alibayram/wikipedia-40-langs huggingface dataset:
Andrei Sakharov

Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov (Russian: Андре́й Дми́триевич Са́харов, May 21 1921 – December 14 1989), was a Soviet nuclear physicist. He was also a well-known dissident and human rights activist. Sakharov was an advocate of nuclear disarmament and civil liberties and reforms in the Soviet Union.

Life 
Sakharov was a very clever scientist. He graduated from college during World War II but was kept out of the Red Army to do scientific research for the government. Sakharov helped the Soviets develop the hydrogen bomb in the 1950s. But he also made many peaceful uses of nuclear power.

The bomb he had helped make started Sakharov to be a dissident. He argued with Nikita Khrushchev against unneeded nuclear tests.  He was afraid that these tests put people's lives and healths in danger without need. He began asking, too, for more freedom of speech.  The government removed him from his secret work and his special job as a scientist. Sakharov began to see what unhappy lives most Soviet citizens led.

Persecution only made him speak out more.  He asked for more freedom of religion and defended others who had spoken out and been put into jail. The secret police began to watch him and to make files of information against him. After Sakharov criticized activities of the USSR's Arab allies, Arab terrorists came to his apartment and held him, his wife, and his stepson hostage for an hour.  "Do you want to kill us?" cried Sakharov's wife. "We can do worse things than kill you," they replied. After the terrorists left without doing anything, Sakharov tried to tell the police about it. The police did not really care.

The only thing that protected Sakharov was many people knew about him outside the Soviet Union. The Communists were afraid that if something happened to him, it would give the world a bad image of the USSR. But when Sakharov criticized the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, they became very angry and took him to the city of Gorky. There he was watched by the police outside his apartment. He tried to go on a hunger strike, not eating anything. The Soviet Union was afraid he might die, so they force-fed him (forcing him to eat).

Sakharov kept on asking for glasnost (openness). In 1986, Mikhail Gorbachev, who agreed with Sakharov and thought there should be glasnost, let the dissident scientist return home. Sakharov continued to call for reform, and in December 1989, he died of heart failure, at the age of 68. . But two years later his wish became true with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. .

References 

1921 births
1989 deaths
Soviet dissidents
Russian human rights activists
Nuclear physicists
Russian physicists
1686

Year 1686 was a common year that started on a Tuesday when using the Gregorian calendar.

Events 

 May 4 – The Municipality of Ilagan was founded in the Philippines.
 July 17 – A meeting took place at Lüneburg between 'some evangelical Princes and Electors' and representatives of the King of Navarre, the King of Denmark and the Queen of England. The object of this meeting is the formation of an 'evangelical' league of defence against the Catholic League, called the 'Confederatio Militiae Evangelicae'.
 July 22 – New York City and Albany, New York are granted city charters by the colonial governor.
 September 2 – The forces of the Holy League of 1684 liberate Buda from the Ottoman Turkish rule that leads to the end of Turkish rule in Hungary during the subsequent years.

Undated 
 The League of Augsburg is founded.
 Russia, Saxony, Brandenburg and Bavaria join the Holy League against the Ottoman Turkish Empire.
 A group of conspirators met at Charborough House in Dorset to plan the overthrow of king James II of England by Parliamentarians and the Dutch William III of Orange-Nassau.
 A hurricane saves Charleston, South Carolina, from attack by Spanish vessels.

Births 

 January 16 – Archibald Bower, Scottish historian (died 1766)
 January 31 – Hans Egede, Norwegian Lutheran missionary (died 1758)
 April 9 – James Craggs the Younger, English politician (died 1721)
 April 28 – Michael Brokoff, Czech sculptor (died 1721)
 April 29 – Peregrine Bertie, 2nd Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven, English statesman (died 1742)
 May 24 – Gabriel Fahrenheit, German physicist and inventor (died 1736)
 June 9 – Andrei Osterman, Russian statesman (died 1747)
 July 6 – Antoine de Jussieu, French naturalist (died 1758)
 July 9 – Philip Livingston, American politician (died 1749)
 July 31 (or August 1) – Benedetto Marcello, Italian composer (died 1739)
 August 12 – John Balguy, English philosopher (died 1748)
 August 19 – Eustace Budgell, English writer (died 1737)
 August 19 – Nicola Porpora, Italian composer (died 1768)
 October 15 – Allan Ramsay, Scottish poet (died 1758)

Deaths 

 January 31 – Jean Mairet, French dramatist (born 1604)
 February 10 – William Dugdale, English antiquarian (born 1605)
 April 6 – Arthur Annesley, 1st Earl of Anglesey, English royalist statesman (born. 1614)
 April 19 – Antonio de Solís y Ribadeneyra, Spanish writer (born 1610)
 June 23 – William Coventry, English statesman (born c.1628)
 July 10 – John Fell, English churchman (born 1625)
 July 16 – John Pearson, English theologian (born 1612)
 August 13 – Louis Maimbourg, French-born historian (born 1610)
 October 26 – John Egerton, 2nd Earl of Bridgewater, English politician (born 1623)
 November 11 – Louis II de Bourbon, Prince de Condé, French general (born 1621)
 November 11 – Otto von Guericke, German physicist and inventor (born 1602)

References
1149

1149 was a common year.

Events 
 Castle of Carimate destroyed.
 Nur ad-Din defeats the Principality of Antioch at the Battle of Inab.
Lynx

The Lynx is a small cat. It is a genus with four species. The four species are in Eurasia, Spain, Canada and America, and do not overlap much.

