The Washington Navy Yard is the former shipyard and ordnance plant of the United States Navy in Southeast Washington, D.C. It is the oldest shore base of the U.S. Navy. The Yard currently serves as a ceremonial and administrative center for the U.S. Navy. It has the offices of the Chief of Naval Operations,  the Naval Sea Systems Command, Naval Historical Center, the Department of Naval History, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, the U.S. Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps, Naval Reactors, Marine Corps Institute, the United States Navy Band, and numerous other naval commands. Before 2006, it used to be the headquarters to the Marine Corps Historical Center, but that center moved to Quantico. The Washington Navy Yard was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973. It was designated a National Historic Landmark on May 11, 1976.

History
The history of the yard can be divided into its military history and cultural and scientific history.

Military

The land was purchased under an Act of Congress on July 23, 1799. The Washington Navy Yard was established on October 2, 1799, the date the property was transferred to the Navy. It is the oldest shore base of the U.S. Navy.  The Yard was built under the direction of Benjamin Stoddert, the first Secretary of the Navy, under the supervision of the Yard's first commandant, Commodore Thomas Tingey, who served in that capacity for 29 years.

The original boundaries that were established in 1800, along 9th and M Street Southeast, are still marked by a white brick wall that surrounds the Yard on the north and east sides. The next year, two additional lots were purchased. The north wall of the Yard was built in 1809 along with a guardhouse, now known as the Latrobe Gate. After the Burning of Washington in 1814, Tingey recommended that the height of the eastern wall be increased to ten feet (3 m) because of the fire and subsequent looting.

The southern boundary of the Yard was formed by the Anacostia River (then called the "Eastern Branch" of the Potomac River). The west side was undeveloped marsh. The land located along the Anacostia was added to by landfill over the years as it became necessary to increase the size of the Yard.

From its first years, the Washington Navy Yard became the navy's largest shipbuilding and shipfitting facility, with 22 vessels constructed there, ranging from small 70-foot (21 m) gunboats to the 246-foot (75 m) steam frigate USS Minnesota. The USS Constitution came to the Yard in 1812 to refit and prepare for combat action.

During the War of 1812, the Navy Yard was an important support facility. It was also helped defend the capital city from the British. Sailors at the Navy Yard were part of the hastily assembled American army which, at Bladensburg, Maryland, opposed the British forces marching on Washington. The Navy Yard sailors and marines of nearby Marine Barracks, Washington, D.C., were in the third and last line of defense at Bladensburg. Together, they fought hand to hand with cutlasses and pikes against the British regulars before being overwhelmed. As the British marched into Washington, holding the Yard became impossible. Tingey, seeing the smoke from the burning Capitol, ordered the Yard burned to prevent its capture by the enemy. Tingey's own quarters (now Quarters A) and the Latrobe Gate were spared from the flames. Both structures are now individually listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Following the War of 1812, the Washington Navy Yard never regained its prominence as a shipbuilding facility. The waters of the Anacostia River were too shallow to accommodate larger vessels, and the Yard was deemed too inaccessible to the open sea. Thus came a shift to what was to be the character of the Yard for more than a century: ordnance and technology. The Yard possessed one of the earliest steam engines in the United States, and was used to manufacture anchors, chain, and steam engines for vessels of war.

During the American Civil War, the Yard once again became an integral part of the defense of Washington. Commandant Franklin Buchanan resigned his commission to join the Confederacy, leaving the Yard to Commander John A. Dahlgren. President Abraham Lincoln, who held Dahlgren in the highest esteem, was a frequent visitor. The famous ironclad USS Monitor was repaired at the Yard after her historic battle with the CSS Virginia. The Lincoln assassination conspirators were brought to the Yard following their capture. The body of John Wilkes Booth was examined and identified on the monitor USS Montauk, moored at the Yard.

Following the war, the Yard continued to be the scene of technological advances. In 1886, the Yard was designated the manufacturing center for all ordnance in the Navy. Commander Theodore F. Jewell was Superintendent of the Naval Gun Factory from January 1893 to February 1896. Ordnance production continued as the Yard manufactured armament for the Great White Fleet and the World War I navy. The  naval railway guns used in France during World War I were manufactured at the Yard.

By World War II, the Yard was the largest naval ordnance plant in the world. The weapons designed and built there were used in every war in which the United States fought until the 1960s. At its peak, the Yard consisted of 188 buildngs on 126 acres (0.5 km²) of land and employed nearly 25,000 people. Small components for optical systems, and enormous  battleship guns were all manufactured here. In December 1945, the Yard was renamed the U.S. Naval Gun Factory. Ordnance work continued for some years after World War II until finally phased out in 1961. Three years later, on July 1, 1964, the activity was redesignated the Washington Navy Yard. The deserted factory buildings began to be converted to office use.

The Washington Navy Yard was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973, and designated a National Historic Landmark on May 11, 1976.

It was headquarters to the Marine Corps Historical Center. That was moved in 2006 to Quantico.

Cultural and scientific

Many scientific developments took place at the Washington Navy Yard. Robert Fulton worked on his clockwork torpedo during the War of 1812. In 1822, Commodore John Rodgers built the country's first marine railway for the overhaul of large vessels. John A. Dahlgren developed his bottle-shaped cannon that became the mainstay of naval ordnance before the Civil War. In 1898, David W. Taylor developed a ship model testing basin which was used by the Navy and private shipbuilders to test the effect of water on new hull designs. The first shipboard aircraft catapult was tested in the Anacostia River in 1912. A wind tunnel was completed at the Yard in 1916. The giant gears for the Panama Canal locks were cast at the Yard. Navy Yard technicians applied their efforts to medical designs for prosthetic hands and molds for artificial eyes and teeth.

The Washington Navy Yard was the ceremonial gateway to the nation's capital. In 1860, the first Japanese diplomatic mission was welcomed to the United States in an impressive pageant at the Yard. The body of World War I's Unknown Soldier was received here. Charles A. Lindbergh returned to the Navy Yard in 1927 after his famous transatlantic flight. In 1939, Britain's King George VI, representing the dominion of Canada, visited the Yard during his Washington stay.

As of 2004, the Navy Yard houses a variety of activities. It is the main office of the Naval District Washington, and houses numerous support activities for the fleet and aviation communities. The Navy Museum welcomes visitors to the Navy Art Collection. Its displays of naval art and artifacts trace the Navy's history from the Revolutionary War to the present day. The Naval History and Heritage Command is housed in a complex of buildings known as the Dudley Knox Center for Naval History. Leutze Park is the scene of colorful ceremonies.

The destroyer USS Barry is a museum ship at the Washington Navy Yard, and is open to tourists. The Barry is frequently used for change of command ceremonies for naval commands in the area.

Operations
The Yard serves as a ceremonial and administrative center for the U.S. Navy, home to the Chief of Naval Operations. It is headquarters for the Naval Sea Systems Command, Naval Historical Center, the Department of Naval History, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, the U.S. Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps, Naval Reactors, Marine Corps Institute, the United States Navy Band, and many other naval commands.

2013 shooting

On September 16, 2013, a shooting took place at the Yard. Shots were fired at the headquarters for the Naval Sea Systems Command Headquarters building #197. At least 17 people, including at least eight civilians, one D.C. police officer and one peacekeeper, were shot. Thirteen fatalities were confirmed by the United States Navy and D.C. Police. Officials said the gunman, Aaron Alexis, a 34-year-old civilian contractor from Queens, New York, was killed during a gun battle with police.

Related pages
 Arsenal Point
 Building 170
 List of National Historic Landmarks in the District of Columbia

References

Other websites

 Washington Navy Yard history
 The United States Naval Gun Factory by Commander Theodore F. Jewell, Harper's Magazine, Vol. 89, Issue 530, July 1894, pp 251–261.

1799 establishments in the United States
Buildings and structures in Washington, D.C.
18th-century establishments in Washington, D.C.

Washington Navy Yard


Natalya Fyodorovna Simonova () is a fictional character and the main Bond girl in the James Bond film GoldenEye, played by actress Izabella Scorupco.

Biography
Natalya Simonova works as a Level 2 programmer at the Severnaya facility of the Russian Space Forces, on work involving missile guidance systems. When the treasonous General Ouromov and Xenia Onatopp attack the station with a stolen Tiger helicopter, she is left the only survivor besides Boris Grishenko, who had allied himself with Ourumov and Alec Trevelyan, the plan's mastermind.

She attempts to find Boris, whom she believes to be innocent; he meets her in a cathedral and turns her over to Onatopp.

Simonova and Bond, who have both been captured by Trevelyan, are trapped in the stolen Tiger helicopter. The helicopter fires missiles at itself, but Bond is able to eject the two, who are subsequently arrested by the Russian government.

Ourumov sets Bond free to clear his own name of murder; Bond escapes, but loses Natalya in the process. He then rescues her from Ourumov and Trevelyan, and they become lovers. The two then follow Trevelyan to Cuba.

Finally, the two assault Trevelyan's satellite base, where Natalya is able to prevent the rogue satellite Mischa from sending an electromagnetic pulse to destroy London. Natalya breaks into the computer room and resets the satellite's course to cause a burn up over the Atlantic Ocean. She destroys the GoldenEye satellite and commandeers a helicopter to pick up Bond and herself by using the gun Bond gave her. Natalya saves Bond right after he defeats Trevelyan. She and Bond leave in the helicopter and get dropped off a distance away. Jack Wade was waiting for the two. He picks them up in the helicopter, ending the movie.

In an early draft of the script for the next film in the series, Tomorrow Never Dies, Bond mentioned to Wade that Natalya married a hockey player, a reference to Izabella Scorupco's real-life marriage to Polish hockey player Mariusz Czerkawski.

Featured in
 GoldenEye (1995)
 GoldenEye 007 (1997) — video game
 GoldenEye 007 (2010) — video game - She is portrayed by Kirsty Mitchell in this game

Reception
Helena Bassil-Morosow notes that "like her predecessors, Tatyana Romanova and Anya Amasova, Natalya is strong, beautiful and resilient but still needs Bond to save her."

IGN ranked Natalya as the 7th best Bond girl, saying "she was exactly what the franchise needed to get back on top after a lengthy time away from the big screen". Allwomenstalk rank her as the 2nd sexiest Bond girl.

When addressing the video game version of Natalya, Cracked.com rated her 10th on their The 15 Most Annoying Video Game Characters (From Otherwise Great Games) stating: "If James Bond is licensed to kill, Natalya must be licensed to die. She, like the aforementioned Ashley Graham, was born with a rare genetic disorder that disables her instinct for self-preservation."

