes in Latin America and the Spanish-speaking Caribbean was Collins Company of Collinsville, Connecticut. The company was founded as Collins & Company in 1826 by Samuel W. Collins to make axes. Its first machetes were sold in 1845 and became so famous that all good machetes were called "un Collins". In the English-speaking Caribbean, Robert Mole & Sons of Birmingham, England, was long considered the manufacturer of agricultural cutlasses of the best quality. Some Robert Mole blades survive as souvenirs of travelers to Trinidad, Jamaica, and, less commonly, St. Lucia. Colombia is the largest exporter of machetes worldwide. Cultural influence The flag of Angola features a machete, along with a cog-wheel. The southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul has a dance called the dança dos facões (machetes' dance) in which the dancers, who also always men, knock their machetes while dancing, simulating a battle. Maculelê, an Afro-Brazilian dance and martial art, can also be performed with facões. This practice began in the city of Santo Amaro, Bahia, in the northeastern part of the country. In the Philippines, the bolo is used in training in eskrima, the indigenous martial art of the Philippines. Similar tools The panga or tapanga is a variant used in East and Southern Africa. This name may be of Swahili etymology; not to be confused with the Panga fish. The panga blade broadens on the backside and has a length of . The upper inclined portion of the blade may be sharpened. Other similar tools include the parang and the golok (from Malaysia and Indonesia); however, these tend to have shorter, thicker blades with a primary grind, and are more effective on woody vegetation. Other similar tools include: Dusack Golok Kopis Kukri Macuahuitl Seax Sorocaban Knife References External links Machetes American inventions Hiking equipment Blade weapons Camping equipment Gardening tools

20264

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mushroom

Mushroom

A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground, on soil, or on its food source. The standard for the name "mushroom" is the cultivated white button mushroom, Agaricus bisporus; hence the word "mushroom" is most often applied to those fungi (Basidiomycota, Agaricomycetes) that have a stem (stipe), a cap (pileus), and gills (lamellae, sing. lamella) on the underside of the cap. "Mushroom" also describes a variety of other gilled fungi, with or without stems, therefore the term is used to describe the fleshy fruiting bodies of some Ascomycota. These gills produce microscopic spores that help the fungus spread across the ground or its occupant surface. Forms deviating from the standard morphology usually have more specific names, such as "bolete", "puffball", "stinkhorn", and "morel", and gilled mushrooms themselves are often called "agarics" in reference to their similarity to Agaricus or their order Agaricales. By extension, the term "mushroom" can also refer to either the entire fungus when in culture, the thallus (called a mycelium) of species forming the fruiting bodies called mushrooms, or the species itself. Etymology The terms "mushroom" and "toadstool" go back centuries and were never precisely defined, nor was there consensus on application. During the 15th and 16th centuries, the terms mushrom, mushrum, muscheron, mousheroms, mussheron, or musserouns were used. The term "mushroom" and its variations may have been derived from the French word mousseron in reference to moss (mousse). Delineation between edible and poisonous fungi is not clear-cut, so a "mushroom" may be edible, poisonous, or unpalatable. The word toadstool appeared first in 14th century England as a reference for a "stool" for toads, possibly inferring an inedible poisonous fungus. Identification Identifying mushrooms requires a basic understanding of their macroscopic structure. Most are Basidiomycetes and gilled. Their spores, called basidiospores, are produced on the gills and fall in a fine rain of powder from under the caps as a result. At the microscopic level, the basidiospores are shot off basidia and then fall between the gills in the dead air space. As a result, for most mushrooms, if the cap is cut off and placed gill-side-down overnight, a powdery impression reflecting the shape of the gills (or pores, or spines, etc.) is formed (when the fruit body is sporulating). The color of the powdery print, called a spore print, is used to help classify mushrooms and can help to identify them. Spore print colors include white (most common), brown, black, purple-brown, pink, yellow, and creamy, but almost never blue, green, or red. While modern identification of mushrooms is quickly becoming molecular, the standard methods for identification are still used by most and have developed into a fine art harking back to medieval times and the Victorian era, combined with microscopic examination. The presence of juices upon breaking, bruising reactions, odors, tastes, shades of color, habitat, habit, and season are all considered by both amateur and professional mycologists. Tasting and smelling mushrooms carries its own hazards because of poisons and allergens. Chemical tests are also used for some genera. In general, identification to genus can often be accomplished in the field using a local mushroom guide. Identification to species, however, requires more effort. A mushroom develops from a button stage into a mature structure, and only the latter can provide certain characteristics needed for the identification of the species. However, over-mature specimens lose features and cease producing spores. Many novices have mistaken humid water marks on paper for white spore prints, or discolored paper from oozing liquids on lamella edges for colored spored prints. Classification Typical mushrooms are the fruit bodies of members of the order Agaricales, whose type genus is Agaricus and type species is the field mushroom, Agaricus campestris. However, in modern molecularly defined classifications, not all members of the order Agaricales produce mushroom fruit bodies, and many other gilled fungi, collectively called mushrooms, occur in other orders of the class Agaricomycetes. For example, chanterelles are in the Cantharellales, false chanterelles such as Gomphus are in the Gomphales, milk-cap mushrooms (Lactarius, Lactifluus) and russulas (Russula), as well as Lentinellus, are in the Russulales, while the tough, leathery genera Lentinus and Panus are among the Polyporales, but Neolentinus is in the Gloeophyllales, and the little pin-mushroom genus, Rickenella, along with similar genera, are in the Hymenochaetales. Within the main body of mushrooms, in the Agaricales, are common fungi like the common fairy-ring mushroom, shiitake, enoki, oyster mushrooms, fly agarics and other Amanitas, magic mushrooms like species of Psilocybe, paddy straw mushrooms, shaggy manes, etc. An atypical mushroom is the lobster mushroom, which is a deformed, cooked-lobster-colored parasitized fruitbody of a Russula or Lactarius, colored and deformed by the mycoparasitic Ascomycete Hypomyces lactifluorum. Other mushrooms are not gilled, so the term "mushroom" is loosely used, and giving a full account of their classifications is difficult. Some have pores underneath (and are usually called boletes), others have spines, such as the hedgehog mushroom and other tooth fungi, and so on. "Mushroom" has been used for polypores, puffballs, jelly fungi, coral fungi, bracket fungi, stinkhorns, and cup fungi. Thus, the term is more one of common application to macroscopic fungal fruiting bodies than one having precise taxonomic meaning. Approximately 14,000 species of mushrooms are described. Morphology A mushroom develops from a nodule, or pinhead, less than two millimeters in diameter, called a primordium, which is typically found on or near the surface of the substrate. It is formed within the mycelium, the mass of threadlike hyphae that make up the fungus. The primordium enlarges into a roundish structure of interwoven hyphae roughly resembling an egg, called a "button". The button has a cottony roll of mycelium, the universal veil, that surrounds the developing fruit body. As the egg expands, the universal veil ruptures and may remain as a cup, or volva, at the base of the stalk, or as warts or volval patches on the cap. Many mushrooms lack a universal veil, therefore they do not have either a volva or volval patches. Often, a second layer of tissue, the partial veil, covers the bladelike gills that bear spores. As the cap expands, the veil breaks, and remnants of the partial veil may remain as a ring, or annulus, around the middle of the stalk or as fragments hanging from the margin of the cap. The ring may be skirt-like as in some species of Amanita, collar-like as in many species of Lepiota, or merely the faint remnants of a cortina (a partial veil composed of filaments resembling a spiderweb), which is typical of the genus Cortinarius. Mushrooms lacking partial veils do not form an annulus. The stalk (also called the stipe, or stem) may be central and support the cap in the middle, or it may be off-center and/or lateral, as in species of Pleurotus and Panus. In other mushrooms, a stalk may be absent, as in the polypores that form shelf-like brackets. Puffballs lack a stalk, but may have a supporting base. Other mushrooms, such as truffles, jellies, earthstars, and bird's nests, usually do not have stalks, and a specialized mycological vocabulary exists to describe their parts. The way the gills attach to the top of the stalk is an important feature of mushroom morphology. Mushrooms in the genera Agaricus, Amanita, Lepiota and Pluteus, among others, have free gills that do not extend to the top of the stalk. Others have decurrent gills that extend down the stalk, as in the genera Omphalotus and Pleurotus. There are a great number of variations between the extremes of free and decurrent, collectively called attached gills. Finer distinctions are often made to distinguish the types of attached gills: adnate gills, which adjoin squarely to the stalk; notched gills, which are notched where they join the top of the stalk; adnexed gills, which curve upward to meet the stalk, and so on. These distinctions between attached gills are sometimes difficult to interpret, since gill attachment may change as the mushroom matures, or with different environmental conditions. Microscopic features A hymenium is a layer of microscopic spore-bearing cells that covers the surface of gills. In the nongilled mushrooms, the hymenium lines the inner surfaces of the tubes of boletes and polypores, or covers the teeth of spine fungi and the branches of corals. In the Ascomycota, spores develop within microscopic elongated, sac-like cells called asci, which typically contain eight spores in each ascus. The Discomycetes, which contain the cup, sponge, brain, and some club-like fungi, develop an exposed layer of asci, as on the inner surfaces of cup fungi or within the pits of morels. The Pyrenomycetes, tiny dark-colored fungi that live on a wide range of substrates including soil, dung, leaf litter, and decaying wood, as well as other fungi, produce minute, flask-shaped structures called perithecia, within which the asci develop. In the Basidiomycetes, usually four spores develop on the tips of thin projections called sterigmata, which extend from club-shaped cells called a basidia. The fertile portion of the Gasteromycetes, called a gleba, may become powdery as in the puffballs or slimy as in the stinkhorns. Interspersed among the asci are threadlike sterile cells called paraphyses. Similar structures called cystidia often occur within the hymenium of the Basidiomycota. Many types of cystidia exist, and assessing their presence, shape, and size is often used to verify the identification of a mushroom. The most important microscopic feature for identification of mushrooms is the spores. Their color, shape, size, attachment, ornamentation, and reaction to chemical tests often can be the crux of an identification. A spore often has a protrusion at one end, called an apiculus, which is the point of attachment to the basidium, termed the apical germ pore, from which the hypha emerges when the spore germinates. Growth Many species of mushrooms seemingly appear overnight, growing or expanding rapidly. This phenomenon is the source of several common expressions in the English language including "to mushroom" or "mushrooming" (expanding rapidly in size or scope) and "to pop up like a mushroom" (to appear unexpectedly and quickly). In reality, all species of mushrooms take several days to form primordial mushroom fruit bodies, though they do expand rapidly by the absorption of fluids. The cultivated mushroom, as well as the common field mushroom, initially form a minute fruiting body, referred to as the pin stage because of their small size. Slightly expanded, they are called buttons, once again because of the relative size and shape. Once such stages are formed, the mushroom can rapidly pull in water from its mycelium and expand, mainly by inflating preformed cells that took several days to form in the primordia. Similarly, there are other mushrooms, like Parasola plicatilis (formerly Coprinus plicatlis), that grow rapidly overnight and may disappear by late afternoon on a hot day after rainfall. The primordia form at ground level in lawns in humid spaces under the thatch and after heavy rainfall or in dewy conditions balloon to full size in a few hours, release spores, and then collapse. They "mushroom" to full size. Not all mushrooms expand overnight; some grow very slowly and add tissue to their fruiting bodies by growing from the edges of the colony or by inserting hyphae. For example, Pleurotus nebrodensis grows slowly, and because of this combined with human collection, it is now critically endangered. Though mushroom fruiting bodies are short-lived, the underlying mycelium can itself be long-lived and massive. A colony of Armillaria solidipes (formerly known as Armillaria ostoyae) in Malheur National Forest in the United States is estimated to be 2,400 years old, possibly older, and spans an estimated . Most of the fungus is underground and in decaying wood or dying tree roots in the form of white mycelia combined with black shoelace-like rhizomorphs that bridge colonized separated woody substrates. Nutrition Raw brown mushrooms are 92% water, 4% carbohydrates, 2% protein and less than 1% fat. In a 100 gram (3.5 ounce) amount, raw mushrooms provide 22 calories and are a rich source (20% or more of the Daily Value, DV) of B vitamins, such as riboflavin, niacin and pantothenic acid, selenium (37% DV) and copper (25% DV), and a moderate source (10-19% DV) of phosphorus, zinc and potassium (table). They have minimal or no vitamin C and sodium content. Vitamin D The vitamin D content of a mushroom depends on postharvest handling, in particular the unintended exposure to sunlight. The US Department of Agriculture provided evidence that UV-exposed mushrooms contain substantial amounts of vitamin D. When exposed to ultraviolet (UV) light, even after harvesting, ergosterol in mushrooms is converted to vitamin D2, a process now used intentionally to supply fresh vitamin D mushrooms for the functional food grocery market. In a comprehensive safety assessment of producing vitamin D in fresh mushrooms, researchers showed that artificial UV light technologies were equally effective for vitamin D production as in mushrooms exposed to natural sunlight, and that UV light has a long record of safe use for production of vitamin D in food. Human use Edible mushrooms Mushrooms are used extensively in cooking, in many cuisines (notably Chinese, Korean, European, and Japanese). Most mushrooms sold in supermarkets have been commercially grown on mushroom farms. The most popular of these, Agaricus bisporus, is considered safe for most people to eat because it is grown in controlled, sterilized environments. Several varieties of A. bisporus are grown commercially, including whites, crimini, and portobello. Other cultivated species available at many grocers include Hericium erinaceus, shiitake, maitake (hen-of-the-woods), Pleurotus, and enoki. In recent years, increasing affluence in developing countries has led to a considerable growth in interest in mushroom cultivation, which is now seen as a potentially important economic activity for small farmers. China is a major edible mushroom producer. The country produces about half of all cultivated mushrooms, and around of mushrooms are consumed per person per year by 1.4 billion people. In 2014, Poland was the world's largest mushroom exporter, reporting an estimated annually. Separating edible from poisonous species requires meticulous attention to detail; there is no single trait by which all toxic mushrooms can be identified, nor one by which all edible mushrooms can be identified. People who collect mushrooms for consumption are known as mycophagists, and the act of collecting them for such is known as mushroom hunting, or simply "mushrooming". Even edible mushrooms may produce allergic reactions in susceptible individuals, from a mild asthmatic response to severe anaphylactic shock. Even the cultivated A. bisporus contains small amounts of hydrazines, the most abundant of which is agaritine (a mycotoxin and carcinogen). However, the hydrazines are destroyed by moderate heat when cooking. A number of species of mushrooms are poisonous; although some resemble certain edible species, consuming them could be fatal. Eating mushrooms gathered in the wild is risky and should only be undertaken by individuals knowledgeable in mushroom identification. Common best practice is for wild mushroom pickers to focus on collecting a small number of visually distinctive, edible mushroom species that cannot be easily confused with poisonous varieties. Common mushroom hunting advice is that if a mushroom cannot be positively identified, it should be considered poisonous and not eaten. Toxic mushrooms Many mushroom species produce secondary metabolites that can be toxic, mind-altering, antibiotic, antiviral, or bioluminescent. Although there are only a small number of deadly species, several others can cause particularly severe and unpleasant symptoms. Toxicity likely plays a role in protecting the function of the basidiocarp: the mycelium has expended considerable energy and protoplasmic material to develop a structure to efficiently distribute its spores. One defense against consumption and premature destruction is the evolution of chemicals that render the mushroom inedible, either causing the consumer to vomit the meal (see emetics), or to learn to avoid consumption altogether. In addition, due to the propensity of mushrooms to absorb heavy metals, including those that are radioactive, as late as 2008, European mushrooms may have included toxicity from the 1986 Chernobyl disaster and continued to be studied. Psychoactive mushrooms Mushrooms with psychoactive properties have long played a role in various native medicine traditions in cultures all around the world. They have been used as sacrament in rituals aimed at mental and physical healing, and to facilitate visionary states. One such ritual is the velada ceremony. A practitioner of traditional mushroom use is the shaman or curandera (priest-healer). Psilocybin mushrooms, also referred to as psychedelic mushrooms, possess psychedelic properties. Commonly known as "magic mushrooms" or shrooms", they are openly available in smart shops in many parts of the world, or on the black market in those countries that have outlawed their sale. Psilocybin mushrooms have been reported as facilitating profound and life-changing insights often described as mystical experiences. Recent scientific work has supported these claims, as well as the long-lasting effects of such induced spiritual experiences. Psilocybin, a naturally occurring chemical in certain psychedelic mushrooms such as Psilocybe cubensis, is being studied for its ability to help people suffering from psychological disorders, such as obsessive–compulsive disorder. Minute amounts have been reported to stop cluster and migraine headaches. A double-blind study, done by the Johns Hopkins Hospital, showed psychedelic mushrooms could provide people an experience with substantial personal meaning and spiritual significance. In the study, one third of the subjects reported ingestion of psychedelic mushrooms was the single most spiritually significant event of their lives. Over two-thirds reported it among their five most meaningful and spiritually significant events. On the other hand, one-third of the subjects reported extreme anxiety. However, the anxiety went away after a short period of time. Psilocybin mushrooms have also shown to be successful in treating addiction, specifically with alcohol and cigarettes. A few species in the genus Amanita, most recognizably A. muscaria, but also A. pantherina, among others, contain the psychoactive compound muscimol. The muscimol-containing chemotaxonomic group of Amanitas contains no amatoxins or phallotoxins, and as such are not hepatoxic, though if not properly cured will be non-lethally neurotoxic due to the presence of ibotenic acid. The Amanita intoxication is similar to Z-drugs in that it includes CNS depressant and sedative-hypnotic effects, but also dissociation and delirium in high doses. Folk medicine Some mushrooms are used in folk medicine. In a few countries, extracts, such as polysaccharide-K, schizophyllan, polysaccharide peptide, or lentinan, are government-registered adjuvant cancer therapies, but clinical evidence for efficacy and safety of these extracts in humans has not been confirmed. Although some mushroom species or their extracts may be consumed for therapeutic effects, some regulatory agencies, such as the US Food and Drug Administration, regard such use as a dietary supplement, which does not have government approval or common clinical use as a prescription drug. Other uses Mushrooms can be used for dyeing wool and other natural fibers. The chromophores of mushroom dyes are organic compounds and produce strong and vivid colors, and all colors of the spectrum can be achieved with mushroom dyes. Before the invention of synthetic dyes, mushrooms were the source of many textile dyes. Some fungi, types of polypores loosely called mushrooms, have been used as fire starters (known as tinder fungi). Mushrooms and other fungi play a role in the development of new biological remediation techniques (e.g., using mycorrhizae to spur plant growth) and filtration technologies (e.g. using fungi to lower bacterial levels in contaminated water). See also Fungiculture List of poisonous fungus species List of psilocybin mushrooms List of world's largest mushrooms and conks Lists of fungal species Mushroom poisoning Mushrooms in art References Literature cited External links Identification Mushroom Observer, a collaborative mushroom recording and identification project An Aid to Mushroom Identification, Simon's Rock College Online Edible Wild Mushroom Field Guide Basidiomycota Edible fungi Fungus common names Non-timber forest products et:Seened fi:Sienet

