Folktales about luminous gemstones are an almost worldwide motif in mythology and history among Asian, European, African, and American cultures. Some stories about light-emitting gems may have been based on luminescent and phosphorescent minerals such as diamonds.

Mineralogical luminosity

First, it will be useful to introduce some mineralogical terminology for gemstones that can glow when exposed to light, friction, or heat. Note that the following discussion will omit modern techniques such as X-rays and ultraviolet light that are too recent to have influenced folklore about luminous gems. Luminescence is spontaneous emission of light by a substance not resulting from heat, as distinguished from incandescence, which is light emitted by a substance as a result of heating. Luminescence is caused by the absorption of energy that is released in small amounts. When the energy comes from light or other electromagnetic radiation, it is referred to as photoluminescence; which is divisible between fluorescence when the glow ceases immediately with the excitation and phosphorescence when the glow continues beyond the period of excitation. Two types of luminescent phenomena are relevant to crystalline materials. Triboluminescence generates light through the breaking of chemical bonds in a material when it is rubbed, pulled apart, scratched, or crushed. Thermoluminescence re-emits previously absorbed electromagnetic radiation upon being heated (e.g., thermoluminescence dating).

The American geologist Sydney Hobart Ball, who wrote an article on "Luminous Gems, Mythical and Real", outlined the history of discoveries about luminescent and phosphorescent minerals. Most diamonds are triboluminescent if rubbed with a cloth, and a few are photoluminescent after exposure to direct sunlight. Both diamonds and white topaz may phosphoresce if heated below red heat. The phosphorescent quality of diamonds when heated by sunlight is usually believed to have been first revealed by Albertus Magnus (c. 1193–1280) and it was apparently rediscovered by Robert Boyle in 1663, who also found that some diamonds will luminesce under pressure. According to Prafulla Chandra Ray, the Indian king Bhoja (r. 1010–1055) knew that diamonds can phosphoresce (Ball 1938: 496).

The luminescent Bologna Stone (impure barite), which was discovered by Vincenzo Cascariolo in 1602, was sometimes called "" ("lunar stone"), because, like the moon, it gave out in the darkness the light it received from the sun (Kunz 1913: 168). In 1735, the French chemist Charles François de Cisternay du Fay determined that lapis lazuli, emerald, and aquamarine were luminescent. Josiah Wedgwood, in 1792, found phosphoresce from rubbing together two pieces of quartz or of agate, and wrote that the ruby gives "a beautiful red light of short continuance." Edmond Becquerel reported in 1861 that ruby fluoresces better than sapphire, red feldspar fluoresces, and crushed orthoclase will flame. In 1833, David Brewster discovered the fluorescence of the mineral fluorite or fluorspar. However, the English naturalist Philip Skippon (1641–1691) stated that one Monsieur Lort, of Montpellier, France, a "counterfeiter" of "amethysts, topazes, emeralds, and sapphires" found that on heating "fluor smaragdi" (Latin for "flowing emerald/beryl/jasper") in a pan of coals and afterwards "putting it in a dark place (it) shines very much: At the same time several other stones were tried but did not shine." (1732 6: 718).

Some fluorite, particularly the variety chlorophane (aka pyroemerald and cobra stone), may become very faintly luminescent simply from the heat of one's hand. Chlorophane is unusual for combining the properties of thermoluminescence, triboluminescence, phosphorescence, and fluorescence; it will emit visible spectrum light when rubbed, or exposed to light or heat, and can continue emitting for a long period of time. Among the gravels of the Irtysh River, near Krasnoyarsk, Russia, the German mineralogist Gustav Rose recorded seeing chlorophane pebbles that shone with brilliancy all night long, merely from exposure to the sun's heat. For luminous gem myths, Ball concludes that while it is "not impossible that the inventors of certain of the [luminous gem] tales may have been acquainted with the luminosity of gems, in my opinion many of the tales must be of other origin" (1938: 497).

Scholars have proposed many identifications for myths about luminous gemstones described for over two thousand years. Most frequently rubies or carbuncles (often red garnets), which classical and medieval mineralogists did not differentiate, and less commonly other gems, including diamonds, emeralds, jade, and pearls (Ball 1938: 497).

The American sinologist Edward H. Schafer proposes that the phosphorescent "emeralds" of classical antiquity, such as the brilliantly shining green eyes of the marble lion on the tomb of King Hermias of Atarneus (d. 341 BCE) on Cyprus, were fluorite, even though the Hellenistic alchemists had methods, "seemingly magical, of making night-shining gems by the application of phosphorescent paints to stones", the most famous being their "emeralds" and "carbuncles." (1963: 238).

The names of some luminescent gemstones etymologically derive from "glow" or "fire" words (e.g., pyroemerald for "chlorophane" above).
The OED defines pyrope (from Greek Πυρωπός, lit. "fire-eyed")" as: "In early use applied vaguely to a red or fiery gem, as ruby or carbuncle; (mineralogy) the Bohemian garnet or fire-garnet"; and carbuncle or carbuncle-stone (from Latin "carbunculus," "small glowing ember") as: "A name variously applied to precious stones of a red or fiery colour; the carbuncles of the ancients (of which Pliny describes twelve varieties) were probably sapphires, spinels or rubies, and garnets; in the Middle Ages and later, besides being a name for the ruby, the term was esp. applied to a mythical gem said to emit a light in the dark." (Ball 1938: 498).

Mythological luminosity
Luminous gems are common theme in comparative mythology. Ball cross-culturally analyzed stories about luminous stones and pearls and found about one hundred variants in ancient, medieval, and modern sources. The wide-ranging locations of the tales comprise all Asia (except Siberia), all Europe (except Norway and Russia), Borneo, New Guinea, the United States, Canada, certain South American countries and Abyssinia, French Congo, and Angola in Africa. The later African and American myths were likely introduced by Europeans. Ball divides legends about luminous gems into three principal themes: light sources, gem mining, and animals (Ball 1938: 497–498).

Light source legends
The first theme is using legendary luminous gems to illuminate buildings, for navigation lights on ships, or sometimes as guiding lights for lost persons (Ball 1938: 498–500).

In India, the earliest country in which fine gemstones were known, belief in luminous gems dates back some twenty-five centuries. The c. 700 BCE-300 CE Vishnu Purana states that Vishnu, in his avatar as the many-headed snake Shesha under the name Ananta ("Endless"), "has a thousand heads adorned with the mystical Swastika and in each head a jewel to give light" (Ball 1938: 498). The c. 400 BCE-300 CE Hindu classic Mahabharata tells the story of the five Pandava brothers and the raja Babruvahana's palace with its precious stones that "shone like lamps so that there was no need for any other light in the assembly." In the c. 100 CE Buddhacarita, the city of Kapila is said to have gems so bright "that darkness like poverty could find no place." (Ball 1938: 499).

In Classical antiquity, the Greek historian Herodotus (c. 484-425 BCE) was the first European to describe luminous gems. The temple of Heracles at Tyre had two great columns, one of gold, the other of smaragdos (, "green gems including emerald") that "shone brightly at night" (Harvey 1957: 33, suggesting the phosphorescent "false emerald" type of fluorspar). Ball says that the "wily priests doubtless enclosed a lamp in hollow green glass, to mislead the credulous". The Pseudo-Plutarch "On Rivers", probably written by the Greek grammarian Parthenius of Nicaea (d. 14 CE), states that in the Sakarya River the Aster (, "star") gem is found, "which flames in the dark", and thus called Ballen (the "King") in the Phrygian language (King 1867: 9). The Roman author Pliny the Elder (23–79 CE) described the chrysolampis as an eastern gem, "pale by day but of a fiery luster by night" (Ball 1938: 499). The Syrian rhetorician Lucian (c. 125-180 CE) describes a statue of the Syrian goddess Atargatis in Hierapolis Bambyce (present-day Manbij) with a gem on her head called Greek lychnis (, "lamp; light") (Schafer 1963: 237). "From this stone flashes a great light in the night-time, so that the whole temple gleams brightly as by the light of myriads of candles, but in the daytime the brightness grows faint; the gem has the likeness of a bright fire." (tr. Strong and Garstang 1913: 72). According to Pliny, the stone is called lychnis because its luster is heightened by the light of a lamp, when its tints are particularly pleasing (Laufer 1915: 58).

Although early Chinese classics from the Eastern Zhou dynasty (770–256 BCE) refer to luminous gems (e.g., "the Marquis of Sui's pearl" discussed below under grateful animals), Sima Qian's c. 94 BCE Han dynasty Records of the Grand Historian has two early references to using them as a source of light. Most Chinese names for shining pearls/gems are compounds of zhū (珠, "pearl; gem; bead; orb"), such as yèmíngzhū (夜明珠, "night luminous pearl"), míngyuèzhū (明月珠, "luminous moon pearl"), and yèguāngzhū (夜光珠, "night shining pearl"). The "House of Tian Jingzhong" history records that in 379 BCE, King Wei of Qi boasted to King Hui of Wei, "Even a state as small as mine still has ten pearls one inch in diameter that cast radiance over twelve carriages in front and behind them." (tr. Sawyer 2018: n.p.). In the biography of the Han court minister Zou Yang (鄒陽, fl. 150 BCE), he figuratively uses the terms mingyue zhi zhu (明月之珠, "luminous moon pearl") and yeguang zhi bi (夜光之壁, "night shining jade-disk") to illustrate how talented people are lost for lack of recommendations, "If I were to throw a luminous moon pearl or a night shining jade-disk on a dark road in front of someone, who would not grasp their sword and look startled?" The German sinologist August Conrady suggested that the Chinese names mingyuezhizhu and yeguangzhu may have an Indian origin, with analogs in the chandra-kânta ("moon-beloved") gem that contains condensed moonlight and the harinmaṇi ("moon-jewel") name for emerald (1931: 168–169).

Li Shizhen's 1578 Bencao Gangmu pharmacopeia describes leizhu (雷珠, "thunder pearls/beads") that the divine dragon shenlong "held in its mouth and dropped. They light the entire house at night" (tr. Laufer 1912: 64). Chinese dragons are frequently depicted with a flaming pearl or gem under their chin or in their claws. According to the German anthropologist Wolfram Eberhard, the long dragon is a symbol of clouds and rainstorms, and when it plays with a ball or pearl, this signifies the swallowing of the moon by the clouds or thunder in the clouds. The moon frequently appears as a pearl, and thus the dragon with the pearl is equal to the clouds with the moon. The pearl-moon relationship is expressed in the Chinese belief that at full moon pearls are solid balls and at new moon they are hollow. (1968: 239, 382).