References

External links

Bond girls
Fictional Russian people
GoldenEye
Film characters introduced in 1995
Fictional programmers
Female characters in film

Natalya Simonova


Wood carving is a form of working wood by means of a cutting tool. A chisel or knife are usual tools: the chisel can be tapped with a wooden mallet. The result is a wooden figure, or the sculptural ornamentation of a wooden object. A 'wood carving' may also refer to the finished product.

The making of sculpture in wood has a long history. Wood survives much less well than the other materials such as stone and bronze. It is vulnerable to decay, insect damage, and fire. Therefore, we do not know much about wood in the art history of older cultures.   Outdoor wood sculptures do not last long in most parts of the world, so that we have little idea how the totem pole tradition developed.

Many of the most important sculptures of China and Japan are in wood, also most African sculpture and that of Oceania and other regions. Wood is light, so it is suitable for masks and other objects meant to be carried. It can take very fine detail, and is also much easier to work than stone.

Some of the finest examples of early European wood carving are from the Middle Ages in Germany, Russia, Italy and France, where the typical themes of that era were used in Christian icons. In England many complete examples remain from the 16th and 17th century, when oak was often used. In general, really fine carving is done in fruitwood (wood of a fruit tree) because that is easy to work with. The famous woodcarver Grinling Gibbons used to work with lime wood. Complex pieces are often carved in separate sections which are later stuck together.

Related pages
Grinling Gibbons

References

Sculpture
Woodworking

Wood carving


Georg Hirth (13 July 1841 in Tonna – 28 March 1916 in Tegernsee) was a German writer, journalist and publisher. He is best known for founding the cultural magazine Jugend in 1896, which was instrumental in popularizing Art Nouveau.

Biography
Hirth was born in Tonna, present-day Thuringia in 1841, studied to be an economist in Gotha and in Leipzig, and after a career working as a journalist he founded the magazine Jugend: Münchner illustrierte Wochenschrift für Kunst und Leben (Youth: the illustrated weekly magazine of art and lifestyle of Munich). This publication, which reflected the modernist ideals that were circulating at the time among artists, was instrumental in promoting the style of Art Nouveau in Germany. As a result, the magazine's name was adopted as the most common German-language term for the movement: Jugendstil ("Jugend-style"). Hirth also coined the term "Secession" to represent the spirit of the various modern and reactionary movements of the era.<ref>Nicolas Powell, "Review of C. Nebehay, Ver Sacrum, 1898–1903," The Burlington Magazine, vol. 118 (Sep. 1976): 660.</ref> He died in Tegernsee in 1916.

 Selected works

Herausgeber: Tagebuch des deutsch-französischen Kriegs (Leipzig 1870–1874) – Diary of the Franco-Prussian WarDer Formenschatz der Renaissance (1877 ff., seit 1879 unter dem Titel Der Formenschatz) – published in English as Art TreasureDas deutsche Zimmer der Gotik und Renaissance etc. (3. Auflage 1886) – The German Gothic and Renaissance RoomKulturgeschichtliches Bilderbuch aus drei Jahrhunderten (1883 ff.) – published in English as Picture book of the graphic arts, 1500–1800Published a series of facsimile-reproductions of German woodcut prints and drawings by Albrecht Dürer, Hans Holbein the younger, Lucas Cranach the Elder, Jost Amman, Virgil Solis and others in the Liebhaber-Bibliothek alter Illustratoren'' (1880 ff.)

References

Bibliography
Neue Deutsche Biographie, vol. 9, pp. 239–241, and vol. 12, p. 217

External links

Art Nouveau
German editors
German art critics
German art historians
German art collectors
19th-century art collectors
20th-century art collectors
1841 births
1916 deaths
German male non-fiction writers
German magazine founders

Georg Hirth


Mark Berry (born September 22, 1962 in Oxnard, California) is the former third base coach for the Cincinnati Reds. He spent 27 seasons in the Reds organization as a player, coach, and manager.

Early life
Berry graduated from Hueneme High School in Oxnard in 1981. He played college baseball at Oxnard Junior College and the University of Arkansas.

Playing career
The Reds selected Berry in the 6th round of the 1984 draft with the 137th overall pick. He was signed by baseball scout Bill Clark. In his seven seasons as a Reds minor leaguer he, predominantly, played catcher, but also played first base, third base, nine games in the outfield, and one game at shortstop. He was a Pioneer League All-Star catcher in his first season in 1984, then was the Most Valuable Player for the Tampa Tarpons in 1986 and was ranked the organization's eight-best prospect in 1985 and 1987. He retired as a player in 1990.

Coaching career

Minor leagues
When Berry retired as a player from the Charleston Wheelers, he stayed with the team as a coach. A month later, he went from Charleston to Plant City of the Gulf Coast League as a coach. He spent the 1991 season as the pitching coach for the Cedar Rapids Reds. The following year he managed the Cedar Rapids Reds to a Midwest League championship title. In 1993, he managed the Winston-Salem Spirit to the Carolina League title.

In 1996, Berry began his managerial tenure for the Chattanooga Lookouts, the Double-A affiliate of the Reds. The team won the division in his first season, earning him the Southern League Manager of the Year award. In 1997, he was named the Southern League's Best Managerial Prospect by Baseball America. He managed the Lookouts until 1998. He finished his minor league managerial career with a 506-463 record (.522), two league championships, three division titles, and made the post-season four of his seven seasons.

Major Leagues
Berry went to spring training in 1999 scheduled to be the hitting coach for class-AAA Indianapolis, but remained with Cincinnati as the bullpen catcher. He remained the bullpen catcher until July 28, 2003, when he was named the Reds bench coach. The following offseason Berry was named third base coach. As well as being the Reds third base coach, Berry was also the spring training and regular season daily coordinator for the Reds.

References
Baseball Reference (minors)
  Reds.com – Roster – Coaches – Mark Berry
  The Baseball Cube – People – Coaches – Mark Berry

Billings Mustangs players
Cedar Rapids Reds players
Arkansas Razorbacks baseball players
Oxnard Condors baseball players
Tampa Tarpons (1957–1987) players
Vermont Reds players
Nashville Sounds players
Greensboro Hornets players
Charleston Wheelers players
Chattanooga Lookouts managers
1962 births
Living people
Cincinnati Reds coaches
Baseball players from Oxnard, California
Major League Baseball bullpen catchers

Mark Berry (baseball)


BDD is an abbreviation. It may mean:
 Binary decision diagram, a data structure in computer science
 Body dysmorphic disorder, a mental disorder
 Behavior driven development, a software design method
 Business-driven development, a software development method focusing on business requirements
 BostonDirtDogs.com, a blog-style website focusing on the Boston Red Sox
 Business Desktop Deployment, a free set of tools by Microsoft to manage desktop deployment projects

BDD (disambiguation)


A crystal radio, sometimes called a crystal set, is a very simple AM (or rarely FM) radio receiver, that does not need batteries to work. A long wire antenna gathers enough of the radio signals from nearby transmitters to power a crystal diode, which demodulates the signals, and plays them as sound through an earphone or small headset.

Crystal radios have come and gone many times in history. They were built in the early days of radio broadcasting by amateurs, and people who could not afford a well-made radio. They became popular again during the Great Depression, when money was scarce. During World War II, American soldiers built "foxhole radios" that used a razor blade and pencil point instead of a crystal. (German and Italian troops had equipment to detect normal superheterodyne radio receivers working, so an alternate choice was a wise one.)

After the war ended, amateurs built more crystal sets, and children began to make them as science and hobby projects. Later during the Vietnam War prisoners of war again built simple radios, and soldiers used Slinky springs as antennas.

Hobby clubs still exist, that give information to persons who want to build a crystal radio or similar radio project.

Other websites
 Stay Tuned
 Xtal Set Society
 Foxhole Radio article at Bizarre Stuff

Radio receivers
Hobbies

Crystal radio


Galena is the main ore of lead. It is mostly lead(II) sulphide.
Galena is one of the most common and widely used sulfide minerals. It crystallizes in the cubic crystal system often showing octahedral forms. It is often found with the minerals sphalerite, calcite and fluorite.

Minerals
Ores

Galena


Henryk Szeryng (pronounce: SHERR-ing), (born Żelazowa Wola, Poland, 22 September 1918; died Kassel, 8 March 1988) was a Polish-born violinist who later became Mexican. He is thought to be one of the greatest violinists of his time.

Early Years

Szeryng was born in a very small village called Żelazowa Wola in Poland. The famous composer Chopin had also been born in this village. Henryk started to learn the piano from his mother when he was five. When he was seven he changed to the violin. His violin teacher was Maurice Frenkel who had been an assistant to the famous violin teacher Leopold Auer. Four years later he went to Berlin to study with Carl Flesch who was a wonderful teacher for him. Szerynk later said: "Everything I know about the violin I learned from him. After three years he went to Paris to have lessons with Jacques Thibaud at the Paris Conservatory. He got the first prize in 1937. He also studied composition in Paris with Nadia Boulanger, and continued studying with her until 1939.

Career

He gave his first solo performance on 6 January 1933 playing the Brahms Violin Concerto with the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra. Szeryng spoke seven languages fluently, so when World War II broke out he became an official interpreter for the Polish government which was based in exile in London. He went with the prime minister to Mexico to find a home for refugees. During the war he gave more than 300 concerts for Allied troops all over the world. During one of these concerts in Mexico City he was given the job of being head of the string department of the university there.

In 1946, he became a naturalized citizen of Mexico.

Szeryng spent several years teaching the violin. Then the pianist Artur Rubinstein told him he ought to perform again, so in 1954 he started to give concerts once more. He spent the rest of his life touring all over the world playing the violin. He made many recordings, and also played many works by Mexican composers, helping them to make their music better known. He became Mexico's special advisor at UNESCO in Paris. He continued to spend some time teaching, especially in Mexico. He owned several wonderful violins, some of which he gave away.

He died in Kassel.

His playing
Szeryng is remembered for the beautiful tone that he made. He had an amazing technique. He always played very precisely in tune, even "bending" notes slightly to make his intonation very expressive. He could get different qualities of sound by turning the bow slightly or by changing the speed of his vibrato. He was able to play with great emotion in a very individual way.

References
Legendary Violinists

Mexican musicians
Polish musicians
1918 births
1988 deaths

Henryk Szeryng


Christmas (which means "The Mass of Christ") is a Christian holiday that celebrates the birth of Jesus, who Christians believe is the Son of God. Christmas is also a cultural holiday for many non-Christians.

