As we know Somatic psychology is a form of therapy which focuses on somatic experience. It’s a body-centered therapy which looks at the connection of your body and mind. It uses physical therapies and psychotherapy for holistic healing. Therapists use mind and body exercises. They also use physical techniques to help release tension. This tension negatively impacts your emotional and physical well-being.
How does Somatic Psychology Work?
The theory behind somatic psychology is that the body, mind, spirit, and emotions are connected to each other. Because of this, the stress of the past traumatic and emotional events affects our central nervous system. It can also cause changes in our body and our body language. This results in changing our facial expressions, posture, and physical pain.
By developing awareness of the body and mind, we are able to release anger, frustration, tension, and other emotions we have in our body. These emotions may have come from our past negative experiences. The purpose of this is to help us relieve from the pain and stress which prevent us from engaging in our life completely. Here’s how it works.
- Somatic treatment starts with a counselor getting to understand why a patient is looking for healing. The counselor asks about the experiences that have caused their health status currently. The first session with the counselor may or may not cover this part yet. It depends on how much the trauma is and if the client is okay with it.
- This is a collaborative therapy. This means that it begins by deciding on the appropriate approach. Sometimes, somatic psychology treatment consists of interacting and talking. This involves going over the patient’s physical presentation, emotions, and thoughts.
- The healing process takes time, even though many clients want to relieve their physical and mental symptoms as soon as possible. Body experiences abruptly change positively. These changes catch the clients off guard. Patients should know that whenever the positive changes take place, negative feedback follows. That’s because there’s an attempt to change the patients’ current way of thinking.
- The techniques show the patients how to create awareness between their body and mind. Doing this helps them learn how they can ease chronic pains. If the confusion or trauma in the patient is eliminated, the chronic pain diminishes. This resolves a lot of emotional and mental suffering.
- There is a link between the body, mind, and spirit. If one of the elements is offset, then it may result in a chain reaction. Building a deep connection with oneself can increase the patient’s harmony and balance in life. When someone is undergoing tension in their chest, neck, back, or shoulders, it may be the aftermath of tension and stress. This is caused by a past event.
- After releasing negative energy, the patient discovers a tranquil state of mind. This takes the pressure off the physical manifestation. When the patients release their traumatic memories, they can eliminate the tension caused by their state of mind.
When is Somatic Psychology Used?
Somatic psychology is known to be very helpful to many people. But when is it used?
- To help people who have suffered from stress, depression, and anxiety.
- To help people who are suffering from addiction, relationship problems, grievances, and trauma and abuse.
- To help people who have digestive disorders, chronic physical pain, and other medical problems. There are those who used the traditional remedies for these issues but didn’t feel better. Therapy techniques can be used for both group and individual therapy settings.
What to Expect?
Somatic psychology combines talk therapy and other forms of physical therapy. The therapists help revive those memories of traumatic experiences. They also pay attention to any of your physical responses after recovering the memory.
This uses physical techniques like deep breathing, meditation, and relaxation exercises. These activities are used to help relieve the symptoms. Other activities that can also be used are adjunctive physical techniques. These techniques include dancing, yoga, exercising, and other types of movement, massage, and vocal work.
How to look For a Somatic Therapist
Somatic therapy is integrated into other counseling psychotherapy practices. When looking for a therapist, there are different factors that you need to consider. Is the therapist licensed? Does he or she have expertise with mental health and somatic therapy techniques? Does the therapist have an appropriate educational background? Below are some tips that you can follow when you look for a somatic therapist.
- Search smart: Finding a therapist requires research. You can streamline this process by asking for referrals from friends and family members. If referrals aren’t available, you can search through Google. Read through each website and check out the reviews. To narrow your search, you can make a list of the characteristics that you think are necessary.
- Shop around:.As soon as you’ve found two or three potential somatic therapists, you can start shopping around. Identify how they react to your situation and how you interact with each other. Just like any relationship, your therapist may look great on paper, but the connection may not be there.
- Confirm the price and make sure it’s right: Therapy can be costly. Some of them take insurance but some are private fee-based. Some offer a sliding scale who adjust the fees based on the income. Before you hire a therapist, make sure to get the pricing information upfront.
In case the insurance doesn’t cover your mental health treatment, try to ask for referrals for psychotherapy students with expert supervisors. This helps you ensure mental health care at the cost which won’t hurt your wallet.
- Don’t just settle with talk therapy: Straight talk therapy doesn’t always work for everybody, especially those who already tried in the past. There are a lot of alternative options that you can go for. Somatic therapy is among these alternatives.
- Use technology: There are high-tech e-therapies that you can go for, especially if you’re not available to do it in person. These therapies can be done through Skype or via app-based texting services. Certain apps match clients with therapists from the roster and provide them unlimited texting. The cost for this is cheaper compared to traditional therapies.


Spine fusion surgery
is our body consists of many vertebrae that are linked by tissues. These
tissues between the vertebrae makes it possible for the spine to move
A spine fusion surgery is a technique in which the movement of the vertebrae is limited. Bone grafts are place around the vertebrae and in due course they grow together with the spine to form a single vertebra and hence the movement is restricted.
In a spine fusion surgery the bone graft is used to surround the two or more vertebrae in which movement has to be restricted.
The candidates for a spine fusion surgery are selected carefully after proper diagnosis. People who have fractures in the vertebra or who have deformity in the spine and have slippages are the right candidates for a spine fusion surgery.
If a patient has painful motion and if there is instability then that person can also undergo a spine fusion surgery. A person with disc herniation can also be performed a spine fusion surgery.
Scoliosis is a form of spinal deformity which affects adolescents and children. The worst curves are fused (joined together) with the spine fusion surgery.
Fractures that allow the vertebrae to slip on to each other can also be treated with a spine fusion surgery. This is calledspondylolisthesis.
Cervical disc herniations are also treated with spine fusion surgery after a disc is removed by discectomy. Any abnormal movement between the vertebrae also causes severe pain and the spine fusion surgery is a good remedy for such conditions.
Identifying the source of the pain is the important factor that affects any spinal fusion surgery. Treating these problems without a surgery is considered first by the doctor and only in cases of extreme pain the surgeon goes for a spinal fusion surgery or any type of surgery.
Surgery would be the last option to treat such conditions.It takes a long time to recover from a spinal fusion surgery than any type of surgery.
The spinal fusion surgery requires our body to heal the bone graft and fuse it with the vertebrae naturally and it takes months for that to occur.
The patient who has undergone a spine fusion surgery is required to stay in a rehabilitation centre after a spinal fusion surgery if the patient has undergone an extensive spine fusion surgery.
around six weeks to identify whether the healing as a result of a spine
fusion surgery is going in the proper direction.


Introduction: New Zealand Cuisine
New Zealand cuisine is a fusion of indigenous Maori, Pacific Island, European, and Asian culinary traditions. The country’s unique location and diverse natural resources have influenced its cuisine. New Zealand’s culinary scene is renowned for its fresh and seasonal ingredients, which are sourced from its fertile land, pristine waters, and lush forests. Kiwi cuisine is also characterized by its innovative and experimental approach to food, which incorporates global flavors and techniques.
Unique Ingredients: A Kiwi Twist
New Zealand cuisine features several unique and unusual ingredients that have gained popularity both locally and internationally. These ingredients add a distinctive Kiwi twist to traditional dishes and showcase the country’s rich and vibrant culinary heritage. Some of the most noteworthy and sought-after ingredients include horopito, manuka honey, paua, and kina.
Horopito: The Native Pepper Plant
Horopito is a native New Zealand plant that belongs to the pepper family. The herb has a pungent and spicy flavor that is reminiscent of black pepper and cloves. It is often used as a seasoning for meats, fish, and vegetables, as well as in marinades, rubs, and sauces. Horopito is also believed to have medicinal properties and is used in traditional Maori medicine to treat a range of ailments, including rheumatism, indigestion, and infections.
Manuka Honey: A Medicinal Sweetener
Manuka honey is a unique type of honey that is produced by bees that feed on the nectar of the manuka tree, which is native to New Zealand. The honey has a distinctive taste and aroma and is known for its antibacterial and anti-inflammatory properties. Manuka honey is used in a variety of dishes, including desserts, marinades, and dressings. It is also used in traditional Maori medicine to treat wounds, sore throats, and digestive issues.
Paua: A Delicacy from the Sea
Paua is a type of sea snail that is considered a delicacy in New Zealand. The meat of the paua is tender and sweet and is often used in fritters, chowders, and salads. Paua is also a popular ingredient in Maori cuisine and is served during special occasions and celebrations. Paua shells are also prized for their iridescent colors and are used in jewelry and decorative items.
Kina: A Sea Urchin Specialty
Kina, also known as sea urchin, is a popular seafood delicacy in New Zealand. The meat of the kina is prized for its delicate and briny flavor and is often eaten raw or used in sushi and sashimi. Kina is also used in sauces, dressings, and soups. The spiny shells of the kina are used in Maori crafts and are also popular souvenirs for tourists.
In conclusion, New Zealand cuisine is a melting pot of flavors and ingredients that reflect the country’s diverse cultural heritage and natural resources. The unique and unusual ingredients add a Kiwi twist to traditional dishes and showcase the country’s innovative and experimental approach to food. Horopito, manuka honey, paua, and kina are just a few of the many unique ingredients that make New Zealand cuisine a culinary adventure.


The dream that labor knows in frost's poems of work is often sweet because it after apple-picking is a dream vision, and from the outset it proposes that only labor particular natural facts are symbols of particular spiritual facts i cannot rub the strangeness from my sight i got from looking through a pane of glass i. In this poem, robert frost uses the symbol of picking apples to represent the speaker's the imagery of the thousands of apples that struck the earth and became look like the steps of the ladder mentioned in the second line of the poem.
