Wallachia or Walachia (; , ; archaic: , Romanian Cyrillic alphabet: ) is a historical and geographical region of Romania. It is situated north of the Lower Danube and south of the Southern Carpathians. Wallachia is traditionally divided into two sections, Muntenia (Greater Wallachia) and Oltenia (Lesser Wallachia). Dobruja could sometimes be considered a third section due to its proximity and brief rule over it. Wallachia as a whole is sometimes referred to as Muntenia through identification with the larger of the two traditional sections.

Wallachia was founded as a principality in the early 14th century by Basarab I after a rebellion against Charles I of Hungary, although the first mention of the territory of Wallachia west of the river Olt dates to a charter given to the voivode Seneslau in 1246 by Béla IV of Hungary. In 1417, Wallachia was forced to accept the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire; this lasted until the 19th century.

In 1859, Wallachia united with Moldavia to form the United Principalities, which adopted the name Romania in 1866 and officially became the Kingdom of Romania in 1881. Later, following the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the resolution of the elected representatives of Romanians in 1918, Bukovina, Transylvania and parts of Banat, Crișana, and Maramureș were allocated to the Kingdom of Romania, thereby forming the modern Romanian state.

Etymology

The name Wallachia is an exonym, generally not used by Romanians themselves, who used the denomination "Țara Rumânească" – Romanian Country or Romanian Land, although it does appear in some Romanian texts as Valahia or Vlahia. It derives from the term walhaz used by Germanic peoples and Early Slavs to refer to Romans and other speakers of foreign languages. In Northwestern Europe, this gave rise to Wales, Cornwall, and Wallonia, among others, while in Southeast Europe it was used to designate Romance-speakers, and subsequently shepherds in general.

In Slavonic texts of the Early Middle Ages, the name  ( or "Hungaro-Wallachian Land") was also used as a designation for the region. The term, translated in Romanian as "Ungrovalahia", remained in use up to the modern era in a religious context, referring to the Romanian Orthodox Metropolitan seat of Hungaro-Wallachia, in contrast to Thessalian or Great Vlachia in Greece or Small Wallachia (Mala Vlaška) in Serbia. The Romanian-language designations of the state were Muntenia (The Land of Mountains), Țara Rumânească (the Romanian Land), Valahia, and, rarely, România. The spelling variant Țara Românească was adopted in official documents by the mid-19th century; however, the version with u remained common in local dialects until much later.

For long periods after the 14th century, Wallachia was referred to as  () by Bulgarian sources,  () by Serbian sources,  () by Ukrainian sources, and  or  by German-speaking (most notably Transylvanian Saxon) sources. The traditional Hungarian name for Wallachia is , literally "Snowy lowlands", the older form of which is , meaning "Land beyond the snowy mountains" ("snowy mountains" refers to the Southern Carpathians (the Transylvanian Alps)); its translation into Latin,  was used in the official royal documents of the Kingdom of Hungary. In Ottoman Turkish, the term , or simply  , appears. (Note that in a turn of linguistic luck utterly in favor of the Wallachians' eastward posterity, this toponym, at least according to the phonotactics of modern Turkish, is homophonous with another word, , meaning "heavens" or "skies".). In old Albanian, the name was "Gogënia", which was used to denote non-Albanian speakers.

Arabic chronicles from the 13th century had used the name of Wallachia instead of Bulgaria. They gave the coordinates of Wallachia and specified that Wallachia was named  and the dwellers  or .

The area of Oltenia in Wallachia was also known in Turkish as Kara-Eflak ("Black Wallachia") and Kuçuk-Eflak ("Little Wallachia"), while the former has also been used for Moldavia.

History

Ancient times

In the Second Dacian War (AD 105) western Oltenia became part of the Roman province of Dacia, with parts of Wallachia included in the Moesia Inferior province. The Roman limes was initially built along the Olt River in 119 before being moved slightly to the east in the second century, during which time it stretched from the Danube up to Rucăr in the Carpathians. The Roman line fell back to the Olt in 245 and, in 271, the Romans pulled out of the region.

The area was subject to Romanization also during the Migration Period, when most of present-day Romania was also invaded by Goths and Sarmatians known as the Chernyakhov culture, followed by waves of other nomads. In 328, the Romans built a bridge between Sucidava and Oescus (near Gigen) which indicates that there was a significant trade with the peoples north of the Danube. A short period of Roman rule in the area is attested under Emperor Constantine the Great, after he attacked the Goths (who had settled north of the Danube) in 332. The period of Goth rule ended when the Huns arrived in the Pannonian Basin and, under Attila, attacked and destroyed some 170 settlements on both sides of the Danube.

Early Middle Ages

Byzantine influence is evident during the fifth to sixth century, such as the site at Ipotești–Cândești culture, but from the second half of the sixth century and in the seventh century, Slavs crossed the territory of Wallachia and settled in it, on their way to Byzantium, occupying the southern bank of the Danube. In 593, the Byzantine commander-in-chief Priscus defeated Slavs, Avars and Gepids on future Wallachian territory, and, in 602, Slavs suffered a crucial defeat in the area; Flavius Mauricius Tiberius, who ordered his army to be deployed north of the Danube, encountered his troops' strong opposition.

From its establishment in 681 to approximately the Hungarians' conquest of Transylvania at the end of the tenth century, the First Bulgarian Empire controlled the territory of Wallachia. With the decline and subsequent Byzantine conquest of Bulgaria (from the second half of the tenth century up to 1018), Wallachia came under the control of the Pechenegs, Turkic peoples who extended their rule west through the tenth and 11th century, until they were defeated around 1091, when the Cumans of southern Ruthenia took control of the lands of Wallachia. Beginning with the tenth century, Byzantine, Bulgarian, Hungarian, and later Western sources mention the existence of small polities, possibly peopled by, among others, Vlachs led by knyazes and voivodes.

In 1241, during the Mongol invasion of Europe, Cuman domination was ended—a direct Mongol rule over Wallachia was not attested. Part of Wallachia was probably briefly disputed by the Kingdom of Hungary and Bulgarians in the following period, but it appears that the severe weakening of Hungarian authority during the Mongol attacks contributed to the establishment of the new and stronger polities attested in Wallachia for the following decades.

Creation

One of the first written pieces of evidence of local voivodes is in connection with Litovoi (1272), who ruled over land each side of the Carpathians (including Hațeg Country in Transylvania), and refused to pay tribute to Ladislaus IV of Hungary. His successor was his brother Bărbat (1285–1288). The continuing weakening of the Hungarian state by further Mongol invasions (1285–1319) and the fall of the Árpád dynasty opened the way for the unification of Wallachian polities, and to independence from Hungarian rule.

Wallachia's creation, held by local traditions to have been the work of one Radu Negru (Black Radu), is historically connected with Basarab I of Wallachia (1310–1352), who rebelled against Charles I of Hungary and took up rule on either side of the Olt, establishing his residence in Câmpulung as the first ruler of the House of Basarab. Basarab refused to grant Hungary the lands of Făgăraș, Almaș and the Banate of Severin, defeated Charles in the Battle of Posada (1330), and, according to Romanian historian Ștefan Ștefănescu, extended his lands to the east, to comprise lands as far as Kiliya in the Budjak (reportedly providing the origin of Bessarabia); the supposed rule over the latter was not preserved by the princes that followed, as Kilia was under the rule of the Nogais c.1334.

There is evidence that the Second Bulgarian Empire ruled at least nominally the Wallachian lands up to the Rucăr–Bran corridor as late as the late 14th century. In a charter by Radu I, the Wallachian voivode requests that tsar Ivan Alexander of Bulgaria order his customs officers at Rucăr and the Dâmboviţa River bridge to collect tax following the law. The presence of Bulgarian customs officers at the Carpathians indicates a Bulgarian suzerainty over those lands, though Radu's imperative tone hints at a strong and increasing Wallachian autonomy. Under Radu I and his successor Dan I, the realms in Transylvania and Severin continued to be disputed with Hungary. Basarab was succeeded by Nicholas Alexander, followed by Vladislav I. Vladislav attacked Transylvania after Louis I occupied lands south of the Danube, conceded to recognize him as overlord in 1368, but rebelled again in the same year; his rule also witnessed the first confrontation between Wallachia and the Ottoman Empire (a battle in which Vladislav was allied with Ivan Shishman).

1400–1600

Mircea the Elder to Radu the Great

As the entire Balkans became an integral part of the growing Ottoman Empire (a process that concluded with the fall of Constantinople to Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror in 1453), Wallachia became engaged in frequent confrontations in the final years of the reign of Mircea I (r. 1386–1418). Mircea initially defeated the Ottomans in several battles, including the Battle of Rovine in 1394, driving them away from Dobruja and briefly extending his rule to the Danube Delta, Dobruja and Silistra (c. 1400–1404). He swung between alliances with Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor, and Jagiellon Poland (taking part in the Battle of Nicopolis), and accepted a peace treaty with the Ottomans in 1417, after Mehmed I took control of Turnu Măgurele and Giurgiu. The two ports remained part of the Ottoman state, with brief interruptions, until 1829. In 1418–1420, Michael I defeated the Ottomans in Severin, only to be killed in battle by the counter-offensive; in 1422, the danger was averted for a short while when Dan II inflicted a defeat on Murad II with the help of Pippo Spano.

The peace signed in 1428 inaugurated a period of internal crisis, as Dan had to defend himself against Radu II, who led the first in a series of boyar coalitions against established princes. Victorious in 1431 (the year when the boyar-backed Alexander I Aldea took the throne), boyars were dealt successive blows by Vlad II Dracul (1436–1442; 1443–1447), who nevertheless attempted to compromise between the Ottoman Sultan and the Holy Roman Empire.

The following decade was marked by the conflict between the rival houses of Dănești and Drăculești. Faced with both internal and external conflict, Vlad II Dracul reluctantly agreed to pay the tribute demanded of him by the Ottoman Empire, despite his affiliation with the Order of the Dragon, a group of independent noblemen whose creed had been to repel the Ottoman invasion. As part of the tribute, the sons of Vlad II Dracul (Radu cel Frumos and Vlad III Dracula) were taken into Ottoman custody. Recognizing the Christian resistance to their invasion, leaders of the Ottoman Empire released Vlad III to rule in 1448 after his father's assassination in 1447.