Religious meaning
Christmas Day is celebrated on the 25th of December.  It is a really important day, mainly for Christians, along with Easter (which celebrates the death and resurrection of Jesus). The season of Advent begins on a Sunday about four weeks before Christmas.  During Advent, people prepare for Christmas.

The Christmas season (called Christmastide) ends 6 January, also called the Twelfth Day of Christmas. On this day, Christians celebrate ''Epiphany''.

People celebrate Christmas in many places around the world. Some people celebrate Christmas as a religious holiday. In some places, Christmas is a time of celebration for Christians and non-Christians alike. Christmas traditions are different in different countries. However, they almost always include a feast; giving gifts or cards; and enjoying church or public festivities, like singing Christmas carols and songs. Christmas is not limited to Christianity. The idea of Santa Claus is based on Saint Nicholas, a 4th-century Christian saint of Greek origin.

In the Northern Hemisphere, Christmastide happens during the winter. Before Christmas was ever celebrated, ancient peoples celebrated winter festivals. Some traditions from these ancient festivals became Christmas traditions.  For example, some Christmas traditions come from the pagan holiday of Yule.

Today, Christmas traditions often focus on gift-giving. About a month before Christmas Day, retail stores start selling gifts, food, greeting cards, Christmas trees, Sugar cookies, Candy canes, and decorations.

The history of Christmas

Christmas in the Gospels

Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus. There are four different Gospels in the Bible which talk about Jesus' birth. The Gospel of Luke gives details about Jesus' birth. The Gospel of Matthew tells another part of the story.  The Gospel of John says that Jesus came from God to bring his "Word" (his message) to all people.  Christians believe these Gospels are based on fact.

The Gospels say that many years before Jesus' birth, prophets had told a promise to the Jewish people that God would send them a Messiah, or holy teacher. Christians believe that the promised Messiah was Jesus. His mother was a young woman called Mary, who was engaged, but not yet married to a carpenter called Joseph. Joseph found out that Mary was pregnant and was upset. He was wondering what he should do, when an angel came from God to tell him that the baby was the Holy One. The angel said that he must ''name the baby''. This was a sign that he would take care of it like his own child.

At this time, the Middle East was ruled by the Romans. An order came that all the people had to travel back to their home town, to put their names on the taxation lists. Joseph took his new wife to Bethlehem. There was nowhere for them to stay, except a stable where the animals slept. This is where the baby was born. Joseph called him Jesus, as the angel had said.

The baby Jesus had two lots of visitors. On the night he was born, angels told some shepherds in the fields that they would find a newborn king lying in an animals' feed bin (or ''manger''). Jesus' other visitors were some wise men who saw a new star in the sky and followed it, until they found the house where the family was now living and gave the young child expensive gifts of gold, incense and a precious herb called myrrh. (The wise men are often traditionally called the Three Kings, because there were three very expensive presents but the Bible does not say how many wise men there were.)

All these parts of the Christmas story are remembered and celebrated in different ways at Christmas: in pictures, songs, plays, stories and in models that are called "cribs", "creches" or "presepe".

Date of celebration
Most Christian countries of the world use a calendar called the Gregorian Calendar, but some churches use a calendar called the Julian Calendar. Most Christians, such as those of the Catholic and Protestant Churches, celebrate the birth of Jesus on 25 December, although holidays begin on 24 December also known as Christmas Eve.

The Eastern Orthodox Church still uses the Julian Calendar in some regions such as Russia. In such regions, Christmas is celebrated on 25 December in the Julian Calendar, but because of the difference between the calendars it is 7 January in the modern Gregorian Calendar.

Some Christians, like Jehovah's Witnesses, do not celebrate Christmas because there is no instruction from Jesus in the Bible which tells Christians to celebrate his birth. Mormons celebrate Christmas on 25 December but they believe that Christ's actual birth took place on 6 April.

Some believe that Jesus was probably not born on 25 December. Some historians believe this date was used by the Catholic Church to replace the pagan rites that took place at that time of the year.

Advent

The Season of Advent, which begins on Sunday about four weeks before Christmas Day, is celebrated by the Catholic and Anglican Churches, as well as others. It is a time for people to prepare themselves for two different things: for the coming of the baby Jesus and Christmas, and for the second coming of Jesus, when he shall rule over all the Earth in peace. Not all Christian people remember Advent. Some people use it as a time of fasting, study, meditation and prayer. Special Advent Calendars are made for children, with pictures or treats for each day of Advent.

Generally, Advent is a time when many people are very busy in preparation for Christmas Day, cleaning and decorating, buying food and presents, writing cards and letters, and cooking the Christmas feast.

Religious celebrations
Before the 4th century AD, Christians could only worship and celebrate in secret. The feast of Christmas probably began while Constantine was the Emperor of Rome, because it was he who made Christianity a legal religion and built some of Rome's oldest churches. Some old stone coffins or ''sarcophagi'' from this time are carved with pictures of Mary and baby Jesus and the Wise Men.

Through the Middle Ages Christmas was celebrated with feasting, singing and plays. The plays were held in churches, and also in castles and in market places, where a big hay wagon was sometimes used as a stage.

Because Advent was a time of prayer and preparation, most parties were held after Christmas, rather than before it. The main pre-Christmas celebration was the Feast of St. Nicholas on 6 December. In some countries, particularly the Netherlands, the tradition grew for children to receive presents on this day, rather than Christmas Day. The name of Saint Nicholas is now remembered in many countries as Santa Claus.

Another festivity that takes place is the Feast of Saint Lucy (St. Lucia Day) on 13 December which is particularly celebrated in Scandinavia, where girls take part in candlelit processions, and the daughters of the house must rise early to bring coffee or chocolate to the family.

For many centuries, the celebration of Christmas often began with a church service or mass, which lasted from late at night to after midnight on Christmas morning. Christmas Day was a time of feasting. On the following day, the Feast of Saint Stephen people from rich households would carry boxes of food out to the street for the poor and hungry. Many people would go back to work but employers would give gifts of money to their workers. The Holy Days continued with the feast of Saint John and Holy Innocents' Day. The feasting and parties ended on the Feast of the Epiphany, the day of the Three Wise Men, often called the "Three Kings". The season is nowadays remembered by the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas". William Shakespeare wrote a play to be performed as part of the celebration, called "Twelfth Night".

Many Christians celebrate Christmas by attending church, and with prayers and singing. And each year there are Bible readings from the Gospels that tell the story of the birth of Jesus.

Traditions of the Church

The celebration of Christmas is a very important time for churches. Almost every church has special services or celebrations. Here are some of the ways that churches celebrate Christmas.

The Crib
It is the custom in many churches to set up a Crib (or ''Creche'') scene of the ''Nativity'' or birth of Jesus. The first scene of this type was set up by St. Francis of Assisi in the 13th century. They have been very popular in Italy ever since then, and the custom has spread to other countries.

Nativity scenes can be large with life-sized statues, or they can be tiny enough to fit in a matchbox. They are made of many different things including carved and painted wood, brightly coloured ceramics (pottery), painted paper glued to boards, and mixtures of material with clay, wood, cloth, straw and metal used for different parts.

The Advent wreath is a circle of leaves, usually pine boughs, ivy and holly, with 4 (or sometimes 5) candles in it which is hung up in a church. The candles are lit on each Sunday in Advent, and the central candle is lit on Christmas morning. Churches are often decked with green branches and leaves, and many churches also have a Christmas tree.

Carols by Candlelight
A popular tradition in many churches is the Carol Service which is often lit only by candles. The carol service generally has lots of singing and Bible readings. There is a tradition in England which began in the Temple Church in London and has now spread to many other places for a service of Nine Lessons and Carols. The lessons are Bible readings. Some carols are sung by a choir and others by the choir and people (the congregation). Every year one of these services is recorded in a large English Church, often King's College Chapel, Cambridge, and is broadcast on radio and television to be enjoyed by people who love good music and carol singing, but particularly for people who cannot go to a Christmas service.

Christmas Traditions

For many, Christmas has become a time when having parties, sending messages to family and friends and giving presents has become more important than the celebration of Jesus' birth. Manufacturers and stores have responded to the feasting and present-giving with lots of advertising, decorations and displays. In the US, the Christmas displays are put up right after Thanksgiving, late in November. In some countries such as Australia, stores put up decorations at the beginning of November. Given that Jesus himself called people making money in the Jewish Temple 'robbers' (Matthew 21:13) many Christians are uneasy about profit instead of prophets at Christmas.

Town councils celebrate by decorating streets and squares, and providing Christmas entertainment for shoppers. In countries of the Southern Hemisphere, where Christmas falls in Summer, there is a tradition of open-air Carol Services, often organised by the town council, which are attended by thousands of people.

Public and commercial celebrations

Many cities and towns celebrate Christmas by putting up decorations. These may be banners and bunting which are strung from buildings or lampposts. They may be Christmas lights which can also decorate buildings and street trees. Many large cities put up a huge Christmas tree in a public place, such as those in Trafalgar Square in London, Times Square in New York and Martin Place in Sydney. This is often combined with an appeal to the people of the city to give money or gifts to help the poor and needy.

In many cities, the usual shopping hours are made longer before Christmas so that workers have more time to buy Christmas food and presents. Shop windows are often decorated with Christmas scenes, with large department stores often having animated scenes to entertain children. Shopping malls and big stores often have a Santa Claus, who sits on a throne, while children tell him what they want for Christmas, and have their photos taken.

Many towns hold Christmas parades, street entertainment and concerts. Some towns have a tradition of carols with a choir and entertainers in the town hall, while in Australia and New Zealand, these concerts of Christmas entertainment and carols are usually held outdoors, in parks or even on beaches, with families bringing picnics. The arrival of Santa Claus at the end of the evening is accompanied by a firework display.

A traditional part of Christmas is the theatre entertainment. This includes the performance of classical music such as Handel's Messiah as well as orchestral concerts and band recitals. Pantomimes are often played at Christmas and favourites include "Peter Pan and Wendy" and "Cinderella". Many children's movies are released during the Christmas season.

Because many people feel very lonely, hungry and sad at Christmas, many cities, churches, charities and service organisations try to help the poor and lonely by providing Christmas food and gifts for poor families, and Christmas parties for people who are hungry or who are lonely and without any friends or family.

Family celebrations
Family celebrations are often very different from each other, depending on where a family comes from, and the customs that have grown in particular families.