Appearance 
Lynx have short tails, and usually some hair on the ears. They have large paws (feet) padded for walking on snow, and long whiskers on the face. The color of the body is from light brown to grey and is sometimes marked with dark brown spots, especially on the legs. They weigh about 5 kg or about 11 pounds (approximately the size of a large domestic cat) and can weigh up to about 30 kg (66 pounds). They are between 70 and 150 cm long, with a relative short tail - 5-25 cm. They live for about 20 years.

Lynx are similar to a regular house cat, but larger. They have a powerful body on short, furry legs attached to hefty feet, and a bobbed, black-tipped tail. The fur is spotted and yellowish-brown to grey. It has a collar of fur around the face, giving a triangular shape. They also have long black ear tufts.

Habitat 
Lynx live in the high altitude forests with many shrubs, reeds and grass. They hunt only on the ground, but can climb trees and swim.

They can be found in the some places in northern Scandinavia, in North America and also in the Himalayas. Since the 1990s people try to move part of the population of the Eurasian lynx to Germany. They can also be found in Białowieża Forest (northeastern Poland), and southern Spain.

The Colorado Division of Wildlife tried to move other wild Lynx populations from Canada back to the United States.

Behaviour 
Lynx are usually solitary, although a small group may travel and hunt together occasionally. Mating takes place in the late winter and once a year the female gives birth to between two and four kittens. The young stay with the mother for one more winter, a total of around nine months, before moving out to live on their own as young adults.

Lynx make their dens in crevices or under ledges. They feed on a wide range of animals from white-tailed deer, reindeer, roe deer, small red deer, and chamois, to smaller, more usual prey: snowshoe hares, fish, foxes, sheep, squirrels, mice, turkeys and other birds, and goats. They also eat ptarmigans, voles, and grouse.

The genus Lynx 
 Genus Lynx
 Canada lynx, Lynx canadensis
 Eurasian lynx, Lynx lynx
 Iberian lynx or Spanish Lynx, Lynx pardinus
 Bobcat, Lynx rufus

Conservation 
The Iberian lynx is the most endangered feline in the world. There are only two populations (together, 300 animals), in the southern Spain.
Hunting lynxes is illegal in many countries.

References

Other websites 

 Canada Lynx in the Southern Rockies 
 The Iberian Lynx The natural history of the Iberian lynx
 Hopes raised by Spain lynx births

Felines
Mammals of North America
Mammals of Europe
Mammals of Asia

National symbols of Romania
National symbols of Serbia
The Grass Roots

The Grass Roots are an American rock music group. Their peak in popularity was in the 1960s and 1970s. They formed in Los Angeles, California in 1966. Their biggest hit was the song "Midnight Confessions" which charted in the US at #5 in 1968.  Their 1969 song "I'd Wait a Million Years" was #15 in the U.S..

Albums 
 Where Were You When I Needed You (1966)
 Let's Live for Today (1967)
 Feelings (1968)
 Leavin' It All Behind (1969)
 Lovin' Things (1969)
 Move Along (1972)
 Alotta Mileage (1973)
 Grass Roots (1975)
 The ABC Collection (1976)
 14 Greatest (1978)
 Powers of the Night (1982)
 Live at Last (2000)
 Symphonic Hits (2001)
 Live Gold (2008)
 The Complete Original Dunhill/ABC Hit Singles (2014)

Musical groups from Los Angeles
American pop music groups
Folk music groups
American rock bands
Dionne Warwick

Dionne Warwick (born December 12, 1940) is an American R&B singer. She was born in East Orange, New Jersey.

Warwick sang many songs written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David.  Many of these songs were hits.

In 1990, Warwick hosted and executive produced a talk show, Dionne and Friends. She was a contestant in the 2011 season of The Apprentice.

Warwick's sister Dee Dee Warwick (1942-2008), their aunt Cissy Houston (born 1933) and cousin Whitney Houston (1963-2012) were singers.

Sources

Other websites 
 

1940 births
Living people
Actors from New Jersey
African American musicians
American movie actors
American R&B singers
American soul musicians
American television actors
American television presenters
People from East Orange, New Jersey
Participants in American reality television series
Singers from New Jersey
Television talk show hosts
Warner Bros. Records artists
Barenaked Ladies

Barenaked Ladies are a Canadian band. They formed in Toronto, Canada in 1988. The band is made up of four men. In 1991, the band was taken off the program for a New Year's Eve concert in Toronto because someone thought the name was bad. The band started as a duo with Ed Roberstson and Steven Page. Lead singer Page left the band in 2009 to begin a solo career. He was also arrested in 2008 for having the illegal drug cocaine.

Members
The current band members are:
 Ed Roberston - guitar and vocals
 Jim Creegan - vocals and bass
 Kevin Hearn - vocals, keyboard, accordion and guitar
 Tyler Stewart - vocals and drums

Television
Ed Robertson is also the host of a television programme, called Ed's Up. On the programme, he travels around Canada by airplane. A plane he was flying crashed into trees in 2008. Roberston and the other passengers were not hurt.

The theme song to the television series The Big Bang Theory is performed by Barenaked Ladies.