Known as Vlad III the Impaler or Vlad III Dracula, he immediately put to death the boyars who had conspired against his father, and was characterized as both a national hero and a cruel tyrant. He was cheered for restoring order to a destabilized principality, yet showed no mercy toward thieves, murderers or anyone who plotted against his rule. Vlad demonstrated his intolerance for criminals by utilizing impalement as a form of execution. Vlad fiercely resisted Ottoman rule, having both repelled the Ottomans and been pushed back several times.

The Transylvanian Saxons were also furious with him for strengthening the borders of Wallachia, which interfered with their control of trade routes. In retaliation, the Saxons distributed grotesque poems of cruelty and other propaganda, demonizing Vlad III Dracula as a drinker of blood. These tales strongly influenced an eruption of vampiric fiction throughout the West and, in particular, Germany. They also inspired the main character in the 1897 Gothic novel Dracula by Bram Stoker.

In 1462, Vlad III was defeated by Mehmed the Conqueror's during his offensive at the Night Attack at Târgovişte before being forced to retreat to Târgoviște and accepting to pay an increased tribute. Meanwhile, Vlad III faced parallel conflicts with his brother, Radu cel Frumos, (r. 1437/1439—1475), and Basarab Laiotă cel Bătrân. This led to the conquest of Wallachia by Radu, who would face his own struggles with the resurgent Vlad III and Basarab Laiotă cel Bătrân during his 11-year reign. Subsequently, Radu IV the Great (Radu cel Mare, who ruled 1495–1508) reached several compromises with the boyars, ensuring a period of internal stability that contrasted his clash with Bogdan III the One-Eyed of Moldavia.

Mihnea cel Rău to Petru Cercel
The late 15th century saw the ascension of the powerful Craiovești family, virtually independent rulers of the Oltenian banat, who sought Ottoman support in their rivalry with Mihnea cel Rău (1508–1510) and replaced him with Vlăduț. After the latter proved to be hostile to the bans, the House of Basarab formally ended with the rise of Neagoe Basarab, a Craioveşti. Neagoe's peaceful rule (1512–1521) was noted for its cultural aspects (the building of the Curtea de Argeş Cathedral and Renaissance influences). It was also a period of increased influence for the Saxon merchants in Brașov and Sibiu, and of Wallachia's alliance with Louis II of Hungary. Under Teodosie, the country was again under a four-month-long Ottoman occupation, a military administration that seemed to be an attempt to create a Wallachian Pashaluk. This danger rallied all boyars in support of Radu de la Afumaţi (four rules between 1522 and 1529), who lost the battle after an agreement between the Craiovești and Sultan Süleyman the Magnificent; Prince Radu eventually confirmed Süleyman's position as suzerain and agreed to pay an even higher tribute.

Ottoman suzerainty remained virtually unchallenged throughout the following 90 years. Radu Paisie, who was deposed by Süleyman in 1545, ceded the port of Brăila to Ottoman administration in the same year. His successor Mircea Ciobanul (1545–1554; 1558–1559), a prince without any claim to noble heritage, was imposed on the throne and consequently agreed to a decrease in autonomy (increasing taxes and carrying out an armed intervention in Transylvania – supporting the pro-Turkish John Zápolya). Conflicts between boyar families became stringent after the rule of Pătrașcu the Good, and boyar ascendancy over rulers was obvious under Petru the Younger (1559–1568; a reign dominated by Doamna Chiajna and marked by huge increases in taxes), Mihnea Turcitul, and Petru Cercel.

The Ottoman Empire increasingly relied on Wallachia and Moldavia for the supply and maintenance of its military forces; the local army, however, soon disappeared due to the increased costs and the much more obvious efficiency of mercenary troops.

17th century

Initially profiting from Ottoman support, Michael the Brave ascended to the throne in 1593, and attacked the troops of Murad III north and south of the Danube in an alliance with Transylvania's Sigismund Báthory and Moldavia's Aron Vodă (see Battle of Călugăreni). He soon placed himself under the suzerainty of Rudolf II, the Holy Roman Emperor, and, in 1599–1600, intervened in Transylvania against Poland's king Sigismund III Vasa, placing the region under his authority; his brief rule also extended to Moldavia later in the following year. For a brief period, Michael the Brave ruled (in a personal, but not formal, union) most of the territories where Romanians lived, rebuilding the base of the ancient Kingdom of Dacia. The rule of Michael the Brave, with its break with Ottoman rule, tense relations with other European powers and the leadership of the three states, was considered in later periods as the precursor of a modern Romania, a thesis which was argued with noted intensity by Nicolae Bălcescu. Following Michael's downfall, Wallachia was occupied by the Polish–Moldavian army of Simion Movilă (see Moldavian Magnate Wars), who held the region until 1602, and was subject to Nogai attacks in the same year.

The last stage in the Growth of the Ottoman Empire brought increased pressures on Wallachia: political control was accompanied by Ottoman economical hegemony, the discarding of the capital in Târgoviște in favour of Bucharest (closer to the Ottoman border, and a rapidly growing trade center), the establishment of serfdom under Michael the Brave as a measure to increase manorial revenues, and the decrease in importance of low-ranking boyars (threatened with extinction, they took part in the seimeni rebellion of 1655). Furthermore, the growing importance of appointment to high office in front of land ownership brought about an influx of Greek and Levantine families, a process already resented by locals during the rules of Radu Mihnea in the early 17th century. Matei Basarab, a boyar appointee, brought a long period of relative peace (1632–1654), with the noted exception of the 1653 Battle of Finta, fought between Wallachians and the troops of Moldavian prince Vasile Lupu—ending in disaster for the latter, who was replaced with Prince Matei's favourite, Gheorghe Ștefan, on the throne in Iași. A close alliance between Gheorghe Ștefan and Matei's successor Constantin Șerban was maintained by Transylvania's George II Rákóczi, but their designs for independence from Ottoman rule were crushed by the troops of Mehmed IV in 1658–1659. The reigns of Gheorghe Ghica and Grigore I Ghica, the sultan's favourites, signified attempts to prevent such incidents; however, they were also the onset of a violent clash between the Băleanu and Cantacuzino boyar families, which was to mark Wallachia's history until the 1680s. The Cantacuzinos, threatened by the alliance between the Băleanus and the Ghicas, backed their own choice of princes (Antonie Vodă din Popești and George Ducas) before promoting themselves—with the ascension of Șerban Cantacuzino (1678–1688).

Russo-Turkish Wars and the Phanariotes

Wallachia became a target for Habsburg incursions during the last stages of the Great Turkish War around 1690, when the ruler Constantin Brâncoveanu secretly and unsuccessfully negotiated an anti-Ottoman coalition. Brâncoveanu's reign (1688–1714), noted for its late Renaissance cultural achievements (see Brâncovenesc style), also coincided with the rise of Imperial Russia under Tsar Peter the Great—he was approached by the latter during the Russo-Turkish War of 1710–11, and lost his throne and life sometime after sultan Ahmed III caught news of the negotiations. Despite his denunciation of Brâncoveanu's policies, Ștefan Cantacuzino attached himself to Habsburg projects and opened the country to the armies of Prince Eugene of Savoy; he was himself deposed and executed in 1716.

Immediately following the deposition of Prince Ștefan, the Ottomans renounced the purely nominal elective system (which had by then already witnessed the decrease in importance of the Boyar Divan over the sultan's decision), and princes of the two Danubian Principalities were appointed from the Phanariotes of Constantinople. Inaugurated by Nicholas Mavrocordatos in Moldavia after Dimitrie Cantemir, Phanariote rule was brought to Wallachia in 1715 by the very same ruler. The tense relations between boyars and princes brought a decrease in the number of taxed people (as a privilege gained by the former), a subsequent increase in total taxes, and the enlarged powers of a boyar circle in the Divan.

In parallel, Wallachia became the battleground in a succession of wars between the Ottomans on one side and Russia or the Habsburg monarchy on the other. Mavrocordatos himself was deposed by a boyar rebellion, and arrested by Habsburg troops during the Austro-Turkish War of 1716–18, as the Ottomans had to concede Oltenia to Charles VI of Austria (the Treaty of Passarowitz). The region, organized as the Banat of Craiova and subject to an enlightened absolutist rule that soon disenchanted local boyars, was returned to Wallachia in 1739 (the Treaty of Belgrade, upon the close of the Austro-Russian–Turkish War (1735–39)). Prince Constantine Mavrocordatos, who oversaw the new change in borders, was also responsible for the effective abolition of serfdom in 1746 (which put a stop to the exodus of peasants into Transylvania); during this period, the ban of Oltenia moved his residence from Craiova to Bucharest, signalling, alongside Mavrocordatos' order to merge his personal treasury with that of the country, a move towards centralism.

In 1768, during the Fifth Russo-Turkish War, Wallachia was placed under its first Russian occupation (helped along by the rebellion of Pârvu Cantacuzino). The Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca (1774) allowed Russia to intervene in favour of Eastern Orthodox Ottoman subjects, curtailing Ottoman pressures—including the decrease in sums owed as tribute—and, in time, relatively increasing internal stability while opening Wallachia to more Russian interventions.

Habsburg troops, under Prince Josias of Coburg, again entered the country during the Russo-Turkish-Austrian War, deposing Nicholas Mavrogenes in 1789. A period of crisis followed the Ottoman recovery: Oltenia was devastated by the expeditions of Osman Pazvantoğlu, a powerful rebellious pasha whose raids even caused prince Constantine Hangerli to lose his life on suspicion of treason (1799), and Alexander Mourousis to renounce his throne (1801). In 1806, the Russo-Turkish War of 1806–12 was partly instigated by the Porte's deposition of Constantine Ypsilantis in Bucharest—in tune with the Napoleonic Wars, it was instigated by the French Empire, and also showed the impact of the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca (with its permissive attitude towards Russian political influence in the Danubian Principalities); the war brought the invasion of Mikhail Andreyevich Miloradovich. After the Peace of Bucharest, the rule of Jean Georges Caradja, although remembered for a major plague epidemic, was notable for its cultural and industrial ventures. During the period, Wallachia increased its strategic importance for most European states interested in supervising Russian expansion; consulates were opened in Bucharest, having an indirect but major impact on Wallachian economy through the protection they extended to Sudiți traders (who soon competed successfully against local guilds).

