Howe Browne, 2nd Marquess of Sligo

Howe Peter Browne, 2nd Marquess of Sligo (18 May 1788, London – 26 January 1845, Tunbridge Wells), was an Irish peer and colonial governor, styled Viscount Westport until 1800 and Earl of Altamont from 1800 to 1809.
Early life.
Howe Browne was the son and heir of John Browne, 1st Marquess of Sligo. He was educated at Eton and Jesus College, Cambridge, receiving his MA as Lord Altamont in 1808. During his early years he is reputed to have befriended Thomas De Quincey and Lord Byron. He became Marquess of Sligo in 1809 on the death of his father and was appointed a Knight of the Order of St Patrick on 11 November 1809.
In 1812 Browne was charged with "enticing and persuading (a seaman) to desert (the navy)", a charge punishable with the death sentence at its most extreme. Browne was found guilty and sentenced to a £5,000 fine and four months in Newgate prison. In an odd turn of events, during the course of the trial his mother, grew amorous for the Judge Sir William Scott. Following the trial, the two were introduced and later married, despite a 20-year age gap. However, the marriage did not prove to be a happy one and was apparently on the rocks after just one year.
Previous to his marriage, he had a relationship with the French courtesan Pauline 'Cherie' Pacquot. The affair produced one son, whose paternity Howe questioned upon discovering he was not Pauline's only lover. Following his split from Pauline, On 4 March 1816, Browne married the sixteen-year-old Hester Catherine, daughter of John de Burgh, 13th Earl of Clanricarde. His mother is said to have remarked that "the most remarkable likeness to Pauline that I ever saw". The couple had fourteen children between 1817 and 1839. Lady Hester was a cultured woman who patronised the arts and renovated Westport House, the family seat in County Mayo, and its gardens. The family also had a London home in Mansfield Street, Marylebone. With her husband, she campaigned to abolish slavery, and later to relieve the Irish famine. She was a patron of the Sisters of Mercy.
Governor of Jamaica.
In 1834-35 he was appointed Governor and Vice-Admiral of Jamaica and received with much pomp and circumstance. The local plantation owners assumed that Browne, as a plantation owner himself, would look after their interests. However Browne's ownership of two plantations on the island had come to him via an inheritance upon the death of his grandmother, and as Browne would reveal in short order, did not think much of the institution of slavery being practised on the island.
Arriving shortly after the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833, Browne attempted to oversee the transition from slavery into a free society. He reformed the legal system, appointing the mixed-race Richard Hill in charge of the stipendiary magistrates during "the Apprenticeship" (a four-year period in which the black population was to be "taugh" how to be "proper citizens"). He also set up schools for the black population, two of which he personally financed.
These moves almost instantly made Browne a villain to the ruling class on Jamaica. They quickly mocked his past reputation in the local press; "We are fully aware of his Lordship's nautical excursions and frolics before he came to Jamaica." By 1836 the Jamaican Assembly were blocking his attempts to fully emancipate the Black Jamaican population and were able to force him to resign from the Governorship. The first free village of Sligoville in Saint Catherine parish, Jamaica is named after him.
Lord and Lady Sligo are buried in Kensal Green Cemetery. Their grave lies in the centre of the overgrown north-west quadrant of the inner circle.


Women in Austria

The legal position of women in Austria improved since the middle of the 1970s. With regard to women's rights, the priority in Austria is based on the equal treatment of both genders, rather than having equal rights only. Thus, Austrian women benefit from their government's attempt to compensate for gender-specific inequality of burdens. However, the concept of traditional roles, influenced by Roman Catholicism in Austria, is still prevalent within Austrian society.
Suffrage.
First attempts to improve political participation by women were made during the Revolution of 1848 by the Wiener Demokratischer Frauenverein, but the association was short-lived.
The struggle for suffrage began anew with the formation of Allgemeiner Österreichischer Frauenverein in 1893.
Women's suffrage was granted in 1919, after the breakdown of the Habsburg Monarchy.
Marriage and family life.
As in other European countries, marriage was traditionally based on the husband's legal authority over the wife. Until the late 1970s, married women's freedoms were legally restricted. Austria made marital rape illegal in 1989. Austria was one of the last Western countries to decriminalize adultery, in 1997. In 2004 marital rape became a state offense meaning it can be prosecuted by the state even in the absence of a complaint from the spouse, with procedures being similar to stranger rape.
In recent years, new ways of living have emerged, with unmarried cohabitation increasing, as more young people question traditional ways. In the European Values Study (EVS) of 2008 the percentage of Austrian respondents who agreed with the assertion that "Marriage is an outdated institution" was 30.5%, and as of 2012, 41.5% of children were born outside of marriage. The total fertility rate is 1.46 children/women (as of 2015), which is below the replacement rate of 2.1.
Employment.
Most women are employed, but many work part-time. In the European Union, only the Netherlands has more women working part-time. As in other German speaking areas of Europe, social norms regarding gender roles are quite conservative. In 2011, Jose Manuel Barroso, then president of the European Commission, stated "Germany, but also Austria and the Netherlands, should look at the example of the northern countries [...] that means removing obstacles for women, older workers, foreigners and low-skilled job-seekers to get into the workforce".
Infrastructure changes.
In the early 1990s, most of the pedestrian traffic and public transportation in Vienna was accounted for by women. Eva Kail organized “Who Owns Public Space – Women’s Everyday Life in the City” in 1991. This exhibit, coupled with a 1999 survey conducted by the City Women’s Office, demonstrated that women, in general, had more varied destinations and needed safety measures in travel more than the men in the city. These led to a change in Vienna’s urban planning. Some of the changes implemented by the city include widening the sidewalks and adding pedestrian overpasses in certain areas.
Vienna started the Frauen-Werk-Stadt, a project to produce housing complexes designed by female architects specifically to account for the needs of women. These complexes have easy access to public transportation, as well as on site facilities, such as kindergartens and pharmacies. Similar efforts with a heavy emphasis on aiding women were conducted following Vienna’s success.
The changes in infrastructure served to significantly increase pedestrian traffic. As a result, the streets were more densely packed with witnesses of potential crimes. This served to reduce the amount of minor crimes committed in public spaces.
Linda McDowell argued that such efforts are counterproductive, and act to deepen the existing class struggles in locations such as Vienna. McDowell’s main contention is these efforts were not careful enough to account for both women’s rights, as well as poverty.