20266

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainframe%20computer

Mainframe computer

A mainframe computer, informally called a mainframe or big iron, is a computer used primarily by large organizations for critical applications like bulk data processing for tasks such as censuses, industry and consumer statistics, enterprise resource planning, and large-scale transaction processing. A mainframe computer is large but not as large as a supercomputer and has more processing power than some other classes of computers, such as minicomputers, servers, workstations, and personal computers. Most large-scale computer-system architectures were established in the 1960s, but they continue to evolve. Mainframe computers are often used as servers. The term mainframe was derived from the large cabinet, called a main frame, that housed the central processing unit and main memory of early computers. Later, the term mainframe was used to distinguish high-end commercial computers from less powerful machines. Design Modern mainframe design is characterized less by raw computational speed and more by: Redundant internal engineering resulting in high reliability and security Extensive input-output ("I/O") facilities with the ability to offload to separate engines Strict backward compatibility with older software High hardware and computational utilization rates through virtualization to support massive throughput. Hot-swapping of hardware, such as processors and memory. Their high stability and reliability enable these machines to run uninterrupted for very long periods of time, with mean time between failures (MTBF) measured in decades. Mainframes have high availability, one of the primary reasons for their longevity, since they are typically used in applications where downtime would be costly or catastrophic. The term reliability, availability and serviceability (RAS) is a defining characteristic of mainframe computers. Proper planning and implementation are required to realize these features. In addition, mainframes are more secure than other computer types: the NIST vulnerabilities database, US-CERT, rates traditional mainframes such as IBM Z (previously called z Systems, System z and zSeries), Unisys Dorado and Unisys Libra as among the most secure with vulnerabilities in the low single digits as compared with thousands for Windows, UNIX, and Linux. Software upgrades usually require setting up the operating system or portions thereof, and are non-disruptive only when using virtualizing facilities such as IBM z/OS and Parallel Sysplex, or Unisys XPCL, which support workload sharing so that one system can take over another's application while it is being refreshed. In the late 1950s, mainframes had only a rudimentary interactive interface (the console) and used sets of punched cards, paper tape, or magnetic tape to transfer data and programs. They operated in batch mode to support back office functions such as payroll and customer billing, most of which were based on repeated tape-based sorting and merging operations followed by line printing to preprinted continuous stationery. When interactive user terminals were introduced, they were used almost exclusively for applications (e.g. airline booking) rather than program development. Typewriter and Teletype devices were common control consoles for system operators through the early 1970s, although ultimately supplanted by keyboard/display devices. By the early 1970s, many mainframes acquired interactive user terminals operating as timesharing computers, supporting hundreds of users simultaneously along with batch processing. Users gained access through keyboard/typewriter terminals and specialized text terminal CRT displays with integral keyboards, or later from personal computers equipped with terminal emulation software. By the 1980s, many mainframes supported graphic display terminals, and terminal emulation, but not graphical user interfaces. This form of end-user computing became obsolete in the 1990s due to the advent of personal computers provided with GUIs. After 2000, modern mainframes partially or entirely phased out classic "green screen" and color display terminal access for end-users in favour of Web-style user interfaces. The infrastructure requirements were drastically reduced during the mid-1990s, when CMOS mainframe designs replaced the older bipolar technology. IBM claimed that its newer mainframes reduced data center energy costs for power and cooling, and reduced physical space requirements compared to server farms. Characteristics Modern mainframes can run multiple different instances of operating systems at the same time. This technique of virtual machines allows applications to run as if they were on physically distinct computers. In this role, a single mainframe can replace higher-functioning hardware services available to conventional servers. While mainframes pioneered this capability, virtualization is now available on most families of computer systems, though not always to the same degree or level of sophistication. Mainframes can add or hot swap system capacity without disrupting system function, with specificity and granularity to a level of sophistication not usually available with most server solutions. Modern mainframes, notably the IBM zSeries, System z9 and System z10 servers, offer two levels of virtualization: logical partitions (LPARs, via the PR/SM facility) and virtual machines (via the z/VM operating system). Many mainframe customers run two machines: one in their primary data center and one in their backup data center—fully active, partially active, or on standby—in case there is a catastrophe affecting the first building. Test, development, training, and production workload for applications and databases can run on a single machine, except for extremely large demands where the capacity of one machine might be limiting. Such a two-mainframe installation can support continuous business service, avoiding both planned and unplanned outages. In practice, many customers use multiple mainframes linked either by Parallel Sysplex and shared DASD (in IBM's case), or with shared, geographically dispersed storage provided by EMC or Hitachi. Mainframes are designed to handle very high volume input and output (I/O) and emphasize throughput computing. Since the late 1950s, mainframe designs have included subsidiary hardware (called channels or peripheral processors) which manage the I/O devices, leaving the CPU free to deal only with high-speed memory. It is common in mainframe shops to deal with massive databases and files. Gigabyte to terabyte-size record files are not unusual. Compared to a typical PC, mainframes commonly have hundreds to thousands of times as much data storage online, and can access it reasonably quickly. Other server families also offload I/O processing and emphasize throughput computing. Mainframe return on investment (ROI), like any other computing platform, is dependent on its ability to scale, support mixed workloads, reduce labor costs, deliver uninterrupted service for critical business applications, and several other risk-adjusted cost factors. Mainframes also have execution integrity characteristics for fault tolerant computing. For example, z900, z990, System z9, and System z10 servers effectively execute result-oriented instructions twice, compare results, arbitrate between any differences (through instruction retry and failure isolation), then shift workloads "in flight" to functioning processors, including spares, without any impact to operating systems, applications, or users. This hardware-level feature, also found in HP's NonStop systems, is known as lock-stepping, because both processors take their "steps" (i.e. instructions) together. Not all applications absolutely need the assured integrity that these systems provide, but many do, such as financial transaction processing. Current market IBM, with z Systems, continues to be a major manufacturer in the mainframe market. In 2000, Hitachi co-developed the zSeries z900 with IBM to share expenses, and the latest Hitachi AP10000 models are made by IBM. Unisys manufactures ClearPath Libra mainframes, based on earlier Burroughs MCP products and ClearPath Dorado mainframes based on Sperry Univac OS 1100 product lines. Hewlett-Packard sells its unique NonStop systems, which it acquired with Tandem Computers and which some analysts classify as mainframes. Groupe Bull's GCOS, Stratus OpenVOS, Fujitsu (formerly Siemens) BS2000, and Fujitsu-ICL VME mainframes are still available in Europe, and Fujitsu (formerly Amdahl) GS21 mainframes globally. NEC with ACOS and Hitachi with AP10000-VOS3 still maintain mainframe businesses in the Japanese market. The amount of vendor investment in mainframe development varies with market share. Fujitsu and Hitachi both continue to use custom S/390-compatible processors, as well as other CPUs (including POWER and Xeon) for lower-end systems. Bull uses a mixture of Itanium and Xeon processors. NEC uses Xeon processors for its low-end ACOS-2 line, but develops the custom NOAH-6 processor for its high-end ACOS-4 series. IBM also develops custom processors in-house, such as the zEC12. Unisys produces code compatible mainframe systems that range from laptops to cabinet-sized mainframes that use homegrown CPUs as well as Xeon processors. Furthermore, there exists a market for software applications to manage the performance of mainframe implementations. In addition to IBM, significant market competitors include BMC, Maintec Technologies, Compuware, and CA Technologies. Starting in the 2010s, cloud computing is now a less expensive, more scalable alternative commonly called Big Data. History Several manufacturers and their successors produced mainframe computers from the 1950s until the early 21st Century, with gradually decreasing numbers and a gradual transition to simulation on Intel chips rather than proprietary hardware. The US group of manufacturers was first known as "IBM and the Seven Dwarfs": usually Burroughs, UNIVAC, NCR, Control Data, Honeywell, General Electric and RCA, although some lists varied. Later, with the departure of General Electric and RCA, it was referred to as IBM and the BUNCH. IBM's dominance grew out of their 700/7000 series and, later, the development of the 360 series mainframes. The latter architecture has continued to evolve into their current zSeries mainframes which, along with the then Burroughs and Sperry (now Unisys) MCP-based and OS1100 mainframes, are among the few mainframe architectures still extant that can trace their roots to this early period. While IBM's zSeries can still run 24-bit System/360 code, the 64-bit zSeries and System z9 CMOS servers have nothing physically in common with the older systems. Notable manufacturers outside the US were Siemens and Telefunken in Germany, ICL in the United Kingdom, Olivetti in Italy, and Fujitsu, Hitachi, Oki, and NEC in Japan. The Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries manufactured close copies of IBM mainframes during the Cold War; the BESM series and Strela are examples of an independently designed Soviet computer. Shrinking demand and tough competition started a shakeout in the market in the early 1970s—RCA sold out to UNIVAC and GE sold its business to Honeywell; between 1986 and 1990 Honeywell was bought out by Bull; UNIVAC became a division of Sperry, which later merged with Burroughs to form Unisys Corporation in 1986. In 1984 estimated sales of desktop computers ($11.6 billion) exceeded mainframe computers ($11.4 billion) for the first time. IBM received the vast majority of mainframe revenue. During the 1980s, minicomputer-based systems grew more sophisticated and were able to displace the lower end of the mainframes. These computers, sometimes called departmental computers, were typified by the Digital Equipment Corporation VAX series. In 1991, AT&T Corporation briefly owned NCR. During the same period, companies found that servers based on microcomputer designs could be deployed at a fraction of the acquisition price and offer local users much greater control over their own systems given the IT policies and practices at that time. Terminals used for interacting with mainframe systems were gradually replaced by personal computers. Consequently, demand plummeted and new mainframe installations were restricted mainly to financial services and government. In the early 1990s, there was a rough consensus among industry analysts that the mainframe was a dying market as mainframe platforms were increasingly replaced by personal computer networks. InfoWorld's Stewart Alsop infamously predicted that the last mainframe would be unplugged in 1996; in 1993, he cited Cheryl Currid, a computer industry analyst as saying that the last mainframe "will stop working on December 31, 1999", a reference to the anticipated Year 2000 problem (Y2K). That trend started to turn around in the late 1990s as corporations found new uses for their existing mainframes and as the price of data networking collapsed in most parts of the world, encouraging trends toward more centralized computing. The growth of e-business also dramatically increased the number of back-end transactions processed by mainframe software as well as the size and throughput of databases. Batch processing, such as billing, became even more important (and larger) with the growth of e-business, and mainframes are particularly adept at large-scale batch computing. Another factor currently increasing mainframe use is the development of the Linux operating system, which arrived on IBM mainframe systems in 1999 and is typically run in scores or up to c. 8,000 virtual machines on a single mainframe. Linux allows users to take advantage of open source software combined with mainframe hardware RAS. Rapid expansion and development in emerging markets, particularly People's Republic of China, is also spurring major mainframe investments to solve exceptionally difficult computing problems, e.g. providing unified, extremely high volume online transaction processing databases for 1 billion consumers across multiple industries (banking, insurance, credit reporting, government services, etc.) In late 2000, IBM introduced 64-bit z/Architecture, acquired numerous software companies such as Cognos and introduced those software products to the mainframe. IBM's quarterly and annual reports in the 2000s usually reported increasing mainframe revenues and capacity shipments. However, IBM's mainframe hardware business has not been immune to the recent overall downturn in the server hardware market or to model cycle effects. For example, in the 4th quarter of 2009, IBM's System z hardware revenues decreased by 27% year over year. But MIPS (millions of instructions per second) shipments increased 4% per year over the past two years. Alsop had himself photographed in 2000, symbolically eating his own words ("death of the mainframe"). In 2012, NASA powered down its last mainframe, an IBM System z9. However, IBM's successor to the z9, the z10, led a New York Times reporter to state four years earlier that "mainframe technology—hardware, software and services—remains a large and lucrative business for I.B.M., and mainframes are still the back-office engines behind the world's financial markets and much of global commerce". , while mainframe technology represented less than 3% of IBM's revenues, it "continue[d] to play an outsized role in Big Blue's results". In 2015, IBM launched the IBM z13, in June 2017 the IBM z14 and in September 2019 IBM launched the latest version of the product, the IBM z15. Differences from supercomputers A supercomputer is a computer at the leading edge of data processing capability, with respect to calculation speed. Supercomputers are used for scientific and engineering problems (high-performance computing) which crunch numbers and data, while mainframes focus on transaction processing. The differences are: Mainframes are built to be reliable for transaction processing (measured by TPC-metrics; not used or helpful for most supercomputing applications) as it is commonly understood in the business world: the commercial exchange of goods, services, or money. A typical transaction, as defined by the Transaction Processing Performance Council, updates a database system for inventory control (goods), airline reservations (services), or banking (money) by adding a record. A transaction may refer to a set of operations including disk read/writes, operating system calls, or some form of data transfer from one subsystem to another which is not measured by the processing speed of the CPU. Transaction processing is not exclusive to mainframes but is also used by microprocessor-based servers and online networks. Supercomputer performance is measured in floating point operations per second (FLOPS) or in traversed edges per second or TEPS, metrics that are not very meaningful for mainframe applications, while mainframes are sometimes measured in millions of instructions per second (MIPS), although the definition depends on the instruction mix measured. Examples of integer operations measured by MIPS include adding numbers together, checking values or moving data around in memory (while moving information to and from storage, so-called I/O is most helpful for mainframes; and within memory, only helping indirectly). Floating point operations are mostly addition, subtraction, and multiplication (of binary floating point in supercomputers; measured by FLOPS) with enough digits of precision to model continuous phenomena such as weather prediction and nuclear simulations (only recently standardized decimal floating point, not used in supercomputers, are appropriate for monetary values such as those useful for mainframe applications). In terms of computational speed, supercomputers are more powerful. Mainframes and supercomputers cannot always be clearly distinguished; up until the early 1990s, many supercomputers were based on a mainframe architecture with supercomputing extensions. An example of such a system is the HITAC S-3800, which was instruction-set compatible with IBM System/370 mainframes, and could run the Hitachi VOS3 operating system (a fork of IBM MVS). The S-3800 therefore can be seen as being both simultaneously a supercomputer and also an IBM-compatible mainframe. In 2007, an amalgamation of the different technologies and architectures for supercomputers and mainframes has led to a so-called gameframe. See also Channel I/O Cloud computing Computer types Failover Gameframe List of transistorized computers Commodity computing Notes References External links IBM Systems Mainframe Magazine IBM z Systems mainframes IBM Mainframe Computer Support Forum since 2003 Univac 9400, a mainframe from the 1960s, still in use in a German computer museum Lectures in the History of Computing: Mainframes (archived copy from the Internet Archive)

