grossenouille

tea

2009-03-24T01:45:00.001-07:00

Tea refers to the agricultural products of the leaves, leaf buds, and internodes of the Camellia sinensis plant, prepared and cured by various methods. "Tea" also refers to the aromatic beverage prepared from the cured leaves by combination with hot or boiling water, and is the colloquial name for the Camellia sinensis plant itself.

After water, tea is the most widely-consumed beverage in the world. It has a cooling, slightly bitter, astringent flavour.

The four types of tea most commonly found on the market are black tea, oolong tea, green tea and white tea, all of which can be made from the same bushes, processed differently, and in the case of fine white tea, grown differently. Pu-erh tea, a double-fermented black tea, is also often classified as amongst the most popular types of tea.

The term "herbal tea" usually refers to an infusion or tisane of fruit or herbs that contains no Camellia sinensis.The term "red tea" either refers to an infusion made from the South African rooibos plant, also containing no Camellia sinensis, or, in Chinese, Korean, Japanese and other East Asian languages, refers to black tea.

2008-05-02T08:16:00.001-07:00

King George has referred to many kings throughout history. When used, by Americans, without further reference it most often means George III of the United Kingdom, against whom the Whigs of the American Revolution rebelled.

King George I of Great Britain and Ireland
King George II of Great Britain and Ireland
King George III of the United Kingdom
King George IV of the United Kingdom
King George V of the United Kingdom
King George VI of the United Kingdom
King George I of Greece
King George II of Greece
King George of Bohemia
King George of the Duala people
George of Georgia (several)

2008-05-01T08:16:00.001-07:00

Bolingbrook is a village in Will County, Illinois and DuPage County, Illinois. As of the 2000 census, the village had a total population of 56,321. As of a 2005 estimate, the population is 69,662. Today, Bolingbrook has nearly 75,000 residents.

Geography
As of the census of 2000, there were 56,321 people, 17,416 households, and 14,246 families residing in the village. The population density was 1,060.2/km² (2,746.5/mi²). There were 17,884 housing units at an average density of 336.7/km² (872.1/mi²). The racial makeup of the village was 64.51% White, 20.41% African American, 0.23% Native American, 6.38% Asian, 0.06% Pacific Islander, 5.65% from other races, and 2.77% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 13.09% of the population.
There were 17,416 households out of which 48.0% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 66.5% were married couples living together, 10.9% had a female householder with no husband present, and 18.2% were non-families. 14.2% of all households were made up of individuals and 2.8% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 3.22 and the average family size was 3.56.
In the village the population was spread out with 32.3% under the age of 18, 8.4% from 18 to 24, 35.2% from 25 to 44, 19.9% from 45 to 64, and 4.3% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 31 years. For every 100 females there were 99.6 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 97.0 males.
The median income for a household in the village was $67,852, and the median income for a family was $71,527. Males had a median income of $46,915 versus $33,665 for females. The per capita income for the village was $23,468. About 2.9% of families and 4.1% of the population were below the poverty line, including 5.1% of those under age 18 and 6.8% of those age 65 or over.

Growth History
Illinois Route 53 - Bolingbrook Drive, Illinois Route 126
Interstate 55 and Interstate 355
Former U.S Route 66
Other Major streets include Boughton Road, Weber Road, Lily Cache Lane, and Briarcliff Road

Transportation
Jaslene Gonzalez, America's Next Top Model Cycle 8
Steve Jaros, PBA Bowler - Major Champion

Schools
Bolingbrook has one airport which is owned by the Village and operated under a contract with a management company., Clow International Airport. WGN-TV Helicopter is stationed at Clow Airport as well as a base station for Air Angels Aeromedical transport. (life flight type operation)
Bolingbrook Medical Center which currently operates the only free standing full service hospital emergency room, was given the OK to become a full service hospital. The first new hospital in Illinois since Olympia Fields Osteopathic Medical Center and Hospital (now St James Hospital) opened in Olympia Fields in 1979.(Note other hospitals have been built in Illinois, but these new hospitals have replaced older hospitals) The emergency room is unique in that it is one of the few full service ERs in the country not directly connected to a hospital. It is a level II trauma center.
The current mayor of Bolingbrook is Roger C. Claar, who has served in that role for nearly two decades.
District 365U was originally known as District 94. It took it's present name when it became the first school district in the United States to implement the 45-15 plan where schools were occupied year round with 3/4 of the students in session at any one time. Students went to school for 9 weeks and had 3 weeks off. Teachers were optionally allowed to work year-round.
Part of the area where Bolingbrook lies today was originally known as "Barber's Corners", and before that, "Welco".

2008-04-30T08:31:00.000-07:00

Part of a series on Libertarianism Agorism Anarcho-capitalism Autarchism Geolibertarianism Green libertarianism Left-libertarianism Libertarian feminism Minarchism Neolibertarianism Paleolibertarianism Progressive libertarianism Right-libertarianism Austrian School Chicago School Classical liberalism Individualist anarchism Civil liberties Economic freedom Free markets Free trade Humanism Laissez-faire Liberty Individualism Non-aggression Private property Self-ownership Tax cuts Economic views History Movement Parties Theories of law Views of rights Criticism of libertarianism Libertarian Republican Libertarian Democrat The Austrian School, also known as the "Vienna School" or the "Psychological School", is a heterodox school of economic thought that advocates adherence to strict methodological individualism. As a result Austrians hold that the only valid economic theory is logically derived from basic principles of human action. Alongside the formal approach to theory, often called praxeology, the school has traditionally advocated an interpretive approach to history. The praxeological method allows for the discovery of economic laws valid for all human action, while the interpretive approach addresses specific historical events.
This Aristotelian/rationalist approach differs both from the currently dominant Platonic/positivist approach of contemporary neo-classical economics and the once dominant historical approach of the German historical school and the American institutionalists. Regardless, Austrian economics has made significant contributions to modern mainstream neo-classical economics. because of its emphasis on the creative phase (i.e. the time element) of economic productivity and its questioning of the basis of the behavioral theory underlying neoclassical economics.
Because many of the policy recommendations of Austrian theorists call for small government, strict protection of private property, and support for individualism in general, they are often cited by conservatives, laissez-faire liberal, libertarian, and Objectivist groups for support, although Austrian School economists, like Ludwig von Mises, insist that praxeology must be value-free. They do not answer the question "should this policy be implemented?", but rather "if this policy is implemented, will it have the effects you intend?".

History
Austrian economists reject statistical methods and artificially constructed experiments as tools applicable to economics, saying that while it is appropriate in the natural sciences where factors can be isolated in laboratory conditions, acting human beings are too complex for this treatment. Instead one should isolate the logical processes of human action - a discipline named "praxeology" by Alfred Espinas..
This focus on opportunity cost alone means that their interpretation of the time value of a good has a strict relationship: since goods will be as restricted by scarcity at a later point in time as they are now, the strict relationship between investment and time must also hold. A factory making goods next year is worth as much less as the goods it is making next year are worth. This means that the business cycle is driven by miscoordination between sectors of the same economy, caused by money not carrying incentive information correct about present choices, rather than within a single economy where money causes people to make bad decisions about how to spend their time.

Analytical framework
Some contributions of Austrian economists:

A theory of distribution in which factor prices result from the imputation of prices of consumer goods to goods of "higher order", that is goods used in the production of consumer goods (goods of the first order).
An emphasis on the forward-looking nature of choice, seeing time as the root of uncertainty within economics (see also time preference).
A fundamental rejection of mathematical methods in economics seeing the function of economics as investigating the essences rather than the specific quantities of economic phenomena. This was seen as an evolutionary, or "genetic-causal", approach against the stresses of equilibrium and perfect competition found in mainstream Neoclassical economics (see also praxeology).
Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk's critique of Marx centered around the untenability of the labor theory of value in the light of the transformation problem. There was also the connected argument that capitalists do not exploit workers; they accommodate workers by providing them with income well in advance of the revenue from the output they helped to produce.
Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk's capital theory, which equates capital intensity with the degree of roundaboutness of production processes.
Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk's demonstration that the law of marginal utility, as formulated by Menger necessarily implies the classical law of costs and hence the vast majority of the conclusions of the British classical economists. This discovery was later fully developed and its implications traced by a student of von Mises, George Reisman, in his book, Capitalism.
An emphasis on opportunity cost and reservation demand in defining value, and a refusal to consider supply as an otherwise independent cause of value. (The British economist Philip Wicksteed adopted this perspective.)
The Mises-Hayek business cycle theory, which explains depression as a reaction to an intertemporal production structure fostered by monetary policy setting interest rates inconsistent with individual time preferences.
Hayek's concept of intertemporal equilibrium. (John Hicks took over this theory in his discussion of temporary equilibrium in Value and Capital, a book very influential on the development of neoclassical economics after World War II.)
Mises and Hayek's view of prices as permitting agents to make use of dispersed tacit knowledge.
The time preference theory of interest, which explains interest rates through intertemporal choice - the different time preferences of the borrower or lender - rather than as a price paid for a factor of production.
Stressing uncertainty in the making of economic decisions, rather than relying on "Homo economicus" or the rational man who was fully informed of all circumstances impinging on his decisions. The fact that perfect knowledge never exists, means that all economic activity implies risk.
Seeing the entrepreneurs' role as collecting and evaluating information and acting on risks.
The economic calculation debate between Austrian and Marxist economists, with the Austrians claiming that Marxism is flawed because prices could not be set to recognize opportunity costs of factors of production, and so socialism could not make rational decisions. Contributions
One criticism of the Austrian school is its rejection of the scientific method and empirical testing in favor of supposedly self-evident axioms and logical reasoning.

Economists affiliated with the Austrian School

Richard Cantillon
Frédéric Bastiat (precursor)
Henry Hazlitt (introduced the Austrian School to the USA)
School of Salamanca (Renaissance precursors)
Étienne Bonnot de Condillac
Louis Say
Jean-Baptiste Say
Léon Walras
Jules Dupuit
Lionel Robbins
Wilhelm Röpke
Joseph Schumpeter
A.R.J. Turgot
Knut Wicksell Other related economists

Bryan Caplan
David D. Friedman
Tyler Cowen Seminal works

2008-04-29T09:46:00.001-07:00

Claude Morin, born on May 16, 1929 (born in Montmorency, Quebec), is a politician from Quebec, Canada and was the Parti Québécois Member of the National Assembly for the electoral district of Louis-Hébert, from 1976 until his resignation in 1981.
A bachelor from the Universite Laval, Morin went to Columbia University in New York City where he had a Master's degree in Social Welfare.
He also served as Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs in the cabinet of Premier René Lévesque, from 1976 to 1982.

2008-04-27T08:44:00.000-07:00

Description
The relational database model uses a structure of attributes within tuples within relations to represent data (relations are erroneously referred to as tables in SQL-DBMSs). Tables can be linked by common key values. Edgar F. Codd first designed this model in 1970, while working for IBM, and its simplicity revolutionized database usage at the time. Codd's work was in many ways ahead of its time, as computing power could not support the overheads of his database system (Hasan 1999).
In the 1980s the power of computers had grown to the point where these overheads were no longer a problem, and today relational database management systems (RDBMS) are available on local desktops, as well as large organisational database management servers.

Why use dimensional databases?
Apart from the inherent advantages of using a multi-dimensional array structure, multi-dimensional databases also contain the following advantages.
Intuitive spreadsheet-like views of the data are the output of multi-dimensional databases. Such views are difficult to generate in relational systems without the use of complex SQL queries, while others cannot be performed by standard SQL at all, eg. top ten exam results.
Multi-dimensional databases are very easy to maintain, because data is stored in the same way as it is viewed, that is according to its fundamental attributes, so no additional computational overhead is required for queries of the database. Compare this to relational system, where complex indexing and joins may be used that require significant maintenance and overhead.
Multi-dimensional database achieve performance levels that are well in excess of that of relational systems performing similar data storage requirements. These high performance levels encourage and enable OLAP applications. Performance can be improved in relational systems through database tuning, but the database cannot be tuned for every possible on-the-fly query. In relational systems, tuning is quite specific, therefore decreasing flexibility, and also requires expensive database specialists.
In summary, multi-dimensional database systems are a complementary technology to entity relational systems, and in some circumstances it makes more sense to use multi-dimensional arrays rather than relational tables.
Where multi-dimensional systems excel over their relational system counterparts is in the area of data presentation and analysis, where the data in question leads itself to being suitable for multi-dimensional systems, such as where complex inter-relationships exist.
The top-level views of data over many combinations of dimensions make multi-dimensional systems particularly useful for trend analysis over time by management staff of organizations, due to te ease of viewing the data in a more naturally intuitive way.

2008-04-26T10:25:00.001-07:00

Geography
As of the census of 2000, there were 3,645 people, 1,274 households, and 983 families residing in the CDP. The population density was 140.0/km² (362.7/mi²). There were 1,311 housing units at an average density of 50.4/km² (130.5/mi²). The racial makeup of the CDP was 90.67% White, 0.47% African American, 1.78% Native American, 1.15% Asian, 0.11% Pacific Islander, 2.22% from other races, and 3.59% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 10.70% of the population.
There were 1,274 households out of which 37.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 63.9% were married couples living together, 8.2% had a female householder with no husband present, and 22.8% were non-families. 16.9% of all households were made up of individuals and 4.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.86 and the average family size was 3.22.
In the CDP the population was spread out with 27.4% under the age of 18, 7.1% from 18 to 24, 29.8% from 25 to 44, 27.6% from 45 to 64, and 8.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females there were 104.1 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 100.2 males.
The median income for a household in the CDP was $56,975, and the median income for a family was $60,913. Males had a median income of $41,058 versus $31,371 for females. The per capita income for the CDP was $23,914. About 5.1% of families and 4.8% of the population were below the poverty line, including 4.6% of those under age 18 and 3.6% of those age 65 or over.

History
Harbison Canyon, after its unfortunate encounters with wildfires, is best known among locals for the presence of a nudist resort, "Sun Island resort". Harbison Canyon is home to Old Ironsides Park, maintained by the County of San Diego Parks and Recreation. Kumeyaay Indian relics can be found near the stream that runs through the park and Canyon. The park also has a community center building where community and civic groups meet.