History of the Jews in Lithuania

The history of the Jews in Lithuania spans the period from the 14th century to the present day. There is still a small community in the country, as well as an extensive Lithuanian Jewish diaspora in Israel, the United States and other countries. For more detail, see Lithuanian Jews.
Early history.
The origin of the Jews of Lithuania has been a subject of much speculation. The first reliable document attesting the presence of Jews in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania is the charter of 1388 granting privileges to the Jews in Trakai. The gathering together of the scattered Jewish settlers in sufficient numbers and with enough power to form communities and to obtain privileges from their Lithuanian rulers implies the lapse of considerable time from the first migrations. Therefore, various historians attempted to claim that Jews migrated to Lithuania earlier. For example, Abraham Harkavy (1835–1919) claimed that the first Jews migrated in the 10th century from the Khazar Khaganate (see also Khazar hypothesis of Ashkenazi ancestry). Other historians claim that Jews migrated from Germany in the 12th century. German Jews were persecuted during the era of crusades. The traditional language of the vast majority of Jews of Lithuania, Yiddish, is based largely upon the Medieval German spoken by the western Germanic Jewish immigrants. Another theory is that Jews migrated during the reign of Grand Duke Gediminas (reigned 1316–1341) attracted by his invitation of merchants and craftspeople in 1323–1324 and economic opportunities – at the time, Lithuania had no cities in the western sense of the word, no Magdeburg Rights or closed guilds. In the 14th century, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania expanded into Galicia–Volhynia (see Galicia–Volhynia Wars) and the Principality of Kiev (see Battle on the Irpin River and Battle of Blue Waters), territories already inhabited by Jews. After the death of Casimir III (1370), the condition of the Polish Jews changed for the worse. The influence of the Roman Catholic clergy at the Polish court grew; Louis of Anjou was indifferent to the welfare of his subjects, and his eagerness to convert the Jews to Christianity, together with the increased Jewish immigration from Germany, caused the Polish Jews to become apprehensive for their future.
The Charter of 1388.
Duke Vytautas granted privileges to the Jews of Trakai on June 24, 1388. Later similar privileges were granted to the Jews of Brest (July 1, 1388), Grodno (1389), Lutsk, Vladimir, and other large towns. The charter was modeled upon similar documents granted by Casimir III, and earlier by Boleslaw of Kalisz, to the Jews in Poland in 1264. Therefore, it seems more than likely that influential Polish Jews cooperated with the leading Lithuanian communities in securing the charters from Vytautas.
Under the charter, the Lithuanian Jews formed a class of freemen subject in all criminal cases directly to the jurisdiction of the grand duke and his official representatives, and in petty suits to the jurisdiction of local officials on an equal footing with the lesser nobles ("szlachta"), "boyars", and other free citizens. The official representatives of the Polish king and the grand duke were the voivode (palatine) in Poland and the elder (starosta) in Lithuania, who were known as the "Jewish judges" (judex Judæorum), and their deputies. The Jewish judge decided all cases between Christians and Jews and all criminal suits in which Jews were concerned; in civil suits, however, he acted only on the application of the interested parties. Either party who failed to obey the judge's summons had to pay him a fine. To him also belonged all fines collected from Jews for minor offenses. His duties included the guardianship of the persons, property, and freedom of worship of the Jews. He had no right to summon any one to his court except upon the complaint of an interested party. In matters of religion the Jews were given extensive autonomy.
Under these equitable laws the Jews of Lithuania reached a degree of prosperity unknown to their Polish and German co-religionists at that time. The communities of Brest, Grodno, Trakai, Lutsk, and Minsk rapidly grew in wealth and influence. Every community had at its head a Jewish elder. These elders represented the communities in all external relations, in securing new privileges, and in the regulation of taxes. Such officials are not, however, referred to by the title "elder" before the end of the 16th century. Up to that time the documents merely state, for instance, that the "Jews of Brest humbly apply," etc. On assuming office the elders declared under oath that they would discharge the duties of the position faithfully, and would relinquish the office at the expiration of the appointed term. The elder acted in conjunction with the rabbi, whose jurisdiction included all Jewish affairs with the exception of judicial cases assigned to the court of the deputy, and by the latter to the king. In religious affairs, however, an appeal from the decision of the rabbi and the elder was permitted only to a council consisting of the chief rabbis of the king's cities. The cantor, sexton, and "shochet" were subject to the orders of the rabbi and elder.
The goodwill and tolerance of Vytautas endeared him to his Jewish subjects, and for a long time traditions concerning his generosity and nobility of character were current among them. His cousin, the king of Poland Jogaila, did not interfere with his administration during Vytautas's lifetime.
Jagiellon rule.
In 1569, Poland and Lithuania were united (Union of Lublin). It was generally a time of prosperity and relative safety for the Jews of both countries (with the exception of the Chmielnicki Uprising in the 17th century). However, a few events, such as the expulsion of the Jews from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania between 1495 and 1503 occurred just within Lithuania.
Expulsion of the Jews in 1495 and return in 1503.
Casimir was succeeded as king of Poland by his son John Albert, and on the Lithuanian throne by his younger son, Alexander Jagellon. The latter confirmed the charter of privileges granted to the Jews by his predecessors, and even gave them additional rights. His father's Jewish creditors received part of the sums due to them, the rest being withheld under various pretexts. The favorable attitude toward the Jews which had characterized the Lithuanian rulers for generations was unexpectedly and radically changed by a decree promulgated by Alexander in April 1495. By this decree all Jews living in Lithuania proper and the adjacent territories were summarily ordered to leave the country.
The expulsion was evidently not accompanied by the usual cruelties; for there was no popular animosity toward the Lithuanian Jews, and the decree was regarded as an act of mere willfulness on the part of an absolute ruler. Some of the nobility, however, approved Alexander's decree, expecting to profit by the departure of their Jewish creditors, as is indicated by numerous lawsuits on the return of the exiles to Lithuania in 1503. It is known from the Hebrew sources that some of the exiles migrated to the Crimea, and that by far the greater number settled in Poland, where, by permission of King John Albert, they established themselves in the towns situated near the Lithuanian boundary. This permission, given at first for a period of two years, was extended "because of the extreme poverty of the Jews on account of the great losses sustained by them." The extension, which applied to all the towns of the kingdom, accorded the enjoyment of all the liberties that had been granted to their Polish brethren (Kraków, June 29, 1498). The expelled Karaites settled in the Polish town of Ratno, now known as Ratne, Ukraine .
The causes of the unexpected expulsion were probably many, including religious reasons, the need to fill a depleted treasury by confiscating the Jews' money, personal animosity, and other causes.
Soon after Alexander's accession to the throne of Poland he permitted the Jewish exiles to return to Lithuania. Beginning in March 1503, as is shown by documents still extant, their houses, lands, synagogues, and cemeteries were returned to them, and permission was granted them to collect their old debts. The new charter of privileges permitted them to live throughout Lithuania as before. The return of the Jews and their attempt to regain their old possessions led to many difficulties and lawsuits. Alexander found it necessary to issue an additional decree (April 1503), directing his vice-regent to enforce the law. In spite of this some of the property was not recovered by the Jews for years.
The Act of 1566.
At the same time, the middle of the 16th century witnessed a growing antagonism between the lesser nobility and the Jews. Their relations became strained, and the enmity of the Christians began to disturb the life of the Lithuanian Jews. The anti-Jewish feeling, due at first to economic causes engendered by competition, was fostered by the clergy, who were then engaged in a crusade against heretics, notably the Lutherans, Calvinists, and Jews. The Reformation, which had spread from Germany, tended to weaken the allegiance to the Roman Catholic Church. Frequent instances occurred of the marriage of Catholic women to Jews, Turks, or Tatars. The Bishop of Vilnius complained to Sigismund August (Dec., 1548) of the frequency of such mixed marriages and of the education of the offspring in their fathers' faiths. The "shlyakhta" also saw in the Jews dangerous competitors in commercial and financial undertakings. In their dealings with the agricultural classes the lords preferred the Jews as middlemen, thus creating a feeling of injury on the part of the "shlyakhta". The exemption of the Jews from military service and the power and wealth of the Jewish tax-farmers intensified the resentment of the "shlyakhta". Members of the nobility, like Borzobogaty, Zagorovski, and others, attempted to compete with the Jews as leaseholders of customs revenues, but were never successful. Since the Jews lived in the towns and on the lands of the king, the nobility could not wield any authority over them nor derive profit from them. They had not even the right to settle Jews on their estates without the permission of the king; but, on the other hand, they were often annoyed by the erection on their estates of the toll houses of the Jewish tax-collectors.
Hence when the favorable moment arrived, the Lithuanian nobility endeavored to secure greater power over the Jews. At the Diet of Vilna in 1551 the nobility urged the imposition of a special poll tax of one "ducat" per head, and the Volhynian nobles demanded that the Jewish tax-collectors be forbidden to erect tollhouses or place guards at the taverns on their estates.
The opposition to the Jews was finally crystallized and found definite expression in the repressive Lithuanian statute of 1566, when the Lithuanian nobles were first allowed to take part in the national legislation. Paragraph Twelve of this statute contains the following articles:
Other restrictions of a similar nature are contained in the same paragraph. However, the king checked the desire of the nobility to modify essentially the old charters of the Jews.
In the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.
Effect of the Cossacks' Uprising in Lithuania.
The fury of this uprising destroyed the organization of the Lithuanian Jewish communities. The survivors who returned to their old homes in the latter half of the 17th century were practically destitute. The wars which raged constantly in the Lithuanian territory brought ruin to the entire country and deprived the Jews of the opportunity to earn more than a bare livelihood. The intensity of their struggle for existence left them no time to reestablish the conditions which had existed up to 1648. John Casimir (1648–1668) sought to ameliorate their condition by granting various concessions to the Jewish communities of Lithuania. Attempts to return to the old order in the communal organization were not wanting, as is evident from contemporary documents. Thus in 1672, Jewish elders from various towns and villages in the grand duchy of Lithuania secured a charter from King Michael Wiśniowiecki (1669–1673), decreeing "that on account of the increasing number of Jews guilty of offenses against the "Shlyakhta" and other Christians, which result in the enmity of the Christians toward the Jews, and because of the inability of the Jewish elders to punish such offenders, who are protected by the lords, the king permits the "kahals" to summon the criminals before the Jewish courts for punishment and exclusion from the community when necessary." The efforts to resurrect the old power of the "kahals" were not successful. The impoverished Jewish merchants, having no capital of their own, were compelled to borrow money from the nobility, from churches, congregations, monasteries, and various religious orders. Loans from the latter were usually for an unlimited period and were secured by mortgages on the real estate of the "kahal". The "kahals" thus became hopelessly indebted to the clergy and the nobility.