From Wallachia to Romania

Early 19th century
The death of prince Alexander Soutzos in 1821, coinciding with the outbreak of the Greek War of Independence, established a boyar regency which attempted to block the arrival of Scarlat Callimachi to his throne in Bucharest. The parallel uprising in Oltenia, carried out by the Pandur leader Tudor Vladimirescu, although aimed at overthrowing the ascendancy of Greeks, compromised with the Greek revolutionaries in the Filiki Eteria and allied itself with the regents, while seeking Russian support (see also: Rise of nationalism under the Ottoman Empire).

On 21 March 1821 Vladimirescu entered Bucharest. For the following weeks, relations between him and his allies worsened, especially after he sought an agreement with the Ottomans; Eteria's leader Alexander Ypsilantis, who had established himself in Moldavia and, after May, in northern Wallachia, viewed the alliance as broken—he had Vladimirescu executed, and faced the Ottoman intervention without Pandur or Russian backing, suffering major defeats in Bucharest and Drăgășani (before retreating to Austrian custody in Transylvania). These violent events, which had seen the majority of Phanariotes siding with Ypsilantis, made Sultan Mahmud II place the Principalities under its occupation (evicted by a request of several European powers), and sanction the end of Phanariote rules: in Wallachia, the first prince to be considered a local one after 1715 was Grigore IV Ghica. Although the new system was confirmed for the rest of Wallachia's existence as a state, Ghica's rule was abruptly ended by the devastating Russo-Turkish War of 1828–1829.

The 1829 Treaty of Adrianople placed Wallachia and Moldavia under Russian military rule, without overturning Ottoman suzerainty, awarding them the first common institutions and semblance of a constitution (see Regulamentul Organic). Wallachia was returned ownership of Brăila, Giurgiu (both of which soon developed into major trading cities on the Danube), and Turnu Măgurele. The treaty also allowed Moldavia and Wallachia to freely trade with countries other than the Ottoman Empire, which signalled substantial economic and urban growth, as well as improving the peasant situation. Many of the provisions had been specified by the 1826 Akkerman Convention between Russia and the Ottomans, but it had never been fully implemented in the three-year interval. The duty of overseeing of the Principalities was left to Russian general Pavel Kiselyov; this period was marked by a series of major changes, including the reestablishment of a Wallachian Army (1831), a tax reform (which nonetheless confirmed tax exemptions for the privileged), as well as major urban works in Bucharest and other cities. In 1834, Wallachia's throne was occupied by Alexandru II Ghica—a move in contradiction with the Adrianople treaty, as he had not been elected by the new Legislative Assembly; he was removed by the suzerains in 1842 and replaced with an elected prince, Gheorghe Bibescu.

1840s–1850s

Opposition to Ghica's arbitrary and highly conservative rule, together with the rise of liberal and radical currents, was first felt with the protests voiced by Ion Câmpineanu (quickly repressed); subsequently, it became increasingly conspiratorial, and centered on those secret societies created by young officers such as Nicolae Bălcescu and Mitică Filipescu.
Frăția, a clandestine movement created in 1843, began planning a revolution to overthrow Bibescu and repeal Regulamentul Organic in 1848 (inspired by the European rebellions of the same year). Their pan-Wallachian coup d'état was initially successful only near Turnu Măgurele, where crowds cheered the Islaz Proclamation (9 June); among others, the document called for political freedoms, independence, land reform, and the creation of a national guard. On 11–12 June the movement was successful in deposing Bibescu and establishing a Provisional Government, which made Dreptate, Frăție ("Justice, Brotherhood") the national motto. Although sympathetic to the anti-Russian goals of the revolution, the Ottomans were pressured by Russia into repressing it: Ottoman troops entered Bucharest on 13 September. Russian and Turkish troops, present until 1851, brought Barbu Dimitrie Știrbei to the throne, during which interval most participants in the revolution were sent into exile.

Briefly under renewed Russian occupation during the Crimean War, Wallachia and Moldavia were given a new status with a neutral Austrian administration (1854–1856) and the Treaty of Paris: a tutelage shared by Ottomans and a Congress of Great Powers (Britain, France, the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia, the Austrian Empire, Prussia, and, albeit never again fully, Russia), with a kaymakam-led internal administration. The emerging movement for a union of the Danubian Principalities (a demand first voiced in 1848, and a cause cemented by the return of revolutionary exiles) was advocated by the French and their Sardinian allies, supported by Russia and Prussia, but was rejected or suspicioned by all other overseers.

After an intense campaign, a formal union was ultimately granted: nevertheless, elections for the Ad hoc Divans of 1859 profited from a legal ambiguity (the text of the final agreement specified two thrones, but did not prevent any single person from simultaneously taking part in and winning elections in both Bucharest and Iași). Alexander John Cuza, who ran for the unionist Partida Națională, won the elections in Moldavia on 5 January; Wallachia, which was expected by the unionists to carry the same vote, returned a majority of anti-unionists to its divan.

Those elected changed their allegiance after a mass protest of Bucharest crowds, and Cuza was voted prince of Wallachia on 5 February (24 January Old Style), consequently confirmed as Domnitor of the United Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia (of Romania from 1862) and effectively uniting both principalities. Internationally recognized only for the duration of his reign, the union was irreversible after the ascension of Carol I in 1866 (coinciding with the Austro-Prussian War, it came at a time when Austria, the main opponent of the decision, was not in a position to intervene).

Society

Slavery
Slavery () was part of the social order from before the founding of the Principality of Wallachia, until it was abolished in stages during the 1840s and 1850s. Most of the slaves were of Roma (Gypsy) ethnicity. The very first document attesting the presence of Roma people in Wallachia dates back to 1385, and refers to the group as ațigani (from the Greek athinganoi, the origin of the Romanian term țigani, which is synonymous with "Gypsy"). Although the Romanian terms robie and sclavie appear to be synonyms, in terms of legal status, there are significant differences: sclavie was the term corresponding to the legal institution during the Roman era, where slaves were considered goods instead of human beings and the owners had ius vitae necisque over them (right to end the life of the slave); while robie is the feudal institution where the slaves were legally considered human beings and they had reduced legal capacity.

The exact origins of slavery in Wallachia are not known. Slavery was a common practice in Eastern Europe at the time, and there is some debate over whether the Romani people came to Wallachia as free people or as slaves. In the Byzantine Empire, they were slaves of the state and it seems the situation was the same in Bulgaria and Serbia until their social organization was destroyed by the Ottoman conquest, which would suggest that they came as slaves who had a change of 'ownership'. Historian Nicolae Iorga associated the Roma people's arrival with the 1241 Mongol invasion of Europe and considered their slavery as a vestige of that era, the Romanians taking the Roma from the Mongols as slaves and preserving their status. Other historians consider that they were enslaved while captured during the battles with the Tatars. The practice of enslaving prisoners may also have been taken from the Mongols. While it is possible that some Romani people were slaves or auxiliary troops of the Mongols or Tatars, the bulk of them came from south of the Danube at the end of the 14th century, some time after the foundation of Wallachia. The arrival of the Roma made slavery a widespread practice.

Traditionally, Roma slaves were divided into three categories. The smallest was owned by the hospodars, and went by the Romanian-language name of țigani domnești ("Gypsies belonging to the lord"). The two other categories comprised țigani mănăstirești ("Gypsies belonging to the monasteries"), who were the property of Romanian Orthodox and Greek Orthodox monasteries, and țigani boierești ("Gypsies belonging to the boyars"), who were enslaved by the category of landowners.

The abolition of slavery was carried out following a campaign by young revolutionaries who embraced the liberal ideas of the Enlightenment. The earliest law which freed a category of slaves was in March 1843, which transferred the control of the state slaves owned by the prison authority to the local authorities, leading to their sedentarizing and becoming peasants. During the Wallachian Revolution of 1848, the agenda of the Provisional Government included the emancipation (dezrobire) of the Roma as one of the main social demands. By the 1850s the movement gained support from almost the whole of Romanian society, and the law from February 1856 emancipated all slaves to the status of taxpayers (citizens).

Military forces

Geography

With an area of approximately , Wallachia is situated north of the Danube (and of present-day Bulgaria), east of Serbia and south of the Southern Carpathians, and is traditionally divided between Muntenia in the east (as the political center, Muntenia is often understood as being synonymous with Wallachia), and Oltenia (a former banat) in the west. The division line between the two is the Olt River.

Wallachia's traditional border with Moldavia coincided with the Milcov River for most of its length. To the east, over the Danube north-south bend, Wallachia neighbours Dobruja (Northern Dobruja). Over the Carpathians, Wallachia shared a border with Transylvania; Wallachian princes have for long held possession of areas north of the line (Amlaș, Ciceu, Făgăraș, and Hațeg), which are generally not considered part of Wallachia proper.

The capital city changed over time, from Câmpulung to Curtea de Argeș, then to Târgoviște and, after the late 17th century, to Bucharest.

Map gallery

Population

Historical population

Contemporary historians estimate the population of Wallachia in the 15th century at 500,000 people. In 1859, the population of Wallachia was 2,400,921 (1,586,596 in Muntenia and 814,325 in Oltenia).

Current population
According to the latest 2011 census data, the region has a total population of 8,256,532 inhabitants, distributed among the ethnic groups as follows (as per 2001 census): Romanians (97%), Roma (2.5%), others (0.5%).

Cities
The largest cities (as per the 2011 census) in the Wallachia region are:
Bucharest (1,883,425)
Craiova (269,506)
Ploiești (209,945)
Brăila (180,302)
Pitești (155,383)
Buzău (115,494)
Drobeta-Turnu Severin (92,617)
Râmnicu Vâlcea (92,573)

See also

History of Bucharest
List of rulers of Wallachia
Balkan–Danubian culture
Bulgarian lands across the Danube

Notes

References

Bibliography
Berza, Mihai. "Haraciul Moldovei și al Țării Românești în sec. XV–XIX", in Studii și Materiale de Istorie Medie, II, 1957, pp. 7–47.
Brătianu, Gheorghe I (1980). Tradiția istorică despre întemeierea statelor românești (The Historical Tradition of the Foundation of the Romanian States). Editura Eminescu.

Djuvara, Neagu. Între Orient și Occident. Țările române la începutul epocii moderne, Humanitas, Bucharest, 1995.
Giurescu, Constantin. Istoria Românilor, Vol. I, 5th edition, Bucharest, 1946.
Giurescu, Constantin. Istoria Bucureștilor. Din cele mai vechi timpuri pînă în zilele noastre, ed. Pentru Literatură, Bucharest, 1966.
Ștefănescu, Ștefan. Istoria medie a României, Vol. I, Bucharest, 1991.

