Khufu or Cheops was an ancient Egyptian monarch who was the second pharaoh of the Fourth Dynasty, in the first half of the Old Kingdom period (26th century BC). Khufu succeeded his father Sneferu as king. He is generally accepted as having commissioned the Great Pyramid of Giza, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, but many other aspects of his reign are poorly documented.

The only completely preserved portrait of the king is a three-inch high ivory figurine found in a temple ruin of a later period at Abydos in 1903. All other reliefs and statues were found in fragments, and many buildings of Khufu are lost. Everything known about Khufu comes from inscriptions in his necropolis at Giza and later documents. For example, Khufu is the main character noted in the Westcar Papyrus from the 13th dynasty.

Most documents that mention king Khufu were written by ancient Egyptian and Greek historians around 300 BC. Khufu's obituary is presented there in a conflicting way: while the king enjoyed a long-lasting cultural heritage preservation during the period of the Old Kingdom and the New Kingdom, the ancient historians Manetho, Diodorus and Herodotus hand down a very negative depiction of Khufu's character. Thanks to these documents, an obscure and critical picture of Khufu's personality persists.

Khufu's name
Khufu's name was dedicated to the god Khnum, which might point to an increase of Khnum's popularity and religious importance. In fact, several royal and religious titles introduced at this time may point out that Egyptian pharaohs sought to accentuate their divine origin and status by dedicating their official cartouche names to certain deities. Khufu may have viewed himself as a divine creator, a role that was already given to Khnum, the god of creation and growth. As a consequence, the king connected Khnum's name with his own. Khufu's full name (Khnum-khufu) means "Khnum protect me". While modern Egyptological pronunciation renders his name as Khufu, at the time of his reign his name was probably pronounced as Kha(w)yafwi(y), and during the Hellenized era, Khewaf(w).

The pharaoh officially used two versions of his birth name: Khnum-khuf and Khufu. The first (complete) version clearly exhibits Khufu's religious loyalty to Khnum, the second (shorter) version does not. It is unknown as to why the king would use a shortened name version since it hides the name of Khnum and the king's name connection to this god. It might be possible though, that the short name was not meant to be connected to any god at all.

Khufu is well known under his Hellenized name , Khéops or Cheops (, , by Diodorus and Herodotus) and less well known under another Hellenized name, , Súphis (, , by Manetho). A rare version of the name of Khufu, used by Josephus, is , Sofe (, ). Arab historians, who wrote mystic stories about Khufu and the Giza pyramids, called him Saurid () or Salhuk (سلهوق).

Family

Khufu's origin

The royal family of Khufu was quite large. It is uncertain if Khufu was actually the biological son of Sneferu. Egyptologists believe Sneferu was Khufu's father, but only because it was handed down by later historians that the eldest son or a selected descendant would inherit the throne. In 1925 the tomb of queen Hetepheres I, G 7000x, was found east of Khufu's pyramid. It contained many precious grave goods, and several inscriptions give her the title Mut-nesut (meaning "mother of a king"), together with the name of king Sneferu. Therefore, it seemed clear at first that Hetepheres was the wife of Sneferu, and that they were Khufu's parents. More recently, however, some have doubted this theory, because Hetepheres is not known to have borne the title Hemet-nesut (meaning "king's wife"), a title indispensable to confirm a queen's royal status.

Instead of the spouse's title, Hetepheres bore only the title Sat-netjer-khetef (verbatim: "daughter of his divine body"; symbolically: "king's bodily daughter"), a title mentioned for the first time. As a result, researchers now think Khufu may not have been Sneferu's biological son, but that Sneferu legitimised Khufu's rank and familial position by marriage. By apotheosizing his mother as the daughter of a living god, Khufu's new rank was secured. This theory may be supported by the circumstance that Khufu's mother was buried close to her son and not in the necropolis of her husband, as it was to be expected.

Family tree
The following list presents family members, which can be assigned to Khufu with certainty.Parents:
 Sneferu: Most possibly his father, maybe just stepfather. Famous pharaoh and builder of three pyramids.
 Hetepheres I: Most possibly his mother. Wife of king Sneferu and well known for her precious grave goods found at Giza.

Spouses:
 Meritites I: First wife of Khufu.
 Henutsen: Second wife of Khufu. She is mentioned on the famous Inventory Stela.

Brothers and Sisters:
 Hetepheres: Wife of Ankhhaf.
 Ankhhaf: The eldest brother. His nephew would later become pharaoh Khafra.
 Nefermaat: Half-brother; buried at Meidum and owner of the famous "mastaba of the geese".
 Rahotep: Elder brother or half-brother. Owner of a life-size double statue portraying him and his wife Nofret, displayed in the Egyptian Museum of Cairo.

Sons of Khufu:
 Kawab: Most possibly the eldest son and crown prince, he died before Khufu's own end of reign and thus did not follow Khufu on the throne.
 Djedefra: Also known as Radjedef and Ratoises. Became the first throne successor.
 Khafre: Most possibly second throne successor.
 Djedefhor: Also known as Hordjedef, mentioned in Papyrus Westcar.
 Baufra: Possibly a son of Khufu, but neither archaeologically nor contemporarily attested. Only known from two much later documents.
 Babaef I: Also known as Khnum-baef I.
 Khufukhaf I: Also known as Kaefkhufu I.
 Minkhaf I.
 Horbaef.

Daughters:
 Nefertiabet: Known for her beautiful slab stelae.
 Hetepheres II: Wife of prince Kawab, later married to pharaoh Djedefra.
 Meresankh II.
 Meritites II: Married to Akhethotep.
 Khamerernebty I: Wife of king Khafra and mother of Menkaura.

Grandchildren:
 Duaenhor: Son of Kawab and possibly eldest grandchild.
 Kaemsekhem: Second son of Kawab.
 Mindjedef: Also known as Djedefmin.
 Djaty: Son of Horbaef.
 Iunmin I: Son of Khafre.

Nephews and nieces:
 Hemiunu: Director of the building of Khufu's great pyramid.
 Nefertkau III: Daughter of Meresankh II.
Djedi: Son of Rahotep and Nofret
Itu: Son of Rahotep and Nofret
Neferkau: Son of Rahotep and Nofret
Mereret: Daughter of Rahotep and Nofret
Nedjemib: Daughter of Rahotep and Nofret
Sethtet: Daughter of Rahotep and Nofret

Reign

Length of reign
It is still unclear how long exactly Khufu ruled over Egypt. Dates from Khufu's final years suggest that he was approaching his 30-year jubilee, but may have just missed it.

One of them was found at the Dakhla Oasis in the Libyan Desert. Khufu's serekh name is carved in a rock inscription reporting the "Mefat-travelling in the year after the 13th (biennial) cattle count under Hor-Medjedu", reignal year 27.

Several papyrus fragments, known as the Diary of Merer, were found at Khufu's harbor at Wadi al-Jarf. They log the transport of limestone blocks from Tura to the Great Pyramid of Giza in the "year after the 13th cattle count under Hor-Medjedw".

The highest known date from Khufu's reign is related to his funeral. Four graffiti from the western of two rock-cut pits along the south side of the Great Pyramid attest a date from the 28th or 29th reignal year of Khufu: the 14th census, month 1 of the season Shemu (our spring-early summer).

The Royal Canon of Turin from the 19th Dynasty, gives 23 years of rulership for Khufu. The ancient historian Herodotus gives 50 years, and the ancient historian Manetho even credits him 63 years of reign. These figures are now considered an exaggeration or a misinterpretation of antiquated sources.

Political activities
There are only a few hints about Khufu's political activities within and outside Egypt. Within Egypt, Khufu is documented in several building inscriptions and statues. Khufu's name appears in inscriptions at Elkab and Elephantine and in local quarries at Hatnub and Wadi Hammamat. At Saqqara two terracotta figures of the goddess Bastet were found, on which, at their bases, the horus name of Khufu is incised. They were deposited at Saqqara during the Middle Kingdom, but their creation can be dated back to Khufu's reign.

Wadi Maghareh

At Wadi Maghareh in the Sinai a rock inscription depicts Khufu with the double crown. Khufu sent several expeditions in an attempt to find turquoise and copper mines. Like other kings, such as Sekhemkhet, Sneferu and Sahure, who are also depicted in impressive reliefs there, he was looking for those two precious materials. Khufu also entertained contacts with Byblos. He sent several expeditions to Byblos in an attempt to trade copper tools and weapons for precious Lebanon cedar wood. This kind of wood was essential for building large and stable funerary boats and indeed the boats discovered at the Great Pyramid were made of it.

Wadi al-Jarf
New evidence regarding political activities under Khufu's reign has recently been found at the site of the ancient port of Wadi al-Jarf on the Red Sea coast in the east of Egypt. The first traces of such a harbour were excavated in 1823 by John Gardner Wilkinson and James Burton, but the site was quickly abandoned and then forgotten over time. In 1954, French scholars François Bissey and René Chabot-Morisseau re-excavated the harbour, but their works were brought to an end by the Suez Crisis in 1956. In June 2011, an archaeological team led by French Egyptologists Pierre Tallet and Gregory Marouard, organized by the French Institute of Oriental Archeology (IFAO), restarted work at the site. Among other material, a collection of hundreds of papyrus fragments were found in 2013 dating back 4500 years. The papyrus is currently exhibited at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. The Egyptian archaeologist Zahi Hawass called this ancient papyrus "the greatest discovery in Egypt in the 21st century."

Ten of these papyri are very well preserved. The majority of these documents date to the 27th year of Khufu's reign and describe how the central administration sent food and supplies to the sailors and wharf workers. The dating of these important documents is secured by phrases typical for the Old Kingdom period, as well as the fact that the letters are addressed to the king himself, using his Horus name. This was typical when the king in question was still alive; when the ruler was dead he was addressed by his cartouche name or birth name. One document is of special interest: the diary of Merer, an official involved in the building of the Great Pyramid. Using the diary, researchers were able to reconstruct three months of his life, providing new insight into the everyday lives of people of the Fourth Dynasty. These papyri are the earliest examples of imprinted papyri ever found in Egypt. Another inscription, found on the limestone walls of the harbor, mentions the head of the royal scribes controlling the exchange of goods: Idu.

Khufu's cartouche name is also inscribed on some of the heavy limestone blocks at the site. The harbor was of strategic and economic importance to Khufu because ships brought precious materials, such as turquoise, copper and ore from the southern tip of the Sinai peninsula. The papyri fragments show several storage lists naming the delivered goods. The papyri also mention a certain harbour at the opposite coast of Wadi al-Jarf, on the western shore of the Sinai Peninsula, where the ancient fortress Tell Ras Budran was excavated in 1960 by Gregory Mumford. The papyri and the fortress together reveal an explicit sailing route across the Red Sea for the very first time in history. It is the oldest archaeologically detected sailing route of Ancient Egypt. According to Tallet, the harbor could also have been one of the legendary high sea harbours of Ancient Egypt, from where expeditions to the infamous gold land Punt had started.