Read this full essay on the use of metaphors in frost's, “after apple picking”, “ birches”, and robert frost was a man who went through several challenging obstacles in his life this quote is ideal as we look further into three poems by frost in which the analysis and comparison of birches and the pomegranate. By robert frost after apple-picking symbolism, imagery, allegory the bible is never explicitly mentioned in this poem, but frost nonetheless includes. I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight 10 i got from looking through a pane after apple-picking is one of robert frost's great poems and among the greatest sources concur in calling brower's analysis a tour-de-force.
Dive deep into robert frost's after apple-picking with extended analysis, the poem is filled with images drawn from the speaker's experience with the the speaker's vision is compared to looking at the world through a thin sheet of ice. After apple-picking is a poem by american poet robert frost it was published in north of boston, frost's second poetry collection the poem does not conform. But as it often happens in case of robert frost, it is possible to read this lyric on a similarly the ice sheet, through which he looks, signals the termination of the it also suggests through the symbols that long sleep must lead to realization describe critical appreciation of the poem , after apple picking, by robert frost.
'after apple-picking' is absorbed with states between not only of winter sleep, in the morning by looking through a sheet of ice which he had picked up from his . After apple picking, by robert frost from imagessearchyahoocom to really have an educated opinion about it, but i just love the imagery in this poem.
The poems frost would write in the next two decades would go further by making 'the wood-pile and after apple-picking, both from north of modes of meditation (allegory, symbolism) they initially invoke, their critique of or robert frost 37 but, he explains, is linked to a shift in vision, a new way of looking. Frost uses visual, olfactory, kinesthetic, tactile, and auditory imagery throughout this piece he looks through the ice at the frosted grass robert frost's after apple-picking in the poem “after apple-picking”, robert frost has cleverly.
After apple picking was written and published in 1914 in north of boston it is one of the remarkable nature-poems of frost written in 42 lines it is written in the. Robert frost: allegory, spiritual crisis and punxsutawney phil in “after although the poem purports to take place after apple-picking, the apple-picking as a specific kind of labor is, of course, laden with religious symbolism, as frost's poem makes clear from i got from looking through a pane of glass. There are many other things i have found myself saying about poetry, but the chiefest of these is that it is metaphor, “after apple-picking” is about picking apples, but with its ladders pointing “[t]oward heaven still,” with its great and this poem looks at the end of the harvest robert frost's “after apple-picking” analysis.
Presentation on theme: after apple-picking by robert frost 11 i got from looking through a pane of glass 49 language techniques used in the poem. Robert frost: poems metaphor and imagery in after apple picking by robert frost after apple i got from looking through a pane of glass.
The world of robert frost's poetry contains snow, woods, birches as well as lakes looking into certain lexical words manually is surely more time-consuming and similarly, in the poem after apple picking, the narrator expresses the anxiety and essay from woods to stars: a pattern of imagery in robert frost's poetry. Analysis of poem after apple-picking by robert frost robert frost | source yet, there is always something else to look for in his poems. In his poems, he uses a great deal of orientational metaphor frost also looks back on his life wondering if he made the right choices “beside robert frost's “after apple-picking” set in the evening of a late autumn day at the end of harvest time, robert frost's “after essay on analysis of robert frost´s poem birches.


T O P I C
SECRET JUDAISM IN THE SHADOW OF THE INQUISITION
Dr.Rivka Shpak Lissak (12/17/2006)
unveils new findings about the lives of the Marranos in the New World.
The remarkable steadfastness which the converted Jews displayed
to their original faith attests to the vitality of the Jewish people
THE SPANISH AND PORTUGUESE EMPIRES ON THE AMERICAN CONTINENT The New World, which was conquered by Spain and Portugal, was divided into colonies and sub colonies. Under the Treaty of Tordesillas of 1494, Portugal received the eastern portion of the South American continent, in other words Brazil, and the rest was given to Spain. The original Spanish colonies were "New Spain" and Peru. New Spain comprised Mexico, today's South Western United States, Central America and a number of islands in the Caribbean Sea. The Philippines in the Far East were also part of the colony. At first, Peru, Brazil, and Panama comprised all of Latin America. In 1717, part of Peru was severed and became "New Granada". It included what are today Columbia, Panama, Venezuela and Ecuador. In 1776 additional areas were taken from Peru and the new colony was called "Rio de la Plata", and comprised what are today Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. See also The Americas
THE IMMIGRATION POLICY OF SPAIN AND PORTUGAL REGARDING NEW CHRISTIANS Spain prohibited New Christians (who recently converted to Christianity, including many converted Jews) until the fourth generation from emigrating to their New World empire, while Portugal was interested in settling Brazil as they did not have surplus population like Spain, permitted New Christians to emigrate and even exiled New Christians who had been arrested and condemned by the Inquisition to Brazil.
In Spain, many New Christians found ways to circumvent the law, and the fact that the Spanish government kept reiterating the prohibition proves that the prohibition was flouted. Some New Christians forged documents and fled to Portugal or northwest Europe, and thence to the New World. Others arrived as sailors or stowaways. In any event, the fact is that many New Christians managed to emigrate to the New World. Brazilian historians estimate that about 10% of 180 million residents of Brazil are descendants of New Christians. Luis de Carbajal, who was burnt at the stake in Mexico City in December 1596, declared before the flames consumed him, that Mexico had more New Christians than old ones.
CLANDESTINE JEWISH COMMUNAL LIFE From Inquisition and other documents it emerges that the New Christians (not all New Christians were Marranos) who remained faithful to Judaism, managed to preserve Jewish life in secret for over 200 years, in the framework of communities who gathered in private houses.
The Inquisition archives in the New World, in Spain and Portugal, shed light on the efforts by Marranos to preserve their Judaism in secret. The Inquisition kept precise records regarding the confessions of Marranos from which one can deduce this. It's important to note, that not only New Christians from Spain and Portugal emigrated to the New World. There were New Christians who originally emigrated to Europe, returned to Judaism, and subsequently emigrated to the New World. The New Christians in Portugal possessed inner Jewish resilience and were proficient in Jewish customs, because their adoption of Christianity took place on a single and collective basis, in October 1497. They not only continued to live in Jewish quarters, but the Portuguese king gave them a respite of 20 years during which they would not be sued for observing Jewish customs. The arrests only began in 1536, when the Inquisition was established in Portugal. The New Christians of Spain, in contradistinction, converted to Christianity, most of them under duress, but the act was a personal one, and the process continued over a hundred years. It was also accompanied by the terror of Christian gangs and pogroms, which led to a gradual weakening among the New Christians and made it difficult for them to observe their Judaism, especially after the expulsion of Spanish Jewry in 1492, and the severance of all contacts with Jews and Judaism. In short, there were various levels of knowledge and proficiency in Jewish customs among the emigrants.
New Christians established secret synagogues in private houses, and their congregations were organized in communities throughout the Spanish and Portuguese empires. There is testimony of three communities in Mexico City and communities in Guadalajara, Vera Cruz and Pueblo in New Spain and in a series of communities in New Granada, in Peru in La Plata and in the Caribbean Islands, which were under Spanish rule. Likewise, there were communities in Bahia and Rio de Janeiro, and in northeastern Brazil there was a concentration of communities in Recife, Natal, Pernambuco and others. From the confessions it emerges that there were rabbis and Jewish scholars in the communities and members of the communities gathered every afternoon for prayer. Some of the Marranos were circumcised. For example out of a group that was burnt at the stake in Mexico City in one of the auto da fe ceremonies, 57 were circumcised.
One of the most striking facts is the New World Marannos’ success in maintaining close ties with New Christians in Spain and Portugal, France, Italy and Belgium, and with New Jews - Marranos who returned to Judaism - in northwest Europe and even with Sephardic communities in the Ottoman Empire. These ties were facilitated by virtue of a ramified system of international commercial and family ties. For example, Anthony de Fonesca had brothers in the Canary Islands, Lisbon, France and Pernambuco, in northeast Brazil. Thanks to these ties, money was raised for various purposes: redemption of captives of Jewish origins, who were taken captive by barbarian pirates, transfer of money to Holland to finance its war against Spain, contributions to Jews in the Holy Land, bribing government officials and the Inquisition etc.
The New Christians also had a secret code, which they used to preserve the secrecy of their correspondence. Preserved in the archives of the British Museum are the documents of Mendes da Costa, written in a secret code. New Christians identified each other throughout the world by placing the right-hand on their heads, in the course of conversation. There was also a question, used as a means of identifying a person of Marrano stock by to the answer. They provided mutual assistance, when someone had to escape the Inquisition. New World had secret harbors, where one could board a vessel belonging to a New Christian who observed Judaism and escape to Europe. For example, the two brothers of Luis de Carbajal, who was burnt at the stake in Mexico City in December 1596, managed to reach Europe in a vessel, which took them on at a secret location near Campiza. Marranos arriving from Madrid or Seville at the port of Veracruz in New Spain knew that they had to go to the home of Fernando Rodriguez. They stayed in his home for several days, and only then proceeded to Mexico City to the home of Simon Vajiz, one of the leaders of the city's Jewish community.
Circumcision-according to Jewish law the foreskin was removed. But since the Inquisition was aware of the obligation of circumcision and its nature, and was accustomed to strip the prisoners in order to check if they underwent circumcision, there were Marranos who tried to trick the Inquisition by making a longitudinal cut instead of removing the foreskin. But there were those who were willing to take the risk and were circumcised.
Outward Fulfillment of Church Obligations - Marranos visited church and attended mass and communion - eating the sacred bread and drinking wine - but only a few went to confession. Those who went to confession obviously did not confess their Judaism. While visiting church, Marranos refrained from looking at the holy bread when they received it, and hastened to spit it out immediately upon leaving church.
Smiting Images of the Saints and Concealing Their Faces - One of the accepted ceremonies in the secret gatherings of the Marranos for the purpose of prayer was smiting the statues of the Christian saints. On January 21, 1639, 12 Marranos were burned at the stake in Lima the capital of Peru for smiting statues. Since maintaining the statues of the saints in the home was a common practice amongst Christians, the Marranos were accustomed to retaining statues of saints in their houses for security purposes, but their faces were turned to the wall. Only when Christians visited the house would the statues be turned to face the room.
