The Ethnographic Open-Air Museum of Latvia () is an open-air museum located just outside Riga, the capital of Latvia, on the lightly wooded shores of Jugla Lake.

History
In 1924, the Latvian Council of Monuments signed an order to create the open-air museum in Riga. The idea for the new museum was inspired by open-air museums in Scandinavia, particularly Skansen in Stockholm. The plan was to relocate a homestead from all four regions of Latvia – Kurzeme, Zemgale, Vidzeme and Latgale – to the museum. Each of the buildings would represent the different crafts of each area.

The new museum acquired land from a state land fund in the sandy dunes near Jugla Lake, just outside the city. In 1928, the first building, a barn from Vestiena parish was relocated and rebuilt in the museum. In 1932, the museum was opened to the public with six buildings (Vidzeme homestead). In 1939, there were already 40 buildings erected in the museum. Every region had its homestead and several other buildings of architectural or cultural value represented here. In the 1930s the museum became a very popular place and the community actively participated in the development of the museum. Several buildings were relocated and rebuilt, funded by private donations.

During World War II, the museum remained mostly undamaged, but most of its pre-war personnel were unavailable after having been repressed or forced into exile. Many documents were also lost during this period. During the Latvian SSR the museum was declared ideologically incorrect. Only in the late 1960s did the museum see a renaissance, when a new generation of museum specialists started to work in the museum. As communication with other countries was improved, the territory of the museum was expanded and many new and high-value objects were placed into the museum.

When Latvia regained its independence in 1991, the museum started actively collecting and documenting Latvian heritage from the 1920s and 1930s, a period during which Latvian agrarian reforms reshaped the Latvian countryside. As a result, a new complex of farmers' homesteads from the 1930s was opened in 1997.

Today

Today, the museum organizes many cultural events, such as folk concerts and traditional and craft festivals. The museum promotes traditional Latvian culture and lifestyle with these cultural events. The annual traditional craft fair has been organized by the museum since 1971. The fair has become the museum's most famous annual event, attended by tens of thousands of people every year.

The museum currently occupies 87 hectares and displays 118 buildings, as well as more than 3,000 items. Most of Latvia's historical ethnic groups are represented in the museum. The museum's collection holds approximately 150,000 artifacts.

Gallery

References

External links

Mobile App for iPhone
Mobile App for Android
Virtual Tour of the Annual Crafts Fair at the Ethnographic Open Air Museum
Documentary examines the founding of the Latvian Ethnographic Open-Air Museum. January 23, 2021. Public Broadcasting of Latvia. Retrieved: March 19, 2022

Museums in Riga
Museums established in 1924
1924 establishments in Latvia
Open-air museums
History museums in Latvia
Outdoor structures in Latvia


Clifton Garrick Utley (November 19, 1939 – February 20, 2014) was an American television journalist. He established his career reporting about the Vietnam War and has the distinction of being the first full-time television correspondent covering the war on-site.

Early life
Utley was born in Chicago, Illinois. He graduated from Westtown School, a Quaker boarding school in Westtown, Pennsylvania, in 1957 and from Carleton College in 1961. His parents, Frayn and Clifton Utley, were correspondents for the NBC Radio Network in the mid-20th century, based in Chicago.

Career

NBC News
Utley joined NBC News in 1963 as researcher in Europe for The Huntley-Brinkley Report, where he became Foreign and Principal correspondent. Besides covering the Vietnam War, Utley reported from many other areas including stints as bureau chief in London and Paris.  He reported on events within the U.S. as well.

Utley was also an anchor.  He served as weekend anchor from 1971-1973, and frequently substituted for John Chancellor during that decade and for Tom Brokaw in the 1980s on NBC Nightly News.  He also filled in for Bryant Gumbel as host of Today.   Utley was news anchor for Sunday Today from 1987 to 1988 and frequently substituted for Boyd Matson and then co-anchored the program from 1988 to 1992. Utley also served again as main weekend anchor (Sunday initially and both Saturday and Sunday later) from 1987 to 1993 of NBC Nightly News. One noteworthy Nightly News broadcast Utley appeared on aired on January 22, 1973, the day the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its Roe v. Wade decision. In the midst of that broadcast (fed to affiliates at 6:30 p.m. Eastern), and just before reporting on the decision, news broke that former U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson had died.

In the 1970s, Utley frequently hosted newsmagazine-style programs for NBC News. In the UK he covered the February 1974 British General Election and appeared on the BBC election night program. In the US, from January 1989 to December 1991, he moderated  NBC's long-running public affairs discussion program Meet the Press, while simultaneously hosting the newly debuted Sunday version of the Today Show. In 1992, Utley issued a controversial commentary essay at the close of a weekend newscast, expressing a view that then-President George H. W. Bush should forgo reelection in the interest of the country.

PBS
For a time, Utley hosted the PBS opera series Live from the Met, during which he introduced the televised performances and interviewed the participants during intermissions.

ABC News and CNN
Utley worked for NBC News for 30 years before moving to ABC as chief foreign correspondent in 1993. He later moved to CNN in 1997, where he worked until 2002. He co-anchored CNN's coverage of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, during the early morning hours of September 12, 2001.

Later career
After leaving network television, Utley was a professor of broadcasting and journalism at the State University of New York at Oswego and was senior fellow at the SUNY Levin Institute of the State University of New York in Manhattan, from which he retired as head in December 2011. He also co-hosted America Abroad on public radio, a program which examines the United States' role and relationships in the world, and hosted Metropolitan Opera broadcasts on public television.

He authored You Should Have Been Here Yesterday (2000), a narrative of the growth of television news in the United States. Board service included The Council on Foreign Relations (1993–2003), Carleton College (1983–2007), Public Radio International (1996–2008), the Board of Advisors of Doctors without Borders and Chairman of the American Council on Germany.

Death
Utley died on February 20, 2014, at the age of 74, from prostate cancer. He was survived by his wife, Gertje Utley ( Rommeswinkel); his brothers, David and Jonathan; and his sister-in-law, Carol Marin, a long-time reporter at NBC station WMAQ.

References

External links
 Profile at America Abroad Media

1939 births
2014 deaths
American male journalists
American television news anchors
Carleton College alumni
NBC News people
Journalists from Chicago
University of Chicago Laboratory Schools alumni
Deaths from prostate cancer
Deaths from cancer in New York (state)
Westtown School alumni
ABC News personalities
CNN people
PBS people

Garrick Utley


Solkan ( or ; ,  or Salcano) is a settlement in the Municipality of Nova Gorica in the Gorizia region of western Slovenia, at the border with Italy. Although it forms a single urban area with the city of Nova Gorica today, it has maintained the status of a separate urban settlement due to its history and the strong local identity of its residents.

The parish church in the settlement is dedicated to Saint Stephen and belongs to the Diocese of Koper.

History

Solkan was first mentioned in 1001, in the same document as the neighbouring town of Gorizia (now in Italy), which was then still a village. During the rule of the Counts of Gorizia in the Middle Ages, Gorizia developed into an important urban settlement, while Solkan maintained its predominantly rural character. Contrary to Gorizia, in which the Friulian and later Venetian language prevailed over Slovene by the end of the 16th century, Solkan has remained an essentially Slovene-speaking village.

In the 18th century, the incorporation of Solkan into the urban area of Gorizia slowly began, as many local noble families built their residences in it. In the second half of the 19th century, it developed into an important center of the furnishing industry. The expansion of nearby Gorizia was transforming Solkan into a suburb.

According to the last Austrian census of 1910, Solkan had 3075 inhabitants, of whom 90.3% were Slovenes; the rest was mostly composed of German speakers (5.2%) and few Italian- and Friulian-speaking families.

During World War I, the village was almost completely destroyed in the Battles of the Isonzo. After the collapse of Austria-Hungary in 1918, it became part of the Kingdom of Italy, together with all the County of Gorizia and Gradisca. Its predominantly Slovene population suffered under the policies of Fascist Italianization from the 1920s to 1940s. In 1925, it was abolished as a separate municipality and merged with Gorizia. Nevertheless, Solkan remained a separate settlement because of the hindered urban expansion of Gorizia after the annexation to Italy. During World War II, it became one of the major centers of Partisan resistance in the Julian March.

In 1947, Solkan was annexed to the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, while Gorizia remained in Italy, thus cutting off the secular connection of the two settlements. The same year, the construction of a new town of Nova Gorica began in the area previously occupied by vineyards and fields mostly belonging to the rural area of Solkan. In 1952, the City of Nova Gorica was created and Solkan was incorporated into it. Since then, it has gradually merged with the modern town of Nova Gorica, although it has been since 1988 an autonomous settlement and has a pronounced local identity.

Language, ethnicity and culture

Solkan has been a largely Slovene settlement. It has however also had different ethnic and linguistic minorities. Since the Middle Ages, many Friulians have lived in Solkan, but they have been now mostly assimilated. Italians lived here mostly between the late 19th and early 20th century, but after 1947 they mostly fled to Italy or assimilated to the Slovene majority. Immigrants from other regions of former Yugoslavia started settling in Solkan from early 1970s. Today, Slovenes represent around 90% of the population, the remaining 10% are mostly Serbs, Croats, and Bosnians, together with smaller numbers of Italians and Albanians.

According to the census of 1991, 91% of the population spoke Slovene as their first language. Serbo-Croatian came second with a little less than 8%. The native inhabitants of Solkan speak a variant of the Karst dialect of Slovene. The Solkan variant of the dialect served as the basis for the development of the urban dialect of Nova Gorica, which emerged with the second generation of settlers of the town. The Solkan dialect has become well known throughout Slovenia since the early 1990s because the singer-songwriter Iztok Mlakar uses it in the lyrics of his songs.

The culture of Solkan has been strongly influenced by the contacts with neighbouring Italian region of Friuli. The influence can be felt in the local cuisine, language, customs and traditions.

Its most prominent landmark is the Solkan Bridge, built between 1904 and 1905. It is a bridge over the Soča on the Jesenice-to-Nova Gorica railway. It is 220 m long with a central arch spanning 85 m, making it the longest stone arch spanning a river and the longest stone-arch railway bridge in the world. The original bridge railing was designed by Otto Wagner.