Family get-togethers

Most families think of Christmas as a time to get together with other members of the family. People often travel from far away to be with other family members at Christmas. Those people who cannot travel often make long-distance phone calls on Christmas Day. Many people also see Christmas as a time to reach out to others that they know might be lonely, and invite them to dinner on Christmas Day. Christmas is seen as a time for people of all ages to have fun together, for cousins to get to know each other, for grandparents to see their grandchildren and for the family to admire the babies that have been born during the year. Big family parties are usually a time of joy, but some families often talk about their disagreements and have big fights at Christmas time.

Family traditions are very different. Some families might all go off to church together, to a Carol Service, a Midnight Mass, or a Christmas Morning service. Some families are pulled out of bed very early by children who want to open their presents. In other families, presents are given on St. Nicholas Day, on Christmas Eve or not until after church on Christmas morning. The Christmas feast might start on Christmas Eve, with a special breakfast on Christmas morning, or at midday on Christmas Day.

Some families have a tradition of carol singing, and might go around the streets, to hospitals and other such places singing with members of their church. Other families like to watch certain television programs together, which might include carol services and the Queen's Message. Some families use Christmas as a time to play music and sing together, or to read a favourite book such as "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens. In countries in the Southern Hemisphere, a visit to the beach or a swim in a pool is often part of the Christmas Day tradition.

Christmas dinner
Christmas Dinner, usually eaten in the middle of the day, is an important part of the family celebration. The food differs from country to country and also from family to family. In the Northern Hemisphere, roasted meat and vegetables are generally the main courses of the meal. Usually one of several types of meat are served, which may include turkey, Chicken, ham, roast beef, or lamb. There are often several courses, with special treats that are usually only eaten at Christmas.

In English-speaking countries, the traditional dessert is Christmas plum pudding. Nowadays these puddings are often bought from bakers, but many people make their own to a family recipe. The tradition came from the Middle Ages when the pudding was used to preserve some of the fruit from autumn until the mid-winter. A traditional pudding is baked six weeks before Christmas and is left tied up in a cloth or basin with a cloth covering, in a cool place. Stirring the pudding is sometimes a family tradition, with everyone making a wish as they stir. Traditionally a silver coin would be stirred into the pudding, to bring luck to the person who found it. Nowadays most coins cannot be used because they are not made of silver so taste horrible and may be poisonous. Some families use old coins or silver charms. On Christmas Day the pudding must be boiled in a pot for several hours. When it is served, the cloth is cut off, brandy is poured onto the pudding, and it is set on fire before it is carried to the table. Christmas crackers are  used to decorate and are often opened prior to serving the dish or starter course. It is usually served with hard sauce.

Many families have a Christmas cake or a special bread instead of a pudding (or as well as a pudding). These are very different depending on the country, but often have marzipan which is made from almonds and is traditional in many countries at Christmas. In France ''Buche de Noäl'' or gingerbread men and women are decorated and hung on the Christmas tree. In Scotland a pastry biscuit called shortbread is made and has become a popular tradition in many countries. A German tradition is ''pfeffernuss'', spiced cookies rolled in powdered sugar. Other Christmas food includes fruit cakes, sultanas, ginger, Greek baklava, almonds, chocolates, caramel toffee, candy canes and cookies.

Many families also prepare mulled wine which is warmed with cinnamon and nutmeg or egg nogs, a sweet drink made of milk, sugar, eggs, nutmeg and sometimes alcohol.

In the Southern Hemisphere, the traditional roast dinner is often replaced with cold cuts of meat, and served with salads. The first course might be prawn cocktail or a cold soup like borsch. The plum pudding might be served with ice cream. White wine and beer are both served cold (beer is kept in a refrigerator). Christmas dinner may be served on the veranda, or sometimes as a picnic.

Tree and decorations

In most homes when Christmas is celebrated, people set up a Christmas tree in the house. This old Yuletide custom began in Germany as the "Tannenbaum" (German for ''Fir Tree''). These are traditionally evergreens, the best type being the Fir Tree which does not shed its needles or lose its fragrance. The tree may be a cut tree that is bought from a plantation or taken from the forest. Artificial trees are sometimes preferred to real trees. The Christmas tree is decorated with lights, shiny coloured balls, sparkly tinsel and other ornaments. A wreath of leaves or pine is often put on the front door of a house as a sign of welcome. Other plants that have special significance at Christmas are holly which is used as decoration and mistletoe which is hung in the centre of a room. The tradition is that people who meet under the mistletoe must kiss.

Many people decorate their homes at Christmas time. These decorations and the Christmas tree are generally inside, but may be put where they can also be seen through a window by people passing by. In the mid 20th century there grew up a custom for decorating the outside of houses as well. These decorations may be just a few lights around the porch, or hundreds of lights and colourful Christmas figures decorating the whole house and garden. Some neighbourhoods hold competitions for the best-decorated house, and driving around the streets to look at them has become another family tradition.

Cards and presents
The giving of gifts at Christmas comes from several different ideas. One is that God gave his son, Jesus, to the world at Christmas. There is also the story of the Wise Men who came to the baby Jesus with three gifts, gold, frankincense and myrrh. For many centuries it has been the custom for people to give small gifts at Christmas, and also to give generously to the poor and needy to help them through the winter. Another tradition has become linked to this one, and the result is the tradition of Santa Claus, or Father Christmas as he is sometimes called, and who is nowadays thought by many children to be the bringer of presents and happiness.

In the 4th century, in a Greek village that is now part of Turkey, there was a good man who would secretly given presents to the poor to help them. He became a bishop and is called Saint Nicholas. Over the centuries, he became a very popular saint and lots of churches were named after him. He was very popular in places where there were lots of sailors. One of those places was the Netherlands. In the Netherlands and many other European countries, presents are given on the feast of Saint Nicholas, 6 December. Traditionally, the presents are not big, and are sometimes hidden, or have a funny joke or poem that must be read. In many towns of Europe a man dressed in bishop's robes comes on a horse or in a boat, acting as St. Nicholas. His name was often shortened to Sante Claus, or Santa Claus in English.

In English speaking countries, where presents are usually given on Christmas Day, not 6 December, Santa Claus, (or Father Christmas) is usually thought of as coming on Christmas Night, when his magic sleigh is pulled across the sky by reindeer, and he comes into houses through the chimney. While in Europe, children put out their shoes for St. Nicholas, the English tradition is to hang up stockings (or long socks) in front of the fireplace. Santa Claus would traditionally fill the socks or shoes with nuts, raisins, chocolates and an orange. Nowadays children usually get much more expensive presents, and hang up pillow cases or have the presents in a big pile under the Christmas tree.

Another Christmas tradition is the sending of cards to friends and relatives. These contain warm greetings and may also have a letter telling all the things that have happened to the person or family during the year.

Pop culture

In December, many Christmas movies are shown on television. Some of the most popular Christmas films are: Home Alone, The Grinch, Scrooge, The Polar Express, A Christmas Carol, Elf and The Nightmare Before Christmas.

In addition to movies, many Christmas songs are played on radios throughout Winter. Some of the most popular songs are: All I Want for Christmas Is You, Last Christmas,Santa Baby and Feliz Navidad.

Related pages
 Christianity
 Advent
 Epiphany (holiday)
 Carnival
 Easter
 Pentecost
 Holiday

Other websites

  & (Occitan) Traditional Christmas carols from County of Nice, France

Christmas

Christmas


A quickdraw is used in rock climbing for lead climbing. One end is hooked into an anchor in
the wall. Afterwards the rope is hooked into the other end. Usually quickdraws are used every few meters. Quickdraws are made of two carabiners connected by a sling. Quickdraws can hold up to 22 kN.
The quickdraw has one straight gate carabineer and one bent gate carabineer. The bent gate carabineer should always be the one clipped to the rope. For leading and top roping at an indoor climbing wall usually a quickdraw is already attached to each of the protection points on the route. The lower carabineer, (the one with the bent gate) should be clipped so the gate is pointing away from the rope and pointing away from the climbing wall or rock face. Doing this will help prevent the quickdraw from twisting the gate into the wall. The rope should run freely through the spine of each carabineer, not along the gate. The spine is the strongest part of the carabineer.

Rock climbing

Quickdraw


Marceline is a neighborhood in Pasadena, California, whose central feature is Pasadena City College. It has an area of roughly half a square mile and is bordered by Walnut Street to the north, Orlando Road to the south, Hill Avenue to the west, and Allen Avenue to the east. The neighborhood is named for a short-lived railroad cutoff which ran through the center of the neighborhood at the turn of the 20th century.

Landmarks
The vast majority of commercial activity is centered on the PCC Campus, especially on Colorado Boulevard. There are no parks in the neighborhood, though Marceline borders the Huntington Library.

Transportation
The Metro L Line has a station on Allen Avenue, two blocks from Marceline's edge. Pasadena City College is the eastern terminus of Metro Rapid line 780, and Metro Local lines 180, 267 and 686 run through the neighborhood, as well as Pasadena Transit routes 10 and 60 and Foothill Transit route 187.

Neighborhoods in Pasadena, California

Marceline, Pasadena, California


The Treaty of Amiens (French: paix d'Amiens) temporarily ended hostilities between France and the United Kingdom during the French Revolutionary Wars. It was signed in the city of Amiens on 25 March 1802 (4 Germinal X in the French Republican Calendar) by Joseph Bonaparte and Marquess Cornwallis as a "Definitive Treaty of Peace". The consequent peace lasted for only one year (18 May 1803) and was the only period of general peace in Europe between 1793 and 1814.

Under the treaty, Britain recognised the French Republic. Together with the Treaty of Lunéville (1801), the Treaty of Amiens marked the end of the Second Coalition, which had waged war against Revolutionary France since 1798.

19th-century treaties
Amiens
1800s in France
19th century in the United Kingdom

Treaty of Amiens


The Western United States—commonly referred to as the American West or simply The West—traditionally refers to the westernmost states of the United States.  As the United States has expanded westward since its founding, the definition of the West has changed over time.  In the 18th and early 19th centuries the Appalachian Mountains were considered to be the boundary.  Nowadays the Mississippi River is often referenced as the easternmost possible boundary of the West. This region is divided into Mountain States and Pacific States subregions. The Census Bureau defines the western United States as these states:

 Alaska
 Arizona
 California
 Colorado
 Hawaii
 Idaho
 Montana
 Nevada
 New Mexico
 Oregon
 Utah
 Washington
 Wyoming.

The "West" had played a large role in American history; the American Old West is an important part of America's folklore.

Census Regions of the United States

Western United States


Silt is soil or rock that developed from granular material of a specific grain size.