The First Born to the Church - Generally young people were apprised of their origin when they reached bar mitzvah age (13), but they were sworn to secrecy. They did not reveal the secrets to the first born and intended him to fill a post in the church, as a security measure, as well as to ferret out the current moods in the church. See also Ethnic Jewish Groups
WHERE DOES THE TERM ‘SEPHARDIM’ COME FROM? The exiles called themselves Sephardim the plural of Sepharad the Hebrew name for their native Spain The name Sepharad appears in the prophecy of Obadiah (Obad. 20) as one of the places where the Jews exiled from Jerusalem lived. The biblical allusion is probably to Sardis, a city in Asia Minor. But Jewish tradition, especially since the eighth century C.E., tended to identify Sepharad with the western edge of the known world--the Iberian Peninsula. Thus, during the entire Middle Ages, and especially during the Golden Age of Hispano-Hebraic culture, Spanish Jews called themselves Sephardim, a name they subsequently used (and not without a certain pride in their glorious peninsular past) in the diaspora following their expulsion from Spain.
The term Sephardi is often used in contrast to Ashkenazi, which refers to another major ethnocultural branch of Judaism--the Franco-German-Slavic branch. As in the case of Sepharad, Ashkenaz is also a biblical place name (it appears in Gen. 10:3, Chron. 1:6, and Jer. 51:27), which originally seems to have meant a country in the upper Euphrates valley bordering Armenia, but which medieval rabbinic literature identified with the earliest Jewish settlements in central Europe--first Germany and northern France, then Poland and Lithuania. A cultural tradition grew from this nucleus, one with its own folkways and customs, rich folklore, religious and literary currents, a strong philosophy, and its own liturgy. Linguistically, the Ashkenazi branch of Judaism is characterized by its particular pronunciation of Hebrew in religious texts and by the use of Yiddish--a derivative of High German influenced by Slavic, other European languages, and, naturally, Hebrew--in daily life. Successive migrations have placed the Ashkenazim in other areas, especially North and South America and Israel.
Curiously enough, the opposition Sephardi/Ashkenazi has given rise to a certain confusion that dates from the end of the nineteenth century and has religious, or rather, liturgical origins. The growing Ashkenazi emigration to Palestine created the need for a chief rabbi for the Ashkenazim, parallel to the Sephardic chief rabbinate that had existed for many years. An immediate consequence of the increasing impact of Ashkenazi culture in the area of Palestine that later became Israel was to include under the authority of the Sephardic rabbinate all matters that were not Ashkenazi, even those that had no connection to the Jews of Spanish origin. And so Sephardim became the name not only of the descendants of the Jews expelled from Spain in the fifteenth century but also of all those who came from Arab and Eastern countries, be they the Jews of Conchin (India), the Yemenites, or the black Jews from Ethiopia.
Candle lighting on the Sabbath and Festivals - Failure to light candles was considered a sin divinely punishable by death. The wives of the Marranos were accustomed to hide the candles under the table or to cover the windows with a black cloth. However, there were families who had candles burning daily to observe the commandments of lighting candles on the sabbath and festivals without being caught.
Gathering for Prayer - The Marranos met secretly to pray. The custom of the prayer quorum was scrupulously observed. When there was a need to invite the worshipers for a special meeting, they were accustomed to send a Negro dressed in red and playing on the tambourine, to circulate through the streets. This was a secret sign to come to synagogue. They were accustomed to fast in groups and gather in groups to read the Torah. Since Bibles were rare, the Marranos used psalms from the Dominican Psalm Book. The prayers were in Spanish and Portuguese, but there were a number of words that were recited in Hebrew, such as Adoshem, Shma Yisrael Hashem Elokeinu Hashem Ehad. There were a few who knew additional words such as: talit, tefilla, teref and treifa. There were also isolated individuals who knew the Shmona Esreh prayer. During prayers there was no separation between men and women. They were accustomed to reciting the Shama Yisrael prayer by raising their arms or by crossing them on their chest. Likewise they were accustomed to cover their eyes with the left hand, while placing the right-hand on their hearts, when the direction of the prayer was towards Jerusalem.
Kashrut Observance - Marranos observed the customs of Jewish ritual slaughter. They had a special knife for slaughtering and they hung the animal by its hoofs after slaughter, so the blood could drain out. They salted the meat, did not eat fish without scales, did not use animal fat for cooking, but only olive oil, made their own wine for kiddush, or used a liquid produced from cocoa beans. They did not have separate utensils for meat and dairy, but pig derivatives did not enter their homes.
Sabbath Observance - They were accustomed to prepare hot food on Friday and it was retained on the stove during the Sabbath. Towards the Sabbath eve they changed clothes and everybody wore clean clothing. They opened their stores on the Sabbath, but refrained from using sales stratagems.
Yom Kippur - was fixed on the tenth of September. They fasted on Yom Kippur, which was called "The Day of Forgiveness" or "The Day of the Great Fast". On Yom Kippur eve they customarily asked forgiveness from members of the family and friends in case that they had offended them during the year. Likewise, it was customary, following the concluding meal before the fast, which included fish and vegetables, to go down on bended knee in chronological order before the mother of the family and a grandmother in order to receive a blessing. The boys were blessed that they should be like Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, whereas girls were blessed to be like Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah. On Yom Kippur they were accustomed to pray all day in a secret synagogue and in order to avoid suspicion, it was customary to take an afternoon break when the worshipers went out walking through town.
Passover - Before Passover they would customarily purchase new dishes. This did not arouse suspicion because people used earthenware dishes, which were broken easily. The women would customarily bake the matzos by themselves. They were round and called "tortas". Prior to the meal they ate lettuce, bitter herbs and radish. They did not have a Hagoda (Order of the Passover Night celebration) and they read from the Latin translation of the Bible about the Exodus from Egypt. The person conducting the Seder wore white clothing. The festival lasted seven to eight days.
Purim - was not considered a happy festival in the New World. The Marranos felt a sense of identification with Esther and Mordechai and the Jews of Persia and Medea, who suffered persecution at the hands of Haman. The king of Persia did not know that Esther was a Jewess, and she fasted three days before she approached him to intercede on behalf of the Jews. The Marannos observed the "Fast of Esther", and used the Latin version of the Book of Esther for the purpose of reading the Book of Esther.
The Ninth Day of Av - In July, the Marranos were accustomed to observe the Fast of the Ninth Day of Av, which commemorates the destruction of the First and Second Temples. They refrained from eating meat and fowl for three weeks prior to the fast.
Tabernacles - From the middle of the seventeenth century they stopped celebrating the festival, for fear of exposure.
Rosh Hashanah - was not observed.
Hanukkah - They were accustomed to lighting candles in a Hanukah candelabrum for the eight days of the festival, to commemorate the victory of the Maccabees and the purification of the temple.
Marriage - Mothers and grandmothers were responsible for arranging marriages. The first preference - even prior to love - was marriage into a Marrano family. However, there were many marriages within the family to guarantee the religion was preserved. For quite a few years, there was a permanent connection, via an emissary, with Italy and other parts of Europe and even the Ottoman Empire, in order to provide grooms and brides for Marranos in the New World. Some of the grooms were circumcised, as emerges from the Inquisition documents. After the wedding night it was customary to abstain from sexual relations, until hymeneal bleeding stopped. Husbands and wives did not bear the same family name. There was a custom which originated in Spain in 1480, to adopt the family name of the grandfather or grandmother of one of the parents. The menu of the wedding meal included honey cake among other things.
Customs of Burial and Bereavement - When a person died, they turned his face to the wall, washed him in warm water and wrapped him in imported linen fabric, originally produce in Rouen, France and subsequently in Holland. The cloth was woven in factories that belonged to people of Jewish origin. The custom of tearing one's clothes was common amongst the Marranos. After the burial of the dead they ate hard-boiled eggs without salt. The egg symbolized the cycle of life, and the absence of salt came to emphasize the bitterness of the loss. Marannos observed the custom of shiva, and during the seven days they were accustomed to turn the mirrors towards the wall and empty water vessels, in order to get rid of evil spirits. During the shiva, friends and relatives would customarily bring food. They would recite the Kaddish three times a day for 11 months in the framework of a prayer quorum.
Belief in the Advent of the Messiah - Of course they did not believe in the Holy Trinity or Jesus as the Messiah. They were firm in their belief that when the Messiah of David's seed would arrive they would be saved and would live in peace and tranquility in accordance with their faith.
Fast and Prayers for Forgiveness - Marannos bore a heavy sense of guilt for betraying Judaism. They were accustomed to fast frequently and composed a special prayer to ask forgiveness and absolution from the Lord God of Israel.
DISINTEGRATION OF JEWISH COMMUNITIES? It emerges that the persecutions of the Inquisition failed to liquidate Jewish life in the New World. However, two primary factors account for the disintegration of the communities.
The first factor was the lack of the rabbis, scholars, and teachers who were sufficiently learned in Judaism to be able to preserve Judaism in a communal framework over generations. In the fourth generation, the ties between the Old World and the New were severed, due to a lack of family and commercial ties. The knowledge that was transmitted within the framework of the family dwindled appreciably.
The second factor was the decline in scope of Inquisition activities. Persecution had reinforced adherence to Judaism and it was precisely the decline in persecutions that weakened devotion to Judaism. In the absence of pressure by the Inquisition, the assimilation of New Christians within Christian society increased, and the financial success of many turned them into desirable matches. Mixed marriages became more common and conversely the link to Judaism became attenuated. But, as has become clear in recent years from the reawakening of descendants of the Marranos, which has prompted them to explore their Jewish roots, there were families that continued to cleave to Jewish customs for over 500 years.
One of the major issues concerning research on Crypto-Jews is the exact term which should be used. Is it Marrano, Converso, Crypto Jew, Secret Jew, Hidden Jew, New Christian, or Anusim? The following article, from Volume 3, Spring 2011, pages 150-155, of the Journal of Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian Crypto-Jews (JOSPIC-J) discusses this issue. From Dr. Abraham D. Lavender Editor in Chief, JOSPIC-J (http://www.cryptojewsjournal.org/major-issues.htm)
In Volume 1 (2009) of this journal, it was noted that one of the major issues facing the growing academic study of “crypto Jews” is which term to use to describe the Jews in Spain, Portugal, or Italy who converted, or pretended to convert, to Christianity in the time of the Inquisition.