20268

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft%20Excel

Microsoft Excel

Microsoft Excel is a spreadsheet developed by Microsoft for Windows, macOS, Android and iOS. It features calculation or computation capabilities, graphing tools, pivot tables, and a macro programming language called Visual Basic for Applications (VBA). Excel forms part of the Microsoft Office suite of software. Features Basic operation Microsoft Excel has the basic features of all spreadsheets, using a grid of cells arranged in numbered rows and letter-named columns to organize data manipulations like arithmetic operations. It has a battery of supplied functions to answer statistical, engineering, and financial needs. In addition, it can display data as line graphs, histograms and charts, and with a very limited three-dimensional graphical display. It allows sectioning of data to view its dependencies on various factors for different perspectives (using pivot tables and the scenario manager).> A PivotTable is a tool for data analysis. It does this by simplifying large data sets via PivotTable fields It has a programming aspect, Visual Basic for Applications, allowing the user to employ a wide variety of numerical methods, for example, for solving differential equations of mathematical physics, and then reporting the results back to the spreadsheet. It also has a variety of interactive features allowing user interfaces that can completely hide the spreadsheet from the user, so the spreadsheet presents itself as a so-called application, or decision support system (DSS), via a custom-designed user interface, for example, a stock analyzer, or in general, as a design tool that asks the user questions and provides answers and reports. In a more elaborate realization, an Excel application can automatically poll external databases and measuring instruments using an update schedule, analyze the results, make a Word report or PowerPoint slide show, and e-mail these presentations on a regular basis to a list of participants. Excel was not designed to be used as a database. Microsoft allows for a number of optional command-line switches to control the manner in which Excel starts. Functions Excel 2016 has 484 functions. Of these, 360 existed prior to Excel 2010. Microsoft classifies these functions in 14 categories. Of the 484 current functions, 386 may be called from VBA as methods of the object "WorksheetFunction" and 44 have the same names as VBA functions. With the introduction of LAMBDA, Excel will become Turing complete. Macro programming VBA programming The Windows version of Excel supports programming through Microsoft's Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), which is a dialect of Visual Basic. Programming with VBA allows spreadsheet manipulation that is awkward or impossible with standard spreadsheet techniques. Programmers may write code directly using the Visual Basic Editor (VBE), which includes a window for writing code, debugging code, and code module organization environment. The user can implement numerical methods as well as automating tasks such as formatting or data organization in VBA and guide the calculation using any desired intermediate results reported back to the spreadsheet. VBA was removed from Mac Excel 2008, as the developers did not believe that a timely release would allow porting the VBA engine natively to Mac OS X. VBA was restored in the next version, Mac Excel 2011, although the build lacks support for ActiveX objects, impacting some high level developer tools. A common and easy way to generate VBA code is by using the Macro Recorder. The Macro Recorder records actions of the user and generates VBA code in the form of a macro. These actions can then be repeated automatically by running the macro. The macros can also be linked to different trigger types like keyboard shortcuts, a command button or a graphic. The actions in the macro can be executed from these trigger types or from the generic toolbar options. The VBA code of the macro can also be edited in the VBE. Certain features such as loop functions and screen prompt by their own properties, and some graphical display items, cannot be recorded but must be entered into the VBA module directly by the programmer. Advanced users can employ user prompts to create an interactive program, or react to events such as sheets being loaded or changed. Macro Recorded code may not be compatible with Excel versions. Some code that is used in Excel 2010 cannot be used in Excel 2003. Making a Macro that changes the cell colors and making changes to other aspects of cells may not be backward compatible. VBA code interacts with the spreadsheet through the Excel Object Model, a vocabulary identifying spreadsheet objects, and a set of supplied functions or methods that enable reading and writing to the spreadsheet and interaction with its users (for example, through custom toolbars or command bars and message boxes). User-created VBA subroutines execute these actions and operate like macros generated using the macro recorder, but are more flexible and efficient. History From its first version Excel supported end-user programming of macros (automation of repetitive tasks) and user-defined functions (extension of Excel's built-in function library). In early versions of Excel, these programs were written in a macro language whose statements had formula syntax and resided in the cells of special-purpose macro sheets (stored with file extension .XLM in Windows.) XLM was the default macro language for Excel through Excel 4.0. Beginning with version 5.0 Excel recorded macros in VBA by default but with version 5.0 XLM recording was still allowed as an option. After version 5.0 that option was discontinued. All versions of Excel, including Excel 2010 are capable of running an XLM macro, though Microsoft discourages their use. Charts Excel supports charts, graphs, or histograms generated from specified groups of cells. It also supports Pivot Charts that allow for a chart to be linked directly to a Pivot table. This allows the chart to be refreshed with the Pivot Table. The generated graphic component can either be embedded within the current sheet or added as a separate object. These displays are dynamically updated if the content of cells changes. For example, suppose that the important design requirements are displayed visually; then, in response to a user's change in trial values for parameters, the curves describing the design change shape, and their points of intersection shift, assisting the selection of the best design. Add-ins Additional features are available using add-ins. Several are provided with Excel, including: Analysis ToolPak: Provides data analysis tools for statistical and engineering analysis (includes analysis of variance and regression analysis) Analysis ToolPak VBA: VBA functions for Analysis ToolPak Euro Currency Tools: Conversion and formatting for euro currency Solver Add-In: Tools for optimization and equation solving Excel for the web Excel for the web is a free lightweight version of Microsoft Excel available as part of Office on the web, which also includes web versions of Microsoft Word and Microsoft PowerPoint. Excel for the web can display most of the features available in the desktop versions of Excel, although it may not be able to insert or edit them. Certain data connections are not accessible on Excel for the web, including with charts that may use these external connections. Excel for the web also cannot display legacy features, such as Excel 4.0 macros or Excel 5.0 dialog sheets. There are also small differences between how some of the Excel functions work. Data storage and communication Number of rows and columns Versions of Excel up to 7.0 had a limitation in the size of their data sets of 16K (214 = ) rows. Versions 8.0 through 11.0 could handle 64K (216 = ) rows and 256 columns (28 as label 'IV'). Version 12.0 onwards, including the current Version 16.x, can handle over 1M (220 = ) rows, and (214, labeled as column 'XFD') columns. File formats Microsoft Excel up until 2007 version used a proprietary binary file format called Excel Binary File Format (.XLS) as its primary format. Excel 2007 uses Office Open XML as its primary file format, an XML-based format that followed after a previous XML-based format called "XML Spreadsheet" ("XMLSS"), first introduced in Excel 2002. Although supporting and encouraging the use of new XML-based formats as replacements, Excel 2007 remained backwards-compatible with the traditional, binary formats. In addition, most versions of Microsoft Excel can read CSV, DBF, SYLK, DIF, and other legacy formats. Support for some older file formats was removed in Excel 2007. The file formats were mainly from DOS-based programs. Binary OpenOffice.org has created documentation of the Excel format. Two epochs of the format exist: the 97-2003 OLE format, and the older stream format. Microsoft has made the Excel binary format specification available to freely download. XML Spreadsheet The XML Spreadsheet format introduced in Excel 2002 is a simple, XML based format missing some more advanced features like storage of VBA macros. Though the intended file extension for this format is .xml, the program also correctly handles XML files with .xls extension. This feature is widely used by third-party applications (e.g. MySQL Query Browser) to offer "export to Excel" capabilities without implementing binary file format. The following example will be correctly opened by Excel if saved either as Book1.xml or Book1.xls: <?xml version="1.0"?> <Workbook xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:spreadsheet" xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:x="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:excel" xmlns:ss="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:spreadsheet" xmlns:html="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40"> <Worksheet ss:Name="Sheet1"> <Table ss:ExpandedColumnCount="2" ss:ExpandedRowCount="2" x:FullColumns="1" x:FullRows="1"> <Row> <Cell><Data ss:Type="String">Name</Data></Cell> <Cell><Data ss:Type="String">Example</Data></Cell> </Row> <Row> <Cell><Data ss:Type="String">Value</Data></Cell> <Cell><Data ss:Type="Number">123</Data></Cell> </Row> </Table> </Worksheet> </Workbook> Current file extensions Microsoft Excel 2007, along with the other products in the Microsoft Office 2007 suite, introduced new file formats. The first of these (.xlsx) is defined in the Office Open XML (OOXML) specification. Old file extensions Using other Windows applications Windows applications such as Microsoft Access and Microsoft Word, as well as Excel can communicate with each other and use each other's capabilities. The most common are Dynamic Data Exchange: although strongly deprecated by Microsoft, this is a common method to send data between applications running on Windows, with official MS publications referring to it as "the protocol from hell". As the name suggests, it allows applications to supply data to others for calculation and display. It is very common in financial markets, being used to connect to important financial data services such as Bloomberg and Reuters. OLE Object Linking and Embedding allows a Windows application to control another to enable it to format or calculate data. This may take on the form of "embedding" where an application uses another to handle a task that it is more suited to, for example a PowerPoint presentation may be embedded in an Excel spreadsheet or vice versa. Using external data Excel users can access external data sources via Microsoft Office features such as (for example) connections built with the Office Data Connection file format. Excel files themselves may be updated using a Microsoft supplied ODBC driver. Excel can accept data in real-time through several programming interfaces, which allow it to communicate with many data sources such as Bloomberg and Reuters (through addins such as Power Plus Pro). DDE: "Dynamic Data Exchange" uses the message passing mechanism in Windows to allow data to flow between Excel and other applications. Although it is easy for users to create such links, programming such links reliably is so difficult that Microsoft, the creators of the system, officially refer to it as "the protocol from hell". In spite of its many issues DDE remains the most common way for data to reach traders in financial markets. Network DDE Extended the protocol to allow spreadsheets on different computers to exchange data. Starting with Windows Vista, Microsoft no longer supports the facility. Real Time Data: RTD although in many ways technically superior to DDE, has been slow to gain acceptance, since it requires non-trivial programming skills, and when first released was neither adequately documented nor supported by the major data vendors. Alternatively, Microsoft Query provides ODBC-based browsing within Microsoft Excel. Export and migration of spreadsheets Programmers have produced APIs to open Excel spreadsheets in a variety of applications and environments other than Microsoft Excel. These include opening Excel documents on the web using either ActiveX controls, or plugins like the Adobe Flash Player. The Apache POI opensource project provides Java libraries for reading and writing Excel spreadsheet files. ExcelPackage is another open-source project that provides server-side generation of Microsoft Excel 2007 spreadsheets. PHPExcel is a PHP library that converts Excel5, Excel 2003, and Excel 2007 formats into objects for reading and writing within a web application. Excel Services is a current .NET developer tool that can enhance Excel's capabilities. Excel spreadsheets can be accessed from Python with xlrd and openpyxl. js-xlsx and js-xls can open Excel spreadsheets from JavaScript. Password protection Microsoft Excel protection offers several types of passwords: Password to open a document Password to modify a document Password to unprotect the worksheet Password to protect workbook Password to protect the sharing workbook All passwords except password to open a document can be removed instantly regardless of the Microsoft Excel version used to create the document. These types of passwords are used primarily for shared work on a document. Such password-protected documents are not encrypted, and a data sources from a set password is saved in a document's header. Password to protect workbook is an exception – when it is set, a document is encrypted with the standard password “VelvetSweatshop”, but since it is known to the public, it actually does not add any extra protection to the document. The only type of password that can prevent a trespasser from gaining access to a document is password to open a document. The cryptographic strength of this kind of protection depends strongly on the Microsoft Excel version that was used to create the document. In Microsoft Excel 95 and earlier versions, the password to open is converted to a 16-bit key that can be instantly cracked. In Excel 97/2000 the password is converted to a 40-bit key, which can also be cracked very quickly using modern equipment. As regards services that use rainbow tables (e.g. Password-Find), it takes up to several seconds to remove protection. In addition, password-cracking programs can brute-force attack passwords at a rate of hundreds of thousands of passwords a second, which not only lets them decrypt a document but also find the original password. In Excel 2003/XP the encryption is slightly better – a user can choose any encryption algorithm that is available in the system (see Cryptographic Service Provider). Due to the CSP, an Excel file can't be decrypted, and thus the password to open can't be removed, though the brute-force attack speed remains quite high. Nevertheless, the older Excel 97/2000 algorithm is set by the default. Therefore, users who do not change the default settings lack reliable protection of their documents. The situation changed fundamentally in Excel 2007, where the modern AES algorithm with a key of 128 bits started being used for decryption, and a 50,000-fold use of the hash function SHA1 reduced the speed of brute-force attacks down to hundreds of passwords per second. In Excel 2010, the strength of the protection by the default was increased two times due to the use of a 100,000-fold SHA1 to convert a password to a key. Microsoft Excel Viewer Microsoft Excel Viewer was a freeware program for Microsoft Windows for viewing and printing spreadsheet documents created by Excel. Microsoft retired the viewer in April 2018 with the last security update released in February 2019 for Excel Viewer 2007 (SP3). The first version released by Microsoft was Excel 97 Viewer. Excel 97 Viewer was supported in Windows CE for Handheld PCs. In October 2004, Microsoft released Excel Viewer 2003. In September 2007, Microsoft released Excel Viewer 2003 Service Pack 3 (SP3). In January 2008, Microsoft released Excel Viewer 2007 (featuring a non-collapsible Ribbon interface). In April 2009, Microsoft released Excel Viewer 2007 Service Pack 2 (SP2). In October 2011, Microsoft released Excel Viewer 2007 Service Pack 3 (SP3). Microsoft advises to view and print Excel files for free to use the Excel Mobile application for Windows 10 and for Windows 7 and Windows 8 to upload the file to OneDrive and use Excel for the web with a Microsoft account to open them in a browser. Quirks In addition to issues with spreadsheets in general, other problems specific to Excel include numeric precision, misleading statistics functions, mod function errors, date limitations and more. Numeric precision Despite the use of 15-figure precision, Excel can display many more figures (up to thirty) upon user request. But the displayed figures are not those actually used in its