External links

Medieval Coins of Moldavia and Wallachia

Former Russian protectorates
States and territories established in 1330
History of Wallachia
Ottoman period in Romania
States and territories disestablished in 1859
Vassal states of the Ottoman Empire
Fiefdoms of Poland
Former principalities

Wallachia


Helenium pinnatifidum is a North American perennial plant in the sunflower family, commonly known as southeastern sneezeweed. It is found in the southeaster United States (Alabama, Georgia, Florida, and the Carolinas).

Helenium pinnatifidum is an perennial herb up to  tall, with small wings running down the sides of the stems. Leaves are pinnatifid, meaning deeply divided into many small parts. One plant generally produces only 1-3 hemispherical flower heads, about  across. Each head can have 800 or more minuscule disc flowers  across, each yellow toward the bottom but yellow-brown toward the tip. There are also 13-34 yellow ray flowers, each with three prominent lobes at the tip.

References

External links
Southeastern Flora
Native Florida Wildflowers
Alabama Plant Atlas

Flora of the Southeastern United States
Plants described in 1841
pinnatifidum
Flora without expected TNC conservation status

Helenium pinnatifidum


Charles H. Smith (born September 30, 1950) is Professor Emeritus at Western Kentucky University (WKU). He is best known for his work as a biogeographer, historian/philosopher and bibliographer of science, especially for his expertise on the career of Alfred Russel Wallace.

Smith was born in Winsted, Connecticut, and grew up in the nearby town of New Hartford. Since his undergraduate college years he has lived in Georgia, Connecticut, Indiana, Illinois, Australia, Pennsylvania, and, from 1995, Bowling Green, Kentucky.

He created and maintains the website The Alfred Russel Wallace Page hosted by WKU and devoted to Wallace scholarship, which includes a comprehensive bibliography of Wallace's publications and interviews, texts of Wallace's works, and writings on Wallace by Smith and others. Smith has also produced a number of conventional writings on Wallace including the anthology Alfred Russel Wallace: An Anthology of His Shorter Writings published in 1991, a three-volume collection Alfred Russel Wallace: Writings on Evolution, 1843–1912 published in 2004, an edited collection of writings Natural Selection and Beyond: The Intellectual Legacy of Alfred Russel Wallace published in 2008, Alfred Russel Wallace's 1886–1887 Travel Diary: The North American Lecture Tour published in 2013, Enquête sur un Aventurier de l'Esprit: Le Véritable Alfred Russel Wallace (translated by Antoine Guillemain) published in 2013, Dear Sir: Sixty-Nine Years of Alfred Russel Wallace Letters to the Editor published in 2014, An Alfred Russel Wallace Companion published in 2019, and about seventy journal articles, including many in the series Alfred Russel Wallace Notes (of which he is the Editor).

Smith was originally trained as a biogeographer and has produced written work in that and cognate fields, including the bibliographic compilation Biodiversity Studies: A Bibliographic Review published in 2000, and journal-based philosophical, historical and empirical studies; he additionally hosts several related websites. He has also created and maintains three well known sites on music education hosted by WKU: The 111  Greatest Acts of the Anglo-American Folk Music Tradition, The Classical Music Navigator, and Malvina Reynolds: Song Lyrics and Poems.

In April 2013 Smith was a recipient of the national President's Call to Service Award, given to individuals who over their lifetime have volunteered at least 4000 hours of their time to public service, for his "website development for global awareness and education." In 2020 he issued a novel, Many Miles Away. In 2023 he was the recipient of the silver Wallace Medal, awarded by The Alfred Russel Wallace Memorial Fund.

Smith received a B.A. (1972) in Geology, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut; M.A. (1980), in Geography, Indiana University; Ph.D. (1984), in Geography (emphasis: Biogeography; minor: History & Philosophy of Science), University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; M.L.S. (1995), University of Pittsburgh.

References

External links
 The Alfred Russel Wallace Page
 Smith's WKU page and bibliography
 The 111 Greatest Acts of the Anglo-American Folk Music Tradition
 The Classical Music Navigator
 Malvina Reynolds: Song Lyrics and Poems
 Some Biogeographers, Evolutionists and Ecologists: Chrono-Biographical Sketches

Living people
Wesleyan University alumni
American historians of science
Biogeographers
1950 births
Western Kentucky University faculty
21st-century American historians
21st-century American male writers
American male non-fiction writers

Charles H. Smith (historian)


The Agricultural Wages (Regulation) Act 1924 (14 & 15 Geo. V c. 37) was an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom passed in 1924 by the minority Labour Government.

It was the first attempt since the ill-fated Agriculture Act 1920 to establish minimum wages for farm labourers. These wages were to be controlled by County Wage Committees, allowing wages to be set on a local level rather than a single national scale.

These County Committees were independent of central government, and some set very low minimums, but the level of pay did slowly improve. An early draft of the Bill had the Minister of Agriculture power to override the decisions of the County Committees if they made decisions he felt unfair, but this clause was struck out by the Liberals before the bill was passed.

The law was repealed by the Agricultural Wages Act 1948.

Further reading
Digital reproduction of the Original Act on the Parliamentary Archives catalogue

References
Facts and Figures for Socialists, 1951. Labour Party Research Department, London, 1950

United Kingdom Acts of Parliament 1924
1924 in economics
Repealed United Kingdom Acts of Parliament
Agriculture legislation in the United Kingdom
Minimum wage law
United Kingdom labour law
1924 in labor relations


The Heidelberg University Faculty of Law (also known as Heidelberg Law School), located in Heidelberg, Germany, is one of the original four constituent faculties of Heidelberg University. Founded in 1386 by Rupert I, Elector Palatine, it is the oldest law school in Germany.

Academics

Besides the first professional degree in law, and various doctoral programs, the school offers a general Master of Laws (LL.M.) program for foreign-educated lawyers, a specialized LL.M. in corporate restructuring, as well as a specialized LL.M. in international law, the latter being offered exclusively at the Heidelberg Center in Santiago, Chile. Teaching is delivered through lectures, tutorials, Moot courts and seminars. The school also runs the Max Planck Research School for Successful Dispute Resolution in International Law in cooperation with the Max Planck Institute for International Law.

Law students have to cover a wide range of compulsory subjects. After the intermediate examination, they can choose one of eleven elective subjects ("Schwerpunktbereiche"), in Heidelberg: Legal history and Historical Comparative Law; Criminal Law and Criminology; German and European Administrative Law; Labor Law and Social Legislation; Tax Law; Business Law; Commercial Law and European Community Law; Civil Procedure; Conflict of Laws; Public International Law; Health Care Law.
Thomas Lobinger and the exam preparation course "HeidelPräp!" won the Ars legendi-Award 2014 for excellence in higher education didactics, donated by Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft and German Rectors' Conference.
Heidelberg is home of Germany's oldest student law review "StudZR".

The main research interests of the faculty center around the harmonisation of private and public law at a European and international level; the ongoing refinement and adaptation of commercial, fiscal and labor legislation; the design of a legal framework for dealing with issues posed by statehood and European and global transnationality; criminology; and the history of law.

Reputation and admission

For centuries Heidelberg has been one of the preeminent law schools in Germany, today regularly placing at or near the top of various German law school rankings.

In the 2022 QS World University Rankings by subjects Heidelberg Law ranks 62 globally, down from rank 24 in 2014. It is ranked third in Germany after the University of Bonn and Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. In the 2020 CHE University Ranking, Heidelberg University is in the top group with regard to support in the study entry phase and doctorates per professor.

The school accepts less than one in ten applicants for the first professional degree program, and consistently has the highest number of applicants per place of all German law schools. Admission decisions for the first professional degree course are based on the Abitur GPA; the Abitur grades in German, mathematics, and in the first foreign language; as well as on other individual merits. Admission to graduate degrees is based on the results of the previous law degree and if applying for doctoral studies, the candidate's demonstrated capacity to pursue independently original research.

Statistics
The school comprises 2.764 students, including 2.396 students pursuing the first legal examination, 241 doctoral students and 96 Master of Laws students. Ten percent of the student body are international students. As of 2014, the law school's faculty consists of 62 full professors, excluding assistant professors, graduate research and teaching assistants, adjunct faculty, and visiting scholars.
In 2012, the school raised 790,000 EUR in third-party funds.
In Germany, regularly thirty percent of the candidates fail the First Legal Examination, and only 10 percent achieve a distinction. At Heidelberg Law School, the failure rate is only 20 percent and more than 20 percent graduate with distinction in the statewide final exam.

International cooperations
The school has student exchange agreements and research cooperations with some 40 partner universities, and it has established a professorial exchange program with the Georgetown University Law Center. In addition, it co-runs the School of German Law at the Jagiellonian University of Kraków, and it is actively involved in the development of the German-speaking Andrássy University of Budapest.

Noted people

Among the school's noted alumni in government are three Chancellors of Germany, a Prime Minister of Belgium and Nobel Peace Laureate, a Prime Minister of Bulgaria, a Prince Regent of Thailand, a Secretary General of NATO, two Federal Ministers of Justice, a Federal Minister of the Interior, a Federal Minister of Defense, a Federal Minister of Education and Research, and two Nazi-era ministers. Besides numerous Federal Judges, alumni in judiciary include 17 Justices of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany including three vice presidents of the court, a President of the International Court of Justice, two Presidents of the European Court of Human Rights, a President of the Federal Court of Justice of Germany, a President of the Federal Labor Court of Germany, a Vice President of the International Criminal Court, two Vice Presidents of the OSCE Court of Conciliation and Arbitration, two Attorneys General of Germany, an Advocate General at the European Court of Justice, a Justice in the Supreme Court of the Philippines, and a British Law Lord. Other famous alumni include the national poet of Pakistan Sir Muhammad Iqbal and classical composer Robert Schumann.

Among the Heidelberg law scholars in the 19th and 20th centuries were Anton Friedrich Justus Thibaut, Bernhard Windscheid, Johann Caspar Bluntschli, Georg Jellinek, Otto von Gierke, Gerhard Anschütz and Gustav Radbruch.
The law school's present professors include former Justice of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany Paul Kirchhof, former President of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea Rüdiger Wolfrum, former Secretary General of UNIDROIT and sitting chairman in the Iran–United States Claims Tribunal Herbert Kronke, and sitting President of the European Nuclear Energy Tribunal Armin von Bogdandy. Also, many Heidelberg law professors frequently act as consultants to the Federal Government, the Federal Parliament, the European Commission, and to the highest national and international courts. Sitting Justices of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany Ferdinand Kirchhof, Johannes Masing, Rudolf Mellinghoff, and Lerke Osterloh have served as lecturers and researchers in the school prior to their appointment to the court.