Monuments and statues

Statues

The only three-dimensional depiction of Khufu that has survived time nearly completely is a small and well restored ivory figurine known as the Khufu Statuette. It shows the king with the Red Crown of Lower Egypt. The king is seated on a throne with a short backrest, at the left side of his knees the Horus-name Medjedu is preserved, and, at the right side, a fragment of the lower part of the cartouche name Khnum-Khuf is visible. Khufu holds a flail in his left hand and his right hand rests together with his lower arm on his right upper leg. The artifact was found in 1903 by Flinders Petrie at Kom el-Sultan near Abydos. The figurine was found headless; according to Petrie, it was caused by an accident while digging. When Petrie recognized the importance of the find, he stopped all other work and offered a reward to any workman who could find the head. Three weeks later the head was found after intense sifting in a deeper level of the room rubble.

Today the little statue is restored and on display in the Egyptian Museum of Cairo in room 32 under its inventory number JE 36143. Most Egyptologists believe the statuette is contemporary, but some scholars, such as Zahi Hawass, think that it was an artistic reproduction of the 26th dynasty. He argues that no building that clearly dates to the Fourth Dynasty was ever excavated at Kom el-Sultan or Abydos. Furthermore, he points out that the face of Khufu is unusually squat and chubby and shows no emotional expression. Hawass compared the facial stylistics with statues of contemporary kings, such as Sneferu, Khaefra and Menkaura. The faces of these three kings are of even beauty, slender and with a kindly expression – the clear result of idealistic motivations; they are not based on reality. The appearance of Khufu on the ivory statue instead looks like the artist did not care very much about professionalism or diligence.

He believes Khufu himself would never have allowed the display of such a comparatively sloppy work. And finally, Hawass also argues that the sort of throne the figurine sits on does not match the artistic styles of any Old Kingdom artifact. Old Kingdom thrones had a backrest that reached up to the neck of the king. But the ultimate proof that convinces Hawass about the statue being a reproduction of much later time is the Nehenekh flail in Khufu's left hand. Depictions of a king with such a flail as a ceremonial insignia appear no earlier than the Middle Kingdom. Zahi Hawass therefore concludes that the figurine was possibly made as an amulet or lucky charm to sell to pious citizens.

Deitrich Wildung has examined the representation of Nubian features in Egyptian iconography since the predynastic era and has argued that Khufu had these specific, Nubian features and this was represented in his statues.

It is often said that the small figurine is the only preserved statue of Khufu. This is not quite correct. Excavations at Saqqara in 2001 and 2003 revealed a pair of terracotta statues depicting a lion goddess (possibly Bastet or Sekhmet). On her feet two figures of childlike kings are preserved. While the right figurine can be identified as king Khufu by his Horus name, the left one depicts king Pepy I of 6th dynasty, called by his birth name. The figurines of Pepy were added to the statue groups in later times, because they were placed separately and at a distance from the deity.

This is inconsistent with a typical statue group of the Old Kingdom — normally all statue groups were built as an artistic unit. The two statue groups are similar to each other in size and scale but differ in that one lion goddess holds a scepter. The excavators point out that the statues were restored during the Middle Kingdom, after they were broken apart. However, it seems that the reason for the restoration lay more in an interest in the goddess, than in a royal cult around the king figures: their names were covered with gypsum.

The Palermo Stone reports on its fragment C-2 the creation of two oversize standing statues for the king; one is said to have been made of copper, the other of pure gold.

Furthermore, several alabaster and travertine fragments of seated statues, which were found by George Reisner during his excavations at Giza, were once inscribed with Khufu's full royal titulary. Today, the complete or partially preserved cartouches with the name Khufu or Khnum-Khuf remain. One of the fragments, that of a small seated statue, shows the legs and feet of a sitting king from the knuckles downward. To the right of them the name ...fu in a cartouche is visible, and it can easily be reconstructed as the cartouche name Khufu.

Two further objects are on display at the Roemer- und Pelizaeus-Museum Hildesheim. These are also made of alabaster. One of them shows the head of a cat goddess (most probably Bastet or Sekhmet). The position of her right arm suggests that the bust once belonged to a statue group similar to the well known triad of Mycerinus.

Several statue heads might have belonged to Khufu. One of them is the so-called "Brooklyn head" of the Brooklyn Museum in New York City. It is 54,3 cm large and made of pink granite. Because of its chubby cheeks the head is assigned to Khufu as well as to king Huni. A similar object is on display at the State Collection of Egyptian Art in Munich. The head is made of limestone and is comparatively small at only 5,7 cm.

Reliefs
Khufu is depicted in several relief fragments found scattered in his necropolis and elsewhere. All reliefs were made of finely polished limestone. Some of them originate from the ruined pyramid temple and the destroyed causeway, where they once covered the walls completely. Others were found re-used in the pyramid necropolis of king Amenemhet I at Lisht and at Tanis and Bubastis. One of the relief fragments shows the cartouche of Khufu with the phrase: "Building of the sanctuaries of the gods". Another one shows a row of fat oxen decorated with flowers – they were prepared as sacrifices during an offering procession. The guiding inscription calls them "the surroundings of Tefef serve Khufu", "beautiful bulls of Khufu" and "bawling for Khufu". A third one shows the earliest known depiction of royal warfare: the scene is called "archers prepare", since it shows archers drawing their bows. And a fourth example shows the king with the double crown impaling a hippopotamus.

At the Wadi Maghareh in Sinai a rock inscription contains Khufu's names and titles and reports: "Hor-Medjedu, Khnum-Khuf, Bikuj-Nebu, the great god and smiter of the troglodytes, all protection and life are with him". The work-off of the relief is similar to that of king Snefru. In one scene king Khufu wears the double-crown; nearby, the depiction of the god Thoth is visible. In another scene, close by, Khufu wears the Atef-crown while smiting an enemy. In this scene the god Wepwawet is present.

None of the numerous relief fragments shows king Khufu offering to a god. This is remarkable, since reliefs of Sneferu and those of all kings from Menkaura onward show the king offering to a deity. It is possible that the lack of this special depiction influenced later ancient Greek historians in their assumptions that Khufu could have actually closed all temples and prohibited any sacrifice.

Pyramid complex

The pyramid complex of Khufu was erected in the northeastern section of the plateau of Giza. It is possible that the lack of building space, the lack of local limestone quarries and the loosened ground at Dahshur forced Khufu to move north, away from the pyramid of his predecessor Sneferu. Khufu chose the high end of a natural plateau so that his future pyramid would be widely visible. Khufu decided to call his pyramid Akhet-Khufu (meaning "horizon of Khufu").

The Great Pyramid has a base measurement of ca. 750 x 750 ft (≙ 230.4 x 230.4 m) and today a height of . Once it had been  high, but the pyramidion and the limestone casing are completely lost due to stone robbery. The lack of the casing allows a full view of the inner core of the pyramid. It was erected in small steps by more or less roughly hewn blocks of dark limestone. The casing was made of nearly white limestone. The outer surface of the casing stones were finely polished so the pyramid shimmered in bright, natural lime-white when new. The pyramidion might have been covered in electrum, but there is no archaeological proof of that. The inner corridors and chambers have walls and ceilings made of polished granite, one of the hardest stones known in Khufu's time. The mortar used was a mixture of gypsum, sand, pulverized limestone and water.

The original entrance to the pyramid is on the northern side. Inside the pyramid are three chambers: at the top is the burial chamber of the king (the king's chamber), in the middle is the statue chamber (erroneously called the queen's chamber), and under the foundation is an unfinished subterranean chamber (underworld chamber). Whilst the burial chamber is identified by its large sarcophagus made of granite, the use of the "queen's chamber" is still disputed – it might have been the serdab of the Ka statue of Khufu. The subterranean chamber remains mysterious as it was left unfinished.

A tight corridor heading south at the western end of the chamber and an unfinished shaft at the eastern middle might indicate that the subterranean chamber was the oldest of the three chambers and that the original building plan contained a simple chamber complex with several rooms and corridors. But for unknown reasons the works were stopped and two further chambers were built inside the pyramid. Remarkable is the so-called Grand Gallery leading to the king's chamber: It has a corbelled arch ceiling and measures  in height and  in length. The gallery has an important static function; it diverts the weight of the stone mass above the king's chamber into the surrounding pyramid core.

Khufu's pyramid was surrounded by an enclosure wall, with each segment  in distance from the pyramid. On the eastern side, directly in front of the pyramid, Khufu's mortuary temple was built. Its foundation was made of black basalt, a great part of which is still preserved. Pillars and portals were made of red granite and the ceiling stones were of white limestone. Today nothing remains but the foundation. From the mortuary temple a causeway 0.43 miles long once connected to the valley temple. The valley temple was possibly made of the same stones as the mortuary temple, but since even the foundation is not preserved, the original form and size of the valley temple remain unknown.

On the eastern side of the pyramid lies the East Cemetery of the Khufu necropolis, containing the mastabas of princes and princesses. Three small satellite pyramids, belonging to the queens Hetepheres (G1-a), Meritites I (G1-b) and possibly Henutsen (G1-c) were erected at the southeast corner of Khufu's pyramid. Close behind the queens' pyramids G1-b and G1-c, the cult pyramid of Khufu was found in 2005. On the southern side of the Great Pyramid lie some further mastabas and the pits of the funerary boats of Khufu. On the western side lies the West Cemetery, where the highest officials and priests were interred.

A possible part of Khufu's funerary complex is the famous Great Sphinx of Giza. It's a  large limestone statue in the shape of a recumbent lion with the head of a human, decorated with a royal Nemes headdress. The Sphinx was directly hewn out of the plateau of Giza and originally painted with red, ochre, green and black. To this day it is passionately disputed as to who exactly gave the order to build it: the most probable candidates are Khufu, his elder son Djedefra and his younger son Khaefra. One of the difficulties of a correct attribution lies in the lack of any perfectly preserved portrait of Khufu. The faces of Djedefre and Khaefra are both similar to that of the Sphinx, but they do not match perfectly. Another riddle is the original cultic and symbolic function of the Sphinx. Much later it was called Heru-im-Akhet (Hârmachís; "Horus at the horizon") by the Egyptians and Abu el-Hὀl ("father of terror") by the Arabians. It might be that the Sphinx, as an allegoric and mystified representation of the king, simply guarded the sacred cemetery of Giza.