In the early period, Marrano was the most used term, and Converso was second. In the middle period, Converso strongly passed Marrano to become the most used term. Since 2000, Converso has decreased, but still remains a strong first, and Crypto Jew has narrowly passed Marrano to become second. New Christian ranked a distant third in the early period, but has decreased since then. Secret Jew and especially Hidden Jew are seldom used. Anusim is still rarely used in books, although it is increasingly being used in articles.
Preface to : The Mezzuzah in the Maddonah's Foot' , Trudi Alexy, 1994
‘Marrano’ is a pejorative name meaning ‘swine’ given to secret Jews by suspicious Christians during the Spanish Inquisition. I have used it in the book reluctantly—only because it is a historical term with which most people are familiar and because it symbolizes the demeaned status and fear suffered by Jews who were forced to convert during that terrible time.
Why does this ugly term have so much resonance for so many people? Why does a book such as mine, which deals primarily with the experiences of Jews in Spain during the past fifty years, keep inspiring conversation and debate about the mysterious Marrano’s? What is it about the Marrano experience that provokes such intense fascination?
The drama of the Marranos dogged determination to cling to their way of life, holding fast to their beliefs and practicing their laws and traditions when being found out meant torture and death, symbolizes, for many, the importance of a connection to one's ancestral roots and the miraculous survival of the spirit, even in the most hostile of environments.
One of the many stories recounted in this book compares Judaism to the scraggly cactus, which, unlike other beautifully flowering but more fragile plants, not only survives in an arid climate under a burning sun, but thrives. Marranos are the human counterparts to that cactus.
Speaking with people throughout the U. S. and Canada about Spain, the Jews, and the Holocaust, it is the history of the Marranos that seems to have the most powerful impact—stirring the imagination, rousing the curiosity, and touching the hearts of nearly all who learn about them. I should not be surprised. After all, the Marranos' influence on my own life was profound: finding out about them inspired me to search for my lost Jewish heritage.
Seldom before has the pull towards one's own people, the need to belong, the stubborn resistance to assimilation, and the challenge to prevent the blurring of identity emerged with more urgency than now. Today, when frustration over centuries-old suppressed ethnic and religious differences is erupting all around us with atrocities such as the world has not witnessed since the Holocaust, the Marranos' stubborn but contained commitment to their spiritual heritage stands as a shining example of fortitude under fire. But the burden of secrecy inherited from their martyred ancestors by present-day crypto-Jews living in Majorca, Portugal, and South and Central America, as well as in our own American Southwest, passed on from generation to generation through five fear-ridden centuries, is graphic evidence of the enormous price they are still paying. May their tragic legacy help us to create a world in which all people can safely and openly affirm their true identities.
New Christians (Jews who converted to Christianity) began to leave Spain after the forced conversions in 1391. This reached a climax when the Jews were expelled in 1492 followed by the forced Portuguese conversion of 1497. Pressure to leave was increased by the activities of the Inquisition introduced in Spain in 1481 and Portugal in 1536.
To stem emigration decrees that were passed forbidding New Christians from emigration, other than to South America, led to traders going to other countries and not returning sometimes by pretending to go on pilgrimage. Once safe their object was to practice Judaism openly. While not all those emigrating were secret Jews the Spanish and Portuguese administration had difficulty distinguishing those who were secret Jews.
Emigrating Marranos could go to four different kinds of countries: Muslim lands, Protestant territories as they came into being, Catholic countries outside the jurisdiction of Spain and Portugal, and Catholic countries within the peninsular orbit.
from: The Nutshell History of Marranos of Portugal by Manuel Azevedo
After the forced conversion in 1497 there were supposedly no more Jews in Portugal, only Christians, Old and New. King Manuel ordered the confiscation of all synagogues and their contents. Yeshivas, kosher producing facilities and all communal property were seized. Hebrew books were prohibited and ordered to be deposited in the synagogues. Contrary to some reports, the books were not burned, Manuel may have been cruel, but he was not stupid. He sold the valuable Hebrew manuscripts, many brought to Portugal in 1492. The books turned up in places such as North Africa and Goa. Many synagogues were converted into churches, including the grand synagogue of Lisbon which was destroyed in the great earthquake of 1755. Many contemporary Misericordia churches are former synagogues such as the Misericordia chapel in Vila Real or the Misericordia church in Leiria.
Following the forced baptism, the King encouraged marriages between Old Christians who had titles and “pure blood” and New Christians. He prohibited the inter-marriage of New Christians. There would be no inquiry as to the religious practices of New Christians in their private homes for 20 years but they were not free to leave the realm. However, following the Lisbon massacre of 1506, when two to four thousand New Christian men, women and children, were slaughtered over a period of three days, the King extended the 20 year period and removed many disabilities such as the ability to emigrate and the prohibition on inter-marriage.
The Lisbon massacre, the subject of a recent book by Susana Mateus Basto and Paulo Mendes of the Alberto Benveniste Centre for Sephardic Studies and Culture at the University of Lisbon, signalled a failure of King Manuel’s policy of integration. Most of the New Christians, outwardly Catholic, had remained Jewish in their hearts. The New Christian secret Jews became known as Marranos, from the Portuguese "marrar", i.e. forced, or from the Aramaic-Hebrew Mar Anus, a forced one, like the widely used Hebrew term today, Anousim, although some historians claim the once pejorative term derives from the Castilian term for swine.
Distressed at the growing rift between New and Old Christians, the King sought permission from Rome to introduce the Inquisition that had been created in Spain in the late 15th century. However, Marrano bribes paid to high ranking Church officials in Rome, including Cardinals and no doubt the Pope himself, thwarted the introduction of the Inquisition in Portugal until 1535 and although the first auto de fe was held in 1540, the Inquisition did not get into full swing until 1580, thus enabling several generations of Marranos to develop a unique secret Portuguese Jewish culture.
The ambiguous Portuguese Marranos became known throughout Europe as "Men of the Nation". Being Portuguese in 16th century in Europe was synonymous with being Jewish. The Marranos established flourishing Jewish communities in Amsterdam, Bordeaux, London, Hamburg, Venice, Livorno, Salonica, and Constantinople, amongst others. In the New World, the relatively small number of Marranos established communities in Brazil, New York, Philadelphia, Charleston, Newport Rhode Island, as well as the Caribbean Islands. The success of the American war of Independence owes its success to the financial and material aid provided by the Marranos, then openly professing their Judaism, such as the money and ships provided to George Washington by Aaron Lopez, the wealthiest merchant of the thirteen colonies, born Duarte Lopez in Lisbon.
The Marranos prospered both in business and government wherever they went. It was a the son of a Marrano, Rabbi Manasseh ben Israel (Manuel Dias Soeiro) of Amsterdam, born in Lisbon or Madeira, who convinced Oliver Cromwell in 1656 to allow Jews back into England. The Marranos established the coffee, diamond and tulip industries in Amsterdam. They were instrumental in establishing the stock exchanges of Amsterdam, London and New York. They controlled the sugar and tobacco industries, and regrettably were involved in slavery, amassing huge fortunes.
This rising merchant class created the world’s first truly global Empire (see The First Global Village, How Portugal Changed the World by Martin Page, now in its 8th edition). Lisbon became one of the wealthiest cities in Europe. However, not even the huge bribes paid to the pope and cardinals could keep the Inquisition at bay forever. With the onset of the Inquisition, many of the wealthy Marranos left Portugal, contributing to the decline of Portugal. The poor Marranos, the old and infirm had no option but to remain, becoming even more secretive. Thousands were burned at the stake, including most of the leading intellectuals of the University of Coimbra in the early 17th century. Even Antonio Homem, the chancellor of the University and an advisor to the Pope was burned alive in 1624 (he also happened to be a Marrano rabbi). The ones that left established the oldest extant synagogues in the U.S.A; England, and Holland, Touro synagogue, Newport, R.I; 1762 (founded in 1658), Bevis Marks synagogue, London 1701 (founded 1656), and the Esnoga, Amsterdam, 1675 (amalgamated from three communities dating from 1598). The Esnoga, undisturbed by the Nazis, stands as the model synagogue for the Western Sephardic world. Bevis Marks in London is a replica, one-quarter its size.
The philosophers Baruch Espinoza, Frances Sanches, Uriel Acosta, Montaigne, and David Ricardo were all Marrano descendants. So were rabbis Ben Israel and Aboab Fonseca, the first rabbi in the Americas (Recife, Brazil, 1635). The father of French impressionism, Camille Pissaro was descendant of a Marrano born in Bragança, in the Tras Montes region of Portugal. So too were les freres Peyrere (Pereira) of Bordeaux and later Paris, contemporaries and associates of the Rothchilds. Portugal has yet to recover from this extraordinary brain drain.
It was not until the liberal revolution of the early 19th century that the Inquisition was abolished. Although the Marquis of Pombal invited Jews back to Portugal at the end of the 18th century, very few took up his offer. Some Jews from North Africa and Gibraltar did establish communities in Lisbon, Faro, and the Azores in the 19th century but eventually disappeared. The only surviving remnant maintains a synagogue in Lisbon, Shaare Tikve, and recently a museum opened in the Faro Jewish cemetery.
However, to the surprise of many, indigenous Marranos did survive nearly 300 years of the Inquisition. In 1920, Samuel Schwarz, a Polish engineer working in Portugal, encountered a community of Marranos in the interior of Portugal (Belmonte) who had managed to preserve some of the secret rituals, including prayers, of their ancestors. At first distrustful and denying any Jewish connection, they opened up only after Schwartz recited a Hebrew prayer, in which one of the women elders (women handed down the secret prayers from generation to generation) recognized the Hebrew word, Adonai.. Today Belmonte boasts a modern new synagogue and professional Jewish museum.