Rabbinic Judaism includes a number of references to luminous gems. For example, the first century Rabbi, Rav Huna, says he was fleeing from Roman soldiers and hid in a cave illuminated by a light that was brighter in the night and darker in the day.

The best documented of the illumination tales is that of the King of Ceylon's luminous carbuncle or ruby, first mentioned by the Greek traveler Cosmas Indicopleustes in the 6th century and thereafter described by many travelers, the latest of the 17th century. According to Indicopleustes, it was "as large as a great pine-cone, fiery red, and when seen flashing from a distance, especially if the sun's rays are playing around it, being a matchless sight" (Laufer 1915: 62). The Chinese Buddhist pilgrim Xuanzang's 646 Great Tang Records on the Western Regions locates it in the Buddha Tooth Temple near Anuradhapura, "Its magical brilliance illumines the whole heaven. In the calm of a clear and cloudless night it can be seen by all, even at a distance of a myriad li." The Song Scholar Zhao Rukuo's c. 1225 Zhu Fan Zhi ("Records of Foreign People") says, "The king holds in his hand a jewel five inches in diameter, which cannot be burnt by fire, and which shines in (the darkness of) night like a torch. The king rubs his face with it daily, and though he were passed ninety he would retain his youthful looks." (Hirth and Rockhill 1911: 73). Based on this incombustibility, Laufer says this night-shining jewel was probably a diamond (1915: 63). Others state that it "serves instead of a lamp at night", has "the appearance of a glowing fire", or of that "of a great flame of fire." Due to its luminescence, Marco Polo called it "The Red Palace Illuminator" (Ball 1938: 499).

The English alchemist John Norton wrote a 1470 poem entitled "Ordinal, or a manual of the chemical art", in which he proposed erecting a gold bridge over the River Thames and illuminating it with carbuncles set on golden pinnacles, "A glorious thing for men to beholde" (Ashmole 1652: 27).

Boats lit by luminous gems are a variant of the illumination idea. Rabbinic Judaism had a tradition that "Noah had a luminous stone in the Ark that "shone more brightly by night than by day, thus serving to distinguish day and night when the sun and moon were shrouded by dense clouds." (Harvey 1957: 15). The Genesis Rabbah describes the Tzoar that illuminates Noah's Ark (Genesis 6:16) as a luminous gemstone (the King James Version translates as 'window'). The Mormon Book of Ether describes "sixteen small stones; and they were white and clear, even as transparent glass", being touched by God's hand so that they might "shine forth in darkness." The Jaredites placed a stone fore and aft on each ship and had "light continually" during their 344-day voyage to America (Ball 1938: 500).

The theme of luminous gems guiding mariners and others originated in Europe in the Middle Ages. The earliest is probably the Scandinavian saga of the Visby garnets. In the Hanseatic city Visby, on the island of Gotland, the Church of St. Nicholas had two rose windows with huge garnets in the center, overlooking the Baltic Sea. Sagas say the two gems shone at night as brightly as did the sun at noon and guided mariners safely to port. In 1361 King Valdemar IV of Denmark conquered Gotland, but his rich booty, including the marvelous garnets, sank in the ocean when the king's ship was wrecked on the Kong Karls Land islands (Ball 1938: 500).

The relic of the Virgin Mary's wedding ring, which according to different accounts had an onyx, amethyst, or green jasper, was supposedly brought back from the Holy Land in 996 CE. It was placed in the Church of Santa Mustiola, Clusium (modern Chiusi), Italy, and in 1473 the ring was transferred to the Franciscan monastery in that city. One of the monks stole it and fled into the night, but when he repented and promised to return it, the ring emitted a bright light by which he traveled to Perugia. The two cities fought fiercely for the possession of this sacred ring, but in 1486 the Vatican decreed the relic should be placed in the Perugia Cathedral (Ball 1938: 500).

The Dutch scholar Alardus of Amsterdam (1491–1544) relates the history of a luminous "chrysolampis" (χρυσόλαμπις, "gold-gleaming") gem set on a golden tablet with other valuable gemstones. Around 975, Hildegard, wife of Dirk II, Count of Holland, dedicated the tablet to Saint Adalbert of Egmond and presented it to Egmond Abbey, where the saint's body reposed. Alardus tells us that the "chrysolampis" "shone so brightly that when the monks were called to the chapel in the nighttime, they could read the Hours without any other light," however this brilliant gem was stolen by one of the monks and thrown into the sea (Kunz 1913: 164).

The French chemist Marcellin Berthelot (1888) discovered an early Greek alchemical text "from the sanctuary of the temple" that says the Egyptians produced "the carbuncle that shines in the night" from certain phosphorescent parts ("the bile") of marine animals, and when properly prepared these precious gems would glow so brightly at night "that anyone owning such a stone could read or write by its light as well as he could by daylight." (Kunz 1913: 173).

Gem mining legends

Second, there are stories about miners finding luminous gems at night and extracting them by day (Ball 1938: 500–501). One notable exception is Pliny's c. 77 CE Natural History that describes finding carbuncles in the daytime, some kinds "doe glitter and shine of their owne nature: by reason whereof, they are discovered soone wheresoever they lie, by the reverberation of the Sun-beams" (Harvey 1957: 34).

In the 1st century BCE, the Greek historians Diodorus Siculus (c. 90–30) and Strabo (c. 63–24) both record the peridot (gem-quality olivine) mine of Egyptian king Ptolemy II Philadelphus (r. 285–246 BCE) on the barren, forbidden island of Ophiodes (, "Snakey") or Topazios (, "Topaz"), modern Zabargad Island, off the ancient Red Sea port Berenice Troglodytica.
Diodorus says Philadelphus exterminated the "divers sorts of dreadful Serpents" that formerly infested on the island on account of the "Topaz, a resplendent Stone, of a delightful Aspect, like to Glass, of a Golden colour, and of admirable brightness; and therefore all were forbidden to set footing upon that Place; and if any landed there, he was presently put to death by the Keepers of the Island." The Egyptian mining technique relied upon luminosity. "This Stone grows in the Rocks, darken'd by the brightness of the Sun; it's not seen in the Day, but shines bright and glorious in the darkest Night, and discovers itself at a great distance. The Keepers of the Island disperse themselves into several Places to search for this stone, and wherever it appears, they mark the Place, with a great Vessel of largeness sufficient to cover the sparkling Stone; and then in the Day time, go to the Place, and cut out the Stone, and deliver it to those that are Artists in polishing of 'em." (tr. Oldfather et al. 1814 3: 36). According to Strabo, "The topaz is a transparent stone sparkling with a golden lustre, which, however, is not easy to be distinguished in the day-time, on account of the brightness of the surrounding light, but at night the stones are visible to those who collect them. The collectors place a vessel over the spot [where the topazes are seen] as a mark, and dig them up in the day." (tr. Hamilton and Falconer 1889 3:103). Ball notes that the legendary "topaz" of Topazios island is olivine, which is not luminescent while true topaz is, and suggests, "This tale may well have been told to travelers by astute Egyptian gem merchants anxious to enhance the value of their wares by exaggerating the dangers inherent to procuring the olivines." (1938: 500). In the present day, the island mine is now submerged underwater and inaccessible.

The theme of locating luminous gems at night is found in other sources. The c. 125 CE didactic Christian text Physiologus states that the diamond ("carbuncle") is not to be found in the day but only at night, which may imply that it emits light (Laufer 1915:62). The Anglo-Indian diplomat Thomas Douglas Forsyth says that in 632, the ancient Iranian Saka Buddhist Kingdom of Khotan sent a "splendid jade stone" as tribute to Emperor Taizong of Tang. Khotan's rivers were famous for their jade, "which was discovered by its shining in the water at night", and divers would procure it in shallow waters after the snowmelt floods had subsided (1875: 113). The Bohemian rabbi Petachiah of Regensburg (d. c. 1225) adapted Strabo's story for the gold he saw in the land of Ishmael, east of Nineveh, where "the gold grows like herbs. In the night its brightness is seen when a mark is made with dust or lime. They then come in the morning and gather the herbs upon which the gold is found." (tr. Benisch and Ainsworth 1856: 51, 53).

A modern parallel to ancient miners seeking luminous gems at nighttime is mineworkers using portable shortwave ultraviolet lamps to locate ores that respond with color-specific fluorescence. For instance, under short-wave UV light, scheelite, a tungsten ore, fluoresces a bright sky-blue, and willemite, a minor ore of zinc, fluoresces green (Ball 1938: 501).

Animal legends
The third luminous-gem theme involves serpents (of Hindu origin), or small animals (Spanish), with gems in their heads, or grateful animals repaying human kindness (Chinese and Roman) (Ball 1938: 501–505).

Legends about snakes that carry a marvelous jewel either in their forehead or in their mouth are found almost worldwide. Scholars have suggested that the myth may have originated with snake worship, or light reflected by a serpent's eye, or the flame color of certain snakes' lips. In only a relative few of these legends is the stone luminous, this variant being known in India, Ceylon, ancient Greece, Armenia, and among Cherokee Indians (Ball 1938: 502).

The Hindu polymath Varāhamihira's 6th century Brhat Samhit encyclopedic work describes the bright star Canopus, named Agastya (अगस्त्य) in Sanskrit, also the name of the rishi Agastya, "Its huge white waves looked like clouds; its gems looked like stars; its crystals looked like the Moon; and its long bright serpents bearing gems in their hoods looked like comets and thus the whole sea looked like the sky." Another context says black glossy pearls are also produced in the heads of serpents related to the nāgarāja (नागराज, "dragon kings") Takshaka and Vasuki (tr. Iyer 1884: 77, 179).

The "Snake Jewel" story in Somadeva's 11th-century Kathasaritsagara ("Ocean of the Streams of Stories") refers to a maṇi (मणि, "gem; jewel; pearl") on a snake's head. When the Hindu mythological king Nala is fleeing from a jungle wildfire, he hears a voice asking for help and turns back to see a snake "having his head encircled with the rays of the jewels of his crest", who, after being rescued reveals himself to be the nāgarāja Karkotaka (tr. Tawney 1928 4: 245).

The 3rd-century CE Life of Apollonius of Tyana, the Greek sophist Philostratus's biography of Apollonius of Tyana (c. 3 BCE-97 CE), says that in India, people will kill a mountain dragon and cut off its head, in which, "are stones of rich lustre, emitting every-coloured rays and of occult virtue." It also mentions a myth that cranes will not build their nests until they have affixed a "light-stone" (Ancient Greek lychnidis, "shining") to help the eggs hatch and to drive away snakes (tr. Conybeare 1912: 103, 155).