In fiction and popular culture
In Bernhard Schlink's semi-autobiographical 1995 novel The Reader, Heidelberg University is one of the main scenes of Part II. Nearly a decade after his affair with an older woman came to a mysterious end, Michael Berg, a law student at the university, re-encounters his former lover as she defends herself in a war-crimes trial, which he observes as part of a seminar. The university is also featured in the Academy Award-winning 2008 film version The Reader, starring Kate Winslet, David Kross and Ralph Fiennes.

Heidelberg university is featured in Naoki Urasawa's 1994–2001 manga series, Monster, and its subsequent 2004–2005 anime adaptation, wherein it is featured as the university Nina Fortner (Anna Liebert) is attending to get her degree in law. By the end of the series, despite the turmoil she's faced and her professor's initial displeasure at her consistent tardiness, she graduates with her degree.

In Michel Favart's film «Les Alsaciens ou les Deux Mathilde», Karl Kempf, one of the main characters, studies law at Heidelberg university, while his brother Edouard begins his studies at the École Polytechnique in France.

Hans Julius Grebenar is a law graduate of Heidelberg university in Jeffrey Archer's short story "A good eye" of the collection And Thereby Hangs a Tale, as well as the East Prussian Junker (Prussia) Count Rudolf von Adelhaus in Harold Spender's 1916 Novel "The Dividing Sword".

See also
 Heidelberg University, General Presentation
 Max Planck Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law
 Studentische Zeitschrift für Rechtswissenschaft Heidelberg

Further reading

 Heidelberg University Bibliography (Juristische Fakultät): As the main index of publications Heidelberg University Bibliography (HeiBIB) lists the academic publications by members of Heidelberg University,

References

External links
 Heidelberg University Faculty of Law
 Introduction to the Faculties

Heidelberg University
Heidelberg
1380s establishments in the Holy Roman Empire
1386 establishments in Europe
Law schools in Germany

Heidelberg University Faculty of Law


"Thinking of You" is a song written and recorded by American singer and songwriter Katy Perry from her second studio album, One of the Boys (2008). It was produced by Katy Perry and Butch Walker, and released on January 12, 2009, as the album's third single. "Thinking of You" deals with a break-up in which Perry does not want to move on but has no choice, and feels nostalgic of a previous lover while in a relationship with another man. Retrospectively, "Thinking of You" has been described as a favorite among her fans.

The song peaked at number 29 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, becoming the album's only single not to reach the Top 10 in the United States. It peaked at number 27 in the United Kingdom. There are two music videos released for the song. The first was released in 2007 and features Perry in two different rooms—black and white—and was directed by a friend of hers. The second was the commercial release in 2009, which is set in the 1940s and features Perry playing a woman who lost her lover, a soldier (played by Matt Dallas), in battle during World War II. Perry began playing the song during gigs as early as 2006, and performed the song on all of her concert tours: the Hello Katy Tour, the California Dreams Tour, the Prismatic World Tour and Witness: The Tour. In South America, the song was included in the international soundtrack of Brazilian soap opera India, a Love Story and became very successful.

Background and composition
"Thinking of You" was written by Perry in 2002 and produced by Butch Walker. Amateur video of Perry performing an entirely acoustic version at the Hotel Café in Los Angeles as early as 2006 is available on YouTube. The song has been described as a soft rock ballad that was compared to Alanis Morissette and Evanescence. An audio video of the song was officially uploaded to Perry's YouTube channel on June 12, 2008. After music video premiere in December 2008, "Thinking of You" was chosen as the third single promoting the album, seeing its first official release on January 12, 2009, when it debuted on the US mainstream radio stations. The next month, the single was issued to American hot adult contemporary format, on February 10. In following weeks, "Thinking of You" received both digital and physical releases, with a CD being released first in Germany by Capitol Records, and later to whole Europe by EMI Music Publishing. On March 9, original and acoustic versions of the song were released on iTunes collectively, and separately on Amazon. Later that month, another CDs were released in the United Kingdom and France.

According to digital sheet music published at Musicnotes.com by Sony-ATV Music Publishing, the song is written in the key of E major and the tempo moves at 76 beats per minute. Perry's vocal range in the song spans from the low note of G♯3 to the higher note of C5. According to Perry, the lyrics of the song are about a break-up after which she doesn't want to move on but has no choice, and is thinking about her ex-boyfriend while she is with her current lover. Perry describes her former lover as "perfection" and feels disgusted with herself when she kisses her current boyfriend, calling him second best in comparison.

Critical reception

The song has received some retrospective praise, with Christopher Rosa of Glamour calling it a "fan favorite" and described it as her most emotional song compared to others in her discography, adding that it is "one of Perry's rawest vocal performances, but [the] chorus still packs a punch."

Writing for BBC Music, Lizzie Ennever exalted her vocal performance while commenting that the song possesses "edge" and "rawness" that, according to Ennever, are characteristic of the "real [Perry]". David Balls from Digital Spy described the track as a "serious offering designed to show off her vocal and songwriting talents", and compared it to the catalogues of Alanis Morissette and band Evanescence. Giving it three stars out of five, he wrote: "So does she succeed? Well, certainly not for want of trying." In a less positive review, Nicole Frehsee from Rolling Stone dismissed the song as "generic Dawson's Creek schlock".

Jon Caramanica of The New York Times favored the song's production, stating that Perry works better with melody and emotion. He contrasted the song—which he described as "gently and compellingly angry"—with Perry's singles of sexual themes, and concluded that "feeling deeply is shocking enough". For Contactmusic.com, Kelda Manley called the song "high quality" whereas NME reviewer Alex Miller jokingly regarded it as having "all the emotional subtlety of a flamethrower". A writer for The Boston Globe found similarities to Alanis Morissette's musicality in the track, such as her "sour melodicism" and vocals. Reviewing the single for Billboard, editor CT praised Perry for her "distinct vocal inflection". Another writer of Capital described it as "cracking" and "single material".

Chart performance
In the United States, "Thinking of You" attained moderate success. The song debuted on the US Billboard component chart Bubbling Under Hot 100 at number five. Three weeks later, it entered the primary Hot 100 chart at number 79; having climbed to number 50 in the following week. It rose fifteen spots one week after, giving the track the title of "Greatest Digital Gainer" for that chart issue. The following week, it reached a peak of number 29, where it stayed for more two weeks. By the seventh week spent on the chart, the song moved to number 31; from there on, it started plummeting down the chart. Following a chart progression of 34– 44– 51– 55– 67– 68– 84, it left the chart at number 91 on the May 9 chart issue. "Thinking of You" has sold 1.1 million copies in the United States as of January 2015.

Internationally, commercial outcomes for "Thinking of You" were likewise modest. In Europe, the song received moderate success. The song debuted at number 63 on the UK Singles Chart. After seven weeks on the chart, the song peaked at number 27. The song peaked at 38 on the Irish Singles Chart. In France, the song was much more successful, debuting at number 11 on the singles chart, and stayed in the charts for 32 weeks. The song peaked at number 29 on the Swedish Singles Chart and number 14 on the Italian Singles Chart. In Brazil the song peaked at number one and stayed there for several weeks, partly due to the use of the song in the Emmy-winning soap opera India – A Love Story. In Australia, the song debuted at number 34 on the Australian Singles Chart, which was its peak position. The single stayed in the charts for six weeks.

Music videos

Original version

The first music video was released in 2007 and surfaced on YouTube in May 2008. The video features Perry in two rooms: a white room in which Perry is happily in a relationship and a dark room with an unhappy Perry showing signs of regret. In the dark room, Perry smokes a cigarette as a man dressed in a suit sits beside her. Soon after, another woman enters and pushes Perry off to the side. Back in the white room, Perry sips red wine as her lover undresses beside her, while Perry's hands are wet with blood and there is blood on the bedsheets. The video ends with the revelation that Perry stabbed her lover in the white room in the back, as she sings tearfully while covered in blood before the shot spans to the side, showing the knife on the floor. The video uses a cross-cutting technique that compares the two relationships. Perry stated that the aim of the video was never to get a commercial release, but that it is just a simple video "made by a friend".

Commercial version
Perry revealed on her blog that she had already started filming a second and official music video in the first week of December 2008, directed by Melina Matsoukas. The video premiered exclusively on iTunes on December 23, 2008. The music video is presented as a flashback montage with a young woman whose lover, played by actor Matt Dallas, is killed in France during World War II, and begins with Perry in bed with another man, played by model Anderson Davis. Perry is clearly unhappy with her new partner and longs for her deceased lover as she looks at a photograph of him. Perry reminisces back to a bicycle ride with him, and looks out of her window to see a vision of the two of them laughing outside. Perry's current boyfriend approaches her and kisses her while she remembers a picnic with her former lover, as well as a trip to a lake. In another flashback, Perry slow dances with her former lover at a bar before emotionally waving goodbye to him before he goes to war. While Perry's new love kisses her, she imagines her old lover at a battlefield, being shot and clutching his chest. In another scene, Perry is tearfully applying makeup and putting on a funeral veil, and in another she is opening a letter informing her that her boyfriend has died in battle. After applying dark makeup and dressed in funeral attire, Perry walks out of her house to attend her dead lover's funeral. On April 16, 2012, Perry uploaded on her Vevo channel an "Extended Version" of the video. The video received largely positive reviews from critics.

Credits and personnel
Credits are adapted from One of the Boys album liner notes and "Thinking of You" CD release.

