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European History/A Background of European History

This book presents a broad overview of European history, from the end of the Roman empire to the present day, roughly from the fifth century to the twentieth century. This is, of course, a somewhat arbitrary period, but not a wholly unuseful one. Though archaeological evidence shows a Europe of continuous settlement over tens of thousands of years, the evidence for the political and sociological order of these communities is scarce if not completely absent. The history of early Europeans is, therefore, a history of their tools and settlements.

Neolithic Era (7,000 BCE to 3,000 BCE)
The Neolithic period was a period of human development characterized by the spread of agriculture and pottery. Tools such as the stone ax and microflint arose during this era, and are common throughout despite their origins predating the Neolithic era. The stone ax, though rudimentary in its design, is perfectly capable of forest clearance. It is only natural to presume that tools made of wood were also available to Neolithic man, and with the rise of agriculture, the need for wood yokes and plows. However, wood is not a durable material, and therefore archaeological finds are rare. Evidence for agrarian societies dates back to 9,000 BCE on the Asian continent and it is believed that agricultural practices spread throughout two millennia into Europe. There is an argument for independent development of technologies not influenced by any other source except the internal ingenuity of the community itself, though further investigation will be needed to give full credence to this idea. For our purposes, we will view the spread of Neolithic technology as reliant on societies being in contact with one another and will adhere to the east to west advancement theories.

The Aegean Sea and Southern Europe
The earliest evidence of European agriculture can be found at Knossos, Crete, and dates from the sixth millennium BCE. The Aegean Sea, with its numerous islands within a short distance and clement weather, provided ideal conditions for settlement. Successive waves of migration by different tribal peoples from the east led to the establishment of communities throughout the Aegean and also along with the coastal areas of modern day Turkey and Greece. It is no coincidence that the Romans believed themselves, descendants of Aeneas, the legendary hero of Troy, for in the legends and myths of Classical Europe lies the eastern pantheon of gods and heroes. Crete, one of the largest islands in the Aegean and situated between the coasts of North Africa, the Southern European peninsula, and the coast of Asia Minor, had more natural resources than smaller Aegean islands as well as enough landmass to support a sizeable population. These factors made it ideal for colonization. The settlers of Crete arriving in 6,500 BCE brought with them both the agricultural practices of the East and seafaring skills. These played a large part in their eventual rise as a major force in the Aegean.

On the mainland of central Greece in the region of Thessaly, hundreds of Neolithic dwellings have been discovered through field archaeology, aerial mapping, and spectrum analysis by satellites. The alluvial plains of the region were attractive to communities based on agriculture and animal husbandry. The analysis of sherds and dwellings show a common culture amongst these sites with the pottery showing a distinctive style and the "wattle and daub" technique of architecture.

Northern Europe
The prehistoric Pile Dwellings of Vingelz in Switzerland (3,000 BCE) with its stone ax "factory" and dwellings near a water source are typical of other agrarian sites found in France, Germany, Austria and many other parts of Europe. These neolithic "villages" built near the lake shores and wetlands of the Alps show a continuous settlement of 4,500 years. The Alps were no impediment to trade with archaeological finds of sherds, stone tools and dwelling structures showing similarities that can only be explained by contact and mutual exchange. These neolithic "villages" were probably trading and intermarrying across the Alps though this was in some respects limited by small population numbers and structured by family and tribal identification rather than nationhood.

It must be borne in mind by the reader that the regions of Europe developed at different times though extensive trade networks across Europe existed at this period. This fact does allow for a certain degree of uniformity within periods so that we can group early European periods according to archaeological finds, normally to do with tools, utensils, and weapons.

The Bronze Age (3,000 BCE to 700 BCE)
The rise of the Minoan (3000 BCE to 1100 BCE) and Mycenaean civilizations and their influence on the Aegean islands and mainland Greece shapes the earliest history of Southern Europe. The discovery of these early civilizations was a result of investigations by a new breed of 19th century archaeologists who studied the classical literature of the Ancient world for its historical value rather than its mythical content. The descriptions of kings and cities mentioned in the Iliad were investigated for ethnographical and geographical clues as to their location. Heinrich Schliemann and Arthur Evans were two pioneers in this type of investigation. Schliemann went in search of the city of Troy on the coast of modern day Turkey and Arthur Evans searched for the lost cities of the Aegean islands. Schliemann who had made his fortune from Crimean War contracts turned to an area of Turkey now called Hisarlik. Earlier investigations of the Hisarlik site had led some to propose that this was the fabled lost city of Troy mentioned in the Iliad which thousands of years later is still known to modern audiences by the tale of the wooden horse. Schliemann was the first major excavator of this site and his discovery of Troy is considered to be the first modern investigation of classical history in relation to its myths and literature. It was not long after Schliemann's discovery that Arthur Evans discovered the Minoan civilization on Crete. Schliemann was to make one more great discovery; the Mycenean civilization that dominated the Aegean islands. Of special importance to Europeans is the discovery of the Linear B tablets at Knossos (Crete) by Arthur Evans. These clay tablets contain a form of archaic Greek from the 2nd millennium BCE. This is the oldest Greek (European) written language known to us and therefore its importance in relation to Homer's Iliad is fundamental to our understanding and investigation of the Aegean world during the Bronze Age.

The Classical Period (700 BCE to 500 CE)

The rise of the Greek city states from 1000 BCE onwards constitute in part a continuation of the hegemony that the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations imposed upon the region. However the Greeks took a distinctly different view of the city state and developed forms of government that relied on citizen participation of which Athens in the fifth century BCE is considered to be the high point. One of the unusual aspects of Greek society was the existence of the city state of Sparta situated on the Southern Peloponnese. Sparta was a formidable regional military power and a rival to Athens throughout the classical period. It was of interest to such Athenians as the philosopher Plato who examines the various forms of government in his book The Republic including the warrior caste system as found in Sparta. The action of the 300 Spartans who defended the pass at Thermopylae against the invading army of Persia is still considered as encapsulating the essence of the Spartan city state. In the other city states of Greece, whether ruled by a dictator, king or democracy, the Spartan austerity and discipline directed towards the formation of a military state ruled by an elite oligarchy was both admired and feared. The history of mainland Greece is tied to the conflict between Athens and Sparta; both forming alliances with other Greek city states to create leagues. The Delian League representing the interests of Athens and her allies with its counterpart The Peloponnesian League led by Sparta. The idea of the city state as an independent power was so strong that Greek city states only overcame their enmity when faced with a foreign invasion that equally threatened them all. Once a foreign threat was removed the city states reverted back to open hostility towards one another. Eventually this internal friction between the Greek city states allowed the Macedonians to gain control of all Greece. The Romans viewed this Macedonian expansion as a threat and the conflict that would later arise would lead to Roman domination of all Greece.

The height of Athens in the 5th century BCE is also the starting point for the expansion of a Rome which was then a city surrounded by other tribes and city states. Rome's expansion started initially as a form of alliances or aggressions against other Latium kingdoms with a view to securing a central role in the region. Eventually as Rome's strength grew so did its expansion and soon the city states of Magna Graecia (Greek cities of southern Italy) felt obliged to form an alliance with Rome. Internal tribal divisions in Italy led to Rome's war with the Samnites (central Italian tribe) who were threatening the Greek city states of Italy. Rome's wars with Carthage further entrenched Rome's position in the region. Rome had subdued the Etruscans north of its city and the surrounding tribes. It had fought and been victorious against tribes in the central region. Southern Italy now came under Rome's hegemony as a guard against further Carthaginian expansion through their political alliances with Aegean kingdoms opposed to Roman power. Rome had become master of all Italy by 272 BCE. This domination of Italy led Rome to feel confident enough to launch military operations against Carthage. Italy which had for so long defended itself against Carthage's military was now on the offensive. Eventually Rome would attack Carthage itself in 148 BCE and divest them of their Aegean interests and Spain after they sued for peace. Rome had now extended its control to the whole of the Aegean and coastal areas of Spain. Carthage was destroyed and habitation of the city was disallowed by the Romans.

Rome's empire reached its zenith during the Augustan period (50 BCE to 20 BCE). Though Rome as a republic already had extensive territorial conquests, it was during the reign of Augustus that the empire achieved its greatest territorial expansion. From that period on Rome the Republic would never exist in anything except the imaginations of its historians and people. The reign of Augustus heralded the end of the republic and the beginning of the empire. Though the banner "SPQR" (Senatus Populusque Romanus - The Senate and People Of Rome) flew, its stated republican values now bowed to the will of the emperor. The Augustan period is seen as a golden age for Rome - the relative peace and stability during the reign of Augustus allowed Roman writers and arts to flourish. For the next 400 years Rome would be the greatest power in the world, though eventually, during the 3rd and 4th centuries CE, the pressures of empire led to Rome relinquishing its hold over its provinces.

Whilst the collapse of the Roman empire from the 4th century CE onward saw a contraction of the connections that tied the urbanized centers of Europe together (as evidenced in the decline of road building and maintenance), it did lay the foundation for the inward-looking reorganization of Roman provinces, which by the eleventh century had created an abundance of small regional states. From the eleventh century onward these small regional states started to change into the precursors of today's modern European nations. This was in part driven by the invention of banking, international commerce and the rise of mercantile states like Venice which controlled the trade from the East. The fifth century CE is, then, a useful starting point, for it forms a historical boundary between the ancient and modern.