Recordings
The band have made 18 albums:
 Gordon (1992)
 Maybe You Should Drive (1994)
 Born on a Pirate Ship (1996)
 Rock Spectacle (1996)
 Stunt (1998)
 Maroon (2000)
 Disc One: All Their Greatest Hits (2001)
 Everything To Everyone (2003)
 Barenaked For The Holidays (2004)
 Barenaked Ladies Are Me (2006)
 Talk To The Hand: Live In Michigan DVD (2007)
 Barenaked Ladies Are Men (2007)
 Snacktime! (2008)
 All In Good Time (2010)
 Grinning Streak (2013)
 Silver Ball (2015)
 Fake Nudes (2017)
 Detour de Force (2021)

References

Other websites
 Ed's Up TV pages 

1980s Canadian music groups
1990s Canadian music groups
2000s Canadian music groups
2010s Canadian music groups
Canadian rock bands
Musical groups established in 1988
Organizations based in Ontario
1988 establishments in Canada
Paul Revere & the Raiders

Paul Revere & the Raiders were an American pop group who were popular in the 1960s. They started in Portland, Oregon in 1960.

The band claimed to have 23 hits from 1961 to 1972, more hits for a long period of time than even the likes of The Beatles did not achieve. The Raiders most well known lineup consisted of: Mark Lindsay (lead vocals), Drake Levin (guitar), Jim Valley (guitar), Phil Volk (bass), Paul Revere (keyboards) and Mike Smith (drums).

American rock bands
Musical groups from Oregon
Musicians from Idaho
Musicians from Portland, Oregon
Singers from Idaho
Singers from Portland, Oregon
Musical groups established in 1958
1958 establishments in the United States
20th-century establishments in Oregon
Musical groups disestablished in the 1970s
1976 disestablishments in the United States
Musical groups established in 1978
1978 establishments in the United States
Nintendogs

is a video game for the Nintendo DS. In Nintendogs, the player has dogs. At the start of the game one can choose a type of dog and give it a name. They give the dogs food and drinks. If a dog is good one might get to feed them a dog biscuit or a jerky treat. The dogs can be washed, taken for a walk, taught to do tricks and put into contests. The contests are: agility trial, disc competition and obedience trial. One can find out how to compete in these contests by looking at their care books, under Supplies.

There are four versions of the game each with different breeds.
They are: Dalmatian and Friends, Chihuahua and Friends, Labrador and Friends and Dachshund and Friends. All breeds are unlockable in every version and a player can unlock dogs by increasing his trainer points. However, the player can only have three dogs at home. To get more the player must drop off one at the Dog Hotel. Every player can only drop off five dogs at a time.

If the player does not play the game for a long period of time, the dog may run away, so players need to play with their dogs daily.

A sequel, Nintendogs + Cats, was released for the Nintendo 3DS in 2011.

References

Other websites
 Official website

2005 video games
Cancelled Nintendo GameCube games
Nintendo DS games
Nintendo DS-only games
Leonid Brezhnev

Leonid Illich Brezhnev (19 December 1906 – 10 November 1982) was a leader of the Soviet Union. Born in 1906, Brezhnev was First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He was effectively the dictator of the Soviet Union from 1964 until his death in 1982. 

During the Second World War, Brezhnev was a Political Commissar. He supervised various military units. There, he became a friend of Nikita Khrushchev. 

Unlike Khrushchev, the leader of the Soviet Union before him, Brezhnev did not agree with the process of destalinization, and did not support reform. Under Brezhnev, the Soviet economy mostly consisted of military spending. Because the country's resources were going to the armed forces, as they had under Joseph Stalin in wartime, consumer wants were ignored. The standard of living began to fall.

Brezhnev died of a heart attack on November 10, 1982. At over 18 years, Brezhnev was longest ruling Russian Ruler since Stalin until Vladimir Putin broke this record in 2017.

List of wars and uprisings in Europe: WW2 ; Great Patriotic War (1941-1945),Hungarian Revolution of 1956,1968 Warsaw Pact Invasion Of Czechoslovakia

List of wars in Asia: Korean War,Vietnam War,Cambodian Civil War,Cambodian–Vietnamese War,Soviet–Afghan War (1950-1982)

List of wars in Africa and Middle East : Nigerian Civil War,Angolan Civil War,Iran–Iraq War (1967-1982)

References 

1906 births
1982 deaths
Former dictators
People of the Vietnam War
Recipients of the Order of Lenin
Heads of government of the Soviet Union
Approximation

An approximation is a version of a piece of information that does not describe it exactly, but is close enough to be used. An approximation may be used either when the exact piece of information is not known, or when it's too long or complicated and people need something simpler. The most common simple adjective for an approximation is "about". 

For example, if you wanted to add 2.0002 and 2.0003, you can add 2 and 2, and it would be an approximation.
If you are left with a balance of Dollar 78.23 you might want to say you are left with 80 dollars. In mathematics, this is written using the  symbol (e.g., ).

Archimedes used polygons to approximate a circle, and to calculate an approximation for  as shown below:

Related pages 
 Approximation theory
 Diophantine approximation
 Estimation

References 

Measurement
Mathematical approximation
PhpBB

phpBB is a commonly used, free computer software for forums. As the name suggests, phpBB is written in PHP, with the use of one of SQL compatible databases.

References

Other websites 
 Official website

Software
Free software
World Health Organization

The World Health Organization (WHO) is part of the United Nations (UN), working on international public health, with its headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. The WHO was established by the UN on April 7, 1948. In the previous year they had already started an epidemiology service. WHO World Health Day is celebrated on April 7.