Publishing and locations
 Published by When I'm Rich You'll Be My Bitch / WB Music Corp
 Recorded at Deathstar Studios and  Butch's old house (Los Feliz)
 Mixed at Aus Studios (Studio City, Los Angeles)
 Mastered at Bernie Grundman Mastering (Hollywood)

Personnel

 Katy Perry vocals, songwriting
 Butch Walker instrumentation, production
 Darren Dodd drums
 Dan Chase keyboards, programming
 Paul Hager vocal recording
 Joe Zook mixing
 Brian "Big Bass" Gardener mastering

Track listing
CD single and 2-track digital download
 "Thinking of You"  4:09
 "Thinking of You" (live acoustic version) 4:51

Digital download / French CD single
 "Thinking of You" 4:09

Charts

Weekly charts

Monthly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

Release history

References

2009 singles
2008 songs
2000s ballads
Katy Perry songs
Music videos directed by Melina Matsoukas
Songs written by Katy Perry
Song recordings produced by Butch Walker
Songs about loneliness
Rock ballads
Capitol Records singles
Pop ballads

Thinking of You (Katy Perry song)


The White Fortress (Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian:  / ) is an old fort overlooking the historic core of Sarajevo. It is a national monument of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Bijela Tabija is  above sea level.
Bijela Tabija is a protruding part of the wall of what was historically known as the old Vratnik City, and dominates the Eastern, the natural entrance to Sarajevo. It is built of stone and it used to house a gun-crew and an ammunition storage. Its thick walls have openings for cannons.

History
As far as the precise year of construction goes, differing opinions have been put forward. One of them proposes that Bijela Tabija was built around 1550 (this opinion is founded on the information given by the travel writer Katarino Zeno) and was destroyed during the time of Vratnik City's construction when a new fort was erected in its place.

According to another opinion, a fortress existed in the place of Bijela Tabija during the Middle Ages  and it was not bigger than the usual medieval defence fortresses that protected open settlements in their vicinity. Since it is confirmed that there was a medieval settlement Tornik on the site of today's Sarajevo, it is safe to presume that this settlement must have had a fort which protected it.

Bijela Tabija's location which overlooks the entire Sarajevo valley is ideal for situating a mediaeval fortress. It was a fortress with a rectangular base, accompanied with four square-based towers at each of its corners and a fifth above the entrance gate. This shape classifies it as a building from the late 14th or early 15th century, which is exactly the time when the medieval settlement on the site of today's Sarajevo is first mentioned in written documents.

Preservation and future plans
Prior to the Bosnian War of the 1990s, devastation inside the Bijela Tabija complex were the result of poor maintenance which caused the decaying and destruction. Furthermore, the site was endangered by stealing of its construction material (stone) and illegal housing in the contact zone caused the additional demolition of ramparts and surrounding area. During the several years of war Bijela Tabija was exposed to direct shelling of heavy weaponry.

Plans for a project of structural repairs, preservation, restoration and revitalization of Bijela Tabija to active use of this area are under way. Their goal is to establish Tabija as the permanent destination of Sarajevo's art scene and to include it as a tourist attraction which includes exhibition halls, shops, inns and various tourist businesses.

Bijela Tabija has been placed under legal protection as an object of cultural and historical heritage and listed under the Protected Monuments Register by Act of Municipal Court in Sarajevo on 9 September 1971.

See also

 Žuta Tabija
 Vratnik

References

National Monuments of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Architecture in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Illegal housing
Buildings and structures in Sarajevo
Castles in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Bijela Tabija


Scott Curtis (born May 5, 1976) is an American actor and musician.

Life and career
Curtis was born in Van Nuys, California, United States. As a former child actor, he is known for his role as Brandon Capwell (1984-1985) on the daytime television series Santa Barbara. He also had a regular role on Aaron's Way, amongst other shows. In 1988 Curtis had the lead role in the horror film Cameron's Closet. Curtis was the voice actor for the "Buzzy" character at Walt Disney World's Cranium Command attraction, which opened at Epcot Center in 1989. Curtis also appeared alongside Fred Savage in some deleted scenes in the 1989 movie The Wizard as "Mitchell". Curtis has not acted since 1990, the same year he made guest appearances on episodes of Full House titled, "Thirteen Candles" and "Just Say No Way". Curtis credits his professional upbringing with his enthusiasm to produce music to the result of very high expectations.

Curtis has been married since 2005. A keen musician, Curtis is in the bands The Up and Ornj", having also played with The Greedy Kings and Champion. He has produced Lane Change and was a member of the shadow punk band, The Fuglies. In December 2005, Curtis prepared with his band RED for a gig at Paramount Studios for New Year's Eve. Gridlock 2006 with the Pussycat Dolls performing at midnight and hosted by Pamela Anderson. Curtis now produces music in Reno as co-owner of The 505 Recording Group. With bands like Sinister Scene, The Kanes, Sil Shoda, Full Count, Demension 13 and Broken Roots under his belt, he is bringing recording to the musician with professionalism and at rates that are attainable on any budget. Curtis believes that bands should be able to create, and not have to invest a ridiculous amount of money to do so.

External links

American male television actors
American male soap opera actors
Living people
1976 births
People from Van Nuys
American male child actors
American male film actors
20th-century American male actors

Scott Curtis


The Lower Williamson Gorge is located in the Winema National Forest north of Chiloquin in Klamath County, Oregon.  It is formed where the Williamson River eroded its way from the Beaver Marsh area down through the escarpment north of Collier Memorial State Park into the Klamath Basin

The 1990 Land and Management Plan of the Winema National Forest stated about this section of the river:
  "The length of the river, height of the sheer rock face above the water, and visual diversity are superior to any other area on the Forest, including the (federally designated Wild and Scenic) Sycan River. In visual diversity, it is comparable to the Klamath River Canyon and the Deschutes River.  The Lower Williamson Gorge was inventoried as being distinctive in rock form, vegetation, and water from.  In comparison with other rivers in south or central Oregon, Segment Two of the Lower Williamson River is considered to have outstandingly remarkable scenic value and is eligible for designation under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act."

No action has yet been taken to place the gorge under the provisions of the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, however.

The gorge is just a short distance east of U.S. Highway 97.  It is not commonly visited as it is accessed only by primitive roads. Railroad tracks run just to the east, giving AMmtrak passengers occasional views of the gorge.

Wildlife includes beaver, otters, kingfishers, yellow warblers; sometimes prairie falcons may nest on the cliffs.  Flora includes willows, ponderosa pines, aspen, firs, chokecherry and elderberries.  During the winter the river may run brown with tannins from the upstream Klamath Marsh; later in the summer the stream is mainly fed by springs along the canyon walls and the water becomes clear.

References

External links
 Oregon Wild: Williamson Gorge
 Hiking the gorge

Landforms of Klamath County, Oregon
Canyons and gorges of Oregon

Lower Williamson Gorge


Artem Ohandjanian is an Austrian-Armenian historian and documentalist, Honorary Doctor of Sciences Academy of Armenia. He is the deputy head of the "Franz Werfel Committee" (Austria).

Since 1982 he worked at Austrian state archives and in 1995 published Armenia-related documents and materials of 1872-1936 in 12 volumes.

He is the author of "1915: The Forgotten Genocide" (1989, Vienna) which was translated and published in different languages. He also authored works called "Franz Werfel and the 40 Days of Musa Dagh" and "The Armenian Question, Austro-Hungary and Germany", published by the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute in German.

He is an author of about 70 films that mainly refer to Armenian history and culture. He was the prize-winner of 6 international film festivals. The latest award he received in Chicago, 2001 for his film dedicated to Sergei Parajanov.

References

Personal Website

20th-century Austrian historians
Austrian people of Armenian descent
Living people
Year of birth missing (living people)
Austrian documentary filmmakers
21st-century Austrian historians

Artem Ohandjanian


The existence of pacifism in Germany has changed over time, with the consistent feature of having diverse groups with a shared belief in an opposition to participating in war. These movements both individually and collectively, have historically been small in their numbers and have not been well organised. With a culture of war in the early history of Germany, pacifism was not a culturally significant group. This was driven by the government as they attempted to use the media in order to promote the expansion of Germany as a growing empire. The exception to this is during the Cold War with the Bonn demonstration with a large turnout of around 300,000 people. Christian peace groups have been the most consistent groups within the classification of pacifists as an opposition to violence is a key part of their faith. The size, whilst remaining small varies over the history of the Federal Republic of Germany. The reception from the public regarding pacifists also changes depending on the historical period.

Historical periods

Imperial Germany (1871–1914)

With the unification of Germany as a single state, the country began to expand militarily as an international power, which in turn created a pacifist movement in Germany. This first movement was called the German Peace Society and was founded in 1892. However, the movement was small with only 10,000 active members at its peak, as it did not resonate with the wider population who was in favour of the German expansion. With relatively low support the ability of the movement to grow was limited to the ability to speak freely, which was later limited due to the government declaring a state of war. The rapid military expansion of Germany was also largely popular with the population. Prior to the outbreak of war the support of the movement began to decline as the public support of a war grew and also to avoid a response from the government.

During this time there were two Hague Peace Conferences, which resulted in various multi-lateral treaties regarding military expansion and foreign policy. The conferences were also about establishing the universal values and therefore the obligations of states. In 1899 there was a Hauge Peace Conference, however, Germany did not attend, and it was not until the 1907 conference where Germany would participate. At this conference Germany was considered uncooperative, which was due to the restrictions on their ability to expand their military power. As Germany was a rising power there was a hesitation to reduce their expansion as it would restrict their self-defence capabilities.

World War One Germany (1914–1918)

German Pacifism was not as organised in this era when compared to that of Cold War Germany; however, a large number of groups adopted pacifist attitudes, which evolved throughout the war. During this period a group of female war opponents emerged, which was a pacifist group who were opposed to the war as it was, according to this group, caused by masculine values and attitudes. This group also overlapped with the group of advocates for women's' rights during the same period, as well as the socialist movement. This activism from female groups was the result of changing cultural, political and social roles of women which had developed during the war.

Early in the war attitudes towards war were very positive, which along with the conscription of German soldiers resulted in the pacifists' movement remaining a relatively small group. As the country was in a state of war the government was heavily involved in censorship of the population. So, the pacifist publications were censored to not have views, which directly opposed the government. They rather would talk about the wider issue of war with other countries. The government remained lenient towards those with pacifist attitudes, which contrasts the government attitude of the Nazi Government and other governments, which enacted the concept of total war on the home front.

In 1915 at the Hague, the Women's Peace Conference met to discuss methods to end the war through negotiations. Attending this event was four German delegates. After this conference, the government began to restrict pacifists and their groups as there was a consensus that this conference had weakened the position of Germany for negotiations. Towards the end of the war, the public support massively declines, which resulted in an increase in the support for pacifist ideas. Despite this the movement remained small in size. At this time the government tried to assert more control over the home front in order to provide more resources for soldiers on the front line. With the Russian Revolution, the pacifist movement also gained support and inspiration through the Marxist ideology behind the revolution. The literature during the km war was restricted and the literature that was promoted all displayed similar views. These views support the war effort, which was achieved through the justification of the war, as well as the celebration of acts of heroism and sacrifice. Pacifist literature was virtually non-existent during this time period, which continued until the end of the war before it became more widely discussed in the literature.