In 1792 the Jewish population of Lithuania was estimated at 250,000 (as compared with 120,000 in 1569). The whole of the commerce and industries of Lithuania, now rapidly declining, was in the hands of the Jews. The nobility lived for the most part on their estates and farms, some of which were managed by Jewish leaseholders. The city properties were concentrated in the possession of monasteries, churches, and the lesser nobility. The Christian merchants were poor. Such was the condition of affairs in Lithuania at the time of the second partition of Poland (1793), when the Jews became subjects of Russia.
Jewish culture in Lithuania.
The founding of the "yeshivot" in Lithuania was due to the Lithuanian-Polish Jews who studied in the west, and to the German Jews who migrated about that time to Lithuania and Poland. Very little is known of these early "yeshivot". No mention is made of them or of prominent Lithuanian rabbis in Jewish writings until the 16th century. The first known rabbinical authority and head of a "yeshivah" was Isaac Bezaleel of Vladimir, Volhynia, who was already an old man when Solomon Luria went to Ostroh in the fourth decade of the 16th century. Another rabbinical authority, Kalman Haberkaster, rabbi of Ostrog and predecessor of Luria, died in 1559. Occasional references to the "yeshivah" of Brest are found in the writings of the contemporary rabbis Solomon Luria (died 1585), Moses Isserles (died 1572), and David Gans (died 1589), who speak of its activity. Of the "yeshivot" of Ostrog and Vladimir in Volhynia it is known that they were in a flourishing condition at the middle of the 16th century, and that their heads vied with one another in "Talmudic" scholarship. Mention is also made by Gans of the head of the Kremenetz "yeshivah", Isaac Cohen (died 1573), of whom but little is known otherwise.
At the time of the Lublin Union, Solomon Luria was rabbi of Ostrog, and was regarded as one of the greatest "Talmudic" authorities in Poland and Lithuania. In 1568 King Sigismund ordered that the suits between Isaac Borodavka and Mendel Isakovich, who were partners in the farming of certain customs taxes in Lithuania, be carried for decision to Rabbi Solomon Luria and two auxiliary rabbis from Pinsk and Tiktin.
The far-reaching authority of the leading rabbis of Poland and Lithuania, and their wide knowledge of practical life, are apparent from numerous decisions cited in the "responsa". In the "Eitan ha-Ezrachi" (Ostrog, 1796) of Abraham Rapoport (known also as Abraham Schrenzel; died 1650), Rabbi Meïr Sack is cited as follows: "I emphatically protest against the custom of our communal leaders of purchasing the freedom of Jewish criminals. Such a policy encourages crime among our people. I am especially troubled by the fact that, thanks to the clergy, such criminals may escape punishment by adopting Christianity. Mistaken piety impels our leaders to bribe the officials, in order to prevent such conversions. We should endeavor to deprive criminals of opportunities to escape justice." The same sentiment was expressed in the 16th century by Maharam Lublin ("Responsa", § 138). Another instance, cited by Katz from the same "responsa", likewise shows that Jewish criminals invoked the aid of priests against the authority of Jewish courts by promising to become converts to Christianity.
The decisions of the Polish-Lithuanian rabbis are frequently marked by breadth of view also, as is instanced by a decision of Joel Sirkes ("Bayis Hadash," § 127) to the effect that Jews may employ in their religious services the melodies used in Christian churches, "since music is neither Jewish nor Christian, and is governed by universal laws."
Decisions by Luria, Meïr Katz, and Mordecai Jaffe show that the rabbis were acquainted with the Russian language and its philology. Jaffe, for instance, in a divorce case where the spelling of the woman's name as "Lupka" or "Lubka" was in question, decided that the word is correctly spelled with a "b," and not with a "p," since the origin of the name was the Russian verb = "to love," and not = "to beat" ("Levush ha-Butz we-Argaman," § 129). Meïr Katz ("Geburat Anashim," § 1) explains that the name of Brest-Litovsk is written in divorce cases "Brest" and not "Brisk," "because the majority of the Lithuanian Jews use the Russian language." It is not so with Brisk, in the district of Kujawa, the name of that town being always spelled "Brisk." Katz (a German) at the conclusion of his "responsum" expresses the hope that when Lithuania shall have become more enlightened, the people will speak one language only—German—and that also Brest-Litovsk will be written "Brisk."
Items from the "Responsa".
The "responsa" shed an interesting light also on the life of the Lithuanian Jews and on their relations to their Christian neighbors. Benjamin Aaron Solnik states in his "Mas'at Binyamin" (end of 16th and beginning of 17th century) that "the Christians borrow clothes and jewelry from the Jews when they go to church." Sirkes (l.c. § 79) relates that a Christian woman came to the rabbi and expressed her regret at having been unable to save the Jew Shlioma from drowning. A number of Christians had looked on indifferently while the drowning Jew was struggling in the water. They were upbraided and beaten severely by the priest, who appeared a few minutes later, for having failed to rescue the Jew.
Luria gives an account ("Responsa," § 20) of a quarrel that occurred in a Lithuanian community concerning a cantor whom some of the members wished to dismiss. The synagogue was closed in order to prevent him from exercising his functions, and religious services were thus discontinued for several days. The matter was thereupon carried to the local lord, who ordered the reopening of the building, saying that the house of God might not be closed, and that the cantor's claims should be decided by the learned rabbis of Lithuania. Joseph Katz mentions ("She'erit Yosef," § 70) a Jewish community which was forbidden by the local authorities to kill cattle and to sell meat—an occupation which provided a livelihood for a large portion of the Lithuanian Jews. For the period of a year following this prohibition the Jewish community was on several occasions assessed at the rate of three "gulden" per head of cattle in order to furnish funds with which to induce the officials to grant a hearing of the case. The Jews finally reached an agreement with the town magistrates under which they were to pay forty gulden annually for the right to slaughter cattle. According to Hillel ben Herz ("Bet Hillel," "Yoreh De'ah", § 157), Naphtali says the Jews of Vilna had been compelled to uncover their heads when taking an oath in court, but later purchased from the tribunal the privilege to swear with covered head, a practise subsequently made unnecessary by a decision of one of their rabbis to the effect that an oath might be taken with uncovered head.
The "responsa" of Meïr Lublin show (§ 40) that the Lithuanian communities frequently aided the German and the Austrian Jews. On the expulsion of the Jews from Silesia, when the Jewish inhabitants of Silz had the privilege of remaining on condition that they would pay the sum of 2,000 "gulden," the Lithuanian communities contributed one-fifth of the amount.
Vilna Gaon.
Religious observances owe greatly to Elijah ben Solomon (1720–1797), the Vilna Gaon, who lived in Lithuania's greatest city, Vilnius. His style of "Torah" and "Talmud" study shaped the analytical "Lithuanian-style" form of learning still practiced in most "yeshivas". The "yeshiva movement" itself is a typical Lithuanian development, initiated by the Vilna Gaon's main disciple, Rabbi Chaim Volozhin.
The "Misnagdim" were the early opponents of Hasidic Judaism, led by the Vilna Gaon who sharply denounced the innovations by the "Hasidim". Despite this, several prominent Hasidic scholars and dynasties originated from Lithuania such as Karlin-Stolin founded by Aharon of Karlin, Kopust founded by Yehuda Leib Schneersohn and Koidanov. Some Polish Hasidic dynasties even settled in Lithuania such as those of Elijah Winograd.
Lithuanian Jews under the Russian Empire.
In 1795 the final Third Partition ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the former lands of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania became part of the Russian partition.
By the end of the 19th century, many of Lithuania's Jews fled Eastern Europe to escape the Anti-Jewish pogroms in the Russian Empire and the anti-Semitism. Tens of thousands of Lithuanian Jews emigrated to the United States of America and South Africa. A small number also emigrated to the British Mandate of Palestine.
Republic of Lithuania (1918–1940).
Lithuanian Jews took an active part in Freedom wars of Lithuania. On December 29, 1918, Lithuania's government called for volunteers to defend the Lithuanian state; of 10,000 volunteers more than 500 Jewish. More than 3,000 Jews served in the Lithuanian army between 1918 and 1923. Initially, the Jewish community was given a wide amount of autonomy in education and taxation through community councils, or "kehillot".
By 1934, in a nationalist trend that reflected throughout Europe, the government scaled back much of this autonomy, and cases of antisemitism increased.
After the Soviet occupation in June 1941, some Jewish communists assumed significant roles in the NKVD and local communist nomenklatura. Other Jews, particularly religious Jews and Zionists, were treated harshly by the Soviet-imposed communist government in Lithuania prior to the German invasion.
Some Lithuanians, spurred on by far-right groups such as the Iron Wolf and Nazi propaganda, blamed Jews for the communist regime, and participated in the mass murder of Lithuanian Jews during the Holocaust.
World War II and the Holocaust.
The Lithuanian Republic was occupied by Soviet Union in June 1940, and one year later, in June 1941, occupied by the Germans. During World War II, 91–95% of Lithuania's Jewish population of Lithuanian Jews were killed – almost all the Jews who had not managed to leave Lithuania and its environs. This was the highest casualty rate of Jews in any nation in the Holocaust.
The only European yeshiva to survive the Holocaust was the Mir yeshiva. With help of the Japanese consul in Kaunas, Chiune Sugihara, its leaders and students managed to escape to the Shanghai ghetto.
The Soviet era (1944–1990).
Following the expulsion of Nazi German forces in 1944, The Soviets reannexed Lithuania as a Soviet republic, and prosecuted a number of Lithuanians for collaborating with the Nazis. Sites of wartime massacres, such as the Ninth Fort near Kaunas became monuments. To avoid nationalist themes, the memorials were declared in the name of all victims, though the clear majority of them are Jewish. Most survivors never returned, moving to Israel instead. Throughout Soviet rule, there was tension between the Jewish community and the authorities over the right to emigrate to Israel, and how to properly commemorate the Holocaust. The majority of Jews in Soviet Lithuania arrived after the war, with Russian and Yiddish as their primary language.
Jews in modern Lithuania.
Interest among descendants of Lithuanian Jews has spurred tourism and a renewal in research and preservation of the community's historic resources and possessions. Increasing numbers of Lithuanian Jews are interested in learning and practising the use of Yiddish. In 2000, the Jewish population of the country was 3,600.
The beginning of the 21st century was marked by conflicts between members of Chabad-Lubavitch and secular leaders. In 2005, Chief Rabbi Sholom Ber Krinsky was physically removed from the Synagogue by two men hired by the community's secular leader Mr. Alperovich, who then declared a new Chief Rabbi. For more detail, see Chabad-Lubavitch related controversies: Lithuania.
Among notable contemporary Lithuanian Jews are the brothers Emanuelis Zingeris (a member of the Lithuanian Seimas) and Markas Zingeris (writer), Ephraim Oshry (one of the few Rabbis to survive the Holocaust), Anatolijus Šenderovas (world-renowned composer, Laureate of the Lithuanian National Award and European Composer's Prize winner), Arturas Bumsteinas (composer, sound artist), Arkadijus Vinokuras (actor, publicist), Gercas Žakas (football referee), Gidonas Šapiro-Bilas (pop-singer from ŽAS), Dovydas Bluvšteinas (music producer), Leonidas Donskis (philosopher, essayist), Icchokas Meras (writer), Benjaminas Gorbulskis (composer), Chaim Baruch Utinsky (poet), Grigorijus Kanovičius (writer), Rafailas Karpis (opera singer (tenor), David Geringas (world-renowned cellist and conductor), Liora Grodnikaitė (opera singer (mezzo-soprano), Arkadijus Gotesmanas (Jazz percussionist), Ilja Bereznickas (animator, illustrator, scriptwriter and caricaturist), Adomas Jacovskis, Marius Jacovskis, Aleksandra Jacovskytė (painters), Adasa Skliutauskaitė (painter), etc.
In 2019 after a memorial plaque in central Vilnius was smashed with a sledgehammer by Jewish Lithuanian politician Stanislovas Tomas, the Choral Synagogue, Vilnius's only remaining synagogue, was temporarily shuttered due to threats, along with the Jewish community headquarters. The decision coincided with a rise in antisemitic rhetoric related to public debate about honoring Lithuanian collaborators with the Nazis.