About the same time as Schwartz learned of the Marranos of Belmonte, Captain Barros Basto, a decorated World War I veteran founded a synagogue for Marranos, the Mekor Haim synagogue in Porto on the second floor above a store. This charismatic army captain embarked on campaign to convince Marranos to return openly to normative Judaism. In full uniform, sometime on horseback, he travelled the isolated communities of Tras Montes and Beiras, founding several Jewish communities, including Bragança, Covilha and Pinhel. Some estimate his adherents at the time upwards of 10,000. Cecil Roth, who first met him in 1926, described Basto as the most charismatic man he had ever met.
Barros Basto succeeded in creating the community and synagogue in Porto. As a result of trumped up charges he was cashiered out of the army and died a desolate man. This decision has been reversed by the Portuguese parliament and he has been posthumously reinstated into the army. He is known as ‘The Portuguese Dreyfus’.
The Portuguese government have also passed legislation entitling any Jew who fled Portugal through fear to regain their passport.
Museum of Portuguese Jewish History
Secret Jews (crypto Jews) are Jews who practised Judaism in secrecy while in public they claimed to be a member of another religion which they or their ancestors had been forced to accept. They came into existence after forced conversions by the Visigoths in Spain in the 7th century, by the Muslim Almohads in North Africa and Spain in the 12th century, in southern Italy in 1493 and known as neofiti, the *conversos or *Marranos (Heb. *anusim) of Spain after the persecutions of 1391 and the expulsion of 1492 and then Portugal in 1497. In Majorca they were known as the Chuetas)
Many who went to South America also became secret Jews (see Stories)
The Dönmeh (Turkish: Dönme) in the Ottoman Empire who publicly converted to Islam, Centred in Salonica it originated during and soon after the era of Sabbatai Zevi, a 17th-century Jewish kabbalist who claimed to be the Messiah and eventually converted to Islam in order to escape punishment by the Sultan Mehmed IV.
A group adopting Islam were the Jadīd al-Islām in Meshed, Persia.
Many converted Jews returned to Judaism.
Crypto-Jew consisted of those who held on to the Jewish customs and faith in which they had been reared. These were known as "Judíos Escondidos"—hidden Jews. They secretly preserved the religion of their fathers and, in spite of the high positions which some held, observed Jewish traditions in private. Many of the wealthiest supposed coverts of Aragon belonged to this category. Some constructed hidden synagogues in their homes, to which trusted neighbors might be invited, while others used their influence at court to protect the Jewish and Converso communities from persecution.
Today, this can also refer to Christians who consciously, or unconsciously maintain Jewish laws and traditions.
See also Wikipedia
FINDING SECRET JEWS
Customs and questions which could suggest Crypto-Jewish ancestry
Museum of Portuguese Jewish History
The list below is a small compilation of crypto-Jewish customs that originated in XV Century Spain and Portugal. These customs are still practiced by many families throughout South America, New Mexico, Spain, Portugal and the islands of the Azores. When analyzing the list, remember that each family might have their own adaptations of the traditions.
In some places there was a man known as the “Abafador”, who used to help the people who were gravelly sick, before the doctor came into the house. The Abafador would close the door, and stop the sick person from breathing, saying very calmly: “come one my son (daughter), our G-d is waiting for you!” after the work was done, the Abafador would go to the relatives and say: “he went like a little bird…”
Anusim is a legal category of Jews in halakha (Jewish law) who were forced to abandon Judaism against their will, typically while forcibly converted to another religion. The term "anusim" is most properly translated as the "coerced [ones]" or the "forced [ones]".
The religious legal terms anús/anusáh/anusim were applied to those Jews who were forced to abandon Judaism against their will, and yet had children who continued to do whatever was in their power to continue practicing Judaism under the forced conditions. The terminology derives from the Talmudic phrase "`averah b'ones (Hebrew: עבירה באונס).", meaning "a forced transgression." The Hebrew term "ones" originally referred to any case where a Jew has been forced into any act against his or her will. The term anús is used in contradistinction to meshumad which means a person who has voluntarily abandoned the practice of Jewish Law in whole or part.
In more recent times, the term Anusim or Reverse Marrano has been used to describe Ultra-Orthodox Jews who are religious on the outside, but are not necessarily practicing in private.
The term anusim became more frequently used after the forced conversion to Christianity of Ashkenazi Jews in Germany at the end of the 11th century. In his religious legal opinions, Rashi, a French rabbi who lived during this period, commented about the issue of anusim.
Several centuries later, following the mass forced conversion of Sephardi Jews (those Jews with extended histories in Spain and Portugal, known jointly as Iberia, or "Sepharad" in Hebrew) of the 15th and 16th centuries, the term "anusim" became widely used by Spanish rabbis and their successors for the following 600 years, henceforth becoming associated with Sephardic history.
The term may be properly applied to any Jew of any ethnic division. Since that time, it has also been applied to other forced or coerced converted Jews, such as the Mashadi Jews of Persia (modern Iran) (see Asia above), who converted to Islam in the public eye, but secretly practised Judaism at home. They lived dual-religious lives, being fully practising Muslims in public life, and fully practising Jews at home.
Sephardic Surnames, Yoram Zara
STORY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE
SECRET JUDAISM DURING THE SPANISH INQUISITION


Regardless of how much money a person has, it can be difficult for them to manage it properly. It can be even more challenging for parents to teach their children to be balanced with how they view and use money. This is necessary for them to learn, though, so they can grow up to be happy and capable of managing their finances.
Here are 3 tips to help teach your children not to take money for granted, and to spend it responsibly.
1.) Teach your kids to make smaller financial decisions
You can start out when your kids are rather young, and take them to a store to spend a small amount, perhaps $1 or $5. If your children are at the age where they can’t yet distinguish different prices on items, you may want to take them to a store that has a dollar or two-dollar section, so that all of their options cost the same.
You can let them know that they can pick out one thing to buy with their money. You may need some patience the first few times you do this with them, as they are no doubt going to want several things. If they have a hard time choosing, you can give them a time limit to make their decision. You should remind them to pick something they really want, so they’ll be happy with their choice. You can talk to them about how when you go shopping, you have a limited amount of money to spend, so you have to make good decisions about what you buy.
As your kids get older, you can take them to different stores, and help them to compare prices of similar items, so they gain insight as to how to shop wisely. Additionally, when you are making decisions about an item you will potentially purchase, talk with your kids about the things you consider before buying it. Ask for their thoughts, as this will encourage them to think before making purchases themselves.
2.) Teach your kids to balance quality and prices
Help your children appreciate not just brand names- and the popularity that goes along with them but also the quality behind the brand. You should teach them to compare the quality of high-priced items with those that are lower priced, but may not be as well-known. You can encourage them to save money in cases where high-priced items do not offer better quality for the cost. Help them to see that they should get their money’s worth for each purchase, and that the less things cost, the more they will have left to spend. On the other hand, make sure they know not to settle for something of lower cost if the quality is poor.
3.) Use good judgement when you buy things for your kids
Even if you can afford to get your kids most of the things they want, this doesn’t mean it’s always a good idea. You can teach your children to save up a portion of what they earn for certain things they want, so they can practice buying things they’ve saved up for. Some of the items you buy them can be used as a reward for good behavior. Try to sometimes purchase items that aren’t electronic, but that they’ll still enjoy using- books, toys, games, puzzles, etc.
Teaching your children to be balanced with money takes some effort, but you can succeed. When they grow up and know how to make good financial decisions, you’ll be glad you took the time to show them how to do so. For more tips on family and money, check out our other articles, and feel free to contact us with any questions.
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Even after gaining acceptance into military service, black soldiers suffered racist treatment from many of their white officers.
They received half the pay of white troops and were given menial duties. The Confederates generally treated their black prisoners with brutality. When several hundred black Union troops were captured at Fort Pillow, Tennessee, in 1864, they were murdered by the Southern forces.
In the early part of the conflict, some Northern commanders returned slaves to their masters, while others forced escapees to work for the Union army. In a few instances, blacks were allowed to farm land confiscated from white planters, but most of these lands were returned to their former owners at the end of the war.
Black women contributed much to the Union effort in the Civil War, acting as spies, nurses, and teachers. Susie King Taylor, was a nurse and laundress with the 33rd U.S. Colored Troops.


The "dominance hierarchy theory" is badly in need of replacement. Schenkel (at the time,
the greatest living authority on wolves) protested the instant the theory was used to explain the social
organization of wolves, but for some reason everyone ignored him. It didn't take long before the
same myth was being used to tell us how domestic dogs organize their groups. We can't even call
this bad science because, in fact, it wasn't science at all. It was and still is simple human projection.
So how do dogs create stable social systems if not by forming 'dominance hierarchies'? We are
proud to offer here the revolutionary work that gives the real answer to this question.
In her paper, The Social Organization of the Domestic Dog: A Longitudinal Study of Domestic Canine
Behavior and the Ontogeny of Domestic Canine Social Systems, animal behaviourist Alexandra
Semyonova presents a new and accurate model of what the dog is all about. She explains how
dogs construct their social systems -- and that dominance has nothing to do with it. Dogs follow three
simple rules as they interact. These three simple rules enable them to form groups of almost
unlimited size, absorbing both strangers and other species into the groups they form. These groups
are complex self-organising systems, without a central authority. They are much more stable and
elegant -- and at the same time more flexible -- than anything so clumsy as 'dominance' could
produce. The paper is a compact journey into the life of dogs, how they become what they are, and
what really moves them as they construct social relationships.
We also proudly present excerpts from Alexandra Semyonova's groundbreaking new book The
100 Silliest Things People Say About Dogs.
Intended for both beginners and "experts", this serious book takes us through many of the beliefs we
have about dogs, explaining what domestic dogs really are and where their behavior really comes
from. It is a fun, easy read that will change the way you see your dog and greatly improve your
relationship with him or her.