People

People who were born or lived in Solkan include:

 Jure Franko, skier
 Ivo Hvalica, politician (Slovenian Democratic Party)
 Klement Jug, philosopher and mountaineer
 Boris Kalin, sculptor
 Zdenko Kalin, sculptor
 Milan Klemenčič, Slovene puppeteer
 Andrej Komel Sočebran, officer of the Austro-Hungarian Army and creator of Slovenian military terminology
 Branko Marušič, historian
 Fedja Marušič, kayak champion
 Franc Marušič, physician
 Franc Lanko Marušič, linguist
 Ivan Janez Marušič, landscape architect
 Tomaž Marušič, politician (Slovenian People's Party), Minister of Justice (1997–2000)
 Anton Mihelič, neurophysiologist, dean of the Charles University in Prague
 Dušan Pirjevec Ahac, literary historian and philosopher
 Marko Anton Plenčič, pioneer of modern microbiology
 Josip Srebrnič, theologian, bishop of Krk
 Jože Srebrnič, politician, communist leader, member of the Italian Parliament
 Boštjan Vuga, architect
 Lucijan Vuga, mechanic engineer and innovator, author
 Danilo Zavrtanik, scientist and president of the University of Nova Gorica
 Pavel Bone, kayak silver and bronze world championship medal winner 1959 and 1961, producer of kayaks
 Toni Prijon, kayak gold world championship medal winner 1959, inventor of kayak brand Prijon

References

External links

Solkan on Geopedia
Catholic church website in Solkan

Populated places in the City Municipality of Nova Gorica
Italy–Slovenia border crossings
Populated places in the Soča Valley
1988 establishments in Slovenia

Solkan


Si Johannes Aavik  ( sa Randvere, Laimjala Parish, Saare County – 18 Marso1973 sa Stockholm) ay isang pilologong Estonianat Fennophile na may mahalagang papel sa modernisasyon at pagdevelop ng wikang Estonian.

Education and career
Nag-aral si Aavik ng kasaysayan sa Unibersidad ng Tartu at sa Unibersidad ng Nezin noong 1905. Naging miyembro siya ng  Young Estonia movement at nagtamo ng Doktorado sa wikang Romanse sa  Unibersidad ng Helsinki noong 1910. Nagturo si Aavik ng Estonian and French sa Unibersidad ng Tartu noong 1926 hanggang 1933. Noong 1934 itinalaga siya ng Estonian Ministry of Education bilang Punong Inspektor ng Paaralang Sekundarya, isang posisyong pinagsilbihan niya hanggang 1940.  Tumakas siya sa Soviet occupation noong 1944 at nanirahan sa Stockholm hanggang sa mamatay.

Estonian language development
Johannes Aavik found that Estonian, which had for centuries been the language of peasants, needed innovation, as its sphere of usage widened rapidly with the emergence of a modern nation. There was a need for standardization of grammar and orthography as well as new technical terminology. Aavik added that the language also needed to be versatile and euphonic. In 1912 he started writing articles to literary journals, making propositions how to develop Estonian language. He suggested intensive borrowing from Finnish; many of his suggestions were quickly widely accepted and have become part of standard Estonian vocabulary. From 1914 he started to artificially create well sounding new word stems to replace awkward compound words. Thus, he proposed relv ('weapon') instead of sõjariist (literally 'war tool'), roim ('crime') instead of kuritöö ('evil deed') and veenma ('convince') instead of uskuma panema ('make believe'). He generally tried to avoid the sounds t and s and preferred shorter words to longer ones. He also favoured o in successive syllables to u, as is common in the South Estonian dialects.

Aavik tried to modernize even the grammar. He advocated the usage of i-plural instead of t(d)-plural (keelis pro keeltes) and the i-superlative instead of the ordinary superlative (suurim pro kõige suurem), as well as –nd instead of –nud in active past participle. He proposed inflexional affixes to the ma-infinitive, but only some of them entered into popular usage. He also tried to introduce a future form of verbs and a female personal pronoun, but these got little positive response.

Aavik published numerous essays and translations to propagate his ideas; he had vocal supporters as well as opponents. In 1919, he published a dictionary of 2000 novelty words. His principles (utility, aesthetics and native quality) were summarized in "Keeleuuenduse äärmised võimalused" (Extreme Perspectives of Language Innovation; Tartu, 1924).

Language innovation slowly died away after the 1927 act that made it compulsory for schools to teach standard Estonian as put down in Estonian Orthographic Dictionary (1925, chief editor J. V. Veski) and Estonian Grammar (by Elmar Muuk, 1927). However, some words proposed by Aavik and fallen into oblivion have been picked up and re-introduced by more recent literati.

An essay on linguistic innovation in Estonian by Paul Saagpakk can be found in his Estonian-English Dictionary.

References

Further reading
 Antoine Chalvin. Johannes Aavik et la rénovation de la langue estonienne. Paris: ADEFO/L'Harmattan, 2010. 334 p.
 Virve Raag. The Effects of Planned Change on Estonian Morphology. Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Studia Uralica Upsaliensia, 29. Uppsala, 1998. 156 p.

Johannes Aavik


Contemporary art means modern art done after Pop Art and Conceptual Art. Another term, which really means the same thing, is postmodern art. Yet another term, which goes wider than art, is Postmodernism.

This problem of labelling comes about because the word 'modern' in art was used for some art from the mid-Victorian period through the whole 20th century. It covers a wide range of styles and movements. So when art critics wanted to describe post-WWII art they had to use a different word. Thus, in art, 'contemporary' (which really means 'at the same time as') comes to mean 'modern', and modern comes to mean 'earlier'.                   ...

Related pages
Conceptual art
Street art

Art movements

Contemporary art


Alexander Parris (November 24, 1780 – June 16, 1852) was a prominent American architect-engineer. Beginning as a housewright, he evolved into an architect whose work transitioned from Federal style architecture to the later Greek Revival. Parris taught Ammi B. Young, and was among the group of architects influential in founding what would become the American Institute of Architects. He is also responsible for the designs of many lighthouses along the coastal Northeastern United States.

Early life and work
Parris was born in Halifax, Massachusetts. At the age of 16, he apprenticed to a housewright in Pembroke, but talent led him towards architecture. Married to Silvina Bonney Stetson in 1800, he moved to Portland, Maine, which was then experiencing a building boom. The city had been bombarded during the Revolution by the Royal Navy, reducing three-quarters to ashes in 1775. But following the war, its trade recovered, almost challenging Boston as the busiest port in New England. Parris received numerous residential and commercial commissions, working in the fashionable style of architect Charles Bulfinch. Like most housewrights of the era, he often used elements derived directly from English architectural books, or those published in the United States by Asher Benjamin. Unfortunately, some of his designs were lost in the Great Fire of 1866, but early photographs and Parris' surviving drawings bespeak works of neoclassical artistry and taste.

The boom would end, however, with Jefferson's Embargo of 1807, which lasted 14 months and devastated Portland's mercantile base.  Merchants went bankrupt. The Portland Bank, its building designed by Parris, failed. By 1809, construction in the city had come to a halt. Parris left for Richmond, Virginia, where he designed the Wickham House and the Executive Mansion. But architect Benjamin Latrobe examined Parris' preliminary plans for the Wickham House, which resembled his previous Federal style works in Portland, and gave it a blistering review. Latrobe's advice left a profound imprint on the future work of Parris, beginning with the building's revised design. Consequently, the Wickham House is considered a watershed design by Parris, marking the shift from his earlier Adamesque period towards his later, more severe, monumental and architectonic period. In the War of 1812, he served in Plattsburgh, New York as a Captain of the Artificers (engineers), gaining knowledge of military requirements for engineering.

Boston and federal patronage
In 1815, he moved to Boston, where he found a position in the office of Charles Bulfinch. Like his famous employer, Parris produced refined residences, churches and commercial buildings. When in 1817 Bulfinch was called to Washington to work on the U.S. Capitol Building, Parris helped complete the Bulfinch Building home of the Ether Dome at Massachusetts General Hospital. With Bulfinch's departure, Parris soon became the city's leading architect, and a proponent of what would be called "Boston Granite Style", with austere, monolithic stonework. Around 1818-1823 he kept an office on Court Street. He belonged to the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association.

In 1824, however, he began a twenty-year association working for the Boston Navy Yard in Charlestown. He would end his career as chief engineer at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine. With the federal government as patron, Parris produced plans for numerous utilitarian structures, from storehouses to ropewalks, and was superintendent of construction at one of the nation's first drydocks, located at the Charlestown base. Today, he is fondly remembered for his stalwart stone lighthouses, commissioned by the U.S. Treasury Department. They are often of a tapered form termed "windswept."

Parris balanced the delicacy of his "superb draftsmanship", as it was called, with the coarseness of his building material of choice: granite. His most famous building, Quincy Market, is made of it. Parris died in Pembroke, where he is interred in the Briggs Burying Ground.

Designs

 1801 - Joseph Holt Ingraham House, Portland, Maine
 1803-1804 - Maine Fire & Marine Insurance Company Building, Portland, Maine
 1804 - James Deering House, Portland, Maine
 1805 - Commodore Edward Preble House, Portland, Maine
 1805 - Hunnewell-Shepley House, Portland, Maine
 1806-1807 - Portland Bank, Portland, Maine
 1807 - St. John's Church, Portsmouth, New Hampshire
 1809-1810 - Moses Payson House, Bath, New Hampshire
 1812 - Wickham House, Richmond, Virginia
 1813 - Executive Mansion, Richmond, Virginia
 1816 - Watertown Arsenal, Watertown, Massachusetts
 1818 - 39 and 40 Beacon Street, Boston, Massachusetts
 1819 - Cathedral Church of St. Paul, Boston, Massachusetts
 1819 - David Sears House (now the Somerset Club), Boston, Massachusetts
 1819 - Appleton-Parker House, or Nathan Appleton Residence, Boston, Massachusetts
 1822 - St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Windsor, Vermont
 1824 - Pilgrim Hall, Plymouth, Massachusetts
 1824-1826 - Quincy Market, Boston, Massachusetts
 1828 - United First Parish Church, Quincy, Massachusetts
1831 - Barnstable County Courthouse, Barnstable, Massachusetts
 1834 - St. Joseph's Church, Boston, Massachusetts
 1834 - Ropewalk, Boston Navy Yard, Charlestown, Massachusetts
 1836 - Chelsea Naval Hospital, Chelsea, Massachusetts
 1837 - Chelsea Naval Magazine, Chelsea, Massachusetts
 1839 - Saddleback Ledge Lighthouse, between the islands of Vinalhaven and Isle au Haut, Maine
 1847 - Mount Desert Rock Lighthouse, south of Mount Desert Island, Maine
 1848 - Libby Island Lighthouse, Machiasport, Maine, at the entrance to Machias Bay
 1848 - Matinicus Rock Lighthouse, 6 miles south of Matinicus Island, Maine
 1848 - Whitehead Island Lighthouse, Whitehead Island, Maine—southern entrance to Penobscot Bay
 1849 - Execution Rocks Lighthouse, Long Island Sound, New York
 1850 - Monhegan Island Lighthouse, Monhegan Island, Maine