James Tobin (planter)

James Tobin (1736/7–1817) was a prominent merchant and planter based in Nevis. During his life, he became of the most prominent proslavery activists from the West Indies.
Life.
Tobin was born in London, the son of James Tobin Sr. of Nevis, identified tentatively in the ODNB with the sea captain James Tobin (1698–1770), as given in "Caribbeana". Educated at Westminster School, he took articles as a solicitor. After a period in Nevis, he returned in 1784 to Bristol. He was in business there, with John Pretor Pinney, and advocated for the planters' point of view on the abolitionist movment. He was a member of the Bristol West India Association.
Tobin travelled first to Nevis in 1758, to work in the family plantation business, at Stoney Grove Estate. From 1760 to 1782 he was there at least three times. He went back there in 1808. In 1817, the year of his death, there were 213 enslaved people on the Stoney Grove plantation.
In the end Tobin quarrelled with the Pinney family. He died in Bristol, on 6 October 1817.
Works.
Tobin was one of a group of writers who defended the existing institution of slavery, based on experience in the Caribbean, that included also Samuel Estwick, Edward Long, Richard Nisbet who published "Slavery not Forbidden by Scripture" (1773), and Philip Thicknesse. He was drawn into controversy by the views of James Ramsay, expressed in "An Essay on the Treatment and Conversion of African Slaves in the British Sugar Colonies" of 1784; and published a number of works:
Tobin was addressed personally by Ramsay in "A Letter to James Tobin, Esq., late member of His Majesty's Council in the island of Nevis" (1787). He replied in:
The 1786 "Essay on Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species" by Thomas Clarkson deals with Tobin as the "Cursory Remarker". In 1787, Ottobah Cugoano responded to a number of authors defending enslavement, including Tobin, in "Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil and Wicked Traffic of the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species". Olaudah Equiano replied to Tobin in 1788, in "The Public Advertiser", attacking two of his pamphlets, and also a related book from 1786 by Gordon Turnbull. Hector Macneill wrote positively about Tobin's "Cursory Remarks" in his "Observations on the Treatment of the Negroes in Jamaica" (1788).
In February 1790 Tobin gave evidence to a parliamentary committee on the slave trade. A later work was "A Plain Man's Thoughts on the present Price of Sugar" (1792). In that year a bill to abolish the slave trade was defeated in the House of Commons.
Family.
Tobin married in 1766 Elizabeth Webbe, daughter of George Webbe, a Nevis planter. Living until 1777 in Salisbury, they had eight children: James Webbe, George, Henry Hope, John, Elizabeth, Charles Meadows, Joseph Webbe, and Frances. Elizabeth married John Cobham of Barbados, and Frances Robert Bush of Clifton. In a marriage of first cousins, George Webbe Tobin, son of George, married Susannah Cobham, daughter of Elizabeth.


Bombings in Sweden

Bombings in Sweden are attacks and sabotage using explosive devices by criminals in Sweden. The weapons used are weapons such as hand grenades and explosives intended for either civilian or military use. Legal authorities use the term "allmänfarlig ödeläggelse genom sprängning" (English: damage by explosive blast) and media in Sweden use the shorter term "sprängdåd". This crime was not categorized separately prior to 2017. In 2018 there were 162 explosions, and in the first nine months of 2019 97 explosions were registered, usually carried out by criminal gangs. According to Swedish police commissioner Anders Thornberg in 2019, there is no international equivalent to Sweden's wave of bombings.
Usage of hand grenades reached a significant peak in 2016. According to police in Gothenburg and Malmö in 2016, the use of hand grenades by criminals in Sweden is a phenomenon which is unusual for all comparable countries both inside and outside the EU. According to criminologists Manne Gerell and Amir Rostami, the only other country that keeps track of hand grenade explosions is Mexico. While Mexico has a murder rate 20 times that of Sweden, on the specific category of grenade explosions per capita the two countries were comparable at the time. According to police authorities, many of the hand grenades used are weapons which originate from the Yugoslav Wars, and the hand grenades found by the police are exclusively the ex-Yugoslavian M75 hand grenade.
Explosions have occurred in both rich and low-income areas. Swedish police do not record or release the ethnicity of convicted criminals, but Linda H Straaf head of intelligence at National Operations Department says they are from poor areas and many are second- or third-generation immigrants. Swedish media sometimes are accused of not covering the topic enough, but a 2019 study by polling company Kantar Sifo found that law and order was still the most covered news topic on Swedish TV and radio and on social media.<ref name="bbc.com/news/"></ref>
In 2019, Denmark, worried about the bombings in Sweden, introduced passport controls on its border checkpoints with Sweden for the first time since the 1950s. In September 2019, police in Malmö issued a general warning to be vigilant for explosive devices when walking the city at night.
Perpetrators.
According to police the attackers are part of the same gangs which also increasingly engaged in gun crime leading to a wave in shootings. While there were 17 deadly shootings in 2011, there were 45 in 2018. Ethnicity is not recorded and published for either suspect or convicted criminals, but according to police intelligence chief Linda H Staaf many are second or third generation immigrants, are members of disadvantaged groups and have grown up in disadvantaged areas.
Geographic distribution.
Most of the attacks were earlier recorded in low-income suburbs in Malmö, Gothenburg and Stockholm. In a more recent trend, more affluent districts also experienced attacks, such as a detonation in Bromma.
Timeline of noted bombings.
According to a December 2018 Swedish Television interview with researcher , Sweden has a high number of hand grenade attacks compared to neighbouring countries Denmark, Norway and Germany. While gun homicides were on the rise in the 2011-2018 time span, according to a study at Malmö University the number of hand grenade attacks had shown a strong increase in the same period and a total of 116 hand grenade detonations were recorded. Rostami said criminologists in Sweden do not know why there was a strong increase and why Sweden has a much higher rate than countries close by.
2012.
In 2012 the Swedish National Forensic Centre investigated 88 incidents involving explosives.
2016.
In 2016 police forensic experts reported that the number of annual investigations had increased from 100 to 150 annually in the 2014-2015 time span.
According to Amir Rostami, 2016 saw a record number of hand grenade attacks.
2017.
In 2017, the Swedish National Forensic Centre investigated 211 incidents involving explosives, of which 43 involved hand grenades.
2018.
In the first half of 2018, 75 bombings were reported to authorities and the total for the year was 162. Of the 162, 47 were in the Stockholm region and 56 were in the southern region which includes Malmö.
In January 2018, Minister for Justice Morgan Johansson called for an "amnesty" for illegal explosives after the death of bystander Daniel Cuevas Zuniga who was killed by a hand grenade. The "amnesty", where people could hand over grenades to authorities without being prosecuted, had the aim of getting explosive weapons off the streets.
2019.
In the first three months of 2019, there were 48 bombings in Sweden. By June 2019, Malmö and Stockholm had the most bombings. Up until July there were 120 bombings compared to 83 the same period the previous year. Up until 1 November, this represented double the number of detonations compared to the previous year.
Public broadcaster Sveriges Radio published a news item on 1 November entitled "Unusually high workload for the national bomb disposal unit." The unit had processed 98 bombings in 2019 up until 1 November.