2008-04-25T10:05:00.001-07:00

Charles Prestwich Scott (26 October 1846 – 1 January 1932) was a British journalist, publisher and politician.
Born in Bath, Somerset, England, he was the editor of the Manchester Guardian from 1872 until 1929 and its owner from 1907 until his death. He was also a Liberal Member of Parliament and pursued a progressive liberal agenda in the pages of the newspaper.
Scott was connected to the Manchester Guardian from birth. The paper's founder, John Edward Taylor, was his uncle, and at the time of his birth his father Russell Scott was the paper's owner, though he later sold it back to Taylor's sons under the terms of Taylor's will. C. P. Scott went up to Corpus Christi College, Oxford and was still an undergraduate there when Edward Taylor offered him the editorship of the Guardian in 1867. He took a first in Greats in the autumn of 1869, then in 1870 went to Edinburgh to train on The Scotsman. He joined the Guardian in February 1871 and became its editor on January 1, 1872.
As editor Scott initially maintained the Guardian's well-established moderate Liberal line, "to the right of the party, to the right, indeed, of much of its own special reporting" (Ayerst, 1971). However, when in 1886 the whigs led by Lord Hartington and a few radicals led by Joseph Chamberlain, split the party, formed the Liberal Unionist Party and gave their backing to the Conservatives, Scott's Guardian swung to the left and helped Gladstone lead the party towards support for Irish Home Rule and ultimately the "new liberalism".
In 1886, Scott fought his first general election as a Liberal candidate, an unsuccessful attempt in the Manchester North East constituency; he stood again for the same seat in 1891 and 1892. He was elected at the 1895 election as MP for Leigh, and thereafter spent long periods away in London during the parliamentary session. His combined position as a Liberal backbencher, the editor of an important Liberal newspaper, and the president of the Manchester Liberal Federation made him an influential figure in Liberal circles, albeit in the middle of a long period of opposition. He was re-elected at the 1900 election despite the unpopular stand against the Boer War that the Guardian had taken, but retired from Parliament at the time of the Liberal landslide victory in 1906, at which time he was occupied with the difficult process of becoming owner of the newspaper he edited.
In 1905, the Guardian's owner, Edward Taylor, died. His will provided that the trustees of his estate should give Scott first refusal on the copyright of the Guardian at £10,000, and recommended that they should offer him the offices and printing works of the paper on "moderate and reasonable terms". However, they were not required to sell it at all, and could continue to run the paper themselves "on the same lines and in the same spirit as heretofore". Furthermore, one of the trustees was a nephew of Taylor and would financially benefit from forcing up the price at which Scott could buy the paper, and another was the Guardian's manager, but faced losing his job if Scott took control. Scott was therefore forced to dig deep to buy the paper: he paid a total of £240,000, taking large loans from his sisters and from Taylor's widow (who had been his chief supporter among the trustees) to do so. Taylor's other paper, the Manchester Evening News, was inherited by his nephews in the Allen family. Scott made an agreement to buy the MEN in 1922 and gained full control of it in 1929.
In a famous 1921 essay marking the Manchester Guardian's centenary (at which time he had served nearly fifty years as editor), Scott put down his opinions on the role of the newspaper. He argued that the "primary office" of a newspaper is accurate news reporting: in his now-clichéd words, "comment is free, but facts are sacred". Even editorial comment has its responsibilities: "It is well to be frank; it is even better to be fair". A newspaper should have a "soul of its own", with staff motivated by a "common ideal": although the business side of a newspaper must be competent, if it becomes dominant the paper will face "distressing consequences".
C. P. Scott remained editor of the Manchester Guardian until July 1, 1929, at which time he was eighty-three years old and had been editor for exactly fifty seven and a half years. His successor as editor was his youngest son, Ted Scott, though C. P. remained as Governing Director of the company and was at the Guardian offices most evenings. He died in the small hours of New Year's Day 1932. In 1874, he had married Rachel Cook, who had been one of the first undergraduates of the College for Women, Hitchin (later Girton College, Cambridge). She died in the midst of the dispute over Taylor's will. Their daughter Madeline married long-time Guardian contributor C. E. Montague; eldest son Lawrence died in 1908, aged thirty-one, after contracting tuberculosis; middle son John became the Guardian's manager and founder of the Scott Trust; and youngest son Ted, who succeeded his father as editor, drowned in a sailing accident after less than three years in the post. John and Ted Scott jointly inherited the ownership of the Manchester Guardian & Evening News Ltd.; after Ted's death John passed it on to the Scott Trust.

External link

Comment is free, but facts are sacred: Scott's famous essay

2008-04-24T09:28:00.000-07:00

For guidelines on making and editing abbreviation articles on Wikipedia, see Wikipedia:Disambiguation and abbreviations.
An abbreviation (from Latin brevis "short") is a shortened form of a word or phrase. Usually, but not always, it consists of a letter or group of letters taken from the word or phrase. For example, the word "abbreviation" can itself be represented by the abbreviation "abbr." or "abbrev."

Types of abbreviations
Related article: Clipping (lexicography)
A syllabic abbreviation (SA) is an abbreviation formed from (usually) initial syllables of several words, such as Interpol for International police, but should be distinguished from portmanteaux. They are usually written in lower case, sometimes starting with a capital letter, and are always pronounced as words rather than letter by letter.

Syllabic abbreviation
Syllabic abbreviations are not widely used in English or French, but are common in certain languages, like German and Russian.
They prevailed in Germany under the Nazis and in the Soviet Union for naming the plethora of new bureaucratic organizations. For example, Gestapo stands for Geheime Staats-Polizei, or "secret state police". This has given syllabic abbreviations a negative connotation, even though they were used in Germany before the Nazis, such as Schupo for Schutzpolizist. Even now Germans call part of their police Kripo for Kriminalpolizei. Syllabic abbreviations were also typical of German language used in the German Democratic Republic, for example, Stasi for Staatssicherheit ("state security", the secret police and secret service) or Vopo for Volkspolizist ("people's policeman").
Some syllabic abbreviations from Russian that are familiar to English speakers include samizdat and kolkhoz. The English names for the Soviet "Comintern" (Communist International) and "Milrevcom" (Military Revolution Committee) are further examples.
Orwell's novel 1984 uses fictional syllabic abbreviations like "Ingsoc" (English Socialism) to evoke the use of language under the Nazi and Soviet regimes.
East Asian languages whose writing uses Chinese-originated ideograms instead of an alphabet form abbreviations similarly by using key characters from a term or phrase. For example, in Japanese the term for the United Nations, kokusai rengō (国際連合) is often abbreviated to kokuren (国連). Such abbreviations are called ryakugo (略語) in Japanese. SAs are frequently used for names of universities: for instance, Beida (北大, Běidà) for Peking University (Beijing), Yondae (연대) for the Yonsei University, Seouldae (서울대) for the Seoul National University and Tōdai (東大) for the University of Tokyo.

Use in various languages
Syllabic abbreviations are preferred by the US Navy as it increases readability amidst the large number of initialisms that would otherwise have to fit into the same acronyms. Hence DESRON 6 is used (in the full capital form) to mean "Destroyer Squadron 6," and DEFCON means "Defense Condition".

Syllabic abbreviations in names of organizations
In modern English there are several conventions for abbreviations and the choice may be confusing. The only rule universally accepted is that one should be consistent, and to make this easier, publishers express their preferences in a style guide. Questions which arise include those in the following subsections.

Lower case letters
A period (full stop) is sometimes written after an abbreviated word, but there is much disagreement and many exceptions.
There is never a stop/period between letters of the same word. For example, Tiberius is abbreviated as Tb. and not as T.b..
In formal British English it is more common to write abbreviations with full stops if the word has been cut at the point of abbreviation but not otherwise: for example, Street — "St[reet]" — becomes "St.", but "Saint" — "S[ain]t" — becomes "St".
In American English, the period is usually added if the abbreviation may be interpreted as a word, but some American writers do not use a period here. Sometimes, periods are used for certain acronyms but not others; a notable instance in American English is to write United States, European Union, and United Nations as U.S., EU, and UN respectively.
A third standard removes the full stops from all abbreviations (both "Saint" and "Street" become "St") .
Acronyms that were originally capitalized (with or without periods) but have since entered the vocabulary as generic words are no longer abbreviated with capital letters nor with any periods. Examples are sonar, radar, lidar, laser, and scuba.
Spaces are generally not used between single letter abbreviations of words in the same phrase, so one almost never encounters "U. S.".

Periods (full stops) and spaces
To form the plural of an abbreviation, a number, or a capital letter used as a noun, simply add a lowercase s to the end.
To form the plural of an abbreviation with periods, a lowercase letter used as a noun, and abbreviations or capital letters that would be ambiguous or confusing if the 's' alone were added, use an apostrophe and an s.
While some authors use the apostrophe in all plural abbreviated forms, it is generally best avoided except as above to prevent ambiguity with the possessive form.[1] [2] [3]

A group of MPs
The roaring '20s
Mind your Ps and Qs
A group of Ph.D.'s
The x's of the equation
Sending SOS's Plural Forms

Conventions followed by publications and newspapers
Publications based in the U.S. tend to follow the style guides of the Chicago Manual of Style and the Associated Press. The U.S. Government follows a style guide published by the U.S. Government Printing Office.
However, there is some inconsistency in abbreviation styles, as they are not rigorously defined by style guides. Some two-word abbreviations, like "United Nations", are abbreviated with uppercase letters and periods, and others, like "personal computer" (PC) and "compact disc" (CD), are not; rather, they are typically abbreviated without periods and in uppercase letters. A third variation is to use lowercase letters with periods; this is used by Time Magazine in abbreviating "public relations" (p.r.). Moreover, even three-word abbreviations (most U.S. publications use uppercase abbreviations without periods) are sometimes not consistently abbreviated, even within the same article.
The New York Times is unique in having a consistent style by always abbreviating with periods: P.C., I.B.M., P.R. This is in contrast with the trend of British publications to completely make do without periods for convenience.

In the United States
Many British publications follow some of these guidelines in abbreviation:

For the sake of convenience, many British publications, including the BBC and The Guardian, have completely done away with the use of full stops or periods in all abbreviations. These include:

Social titles, like Ms or Mr (though these would usually not have had full stops — see above) Capt, Prof, etc.;
Two-letter abbreviations for countries ("US", not "U.S.");
Abbreviations beyond three letters (full caps for all except initialisms);
Words seldom abbreviated with lower case letters ("PR", instead of "p.r.", or "pr")
Names ("FW de Klerk", "GB Whiteley", "Park JS"). A notable exception is the newspaper The Economist which writes "Mr F. W. de Klerk".
Scientific units.
Acronyms are often referred to with only the first letter of the abbreviation capitalised. For instance, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation can be abbreviated as "Nato" or "NATO", and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome as "Sars" or "SARS" (compare with "laser" which has made the full transition to an English word and is rarely capitalised at all).
Initialisms are always written in capitals; for example the "British Broadcasting Corporation" is abbreviated to "BBC", never "Bbc". An initialism is similar to acronym but is not pronounced as a word.
When abbreviating scientific units, no space is added between the number and unit (100mph, 100m, 10cm, 10ºC). (This is contrary to the SI standard, see below.) In Britain

Plurals are often formed by doubling the last letter of the abbreviation. Most of these deal with writing and publishing: MS=manuscript, MSS=manuscripts; l=line, ll=lines; p=page, pp=pages; s=section, ss=sections; op.=opus, opp.=opera. This form, derived from Latin is used in Europe in many places: dd=didots. "The following (lines or pages)" is denoted by "ff". One example that does not concern printing is hh=hands.
A doubled letter also appears in abbreviations of some Welsh names, as in Welsh the double "l" is a separate sound: "Ll. George" for (British prime minister) Lloyd George.
Some titles, such as "Reverend" and "Honourable", are spelt out when preceded by "the", rather than as "Rev." or "Hon." respectively. This is true for most British publications, and some in the United States.
It is usually advised to spell out the abbreviation where it is new or unfamiliar to the reader (UNESCO in a magazine about music, because it refers to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, whose work does not concern the music). Miscellaneous and general rules
The International System of Units (SI) defines a set of base units, from which other "derived" units may be obtained. The abbreviations, or more accurately "symbols" (using Roman letters, or Greek in the case of ohm) for these units are also clearly defined together with a set of prefixes, themselves symbolised (abbreviated) with Roman letters (except only for micro, which uses the Greek letter µ), denoting powers of ten. The system is internationally recognised. Periods are not used, except as described below. Unit symbols do not have plural forms.
Units are written either in full, including the base units and their prefixes, or with all symbols. When a unit is written in full, it is written in all lower case. For example, megaampere for MA.
There should never be a period after or inside a unit; both '10 k.m.' and '10 k.m' are wrong — the only correct form is '10 km' (only followed with a period when at the end of a sentence).
A period "within" a compound unit denotes multiplication of the base units on each side of it. Ideally, this period should be raised to the centre of the line, but often it is not. For instance, '5 ms' means 5 millisecond(s), whereas '5 m.s' means 5 metre·second(s). The "m.s" here is a compound unit formed from the product of two fundamental SI units — metre and second.
There should always be a (non-breaking) space between the number and the unit — '25 km' is correct, and '25km' is incorrect.
The case of letters (uppercase or lowercase) has meaning in the SI system, and should never be changed in a misguided attempt to follow an abbreviation style. For example, "10 S" denotes 10 siemens (a unit of conductance), while "10 s" denotes 10 seconds. Any unit named after a person is denoted by a symbol with an upper case first letter (S, Pa, A, V, N, Wb, W), but spelt out in full in lower case, (siemens, pascal, ampere, volt, newton, weber and watt). By contrast g, l, m, s, cd, ha represent gramme, litre, metre, second, candela and hectare respectively. The one slight exception to this rule is that the symbol for litre is allowed to be L to help avoid confusion with an upper case i or a one in some typefaces — compare l, I, and 1.
Likewise, the abbreviations of the prefixes denoting powers of ten are case-sensitive: m (milli) represents a thousandth, but M (mega) represents a million, so by inadvertent changes of case one may introduce (in this example) an error of a factor of 1 000 000 000. When a unit is written in full, the whole unit is written in lowercase, including the prefix: millivolt for mV, nanometre for nm, gigacandela for Gcd.
The above rules, if followed, ensure that the SI system is always unambiguous, so for instance mK denotes millikelvin, MK denotes megakelvin, K.m denotes kelvin.metre, and km denotes kilometre. Forms such as k.m and kms are ill-formed and technically meaningless in the SI system, although the meaning might be inferred from the context.

History

List of classical abbreviations
List of medieval abbreviations
List of abbreviations in use in 1911
List of acronyms and initialisms
The abbreviations used in the 1913 edition of Webster's dictionary

2008-04-23T10:37:00.001-07:00

Chester-le-Street is a local government district in County Durham in north-east England. Its council is based in Chester-le-Street. Other places in the district include Great Lumley and Sacriston.
The district was formed on 1 April 1974 under the Local Government Act 1972, and was a merger of the urban district of Chester-le-Street along with part of Chester-le-Street Rural District. Other parts of the rural district, despite being geographically part of Chester-le-Street were bizarrely transferred to Gateshead and Sunderland.