computations, and so, for example, the difference of two numbers may differ from the difference of their displayed values. Although such departures are usually beyond the 15th decimal, exceptions do occur, especially for very large or very small numbers. Serious errors can occur if decisions are made based upon automated comparisons of numbers (for example, using the Excel If function), as equality of two numbers can be unpredictable. In the figure, the fraction 1/9000 is displayed in Excel. Although this number has a decimal representation that is an infinite string of ones, Excel displays only the leading 15 figures. In the second line, the number one is added to the fraction, and again Excel displays only 15 figures. In the third line, one is subtracted from the sum using Excel. Because the sum in the second line has only eleven 1's after the decimal, the difference when 1 is subtracted from this displayed value is three 0's followed by a string of eleven 1's. However, the difference reported by Excel in the third line is three 0's followed by a string of thirteen 1's and two extra erroneous digits. This is because Excel calculates with about half a digit more than it displays. Excel works with a modified 1985 version of the IEEE 754 specification. Excel's implementation involves conversions between binary and decimal representations, leading to accuracy that is on average better than one would expect from simple fifteen digit precision, but that can be worse. See the main article for details. Besides accuracy in user computations, the question of accuracy in Excel-provided functions may be raised. Particularly in the arena of statistical functions, Excel has been criticized for sacrificing accuracy for speed of calculation. As many calculations in Excel are executed using VBA, an additional issue is the accuracy of VBA, which varies with variable type and user-requested precision. Statistical functions The accuracy and convenience of statistical tools in Excel has been criticized, as mishandling missing data, as returning incorrect values due to inept handling of round-off and large numbers, as only selectively updating calculations on a spreadsheet when some cell values are changed, and as having a limited set of statistical tools. Microsoft has announced some of these issues are addressed in Excel 2010. Excel MOD function error Excel has issues with modulo operations. In the case of excessively large results, Excel will return the error warning instead of an answer. Fictional leap day in the year 1900 Excel includes February 29, 1900, incorrectly treating 1900 as a leap year, even though e.g. 2100 is correctly treated as a non-leap year. The bug originated from Lotus 1-2-3 (deliberately implemented to save computer memory), and was also purposely implemented in Excel, for the purpose of bug compatibility. This legacy has later been carried over into Office Open XML file format. Thus a (not necessarily whole) number greater than or equal to 61 interpreted as a date and time are the (real) number of days after December 30, 1899, 0:00, a non-negative number less than 60 is the number of days after December 31, 1899, 0:00, and numbers with whole part 60 represent the fictional day. Date range Excel supports dates with years in the range 1900–9999, except that December 31, 1899, can be entered as 0 and is displayed as 0-jan-1900. Converting a fraction of a day into hours, minutes and days by treating it as a moment on the day January 1, 1900, does not work for a negative fraction. Conversion problems Entering text that happens to be in a form that is interpreted as a date, the text can be unintentionally changed to a standard date format. A similar problem occurs when a text happens to be in the form of a floating-point notation of a number. In these cases the original exact text cannot be recovered from the result. Formatting the cell as TEXT before entering ambiguous text prevents Excel from converting to a date. This issue has caused a well known problem in the analysis of DNA, for example in bioinformatics. As first reported in 2004, genetic scientists found that Excel automatically and incorrectly converts certain gene names into dates. A follow-up study in 2016 found many peer reviewed scientific journal papers had been affected and that "Of the selected journals, the proportion of published articles with Excel files containing gene lists that are affected by gene name errors is 19.6 %." Excel parses the copied and pasted data and sometimes changes them depending on what it thinks they are. For example, MARCH1 (Membrane Associated Ring-CH-type finger 1) gets converted to the date March 1 (1-Mar) and SEPT2 (Septin 2) is converted into September 2 (2-Sep) etc. While some secondary news sources reported this as a fault with Excel, the original authors of the 2016 paper placed the blame with the researchers misusing Excel. In August 2020 the HUGO Gene Nomenclature Committee (HGNC) published new guidelines in the journal Nature regarding gene naming in order to avoid issues with "symbols that affect data handling and retrieval." So far 27 genes have been renamed, including changing MARCH1 to MARCHF1 and SEPT1 to SEPTIN1 in order to avoid accidental conversion of the gene names into dates. Errors with large strings The following functions return incorrect results when passed a string longer than 255 characters: incorrectly returns 16, meaning "Error value" , when called as a method of the VBA object (i.e., in VBA), incorrectly returns "false". Filenames Microsoft Excel will not open two documents with the same name and instead will display the following error: A document with the name '%s' is already open. You cannot open two documents with the same name, even if the documents are in different folders. To open the second document, either close the document that is currently open, or rename one of the documents. The reason is for calculation ambiguity with linked cells. If there is a cell ='[Book1.xlsx]Sheet1'!$G$33, and there are two books named "Book1" open, there is no way to tell which one the user means. Versions Early history Microsoft originally marketed a spreadsheet program called Multiplan in 1982. Multiplan became very popular on CP/M systems, but on MS-DOS systems it lost popularity to Lotus 1-2-3. Microsoft released the first version of Excel for the Macintosh on September 30, 1985, and the first Windows version was 2.05 (to synchronize with the Macintosh version 2.2) in November 1987. Lotus was slow to bring 1-2-3 to Windows and by the early 1990s, Excel had started to outsell 1-2-3 and helped Microsoft achieve its position as a leading PC software developer. This accomplishment solidified Microsoft as a valid competitor and showed its future of developing GUI software. Microsoft maintained its advantage with regular new releases, every two years or so. Microsoft Windows Excel 2.0 is the first version of Excel for the Intel platform. Versions prior to 2.0 were only available on the Apple Macintosh. Excel 2.0 (1987) The first Windows version was labeled "2" to correspond to the Mac version. This included a run-time version of Windows. BYTE in 1989 listed Excel for Windows as among the "Distinction" winners of the BYTE Awards. The magazine stated that the port of the "extraordinary" Macintosh version "shines", with a user interface as good as or better than the original. Excel 3.0 (1990) Included toolbars, drawing capabilities, outlining, add-in support, 3D charts, and many more new features. Excel 4.0 (1992) Introduced auto-fill. Also, an easter egg in Excel 4.0 reveals a hidden animation of a dancing set of numbers 1 through 3, representing Lotus 1-2-3, which is then crushed by an Excel logo. Excel 5.0 (1993) With version 5.0, Excel has included Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), a programming language based on Visual Basic which adds the ability to automate tasks in Excel and to provide user-defined functions (UDF) for use in worksheets. VBA includes a fully featured integrated development environment (IDE). Macro recording can produce VBA code replicating user actions, thus allowing simple automation of regular tasks. VBA allows the creation of forms and in‑worksheet controls to communicate with the user. The language supports use (but not creation) of ActiveX (COM) DLL's; later versions add support for class modules allowing the use of basic object-oriented programming techniques. The automation functionality provided by VBA made Excel a target for macro viruses. This caused serious problems until antivirus products began to detect these viruses. Microsoft belatedly took steps to prevent the misuse by adding the ability to disable macros completely, to enable macros when opening a workbook or to trust all macros signed using a trusted certificate. Versions 5.0 to 9.0 of Excel contain various Easter eggs, including a "Hall of Tortured Souls", a Doom-like minigame, although since version 10 Microsoft has taken measures to eliminate such undocumented features from their products. 5.0 was released in a 16-bit x86 version for Windows 3.1 and later in a 32-bit version for NT 3.51 (x86/Alpha/PowerPC) Excel 95 (v7.0) Released in 1995 with Microsoft Office for Windows 95, this is the first major version after Excel 5.0, as there is no Excel 6.0 with all of the Office applications standardizing on the same major version number. Internal rewrite to 32-bits. Almost no external changes, but faster and more stable. Excel 97 (v8.0) Included in Office 97 (for x86 and Alpha). This was a major upgrade that introduced the paper clip office assistant and featured standard VBA used instead of internal Excel Basic. It introduced the now-removed Natural Language labels. This version of Excel includes a flight simulator as an Easter Egg. Excel 2000 (v9.0) Included in Office 2000. This was a minor upgrade but introduced an upgrade to the clipboard where it can hold multiple objects at once. The Office Assistant, whose frequent unsolicited appearance in Excel 97 had annoyed many users, became less intrusive. Excel 2002 (v10.0) Included in Office XP. Very minor enhancements. Excel 2003 (v11.0) Included in Office 2003. Minor enhancements, the most significant being the new Tables. Excel 2007 (v12.0) Included in Office 2007. This release was a major upgrade from the previous version. Similar to other updated Office products, Excel in 2007 used the new Ribbon menu system. This was different from what users were used to, and was met with mixed reactions. One study reported fairly good acceptance by users except highly experienced users and users of word processing applications with a classical WIMP interface, but was less convinced in terms of efficiency and organization. However, an online survey reported that a majority of respondents had a negative opinion of the change, with advanced users being "somewhat more negative" than intermediate users, and users reporting a self-estimated reduction in productivity. Added functionality included the SmartArt set of editable business diagrams. Also added was an improved management of named variables through the Name Manager, and much-improved flexibility in formatting graphs, which allow (x, y) coordinate labeling and lines of arbitrary weight. Several improvements to pivot tables were introduced. Also like other office products, the Office Open XML file formats were introduced, including .xlsm for a workbook with macros and .xlsx for a workbook without macros. Specifically, many of the size limitations of previous versions were greatly increased. To illustrate, the number of rows was now 1,048,576 (220) and columns was 16,384 (214; the far-right column is XFD). This changes what is a valid A1 reference versus a named range. This version made more extensive use of multiple cores for the calculation of spreadsheets; however, VBA macros are not handled in parallel and XLL add‑ins were only executed in parallel if they were thread-safe and this was indicated at registration. Excel 2010 (v14.0) Included in Office 2010, this is the next major version after v12.0, as version number 13 was skipped. Minor enhancements and 64-bit support, including the following: Multi-threading recalculation (MTR) for commonly used functions Improved pivot tables More conditional formatting options Additional image editing capabilities In-cell charts called sparklines Ability to preview before pasting Office 2010 backstage feature for document-related tasks Ability to customize the Ribbon Many new formulas, most highly specialized to improve accuracy Excel 2013 (v15.0) Included in Office 2013, along with a lot of new tools included in this release: Improved Multi-threading and Memory Contention FlashFill Power View Power Pivot Timeline Slicer Windows App Inquire 50 new functions Excel 2016 (v16.0) Included in Office 2016, along with a lot of new tools included in this release: Power Query integration Read-only mode for Excel Keyboard access for Pivot Tables and Slicers in Excel New Chart Types Quick data linking in Visio Excel forecasting functions Support for multi-selection of Slicer items using touch Time grouping and Pivot Chart Drill Down Excel data cards Excel 2019, Office 365 and subsequent (v16.0) Microsoft no longer releases Office or Excel in discrete versions. Instead, features are introduced automatically over time using Windows Update. The version number remains 16.0. Thereafter only the approximate dates when features appear can now be given. Dynamic Arrays. These are essentially Array Formulas but they "Spill" automatically into neighboring cells and does not need the ctrl-shift-enter to create them. Further, dynamic arrays are the default format, with new "@" and "#" operators to provide compatibility with previous versions. This is perhaps the biggest structural change since 2007, and is in response to a similar feature in Google Sheets. Dynamic arrays started appearing in pre-releases about 2018, and as of March 2020 are available in published versions of Office 365 provided a user selected "Office Insiders". Apple Macintosh 1985 Excel 1.0 1988 Excel 1.5 1989 Excel 2.2 1990 Excel 3.0 1992 Excel 4.0 1993 Excel 5.0 (part of Office 4.x—Final Motorola 680x0 version and first PowerPC version) 1998 Excel 8.0 (part of Office 98) 2000 Excel 9.0 (part of Office 2001) 2001 Excel 10.0 (part of Office v. X) 2004 Excel 11.0 (part of Office 2004) 2008 Excel 12.0 (part of Office 2008) 2010 Excel 14.0 (part of Office 2011) 2015 Excel 15.0 (part of Office 2016—Office 2016 for Mac brings the Mac version much closer to parity with its Windows cousin, harmonizing many of the reporting and high-level developer functions, while bringing the ribbon and styling into line with its PC counterpart.) OS/2 1989 Excel 2.2 1990 Excel 2.3 1991 Excel 3.0 Mobile Excel Mobile is a spreadsheet program that can edit XLSX files. It can edit and format text in cells, calculate formulas, search within the spreadsheet, sort rows and columns, freeze panes, filter the columns, add comments, and create charts. It can't add columns or rows except at the edge of the document, rearrange columns or rows, delete rows or columns, or add spreadsheet tabs. The 2007 version has the ability to use a full-screen mode to deal with limited screen resolution, as well as split panes to view different parts of a worksheet at one time. Protection settings, zoom settings, autofilter settings, certain chart formatting, hidden sheets, and other features are not supported on Excel Mobile, and will be modified upon opening and saving a workbook. In 2015, Excel Mobile became available for Windows 10 and Windows 10 Mobile on Windows Store. Summary Impact Excel offers many user interface tweaks over the earliest electronic spreadsheets; however, the essence remains the same as in the original spreadsheet software, VisiCalc: the program displays cells organized in rows and columns, and each cell may contain data or a formula, with relative or absolute references to other cells. Excel 2.0 for Windows, which was modeled after its Mac GUI-based counterpart, indirectly expanded the installed base of the then-nascent Windows environment. Excel 2.0 was released a month before Windows 2.0, and the installed base of Windows was so low at that point in 1987 that Microsoft had to bundle a runtime version of Windows 1.0 with Excel 2.0. Unlike Microsoft Word, there never was a DOS version of Excel. Excel became the first spreadsheet to allow the user to define the appearance of spreadsheets (fonts, character attributes, and cell appearance). It also introduced intelligent cell re-computation, where only cells dependent on the cell being modified are updated (previous spreadsheet programs recomputed everything all the time or waited for a specific user command). Excel introduced auto-fill, the ability to drag and expand the selection box to automatically copy a cell or row contents to adjacent cells or rows, adjusting the copies intelligently by automatically incrementing cell references or contents. Excel also introduced extensive graphing capabilities. Security Because Excel is widely used, it has been attacked by hackers. While Excel is not directly exposed to the Internet, if an attacker can get a victim to open a file in Excel, and there is an appropriate security bug in Excel, then the attacker can gain control of the victim's computer. UK's GCHQ has a tool named TORNADO ALLEY with this purpose. See also Comparison of spreadsheet software Comparison of risk analysis Microsoft Excel add-ins Numbers (spreadsheet)—the iWork equivalent Spreadmart References General sources External links – official site 1985 software Articles with example code Classic Mac OS software Computer-related introductions in 1985 Excel Spreadsheet software for macOS Spreadsheet software for Windows