Khufu in later Egyptian traditions

Old Kingdom
Khufu possessed an extensive mortuary cult during the Old Kingdom. At the end of 6th dynasty at least 67 mortuary priests and 6 independent high officials serving at the necropolis are archaeologically attested. Ten of them were already serving during the late 4th dynasty (seven of them were royal family members), 28 were serving during the 5th dynasty and 29 during the 6th dynasty. This is remarkable: Khufu's famous (step-)father Sneferu enjoyed "only" 18 mortuary priesthoods during the same period of time, even Djedefra enjoyed only 8 and Khaefra enjoyed 28. Such mortuary cults were very important for the state's economy, because for the oblations special domains had to be established. A huge number of domains' names are attested for the time of Khufu's reign. However, by the end of the 6th dynasty the number of domains abated quickly. With the beginning of the 7th dynasty no domain's name was handed down any more.

Middle Kingdom
At Wadi Hammamat a rock inscription dates back to the 12th dynasty. It lists five cartouche names: Khufu, Djedefra, Khafra, Baufra and Djedefhor. Because all royal names are written inside cartouches, it was often believed that Baufra and Djedefhor once had ruled for short time, but contemporary sources entitle them as mere princes. Khufu's attendance roll call in this list might indicate that he and his followers were worshipped as patron saints. This theory is promoted by findings such as alabaster vessels with Khufu's name found at Koptos, the pilgrimage destination of Wadi Hammamat travellers.

A literary masterpiece from the 13th dynasty talking about Khufu is the famous Papyrus Westcar, where king Khufu witnesses a magical wonder and receives a prophecy from a magician named Dedi. Within the story, Khufu is characterised in a difficult-to-assess way. On one hand, he is depicted as ruthless when deciding to have a condemned prisoner decapitated to test the alleged magical powers of Dedi. On the other hand, Khufu is depicted as inquisitive, reasonable and generous: He accepts Dedi's outrage and his subsequent alternative offer for the prisoner, questions the circumstances and contents of Dedi's prophecy and rewards the magician generously after all. The contradictory depiction of Khufu is the subject of great dispute between Egyptologists and historians to this day. Especially earlier Egyptologists and historians such as Adolf Erman, Kurt Heinrich Sethe and Wolfgang Helck evaluated Khufu's character as heartless and sacrilegious. They leaned on the ancient Greek traditions of Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus, who described an exaggerated negative character image of Khufu, ignoring the paradoxical (because positive) traditions the Egyptians themselves had always taught.

But other Egyptologists, such as Dietrich Wildung, see Khufu's order as an act of mercy: the prisoner would have received his life back if Dedi had actually performed his magical trick. Wildung thinks that Dedi's refusal was an allusion to the respect Egyptians showed to human life. The ancient Egyptians were of the opinion that human life should not be misused for dark magic or similar evil things. Verena Lepper and Miriam Lichtheim suspect that a difficult-to-assess depiction of Khufu was exactly what the author had planned. He wanted to create a mysterious character.

New Kingdom
During the New Kingdom the necropolis of Khufu and the local mortuary cults were reorganized and Giza became an important economic and cultic destination again. During the Eighteenth Dynasty king Amenhotep II erected a memorial temple and a royal fame stele close to the Great Sphinx. His son and throne follower Thutmose IV freed the Sphinx from sand and placed a memorial stele – known as the "Dream Stele" – between its front paws. The two steles' inscriptions are similar in their narrative contents, but neither of them gives specific information about the true builder of the Great Sphinx.

At the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty a temple for the goddess Isis was built at the satellite pyramid G1-c (that of queen Henutsen) at Khufu's necropolis. During the Twenty-first Dynasty the temple got extended, and, during the Twenty-sixth Dynasty, the extensions continued. From this period of time several "priests of Isis" (Hem-netjer-Iset), who were also "priests of Khufu" (Hem-netjer-Khufu), worked there. From the same dynasty a golden seal ring with the name of a priest Neferibrê was found at Giza.

Late Period
During the Late Period huge numbers of scarabs with the name of Khufu were sold to the citizens, possibly as some kind of lucky charms. More than 30 scarabs are preserved. At Isis' temple a family tree of the Isis priests is on display, which lists the names of priests from 670 to 488 BC. From the same period comes the famous Inventory Stela, which names Khufu and his wife Henutsen. However, modern Egyptologists question whether Khufu was still personally adored as a royal ancestor at this time; they think it more likely that Khufu was already seen as a mere symbolic foundation figure for the history of the Isis temple.

Khufu in ancient Greek traditions

Manetho
The later Egyptian historian Manetho called Khufu "Sûphis" and credited him with a rulership of 63 years. He also mentions that Khufu built the Great Pyramid, then he claims that his contemporary Herodotus says that the pyramid was built by a king "Khéops". Manetho thought "Khéops" and "Sûphis" to be two different kings. Manetho also says that Khufu received a contempt against the gods and that he had written a sacred book about that and that he (Manetho) received that book during his travel through Egypt. The story about the alleged "Sacred Book" is questioned by modern Egyptologists, for it would be highly unusual that a pharaoh wrote books and that such a precious document could be sold away so easily.

Herodotus
The Greek historian Herodotus instead depicts Khufu as a heretic and cruel tyrant. In his literary work Historiae, Book II, chapter 124–126, he writes: "As long as Rhámpsinîtos was king, as they told me, there was nothing but orderly rule in Egypt, and the land prospered greatly. But after him Khéops became king over them and brought them to every kind of suffering: He closed all the temples; after this he kept the priests from sacrificing there and then he forced all the Egyptians to work for him. So some were ordered to draw stones from the stone quarries in the Arabian mountains to the Nile, and others he forced to receive the stones after they had been carried over the river in boats, and to draw them to those called the Libyan mountains. And they worked by 100,000 men at a time, for each three months continually. Of this oppression there passed ten years while the causeway was made by which they drew the stones, which causeway they built, and it is a work not much less, as it appears to me, than the pyramid. For the length of it is 5 furlongs and the breadth 10 fathoms and the height, where it is highest, 8 fathoms, and it is made of polished stone and with figures carved upon it. For this, they said, 10 years were spent, and for the underground chambers on the hill upon which the pyramids stand, which he caused to be made as sepulchral chambers for himself in an island, having conducted thither a channel from the Nile.

For the making of the pyramid itself there passed a period of 20 years; and the pyramid is square, each side measuring 800 feet, and the height of it is the same. It is built of stone smoothed and fitted together in the most perfect manner, not one of the stones being less than 30 feet in length. This pyramid was made after the manner of steps, which some call 'rows' and others 'bases': When they had first made it thus, they raised the remaining stones with devices made of short pieces of timber, lifting them first from the ground to the first stage of the steps, and when the stone got up to this it was placed upon another machine standing on the first stage, and so from this it was drawn to the second upon another machine; for as many as were the courses of the steps, so many machines there were also, or perhaps they transferred one and the same machine, made so as easily to be carried, to each stage successively, in order that they might take up the stones; for let it be told in both ways, according as it is reported. However, that may be, the highest parts of it were finished first, and afterwards they proceeded to finish that which came next to them, and lastly they finished the parts of it near the ground and the lowest ranges.

On the pyramid it is declared in Egyptian writing how much was spent on radishes and onions and leeks for the workmen, and if I remember correctly what the interpreter said while reading this inscription for me, a sum of 1600 silver talents was spent. Kheops moreover came to such a pitch of evilness, that being in want of money he sent his own daughter to a brothel and ordered her to obtain from those who came a certain amount of money (how much it was they did not tell me). But she not only obtained the sum that was appointed by her father, but she also formed a design for herself privately to leave behind her a memorial: She requested each man who came in to her to give her one stone for her building project. And of these stones, they told me, the pyramid was built which stands in front of the great pyramid in the middle of the three, each side being 150 feet in length."

The same goes for the story about king Khafre. He is depicted as the direct follower of Khufu and as likewise evil and that he ruled for 56 years. In chapter 127–128 Herodotus writes: "After Khéops was dead his brother Khéphrên succeeded to the royal throne. This king followed the same manner as the other ... and ruled for 56 years. Here they reckon altogether 106 years, during which they say that there was nothing but evil for the Egyptians, and the temples were kept closed and not opened during all that time".

Herodotus closes the story of the evil kings in chapter 128 with the words: "These kings the Egyptians (because of their hate against them) are not very willing to say their names. What's more, they even call the pyramids after the name of Philítîs the shepherd, who at that time pastured flocks in those regions."

Diodorus of Sicily
The ancient historian Diodorus claims that Khufu was so much abhorred by his own people in later times that the mortuary priests secretly brought the royal sarcophagus, together with the corpse of Khufu, to another, hidden grave. With this narration he strengthens and confirms the view of the Greek scholars, that Khufu's pyramid (and the other two, as well) must have been the result of slavery. However, at the same time, Diodorus distances himself from Herodotus and argues that Herodotus "only tells fairy tales and entertaining fiction". Diodorus claims that the Egyptians of his lifetime were unable to tell him with certainty who actually built the pyramids. He also states that he did not really trust the interpreters and that the true builder might have been someone different: the Khufu pyramid was (according to him) built by a king named Harmais, the Khafre pyramid was thought to be built by king Amasis II and the Menkaura pyramid was allegedly the work of king Inaros I.

Diodorus states that the Khufu pyramid was beautifully covered in white, but the top was said to be capped. The pyramid therefore already had no pyramidion anymore. He also thinks that the pyramid was built with ramps, which were removed during the finishing of the limestone shell. Diodorus estimates that the total number of workers was 300,000 and that the building works lasted for 20 years.

Khufu in Arabic traditions
In AD 642, the Arabs conquered Egypt. Upon arriving at the Giza pyramids, they searched for explanations as to who could have built these monuments. By this time, no inhabitant of Egypt was able to tell and no one could translate the Egyptian hieroglyphs anymore. As a consequence, the Arab historians wrote down their own theories and stories.

The best known story about Khufu and his pyramid can be found in the book Hitat (completely: al-Mawāʿiẓ wa-'l-iʿtibār fī ḏikr al-ḫiṭaṭ wa-'l-ʾāṯār), written in 1430 by Muhammad al-Maqrizi (1364–1442). This book contains several collected theories and myths about Khufu, especially about the Great Pyramid. Though King Khufu himself is seldom mentioned, many Arab writers were convinced that the Great Pyramid (and the others, too) were built by the god Hermes (named Idris by the Arabs).

Al-Maqrizi notes that Khufu was named Saurid, Salhuk and/or Sarjak by the biblical Amalekites. Then he writes that Khufu built the pyramids after repeated nightmares in which the earth turned upside-down, the stars fell down and people were screaming in terror. Another nightmare showed the stars falling down from heaven and kidnapping humans, then putting them beneath two large mountains. King Khufu then received a warning from his prophets about a devastating deluge that would come and destroy Egypt. To protect his treasures and books of wisdom, Khufu built the three pyramids of Giza.