References

 Richard M. Candee, "Maine Towns, Maine People -- Architecture and the Community, 1783-1820", a chapter in Maine in the Early Republic; Maine Historical Society & Maine Humanities Council; University Press of New England, Hanover & London 1988
 Arthur Gerrier, "Alexander Parris' Portland Years, 1801-1809", Landmarks Observer (Greater Portland Landmarks, Inc.), VIII, November–December 1981, pp. 10–11
 Edward F. Zimmer, Pamela J. Scott, "Alexander Parris, B. Henry Latrobe and the John Wickham House in Richmond, Virginia", The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 41, No. 3 (October, 1982), pp. 202–211
The Bulfinch Building: State of the Art from the Start, R. Tomsho, Massachusetts General Hospital Magazine, 2011

External links

 Alexander Parris Digital Project
 Moses Payson House (1809-1810)
 Quincy Market (1824-1826), Boston, Massachusetts
 Wickham House (1812), Richmond Virginia
 Wickham House -- The Valentine Richmond History Center

1780 births
1852 deaths
American civil engineers
Architects from Boston
People from Halifax, Massachusetts
Federalist architects
19th century in Boston
Architects from Portland, Maine
Engineers from Maine
Engineers from Massachusetts
19th-century American architects
19th-century American engineers

Alexander Parris


The Thermidorian Reaction was a coup d'état inside the French Revolution. It was against the leaders of the Jacobin Club, who had dominated the Committee of Public Safety. It was triggered by a vote of the National Convention to execute Maximilien Robespierre, Louis Antoine de Saint-Just, and several other leading members of the revolutionary government. This ended the Reign of Terror, the most radical phase of the French Revolution.

The name Thermidorian refers to 9 Thermidor Year II (27 July 1794), the date according to the French Republican Calendar.

A Thermidorian Reaction is a phrase now used when an oppressive regime (government) is overthrown, and replaced by an even more repressive regime.

This term comes from the French Revolution, when the monarchy was overthrown. It was replaced by several forms of government, each more oppressive than the last.  One of the regimes renamed the months and renumbered the years because they were too Christian.  One of the summer months was called Thermidor.  This particular revolution happened in that month, so it was called the Thermidorian Reaction.

Politics of France

Thermidorian Reaction


The curie (symbol Ci) is a unit of measurement. It measures  radioactivity. It is defined as

 1 Ci = 3.7×1010 decays per second.

This is roughly the activity of 1 gram of the radium isotope 226Ra. Radium was studied by the pioneers of radiology, Marie and Pierre Curie so the unit is named after them. The curie has since been replaced by an SI derived unit, the becquerel (Bq), which is decay per second. Therefore:

 1 Ci = 3.7×1010 Bq or 37 Gigabecquerel (Gbq)

and

 1 Bq = 2.70×10−11 Ci

In 1962, the International Commission on Radiological Units suggested the usage of this unit named after Marie Curie.

Old units of measurement
Units of radioactivity

Curie (unit)


The Ural River is a river in the European country of Russia. It is 1,509 miles (2,428 kilometers) long. It is generally considered to be the border between the continents of Europe and Asia. The river flows from the Ural Mountains to the Caspian Sea and is the third longest river in Europe. Some of the large cities the river runs through are Orsk and Uralsk.

Rivers of Russia
Rivers of Kazakhstan

Ural (river)


The Hague (with capital T; Dutch: also called , commonly ) is the third-largest city in the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam. It has a population of about 546,000 (2020) and an area of around 98 km². It is in the west of the country, in the province South Holland. It is the capital of the province. About 1 million people live in the urban area of The Hague, on about 405 square kilometers.

The Hague is the location of the Binnenhof, the building where the national government of the Netherlands meets. Built in the 13th century, the Binnenhof is the home of the "Eerste Kamer" (literally "First Chamber") or "Senaat", and the "Tweede Kamer" (literally "Second Chamber"). These are the same as the upper and lower houses in some other countries. They form the "Staten Generaal" (literally the "Estates-General").

Willem-Alexander, the king of the Netherlands, lives and works in The Hague. His home is called the Noordeinde Palace and it is not far away from the Binnenhof. All foreign embassies and government ministries of the country are in the city, as well as the Hoge Raad der Nederlanden (The Supreme Court) and many lobbying organisations.

All of this is unusual for a country, because The Hague is not the capital of the Netherlands, which is Amsterdam. This is made so by the Constitution of the Netherlands.

Besides the buildings used by the government, the International Court of Justice of the United Nations is based in the Peace Palace, which is also in The Hague and often referred to as "The Hague" by metonymy. A tourist attraction is Madurodam, which has lots of tiny buildings that look like the real things.

The Hague is part of a large conurbation called the Randstad, where most Dutch people live. It is only an hour away from Amsterdam, Utrecht, and Amsterdam Airport Schiphol by train (most of which are run by Nederlandse Spoorwegen) and with its two train stations, is easy to get to from many places in the Netherlands and all around Europe.

Partner cities
 Warsaw, Poland

Things to see

Related pages
Residentie Orchestra

References

The Hague


The Los Angeles Philharmonic (LA Phil, LAP, or LAPO) is an American orchestra based in Los Angeles, California, United States. They give concerts every year from October until June at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, and a summer season at the Hollywood Bowl from July to September. Their conductor is Gustavo Dudamel.

The orchestra are world famous, and well known for playing a lot of music written by modern composers.

History
The orchestra was started in 1919 by William Andrews Clark. He was a business man who had a lot of money and he paid the orchestra himself. They gave their first concert eleven days after their first rehearsal. Clark played the violin himself and sometimes played with the second violin section. Their conductor was Walter Henry Rothwell. After he died several other conductors led the orchestra, including Georg Schnéevoigt and Artur Rodziński.

The famous conductor Otto Klemperer led the orchestra in 1933. He was one of many German emigrants fleeing from Nazi Germany. He gave many new orchestral pieces their first performance, and introduced the audience to the music of Igor Stravinsky and Arnold Schoenberg. The orchestra played well for him, but Klemperer had health problems and suffered from manic depression.

William Andrews Clark died without leaving the orchestra an endowment. A new orchestra called the Southern California Symphony Association was started to try to keep the concerts going. Then a businessman called Harvey Mudd offered to pay Klemperer's salary, and the orchestra started to earn more money playing in the Hollywood Bowl.
so they managed to keep going during the Great Depression.

After the 1939 Klemperer left because of serious health problems. Four years later he was followed by Alfred Wallenstein. Wallenstein had been the principal cellist of the New York Philharmonic and had then been the youngest member of the Los Angeles Philharmonic when it was founded in 1919. Arturo Toscanini had encouraged him to become a conductor. He had conducted the LA Phil several times. During his years as conductor of the LAPhil Wallenstein recorded several concertos with famous soloists such as Jascha Heifetz.

By the mid-1950s the rich business woman Dorothy Buffum Chandler was funding the orchestra. They were looking for a really good conductor to be their musical director. They had hoped to get Eduard van Beinum, but he suddenly died. Then Georg Solti agreed to come for three years. He was going to begin officially in 1962 but then he resigned because he had not been consulted when the orchestra had appointed Zubin Mehta as assistant conductor. So Zubin Mehta became musical director.

In 1969 Ernest Fleischmann became the manager of the orchestra. He had some new ideas, including starting the Los Angeles Philharmonic Chamber Music Society and the Los Angeles Philharmonic New Music Group. Both these groups had musicians from the large symphony orchestra in them. It gave the musicians a change to play different sorts of music. Other orchestras in the world gradually copied this idea.

When Zubin Mehta left to go to the New York Philharmonic in 1978, Carlo Maria Giulini took over as Music Director. Giulini left when his wife became ill and went back to Italy. André Previn was the next conductor. He was a good conductor, but he had some arguments with Fleischmann and so he resigned in 1989 and Esa-Pekka Salonen took over. He has conducted every season since then.

At the beginning of Salonen's time with the orchestra they gave regular performances at the Salzburg Festival and they played for a production of the opera Saint-François d'Assise by Olivier Messiaen. Salonen later took the orchestra on many other tours of the United States, Europe, and Asia, and conducted regularly at the Lucerne Festival in Switzerland, the BBC Proms in London, in Cologne for a festival of Salonen's own works, and, in 1996, in Paris for a Stravinsky festival conducted by Salonen and Pierre Boulez.
Today the orchestra play in the Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Salonen left the LAPhilharmonia in 2009. Their conductor is now Gustavo Dudamel.

Conductors (Music Directors)

Other websites
 Los Angeles Philharmonic official website

American orchestras
Music in Los Angeles
1919 establishments in the United States
1910s establishments in California

Los Angeles Philharmonic


Remembrance Day (in Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom) is a day to remember people who fought and died in wars. It is on November 11. On that day in 1918 came the end of World War I with Armistice with Germany.

Remembrance Day was started in 1919 by King George V of the United Kingdom.  On the same day, other countries also have days to remember war and soldiers.  There is Veteran's Day in the United States,  and Armistice Day in France, Belgium, New Zealand and other countries.

Traditions

There are some things that people do on Remembrance Day at 11:00 AM. That is when World War I ended. At a ceremony for Remembrance Day, a tune called "The Last Post" is played on a bugle (or sometimes a trumpet). Then there are two minutes of silence. At the end of the silence, the bugle plays a tune called "Reveille".

In many countries, many people wear a poppy on Remembrance Day, and for a few days before. The remembrance poppy is an artificial flower to commemorate those who died in war. People bring wreaths made of poppies to Remembrance Day ceremonies. The poppy is a symbol to show they remember the wars and the soldiers who fought in them. Poppies were chosen as a symbol because they often grew in battlefields after the soldiers stopped fighting.

References

Related pages
Veterans Day

Holidays
Australia
Holidays of Canada
Anniversary days in the United Kingdom

Remembrance Day


Region is a geographic term used in many ways in the different types of geography. In general, a region is a medium-scale area of land or water. It is smaller than the whole area of something (which could be, for example, the world, a nation, a mountain range, and so on). A climate zone is one kind of region.

A region is larger than a specific location. It may be seen as a collection of smaller things (as in "the New England states") or as one part of a larger whole (as in "the New England region of the United States"). In some countries a region is a unit of local government.

Region


Theon of Smyrna ( Theon ho Smyrnaios, gen. Θέωνος Theonos; fl. 100 CE) was a Greek philosopher and mathematician, whose works were strongly influenced by the Pythagorean school of thought. His surviving On Mathematics Useful for the Understanding of Plato is an introductory survey of Greek mathematics.