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael%20Hutchence

Michael Hutchence

Michael Kelland John Hutchence (22 January 1960 – 22 November 1997) was an Australian musician, singer-songwriter and actor. Hutchence co-founded the rock band INXS, which sold over 75 million records worldwide and was inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame in 2001. He was the lead singer and lyricist of INXS from 1977 until his death. Hutchence was a member of the short-lived pop rock group Max Q. He also recorded some solo material and acted in feature films, including Dogs in Space (1986), Frankenstein Unbound (1990), and Limp (1999). Hutchence had a string of love affairs with prominent actresses, models and singers, and his private life was often reported in the Australian and international press. In July 1996, Hutchence and English television presenter Paula Yates had a daughter, Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily. On the morning of 22 November 1997, Hutchence was found dead in his hotel room in Sydney. His death was reported by the New South Wales Coroner to be the result of suicide by hanging. Early life Michael Kelland John Hutchence was born on 22 January 1960, to Sydney businessman Kelland ("Kell") Frank Hutchence (1924–2002) and make-up artist Patricia Glassop (née Kennedy, 1926–2010). Kelland's parents were sea captain Frank Hutchence and Mabs from England who settled in Sydney in 1922. Michael joined elder half-sister Tina; both siblings were of Irish ancestry from their mother's side, as Patricia's father was from County Cork in Ireland. Following Kell's business interests, the Hutchence family moved to Brisbane (where younger brother Rhett was born) and later to Hong Kong. During the early years in Hong Kong, both boys attended Beacon Hill School in Kowloon Tong. While in Hong Kong, Michael showed promise as a swimmer before breaking his arm badly. He then began to show interest in poetry and performed his first song in a local toy store commercial. Michael attended King George V School during his early teens. The family returned to Sydney in 1972, buying a house in Belrose near the Northern Beaches. Hutchence attended Davidson High School, where he met and befriended Andrew Farriss. Around this time, Hutchence and Farriss spent a lot of time jamming in the garage with Andrew's brothers. Farriss then convinced Hutchence to join his band, Doctor Dolphin, alongside classmates Kent Kerny and Neil Sanders. Bass guitarist Garry Beers and drummer Geoff Kennelly from nearby Forest High School filled out the line-up. Hutchence's parents separated when he was 15; for a short time in 1976, he lived with his mother and half-sister Tina in California. Hutchence later returned to Sydney with his mother. In 1977, a new band, the Farriss Brothers, was formed with Tim Farriss on lead guitar, his younger brother Andrew as keyboardist, and youngest brother Jon on drums. Andrew brought Hutchence on board as a vocalist and Beers on bass guitar, and Tim brought in his former bandmate Kirk Pengilly to play guitar and saxophone. The band made their debut on 16 August 1977 at Whale Beach, 40 km (25 mi) north of Sydney. Career Early career Hutchence, the Farriss brothers, Kerny, Sanders, Beers and Kennelly briefly performed as The Vegetables, singing "We Are the Vegetables". Ten months later, they returned to Sydney and recorded a set of demos. The Farriss Brothers regularly supported hard rockers Midnight Oil on the pub rock circuit, and were renamed as INXS in 1979. Their first performance under the new name was on 1 September at the Oceanview Hotel in Toukley. In May 1980, the group released their first single, "Simple Simon"/"We Are the Vegetables" which was followed by the debut album INXS in October. Their first Top 40 Australian hit on the Kent Music Report Singles Chart, "Just Keep Walking", was released in September 1980. Hutchence became the main spokesperson for the band. He co-wrote almost all of INXS's songs with Andrew Farriss. According to Hutchence, most of the songs on the band's second album, Underneath the Colours, were written within a fairly short space of time: "Most bands shudder at the prospect of having 20 years to write their first album and four days to write their second. For us, though, it was good. It left less room for us to go off on all sorts of tangents". Soon after recording sessions for Underneath the Colours – produced by Richard Clapton – had finished, band members started work on outside projects. Hutchence recorded "Speed Kills", written by Don Walker of hard rockers Cold Chisel, for the Freedom (1982) film soundtrack, directed by Scott Hicks. It was Hutchence's first solo single and was released by WEA in early 1982. Stardom and acting career In March 1985, after Hutchence and INXS recorded their album The Swing (1984), WEA released the Australian version of Dekadance, as a limited edition cassette only EP of six tracks including remixes from the album. The cassette also included a cover version of Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood's hit "Jackson", which Hutchence sang as a duet with Jenny Morris, a backing singer for The Swing sessions. The EP reached No 2 on the Kent Music Report Albums Chart. Hutchence provided vocals for new wave band Beargarden's 1985 single release. On 19 May, INXS won seven awards at the 1984 Countdown Music and Video Awards ceremony, including 'Best Songwriter' for Hutchence and Andrew, and 'Most Popular Male' for Hutchence. They performed "Burn for You", dressed in Akubras (a brand of hats) and Drizabones (a brand of outdoor coats/oilskin jackets) followed by Hutchence and Morris singing "Jackson" to close. In 1986, Hutchence played Sam, the lead male role, in the Australian film Dogs in Space, directed by long-time INXS music video collaborator Richard Lowenstein. Sam's girlfriend, Anna, was portrayed by Saskia Post as a "fragile peroxide blonde in op-shop clothes". Hutchence provided four songs on the film's soundtrack. Also working on the film and its soundtrack, as music director, was Ollie Olsen (ex-Whirlywirld). Late in 1986, before commencing work on a new INXS album and while supposedly taking an eight-month break, the band's management decided to stage the Australian Made tour as a series of major outdoor concerts across the country. The roster featured INXS, Jimmy Barnes (Cold Chisel), Models, Divinyls, Mental as Anything, The Triffids and I'm Talking. To promote the tour, Hutchence and Barnes shared vocals on The Easybeats cover "Good Times" and "Laying Down the Law", which Barnes cowrote with Beers, Andrew Farriss, Jon Farriss, Hutchence and Pengilly. "Good Times" was used as the theme for the concert series of 1986–1987. It peaked at No. 2 on the Australian charts, and months later was featured in the Joel Schumacher film The Lost Boys and its soundtrack, allowing it to peak at No. 47 in the U.S. on 1 August 1987. Divinyls' lead singer Chrissy Amphlett enjoyed the tour and reconnected with Hutchence, stating that "[he] was a sweet man, who said in one interview that he wanted me to have his baby." In 1987, Hutchence provided vocals for Richard Clapton's album Glory Road, which was produced by Jon Farriss. INXS released Kick in October 1987, and the album provided the band with worldwide popularity. Kick peaked at No. 1 in Australia, No. 3 on the US Billboard 200, No. 9 in UK, and No. 15 in Austria. The band's most successful studio album, Kick has been certified six times platinum by the RIAA and spawned four US top 10 singles ("New Sensation", "Never Tear Us Apart", "Devil Inside" and "Need You Tonight", the last of which reached the top of the US Billboard singles charts). According to 1001 Songs: The Great Songs of All Time and the Artists, Stories and Secrets Behind Them, the single "Need You Tonight" is not lyrically complex; it is Hutchence's performance where "he sings in kittenish whisper, gently drawing back with the incredible lust of a tiger hunting in the night" that makes the song "as sexy and funky as any white rock group has ever been". In September 1988, the band swept the MTV Video Music Awards with the video for "Need You Tonight/Mediate" winning in five categories. In 1989, Hutchence collaborated further with Olsen for the Max Q project, and was joined by members of Olsen's previous groups including Whirlywirld, No and Orchestra of Skin and Bone. They released a self-titled album and three singles, "Way of the World", "Sometimes" and "Monday Night by Satellite". Max Q disbanded in 1990. Max Q showed Hutchence exploring the darker side of his music and, with Olsen, he created "one of the most innovative dance music albums of the decade". Hutchence wrote most of the music and provided "an extraordinary performance ... it was one of the most significant statements Hutchence was to make". In 1990, Hutchence portrayed nineteenth-century Romantic poet Percy Shelley in Roger Corman's film version of Frankenstein Unbound, which was based on a science fiction time travel story of the same name written by Brian Aldiss. In 1990, INXS released X, which spawned more international hits such as "Suicide Blonde" and "Disappear" (both Top 10 in the US). "Suicide Blonde" peaked at No. 2 in Australia and No. 11 in the UK. Hutchence, with Andrew Farriss, wrote the song after Hutchence's then-girlfriend, Kylie Minogue, used the phrase "suicide blonde" to describe her look during her 1989 film, The Delinquents; the film depicted Minogue in a platinum blonde wig. Hutchence won the 'Best International Artist' at the 1991 BRIT Awards with INXS winning the related group award. Hutchence provided vocals for pub rockers Noiseworks' album, Love Versus Money (1991). Welcome to Wherever You Are was released by INXS in August 1992. It received good critical reviews and went to No. 1 in the UK. Later career Hutchence and INXS faced reduced commercial success with Full Moon, Dirty Hearts, especially in the U.S. The band took time off to rest and be with their families, while Hutchence remained in the public eye through his romances. He commenced work on a self-titled solo album in the mid-1990s. After a period of inactivity and releases that received lukewarm reviews, INXS recorded the band's 10th official album, Elegantly Wasted, in 1996. Artistry Hutchence was a baritone. His vocal range spanned from the bass B1 to the high tenor F#5. In 2013, News.com.au ranked Hutchence fourth in a list of the 15 greatest Australian singers of all time. Billboard described Hutchence as "charismatic," with a "seductive purr and [a] lithe, magnetic stage presence." Paul Donoughue of ABC.net.au wrote that Hutchence had "a phenomenal voice — moody, sexual, and dynamic, able to shift effortlessly from fragile to cocksure." Reviewing an INXS concert, Dave Simpson of The Guardian wrote, "Watching Hutchence, hair flailing, crotch thrusting, a mischievous smile forever creeping across his leathery face, I realised that here was a man born to be onstage, living and loving every minute, an explosion of sexual energy". Hutchence biographer Toby Creswell asserted that "Hutchence was, without question, one of the truly great frontmen — he expressed the music in a dynamic way that few others could." Personal life According to People, Hutchence's "public brawls and onetime open drug use led London tabloids to dub him the 'wild man of rock.'" He was romantically linked to Kylie Minogue, Belinda Carlisle, Helena Christensen, and Kym Wilson. In August 1992, Helena Christensen and Hutchence were riding their bikes at night on a street in Copenhagen when he refused to move for a taxi. The taxi driver then assaulted him, causing him to fall backwards and hit his head on the roadway. Hutchence suffered a fractured skull in the altercation. Hutchence did not immediately seek medical assistance for the injury, instead waiting several days before seeing a doctor. As a result, his fractured skull left him with an almost complete loss of the sense of smell and significant loss of taste. This injury led to periods of depression and increased levels of aggression; he had not fully recovered after two weeks in a Copenhagen hospital. According to INXS bandmate Beers, Hutchence brandished a knife and threatened to kill him during the 1993 recording of Full Moon, Dirty Hearts on the isle of Capri. Beers recalled, "Over those six weeks, Michael threatened or physically confronted nearly every member of the band." In the mid-1990s, Hutchence became romantically involved with Paula Yates. They met in 1985, during an interview for the British TV program, The Tube. Yates interviewed him again in 1994 for her Big Breakfast show, and their affair was soon uncovered by the British press. At the time, Yates was married to The Boomtown Rats' lead singer and Live Aid organiser Bob Geldof. Media scrutiny was intense, and Hutchence assaulted a photographer who had followed them. Yates' separation from Geldof in February 1995 sparked a public and at times bitter custody battle over their daughters. Yates and Geldof divorced in May 1996. On 22 July 1996, Yates gave birth to her daughter with Hutchence, Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily Hutchence. In September 1996, Yates and Hutchence made headlines when they were arrested for suspicion of drug possession after the family nanny reportedly found a small amount of opium in a shoebox underneath their bed. The case was later dropped due to lack of evidence. Death Hutchence and INXS went on a world tour to support the April 1997 release of Elegantly Wasted. The final 20th anniversary tour was to occur in Australia in November and December. During the tour, Paula Yates planned to visit Hutchence with their daughter and Yates's three other children, but Bob Geldof had taken legal action to prevent the visit. On the morning of 22 November 1997, Hutchence, aged 37, was found dead in Room 524 at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Double Bay, Sydney. Actress Kym Wilson was the last person to see Hutchence alive, when she visited him in his hotel room the previous evening. Geldof and Yates each gave police statements on the phone calls they exchanged with Hutchence on the morning of his death; however, they did not volunteer their phone records. Yates's statement on 26 November indicated that she had informed Hutchence of the Geldof girls' custody hearing being adjourned until 17 December, which meant that Yates would not be able to bring Tiger and the Geldof girls to Australia for a visit as previously intended. According to Yates, Hutchence "was frightened and couldn't stand a minute more without his baby... [he] was terribly upset and he said, 'I don't know how I'll live without seeing Tiger'". Yates indicated that Hutchence said he was going to phone Geldof "to let the girls come to Australia". Geldof's police statements and evidence to the coroner indicated he did receive a call from Hutchence, who was "hectoring and abusive and threatening" during their phone conversation. The occupant in the room next to Hutchence's heard a loud male voice and swearing at about 5 am; the coroner was satisfied that this was Hutchence arguing with Geldof. At 9:54 am on 22 November, Hutchence spoke with a former girlfriend, Michèle Bennett; according to Bennett, Hutchence was crying, sounded upset, and told her he needed to see her. Bennett arrived at his hotel room door at about 10:40 am, but there was no response. Hutchence's body was discovered by a hotel maid at 11:50 am. Police reported that Hutchence was found "in a kneeling position facing the door. He had used his snakeskin belt to tie a knot on the automatic door closure at the top of the door, and had strained his head forward into the loop so hard that the buckle had broken." On 6 February 1998, after an autopsy and coronial inquest, New South Wales State Coroner, Derrick Hand, presented his report. The report ruled that Hutchence's death was suicide while depressed and under the influence of alcohol and other drugs. "An analysis report of Hutchence's blood [indicated] the presence of alcohol, cocaine, Prozac and prescription drugs." In producing his coroner's report, Hand had specifically considered the suggestions of accidental death (coupled with the fact that Hutchence left no suicide note), but had discounted them based on substantial evidence presented to the contrary. In a 1999 interview on 60 Minutes (and in a documentary film on Channel 4), Yates claimed that Hutchence's death might have resulted from autoerotic asphyxiation; this claim contradicted her previous statements to police investigators and the coroner. On 27 November 1997, Hutchence's funeral was held at St Andrew's Cathedral, Sydney. His casket was carried out of the cathedral by members of INXS and by his younger brother, Rhett; "Never Tear Us Apart" was played in the background. Nick Cave, a friend of Hutchence's, performed his 1997 song "Into My Arms" during the funeral and requested that television cameras be switched off. Rhett claimed in his 2004 book, Total XS, that on the previous day at the funeral home, Yates had put a gram of heroin into Hutchence's pocket. Later developments After Hutchence's death, INXS continued recording and performing until 2012. According to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), INXS has sold 30 million units in the United States alone, making them the second highest-selling Australian music act in the United States, behind AC/DC. INXS has sold over 75 million records worldwide. INXS was inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame in 2001. Hutchence's solo album, Michael Hutchence, was released in October 1999. He had started on the album in 1995, recording songs in between INXS sessions; he had last worked on it three days before his death. The last song he recorded was "Possibilities". The album includes "Slide Away", a duet with U2's Bono; Bono's vocals were recorded after Hutchence's death. The 1999 movie Limp includes a cameo by Hutchence. On 18 June 2000, Patricia Glassop and Tina Schorr released their book, Just a Man: The Real Michael Hutchence, which has been described as "an odd biography ... [that] combines the basic facts of Hutchence's early life ... with an almost too-intimate view of the authors' feelings". Paula Yates died on 17 September 2000 of an accidental heroin overdose; she was discovered in the presence of the then four-year-old Tiger, her daughter by Hutchence. Soon after Yates's death, Bob Geldof assumed foster custody of Tiger so that she could be brought up with her three older half-sisters, Fifi, Peaches and Pixie. In 2007, Tiger was adopted by Geldof. As of 2019, Tiger's legal name is Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily Hutchence Geldof. On 20 August 2005, Melbourne's The Age reported on the disposition of Hutchence's estate and assets, which, although estimated at between $10 million and $20 million, amounted to virtually nothing. The remainder of his estate had reportedly been sold off or swallowed in legal fees. A documentary about Hutchence, Michael Hutchence: The Last Rockstar, aired in 2017. In 2019, Mystify: Michael Hutchence—another documentary about Hutchence's life—was released. Discography Posthumous albums Singles Collaborations and soundtrack appearances Freedom Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1982) – "Speed Kills", "Forest Theme" (with Don Walker of Cold Chisel) Flame Fortune (1985) – "Sex Symbol", "Jungle Boy" Dogs in Space Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1987) – "Dogs in Space", "Golf Course", "The Green Dragon", "Rooms for the Memory" Symphonic Music of the Rolling Stones (1994) – "Under My Thumb" It's Now or Never: The Tribute The Elvis (1994) – "Baby Let's Play House" Batman Forever Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1995) – "The Passenger" Barb Wire Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1996) – "Spill the Wine" One Voice: The Songs of Chage & Aska (1996) – "Red Hill" No Talking, Just Head (1996) – "The King Is Gone" (The Heads with Michael Hutchence) See also INXS Max Q Tributes and dedications In 1997, Duran Duran wrote the song “Michael You’ve Got a Lot to Answer For”. The song appeared on their album Medazzaland. Lead singer Simon Le Bon told Q magazine that the song, released shortly before Hutchence's death, was about “Michael being a naughty boy ... when he was living with Paula Yates. He did like his substances." Nick Cave sang "Into My Arms" at Hutchence's funeral on 27 November 1997. The funeral was broadcast live on Australian TV. Out of respect, Cave requested the song not be televised. Terri Nunn of Berlin and Billy Corgan collaborated on "Sacred and Profane" for Berlin's 2000 album Live: Sacred & Profane. Nunn said, "The song is about my first experience seeing [Hutchence] because that changed my life. He influenced me probably more than anyone else as a performer. I became 12 years old in five minutes wanting to have sex with him. That's all I wanted! Oh my God. Everybody did! You just wanted him. He was the epitome of [a] rock star." Bono, a close friend of Hutchence, wrote "Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of" on the 2000 U2 album All That You Can't Leave Behind. The song is written in the form of an argument about suicide in which he tries to convince Hutchence of its foolishness. Bono characterised the song as a good old row between friends, adding that he felt guilty for never having had it with Hutchence in real life. In a 2005 interview, Bono regretted that he had not spent more time with Hutchence. Bono's wife, Alison Hewson, had seen Hutchence before his death and noted "he looked a bit shaky to [her]". On 23 November 2019, U2 paid tribute to Hutchence in Sydney, Australia on their Joshua Tree Tour. Awards and nominations Countdown Australian Music Awards Countdown was an Australian pop music TV series on national broadcaster ABC-TV from 1974 to 1987, it presented music awards from 1979 to 1987, initially in conjunction with magazine TV Week. The TV Week / Countdown Awards were a combination of popular-voted and peer-voted awards. |- | rowspan="3" | 1984 | himself (with Andrew Farriss) | Best Songwriter | |- | himself | Most Popular Male Performer | |- | himself ("Burn for You" by INXS) | Best Male Performance in a Video | |- | 1986 | himself | Most Popular Male Performer | |- References General Note: Archived [on-line] copy has limited functionality. Note: [on-line] version established at White Room Electronic Publishing Pty Ltd in 2007 and was expanded from the 2002 edition. As from September 2010, [on-line] version appears to have an Internal Service Error. Specific External links Official Michael Hutchence Website Michael Hutchence Official Site – created by his mother, Patricia Glassop, and his half-sister Tina Schorr. Official Michael Hutchence Memorial Website – created by his father, Kelland Hutchence 1960 births 1997 deaths 20th-century Australian male actors 20th-century Australian singers APRA Award winners Male actors from Sydney Australian people of English descent Australian people of Irish descent Alumni of King George V School, Hong Kong People educated at Davidson High School Australian baritones Australian expatriates in Hong Kong Australian expatriates in the United States Australian expatriates in the United Kingdom Australian expatriates in Denmark Australian male film actors Brit Award winners Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills) INXS members Australian new wave musicians Singers from Sydney 1997 suicides Suicides by asphyxiation Suicides by hanging in New South Wales Australian rock singers V2 Records artists Max Q (Australian band) members 20th-century Australian male singers People named in the Paradise Papers