Modern egyptological evaluations
Over time, Egyptologists examined possible motives and reasons as to how Khufu's reputation changed over time. Closer examinations of and comparisons between contemporary documents, later documents and Greek and Coptic readings reveal that Khufu's reputation changed slowly, and that the positive views about the king still prevailed during the Greek and Ptolemaic era. Alan B. Lloyd, for example, points to documents and inscriptions from the 6th dynasty listing an important town called Menat-Khufu, meaning "nurse of Khufu". This town was still held in high esteem during the Middle Kingdom period. Lloyd is convinced that such a heart-warming name wouldn't have been chosen to honour a king with a bad (or, at least, questionable) reputation. Furthermore, he points to the overwhelming number of places where mortuary cults for Khufu were practiced, even outside Giza. These mortuary cults were still practiced even in Saitic and Persian periods.

The famous Lamentation Texts from the First Intermediate Period reveal some interesting views about the monumental tombs from the past; they were at that time seen as proof of vanity. However, they give no hint of a negative reputation of the kings themselves, and thus they do not judge Khufu in a negative way.

Modern Egyptologists evaluate Herodotus's and Diodorus's stories as some sort of defamation, based on both authors' contemporary philosophy. They call for caution against the credibility of the ancient traditions. They argue that the classical authors lived around 2000 years after Khufu, and their sources that were available in their lifetimes surely were antiquated. Additionally some Egyptologists point out that the philosophies of the ancient Egyptians had changed since the Old Kingdom. Oversized tombs such as the Giza pyramids must have appalled the Greeks and even the later priests of the New Kingdom, because they remembered the heretic pharaoh Akhenaten and his megalomaniac building projects.

This negative picture was presumably projected onto Khufu and his pyramid. The view was possibly promoted by the fact that during Khufu's lifetime, permission for the creation of oversized statues made of precious stone and their displaying in public was limited to the king. In their era, the Greek authors, mortuary priests, and temple priests could only explain the impressive monuments and statues of Khufu as the result of a megalomaniac. These negative evaluations were applied to Khufu.

Furthermore, several Egyptologists point out that Roman historians such as Pliny the Elder and Frontinus (both around AD 70) equally do not hesitate to ridicule the pyramids of Giza: Frontinus calls them "idle pyramids, containing the indispensable structures likewise to some of our abandoned aqueducts at Rome" and Pliny describes them as "the idle and foolish ostentation of royal wealth". Egyptologists clearly see politically and socially motivated intentions in these criticisms and it seems paradoxical that the use of these monuments was forgotten, but the names of their builders remained immortalized.

Another hint to Khufu's bad reputation within the Greek and Roman folk might be hidden in the Coptic reading of Khufu's name. The Egyptian hieroglyphs forming the name "Khufu" are read in Coptic as "Shêfet", which actually would mean "bad luck" or "sinful" in their language. The Coptic reading derives from a later pronunciation of Khufu as "Shufu", which in turn led to the Greek reading "Suphis". Possibly the bad meaning of the Coptic reading of "Khufu" was unconsciously copied by the Greek and Roman authors.

On the other hand, some Egyptologists think that the ancient historians received their material for their stories not only from priests, but from the citizens living close to the time of the building of the necropolis. Among the "simple folk", also, negative or critical views about the pyramids might have been handed down, and the mortuary cult of the priests was surely part of tradition. Additionally a long-standing literary tradition does not prove popularity. Even if Khufu's name survived within the literary traditions for so long, different cultural circles surely fostered different views about Khufu's character and historical deeds. The narrations of Diodorus, for example, are credited with more trust than those of Herodotus, because Diodorus collected the tales with much more scepsis. The fact that Diodorus credits the Giza pyramid to Greek kings, might be reasoned in legends of his lifetimes and that the pyramids were demonstrably reused in late periods by Greek and Roman kings and noblemen.

Modern Egyptologists and historians also call for caution about the credibility of the Arabian stories. They point out that medieval Arabs were guided by the strict Islamic belief that only one god exists, and therefore no other gods were allowed to be mentioned. As a consequence, they transferred Egyptian kings and gods into biblical prophets and kings. The Egyptian god Thoth, named Hermes by the Greeks, for example, was named after the prophet Henoch. King Khufu, as already mentioned, was named "Saurid", "Salhuk" and/or "Sarjak", and often replaced in other stories by a prophet named Šaddād bīn 'Âd. Furthermore, scholars point to several contradictions which can be found in Al-Maqrizi's book. For example, in the first chapter of the Hitat, the Copts are said to have denied any intrusion of the Amalekites in Egypt and the pyramids were erected as the tomb of Šaddād bīn 'Âd. But some chapters later, Al-Maqrizi claims that the Copts call Saurid the builder of the pyramids.

Khufu in popular culture
Because of his fame, Khufu is the subject of several modern references, similar to kings and queens such as Akhenaten, Nefertiti and Tutankhamen. His historical figure appears in movies, novels and documentaries. In 1827, Jane C. Loudon wrote the novel The Mummy! A Tale of the 22nd Century. The story describes the citizens of the 22nd century, which became highly advanced technologically, but totally immoral. Only the mummy of Khufu can save them. In 1939, Nagib Mahfuz wrote the novel Khufu's Wisdom, which is based on the stories of Papyrus Westcar.

In 1997, French author Guy Rachet published the novel series Le roman des pyramides, including five volumes, of which the first two (Le temple soleil and Rêve de pierre) use Khufu and his tomb as a theme. In 2004, spiritualist Page Bryant published the novel The Second Coming of the Star Gods, which deals with Khufu's alleged celestial origin. The novel The Legend of The Vampire Khufu, published by Raymond Mayotte in 2010, deals with king Khufu awakening in his pyramid as a vampire.

Films which deal with Khufu, or have the Great Pyramid as a subject, include Howard Hawks' Land of the Pharaohs from 1955, a fictional account of the building of the Great Pyramid of Khufu, and Roland Emmerich's Stargate from 1994, in which an extraterrestrial device is found near the pyramids.

Khufu and his pyramid are the subject of pseudoscientific theories purporting that Khufu's pyramid was built with the help of extraterrestrials and that Khufu simply seized and re-used the monument, ignoring archaeological evidence or even falsifying it.

A near-Earth asteroid bears Khufu's name: 3362 Khufu.

Khufu and his pyramid are referenced in several computer games such as Tomb Raider – The Last Revelation, in which the player must enter Khufu's pyramid and face the god Seth as the final boss. Another example is Duck Tales 2 for the Game Boy; the player here must guide Uncle Scrooge through a trap-loaded Khufu's pyramid. In the classic action role playing game Titan Quest, the Giza Plateau is a large desert region in Egypt, where the tomb of Khufu and the Great Sphinx can be found. He is also mentioned in Assassin's Creed Origins, where the player can find his tomb.

See also

 Egyptian pyramid construction techniques
 Fourth Dynasty of Egypt family tree
 Khufu ship

References

External links

26th-century BC Pharaohs
26th-century BC deaths
Pharaohs of the Fourth Dynasty of Egypt
Year of birth unknown
Sneferu
Khnum

Khufu


Marti Hearst is a professor in the School of Information at the University of California, Berkeley. She did early work in corpus-based computational linguistics, including some of the first work in automating sentiment analysis, and word sense disambiguation. She invented an algorithm that became known as "Hearst patterns" which applies lexico-syntactic patterns to recognize hyponymy (ISA) relations with high accuracy in large text collections, including an early application of it to WordNet; this algorithm is widely used in commercial text mining applications including ontology learning. Hearst also developed early work in automatic segmentation of text into topical discourse boundaries, inventing a now well-known approach called TextTiling.

Hearst's research is on user interfaces for search engine technology and big data analytics. She did early work in user interfaces and information visualization for search user interfaces, inventing the TileBars query term visualization. Her Flamenco research project investigated and developed the now widely used faceted navigation approach for searching and browsing web sites and information collections. She wrote the first academic book on the topic of Search User Interfaces (Cambridge University Press, 2009).

Hearst is an Edge Foundation contributing author and a member of the Usage panel of the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language.

Hearst received her B.A., M.S., and Ph.D. in computer science, all from Berkeley. In 2013 she became a fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery. She became a member of the CHI Academy in 2017, and has previously served as president of the Association for Computational Linguistics and on the advisory council of NSF's CISE Directorate. Additionally, she has been a member of the Web Board for CACM, the Usage Panel for the American Heritage Dictionary, the Edge.org panel of experts, the research staff at Xerox PARC, and the boards of ACM Transactions on the Web, Computational Linguistics, ACM Transactions on Information Systems, and IEEE Intelligent Systems.

Hearst has received an NSF CAREER award, an IBM Faculty Award, and an Okawa Foundation Fellowship. Her work on user interfaces has had a profound impact on the industry, earning Hearst two Google Research Awards and four Excellence in Teaching Awards.} She has also led projects worth over $3.5M in research grants.

Hearst's publications date back to 1990, when 'A Hybrid Approach to Restricted Text Interpretation' was published in Stanford University's AAAI Spring Symposium on Text Based Intelligent Systems in March of that year.

References

External links
 Web page at UC Berkeley
 Website for Search User Interfaces book (text freely available and searchable)
 The Flamenco Faceted Navigation and Search Project

University of California, Berkeley School of Information faculty
UC Berkeley College of Engineering faculty
Computational linguistics researchers
American computer scientists
University of California, Berkeley School of Information alumni
Living people
Women inventors
American women computer scientists
Fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery
Scientists at PARC (company)
Year of birth missing (living people)
Natural language processing researchers
Presidents of the Association for Computational Linguistics

Marti Hearst


Tha Eastsidaz were an American West Coast hip hop trio. Tray Deee, Snoop Dogg, and Goldie Loc were members of this band. They were based in Long Beach, California and were signed to one of the members' record labels and TVT Records. The group was formed in 1997 and ended in 2016.

Musical groups disestablished in 2004
Musical groups disestablished in 2016
Musical groups established in 1997
Musical trios
Musical groups from California
People from Long Beach, California
1990s American music groups
1997 establishments in the United States
2004 disestablishments in the United States
2010s American music groups
2014 establishments in California
2016 disestablishments in the United States

Tha Eastsidaz


Robin Duncan Harry Williamson (born 24 November 1943) is a Scottish multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, and storyteller who was a founding member of The Incredible String Band.

Career
Williamson lived in the Fairmilehead area of Edinburgh and attended George Watson's College before leaving at the age of 15 to become a professional musician. He performed in local jazz bands with Gerard Dott (later to be a member of the Incredible String Band) before turning to traditional music as a singer and guitarist. By 1961 he had met and begun sharing a flat with Bert Jansch, and in 1963 they traveled to London to play the metropolitan folk circuit. By 1965 he had returned to Edinburgh and formed a duo with Clive Palmer, specializing in fiddle and banjo arrangements of traditional Scottish and Irish songs. Joe Boyd signed them to Elektra Records in 1966, by which time they had hired a third member, Mike Heron. As resident band at Clive's Incredible Folk Club in Glasgow, they called themselves the Incredible String Band.