Other websites 

World Health Organization

1948 establishments
Organizations based in Geneva
International medical and health organizations
United Nations specialized agencies
Jerboa

A jerboa is a small desert rodent of Asia and Northern Africa. It looks like a mouse, but it has a long tail and very long back legs. The jerboa moves by jumping. Jerboas have long tails, long hind legs, and short front legs. They tend to live in hot deserts.

When they are being chased, jerboas can run up to 24 kilometers per hour. Some jerboa species are preyed on by little owls in central Asia. Most species of jerboas have very good hearing. Their hearing helps them avoid being attacked by predators.

Jerboas are also  2 4km/h and there highest jump is 6 feet high and there are 33 species of jerboa

Related pages 

 Hopping mouse
 Jumping mouse
 Kangaroo rat and kangaroo mouse
 Kultarr
 Springhare

References 

Rodents
Arabic words and phrases
Mammals of Africa
Mammals of Asia
Smell

The term smell may refer to one of the following articles:

 Olfaction, the sense of smell, that is, the ability to perceive odors
 Odor - the sensation perceived by the detection of certain chemical compounds by the sense of olfaction

Basic English 850 words
Olfaction

Olfaction is the sense of smell. The sense of smell is how a human or animal notices a smell (or odour or odor) by using the nose. Many animals have better noses than people. Some animals can detect small particles in the air or sometimes water that people cannot. 

People have special cells in the nose that can detect some chemicals. These are special nerve cells attached to the olfactory epithelium. All vertebrates have these cells. The smell is first processed by the olfactory system. The information is given to the olfactory bulb in the front of the forebrain.  

In insects, smells are sensed by sensillum on the antennae and first processed by the antennal lobe.

Olfactory reception cells 

The olfactory reception (OR) cells are neurons (nerve cells). Many tiny hair-like cilia stick out of these cells into the mucus covering the surface of the epithelium. The surface of these cilia is covered with olfactory receptors, a kind of protein.  

There are about 1000 different genes which code for the ORs, though only about a third are functional. The rest are pseudogenes. The OR genes are the largest gene family. An odor molecule dissolves into the mucus of the olfactory epithelium and then binds to an OR. Various odor molecules bind to various ORs. The basis of the sense of smell is that different groups of scent molecules bind to different receptor cells and so fire different groups of neurons. Inside the olfactory region of the brain, the firing of neurons produces the perceived smell. 

When the OR is activated, changes start in the cells. Positive ions come in and  negative ions go out of the cells. This causes the neuron to fire an impulse (generate an action potential).

References

Other websites 
Smells and Odours - How Smell Works
Olfaction
The importance of smell, and pheromones, to Humans and other Animals
Structure-odor relations: a modern perspective (PDF)
Olfactory network dynamics and the coding of multidimensional signals  (PDF)

Sensory system
Teaspoon

A teaspoon is a spoon used for stirring tea, measuring sugar, and playing games such as spoons. They are also called flatspoons in American English. Longer teaspoons can be used to eat ice cream and other desserts, too. It is usually covered with silver or stainless steel.

It is also a unit of measurement, now equal to 5 millilitres.

References 

Imperial units
Kitchenware
Units of volume
Tea
Camembert

Camembert is a village in France. It is in Normandy. It is in the Orne département of the Lower Normandy region in France. It is most famous as the place where Camembert cheese originated. In 1999, 199 people lived there.

Geography 
Camembert has a total area of 10.3 square kilometers.

Communes in Orne
Camembert cheese

Camembert cheese, more generally known as Camembert, is a French soft cheese. It originated in the village of Camembert in Normandy. Since 1983, the name Camembert de Normandie has been protected as Appellation d'Origine controlée (AOC).

Production 
Camembert is made from unpasteurized cow's milk, and is ripened by the moulds Penicillium candida and Penicillium camemberti for at least three weeks. It is produced in small rounds, about 250 grams in weight, which are wrapped in paper and boxed in thin wooden boxes.

Characteristics 
When fresh, it is quite crumbly and relatively hard, but it characteristically ripens and becomes more runny and strongly flavoured as it ages.

Camembert can be used in many dishes, but it is popularly eaten uncooked on bread or with wine or meat, to enjoy the subtle flavour and texture which do not survive heating.

History 

Camembert was reputedly invented in 1791 by Marie Harel, a farmer from Normandy. However, the origin of the cheese we know today as camembert is more likely to rest with the beginnings of the industrialisation of the cheese-making process at the end of the 19th century. In 1890, an engineer, M. Ridel invented the wooden box which was used to carry the cheese and helped to send it for longer distances, in particular to America where it became very popular. These boxes are still used today.

Before fungi were properly understood, the colour of Camembert rind was a matter of chance, most commonly blue-grey, with brown spots. From the early 20th century onwards the rind has been more commonly pure white, but it was not until the mid-1970s that pure white became standard.

The cheese was famously issued to French troops in the First World War, becoming firmly fixed in the French popular culture as a result. It has many other roles in French culture, literature and history. It is now internationally known, and many local varieties are made around the world.

The cheese is said to have inspired Salvador Dalí to create his famous painting, The Persistence of Memory. Its "melting" watches were inspired by the sight of a melting wheel of over-ripe Camembert.

The Camembert de Normandie was granted a protected designation of origin in 1992 after the original AOC in 1983.