In the Bengali tale of "The Rose of Bakáwalí", the heroic prince Jamila Khatun encounters a monstrous dragon that carried in its mouth "a serpent which emitted a gem so brilliant that it lighted up the jungle for many miles". His plan to obtain it was to throw a heavy lump of clay on the luminous gem, plunging the jungle into darkness, "so that the dragon and the serpent knocked their heads against the stones and died." (tr. Clouston 1889: 296–297).

According to Armenian "The Queen of the Serpents" legend, the serpents of Mount Ararat select a queen who destroys invading armies of foreign serpents, and carries in her mouth a "wonderful stone, the Hul, or stone of light, which upon certain nights she tosses in the air, when it shines as the sun. Happy the man who shall catch the stone ere it falls." (von Haxthausen 1854: 355).

Henry Timberlake, the British emissary to the Overhill Cherokee during the 1761-1762 Timberlake Expedition, records a story about medicine men ("conjurers") using gemstones, which is a variant of the Horned Serpent legend in Iroquois mythology. One luminous gem "remarkable for its brilliancy and beauty" supposedly "grew on the head of a monʃtrous ʃerpent" that was guarded by many snakes. The medicine man hid this luminous gemstone, and no one else had seen it. Timberlake supposed he had "hatched the account of its difcovery" (1765: 48–49). Ball doubts the myth and suggests "European influence" (1938: 503).

The Catalan missionary Jordanus's c. 1330 Mirabilia says he heard that the dragons of India Tertia (Eastern African, south of Abyssinia) have on their heads "the lustrous stones which we call carbuncles." When they become too large to fly, they fall and die in a "certain river which issues from Paradise". After seventy days the people recover the "carbuncle which is rooted in the top of his head" and take it to Prester John, the Emperor of the Ethiopians (tr. Yule 1863: 42)

After his third visit to Persia in 1686, the French jeweler and traveler John Chardin wrote that the Egyptian carbuncle was "very probably only an Oriental Ruby of higher Colour than usual." The Persians call it Icheb Chirac, the Flambeau ["burning torch"] of the Night because of the property and Quality it has of enlightening all things round it", and "They tell you that the Carbuncle was bred within the Head of a Dragon, a Griffin, or a Royal Eagle, which was found upon the Mountain of Caf." (Chardin 2010: 166–167)

Like Chardin's griffin or eagle, some stories about luminous gems involve animals other than snakes and dragons. An early example is the 3rd-century CE Greek Pseudo-Callisthenes Romance of Alexander that says Alexander the Great once speared a fish, "in whose bowels was found a white stone so brilliant that everyone believed it was a lamp. Alexander set it in gold, and used it as a lamp at night." (Laufer 1915: 58).

Sydney H. Ball recounts the widespread variation of the animal-gratitude snake story involving a wild animal (often called carbuncle, Spanish carbunclo, or Latin carbunculo) with a luminous gem on its head, and which Europeans apparently introduced into Africa and America.

In 1565, Don John Bermudez, ambassador of Prester John to John III of Portugal, described an Upper Nile snake called "Of the shadow, or Canopie, because it hath a skinne on the head wherewith it covereth a very precious stone, which they say it hath in her head." (Purchas 1625 2: 1169).

The English merchant William Finch reported around 1608 a Sierra Leone story about a wolf-like creature with a luminous gem. "The Negros told us of a strange beast (which the interpreter called a Carbuncle) oft seene yet only by night, having a stone in his forehead, incredibly shining and giving him light to feed, attentive to the least noyse, which he no sooner heareth, but he presently covereth the same with a filme or skinne given him as a naturall covering that his splendour betray him not." (Dickens 1857: 124).

In 1666, another version of the theme is a huge snake recorded from Island Caribs on the island of Dominica, West Indies. "On its head was a very sparkling stone, like a Carbuncle, of inestimable price: That it commonly veil'd that rich Jewel with a thin moving skin, like that of a man's eye-lid: but that when it went to drink or sported himself in the midst of that deep bottom, he fully discover'd it, and that the rocks and all about receiv'd a wonderful lustre from the fire issuing out of that precious crown." (de Rochefort 1666: 15).

According to the Swiss explorer Johann Jakob von Tschudi, in the highlands of Peru and Bolivia, the native peoples tell stories of a fabulous beast with a luminous gem. "The carbunculo is represented to be of the size of a fox, with long black hair, and is only visible at night, when it slinks slowly through the thickets. If followed, he opens a flap or valve in the forehead, from under which an extraordinary, brilliant, and dazzling light issues. The natives believe that this light proceeds from a brilliant precious stone, and that any fool hardy person who may venture to grasp at it rashly is blinded; then the flap is let down, and the animal disappears in the darkness." (von Tschudi 1854: 320). The American archeologist Adolph Francis Alphonse Bandelier cites von Tschudi and describes the carbunculo as a cat with a blood-red jewel, which is supposed to dwell on Nevado Sajama mountain, near Oruro, Bolivia. Bandelier believes his Bolivian informants that the carbunculo has existed from the earliest times, and "certainly before the conquest, so that its introduction cannot be attributed to the Spaniards" (1910: 320). Nevertheless, based upon how closely the above American versions of the myth follow the pattern of the European form, Ball concludes that the Spaniards introduced the carbuncle myth (1938: 504).

In contrast to the above legends about people killing snakes and animals in order to obtain their luminous gems, another group of legends has a theme of injured animals presenting magical gems out of gratitude to people who helped them. This is a subcategory of The Grateful Animals folktale motif (Aarne–Thompson classification systems 554), for example, The White Snake or The Queen Bee.

These animal-gratitude stories are first recorded around two millennia ago in China and Rome. Based upon striking coincidences in Chinese and Roman versions of the story, Laufer reasoned that there was an obvious historical connection (1915: 59–60), and Ball believes these tales probably originated independently (1938: 504).

The earliest known story about a grateful animal with a luminous gem is the Chinese Suihouzhu (隨侯珠, "the Marquis of Sui's pearl") legend that a year after he saved the life of a wounded snake, it returned and gave him a fabulous pearl that emitted a light as bright as that of the moon (Ball 1938: 504). Sui (隨, cf. 隋 Sui dynasty), located in present-day Suizhou, Hubei, was a lesser feudal state during the Zhou dynasty (c. 1046 BC–256 BCE) and a vassal state of Chu. Several Warring States period (c. 475-221 BCE) texts mention Marquis Sui's pearl as a metaphor for something important or valuable, but without explaining the grateful snake tale, which implies that it was common knowledge among contemporary readers.

The Marquis of Sui's pearl is mentioned in the Zhanguo ci ("Strategies of the Warring States") compendium of political and military anecdotes dating from 490 to 221 BCE. King Wuling of Zhao (r. 325–299 BCE) summoned Zheng Tong (鄭同) for an audience and asked how to avoid warfare with neighboring feudal states. Zheng Tong replied, 'Well, let us suppose there is a man who carries with him the pearl of Sui-hou and the Ch'ih-ch'iu armband [持丘之環, uncertain] as well as goods valued at ten thousand in gold. Now he stops the night in an uninhabited place." Since he has neither weapons nor protectors, "It is clear he will not spend more than a night abroad before someone harms him. At the moment there are powerful and greedy states on your majesty's borders and they covet your land. … If you lack weapons your neighbours, of course, will be quite satisfied." (tr. Crump 1970: 327).

The c. 3rd-1st centuries BCE Daoist Zhuangzi (book) alludes to the marquis's pearl. "Whenever the sage makes a movement, he is certain to examine what his purpose is and what he is doing. If now, however, we suppose that there were a man who shot at a sparrow a thousand yards away with the pearl of the Marquis of Sui, the world would certainly laugh at him. Why is this? It is because what he uses is important and what he wants is insignificant. And is not life much more important than the pearl of the Marquis of Sui?" (tr. Mair 1994: 288).

Several Chinese classics pair the legendary Suihouzhu ("the Marquis of Sui's pearl") with another priceless gem, the Heshibi (和氏璧, "Mr. He's jade"). The bi is a type of circular Chinese jade artifact, and "Mr. He" was Bian He (卞和), who found a marvelous piece of raw jade that went cruelly unrecognized by successive Chu monarchs until it was finally acknowledged as a priceless jewel. The c. 3rd-1st century BCE Chuci ("Songs of Chu") mentions the paired gems, "Shards and stones are prized as jewels / Sui and He rejected". This poetic anthology also says, "It grieves me that shining pearls [明珠] should be cast out in the mire / While worthless fish-eye stones are treasured in a strong-box", and describes a flying chariot, "Fringed with the dusky Moon Bright pearls [明月之玄珠]" (tr. Hawkes 1985: 277, 295, 290). King Liu An's c. 139 BCE Huainanzi ("Philosophers of Huainan") uses the story to describe one who has attained the Way of Heaven (天道), "It is like the pearl of Marquis Sui or the jade disk of Mr. He. Those who achieved it became rich; those who lost it became poor." (tr. Major et al. 2010: 218).

The c. 222 CE De Natura Animalium ("On the Characteristics of Animals"), compiled by Roman author Claudius Aelianus, told the story of Heraclea or Herakleis, a virtuous widow of Tarentum, who after seeing a fledgling stork fall and break its leg, nursed it back to health, and set it free. One year later, as Heraclea sat at the door of her cottage, the young stork returned and dropped a precious stone into her lap, and she put it indoors. Awakening that night, she saw that the gem "diffused a brightness and a gleam, and the house was lit up as though a torch had been brought in, so strong a radiance came from, and was engendered by, the lump of stone." (tr. Scholfield 1959: 209–210).