Life
Little is known about the life of Theon of Smyrna. A bust created at his death, and dedicated by his son, was discovered at Smyrna, and art historians date it to around 135 CE. Ptolemy refers several times in his Almagest to a Theon who made observations at Alexandria, but it is uncertain whether he is referring to Theon of Smyrna. The lunar impact crater Theon Senior is named for him.

Works
Theon wrote several commentaries on the works of mathematicians and philosophers of the time, including works on the philosophy of Plato. Most of these works are lost. The one major survivor is his On Mathematics Useful for the Understanding of Plato. A second work concerning the order in which to study Plato's works has recently been discovered in an Arabic translation.

On Mathematics Useful for the Understanding of Plato
His On Mathematics Useful for the Understanding of Plato is not a commentary on Plato's writings but rather a general handbook for a student of mathematics. It is not so much a groundbreaking work as a reference work of ideas already known at the time. Its status as a compilation of already-established knowledge and its thorough citation of earlier sources is part of what makes it valuable.

The first part of this work is divided into two parts, the first covering the subjects of numbers and the second dealing with music and harmony. The first section, on mathematics, is most focused on what today is most commonly known as number theory: odd numbers, even numbers, prime numbers, perfect numbers, abundant numbers, and other such properties. It contains an account of 'side and diameter numbers', the Pythagorean method for a sequence of best rational approximations to the square root of 2, the denominators of which are Pell numbers.  It is also one of the sources of our knowledge of the origins of the classical problem of Doubling the cube.

The second section, on music, is split into three parts: music of numbers (hē en arithmois mousikē), instrumental music (hē en organois mousikē), and "music of the spheres" (hē en kosmō harmonia kai hē en toutō harmonia). The "music of numbers" is a treatment of temperament and harmony using ratios, proportions, and means; the sections on instrumental music concerns itself not with melody but rather with intervals and consonances in the manner of Pythagoras' work. Theon considers intervals by their degree of consonance: that is, by how simple their ratios are. (For example, the octave is first, with the simple 2:1 ratio of the octave to the fundamental.) He also considers them by their distance from one another.

The third section, on the music of the cosmos, he considered most important, and ordered it so as to come after the necessary background given in the earlier parts. Theon quotes a poem by Alexander of Ephesus assigning specific pitches in the chromatic scale to each planet, an idea that would retain its popularity for a millennium thereafter.

The second book is on astronomy. Here Theon affirms the spherical shape and large size of the Earth; he also describes the occultations, transits, conjunctions, and eclipses. However, the quality of the work led Otto Neugebauer to criticize him for not fully understanding the material he attempted to present.

On Pythagorean Harmony

Theon was a great philosopher of harmony and he discusses semitones in his treatise. There are several semitones used in Greek music, but of this variety, there are two that are very common. The "diatonic semitone" with a value of 16/15 and the "chromatic semitone" with a value of 25/24 are the two more commonly used semitones (Papadopoulos, 2002). In these times, Pythagoreans did not rely on irrational numbers for understanding of harmonies and the logarithm for these semitones did not match with their philosophy. Their logarithms did not lead to irrational numbers, however Theon tackled this discussion head on. He acknowledged that "one can prove that" the tone of value 9/8 cannot be divided into equal parts and so it is a number in itself. Many Pythagoreans believed in the existence of irrational numbers, but did not believe in using them because they were unnatural and not positive integers. Theon also does an amazing job of relating quotients of integers and musical intervals. He illustrates this idea in his writings and through experiments. He discusses the Pythagoreans method of looking at harmonies and consonances through half-filling vases and explains these experiments on a deeper level focusing on the fact that the octaves, fifths, and fourths correspond respectively with the fractions 2/1, 3/2, and 4/3. His contributions greatly contributed to the fields of music and physics (Papadopoulos, 2002).

See also
Theon of Alexandria

Notes

Bibliography
Theon of Smyrna: Mathematics useful for understanding Plato; translated from the 1892 Greek/French edition of J. Dupuis by Robert and Deborah Lawlor and edited and annotated by Christos Toulis and others; with an appendix of notes by Dupuis, a copious glossary, index of works, etc. Series: Secret doctrine reference series, San Diego : Wizards Bookshelf, 1979. . 174pp.
E.Hiller, Theonis Smyrnaei: expositio rerum mathematicarum ad legendum Platonem utilium, Leipzig:Teubner, 1878, repr. 1966.
J. Dupuis, Exposition des connaissances mathematiques utiles pour la lecture de Platon, 1892.  French translation.
Lukas Richter:"Theon of Smyrna". Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy. Accessed 29 Jun 05. (subscription access)

 Papadopoulos, Athanase (2002). Mathematics and music theory: From Pythagoras to Rameau. The Mathematical Intelligencer, 24(1), 65–73. doi:10.1007/bf03025314

External links

 Scans of editions of On Mathematics Useful for the Understanding of Plato at wilbourhall.org

2nd-century Greek philosophers
Ancient Greek mathematicians
Ancient Greek music theorists
Ancient Smyrnaeans
Neo-Pythagoreans
Philosophers of ancient Ionia
Middle Platonists
2nd-century mathematicians

Theon of Smyrna


"Sun, Moon, and Talia" () is a fairy tale by Giambattista Basile. It was published in his Pentamerone (1636). It is similar to the "Sleeping Beauty" tales by Charles Perrault and the Brothers Grimm.

Story
A great lord consults several wise men about the future of his newborn daughter Talia. They predict she will be put in danger from a splinter of flax. To protect his daughter, the father commands that no flax be brought into his house. Years later, Talia sees an old woman spinning flax on a spindle. She asks if she may try it. As soon as she begins to spin, a splinter of flax goes under her fingernail. She drops to the ground, and appears dead. Her father puts Talia in one of his country houses and abandons her.

Some time later, a king, hunting in the nearby woods, follows his falcon into the house. He finds Talia, and tries unsuccessfully to wake her up. He rapes her and returns to his own city.
Still deep in sleep, Talia gives birth to twins (a boy and a girl). They are tended by fairies. One day, the boy begins to suck on Talia's finger and draws out the flax splinter. Talia awakens immediately. She names them "Sun" and "Moon" and lives with them in the house. The king returns and finds Talia is the mother of twins. He tells her what happened and they form a bond.

However, the king is married. His wife is suspicious and learns the truth. She gains possession of the two children. She orders the cook to prepare them for consumption. The cook spares the children and sends the queen a dish of lamb. The queen taunts the king while he eats. The queen has Talia brought to court. She commands that a huge fire be lit in the courtyard, and that Talia be thrown into the flames. Talia undresses and screams with grief.  The king hears Talia's screams. He commands that his wife be thrown into the fire instead. The king and Talia marry.

References
 Opie, Iona and Peter. 1974. The Classic Fairy Tales. Oxford UP. pp. 81-3.

Other websites
Sun, Moon, and Talia
Unexpurgated translation of Sun, Moon, and Talia
Analysis of the Sleeping Beauty stories

Fairy tales
Sleeping Beauty

Sun, Moon, and Talia


The School of Posillipo refers to a loose group of landscape painters, based in the waterfront Posillipo neighborhood of Naples, Italy. While some among them became academicians, it was not a formal school or association.

In the 18th century, landscape painting or vedute had emerged as a profitable, and respectable, style of painting. Landscapes were, in part, higher in demand than depictions of Catholic religious imagery to buyers from Protestant Europe during the Age of the Enlightenment. This included the mainly aristocratic travellers on a grand tour of Southern Europe. Items in demand by travellers were paintings evoking memories of the place, playing the role that photographic postcards now fill. Pietro Fabris, for example, had created views of Pompeii and the Volcanic fields surrounding Vesuvius and Etna. In Venice, Canaletto and the Guardi for example, had depicted mainly urban vistas of the waterlogged city. Vanvitelli, Panini, and Belloto adapted these styles to different urbanscapes in Italy and abroad. Their styles were realistic, and Canaletto was said to use a camara obscura.

Such detailed realism, however, was rarely applied to natural scenery. There was a tradition in Italy of landscape painting dating to the Baroque 17th century with Claude Lorrain in Rome and Salvatore Rosa in Rome and Naples as two distinct trends. Lorrain's landscapes were lush and imagined, and still often anchored in classical stories using subsidiary figures. Rosa painted tempestuous short range arrangements of natural elements, a craggy hillock with perilously perched trees.

At the start of the 19th century in Naples, the premier representative of landscape painters was the Dutch emigree Jacob Philipp Hackert (1737–1807), the court painter of Ferdinand IV, who seem to be following the tradition of Lorrain. His paintings had a stock arrangement of a nearby tree in a pastoral hill or mountainside, and with distant ruins or a recognizable mountain in the background. Volcano-ridden southern Campania and Sicily had such distinctive peaks. The fortunes of Hackert suffered with the rise of the Napoleonic Neoclassicism and the deposition of the Bourbon kingdom of two Sicilies by the French.

In 1815, the painter Anton Sminck Pitloo, (1790–1837) was coaxed to move to Naples. He opened a studio in the Chiaia neighborhood. he preferred to paint outdoors with natural lighting. Posillipo at one end of the crescent shape bay of Naples, was a natural spot that allowed the painters to paint both buildings and water. Some say he was influenced by the visits of Turner (1819–1820) and Corot to Naples, but in general, Pitloo's paintings are devoid of passionate political or social imagery Pitloo's favorite vedute was painted out of doors, not in the studio; and was a view of the crescentic Neapolitan shore from his vantage point from the peninsula of Posillipo. In this way his canvas scene included water, the bustling shoreline and docks, and the land across the bay. The vista while somewhat idyllic romanticism; there was also the encroachment of the daily activities of sailors, fisherman, and their families.

Like Hackert before him, Pitloo became a professor at the Accademia di Belli Arti in Naples, and was able to influence fellow painters and pupils such as Carl Götzloff, Giacinto Gigante, Teodoro Duclere, Gabriele Smargiassi, Vincenzo Franceschini, Achille Vianelli, and Consalvo Carelli. Many of the works of these painter from circa 1820 to circa 1850 are known as products of the School of Posillipo. Other painters influence by this school are Salvatore Fergola, a pupil of Hackert. In time, the lessening of the demands for accuracy and a greater attention to the mood of the painting during the age of Romanticism, led to more impressionist styles found in post-1850s Tuscan school of Macchiaioli (who also painted out of doors), or in the School of Resina represented by painters such as Guglielmo Ciardi.