Electoral divisions

Chester-le-Street North and East Chester East ward; Chester North ward
Chester-le-Street South Chester South ward; Edmondsley and Waldridge ward
Chester-le-Street West Central Chester Central ward; Chester West ward; Pelton Fell ward
Lumley Bournmoor ward; Lumley ward == Website: http://www.greatlumley.com/ ==
Ouston and Urpeth Grange Villa and West Pelton ward; Ouston ward; Urpeth ward
Pelton North Lodge ward; Pelton ward
Sacriston Kimblesworth and Plawsworth ward; Sacriston ward

2008-04-22T09:58:00.001-07:00

In computer science and information theory, Huffman coding is an entropy encoding algorithm used for lossless data compression. The term refers to the use of a variable-length code table for encoding a source symbol (such as a character in a file) where the variable-length code table has been derived in a particular way based on the estimated probability of occurrence for each possible value of the source symbol. It was developed by David A. Huffman while he was a Ph.D. student at MIT, and published in the 1952 paper "A Method for the Construction of Minimum-Redundancy Codes." Huffman became a member of the MIT faculty upon graduation and was later the founding member of the Computer Science Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz, now a part of the Baskin School of Engineering.
Huffman coding uses a specific method for choosing the representation for each symbol, resulting in a prefix-free code (sometimes called "prefix codes") (that is, the bit string representing some particular symbol is never a prefix of the bit string representing any other symbol) that expresses the most common characters using shorter strings of bits than are used for less common source symbols. Huffman was able to design the most efficient compression method of this type: no other mapping of individual source symbols to unique strings of bits will produce a smaller average output size when the actual symbol frequencies agree with those used to create the code. A method was later found to do this in linear time if input probabilities (also known as weights) are sorted.
For a set of symbols with a uniform probability distribution and a number of members which is a power of two, Huffman coding is equivalent to simple binary block encoding, e.g., ASCII coding. Huffman coding is such a widespread method for creating prefix-free codes that the term "Huffman code" is widely used as a synonym for "prefix-free code" even when such a code is not produced by Huffman's algorithm.
Although Huffman coding is optimal for a symbol-by-symbol coding with a known input probability distribution, its optimality can sometimes accidentally be over-stated. For example, arithmetic coding and LZW coding often have better compression capability. Both these methods can combine an arbitrary number of symbols for more efficient coding, and generally adapt to the actual input statistics, the latter of which is useful when input probabilities are not precisely known.

History

Problem definition
Given. A set of symbols and their weights (usually probabilities). Find. A prefix-free binary code (a set of codewords) with minimum expected codeword length (equivalently, a tree with minimum weighted path length).
Formalized description
For any code that is biunique, meaning that the code is uniquely decodeable, the sum of the probability budgets across all symbols is always less than or equal to one. In this example, the sum is strictly equal to one; as a result, the code is termed a complete code. If this is not the case, you can always derive an equivalent code by adding extra symbols (with associated null probabilities), to make the code complete while keeping it biunique.
As defined by Shannon (1948), the information content h (in bits) of each symbol a_i with non-null probability is

The information content of symbols with null probability is not defined, but in practice can be defined as any finite value because this information will be absent from the encoded message (unless the message A has an infinite symbol length, but in this case these symbols have an infinitesimal positive probability 0).
The entropy H (in bits) is the weighted sum, across all symbols a_i with non-zero probability w_i, of the information content of each symbol:

All symbols with zero probability have in theory a positive infinite entropy, but as they are necessarily absent from the original message to be encoded, they don't contribute to the entropy of the encoded message (unless the message is infinite) ; so they could be made equivalent to a zero entropy within the sum above, removing the restriction on the suitable indices.
As a consequence of Shannon's Source coding theorem, the entropy is a measure of the smallest codeword length that is theoretically possible for the given alphabet with associated weights. In this example, the weighted average codeword length is 2.25 bits per symbol, only slightly larger than the calculated entropy of 2.205 bits per symbol. So not only is this code optimal in the sense that no other feasible code performs better, but it is very close to the theoretical limit established by Shannon.
Note that, in general, a Huffman code need not be unique, but it is always one of the codes minimizing

L (C)

.

Samples
The technique works by creating a binary tree of nodes. These can be stored in a regular array, the size of which depends on the number of symbols(N). A node can be either a leaf node or an internal node. Initially, all nodes are leaf nodes, which contain the symbol itself, the weight (frequency of appearance) of the symbol and optionally, a link to a parent node which makes it easy to read the code (in reverse) starting from a leaf node. Internal nodes contain symbol weight, links to two child nodes and the optional link to a parent node. As a common convention, bit '0' represents following the left child and bit '1' represents following the right child. A finished tree has N leaf nodes and N−1 internal nodes.
A linear-time* method to create a Huffman tree is to use two queues, the first one containing the initial weights (along with pointers to the associated leaves), and combined weights (along with pointers to the trees) being put in the back of the second queue. This assures that the lowest weight is always kept at the front of one of the two queues.
Creating the tree:
It is generally beneficial to minimize the variance of codeword length. For example, a communication buffer receiving Huffman-encoded data may need to be larger to deal with especially long symbols if the tree is especially unbalanced. To minimize variance, simply break ties between queues by choosing the item in the first queue. This modification will retain the mathematical optimality of the Huffman coding while both minimizing variance and minimizing the length of the longest character code.
* This method is linear time assuming that you already have the leaf nodes sorted by initial weight. If not, sorting them will take

O (n log n)

time.

Start with as many leaves as there are symbols.
Enqueue all leaf nodes into the first queue (by probability in increasing order so that the least likely item is in the head of the queue).
While there is more than one node in the queues:

Dequeue the two nodes with the lowest weight.
Create a new internal node, with the two just-removed nodes as children (either node can be either child) and the sum of their weights as the new weight.
Enqueue the new node into the rear of the second queue.
The remaining node is the root node; the tree has now been generated. Basic technique
The frequencies used can be generic ones for the application domain that are based on average experience, or they can be the actual frequencies found in the text being compressed. (This variation requires that a frequency table or other hint as to the encoding must be stored with the compressed text; implementations employ various tricks to store tables efficiently.)
Huffman coding is optimal when the probability of each input symbol is a negative power of two. Prefix-free codes tend to have slight inefficiency on small alphabets, where probabilities often fall between these optimal points. "Blocking", or expanding the alphabet size by coalescing multiple symbols into "words" of fixed or variable-length before Huffman coding, usually helps, especially when adjacent symbols are correlated (as in the case of natural language text). The worst case for Huffman coding can happen when the probability of a symbol exceeds 2 = 0.5, making the upper limit of inefficiency unbounded. These situations often respond well to a form of blocking called run-length encoding.
Arithmetic coding produces slight gains over Huffman coding, but in practice these gains have seldom been large enough to offset arithmetic coding's higher computational complexity and patent royalties. (As of July 2006, IBM owns patents on many methods of arithmetic coding in several jurisdictions; see US patents on arithmetic coding.)

Main properties
Many variations of Huffman coding exist, some of which use a Huffman-like algorithm, and others of which find optimal prefix codes (while, for example, putting different restrictions on the output). Note that, in the latter case, the method need not be Huffman-like, and, indeed, need not even be polynomial time. An exhaustive list of papers on Huffman coding on its variations is given by "Code and Parse Trees for Lossless Source Encoding"[1].

Variations
The n-ary Huffman algorithm uses the {0, 1, ..., n − 1} alphabet to encode message and build an n-ary tree. This approach was considered by Huffman in his original paper.

n-ary Huffman coding
A variation called adaptive Huffman coding calculates the frequencies dynamically based on recent actual frequencies in the source string. This is somewhat related to the LZ family of algorithms.

Adaptive Huffman coding
Most often, the weights used in implementations of Huffman coding represent numeric probabilities, but the algorithm given above does not require this; it requires only a way to order weights and to add them. The Huffman template algorithm enables one to use any kind of weights (costs, frequencies, pairs of weights, non-numerical weights) and one of many combining methods (not just addition). Such algorithms can solve other minimization problems, such as minimizing " src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/math/9/3/f/93f6a8cf382b97ccad472e4b2816479e.png" /] , a problem first applied to circuit design[2].

Huffman template algorithm
Length-limited Huffman coding is a variant where the goal is still to achieve a minimum weighted path length, but there is an additional restriction that the length of each codeword must be less than a given constant. The package-merge algorithm solves this problem with a simple greedy approach very similar to that used by Huffman's algorithm. Its time complexity is $O (n L)$ , where $L$ is the maximum length of a codeword. No algorithm is known to solve this problem with the same efficiency as conventional Huffman coding,

Length-limited Huffman coding
In the standard Huffman coding problem, it is assumed that each symbol in the set that the code words are constructed from has an equal cost to transmit: a code word whose length is N digits will always have a cost of N, no matter how many of those digits are 0s, how many are 1s, etc. When working under this assumption, minimizing the total cost of the message and minimizing the total number of digits are the same thing.
Huffman coding with unequal letter costs is the generalization in which this assumption is no longer assumed true: the letters of the encoding alphabet may have non-uniform lengths, due to characteristics of the transmission medium. An example is the encoding alphabet of Morse code, where a 'dash' takes longer to send than a 'dot', and therefore the cost of a dash in transmission time is higher. The goal is still to minimize the weighted average codeword length, but it is no longer sufficient just to minimize the number of symbols used by the message. No algorithm is known to solve this in the same manner or with the same efficiency as conventional Huffman coding.

Huffman coding with unequal letter costs
In the standard Huffman coding problem, it is assumed that any codeword can correspond to any input symbol. In the alphabetic version, the alphabetic order of inputs and outputs must be identical. Thus, for example, could not be assigned code , but instead should be assigned either or . This is also known as the Hu-Tucker problem, after the authors of the paper presenting the first linearithmic solution to this optimal binary alphabetic problem, which has some similarities to Huffman algorithm, but is not a variation of this algorithm. These optimal alphabetic binary trees are often used as binary search trees. If weights corresponding to the alphabetically ordered inputs are in numerical order, the Huffman code has the same lengths as the optimal alphabetic code, which can be found from calculating these lengths. The resulting alphabetic code is sometimes called the canonical Huffman code and is often the code used in practice, due to ease of encoding/decoding. The technique for finding this code is sometimes called Huffman-Shannon-Fano coding, since it is optimal like Huffman coding, but alphabetic in weight probability, like Shannon-Fano coding. The Huffman-Shannon-Fano code corresponding to the example is ${000,001,01,10,11}$ , which, having the same codeword lengths as the original solution, is also optimal.

Applications

Modified Huffman coding - used in fax machines
Shannon-Fano coding
Data compression

2008-04-21T10:03:00.000-07:00

Use of historical methods
The Five Gospels lists seven bases for the modern critical scholarship of Jesus. These "pillars" have developed since the end of the 18th century.
While some of these pillars are noncontroversial, some scholars of the historical Jesus follow Albert Schweitzer. First, since the 1960s, the gospel references to the coming Son of Man have been sometimes viewed as insertions by the early Christian community. Second, many scholars came to see Jesus' kingdom of God as a present reality, a "realized eschatology", rather than an imminent end of the world. The apocalyptic elements attributed to Jesus, according to The Five Gospels, come from John the Baptist and the early Christian community (p. 4).

Distinguishing between historical Jesus and the Christ of faith (see Hermann Samuel Reimarus, David Strauss).
Recognizing the synoptic gospels as more historically accurate than John (19th century German tradition, see higher criticism).
The priority of Mark before Matthew and Luke (by 1900)
Identification of the Q document (by 1900)
Rejection of eschatological (apocalyptic) Jesus (1970s and 1980s).
Distinction between oral and written culture
Reversal of burden of proof from those who consider gospel content to be ahistorical to those who consider it historical. "Seven pillars of scholarly wisdom"
The Seminar began by translating the gospels into modern American English, producing the "Scholars Version," (to be found in The Five Gospels). This translation uses current colloquialisms and contemporary phrasing in an effort to provide a contemporary sense of the gospel authors' styles, if not their literal words. The goal was to let the reader hear the message as a first-century listener might have. The translators avoided other translations' archaic, literal translation of the text, or a superficial update of it. For example, they translate "woe to you" as "damn you" because it sounds like something someone today would really say. The authors of The Five Gospels allege that some other gospel translations have attempted to unify the language of the gospels, while they themselves have tried to preserve each author's distinct voice.

The Scholars translation
The Jesus Seminar, like the translation committees who created the King James Version and the Revised Standard Version of the Bible and the Novum Testamentum Graece, chose voting as the most efficient means of determining consensus in an assembled group. The system also lent itself to publicity, which the Seminar actively pursued.
The Fellows used a "bead system" to vote on the authenticity of about 500 statements and events. The color of the bead represented how sure the Fellow was that a saying or act was or was not authentic.
The consensus position was determined by the average weighted score, rather than by simple majority. This meant that all opinions were reflected in the decisions. The voting system means that the reader can second-guess each vote. The Five Gospels defines not only the result of the vote (red, pink, gray, or black) but also how many polls were necessary to reach a conclusion (if any were necessary at all) and why various fellows chose to vote in different ways.
Attendees, however, did more than vote. They met semi-annually to debate the papers presented. Some verses required extensive debate and repeated votes.

Red beads – indicated the voter believed Jesus did say the passage quoted, or something very much like the passage. (3 Points)
Pink beads – indicated the voter believed Jesus probably said something like the passage. (2 Points)
Grey beads – indicated the voter believed Jesus did not say the passage, but it contains Jesus' ideas. (1 Point)
Black beads – indicated the voter believed Jesus did not say the passage—it comes from later admirers or a different tradition. (0 Points) Seminar proceedings
The first findings of the Jesus Seminar were published in 1993 as The Five Gospels: The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus.

Sayings of Jesus
Like other scholars of the historical Jesus, the Jesus Seminar treats the gospels as fallible historical artifacts, containing both authentic and inauthentic material. Like their colleagues, the fellows used several criteria for determining whether a particular saying or story is authentic, including the criteria of multiple attestation and embarrassment. Among additional criteria used by the fellows are the following:

Orality: According to current estimates, the gospels weren't written until decades after Jesus' death. Parables, aphorisms, and stories were passed down orally (30 - 50 CE). The fellows judged whether a saying was a short, catchy pericope that could possibly survive intact from the speaker's death until decades later when it was first written down. If so, it's more likely to be authentic. For example, "turn the other cheek."
Irony: Based on several important narrative parables (such as the Parable of the Good Samaritan), the fellows decided that irony, reversal, and frustration of expectations were characteristic of Jesus' style. Does a pericope present opposites or impossibilities? If it does, it's more likely to be authentic. For example, "love your enemies."
Trust in God: A long discourse attested in three gospels has Jesus telling his listeners not to fret but to trust in the Father. Fellows looked for this theme in other sayings they deemed authentic. For example, "Ask -- it'll be given to you." Criteria for authenticity
The seminar looked for several characteristics that, in their judgment, identified a saying as inauthentic, including self-reference, leadership issues, and apocalyptic themes.