Laufer cites three c. 4th-century Chinese grateful-animal stories that parallel Heraclea's stork. The Shiyi ji ("Researches into Lost Records"), compiled by the Daoist scholar Wang Jia (d. 390 CE) from early apocryphal versions of Chinese history, recounts an anecdote about King Zhao of Yan (燕昭王, r. 311–279 BCE) and grateful birds with dongguangzhu (洞光珠, "cave shining pearls").
When Prince Chao of Yen was once seated on a terrace, black birds with white heads flocked there together, holding in their beaks perfectly resplendent pearls, measuring one foot all round. These pearls were black as lacquer, and emitted light in the interior of a house to such a degree that even the spirits could not obscure their supernatural essence." (tr. Laufer 1915: 59).
The imperial historian Gan Bao's c. 350 CE Soushen Ji ("In Search of the Supernatural") has two grateful-animal stories involving luminous pearls/gems. The first involves a black crane; according to legend, when a crane has lived a thousand years it turns blue; after another thousand it becomes black and is called a xuanhe (玄鶴. "dark crane").
Kuai Shen [噲參] was the most filial son to his mother. Once a black crane was injured by a bow hunter and in its extremity, went to Kuai. The latter took it in, doctored its wound, and when it was cured set it free. Soon afterwards the crane showed up again outside Kuai's door. The latter shone a torch to see out and discovered its mate there too. Each of them held a single night-glowing pearl [明珠] in its beak to repay Kuai. (tr. DeWoskin and Crump 1996: 238).
The second story is oldest detailed explanation of Marquis of Sui's pearl.
Once upon a time, when the ruler of the old Sui kingdom was journeying, he came upon a great wounded serpent whose back was broken. The ruler believed the creature to be a spirit manifestation and ordered his physician to treat it with drugs to close up its wound. Thereafter the serpent was able to move again, and the place was called Mound of the Wounded Serpent. One year later the serpent brought a bright pearl [明珠] in its mouth to give the ruler of Sui to show its gratitude. The pearl was greater than an inch in diameter, of the purest white and emitted light like moonglow. In the dark it could illuminate an entire room. For these reasons it was known as "Duke Sui's Pearl" [隋侯珠] or the "Spirit Snake's Pearl" [靈蛇珠], or, again, the "Moonlight Pearl" [明月珠]. (tr. DeWoskin and Crump 1996: 239).
Laufer concludes that the "coincidences in these three Chinese versions and the story of the Greek author, even in unimportant details such as the thankful bird returning after one year to the marquis of Sui, are so striking, that an historical connection between the two is obvious." (1915: 60).

A later elaboration of animal-gratitude stories involves grateful animals and ungrateful people, who are typically rescued from a pitfall trap (Ashliman 2010). Two versions mention marvelous gems. The English historian Matthew Paris's c. 1195 Chronicles says that Richard I of England (1157-1199) used to tell a parable about ungrateful people. A Venetian, Vitalis, was rescued from a horrible death by a ladder being let down into a pit into which he had fallen. A lion and a serpent trapped in the same pit used his ladder to escape, and the lion in gratitude brought to Vitalis a goat he had killed and the snake a luminous jewel that he carried in his mouth. As Richard reportedly told the story after his return from the Crusades he may have heard it in the East, as similar stories, but without the stone being luminous, occur in two Indian collections, the c. 300 BCE Kalila wa Dimnah and the 11th-century Kathasaritsagara (Ball 1938: 505). The English poet John Gower's 1390 Confessio Amantis tells the story of the rich Roman lord Adrian and the poor woodcutter Bardus. Adrian falls into a pit that had already captured an ape and a serpent, and promises to give half his wealth to Bardus for pulling him out. After Bardus rescues the three, out of gratitude the ape piled up firewood for him and the serpent gave him "a stone more bright than cristall out of his mouth", but Adrian refuses to pay his debt. Bardus sells the luminous gem for gold and afterwards found it again in his purse, and the same thing happened every time he sold it. Emperor Justinian I summons Bardus, listens to his testimony supported by the magically reappearing gem, and compels Adrian to fulfill his promise (tr. Clouston 1887 1: 224–226).

Some scholars were skeptical about luminous gem stories. In the West, the earliest nonbeliever was the Portuguese traveler to India and gem expert, Garcia de Orta (1563), who, having been told by a jeweler of a luminous carbuncle, doubted its existence. In the East, the first recorded skeptic was the Chinese encyclopedist Song Yingxing, who in 1628 wrote "it is not true that there are pearls emitting light at the hour of the dusk or night." (Ball 1938: 505).

See also
Cintamani, a wish-fulfilling jewel in Hindu and Buddhist traditions
Mani Jewel, various legendary jewels mentioned in Buddhist texts
Indra's net, Buddhist metaphor of a vast net with a jewel or pearl at each knot, infinitely reflecting all the other jewels

References

Ashliman, D. L. (2010), "The Grateful Animals and the Ungrateful Man", University of Pittsburgh.
Ashmole, Elias (1652), Theatrum Chemicum Britannicum: containing severall poeticall pieces of our famous English philosophers, who have written the hermetique mysteries in their owne ancient language, Nath Brooks.
Ball, Sydney H. (1938), "Luminous Gems, Mythical and Real", The Scientific Monthly 47.6: 496–505.
Bendelier, Adolph F. (1910), The islands of Titicaca and Koati, The Hispanic Society of America.
Benisch, A, and William F. Ainsworth (1856), Travels of Rabbi Petachia of Ratisbon: who, in the latter end of the twelfth century, visited Poland, Russia, Little Tartary, the Crimea, Armenia, Assyria, Syria, the Holy Land, and Greece, Trubner & Co.
Chardin, John (1720, 2010), Sir John Chardin's Travels in Persia, Cosimo, Inc. reprint.
Clouston, William Alexander (1887), Popular Tales and Fictions: Their Migrations and Transformations, William Blackwood and Sons.
Clouston, William Alexander (1889), A Group of Eastern Romances and Stories from the Persian, Tamil, and Urdu, W. Hodge & Co.
Conybeare, Frederick Cornwallis, tr. (1912), The Life of Appolonius of Tyana, William Heinemann.
Crump, James I., Jr., tr. (1970), Chan-kuo ts'e, Clarendon Press.
De Ment, Jack (1949), Handbook of Fluorescent Gems and Minerals - An Exposition and Catalog of the Fluorescent and Phosphorescent Gems and Minerals, Including the Use of Ultraviolet Light in the Earth Sciences, Mineralogist Publishing Company.
DeWoskin, Kenneth J. and James Irving Crump, trs. (1996), In Search of the Supernatural: The Written Record, Stanford University Press.
Dickens, Charles (1857), Wolves, Household Words vol. 15.
Eberhard, Wolfram (1968), The Local Cultures of South and East China, Alide Eberhard, tr. Lokalkulturen im alten China, 1943, E.J. Brill.
Forsyth, Thomas Douglas (1875), Report of a Mission to Yarkund in 1873, Under Command of Sir T. D. Forsyth: With Historical and Geographical Information Regarding the Possessions of the Ameer of Yarkund, Foreign Department Press.
Harvey, E. Newton (1957), A History of Luminescence from the Earliest Time until 1900, American Philosophical Society Memoirs, 44.
Hawkes, David (1985), The Songs of the South: An Anthology of Ancient Chinese Poems by Qu Yuan and Other Poets, Penguin Books.
von Haxthausen, August ranz L.M. Haxthausen (1854), Transcaucasia, sketches of the nations and races between the Black sea and the Caspian, tr. by J.E. Taylor, Chapman & Hall.
Hill, John (2015), Through the Jade Gate – China to Rome (A Study of the Silk Routes 1st to 2nd Centuries CE), revised edition, 2 vols., BookSurge.
Hirth, Friedrich (1875), China and the Roman Orient, Ares Publishers 1975.
Hirth, Friedrich and William Woodville Rockhill, trs. (1911), Chau Ju-kua: His Work On The Chinese And Arab Trade In The Twelfth And Thirteenth Centuries, Entitled Chu-fan-chï, Imperial Academy of Sciences.––
Iyer, N. Chidambaram, tr. (1884), The Bṛihat Saṃhitâ of Varaha Mihira, Volumes 1-2, South Indian Press.
Jordanus, Friar, tr. Henry Yule (1863), Mirabilia Descripta: The Wonders of the East, Hakluyt Society.
King, Charles William (1867), Natural History of Precious Stones and of the Precious Metals, Deighton, Bell, & Co.
Kunz, George Frederick (1913), The Curious Lore of Precious Stones, B. Lippincott Company.
Laufer, Berthold (1912), Jade, A Study in Chinese Archaeology and Religion, Field Museum of Natural History Publication 154, 10.
Laufer, Berthold (1915), "The Diamond, a Study in Chinese and Hellenistic Folk-lore, Field Museum of Natural History Publication 184, 15.1.
Lucian, tr. by Herbert A. Strong and John Garstang (1913) The Syrian Goddess, Constable and Co.
Major, John S., Sarah Queen, Andrew Meyer, and Harold D. Roth (2010), The Huainanzi: A Guide to the Theory and Practice of Government in Early Han China, Columbia University Press.
Purchas, Samuel (1625), Hakluytus Posthumus, or Purchas his Pilgrimes, contayning a History of the World in Sea Voyages and Lande Travells, James MacLehose.
de Rochefort, Charles (1666) The History of the Caribby Islands Rendered into English by John Davies, London.
Sawyer, Ralph D. (2018), Sun Pin: Military Methods, Routledge.
Siculus, Diodorus, tr. by C.H. Oldfather et al. (1814), The Historical Library of Diodorus the Sicilian in Fifteen Books to which are added the Fragments of Diodorus, Edward Jones.
Skippon, Philip (1732), "An Account of a Journey made through Part of the Low Countries, Germany, Italy, and France about 1663-5," Churchill's Voyages,
Schafer, Edward H. (1963), The Golden Peaches of Samarkand, University of California Press.
Scholfield, A. F. tr. (1959), Aelian, Characteristics of Animals, Harvard University Press.
Strabo, tr. by H.C. Hamilton and W. Falconer (1889), The Geography of Strabo, Literally Translated with Notes, G. Bell & sons.
Tawney, Charles Henry (1928), The Ocean of Story, 10 vols., Chas. J. Sawyer.
Timberlake, Henry (1765), Memoirs of Lieut. Henry Timberlake, J. Ridley.
von Tschudi, Johann Jakob (1854), Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests, tr. by Thomasina Ross, A.S. Barnes & Co.

External links
Luminescence, The Gemology Project
World's largest night-shining jewel displayed in S China, China Daily'', 22 November 2010
"Mens PumpUp" Maintain and Stimulate Glow-in-The-Dark Pearl-Beaded Prolonging Rubber Ring, Amazon

Folklore
Gemstones
Luminescent minerals
Mythology

Luminous gemstones


The upe (or upi) is a traditional headdress worn by men in parts of Bougainville (an autonomous region of Papua New Guinea) to symbolise their transition to adulthood. The term is also used to refer to the process of undergoing the transition and to the initiates themselves.

The upe is the central figure of the flag of Bougainville and forms the crest of the emblem of Bougainville. It is made of tightly wound straw.

According to the Papua New Guinea Post-Courier, the tradition is practised on Buka Island and in the Bougainville Island districts of Selau, Wakunai and Teua. Upes spend as long as three years undergoing initiation rites in a "school" or "college", located in a remote region. They learn traditional customs including medicine, fishing, hunting, gardening, and singing. During this time women are forbidden to see them.

During the 2019 independence referendum, upes were authorised to vote at special male-only polling stations to avoid being seen by women. Election officials "hiked for two hours into the jungle to collect the votes".

References

Hats
Autonomous Region of Bougainville

Upe


Dipak Chand Jain is Co-President and Global Advisor of China Europe International Business School. He previously was the Director (Dean) of Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration of Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok, Thailand. The announcement of his appointment as Director of Sasin was made on 7 June 2014. He stepped down in 2017.