The most prominent of Pitloo's students was Giacinto Gigante (1806–1876), who started his career working for the Neapolitan Royal Topographic Office. Gigante had observed the use of a camara lucida in the studio of Swiss-German artist, Jakob Wilhelm Hüber (1787–1871), who used camara lucida. He also worked with watercolors. He collaborated with Cuciniello and Bianchi in landscapes collected in a book titled Viaggio pittorico nel Regno delle Due Sicilie (Pictorial journey through the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies). Gigante befriended Sylvester Shchedrin, and through him also obtained commissions from the Russian aristocracy. Like Pitloo before him, Gigante he was appointed chief of design at the Neapolitan Academy. Giuseppe and  Filippo Palizzi (1818–1899) were briefly pupils of Gigante, but soon fell under the influence of the Barbizon School,  who in turn were to influence Domenico Morelli

References

Italian art movements
Realism (art movement)
Posillipo
Painters from Naples
Culture in Naples
Italian artist groups and collectives

School of Posillipo


Selenide is an ion. Its chemical formula is Se2–. Selenides are similar to sulfides. Selenides are reducing agents when pure. They are stronger reducing agents than sulfides. Selenide ores are the source of selenium. Selenides are normally mixed with sulfides. The selenide ion is unstable except in very basic conditions. Normally hydroselenide is made, which is HSe-. In acidic conditions, hydrogen selenide gas is made.

Related pages
Selenite
Selenate

Selenium compounds
Ions

Selenide


The String Quartet No. 4 in C major by Béla Bartók was written from July to September 1928 in Budapest. It is one of six string quartets by Bartok.

The work is dedicated to the Pro Arte Quartet but its first public performance was given by the Waldbauer-Kerpely Quartet in Budapest on 20 March 1929. It was first published in the same year by Universal Edition.

Overview
The work is in five movements:

A study of the manuscript sources, as published by László Somfai finds that Bartók originally intended the quartet to have four movements, not five.

This work, like Bartók String Quartet No. 5, and several other pieces by Bartók, exhibits an arch form — the first movement is thematically related to the last, and the second to the fourth, with the third movement standing alone. Also, the outer four movements feature rhythmic sforzandos that cyclically tie them together in terms of climactic areas.

The quartet shares a similar harmonic language to that of the String Quartet No. 3, and as with that work, it has been suggested that Bartók was influenced in his writing by Alban Berg's Lyric Suite (1926) which he had heard in 1927.

The quartet employs a number of extended instrumental techniques. For the whole of the second movement, all four instruments play with mutes, while the entire fourth movement features pizzicato. In the third movement, Bartók sometimes indicates held notes to be played without vibrato, and in various places he asks for glissandi (sliding from one note to another) and so-called Bartók or snap pizzicati, (a pizzicato where the string rebounds against the instrument's fingerboard).

Analysis

Bartók's musical vocabulary, as demonstrated in his string quartets particularly, departs from traditional use of major and minor keys, focusing more on the chromatic scale and attempting to utilize each note equally.  Regardless, Bartók doesn't follow any form of serialism, instead dividing the chromatic scale into symmetrical units, with tonal centers being based on "axes of symmetry". He also incorporates whole-tone, pentatonic, and octatonic scales — as well as diatonic and heptatonia seconda scales — as subsets of the chromatic scale.

His use of these subset scales allowed him to incorporate a wide range of folk music in an expanded harmonic system. Indeed, his original studies and settings of many examples gleaned from his extensive explorations of the Hungarian countryside and Eastern and Central Europe served as a major influence upon his expanded musical vocabulary.

Bartók held a long fascination with mathematics and how it pertained to music. He experimented with incorporating the golden section and the Fibonacci sequence into his writing. Though these fascinations aren't obviously present in his Fourth String Quartet, he did incorporate symmetrical structures: Movements I and V are similar, as are movements II and IV; movement III is at center, greatly contrasting with the other movements.

Movements I and V share similar motifs; the second theme in the first movement is prominent in the fifth. Movements II and IV share similar ideas as well, but the ideas present within these two movements can be considered variations on themes presented earlier, expanding and building on ideas presented in the first and fifth movements. Movement III differs from the other four movements in that it is textured and quiet.

The symmetry of the movements isn't limited only to the themes; the lengths of the movements show symmetry as well.  The first, third and fifth movements are approximately six minutes long, whereas the second and fourth are shorter, at about three minutes each.

I. Allegro

Movement I utilizes whole-tone elements. Though not traditionally tonal, it is centered on 'C'. The movement gradually progresses from cluster-like elements to full chords. This, in part, helps with building tension through the movement's six minutes.

II. Prestissimo, con sordino

The second movement moves quicker than the first, giving off a hurried feeling. The chromatic scale is widely utilized, starting off in the lower registers and being answered in higher registers. Fast scales, trills, and vibrato are all used to add color and texture. The pentatonic scale is present and apparent throughout. Additionally, the strings are used to produce horn-like and percussive effects.

III. Non troppo lento

The third movement includes a great example of Bartók's night music style. It completely departs from the first two movements in that it is more consonant, widely using diatonic and many folk-like elements. Usage of the pentatonic scale is more apparent.

IV. Allegretto pizzicato

The fourth movement is similar to the second and is faster than the previous, instilling the same hurry as in the first two movements.  The musicians play pizzicato throughout. Bartók also utilizes Bartók pizzicato throughout the movement. Staying symmetrical, the music references and builds on ideas in movement II.

V. Allegro molto

The final movement mirrors the first, the second theme of the first movement seeing extensive use. The randomly accentuated quarter notes sound percussive and horn-like. Inversions and retrogrades of the theme are heard throughout the movement, utilized in different octaves.  Overall, the fifth movement is more liberal in using variations of themes present in the first movement.

Discography

Notes

External links

Further reading
Leo Treitler, "Harmonic procedure in the Fourth Quartet of Bartók" in the Journal of Music Theory (November 1959)

1928 compositions
Compositions that use extended techniques
4

String Quartet No. 4 (Bartók)


Circular chess is a chess variant played using the standard set of pieces on a circular board consisting of four rings, each of sixteen squares. This is topologically equivalent to playing on the curved surface of a cylinder.

History
The Chronicles of nearly a thousand years of "The Persians, Arabs, Byzantines and other people who were playing chess does have described various forms, movements, rules that have given them to the game and their peculiarities and placing the pieces in a circular board... ". In fact, documents in the British Library and elsewhere suggest that circular chess was played in Persia as early as the 10th century AD, and further references are found in India, Persia.

The great Arab scholar of origin Yemeni Ibnal-Khatibis who documented the creation of the chess circle, found in a manuscript 618 in Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire, describing a round chess circular called Rumi, a chess tournament Arabstyle, published in Al-Andalus and is also attributed to Abu Ali Ibn al-Murci Rashiq (died in 694), the invention of a chess move, documented by historian and scholar Ibn Al-Jatiba who leaves testimony Circular Chess.
Everything indicates that chess move is of Persian origin and Arabic and then adopted and played by the Byzantine Empire.

Historical rules are in sources that are little-known in the West, such as Muhammad ibn Mahmud Amuli's 'Treasury of the Sciences', so when, in 1983, Lincoln historian David Reynolds came across a reference to the game being played in the Middle Ages and set about attempting to revive interest in it, he chose to draw up a new set of rules, based around those of orthodox chess. Since that time, the older rules of circular chess have become far better known. Abu Faisal Sergio Tapia, international and geopolitical analyst and expert over Middle East in various media of the Arab and Islamic world, who notes that Circular Chess - in all its beauty, in all its game-style it is the art of placing the parts in strategic positions from the start on two fronts, and expresses the true sense of the Persians and Arabs of the time chess. It is a circular board where the rings represent the universal knowledge, God, faith, creation, harmony of tactics, the ancient wisdom, the DNA of chess in the history of mankind.  And likewise the Islamic style abstract pieces are the oldest chronologically in chess. The Circular Chess known as "al-Muddawara", "ar Rumiya" or "the Byzantine chess".

Historical circular chess

Rules

One set of rules for medieval circular chess is from the Persian author  Muhammad ibn Mahmud Amuli's 'Treasury of the Sciences' (1325).
In this version, called shatranj al-muddawara (circular chess) or shatranj ar-Rūmīya (Roman or Byzantine chess), the game uses a board with four concentric rings, each split into 16 spaces. The Board contains 64 squares.
With an algebraic notation in the round board, in letters of 4 rings ABCD and every space with a number from 1 to 16. A game of chess is played between two players; each has 16 pieces, white, and black opponents of calls.
The purpose of Circular Chess is to position their chess pieces in order to checkmate the opponent's king, ending the game.

The game uses the same pieces as shatranj. The king and the counselor on the inner ring, next to each other.  The next ring has the elephants, the next ring has the knights, and the last ring has the rooks.
A single row of 4 pawns flanks each side of the central pieces.  The king of one side "faces" the counselor of the other (a shorter path is between the king of one side and the counselor of the other than between the kings of the two sides).
Movement is the same as shatranj, except that, if two pawns from the same side, going in opposite directions, end up being blocked by each other, the opponent may remove both pieces, which does not use the opponent's turn.
As there is no back row, there is no promotion. A stalemate is a victory for the stalemating player. A bare king is a loss for the player who only has the king left unless, in the next turn, the player can also impose a bare king, at which point the game is a draw.

Citadel chess
A variant of this game attested by Muhammad ibn Mahmud Amuli has two "citadel" spaces in the centre of the board and a different starting setup. In the citadel game, if a king reaches the citadel, a draw is forced.

Modern circular chess

Rules

The starting position is essentially obtained from that of orthodox chess by cutting the board in half and bending the two halves to join at the ends. Two lines are marked on opposite sides of the board, and each set of pieces is positioned so as to straddle this line. The king and queen start on the innermost ring, with, as is the case in square chess, the queen on a square of the same colour; the bishops start in the second ring from the centre, the knights on the third and the rooks on the outermost ring. The pawns are positioned in front of the pieces.

The moves of the pieces are identical to those in orthodox chess; a queen or rook may, if it is not obstructed, move any distance round a ring, except that the "null move" of moving a piece all the way round the board and back to its original square is not permitted. A pawn is promoted after moving six squares from its initial position, to the square immediately before the opponent's starting line. Castling and en passant captures are not permitted. Announcing a check is not obligatory, and "snaffling" (winning the game immediately by capturing the opponent's king after he either moved into or failed to move out of check) is allowed – and has on more than one occasion decided a world championship game.