Self-reference: Does the text have Jesus referring to himself? For example, "I am the way, and I am the truth, and I am life" (John 14:1-14).
Framing Material: Are the verses used to introduce, explain, or frame other material, which might itself be authentic? For example, in Luke, the "red" parable of the good samaritan is framed by scenes about Jesus telling the parable, and the seminar deemed Jesus' framing words in these scenes to be "black."
Community Issues: Do the verses refer to the concerns of the early Christian community, such as instructions for missionaries or issues of leadership? For example, Peter as "the rock" on which Jesus builds his church (Matthew 16:17-19).
Theological Agenda: Do the verses support an opinion or outlook that is unique to the gospel, possibly indicating redactor bias? For example, the prophecy of the sheep and the goats (Matthew 25:31-46) was voted black because the fellows saw it as representing Matthew's agenda of speaking out against unworthy members of the Christian community. Criteria for inauthenticity
The Red sayings (with % indicating the weighted average of those in agreement), given in the Seminar's own "Scholar's Version" translation, are:
1. Turn the other cheek (92%): Mt 5:39, Lk6:29a
2. Coat & shirt: Mt5:40 (92%), Lk6:29b (90%)
3. Congratulations, poor!: Lk6:20b (91%), Th54 (90%), Mt5:3 (63%)
4. Second mile (90%): Mt5:41
5. Love your enemies: Lk6:27b (84%), Mt5:44b (77%), Lk6:32,35a (56%) (compare to black rated "Pray for your enemies": POxy1224 6:1a; Didache 1:3; Poly-Phil 12:3; and "Love one another": John 13:34-35, Romans 13:8, 1 Peter 1:22)
6. Leaven: Lk13:20–21 (83%), Mt13:33 (83%), Th96:1–2 (65%)
7. Emperor & God (82%): Th100:2b–3, Mk12:17b, Lk20:25b, Mt22:21c (also Egerton Gospel 3:1-6)
8. Give to beggars (81%): Lk6:30a, Mt5:42a, Didache1:5a
9. Good Samaritan (81%): Lk10:30–35
10. Congrats, hungry!: Lk6:21a (79%), Mt5:6 (59%), Th69:2 (53%)
11. Congrats, sad!: Lk6:21b (79%), Mt5:4 (73%)
12. Shrewd manager (77%): Lk16:1–8a
13. Vineyard laborers (77%): Mt20:1–15
14. Abba, Father (77%): Mt6:9b, Lk11:2c
15. The Mustard Seed : Th20:2–4 (76%), Mk4:30–32 (74%), Lk13:18–19 (69%), Mt13:31–32 (67%)

Authentic sayings, as determined by the seminar
The top 15 (of 75) Pink sayings are:
16. On anxieties, don't fret (75%): Th36, Lk12:22–23, Mt6:25
17. Lost Coin (75%): Lk15:8–9
18. Foxes have dens: Lk9:58 (74%), Mt8:20 (74%), Th86 (67%)
19. No respect at home: Th31:1 (74%), Lk4:24(71%), Jn4:44 (67%), Mt13:57 (60%), Mk6:4 (58%)
20. Friend at midnight (72%): Lk11:5–8
21. Two masters : Lk16:13a, Mt6:24a (72%); Th47:2 (65%)
22. Treasure: Mt13:44 (71%), Th109 (54%)
23. Lost sheep: Lk15:4–6 (70%), Mt18:12–13 (67%), Th107 (48%)
24. What goes in: Mk7:14–15 (70%), Th14:5 (67%), Mt15:10-11 (63%)
25. Corrupt judge (70%): Lk18:2–5
26. Prodigal son (70%): Lk15:11–32
27. Leave the dead (see also But to bring a sword, Nazirite): Mt8:22 (70%), Lk9:59–60 (69%)
28. Castration for Heaven (see also Origen, Antithesis of the Law) (70%): Mt19:12a
29. By their fruit (69%) (see Antinomianism): Mt7:16b, Th45:1a, Lk6:44b (56%)
30. The dinner party, The wedding celebration: Th64:1–11 (69%), Lk14:16-23 (56%), Mt22:2-13 (26%)

Some probably authentic sayings, as determined by the seminar
The Seminar concluded that of the various statements in the "five gospels" attributed to Jesus, only about 18% of them were likely uttered by Jesus himself (red or pink). The Gospel of John fared worse than the synoptic gospels, with nearly all its passages attributed to Jesus being judged inauthentic. The Gospel of Thomas includes just two unique sayings that the seminar attributes to Jesus: the empty jar (97) and the assassin (98). Every other probably-authentic or authentic saying has parallels in the synoptics.

Overall reliability of the five gospels
The gospels use the terms gehenna and hades for places of fiery punishment and death. The fellows rated Jesus' references to gehenna and hades as gray at best, often black. Some such references (such as the parable of Lazarus and Dives) have features that the fellows might regard as authentic, such as dramatic reversals of fortune. These received gray designations. The fellows regarded other references as inventions of early Christians responding to those who rejected Jesus' message or to "false" Christians within the community.

Gehenna and Hades
The Jesus Seminar rated various beatitudes as red, pink, gray, and black.
To analyze the beatitudes, they first innovated a nonliteral translation for the formula "blessed are," as in "Blessed are the poor." Modern readers are familiar enough with the beatitudes that this construction doesn't shock or surprise, as the original sayings allegedly did. As the modern equivalent, the Scholar's Version uses "Congratulations!"
Three beatitudes are "paradoxical" and doubly attested. They are rated red (authentic) as they appear in Luke 6:20-21.
Congratulations, you poor! God's domain belongs to you. Congratulations, you hungry! You will have a feast. Congratulations, you who weep now! You will laugh.
These beatitudes feature the dramatic presentation and reversal of expectations that the seminar regards as characteristic of Jesus.
The beatitude for those persecuted in Jesus' name might trace back to Jesus as a beatitude for those who suffer, the fellows decided, but in its final form the saying represents concerns of the Christian community rather than Jesus' message. Thus it received a gray rating.
Matthew's version of the three authentic beatitudes were rated pink. The author has spiritualized two of them, so that they now refer to the poor "in spirit" and to those who hunger "and thirst for justice." Matthew also includes beatitudes for the meek, the merciful, the pure of heart, and peace-makers. These beatitudes have no second attestation, lack irony, and received a black rating.

Example: the beatitudes
In 1998 the Jesus Seminar published The Acts of Jesus: The Search for the Authentic Deeds of Jesus. According to the front flap summary: "Through rigorous research and debate, they have combed the gospels for evidence of the man behind the myths. The figure they have discovered is very different from the icon of traditional Christianity."
According to the Jesus Seminar:
The 10 authentic ("red") acts of Jesus are:
The 19 "pink" acts ("a close approximation of what Jesus did") are:
Also 1 red "summary and setting" (not a saying or action): Women companions of Jesus: Luke 8:1-3.

Jesus of Nazareth was born during the reign of Herod the Great.
His mother's name was Mary, and he had a human father whose name may not have been Joseph.
Jesus was born in Nazareth, not in Bethlehem.
Jesus was an itinerant sage who shared meals with social outcasts.
Jesus practiced healing without the use of ancient medicine or magic, relieving afflictions we now consider psychosomatic.
He did not walk on water, feed the multitude with loaves and fishes, change water into wine or raise Lazarus from the dead.
Jesus was arrested in Jerusalem and crucified by the Romans.
He was executed as a public nuisance, not for claiming to be the Son of God.
The empty tomb is a fiction -- Jesus was not raised bodily from the dead.
Belief in the resurrection is based on the visionary experiences of Paul, Peter and Mary.
The Beelzebul controversy: Luke 11:15-17
A voice in the wilderness: Mark 1:1-8, Matt 3:1-12, Luke 3:1-20, Gospel of the Ebionites 1
John baptizes Jesus: Mark 1:9-11, Matt 3:13-17, Luke 3:21-22, Gospel of the Ebionites 4
Jesus proclaims the good news: Mark 1:14-15
Dining with sinners: Mark 2:15-17, Matt 9:10-13, Oxyrhynchus Gospels 1224 5:1-2
Herod beheads John: Mark 6:14-29, Matt 14:1-12, Luke 9:7-9
Crucifixion: core event considered authentic but all gospel reports are "improbable or fictive" ("black")
The Death of Jesus: core event considered authentic but all gospel reports are "improbable or fictive" ("black")
The first list of appearances: Jesus appeared to Cephas: 1Cor 15:3-5
Birth of Jesus: Jesus's parents were named Joseph and Mary: parts of Matt 1:18-25 and Luke 2:1-7
Peter's mother-in-law: Mark 1:29-31, Matt 8:14-15, Luke 4:42-44
The leper: Mark 1:40-45, Matt 8:1-4, Luke 5:12-16, Egerton Gospel 2:1-4
Paralytic and four: Mark 2:1-12, Matt 9:1-8, Luke 5:17-26
Call of Levi: Mark 2:13-14, Matt 9:9, Luke 5:27-28, Gospel of the Ebionites 2:4
Sabbath observance: Mark 2:23-28, Matt 12:1-8, Luke 6:1-5
Jesus' relatives come to get him: Mark 3:20-21
True relatives: Mark 3:31-35, Matt 12:46-50, Thomas 99:1-3
Woman with a vaginal hemorrhage: Mark 5:24-34, Matt 9:20-22, Luke 8:42-48
No respect at home: Mark 6:1-6, Matt 13:54-58
Eating with defiled hands: Mark 7:1-13, Matt 15:1-9
Demand for a sign: Luke 11:29-30
The blind man of Bethsaida: Mark 8:22-26
Blind Bartimaeus: Mark 10:46-52, Luke 18:35-43
Temple incident: Mark 11:15-19, Matt 21:12-17, Luke 19:45-48
Emperor & God: Mark 12:13-17, Matt 22:15-22, Luke 20:19-26, Thomas 100:1-4, Egerton 3:1-6
The arrest: core event not accurately recorded
Before the high priest: core event not accurately recorded
Before the Council: core event not accurately recorded
Before Pilate: core event not accurately recorded Acts of Jesus
Arguably the single most telling criticism of the Jesus Seminar is that their "Criteria for In/Authenticity" create 'an eccentric Jesus who learned nothing from his own culture and made no impact on his followers'. go so far as to depict the Jesus Seminar as a tool of Satan, meant to undermine Biblical beliefs.

the voting system is seriously flawed,
the criteria defining what constitutes red/pink/grey/black are inconsistent,
it was an error to exclude apocalyptic messages from Jesus' ministry,
the attempt to popularize Jesus research degraded the scholarly value of the effort,
the conclusions largely represent the premises of the fellows: 'Beware of finding a Jesus entirely congenial to you.' Funk et al., The Five Gospels;
only about 14 of the fellows are leading figures in New Testament scholarship, and
the fellows do not represent a fair cross-section of viewpoints. Fellows of the Jesus Seminar

Historicity of Jesus
Liberal Christianity
Two-source hypothesis

2008-04-20T09:11:00.001-07:00

Coordinates: 53°54′″N, 27°34′″E
Minsk (Belarusian: Мінск /mʲinsk/; Polish: Mińsk; Russian: Минск /miɲsk/), is the capital and largest city in Belarus, situated on the Svislach and Niamiha rivers. Minsk is also a headquarters of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). As the national capital, Minsk has a special administrative status in Belarus and is also the administrative centre of Minsk voblast (province) and Minsk raion.
The earliest references to Minsk date to the 11th century (1067). In 1242, Minsk became a part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and it received its town privileges in 1499. From 1569, it was a capital of the Minsk Voivodship in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was annexed by Russia in 1793, as a consequence of the Second Partition of Poland. From 1919–1991, Minsk was the capital of the Byelorussian SSR.

Geography & Climate

Main article: History of Minsk History
The area of today's Minsk was settled by the Early East Slavs by the 9th century. The Svislach River valley was the settlement boundary between two Early East Slavs tribes - the Krivichs and Dregovichs. By 980, the area was incorporated into the early medieval Principality of Polatsk, one of the earliest East Slav states. Minsk was first mentioned in the name form Měneskъ (Мѣнескъ) in the Primary Chronicle for the year 1067. 1067 is now widely accepted as the founding year of Minsk, though the town (by then fortified by wooden walls) had certainly existed for some time by then.
In the early 12th century, the Principality of Polatsk disintegrated into smaller fiefs. The Principality of Minsk was established by one of the Polatsk dynasty princes. In 1129, the Principality of Minsk was annexed by Kiev, the dominant principality of Kievan Rus; however in 1146 the Polatsk dynasty regained control of the principality. By 1150, Minsk rivaled Polatsk as the major city in the former Principality of Polatsk. The princes of Minsk and Polatsk were engaged in years of struggle trying to unite all lands previously under the rule of Polatsk.

Early history
Minsk escaped the Mongol invasion of Rus in 1237-1239. However, in later years it was attacked by nomadic invaders from the Golden Horde, who turned many principalities of disintegrated Kievan Rus into their vassal states. Trying to avoid the Tatar yoke, the Principality of Minsk sought protection from Lithuania from various northern princes, who had been consolidating their power in the region. In 1242, Minsk became a part of the expanding Grand Duchy of Lithuania. It was joined peacefully and local elites enjoyed high rank in the society of the Grand Duchy. In 1413, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Kingdom of Poland entered into a union. Minsk became the centre of Minsk Voivodship (province). In 1441, the Lithuanian prince Kazimierz IV Jagiellon included Minsk in a list of cities enjoying certain privileges, and in 1499, during the reign of his son, Aleksander Jagiellon, Minsk received town privileges under Magdeburg law. In 1569, after the Union of Lublin, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland merged into a single state, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Afterwards, a Polish community including government clerks, officers, and craftsmen settled in Minsk.
By the middle of the 16th century, Minsk was an important economic and cultural centre in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was also an important centre for the Eastern Orthodox Church. Following the Union of Brest, both the Uniate church and the Roman Catholic Church increased in influence.
In 1654, Minsk was conquered by troops of Tsar Alexei of Russia. Russians governed the city until 1667, when it was regained by Jan Kasimir, King of Poland. By the end of the Polish-Russian war, Minsk had only about 2,000 residents and just 300 houses. The second wave of devastation occurred during the Great Northern War, when Minsk was occupied in 1708 and 1709 by the Swedish army of Charles XII and then by the Russian army of Peter the Great. The last decades of the Polish rule involved decline or very slow development, since Minsk had become a small provincial town of little economic or military significance. By 1790, however, it had a population of 6,500-7,000 and was slowly re-expanding to the city limits of 1654. Most of the Minsk residents at the time were Jews and Poles, with a minority of Belarusians.

Lithuanian and Polish rule
Minsk was annexed by Russia in 1793 as a consequence of the Second Partition of Poland. In 1796, it became the centre of the Minsk guberniya (province). All of the Polish street names were replaced by Russian, though the spelling of the city's name remained unchanged.
Throughout the 19th century, the city continued to grow and significantly improve. In the 1830s, major streets and squares of Minsk were cobbled and paved. A first public library was opened in 1836, and a fire brigade was put into operation in 1837. In 1838, the first local newspaper, Minskie gubernskie vedomosti ("Minsk province news") went into circulation. The first theatre was established in 1844. By 1860, Minsk was an important trading city with a population of 27,000. There was a construction boom that led to the building of 2 and 3-story brick and stone houses in Upper Town.
Minsk's development was boosted by improvements in transportation. In 1846, the Moscow-Warsaw road was laid though Minsk. In 1871, a railway link between Moscow and Warsaw ran via Minsk, and in 1873, a new railway from Romny in Ukraine to the Baltic Sea port of Libava (Liepaja) was also constructed. Thus Minsk became an important rail junction and a manufacturing hub. A municipal water supply was introduced in 1872, the telephone in 1890, the horse tram in 1892, and the first power generator in 1894. By 1900, Minsk had 58 factories employing 3,000 workers. The city also boasted theatres, cinemas, newspapers, schools and colleges, as well as numerous monasteries, churches, synagogues, and a mosque. According to the 1897 Russian census, the city had 91,494 inhabitants, with some 47,561 Jews constituting more than half of the city population.