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola%2068000

Motorola 68000

The Motorola 68000 (sometimes shortened to Motorola 68k or m68k and usually pronounced "sixty-eight-thousand") is a 16/32-bit complex instruction set computer (CISC) microprocessor, introduced in 1979 by Motorola Semiconductor Products Sector. The design implements a 32-bit instruction set, with 32-bit registers and a 16-bit internal data bus. The address bus is 24 bits and does not use memory segmentation, which made it easier to program for. Internally, it uses a 16-bit data arithmetic logic unit (ALU) and two more 16-bit ALUs used mostly for addresses, and has a 16-bit external data bus. For this reason, Motorola termed it a 16/32-bit processor. As one of the first widely available processors with a 32-bit instruction set, and running at relatively high speeds for the era, the 68k was a popular design through the 1980s. It was widely used in a new generation of personal computers with graphical user interfaces, including the Macintosh, Amiga, Atari ST, and X68000. The 1988 Mega Drive console is also powered by a 68000. The 68k was soon expanded with more family members, implementing full 32-bit ALUs as part of the growing Motorola 68000 series. The original 68k is generally software forward-compatible with the rest of the line despite being limited to a 16-bit wide external bus. After in production, the 68000 architecture is still in use. History Motorola's first widely-produced CPU was the Motorola 6800. Although a capable design, it was eclipsed by more powerful designs, such as the Zilog Z80, and less expensive designs, such as the MOS Technology 6502 (MOS 6502). As the sales prospects of the 6800 dimmed, Motorola began a new design to replace it. This became the Motorola Advanced Computer System on Silicon project, or MACSS, begun in 1976. The MACSS aimed to develop an entirely new architecture without backward compatibility with the 6800. It ultimately does retain a bus protocol compatibility mode for existing 6800 peripheral devices, and a version with an 8-bit data bus was produced. However, the designers mainly focused on the future, or forward compatibility, which gives the 68000 design a head start against later 32-bit instruction set architectures (ISAs). For instance, the CPU registers are 32 bits wide, though few self-contained structures in the processor itself operate on 32 bits at a time. The MACSS team drew heavily on the influence of minicomputer processor design, such as the PDP-11 and VAX systems, which are similarly microcode-based. In the mid 1970s, the 8-bit microprocessor manufacturers raced to introduce the 16-bit generation. National Semiconductor had been first with its IMP-16 and PACE processors in 1973–1975, but these had issues with speed. Intel had worked on their advanced 16/32-bit Intel iAPX 432 (alias 8800) since 1975 and their Intel 8086 since 1976 (it was introduced in 1978 but became widespread in the form of the almost identical 8088 in the IBM PC a few years later). Arriving late to the 16-bit arena affords the new processor more transistors (roughly 40,000 active versus 20,000 active in the 8086), 32-bit macroinstructions, and acclaimed general ease of use. The original MC68000 was fabricated using an HMOS process with a 3.5 µm feature size. Formally introduced in September 1979, initial samples were released in February 1980, with production chips available over the counter in November. Initial speed grades are 4, 6, and 8 MHz. 10 MHz chips became available during 1981, and 12.5 MHz chips by June 1982. The 16.67 MHz "12F" version of the MC68000, the fastest version of the original HMOS chip, was not produced until the late 1980s. IBM considered the 68000 for the IBM PC but chose the Intel 8088 because the 68000 was not ready; Walden C. Rhines wrote that thus "Motorola, with its superior technology, lost the single most important design contest of the last 50 years". (IBM Instruments briefly sold the 68000-based IBM System 9000 laboratory computer systems.) The 68k instruction set is particularly well suited to implement Unix, and the 68000 and its successors became the dominant CPUs for Unix-based workstations including Sun workstations and Apollo/Domain workstations. The 68000 also is used for mass-market computers such as the Apple Lisa, Macintosh, Amiga, and Atari ST. The 68000 is used in Microsoft Xenix systems, as well as an early NetWare Unix-based Server. The 68000 is used in the first generation of desktop laser printers, including the original Apple Inc. LaserWriter and the HP LaserJet. In 1981, Motorola introduced the Motorola 68000 Educational Computer Board, a single-board computer for educational and training purposes which in addition to the 68000 itself contained memory, I/O devices, programmable timer and wire-wrap area for custom circuitry. The board remained in use in US colleges as a tool for learning assembly programming until the early 1990s. In 1982, the 68000 received a minor update to its instruction set architecture (ISA) to support virtual memory and to conform to the Popek and Goldberg virtualization requirements. The updated chip is called the 68010. It also adds a new "loop mode" which speeds up small loops, and increases overall performance by about 10% at the same clock speeds. A further extended version, which exposes 31 bits of the address bus, was also produced in small quantities as the 68012. To support lower-cost systems and control applications with smaller memory sizes, Motorola introduced the 8-bit compatible MC68008, also in 1982. This is a 68000 with an 8-bit data bus and a smaller (20-bit) address bus. After 1982, Motorola devoted more attention to the 68020 and 88000 projects. Second-sourcing Several other companies were second-source manufacturers of the HMOS 68000. These included Hitachi (HD68000), who shrank the feature size to 2.7 µm for their 12.5 MHz version, Mostek (MK68000), Rockwell (R68000), Signetics (SCN68000), Thomson/SGS-Thomson (originally EF68000 and later TS68000), and Toshiba (TMP68000). Toshiba was also a second-source maker of the CMOS 68HC000 (TMP68HC000). Encrypted variants of the 68000, being the Hitachi FD1089 and FD1094, store decryption keys for opcodes and opcode data in battery-backed memory and were used in certain Sega arcade systems including System 16 to prevent piracy and illegal bootleg games. CMOS versions The 68HC000, the first CMOS version of the 68000, was designed by Hitachi and jointly introduced in 1985. Motorola's version is called the MC68HC000, while Hitachi's is the HD68HC000. The 68HC000 offers speeds of 8–20 MHz. Except for using CMOS circuitry, it behaved identically to the HMOS MC68000, but the change to CMOS greatly reduced its power consumption. The original HMOS MC68000 consumed around 1.35 watts at an ambient temperature of 25 °C, regardless of clock speed, while the MC68HC000 consumed only 0.13 watts at 8 MHz and 0.38 watts at 20 MHz. (Unlike CMOS circuits, HMOS still draws power when idle, so power consumption varies little with clock rate.) Apple selected the 68HC000 for use in the Macintosh Portable. Motorola replaced the MC68008 with the MC68HC001 in 1990. This chip resembles the 68HC000 in most respects, but its data bus can operate in either 16-bit or 8-bit mode, depending on the value of an input pin at reset. Thus, like the 68008, it can be used in systems with cheaper 8-bit memories. The later evolution of the 68000 focused on more modern embedded control applications and on-chip peripherals. The 68EC000 chip and SCM68000 core remove the M6800 peripheral bus, and exclude the MOVE from SR instruction from user mode programs, making the 68EC000 and 68SEC000 the only 68000 CPUs not 100% object code compatible with previous 68000 CPUs when run in User Mode. When run in Supervisor Mode, there is no difference. In 1996, Motorola updated the standalone core with fully static circuitry, drawing only 2 µW in low-power mode, calling it the MC68SEC000. Motorola ceased production of the HMOS MC68000 and MC68008 in 1996, but its spin-off company Freescale Semiconductor was still producing the MC68HC000, MC68HC001, MC68EC000, and MC68SEC000, as well as the MC68302 and MC68306 microcontrollers and later versions of the DragonBall family. The 68000's architectural descendants, the 680x0, CPU32, and Coldfire families, were also still in production. More recently, with the Sendai fab closure, all 68HC000, 68020, 68030, and 68882 parts have been discontinued, leaving only the 68SEC000 in production. As a microcontroller core Since being succeeded by "true" 32-bit microprocessors, the 68000 is used as the core of many microcontrollers. In 1989, Motorola introduced the MC68302 communications processor. Applications At its introduction, the 68000 was first used in high-priced systems, including multiuser microcomputers like the WICAT 150, early Alpha Microsystems computers, Sage II / IV, Tandy 6000 / TRS-80 Model 16, and Fortune 32:16; single-user workstations such as Hewlett-Packard's HP 9000 Series 200 systems, the first Apollo/Domain systems, Sun Microsystems' Sun-1, and the Corvus Concept; and graphics terminals like Digital Equipment Corporation's VAXstation 100 and Silicon Graphics' IRIS 1000 and 1200. Unix systems rapidly moved to the more capable later generations of the 68k line, which remained popular in that market throughout the 1980s. By the mid-1980s, falling production cost made the 68000 viable for use in personal and home computers, starting with the Apple Lisa and Macintosh, and followed by the Commodore Amiga, Atari ST, and Sharp X68000. On the other hand, the Sinclair QL microcomputer was the most commercially important utilisation of the 68008, along with its derivatives, such as the ICL One Per Desk business terminal. Helix Systems (in Missouri, United States) designed an extension to the SWTPC SS-50 bus, the SS-64, and produced systems built around the 68008 processor. While the adoption of RISC and x86 displaced the 68000 series as desktop/workstation CPU, the processor found substantial use in embedded applications. By the early 1990s, quantities of 68000 CPUs could be purchased for less than 30 USD per part. Video game manufacturers used the 68000 as the backbone of many arcade games and home game consoles: Atari's Food Fight, from 1982, was one of the first 68000-based arcade games. Others included Sega's System 16, Capcom's CP System and CPS-2, and SNK's Neo Geo. By the late 1980s, the 68000 was inexpensive enough to power home game consoles, such as Sega's Mega Drive/Genesis console and also the Mega CD attachment for it (A Mega CD system has three CPUs, two of them 68000s). The 1993 multi-processor Atari Jaguar console used a 68000 as a support chip, although some developers used it as the primary processor due to familiarity. The 1994 multi-processor Sega Saturn console used the 68000 as a sound co-processor (much as the Mega Drive/Genesis uses the Z80 as a co-processor for sound and/or other purposes). By 1995 the 68000 had made it into a handheld game console, Sega's Genesis Nomad, as its main CPU. Certain arcade games (such as Steel Gunner and others based on Namco System 2) use a dual 68000 CPU configuration, and systems with a triple 68000 CPU configuration also exist (such as Galaxy Force and others based on the Sega Y Board), along with a quad 68000 CPU configuration, which has been used by Jaleco (one 68000 for sound has a lower clock rate compared to the other 68000 CPUs) for games such as Big Run and Cisco Heat; another, fifth 68000 (at a different clock rate than the other 68000 CPUs) was used in the Jaleco arcade game Wild Pilot for input/output (I/O) processing. The 68000 also saw great success as an embedded controller. As early as 1981, laser printers such as the Imagen Imprint-10 were controlled by external boards equipped with the 68000. The first HP LaserJet, introduced in 1984, came with a built-in 8 MHz 68000. Other printer manufacturers adopted the 68000, including Apple with its introduction of the LaserWriter in 1985, the first PostScript laser printer. The 68000 continued to be widely used in printers throughout the rest of the 1980s, persisting well into the 1990s in low-end printers. The 68000 also saw success in the field of industrial control systems. Among the systems benefited from having a 68000 or derivative as their microprocessor were families of programmable logic controllers (PLCs) manufactured by Allen-Bradley, Texas Instruments and subsequently, following the acquisition of that division of TI, by Siemens. Users of such systems do not accept product obsolescence at the same rate as domestic users, and it is entirely likely that despite having been installed over 20 years ago, many 68000-based controllers will continue in reliable service well into the 21st century. In a number of digital oscilloscopes from the 80s, the 68000 has been used as a waveform display processor; some models including the LeCroy 9400/9400A also use the 68000 as a waveform math processor (including addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division of two waveforms/references/waveform memories), and some digital oscilloscopes using the 68000 (including the 9400/9400A) can also perform fast Fourier transform functions on a waveform. The 683XX microcontrollers, based on the 68000 architecture, are used in networking and telecom equipment, television set-top boxes, laboratory and medical instruments, and even handheld calculators. The MC68302 and its derivatives have been used in many telecom products from Cisco, 3com, Ascend, Marconi, Cyclades and others. Past models of the Palm PDAs and the Handspring Visor used the DragonBall, a derivative of the 68000. AlphaSmart used the DragonBall family in later versions of its portable word processors. Texas Instruments used the 68000 in its high-end graphing calculators, the TI-89 and TI-92 series and Voyage 200. A modified version of the 68000 formed the basis of the IBM XT/370 hardware emulator of the System 370 processor. Architecture Address bus The 68000 has a 24-bit external address bus and two byte-select signals "replaced" A0. These 24 lines can therefore address 16 MB of physical memory with byte resolution. Address storage and computation uses 32 bits internally; however, the 8 high-order address bits are ignored due to the physical lack of device pins. This allows it to run software written for a logically flat 32-bit address space, while accessing only a 24-bit physical address space. Motorola's intent with the internal 32-bit address space was forward compatibility, making it feasible to write 68000 software that would take full advantage of later 32-bit implementations of the 68000 instruction set. However, this did not prevent programmers from writing forward incompatible software. "24-bit" software that discarded the upper address byte, or used it for purposes other than addressing, could fail on 32-bit 68000 implementations. For example, early (pre-7.0) versions of Apple's Mac OS used the high byte of memory-block master pointers to hold flags such as locked and purgeable. Later versions of the OS moved the flags to a nearby location, and Apple began shipping computers which had "32-bit clean" ROMs beginning with the release of the 1989 Mac IIci. The 68000 family stores multi-byte integers in memory in big-endian order. Internal registers The CPU has eight 32-bit general-purpose data registers (D0-D7), and eight address registers (A0-A7). The last address register is the stack pointer, and assemblers accept the label SP as equivalent to A7. This was a good number of registers at the time in many ways. It was small enough to allow the 68000 to respond quickly to interrupts (even in the worst case where all 8 data registers D0–D7 and 7 address registers A0–A6 needed to be saved, 15 registers in total), and yet large enough to make most calculations fast, because they could be done