Between 1966 and 1974 the Incredible String Band, now led by Williamson and Heron, released some 13 albums. The group also included Williamson's girlfriend Licorice McKechnie.

Williamson released his first solo album, Myrrh, in 1971 when still a member of the Incredible String Band. After the band split up in 1974, he began living in Los Angeles and, for a while, turned his attention to writing, co-writing an espionage novel, The Glory Trap. Many of his albums are released by his label, Pig's Whisker Music.

By 1976 he had returned to music, forming The Merry Band with Sylvia Woods (Celtic harp), Jerry McMillan (fiddle), and Chris Caswell (flutes, and wire-strung harp). They toured extensively for three years throughout the US, Canada, and Europe, and released three albums: Journey's Edge, American Stonehenge, and A Glint at the Kindling.

After the breakup of the Merry Band, Williamson returned to the UK and started to tour as a solo act, offering sets dominated by traditional stories set to song. Releases of this period include Songs of Love and Parting and Legacy of the Scottish Harpers. He has also written a tutorial book of English, Welsh, Scottish, and Irish fiddle tunes as well as one for the penny whistle .

Williamson's live album with John Renbourn, Wheel of Fortune (1995), was nominated for a Grammy Award, as was the Incredible String Band album Hangman's Beautiful Daughter in 1968.).

In the late 1990s he took part, with Palmer and Heron, in a reformed Incredible String Band. Williamson left the band some time around the start of 2003. The reformed band disbanded again in 2006.

Williamson resumed his solo career on record with a series of albums for ECM: The Seed-at-Zero (2000), Skirting the River Road (2002), The Iron Stone (2006), and Trusting in the Rising Light (2014). As well as his own words these albums featured material from Dylan Thomas, William Blake, and Walt Whitman.

Involvement with Scientology
Williamson was introduced to Scientology in the 1968-1969 period. In a 1979 interview, he stated: It's actually a very practical philosophy. It enables you to live slightly better, get on with your fellows slightly better and feel a bit happier about things. That's the reason that I'm interested in it – it's very useable and practical. I've been rather romantic and spiritually inclined. It's probably been helpful to me because of its practicality.

Solo discography

Myrrh (1972)
Journey's Edge (1977) (with The Merry Band)
American Stonehenge (1978) (with The Merry Band)
A Glint at the Kindling (1979) (with The Merry Band)
Songs of Love & Parting (1981)
The Fisherman's Son and the Gruagach of Tricks (1981)
Prince Dougie and the Swan Maiden (1982)
Rory Mor and the Gruagach Gaire (1982)
Music for the Mabinogi (1983)
Selected Writings (1984)
Five Humorous Tales of Scotland and Ireland (1984)
The Dragon Has Two Tongues (1985)
Five Celtic Tales of Enchantment (1985)
Five Legendary Histories of Britain (1985)
Five Bardic Mysteries (1985)
Five Tales of Prodigies and Marvels (1985)
Legacy of the Scottish Harpers (1986)
Legacy of the Scottish Harpers Volume Two (1986)
Winter's Turning (1986)
Songs For Children of All Ages (1987)
Ten of Songs (1988)
Music for the Newly Born (1990)
Wheel of Fortune (1995, with John Renbourn)
The Island of the Strong Door (1996)
Songs for the Calendarium (1996)
Farewell Concert at McCabe's (1997, with The Merry Band)
Mirrorman's Sequences (1997)
Celtic Harp Airs And Dance Tunes (1997)
Memories/Erinnerungen (1997)
Dream Journals (1997)
Bloomsbury 1997 (1998, with Mike Heron)
Gems of Celtic Story 1 (1998)
Ring Dance (1998)
Gems of Celtic Story 2 (1998)
A Job of Journey Work (1998)
The Old Fangled Tone (1999)
Music For Macbeth (1999)
At The Pure Fountain (1999, with Clive Palmer)
The Seed-at-Zero (2000)
Just Like The Ivy (2000, with Clive Palmer)
Bloomsbury 2000 (2001, with reformed Incredible String Band)
Carmina (2001)
Skirting The River Road (2002)
Gems of Celtic Story 3 (2002)
The Iron Stone (2006)
The Celtic Bard (2008)
Just Like The River And Other Songs For Guitar (2008)
Love Will Remain (2012)
Trusting in the Rising Light (2014)

Bibliography
by Robin Williamson; illustrated by Janet Williamson
Home Thoughts from Abroad : Poems 1966-1971; illustrated by Janet Williamson (1972)

by Robin Williamson
 English, Welsh, Scottish and Irish Fiddle Tunes (1976)
 Penny Whistle Book (1977)
 Five Denials on Merlin's Grave: A Poem With Annotations (1979)
The Craneskin Bag: Celtic Stories and Poems (1989)
 The Wise and Foolish Tongue: Celtic Stories and Poems* (1991)

by John Matthews, with a foreword by Robin Williamson
From the Isles of Dream: Visionary Stories and Poems of the Celtic Renaissance (1993)
 The Bardic Source Book: Inspirational Legacy and Teachings of the Ancient Celts (1998)

by R. J. Stewart and Robin Williamson; illustrated by Chris Down
Celtic Bards, Celtic Druids (1996)

*NB. The Wise and Foolish Tongue is a reprint of The Craneskin Bag, but without many of the illustrations.

References

External links
Official Robin and Bina Williamson website
2003 Robin Williamson interview by Richie Unterberger
Robin Williamson fansite
Full discography
Robin Williamson, interview documentary in Andalucia (Spain).

1943 births
Scottish multi-instrumentalists
Living people
Musicians from Edinburgh
People educated at George Watson's College
Scottish folk musicians
Scottish male songwriters
20th-century Scottish male singers
British storytellers
Island Records artists
The Incredible String Band members
Claddagh Records artists
Scottish tin whistle players
Flying Fish Records artists
British male songwriters
20th-century flautists

Robin Williamson


The Icelandic Sheepdog (,  ), is an Icelandic breed of dog of Nordic Spitz type. It derives from dogs brought to Iceland by Viking settlers in the ninth century; it is both similar and closely related to the Buhund of Norway and the Vallhund of Sweden, which  derive from the same ancestral stock.

It is the only dog breed indigenous to Iceland. Its traditional uses include herding of both sheep and horses.

History

The Icelandic Sheepdog is one of very few breeds of dog for which claims of ancient origin are demonstrably supported by both archaeological and written evidence. It derives from dogs brought to Iceland by Viking colonists from 874 onwards; these are thought to have been from the same ancestral stock which gave rise to the modern Buhund of Norway and Vallhund of Sweden.

As a result of commerce with Iceland in the Middle Ages, the dog became fairly well known in other European countries including England and France; an early description dates to 1492. It is mentioned by John Caius in his writings on dogs in 1570, and by William Shakespeare in Henry V, thought to date from about 1599. In his Account of Island, alias Ice-land; in the Year 1662, published posthumously, Sir Thomas Browne wrote: "... they bring another sort over, Headed like a Fox, which they say are bred betwixt Dogs and Foxes; these are desired by the Shepherds of this Country".

The  or Iceland Dog was both discussed and illustrated in the fifth volume of the Histoire Naturelle of Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, published in 1755. In 1788 it was classified by Johann Friedrich Gmelin as a species, Canis islandicus.

Plague and canine distemper destroyed over 75% of the breed in the late nineteenth century, leading to a ban on the importation of dogs to Iceland. The purebred Icelandic Sheepdog was again bordering extinction in the late twentieth century.

A national kennel club, the  or Icelandic Kennel Club, was formed in  1969; at its first dog show, at Hveragerði in 1973, twenty-three of the sixty dogs shown were of this breed. In 1979 a breed society was established, the  or Icelandic Sheepdog Breed Club. In 1994 the Alþingi (national parliament) determined that the Icelandic Sheepdog was part of the cultural heritage of the country, and should be protected as a national breed. In 1996 an international breed association, the Icelandic Sheepdog International Cooperation, was formed; it has ten European member kennel clubs (including that of Iceland), plus the American Kennel Club.

The breed was definitively accepted by the Fédération Cynologique Internationale in 1972, and was recognised by the American Kennel Club in 2010.

In 2015, registrations in the Nordic countries were: 137 in Iceland; 100 in Denmark; 44 in Finland; 35 in Norway; and 76 in Sweden. In 2022 the total number registered world-wide was approximately .

Characteristics

It is a muscular and hardy dog, and moves with ease over the rough terrain of rural Iceland. Weights are commonly in the range , with heights at the withers of about  for dogs and a few centimetres less for bitches. The coat is thick and provides good protection from the weather; there are two distinct types: short-haired and long-haired. It may be tan or fawn, ranging from cream-colour to a reddish brown; or black, chocolate-brown or grey. White markings, often extensive, occur with all colours; tan and grey animals may have a black mask. Dogs may be expected to live for some twelve to fifteen years.

References

Dog breeds originating in Iceland
FCI breeds
Herding dogs
Rare dog breeds
Spitz breeds

Icelandic Sheepdog


The Mann Gulch fire was a wildfire reported on August 5, 1949, in a gulch located along the upper Missouri River in the Gates of the Mountains Wilderness (then known as the Gates of the Mountains Wild Area), Helena National Forest, in the U.S. state of Montana. A team of 15 smokejumpers parachuted into the area on the afternoon of August 5, 1949, to fight the fire, rendezvousing with a former smokejumper who was employed as a fire guard at the nearby campground. As the team approached the fire to begin fighting it, unexpected high winds caused the fire to suddenly expand, cutting off the men's route and forcing them to flee uphill. During the next few minutes, a "blow-up" of the fire covered  in ten minutes, claiming the lives of 13 firefighters, including 12 of the smokejumpers. Only three of the smokejumpers survived. The fire would continue for five more days before being controlled.

The United States Forest Service drew lessons from the tragedy of the Mann Gulch fire by designing new training techniques and safety measures that developed how the agency approached wildfire suppression. The agency also increased emphasis on fire research and the science of fire behavior.

University of Chicago English professor and author Norman Maclean (1902–1990) researched the fire and its behavior for his book, Young Men and Fire (1992) which was published after his death. Maclean, who worked northwestern Montana in logging camps and for the Forest Service in his youth, recounted the events of the fire and ensuing tragedy and undertook a detailed investigation of the fire's causes.  Young Men and Fire won the National Book Critics Circle Award for non-fiction in 1992. The 1952 film Red Skies of Montana, starring actor Richard Widmark and directed by Joseph M. Newman, was loosely based on the events of the Mann Gulch fire.