He is also INSEAD Chaired Professor of Marketing. He had served as Dean of INSEAD since his appointment from May 2011 to March 2013. He was Dean of Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management from 2001-2009.

He was also Sandy and Morton Goldman Professor of Entrepreneurial Studies & Professor of Marketing at the Kellogg School of Management, where he had been a member of the faculty since 1987. Jain has been a visiting professor of marketing since 1989 at the Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok.

Jain's areas of research include the marketing of high-tech products; market segmentation and competitive market structure analysis; cross-cultural issues in global product diffusion; new product diffusion; and forecasting models. He has had more than 50 articles published in leading academic journals.

A marketing expert trained in mathematics and statistics, Jain assumed leadership of the school in 2001, after serving for five years as the school's associate dean for academic affairs working with Dean Donald P. Jacobs.

After 13 years in the Dean's office, Jain stepped down on 1 September 2009 to devote more time towards family and teaching commitments. From March 2011, he took office as Dean of INSEAD, one of the world's most prestigious business schools, with campuses in France, Singapore and Abu Dhabi.

Jain also serves as an Independent Director on the Board of Indian Conglomerate Reliance Industries Limited which is also the largest refiner in the world at a single location. He has served as a consultant to Microsoft, Novartis, American Express, Sony, Nissan, Eli Lilly and Company, and Hyatt International. He also serves as a member of the board of directors of Deere & Company and Northern Trust Corporation. He is also a former director at United Airlines, Hartmarx Corporation and Peoples Energy.

Jain has served as the departmental editor for the journal Management Science, the area editor for Marketing Science and associate editor for the Journal of Business and Economic Statistics. He is also a former member of the editorial board of the Journal of Marketing Research.

Early life and education

Jain was born on 9 June 1957 in the town of Tezpur in Assam, a state in north-eastern part of India. He did his schooling from Rastrabhasa Hindi School at Tezpur. He went on to earn his bachelor's degree in statistics (hons.) in 1976 from Darrang College, Tezpur (affiliated with Gauhati University) and his master's degree in Statistics in 1978 from Gauhati University in India. He taught at Gauhati University for the next five years before coming to US to pursue his PhD in Marketing at the University of Texas at Dallas under the direction of Frank Bass.

Awards and honors
Dean Jain's teaching honors include:
 Asom Sourav, 2nd highest civilian award of Assam, 2021
 Pravasi Bharatiya Samman 2004;
 The Sidney Levy Award for Excellence in Teaching in 1995;
 The John D.C. Little Best Paper Award in 1991;
 Kraft research professorships in 1989-90 and 1990–91;
 The Beatrice research professorship in 1987-88;
 The Outstanding Educator Award from the State of Assam in India in 1982;
 The Gold Medal for the Best Post-Graduate of the Year from Gauhati University in India in 1978;
 The Gold Medal for the Best Graduate of the Year from Darrang College in Assam in India in 1976;
 The Gold Medal from Jaycees International in 1976;
 The Youth Merit Award from Rotary International in 1976; and
 The Jawaharlal Nehru Merit Award, Government of India in 1976.

Personal life
He is married to Sushant Jain and they have three children.

References

External links
 Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration of Chulalongkorn University
 Jain's INSEAD Web Profile
 Jain's Business Educators Member Profile

1957 births
Dipak C. Jain
American academics of Indian descent
American businesspeople
Gauhati University alumni
Indian emigrants to the United States
Living people
Northwestern University faculty
People from Sonitpur district
University of Texas at Dallas alumni
Business educators
Business school deans
Recipients of Pravasi Bharatiya Samman

Dipak C. Jain


Alisal, or El Alisal (The Sycamores), was a Californio settlement located on the lands of the Rancho Santa Rita near the site of an Indian ranchera, around the Francisco Solano Alviso Adobe, called El Alisal (The Sycamores), one of the earliest houses built in the Livermore Valley in 1844.   Note that even though the database and plaque use the word "sycamore",  the English translation of the Spanish "aliso" is "alder".

Alisal, nicknamed "The Most Desperate Town in the West", was one of the settlements located along the trail called  La Vereda del Monte that was a haunt and refuge of bandits and desperados in the era following the beginning of the California Gold Rush.  Main Street shootouts were not uncommon.  Banditos such as Claudio Feliz and Joaquin Murrieta would ambush prospectors on their way back from the gold fields and then seek refuge in Alisal.  In the 1860s and 1870s Procopio, Narciso Bojorques and others took refuge there.

During the period of the railroad boom in the late 1860s, Rancho Santa Rita was sub divided. In 1869 J.W. Kottinger and J.A. Neal each laid out and plotted a subdivision for a new town called Alisal, situated about five miles south of Dublin. By 1878 the village was an unincorporated town of about 500 people.

Alisal was later included within Pleasanton, California that was founded in 1894.

Notes

Alisal
Livermore Valley
Former settlements in Alameda County, California
Populated places established in 1844
1844 establishments in Alta California

Alisal, Pleasanton, California


The Malta Philharmonic Orchestra is recognized as Malta's foremost musical institution.

Founded in 1968 as the Manoel Theatre Orchestra, in September 1997 it became an independent body and was officially named as Malta's national orchestra. In 2008, it expanded into a full-size orchestra and became the MPO.

History
The orchestra was founded in April 1968, when musicians from the defunct "Commander-in-Chief" (C-in-C) orchestra of the Malta-based British Mediterranean Fleet regrouped as the Manoel Theatre Orchestra. It continued to serve as the theatre's resident orchestra until September 1997, when it became an independent orchestra, taking up the name National Orchestra of Malta. The orchestra became the MPO in 2008 when it expanded into a full-size symphony orchestra, bringing together the best of Maltese talent and musicians from Europe and beyond.

Joseph Sammut, the C-in-C's last conductor, was the orchestra's first conductor, remaining at the helm until 1992. Since then, the orchestra has also been under the direction of Joseph Vella, John Galea, Michael Laus, and Brian Schembri(Artistic Director and Principal Conductor). In 2019, the MPO has appointed Sergey Smbatyan as Principal Conductor, joining Resident Conductor Michael Laus as part of the orchestra's Artistic Team. The MPO also works with local and international guest conductors and soloists including Lawrence Renes, Michalis Economou, Guy Braunstein, Alexei Volodin, Camilla Tilling, Joseph Calleja, and Enrico Dindo.

As Malta's leading musical ensemble, the MPO averages more than one performance a week including symphonic concerts, opera productions in Malta and Gozo, community outreach and educational initiatives, as well as various concerts of a lighter nature.

The orchestra has performed in leading venues across the globe, including in the United States, Russia, Germany, Austria, China, Italy, and Belgium, and presently embarks on at least one international tour each concert season.

The MPO is a keen exponent of Maltese composers, regularly performing their works in Malta and overseas, as well as frequently premiering and commissioning new compositions.

Through the MPO Academy and the Malta Youth Orchestra, which regularly give concerts across Malta, the MPO is also responsible for the training and professional development of the next generation of Maltese musicians.

References
Baldacchino, Lisa Gwen, "New premises for Malta Philharmonic Orchestra", The Times of Malta, 12 September 2008, Accessed 6 February 2009.
Storace, Albert, "A dazzling and colourful show of Saint-Saëns", The Times of Malta, 21 December 2011, Accessed 21 December 2011.
Malta Philharmonic Orchestra, History. Accessed 11 March 2021.

External links
Malta Philharmonic Orchestra official website

Maltese musical groups
European orchestras
National orchestras
Symphony orchestras
Musical groups established in 1968
Classical music

Malta Philharmonic Orchestra


Ojoraptorsaurus is a genus of oviraptorosaurian dinosaur from the late Cretaceous. Ojoraptorsaurus is only known from pubic bones found at the Naashoibito Member of the Ojo Alamo Formation dating to the early Maastrichtian, about 69 million years ago. It was first named by Robert M. Sullivan, Steven E. Jasinski and Mark P.A. van Tomme in 2011 and the type species is Ojoraptorsaurus boerei. The generic name combines a reference to the formation with a Latin raptor, "plunderer", and a Latinised Greek saurus, "lizard". The specific name honours oceanographer Arjan Boeré who found the specimen.

Description

The holotype of Ojoraptorsaurus is SMP VP-1458, an incomplete pair of fused pubes. Due to the fusion of the pubes, this specimen is believed to have been a mature individual. Most caenagnathid species are known from very few remains, and Ojoraptorsaurus is no exception. The holotype was compared to well-described pubic remains of other oviraptorosaurians, namely Microvenator, Epichirostenotes, Nomingia, and CM 78001 (now known as Anzu). It shares with the latter three taxa an enclosed fossa on the inside edge of the pubis near the acetabular rim, a trait which may be diagnostic to caenagnathids (in which case Nomingia is a caenagnathid). Ojoraptorsaurus's fossa is further away from the acetabular rim than those of the other species, a feature characteristic to the genus. Among compared oviraptorosaurians, Ojoraptorsaurus is most similar to Epichirostenotes, a genus differentiated from Chirostenotes in the same paper that Ojoraptorsarus was described in. By comparing pubic proportions with those of CM 78001 (Anzu), Ojoraptorsaurus has been estimated to have been about 1.8 to 2.1 meters (5.9 to 6.9 feet) in length, about 20% smaller than Epichirostenotes.

Ojoraptorsaurus differs from other caenagnathids due to possessing the following autapomorphies:
 A "spoon-shaped" depression on the anterior dorsal surface of the pubic boot.
 An enclosed fossa on the inside edge of the pubis which lies 1 centimeter away from the acetabular rim.
 The portion of the pubic shaft directly above the pubic boot being slightly anteriorly convex.
 A sub-trapezoidal iliac peduncle articular surface of the pubis.

See also
 Timeline of oviraptorosaur research

References

Caenagnathids
Late Cretaceous dinosaurs of North America
Fossil taxa described in 2011
Paleontology in New Mexico
Ojo Alamo Formation
Maastrichtian genus first appearances
Maastrichtian genus extinctions

Ojoraptorsaurus


Blood on the Cat's Neck or Blood on the Neck of the Cat is an absurdist 1971 play originally written by Rainer Werner Fassbinder. It was first produced in Nuremberg under the title Blut am Hals der Katze. It is sometimes subtitled Marilyn Monroe vs. The Vampires. In translation, it has been revived several times, including a six-month stint at the Trap Door Theatre in 1996 and then the Mercury Theater in Chicago.