Veborg


Christian Georg Kohlrausch

Christian Georg Kohlrausch re-discovered the Discus - see Discus throw. Since the end of the Ancient Olympic Games, the discus was only known from sculpture like the Discobolus and drawings. The exact dimensions (shape), weight and the technique of throwing had not been recorded and handed down.
In 1880, Christian Georg Kohlrausch was appointed as gymnastics teacher at the Klosterschule "Pädagogium zum Kloster Unser Lieben Frauen" (grammar school "Our Ladies"), a former cloister school in Magdeburg. He taught here until his retirement in 1913. He became known around the World through his studies and experiments with pupils to re-discover the discus and the technique of throwing it. He was so well known in Germany at the time that he would receive letters from around the World addressed simply to "Christian Kohlrausch, Germany".
Christian Kohlrausch examined what was known about this key Olympic discipline. He worked with students to re-discover once more the shape and dimensions of the discus. During sport lessons in and outside of school he developed and refined the technique of throwing and turned it once more into a competitive sport discipline. Due to his work the Discus throw was included in the very first Olympic Games of Modern Times in 1896.
Around 1880/81, he introduced "games in the open air" ("Spiele im Freien") to his school in Magdeburg and in this helped to introduce Football in Germany, which is mostly attributed to Konrad Koch with whom he collaborated. In the early days (until 1893) the rules of Football were based on Rugby.


Juliana of Hesse-Eschwege

Juliana of Hesse-Eschwege (14 May 1652 – 20 June 1693) was a German noblewoman. In her teens she was brought up at the Swedish royal court as the future queen of King Charles XI of Sweden, her cousin. However, on two occasions before the wedding Juliana became pregnant, and the engagement was eventually broken off. In 1679 or 1680, Juliana married a Dutchman and lived the rest of her life in the Netherlands, while Charles married Ulrike Eleonora of Denmark in 1680.
Life.
Juliana was born in Eschwege to Frederick, Landgrave of Hesse-Eschwege (son of Maurice of Hesse-Kassel and his second wife, Juliane of Nassau-Dillenburg), and Eleonora Catherine, a Swedish princess. Her maternal grandmother was Princess Catharina of Sweden, and her mother was a sister of King Charles X of Sweden. Juliana was likely named after her paternal grandmother, a daughter of John VII of Nassau, who was herself likely named after her paternal grandmother, Juliana of Stolberg.
Juliana's mother had caused a scandal in Sweden when she confessed to her husband that she had an affair with a French lute-player and actor, Beschon, and was expecting his child. Juliana's father tried to hide the matter but it became a known scandal. It is said that Eleonora was too embarrassed to return to the Swedish court, so she preferred to live in the palace in Eschwege, although she did visit Sweden.
Juliana was described as a great beauty. She was taken to the royal Swedish court to be brought up there as the future queen of Sweden by queen dowager Hedwig Eleonora of Holstein-Gottorp, with the prospect of being married to her cousin, King Charles, when he reached adulthood.
These plans never came about. In 1672, during a "walk by carriage" in Stockholm with the queen dowager, Princess Juliana fell to the floor of the carriage in labour. The father of the child proved not to be her cousin the king, but a married officer of the court, Count Gustaf Lillie. The count was exiled, and Juliana was sent to the country, where she was given her own estate and court. The child, a son, was named after his father, Gustaf Gustafsson Lillie, was later raised by Baron Gustaf Adolf von der Osten. His fate is unknown.
A couple of years later, Juliana gave birth to another son. This time the father was Johann Jakob Marchand, the young, unmarried son of her Dutch housekeeper. Baptized on 29 November 1656 in Breda, Marchand was the secretary of the Dutch ambassador, and about four years younger than Juliana. In 1679, Juliana's cousin, King Charles, gave her his permission to marry her lover, who was given the title Baron von Lilienburg (Lilie's estate was named Lillienborg). They were married on 22 February 1680 in Raeftnas, Soedermanland and then settled in Haarlem, the Netherlands.
Juliana died in 1693 in IJsselstein. Her husband lived ten years more and died on 7 April 1703 in IJsselstein.
Her sister, Christine of Hesse-Eschwege, became the Duchess of Brunswick-Lüneburg as the wife of Ferdinand Albert I, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, and was a great-great-great-grandmother of Victoria of the United Kingdom.
Children.
Juliana had the following children.
With Count Gustaf Lillie:
With her husband, Johan Jakob Marchand:


Iberavia

Iberavia was a Spanish aircraft manufacturing company established in Madrid in 1946. Originally, the firm built aircraft instruments, but from 1948 onwards supplied training gliders of its own design to the Spanish Air Force (the IP-2). In 1951 it flew a prototype light plane, the Iberavia I-11 which only entered production when the firm was bought by AISA shortly thereafter.


Talachyn

Talachyn (, Łacinka: "Tałačyn", ) or Tolochin (; , , ) is a city in the Vitebsk Region of Belarus, an administrative center of the Talachyn District. It is perhaps the coldest city in Belarus in winter, with a record low of -42.2C.
History.
The town was first mentioned in 1433. The village was a shtetl, the Jewish population of the town constituted more than 70% of all inhabitants.
In March 1942 the Germans killed more than 2,000 Jews from the city and its suburbs in a mass execution.
A memorial has been erected to remember the fate of the victims.
American composer Irving Berlin was likely born in this city.