The location of the Mann Gulch fire was added as a historical district to the United States National Register of Historic Places on May 19, 1999. A sign is placed near Mann Gulch to memorialize the tragedy, and can be seen from the waters of the nearby Missouri River.

The fire
The fire started when lightning struck south of Mann Gulch, a tributary of the Missouri River that cuts through steep terrain for approximately five miles ( 8 km ) in the Gates of the Mountains, The place was noted and named by Lewis and Clark on their journey west in 1805. The fire was spotted by forest ranger James O. Harrison around noon on August 5, 1949. Harrison, a college student at Montana State University, was working the summer as recreation and fire prevention guard for the Meriwether Canyon Campground.  He had been a smokejumper the previous year but had given it up because of the danger. As a ranger, he still had a responsibility to watch for and help fight fires, but it was not his primary role. On this day, he fought the fire on his own for four hours before he met the crew of smokejumpers who had been dispatched from Hale Field, Missoula, Montana, in a Douglas DC-3.

Contributing factors
Several factors that combined to create the disaster are described in Norman Maclean's book Young Men and Fire.
 Slope – Fire spreads faster up a slope, and the south facing slope north of Mann Gulch was about a 75% incline in places. Slope also makes it very difficult to run.
 Fuel – Fire spreads fast in dry grass. The south facing slope of Mann Gulch was mostly knee high cheatgrass, an especially volatile fuel. Additionally, the burn-over incident occurred on a hot day, on a south-facing slope, in the early afternoon. All of these factors would have contributed to the volatility of the fire, as they would have decreased fuel moisture
 Leadership – Smokejumpers foreman R. Wagner "Wag" Dodge did not know most of the crew, as he had been doing base maintenance work during the normal training and "get acquainted" time of the season. This may have contributed to the crew not trusting the "escape fire" that he set. Furthermore, Dodge left his crew for several minutes, during which the second-in-command let them spread out instead of staying together.
 Communication – The crew's single radio broke because its parachute failed to open. It could have possibly prevented the disaster or helped get aid more quickly to the two burned men who died later. There were other dangerous fires going on at the same time and Forest Service leaders did not know what was happening on Mann Gulch.
 Weather – The season was very dry and that day was extremely hot. Winds in the Gulch were also strong "up gulch'" the same direction in which the men tried to run.

Airplane
The C-47/DC-3 "Miss Montana" (a name applied during the eventual restoration, not used at the time of the fire and use by Johnson), registration number NC24320, was the only smokejumper plane available at Hale Field, near the current location of Sentinel High School, on August 5, 1949, when the call came in seeking 25 smokejumpers to fight a blaze in a hard-to-reach area of the Helena National Forest. The C-47/DC-3 could only hold 16 jumpers and their equipment. Even though more help was needed, fire bosses decided not to wait for a second plane, and instead sent No. NC24320 out on its own. NC24320 flew with Johnson Flying Service from Hale Field in Missoula, Montana and was used to drop smokejumpers as well as for other operations for which Johnson Flying Service held contracts. "Miss Montana" has since been restored to airworthy condition and still flies out of Missoula.

Incident
It was hot, with a temperature of , and the fire danger rating was high, rated 74 out of a possible 100. Wind conditions were turbulent. The plane flight was especially rough. One smokejumper got sick on the way and did not jump, returning with the airplane to Hale Field. Getting off the plane, he resigned from the smokejumpers. The remaining 15 smokejumpers parachuted into an open area at the top of the gulch. Below them, they could see the fire burning on the ridge south of Mann Gulch toward the Missouri River. Gear and individual jumpers were scattered widely due to the conditions. Their radio was destroyed after its parachute failed to open. After the smokejumpers had landed, a shout was heard coming from the front of the fire. The foreman, Wagner "Wag" Dodge, went out ahead to find the person shouting and to scout the fire. He left instructions for the team to finish gathering their equipment and eat, and then advance to the front of the fire. The voice turned out to be Jim Harrison who had been fighting the fire by himself for the past four hours.

The two headed back up the gulch and Dodge noted that one could not get closer than  to the fire due to the heat. The crew met Dodge and Harrison about half way to the fire. Dodge instructed the team to move off the front of the fire, and instead "sidehill" (keeping to the same contour or elevation); and cross over to the thinly-forested and grass-covered south facing slope, north of the stream; where they would  move "down gulch" (west towards the confluence between Mann Gulch and the Missouri River). They could then fight the fire from the flank and steer it toward a low-fuel area. Dodge returned with Harrison to the supply area at the top of the gulch. The two stopped there to eat. From the high vantage point, Dodge noticed the smoke along the fire front boiling up indicating an intensification of the heat of the fire. He and Harrison headed down the gulch to catch up with the crew.

"Blow up"

By the time Dodge reached his men, the fire west of them, down-gulch toward the Missouri River, had already jumped from the ridge south of Mann Gulch to the bottom of the south facing slope north of the stream. The intense heat, combined with wind coming off the river, and the upslope direction of the burn (which pre-dries and heats the fuel, and leads to much faster fire movement when a fire is burning up-slope) pushed the flames up the gulch in the dry grass of the south facing slope, causing what fire fighters call a "blow up". Various side ridges running down the slope obscured the crew's view, so they could not see the conditions further down the gulch, and they initially continued to move toward the fire. When Dodge finally got a glimpse of what was happening, he turned the men around and started them angling back up upslope and up the gulch. Within a couple hundred yards, he ordered the men to drop their Pulaskis, shovels, and crosscut saws:

Dodge's order was to throw away just their packs and heavy tools, but to his surprise some of them had already thrown away all of their heavy equipment. On the other hand, some of them wouldn't abandon their heavy tools, even after Dodge's order. Diettert, one of the most intelligent of the crew, continued carrying both his tools until Rumsey caught up with him, took his shovel and leaned it against a pine tree. Just a little further on, Rumsey and Sallee passed the recreation guard, Jim Harrison, who, having been on the fire all afternoon, was now exhausted. He was sitting with his heavy pack on and was making no effort to take it off

By this point, the fire was moving extremely fast up the 76% incline of the northern slope (37.23 degree slope) of Mann Gulch and Dodge realized they would not be able to make the ridge line in front of the fire. With the fire less than a  behind, he took a match out and set fire to the grass in front of them. In doing so, he was attempting to create an escape fire to lie in so that the main fire would burn around him and his crew. In the back draft of the main fire, the grass fire Dodge had set burned straight up toward the ridge above. Turning to the three men by him — Robert Sallee, Walter Rumsey and Eldon Diettert — Dodge said "Up this way", but the men misunderstood him. The three ran straight up for the ridge crest, moving up along the far edge of Dodge's fire. Sallee later said he was not sure what Dodge was doing, and thought perhaps he intended the fire to act as a buffer between the men and the main fire. It was not until he got to the ridge crest and looked back down that he realized what Dodge had intended. As the rest of the crew came up, Dodge tried to direct them through the fire he had set and into the center burnt out area. Dodge later stated that someone, possibly squad leader William Hellman, said "To hell with that, I'm getting out of here". The rest of the team raced past Dodge up the slope toward the hogback of Mann Gulch ridge, hoping they had enough time to get through the rock ridge line to safer ground on the other side. None of the men trying to outrun the fire entered the area Dodge had burned.

Immediate outcome

Four of the men reached the ridge crest, but only two, Bob Sallee and Walter Rumsey, managed to escape through a crevice or deep fissure in the rock ridge to reach the other side. In the dense smoke of the fire, the two had no way of knowing if the crevice they found actually "went through" to the other side or would be a blind trap. Diettert had been just to the right, slightly upgulch of Sallee and Rumsey, but he did not drop back to the crevice and continued on up the right side of the hogback. He did not find another escape route and was overtaken by the fire. Sallee and Rumsey came through the hogback to the ridge crest above what became known as Rescue Gulch. Dropping down off the ridge, they managed to find a rock slide with little to no vegetation. They waited there for the fire to overtake them, moving from the bottom of the slide to the top as the fire moved past. Hellman was caught by the fire on the top of the ridge and was badly burned. Though he and Joseph Sylvia initially survived the fire, they suffered heavy injuries and both died in the hospital the next day. Wag Dodge entered the charred center of the escape fire he had built and survived the intensely burning main fire.

In Young Men and Fire, Maclean stated that when the fire passed over Dodge's position, "he was lifted off the ground two or three times." Later researchers repeated the claim. However, this statement was an exaggeration. Dodge actually wrote, in his statement to the board of review, "There were three extreme gusts of hot air that almost lifted me from the ground as the fire passed over." In another description of Dodge's ordeal, John Maclean said, "as the main fire passed, it [the fire] picked him up and shook him like a dog with a bone." Young Men and Fire attributed the story to Earl Cooley, the spotter and kicker aboard the airplane, who had rebuffed Maclean's overture and proceeded to publish his own book. The mistaken story actually originated with C. E. "Mike" Hardy, who was the head of the litter bearers collecting the bodies the day after the disaster, and spoke with Dodge then as they sat on a log. Rothermel, in the early 1990s and Alexander in 2009 cite separate personal communications with Hardy asserting this account. Hardy assisted Norman Maclean in his research and accompanied him on a trip to the site. Four-hundred-and-fifty men fought for five more days to get the fire under control, which had spread to .

Casualties

Thirteen firefighters died, with eleven killed in the fire itself and two who sustained fatal burns. Only three of the sixteen survived.

Smokejumpers
Those who were killed by the fire:
Robert J. Bennett, age 22, from Paris, Tennessee
Eldon E. Diettert, age 19, from Moscow, Idaho, died on his 19th birthday
James O. Harrison, Helena National Forest Fire Guard, age 20, from Missoula, Montana
William J. Hellman, age 24, from Kalispell, Montana
Philip R. McVey, age 22, from Babb, Montana
David R. Navon, age 28, from Modesto, California
Leonard L. Piper, age 23, from Blairsville, Pennsylvania
Stanley J. Reba, age 25, from Brooklyn, New York
Marvin L. Sherman, age 21, from Missoula, Montana
Joseph B. Sylvia, age 24, from Plymouth, Massachusetts
Henry J. Thol Jr., age 19, from Kalispell, Montana
Newton R. Thompson, age 23, from Alhambra, California
Silas R. Thompson, age 21, from Charlotte, North Carolina

Those who survived:
R. Wagner (Wag) Dodge, Missoula SJ foreman, age 33 at the time of the fire. Dodge died five years after the fire from Hodgkin lymphoma.
Walter B. Rumsey, age 21 at time of the fire, from Larned, Kansas.  Rumsey died in an airplane crash in 1980, age 52.
Robert W. Sallee, youngest man on the crew, age 17 at time of the fire, from Willow Creek, Montana. Last survivor of the smokejumpers; he died May 26, 2014, at age 82.