Silty soil has much smaller particles than sandy soil, so it is smooth to the touch. When moistened, it is soapy slick. When rolled between the fingers, dirt is left on the skin.

Silty soil retains water longer, but it can't hold on to as many nutrients as you'd want it to, though it's fairly fertile. Due to its moisture-retentive quality, silty soil is cold and drains poorly.

Grain size criteria
Silt particles range between a  and  mm (3.9 to 62.5 μm), larger than clay but smaller than a sand.  Silt is chemically distinct from clay, and unlike clay, grains of silt are about the same size in all dimensions.

Silt may occur as a soil or alternatively as suspended sediment in a water column of any surface water body.  It may also exist as deposition soil at the bottom of a water body after it is eroded elsewhere and transported by a stream or by a current.  Silt is easily transported in water and is fine enough to be carried long distances by air as 'dust'. Thick deposits of silty material that result from wind deposition are often called loess (a German term) or limon (French).  Silt and clay contribute to  in water.

Geology

Silt


Ilias Iliou (, also transliterated as Ēlías Ēlioú; May 1904 – 25 January 1985) was a Greek lawyer and politician, member of the Greek Parliament and leader of the United Democratic Left (EDA). He was also a distinguished writer and jurist.

Life

Early years
Iliou was born in 1904 in Kastro (now renamed Myrina), the main town of Lemnos. The island was part of the Ottoman Empire until 1912. His grandfather Ilias was a shoemaker originally from Macedonia, his father Philippos (d. 1927) a rich merchant who lost his fortune in 1929, and his mother Efthalia (d. 1916) a schoolteacher, rare for a woman at the time. He was the eldest of three brothers and one sister. The others were Yannis (b. 1906, died soon after), another Yannis (b. 1908), Konstantinos (b. 1910) and Eleni (b. 1912).

A brilliant pupil, he finished the gymnasium at the age of 16, studied law in the University of Athens, and graduated in 1924.

Before the Second World War
He started a legal practice in Mytilene with George Zoanos which continued in Athens after 1935. In addition to his legal work he also wrote poetry, was a translator from classical Greek and French of literary and legal books, contributing many articles to specialist law journals. He also wrote articles for literary magazines such as Noumas (Νουμάς), Philiki Etairia (Φιλική Εταιρεία), Ellinika Grammata (Ελληνικά Γράμματα) and Neoellinika Grammata (Νεοελληνικά Γράμματα), which broke new ground as they were written in the Demotic Greek (spoken, popular form of Greek) which was only officially recognized in 1975 instead of the usual more classical katharevousa.

During the Metaxas dictatorship (1936–41) he contributed two books in the series "Library of Writers and Poets of Ancient Greece" published by Zacharopoulos. After the war he wrote several more books and contributed many articles to journals and newspapers. In 1922 he joined the Democratic Union of Alexandros Papanastasiou and stood as a candidate in the Parliamentary elections of 1932 and 1936, without success. He moved to Athens in 1935 and in 1942 he was called to the bar of the Areios Pagos.

Iliou was always a supporter of liberal progressive causes. In 1935, during the dictatorship of General Metaxas, he was contacted by Joe Nordmann (b. 1910, a prominent lawyer who was a member of the French Communist Party and later of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers) and asked to send information about the persecution of anti-fascists in Greece.

Resistance and civil war
World War II broke out for Greece in 1940, and he joined the National Liberation Front (EAM) in 1942. When the Germans had been driven out, a conflict broke out between the left-wing Greek Resistance (EAM-ELAS) and the Greek Royalists assisted by British troops which were brought from Egypt in December 1944 (the Dekemvriana). Iliou's house in Ambelokipoi was in the front line.

His son Philippos Iliou, 14 at the time, was a runner for EPON (United Panhellenic Organization of Youth) - one of those who, in the absence of phones radios and newspapers, formed the practical liaison between units and disseminated news about Athens. One day, British soldiers arrived at the house with an interpreter to arrest Philippos and Ilias. His father-in-law, Senator George Emmanuel Kaldis, happened to be there and was also arrested. They were brought to a warehouse in Kallithea which was used as a temporary prison.

The prisoners were then summoned one by one for interrogation. The procedure was that each would be asked what he had done through an interpreter. He would answer that he knew nothing, the interpreter would translate that as "I was involved with EAM", and the British would pack him off to Hassani airport, from which they were then sent to a prison camp in Libya. After a few people had been through this process, Ilias came forward and said "I am a lawyer and I wish to record that the translator is not doing his job properly". He was sent back to await his turn in the line and they were released after 3 days.

Free again, he became the defence lawyer of many of the members of the Resistance persecuted by the Royalist government. Offended by the gross injustices, he joined the Greek Communist Party (ΚΚΕ) as a protest in 1945.

During the Greek Civil War (1946–1950) he was arrested once more in March 1947. First, he was deported to Ikaria, then to the concentration camp of Makronisos, and finally to the little island of Agios Efstratios until November 1951. He would recount later how he had been ushered around the Aegean Sea to do some tourism "at the expense of the State".

Post-war political career
The EDA party (United Democratic Left) was created in 1951 to represent a broad front covering the parties on the Left, including the proscribed Communist Party. Iliou was one of the founders. In the elections of 1952 Iliou was one of the deported candidates who were elected. The government was forced to release them, but it immediately annulled their election. Iliou became an MP for EDA and was re-elected in all the general elections from 1956 to 1967. He was its parliamentary leader and later President.

In 1965 Colonel Georgios Papadopoulos arranged for the tanks of an army unit on the country's north-eastern frontier to be sabotaged, and announced this as Communist sabotage. This was used as a pretext for the immediate arrest, without any formal process, of a number of soldiers and civilians throughout the country. When this subterfuge was exposed, this was raised in Parliament by the Prime Minister George Papandreou. The speech by Iliou on that occasion was seen as prophetic:

" ... How come there is a presumption that someone called Papadopoulos is telling the truth while dozens of free citizens are presumed to be guilty without evidence, that an order by Mr. Papadopoulos is enough for the arrest of ten citizens at home in the middle of the night and their imprisonment in total isolation, subject to the usual beatings and maltreatment, and that eventually it should be established that it was all a lot of hot air? And if tomorrow another order targets not 10 but 500, 1,000, 10,000 citizens, might it be possible that this country once more becomes home to a regime of fear, based on another arbitrary and malicious act by some Mr Papadopoulos?"

A cartoon by Bost in Avghi on 5 April 1964 shows Iliou and George Papandreou in a debate - this was turned into a painting which itself became a political prisoner later (see Bost for details).

Less than two years later, in April 1967, a military junta, led by Papadopoulos, seized power. Iliou was arrested again and after detention in the Hippodrome, where he was badly beaten, transferred once more to the revived concentration camp on Gioura. His health suffered and he was transferred under solitary confinement to the hospital of the Averof prison in Athens. In 1971 he was released, but had to report regularly to the nearest police station. He was often stopped in the street when he called his wife - her name Eleftheria meant freedom.

After the fall of the Junta in 1974, he was reelected to Parliament in 1974 with EDA and in 1977 with the Coalition of Left and Progressive Forces (Συμμαχία Αριστερών και Προοδευτικών Δυνάμεων) which included inter alia EDA and the two Communist parties that had come out of the Party schism of 1968. By this time he was one of the senior, longest-serving MPs and a popular public figure. In 1978 the coalition dissolved into its constituents and in 1981 he retired from politics.

Poet, lawyer and politician, recognized as a humanist, a non-dogmatic and objective progressive precursor of Eurocommunism, an eloquent orator with a sense of humour, often called the "Nestor of Greek politics", he was respected by his enemies as well. At his death in 1985 from complications of diabetes mellitus, he was granted a state funeral at the First Cemetery of Athens with the honours of a Minister. Many streets throughout Greece were renamed in his honour after his death.

Personal life
In 1930 he married Eleftheria Kaldis, daughter of Georgios Emmanouil Kaldis (1875–1953), MP for Lesbos and Lemnos, and they had 2 children: Philippos Iliou (historian, 1931–2004) and Mary Iliou Ciompi (b. 1934). His wife died in 2003.

Writings
(All the publications below, which are a selection only, are in Greek and by I. Iliou. The titles have been translated from the original Greek)

1939:	"Speeches by Aeschines" (translation and commentary I. Iliou), publisher Zacharopoulos.

1940:	Ρητορική "Rhetoric" by Aristotle (introduction, translation, notes by I. Iliou), publisher Zacharopoulos (2 volumes). Republished by Kedros 1984  & 2002. .

1953:	"Public and private law", Charles Eisenmann (Introduction and translation I. Iliou).

1958:	"The youth of Greece"; I: Iliou (privately printed).

1960:	"The program for national democratic reform" (Report to 1st National Congress of EDA, publisher EDA pp 93–104).

1960:	"The national economy and the public finances in 1960" (General report on the budget of 1960), Greek national printing press.

1962:	Presentation to "Reunion de Juristes d'Europe occidentale pour la restauration des libertes publiques en Grece, 26 mai 1962", Edition de l'Association Internationale de Juristes, pp 8–19.

1962	"The truth on the Common Market", printed by K. Koulouphakos.

1963:	"The immediate demands of the people", report to the 2nd Panhellenic Congress of EDA, official texts pp 84–124.

1966:	"The socioeconomic basis and definition of political objectives", in "Week of contemporary thoughts", publisher Themelio pp 503–563.

1966:	"The crisis of power", publisher Themelio.

1973:	"The definition of political objectives", in periodical Iridanos no. 2-3, January–April 1973 p4-44.

1973:	"The multinationals: present day economic empires", pp 9–92 of "Multinational hypermonopolies: the disintegration of imperialism" by I. Iliou, K. Hadjiargyris, N. Panousis, publisher Gutenberg.

1975:	"The constitution and its revision", publisher Themelio.

1977:	"Selected political writings 1974-76", publisher Diogene.

1977:	"The violations of Human Rights", publisher Ermeias.

1980:	Το μήνυμα του Θουκυδίδη - Δοκίμιο "The message of Thucydides -  Essay", publisher Kedros, 1980 & 2002, ISAN 960-04-1428-9.

2005:	Κριτικά κείμενα για την τέχνη 1925-1937 "Critical texts on art (1925-1937)", posthumous edition published by Themelio. .