Geography
Europe is not a discrete geographical unit, and it is too easy to see it as such, when in reality the cultures of Europe flow across its borders. The medieval peasants of Italy or Spain, for instance, shared far more in common with their close neighbours in North Africa than they did with their counterparts in Germany or England. Similarly, large parts of Eastern Europe, most particularly Russia, show significant cultural influence from Asian cultures, and were historically more closely connected with the east than the west.

A significant problem, therefore, is the porous nature of Europe's geographical borders. In the south, Europe's Mediterranean countries are only a short sail from the ports of North Africa. In the south-east, Europe is separated from Asia by nothing more than the short channel of the Bosphorus, and the most significant cultures in this region, such as the Byzantine Empire and the Ottoman Turks, were spread between modern Greece and Turkey. In Europe's far eastern reaches the continent is separated from Asia by the Ural mountains, and weather, rather than geography, is the most significant bar for travel between east and west. It is only to Europe's west, with the Atlantic Ocean, that we see a clear and significant geographical barrier.

The response to this problem is to accept that treating Europe as a discrete unit is somewhat arbitrary. It is essential, in any history, to define one's field of study, and to treat Europe as a unit is one way of achieving this aim. Providing one bears this in mind, the problem of European geography is not a problem at all. The somewhat arbitrary geographical borders of Europe need not detract from attempts to investigate the history of individual regions within the continent.

How To Approach Historical Investigation
History is frequently seen in narrative terms, as a story concerning the activities of our collective ancestors. It is true, to a great extent, that history is a form of storytelling, after all. However, unlike other forms of storytelling, history is closely based on real events and, as such, is shaped by certain rules and guidelines.

The most important of these govern how the historian reads source material. Before the historian can confidently say that a particular event occurred, he or she requires evidence. Much of the evidence is documentary in form, such as written records left by past generations in the course of everyday life. It is rare for these documents to have been written for the consumption of future generations, so it is important for the historian to understand the forces that shaped the production of these documents.

There are a number of criteria for this:

 * What motivated this person to act?
 * What were the prevailing attitudes at the time regarding this issue?
 * How did previous events cause this one?
 * What are similar events and how did they turn out?
 * How will this event matter in the future?
 * Why does this event occur now rather than earlier or later?
 * How was this event or person affected by forces in society? These forces could include the church, economic conditions, the government, geography, the education of the person as well as the general education of society, technology, nationalism, culture and traditions, and the class of the person.

This can be summed up in the 'ADAPTIL' method of evaluating historical sources:

 * 'A' - consideration of the author of the source
 * 'D' - consideration of the date of the source
 * 'A' - consideration of the source's intended audience
 * 'P' - consideration of the purpose of the source
 * 'T' - consideration of the tone of the source
 * 'I' - consideration of what the source implies (inference)
 * 'L' - consideration of the limitations of the source

Using these techniques will allow you to better grasp the events documented throughout this wiki book, and they will allow you to apply your knowledge outside of simple memorization.

All of our contributors hope you find this wiki book a useful method to learn more about European history - whether you are preparing for the Advanced Placement European History Test, a college final, or even if you simply desire to learn more about European history.

Fall of the Roman Empire

It is normal to speak of the fall of the Roman empire, but in many ways this description is too simple, and can be misleading. Certainly, the centralized state ruled by Augustus Caesar and his successors disappeared from history. However, the laws and language that Rome had given to a wide area of Europe persisted in its influence long after the empire had collapsed.

The Roman empire's later period was riddled with political and social turmoil. Much of the turmoil involved the failing Western empire. From the 3rd century, the Roman empire was under constant attack by internal and external forces. Tribes that Rome had never fully brought under Pax Romana saw in a weakened Rome the chance to either expand or raid. The cost of maintaining the furthest flung outposts and borders of the empire had meant that a professional army had to be maintained abroad permanently; a costly endeavour for any state in any period. Internally the militarization of the Roman empire meant that the army had become a powerful political force and in the Empire's later stages they played a major role in the choice of Emperor.

Though Rome had conquered east and west, this small city on the Alban Hills in the region of Latium was now finding itself stretched. With a large empire came the need to extend citizenship and this in turn led to emperors being drawn from all over the empire during its last years. These strains upon the very fibre of empire were drawing a line between the eastern and western provinces. The fact that the City of Rome had entered a period of decline and the perennial importance of grain imports from Egypt and other eastern provinces meant that Byzantium (now Istanbul, Turkey, and previously called Constantinople - the city of Constantine) would be used to bind the eastern Roman empire to the west. Constantine I, in attempting to use Constantinople as representative of full intergration of the eastern Roman empire into the Latin western empire, had inadvertently set up the ideal conditions for the breaking of the empire. After Constantine's death the empire in the west saw a period of turmoil as his three sons fought each other for control of Rome. Constantius II eventually became sole emperor after his two brothers were assassinated, and raised his cousin Constantius Gallus to the rank of Ceasar of the eastern empire. The empire was now two distinct powers; a fact that would shape the history of the Medieval period and the course of Christianity for the next thousand years.

The diminishing influence and power of Rome led to a retraction of the roman culture that had once dominated the provinces. Throughout Roman territories, non-Italian citizens whose forbears had adopted Rome as the axis of their world began to give more emphasis to their local identities—Gauls, Spaniards, Britons, North Africans filled the void left by the departure of Rome's armies and administration by reasserting their own culture and laws. Pax Romana as decreed by Augustus had already allowed local laws and customs to take precedence over Rome's laws as long as the provinces accepted military and taxation control. In this respect the end of the Roman empire meant that the provinces were now free to organise their own military and economic affairs. However they did not discard all that Rome had offered. Latin had by then become the lingua franca of politics and trade, and the better traits of Roman law were keenly adopted, especially in regards to codification of laws that were then made accessible to the public and applicable to all citizens. Hostile tribes who had once been repelled by Rome's military might now invaded across the Roman frontier, settling in imperial lands. These tribes were not alien to Roman culture with many of their leaders and people having constant contact with Rome through the political and economic machine of empire. After setting up parallel societies in the areas they invaded, it was only natural that they slowly mixed with the existing Roman population. This process went on for two to three centuries and resulted in a sweeping change in the makeup of European society within Rome's old boundaries. The Greek-speaking eastern portion looked now to Byzantium as its centre, and this division of the empire would become permanent in the Europe of later centuries.

Most significant of Constantine's acts as Emperor was to make a death bed conversion to Christianity. Although the empire moved to Constantinople, the new found papacy remained in Rome, as envisaged by Saint Peter - the symbolic first Pope. To some extent papal power became synonymous with that of the Western Emperor. The secular capital of the Western empire though was at Ravenna. Poor leadership and stress from invasion led to the fall of Rome in 410 to the Visigoths. The Western empire itself fell in 476 at Ravenna. The remaining Eastern empire was now referred to as the Byzantine empire, after its capital. Italy would not be a unified state again until the 19th century.

Barbarians Unite
As Roman power moved away, tribes from outside the old borders moved in to fill the vacuum. Visigoths set up a new kingdom in Iberia, while Vandals settled eventually in north Africa. In Britain, Germanic tribes arrived and settled on the east coast in 5CE. These settlers eventually formed small Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which filled the vacuum left by the departure of the Romans. Post-Roman Italy itself came under the sway of the Ostrogoths, whose most influential king, Theoderic, was hailed as a new emperor by the Roman Senate, and had good relations with the Christian pope, but kept his seat of power at Ravenna in northern Italy. Southern Italy and Sicily were under the sway of the Byzantine Emperor for several centuries during this period.

The province of Gaul, which had been the most prosperous of the Western Roman provinces, came into the possession of the Franks. The Roman-Gaulish society and its leaders eventually assimilated with the Franks, relying on their warriors for security and cementing connections of marriage with Frankish clans. The new Frankish kingdom came to include much of modern western Germany and northern France, its power within this region made clear by victories over the Visigoths and other barbarian rivals. Today the German word for France, Frankreich, pays homage to the Frankish kingdom of times past. The Merovingian dynasty, named after the legendary tribal king Merovech, was first to rule over the Frankish realm. Their most skilled and powerful ruler, Clovis, converted to Catholic Christianity in 496 as a promise for victory in battle. At Clovis's death, he divided his kingdom up among his many sons, whose rivalries touched off a century of intermittent and bloody civil war. Some, like Chilperic, were insane, and none were willing to give up lands or power to reunify the kingdom. The fortunes of the Merovingians ebbed and they faded into irrelevance.

The rise of a new ruling power, the Carolingian dynasty, was the result of the expanded power of the Majordomo, or "head of the house". Merovingian kings gave their majordomo extensive power to command and control their estates, and some of them used this power to command and control entire territories. Pepin II was one of the first to expand his power so much that he held power over almost all of Gaul. His son, also a majordomo, Charles Martel, won the Battle of Tours against invading Islamic armies, keeping Muslim influence out of most of Europe. "Martel", meaning "The Hammer", was a reference to his weapon of choice.

Martel's son, Pepin III the Short, after requesting support of the papacy, disposed of the Merovingian "puppets". The papacy gave Pepin permission to overthrow the Merovingians in order to secure Frankish support of the papal states, and protection against Lombard incursion. Pepin was declared rex Dei gratia, "King by the grace of God", thereby setting a powerful precedent for European absolutism, by arguing that it was the Christian God's will to declare someone a king.

(Both Pepin II and Pepin III were known as Pepin the Younger, as Pepin I was Pepin the Elder. However, Pepin III is also known as Pepin the Short, so that is the name that will be used here.)