World War Two Germany (1939–1945)

The existence of pacifists in Germany is at its lowest and least organised during this time, as a result of the Nazi Government's policies regarding movements which oppose their regime. Pacifists during this time are mostly individuals, who may not necessarily be a part of a formalised group, rather they act out the ideology of pacifism. A key reason for this was the continued support of the war effort as well as public support for the Fuhrer of Germany, Adolf Hitler remaining high throughout the war. This period was also when popular support for pacifism was at its lowest as there was significant support for the war effort. As Nazism was built on the outcome of the First World War, there was significant pro-war sentiment in the ideology as a means of resolving the issues which occurred after the war. This was in opposition to the pacifist ideology which was one reason for the Nazi response to Pacifist groups and individuals during the course of the Second World War. The atrocities of the Second World War also inspired the pacifist movement after the end of the war.

Cold War Germany (1945–1990)
The pacifist movement was at its most popular during the Cold War era. This is evident as a peace protest at Bonn occurred in 1981 which was a demonstration against the production of nuclear weapons and the militarism of the NATO alliance system. The reason for the popularity was the outcome of the First and Second World War, as the significant loss of lives shifted the culture towards militarism in Germany. Another key issue which was protested was the ability of the United States government to use West German weapons without consulting the West German government. The event had approximately 300,000 people attend, which was a significant number for a pacifist event in West Germany, as it contrasts the historical size of the pacifist movements. This event was made up of 700 individual groups which protested together with the common link of the pacifist ideology. Another factor which influenced the size of the Bonn demonstration was the NATO plan to introduce intermediate-range theatre nuclear forces (INF) into Germany as a part of their military arsenal. This debate was a prominent part of West German discourse during 1957 and 1958. The main concerns around the policy were the implications for domestic and international responsibilities as a nuclear state. The SPD initially opposed this proposition; however, they made a concession to introduce a military without nuclear capabilities. The following election the SPD lost to the Christian Democrats, which resulted in the SPD reforming their party and their ideology. The part ideology after the reform, resembled Marxism as pacifism became an integral part of the party. Western Germany had a much greater presence of pacifists than Eastern Germany. Christian-moral ethics were the driver of the movement, however, not all pacifists were Christian. While these Christian movements and groups have historically been the only consistent pacifists, this era saw the rise in pacifists not from the Christian faith. From the 1960s, there was a significant increase in student protests as part of the pacifist movement. Unions were also another group which became heavily involved in pacifism during this time. Even during its most popular stage, pacifism was not a characteristic of either political wing. The policy of disarmament was also a heavily discussed policy at the time and the pacifist movement was advocating for the adoption of this policy.

Contemporary Germany (1990–present)
The foreign policy of Contemporary Germany has been more pacifist than those of the previous historical eras. This is driven primarily by the history of Germany during the First and Second World Wars, as there was a significant loss of lives as a result of the perception of pacifism by the wider population. The use of force rarely occurs unless there is a need for humanitarian intervention, which is derived from the United Nations principle of collective security. One example of the government use of pacifism is demonstrated in their response to the United States' declaration of war on Iraq, as they were the first allied nation to condemn the decision and decide against participating in the war. This damaged bi-lateral relations between the nations and was a significant moment for modern German foreign policy and its reliance on pacifism. There was no bi-partisan support for pacifism as it was primarily linked to the left-wing parties, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and The Greens. The German government also abstained from participating in Kosovo War which was another war NATO participated in without German military support. After the Rwandan Genocide and the Bosnian War, the left-wing German parties allowed for military intervention on the basis of humanitarian reasons, while their right-wing counterparts believed in the strategic use of force for foreign policy. The NATO intervention during the later stages of the Yugoslavia Wars demonstrated this movement towards military intervention on the basis of humanitarian reasons. This was voted on by the two major left-wing parties the SPD and The Greens, who voted 75% and 50% in favour of the humanitarian intervention. The use of pacifism has changed as the major German political parties' ideologies and positions change over time. During the 1990s there was limited agreement on whether the German government should oppose the use of force. However, from the early 2000s, the left-leaning parties have evolved to adopt policies of pacifism and an opposition to participating in the war. While the right-wing Christian-Democratic party has adopted a policy stating that Germany should be capable of defending itself through the use of military force. During this same era, Germany has consolidated its economic and political power over Europe, making the impact of their foreign policy significant. The non-intervention in the Syrian Civil War shows how despite humanitarian intervention allowing for military action, the German government is still unlikely to use military force. With the Annexation of Crimea Russia has shown an aggressive use of military force in their conduct of foreign policy which provides the German Government with difficulties maintaining their pacifist ideology as the breach of human rights has had little impact on the Russian foreign policy, which is considered to be the result of Germany pacifism to some extent.

See also
 Das Andere Deutschland
 Friedensbund der Kriegsteilnehmer
 German Catholics' Peace Association
 German resistance to Nazism
 Graswurzelrevolution
 Soldiers are murderers
 West German student movement

References

Further reading

 Chickering, Roger. Imperial Germany and a World Without War: The Peace Movement and German Society, 1892-1914 (Princeton University Press, 2015).
 Chickering, Roger Philip. "The Peace Movement and the Religious Community in Germany, 1900–1914." Church history 38.3 (1969): 300-311.

 Davy, Jennifer Anne. "Pacifist thought and gender ideology in the political biographies of women peace activists in Germany, 1899-1970: introduction." Journal of Women's History 13.3 (2001): 34-45.
 Oppenheimer, Andrew. "West German Pacifism and the Ambivalence of Human Solidarity, 1945–1968." Peace & Change 29.3‐4 (2004): 353-389. online

 Ritchie, J. M. "Germany–a peace-loving nation? A Pacifist Tradition in German Literature." Oxford German Studies 11.1 (1980): 76-102.

Pacifism in Germany


Kevin Richard Hart (born December 29, 1982) is a former professional baseball pitcher who played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Chicago Cubs and Pittsburgh Pirates.  As of , he is a Major League Professional Scout for the New York Yankees.

Career
Hart attended Jesuit College Preparatory School of Dallas and played collegiately at the University of Maryland before being selected by the Baltimore Orioles in the 11th round (319th pick) in the 2004 Major League Baseball Draft. On December 7, 2006, Hart was acquired by the Chicago Cubs as the player to be named later in a trade that had sent Freddie Bynum to the Orioles a day earlier.

When rosters expanded, he made his major league debut on September 4, , after being called up from the Double-A Tennessee Smokies that same day. Hart's debut came under difficult circumstances, as he was summoned to relieve Will Ohman in the 8th inning of a game against the Los Angeles Dodgers with the bases loaded and nobody out. After walking the first batter (former Cub Ramón Martínez) on 4 pitches to force in a run, Hart struck out Mark Sweeney, and Rafael Furcal hit into an inning-ending double play. Hart gave up one hit in his second inning of work while also striking out Jeff Kent and Andre Ethier, for a total of three strikeouts, one hit, and no runs in his two-inning Major League debut.

Despite his inexperience, manager Lou Piniella showed a willingness to use Hart as the Cubs progressed through the stretch run of a pennant race, and he appeared in several close games in September. He was impressive enough during his limited time to be chosen as one of the 11 pitchers on the team's playoff roster. Hart made 8 appearances in September's stretch playoff run. He held a 0.82 ERA with 11 innings pitched, 13 strikeouts, and held batters to a .189 batting average.

After spring training in 2009, he was sent to the Triple A Iowa Cubs.

Hart made his first start of 2009, on July 8, against the Atlanta Braves at Wrigley Field. In that game, Hart pitched five innings and allowed only four hits and one run, but was the losing pitcher, as the Cubs lost 4–1. Hart was optioned to the Single-A Peoria Chiefs after the game in order to continue to pitch on his regular schedule while the Cubs were on the All-Star break. He was recalled on July 19.

On July 19, 2009, Hart recorded his first career Major League hit and his first career RBI. During a 7-run 4th inning against the Washington Nationals at Nationals Park, Hart, squaring around as if to sacrifice bunt, pulled his bat back and lined a pitch from Garrett Mock into center field, driving in Mike Fontenot from second base, and thwarting the Nationals' defensive attempt to execute a wheel play. Hart would later score himself during the inning on a sacrifice fly by Ryan Theriot. Hart pitched five innings and recorded his first win of the 2009 season in that game, as the Cubs went on to win 11–3, completing a four-game sweep of the Nationals.

On July 30, 2009, Hart was traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates along with right-handed pitcher José Ascanio and third baseman Josh Harrison for left-handed pitchers John Grabow and Tom Gorzelanny. Just hours before the trade Hart started for the Cubs against the Houston Astros, he went six innings and gave up three earned runs while recording his third win of the season.

He would go on to have shoulder surgery in May 2010 and spend all of the 2010 and 2011 seasons on the MLB disabled list. He missed the rest of the season and all of the 2011 season.

In August 2012, Hart signed with the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs.  He would retire from baseball after the 2012 season.

References

External links
, or Chicago Tribune article, or Chicago Cubs press release, or Play-by-play of Hart's debut He went to Jesuit in Dallas, Tx.

1982 births
Living people
Aberdeen IronBirds players
Baseball players from Cleveland
Chicago Cubs players
Delmarva Shorebirds players
Frederick Keys players
Indianapolis Indians players
Iowa Cubs players
Jesuit College Preparatory School of Dallas alumni
Leones del Caracas players
American expatriate baseball players in Venezuela
Major League Baseball pitchers
Maryland Terrapins baseball players
Navarro Bulldogs baseball players
New York Yankees scouts
Peoria Chiefs players
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Southern Maryland Blue Crabs players
Tennessee Smokies players
University of Maryland, College Park alumni

Kevin Hart (baseball)


Lake Karapiro () is an artificial reservoir lake on the Waikato River at Karapiro,  south-east of Cambridge in New Zealand's North Island. The lake was formed in 1947 by the damming of the Waikato River to store water for the 96-megawatt Karapiro power station. The lake is also one of two premier rowing venues in New Zealand (alongside Lake Ruataniwha in Canterbury) and is the base for the country's high-performance rowing programme.