References
(Titles translated from the Greek original)

 Obituary in Avghi 26 and 29 January 1985.
N. K. Alivizatos: "Ilias Iliou, the sage of the democratic left", in "Personalities of the 20th Century. Greeks who have affected the 20th century", editor V. Panagiotopoulos, publisher Ta Nea - New Frontiers, A. A. Livanis Athens 2000 pp 153–158.
Takis Benas: "A congress that never occurred. Forerunning trends of the Left before the dictatorship", publisher Delfini 1995, .
Grigoris Giannaros: "Ilias Iliou: harbinger of Eurocommunism in Greece", in Avghi 3-2-1985.
Tassos Trikkas: "EDA 1951-1967. The new face of the Left", Vols A&B, publisher Themelio 2009, .
Phaidon Vegleris: "Ilias Iliou, lawyer", in Avghi 10-2-1985.
"Members of Parliament and of the European Parliament - writers. 1974-2008", published by the Greek Parliament, 2008.

1904 births
1985 deaths
National and Kapodistrian University of Athens alumni
Greek Resistance members
20th-century Greek lawyers
Greek MPs 1951–1952
Greek MPs 1952–1956
Greek MPs 1956–1958
Greek MPs 1958–1961
Greek MPs 1961–1963
Greek MPs 1974–1977
Greek MPs 1977–1981
MPs of Lesbos
United Democratic Left politicians
People from Lemnos
Prisoners and detainees of Greece

Ilias Iliou


Battle Squadron is a vertically scrolling shooter for the Amiga for one or two players.  It is a sequel to Hybris. A version for the Mega Drive was released in 1990. The game was later ported to iOS devices (2011), Android (2012) and in 2013 also to AmigaOS 4, Windows, OS X and MorphOS.

Plot
Taking place many years in the future in another star system, a century long war is waging between the Earth Defense Fleet and the Barrax Empire. Two Earth Defense Commanders, Lori Bergin and Barry Mayers, were returning from a research and destroy mission regarding the latest Barrax technologies on planet Urania, when suddenly a Barrax cruiser materialized behind them, brought their ship in and took the commanders hostage on planet Terrainia. The player's mission is to rescue the Commanders and eliminate all Barrax threats in the process.

Gameplay

Battle Squadron supports both mouse and joystick controlled play. The game is played from the perspective of elite fighter pilots of the Earth Defense Fleet, known as the Battle Squadron sent to rescue two human agents, Commanders Berry D. Mayers and Lori Bergin, from the clutches of the ruthless alien empire, known as the Barrax. The player's fighters carry unlimited projectile weaponry and a finite number of Nova Smart Bombs. Players acquire weapons by shooting down Barraxian Artillery Gunships which carry weapon Power-Up icons. Weapons include the Red Magnetic Torps, the powerful Green Emerald Laser, the two-way firing Blue Anti-Matter Particle Beam and the sideways firing Orange Magma Wave. Other pick-up items include Barraxian jewel caches marked by small green X's which are worth 1000 points each. The player has the option to increase the number and speed of enemy bullets therefore altering the game's difficulty.

Notable features of the game are relatively big sprites (with Predator-esque cloaking effects applied to a few) and numerous weapon upgrades (supposedly 25 in total). Barraxian opponents consist of ground installations (generally gun turrets and launch platforms), ground vehicles, aircraft and numerous genetically-engineered living weapons.

Enemies include:
Cargo vehicles that drop weapon upgrades upon destruction.
Four-craft squadrons of Barrax fighters that will release an extra, collectable Nova Bomb upon destruction of the entire squadron.
Two different varieties of gigantic, apparently robotic terror machines, functioning as the bosses of two separate levels.
What appear to be several giant faces in the terrain, once again, serving as end-of-level bosses.
The Barrax Nova Cruiser, the end-game boss.

External links

 Battle Squadron Soundtrack Remix by the original composer, Ron Klaren
 Entry for Battle Squadron at Hall of Light
 Downloadable demo versions of Battle Squadron

1989 video games
Amiga games
AmigaOS 4 games
Android (operating system) games
Cope-Com games
Innerprise Software games
IOS games
MorphOS games
Multiplayer and single-player video games
Piko Interactive games
Sega Genesis games
Vertically scrolling shooters
Video games developed in Denmark

Battle Squadron


Philippine habeas corpus cases  are cases decided by the Supreme Court of the Philippines, which invoke the writ of habeas corpus.

The writ of habeas corpus may be suspended in order to prevent any violence in cases of rebellion or insurrection, as the case may be. In Philippine jurisdiction, the present 1987 Philippine Constitution, Article III, Section 15 provides that "The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended except in cases of invasion or rebellion, when the public safety requires it."

The Writ of Habeas Corpus
As per definition, it is  a law stating that an individual cannot be imprisoned or held in custody inside a prison cell unless he/she has first been brought before a court of law, which decides whether or not it is legal for the person to be kept in prison.

Barcelon v. Baker (5 Phil. Reports 87, 1905 )

At the early years of the American Rule in the Philippines, lawlessness was rampant and criminal activities were at large. Governor-General James Francis Smith, with the consent of the Philippine Commission, suspended the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus in the provinces of Batangas and Cavite. A petition was raised questioning such suspension of the writ.

The Supreme Court issued a ruling sustaining the suspension of the privilege of the writ. It said that the decision of the Governor-General is his duty on his part, and that the court cannot question the acts of the executive and legislative branches of government. Simply put, the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus is a political question that courts cannot decide upon.

Montenegro v. Castañeda (91 Phil. Reports 882, 1949)

President Elpidio Quirino suspended the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus in some parts of Luzon in order to stifle the emergence of the Hukbalahap guerillas. Such suspension was again questioned in the Supreme Court. The court affirmed the president's acts of suspending the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, based on the decision in the Barcelon case.

Lansang v. Garcia (G.R. No. L-33964, December 11, 1971; 42 SCRA 448 )

On August 21, 1971, grenades exploded at Plaza Miranda in the city of Manila during a public meeting of the Liberal Party. Acting on such an event, on August 23, 1971, President Ferdinand Marcos suspended the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus on the entire country. Petitions were filed in the Supreme Court for the release of several arrested persons.

The Supreme Court, through Chief Justice Roberto Concepcion, ruled that the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus was proper for having factual and legal basis clearly provided forth by the government. But the Supreme Court, reversing the Barcelon and Montenegro cases, declared that the Judiciary has the authority to inquire into the factual basis of such suspension, and that the suspension is to be annulled if no legal ground would be established. Thus, such action is now considered justiciable to be decided by the courts.

Aquino v. Enrile (G.R. No. L-35546, September 17, 1974, 59 SCRA 183  )

Decided during martial law, it involved the petition of habeas corpus of Marcos' critics, notably Benigno Aquino Jr. and Jose W. Diokno. The Supreme Court decided unanimously to dismiss the petitions, but as Chief Justice Querube Makalintal put it, "there was no agreement as to the manner the issues would be treated and developed. The same destination would be reached, so to speak, but through different routes and by means of different vehicles of approach." He said that the reason why the Court did not produce a single, collegial opinion, among others, was that the members of the Supreme Court are conscious of "the future verdict of history" upon their stand.

Even before the cases were decided, Diokno, to the chagrin of the Supreme Court, opted to withdraw his petition on the ground that no fair decision can be made of the court to render him justice. What made it worse was the fact that before the Supreme Court could respond to Diokno's challenge, Marcos issued an order releasing him and the other petitioners, leaving Aquino behind.

Justice Fred Ruiz Castro opined that the declaration of martial law automatically suspends the application of the said writ, thus Aquino cannot be released. He said that martial law "is founded upon the principle that the state has a right to protect itself against those who would destroy it, and has therefore been likened to the right of an individual to self-defense."

Garcia-Padilla v. Enrile (L-61388, April 20, 1983 ,121 SCRA 472,)

In this decision involving subversion, the Supreme Court reversed the Lansang ruling and reverted to the Barcelon and Montenegro ruling that the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus is a political question.

The 1987 Philippine Constitution

The present Philippine Constitution, in reaction to the Marcos regime, adopted a procedure in cases of suspension of the writ or declaration of martial law by the president.

It states that in case of invasion or rebellion, when the public safety requires it, the President may suspend the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus for a period not exceeding sixty days, or place the Philippines or any part of the country under martial law. Within forty-eight hours from the proclamation of martial law or the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, the President shall submit a report in person or in writing to the Congress. The Congress, voting jointly, by a vote of at least a majority of all its Members in regular or special session, may revoke or extend such proclamation or suspension. If Congress is not in session it shall, convene without need of a call within twenty-four hours following such proclamation or suspension.

Such check and balance placed on the Supreme Court relied heavily on the Lansang case. It is provided that the Supreme Court may review the sufficiency of the factual basis of the proclamation of martial law or the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus or the extension thereof. It is mandated to promulgate its decision within thirty days from its filing by any citizen.

The suspension of the privilege of the writ shall apply only to persons judicially charged for rebellion or offenses inherent in, or directly connected with, invasion. During the suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, any person thus arrested or detained shall be judicially charged within three days, otherwise he shall be released.

References

 Bernas, Joaquin (2003). The 1987 Constitution of the Republic of the Philippines: a Commentary. Rex Book Store, Manila
 Cruz, Isagani A. (2000). Res Gestae: A Brief History of the Supreme Court. Rex Book Store, Manila
Magsalin, Mariano (2004). Philippine Political Law, Arellano Law Foundation
Mijares, Primitivo(1976). The Conjugal Dictatorship of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos, Union Square Publications, San Francisco, U.S.A.

Philippine Cases on Habeas Corpus
Habeas corpus

Philippine habeas corpus cases


"Blind Ambition" is the third episode of the fourth season of the American animated sitcom Family Guy. It was first broadcast on Fox in the United States on May 15, 2005. In the episode, Peter swallows an excessive number of nickels, causing him to become blind. He later becomes a hero after unwittingly saving Horace the bartender from a fire at his bar, The Drunken Clam, and then regains his sight. Meanwhile, Quagmire is forced to refrain from perverse sexual behavior or risk being driven out of the neighborhood following his arrest for spying on Lois in a ladies' lavatory.