Pepin the Short was the founder of the Carolingian dynasty, which culminated in his son Charlemagne, "Charles the Great". Charlemagne was also the first king crowned Holy Roman Emperor—the supposed successor to the Caesars and the protector of the Catholic Church. Charlemagne, whose empire expanded by conquest to encompass most of present-day Germany and France, created something of a renaissance for the intellectual world in the Frankish kingdom. Charlemagne set up monasteries and had monks copy out the Bible, in illuminated manuscripts, in rooms called scriptoria. For women, the cloth was one of the few ways they were allowed to expand their intellectual horizons and do something aside from birth children and work in the fields.

Charlemagne's sons followed Germanic tradition after his death and divided his kingdom between them during the 9th century. "East and West Francia" emerged, which in the following centuries would be called France and Germany (the latter known as the Holy Roman Empire). During this time, western Europe's settled regions came under increasing attack by the Vikings or Northmen, independent bands of seagoing warriors from Denmark and Scandinavia whose gods included Thor and Odin, and whose raids on wealthy Christian cities and churches were but one feature of their trade networks, which spanned the Atlantic and Europe from Newfoundland to Byzantium. Viking activity continued until Norway and Sweden reluctantly accepted Christianity in the 11th and 12th centuries. England, Ireland and French Normandy all saw substantial Viking settlement in this period, with important historical consequences.

In Spain, a Visigothic elective kingdom flourished, with continuous conflicts, until 711, when much of Spain fell quickly to the Muslim invaders. A great Muslim empire, called the Califato de Córdoba, flourished culturally and by arms. In the north mountains, small Christian kingdoms, Galiza, Asturias, Navarra and Aragón, persisted. The border with the Frankish empire, called Marca Hispanica, included Barcelona since 801—the origin of the Principality of Catalonia. The Muslims lost their last Spanish kingdom, Granada, in 1492, when the king of Aragón, Fernando, married the Queen of Castille, Isabel, in 1469. The dynastic union, producing grandson Carlos V, maintained the internal borders and different nationalities, laws and institutions of every one of the ancient kingdoms until the 18th century. Navarra was annexed in 1515 and still maintains its own laws and fiscality, as the Basque Country. Italy would begin to split into smaller kingdoms ruled by various different forms of government. However, the papacy would still be able to exert great force over most European people.

Eastern Europe, more thinly populated and more remote from the Roman borders, experienced numerous invasions and migrations during the 6th to 10th centuries. From their homeland in southern Russia, Slavic peoples expanded westward in the wake of the Germanic migrations, settling in the Balkans, Bohemia, Poland and eastern Germany and dividing their allegiances among Rome's successors. The Poles, Czechs, Croats adopted Latin Christianity, while the Bulgarian, Serbian and Russian kings accepted the Greek Byzantine rite. In the middle Bosnians, a small tribe of South Slavs, in highlands of Dinaric Alps, were neither, instead they adopted liturgy of their own and during the 10th century established their Bosnian Church, often confused with Bogomilism since Bosnian rulers showed great deal of tolerance toward them and even protected these people, sometimes with tragic consequences to their own way of life and certainly with historical consequences for entire Balkans. The Magyars, a tribe of mounted warriors ethnically akin to the Huns, entered Europe from the Russian steppes in the 9th century, fought a series of wars with the German emperors who succeeded Charlemagne, and eventually made their home in Hungary as a Latin-Christian kingdom (their king, Stephen, achieving sainthood). The peoples of the Baltic region, such as the Letts and Prussians, remained largely untouched by the Christian expansion during the early Middle Ages. In Russia, a kingdom at Kiev had been formed, incorporating both Slavic peoples and Scandinavian elements.

Great Britain was divided into various kingdoms after the Anglo-Saxon-Jute invasion, until the period of the Danish invasions. King Alfred unified much of England into one kingdom in the late 9th century. On October 10, 1066 William the Bastard, later William the Conqueror, initiated a Norman invasion of England with the Battle of Hastings. French control of England during this period is shown by much of the formal vocabulary in English, which stems from French.

In 1215 the barons of England forced King John to sign the Magna Carta. King John was particularly despotic. He abused his vassals, killed his child nephew Arthur, and brought the wrath of the Church upon the country in the form of a Papal Interdict (no church services were performed: no marriages, funerals, or masses). His barons ultimately united against him. While he was out hunting, they surrounded him giving him the option of signing the Magna Carta or death. The Magna Carta enshrined in law certain rights that the barons were entitled to. Absolute royal power had given way to rule by consensus and the cornerstone for Parliament had been placed.

Romanesque and Gothic Art

Romanesque is the name given to the architectural style found across Europe from the 10th to 13th century. Borrowing elements from Ancient Roman and Oriental Byzantine architecture in a fusion of opulence and utility. These are the churches of a rich and expanding Christian religion. The rise of religous orders and monasticism; the need to cater for larger congregations as populations expanded; the desire for patronage and remembrance as a christian benefactor and the all powerful need to build churches that reflect the beauty and power of religious sentiment are all key factors in Romanesque architecture. You can be in no doubt when entering the Cathedral at Notre Dame that your corporeal flesh is firmly of terra firma but your soul belongs to the realms of heaven. Many churches remain from this period which is a testament to the development of new methods of vaulting in masonry rather than wood. The style of the basilica gives way to loftier expressions of religious architecture. Romanesque architecture is designed to convey the spiritual power and authority of the church. Many castles were also begun at this time and extended later. The chief characteristics of Romanesque architecture are round-headed arches in windows, doors and arcades, rectangular piers, cylindrical columns, barrel vaults, groin vaults and paired windows. Late Romanesque churches may have ribbed vaults. Walls are thick and buttresses are flat. Doorways are often surmounted by sculptured tympanum, particularly with sculpture of Christ in Majesty. Interior wall were often frescoed with scenes from the Bible.

Gothic architecture developed out of Romanesque architecture in France in the early 12th century and spread across Europe, being modified in different regions. It lasted in some parts of Europe into the 1500s. Gothic architecture, as seen in many of the great churches and cathedrals of Europe, is distinguished by the use of the pointed, ribbed vault. Later ribbed vaulting became very complex and decorative, particularly in England, Spain and Eastern Europe. The development of projecting buttresses and flying buttresses allowed openings in the walls to be larger and vaults to be higher. Columns and piers often had a cluster of shafts supporting the ribs and mouldings above. Doors and windows have pointed arches. Doors were often set into richly carved portals and surrounded by figurative sculpture. Windows became increasingly large and were filled with stone tracery supporting the glazing. Stained glass became a more important art form than fresco in most of Europe except Italy.

Manuscript illumination was a major artistic form during the Late Middle Ages. Manuscripts were copied by hand, often by monks working at the scriptoria in a monastery. The books that were thus produced were often illuminated (decorated with illustrations and ornate borders). Often the initial letter on a page was illuminated with colour and small scenes. The style of decoration developed local characteristics, ranging from abstract and floral borders, to detailed landscapes and interior scenes of the Duc du Berry's Tres Riches Heures by the Limbourg brothers.

Poetry and music were carried between cities by travelling musicians called troubadours. These troubadours would give news from across Europe as they travelled and told songs and stories. One of the longest Germanic epic poems, Beowulf tells the tale of the killing of a giant beast that plagued a town. Another of these epics was the Song of Roland (based on the attack on the rear guard of Charlemagne's army by the Basques as Charlemagne led his men out of Spain).
 * Merry and bold is now that Emperour,
 * Cordres he holds, the walls are tumbled down,
 * His catapults have battered town and tow'r.
 * Great good treasure his knights have placed in pound,
 * Silver and gold and many a jewelled gown.
 * In that city there is no pagan now
 * But he been slain, or takes the Christian vow.

Papal Power in the Middle Ages
The papacy was a powerful institution in medieval Europe. Religion permeated every aspect of society and equally applied to king or farm worker. In medieval Europe the Pope was power-broker and peace-maker with immense spiritual authority in an age where the existence of heaven and hell and one's path to either was examined constantly. The shortness of life, diseases, infant mortality and plague all added to a preoccupation with death and the eternal soul; faith was the medieval mind's medicine. The Popes appointed Bishops, received tithes, issued canonical laws throughout Christendom. They could call for Crusades against any enemy of Christendom; raising armies led by the kings and knights of Europe.

This must be seen in context by considering the nature of papal power. Royal power derived from ownership of land, which was essential for raising armies of knights. The papacy held fewer direct assets, and to complicate matters, these could not be passed on by inheritance. This meant that a pope nearing death could only enrich his family by donating Church property, thus siphoning off the assets of the papal court instead of enlarging them. Therefore, the Pope had to rely on other forms of power, and his spiritual authority was always a significant alternative to direct territorial control.

The Pope also attempted through political means to control Europe. He pushed many kings into placing his bishops into powerful secular positions. In response to this European kings chose to put their own bishops into religious positions in a process called lay investiture. Emperor Henry IV sold many bishoprics until he attempted to depose Pope Gregory VII. In response Gregory VII excommunicated him and absolved his vassals of responsibility to him. Henry attempted to hold his kingdom together, but in the face of an angry population terrified for their souls, he went to the Alpine monastery of Canossa to beg the Pope to absolve him, standing outside the walls barefoot in the snow for three days before Gregory VII relented and removed his excommunication. For years the Pope and Holy Roman Empire battled over investiture until Pope Calixtus II and Holy Roman Emperor Henry V sat down and executed the Concordat of Worms. The Concordat gave the Pope the authority to put bishops into religious positions, and the Emperor the authority to put bishops into secular positions. This struggle that ended in the Concordat of Worms was known as The Investiture Controversy.