The Chicago production of the play at the Trap Door Theatre under director Andrew Cooper Wasser starred Beata Pilch, Sean Marlow, Kristie Hassinger, Summer Chance, Eileen James, Valentine Miele, Michael Garvey, Bob Rusch, and others. It was performed again in 2013 to mark the 20th anniversary of the theatre. Clive Mantle also once starred in a production of it. More recently the play has been put on in an Ian W. Hill production at The Brick Theater in which Gyda Arber starred as Phoebe the alien as a "voluptuous blonde in a torn dress", Danny Bowes as the cop, and Toya Lillard as the mistress.
in 2017 at Baran theater This play was directed by Mohsen Moeini in Iran.

Plot
The play visits the question of how an alien from space might view humanity; the alien in the play is an attractive woman named Phoebe Zeitgeist, an alien vampire taken from a 1960s comic book. In this play, she is surrounded by horrible people at a cocktail party and learns how to speak from them. The play has three sections: an opening section in which the main characters give monologues that reveal themselves; a second section in which Phoebe speaks one-on-one with these characters, picking up certain phrases from them; and the final section, in which Phoebe, using her limited vocabulary, repeats back "their aphoristic and self-justifying slogans", with the other characters divided over whether she is smart or drunk.

Reception
Jack Helbig of the Chicago Reader described it as a "darkly sarcastic, gloriously messy absurdist play about an alien [...] who comes into the world naked and guileless and learns to play all our dangerous games."

Kerry Reid of the Chicago Tribune says that Fassbinder's dark world view is shallow, but still fresher than the similar worldview of more recent filmmaker and playwright Neil LaBute.

References

German plays
1971 plays
Plays based on comic strips

Blood on the Cat's Neck


The Palazzo della Cancelleria (Palace of the Chancellery, referring to the former Apostolic Chancery of the Pope) is a Renaissance palace in Rome, Italy, situated between the present Corso Vittorio Emanuele II and the Campo de' Fiori, in the rione of Parione. It was built 1489–1513 by Baccio Pontelli and Antonio da Sangallo the Elder as a palace for Raffaele Cardinal Riario, Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church, and is regarded as the earliest Renaissance palace in Rome.

The Palazzo houses the Papal Chancellery, is an extraterritorial property of the Holy See, and is designated as a World Heritage Site.

History
The Cancelleria was built for |Raffaele Cardinal Riario who held the post of Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church to his powerful uncle, Pope Sixtus IV. The rumor was that the funds came from a single night's winnings at gaming.

In 1517, the newly completed Palazzo was seized by Pope Leo X, who suspected Cardinal Riario of plotting to assassinate him. He gifted the palace to his cousin, Cardinal Giulio de Medici (the future Pope Clement VII). Since Cardinal Giulio was the Vice-Chancellor of the Church, the palace became known as the Palazzo della Cancelleria thereafter, and was generally referred to just as the "Cancelleria".

From 1753 the vice chancellor was the Jacobite pretender to the thrones of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, Henry Benedict Stuart, Cardinal Duke of York, the Jacobite Henry IX and I of England, Scotland, and Ireland. During the late 17th century Christina, former Queen of Sweden, resided here.

During the Roman Republic of 1849 the parliament briefly sat here.

In 2015, it was the residence of retired, and now deceased, Bernard Cardinal Law, Archbishop of Boston, United States.

Architecture

The Palazzo della Cancelleria was the first palazzo in Rome to be erected from the ground up in the new Renaissance style. Its long facade engulfs the small Basilica di San Lorenzo in Damaso, the Cardinal's titular church, that is to its right, with the palatial front continuing straight across it. The entrance to the Basilica is on the right side of the facade. The 5th-century basilica (its interior has been rebuilt) sits, like the Basilica di San Clemente among others, on a pagan Roman mithraeum. Excavations beneath the cortile from 1988 to 1991 revealed the 4th- and 5th-century foundations of the grand Basilica di San Lorenzo in Damaso, founded by Pope Damasus I, and one of the most important early churches of Rome. A cemetery in use from the 8th century until shortly before the construction of the Palazzo was also identified.

The facade, with its rhythm of flat doubled pilasters between the arch-headed windows, is Florentine in conception, comparable to Leone Battista Alberti's Palazzo Rucellai. The overall pattern of drafted masonry, cut with smooth surfaces and grooves around the edges, is ancient Roman in origin. The grand portal was added in the 16th century by Domenico Fontana on the orders of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese.

The bone-colored travertine of the Palazzo was spolia from the nearby ancient ruins of the Theatre of Pompey, for Rome was a field of ruins, built for a city of over one million that then housed a mere 30,000. The 44 Egyptian granite columns of the inner courtyard are from the porticoes of the theatre's upper covered seating, however they were originally taken from the theatre to build the old Basilica di San Lorenzo in Damaso. It is more probable that the form of the courtyard is derived from that of the Palazzo Ducale in Urbino, because the individuals involved in the early planning of the Palazzo had come from Urbino.

Art

The largest reception room, the Salone d'Onore on the piano nobile, has vast murals in fresco that Giorgio Vasari completed in a mere 100 days in 1547. The room is therefore named the Sala dei Cento Giorni ("Room of 100 Days"). He boasted of this accomplishment to Michelangelo, who responded "Si vede" ("It shows").

They were commissioned by Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, the grandson of Pope Paul III, who was Vice-Chancellor of the church for over fifty years. The reign of Paul III is glorified in rather absurd Mannerist style, though the frescos make an impressive ensemble.

The Cancelleria Reliefs are two significant if incomplete 1st-century AD reliefs that were discovered buried at the site when the palazzo was being built. They are now in the Vatican Museums.  They were apparently carved to glorify the Emperor Domitian (r. 81-96), then partly recarved to feature Nerva after his accession.

Music
In the palazzo a little private theatre was installed by Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni, and in the later 17th century the Palazzo became a center of musical performance in Rome.

At the time when Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni lived there as vice-chancellor, the Palazzo della Cancelleria became an important center of the musical life of Rome. Between 1694 and 1705 several oratories by Alessandro Scarlatti and various cantatas for Christmas were performed here for the first time. In 1709 Ottoboni also had a theater built on a project by the architect Filippo Juvarra, which was removed after his death (February 28, 1740). It was in this theater that at least one gathering of the Accademia degli Arcadi was held on the occasion of Christmas 1712 to celebrate the child Jesus.

References

External links
Palazzo della Cancelleria Apostolica
The Vatican: spirit and art of Christian Rome, a book from The Metropolitan Museum of Art Libraries (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on the Palazzo (p. 370-4)

Houses completed in 1513
1513 establishments in Italy
Cancelleria
Extraterritorial properties of the Holy See in Rome
Renaissance architecture in Rome
Cancelleria
Filippo Juvarra buildings
Henry Benedict Stuart
Christina, Queen of Sweden
Pope Leo X

Palazzo della Cancelleria


Baron Carl Fredrik Pechlin (8 August 1720 – 29 May 1796) was a Swedish politician and demagogue.

Life
He was son of the Holstein minister at Stockholm, Johan Pechlin, and brother of Johanna Lohm. After moving to Sweden at age six, he was educated in Sweden, and entered the Swedish army. He rose to the rank of major-general, but became famous by being the type par excellence of the corrupt and egoistic Swedish parliamentarian of the final period of the Age of Liberty; he received for many years the sobriquet of "General of the Riksdag".

Pechlin first appears prominently in Swedish politics in 1760, when by suddenly changing sides he contrived to save the Hats from impeachment. Enraged at being thus excluded from power by their former friend, the Caps procured Pechlin's expulsion from the two following Riksdags. In 1769 Pechlin sold the Hats as he had formerly sold the Caps, and was largely instrumental in preventing the projected indispensable reform of the Swedish constitution. During the revolution of 1772 he escaped from Stockholm and kept quietly in the background. In 1786, when the opposition against Gustavus III was gathering strength, Pechlin reappeared in the Riksdag as one of the leaders of the malcontents, and is said to have been at the same time in the pay of the Russian court. In 1789 he was one of the deputies whom Gustavus III kept under lock and key until he had changed the government into a semi-absolute monarchy.

It is fairly certain that Pechlin was behind the plot for murdering Gustavus in 1792. On the eve of the assassination (16 March) the principal conspirators met at his house to make their final preparations and discuss the form of government which should be adopted after the king's death. Pechlin undertook to crowd the fatal masquerade with accomplices, but took care not to be there personally. He was arrested on 23 March but nothing definite could ever be proved against him. Nevertheless, he was condemned to imprisonment in the fortress of Varberg, where he died four years later.

References

Attribution:

1720 births
1796 deaths
Swedish politicians
Swedish Army major generals
Swedish nobility
Gustavian era people
Age of Liberty people

Carl Fredrik Pechlin


Cell division protein kinase 10 is an enzyme that in humans is encoded by the CDK10 gene.

Function

The protein encoded by this gene belongs to the CDK subfamily of the Ser/Thr protein kinase family. The CDK subfamily members are highly similar to the gene products of S. cerevisiae cdc28, and S. pombe cdc2, and are known to be essential for cell cycle progression. This kinase has been shown to play a role in cellular proliferation. Its function is limited to cell cycle G2-M phase. At least three alternatively spliced transcript variants encoding different isoforms have been reported, two of which contain multiple non-AUG translation initiation sites.

Interactions

Cyclin-dependent kinase 10 has been shown to interact with ETS2.

References

Further reading

External links

Cell cycle
EC 2.7.11

Cyclin-dependent kinase 10


Antoine ("Tony") Wright, born 4 March 1960, is a Vanuatuan politician.

Having studied in Morocco and at the International School in Bordeaux in France, he worked at the French embassy in Vanuatu.

He was first elected to Parliament in the October 2012 general election, as MP for Port Vila, representing the Union of Moderate Parties - a francophone, generally conservative political movement. When Prime Minister Sato Kilman lost the confidence of Parliament on 23 October 2013, new Prime Minister Moana Carcasses Kalosil (of the Green Confederation) appointed Wright as Minister for Youth and Sports within his broad coalition government. In February 2014, he was one of several government MPs to defect to the Opposition, but then defected back to the government a few days later to retain his Cabinet position. He lost office when the Carcasses government was brought down by a motion of no confidence on 15 May 2014.

In June 2015, following a further change of government which returned Sato Kilman to power, Wright became a government backbencher. In October 2015, together with several other MPs, Wright was convicted of bribery by the Vanuatu Supreme Court. The court found that he had accepted a payment of 1,000,000 vatu from Moana Carcasses in return for support in the motion of no-confidence that brought the Kilman government to power.