John Julius Angerstein

John Julius Angerstein (1735 – 22 January 1823) was a London businessman and Lloyd's underwriter, a patron of the fine arts and a collector. It was the prospect that his collection of paintings was about to be sold by his estate in 1824 that galvanised the founding of the British National Gallery.
Parentage.
John Julius Angerstein was born in St Petersburg, Russia, in 1735. It has wrongly been suggested that he was a natural son of empress Catherine II or of Elizabeth, Empress of Russia. Family tradition holds that his true parents were empress Anna of Russia and the London businessman, Andrew Poulett Thompson; his first position after arriving in London at the age of fifteen was in Thompson's counting-house.
Family.
In 1771 Angerstein married Anna Crockett (widow of Charles Crockett and daughter of Henry Muilman (1700–1772) a South Sea Company director, banker, Danish consul in London and Russia Company consul, and Anne née Darnall) at St Peter-le-Poer, Old Broad Street. They had two children – Juliana, who married General of the Russian service, and John Angerstein (MP) (1773–1858).
Anna died in 1783, and in 1785 John Julius Angerstein married Eliza Lucas (daughter of the Rev. Joseph Payne and widow of Thomas Lucas, a director of the South Sea Company, president of Guy's Hospital and West Indies merchant). A portrait of Angerstein and his second wife, Eliza, by Thomas Lawrence was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1792 (now held by The Louvre museum, Paris).
Life and art collection.
In his role as a merchant Angerstein was said to own a third share in slave estates in Grenada, using profits from the slave trade to build up his art collection (and also benefiting from Lloyd's underwriting of the slave trade). Angerstein was chairman of Lloyd's from 1790 to 1796 and counted king George III, British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger and artist Sir Thomas Lawrence among his friends. Although a slave owner, he was also on the Committee for the Relief of the Black Poor, an organisation with strong abolitionist connections.
After a number of knife attacks on women by the so-called "London Monster", Angerstein promised a reward of £100 for capture of the perpetrator.
Among his earliest art purchases was "The Rape of the Sabines" by Rubens. Later acquisitions included works by Rembrandt, Velázquez, Titian, Raphael, Correggio and Hogarth, plus early drawings by J.M.W. Turner. From the sale in London of the French Orleans Collection he bought "The Raising of Lazarus" by Sebastiano del Piombo and other works. After his death, thirty-eight of his finest paintings were bought by the British government for £60,000 to form the nucleus of the collection of the British National Gallery. Until the National Gallery was built in Trafalgar Square in London, the 38 works from Angerstein's collection were displayed in Angerstein's town house in Pall Mall.
He lived for some years in Greenwich in south-east London, leasing a estate from Sir Gregory Page in 1774 and over the next two years building a house, Woodlands (designed by local architect George Gibson). This area is now known as Westcombe Park, part of a wide area on the north-eastern fringes of Blackheath that he sought to enclose in 1801. The house fell empty in 1870 when John's grandson William Angerstein relinquished the lease.
In 1806 Angerstein served as Vice-president of the newly formed London Institution, and the previous year became a founding governor of the British Institution for Promoting the Fine Arts in the United Kingdom. As an active church-goer, he worshipped at St Alfege's Church, Greenwich, where he was also churchwarden.
Connections today.
His family's connections with Greenwich are still commemorated. Angerstein Lane, near the heath at Blackheath, bears the family name. A public house, The Angerstein Hotel, is on Woolwich Road, Greenwich, close to the Woolwich Road flyover (Blackwall Tunnel A102 southern approach) – on the opposite side of which lies the Angerstein Business Park (owned by Greenwich Enterprise Board). East of this is the Angerstein Railway Line (almost solely used for commercial freight, mainly sea-dredged aggregate landed at Angerstein Wharf, operated by Aggregate Industries), linking the peninsula at North Greenwich with the main railway network; as a result, an area of largely industrial land in between the lines, and to the east of the A102 road, is sometimes referred to as the "Angerstein Triangle."


George Colebrooke

Sir George Colebrooke, 2nd Baronet (14 June 1729 – 5 August 1809), of Gatton in Surrey, was an English merchant banker, chairman of the East India Company and Member of Parliament, who bankrupted himself through unwise speculations.
Early life.
Colebrooke was born in 1729 at Chilham, Kent, the third son of James Colebrooke, a London banker, and was educated at Leiden University.
Career.
He acquired Arnos Grove house in 1752 on the death of his father.
After the death of his father and an older brother, George was left in sole charge of the family bank in Threadneedle Street, and invested some of his wealth in buying up control of the borough of Arundel in Sussex, where the family lived. Arundel was not a classic pocket borough, where the power to return MPs was literally tied to property rights that could be freely bought and sold, but a thoroughly corrupt one where bribery was routine and where maintaining influence of the elections required constant expenditure. Nevertheless, Colebrooke kept control for twenty years, sitting himself as its MP from 1754 to 1774 and for most of the period being able to choose also who held the other seat. Meanwhile, his brother, James had bought control of one seat in another rotten borough, Gatton in Surrey, for £23,000, and was also sitting in Parliament.
Both brothers were at first Opposition Whigs, but switched support to the Duke of Newcastle's government and were rewarded in 1759 with the creation of a baronetcy for James (who had daughters but no son) and a special remainder of the baronetcy to George. When James died in 1761, George inherited both the baronetcy, Gatton Park and the Lordship of the Manor at Gatton with its guaranteed control of one of the parliamentary seats there. He had Gatton Park landscaped by Capability Brown between 1762 and 1768
More valuably, however, Colebrooke's support for Newcastle ensured his eligibility for lucrative government contracts. By 1762, he held two of these contracts, one for remitting money to the British forces in the American colonies and the other for victualling the troops there. But with Newcastle's fall from power in that year, Colebrooke was immediately ejected from one contract by the new government, and the other was not renewed when it expired in 1765. Though offered compensation or new contracts on the formation of the Rockingham government, he preferred instead to accept a well-paid post as chirographer to the Court of Common Pleas. From this point onwards although he retained his seat in Parliament he was rarely active there.
Colebrooke's business interests were diverse. He speculated in land, buying large estates in Lanarkshire, and purchased plantations in Antigua (where his wife already had interests), Grenada and Dominica; he was also a member of a syndicate to settle the Ohio Valley in 1768, and had interests in New England. (Colebrook, New Hampshire is named in his honour.) Two interests in particular, however, led to his eventual downfall: his involvement in the East India Company and his speculations in raw materials.
Colebrooke was a Director of the East India Company from 1767 to 1771, Deputy Chairman 1768-69 and was elected Chairman three times, in 1769, 1770 and 1772. His final year in office was a disastrous one: the company got into financial difficulties (which led to the passing of the Regulating Act of 1773), he was accused of speculating in its stock while Chairman, and was left heavily in debt to a number of the other leading figures in the company, partly through arrangements to procure votes in the company's elections. He lost much larger sums, however, speculating on prices of raw materials - hemp, flax, lead, logwood and alum among others. In 1771 he lost £190,000 dealing in hemp; from 1772 he was attempting to corner the world's supply of alum, buying up mines in Yorkshire and Lancashire, and saw much of the remainder of his fortune swallowed up when the market collapsed as part of a wider financial crisis.
At first, Colebrooke was able to stay in business with assistance from the Bank of England, but his bank temporarily stopped payment on 31 March 1773, and permanently (after three years in the control of trustees appointed by his creditors) on 7 August 1776. Yet at the same period he was spending considerable sums on the rebuilding of his London house in Soho Square. Most of his property, including his share in the rotten borough at Gatton, was sold to meet his liabilities, and a commission of bankruptcy was taken out against him in 1777.
Later life.
He retired to Boulogne-sur-Mer, so poor that the East India Company had to vote him a pension, but later returned to England and managed eventually to pay his creditors in full so that some inheritance was left for his descendants. He died on 5 August 1809.
Marriage.
He had married Mary Gayner, daughter of Peter Gayner of Antigua, in 1754, and they had three sons and three daughters:


Kholop

A kholop () was a type of feudal serf in Russia between the 10th and early 18th centuries. Their legal status was close to that of slaves.
Etymology.
The word "kholop" was first mentioned in a chronicle for the year of 986. The word is cognate with Slavic words translated as "boy" (more specifically, adolescent male; modern Ukrainian: хлопець ("khlopets"), Polish: "chłopiec", Bulgarian: "хлапе"/"хлапак"). The further etymology is uncertain. Such transitions between the meanings 'young person' and 'servant' (in both directions) are commonplace, as evident from the English use of 'boy' in the sense of 'domestic servant'.
Kholops.
The "Russkaya Pravda," a legal code of the late Kievan Rus, details the status and types of "kholops" of the time.
In the 11th - 12th centuries, the term referred to different categories of dependent people and especially slaves. A "kholop"’s master had unlimited power over his life, e.g., he could kill him, sell him, or pay his way out of debt with him. The master, however, was responsible for a "kholop"’s actions, such as insulting a freeman or stealing.
A person could become a "kholop" as a result of capture, selling oneself, being sold for debts, after having committed crimes, or through marriage to a "kholop". Until the late 15th century, the "kholops" represented a majority among the servants, who had been working lordly lands. Some "kholops", mainly house serfs, replenished the ranks of the princely servants (including those in the military) or engaged themselves in trades, farming, or administrative activities.
Throughout the 16th century, the "kholops"’ role in the corvée economy had been diminishing due to the increasing involvement of peasant exploitation ("see Russian serfdom"). At the turn of the 16th century, the service class "kholops" (служилое холопство, "sluzhiloye kholopstvo") began to emerge and spread across the country. In the late 17th century, there were also "kholops" "chained" to their land (посаженные на землю, "posazhenniye na zemlyu"), who took care of their own household and had to pay quitrent. Those "kholops", who had been house serfs, were subject to poll tax in 1722-1724 and were thereafter treated as ordinary serfs.
Combat servants.
"Combat servants" (), also known as "military slaves" in literature, constituted an armed retinue and personal protection for large and medium-sized landowners in the 16th-18th centuries, and carried out military service together with noblemen, constituting a considerable part of the "Landed army". They were equipped as mounted archers, usually wearing cheap quilted armor and caps.