Plot
At the bowling alley, Mort Goldman bowls a perfect game and becomes an overnight celebrity. Lois arrives to pick Peter up from the bowling alley, but discovers Quagmire spying on her from the ceiling of the ladies' toilet. Quagmire is arrested, but released shortly after by Joe. On his return, Lois, Bonnie and Loretta reveal that they are petitioning the city of Quahog to have Quagmire removed from their neighborhood. As Peter and the other guys are defending Quagmire, Ernie the Giant Chicken attacks Peter and starts a fight that causes huge casualties inside and outside of Quahog. After the fight, Peter returns to the neighborhood to return to the conversation and tells the women that "Quagmire's a good guy, he's just a little mixed up, that's all!" Eventually, the women agree to let Quagmire stay in the neighborhood so long as he manages to control his perverse behavior or else he's kicked out of the neighborhood. Quagmire's taught self-control through operant conditioning by Peter and his friends, and is eventually allowed out in public. Soon, however, he is distracted by three cheerleaders playing in a fountain in the shopping mall and panics, running into a CCTV camera operation room monitoring women's changing rooms. Discovering that an attractive blonde lady in a fitting room is having a heart attack, he appears to rush to her aid, performing CPR and saving her life. Quagmire is congratulated for his heroism, but his intention had been to molest the woman while she was unconscious (which he reveals by asking "What the hell is CPR?").

This upsets Peter, who is disappointed to notice that he is the one amongst his friends who hasn't been successful. In the hope of becoming famous, Peter attempts to set a world record for eating the largest number of nickels, but develops nickel poisoning and loses his vision. Attempting to drown his sorrows, Peter visits his local bar, The Drunken Clam, with his guide dog, unaware that the bar is on fire (caused by God trying to impress a woman). Discovering the bartender Horace trapped under debris, Peter saves his life and is proclaimed a hero by local newsman Tom Tucker. When told that he saved Horace from a burning building, Peter replies with disbelief, "That freakin' place was on fire?!" For his inadvertent bravery, Peter is awarded a medal by the mayor and receives an eye transplant, the replacement eyes coming from a homeless man dragged to death when Peter accidentally tied his guide dog's leash around the man's neck, thinking he was a parking meter. The end of this episode is an unconnected parody of the closing scene from Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope.

Production

During Family Guy'''s third season, the show was cancelled by its network. In preparation in case the show was revived and began broadcasting again, five short scripts were written in 2001 for future episodes. Blind Ambition was developed from one of those scripts. A number of scenes in the episode were removed before broadcast and one, the reappearance of Ernie the Giant Chicken, had originally been set to broadcast in "The Cleveland–Loretta Quagmire". The scene was moved to this episode because "The Cleveland-Loretta Quagmire" already contained a lengthy fight sequence and overran its time allowance. Several of the removed scenes focused on gags showing Peter and his friends attempting to rehabilitate Quagmire, one of which saw Brian Griffin transporting a fork-lift truck load of porn magazines away from Quagmire's house. Since the episode aired, a selection of action figures have been created of Peter acting as Gary, The No Trash Cougar.

Show producer David Goodman received many telephone calls complaining about the scene where Peter attempts to seduce his son Chris, mistakenly believing him to be his wife, Lois. The scene was believed by some viewers to be encouraging child molestation. The show also received at least one letter of complaint regarding the scene where Quagmire watches Lois going to the toilet; screenwriter Chris Sheridan comments on the DVD commentary that the number of complaints about this scene exceeded one. It is prohibited on Fox to use the term 'Jesus Christ' without actually referring to the person himself, and so in the scene in which God vaporises a person and exclaims "Jesus Christ", it was necessary for Jesus to physically appear before the two run away in order for the scene to be suitable for television airing.

In addition to the regular cast, actor Gary Cole, actress Gina Gershon, actor Judd Hirsch, voice actress Rachael MacFarlane and actress Lisa Wilhoit guest starred in the episode. Recurring guest voice actors Lori Alan, actor John G. Brennan, writer Danny Smith, and actress Jennifer Tilly made minor appearances.

Cultural references
Stewie discovers the Keebler Elves after crashing into the tree, who plan to kill their competition: Snap, Crackle and Pop, with the help of Judd Hirsch's nuclear weapon, which Peter views while peeking through a ball return at the bowling alley. Later on in the bar, Crackle and Pop are seen discussing an attack by the Keebler Elves which apparently resulted in Snap's death.
Beforehand, a ship crashes through Quahog buildings, a reference to Speed 2: Cruise Control.
In one cutaway scene, W. Frederick Gerhardt's Cycleplane crashing is parodied.
Peter discusses Scrubs with Horace in the bar, a show for which both Neil Goldman and Garrett Donovan have written.
In another cutaway scene, Peter recalls living at Superman's Fortress of Solitude with Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman and Aquaman, being annoyed that they have run out of Mr. PiBB and Cheez-Its.
The entire scene in which Peter receives his award from Mayor West is a reenactment of the ending of the original 1977 Star Wars film, A New Hope; Lucasfilm permitted the reproduction of the characters, music and sounds.
The airplane that defeats Ernie the Giant Chicken in the fight is a mirror reference to the climactic scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Stewie being launched into a tree is a reference to The Brady Bunch.
In the scene where the Griffins are in the car and Peter tells them he is setting a world record, he points out two guys morbidly obese guys riding motorbikes nearby. This is a reference to real life pro wrestlers, Billy and Benny McCrary, known professionally as The McGuire Twins, who legitimately hold the Guinness World Record for heaviest twins, weighing in at 723 and 745 pounds respectively, or 1,468 pounds combined.

Reception
PopMatters' Kevin Wong gave the episode a positive review, feeling it was better than the two previous episodes of the season. He commented on the fight scene between Peter and Ernie the Giant Chicken as "a cartoon action sequence to end all cartoon action sequences: vehicles explode and limbs flail as Peter and the chicken beat each other senseless." "Blind Ambition" was criticized by Mike Drucker of IGN, who found that "the long fight with the chicken in Blind Ambition was funny once before, but borderline tiring here". However, Drucker also noted that the Star Wars'' ending was "one of my favorite jokes in the series".

References

External links

Family Guy (season 4) episodes
2005 American television episodes

Blind Ambition (Family Guy)


The name diesel is given to an engine invented by a German named Rudolf Diesel in the late 19th century. It is one of the most used kinds of internal combustion engine.

Most other engines need a system called an ignition system – one that uses an electric spark – in order to burn the mix of fuel and air and make power. Other types of ignition systems use compressed air from an outside source, such as an air compressor.  A diesel does not.  It burns a diesel fuel (similar to heating oil) through very high compression or pressing together of the mix. A tiny bit of fuel is injected, or forced, into the engine's cylinders at just the right moment. Since gases heat when they are pressed together, the compression of the air and fuel mix cause the mix to explode within the cylinder.

Diesel engines make very good use of the fuel they burn. They also make lots of torque (pronounced "tork"), or twisting power. An engine with a lot of torque will be able to spin its shaft even if it is very hard to do so. This makes a diesel engine a good choice in heavy equipment like trucks, trains and construction machines. The very big trucks on the road have diesel engines in them. So do train locomotives, unless they are electric or the old steam-powered kind.

Sometimes, even the torque of a diesel engine is not enough to run such big machines. To boost power, large diesels often have a device called a turbocharger attached. A turbocharger is a type of turbine – something used to move a lot of air very quickly. Jet engines also contain a turbine. In the diesel, pressure from the exhaust spins the turbocharger at a very high speed. Fresh air is then forced back into the engine. Since the engine works by pumping air, the more air you can put through it, the more power it makes. That is where the turbocharger helps. A diesel engine that has a turbocharger is called a turbodiesel. The whistling sound sometimes heard near one of these engines is caused by the turbocharger, or "turbo" for short.

A diesel engine can also be made to run on canola oil made from old cooking oil. This type of fuel is called biodiesel. Running a diesel engine on biodiesel fuel makes the exhaust smell like food. Vegetable oil as fuel is not a new idea. The engine that Rudolf Diesel used to demonstrate his new idea ran on canola oil.

Motors

Diesel engine


A Raster image processor is a part in some printers. The raster image processor receives the data in a description language, like Postscript, PCL, or PDF and changes it to a bitmap or raster image.

Raster image processing can be done in two ways: as Software running as part of the operating system, or as a special microprocessor inside the printer. Cheaper printers use a solution called host-based printing, where this is done in the operating system, more expensive printers, and those that support PCL, Postscript or a similar language have a Raster image processor inside the printer.

Stages of RIP

 Interpretation: This is the stage where the supported PDLs (Page description languages) are translated into a private internal representation of each page. Most RIPs make pages one after another so the current machine state is only for the current page. They do one page at a time. Once a page has been output the page state is discarded to make the RIP ready for the next page.
 Rendering: this is how the private internal representation is turned into a continuous tone bitmap. Note that in practical RIPs interpretation and rendering are frequently done together. Simple languages (mostly the most ancient) were designed to work on minimal hardware so tend to "directly drive" the renderer.
 Screening: In order to print, a continuous-tone bitmap is converted into a halftone (pattern of dots).  Two screening methods or types are Amplitude Modulation (AM) screening and stochastic or Frequency Modulation (FM) screening. In AM screening, dot size varies depending on object density -- tonal values; dots are placed in a fixed grid. In FM screening, dot size remains constant and dots are placed in random order to create darker or lighter areas of the image; dot placement is precisely controlled by sophisticated mathematical algorithms.

References

Other website
 RIP Software Definition

Printers
Printing

Raster image processor


InVision Technologies, Inc. was a publicly traded company based in Newark, California, that manufactured and sold airport security screening devices to detect explosives in passenger baggage.  One of its most well-known products is the CTX explosive-detection device. One of its founding members was Sauveur Chemouni.

FCPA case

The company was notable, in part, because its case was the first time the US Department of Justice had resolved a Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) case through a non-prosecution agreement.

The charges were based upon conduct of the company's third party distributors (but not the company itself), while InVision's staff failed to timely investigate certain "red flag" emails copied to their addresses. The company voluntarily disclosed its findings resulting from internal investigations related to the issues which arose during the preparation for the acquisition of InVision by General Electric Company.

The NPA, concluded in December 2004, required from the company, in part, a $800,000 penalty and a requirement to improve the enforcement of FCPA compliance.

On July 1, 2009, the European Union approved GE Security's sale of 81 percent of the previous InVision business division to French company Safran.

References

External links
 GE Security - Aviation
 SEC info about settlement

Safran Group
Companies based in Newark, California
Technology companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area
Defunct companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area

InVision Technologies


The Reconquista (a Spanish and Portuguese word for "Reconquest"; Arabic: الاسترداد, "Recapturing") was a period of 800 years in the Middle Ages during which the several Christian kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula expanded themselves (grew) by conquering the Muslim states of Al-Andalus (Arabic الأندلس), the Muslim states on the Iberian Peninsula, and pushing them out of the peninsula.