Related pages
 Brie, a similar cheese from a different region

References 
Camembert: A National Myth by Pierre Boisard  claims that Camembert was one of the first globalised, homogenised and standardised foods.

Other websites 
 Camembert website 
 Camembert AOC 
 Joseph Knirim, Marie Harel and the camembert cheese
 Castello's Camembert
 Saga Blue's Camembert

French cheeses
Orne
Childbirth

Childbirth, also known as labour and delivery, is the ending of pregnancy where one or more babies leaves the uterus by passing through the vagina or by Caesarean section. In 2015, there were about 135 million births globally.

About 15 million were born before 37 weeks of gestation, while between 3 and 12 percent were born after 42 weeks.

Birth rate is important in determining the population growth rate.

Related pages
Premature birth

References

Pregnancy and childbirth
ASCII art

ASCII art is art made out of ASCII characters. This can be simple art like "<3" (it looks almost like a heart if you turn your head sideways), or it can be more complex, with characters carefully placed out, containing many lines of characters. 
ASCII art was originally used to "draw" pictures on computers that only allowed ASCII characters. 
Smilies are considered ASCII art. 

ASCII art was invented because in the past, computers could only display simple characters in a format known as ASCII. This meant that computers could only display text. People started making art with ASCII characters to display an "image". Examples are: 

:)      *_*     :(      O_o 

:|      T_T     :D 

They can also be more complicated 

Graphics
Computing
Riddle

A riddle can be classed as a statement with a solution. This solution, however, need not be logical. Solving riddles usually involve thinking about the question and putting it into context.

Other websites 
Anglo-Saxon riddles
riddles for adults-interesting and challenging riddles for adults

Logic
Games
Novalis

Novalis is the pseudonym of Georg Philipp Friedrich Freiherr von Hardenberg (May 2, 1772 – March 25, 1801), who was a writer and philosopher of the early German Romanticism.

1772 births
1801 deaths

Writers from Saxony-Anhalt
Body piercing

Body piercing or just piercing is a form of body modification, where humans of either gender pierce their skin to put jewellery through the hole later. There are many different reasons some people have piercings, such as religious or other cultural purposes. Many people, especially in North America and Europe, choose to be pierced for ornamental, or sexual pleasure.

History
In early records, it was not common to discuss the use of piercings or their meanings. However, body adornment and modification are estimated have been around for more than 5000 years, found in mummies like Ötzi the Iceman, Europe's oldest natural mummy estimated to be about 5,300 years old. Piercing of the ears, nose, and tongue have a long history in many ancient cultures, and lip piercing and stretching were more common in African tribes, especially for cultural identification.

Piercings in the 20th & 21st century 

Body piercings of any kind were not popular in Western cultures in the beginning of the 20th century. After World War II, the gay subculture used piercings as a fashion statement. Other subcultures, such as "hippie" and the punk movement, also began to use piercings as a form of expression in the 1960s and 1970s. Genital piercing is becoming more common. Sometimes people get genital piercings to create interest or attract attention. Some types of genital piercing are supposed to increase sexual pleasure. For males, one type of penis piercing is called an Ampallang.

References
Physical

Physical can mean:
Something that is made of matter
Something about the human body
Physical anthropology
Something done by a force made when something moves to apply or create the force. (This is only a form of Kinetic energy.)

Basic English 850 words
Elonka Dunin

Elonka Dunin (; born December 29, 1958) is an American video game developer. Her job is to make computer games at Simutronics Corporation, in Missouri.  She also knows a lot about famous puzzles, especially a puzzle called Kryptos, which no one knows all the answers to yet.

In 2006, she wrote a book with hundreds of puzzles in it, called The Mammoth Book of Secret Codes and Cryptograms.

References 
 Elonka Dunin's website (biography)
 Simutronics corporation

1958 births
Living people
Writers from Missouri
American video game designers
Bethlehem

Bethlehem is a Palestinian city on the West Bank. It is most famous as the place where Jesus was born. (See Gospel of Matthew chapter 2.) It is five miles from Jerusalem in Israel.

Ancient Israel and Judah
 
New Testament
Old Testament
Albert II, Prince of Monaco

Albert II (born 14 March 1958), is the current Sovereign Prince of Monaco. He became ruler after his father Prince Ranier III died in April 2005. He is the only son and the middle of three children of Rainer and his wife, Grace Kelly.

Legitimate children
Prince Albert and his wife, Charlene, had twins:
Princess Gabriella, Countess of Carladès (born 10 December 2014)
Jacques, Hereditary Prince of Monaco (born 10 December 2014); heir to the throne of Monaco.

Health
On 19 March 2020, amid the large-scale outbreak of COVID-19, it was officially announced that Albert II had tested positive. This made Albert II the first monarch and head of state to have tested positive for COVID-19. On 31 March, it was announced that he had made a full recovery.

Titles and styles
14 March 1958 – 6 April 2005: His Serene Highness The Hereditary Prince of Monaco, Marquis of Baux.
31 March 2005 – 6 April 2005: His Serene Highness The Prince Regent of Monaco.
6 April 2005 – present: His Serene Highness The Sovereign Prince of Monaco.

Ancestry

References

1958 births
Living people
Princes and princesses of Monaco
Recipients of the Order pro merito Melitensi
Current national leaders
Rex Warner

Rex Warner (birth name Reginald Ernest Walker; 9 March 1905 – 24 June 1986) was a classical English writer and translator.