Theory
Orthodox chess generally assigns the pieces relative values of 9 points for a queen, 5 for a rook, 3 for a bishop or knight, and 1 for a pawn; although no attempt has been made to assign specific values for circular chess, it is certain that the same values do not hold. The values of the queen and rook are considerably augmented by their greater range – with two rooks or a queen and rook unobstructed on the same ring being especially powerful – while those of the bishop and knight are diminished; for example, on an 8×8 board two minor pieces are held to be stronger than one rook, but on a circular board the rook is considerably stronger. This can be easily seen by just counting the number of squares an unobstructed piece is able to attack on an orthodox and a circular board: the queen, rook, bishop, and knight can attack 27, 14, 13, and 8 squares respectively on an orthodox board, while on a circular board the counts are instead 24, 18, 6, and 6. The minor pieces can, however, pose a significant danger value, as their moves are more difficult to visualise on the circular board and even strong players often fail to notice a threat.

One of the major differences between orthodox and circular chess in practice is in the opening. In orthodox chess, opening theory has developed over several centuries, and the use of computer analysis has resulted in top level games frequently not deviating from known theory until the 20th move or beyond; in circular chess, there is virtually no opening theory, and consequently players are "on their own" from the first move. In orthodox chess, advancing the king's or queen's pawn are generally considered the best opening moves, as doing so attacks two key central squares, opens a diagonal to enable the development of a bishop, and, in the case of the king's pawn, the queen also. On a circular board these advantages are negated, as a king's or queen's pawn only attacks one square, and its advance only opens one square for the bishop. Some players advance the central pawns first anyway, while others prefer to advance the rooks' pawns in order to open lines of attack for the more powerful pieces; it is not known which move, if any, is objectively best.

The different geometry of the square and circular boards creates considerable differences in endgame theory: three of the four "basic checkmates" on a square board (those with king and rook, king and two bishops, or king and bishop and knight against a lone king) rely on forcing the defending king into the corner of the board, and thus are impossible on a circular board since it doesn't have corners. The "basic mates" in circular chess are thus those with king and queen, king and rook and minor piece, or king and three minor pieces against a lone king. The greater tendency towards drawn endgames often results in the defender playing on in a position which would be considered cause for resignation on a square board. In one particular endgame, however, the circular board favours the attacker: with king and pawn against king, there is no stalemate defence (since it is impossible for the king to be trapped against a side of the board that the pawn is moving towards) and thus the only way for the defending king to draw is to capture the pawn before it can be either defended or promoted (otherwise the endgame is always a win).

World Championship

After experimenting with various possible layouts for the game, Reynolds decided on that pictured above, constructed a board and introduced the game to other players in Lincoln; it caught on, and in 1996, the Circular Chess Society was formed, with the aim of popularising circular chess, primarily by organising a tournament. Since it was not known to be played competitively anywhere else, its claim to the status of world championship was not contested, and thus it became. The inaugural tournament was held in the Tap and Spile public house in Lincoln in 1996; it was played as a knockout, with Lincoln player Rob Stevens beating Nottinghamshire's Mark Spink in the final. Subsequently, the tournament has been held at different venues in Lincoln, usually under the Swiss system, and has been dominated by two players: Peterborough engineer Francis Bowers and Dutch businessman Herman Kok, who between them won eight of the following ten tournaments. Bowers took the title from 1997 to 1999, and remains not just the only player to have won the tournament three years in succession, but the only one to win on more than two occasions; Kok broke the sequence with victory in the 2000 tournament, before Bowers won again in 2001.

The 2002 World Championship, staged in Bishop Edward King House in Lincoln and sponsored by the Duke William Hotel, saw the only instance to date of the participation in the tournament of a player widely known outside the world of circular chess: David Howell, then aged 11 and having recently gained national publicity by becoming the youngest player to avoid defeat (at standard chess) against a reigning world champion, with a draw in the final game of his match against Vladimir Kramnik (having lost the other three games). Howell won the tournament, scoring a maximum 5 points after beating Bowers in the final round, although he commented afterwards "This is the first time I have played in a circular chess contest and it was difficult. Circular chess is a lot harder to play than square chess. Every time you or your opponent makes a move, you have to think about what is happening on the other side of the board." Kok finished runner-up with  points.

The 2003 tournament was again held in Bishop Edward King House; sponsorship for it and the four subsequent tournaments came from Lindum Group. Howell did not return to defend his title (and has not played in the tournament since); Bowers gained his fifth title with victory over Kok in the last round to complete a 5/5 score, and Lincolnshire player David Carew, with , finished second. Bowers repeated the feat the following year, again finishing with a win against Kok; Nottinghamshire's Mike Clark was the runner-up, with Stevens third and Kok and Carew among a group of six players in joint fourth place.

In 2005, the Society gained extra publicity for the tournament by securing the chapter house of Lincoln Cathedral as the venue, only the day after the filming of The Da Vinci Code there had been completed (the cathedral was used to film scenes which, in the book, take place in Westminster Abbey, since the abbey had refused Columbia Pictures permission to film there); much of the film set was (and is) still in place. The draw for the first round of the tournament was conducted by Councillor Steve Allnutt, the Deputy Mayor of Lincoln, and Mrs Chris Noble, the City Sheriff; the two guests accepted an invitation to try the game for themselves, with the Sheriff emerging as the winner. In contrast to previous tournaments, the 2005 championship was held over four rounds rather than five; in the first Stevens drew with Bowers, to end the latter's run of ten consecutive wins in the tournament and leave Kok the favourite to take the title again. At the halfway point there were four players with maximum points – Kok, Hertfordshire's John Beasley, and tournament newcomers David Stamp and Michael Jones, both of Lincolnshire – with Bowers on  after surviving a scare to "snaffle" Carew in the second round. Kok beat Beasley in the third round, while Stamp and Jones remained in contention after both winning; Bowers also won, although, since the top four players would be drawn against each other in the final round, his chances of retaining his title were remote, relying on him winning his own game and the other being drawn to force a three-way playoff. The draw for the final round pitted Kok against Jones and Bowers against Stamp – in each case an experienced player against a tournament newcomer. The former game looked to be heading in Kok's favour before he blundered in time trouble and eventually lost on time, leaving Jones on 4/4 and Stamp needing to beat Bowers to force a tiebreak; he could only draw, so Jones finished the outright champion and Stamp runner-up with 3. Bowers, Herman Kok, his son Robbie, Beasley and Clark tied for third place with 3 points each.

The 2006 World Championship was held at Lincoln Castle, and was dedicated to regular competitor Charles Vermes of Derbyshire, who had died shortly before. The first round brought no surprise results – the only two of the main contenders to be drawn together were Clark and Stevens, with Clark emerging the winner; Jones, Herman Kok and Bowers all won. Clark beat Jones in the second round, at which point there remained five players on maximum points: Clark, Kok, Bowers, Lincolnshire's Richard Kidals and Ian Lewis of Cardiff. Lewis lost his third-round game to tournament founder Reynolds, but the other four leaders all won, ensuring the need for a tiebreak unless one of the last round games was drawn; Kok beat Clark and Bowers beat Kidals to give them both the maximum 4 points, so the expected tiebreak game ensued. The game was close throughout, with Bowers eventually losing on time to give Kok the title – only the second player, after Bowers himself, to claim it more than once.

The 2007 World Championship was held at The Tap & Spile in Lincoln, with Kevin McCarthy lifting the title after remaining unbeaten in his first ever tournament under Circular Rules, including a win against the legendary Herman Kok, who had taught him the rules only a fortnight previously.

The 2011 World Championship was also held at The Tap & Spile in Lincoln, with newcomer Nigel Payne, previously a Welsh All Valleys Champion (Under-15 category), claiming the title.

See also
 Six-player circular chess – a circular variant for multiple players by Hridayeshwar Singh Bhati

References

External links
The Circular Chess Society
Historical roots
 Circular Chess Handbook by Abu Faisal Tapia
"Circular Chess" by Hans Bodlaender, The Chess Variant Pages

Circular Chess Software (Windows 95 – Windows 7)
Circular Chess Software (Windows 3.x)
An Open Source Online Circular Chess
Circular Chess a simple program by Ed Friedlander (Java)
Circular Chess Board Painter a freeware program editing Circular Chess Boards with Classic Chess pieces but also with fairy Chess pieces.

Abstract strategy games
Chess variants

Circular chess


Ludovico Ariosto (Reggio Emilia, 8 September 1474 – Ferrara 6 July 1533) was an Italian poet. He is best known as the author of the romance epic Orlando Furioso (1516). The poem is a continuation of Matteo Maria Boiardo's Orlando Innamorato. It tells about the adventures of Charlemagne, Orlando, and the Franks as they fight the Saracens with diversions into many side plots. Ariosto composed the poem in the ottava rima rhyme scheme and introduced narrative commentary throughout the work.

Ariosto spent the greater part of his life at Ferrara including many years in the service of Cardinal Ippolito d'Este and then of Duke Alfonso I. His poem Orlando Furioso is designed to exalt the Este family; in its final form it was first published in 1532. It is the greatest of the Italian romantic epics. Ariosto also wrote lyric poetry in Italian and Latin, some satires and four comedies.

Minor works
 La Tragedia di Tisbe (1493)
 La Cassaria (1508)
 I Suppositi (1509)
 Il Negromante (1520)
 La Lena (1528)
 Studenti (1518)

References

1474 births
1533 deaths
Italian poets

Ludovico Ariosto


Luis Vélez de Guevara (born Luis Vélez de Santander) (1 August 1579 – 10 November 1644) was a Spanish dramatist and novelist.
He was born at Écija and was of Jewish converso descent.
After graduating as a sizar at the University of Osuna in 1596, he joined the household of Rodrigo de Castro, Cardinal-Archbishop of Seville, and celebrated the marriage of Philip III in a poem signed Vélez de Santander, a name which he continued to use till some years later.

It seems he served as a soldier in Italy and Algiers, returning to Spain in 1602 when he entered the service of the count de Saldaña, and dedicated himself to writing for the stage. He died at Madrid on 10 November 1644.

Velez de Guevara was the author of over four hundred plays, of which the best are Reinar despues de morir, La Luna de la Sierra, and El Diablo está en Cantillana. The play Más pesa el rey que la sangre, which translates into "The King weighs more than blood (kinship)" is based on the episode of the Reconquista in which the nobleman Alonso Pérez de Guzmán allows his son to be sacrificed, rather than surrender his King's possession of Tarifa. However, Vélez de Guevara is most widely known as the author of El diablo cojuelo (1641, "The Lame Devil" or "The Crippled Devil"), a fantastic novel which suggested to Alain-René Lesage the idea for Le Diable boiteux (1707).   The plot presents a rascal student that hides in an astrologer's mansard.  He frees a devil from a bottle.  As an acknowledgement the devil shows him the apartments of Madrid and the tricks, miseries and mischiefs of their inhabitants. A similar theme was suggested by the magic lenses in Los anteojos de mejor vista (1620–1625) by Rodrigo Fernández de Ribera. Charles Dickens refers to El Diablo cojuelo in The Old Curiosity Shop, chapter thirty-three.