Our newest additions: Work on deaf dogs. The fact is that deaf dogs are not more aggressive than
other dogs. They can learn to do everything other dogs do. They can lead full lives and be as
delightful a companion as any other dog. Nevertheless, deaf dogs constitute a particularly
discriminated and abused group among dogs because they are so often misunderstood. Though we
may prefer to sterilize deaf dogs, there is no justification for killing them just because they are deaf.
We invite you to read our documents on this subject: The Deaf Dog Manifesto and Observations of a
Deaf Border Collie.
Scientists have been studying the wrong animal, and they've been doing it the wrong way. They
study dogs under artificial conditions. They ignore everything they can't count. This means they
have failed to ask some of the most important questions. Scientists have also tended to forget that
they are, themselves, animals whose behavior we need to study. Anthropologists and historians of
science are well aware of this, but it looks like scientists aren't reading their work, or are reading too
little of it, maybe because interdisciplinary study is rare in general. So scientists bowl along unaware
(for example) of how their own psychology is affecting not only which questions they ask, but also
what they perceive while they gather data. This had led to an unjustified belief that they are
objective. In fact, a lot of what they tell us about dogs is a projection of human existential paradigms.
This site is still expanding, so please bookmark it and visit again.
Search this entire site using the box below.
A website dedicated to telling the truth about dogs
Dogs are not wolves.
You do not need to keep your dog "subordinate."
Dogs build on trust, not on dominance.
The first, most basic dog rule is "no real aggression." Humans need to learn this.


Here's our round-up for you of the UK museums' free, online Hindu and Diwali educational resources:
© Trustees of the British Museum
The British Museum’s Young explorers’ microsite has pupil-friendly text and the images are large enough for the class to see on the whiteboard. There you’ll discover Shiva, the lord of the dance in the Gods and spirits’ section.
There are more gods, including Vishnu, in the British Museum’s online collection.
Explore Early Hinduism via the British Museum’s website, Ancient India. The story, explore section and challenge suit whiteboard use too.
You can find extra Ancient Civilizations websites on the British Museum's website.
Both Hinduism and Diwali are included in the V&A online collection.
There are some lovely images for you in the V&A’s online collection. For example the Diwali picture, A princess and ladies celebrating Diwali in a palace courtyard, c. 1760, Lucknow by Hunhar, is great for assembly use.
Or how about A devotee performing puja, c.1520-40, possibly Mewar?
We also like the image of Rama and Sita – a useful resource if you’re studying their story with your class.
The British Library
The Sacred Texts interactive on the British Library website has the story of Rama and Sita as well as Nachiketa and Yama. These are perfect for interactive whiteboard use and we like the inclusion of subtitles and background info and questions.
Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery / BM&AG
Check out the search results for Hindu objects in Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery – or BM&AG’s online collection


Can you recognize someone’s voice just by hearing them on the phone? Most people can but did you know that you can do the same thing with birds? Every bird species has its own call and/or song and by knowing that sound it helps you to identify it. So how do you identify birds by sound? It really isn’t that difficult if you pay attention and can be a handy talent especially if you are a birdwatcher.
When I first started out watching the birds in my backyard I really never paid much attention to their songs or calls I just enjoyed seeing them. It really never occurred to me that the calls were that different from each other. I grew up in a small city town and all I ever really noticed were Cardinals and Blue Jays every once in awhile but mostly Sparrows and Crows. So not really exciting if you ask me. Of course I was much younger then too. If I were to go back to that town I would find many other species of birds besides the Cardinals and Blue Jays, because now I am paying a lot more attention to them.
However, there still weren’t as many bird species as I saw living in my first house on six and a half acres and surrounded by woods and a river about 300 yards away. This setup brings in different species of owls such as Barred, Barn, and Screech Owls, Red-tailed Hawks, Cooper’s Hawks, and Sharp-shinned Hawks, Pileated Woodpeckers, Hairy and Downy Woodpeckers, Red-bellied Woodpeckers, Northern Flickers, many different Warblers, Grosbeaks, Wild Turkeys, Belted Kingfishers, and sometimes even Wood Ducks just to name a few.
Bird Songs or Bird Calls?
Each bird species has a variety of calls and songs that is part of their vocabulary. A bird call is a shorter, less rhythmic sound used to communicate. Birds call for their young or their mate, to announce a predator or another bird intruder of a different species, or to scold an intruder.
A bird song is longer and a more complex vocalization and usually is performed by males. Male birds sing to defend and protect their territory as well as to show off to females trying to entice them to be their mate. Female birds found in the tropics are known to sing as well.
How Can You ID Birds By Songs And Calls?
There are a couple of ways to learn the songs and calls too. One is by observing. When you see a bird in your yard or wherever, singing or making its call, take note of what bird it is. After a couple of times doing this you should be able to become familiar with it. An unmistakable bird call is the Blue Jay. Its call is a harsh, jeering jaay or jaay-jaay sound. Another unmistakable bird call that I have learned is the Carolina Wren. It’s such a small bird but its call is pretty loud which is a teakettle-teakettle sound.
Another way to learn bird sounds is by listening to recordings of birds that you happen to see. Play the sounds often to help make it stick. This is something that my fanatical husband Jeff likes to do prior to going on vacation. When we are going out west or out of the country where there are different species of birds, he gets a tape of that particular area’s bird sounds. He listens to them over and over again mainly for repetition of sounds and pitch which helps to zero in on a particular specie’s call. That way when out in the field he will be able to easily identify which bird it is.
If you choose to do this yourself you can get apps for your phone or Ipad to download (IBirdPro is a good one) or there are audio CD’s such as the one by Peterson Field Guides which is Birding By Ear . On this CD the authors teach you how to distinguish the subtle differences of different bird sounds. They do this using techniques such as phonetics, mnemonics, and descriptive words which makes it easier to learn.
All bird species make their own sounds (i.e.songs and/or calls) whether it be for finding a mate, calling to their young, warning other birds of an intruder such as a predator or another bird species, or claiming their territory. Being able to identify a bird’s sounds helps you to identify what bird it is. Birdwatchers in particular like to be able to do this as it makes it easier for them when they are looking for them out in the field.
It may take a little bit of time but you can learn a lot of bird calls and songs with practice. One way is to just be observant. When you hear a bird singing or calling check out to see which one it is. The more you hear it the more you are able to remember it the next time.
Another way is to listen to recordings from an app that you can download on your phone or Ipad or from an audio CD. By listening to it over and over you will learn to recognize bird’s calls. That’s what my husband does each time prior to a vacation where we will be seeing different bird species other than what we have where we live. That way when we are walking along out in the field or on a hike and we hear a bird call my husband will be able to identify what it is.
Do you have a particular way of identifying bird sounds? I would love to hear from you. Please let me know in the comments below.


|Name: _________________________||Period: ___________________|
This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.
Multiple Choice Questions
1. At what age does Cleopatra realize that she could be forced to marry and bear children?
2. What do Cleopatra and Caesarion see for the first time in Rome?
(a) Stained glass.
3. What does Cleopatra give Caesar at their first formal meeting in Rome?
(a) The two pirates.
(b) A chest of gold.
(c) Treasure maps.
(d) A cage of parrots.
4. After her father's death, Cleopatra is to co-rule with ______________.
(a) her sister.
(b) her brother.
(c) her uncle.
(d) her nephew.
5. What does Pompey the Great say about the seven-year-old Cleopatra?
(a) She is a special joy.
(b) She is an enchanting child.
(c) She is impudent.
(d) She has eyes as black as midnight.
6. Why does Cleopatra think that Caesar has brought her to Rome?
(a) To imprison her.
(b) For some personal political gain.
(c) To kill Caesarion.
(d) To marry her.
7. What disease is it determined that Ptolemy has after he is examined in Egypt?
(d) Heart disease.
8. Who meets Cleopatra in Rome on Caesar's behalf?
(a) Mark Antony.
(b) Caesar Augustus.
(c) Gaius Oppius.
(d) Gaius Caesar.
9. What is the name of both of Cleopatra's brothers?
10. Caesar orders a statue of _____________ to be placed in the temple.
11. Why does Caesar say he will not divorce Calpurnia?
(a) She is very ill.
(b) She has money.
(c) She is pregnant.
(d) She has stood behind him during his rise to the top.
12. Why does Cleopatra need help from Olympos?
(a) To give her an ointment for a rash.
(b) To give her a potion for headache.
(c) To bring down a fever.
(d) To calculate when she will give birth.
13. What promise does Caesar make to Cleopatra?
(a) To return her to the throne.
(b) To marry her.
(c) To take her to Rome.
(d) To have her image put on coins.
14. Caesar tells Cleopatra that he will soon leave for a military campaign in which country?
15. What is Cleopatra's opinion of Caesar's wife?
(a) She is big as a barge.
(b) She is pinched like a prune.
(c) She is cold as a statue.
(d) She is very pretty.
Short Answer Questions
1. Cleopatra's pregnancy ends in _________________.
2. Who attacks Cleopatra ships as she sails to Rome?
3. Cleopatra's younger stepsister is named _________________.
4. Which famous warrior does Cleopatra dream about which concerns her?
5. How do Caesar and Cleopatra travel?
This section contains 403 words
(approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page)


Pete Seeger, one of the most influential artists in American history, would be 100 on May 3, were he still alive.
Pete provided much of the soundtrack for the political awakening of several generations of activists. The songs he wrote, including the antiwar tunes, “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” “If I Had a Hammer” and “Turn, Turn, Turn,” and those he has popularized, including “This Land Is Your Land” and “We Shall Overcome,” have been recorded by hundreds of artists in many languages and have become global anthems for people fighting for freedom. He introduced Americans to songs from other cultures, like “Wimoweh” (“The Lion Sleeps Tonight”) from South Africa, “Tzena, Tzena” from Israel (which reached number two on the pop charts), and “Guantanamera” from Cuba, inspiring what is now called “world music.”
Thanks to Seeger’s influence, protest songs — via folk, rock, blues, and soul genres — became popular and even commercially successful. He recorded over eighty albums — of children’s songs, labor, civil rights, and antiwar songs, traditional American folk songs, international songs, and Christmas songs. Among performers around the globe, Seeger became a symbol of a principled artist deeply engaged in the world.