entirely within the processor without keeping any partial results in memory. (Note that an exception routine in supervisor mode can also save the user stack pointer A7, which would total 8 address registers. However, the dual stack pointer (A7 and supervisor-mode A7') design of the 68000 makes this normally unnecessary, except when a task switch is performed in a multitasking system.) Having the two types of registers allows one 32-bit address and one 16-bit data calculation to take place at the one time. This results in reduced instruction execution time as addresses and data can be processed in parallel. Status register The 68000 has a 16-bit status register. The upper 8 bits is the system byte, and modification of it is privileged. The lower 8 bits is the user byte, also known as the condition code register (CCR), and modification of it is not privileged. The 68000 comparison, arithmetic, and logic operations modify condition codes to record their results for use by later conditional jumps. The condition code bits are "zero" (Z), "carry" (C), "overflow" (V), "extend" (X), and "negative" (N). The "extend" (X) flag deserves special mention, because it is separate from the carry flag. This permits the extra bit from arithmetic, logic, and shift operations to be separated from the carry for flow-of-control and linkage. Instruction set The designers attempted to make the assembly language orthogonal. That is, instructions are divided into operations and address modes, and almost all address modes are available for almost all instructions. There are 56 instructions and a minimum instruction size of 16 bits. Many instructions and addressing modes are longer to include more address or mode bits. Privilege levels The CPU, and later the whole family, implements two levels of privilege. User mode gives access to everything except privileged instructions such as interrupt level controls. Supervisor privilege gives access to everything. An interrupt always becomes supervisory. The supervisor bit is stored in the status register, and is visible to user programs. An advantage of this system is that the supervisor level has a separate stack pointer. This permits a multitasking system to use very small stacks for tasks, because the designers do not have to allocate the memory required to hold the stack frames of a maximum stack-up of interrupts. Interrupts The CPU recognizes seven interrupt levels. Levels 1 through 5 are strictly prioritized. That is, a higher-numbered interrupt can always interrupt a lower-numbered interrupt. In the status register, a privileged instruction allows setting the current minimum interrupt level, blocking lower or equal priority interrupts. For example, if the interrupt level in the status register is set to 3, higher levels from 4 to 7 can cause an exception. Level 7 is a level triggered non-maskable interrupt (NMI). Level 1 can be interrupted by any higher level. Level 0 means no interrupt. The level is stored in the status register, and is visible to user-level programs. Hardware interrupts are signalled to the CPU using three inputs that encode the highest pending interrupt priority. A separate encoder is usually required to encode the interrupts, though for systems that do not require more than three hardware interrupts it is possible to connect the interrupt signals directly to the encoded inputs at the cost of more software complexity. The interrupt controller can be as simple as a 74LS148 priority encoder, or may be part of a very large-scale integration (VLSI) peripheral chip such as the MC68901 Multi-Function Peripheral (used in the Atari ST range of computers and Sharp X68000), which also provides a UART, timer, and parallel I/O. The "exception table" (interrupt vector table interrupt vector addresses) is fixed at addresses 0 through 1023, permitting 256 32-bit vectors. The first vector (RESET) consists of two vectors, namely the starting stack address, and the starting code address. Vectors 3 through 15 are used to report various errors: bus error, address error, illegal instruction, zero division, CHK and CHK2 vector, privilege violation (to block privilege escalation), and some reserved vectors that became line 1010 emulator, line 1111 emulator, and hardware breakpoint. Vector 24 starts the real interrupts: spurious interrupt (no hardware acknowledgement), and level 1 through level 7 autovectors, then the 16 TRAP vectors, then some more reserved vectors, then the user defined vectors. Since the starting code address vector must always be valid on reset, systems commonly included some nonvolatile memory (e.g. ROM) starting at address zero to contain the vectors and bootstrap code. However, for a general purpose system it is desirable for the operating system to be able to change the vectors at runtime. This was often accomplished by either pointing the vectors in ROM to a jump table in RAM, or through use of bank switching to allow the ROM to be replaced by RAM at runtime. The 68000 does not meet the Popek and Goldberg virtualization requirements for full processor virtualization because it has a single unprivileged instruction, "MOVE from SR", which allows user-mode software read-only access to a small amount of privileged state. The 68EC000 and 68SEC000, which are later derivatives of the 68000, do meet the requirements as the "MOVE from SR" instruction is privileged. The same change was introduced on the 68010 and later CPUs. The 68000 is also unable to easily support virtual memory, which requires the ability to trap and recover from a failed memory access. The 68000 does provide a bus error exception which can be used to trap, but it does not save enough processor state to resume the faulted instruction once the operating system has handled the exception. Several companies did succeed in making 68000-based Unix workstations with virtual memory that worked by using two 68000 chips running in parallel on different phased clocks. When the "leading" 68000 encountered a bad memory access, extra hardware would interrupt the "main" 68000 to prevent it from also encountering the bad memory access. This interrupt routine would handle the virtual memory functions and restart the "leading" 68000 in the correct state to continue properly synchronized operation when the "main" 68000 returned from the interrupt. These problems were fixed in the next major revision of the 68k architecture with the release of the MC68010. The Bus Error and Address Error exceptions push a large amount of internal state onto the supervisor stack in order to facilitate recovery, and the "MOVE from SR" instruction was made privileged. A new unprivileged "MOVE from CCR" instruction is provided for use in its place by user mode software; an operating system can trap and emulate user mode "MOVE from SR" instructions if desired. Instruction set details The standard addressing modes are: Register direct data register, e.g. "D0" address register, e.g. "A0" Register indirect Simple address, e.g. (A0) Address with post-increment, e.g. (A0)+ Address with pre-decrement, e.g. −(A0) Address with a 16-bit signed offset, e.g. 16(A0) Register indirect with index register & 8-bit signed offset e.g. 8(A0,D0) or 8(A0,A1) Note that for (A0)+ and −(A0), the actual increment or decrement value is dependent on the operand size: a byte access adjusts the address register by 1, a word by 2, and a long by 4. PC (program counter) relative with displacement Relative 16-bit signed offset, e.g. 16(PC). This mode was very useful for position-independent code. Relative with 8-bit signed offset with index, e.g. 8(PC,D2) Absolute memory location Either a number, e.g. "$4000", or a symbolic name translated by the assembler Most 68000 assemblers used the "$" symbol for hexadecimal, instead of "0x" or a trailing H. There were 16 and 32-bit versions of this addressing mode Immediate mode Data stored in the instruction, e.g. "#400" Quick immediate mode 3-bit unsigned (or 8-bit signed with moveq) with value stored in opcode In addq and subq, 0 is the equivalent to 8 e.g. moveq #0,d0 was quicker than clr.l d0 (though both made D0 equal to 0) Plus: access to the status register, and, in later models, other special registers. Most instructions have dot-letter suffixes, permitting operations to occur on 8-bit bytes (".b"), 16-bit words (".w"), and 32-bit longs (".l"). Like many CPUs of its era the cycle timing of some instructions varied depending on the source operand(s). For example, the unsigned multiply instruction takes (38+2n) clock cycles to complete where 'n' is equal to the number of bits set in the operand. To create a function that took a fixed cycle count required the addition of extra code after the multiply instruction. This would typically consume extra cycles for each bit that wasn't set in the original multiplication operand. Most instructions are dyadic, that is, the operation has a source, and a destination, and the destination is changed. Notable instructions were: Arithmetic: ADD, SUB, MULU (unsigned multiply), MULS (signed multiply), DIVU, DIVS, NEG (additive negation), and CMP (a sort of comparison done by subtracting the arguments and setting the status bits, but did not store the result) Binary-coded decimal arithmetic: ABCD, NBCD, and SBCD Logic: EOR (exclusive or), AND, NOT (logical not), OR (inclusive or) Shifting: (logical, i.e. right shifts put zero in the most-significant bit) LSL, LSR, (arithmetic shifts, i.e. sign-extend the most-significant bit) ASR, ASL, (rotates through eXtend and not) ROXL, ROXR, ROL, ROR Bit test and manipulation in memory or data register: BSET (set to 1), BCLR (clear to 0), BCHG (invert) and BTST (no change). All of these instructions first test the destination bit and set (clear) the CCR Z bit if the destination bit is 0 (1), respectively. Multiprocessing control: TAS, test-and-set, performed an indivisible bus operation, permitting semaphores to be used to synchronize several processors sharing a single memory Flow of control: JMP (jump), JSR (jump to subroutine), BSR (relative address jump to subroutine), RTS (return from subroutine), RTE (return from exception, i.e. an interrupt), TRAP (trigger a software exception similar to software interrupt), CHK (a conditional software exception) Branch: Bcc (where the "cc" specified one of 14 tests of the condition codes in the status register: equal, greater than, less-than, carry, and most combinations and logical inversions, available from the status register). The remaining two possible conditions (always true and always false) have separate instruction mnemonics, BRA (branch always), and BSR (branch to subroutine). Decrement-and-branch: DBcc (where "cc" was as for the branch instructions), which, provided the condition was false, decremented the low word of a D-register and, if the result was not -1 ($FFFF), branched to a destination. This use of −1 instead of 0 as the terminating value allowed the easy coding of loops that had to do nothing if the count was 0 to start with, with no need for another check before entering the loop. This also facilitated nesting of DBcc. 68EC000 The 68EC000 is a low-cost version of the 68000 with a slightly different pinout, designed for embedded controller applications. The 68EC000 can have either a 8-bit or 16-bit data bus, switchable at reset. The processors are available in a variety of speeds including 8 and 16 MHz configurations, producing 2,100 and 4,376 Dhrystones each. These processors have no floating-point unit, and it is difficult to implement an FPU coprocessor (MC68881/2) with one because the EC series lacks necessary coprocessor instructions. The 68EC000 was used as a controller in many audio applications, including Ensoniq musical instruments and sound cards, where it was part of the MIDI synthesizer. On Ensoniq sound boards, the controller provided several advantages compared to competitors without a CPU on board. The processor allowed the board to be configured to perform various audio tasks, such as MPU-401 MIDI synthesis or MT-32 emulation, without the use of a terminate-and-stay-resident program. This improved software compatibility, lowered CPU usage, and eliminated host system memory usage. The Motorola 68EC000 core was later used in the m68k-based DragonBall processors from Motorola/Freescale. It also was used as a sound controller in the Sega Saturn game console and as a controller for the HP JetDirect Ethernet controller boards for the mid-1990s HP LaserJet printers. Example code The 68000 assembly code below is for a subroutine named , which copies a null-terminated string of 8-bit characters to a destination string, converting all alphabetic characters to lower case. The subroutine establishes a call frame using register A6 as the frame pointer. This kind of calling convention supports reentrant and recursive code and is typically used by languages like C and C++. The subroutine then retrieves the parameters passed to it ( and ) from the stack. It then loops, reading an ASCII character (one byte) from the string, checking whether it is a capital alphabetic character, and if so, converting it into a lower-case character, otherwise leaving it as it is, then writing the character into the string. Finally, it checks whether the character was a null character; if not, it repeats the loop, otherwise it restores the previous stack frame (and A6 register) and returns. Note that the string pointers (registers A0 and A1) are auto-incremented in each iteration of the loop. In contrast, the code below is for a stand-alone function, even on the most restrictive version of AMS for the TI-89 series of calculators, being kernel-independent, with no values looked up in tables, files or libraries when executing, no system calls, no exception processing, minimal registers to be used, nor the need to save any. It is valid for historical Julian dates from 1 March 1 AD, or for Gregorian ones. In less than two dozen operations it calculates a day number compatible with ISO 8601 when called with three inputs stored at their corresponding LOCATIONS: ; ; WDN, an address - for storing result d0 ; FLAG, 0 or 2 - to choose between Julian or Gregorian, respectively ; DATE, year0mda - date stamp as binary word&byte&byte in basic ISO-format ;(YEAR, year ~ YEAR=DATE due to big-endianness) ; ; ; Apply step 1 - Lachman's congruence ; ; Apply step 2 - Finding spqr as the year of the Julian leap day preceding DATE ; ; (Apply step 0 - Gregorian adjustment) ; ; ; ; Days of the week correspond to day numbers of the week as: ; Sun=0 Mon=1 Tue=2 Wed=3 Thu=4 Fri=5 Sat=6 ; See also Motorola 68000 series Motorola 6800 – an 8-bit predecessor DTACK Grounded – an early 68000 newsletter References Further reading Datasheets and manuals M68000 Microprocessor Users Manual (Rev 8); Motorola (Freescale); 224 pages; 1994. M68000 Microprocessors User's Manual (9th Edition); NXP; 189 pages; 1993. Addendum to M68000 User Manual (Rev 0); Motorola (Freescale); 26 pages; 1997. M68000 Family Programmer's Reference Manual; Motorola (Freescale); 646 pages; 1991; . Books 68000, 68010, 68020 Primer; 1st Ed; Stan Kelly-Bootle and Bob Fowler; Howard Sams & Co; 370 pages; 1985; . (archive) Mastering The 68000 Microprocessor; 1st Ed; Phillip Robinson; Tab Books; 244 pages; 1985; . (archive) Pocket Guide Assembly Language for the 68000 Series; 1st Ed; Robert Erskine; Pitman Publishing; 70 pages; 1984; . (archive) Motorola M68000 die schematics 68000 Machine Code Programming (68000, 68008, 68010, & 68020 Processors); 1st Ed; David Barrow; Collins Professional and Technical Books; 234 pages; 1985; . External links comp.sys.m68k FAQ Descriptions of assembler instructions 68000 images and descriptions at cpu-collection.de EASy68K, an open-source 68k assembler for Windows the 68k and m88k resource – with information on Motorola's VME based 68k boards 68k microprocessors Instruction set architectures Computer-related introductions in 1979 32-bit microprocessors