History and etymology
In about 1600, Te Ihingarangi built a pā (fortified village) called Te Tiki o Ihingarangi near where Lake Karapiro is today.

In 1830 Ngāti Hauā defeated Ngāti Maru in a battle at Taumatawīwī, two kilometres south of Karapiro Domain. On the orders of the Ngāti Hauā chief Te Waharoa, his dead warriors were cremated, this taking place on rocks beside the Waikato River, the location then becoming known as Karāpiro, from the Māori language words , meaning "basaltic stone", and , meaning "foul smelling". The site was flooded when the lake created. The ten-megawatt Horahora Power Station, 13 km upstream of Karapiro Dam was also flooded with the formation of Lake Karapiro.

Construction of the Karapiro Dam began in 1940, however progress was slow due to labour and material shortages related to World War II. The dam was completed in early 1947, four years behind schedule. Due to the post-war electricity shortages, the filling of Lake Karapiro had to be coordinated to minimise the time between Horahora's decommissioning and Karapiro's commissioning. The lake level reached Horahora on 4 April 1947 upon which Horahora stopped generating and was submerged. The lake was sufficiently filled on 10 April 1947 to allow the first turbine-generator at Karapiro to enter service.

Rowing venue

The lake, regarded as one of New Zealand's best rowing venues, hosted the World Rowing Championships in 1978 and 2010, as well as the rowing events for the 1950 British Empire Games. The national rowing championships, then called the Dominion championships, were first held on the lake in 1949. Since the 1980s, Lake Karapiro alternates with the South Island's Lake Ruataniwha in hosting the New Zealand national rowing championships and the New Zealand secondary school rowing championships (Maadi Cup). Rowers who train on the lake mostly live in nearby Cambridge.

An International Rowing Federation inspection panel visited Lake Karapiro in March 2006 and said in its report that it was one of the fairest courses in the world they had seen and that the lake was one of the most picturesque in the world.

The lake hosted the 2010 Rowing World Championships. The purpose-built Sir Don Rowlands Centre was completed in June 2010, prior to the event.

Hydroelectric power
The 96-megawatt Karapiro Power Station is located adjacent to the dam at the head of the lake, and is the eighth and last hydroelectric power station located on the Waikato River. Water taken from the lake is passed through three Kaplan turbines in the powerhouse, before being deposited into the lower Waikato River. Each turbine turns a 32 MW generator, and the electricity from the generators is fed into Transpower's national grid. The station is a base load generator due to its need to maintain water flows into the Waikato River system beyond the lake.

References

External links

Reservoirs in New Zealand
Lakes of Waikato
Waikato River
Rowing venues

Lake Karapiro


Q Planes (known as Clouds Over Europe in the United States) is a 1939 British comedy spy film starring Ralph Richardson, Laurence Olivier and Valerie Hobson. Olivier and Richardson were a decade into their fifty-year friendship and were in the process of staging a theatrical version of Othello, with Richardson in the title role and Olivier as Iago, when this film was made.

Q Planes was produced by Irving Asher, an American, with British film impresario Alexander Korda as executive producer. The film was directed by an American, Tim Whelan (Sidewalks of London, and later in 1940, co-director of The Thief of Bagdad), who had lived in Britain since 1932, working for Korda at Denham Studios.

Plot
In September 1938, advanced British aircraft prototypes carrying experimental and secret equipment are vanishing with their crews on test flights. No one can fathom why, not even spymaster Major Hammond (Ralph Richardson) or his sister Kay (Valerie Hobson), a newspaper reporter, who is working undercover in the works canteen at the Barrett & Ward Aircraft Company.

At first, Major Hammond is seen as an outsider at the aircraft factory, especially by Mr. Barrett, the owner (George Merritt), who is working under a government contract. Hammond soon finds a friend in star pilot, Tony McVane (Laurence Olivier), who helps him try to solve the case. Hammond becomes convinced that Jenkins (George Curzon), the company secretary at the factory, is a mole but Jenkins is killed by a gunman firing from a moving car before he can give up the names of his contacts.

McVane returns to the aircraft factory, determined to make the next test flight. His aircraft, like the others, is brought down by a powerful ray beamed from a mysterious salvage ship, S.S. Viking. (Although the nationality of the crew and agents aboard the ship is only implied, it was understood by audiences that "All of the crew speak with German accents and little doubt is left who the villains are", wrote Variety.)

The aircraft, McVane and the crew are taken onboard Viking, where he discovers many other missing airmen who have suffered the same fate. Escaping from their prison, McVane leads them in an attempt to take control of the ship, gathering up weapons as they go. Back in London, Major Hammond learns the truth and directs a Royal Navy ship () to go to their rescue. Kay and McVane form a relationship, while Hammond, who in the line of duty has repeatedly cancelled plans with his lady friend, eventually meets up with her but learns that she has married someone else.

Cast
Film roles identified by order in the credits.

 Laurence Olivier as Tony McVane
 Ralph Richardson as Major Charles Hammond
 Valerie Hobson as Kay Hammond
 George Curzon as Jenkins
 George Merritt as Barrett
 Gus McNaughton as Bleinkinsop
 David Tree as R. MacKenzie
 Sandra Storme as Daphne
 Hay Petrie as Stage Door Keeper
 Frank Fox as Karl
 George Butler as Sir Marshall Gosport
 Gordon McLeod as The Baron
 John Longden as John Peters
 Ronald Adam as Pollock, Airline Designer
 Ian Fleming as Air Minister
 Reginald Purdell as Pilot
 Roy Emerton as SS Viking First Mate
 David Farrar as SS Viking Mate
 John Laurie as Newspaper Editor
 Raymond Lovell as Company Manager
 Leslie Bradley as Assistant

Production

The film's working title was Foreign Sabotage. Period airports and aircraft including the Airspeed Envoy, de Havilland Dragon Rapide and de Havilland Tiger Moth are featured in the aerial scenes. The Brooklands racetrack, which was also an important airfield, was used as a backdrop for the sequences on the ground.
Written and produced in September 1938, Q Planes was a quick project for Olivier, already bound for America and the filming of Wuthering Heights (1939). Richardson, who had encouraged Olivier to take the role of Heathcliff with his famous advice, "Bit of fame. Good.", was always better at comedy and dominates much of the screen, with a sardonic performance as a spy, either working for Scotland Yard or British Military Intelligence. Q Planes is historically interesting for its contrast to later British war films and to Olivier's later film career. The film might be called the last of the "neutral Britain" spy comedies, which Hitchcock had pioneered in The 39 Steps (1935) and The Lady Vanishes (1938). The tone of Q Planes blends a spy thriller with high-tech villains, sophisticated romance and rapid-fire comedy. The British later excelled at this genre in the James Bond films from the 1960s (Jack Whittington co-wrote Thunderball [1965]) but here the comedic aspects are in contrast to the ardent, patriotic, sombre films that the British made once the Second World War began and the Germans, under Hitler, began to conquer Europe.

Reception

Q Planes was released in the U.S. as Clouds Over Europe, on 30 June 1939. Despite its subject, Q Planes is mainly a comedy, "a sort of Thin Man in an espionage setting", wrote Picturegoer. The film received positive reviews, with much of its success due to Ralph Richardson, who cleverly held together the comedy and dramatic elements as Major Hammond. Kinematograph Weekly described Q Planes as "rousing espionage, romantic melodrama, staged in the best happy-go-lucky but pukka British tradition". C. A. Lejeune called the film "a bright, vigorous little picture, and Mr. Richardson's Major is the brightest thing in it. You should see it. You'll like it. It has savour". Leslie Halliwell called it a "lively, lovely thriller distinguished by a droll leading performance.

Dilys Powell wrote of Olivier that she recalled "being surprised that the actor made so slight an impression" and described him as "dashing but undistinguished". For Olivier scholars and fans, Q Planes shows the dramatic difference his subsequent American work with Wyler and Hitchcock made on his film acting. Here, Olivier is at the height of the glib, self-conscious acting style of the 15 pictures he had made before his work with Wyler. Olivier wrote that it was only then that he learned to stop condescending to pictures as a mere paycheck between Shakespeare productions and instead master acting for the camera as its own form.

The New York Times film critic Frank S. Nugent was initially put off by the film's new opening which, unlike the British release, reflected an ever-darkening scenario of war with Nazi Germany. Hoping to impress this on their reluctant American cousins, the executive producer Korda was Churchill's designated producer, in the filmic aspect of de-neutralising America. The film began with "shots of Commons, Parliament, the War Office, the India Office, No. 10 Downing Street and other imposing edifices", as described by Nugent. "As an added touch of dignity and authority, a commentator's voice noted each building as it passed, spoke gravely of the burden of empire, of trade and population statistics, and of the might and wisdom of Britain's leaders …" Nugent expressed relief when this made-for-America preamble turns into the British comedy it originally was and praised it as "one of the wittiest and pleasantest comedies that have come a capering to the American screen this season".

Variety regarded the newsreel-style introduction as one of the film's "unusual, deft slants" and praised the film as an "excellent summer diversion.… Columbia has an easy winner in Clouds Over Europe which, despite the solemnity of its title, is strictly for comedy, albeit with a hint or two of anti-German propaganda tucked away". While noting the matinee value of Olivier, Variety reported that "the acting honors go — and at a gallop — to Ralph Richardson, playing a Scotland Yard eccentric". Variety reviewers also considered it had a "refreshing tongue-in-cheek attitude… Whole thing is bright, breezy and flavorsome". Less impressed was film critic John Mosher of The New Yorker, who found in the film "a bigger allotment of very British small talk and that special brand of British whimsy which makes us here think at times that at least one of the clouds over England is this particular kind of humour".

Influence
Richardson's dapper, insouciant secret agent was named, years later, as the model for the bowler-hatted upper-class British spy John Steed in the 1960s television series The Avengers, according to producer Brian Clemens.

Home media
Q Planes was released on video by Carlton Home Entertainment in 1991 and on DVD in April 2007.

References

Notes

Bibliography

External links

1939 films
1930s spy comedy films
1930s English-language films
British spy comedy films
British aviation films
British black-and-white films
Columbia Pictures films
Films directed by Arthur B. Woods
Films directed by Tim Whelan
Films with screenplays by Ian Dalrymple
London Films films
Films set in London
Films set in Cornwall
Films set in 1938
Films with screenplays by Jack Whittingham
1939 comedy films
1930s British films

Q Planes