The ascetic aspects of Christ had always been prevalent in the lives of christians; from St Augustine to St Francis of Assisi the intellectual introspection and rejection of luxuries had always appealed to those seeking to draw closer to Jesus. This withdrawal to common community had existed in the Middle East at the birth of Christianity. The Jewish sect who hid the Dead Sea Scrolls in caves were just one of many early ascetic communities devoting themselves to a religious life. The Medieval period saw the development of ascetic orders based around monasteries. New orders were formed to follow certain religious aims. St Benedict was the first to mandate a way in which all orders should function. The Benedictine order followed very specific rituals. Among these rituals were precise times for each prayer; it is suggested that this led to the development of the clock, which was developed around the time of the Fourth Lateran Council. The Fourth Lateran Council set rules for worship for all monastic orders. These rules were heavily based on those of the Cistercians. Citaeux, the father of the Cistercian order, put all of the monasteries into an "Order", but also allowed them their own regional features. Monks not only developed the intellectual policies of Medieval Europe, but also helped among cities by offering food and services to those in need.

Society in the Middle Ages
Guilds, which controlled who could or could not work in a profession through education and vertical integration, were the first to form universities. Among them were the universities of Salamanca, Paris, and Bologna. Scholasticism, an education philosophy that emphasised teachings of the Bible and Aristotle, was the common form in education. Renaissance brought forth Humanism and the Liberal Arts.

Cities began to form as a place to house shops and guilds. Cities were required as centres for trade, and many of the famous medieval cities of Europe were ports. Within these cities money capitalism began to thrive. In the north, the Gilder became a powerful, almost universal currency. Europeans also reopened long-dormant trade routes with China and the Middle East. The Silk Road was traversed once again, and much of Europe's period of exploration and discovery was meant to find easier and faster routes to the East.

Advances in agriculture were also coming about. Fields became ploughed by large metal grates pulled by draft animals. Europeans also began to leave ground fallow to allow nutrients to come back into the soil, thus starting the concept of crop rotation. The systems of feudalism and manorialism grew with the new farming methods. Feudalism, the political arm of the Manorial system, organized society into a pyramid structure, with Lords ruling, and below them vassals. A vassal would receive land and in return, they would protect, and answer to those above them. Manorialism, the economic end of this system, was the way in which these large properties were managed. Vassals would farm the land and then trade grain to their Lord for protection, access to storage, a mill to grind the grain, and access to ovens to bake bread produced from this grain. Food was thus provided. However, the flour milled from medieval grain was often very coarse and harsh on the teeth. Water supplies were often polluted, so grain was also used to make ale which was the main beverage of northern Europeans, while wine remained the potable of choice for southern Europeans.

História da Europa/Antecedentes da História da Europa vi:Lịch sử châu Âu/Mở đầu:Hoàn cảnh lịch sử châu Âu


text:
Talk:Samantha Reid (synchronised swimmer)

"Mermaid"?
From today's "Did you know..." on the Wikipedia front page: "... that 2012 Olympic synchronized swimmer Samantha Reid is a 'Mermaid'?" Huh? What does this mean? Nothing in the article serves to highlight this factoid, and I can't seem to find any reference to it anywhere I've looked (even the did you know nomination simply mentions this without explaining it in the least bit). Do we really want people to click through to the article only to not find the factoid anywhere on this page? I would suggest that someone who knows what this is supposed to mean add a brief mention of it to the article to prevent any such confusion. Arathald (talk) 20:24, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Already there - "and a member of the Gold Coast Mermaids in 2012." Miyagawa   (talk)  20:33, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
 * I just read over the article again, and didn't even see it after you pointed out. I had to search for it to find it. Apparently, I can't read today :| Sorry for the false alarm. Arathald (talk) 20:43, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
 * No worries, better to be safe than sorry! :) Miyagawa   (talk)  20:59, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
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source: wikimedia

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Talk:Barbara F. Lee

Promotional edits
I have reverted this edit. It has a number of issues. First, it removes well-sourced material without explanation. Second, the only sourcing given is WP:SPS, to Lee's own website, and it is used to make unduly self-serving claims. The laundry list of external links to reports published by Lee's foundation is promotional. Overall, there may be a WP:COI issue with these edits. Please do not restore without discussing and obtaining consensus here first. Safehaven86 (talk) 22:30, 28 October 2016 (UTC)

title: Talk:Barbara F. Lee


text:
Talk:Stroganov family

Untitled
Some cleanup undertaken. Man vyi 12:53, 11 August 2006 (UTC) SaraDickinson 14:54, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Verify source
I fixed the broken ISBN in the source:

Kuznetsov S. Pust Francia pouchit nas "tancovat". Sozdanie Strogonovskogo dvorca v Peterburge i svoeobrazie pridvornoi kultury Rossii v pervoi polovine XVIII veka.[verification needed] SPb., 2003. - 512 p. - ISBN 978-5-303-00109-1

The valid ISBN came from the Russian version of the Wiki article. However, when I use the magic link created by the valid ISBN to access the "Book sources" page and I look at WorldCat and Google Books, the title of the book on those sites is very different from the title in this article and the Russian article. Knife-in-the-drawer (talk) 18:31, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
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title: Talk:Stroganov family


text:
Algafari

Algafari is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:

 * Nidal Algafari (born 1965), Bulgarian television director
 * Yousef Algafari (born 1972), Saudi Arabian chief executive

title: Algafari


text:
Midwest Athletic Club

The Midwest Athletic Club is a historic athletic club building located at 6 N. Hamlin Ave. in the West Garfield Park community area of Chicago, Illinois. The club was built in 1926-28 under the direction of a committee of West Side business leaders. The thirteen-story building's design featured ornamental terra cotta, large arched windows on the third floor, and a mansard roof; it also provided views of Garfield Park, the north side of which was across the street. Its facilities included an Olympic-sized swimming pool, a gymnasium and exercise rooms, handball courts, billiard rooms, a library, dining rooms, and a ballroom. The club grew to include 2000 members in its first year, most of them businessmen and their families; however, the building entered receivership in 1930 and was converted into a hotel.

The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 18, 1984.

title: Midwest Athletic Club


text:
Welcome to Leith

Welcome to Leith is a 2015 American documentary film directed by Michael Beach Nichols and Christopher K. Walker about white supremacist Craig Cobb's attempt to take over the North Dakota city Leith. The film premiered on January 26, 2015 at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival and, after a limited theatrical release on September 9, was broadcast on PBS' series Independent Lens on April 4, 2016.

Background
Leith is a town which had a population of 16 in 2010. In May 2012, Craig Cobb, an American Canadian neo-Nazi, moved to Leith with the intention of building a community of people sharing the ideology of neo-Nazism and gaining the electoral majority. He purchased 12 plots of land.

Production
Nichols and Walker, who are based in New York, flew to North Dakota two months after they read an August 2013 New York Times article about Craig Cobb's scheme to transform Leith into a white-supremacist town. They made three trips to Leith within an 8-month period, each around 4 weeks long, for the production of the film. 5 months were spent editing the film. In June 2014 Nichols and Walker launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds for the production of the film. They surpassed their $60,000 goal, raising $64,751. The directors approached the project in many ways as a documentary version of a horror/western—the residents of Leith were scared and confused and felt as if one wrong move could end in violence. They aimed to capture the sense of fear and isolation that residents living in a town of 24 people 70 miles from anything experienced when Cobb made his takeover intentions public.

Reception
On July 25, 2017, Welcome to Leith was nominated for an Emmy for Best Documentary by the News & Doc Emmy Awards. The film received largely positive reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, it holds a 98% score based on 43 reviews, with an average rating of 7.7/10. The site's consensus states: "As disturbing as it is thought-provoking, Welcome to Leith offers an uncomfortable — and essential — glimpse into a part of society many Americans would much rather ignore." Metacritic reports a 78 out of 100 rating based on 16 critics.

Indiewire critic Eric Kohn gave the documentary an A− grade, described it as "a stunning portrait of First Amendment rights pushed to their extremes".

title: Welcome to Leith


text:
召集

Verb

 * 1) to gather together; to convene; to assemble

Noun

 * 1) a call to form a group
 * 2) a summons
 * 3) conscription

Verb

 * 1) to call together into a group
 * 2) to summon
 * 3) to draft; to conscript

title: 召集


text:
Wikiversity:Publishing

This page is initally a brainstorm of the implications of and issues involved in publishing a paper on Wikiversity. (Please edit any errors on this page, and/or add any comments, suggestions, or questions you have.)

One major question that this page aims to address is: "What limitations (if any) does publishing on Wikiversity impose on further use, by the author, of their work?"

GFDL and author's rights
If you are the author of a work, you have the copyright of that work - writing an article on Wikiversity does not change that fact. However, adding content to Wikiversity means that you license this work under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License 3.0 and GFDL license. This means that you give other people the right to use and redistribute copies of this work under the terms of that license. But you still own the copyright to that work.

Reuse of work
Question: If you want to submit the paper to a journal - does the journal have to publish the paper under the terms of the license, or can you relicense the work for another use?

Benefits of publishing on Wikiversity

 * Wide audience
 * Research community "in situ" to give critical feedback
 * Open access - no journal subscriptions required to read your paper

title: Wikiversity:Publishing


text:
Maria Victoria Barros

Maria Victoria Borghetti Barros (born 1 February 1992) is a Brazilian politician and businesswoman. She has spent her political career representing Paraná, having served as a representative in the state legislature since 2019.