References

External links

 Works by Luis Vélez de Guevara at Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes

Spanish poets
Spanish Baroque people
Spanish Golden Age
1579 births
1644 deaths
People from Écija
Spanish male dramatists and playwrights
Spanish male poets
17th-century Spanish dramatists and playwrights
17th-century Spanish poets
Baroque writers

Luis Vélez de Guevara


The White House Endowment Trust, sometimes also called the White House Endowment Fund, is a private, non-profit, tax-exempt fund established to finance the ongoing restoration and refurbishment of the state rooms at the White House, the official home and principal workplace of the president of the United States. The fund is funded by private donation, through individual citizens and corporations. The trust is administered by the White House Historical Association.

Founded in 1964 as the White House Preservation Fund, concurrent with the creation of the Committee for the Preservation of the White House, the goal was to establish an endowment to finance ongoing restoration projects. First Lady Rosalynn Carter restyled the fund as the White House Endowment Trust in 1978 and substantially increased the fund's profile and worth.

By the late 1980s performance of the fund had dwindled. First Lady Barbara Bush sought to revitalize the fund as the White House Endowment Trust to be managed by the White House Historical Association. She set a goal of raising a $25 million endowment. First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton's continued support help expand the trust's endowment to over $35 million. As first lady, Mrs. Clinton also made extensive use of the fund in refurbishing the Blue Room, Red Room, State Dining Room, Cross Hall, and East Room.

In April, 2014 the White House Endowment Trust reported net assets of $51,849,751 on IRS Form 990.

See also
 White House Acquisition Trust
 White House Historical Association
 Committee for the Preservation of the White House

References
 Clinton, Hillary Rodham. An Invitation to the White House: At Home with History. Simon & Schuster: 2000. .
 Garrett, Wendell. Our Changing White House. Northeastern University Press: 1995. .
 Monkman, Betty C. The White House: The Historic Furnishing & First Families. Abbeville Press: 2000. .
 The White House: Celebrating Two Hundred Years 1800–2000. White House Historical Association: 2002. .

White House
White House Executive Residence Operations

White House Endowment Trust


Ernst Heinrich Weber (24 June 1795 – 26 January 1878) was a German physician. He was one of the founders of experimental psychology. Weber was an influential and important figure in the areas of physiology and psychology during his lifetime and beyond. His studies on sensation and touch, and his emphasis on good experimental techniques were notable. They gave new direction and areas of study to future psychologists, physiologists, and anatomists.

Weber was born into an academic background, with his father serving as a professor at the University of Wittenberg. Weber became a doctor, specializing in anatomy and physiology. Two of his younger brothers, Wilhelm and Eduard, were also influential in academia, both as scientists. One did physics and the other anatomy. Ernst became a lecturer and a professor at the University of Leipzig and stayed there until his retirement.

1795 births
1878 deaths
Foreign Members of the Royal Society
German doctors
German psychologists

Ernst Heinrich Weber


The Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards or simply Golden Horse is a movie festival and awards ceremony held annually in Taiwan. The ceremony usually takes place in November or December in Taipei.

The awards, contested by movies submitted from Taiwan, Hong Kong, China and elsewhere, are generally held to be the most prestigious for Chinese language movies outside the People's Republic of China. The awards ceremony is held after the month-long movie festival, which showcases some of the nominated movies for the awards.

Winners are selected by a jury of judges during the week before the ceremony is held. Winners are awarded with a golden horse statuette.

Under current rules and regulations, every movie made primarily in any dialect of Chinese language is eligible for competition. Since 1996, almost any artist or movie from mainland China was allowed to enter the movie  festival.

Other websites
 金馬獎官方網站 Golden Horse Official Website
 The 42nd Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards
 Cri.CN
 Golden Horse 2005
 Golden Horse 2004

Movie awards
Movie festivals
Taipei
Festivals in Asia

Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards


In mathematics, a magma is kind of algebraic structure. It is a set with a binary operation on that set.

A binary operation works by taking two elements from a set (that do not have to be different) and returning some other element of that set.

If we give the set a label (such as X) and the binary operation a label (such as •). Then we give the magma the label (X, •).

Examples

The natural numbers with addition form a magma. Because the set of natural numbers is written as  and addition is written as  the magma is written as . The name of the magma would be "The natural numbers under addition".

The integers with multiplication form a magma. Because the set of integers is written as  and multiplication (in abstract mathematics) is written as  the magma is written as . The name of the magma would be "The integers under multiplication".

The real numbers under division do not form a magma. This is because numbers cannot be divided by 0. A binary operation requires that any two elements can be taken from the set (in this case in order) to produce another element from the set. The real numbers without 0 is written as . It can be shown that the  is a magma.

Abstract algebra

Magma (mathematics)


Battleship Potemkin (, ), whiles, an mair accurately, rendered as  Battleship Potyomkin, is a 1925 silent film directit bi Sergei Eisenstein an produced bi Mosfilm. It presents a dramatized version o the mutiny that occurred in 1905 when the crew o the Roushie battleship Potemkin rebelled against thair officers o the Tsarist regime.

1925 films
Black-an-white films
Epic films
Films aboot mutinies
Films aboot the 1905 Roushie Revolution
Seafarin films based on actual events
Films directit bi Sergei Eisenstein
Films set in 1905
Films set in Ukraine
Mosfilm films
Films set in Odessa
Soviet films
Soviet silent films
Soviet revolutionary propaganda films

Battleship Potemkin


Haut-Médoc () is an Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée (AOC) for wine in the Bordeaux wine region of southwestern France, on the Left Bank of the Gironde estuary. Covering a large part of the viticultural strip of land along the Médoc peninsula, the zone covers approximately  of its length.

As defined by the original Institut National des Appellations d'Origine (INAO) decree of November 14, 1936, its southern edge borders the city of Bordeaux and the Médoc AOC to the north, encompassing fifteen communes exclusive to the appellation, while at the same time it enclaves six appellations made up of  nine communes (Saint-Estèphe AOC, Pauillac AOC, Saint-Julien AOC, Listrac-Médoc AOC, Moulis-en-Médoc AOC and Margaux AOC) that are technically wine-making communes of Haut-Médoc. Similarly, Haut-Médoc is a sub-appellation of the Médoc AOC.

Of Haut-Médoc's fifteen wine-producing communes, eight are located along the waterfront of Garonne and Gironde: Blanquefort, Parempuyre, Ludon, Macau, Arcins, Lamarque, Cussac and Saint-Seurin-de-Cadourne. Seven communes lie inland: Le Taillan, Le Pian-Médoc, Avensan, Saint-Laurent-Médoc. Saint-Sauveur, Cissac and Vertheuil.

Few of the estates falling within the generic Haut-Médoc appellation were included in the Bordeaux Wine Official Classification of 1855 (as all but six of the 61 are located within the AOCs Margaux, Saint-Julien, Pauillac and Saint-Estèphe), but several were included in the classification Cru Bourgeois.

History
For most of its history, the Haut-Médoc was a vast region of salt marshes used for animal grazing rather than viticulture. In the 17th century, Dutch merchants began an ambitious drainage project to convert the marshland into a usable vineyard area. Their objective was to provide the British market a wine alternative to the Graves and Portuguese wines that were dominating the market. Using technology that was advanced for that time, the Dutch were able to convert enough marshland to allow large estates to form all along the Gironde. Soon the Bordeaux wine regions of Margaux, Saint-Julien, Pauillac and Saint-Estèphe took shape. By the 19th century, the wine region of the Haut-Médoc was one of the most prosperous in France, with wines that had an international reputation that would be unparalleled till the late 20th century.

The area covers approximately 4,600 hectares of declared vineyards, constituting 28.5% of the Médoc total, annually producing on average 255,000 hectolitres of wine. The variation in types of soil is greater than other appellations in the region, ranging from less than ideal terrain, to conditions on a par with some of the enclaved appellations of more celebrated reputation.

Of the permitted grape varieties of Haut-Médoc, 52% of the viticultural area is planted with Cabernet Sauvignon, with additional cultivation of Merlot, Petit Verdot and to a small degree Malbec (locally called "Cot"). Also permitted under the regulations of the AOC are the varieties Cabernet Franc and Carménère.

The INAO specifications demand the following production norms: a high planting density, a minimum of 6,500 plants per hectare, and minimum of sugar,  per litre of must, maximum base yield of 48 hectolitres per hectare, and a minimum alcohol by volume of 10%.

Estates
Of the 392 viticultural properties of Haut-Médoc, 150 participate in winemaking cooperatives, the other 242 being independent wineries.

Notes and references

a.    Cru Bourgeois as a term of classification since 1932, was annulled in 2007, and reintroduced in 2009.

General

 Haut-Médoc Bordeaux.com, Le Conseil Interprofessionnel du Vin de Bordeaux (CIVB)
 Haut-Médoc AOC decree, INAO

Footnotes

Bordeaux AOCs

Haut-Médoc AOC


Microscopic traffic flow models are a class of scientific models of vehicular traffic dynamics.

In contrast, to macroscopic models, microscopic traffic flow models simulate single vehicle-driver units, so the dynamic variables of the models represent microscopic properties like the position and velocity of single vehicles.

Car-following models
Also known as time-continuous models, all car-following models have in common that they are defined by ordinary differential equations describing the complete dynamics of the vehicles' positions  and velocities . It is assumed that the input stimuli of the drivers are restricted to their own velocity , the net distance (bumper-to-bumper distance)  to the leading vehicle  (where  denotes the vehicle length), and the velocity  of the leading vehicle. The equation of motion of each vehicle is characterized by an acceleration function that depends on those input stimuli:

In general, the driving behavior of a single driver-vehicle unit  might not merely depend on the immediate leader  but on the  vehicles in front. The equation of motion in this more generalized form reads:

Examples of car-following models
 Optimal velocity model (OVM)
 Velocity difference model (VDIFF)
 Wiedemann model (1974)
 Gipps' model (Gipps, 1981)
 Intelligent driver model (IDM, 1999)
 DNN based anticipatory driving model (DDS, 2021)

Cellular automaton models
Cellular automaton (CA) models use integer variables to describe the dynamical properties of the system. The road is divided into sections of a certain length  and the time is discretized to steps of . Each road section can either be occupied by a vehicle or empty and the dynamics are given by updated rules of the form:

(the simulation time  is measured in units of  and the vehicle positions  in units of ).