Quiero Television

Quiero Televisión SA, commonly known as Quiero TV (Spanish for "I-Want TV"), was a pay television service over digital terrestrial television (TDT) in Spain in the early years of the digital television transition. It launched in 2000,
Quiero TV received its digital television license in 1999, and operated from 2000 to 2002, with 14 channels, at a time when the only other digital terrestrial channels were TVE 1 and La 2, the two main channels of Spain's public broadcaster. Quiero TV was 49% owned by Auna/Retevisión; other investors included Planeta of Spain, Carlton Communications of the UK, and the MediaPark investment firm of Catalonia.
Having to compete aggressively with satellite and cable for the pay TV market, Quiero TV provided set-top boxes and antenna servicing to subscribers. Expenses ended up being far higher than planned. By early 2001, Quiero had 200,000 subscribers, but afterwards, customer counts decreased. Losing 24 million euros a month, and failing to find anyone to buy the company, it shut down in April 2002, having lost around 600 million euros total. Another Carlton pay television service, ITV Digital in the United Kingdom, also shut down a month later.


James Holborne of Menstrie

Major General Sir James Holborne of Menstrie was a Scottish soldier during the years of the English Civil War. Although he initially fought on the side of the English Parliament, he later became a senior officer in the Scottish Army, fighting against Cromwell. He lived at Menstrie Castle, in Menstrie, Clackmannanshire, central Scotland, which he had purchased in 1649.
Action in the Civil War.
James Holborne led a brigade of infantry in the Parliamentarian army of the Earl of Essex at the first Battle of Newbury in 1643. He was with Sir William Waller's army at the Battle of Cropredy Bridge on 29 June 1644. At Stowe St Mary, near Tavistock, in January 1645, Sydenham House, a large Elizabethan mansion on the banks of the River Lyd, then being garrisoned for the King, was taken by Colonel Holborne. In April that year, Holborne was offered command of a regiment of foot in the New Model Army, but like several prominent Scottish and Presbyterian officers, he declined.
Holborne was a Major General by 1645, when he was nominated, with the Earl of Leven, and Lord Kirkcudbright, as a deputation from the Convention of Estates, the most powerful party in Scotland at that time, to open negotiations with Oliver Cromwell, whose army was then at Berwick. On 4 October 1648 Cromwell made his first visit to Edinburgh. The Lord Kirkcudbright and Major General Holborne conducted him into the city, where he was lodged in the Earl of Moray's house in the Canongate.
By the autumn of 1650, James Holborne was fighting against Cromwell at the Battle of Dunbar. After the defeat of the Covenanting army by Cromwell at Dunbar, Charles II had been crowned by Argyll at Scone in Scotland, assuming personal command of the Scottish army, he managed to restrain Cromwell at Stirling for a month. Cromwell tried to turn the Scottish flank by sending a force under Colonel Overton into Fife. To defeat this attempt, Charles sent forward a contingent under two officers, Brown and James Holborne of Menstrie, with twelve hundred horse and fifteen hundred infantry, and on Sunday 20 July a battle took place on the north shore of the Forth at Inverkeithing. In that encounter, Holborne showed himself uncertain of his new allegiance. At the beginning of the battle Holborne fled with his cavalry, and although Brown, with a small force of infantry under Sir Hector Maclean and Sir George Buchanan fought bravely, they were defeated, the army being 'cut to pieces'.
Major General Holborne later arrived at Ardvreck Castle, Sutherland, as escort for James Graham, Marquis of Montrose, who was held captive by Neil Macleod after his defeat at Carbisdale, to be led to Edinburgh by a troop of horse by order of General David Leslie to meet his judges and his death on 4 May 1650. On 5 May, Montrose thus begun his long and humiliating captive journey, and on 6 May, Major General Holborne took shelter at Skibo Castle, the home of the dowager Lady Gray. Lady Gray, being loyal to the King, requested Montrose to be seated next to her at dinner. Major General Holborne insisted on a strict military order to affairs, and placed the Marquis between himself and another officer. With this breach of etiquette, the Lady Gray flew into a violent rage, and seizing upon a leg of roasted mutton by the shank she confronted the Major General with "such a notable blow on his head, knocking him of his seat." The officers took alarm, expecting an attempt to rescue their prisoner. Lady Gray promptly reminded them that they were her guests and as such, as gentleman they should accommodate themselves to such an adjustment of place at her table, as she considered to be correct. Order having been restored, mutton replaced to the table, every possible civility was thereafter directed by all present toward the Marquis.
On 7 May, Montrose was ferried across Dornoch Firth to Tain, where General David Leslie took personal command of the procession. Montrose was led down the east coast of Scotland on the long journey toward Edinburgh, where he was met at the town’s Watergate and the sentence of hanging, drawing and quartering was pronounced.
Family.
Major General Holborne was a relation of Sir Robert Holborne, the attorney general of King James I. A "James Holburn" is recorded as having married Helen Millar on 29 July 1680 at Muthill, Perthshire in Scotland. A reference in the International Genealogical Index records a second marriage, to Margaret Gordon, which took place on 30 August 1682 at Monimail, Fife.
Holborne's son, also named James, was admitted as advocate on 23 November 1714, becoming thereafter an Examiner in the Exchequer. This James was married at first to Janet Inglis of Cramond, and later to Jean, the daughter of Alexander Spital of Leuchat. His son, another James, was created a baronet in 1706, in the Baronetage of Nova Scotia. Among the descendants of Major General Holburne are Sir Alexander Holburn, 3rd Baronet, Vice-Admiral Sir Francis Holburne, and Thomas William Holborne, founder of the Holburne Museum of Art in Bath, all of whom served in the Royal Navy.


Witzan


Sklarek scandal

The Sklarek scandal was a political scandal which started in 1927 in Weimar Germany. It primarily involved three brothers, Leo, Max and Willy Sklarek who were arrested for fraud in the autumn of that year coming to trial on 13 October 1931. As with the previous Barmat scandal, the brothers were Jewish, a fact which was likewise exploited by propagandists of the emergent Nazi Party, who used the scandal to attack Jewish people in general, democracy and the Weimar state.
In 1926, the Sklarek brothers bought the stock of the clothing distribution company, with which the municipality of Berlin dressed its agents during the First World War. This relationship was continued in the postwar years. However, the brothers defrauded the Berlin municipality by issuing a series of false invoices for goods never delivered. When the fraud was discovered, the damages were estimated at over 10 million marks. The brothers bribed or attempted to bribe a large number of Weimer officials to cover up the scandal. The corruption was so widespread that the court proceedings ran to 2300 pages.


List of elections in Belgium

This is an overview of all regular elections held in the Kingdom of Belgium since its independence. This excludes local referenda and special elections (by-elections) that existed before 1919. Municipal elections prior to 1919 are not listed either.
Constituent elections (1830).
Elections to the temporary National Congress:
Unitary state (1831–1994).
Elections in 1831–1919.
Representatives were elected for a 4-year term; half of the Chamber was up for election each two years. Senators were elected for an 8-year term; half of the Senate was up for election each four years. The first series (referenced as "E" here) consisted of the provinces of East Flanders, Hainaut, Liège and Limburg; the second series ("A" below) of Antwerp, Brabant, Luxembourg, Namur and West Flanders.
An equivalent system applied to elections for municipal and provincial councils.
Federal state (1994–present).
The 1993–1994 fourth state reform had far-reaching consequences for the institutional structure of the country.
Local elections (six-year terms) include provincial and municipal elections, as well as district elections in Antwerp.
Regional elections (five-year terms, concurrently with European elections) are elections to the different parliaments of communities and regions: the Flemish Parliament, the Walloon Parliament, the Parliament of the Brussels-Capital Region, the Parliament of the German-speaking Community and indirectly the Parliament of the French Community and the three assemblies of the community commissions in Brussels.