References

1960 births
Members of the Parliament of Vanuatu
Union of Moderate Parties politicians
Government ministers of Vanuatu
Living people

Antoine Wright (politician)


Aslam Farrukhi () (23 October 1923 – 15 June 2016) was an Urdu author, literary critic, linguist, scholar, and radio scriptwriter from Pakistan. He is also known for writing children's books. He remained associated as a professor and chairman with the Department of Urdu, University of Karachi, for many years.

Early life
Aslam Farrukhi was born on 23 October 1923 into a literary family of Lucknow, British India. His ancestors had come to Lucknow from the nearby town Farrukhabad, hence the family name being used here is Farrukhi. After the independence of Pakistan in 1947, he migrated with his family to Karachi, Pakistan in September 1947.

He completed his education from the then Federal Urdu College, now known as Federal Urdu University and the University of Karachi. His PhD degree thesis was on the 19th century writer Muhammad Husain Azad which won the Adamjee Literary Award in 1965.

Career
He started out his career at Radio Pakistan as a scriptwriter for radio plays. Later Aslam Farrukhi taught at Sindh Muslim College, now known as Sindh Madressatul Islam University  and at Karachi University, where he also served as registrar. His son is scholar Asif Farrukhi who also was a co-founder of Karachi Literature Festival. He was associated as professor and retired as chairman with the Department of Urdu, University of Karachi, for many years, and with Radio Pakistan for more than six years. He was among the country's few writers of children's literature.

Awards and recognition
 Pride of Performance Award by the President of Pakistan in 2009.
 Adamjee Literary Award in 1965

Death
Aslam Farrukhi died on June 15, 2016, in Gulshan e Iqbal, Karachi and was buried in Karachi University Graveyard on June 16, 2016, after Zohar Prayer. Among the survivors are his wife and two sons.

Bibliography
  Muhammad Hussain Azad: Hayat-o-Tasaneef - Life and Writings of the 19th century author Muhammad Husain Azad
 Guldasta-e-Ahbab
 Aangann main Sitaray
 Farid-o-Fard-i-Fareed - a book on the life of 13th century Sufi Baba Fariduddin Ganjshakar
 Dabistan-e-Nizam (Publisher:Pakistan Writers Cooperative Society)
 Bachon Ke Sultanjee - a book on the works of 13th century Sufi Khwaja Nizamuddin Auliya who were also lovingly nicknamed 'Sultanjee'
 Bachon ke Ranga Rung Amir Khusraw
 Urdu Ki Pehli Kitab for children
 Mausam-i-Bahar Jaisay Log
 Saat Asman
 Lal, Sabz Kabootar
 Raunaq-i-Bazm-i-Jahan

See also
 List of Pakistani poets
 List of Pakistani writers

References

External links
  Aslam Farrukhi honoured - Daily Dawn
  Aslam Farrukhi Rare Picture
  Urdu Bandhan

1923 births
2016 deaths
Writers from Lucknow
Muhajir people
Urdu-language poets from Pakistan
Pakistani children's writers
Pakistani literary critics
Linguists from Pakistan
Linguists of Urdu
Pakistani scholars
Pakistani educators
Urdu-language writers
Urdu critics
Recipients of the Pride of Performance
Academic staff of the University of Karachi
Writers from Karachi
Urdu-language children's writers
20th-century Pakistani poets
Academics from Karachi
People from Karachi

Aslam Farrukhi


In architecture, a squinch is a triangular corner that supports the base of a dome. Its visual purpose is to translate a rectangle into an octagon. See also: pendentive.

Construction

A squinch is typically formed by a masonry arch that spans a square corner.

History in the Middle East

The dome chamber in the Palace of Ardashir, the Sassanid king, in Firuzabad, Iran, is the earliest surviving example of the use of the squinch, suggesting that the squinch may have been invented in Persia. After the rise of Islam, it was used in the Middle East in both eastern Romanesque and Islamic architecture. It remained a feature of Islamic architecture, especially in Iran, and was often covered by corbelled stalactite-like structures known as muqarnas.

History in Western Europe
It spread to the Romanesque architecture of western Europe, one example being the Normans' 12th-century church of San Cataldo, Palermo, in Sicily. This has three domes, each supported by four doubled squinches.

Etymology
The word may possibly originate, the Oxford English Dictionary suggests, from the French word escoinson, meaning "from an angle", which became the English word "scuncheon" and then "scunch".

References

External links

Domes
Arches and vaults
Architectural elements
Islamic architectural elements

Squinch


Huybrecht Beuckeleer, Huybrecht Beuckelaer or the Monogrammist HB (Antwerp, 1535/40 – possibly in England, after 1605 and before 1625) was a Flemish painter who is mainly known for his genre paintings, still lifes and portraits.  He was trained in Antwerp and also worked in Italy, France and England.  In England he was court painter to Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester.

In 1997 the artist was identified with the artist known by the notname 'Monogrammist HB' and as a result more works have been attributed to him. Although the artist only left a small body of work, he played a role in the development of genre and still life painting in Northern Europe.

Life

Details about the life of the artist are scarce.  Huybrecht Beuckeleer was born in Antwerp in a family of painters.  His father Mattheus Beuckelaer was registered as a master in the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1535. Huybrecht is believed to have been the brother of Joachim Beuckelaer who was a prominent painter of kitchen and market scenes. His father's sister Kathelijne was married to Pieter Aertsen, a Dutch painter active in Antwerp who was best known for his market and kitchen scenes.

Huybrecht Beuckeleer likely studied initially with his father. He is presumed to have trained also in the workshop of his uncle Pieter Aertsen.   By the early 1560s, Aertsen had left for Amsterdam. Huybrecht 's brother Joachim operated at that time a successful workshop in which he produced kitchen and market scenes.  There is uncertainty about the role of Huybrecht in his brother's workshop.  However it is clear that the brothers' early works were heavily influenced by Aertsen in style as well as subject matter. It is known that the artist collaborated with Antonis Mor for day wages just like his brother.

There is evidence of extensive travel in the period 1567–68. Huybrecht was mentioned in Antwerp in January 1567.  Not long thereafter he was said to be 'travelling in various foreign countries in order to see the land and learn the language, and to practise his trade as a painter and thus earn his living'. It has been suggested on stylistic grounds that he may have trained in Bronzino's workshop in Florence as early as the mid-1550s. There is no documentary evidence to support this hypothesis. In September 1568 Huybrecht Beuckeleer had returned to Antwerp where he married Anna Lambrechts. He had a son by her, Daniel Beuckeleer. His wife was recorded as deceased in April 1569. He inherited a rent on a house from her. He had to buy out the inheritance of his son Daniel on 14 April 1569. In 1574 there is a record of him sending from Bordeaux a letter to the mother of his first wife telling her that he is faring better there than in Antwerp.

He was back in Antwerp in October 1577 when he sold the rent he had inherited from his first wife. He married a second time in 1577.  His second wife was Susanna Key; the daughter of the painter Willem Key who had already died by that time. He became an independent master in the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke only in 1579. The artist was last mentioned in Antwerp in 1585.  It is believed that around this time, which coincides with the Fall of Antwerp, he moved to England.  Here he was likely active as a portrait artist.  He probably worked for The Earl of Leicester. He was mentioned in a list of names of people from the Low Countries, probably from 1586. In the list he is referred to as "Hubert Bücheler (or Hubert Bucheler) in Greenwich".  The Earl of Leicester who was possibly his last patron died in 1605. A picture maker by the name of Daniel Buckler mentioned in a list of foreign artists as having died in London in 1625 is believed to have been his son.

Work

Rediscovery

The art historian Johannes Sievers had identified a small group of works with certain stylistic idiosyncrasies and classified them under the notname the Monogrammist HB in 1911 (J. Sievers, Joachim Bueckeleer, in: Jahrbuch der preußischen Kunstsammlungen, 32, 1911, pp. 210–212). The work and artistic personality of the artist given this notname were first defined in 1976 by the art historian Detlev Kreidl in his analysis of the Prodigal Son Feasting with harlots (the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels) and The kitchen maid and her helpers (in the same museum).  The two works had been attributed over the years to both Joachim Beuckelaer and Aertsen. The two paintings were found to bear the monogram HB and in 1997 infra-red reflectography conducted on The kitchen maid and her helpers revealed the signature 'Beuckler' and a date of 1570 or 1676 next to the already familiar monogram HB.  Based on this discovery Kreidl was able to identify the 'Monogrammist HB' as Huybrecht Beuckeleer.  The first Passover feast (Sotheby's New York sale, 26 January 2012, lot 105) is another painting previously attributed to Joachim that was reattributed to Huybrecht.

Only about half a dozen paintings have been attributed to Huybrecht Beuckeleer.  His small output is likely attributable to the fact that he worked for others or in the workshop of other artists. Only a few of his works are clearly dated:The first Passover feast (Sotheby's New York sale, 26 January 2012, lot 105) and The Holy Family with Saint Anne (sale Dorotheum, Vienna, 19 April 2016, lot 34) are both dated 1563.  The kitchen maid and her helpers has a date of either 1570 or 1576.

The subject matter of Huybrecht is similar to that of his brother Joachim and Aertsen and includes kitchen and market scenes as well as some religious compositions and portraits.  A still life has also been attributed to the artist.

Style characteristics
Sievers had in 1911 already identified the main differences between the works of Huybrecht (whom he knew as the Monogrammist HB) and his brother Joachim.  The distinctive traits identified by Sievers point to a greater realism and naturalness in Huybrecht's work when compared to that of his brother.  Sievers found Huybrecht's treatment of the human body to display a higher degree of three-dimensionality and detail and his figures to be more individualized in the treatment of the head.  Huybrecht further adopted a freer treatment of certain details such as the hair and beards.  His figures are placed in a more relaxed arrangement and their gestures and movements appear to be more fluent and naturalistic.  Detlev Kreindl expanded on Sievers' earlier conclusions in 1976. Kreidl highlighted that Huybrecht's figures are more statuesque and sculptural in handling.  Kreidl also posited a similarity between Huybrecht's works and portraits from the circle of the Florentine painter Bronzino.  It is precisely the sculptural treatment of his figures and the crisp modelling of the faces, which are regarded as evidence of the influence of the Florentine master.  Kreidl suggests that possibly he trained in Bronzino's workshop as early as the mid-1550s. On the basis of these characteristics Kreidl reattributed two portraits (art market) previously given to Santi di Tito to Huybrecht.

In their energetic and bold drawing of the main outlines of their compositions the brothers also show their common artistic background. Huybrecht's handling of various textures and patterns also suggests the influence of Anthonis Mor, with whom he is believed to have collaborated in the early 1560s in Antwerp.  A Portrait of a man in the Mauritshuis in The Hague is signed and dated 'Mor 1561'.  It is generally believed that only the head was painted by Mor while the rest was finished by an assistant in his workshop.  It has been suggested that that assistant could be Huybrecht Beuckelaer because of his particular skill in rendering fabrics.

