The exact "varna" status of "Chitraguptavanshi" Kayasthas has been a subject of debate. According to some accounts, they are a literate and educated class of Kshatriyas, and they have been referred to as a twice-born caste.
In Bengal, Bengali Kayastha, alongside Brahmins, have been described as the "highest Hindu castes". After the Muslim conquest of India, Bengali Kayasthas absorbed remnants of Bengal's old Hindu ruling dynasties - including the Sena, Pala, Chandra, and Varman - and, in this way, became the region's surrogate Kshatriya or "warrior" class. During the British rule, the Bengali Kayasthas, along with the Bengali Brahmins and Baidyas, were considered as "Bhadralok", a term coined in Bengal for the 'Gentry' or 'respectable people'- based on refined culture, prestige, education etc.
The last census of the British Raj in India (1931) classified them as an 'upper caste' i.e. Dwija and the final British Raj law case involving their varna in 1926 placed them into the Kashtriya varna.
According to W.Rowe's account (that later scholars disagreed with), during the British Raj era, certain law cases in Calcutta, led to courts classifying Kayasthas as shudras to diminish their influence with Indian royalty, based largely upon the pseudo-theories of Herbert Hope Risley who had conducted studies on castes and tribes of the Bengal Presidency. According to Rowe, the Kayasthas of Bengal, Bombay and the United Provinces repeatedly challenged this classification by producing a flood of books, pamphlets, family histories and journals to pressurize the government for recognizing them as Kshatriya and to reform the caste practices in the directions of sanskritisation and westernisation. However, scholars from the University of Berkeley as well as the University of Cambridge have disagreed with Rowe's research by pinpointing 'factual and interpretative errors' in his study as well as criticizing his study for making 'unquestioned assumptions' about the kayastha movement of sanskritisation and westernisation.
H.Bellenoit gives the details of the individual British Raj era law cases and concludes that since the kayasthas are a non-cohesive group and not a single caste, their varna was resolved in the cases that came up by taking into account regional differences and customs followed by that particular caste. Bellenoit also disagrees with W.Rowe by showing that Herbert Hope Risley's theories were in fact used to ultimately classify them as Kshatriyas by the British courts. The first case began in 1860 in Jaunpur, Uttar Pradesh with a property dispute where the plaintiff was considered an 'illegitimate child' by the defendants, a north-Indian Kayastha family. The British court denied inheritance to the child, citing that Kayasthas are Dvija, "twice-born" or "upper-caste" and that the illegitimate children of Dwijas have no rights to inheritance. In the next case in 1875 in the Allahabad High Court, a north Indian Kayastha widow was denied adoption rights as she was an upper-caste i.e. Dwija woman. However, in a 1884 adoption case as well as a 1916 property dispute, Calcutta High Court argued that Bengali kayasthas have started using names like 'Das' and classified the Bengali Kayasthas as shudras - although the court did acknowledge their Kshatriya origin. The Allahabad High Court ruled in 1890 that Kayasthas were Kshatriyas. Finally, in a property dispute case in Patna in 1926, the Patna court characterized both the 1884 and 1916 Calcutta courts rulings as inconclusive and ultimately ruled that the kayasthas were of Kshatriya origin and hence twice born or dwija. The Patna court cited smritis and Puranas, several colonial ethnologists, such as William Crooke and Herbert Hope Risley, and used their qualified endorsements on the dwija origins of Kayasthas. The British census of 1931 also lists Kayasthas as one of the upper (twice-born) castes.
Rainbow Brite and the Star Stealer
Rainbow Brite and the Star Stealer is an animated movie from 1985. It was produced by DiC Entertainment and Hallmark Cards, and released by Warner Bros.
This is the only movie in which the title character, Rainbow Brite, appears.
Arctic Monkeys
Arctic Monkeys are an Indie rock band from Sheffield, England. Arctic Monkeys' first album was "Whatever People Say I am, That's What I'm Not". It reached #1 in the United Kingdom album charts. Over 300 thousand copies of the album were sold in the first week. This makes it the fasting selling first album by a band in British music history. It was nominated for Best Alternative Album at the 2006 Grammy Awards. Their second album, "Favourite Worst Nightmare" was first released in Japan on April 18, 2007. Their third album, "Humbug" was released in England on 24 August 2009. In 2011 their fourth album "Suck It and See" was released. "AM", the Monkeys' fifth album, was released 6 September 2013. The sixth Arctic Monkeys album, "Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino" was released in 2018.
The members are:
Swarm
A swarm is a big group of animals. The term is usually used for insects, but other animals such fish and birds can make a swarm also. A good example of animals that swarm are locusts. Mammals do not build swarms, but herds.
Queen's University
Queen's University is a public university in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. Queen's University was started on October 16, 1841.
String quartet
A string quartet is a piece of music for four string instruments.
A string quartet can also mean the four people who play a piece for four string instruments.
The four instruments in a string quartet are almost always 2 violins, 1 viola and 1 cello. The reason that a double bass is not used is that it would sound too loud and heavy. The balance between 2 violins, viola and cello is considered ideal.
String quartets are the most popular form of chamber music. Many composers have written string quartets.
String quartet writing started in the 18th century. Italian composers like Sammartini (1698-1775) wrote music for two violins, viola and continuo. The continuo was either just a harpsichord or harpsichord with cello. Gradually composers started to leave the harpsichord out. The cello often played the same as the viola but one octave lower.
Composers of the Classical music period started writing cello parts which had an identity of their own. Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) wrote many string quartets, making it a very popular form. His quartets from op.33 were, he said, “written in a new and special way”. All four parts were very clear and individual. There were always four movements: a fast movement, a slow one, a Minuet and Trio and a fast Finale. Haydn often played in a quartet with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) and two other players. Mozart also wrote many string quartets and dedicated some of them to Haydn. Three of Mozart’s later ones were written for the King of Prussia who played the cello well, so Mozart gave the cello lots of difficult music to play.
By the time Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) was growing up, string quartets treated each of the four instruments as important. Beethoven wrote 16 string quartets. The middle ones became particularly famous and later composers took ideas from them, for example the slow introductions, and the idea of having a fast scherzo instead of a minuet and trio for one of the middle movements. Beethoven’s last quartets are very beautiful, but also very complicated and sometimes quite aggressive. Beethoven was becoming very frustrated because he was deaf and could not hear his own music, but he could imagine it all in his head. Franz Schubert (1797-1827) admired them and wrote several string quartets himself.
In the Romantic period many composers wrote string quartets: Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847), Robert Schumann (1810-1856), Johannes Brahms (1833-1897), Pyotr Tchaikovsky (1840-1893), Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) and many others. Some of them, like Dvořák, included folk song from their own country in their quartets.