Kevin Hyland

Kevin Hyland, OBE (born 1963) was the United Kingdom’s first Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, leading efforts to tackle slavery and human trafficking. He left the post in May 2018 and was succeeded by Dame Sara Thornton. He is the Chair of IHRB's Leadership Group for Responsible Recruitment, collaboration between leading companies and expert organisations to drive positive change in the way that migrant workers are recruited. He was formerly head of the London Metropolitan Police Service’s Human Trafficking Unit.
Police career.
Hyland was a police officer for 30 years until retiring from the force as a detective inspector in 2014. As a detective Hyland specialised in various crimes throughout his policing career including homicide, gun crime, anti-corruption and then human trafficking and slavery. When working as a senior investigating officer, Hyland was responsible for the convictions of a large number of international organised crime groups, which included conducting multi-national JITs (joint investigation teams) bi-lateral prosecutions various criminal offences including money laundering, corruption, sexual exploitation and human trafficking.
In 2010 Hyland was appointed as the lead for the London Metropolitan Police’s Human Trafficking Unit. During Hyland’s tenure the London Metropolitan Police saw an increase in victim identifications and successful prosecutions of traffickers. He retired from the MPS in 2014 with the title of Detective Inspector, after some 30 years of service, in order to accept the position of "anti-slavery tsar".
Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner.
The creation of an Independent Commissioner is one of the main provisions of the UK's Modern Slavery Act 2015. Hyland was appointed to the role in November 2014 and acted as 'designate' Commissioner until the Bill received Royal Assent in March 2015, when he became Commissioner. He resigned in May 2018.
The role complements the existing role of Victims' Commissioner to ensure that modern slavery issues are tackled in a coordinated and effective manner across the UK. He will work closely with law enforcement agencies, local authorities, third sector organisations and internationally to encourage good practice in the identification of victims and the prevention, detection, investigation and prosecution of modern slavery crimes, including international collaboration. The role requires published annual reports for Parliamentary scrutiny.
Kevin Hyland alleged that young children are made to do begging, pickpocketing and shoplifting in a manner similar to what happens in the novel, "Oliver Twist" by Charles Dickens. Hyland maintains 151 convictions for slavery-related offences occurred in 2014 which he felt was far too few. Hyland claims police are doing too little to prevent contemporary slavery in the UK:
Hyland wanted police forces to make dealing with slavery "one of the highest priorities".
In 2016 Hyland urged members of the public in London to report any brothels and flats used for human trafficking. He highlighted risk of labour exploitation on high streets in car washes and nail bars. He also called on ministers to deport foreign diplomats found to be keeping staff in slave conditions, and to implement reforms intended to make it easier for victims to escape abusive employers.
In 2015 he led efforts for inclusion of human trafficking and modern slavery in the 15-year UN Sustainable Development Goals. This was secured as SDG 8.7 on the final day of negotiations at the UN in New York in the summer of 2015. This has resulted in many global efforts focussed on fighting modern slavery and human trafficking, including Alliance 8.7, an initiative led by the International Labour Organisation.
Santa Marta Group.
Hyland helped to establish the Santa Marta Group, a body comprising international law enforcement agencies, civil society, NGOs and the Catholic Church.
The Group was launched by Pope Francis at the Vatican in April 2014, and is named after the Papal residence, where delegates stayed during the first meeting. At the launch Pope Francis described human trafficking as "an open wound on the body of contemporary society; a crime against humanity".
The Group was developed by the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales in collaboration with the London Metropolitan Police and is led by Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the Archbishop of Westminster.
Honours.
Hyland was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for "services to Combating Human Trafficking" in the 2015 New Year Honours List.


Philippa, Countess of Toulouse

Philippa (c. 1073 – 28 November 1118) was "suo jure" Countess of Toulouse, as well as the Duchess of Aquitaine by marriage to Duke William IX of Aquitaine.
Life.
Early life and marriage.
Philippa was born in approximately 1073 to Count William IV of Toulouse, and his wife Emma of Mortain. She was his only surviving child, and thus, by the laws of Toulouse, his heir. In 1088, William went on a pilgrimage to Palestine, leaving his brother Raymond of Saint-Gilles as regent. (Before he left, it is claimed, he also married his daughter to the King of Aragon in order to disinherit her; however, this marriage is apocryphal, as contemporary evidence shows that Sancho was still married to his previous wife at the time of his death in 1094.)
Philippa's early life – if she was not married to Sancho Ramirez of Aragon – is something of a mystery. It is known that she did not marry William IX of Aquitaine until 1094, after the death of her father and the succession of her uncle; the circumstances in which she lived prior to her father's death, the manner of her disinheritance, and the arrangement of her marriage, are thus unknown. Those historians that argue her to have been married to Sancho Ramirez argue that her removal from Toulouse prevented her from effectively claiming her inheritance, and that with the death of Sancho, she was free to remarry based on her own choice. What is certain is that, upon the death of Count William, Philippa's claims were ignored, and Raymond became count.
Political life.
When Raymond IV of Toulouse set out on the First Crusade in the autumn of 1096, he left his son Bertrand to rule the County. However, in the spring of 1098, William and Philippa marched into the city of Toulouse, and took control without a single life being lost. In the next year, she gave birth to her first child in the city: William the Toulousain.
In 1099, her husband went on crusade and he left her as regent in Poitou.
She was an admirer of Robert of Arbrissel and persuaded her husband to grant him land in Poitou to establish a religious community dedicated to the Virgin Mary. In 1100 he founded Fontevraud Abbey there.
She was stunned in 1100 when her husband mortgaged Toulouse to her cousin Bertrand in exchange for a vast sum of money, which the Duke used to go on Crusade himself. Philippa, removed from her home, was sent to his capital of Poitiers, from where she ruled Aquitaine on behalf of her husband whilst he was absent.
After William's return, he and Philippa for a time lived contentedly with each other, producing a further five daughters, and a son, Raymond. She also ignored the Duke's sexual boasting in song and talk, instead concentrating on religion (in particular the Abbey of Fontevrault, of which she remained a keen sponsor), especially the teachings of its founder, who preached the superiority of women over men. Her obsession with a doctrine considered offensive by many men of that time, combined with William's growing dissatisfaction with her, and his teasing of her (claiming to be founding an abbey of prostitutes), led to discord in the marriage.
Toulouse had been won back by William for his wife in 1113, following the death of Bertrand in Syria in 1112: his heir being his half-brother, the 9 year old Alphonse-Jourdain, William had been unopposed. Thus, by 1114, Philippa was spending most of her time ruling there. Accordingly, she was less than pleased when, upon her return from Toulouse to Poitiers in 1114, she discovered her husband to have moved his mistress, Viscountess Dangereuse of Châtellerault, into her palace. Philippa appealed to friends and the church for assistance in ousting her husband's mistress, but to no avail – none could persuade the Duke to give up his mistress.
Later life.
In 1116, a humiliated Philippa, devastated by her husband's repayment of her service to him for so many years, left the Court, taking refuge at the Abbey of Fontevrault. There she became a close friend of her husband's first wife, Ermengarde of Anjou, and the two spent much time reflecting upon the shortcomings of William. However, for all Philippa's devotion to the Abbey and its ideals, she found little peace there, both angry and resentful that her husband had cast her off in favour of a mistress. She died of unknown causes there on 28 November 1118, survived by her husband, his mistress, and Ermengarde, who would shortly attempt to avenge Philippa by attempting to have Dangereuse banished from Aquitaine.
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Siberian Bukharans

The Siberian Bukharans (self-designation: "Bukharlyk", "Sart") are an ethnographic and sociocultural group in Siberia. Their ancestors came from the Khanate of Bukhara, and they constituted a significant part of the Siberian Tatars.
Ethnically they consisted of Uzbeks, Tajiks, Uyghurs and in lesser degree Kazakhs and Karakalpaks. The main languages were Chagatai and Persian. They were merchants from the Khanate of Bukhara and started to settle in the area in the 17th century
after the start of the Russian conquest of Siberia in the 1580s.
Their name as an ethnic group — "Bukharan" appeared in documents until the early 1930s. Now that name refers to people from the city of Bukhara.
Russians formerly used the term "Bukharan" to refer to any caravan merchant from Central Asia, since the Russians did not always have a clear understanding of the geography and peoples further south.
Since Muslim Siberian Bukharans had legal advantages and privileges under Russia, Baraba Tatars pretended to be them.
Population.
The Siberian Bukharans maintained their own identity and were quite numerous. They numbered 23,700 in 1926. Their main bases of settlement were Tobolsk, Tara and Tyumen.
In the Tobolsk Governorate there were several Bukharan towns in different uyezds. In Tarsk uyezd of the Tobolsk Governorate Bukharan Town (Russian: ), where the population was primarily Bukharans, existed until the early 20th century.
In Tyumen there is a raion that is officially named "Bukharan Settlement" (Russian: Бухарская слобода). There are some settlements in the Omsk Oblast which were founded by Bukharans.