Personal life
Coming from a political family, Barros is the daughter of Ricardo Barros, a government minister, state deputy, and former mayor of Maringá, while her mother Cida Borghetti is the governor of Paraná. At her wedding in 2017, Barros had to be shielded from egg-throwing leftist protesters, who were disgruntled with Barros and her parents' strong support of the Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff.

Political career
Barros was elected with about 44,870 votes to the Legislative Assembly of Paraná in 2014. She took office on her 23rd birthday. She was re-elected to her post in the 2018 elections.

title: Maria Victoria Barros


text:
Portal:Learning Materialsnew/Learning Materialsnew topics

 * Learning materials - general discussion of Wikiversity learning materials.
 * Portal:Learning Projects - other types of learning projects
 * List of websites at the Wikibooks "Blended Learning" textbook.
 * Research collaboration


text:
Introduction to Reading English/Verbs

A verb is a word or group of words expressing an action, a condition or a state of being.

Categories of Verbs

 * 1) Action verbs describe physical or mental action.
 * 2) * Transitive verb is a verb having a direct object.
 * 3) * Intransitive verb is a verb never having a direct or indirect object to receive its action.
 * 4) Auxiliary (linking) verbs connect the subject of a sentence to a noun or adjective that describes the subject.
 * 5) Modal (helping) verbs are used before action or linking verbs to convey additional information regarding aspects of possibility or time.

title: Introduction to Reading English/Verbs


text:
Talk:Dingdong Dantes

spanish ancestry?
I'm tired of people categorizing filipinos as having spanish ancestry whitout any formal proof and references this is the spanish fantasy your tipycal filipinos have so I'm erasing it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Anen87 (talk • contribs) 09:43, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * This comment is obviously racial and hateful to us Filipinos. This person needs to be educated about the Philippines' history. The Philippines was occupied by Spanish conquistadors and was made a colony of Spain for more than 300 years THUS, the Spanish ancestry... Deleting above comment...
 * I'm putting back Anen87's post that the person above me deleted. First of all, I don't think his statement is racist and hateful against Filipinos because he/she is just explaining that not all Filipinos are of Spanish descent. Second, 300 years as a Spanish colony doesn't mean that everyone in the Philippines is of Spanish descent. If that's true then all Vietnamese people are of French descent and all Koreans are of Japanese descent then? And yes, I'm also a Filipino but I really find your statement as an exaggeration. There is no known source of Dingdong Dantes stating he is of Spanish descent. Also, just because his last name is Spanish doesn't mean he's already of Spanish descent. I've met several people who have Spanish last names but they aren't of Spanish descent too. Thus, I'll delete the Spanish ancestry part. Last, according to Wikipedia policy, you shouldn't delete any comments made by someone in a Discussion page, hence I'm putting it back. Sairyu (talk) 07:32, 11 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh wait, nevermind. I thought the Spanish ancestry part was still there.--Sairyu (talk) 07:52, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Neutral Point of View
Please rewrite the article in neutral point of view... —Preceding unsigned comment added by <IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 05:17, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Great for a Filipino
I added this 25 Sexiest Men of the World which listed the only Filipino, plust Dantes Bench and Cosmopolitan stars.--Florentino floro (talk) 12:32, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Status
In a relationship with model/actress Max Collins — Preceding unsigned comment added by <IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 02:44, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
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Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 09:54, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

title: Talk:Dingdong Dantes


text:
IB Music/Introduction

Back to IB Music

Definition of Music
In order to properly study music, we must have a working definition of what music is. Defining music is more difficult than it sounds. One has to distinguish between the well-known music of Mozart, the random noise of traffic, and the bizarre styles of contemporary music that might combine traffic and Mozart!

A particularly good example of music that pushes the traditionally accepted boundary of music is 4’33" by John Cage. This piece consists of complete silence for four minutes and thirty-three seconds. The music of the piece is created by the audience in their shuffling, coughing, wondering what happened to the music, etc.

A definition of music is an individual definition, but it must discern between random street noise and contemporary music, or between the ordered music of Haydn and the ordered sound of a speech. One good definition that might serve as a starting point for the reader is:

Music is organized sound with musical intention.

First and foremost, music must have some sort of sound. Even in bizarre examples such as 4'33", there still is sound- it’s just not produced by the performer. This sound needs to have some sort of musical intention as well. A street corner produces noise, but there is no musical intention, so it is not music. The sound must also be organized in some manner. Otherwise, a composer could pronounce a street corner to be “music.” The composer must intervene at some point to control the sound. Though 4’33” is comprised of randomly produced sounds by the audience, Cage exerts his control over the sound by limiting it to four minutes and thirty-three seconds. Also, as obvious as it might seem, the intention needs to have a 'musical' intention, not just an intention. Otherwise, a speech, which is organized sound with intention, would be considered music as well. Sound can only be music if someone wants it to be music.

Elements of Sound
The reason we can have music is because sounds can be different. There are three characteristics of sound that differentiate one sound from the next. These are:

 * Pitch
 * Timbre
 * Dynamic

Pitch
Formally defined, pitch is the frequency of a sound wave. More loosely, it is the "highness" or "lowness" of a sound. This is what distinguishes an A from a B.

Timbre
Timbre is also called the “tone quality” or “tone color.” This is the characteristic of a sound that makes a piano sound different from a trumpet or violin, even when they all are playing at the same pitch.

Dynamic
The formal definition of a dynamic is the amplitude of a sound wave. Loosely, this is how loud the sound is.

Elements of Music
IB analyzes a piece of music using seven characteristics. These are:

 * Melody
 * Harmony
 * Rhythm
 * Form
 * Texture
 * Medium
 * Context

Melody
Melody is the most difficult of the characteristics to define. While there is no good formal definition of "melody," it is loosely, the “song of the song,” or the “hummable” part of a piece. A melody is comprised of multiple musical “sentences,” called phrases. These phrases are then made up of steps and leaps. Steps are short risings or fallings of the melody (e.g. an A to a B or an F to an E). Leaps are longer risings or fallings of the melody (e.g. an A to a C or an F to a D).

Harmony
Harmony is the chord structure of a piece that supports a melody. While a melody can stand on its own, harmonies cannot stand on their own- they are only support. At any given point, a harmony has varying degrees of consonance and dissonance. Dissonance is a stressful sound that feels a need to find resolution. Consonance is the resolution of the dissonance and therefore the release of stress.

Form
The form of a piece is the overall structure it takes. For example, a piece might take the most common, ternary, form (ABA). In this form, a section of music will be played and a different section will follow it. After the second section is played, the piece returns to the original section of music and plays it over again.

Texture
The texture of a piece refers to the layers of sound that are heard. There are three possible textures of a piece of music:

 * Monophonic
 * Homophonic
 * Polyphonic

Monophonic Texture
Monophonic texture is a single, unaccompanied melodic line.

Homophonic Texture
Homophonic texture is a single melodic line that is accompanied by a harmony.

Polyphonic Texture
Polyphonic texture are multiple melodic lines playing at the same time.

Some useful sites with short listening examples of the different types of textures http://gmajormusictheory.org/Listening/textures/textures.html http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/music/musicalelements/texturerev1.shtml

Medium
Medium refers to the instruments that play a piece of music. If the piece being analyzed is a symphony, then the medium will be an orchestra. If the piece being analyzed is a violin sonata, then the medium will be a violin and a piano. To analyze the medium of a piece, one needs to have a strong understanding of the various commonly used instruments. Instruments to know are as follows:

Orchestral Instruments

Strings

 * Violin
 * Viola
 * Violoncello (abbr. Cello)
 * Double Bass

Woodwind

 * Piccolo
 * Flute
 * Oboe
 * English Horn
 * Bb(most common)Clarinet
 * Bass Clarinet
 * Bassoon

Other, perhaps less used Woodwinds

 * (Contra) Bass Flute
 * Oboe d'Amore
 * Bass Oboe
 * Contrabassoon
 * Contrabass Clarinet
 * Several Different Keys of Clarinet

Brass

 * Cornet
 * Bugle
 * Trumpet
 * French Horn
 * Baritone
 * Euphonium
 * Trombone
 * Tuba
 * Sousaphone

Percussion

 * Snare Drum
 * Tympani
 * Bass Drum
 * Triangle
 * Chimes
 * Xylophone
 * Marimba
 * Glockenspiel

Other Commonly Used Instruments
Strings
 * Harp
 * Guitar
 * Lute
 * Harpsichord (Found in Baroque Music, predecessor to Piano)
 * Piano (sometimes considered percussion)

Woodwind
 * Saxophone (Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Baritone, Bass, Double Bass, Contra Bass, Sub-Contra Bass)
 * Recorder

Context
The context of a piece of music refers to the general time period of the work and external influences on the piece of music. E.g. the composer’s life, musical styles of the time, instruments of the period, political happenings, etc. There are six major musical periods we will study. In chronological order, these are:

 * Medieval
 * Renaissance
 * Baroque
 * Classical
 * Romantic
 * 20th Century

These elements will be used throughout our study of music to analyze specific pieces. A good understanding of these elements aids one in writing the analysis essay because it provides a starting point for writing your essay.

Back to IB Music

title: IB Music/Introduction


text:
User:LibUp1050/TWA/Earth/2

Shape and structure

Tectonic plates

Surface

Atmosphere

Weather, climate, and water cycle

Orbit and rotation

title: User:LibUp1050/TWA/Earth/2


text:
носити

Etymology
From, iterative form of.