Russian rule
In the early years of the 20th century, Minsk was a major centre for the worker's movement in Belarus. It was also one of the major centres of the Belarusian national revival, alongside Vilnia. However, the First World War affected the development of Minsk tremendously. By 1915, Minsk was a battle-front city. Some factories were closed down, and residents began evacuating to the east. Minsk became the headquarters of the Western Front of the Russian army and also housed military hospitals and military supply bases.
The Russian Revolution had an immediate effect in Minsk. A Worker's Soviet was established in Minsk in October of 1917, drawing much of its support from disaffected soldiers and workers. After the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, German forces occupied Minsk in February of 1918. On 25 March, 1918, Minsk was proclaimed the capital of the Belarusian People's Republic. The republic was short-lived; in December, 1918, Minsk was taken over by the Red Army. In January, 1919 Minsk was proclaimed the capital of Byelorussian SSR, though later in 1919 (see Operation Minsk) and again in 1920, the city was controlled by the Second Polish Republic during the course of the Polish-Bolshevik war. Under the terms of the Peace of Riga, Minsk was handed over to the Russian SFSR and became the capital of the Byelorussian SSR, one of the constituent republics of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
A programme of reconstruction and development was begun in 1922. By 1924, there were 29 factories in operation; schools, museums, theatres, libraries were also established. Throughout the 1920s and the 1930s, Minsk saw rapid development with dozens of new factories being built and new schools, colleges, higher education establishments, hospitals, theatres, and cinemas being opened. During this period, Minsk was also a centre for the development of Belarusian language and culture.
Before World War II, Minsk had had a population of 300,000 people. After Germany invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June, 1941, as part of Operation Barbarossa, Minsk immediately came under attack. The city was bombed on the first day of the invasion and was occupied by the German Army four days later. However, some factories, museums and tens of thousands of civilians had been evacuated to the east. The Germans designated Minsk the administrative centre of Reichskomissariat Ostland and treated the local population harshly. Communists and sympathisers were killed or imprisoned; thousands were forced into slave labour, both locally and after being transported to Germany. Homes were requisitioned to house German occupying forces. Thousands starved as food was seized by the German Army and paid work was scarce. Some residents did support the Germans, especially at the beginning of the occupation, but by 1942, Minsk had become a major centre of the Soviet partisan resistance movement against the occupation, in what is known as the Great Patriotic War. For this role, Minsk was awarded the title Hero City in 1974.
Minsk was, however, the site of one of the largest Nazi-run ghettos in World War II, temporarily housing over 100,000 Jews. (See below for the external link on the Minsk Ghetto).
Minsk was liberated by Soviet troops on 3 July, 1944, during Operation Bagration. The city was the centre of German resistance to the Soviet advance and saw heavy fighting during the first half of 1944. Factories, municipal buildings, power stations, bridges, most roads and 80% of houses were reduced to rubble. In 1944, Minsk's population was reduced to a mere 50,000.
After World War II, Minsk was rebuilt, but not reconstructed. The historical centre was replaced in the 1940s and 1950s by Stalinist architecture, which favoured grand buildings, broad avenues and wide squares. Subsequently, the city grew rapidly as a result of massive industrialisation. Since the 1960s Minsk's population has also grown apace, reaching 1 million in 1972 and 1.5 million in 1986. This rapid population growth was primarily driven by mass migration of young, unskilled workers from rural areas of Belarus, as well as by migration of skilled workers from other parts of the Soviet Union. To house the expanding population, Minsk spread beyond its historical boundaries. Its surrounding villages were absorbed and rebuilt as mikroraions, districts of high-density apartment housing.

20th century
Throughout the 1990s, after the fall of Communism, the city continued to change. As the capital of a newly-independent country, Minsk quickly acquired the attributes of a major city. Embassies were opened, and a number of Soviet administrative buildings became government centers. During the early and mid-1990s, Minsk was hit by an economic crisis and many development projects were halted, resulting in high unemployment and underemployment. Since the late 1990s, there have been improvements in transport and infrastructure, and a housing boom has been underway since 2002. On the outskirts of Minsk, new mikroraions of residential development have been built. Metro lines have been extended, and the road system (including the Minsk ring road) has been improved. Owing to the small size of the private sector in Belarus, most development has so far been financed by the government.

Recent developments
The Old East Slavic name of the town was Мѣньскъ (i.e. Měnsk < Early Proto-Slavic or Late Indo-European Mēnĭskŭ), derived from a river name Měn (< Mēnŭ, with the same etymology as German Main). The direct continuation of this name in Belarusian is Miensk (pronounced [mʲɛnsk], according to the Łacinka alphabet).
In the 16th and 17th centuries, however, the pronunciation of this name in the Ruthenian language common to the ancestors of Belarusians and Ukrainians was influenced by the pronunciation of *ě as i in many Ukrainian dialects. The resulting form of the name, Minsk (spelled either Минскъ or Мѣнскъ) was taken over both in Russian (modern spelling: Минск) and Polish (Mińsk), and under the influence especially of Russian it also became official in Belarusian. However, some Belarusian-speakers continue to use Miensk (spelled Мeнск) as their preferred name for the city.
When Belarus was under Polish rule, the names Mińsk Litewski 'Minsk of [the Grand Duchy of] Lithuania' and Mińsk Białoruski 'Minsk in Belarus' were used to differentiate this place name from Mińsk Mazowiecki 'Minsk in Masovia'. In modern Polish, Mińsk without an attribute is Minsk, which is about 50 times bigger than Mińsk Mazowiecki; cf. Brest-Litovsk and Brześć Kujawski for a similar case).
Sources: Max Vasmer. Russisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. Vol. 2. Heidelberg 1955. ISBN 3-533-00665-4. = Макс Фасмер. Этимологический словарь русского языка. Vol. 2. Санкт-Петербург 1996, p. 625. ISBN 5-7684-0020-6 (online version).

Etymology and historical names

Demographics
* - census

Population growth
During the first centuries of its existence, Minsk was a city with a predominantly Early East Slavic population (the forefathers of modern-day Belarusians). After the 1569 Polish-Lithuanian union, the city became a destination for migrating Poles (who worked as administrators, clergy, teachers and soldiers) and Jews (who were mainly employed in trade and as craftsmen). During the last centuries of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth many locals were polonized and abandoned their Belarusian culture. After the Partitions of Poland, Minsk became part of the Russian Empire, the Russians essentially stepping in to the leadership role enjoyed by the Poles in earlier centuries. By the end of the 19th century Minsk was undergoing increasing russification. Many locals became russified and claim Russian ethnicity.
At the time of the 1897 census, Jews were the largest ethnic group in Minsk (51.2% of the population). Other substantial ethnic groups were Russians (25.5%), Poles (11.4%) and Belarusians (9%). The latter figure may be not accurate as some local Belarusians were likely to be counted as Russians. There was also a small traditional community of Lipka Tatars living in Minsk for centuries.
Both World War I and World War II affected the demographics of the city. The Jewish community suffered catastrophic losses during the Nazi occupation—very few survived. In the post-war years Minsk's population grew primarily as a result of rural migrants from other parts of Belarus moving to the city.
In 1959 Belarusians made up 63.3% of the city's residents. Other ethnic groups included Russians (22.8%), Jews (7.8%), Ukrainians (3.6%), Poles (1.1%) and Tatars (0.4%). Migration of rural migrants from other parts of Belarus in the 1960s and 1970s changed the ethnic composition further. By 1979 Belarusians made up 68.4% of the city's residents. Other ethnic groups included Russians (22.2%), Jews (3.4%), Ukrainians (3.4%), Poles (1.2%) and Tatars (0.2%).
According to the 1999 census, Belarusians make up 79.3% of the city's residents. Other ethnic groups include Russians (15.7%), Ukrainians (2.4%), Poles (1.1%) and Jews (0.6%). The Russian and Ukrainian populations of Minsk peaked in the late 1980s (at 325,000 and 55,000 respectively). After the break-up of the Soviet Union, many of them chose to move to their respective mother countries. The Jewish population of Minsk peaked in the early 1970s at 50,000 (according to official figures; independent estimates put the figure at 100-120,000), but then declined as a result of emigration to Israel, the USA and Germany. Today there are only about 10,000 Jews living in Minsk. The traditional minorities of Poles and Tatars have remained at much the same size (17,000 and 3,000 respectively). There was migration of rural Poles from the western part of Belarus to Minsk, and many Tatars moved to Minsk from Tatarstan.
Some more recent ethnic minority communities are establishing themselves in the city. The most prominent are migrants from the Caucasus countries—Georgians, Armenians and Azerbaijanis each numbering about 2,000-5,000. They began migrating to Minsk back in the 1970s, and more migrants have joined them since. Many of them are employed in the retail trade in open-air markets. There is also small but prominent Arab community in Minsk, primarily represented by recent migrants from Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Algeria, etc. (often graduates of Minsk universities who decide to settle in Belarus and their families). There is also a small community of Roma people, numbering about 2,000, which is settled in suburbs of north-western and southern Minsk. By Egas

Ethnic groups
Throughout its history Minsk has been a city of many languages. Initially most of its residents spoke Ruthenian (which later developed into modern Belarusian). However, after 1569 the official language was Polish. By the end of the 18th century most residents of Minsk were Polish-speakers (or Yiddish-speakers among the Jewish community). Yiddish remained a major language in Minsk until the early 20th century. In the 19th century Russian became the official language and by the end of that century it had become the language of administration, schools and newspapers. The Belarusian national revival increased interest in the Belarusian language—its use has grown since the 1890s, especially among the intelligentsia. In the 1920s and early 1930s Belarusian was major language of Minsk, including for administration and education (both secondary and tertiary). However, since the late 1930s Russian again began gaining dominance. This process accelerated after World War II —by the mid-1980s Minsk was almost exclusively Russian-speaking. A short period of Belarusian national revival in the early 1990s has seen a rise in numbers of Belarusian speakers. However, in 1994 the newly elected president Alexander Lukashenko slowly reversed this trend. Most residents of Minsk now use Russian exclusively in their everyday lives at home and at work, although Belarusian is understood as well. Substantial number of recent migrants from the rural areas uses Trasyanka (Russo-Belarusian pidgeon language) in their everyday lives.
The most commonly used and understood international language in Minsk, especially among the younger generation, is English. The second widely spoken international language is German. French and Spanish are understood by only a few.

Languages
There is no reliable statistics on religious affiliations in Minsk or in Belarus. According to various estimates, between 30% to 50% of Minsk's population do not practice any religion, while being either atheist, agnostic or simply spiritual, but not attached to a particular formal religious institution. Of those Minsk residents who are religious, about 70% consider themselves to be Russian Orthodox, 15-20% - Roman Catholic, and about 5% - Protestants. Most ethnic Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians from central and eastern parts of Belarus are Russian Orthodox, while Poles and Belarusians from Western Belarus are often Roman Catholic. There are small religious communities of Jews and Muslims (the latter - primarily recent migrants from countries or regions with predominantly Muslim population, such as Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Tadjikistan, etc). Total number of religious groups registered in Minsk is 116.
Currently there are 24 churches of various denominations, another 10 are being built or reconstructed.
In 17th-19th century most common religion in Minsk was represented by the Uniate Church (see Belarusian Greek Catholic Church), which under the Russian Empire was dissolved and merged into Russian Orthodox Church.

Religion
In 1938 Minsk was divided into smaller administrative units (raions, or districts) due to rapid population growth. On 17 March 1938 three districts were established:

Stalinski, i.e., Stalin district, renamed into Zavodzki (Factory/Plant district, after major tractor and automobile plants located there) in 1961
Varashylauski, i.e., Voroshilov district, renamed into Savetski (Soviet district) in 1961
Kahanovichski, i.e., Kaganovich district, renamed into Kastrychnitski (October district) in 1957 Government and administrative divisions
There are now 9 administrative districts:

Frunzenski, named after Mikhail Frunze
Kastrychnitski, named after October, i.e., October Revolution
Leninski, named after Lenin
Maskouski, named after Moscow
Partyzanski, named after Soviet partisans
Pershamayski, named after the 1st of May
Savetski, or "Soviet District"
Centralny, or "Central District"
Zavodzki, or "Factory district" (initially it included major plants, Minsk Tractor Works (MTZ) and Minsk Automobile Plant (MAZ), later the Partyzanski District with MAZ was split off it) Microraions
Minsk is the economic capital of Belarus. It has developed industrial and services sectors which serve the needs not only of the city, but of the entire nation.

Economy
Minsk is the major industrial centre of Belarus. The city has over 250 factories and plants. Its industrial development started in the 1860s and was facitilated by the railways built in the 1870s. However, much of the industrial infrastructure was destroyed during World War I and especially during World War II. After the last war the development of the city was linked to the development of industry, especially of R&D-intensive sectors (heavy emphasis of R&D intensive industries in urban development in the USSR is known in Western geography as 'Minsk phenomenon'). Minsk was turned into a major production site for trucks, tractors, gears, optical equipment, refrigerators, television sets and radios, bicycles, motorcycles, watches, and metal-processing equipment. Outside machine-building and electronics, Minsk also had textiles, construction materials, food processing, and printing industries. During the Soviet period, development of the industries was linked to suppliers and markets within the USSR, and the break-up of the union in 1991 led to a serious economic meltdown in 1991-1994. However, since the adoption of the neo-Keynesean policies under Aleksander Lukashenka's government in 1995, much of the gross industrial production was regained. Unlike many other cities in the CIS and Eastern Europe Minsk was not heavily de-industrialised in the 1990s. About 40% of the labour force is still employed in the manufacturing sector. Over 70% of produced goods are exported from Belarus, especially to Russia and other members of the Commonwealth of Independent States. However, the recent industrial revival did not lead to updating technologies and equipment (as FDI were discouraged), therefore much of the local industry is not highly competitive by international standards.

Industry
As current government economic policies of Belarus favour a neo-socialist path of development, the service sector is underdeveloped in Minsk. In terms of development of the service sector, Minsk lags not only behind cities of comparable size and history (Warsaw, Prague, Kiev, Sofia) but even behind much smaller cities (Vilnius, Riga or Tallinn). A large part of the service sector is controlled by the government and has been showing sluggish growth. Key services include finance and banking, national and local government, and transportation.

Services

Transport and infrastructure
Minsk has an extensive public transport system. Passengers are served by 8 tramway lines, over 70 trolleybus lines, and over 100 bus lines.

Local Transport

Main article: Minsk Metro Rapid Transit
Minsk is the largest transportation hub in Belarus. It is located on the junction of Warsaw-Moscow railway (built in 1871) running from the south-west to the north-east of the city and Liepaja-Romny railway (built in 1873) running from the north-west to the south. The first railway connects Russia with Poland and Germany, the second connects Ukraine with Lithuania and Latvia. They cross at the Minsk-Passazhyrski railway station, main railway station of Minsk. The station was built in 1873 as Vilenski vakzal. The initial wooden building was demolished in 1890 and rebuilt in stone. During World War II Minsk railway station was completely destroyed. It was rebuilt in 1945-1946 and served until 1991. The new building of Minsk-Passazhyrski railway station was built in 1991-2002. Its construction was delayed due to financial difficulties. However now Minsk boasts one of the most modern and up-to-date railway stations in the CIS. There are plans to move all suburban rail traffic from Minsk-Passazhyrski to smaller stations Minsk- Uskhodni (East), Minsk-Paudnyovy (South) and Minsk-Paunochny (North) by 2020.
There are three intercity bus stations, linking Minsk with suburbs, other cities in Belarus and in the neighbouring countries. Frequent schedules bus routes connect it to Moscow, Vilnius, Kiev and Warsaw.