Additional individuals
Earl Cooley was the spotter/kicker (the airborne supervisor who directed the crew of smokejumpers who dropped in to fight the fire) the morning of the August 5, 1949 Mann Gulch fire jump. On July 12, 1940, as part of a two-man jump, Cooley had been the first smokejumper to jump on an operational fire jump. In the 1950s Cooley served as the smokejumper base superintendent and was the first president of the National Smokejumper Association. He died November 9, 2009, at age 98.

Controversy
Much controversy surrounded foreman Dodge and the fire he lit to escape.  In answering the questions of the Forest Service Review Board as to why he took the actions he did, Dodge stated he had never heard of such a fire being set; it had just seemed "logical" to him.  In fact, it was not a method that the Forest Service had considered, nor would it work in the intense heat of the normal tall growth forest fires that they typically fought. Similar types of escape fires had been used by the plains Indians to escape the fast-moving, brief duration grass fires of the plains, and the method had been written about by James Fenimore Cooper (1827) in The Prairie, but in this case Dodge appears to have invented it on the spot, as the only means available to him to save his crew.  None of the men realized what it was and only Dodge was saved by it.

There was some controversy about the fire, with a few parents of the men trying to sue the government. One charge was that the "escape fire" had actually burned the men.

It was originally thought that the unburned patches underneath the bodies indicated they had suffocated for lack of air before the fire caught them. However, the unburned patches are called protected areas. The firefighters' bodies protected these areas by shielding from the intense thermal radiation, by keeping out hot gases, and absorbing heat. All of these factors kept the grass and forest litter unburned where they were lying. It is now known that death by smoke and toxic gas inhalation, while common in structure fires because of the confined atmosphere, is virtually nonexistent among wildland fire fatalities.

Aftermath
Several months following the fire, fire scientist Harry Gisborne, from the U.S. Forest Service Research Center at Priest River, came to examine the damage. Despite a history of heart problems, he nevertheless conducted an on-ground survey of the fire site. He suffered a heart attack and died while finishing the day's research. Gisborne had forwarded theories as to the cause of the blowup prior to his arrival on site. Once there, he discovered several conditions, which caused him to change his concepts of fire activity, particularly those pertaining to fire "blow-ups". He noted this to his companion just before his death on November 9, 1949.

Lessons learned from the Mann Gulch fire had a significant effect on firefighter training. Two training protocols—"Ten Standard Firefighting Orders" and "Eighteen Situations That Shout Watch Out"—were incorporated into Forest Service firefighter training program, and safety training made mandatory to achieve certification to work on a fire line. However, the training methodology proved inadequate and the tragedy would be repeated twice, in the 1990 Dude fire in Arizona, which killed six firefighters, and in the 1994 South Canyon Fire in Colorado, in which 14 firefighters died. A primary factor in the latter appeared to be surprise of the sudden transition from surface fire to crown fire, leading to the development and adoption of LCES, an acronym for a four-point safety procedure to increase observance of the previous training protocols. LCES consists of posting lookouts, providing all firefighters radio communication with lookouts, identifying escape routes, and designating valid safety zones, and ensuring that all members of the process, from "hotshot" crews to seasonal Type 2 crew volunteers to "crew bosses", understand and follow its tenets.

Memorials
Thirteen crosses were erected to mark the locations where the thirteen firefighters who died fighting the Mann Gulch fire fell. However, one of the smokejumpers who died in the Mann Gulch fire was David Navon, who was Jewish. In 2001 the cross marking the location where Navon died was replaced with a marker bearing a Star of David.

"Miss Montana", the C-47/DC-3 that carried the smokejumpers that day, was later placed on exhibit in Missoula at the Museum of Mountain Flying. The aircraft was restored as a memorial to the smokejumpers and the fire guard who lost their lives at Mann Gulch on August 5, 1949. It was made airworthy and flown to France in 2019 as part of the D-Day 75th anniversary commemorations with a flight to Normandy. On August 5, 2019, "Miss Montana" flew back over Mann Gulch on the 70th anniversary of the fire and dropped wreaths for the 13 men lost.

Depiction in media
The fire was a topic in the prologue to Adam Grant's book Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know (2021).

Young Men and Fire

The Mann Gulch fire was the subject of Norman Maclean's book Young Men and Fire, which was published after his death.  The book won the National Book Critics Circle Award for non-fiction in 1992.

Norman Maclean's son John wrote a book in 2003 titled Fire and Ashes: On the Front Lines Battling Wildfires, and it also includes a section on the Mann Gulch fire. In 2004, John N. Maclean also published an article called "Fire and Ashes: The Last Survivor of the Mann Gulch Fire," in Montana: The Magazine of Western History. The article was adapted from the Mann Gulch section of his book, in which he interviewed Bob Sallee, the last remaining survivor of the fire.

Folk songs
James Keelaghan wrote a song about this fire entitled "Cold Missouri Waters" after being inspired by Young Men and Fire. The song was covered by Richard Shindell, Dar Williams, and Lucy Kaplansky on their album Cry Cry Cry. It was also covered by Hank Cramer in his album, Days Gone By. It was again recorded by Paul McKenna Band on their 2012 album "Elements" and by Wolf Loescher on his 2020 album "Sheep's Clothing".  A cover version also appears on the 2014 album "The Call", by Greg Russell and Ciaran Algar. In 2016, Irish singer Pauline Scanlon covered the song on her album Gossamer.  It is sung from the perspective of foreman Dodge, lying on his deathbed dying of Hodgkin's disease five years after the fire. It imagines Dodge saying of his decision to set the escape fire:

"I don't know why, I just thought it. I struck a match to waist high grass, running out of time. Tried to tell them, 'Step into this fire I set. We can't make it, this is the only chance you'll get.' But they cursed me, ran for the rocks above instead. I lay face down and prayed above the cold Missouri waters."

Ross Brown, a musician/songwriter from Townsend, Montana (about 35 miles south of Helena), wrote another song entitled "The Mann Gulch." A scratch version of this song is available on YouTube.

The song also has been recorded on Black Irish Band's album "Into the Fire", released in 2007. The album is all songs about firefighters. The album also features Michael Martin Murphey.  "Underneath Montana Skies" is another song about the Mann Gulch fire written by Patrick Michael Karnahan also on this album.

The song was revived as a tribute to the 19 firefighters who died in the massive Yarnell Hill Fire near Yarnell, Arizona in 2013.

This song was also recorded by Larry Carpenter, a folk singer from Minneapolis, on his 2011 album "Across the Water".

Timeline
The events described above all transpired in a relatively short period of time. Studies estimated that the fire covered 3,000 acres in 10 minutes during this blow-up stage, an hour and 45 minutes after they had arrived.

 4:10 PM : All crew jumped.
 5:00 PM :The scattered cargo had been gathered.
 5:45 PM : The crew had seen the fire coming up towards them on the south-facing slope north of the stream and had turned to run.
 5:56 PM:  The fire had swept over them. The time at which the fire engulfed the men was judged by the melted hands on Harrison's pocket-watch, forever frozen at 5:56 p.m. by the intense heat.

See also
 List of wildfires
 Red Skies of Montana – a movie based on this incident

References

External resources

 Rothermel, Richard C. (May 1993). Mann Gulch Fire: A Race That Couldn't Be Won. United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Intermountain Research Station, General Technical Report INT-GTR-299.
 Turner, Dave. (Spring 1999). "The Thirteenth Fire". Forest History Today.

 "August 5, 1949: Mann Gulch Tragedy". Peeling Back the Bark blog, the Forest History Society.
 Wildfire Lessons from Mann Gulch Fire

External links

 Mann Gulch Fire, 1949, a history of the Mann Gulch fire from the Forest History Society website.
 Mann Gulch Virtual Field Trip
 Satellite map of Mann Gulch, showing a forest fire in progress (via Google Maps)

Wildfires in Montana
Helena National Forest
Lewis and Clark County, Montana
1949 natural disasters in the United States
1949 fires in the United States
1949 in Montana
Natural disasters in Montana
Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Montana
National Register of Historic Places in Lewis and Clark County, Montana
August 1949 events in the United States
Firefighting memorials
Firefighting in Montana
United States Forest Service firefighting
1940s wildfires
20th-century wildfires in the United States

Mann Gulch fire


Jennifer C. Harman (born November 29, 1964) is an American professional poker player. She has won two World Series of Poker bracelets in open events, one of only four women to have done so.

Career
Harman won her first World Series of Poker bracelet in 2000 at the No Limit Deuce to Seven Lowball Event (at a final table that also included fellow professionals Lyle Berman and Steve Zolotow). She had never played that game prior to the event, but received a five-minute tutoring session from Howard Lederer before playing. She won her second WSOP bracelet in 2002 at the $5K Limit Texas hold 'em event (the field also included Mimi Tran, Humberto Brenes, and Allen Cunningham). She was the first woman to hold two bracelets in WSOP open events, joined by Vanessa Selbst in 2012, Loni Harwood in 2015, and Kristen Bicknell in 2020.

In 2004, Harman took a year away from poker to have her second kidney transplant. Problems with her kidneys – shared by her sister and mother, who died from the same illness when Harman was 17 – had plagued her since her childhood. Since her return to the poker tournament circuit, Harman has finished 4th at the World Poker Tour Five-Diamond World Poker Classic, 5th in the inaugural Professional Poker Tour event, and 2nd in the WSOP Circuit Championship Event at the Rio.

Harman authored the limit hold'em chapter for Super System II. Harman is the only woman who is a regular player in the "Big Game" at Bobby's Room, the high-stakes cash game at the Bellagio. She was also an active participant in "The Corporation", a group of high-stakes poker players who played Andy Beal for limits of up to $100,000/$200,000.

Harman has appeared on the GSN series High Stakes Poker and on the NBC series Poker After Dark, where she won Week 8's tournament. In 2007, Harman finished as runner-up in the inaugural World Series of Poker Europe, where she lost in the HORSE event to Thomas Bihl. Harman was also a member of "Team Full Tilt" at Full Tilt Poker.

As of 2021, her total live tournament winnings exceed $2,700,000. $1,502,859 of her total winnings have come from cashes at the WSOP.  Although Harman has had success in tournament poker, most of her wealth and prestige has come from playing in high stakes cash games.

Harman starred in the American reality television series Sin City Rules on TLC. She also appeared in the 2007 Warner Bros. film Lucky You.

In 2015, she was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame.

World Series of Poker Bracelets

Charity Poker
In 2004, Harman took a year off from poker to have her second kidney transplant. She then founded Creating Organ Donation Awareness (CODA), a non-profit organization to raise money for the cause.

Harman is a frequent charity poker tournament host. In March 2009, she organized a number of poker celebrities including ESPN analyst Lon McEachern and Howard Lederer in a two-day event that raised $111,000 for the National Kidney Foundation with the help of Curtis and Co Watches and Dream Team Poker.