1905 births
1986 deaths
English writers
British translators
Hugh Cook

There is also Hugh Cook (science fiction author), born in England, who also lived in New Zealand and Japan.
Hugh Cook (born 1942) is a Canadian writer.

Bibliography
Cracked Wheat and Other Stories - 1985 ()
The Homecoming Man - 1989 ()
Home in Alfalfa - 1998 ()

Cook, Hugh
1942 births
Living people
Zapotec peoples

The Zapotec are a native tribe of people from Mexico. People think there are between 300.000 and 400.000 people. Most of them live in the state of Oaxaca. Most of them speak either Zapotec dialect continuum or the Chatino language. Before Christopher Columbus came to America, the Zapotec civilisation was highly developed. It also included a system of writing.

References
Malinowski, Sharon; Sheets, Anna, ed. (1998); "Zapotec" in The Gale Encyclopedia of Native American Tribes; Gale Research, Detroit, Michigan.

Other websites 
 Zapotec Culture  (in English and Spanish)
 Zapotec Language  (including variants, in English and Spanish)

Mexico
Native Americans
IMAX

IMAX is a kind of movie projection system, which shows movies on a very large screen. It was first introduced in Japan in 1970.

Other websites
Official site

Movie terminology
Esotericism

Esotericism is about secret knowledge for a small group of people.   Esotericism also describes mystical, spiritual or occult points of view. Esotericism studies Gnosticism, Yoga, Alchemy, Magic, Spiritualism, Hypnosis, Astrology, Meditation, Mysticism, and Occultism. Many followers of Abrahamic faiths, particularly Christianity and Islam, have criticized Esotericism as black magic. Esotericism in religion is called "obscurantism".

Esotericism can also be about understanding symbolism and hidden meanings of many different books.  They include religious books, philosophy books and books about history.  They use these books as their texts.

Esoteric groups 
 Alawites
 Anthroposophy
 Freemasons
 Hermeticism
 Illuminati
 Kabbalah
 Knights Templar
 Rosicrucians
 Theosophy

References
Hugh Cook (science fiction author)

Hugh Walter Gilbert Cook (9 August 1956 – 8 November 2008) was a science fiction author. Cook was born in Essex, England, and moved to New Zealand. He moved to Japan in 1997.

1956 births

English writers
Sect

A sect is a small religious or political group that separates from a larger group. Sects have many of the same beliefs and practices as the original group, but often have some different doctrines. In contrast, a denomination is a large religious group.

Related pages 

 Cult
 New religious movement

Religious organizations
Sociology
Caracal

The caracal (Caracal caracal), also called Persian lynx or African lynx, is a wild cat. Caracals are similar to lynxes, but are more related to the serval. Caracals are the fastest of the small cats.

Look 
The Caracal is 65 cm in length (about 2 feet), plus 30 cm tail (about 1 foot). It has longer legs and a look very similar to a lynx. The colour of its fur may be wine-red, grey, black, or sand-coloured (a type of yellow). Young caracals have red spots on the fur, but the only markings adults have are black spots above the eyes. A special part of the caracal body are its long black ears - the word "caracal" come from the Turkish word karakulak ("black ear"). Their ears are controlled by 20 different muscles, to help them find the animals they hunt.

Life 

Caracals live in Africa and Western Asia. Their habitat is dry steppes (areas without trees, covered with grass or shrubs) and semi-deserts, but also can live in places similar to woodlands, savannas, and scrub forests. They live alone or with a mate in a territory.

A caracal may live without drinking for a long time - they get the water from the body of the animals they eat. It hunts at night (but in winter they also hunt in the daytime) for rodents, birds, and hares. It is not usual, but sometimes they hunt small antelopes or young ostriches. They prefer to eat only the external meat of the mammals they hunt, and do not eat the internal organs, and they also do not like eating fur. But they eat the feathers of small birds and rotten meat.

They can hunt birds very well; a caracal is able to snatch a bird in flight, sometimes more than one at a time. Caracals can jump and climb every well, which enables them to catch hyraxes better than any other carnivore.

Caracals and humans 
Because they can learn tricks and get accustomed to live with humans, caracals are sometimes kept as pets (especially in the United States and some European countries). Farmers in Africa do not like them, because sometimes they enter in farms and eat chickens and other animals. So they make their dog chase the caracal.

It is not easy to see caracals in nature because they hide very well. Drivers in countries where caracals live, for example, Kenya and Botswana, see many animals next to roads, but it is very rare a sighting of a caracal.

Kinds of caracals 

There are many species of caracals. See them and where they live:
 Caracal caracal caracal, East, Central and South Africa
 Caracal caracal algira, North Africa
 Caracal caracal damarensis, Namibia
 Caracal caracal limpopoensis, Botswana
 Caracal caracal lucani, Gabon
 Caracal caracal michaelis, Turkmenistan (endangered)
 Caracal caracal nubicus, Ethiopia, Sudan
 Caracal caracal poecilictis, West Africa
 Caracal caracal schmitzi, West Asia, Iran, Arabia, Pakistan and India

References

Felines
Mammals of Pakistan
Mammals of Africa
Eel

Eels are teleost fish. They have long and narrow bodies like snakes. Adult eels can be as short as 10 cm  or as long as 3 m. It depends on their species. The large eels can weigh up to 65 kg.