Verb

 * 1) to

Usage notes

 * носити is in the class of Old Church Slavonic abstract verbs. Its counterpart, is a concrete verb.

Etymology
, iterative form of (whence also ).

Verb

 * 1)  to carry, bring
 * 2)  to wear
 * 3)  to produce, bear (fruit)
 * 4)  to bear

Etymology
From, iterative form of (whence also ).

Verb

 * 1) to carry

Usage notes

 * and are in the class of Ukrainian s. Their counterparts,  and, are s.

title: носити


text:
Cryptography/Proportionality of Secrecy

"The more secret information you know, the more successful the concealment of the plaintext."

It is important to realize that any crypto system in its design is an exercise in resource allocation and optimization.

If we were to return to the postal analogy used in the discussion of Asymmetric Ciphers. Suppose Alice has a secret message to send to Bob in the mail. Alice could put the message in her lock box and use Bob's padlock to lock it allowing Bob to open it with his key, as describe earlier. But if it were a really important message or Alice and Bob had a higher expectation of the opponent they wished to thwart (Bob's girlfriend knows where Bob keeps his keys) Alice and Bob might want to resort to a more complicated crypto system. For example Bob could have multiple keys, one he keeps on his key chain, one he keeps in a rented Post Office box and one that is in a box in a Swiss bank vault. Bob might welcome this sort of security for really serious messages but for day to day messages between Bob and Alice Bob will no doubt find a daily flight to Switzerland rather expensive inconvenient. All crypto systems must face a resource trade-off between convenience and security.

title: Cryptography/Proportionality of Secrecy


text:
The Black Vampyre: A Legend of St. Domingo

The Black Vampyre; A Legend of St. Domingo is an American short story published in 1819 by the pseudonymous Uriah Derick D'Arcy. It is credited as "the first black vampire story, the first comedic vampire story, the first story to include a mulatto vampire, the first vampire story by an American author, and perhaps the first anti-slavery short story." The Black Vampyre tells the story of a black slave, who is resurrected as a vampire after being killed by his captor; the slave seeks revenge on his captor and achieves it by stealing the captor's son and marrying the captor's wife. D'Arcy sets the story against the conditions that led to the Haitian Revolution.

Plot summary
The novel opens with Mr. Anthony Gibbons recalling his family history. He begins his recollection with his ancestors leaving Guinea on a French ship and arriving in St. Domingo, where they are sold into slavery. They all die shortly after being sold, with the exception of one small boy who is sold to Mr. Personne. Mr. Personne kills the boy and throws the body into the ocean, but the body washes ashore and rises in the moonlight. Mr. Personne tries to kill the boy again, deciding to burn the boy in a pyre. Instead, the boy tosses Mr. Personne into the fire, resulting in Mr. Personne becoming badly scarred.

Mr. Personne regains consciousness in his own bed, and he is wrapped in bandages. He calls out for his wife, Euphemia, and his infant son. She informs him that there was nothing left of their son but his skin, hair, and nails. After hearing of his son's death, Mr. Personne also dies.

Euphemia marries two more times. Her second and third marriages were to Mr. Marquand and Mr. Dubois respectively. While mourning the death of Dubois, she is approached by a colored Moorish Prince character, who is led in hand by Zembo, a European boy. Euphemia is enamored by the Prince, and she quickly marries him despite the chaplain's resistance.

Following their wedding, at midnight, the Prince takes Euphemia to her family graveyard. The Prince and Zembo dig up her son's grave. The Prince uses the blood from her son's heart to fill a golden goblet, which he then forces Euphemia to drink from. The Prince tells Euphemia that she is not allowed to tell anyone what happened in the graveyard. Euphemia faints, and she wakes up in her first husband's grave, only to find out that she has become a vampire.

Then, the Prince raises all three of her past husbands from the dead. Mr. Marquand and Mr. Dubois duel, which ends with Zembo and the Prince driving a stake into the two men. The Prince assures Euphemia that her second and third husbands cannot be resurrected again. Then the Prince forgives Mr. Personne for attempting to kill him when he was a boy, revealing that he was the survivor of the drowning and burning from the French slave ship. As a sign of good will, the Prince presents Zembo as Mr. Personne's dead son and explains that Zembo's education has been taken care of.

With instructions from the Prince to journey to Europe, the group stops at a cave where there is a vampyre ball taking place. Inside the cave, there are countless armed slaves listening to the Vampyre monarchs. The monarchs believe that the immortals existed before the mortals and that all the various immortals should rally and take up arms in the name of emancipation. It is also revealed that the only way to kill a vampyre is by using a stake or giving them a cure. However, before any action can be taken, the group is attacked by soldiers, and everyone is killed, except for Mr. Personne and Euphemia.

Both Mr. Personne and Euphemia take the cure and become human again. As a side effect, Mr. Personne ends up sixteen years younger than his wife. Zembo emerges alive, revealing that he was the one who gave the soldiers information on where to find them and how to kill the vampyres. As a reward, he is renamed Barabbas and baptized. Euphemia is revealed to be pregnant with the Prince's son, a mulatto.

In the present day, Mr. Anthony Gibbons is revealed to be the lineal descendant of the Prince's son. Gibbons is also revealed to have bowel troubles, which he fears could be his cravings as a vampyre.

Characters
In order of appearance:

 * Mr. Anthony Gibbons is the lineal descendant of Euphemia and the Prince, who resides in New Jersey. He experiences cravings due to him being part vampyre.
 * The Prince is a former slave from Guinea and a vampyre. Mr. Personne attempts to kill him through different means, but none ever work. He kidnaps Personne's son, raising him as Zembo. He returns many years later, and seduces and marries Euphemia. He also resurrects Euphemia's three husbands, killing two of them. He is betrayed by Zembo and killed at the ball.
 * Mr. Personne is a slave captor, who owns and attempts to kill the Prince as a child. He is badly burned when his plan to burn the vampyre backfires, and he later dies when told his son has died. He is resurrected by the Prince and turned into a vampyre along with his wife, Euphemia. He cures himself along with his wife and returns to being human.
 * Euphemia is the wife of Mr. Personne, who later marries twice more before marrying the Prince. Her last three husbands are dead, but they are resurrected by the Prince. She is turned into a vampyre by the Prince, but takes the cure upon his death and returns to being human. She becomes pregnant with the Prince's son.
 * Zembo is the Prince's page, and the son of Euphemia and Mr. Personne. He is raised by the Prince. He informs the raiding soldiers where to find the vampyres and how to kill them. As a reward, he is baptized with the name Barabbas.
 * Mr. Marquand and Mr. Dubois are the second and third husbands (respectively) of Euphemia, who are raised and killed by the Prince and Zembo.

Historical and literary context
Critics debate The Black Vampyre to be the first American vampire story, but they agree that it is the first black vampire story. Scholars have also noted the text's proximity to the Haitian Revolution, a period of civil unrest in Haiti from 1791 to 1804. In The Black Vampyre, D'Arcy draws a correlation between vampirism, Haitian obeah practices, and the Haitian slave revolution. There are other texts from the nineteenth century that look at monstrous, or inhuman, characters and their ties to the Haitian revolution. In Sarah Juliet Lauro's introduction to The Transatlantic Zombie, Lauro denotes a similar correlation between a monstrous creature and slave revolts in the Haitian Revolution, noting that "the Haitian zombie is in itself a representation of the people's history—as slaves and as slaves in revolt."

In the nineteenth-century, there was an emergence of fiction writing centered around monstrous creatures and the undead. "...Mary Shelley's Frankenstein also gave rise to vampire stories by both Dr. J. Polidori and Lord Byron," and the vampire story referenced by J. Polidori is directly linked to the history of The Black Vampyre. The New Monthly Magazine in London published "The Vampyre: A Tale by Lord Byron" in April 1819, but it was later revealed that the text's true author was John William Polidori. "The Vampyre," by John Polidori, was first published in April 1819. The Black Vampyre is thought by some scholars to be a text written in response, benefiting from "The Vampyre"'s popularity.

The Black Vampyre has also been viewed as a commentary on the Knickerbocker Group, condemning them to be "vampires" that benefit at the expense of others. The work criticizes plagiarism and authorship in the early-19th-century literary scene.

Critical reception
While many early nineteenth-century writers were interested in race and religion, their audiences were entranced by scandalous works. Critics tend to compare The Black Vampyre to The Vampyre, a short story by John William Polidori due to the way that it references Lord Byron's "The Giaour." The Black Vampyre is stated to be "an American response" to Polidori's work. Stemming from that, critics find that the story mixes American with African traditions, noting that the text takes from obeah practice, specifically with the "fetish oath and the use of narcotic potions to make the living seem dead." The story "draws on this obeah literature to enmesh it with vampirism," mixing the convention with vampirism. Some critics noted this to feature "what is probably the second English-language prose vampire." Critics also debate the ambiguity of the story. One example listed by Duncan Faherty is the vampiric nature of Zembo and whether he is a vampire or not; this is often debated among critics with some noting that regardless, "most children appearing in nineteenth-century literature were victims."

Allusions and literary references
Throughout the text, there are multiple classical allusions (including references to the Bible, Greek/Roman mythology, and Renaissance authors), as well as contemporary allusions (including references to plays, poetry, and short stories).