The first Passover feast (Sotheby's New York sale, 26 January 2012, lot 105) illustrates Huybrecht's technique.  In this work he employed a formula already used by Aertsen in the early 1550s. It is characterised by the high viewpoint, which allows every aspect of the scene, in this case, the Passover Feast, to be explained in detail. The scale of the composition is relatively large and the figures are almost lifelike positioned in the immediate foreground.  These traits clearly show his indebtedness to the colorful naturalism of Aertsen's later works of this type.  The scene is dominated by the large figures who are distributed on all levels of the pictorial space and connected by eye contact and individual gestures.  Huybrechts demonstrates in this picture that he could give a more elegant and idealized treatment of figures than Aertsen's or his brother Joachim.

Market and kitchen scenes
The market and kitchen scenes showing the lavish produce available in Antwerp at the time have often been interpreted as showcasing the prosperity of Antwerp, the then most important trading port in the Netherlands. Others see the compositions as satirical and bearing a moralistic intention. Some commentators have pointed to the erotic tension between the various actors in the scenes.  For instance, the composition The kitchen maid and her helpers shows a cook standing in front of a fireplace, while she holds a big cabbage under her left arm and her right hand points to a chicken on a spit. A kitchen boy sitting at her feet on a bench with a dog on his lap is turning the spit. With his right hand he points to a young kitchen helper behind the kitchen maid.  This young helper is placing a pot on a kitchen counter and is returning the boy's gaze. The kitchen interior is unmistakably dominated by erotic tension between the kitchen boy and the older kitchen maid. The big dog in the lap of the kitchen boy refers to his sexual desire while various comical and farcical foods, such as the rotisserie chicken, the cauldron of porridge, the cucumbers and the large cabbage under the arm of the kitchen maid indicate that she is available.  In The egg seller another popular theme of Flemish genre art is depicted: that of the unequal love between an older man and a younger woman.

His Prodigal son feasting with harlots is not only a kitchen style scene but also falls in the category of the 'loose company' or 'merry company' painting genre developed earlier in the century by Jan Sanders van Hemessen.  Beuckeleer depicts the subject in the form of a rendezvous between an elegantly dressed young couple sitting at a table.  On the table a lavish still life is displayed, adding to the impression of upscale taste.  The elegant man has clearly started his wooing earlier by playing the lute at his side.  However, the actions of the servants makes clear that the true nature of the setting is that of a brothel rather than that of an upscale dwelling.  Like Jan Sanders van Hemessen did in his earlier treatment of this subject, Beuckeleer included in his picture another scene from the biblical story of the prodigal son: in the background on the left the prodigal son is seen eating pig swill after he has squandered his inheritance and fallen on hard times.

Still life

A still life referred to as Blackberries, cherries, pears, melons and other fruits, parsnips, bread, cheese and a waffle, roemer, tazza and salt cellar on a draped table (At Christie's on 16 October 2013 in Paris lot 69) has been attributed to Huybrecht Beuckeleer on the basis of the similarities with the still life included in the Prodigal son feasting with harlots of the Royal Museums of Fine Arts in Brussels.

This still life makes clear that Huybrecht Beuckeleer played a role in the development of the genre of still life painting in the 16th century.  In its skilfully organized and balanced composition this still life shows him to be independent from Aertsen's models. This still life prefigures the later works of Floris van Dyck (circa 1575-1651) and Nicolaes Gillis (1595-around 1632).

References

External links

1530s births
17th-century deaths
Flemish Renaissance painters
Flemish history painters
Flemish genre painters
Flemish still life painters
Flemish portrait painters
Painters from Antwerp

Huybrecht Beuckeleer


Lemuel Dale Evans (January 8, 1810 – July 1, 1877) was a U.S. Representative from Texas.

Born in Tennessee, Evans studied law and was admitted to the bar. He moved to Marshall, Texas, in 1843 and engaged in the practice of law. He served as member of the State convention that annexed the State of Texas to the Union in 1845.

Evans was elected as the candidate of the American Party to the Thirty-fourth Congress (March 4, 1855 – March 3, 1857). He was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1856 to the Thirty-fifth Congress. He served as collector of internal revenue in 1867. He served as member of the reconstruction convention in 1868 and as chief justice of the supreme court in 1870 and 1871. He served as associate justice and presiding judge from 1872 to 1873, when he resigned. In 1875, he was the United States marshal for the eastern judicial district of Texas. He died in Washington, D.C., on July 1, 1877. He was interred in the Congressional Cemetery.

Sources

1810 births
1877 deaths
Members of the United States House of Representatives from Texas
Burials at the Congressional Cemetery
Texas Know Nothings
United States Marshals
Know-Nothing members of the United States House of Representatives from Texas
Chief Justices of the Texas Supreme Court
19th-century American politicians
19th-century American judges

Lemuel D. Evans


The term anxiety disorder  is a term for a number of psychiatric disorders. These disorders can be classified into two very broad groups:

Disorders that are marked by extreme worry about the past, present or future.
Disorders that are marked by fear of a given object or situation.

Anxiety conditions include phobia, social anxiety disorder and generalized anxiety disorder. Other anxiety disorders include agoraphobia and panic disorder. Stress from life events, including past abuse, being intimidated or health worries, can trigger anxiety problems for many people. Symptoms include headache, spasms in the muscle, trembling, fatigue and exhaustion. There are various manners for treating anxiety disorders. These include medication and therapy. There is some recent research.

When people talk about feeling, they use the words anxiety and fear without making much of a difference. When professionals talk about them, there is a difference, though: Fear always has a cause, people are afraid of something or of something happening. So fear is the emotional response to an external threat. Anxiety is more general, the cause is either not known, or not controllable easily.

Both fear and anxiety are normal reactions, to protect against a threat. Someone feeling fear or anxiety now and then does not have an anxiety disorder. Only when they occur so often that they impact people's lives do they become a disorder.

References

Anxiety disorder


Christine Elaine Soteros is a Canadian applied mathematician. She is professor and acting head of the department of mathematics and statistics at the University of Saskatchewan, and site director of the Pacific Institute for the Mathematical Sciences for their Saskatchewan site. Her research involves the folding and packing behavior of DNA, proteins, and other string-like biomolecules, and the knot theory of random space curves.

Soteros graduated from the University of Windsor in 1980.
She completed her Ph.D. in chemical engineering at Princeton University in 1988. Her dissertation, Studies of Metal Hydride Phase Transitions Using the Cluster Variation Method, was supervised by Carol K. Hall. After postdoctoral research at the University of Toronto, working with Stuart Whittington and De Witt Sumners, she became a faculty member at the University of Saskatchewan in 1989.

References

External links
Home page

Canadian mathematicians
Women mathematicians
University of Windsor alumni
Princeton University alumni
Academic staff of the University of Saskatchewan
Year of birth missing (living people)
Living people

Chris Soteros


In real estate investing, displaced sales are the opposite of leakage. Essentially, displaced sales are purchases made far out of a consumer's local economic area, even if that local economic area has comparable goods. Displaced sales are sales which come into a firm from outside. Leaked sales are sales, which are not made inside a firm, even if that firm has comparable goods.

References

Investment
Real estate terminology

Displaced sales


James Smith Reid, FBA (1846–1926) was an English author, scholar and historian.

He was educated at the City of London School, which was then in Milk Street, Cheapside, whose masters included Joseph Hirst Lupton.

He was appointed the first Professor of Ancient History at the University of Cambridge, serving from 1899 to 1925.

He was author of numerous articles in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed., 1911) and a great number of Latin textbooks, and also translated Cicero's Academica.

Works
[https://archive.org/details/cu31924028267353 The Municipalities of the Roman Empire] (Cambridge: University Press, 1913)

References

1846 births
1926 deaths
19th-century English historians
20th-century English historians
Professors of Ancient History (Cambridge)

James Smith Reid (author)


Akeem Anifowoshe (11 September 1968 – 1 December 1994), popular as "Kid" Akeem, was a Nigerian Super Flyweight professional boxer.

He is best known for his performance in Ring Magazine's 1991 Fight of the Year, which he lost to Robert Quiroga by a close but bruising unanimous decision .

He was challenging Quiroga for his International Boxing Federation Super Flyweight title.  Shortly after the decision was announced, Anifowoshe collapsed in the ring and was rushed to emergency surgery to remove a bloodclot from his brain.

After being injured in the Quiroga fight, Anifowoshe was not allowed to fight in the United States again. There are reports that he turned to drug trafficking and was deported back to Nigeria, where he picked up boxing again after a while. Reports vary on exactly how he died, some say he had boxed in an ill-advised professional match in Nigeria and collapsed in the shower afterward, some say he collapsed after a training session.

It is known that his death was attributed to the brain injury sustained in his fight with Quiroga.  Called by trainer Miguel Diaz the fighter with the most natural talent he ever trained and a recipient of an honorable mention in the Ring's 1987 "Prospect of the Year" selections, Anifowoshe has a final record of 23 wins against only 1 defeat. A hard puncher, he won 18 of his professional fights by knockout.

External links

1968 births
Yoruba sportspeople
Super-flyweight boxers
1994 deaths
Nigerian male boxers

Akeem Anifowoshe


A bootleg recording is an audio or video recording of a performance or song by an artist which was not officially released by the artist. The process of distributing or making such recordings is called bootlegging.

Recordings may be copied and traded between fans of an artist without profit. But some bootleggers have sold recordings for profit. They sometimes add professional-quality sound engineering and/or packaging to the raw material.

Bootlegs are usually made of either unreleased studio recordings, live performances or interviews with a level of quality that can't be predicted.

Bootlegging dates back to the 16th and 17th centuries, around the time of William Shakespeare.

In the early 20th century, movie soundtracks were often bootlegged. One example was a bootleg of Judy Garland. She performed Annie Get Your Gun. That was before Betty Hutton replaced her early in production. It happened after a full soundtrack had been recorded.

Bootlegging increased between the 1960s and 2000s. One of the most praised bootlegs in the 1980s is Prince's studio album The Black Album. In December 1987, Prince ordered the album taken down because of a few advance copies being used to make bootlegs.

The rise in popularity of the video sharing website YouTube caused it to be a major carrier of bootleg recordings. Its owner, Google, believes that under the "safe harbor" rule of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), it cannot be held responsible for content. That allows bootleg media to be hosted on it without any fear of a lawsuit. In 2010 Youtube removed a 15-minute limit on videos. That allowed entire concerts to be uploaded by fans and bootleggers.

References

Property crimes
Copyright

Bootleg recording