Eels have fewer fins than other fish. They do not have all the belly and chest fins. The back and anal fins are long and usually connected to the tail fin. The fins do not have spines.

The shoulder bones are separate from the skull. The scales have smooth edges or are absent.

Eels hatch from eggs. Baby (larval) eels are flat and transparent (clear). They are called leptocephalus (Greek for "thin head"). A young eel is called an elver. For a long time people did not know where eels came from, because baby eels look very different from adults. They thought the babies were a different species.

Most eels prefer to live in the shallowest parts of the ocean. They live at the bottom of the ocean, sometimes in holes. Eels in the Anguillidae family come to fresh water to live there. Eels in the Nemichthyidae family swim about 500 m below the ocean surface. Eels in the Synaphobranchidae family live as deep as 4000 m below the surface.

Hand netting (catching with nets) is the only legal way of catching eels in England. It has been done for thousands of years on the River Parrett and River Severn.

Most eels are predators. They hunt their prey.

Classification
True eels belong to the order (group) Anguilliformes (Latin for "eel-shaped"). This order has 4 suborders (smaller groups) called Anguilloidei, Nemichthyoidei, Congroidei, and Synaphobranchoidei.

The suborders are separated into 19 families. The families are divided into 110 genera. The genera are then divided into species. There are 400 species of eels in all.

The term "eel" is also used for other eel-shaped fish, such as electric eels, spiny eels, swamp eels, and deep-sea spiny eels. These other clades, however, evolved their eel-like shapes independently from the true eels. Eels live both in salt water and fresh water and some species are catadromous (they migrate).

Uses 
Freshwater eels (unagi) and marine eels (Conger eel, anago) are used in Japanese food. Eels are used in Cantonese (Hong Kong) food and Shanghai food. Some people eat the European eel and other eels that live in lakes all around the world. A traditional London food is "jellied eels." The Spanish meal, angulas, consists of deep-fried elvers.

Eel skins are used to make some wallets and purses.

In some classifications, the family Cyematidae of bobtail snipe eels is included in the Anguilliformes, but in the FishBase system that family is included in the order Saccopharyngiformes.

The electric eel of South America is not a true eel, but is a South American knifefish more closely related to the carps and catfishes.

References

 
Edible fish
Easter egg

An Easter egg is an egg, eaten and used for decoration during the Easter holidays. The egg was a symbol of the earth to celebrate spring. The oldest tradition is to use painted chicken eggs, but today chocolate eggs wrapped in coloured foil, hand-carved wooden eggs, or plastic eggs filled with confectionery such as chocolate is used. It was used by early Christians as a sign of the resurrection (rising from the dead) of Jesus.

Use 
The use of painted and decorated Easter eggs was first recorded in the 13th century. The church did not let people eat eggs during Holy Week, but chickens still laid eggs during that week. Because there was nothing else to do with the eggs, they were used for Easter decoration.

In modern times, chocolate eggs with a colorful wrapping are given to children to be eaten. In the United Kingdom, children receive on average 8.8 chocolate Easter eggs every year. It is unclear where this tradition comes from. Most likely, it comes from a pagan fertility ritual during spring. Sometimes on Easter, children go on egg hunts to look for Easter eggs. They can look for them indoors or outdoors.

An easter egg is also the name of something secret added in computer programs, such as a joke, a picture, or a message that can be uncovered.

History 
Although there have been claims that Easter eggs came from the pagan symbols, there is no solid evidence for this. At the Passover, a hard-boiled egg dipped in salt water is a symbol of both new life and the Passover sacrifice offered at the Temple in Jerusalem. In Christian times, the egg was a symbol of new life just as a chick might hatch from the egg. The Easter egg tradition may have celebrated the end of the privations of Lent. In the Medieval Europe, people were not allowed to eat eggs on fast days. It was traditional to use up all of the eggs that they had before Lent began, and this also made the tradition of Pancake Day. Eggs were viewed as symbols of new life and fertility through the ages. It is believed that for this reason many ancient cultures, including the Ancient Egyptians, Persians, and Romans, used eggs during their spring festivals. In Eastern Christianity, both meat and dairy are still not allowed to be eaten during the fast, and eggs are seen as "dairy" too.

It was during Easter that everybody was trying to get rid of the eggs before the fast. Eggs were given as gifts for children and servants, and used for decoration. And this is probably the reason why eggs came to be associated with Easter.

Gallery

References 

Easter traditions
Lemur

Lemurs are primates and prosimians (not monkeys). The word "lemur" comes from the Latin word lemures, which means "ghosts". Lemur are divided into eight families, with 15 genera and about 100 living species. However, lemur  classification is controversial: it depends on which species concept is used. Lemur is also a genus in one of the families. 

Lemurs are native only to the island of Madagascar. From there a few species got to smaller islands nearby, for example the Comoros. Madagascar, like Africa and India, was part of the ancient southern continent of Gondwana.  

Lemurs weigh from 30g to the 10kg. Larger species have all become extinct since human groups moved to Madagascar. Usually, the smaller lemurs are active at night (nocturnal), and the larger ones were active during the day (diurnal).

Lemurs are endangered species because people destroy their habitat and used to hunt them, and perhaps still do so.

Physical description 
Ring-tailed lemur, the most studied, are white and black with a ring tail The larger species are about 1.5 meters tall and weigh about 2 to 3.5 kilograms. They move quietly, usually at night, sometimes letting out eerie wailing cries, which some people think is the reason why they got their names.