The story starts off with a letter from D'Arcy to the author of "Wall-Street," and hopes that both of them will be remembered in the Auction room of the Temple of the Muses. Wall-Street is a play with an unknown author. It is set in New York City and centers on the theme of finances.

After throwing a slave boy in the ocean and witnessing him rising back up, Mr. Personne is afraid. During this description, there are three lines (192–194) from Book 1 of Lucan's De Bello Civili or Pharsalia. These lines are written in the original Latin. Another reference to the Antiquity occurs when Mr. Personne is tossed into the pyre, and the narrative compares him to Hercules. This is a reference to Book 9 of Metamorphoses by Ovid, in which Hercules puts Lichas in a pyre and burns away his mortal body. Later on in the text, when Euphemia meets the Prince, she notices that he is both beautiful like Helen and ugly like Medusa.

Renaissance authors are invoked as well. In the novel, when Mr. Personne plans on sacrificing the slave boy to Moloch, in which the footnote references Moloch as a fallen angel from Paradise Lost by John Milton. There is also a line from Two Gentlemen of Verona by Shakespeare during Euphemia's first encounter with the Prince.

Mixture
Throughout the text, the mixture of blood appears in many different forms, one being the physical breaching of Euphemia's skin by the Prince. Another example is when Euphemia "gives birth to the mixed-race and half-vampire child of her later husband, the prince." The child then goes on to New Jersey, mixing Haitian, African, and American cultures with religion. In The Black Vampyre, there is a concern with a mixture of races, personified in the birth of the mixed-race son of the Black Vampyre. "…it also introduces a new, mixed-race, vampiric baby…" At this point in American history, both politicians and literary authors were commenting on this social concern of racial mixture and purity. Former American president, Thomas Jefferson, wrote several pieces that discussed racial mixture, such as his Notes on the State of Virginia.

Vampirism
The vampire concept was "beginning to appear as a metaphor for economic or exploitation." D'Arcy makes slavery central in his work "by making his titular vampire black and specifically an African brought to New World enslavement." The prince is a vampire and typically vampires are immortal beings with sharp fangs that they use to suck the blood of their victims, and they then turn the victim into their follower. Very common powers that vampires share in stories are that they have immense strength and a hypnotic (sometimes sensual) control over their victims' minds. The Prince displays a few of these characteristics, such as blood-sucking and hypnotic control over Euphemia. Some critics note that the vampyres are revolting against capitalism, noting: "The developing dorms of capitalism are emphatically linked with both the vampire sucking life from the living and the horror of dead-but-undead institutions...reflecting too on the ostensibly rational origins of the United States that have promoted a different turn to mythology and monstrosity." The close cousins of the vampyre is the zombie, "'whom slaves of West African descent are said to have believed were "returned soul[s], revenant[s]," a word that appears as early as 1797 in travel writing about St. Domingue" which is "the quintessential monster of plantation slavery: it “represents, responds to, and mystifies fear of slavery, collusion with it, and rebellion against it." Like the zombie, the vampyre is connected to a "colonial and post-colonial history of oppression."

Religion
Connecting the story to its Haitian cultural origins, many of the characters were from Central Africa, which had been Catholic for "a quarter millennium prior to the Haitian Revolution, and that they were thus possessed of a collective religious habitus that esteemed both Catholic saints and the spiritual beings and ancestors of traditional African religion as central to their quotidian existence and religious life." The story itself contains a mixture of biblical references and allusions with mythological references. D'Arcy connects vampirism with Haitian obeah practices, and the acts of being a vampire to that of mythological figures like Hercules. The name Barabbas "recalls the criminal who was freed in Jesus’s place; like the biblical Barabbas, Zembo is saved from death-but, ironically, only by a detour into vampirism...even as the text uses names to give authority to some characters, it also uses the Personnes’ allegorical names to imply that this story could have happened to any planter in St. Domingue and that it, at least in part, repeats familiar stories."

Author
The text was originally published under the known literary pseudonym, Uriah Derick D'Arcy. An 1845 reprinting of the text by The Knickerbocker attributed the work to Robert C. Sands, a writer of the magazine along with Lydia Maria Child, author of "The Quadroons." However, some critics remain convinced that the true author is Richard Varick Dey, a fellow Columbia graduate of Sands'. Dey was born on January 11, 1801, and attended Theological Seminary in New Brunswick in 1822. During his time as a reverend, the overseer of the Congregational church in Greenfield Hill, Connecticut and the pastor of the Reformed Church in Vandewater Street, New York City.

Publication history
The Black Vampyre had two editions printed in the United States in 1819. On June 21, 1819, the New York Daily Advertiser announced the publication of The Black Vampyre and marketed sales began two days later on June 23, 1819. The second edition was published two months later on August 30, 1819.


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Seymour Harris Partnership

Seymour Harris Partnership is an architectural partnership based in Birmingham, England. Buildings designed by the practice include Colmore Gate in Birmingham, Queensgate Market in Huddersfield and St David's Hall in Cardiff.

title: Seymour Harris Partnership


text:
Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2012 July 8

= July 8 =

store offline
I was looking for The Weather Channel online store. It's nowhere to be found. What's going on with everything regarding The Weather Channel online store?<IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 02:43, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * At they are saying they stopped doing online orders last fall. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 03:10, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Why's that?<IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 03:36, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Feel free to ask them yourself. Here is their contact information. -- McDoob  AU  93  04:08, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * I would guess that not enough people are willing to pay for the privilege of advertising The Weather Channel to make it profitable. (For brands that can convince people to do so, like Harley-Davidson, it's a good business model.)  If I were advising TWC, I'd say they need to spice up their plain text logo, perhaps by adding a tornado.  StuRat (talk) 05:47, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Weather patterns tend to vary. No one has control over them.<IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 20:22, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Yes, but how is that relevant to your question ? Or did you mean to respond to this question about moving the jet stream, over at the Science Ref Desk: Reference_desk/Science ? StuRat (talk) 20:46, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

I was responding to your suggestion of spicing up The Weather Channel logo. A tornado is not the only weather pattern.<IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 04:18, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Yes, but who says their logo has to represent every possible weather pattern ? That would make it look rather busy.  A picture of fog might be a bit dull, too, don't you think ?  Since a tornado and hurricane and maybe a lightning bolt are the most interesting common weather phenomena, I'd go with one of those.  A hurricane isn't quite as recognizable, since you can only see it's characteristic shape when viewed from space.  A lightning bolt might work too, but there are lots of logos that already use that for products dealing with electricity (I get over 10x as many Google hits as for tornadoes).  Of course, if you insist of representing mundane weather; a raindrop, a snowflake, a cloud, and the Sun might work.  StuRat (talk) 05:28, 9 July 2012

 * I hate to bring the bad tidings to a novomundane citizen, but all weather that occurs on planet Earth is by definition mundane. Sic transit, Gloria Mundy.  :)  --  ♬  Jack of Oz  ♬  [your turn]  23:37, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Let's just remain with the plain text logo.<IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 08:03, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Well, then you're back to the original problem: Most people find it boring, and don't buy from the online store, and therefore it closes down. StuRat (talk) 08:11, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

 * A bit of a tangent but The Weather Channel probably doesn't have the fierce loyalty or fanaticism as something with a bit more "muscle" to it like the aforementioned Harley-Davidson, or John Deere. Dismas |(talk) 08:24, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

 * We are intensely loyal to The Weather Channel. No politics, no "reality" shows. μηδείς (talk) 01:37, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

 * I think there's a market there, if they just cultivated it properly. There are fanatics who just love extreme weather, even up to the point of chasing tornadoes on their own.  However, this type of thrill-seeker isn't likely to be excited by a plain text logo.  They like to be associated with danger, much like those who collect Harley products.  A tornado on their cap might be a start.  StuRat (talk) 17:26, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Is there enough of a market? How many storm chasers (or wannabe storm chasers) are there?  As an aside to this aside, I heard a story on NPR the other day about how Weather Channel bought Weather Underground.  WU had been seen as the weather nerd's weather site since they provide more niggly data and more research tools.  It seems the weather nerds are all up in arms that TWC will sort of dumb down their favorite site.  Dismas |(talk) 23:46, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Well, to sell a few products online and make a profit doesn't require a huge market, but apparently more than they've been able to attract with their plain text logo products. I am a daily user of Weather Underground's Braille page, as it has no ads, video, fancy pics, etc., and loads quickly.  I just hope TWC doesn't screw it up. StuRat (talk) 02:19, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

What could that mean?<IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 02:11, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

 * What ? The impact of their acquisition of Weather Underground ?  Well, they might have realized they've grown their own brand as much as possible, so are now acquiring other brands.  This might be related to their choice to close the online store, if they no longer want to push their own brand.  IMHO, they've drifted from their original mission, to provide local weather forecasts.  Last week they had a show on fireworks displays, which is rather far from this mission.  I'm reminded of MTV, which drifted from showing videos to those hated "reality" shows.  StuRat (talk) 02:19, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm on Medeis' side. That user, like myself, is intensely loyal to The Weather Channel. No politics, no "reality" shows.<IP_ADDRESS> (talk) 07:59, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

Hera's (FPotD) "facial art" -- tattoo?
Looking at the full version of Hera_Hjartardóttir's portrait the facial art doesn't look like a tattoo at all. The "brush stroke" look would be extremely hard to replicate with a tattoo gun. Is this just some sort of paint that she must reapply the exact same way every day/week/whatever? Or does she change the piece regularly? Interesting photo and would like more detail! The Masked Booby (talk) 07:38, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Our article says she was inspired by "Celtic warrior paint", and I agree that it looks like paint. BTW, what is FPotD ? StuRat (talk) 08:48, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Featured Picture of the Day, I would have thought. Britmax (talk) 08:54, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Thanks, that makes sense. StuRat (talk) 09:25, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