The Reconquista began shortly after the Islamic conquest. Much of the ideology of the Reconquista was common to most Crusading: soldiers from all Christendom travelled to Iberia to fight the Muslims as an act of Christian repentance.

The Reconquista came to an end on the 2 January 1492 with the capture of Granada. The last Muslim ruler of Granada surrendered (gave up) his kingdom to Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile, the Catholic kings (los Reyes Católicos). This event marked the end of Muslim rule in Iberia.

Bibliography

 Watt, W. Montgomery: A History of Islamic Spain. University Press of Edinburgh (1992).
 Watt, W. Montgomery: The Influence of Islam on Medieval Europe. (Edinburgh 1972).
 Timothy Reuter, Christopher Allmand, David Luscombe, Rosamond McKitterick (eds.), " The New Cambridge Medieval History", Cambridge University Press, Sep 14, 1995, .
 Bishko, Charles Julian, 1975. The Spanish and Portuguese Reconquest, 1095–1492 in A History of the Crusades, vol. 3: The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries, edited by Harry W. Hazard, (University of Wisconsin Press)

Other websites

 Timeline of the Reconquista , The University of Calgary.
 Battles of Castile & Leon : 844–1521.
 Exiles from Andalusia .

History of Spain

Reconquista


Trefentanil (A-3665) is an opioid analgesic that is an analogue of fentanyl and was developed in 1992.

Trefentanil is most similar to short-acting fentanyl analogues such as alfentanil. In comparative studies, trefentanil was slightly more potent and shorter acting than alfentanil as an analgesic, but induced significantly more severe respiratory depression. For this reason trefentanil has not been adopted for clinical use, although it is still used in research.

Trefentanil has very similar effects to alfentanil, much like those of fentanyl itself but more potent and shorter lasting. Side effects of fentanyl analogs are similar to those of fentanyl itself, which include itching, nausea and potentially serious respiratory depression, which can be life-threatening. Fentanyl analogs have killed hundreds of people throughout Europe and the former Soviet republics since the most recent resurgence in use began in Estonia in the early 2000s, and novel derivatives continue to appear. The risk of respiratory depression is especially high with potent fentanyl analogues such as alfentanil and trefentanil, and these drugs pose a significant risk of death if used outside of a hospital setting with appropriate artificial breathing apparatus available.

References

Opioids
Piperidines
Tetrazoles
Fluoroarenes
Propionamides
Anilides
Mu-opioid receptor agonists

Trefentanil


Polish–Ottoman War (1672–1676) was a conflict between the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Ottoman Empire, as a precursor of the Great Turkish War. It ended in 1676 with the Treaty of Żurawno and the Commonwealth ceding control of most of its Ukraine territories to the Ottomans.

Prelude

The causes of the Polish-Ottoman War of 1672–1676 can be traced to 1666. Petro Doroshenko Hetman of Zaporizhian Host, aiming to gain control of Ukraine but facing defeats from other factions struggling over control of that region, in a final bid to preserve his power in Ukraine, signed a treaty with Sultan Mehmed IV in 1669 that recognized the Cossack Hetmanate as a vassal of the Ottoman Empire.

In the meantime, Commonwealth forces were trying to put down unrest in Ukraine, but were weakened by decades long wars (Khmelnytsky Uprising, The Deluge and Russo-Polish War (1654–1667)). Trying to capitalize on that weakness, Tatars, who commonly raided across the Commonwealth borders in search of loot and plunder, invaded, this time allying themselves with Cossacks under hetman Doroshenko. They were however stopped by Commonwealth forces under hetman John Sobieski, who stopped their first push (1666–67), defeating them several times, and finally gaining an armistice after the Battle of Podhajce.

In 1670, however, hetman Doroshenko tried once again to take over Ukraine, and in 1671 Khan of Crimea, Adil Giray, supportive of the Commonwealth, was replaced with a new one, Selim I Giray, by the Ottoman sultan. Selim entered into an alliance with the Doroshenko's Cossacks; but again like in 1666–67 the Cossack-Tatar forces were dealt defeats by Sobieski. Selim then renewed his oath of allegiance to the Ottoman Sultan and pleaded for assistance, to which the Sultan agreed. Thus an irregular border conflict escalated into a regular war in 1671, as the Ottoman Empire was now prepared to send its regular units onto the battlefield in a bid to try to gain control of that region for itself.

The first phase (1672)

Ottoman forces, numbering 80,000 men and led by Grand Vizier Köprülü Fazıl Ahmed and Ottoman sultan Mehmed IV, invaded Polish Ukraine in August, took the Commonwealth fortress at Kamieniec Podolski and besieged Lwów. Unprepared for war, and torn by internal conflict between the king Michael I and the szlachta nobility, the Commonwealth Sejm could not act to raise taxes and gather a larger army. Its representatives were forced to sign the Peace of Buczacz in October that year, which ceded to the Ottomans the Commonwealth part of Ukraine (the Right-bank Bracław Voivodeship, Podole Voivodeship  and part of Kiev Voivodeship; Left-bank Ukraine was already controlled by Russia since the Treaty of Andrusovo of 1667) and promised an annual tribute of 22,000 ducats.

The second phase (1673–1676)

Instead of ratifying the peace treaty, the Commonwealth Sejm, with most of the deputies finally united by anger due to the territorial losses and the demeaning tribute (which could in fact be seen as reducing the Commonwealth to Ottomans' vassal) finally raised taxes for a new army (of about 37,000 strong was raised) and increased the Cossack register to 40,000. Hetman John Sobieski led a military campaign against the Ottomans and dealt several defeats to the Ottomans; of which the battle of Khotyn was the largest; next he took control of the Moldavia territory and most of disputed Ukrainian lands. That year king Michael I of Poland died, and in recognition of his victories and dedication, John Sobieski was elected King of the Commonwealth in 1674.

Over the next year, however, the Polish forces were subject to attrition, as the Sejm again refused to raise taxes and pay the army, resulting in mass desertions of unpaid soldiery. The Polish problems were further aggravated by the incompetent leadership of hetman Michał Kazimierz Pac, who obstructed Sobieski's leadership, while the Ottomans continued to receive reinforcements. Nonetheless in 1674 the Commonwealth resumed the offensive, taking advantage of a new Russo-Turkish conflict that year, and the Polish-Ottoman war remained undecided. Sobieski's force of 6,000 defeated 20,000 Turks and Tatars under Ibrahim Shyshman in the battle of Lwow in August 1675.  Even after the Battle of Trembowla, the Sejm still refused his pleas for more funds and a larger army.

In 1676, after Sobieski's 16,000 withstood the two-week siege of Żurawno, by 100,000 men under Ibrahim Pasha, a new peace treaty was signed, the Treaty of Żurawno.  The peace treaty partially reversing those from Buczacz: the Ottomans kept approximately two thirds of the territories they gained in 1672, and the Commonwealth no longer was obliged to pay any kind of tribute to the Empire; a large number of Polish prisoners were released by the Ottomans.

Aftermath

The Sejm rejected the treaty, through the actions of Austrian diplomats and Pope Innocent XI.  Sobieski also was forced to reduce his army from 30,000 to 12,000 men.

The war showed the increasing weakness and disorder of the Commonwealth, who by the second half of the 17th century had started its gradual decline that would culminate a century later with the partitions of Poland. The unruly Sejm, paralyzed by liberum veto and foreign bribery, was dominated by politicians who thought in short term gains only and constantly refused the funds to raise an army, as it appeared that most of the Commonwealth would not be ravaged by the Ottoman armies. Even after the unfavourable Buczacz treaty, which convinced the Sejm to raise the taxes,  once initial successes were achieved, the majority of the Sejm again couldn't be convinced to keep up the pressure on the enemy; soldiers were left unpaid and desertions on a mass scale negatively affected the Polish cause. This apparent inability to defend itself, also seen in the other recent and future conflicts the Commonwealth was involved in, increasingly invited foreign forces to prey on the Commonwealth.

On the Polish side the fighting was done mostly by a force privately financed by John Sobieski. He gained reputation as an able, courageous commander and a patriot, having invested part of his personal fortune in the defense of the Commonwealth. In 1674 he was elected King of Poland and ruled now as John III. Sobieski's reputation also preceded him in the Ottoman Empire, and his victory several years later at the battle of Vienna would ensure his reputation as the top commander fighting the Ottomans — however even he would not be able to stop the Commonwealth from decline and introduce reforms that would save the country.

The Commonwealth did regain the territories lost in this war after the Polish–Ottoman War (1683–1699) in 1699 Treaty of Karlowitz, but that was one of the last of its victories.

Battles
Battle of Ładyżyno (or Battle of Czetwertynówka) (18 July 1672)
Battle of Humanie (1672)
Siege of Kamieniec Podolski (18–27 August 1672)
Battle of Korc (1672)
Battle of Krasnobród (5–6 October 1672)
Battle of Narol (6 October 1672)
Battle of Niemirów (7 October 1672)
Battle of Komarno (9 October 1672)
Battle of Petranka (14 October 1672)
Battle of Kałusz (1672)
Battle of Khotyn (11 November 1673)
Battle of Lesienice near Lwów (22 August 1675)
Battle of Trembowla (20 September – 11 October 1675)
Battle of Wojniłowo (24 September 1676)
Battle of Żurawno (25 September – 14 October 1676)

In popular culture
The Polish-Ottoman War had a major effect on Poland. Fire in the Steppe is a historical fiction novel, set in the 17th century in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth during the Polish–Tatar and Polish–Ottoman Wars.

Colonel Wolodyjowski is a Polish historical drama film directed by Jerzy Hoffman. The film is based on the novel Fire in the Steppe, the last part in The Trilogy of Henryk Sienkiewicz.

References

Bibliography

Polish-Ottoman War, 1672–1676
Polish Warfare: The Turkish and Tartar Wars 1667–1676 parts 7 and 8
 Wojny polsko-tureckie , Encyklopedia WIEM
 Viorel Panaite, "On Ottoman-Polish Diplomatic Relations", Asian Studies. International Journal for Asian Studies (II/2001),
 Stanford Jay Shaw, Ezel Kural Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, Cambridge University Press, 1977, , Google Print, p.213

External links
 Edward Krysciak, Wojny polsko-tureckie w drugiej połowie XVII wieku, Portal historicus.pl
 Wojna 1672–1676

1670s conflicts
Polish–Ottoman wars
Wars involving Wallachia
Wars involving Moldavia
Warfare of the early modern period
Poland–Turkey relations
1670s in Europe
1670s in the Ottoman Empire
Military history of Ukraine

Polish–Ottoman War (1672–1676)