Yet even during the height of the 1950s and 1960s folk revival and the popularity of protest music, Seeger was blocked from network TV and the media spotlight because of his left-wing politics. Millions sang his songs without knowing his name.
Seeger’s life and legacy offers some clues for working through perennial riddles faced by American socialists and radicals. How to make use of a relatively privileged background to promote social justice — rather than be paralyzed by guilt? How to create a popular art that doesn’t succumb to banality, cynicism, or spectacle, but that helps inspire activism?
Seeger came of age during the 1930s, when many artists, playwrights, novelists, filmmakers, and musicians aligned themselves with the upsurge of worker militancy and protest. His father, Charles Seeger, and his stepmother, Ruth Crawford Seeger, were leaders in these efforts. Charles, a well-known composer and musicologist, helped create a collective of radically minded composers during the Depression, hoping (and largely failing) to invent a revolutionary proletarian music.
Many participants, including Aaron Copland, Marc Blitzstein, and Earl Robinson, became major figures in classical music and musical theater. Charles eventually was drawn to the notion of creating a democratic popular song movement by reviving the work songs, spirituals, ballads, and dance tunes of American racial, ethnic, and regional subcultures.
It was that vision that inspired the young Pete. During a visit to a folk music festival in North Carolina while still in high school, he heard bluegrass music played on a five-string banjo for the first time. When he returned home, he listened to records and learned to imitate what he heard. In 1938, he dropped out of Harvard in his sophomore year to try his own hand at changing society by becoming a banjo-picking itinerant folk musician.
A major influence was folklorist Alan Lomax, who produced recordings of politically conscious folk musicians like ex-convict Huddie Ledbetter (known as “Leadbelly”), Appalachian mineworker organizer Aunt Molly Jackson, and Woody Guthrie. Lomax hired Pete to work for him at the Library of Congress’s Archive of American Folk Song, where he learned many of the songs he would sing throughout his career.
Pete’s life mission was crystallized when he met Guthrie in March 1940 at a benefit to raise money for migrant farm workers. Pete was impressed by Guthrie’s ability to fuse folk melodies and lyrics about contemporary events. Guthrie had become a radio voice for the swelling Okie population of Southern California, singing about their plight, and developed close ties to union and Communist activists. Pete traveled with Guthrie, singing at migrant labor camps and union halls, and developing his performance skills.
In 1941, at age twenty-two, Seeger formed the Almanac Singers with Lee Hays and Millard Lampell, later joined by Guthrie, Bess Lomax, and others who rotated in and out of the group.
The Almanacs lived and worked collectively, playing at union rallies and left-wing benefits, composing songs they hoped would serve the organizing efforts of the time, including Guthrie’s “Union Maid” and Pete’s “Talking Union,” his first composition. Even Eleanor Roosevelt was a fan. But the Almanacs Communist affiliations made them a target of right-wing press red-baiting and FBI scrutiny. The group disbanded when Pete and Woody joined the armed forces in 1943.
Pete, Woody, and other left-wing musicians wrote a flood of patriotic songs. They hoped that the war against fascism would set the stage for a struggle to end racism in America. In the immediate aftermath of the war, a massive strike wave seemed to portend a progressive political movement to advance beyond the New Deal.
Targeted by the Red Scare
Filled with optimism, in 1946 Seeger led the effort to create People’s Songs, an organization of progressive songwriters and performers, dominated by but not confined to folk musicians, and People’s Artists, a booking agency to help members get concert gigs and recording contracts.
When former vice president Henry Wallace ran for president on the Progressive Party ticket in 1948, Seeger traveled with him, distributing song sheets at every meeting or rally so that sing-alongs, led by Seeger, would alternate with Wallace’s speeches.
That year, Seeger and Hays (both former Almanacs), along with Ronnie Gilbert and Fred Hellerman, formed the Weavers, hoping to continue what the Almanacs had started but aiming for more mainstream audiences. Their repertoire featured dynamic arrangements of American and global folk songs, with an occasional political song, that proved popular as a nightclub act.
Gordon Jenkins, a leading record impresario, saw them at the Village Vanguard and signed the group with Decca Records. They had several huge hits. In 1950 their recording of an Israeli song, “Tzena Tzena,” reached number two on the pop charts, and their version of Leadbelly’s “Goodnight, Irene,” reached number one and stayed on the charts for half a year. Other recordings — “On Top of Old Smokey,” “Kisses Sweeter Than Wine,” “Wimoweh,” and “Midnight Special” — also made the charts; their 1951 recording of Guthrie’s “So Long It’s Been Good to Know You” reached number four.
But the Weavers’ commercial success was short-lived. As soon as they began to be widely noticed, they were targeted by anticommunist witch-hunters.
Several former FBI agents founded the newsletter Counterattack in 1947 to expose Communism in American society. In 1950, the newsletter issued a special report, “Red Channels: The Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television.” It listed 151 actors, writers, musicians, broadcast journalists, and others whom it claimed were part of the Communist influence in the entertainment industry — including Seeger and the Weavers. Hollywood studios, TV shows, and other venues blacklisted people who were named.
The Weavers survived for another year, but the escalating Red Scare caught up with them. Their contract for a summer television show was canceled. They could no longer get bookings in top nightclubs. Radio stations stopped playing their songs, their records stopped selling. They never had another hit record.
Seeger left the Weavers to pursue a solo career, but he was blacklisted from the early 1950s through the mid-1960s. In 1955 he was convicted of contempt of Congress for refusing to discuss his political affiliations at a hearing called by the House Committee on Un-American Activities, basing his refusal on the First Amendment. It took seven years for the courts finally to overturn that conviction and validate Pete’s stance.
Even as the McCarthyist fever was lifting, Seeger was kept off network television. In 1963 ABC refused to allow him to appear on Hootenanny, a weekly show that owed its existence to the folk music revival Seeger had helped inspire. Joan Baez and other young folk singers boycotted the show, but Seeger advised them instead to use the opportunity. Ironically, “hootenanny” was a word that Seeger and Guthrie had popularized, using it to label the free-form folk music concert/parties that were spreading around the country.
During the blacklist years, Seeger made a living by giving guitar and banjo lessons and singing at the summer camps, churches, high schools and colleges, and union halls that were courageous enough to invite the controversial balladeer.
In 1966, he hosted a folk music program on a New York City’s nonprofit UHF TV channel, Rainbow Quest. His guests comprised a racially and musically diverse group of veteran and newly emerging country, bluegrass and folk singers, including Johnny Cash, Doc Watson, Roscoe Holcomb, Judy Collins, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, the Clancy brothers, Elizabeth Cotton, Rev. Gary Davis, Len Chandler, Tom Paxton, Bernice Reagon, Jean Ritchie, and Patrick Sky. The station had a limited viewership at the time, but the programs were taped; some can be viewed on YouTube and bought on DVD.
Out From Under the Blacklist
Despite his exclusion from mainstream media, Seeger’s cultural significance grew enormously in the sixties.
In the 1960s he sang with civil rights workers at rallies and churches in the South and at the march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. Along with the Highlander Center’s Guy Carawan, he popularized the song “We Shall Overcome” among civil rights activists and at concerts in the United States and around the world.
He invited the Freedom Singers — a group of SNCC activists — on stages and supported their efforts. He got a Carnegie Hall audience to sing songs of the Southern freedom movement, just when these songs were on the lips of teenagers being hosed down in Birmingham. In a letter to Seeger, Martin Luther King Jr thanked him for his “moral support and Christian generosity.”
As the anti-Vietnam War movement emerged, Pete and banjo were frequently seen on protest front lines. In the process, Pete’s youthful hope of helping foster a movement that sings was coming true.
Pete began to break through the mainstream media blacklist. He signed a contract with Columbia Records, which promoted his growing number of albums, filled with labor, civil rights, and peace songs as well as special songs for children, including the popular “Abiyoyo.” In 1966, Seeger recorded an antiwar anthem, “Bring ‘Em Home.” “If I Had a Hammer,” “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” and “Turn, Turn, Turn” became major hits for other artists like Peter, Paul, and Mary, the Byrds, Trini Lopez, and even Marlene Dietrich.
One of the most popular network TV shows in the late 1960s was a variety program hosted by the wise-cracking, folk-singing Smothers Brothers. In September 1967 Tom and Dick Smothers defiantly invited Seeger onto their CBS show, the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, to challenge the blacklist. True to his principles, Seeger insisted on singing a newly composed antiwar song, “Waist Deep in the Big Muddy.”
CBS censors refused to air the song, but public outrage forced the network to relent and allow him to perform the song on the show a few months later, on February 17, 1968. The audience for that show — 13.5 million households — was even larger than Seeger’s appearance five months earlier.
Two days after Seeger sang “Big Muddy,” CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite — perhaps the nation’s most trusted person — called on President Lyndon Johnson to withdraw American troops from Vietnam. On March 31, Johnson — facing strong opposition from antiwar candidates Eugene McCarthy and Robert Kennedy — announced he would not seek reelection that year. Quite possibly Pete’s lyrics about the “big muddy” and the “big fool” had something to do with LBJ’s political demise.
Perhaps to Pete’s surprise, mainstream America eventually acknowledged his cultural role and moral stature during the final two decades of his life. In 1993, he received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. A year later, he was honored by the Kennedy Center and President Bill Clinton presented him with the National Medal of Arts. In 1996, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 2009, he and Bruce Springsteen sang at Barack Obama‘s inaugural celebration at the Lincoln Memorial — leading more than half a million people on the mall and millions of people watching on TV in a rendition of “This Land is Your Land.”
Pete told his own story in a kind of narrative songbook, Where Have all the Flowers Gone? in 1993. He also became the subject of several biographies, including David King Dunaway’s How Can I Keep from Singing? The Ballad of Pete Seeger, Alec Wilkinson’s The Protest Singer: An Intimate Portrait of Pete Seeger, and Alan Winkler’s To Everything There Is a Season: Pete Seeger and the Power of Song, and several books for children. Folk historians Ronald D. Cohen and James Capaldi edited a book of articles about him called The Pete Seeger Reader, and in 2007 PBS broadcast Jim Brown’s documentary, “Pete Seeger: The Power of Song” as part of its American Masters series.