 * The designs change slightly between photos - here - so it looks as though they are drawn on. That's confirmed by an interview here that states that she paints the design on herself before she plays: "I put different symbols in it and change it depending on how I feel...".   Ghmyrtle (talk) 09:56, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

2012 Open-Source 3D Action Sci-Fi Game
If I am not mistaken, there is a new (or fairly new) open-source 3D action sci-fi game for Microsoft Windows that is inspired by 'Mars Attacks!'. Does anyone know the title of this game? --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 17:57, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Well, CodeRED: Alien Arena contains characters that do resemble the Mars Attacks aliens, but it's not new, and it's not entirely open source. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 18:51, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * But most importantly, it is precicely the game I had in mind! Thank you. --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 19:05, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Given the issue is resolved, does precicely mean before Ms Tyson's acting career? μηδείς (talk) 22:02, 8 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I find it a bit difficult to write on my laptop keyboard. Am much more used to my regular one. --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 08:44, 9 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Do not apologize, it just struck me funny because I heard your spelling in my head as pre-Cicely, not precisely. μηδείς (talk) 20:53, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

 * Or before Joel Fleischman graduated med school? —Tamfang (talk) 22:16, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


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User:Olga polak

I am very excited for the reading week! I'm going to Poland and then going skiing in Austria with my parents. I've not been skiing in over 6 years, so hopefully I come back to Stirling after the two weeks in one piece. #pray4olga

title: User:Olga polak


text:
OC Photography Program/Digital Photography

Camera Type
Camera type if important depending on what you are looking to get out of your camera. Before buying a camera really think about what you want to accomplish with your camera as well as where you think you want to take your photography interest in the months to come.

MegaPixel
How do the megapixels affect your image?

A megapixel represents one million independent points of color/brightness/hue/luminosity ect. The more pixels that are used to represent an image, the sharper and more distinct that image will become when printed. A digital camera usually captures 72 pixels per inch (which can be altered later to suit the requirements of the print) and in turn, its 'image size' is a factor of the 'megapixels' that camera is capable of recording.

What size prints can I get from the many different range in megapixels?

Term:ppi=points/pixels per inch

My camera just made me an image whose dimensions are 3488x2616 or 9 124 608 pixels. Its a 9.1 megapixel camera, and 48.444 inches by 36.333 inches are the dimensions of the 72 ppi capture. What a photographer needs to know about digital images, is that while 72 ppi are fine for display on the computer screen, its absolute garbage for a print. A minimum of 200 ppi are required for any acceptability of quality, and 300 ppi the minimum required for photographic quality.

You could print any image up to six feet across... but it wont be pretty. One must always consider how close the viewer will be to the final print when its on display... The farther the image, the less aparent points/pixels will become.

To figure out how big a quality print your camera can make, you need only convert the PPI to at least above 200, and higher if possible.

Image Formats

 * Jpeg (Joint Picture Experts Group) Format is the major format that is used buy Point & Shoot(or Compact Digital) cameras and is an option on most [Digital SLR] Cameras. It is a compressed form of bitmap image.
 * Tiff (Tagged Image File Format) is available on some high end Point & Shoot cameras as a replacement for Raw format.

 * Raw (.RAW, .CRW(Canon), .CR2(Canon), .NEF(Nikon), .PEF(Pentax) .DNG(Adobe)) This format is the digital equivalent of a film negative, and is designed for high end cameras like Prosumer Point & Shoot and Digital SLR Cameras, Raw format enables adjusts in more ways than conventional Tiff or Jpeg images and consists of data direct from the cameras sensor with little to no in-camera processing applied, available adjustments include Exposure, Color Temperature, Sharpness, Brightness, Contrast, Gamma and others.

Digital Noise
What is digital noise?

Digital noise is created from heat generated by the cameras CCD(sensor). Digital noise or Image Noise (often shortened to just 'noise') can also be caused by a buildup of charge on the CCD. It usually occurs when using long exposure times or high ISO settings. The amount of noise varies greatly with different models of camera but is not usually a problem at ISO 400 or lower, or when using shutter speeds of under 2.5 seconds.

How to avoid it?

There are a few ways to avoid buildup of noise:
 * Use as low an ISO setting as practical
 * Use as short an exposure time (shutter speed) as conditions permit
 * Try not to underexpose dark areas of the image

How to fix it

The simplest way to fix noise is by avoiding it all together. If your camera has a 'noise reduction' option in the menu, turn it on for long exposures. Image manipulation software such as Adobe Photoshop and Jasc Paintshop Pro have noise reduction filters available, but these tend to introduce a degree of blurriness into the image.

Digital Darkroom Applications
Photoshop

PaintShop Pro

ULead PhotoImpact (low cost, intuitive)

The Gimp (absolutly free, highly recommended)

Darktable is an open source photography workflow application and RAW developer. A virtual lighttable and darkroom for photographers. It manages your digital negatives in a database, lets you view them through a zoomable lighttable and enables you to develop raw images and enhance them.

Photoshop Elements (cheaper version of photoshop)


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Firsovo

Firsovo (Фирсово) is a rural locality (a selo) in Sannikovsky Selsoviet, Pervomaysky District, Altai Krai, Russia. The population was 807 as of 2013. There are 80 streets.

Geography
Firsovo is located 14 km south of Novoaltaysk (the district's administrative centre) by road. Firsovo-2 is the nearest rural locality.

title: Firsovo


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Dilrukshi Dias Wickramasinghe

Dilrukshi Dias Wickramasinghe also simply known as Dilrukshi Dias is the 46th Solicitor General of Sri Lanka. She has held several posts during her career including the position of Director General of the Bribery Commission. In September 2019, she involved in controversies regarding the direct links which she maintained with Avant Garde chairman Nissanka Senadhipathi. In October 2019, Sanjay Rajaratnam replaced Dilrukshi Dias as the acting Solicitor General following the controversial phone call with Avant Garde chairman.

Career
Before her appointment as Solicitor General, she served as a high-profile Director General of the Bribery Commission. She was appointed as the 46th SG in May 2019 by Public Service Commission replacing Dappula de Livera. Following her controversy, in October 2019, she was succeeded by Sanjay Rajaratnam as the Solicitor General.

Controversies
In September 2019, she was levelled with allegations regarding the direct contact with corrupted Avant Garde while serving as the Solicitor General. Dilrukshi Dias involved in a controversial telephone conversation with the chairman of Avant Garde, Nissanka Senadhipathi through her Facebook account which was later reported to have been leaked by the Avant Garde chairman himself to the public.

Following the leaked telephone discussion, she criticised the Avant Garde chairman and said that such discussions shouldn't be disclosed to the public while being the government officer. She also urged the chairman to publicly disclose the conversation without editing the contents. Dilrukshi later claimed allegations that one of the ministers in the cabinet was involved in establishing contact between her and the chairman of Avant Garde.

Referring to the facts revealed by Dilrukshi, President Maithripala Sirisena urged her to disclose the name of the minister whom she mentioned and to reveal other politicians who are behind the Avant Garde case.

On a public statement, Maithripala Sirisena made allegations against the Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe for requesting Dilrukshi to be appointed as new Supreme Court judge. The allegation made by him referring to Dilrukshi Dias was later refuted by Ranil Wickramasinghe in a public speech.

title: Dilrukshi Dias Wickramasinghe


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Carmen Anhorn

Carmen Anhorn (born 5 August 1956) is a Swiss operatic soprano and mezzo-soprano.

Life
Born in Lucerne, Anhorn studied from 1975 to 1980 at the Musikhochschule Zurich with Sylvia Gähwiller and Carol Smith. From 1980 to 1982, she received her diploma in the opera studio of the Bavarian State Opera Munich lessons from Brigitte Fassbaender. From 1982 to 1988, she was a soloist at the Bavarian State Opera, first as coloratura soprano, especially as soubrette. From 1985 she received wide acclaim from Leonore Kirschstein in Augsburg and from 1987 she performed mainly as a mezzo-soprano.

Anhorn gave guest performances at the Hamburg State Opera, the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, the Alte Oper, La Scala, the Teatro Comunale di Firenze, the Gran Teatre del Liceu Barcelona, the Vlaamse Opera in Antwerp and Ghent, at the Opéra de Nice, the Grand Théâtre de Bordeaux, the Vienna Volksoper, the Teatro Massimo, the Osterfestspiele Salzburg and the Bayreuth Festival. As a concert singer, she has performed at the Bachwoche Ansbach and made guest appearances in several European countries.

Her stage repertoire includes Barbarina and Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro, Zerlina in Don Giovanni, Despina in Così fan tutte, Papagena in Die Zauberflöte, Amor in Orfeo ed Euridice, Woglinde in Das Rheingold, Musetta in La Bohème, Najade and the composer in Ariadne auf Naxos and Dorella in Das Liebesverbot.

Anhorn can be heard on several CD recordings with parts from Elektra, Feuersnot, The Queen of Spades, Tiefland, Peer Gynt, Rienzi and Iphigénie en Tauride.

title: Carmen Anhorn


text:
Topic talk:Fluid dynamics

Namespace?
Should this be moved into the name space? Or do we want a department of fluid dynamics? --Remi 06:17, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

title: Topic talk:Fluid dynamics