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minicomputer

Minicomputer

A minicomputer, or colloquially mini, is a class of smaller general purpose computers that developed in the mid-1960s and sold for much less than mainframe and mid-size computers from IBM and its direct competitors. In a 1970 survey, The New York Times suggested a consensus definition of a minicomputer as a machine costing less than (), with an input-output device such as a teleprinter and at least four thousand words of memory, that is capable of running programs in a higher level language, such as Fortran or BASIC. The class formed a distinct group with its own software architectures and operating systems. Minis were designed for control, instrumentation, human interaction, and communication switching as distinct from calculation and record keeping. Many were sold indirectly to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) for final end use application. During the two decade lifetime of the minicomputer class (1965–1985), almost 100 companies formed and only a half dozen remained. When single-chip CPU microprocessors appeared, beginning with the Intel 4004 in 1971, the term "minicomputer" came to mean a machine that lies in the middle range of the computing spectrum, in between the smallest mainframe computers and the microcomputers. The term "minicomputer" is seldom used today; the contemporary term for this class of system is "midrange computer", such as the higher-end SPARC from Oracle, Power ISA from IBM, and Itanium-based systems from Hewlett-Packard. History Definition The term "minicomputer" developed in the 1960s to describe the smaller computers that became possible with the use of transistors and core memory technologies, minimal instructions sets and less expensive peripherals such as the ubiquitous Teletype Model 33 ASR. They usually took up one or a few 19-inch rack cabinets, compared with the large mainframes that could fill a room. In terms of relative computing power compared to contemporary mainframes, small systems that were similar to minicomputers had been available from the 1950s. In particular, there was an entire class of drum machines, like the UNIVAC 1101 and LGP-30, that share some features of the minicomputer class. Similar models using magnetic delay-line memory followed in the early 1960s. These machines however, were essentially designed as small mainframes, using a custom chassis and often supporting only peripherals from the same company. In contrast, the machines that became known as minicomputers were often designed to fit into a standard chassis and deliberately designed to use common devices like the ASR 33. Another common difference was that most earlier small machines were not "general purpose", in that they were designed for a specific role like process control or accounting. On these machines, programming was generally carried out in their custom machine language, or even hard-coded into a plugboard, although some used a form of BASIC. DEC wrote, regarding their PDP-5, that it was "the world’s first commercially produced minicomputer". It meets most definitions of "mini" in terms of power and size, but was designed and built to be used as an instrumentation system in labs, not as a general-purpose computer. Many similar examples of small special-purpose machines exist from the early 1960s, including the UK Ferranti Argus and Soviet UM-1NKh. The CDC 160, circa 1960, is sometimes pointed to as an early example of a minicomputer, as it was small, transistorized and (relatively) inexpensive. However, its basic price of $100,000 () and custom desk-like chassis places it within the "small system" or "midrange computer" category as opposed to the more modern use of the term minicomputer. Nevertheless, it retains a strong contender for the term "first minicomputer". 1960s and 70s success Most computing histories point to the 1964 introduction of Digital Equipment Corporation's (DEC) 12-bit PDP-8 as the first minicomputer. Some of this is no doubt due to DEC's widespread use of the term starting in the mid-1960s. Smaller systems, including those from DEC like the PDP-5 and LINC, had existed prior to this point, but it was the PDP-8 combination of small size, general purpose orientation and low price that puts it firmly within the modern definition. Its introductory price of $18,500 () places it in an entirely different market segment than earlier examples like the CDC 160. In contemporary terms, the PDP-8 was a runaway success, ultimately selling 50,000 examples. Follow-on versions using small scale integrated circuits further lowered the cost and size of the system. Its success led to widespread imitation, and the creation of an entire industry of minicomputer companies along Massachusetts Route 128, including Data General, Wang Laboratories and Prime Computer. Other popular minis from the era were the HP 2100, Honeywell 316 and TI-990. Early minis had a variety of word sizes, with DEC's 12 and 18-bit systems being typical examples. The introduction and standardization of the 7-bit ASCII character set led to the move to 16-bit systems, with the late-1969 Data General Nova being a notable entry in this space. By the early 1970s, most minis were 16-bit, including DEC's PDP-11. For a time, "minicomputer" was almost synonymous with "16-bit", as the larger mainframe machines almost always used 32-bit or larger word sizes. As integrated circuit design improved, especially with the introduction of the 7400-series integrated circuits, minicomputers became smaller, easier to manufacture, and as a result, less expensive. They were used in manufacturing process control, telephone switching and to control laboratory equipment. In the 1970s, they were the hardware that was used to launch the computer-aided design (CAD) industry and other similar industries where a small dedicated system was needed. The boom in worldwide seismic exploration for oil and gas in the early 1970s saw the widespread use of minicomputers in dedicated processing centres close to the data collection crews. Raytheon Data Systems RDS 500 was predominantly the system of choice for nearly all the geophysical exploration as well as oil companies. At the launch of the MITS Altair 8800 in 1975, Radio Electronics magazine referred to the system as a "minicomputer", although the term microcomputer soon became usual for personal computers based on single-chip microprocessors. At the time, microcomputers were 8-bit single-user, relatively simple machines running simple program-launcher operating systems like CP/M or MS-DOS, while minis were much more powerful systems that ran full multi-user, multitasking operating systems, such as VMS and Unix. Around the same time, minis began to move upward in size. Although several 24 and 32-bit minis had entered the market earlier, it was DEC's 1977 VAX, which they referred to as a superminicomputer, or supermini, that caused the mini market to move en-masse to 32-bit architectures. This provided ample headroom even as single-chip 16-bit microprocessors like the TMS 9900 and Zilog Z8000 appeared in the later 1970s. Most mini vendors introduced their own single-chip processors based on their own architecture and used these mostly in low-cost offerings while concentrating on their 32-bit systems. Examples include the Intersil 6100 single-chip PDP-8, DEC T-11 PDP-11, microNOVA and Fairchild 9440 Nova, and TMS9900 TI-990. Mid-1980s and 1990s decline By the early 1980s, the 16-bit market had all but disappeared as newer 16-bit microprocessors began to improve in performance. Those customers who required more performance than these offered had generally already moved to 32-bit systems by this time. But it was not long before this market also began to come under threat; the Motorola 68000 offered a significant percentage of the performance of a typical mini in a desktop platform. True 32-bit processors like the National Semiconductor NS32016, Motorola 68020 and Intel 80386 soon followed. By the mid-1980s, high-end microcomputers offered compute performance equal to low-end and mid-range minis, and the new RISC approach promised performance levels well beyond the fastest minis, and even high-end mainframes. All that really separated micros from the mini market was storage and memory capacity. Both of these began to be addressed through the later 1980s; 1 MB of RAM became typical by around 1987, desktop hard drives rapidly pushed past the 100 MB range by 1990, and the introduction of inexpensive and easily deployable local area network (LAN) systems provide solutions for those looking for multi-user systems. The introduction of the workstation machines opened new markets for graphics-based systems that the terminal-oriented minis could not even address. Minis retained a force for those using existing software products or those who required high-performance multitasking, but the introduction of newer operating systems based on Unix began to become highly practical replacements for these roles as well. Mini vendors began to rapidly disappear through this period. Data General responded to the changing market by focussing entirely on the high-performance file server market, embracing a role within large LANs that appeared resilient. This did not last; Novell NetWare rapidly pushed such solutions into niche roles, and later versions of Microsoft Windows did the same to Novell. DEC decided to move into the large-computer space instead, introducing the VAX 9000 mainframe in 1989, but it was a flop in the market and disappeared after almost no sales. The company then attempted to enter the workstation and server markets with the DEC Alpha, but was too late to save the company and they eventually sold their remains to Compaq in 1998. By the end of the decade all of the classic vendors were gone; Data General, Prime, Computervision, Honeywell, and Wang, failed, merged, or were bought out. Today only a few proprietary minicomputer architectures survive. The IBM System/38 operating system, which introduced many advanced concepts, lives on with IBM's AS/400. Great efforts were made by IBM to enable programs originally written for the IBM System/34 and System/36 to be moved to the AS/400. After being rebranded multiple times, the AS/400 platform was replaced by IBM Power Systems running IBM i. In contrast, competing proprietary computing architectures from the early 1980s, such as DEC's VAX, Wang VS, and Hewlett Packard's HP 3000 have long been discontinued without a compatible upgrade path. OpenVMS runs on HP Alpha and Intel IA-64 (Itanium) CPU architectures. Tandem Computers, which specialized in reliable large-scale computing, was acquired by Compaq, and a few years afterward the combined entity merged with Hewlett Packard. The NSK-based NonStop product line was re-ported from MIPS processors to Itanium-based processors branded as 'HP Integrity NonStop Servers'. As in the earlier migration from stack machines to MIPS microprocessors, all customer software was carried forward without source changes. Integrity NonStop continues to be HP's answer for the extreme scaling needs of its very largest customers. The NSK operating system, now termed NonStop OS, continues as the base software environment for the NonStop Servers, and has been extended to include support for Java and integration with popular development tools like Visual Studio and Eclipse. Industrial impact and heritage A variety of companies emerged that built turnkey systems around minicomputers with specialized software and, in many cases, custom peripherals that addressed specialized problems such as computer-aided design, computer-aided manufacturing, process control, manufacturing resource planning, and so on. Many if not most minicomputers were sold through these original equipment manufacturers and value-added resellers. Several pioneering computer companies first built minicomputers, such as DEC, Data General, and Hewlett-Packard (HP) (who now refers to its HP3000 minicomputers as "servers" rather than "minicomputers"). And although today's PCs and servers are clearly microcomputers physically, architecturally their CPUs and operating systems have developed largely by integrating features from minicomputers. In the software context, the relatively simple OSs for early microcomputers were usually inspired by minicomputer OSs (such as CP/M's similarity to Digital's single user OS/8 and RT-11 and multi-user RSTS time-sharing system). Also, the multiuser OSs of today are often either inspired by, or directly descended from, minicomputer OSs. UNIX was originally a minicomputer OS, while Windows NT kernel—the foundation for all current versions of Microsoft Windows-borrowed design ideas liberally from VMS. Many of the first generation of PC programmers were educated on minicomputer systems. Notable examples Control Data's CDC 160A and CDC 1700 DEC PDP and VAX series Data General Nova Hewlett-Packard HP 3000 series and HP 2100 series Honeywell-Bull DPS 6/DPS 6000 series IBM midrange computers Interdata 7/32 and 8/32 Norsk Data Nord-1, Nord-10, and Nord-100 Texas Instruments TI-990 CTL Modular One, from the UK K-202, first Polish minicomputer See also The Soul of a New Machine – about the development of Data General's Eclipse/MV minicomputers in the early 1980s Charles Babbage Institute History of computing hardware (1960s–present) Superminicomputer Notes References External links Early mini computers, still runnable in a German computer museum A list of Minicomputers Minicomputer Classes of computers American inventions