Harman is also an active fundraiser for the Nevada Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (NSPCA), for which she has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars through live tournaments and online tournaments at Full Tilt. In April 2009, she hosted the 3rd annual Jennifer Harman Charity Poker Tournament at the Venetian poker room in Las Vegas. The tournament has raised over half a million dollars and, in the past, has featured prizes such as a seat at the World Series of Poker Main Event, and dinner with Jennifer and Pete Rose.

Personal life
Harman was married to stylist Marco Traniello (m. 2000-2013), who since became a professional poker player as well. They have twin boys. Traniello and Harman have since divorced.

References

External links
 PokerListings.com Player Profile

1964 births
Living people
American poker players
Female poker players
Kidney transplant recipients
Sportspeople from Reno, Nevada
World Series of Poker bracelet winners
Poker After Dark tournament winners
Poker Hall of Fame inductees

Jennifer Harman


Southern Railway Depot, also known as the Batesburg Boy Scout Hut, is a historic train station located at Batesburg-Leesville, Lexington County, South Carolina. It was built about 1900 by the Southern Railway, and is a one-story weatherboarded frame building with a bellcast hip roof. It has patterned metal shingle roofing and sawn wooden brackets supporting the deep eaves. It was relocated from its original location to its present site about 1960 and used as a meeting place for local Boy Scouts.

The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.

References

Batesburg-Leesburg
Railway stations on the National Register of Historic Places in South Carolina
Railway stations in the United States opened in 1900
Buildings and structures in Lexington County, South Carolina
National Register of Historic Places in Lexington County, South Carolina
Former railway stations in South Carolina

Batesburg station


Westlake Avenue is a major street in Seattle, Washington, connecting Downtown Seattle to the neighborhoods of South Lake Union, Westlake and northeastern Queen Anne. The street runs north–south along the west side of Lake Union for  from McGraw Square to the Fremont Bridge.

The street's unusual route through the Denny Triangle follows a former railroad grade through a narrow valley between two hills that were regraded in the early 20th century. Westlake Boulevard was constructed through the valley in 1906, following the railroad and a streetcar line, and was later renamed to Westlake Avenue. The street was modified to run northbound-only from Denny Way to Mercer Street in the mid-20th century and remained one-way until 2007.

Westlake Avenue is also served by a variety of public transit routes, including the South Lake Union Streetcar and RapidRide C Line. In 2016, a section of the street in South Lake Union received transit-only lanes in March 2016 and a cycletrack was installed along the west side of Lake Union. A Link light rail station is planned to be built at Westlake and Denny Way when a planned extension to Ballard is completed in 2035.

Street description

Westlake Avenue begins at Stewart Street on the north side of McGraw Square, which also serves as the southern terminus of the South Lake Union Streetcar. The square is located adjacent to the Times Square Building and one block north of the Westlake Center and Nordstrom Building. The southernmost block of Westlake Avenue is divided between the streetcar tracks and a southbound-only street that connects to a porte-cochère for the Westin Seattle hotel complex. Westlake gains a northbound lane after crossing 6th Avenue and continues northwest across the Denny Triangle street grid, forming several triangular blocks.

The street passes the east side of the Amazon headquarters campus, including Doppler and the Amazon Spheres, and several high-rise residential buildings. A set of curbside transit-only lanes begin at Virginia Street and include several streetcar stops that are shared with buses. Westlake Avenue turns due north at an intersection with Denny Way, which marks the boundary of South Lake Union. The street continues north through the South Lake Union neighborhood, passing through an office and commercial district with several tech company offices. After crossing Mercer Street at the north end of the neighborhood, the transit-only lanes end and the streetcar's southbound track turns east onto Valley Street near the Allen Institute for Brain Science Building and Google campus.

Westlake Avenue turns northwest to follow the shore of Lake Union near Lake Union Park and the Museum of History and Industry. The east side of the street is used as a parking lot with a protected cycletrack and walking trail that runs along the side of the lake and its marinas. The street continues north through the Westlake neighborhood, parallel to Aurora and Dexter avenues to the west, and crosses under a pedestrian suspension bridge at Galer Street. Westlake gradually turns northwest along the side of a greenbelt and crosses under the Aurora Bridge before terminating at an intersection with Dexter Avenue, Nickerson Street, and Fremont Avenue on the south side of the Fremont Bridge. Nickerson travels west along the Lake Washington Ship Canal to the Seattle Pacific University campus in northern Queen Anne, while Fremont Avenue crosses the bridge into Fremont and continues north to Woodland Park Zoo.

History

A military road was built along the west side of Lake Union in the early 1860s to connect the lake to the modern settlement of Seattle, following the general path of an older trail used by Native Americans. Lake Union became a landing point for coal shipments that were hauled by boat and wagon from modern-day Newcastle and Renton and were bound for ships on Elliott Bay. A narrow gauge railroad was constructed in 1872 through the valley on the east side of Denny Hill, following the modern-day route of Westlake Avenue. The railroad was abandoned five years later and replaced in 1890 with a streetcar line that was built in less than a week by the Seattle Electric Railway and Power Company. Between Depot Street (now Denny Way) and the southern shore of Lake Union, the streetcar followed Rollin Avenue.

The street was constructed in 1907 and completed in November of that year.

Transit service

Westlake Avenue is served by the South Lake Union Streetcar, which began operating in 2007, and several bus routes run by King County Metro. Following the addition of transit-only lanes in March 2016, the RapidRide C Line and Metro Route 40 were moved onto the Westlake Avenue corridor. The C Line connects South Lake Union to West Seattle, while Route 40 continues north on Westlake from Downtown Seattle to Fremont, Ballard, and Northgate. In 2018, Amazon funded 22 additional weekday trips on Route 40 to relieve crowding and improve frequencies during rush hour.

Sound Transit plans to build two light rail stations in the general vicinity of Westlake Avenue in the Denny Triangle area. The Ballard Link Extension, planned to open in 2035, will include a station at the intersection of Westlake and Denny Way, along with an auxiliary South Lake Union station on Republican Street and an auxiliary Denny Triangle station on 6th Avenue near the current Westlake station.

Cycling

The Westlake cycletrack, connecting Lake Union Park to the Fremont Bridge, opened in September 2016. The cycletrack project cost $3.6 million to construct and came after several years of public meetings and negotiations with business owners over the potential loss of public parking spaces. People for Bikes, a bicycle advocacy group, named the Westlake cycletrack the "best new bike lane" of 2016 for the United States. The southern reaches of Westlake have been criticized by cyclists due to the presence of streetcar tracks that pose a danger to thinner bicycle tires.

Major intersections

References

External links

South Lake Union, Seattle
Streets in Seattle
1906 establishments in Washington (state)

Westlake Avenue


Vladimir Shklyarov (, born 9 February 1985) is a principal dancer of Mariinsky Ballet and a guest principal with the Bayerische Staatsballett and The Royal Ballet.

Biography
Vladimir Shklyarov was born in Leningrad, which is now Saint Petersburg. He studied at the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet and graduated in 2003, class of Vitaly Afanaskov, and joined the Mariinsky Ballet the same year. He was promoted to principal in 2011.

His repertoire includes James in La Sylphide, Duke Albrecht in Giselle, Solor in La Bayadère, Prince Désiré in The Sleeping Beauty, Prince Siegfried in Swan Lake, the Prince in The Nutcracker, Jean de Brienne in Raymonda, Basilio in Don Quixote and Ivan the Fool in The Little Humpbacked Horse. He has also danced the lead roles in the Paquita Grand Pas Classique, Le Spectre de la Rose, Chopiniana and Jewels.

In 2007, he danced the lead role of Zéphyr in the première of Sergei Vikharev's reconstruction of Marius Petipa's one act ballet, The Awakening of Flora. He also danced the lead role of Harlequin in the première of Vikharev's reconstruction of Michel Fokine's ballet, La Carnaval.

In September 2016, Shklyarov and his wife took a one-year sabbatical from the Mariinsky and joined the Bayerisches Staatsballett in Munich, Germany as principals with the invitation of Igor Zelensky, the theater's new artistic director. They returned to Saint Petersburg in 2017, but continue to dance as guests in Munich.

In 2017, Shklyarov joined the Royal Ballet in London as a guest principal after he filled in for Sergei Polunin, who withdrew at the last minute, in Frederick Ashton's Marguerite and Armand.

Personal life

Shklyarov is married to fellow Russian ballerina, Maria Shirinkina. In February 2015, two days before his 30th birthday, he became a father for the first time when his wife gave birth to their son, Alexey. In July 2021, the couple's second child, daughter Alexandra was born.

Repertoire
Count Albrecht in Giselle
James in La Sylphide
Prince Désiré in The Sleeping Beauty
Prince Siegfried in Swan Lake
The Prince in Vainonen's The Nutcracker
Zephyr in The Awakening of Flora
Solor in La Bayadère
Jean de Brienne in Raymonda
Basilio in Don Quixote
Ali in Le Corsaire
Petrushka in Petrushka
The Ghost of the Rose in Le Spectre de la rose
Matteo in Pierre Lacotte's Ondine
Romeo in Lavrovsky's and Cranko's Romeo and Juliet
Ali-Batyr in Leonid Yakobson's Shurale
Ivanushka in Alexei Ratmansky's The Little Humpbacked Horse
The Prince in Alexei Ratmansky's Cinderella
Spartacus in Yuri Grigorovich's Spartacus
Ferkhad in Yuri Grigorovich's The Legend of Love
The Hooligan in The Young Lady and the Hooligan
Colas in Frederick Ashton's La fille mal gardée
Aminta in Frederick Ashton's Sylvia
Armand in Frederick Ashton's Marguerite and Armand
Jack/Knave of Hearts in Christopher Wheeldon's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Rubies and Diamonds in Jewels
Third Movement in Symphony in C
Tschaikovsky Pas de Deux
Des Grieux in Kenneth MacMillan's Manon

Awards
Prize-winner at the XI International Ballet and Choreography Competition, in the category "Solo" (Moscow, 2009, 1st prize)
Prize-winner at the Vaganova-Prix International Competition (St. Petersburg, 2002)
Holder of the Soul of Dance – 2008 prize, instituted by Ballet magazine, in the category "Rising Star"
Holder of the annual Leonid Massine International Prize For the Art of Dance (Positano, Italy, 2008)
Holder of the Zegna – Mariinsky New Talent Awards grant (London, 2008)
Holder of the DANCE OPEN international ballet prize in the category "Mr Virtuoso" (2014)
Holder of the BALLET2000 Prize, instituted by BALLET2000 magazine (2016)

References

External links

1985 births
Living people
Vaganova graduates
Russian male ballet dancers
Mariinsky Ballet principal dancers
21st-century Russian ballet dancers

Vladimir Shklyarov