Railway and intercity bus
From 1982 Minsk had two airports. Minsk-1 opened in 1933 a few kilometres to the south of the historical centre. In 1955 it became an international airport and by 1970 served over 1 million passengers a year. From 1982 it mainly served domestic routes in Belarus and short-haul routes to Moscow, Kiev and Kaliningrad.
Airport Minsk-2 is located 42 km to the east of the city. It opened in 1982 (passenger terminal - in 1987.) It is an international airport undergoing modernisation with flights to Austria, Cyprus, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Italy,Iran,Poland, Russia, Turkey, United Kingdom, and other countries, operated by the national carrier Belavia and the German airline Lufthansa as well as Austrian airline Austrian Airlines Group.

Airports
Minsk is the major educational centre of Belarus. It has over 500 nursery schools, 258 schools, 28 further education colleges, and 36 higher education instututions, including 12 major national universities (most specialising in certain areas of science and technology).

Education
Building of the Department of Biology, Belarusian State University
National Technical University
University of Informatics and Radioelectronics
Pedagogical University

Belarusian State University. Major Belarusian universal university, founded in 1921. In 2006 had 15 major departments (Applied Mathematics and Infoscience; Biology; Chemistry; Geography; Economics; International Relations; Journalism; History; Humanitarian Sciences; Law; Mechanics and Mathematics; Philology; Philosophy and Social Sciences; Physics; Radiophysics and Electronics). It also included 5 R&D institutes, 24 Research Centres, 114 R&D laboratories. The University employs over 2,400 lecturers and 1,000 research fellows; 1,900 of these hold Ph.D. or Dr. Sc. degrees. There are 16,000 undergraduate students at the university, as well as over 700 Ph.D. students.
Belarusian State University of Agricultural Technology. Specialised in agricultural technology and agricultural machinery.
Belarusian National Technical University. Specialised in technical disciplines.
Belarusian State Medical University. Specialised in Medicine and Dentistry. Since 1921 - Medicine Department of the Belarusian State University. In 1930 becomes separate as Belarusian Medical Institute. In 2000 upgraded to university level. Currently has 6 departments.
Belarusian State Economic University. Specialised in Finance and Economics. Founded in 1933 as Belarusian Institute for National Economy. Upgraded to university level in 1992.
Belarusian State University of Culture and Arts. Specialised in cultural studies, visual and performing arts.
Maxim Tank Belarusian State Pedagogical University. Specialised in teacher training for secondary schools.
Belarusian State University of Informatics and Radioelectronics. Specialised in IT and radioelectronic technologies. Established in 1964 as Minsk Institute for Radioelectronics.
Belarusian State University of Physical Training. Specialised in sports, coaches and PT teachers training.
Belarusian State Technological University. Specialised in chemical and pharmaceutical technology, in printing and forestry. Founded in 1930 as Forestry Institute in Homel. In 1941 evacuated to Sverdlovsk, now Yekaterinburg. Returned to Gomel in 1944, but in 1946 relocated to Minsk as Belarusian Institute of Technology. Upgraded to university level in 1993. Currently has 9 departments.
Minsk State Linguistic University. Specialised in foreign languages. Founded in 1948 as Minsk Institute for Foreign Languages. In 2006 had 8 departments. Major focus on English, French, German and Spanish.
Andrei Sakharov International State Environmental University. Specialised in environmental sciences. Established in 1992 with the support from the United Nations. Focus on study and research of radio-ecological consequences of the Chernobyl nuclear power station disaster in 1986, which heavily affected Belarus. Major universities
Minsk is the major cultural centre of Belarus. Its first theatres and libraries were established in the middle of the 19th century. Now it has 11 theatres and 16 museums. There are 20 cinemas and 139 libraries.

Culture and religion
Cathedral of the Holy Spirit
Cathedral of the Virgin
Church of St. Joseph
Church of Sts. Peter and Paul
Church of Sts. Simeon and Helene
Church of St. Mary Magdalene
Church of Exaltation of the Holy Cross

The Orthodox Cathedral of the Holy Spirit is actually the former church of the Bernardine convent. It was built in the simplified Baroque style in 1642-87 and went through renovations in 1741-46 and 1869.
The Cathedral of the Virgin was built by the Jesuits as their monastery church in 1700-10, restored in 1951 and 1997; it overlooks the recently restored 18th-century city hall, located on the other side of the Independence Square;
Two other historic churches are the cathedral of St. Joseph, formerly affiliated with the Bernardine monastery, built in 1644-52 and repaired in 1983, and the fortified church of Sts. Peter and Paul, originally built in the 1620s and recently restored, complete with its flanking twin towers.
The impressive Neo-Romanesque Roman Catholic cathedral of Sts. Simeon and Helene was built in 1906-10, immediately after religious freedoms were proclaimed in Imperial Russia and the tsar allowed dissidents to build their churches;
The largest church built in the Russian imperial period of the town's history is dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene;
Many Orthodox churches were built after the dissolution of the USSR in a variety of styles, although most remain true to the Neo-Russian idiom. A good example is St. Elisabeth's Convent, founded in 1999. Churches
Major theatres are:

National Academic Big Opera and Ballet Theatre of the Republic of Belarus
Belarusian Musical Comedy Theatre
Maxim Gorky National Drama Theatre (performances in Russian)
Yanka Kupala National Drama Theatre (performances in Belarusian) Theatres
Major museums include:

Belarusian Great Patriotic War Museum
Belarusian National Arts Museum
Belarusian National History and Culture Museum
Belarusian Nature and Environment Museum
Ethnography and Folklore Museum
Maksim Bahdanovich Literary Museum
Old Belarusian History Museum
Yanka Kupala Literary Museum Museums

Chelyuskinites Park
Children's Railroad
Gorky Park (Minsk)
Forest Park
Yanka Kupala Park Sport
Minsk maintains cultural links to a number of twin cities in various countries:

Abu Dhabi, UAE (since 2006)
Ankara, Turkey (since 2006)
Bangalore, India (since 1982)
Beijing, People's Republic of China
Belo Horizonte, Brazil (since 1987)
Caracas, Venezuela (since 2006)
Changchun, People's Republic of China
Detroit, USA
Eindhoven, Netherlands (since 1995)
Havana, Cuba (since 2005)
Kathmandu, Nepal
Lodz, Poland
Lyon, France
Murmansk, Russia (since 1995)
Nottingham, UK (since 1957)
Novosibirsk, Russia
Odessa, Ukraine
Potsdam, Germany
Sendai, Japan (since 1972)
Tehran, Iran (since 2006)
Yerevan, Armenia

2008-04-19T09:37:00.001-07:00

Sergey Brin (Russian: Сергей Брин) (born August 21, 1973 in Moscow, Russia) is an American entrepreneur who co-founded Google with Larry Page.
Brin is currently the President of Technology at Google and has a net worth estimated at $16.6 billion as of March 9, 2007, making him the 26th richest person in the world together with Larry Page and the 9th richest person in the United States.
He is also an investor in Tesla Motors, which is developing the Tesla Roadster a 250 mile range battery electric vehicle.
In May 2007, Sergey married Anne Wojcicki in the Bahamas.[1]

List of billionaires
List of single-digit salary earners
List of scientific publications by Sergey Brin
Video of Brin giving a lecture at UC Berkeley - Mentions Wikipedia and discusses development of search engines, Google and its evolution, Q&A (Fall 2005)
Sergey Brin fan club
Linux Journal interview - 31 August 2000
Net Café Television Interview - 6 October 2000. Interview starts around 18 minutes and 15 seconds in.
Fresh Air radio interview - 14 October 2003
Search Engine Watch interview - 16 October 2003
UK Channel 4 television interview with Sergey Brin - 31 March 2004
Time Magazine Podcast about Google and its founders
"The Searchmeisters" -- profile on Brin and Page from the B'nai B'rith Magazine (Spring 2006)
Video → Google Founders - Charlie Rose interview from 2001 (14 min)
Forbes.com: Fortunes That Roared In 2004
Momentmag.com: The Story of Sergey Brin

2008-04-18T09:23:00.000-07:00

B.J. Ryan (born Robert Victor Ryan, Jr. on December 28, 1975 in Bossier City, Louisiana) is a closer in Major League Baseball for the Toronto Blue Jays of the American League. Previously, Ryan played with the Cincinnati Reds (1999) and Baltimore Orioles (1999–2005). He bats and throws left-handed.
In a career that has spanned eight years, Ryan has compiled an 18-21 record with 551 strikeouts and a 3.19 ERA in 453 and one-third innings pitched.
Ryan started his career as a left-handed specialist. His inability to command his pitches, combined with a history of difficulty facing right-handed batters, prevented him from acquiring a larger role in the bullpen. However, his eccentric, three-quarter, slingshot-like delivery has made him a dominant force against left-handed batters.
More recently, Ryan has been able to not only control his pitches better, but also add tailing movement to his low-90s fastball. This movement, combined with his already-devastating slider, has helped his success rate against right-handed batters. During his years with Baltimore, he translated this success into a larger role in the Orioles' bullpen. By the middle of 2004, he secured the primary setup role. By the end of the year, he took Jorge Julio's job as the closer. The baseball world has also recognized his new-found success, and his abilities as a reliever are widely considered to be among the best in baseball.
In 2005, Ryan had a spectacular season as closer for Baltimore, converting 36 of 41 save opportunities and compiling a 2.43 ERA and appearing in the All-Star Game.
Ryan became one of the most coveted free agents in Major League Baseball during the 2005 off-season. After considering an offer to rejoin the Orioles, as well as visiting with other potential suitors such as the Cleveland Indians and New York Yankees, Ryan signed a 5-year, $47-million contract with the Toronto Blue Jays on November 28, 2005. At the time, that was the largest contract for a reliever in Major League Baseball history, surpassing Mariano Rivera's 4-year, $40-million deal with the Yankees from 2001–2004.
On July 3, 2006 it was announced that Ryan would make his second All-Star Game appearance when he was one of five Toronto Blue Jays players selected for the American League All-Star Team. During the 2006 All-Star Game held on July 10 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Ryan pitched the scoreless eighth inning and earned the win for the American League. He finished the year with a career-high 38 saves, ranking third in the league behind Francisco Rodriguez of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and Bobby Jenks of the Chicago White Sox.
On May 10, 2007 , The Toronto Blue Jays announced that B.J. Ryan underwent Tommy John surgery in his left elbow and would be out for the remainder of the 2007 season.

Cincinnati Reds (1999)
Baltimore Orioles (1999-2005)
Toronto Blue Jays (2006-present)

2008-04-17T09:28:00.001-07:00

High Town from the River Severn
Coordinates: 52°31′53″N 2°25′04″W / 52.5315, -2.4179
Bridgnorth is a town in Shropshire, England, along the Severn Valley. It is split into Low Town and High Town, named on account of their elevations relative to the River Severn, which separates the upper town on the right bank from the lower on the left. Bridgnorth is named after a bridge over the River Severn, built further north than an earlier bridge at Quatford. It is the seat and most populous town of Bridgnorth district. The population of the town of Bridgnorth was 11,891 at the 2001 Census and a more recent estimate puts it at 12,212 .

History
The early history of Bridgnorth is connected with Æthelfleda, lady of the Mercians, who raised a mound there in 912 as part of her offensive policy against the Danes of the five boroughs. After the Conquest William the Bastard granted the manor of Bridgnorth to Earl Roger of Shrewsbury, whose son Robert de Belesme transferred his castle and borough from Quatford to Bridgnorth, but on Robert's attainder in 1102 the town became a royal borough. Later, in 1546, the town was incorporated by James I.
It is probable that Henry I granted the burgesses certain privileges, for Henry II confirmed to them all the franchises and customs which they had in the time of Henry I. King John in 1215 granted them freedom from toll throughout England except the city of London, and in 1227 Henry III conferred several new rights and liberties, among which were a gild merchant with a hanse. These early charters were confirmed by several succeeding kings, Henry VI granting in addition assize of bread and ale and other privileges. The burgesses returned two members to parliament in 1295, and continued to do so until 1867, when they were assigned only one member. The burgesses were additionally granted two fairs: a yearly fair on the feast of the Translation of St Leonard and three following days was granted in 1359, and in 1630, Charles I granted them licence to hold another fair on the Thursday before the first week in Lent and two following days.
The town was disfranchised in 1885.

Pre-20th century
The Castle, originally built in 1101 by Robert de Belleme (later Earl of Shrewsbury) was besieged four times in its history, last by the Roundheads in 1646 during the English Civil War when Bridgnorth was a Royalists stronghold. Parliamentary forces used an artificial hill (Panpudding Hill) across from the castle in order to bombard it and also tunnelled deep into the cliff underneath Bridgnorth castle in order to plant explosives and blow it up. The threat from this tunnelling (along with dwindling supplies) caused the Royalists to surrender Bridgnorth. Although the castle survived the siege, it was blown up by the Roundheads in 1647 to prevent its future use by the Royalists should they have retaken the town. The only part that remains, part of the great tower, leans at an angle of 17°, greater than the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
During the siege, a large part of high town was set on fire. As a result of the fire, there are no verified images or detailed accounts of the actual layout or even the appearance of Bridgnorth Castle before its destruction.
The castle grounds were excavated over 3 days by Time Team (episode aired 18 March 2001), clarifying the layout of the castle and the history of its construction.

Bridgnorth castle
In 1978, Bridgnorth twinned itself with the French town of Thiers, and later in 1992 it also twinned with the Bavarian town of Schrobenhausen, Since then each have twinned with each other.
On August 21, 2003, Bridgnorth was granted Fairtrade Town status.
In 2005, unverified German papers from 1941 were found, outlining new details about Operation Sealion, the military plans of Nazi Germany for an invasion of Britain. (The plan was never carried out.)
Details about two Shropshire towns in the documentation—Ludlow and Bridgnorth. Some experts now believe that it was Hitler's intention to make Bridgnorth the German headquarters in Britain, due to its central, rural location and now-disused airfield.

Attractions and features
There are a number of Primary Schools in Bridgnorth, including:
The town has two Secondary schools: Oldbury Wells School and The Endowed School. These serve the town and its outlying villages, including Alveley and Highley.

Castlefields (County Primary)
St Mary's (Church of England)
St Leonard's (Church of England)
St John's (Roman Catholic)
Morville
Brown Clee Sport

Richard Baxter (November 12, 1615 - December 8, 1691) the English Puritan church leader, divine scholar and controversialist, called by Dean Stanley "the chief of English Protestant Schoolmen" lived in Bridgnorth town centre, between 1638-1640.
Thomas Percy, bishop of Dromore, the editor of the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry was born in Bridgnorth.
Max Rafferty, musician, attended Bridgnorth Endowed School. Rafferty now plays bass guitar in popular indie rock band The Kooks
David Preece (May 28, 1963 – July 20, 2007) was an English professional footballer who played in midfield. He was born in Bridgnorth. He played three times for the England B team.
Martin Butler (born 15 September 1974 in Dudley, England) is an English football striker with Walsall.
Dominic Sandbrook a British historian and writer, born in Bridgnorth, in 1974

2008-04-16T09:08:00.001-07:00

The history of painting reaches back in time to artifacts from pre-historic humans, and spans all cultures.
Also see articles: Painting, Western painting, History of art, Eastern art history, Outline of painting history.