Feeding habits and life 
Lemurs mostly eat fruit, leaves, and other plant parts. They live in family groups of 5 to 42 members which is called a troop. Females are dominant and remain in the same troop for life. Males move between troops. The female's gestation period lasts four to five months, and they usually have one or two babies. Lemur mothers nurse their babies until they are about four months old. Then they begin to feed the babies solid food such as fruit. Lemurs spend most of their time in the trees. Some are great leapers, flinging themselves from tree to tree.

Communication 
Lemurs communicate with a variety of hoots. They will also send messages with scents (smells). When a male lemur wants to scare another male away, he first rubs its tail on the smelly glands under its arms and then waves the tail in the other male's face. These are called "stink fights".

Lavasoa dwarf lemur
Grey bamboo lemur
Ring-tailed lemur
Aye-aye
Black-and-white ruffed lemur
Silky sifaka

Related pages 
 Duke Lemur Center

References

Other websites 

 Lemurs of the East Coast of Madagascar 
 New lemurs found in Madagascar
Great leaping lemurs
Archaea

The Archaea (or Archea) are a group of single-celled organisms. The name comes from Greek αρχαία, "old ones". They are a major division of living organisms.

Archaea are tiny, simple organisms. They were originally discovered in extreme environments (extremophiles), but are now thought to be common to more average conditions. Many can survive at very high (over 80 °C) or very low temperatures, or highly salty, acidic or alkaline water. Some have been found in geysers, black smokers, oil wells, and hot vents in the deep ocean. Recent research has found ammonia-eating archaea in soil and seawater.

In the past they had been classed with bacteria as prokaryotes (or Kingdom Monera) and named archaebacteria, but this is a mistake. The Archaea have an independent evolutionary history and show many differences in their biochemistry from other forms of life. They are now classified as a separate domain in the three-domain system. In this system, the three distinct branches of evolutionary descent are the Archaea, Bacteria and Eukaryota.

Archaea are, like bacteria, prokaryotes: single-celled organisms that do not have nuclei and cell organelles of the eukaryote type.

Comparison to other domains
The following table compares some major characteristics of the three domains, to illustrate their similarities and differences. Many of these characteristics are also discussed below.

=
Interesting facts about archaea:
No archaean species can do photosynthesis.
Archaea only reproduce asexually.
Archaea show high levels of horizontal gene transfer between lineages.
Many archaea live in extreme environments.
Unlike bacteria, no archaea produce spores.
Archaea are common in the ocean, and especially in the plankton. They make up to 20% of all microbial cells in the ocean.p475
Carl Woese discovered the Archaea in 1978.

Related pages 

Carl Woese
Earliest known life forms
Methanogen

Further reading 
 Barry E.R. & Bell S.D. 2006. DNA replication in the Archaea. Microbiology and molecular biology reviews (MMBR) 70, 876-887.
Kelman L.M. & Kelman Z. 2003. Archaea: An archetype for replication initiation studies? Molecular microbiology'', 48''', 605-615.

Other websites 

 Archaea -Citizendium

References 

Archaeans
Prokaryotes
Microbiology
Jared Diamond

Jared Mason Diamond (born September 10, 1937) is an American author and biologist. His book Guns, Germs, and Steel won a Pulitzer Prize in 1997.

Life 
Diamond was born in Boston, Massachusetts. His father was a doctor and his mother was a teacher. He received his college degree from Harvard University in 1958, and then he received a doctorate degree from the University of Cambridge in 1961.

In 1966, he became a teacher at UCLA, a university in Los Angeles, California. He has also traveled to some islands called New Guinea, which are far away from the United States, in the South Pacific Ocean. Diamond is famous for knowing a lot about the birds that lived on that island, and he has traveled there many times.

Writing 
Diamond writes about science in ways that people can understand, and he has written many articles for magazines like Discover in the United States.

He also writes books. One of his first books was called The Third Chimpanzee, which talked about the way that people evolved from monkeys, and how many things are the same between humans and monkeys.

His most famous book is Guns, Germs, and Steel. In his book, Diamond explained why he thought that different parts of the Earth had people on them at different times, and why some people in some parts of the world had more science or farming than people in other parts of the world. The book went over thousands of years of human history.

In 2004, he wrote another book, called, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. In this book, Diamond wrote about why he thought that some groups of people from many hundreds of years ago were able to have their groups get very big and strong, while other groups fell apart. His book talked about what people today can maybe learn from the studying the problems from history.

Books 
 Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (2005), .
 Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies (1997), .
 Why is Sex Fun? The Evolution of Human Sexuality (1997), .
 The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal (1992), .
 The Birds of Northern Melanesia: Speciation, Ecology, & Biogeography (with Ernst Mayr, 2001), .
 Avifauna of the Eastern Highlands of New Guinea, Publications of the Nuttall Ornithological Club, No. 12, Cambridge, Mass., pp. 438 (1972).

Family 
 Diamond is married to a woman named Marie. Her grandfather was an important man in the country of Poland. She also had an uncle named Raphael Kalinowski, who became a saint.
 Diamond and his wife Marie have two sons, named Josh and Max. They both go to university. Josh goes to Duke University, and Max goes to Northwestern University.

References 
 Diamond's page at the UCLA website 

1937 births
Living people
American biologists
American geographers
Writers from Boston
Scientists from Boston
Pulitzer Prize winners