Late in life, he welcomed Rob Rosenthal, a Wesleyan University sociologist, and Sam Rosenthal, a musician and writer, to dig through his extensive writings — letters stored for decades in his family barn, notes to himself, published articles, rough drafts, stories, books, poems, and songs— to produce Pete Seeger: In His Own Words, published in 2012
Some of the nation’s most prominent singers recorded songs honoring Seeger, including Springsteen’s Seeger Sessions. On his ninetieth birthday in May 2009, more than 15,000 admirers filled New York City’s Madison Square Garden for a concert honoring Seeger. The performers included Springsteen, Baez, Tom Morello, Dave Matthews, Emmylou Harris, Billy Bragg, Rufus Wainwright, Bela Fleck, Taj Mahal, Roger McGuinn, Steve Earle, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Dar Williams, Ani DiFranco, and John Mellencamp.
Throughout his life, Seeger believed that his mission that was not just about injecting politically conscious songs into the musical mainstream. He sang plenty of songs supporting particular causes and campaigns, but that was not his essential purpose. His ultimate goal, one that he learned from his father, was to help inspire and sustain democratic action.
The best testament to this vision can be seen in his public performances and in the way he lived his life. He wanted people to make their own music, and realize their own power, rather than be passive consumers or docile citizens.
Pete was an outstanding musician, inventive and skillful with the five-string banjo (which he brought out of obscurity) and the twelve-string guitar (which he learned to play from Leadbelly). His voice was a serviceable if cracked tenor. But people didn’t go to a Seeger concert to watch him play and sing — nor did he want that. Instead, he wanted people went to participate.
His concerts and records taught audiences songs to take away and sing on their own. He carefully crafted a stage persona that inspired audiences to join him. Every Seeger concert involved a lot of group singing, including multipart harmonizing of South African chants, gospel hymns, rounds, and anthems — which Pete would elicit with patient insistence.
He introduced audiences to song-makers like Leadbelly and Guthrie from his earlier days, and in so doing revealed song treasures and life stories that have become integral to American culture. He sang new songs by writers that his audiences may never have heard of. He was one of the first to perform Dylan’s early songs. He taught audiences songs about workers, draft resisters, civil rights activists, and Wall Street Occupiers. He taught the world “We Shall Overcome,” and asked British folksinger Billy Bragg to write new words appropriate to Tiananmen Square and incidents of nonviolent resistance.
Seeger was an organizer as well as an artist. He organized the Almanac Singers and People’s Artists. In 1950, he helped found and sustain Sing Out! magazine, which has served as a primary folk music source ever since. In 1959, he helped launch the Newport Folk Festival, which brought together on a shared stage the practitioners of every kind of roots music, and is still going on.
In 1969, he started the nonprofit group Clearwater, near his home in Beacon, New York, that included a newly built sloop and an annual celebration dedicated to cleaning up the polluted Hudson River. The effort, at first written off as simplistic and naive, helped inspire the environmental movement. The Hudson, once filled with oil pollution, sewage, and toxic chemicals, is now swimmable.
An Authentic, Radical Life
Seeger owned much of his success to his wife Toshi Ohta Seeger. Although Harold Leventhal was Pete’s professional manager, Toshi was the one who organized his personal and political affairs. The couple, married in 1939, lived most of their life together in a log cabin close to the river, a place they built and developed with their own hands and where they raised their children. Toshi died in July 2013; Pete died six months later at age ninety-four.
To honor the hundredth anniversary of his birth, his fans will be sponsoring many concerts, tributes, publications, and, in May, a comprehensive six-CD set, Pete Seeger: The Smithsonian Folkways Collection, which includes twenty previously unreleased recordings, accompanied by a two hundred page book.
Pete Seeger’s life is one worth examining. Very few people in American history have lived more authentic and morally radical lives.


As temperatures in the Midwest plunged thanks to the polar vortex last week, Australia was experiencing record heat. It made us wonder: What was the widest temperature gap between the world's hottest and coldest places on a given day? Is global warming affecting that spread? After processing 63 years of data from 90,000-plus weather stations, we have an answer: It's not clear.
Well, that's not entirely true. On June 13, 1966, the recorded difference between the world's hottest and coldest places was 134.4º Celsius. At a weather station on the border of Senegal and Mauritania, the temperature maxed out at 52.2º Celsius (126º Fahrenheit). The coldest spot was -82.2º Celsius, or -116º Fahrenheit — in the Antarctic.
The locations of the recording stations are the root of our uncertainty. The Wire compiled this data using the records of the National Climatic Data Center, which lets you download a huge (two-plus gig) file containing all of the weather readings from its Global Historical Climatology Network (the GHCN-Daily). After running scripts to pull out the maximum and minimum temperatures around the world for each day between January 1, 1950, and December 31, 2013, we got the following graph.
That 1966 date, you'll notice falls into the weird period between those two orange lines, a period in which the fluctuations in the spread are varied by season, and in which the spread is larger than in the periods before 1957 (or so) and after 1996 (or so). Then we plotted the daily maximum and minimum temperatures, giving us this graph.
Clearly, something changed in the low temperature data for a few decades. We sent our graphs to Matthew Menne of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who confirmed our suspicion: The change was due to the system using different tracking stations. "[T]he low variability period you pointed out in your graph," he said via email, "coincides with the period of record in GHCN-Daily for the South Pole station. This would explain the lower variability and the lower annual extremes during that period."
Similar data access explains why the spread goes up and down so much with the seasons, despite it being winter in the Southern Hemisphere when it's summer in the Northern, and vice versa. "There are many more high latitude Northern Hemisphere stations than high latitude Southern Hemisphere stations," Menne pointed out. "There is also much more high latitude land area in the Northern Hemisphere." So there are more stations, higher north, which gives lower temperatures when it's winter in the Northern Hemisphere than in the Southern.
What this means is that our assessment is dependent on the data we have available. No one is tracking temperatures everywhere all the time; or, at least, no one was doing that in 1950. If you exclude the period when the NCDC tracked temperatures near the South Pole, the widest single-day spread between the world's hottest and coldest recorded temperatures was on January 16, 1952, when there was a 109º Celsius spread between the hottest and coldest places.
The limitations on the available data also means that some fascinating details emerge. On July 7, 1951, for example, the hottest place recorded was Death Valley, where it was about 122º Fahrenheit. The coldest place was near Lake Tahoe, where temperatures dropped below freezing. But that means that the hottest and coldest places on Earth were both in California — only some 263 miles from each other. You could, theoretically, have been in both the hottest and coldest places recorded on Earth on the same day.
The inclusion of the geographic locations of the weather stations allows us to do some interesting analysis. Below, we compare all 365 of the hottest and coldest places from each day in 1950 and 2013.
Can you guess what continent saw its hottest temperatures on record in 2013? The answer is Australia, which is home to the stations that recorded the hottest days of the year. Compare that with 1950, in which the United States and Mexico had more hot days — and in which the American Rockies recorded a number of the coldest temperatures. Some of this is related to where weather stations are placed, of course, but not all of it.
We also made this tool that lets you see the hottest and coldest recorded temperatures on any of the days from 1950 through 2013. (Some of the coldest temperatures were recorded in the Antarctic for an extended period, remember, so they won't always show up on the map.)
What does all of this tell us about climate change? Not a whole lot. The spread has remained relatively consistent between the hottest and coldest places over time. The graph at right shows how the average hottest temperatures for each day in each decade has increased. In the 1950s, the hottest places on each day were, on average, 44.68º Celsius. In the 2000s, that was up to 45.08º. Which reinforces a key point about climate change: even long-term weather trends are subtle, even if isolated incidents — like a polar vortex or a heat wave — are not.
This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.
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19 September 2017
Renewable Power for All: a call for an environmentally beneficial electrification and multi-sectoral integration
Fighting climate change, air pollution and delivering the Paris Agreement commitments requires replacing fossil fuels by renewables within the power sector and beyond. As large amounts of competitive renewable electricity are today available, a rapid electrification of the most carbon intensive energy uses is the best and most efficient way to decarbonise and grow Europe’s economy.
The following measures would help drive the decarbonisation and energy efficiency of the Transport, Heating and Colling sectors, thanks to the uptake of wind energy, and should be prioritised as part of current and forthcoming discussion on EU legislation:
- A downward revision of the PEF for electricity so non-combustible renewables have a PEF below 1;
- An increase of the fuel suppliers obligation in the Renewable Energy Directive to 10%;
- Stringent post-2020 CO2 standards for cars in line with the Paris Agreement on climate;
- Stronger requirements regarding the deployment of charging points for electric vehicles;
- A revision of the Energy Taxation Directive that avoid favouring fossil fuels where electricity could also be used.
Read the position paper


|In some areas of the reserve where the rhododendron
was cleared in the late 1980's, deciduous woodland is now thriving. The clearance of
the rhododendron allowed light onto the ground beneath the tree canopy, enabling some
deciduous saplings and other plants to grow. This is helping to replace the under
and middle storey of native plant growth destroyed by the rhododendron. Although the
taller mature oak trees were not killed by the invasive plant, they will eventually die
and need to have younger trees growing on to replace them.
From a wildlife
habitat point of view, deciduous woodland will support many more species of plant and
animal than will a conifer forest. However it
is less profitable to the landowner because it takes many more years of growth before any
of the trees are suitable to be cut for their timber.
Deciduous trees all lose their leaves in the winter. The leaves form a carpet on
the ground beneath the trees and eventually rot down forming a type of natural compost
full of nutrients. This makes an ideal home and foodsource to all kinds of plant and
invertebrate life and forms the base of the forest food chain, supporting in turn all the
larger animals including mammals and birds that live in the forest. Two picture galleries
of forest animals and plants here.