Pre-history

Eastern painting
Krishna embraces Gopîs, Gîtâ-Govinda-manuscript, 1760-1765.
Floating Figures Dancing, a mural of c. 850.
Wild Pig Hunt, c. 1540.
Chand Bibi Hawking, Deccan style, 18th century
A Lady Listening to Music, c. 1750.
Rasamañjarî manuscript of the Bhânudatta (erotic treatise), 1720.
Mural fragment of a lady with a parasol, c. 700.
Bahsoli painting of Radha and Krishna in Discussion, c. 1730.
Bahsoli painting of Maharaja Sital Dev of Mankot in Devotion, c. 1690.
Portrait of Ibrahim Adil Shah II (1580-1626) of Bijapur, 1615.
The Throne of the Wealth, Nujûm-al-' Ulûm-manuscript, 1570.
Elephant and cub out of the stable of the Moghul ruler, 17th century.
Mihrdukht Shoots an Arrow Through a Ring, 1564-1579.
Portrait of the Govardhân Chand, Punjab style, c. 1750.
Demon-King of Lanka, 1920.
Ravana kills Jathayu; the captive Sita despairs.
Akbar and Tansen Visit Haridas in Vrindavan, Rajasthan style, c. 1750.
A man with children, Punjab style, 1760.
Râdhâ arrests Krishna, Punjab style, 1770.
Rama and Sita in the Forest, Punjab style, 1780.

South Asian painting

Main article: Indian painting Indian painting
The earliest Indian paintings were the rock paintings of prehistoric times, the petroglyphs as found in places like the Rock Shelters of Bhimbetka, and some of them are older than 5500 BC. Such works continued and after several millennia, in the 7th century, carved pillars of Ajanta, Maharashtra state present a fine example of Indian paintings, and the colors, mostly various shades of red and orange, were derived from minerals.
Ajanta Caves in Maharashtra, India are rock-cut cave monuments dating back to the second century BCE and containing paintings and sculpture considered to be masterpieces of both Buddhist religious art
Madhubani painting is a style of Indian painting, practiced in the Mithila region of Bihar state, India. The origins of Madhubani painting are shrouded in antiquity, and a tradition states that this style of painting originated at the time of the Ramayana, when King Janak commissioned artists to do paintings at the time of marriage of his daughter, Sita, with Sri Rama who is considered to be an incarnation of the Hindu god lord Vishnu.
Rajput painting, a style of Indian painting, evolved and flourished, during the 18th century, in the royal courts of Rajputana, India. Each Rajput kingdom evolved a distinct style, but with certain common features.
Rajput paintings depict a number of themes, events of epics like the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, Krishna's life, beautiful landscapes, and humans. Miniatures were the preferred medium of Rajput painting, but several manuscripts also contain Rajput paintings, and paintings were even done on the walls of palaces, inner chambers of the forts, havelies, particularly, the havelis of Shekhawait.
The colors extracted from certain minerals, plant sources, conch shells, and were even derived by processing precious stones, gold and silver were used. The preparation of desired colors was a lengthy process, sometimes taking weeks. Brushes used were very fine.
Mughal painting is a particular style of Indian painting, generally confined to illustrations on the book and done in miniatures, and which emerged, developed and took shape during the period of the Mughal Empire 16th -19th centuries).
Tanjore painting is an important form of classical South Indian painting native to the town of Tanjore in Tamil Nadu. The art form dates back to the early 9th century, a period dominated by the Chola rulers, who encouraged art and literature. These paintings are known for their elegance, rich colors, and attention to detail. The themes for most of these paintings are Hindu Gods and Goddesses and scenes from Hindu mythology. In modern times, these paintings have become a much sought after souvenir during festive occasions in South India.
The process of making a Tanjore painting involves many stages. The first stage involves the making of the preliminary sketch of the image on the base. The base consists of a cloth pasted over a wooden base. Then chalk powder or zinc oxide is mixed with water-soluble adhesive and applied on the base. To make the base smoother, a mild abrasive is sometimes used. After the drawing is made, decoration of the jewellery and the apparels in the image is done with semi-precious stones. Laces or threads are also used to decorate the jewellery. On top of this, the gold foils are pasted. Finally, dyes are used to add colors to the figures in the paintings.
During British rule in India, the crown found that Madras had some of the most talented and intellectual artistic minds in the world. As the British had also established a huge settlement in and around Madras, Georgetown was chosen to establish an institute that would cater to the artistic expectations of the royals in London. This has come to be known as the Madras School. At first traditional artists were employed to produce exquisite varieties of furniture, metal work, and curios and their work was sent to the royal palaces of the Queen.
Unlike the Bengal School where 'copying' is the norm of teaching, the Madras School flourishes on 'creating' new styles, arguments and trends.
The Bengal School of Art was an influential style of art that flourished in India during the British Raj in the early 20th century. It was associated with Indian nationalism, but was also promoted and supported by many British arts administrators.
The Bengal School arose as an avant garde and nationalist movement reacting against the academic art styles previously promoted in India, both by Indian artists such as Ravi Varma and in British art schools. Following the widespread influence of Indian spiritual ideas in the West, the British art teacher Ernest Binfield Havel attempted to reform the teaching methods at the Calcutta School of Art by encouraging students to imitate Mughal miniatures. This caused immense controversy, leading to a strike by students and complaints from the local press, including from nationalists who considered it to be a retrogressive move. Havel was supported by the artist Abanindranath Tagore, a nephew of the poet Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore painted a number of works influenced by Mughal art, a style that he and Havel believed to be expressive of India's distinct spiritual qualities, as opposed to the "materialism" of the West. Tagore's best-known painting, Bharat Mata (Mother India), depicted a young woman, portrayed with four arms in the manner of Hindu deities, holding objects symbolic of India's national aspirations. Tagore later attempted to develop links with Japanese artists as part of an aspiration to construct a pan-Asianist model of art.
The Bengal School's influence in India declined with the spread of modernist ideas in the 1920s. In the post-independence period, Indian artists showed more adaptability as they borrowed freely from european styles and amalgamated them freely with the Indian motifs to new forms of art. While artists like Francis Newton Souza and Tyeb Mehta were more western in their approach, there were others like Ganesh Pyne and Maqbool Fida Hussain who developed thoroughly indigenous styles of work. Today after the process of liberalization of market in India, the artists are experiencing more exposure to the international art-scene which is helping them in emerging with newer forms of art which were hitherto not seen in India. Jitish Kallat had shot to fame in the late 90s with his paintings which were both modern and beyond the scope of generic definition. However while artists in India in the new century are trying out new styles, themes and metaphors, it would not have been possible to get such quick recognition without the aid of the business houses which are now entering the art field like they had never before.

History
Peonies, by Yun Shouping (1633-1690), Chinese
Ma Lin, 1246 AD, Chinese
Luoshenfu, by Gu Kaizhi (344-406 AD), Chinese
Chinese, 16th century
Portrait of Night-Shining White, by Han Gan, Chinese, 8th century
Spring Outing of the Tang Court, by Zhang Xuan, Chinese, 8th century
The Xiao and Xiang Rivers, by Dong Yuan (c. 934-962 AD), Chinese
Tao Yuanming, by Chen Hongshou (1598-1652), Chinese
Eighty-Seven Celestials, by Wu Daozi (685-758), Chinese
Golden Pheasant and Cotton Rose, by Emperor Huizong of Song (r.1100-1126 AD), Chinese
Listening to the Guqin, by Emperor Huizong of Song (1100-1126 AD), Chinese
A Man and His Horse in the Wind, by Zhao Mengfu (1254-1322 AD), Chinese
A tanuki (raccoon dog) as a tea kettle, by Katsushika Hokusai (1760—1849), Japanese
Genji Monogatari, by Tosa Mitsuoki (1617–1691), Japanese
Emperor Sun Quan in the Thirteen Emperors Scroll and Northern Qi Scholars Collating Classic Texts, by Yan Liben (c. 600-673 AD), Chinese
Chinese, anonymous artist of the 12th century Song Dynasty
Portrait of the Zen Buddhist Wuzhun Shifan, 1238 AD, Chinese
Ladies Playing Double Sixes, by Zhou Fang (730-800 AD), Chinese
Paradise of the Buddha Amitabha, 8th century, Chinese
Chinese, 10th century
Shukei-sansui (Autumn Landscape), Sesshu Toyo, (1420-1506), Japanese
A White-Robed Kannon, Bodhisattva of Compassion, by Kanō Motonobu (1476-1559), Japanese
A screen painting depicting people playing Go, by Kanō Eitoku (1543-1590), Japanese
Pine Trees, six sided screen, by Hasegawa Tohaku (1539-1610), Japanese
Scroll calligraphy of Bodhidharma, "Zen points directly to the human heart, see into your nature and become Buddha", Hakuin Ekaku (1686 to 1769), Japanese
Hanging scroll 1672, Kanō Tanyū, (1602-1674), Japanese
Nanban ships arriving for trade in Japan, Japanese, 16th century
Ike no Taiga, (1723-1776), Fish in Spring, Japanese
Maruyama school, Pine, Bamboo, Plum, six-fold screen, Maruyama Ōkyo (1733–1795), Japanese
Rimpa school, "Autumn Flowers and Moon," Sakai Hoitsu, (1761-1828), Japanese
Katsushika Hokusai, The Dragon of Smoke Escaping from Mt Fuji, Japanese
Miyagawa Isshō, untitled Ukiyo-e painting, Japanese
Nihonga style, Tomioka Tessai, (1837-1924)Two Divinities Dancing, 1924, Japanese
Shin hanga style Hiroshi Yoshida, (1876-1950), watercolour of Mount Fuji, Japanese
An underworld messenger, a Korean painting from the Joseon Dynasty
After Rain at Mt. Inwang, by Korean artist Cheong Seon (1676–1759)
Court portrait of Emperor Shenzong of Song (r. 1067-1085), Chinese
An illustrated sutra from the Nara period, Japanese, 8th century.
Children Playing, by Su Han Chen, c. 1150, Chinese
Ladies making silk, a remake of an 8th century original by Zhang Xuan by Emperor Huizong of Song, early 12th century, Chinese
China, Japan and Korea have a strong tradition in painting which is also highly attached to the art of calligraphy and printmaking (so much that it is commonly seen as painting). Far east traditional painting is characterized by water based techniques, less realism, "elegant" and stylized subjects, graphical approach to depiction, the importance of white space (or negative space) and a preference for landscape (instead of human figure) as a subject. Beyond ink and color on silk or paper scrolls, gold on lacquer was also a common medium in painted East Asian artwork. Although silk was a somewhat expensive medium to paint upon in the past, the invention of paper during the 1st century AD by the Han court eunuch Cai Lun provided not only a cheap and widespread medium for writing, but also a cheap and widespread medium for painting (making it more accessible to the public).
The ideologies of Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism played important roles in East Asian art. Medieval Song Dynasty painters such as Lin Tinggui and his Luohan Laundering [1] (housed in the Smithsonian Freer Gallery of Art) of the 12th century are excellent examples of Buddhist ideas fused into classical Chinese artwork. In the latter painting on silk (image and description provided in the link), bald-headed Buddhist Luohan are depicted in a practical setting of washing clothes by a river. However, the painting itself is visually stunning, with the Luohan portrayed in rich detail and bright, opaque colors in contrast to a hazy, brown, and bland wooded environment. Also, the tree tops are shrouded in swirling fog, providing the common "negative space" mentioned above in East Asian Art.
In Japonisme, late 19th century artists like the Impressionists, Van Gogh, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Whistler admired traditional Japanese Ukiyo-e artists like Hokusai and Hiroshige and their work was influenced by it.
See also Chinese painting, Japanese painting, Korean painting.

East Asian painting

Main article: Chinese painting Chinese painting

Main article: Japanese painting Japanese painting
see article Western painting

Western painting
Also see Ancient art
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt, Queen Nefertari
Ancient Egypt, papyrus
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt
Greek art
Knossos
Roman art, Pompeii
Roman art
Roman art
Roman art
Roman art
Roman art
Roman art
Ancient Egypt, a civilization with very strong traditions of architecture and sculpture (both originally painted in bright colours) also had many mural paintings in temples and buildings, and painted illustrations to papyrus manuscripts. Egyptian wall painting and decorative painting is often graphic, sometimes more symbolic than realistic. Egyptian painting depicts figures in bold outline and flat silhouette, in which symmetry is a constant characteristic. Egyptian painting has close connection with its written language - called Egyptian hieroglyphs. The Egyptians also painted on linen, remnants of which survive today. In fact painted symbols are found amongst the first forms of written language, and religion.
To the north of Egypt was the Minoan civilization on the island of Crete. The wall paintings found in the palace of Knossos are similar to that of the Egyptians but much more free in style. Around 1100 B.C., tribes from the north of Greece conquered Greece and the Greek art took a new direction.
Ancient Greece had great painters, great sculptors (though both endeavours were regarded as mere manual labour at the time), and great architects. The Parthenon is an example of their architecture that has lasted to modern days. Greek marble sculpture is often described as the highest form of Classical art. Painting on pottery of Ancient Greece and ceramics gives a particularly informative glimpse into the way society in Ancient Greece functioned. Black-figure vase painting and Red-figure vase painting gives many surviving examples of what Greek painting was. Some famous Greek painters on wooden panels who are mentioned in texts are Apelles, Zeuxis and Parrhasius, however no examples of Ancient Greek panel painting survive, only written descriptions by their contemporaries or later Romans. Zeuxis lived in 5-6 BC and was said to be the first to use sfumato. According to Pliny the Elder, the realism of his paintings was such that birds tried to eat the painted grapes. Apelles is described as the greatest painter of Antiquity for perfect technique in drawing, brilliant color and modeling.
Roman art was influenced by Greece and can in part be taken as a descendant of ancient Greek painting. However, Roman painting does have important unique characteristics. The only surviving Roman paintings are wall paintings, many from villas in Campania, in Southern Italy. Such painting can be grouped into 4 main "styles" or periods Almost the only painted portraits surviving from the Ancient world are a large number of coffin-portraits of bust form found in the Late Antique cemetery of Al-Fayum. Although these were neither of the best period nor the highest quality, they are impressive in themselves, and give an idea of the quality that the finest ancient work must have had. A very small number of miniatures from Late Antique illustrated books also survive, and a rather larger number of copies of them from the Early Medieval period.