The time scale is typically given by the reaction time of a human driver, . With  fixed, the length of the road sections determines the granularity of the model. At a complete standstill, the average road length occupied by one vehicle is approximately 7.5 meters. Setting  to this value leads to a model where one vehicle always occupies exactly one section of the road and a velocity of 5 corresponds to , which is then set to be the maximum velocity a driver wants to drive at. However, in such a model, the smallest possible acceleration would be  which is unrealistic. Therefore, many modern CA models use a finer spatial discretization, for example , leading to a smallest possible acceleration of .

Although cellular automaton models lack the accuracy of the time-continuous car-following models, they still have the ability to reproduce a wide range of traffic phenomena. Due to the simplicity of the models, they are numerically very efficient and can be used to simulate large road networks in real-time or even faster.

Examples of cellular automaton models
 Rule 184
 Biham–Middleton–Levine traffic model
 Nagel–Schreckenberg model (NaSch, 1992)

See also
Microsimulation

References

Road traffic management
Mathematical modeling
Traffic flow

Microscopic traffic flow model


The cathode ray tube or CRT was invented by Karl Ferdinand Braun. It was the most common type of display for many years. It was used in almost all computer monitors and televisions until LCD and plasma screens started being used.

A cathode ray tube has an electron gun. The cathode is an electrode (a metal that can send out electrons when heated). The cathode is inside a glass tube. Also inside the glass tube is an anode that attracts electrons. This is used to pull the electrons toward the front of the glass tube, so the electrons shoot out in one direction, making a cathode ray. To better control the direction of the ray, the air is taken out of the tube, making a vacuum.

The electrons hit the front of the tube, where a phosphor screen is.  The electrons make the phosphor light up.  The electrons can be aimed by creating a magnetic field.  By carefully controlling which bits of phosphor light up, a bright picture can be made on the front of the vacuum tube.  Changing this picture 30 times every second will make it look like the picture is moving. Because there is a vacuum inside the tube (which has to be strong enough to hold out the air), and the tube must be glass for the phosphor to be visible, the tube must be made of thick glass.  For a large television, this vacuum tube can be quite heavy.

The cathode ray tube was invented in 1897, and used as an oscilloscope (a machine to show waves).  Later, along with other inventions and improvements, it was used for the first modern electronic television by Philo T. Farnsworth in the 1920s. The CRT was the main type of television screen until the liquid crystal display became popular in the early 2000s.

Related pages
 Liquid crystal display
 Vacuum tube

References

Display technology
Television technology
Electronic components

Cathode ray tube


Edward C. Lumley,  (born October 27, 1939) is a Canadian corporate executive and former politician.

Born in Windsor, Ontario, he received a Bachelor of Commerce degree in 1961 from Assumption University (predecessor of the University of Windsor). Lumley established himself in business in Cornwall in the other end of the province before entering politics.  He served as Mayor of Cornwall between 1972 and 1974, and was first elected to the House of Commons of Canada as the Liberal Member of Parliament for Stormont—Dundas in the 1974 federal election.

In 1976, Lumley became parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion. From 1977 to 1978, he served as parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Finance.

Lumley survived the 1979 election that defeated the Liberal government. The Liberals returned to power in the 1980 federal election and Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau appointed Lumley to the cabinet as Minister of State for Trade. After serving in a few other minor portfolios, he was promoted to Minister of Industry and Minister of Regional Economic Expansion in 1982.

Trudeau's successor, John Turner, made Lumley his Minister of Communications and Minister of Regional Industrial Expansion in 1984.  Lumley was defeated in the 1984 federal election that fall.

Following his electoral defeat, Lumley returned to the private sector and became an influential corporate figure. He has served as vice-chairman of BMO Nesbitt Burns since 1991, lead director of Magna International, and a board member of Bell Canada Enterprises, Canadian National Railway and Air Canada.

In 2000, he was appointed to lead a commission examining salaries and compensation for Members of Parliament.

A friend of the former prime minister, Paul Martin, he had been consulted by Martin's government on various issues.

In 2006, he was appointed Chancellor of the University of Windsor.

On July 1, 2014, he was appointed as a member of the Order of Canada.

References

1939 births
People of Bell Canada
Canadian university and college chancellors
Liberal Party of Canada MPs
Living people
Members of the King's Privy Council for Canada
Members of the House of Commons of Canada from Ontario
Members of the United Church of Canada
Politicians from Windsor, Ontario
Canadian corporate directors
Members of the Order of Canada
Members of the 23rd Canadian Ministry

Ed Lumley


The Island of Hawaiʻi is the largest U.S. Hawaiian Island, and it is the farthest south. It is also called the "Big Island." Its area is 4,038 sq. miles (10,458 km2). The widest part of the island is 93 miles (150 km) across.
The Big Island has more than half (~62%) of the total land area of State of Hawaii. It is part of County of Hawaii.

The island is seven separate shield volcanos that erupted more or less one at a time, one partly covering the other. These are (from oldest to youngest): Kohala (extinct), Mauna Kea (dormant), Hualalai (dormant), Mauna Loa (active), Kulani (extinct, mostly buried), and Kilauea (very active). The volcanos were caused by the Pacific oceanic tectonic plate moving over a hotspot. There lava from the Earth's lower mantle or upper core is close to the surface.

The largest city on the island is Hilo. Hilo has many historic buildings, interesting shops, parks, many performances, festivals and events. It is on the rainy, east side of the island. The city of Kailua-Kona is on the dry, west side of Hawaii, and is popular with tourists.

References

MacDonald, G. A., and A. T. Abbott. 1970. Volcanoes in the Sea. Univ. of Hawaii Press, Honolulu. 441 p.
History and culture of Hilo. (2010). Retrieved from http://www.hiloliving.com/Hilo_Culture.html

Islands of Hawaii

Hawaii (island)


Adenoids (also called pharyngeal tonsils, or nasopharyngeal tonsils) are tissues at the very back of the nose.  They are in the part of the nose where is joins the mouth.

In most children they make a soft bump on the top and back section of the nose's air passage.

Taking away adenoids with surgery is called adenoidectomy.

Head (body part)

Adenoid


Sheila Ann Manson McLean  (born 20 June 1951) is International Bar Association Professor of Law and Ethics in Medicine and director of the Institute of Law and Ethics in Medicine at the School of Law of the University of Glasgow. McLean is the Book Reviewers' Editor for Medical Law International.

Early life
Born Sheila Black, she was educated at the Glasgow High School for Girls and studied at the University of Glasgow, graduating LL.B. in 1972. She then worked as an Area Reporter for the Children's Panel, and in 1975 was appointed Lecturer at the School of Law of the University of Glasgow. She was awarded an M.Litt. in 1978, with a dissertation entitled The role of the reporter in the children's hearing system, and in 1987 completed her Ph.D., Information disclosure, consent to medical treatment and the law. She was appointed Senior Lecturer in 1985, and established the Institute of Law and Ethics in Medicine.

Career
In 1990, McLean was appointed the first International Bar Association Professor of Law and Ethics in Medicine, and has since pursued a distinguished research career. She has published widely, in particular on consent, reproductive and end of life issues. She authored a controversial book concerning the ethical future of applied genetic engineering, entitled Modern Dilemma : Choosing Children, and has spoken out with criticism of the Baby Gender Mentor test.

McLean has also held a number of appointments, both nationally and internationally. Currently, she is UK Adviser to the European branch of the World Health Organization on the revision of its Health for All policy, a member of the UNESCO Biomedical Ethics Committee, and Specialist Adviser to the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee. Between 1997 and 1998, she chaired the Department of Health review of consent provisions in the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990 and between 2000 and 2003, chaired the Independent Review Group on Organ Retention at Post Mortem. From 1999 to 2002, she was the first Chairman of the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission.

She has been awarded honorary degrees by the Universities of Abertay Dundee and Edinburgh, and Fellowships of the Academy of Medical Sciences, Royal Society of Edinburgh, Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, Royal College of General Practitioners and the Royal Society of Arts. She is also a distinguished supporter of Humanists UK.

McLean was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2020 New Year Honours for services to health and education.

Personal life
She married Alan McLean in 1976, although the marriage was dissolved in 1987. She is a member of the Lansdowne Club.

References

External links
 Professor Sheila McLean, Staff Profile, University of Glasgow
getCITED profile
Interview discussing her book: Modern Dilemma: Choosing Children at the Edinburgh International Book Festival,

Living people
Scottish legal scholars
Scottish humanists
People educated at the High School of Glasgow
Alumni of the University of Glasgow
Academics of the University of Glasgow
Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh
Scholars of medical law
1951 births
Officers of the Order of the British Empire

Sheila McLean


, or o-toso, is spiced medicinal sake traditionally drunk during Japanese New Year celebrations.

Culture

Toso is drunk to flush away the previous year's maladies and to aspire to lead a long life. For generations it has been said that "if one person drinks this his family will not fall ill; if the whole family does no-one in the village will fall ill" and has been a staple part of New Year's osechi cuisine in Japan.

Toso is written using two kanji: 蘇 representing evil spirits and 屠 meaning to slaughter.

Toso is made by combining several medicinal herbs to form , a spicy mixture, which is then soaked in sake or mirin. If made with mirin, essentially a sweet sake, it is suitable for drinking, but using fermented mirin seasoning would not be appropriate as it is too salty.

Three sizes of cup, called  (see picture), are used starting with the smallest and passed round with each family member or guest taking a sip. Drinking rituals differ by region, but in formal situations would proceed from youngest to eldest. This tradition originated in China in hope for children to grow faster whereas their elders to age slower. However, in Japan, around the beginning of the Meiji or Shōwa periods, custom changed and the head of the household usually takes the first drink.

The tradition of drinking toso at the New Year began in the Tang Dynasty in China and was adopted by Japanese aristocrats during the Heian period. The first cup drunk would be made with tososan and the second and third cups with different varieties called byakusan and toshōsan.

The drinking ceremony finally passed to the general public and doctors would give out tososan. Even today some chemists shops have retained the custom and give tososan away as a free gift at the end of the year.

The custom is now mainly limited to Kansai and west Japan; in other regions celebratory o-toso at New Year is often plain sake without tososan.

Ingredients

The recipe is said to have originated as a prescription of the famous Chinese physician Zhang Zhongjing during the Eastern Han period.

Ingredients have changed somewhat over time; some of the original Chinese ones were deemed at one point or another to be too potent for casual consumption. Nowadays it is typically made from Japanese pepper, asiasari radix, apiaceae, cinnamon, dried ginger, atractylodes Japonica, Chinese bellflower and rhubarb, amongst others.

Sources

 Primarily translated from the Japanese Wikipedia article as of 6 January 2007.

See also
Japanese New Year
Tamagozake
Mulled wine

External links

Japanese cuisine terms
Japanese New Year foods
Sake
Traditional Japanese medicine

Toso