Egypt, Greece and Rome
Cotton Genesis a miniature of Abraham meeting Angels
Byzantine art
Byzantine art
Byzantine art, Mosaic
Limbourg Brothers
Limbourg Brothers
Book of Hours
Book of Hours
Carolingian
Carolingian Saint Mark
Giottino
Vitale da Bologna
Simone Martini
Cimabue
Giotto
Giotto
The rise of Christianity imparted a different spirit and aim to painting styles. Byzantine art, once its style was established by the 6th century, placed great emphasis on retaining traditional iconography and style, and has changed relatively little through the thousand years of the Byzantine Empire and the continuing traditions of Greek and Russian Othodox icon-painting. Byzantine painting has a particularly hieratic feeling and icons were and still are seen as a reflection of the divine. There were also many wall-paintings in fresco, but fewer of these have survived than Byzantine mosaics. In general Byzantium art borders on abstraction, in its flatness and highly stylised depictions of figures and landscape. However there are periods, especially in the so-called Macedonian art of around the 10th century, when Byzantine art became more flexible in approach.
In post-Antique Catholic Europe the first distinctive artistic style to emerge that included painting was the Insular art of the British Isles, where the only surviving examples (and quite likely the only medium in which painting was used) are miniatures in Illuminated manuscripts such as the Book of Kells. These are most famous for their abstract decoration, although figures, and sometimes scenes, were also depicted, especially in Evangelist portraits. Carolingian and Ottonian art also survives mostly in manuscripts, although some wall-painting remain, and more are documented. The art of this period combines Insular and "barbarian" influences with a strong Byzantine influence and an aspiration to recover classical monumentality and poise.
Walls of Romanesque and Gothic churches were decorated with frescoes as well as sculpture and many of the few remaining murals have great intensity, and combine the decorative energy of Insular art with a new monumentality in the treatment of figures. Far more miniatures in Illuminated manuscripts survive from the period, showing the same characteristics, which continue into the Gothic period.
Panel painting becomes more common during the Romanesque period, under the heavy influence of Byzantine icons. Towards the middle of the 13th century, Medieval art and Gothic painting became more realistic, with the beginnings of interest in the depiction of volume and perspective in Italy with Cimabue and then his pupil Giotto. From Giotto on, the treatment of composition by the best painters also became much more free and innovative. They are considered to be the two great medieval masters of painting in western culture. Cimabue, within the Byzantine tradition, used a more realistic and dramatic approach to his art. His pupil, Giotto, took these innovations to a higher level which in turn set the foundations for the western painting tradition. Both artists were pioneers in the move towards naturalism.
Churches were built with more and more windows and the use of colorful stained glass become a staple in decoration. One of the most famous examples of this is found in the cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris. By the 14th century Western societies were both richer and more cultivated and painters found new patrons in the nobility and even the bourgeoisie. Illuminated manuscripts took on a new character and slim, fashionably dressed court women were shown in their landscapes. This style soon became known as International style and tempera panel paintings and altarpieces gained importance.

Middle Ages
Fra Angelico
Filippo Lippi
Andrea Mantegna
Masaccio The Expulsion Of Adam and Eve from Eden, before and after restoration
Paolo Uccello
Leonardo Da Vinci
Raphael
Michelangelo
Albrecht Durer
Giovanni Bellini
Titian
Sandro Botticelli
Giorgione
Jan van Eyck
Hans Holbein the Younger
El Greco
The Renaissance is said by many to be the golden age of painting. Roughly spanning the 14th through the mid 17th century. In Italy artists like Paolo Uccello, Fra Angelico, Masaccio, Piero della Francesca, Andrea Mantegna, Filippo Lippi, Giorgione, Tintoretto, Sandro Botticelli, Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo Buonarroti, Raphael, Giovanni Bellini, and Titian took painting to a higher level through the use of perspective, the study of human anatomy and proportion, and through their development of an unprecedented refinement in drawing and painting techniques.
Flemish, Dutch and German painters of the Renaissance such as Hans Holbein the Younger, Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach, Matthias Grünewald, Hieronymous Bosch, and Pieter Brueghel represent a different approach from their Italian colleagues, one that is more realistic and less idealized. The adoption of oil painting whose invention was traditionally, but erroneously, credited to Jan Van Eyck, (an important transitional figure who bridges painting in the Middle Ages with painting of the early Renaissance), made possible a new verisimilitude in depicting reality. Unlike the Italians whose work drew heavily from the art of ancient Greece and Rome, the northerners retained a stylistic residue of the sculpture and illuminated manuscripts of the Middle Ages.
Renaissance painting reflects the revolution of ideas and science (astronomy, geography) that occur in this period, the Reformation, and the invention of the printing press. Dürer, considered one of the greatest of printmakers, states that painters are not mere artisans but thinkers as well. With the development of easel painting in the Renaissance, painting gained independence from architecture. Following centuries dominated by religious imagery, secular subject matter slowly returned to Western painting. Artists included visions of the world around them, or the products of their own imaginations in their paintings. Those who could afford the expense could become patrons and commission portraits of themselves or their family.
In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, panel paintings which could be hung on walls and moved around at will, became increasingly popular for both churches and private houses, rather than fresco wall-paintings or paintings incorporated into on permanent structures, such as altarpieces. The High Renaissance gave rise to a stylized art known as Mannerism. In place of the balanced compositions and rational approach to perspective that characterized art at the dawn of the sixteenth century, the Mannerists sought instability, artifice, and doubt. The unperturbed faces and gestures of Piero della Francesca and the calm Virgins of Raphael are replaced by the troubled expressions of Pontormo and the emotional intensity of El Greco.

Baroque and Rococo
also see main articles Impressionism, Post Impressionism, Hudson River School
Jacques-Louis David 1787
John Constable 1802
Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres 1862
Eugène Delacroix, 1830
Francisco de Goya 1814
Théodore Géricault 1819
Caspar David Friedrich c.1820
J. M. W. Turner 1838
Gustave Courbet 1849-1850
Albert Bierstadt 1886
Camille Corot c.1867
Claude Monet 1872
Pierre-Auguste Renoir 1876
Edgar Degas 1876
Édouard Manet 1882
Vincent van Gogh 1889
Paul Gauguin 1897-1898
Georges Seurat 1884-1886
Ralph Albert Blakelock 1885
Paul Cézanne 1906
After the decadence of Rococo there arose in the late 18th century an ascetic neo-classicism, best represented by such artists as Jacques Louis David and his heir Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres. Ingres' work already contains much of the sensuality, but none of the spontaneity, that was to characterize Romanticism. This movement turned its attention toward landscape and nature as well as the human figure and the supremacy of natural order above mankind's will. There is a pantheist philosophy (see Spinoza and Hegel) within this conception that opposes Enlightenment ideals by seeing mankind's destiny in a more tragic or pessimistic light. The idea that human beings are not above the forces of Nature is in contradiction to Ancient Greek and Renaissance ideals where mankind was above all things and owned his fate. This thinking led romantic artists to depict the sublime, ruined churches, shipwrecks, massacres and madness.
Romantic painters turned landscape painting into a major genre, considered until then as a minor genre or as a decorative background for figure compositions. Some of the major painters of this period are Eugene Delacroix, Théodore Géricault, J. M. W. Turner, Caspar David Friedrich and John Constable. Francisco de Goya's late work demonstrates the Romantic interest in the irrational, while the work of Arnold Böcklin evokes mystery. In the United States the Romantic tradition of landscape painting was known as the Hudson River School. Important painters of that school include Thomas Cole, Frederick Church, Albert Bierstadt, Thomas Moran, and John Frederick Kensett among others. Luminism was another important movement in American landscape painting related to the Hudson River School.
The leading Barbizon School painter Camille Corot painted sometimes as a romantic, sometimes as a Realist who looks ahead to Impressionism. A major force in the turn towards Realism at mid-century was Gustave Courbet. In the latter third of the century Impressionists like Édouard Manet, Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Camille Pissarro, Alfred Sisley, and Edgar Degas and the slightly younger post-Impressionists like Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, and Georges Seurat, along with Paul Cezanne lead art up to the edge of modernism.

19th century: Neo-classicism, Romanticism, Impressionism
Also see: Modern Art, Modernism, Contemporary art,. The heritage of painters like Van Gogh, Cézanne, Gauguin, and Seurat was essential for the development of modern art. At the beginning of the 20th century Henri Matisse and several other young artists revolutionized the Paris art world with "wild", multi-colored, expressive, landscapes and figure paintings that the critics called Fauvism. Pablo Picasso made his first cubist paintings based on Cézanne's idea that all depiction of nature can be reduced to three solids: cube, sphere and cone.

20th century Modern and Contemporary
Henri Matisse 1909, late Fauvism
Pablo Picasso 1907, early Cubism
Georges Braque 1910, Analytic Cubism
Henri Rousseau 1910 Primitive Surrealism
Wassily Kandinsky 1913, birth of Abstract Art
Giorgio de Chirico 1914, pre-Surrealism
Robert Delaunay, 1911, Orphism
Fernand Leger 1919, Synthetic Cubism, Tubism
Marc Chagall 1911, Expressionism and Surrealism
Franz Marc 1912, Der Blaue Reiter
Francis Picabia 1916, Dada
Max Ernst 1923, early Surrealism
The heritage of painters like Van Gogh, Cézanne, Gauguin, and Seurat was essential for the development of modern art. At the beginning of the 20th century Henri Matisse and several other young artists including the pre-cubist Georges Braque, André Derain, Raoul Dufy and Maurice de Vlaminck revolutionized the Paris art world with "wild", multi-colored, expressive, landscapes and figure paintings that the critics called Fauvism - (as seen in the gallery above). Pablo Picasso made his first cubist paintings based on Cézanne's idea that all depiction of nature can be reduced to three solids: cube, sphere and cone. With the painting Les Demoiselles d'Avignon 1907, (see gallery) Picasso dramatically created a new and radical picture depicting a raw and primitive brothel scene with five prostitutes, violently painted women, reminiscent of African tribal masks and his own new Cubist inventions. Analytic cubism (see gallery) was jointly developed by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque from about 1908 through 1912. Analytic cubism, the first clear manifestation of cubism, was followed by Synthetic cubism, practised by Braque, Picasso, Fernand Léger, Juan Gris, Albert Gleizes, Marcel Duchamp and countless other artists into the 1920s. Synthetic cubism is characterized by the introduction of different textures, surfaces, collage elements, papier collé and a large variety of merged subject matter.
During the years between 1910 and the end of World War I and after the heyday of cubism, several movements emerged in Paris. Giorgio De Chirico moved to Paris in July 1911, where he joined his brother Andrea (the poet and painter known as Alberto Savinio). Through his brother he met Pierre Laprade a member of the jury at the Salon d'Automne, where he exhibited three of his dreamlike works: Enigma of the Oracle, Enigma of an Afternoon and Self-Portrait. During 1913 he exhibited his work at the Salon des Indépendants and Salon d'Automne, his work was noticed by Pablo Picasso and Guillaume Apollinaire and several others. His compelling and mysterious paintings are considered instrumental to the early beginnings of Surrealism. (see gallery)
In the first two decades of the 20th century and after cubism, several other important movements emerged; Futurism (Balla), Abstract art (Kandinsky), Der Blaue Reiter), Bauhaus, (Kandinsky) and (Klee), Orphism, (Robert Delaunay and František Kupka), Synchromism (Morgan Russell), De Stijl (Mondrian), Suprematism (Malevich), Constructivism (Tatlin), Dadaism (Duchamp, Picabia, Arp) and Surrealism (De Chirico, André Breton, Miró, Magritte, Dalí, Ernst). Modern painting influenced all the visual arts, from Modernist architecture and design, to avant-garde film, theatre and modern dance and became an experimental laboratory for the expression of visual experience, from photography and concrete poetry to advertising art and fashion. Van Gogh's painting exerted great influence upon 20th century Expressionism, as can be seen in the work of the Fauves, Die Brücke (a group led by German painter Ernst Kirchner), and the Expressionism of Edvard Munch, Egon Schiele, Marc Chagall, Amedeo Modigliani, Chaim Soutine and others..
Wassily Kandinsky a Russian painter, printmaker and art theorist, one of the most famous 20th-century artists is generally considered the first important painter of modern abstract art. As an early modernist, in search of new modes of visual expression, and spiritual expression, he theorized as did contemporary occultists and theosophists, that pure visual abstraction had corollary vibrations with sound and music. They posited that pure abstraction could express pure spirituality. His earliest abstractions were generally titled as the example in the (above gallery) Composition VII, making connection to the work of the composers of music. Kandinsky included many of his theories about abstract art in his book Concerning the Spiritual in Art. Robert Delaunay was a French artist who is associated with Orphism, (reminiscent of a link between pure abstraction and cubism). His later works were more abstract, reminiscent of Paul Klee. His key contributions to abstract painting refer to his bold use of color, and a clear love of experimentation of both depth and tone. At the invitation of Wassily Kandinsky, Delaunay and his wife the artist Sonia Delaunay, joined The Blue Rider (Der Blaue Reiter), a Munich-based group of abstract artists, in 1911, and his art took a turn to the abstract. Still other important pioneers of abstract painting include Czech painter, František Kupka and Synchromism, an art movement founded in 1912 by American artists Stanton MacDonald-Wright and Morgan Russell that closely resembles Orphism.

Pioneers
Kasimir Malevich 1916 Suprematism
Amadeo Modigliani 1917 Symbolism and Expressionism
Stanton MacDonald-Wright 1920, Synchromism
Piet Mondrian 1921 De Stijl
Otto Dix, 1926 German Expressionism
Stuart Davis American Modernism 1922
Charles Demuth, 1928 American Precisionism (proto Pop Art)
Paul Klee 1928, Bauhaus
Thomas Hart Benton 1920, Regionalism
Grant Wood 1930 Social Realism
Rene Magritte 1928-1929 Surrealism
Salvador Dalí 1931, Surrealism (super-realism)
Max Beckmann 1938-1940 Expressionism
Wassily Kandinsky Composition X 1939 Geometric abstraction
Arshile Gorky 1929-1936 pre Abstract Expressionism
Pablo Picasso Guernica 1937 protest against Fascism
Piet Mondrian's art was intimately related to his spiritual and philosophical studies. In 1908 he became interested in the theosophical movement launched by Helena Petrovna Blavatsky in the late 19th century. Blavatsky believed that it was possible to attain a knowledge of nature more profound than that provided by empirical means, and much of Mondrian's work for the rest of his life was inspired by his search for that spiritual knowledge. Other major pioneers of early abstraction include Russian painter Kasimir Malevich, who after the Russian Revolution in 1919, and after pressure from the Stalinist regime in 1924 returned to painting imagery and Peasants and Workers in the field,

Between the Wars
Frida Kahlo 1940, Latin American Symbolism
Edward Hopper 1942, American Scene painting
Andrew Wyeth 1948, Realism
Adolph Gottlieb 1949, Pictograph
Barnett Newman, Onement 1, 1948, Color Field - Abstract Expressionism
Francis Bacon 1953, British Expressionism
Willem De Kooning 1952-1953 Figurative Abstract Expressionism
Jackson Pollock 1950 Abstract Expressionism
Franz Kline 1954 Action painting
Clyfford Still 1957 Color Field - Abstract Expressionism
Hans Hofmann 1959-1960 Abstract Expressionism and Geometric abstraction
Robert Motherwell, Elegy to the Spanish Republic No. 110
The 1940s in New York City heralded the triumph of American Abstract expressionism, a modernist movement that combined lessons learned from Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Surrealism, Joan Miró, Cubism, Fauvism, and early Modernism via great teachers in America like Hans Hofmann and John D. Graham. American artists benefited from the presence of Piet Mondrian, Fernand Leger, Max Ernst and the Andre Breton group, Pierre Matisse's gallery, and Peggy Guggenheim's gallery The Art of This Century, as well as other factors.
Post-Second World War American painting called Abstract expressionism included artists like Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Arshile Gorky, Mark Rothko, Hans Hofmann, Clyfford Still, Adolph Gottlieb, Barnett Newman, Philip Guston, Robert Motherwell, and Franz Kline, among others. American Abstract expressionism got its name in 1946 from the art critic Robert Coates. It is seen as combining the emotional intensity and self-denial of the German Expressionists with the anti-figurative aesthetic of the European abstract schools such as Futurism, the Bauhaus and Synthetic Cubism.
Technically Surrealism was an important predecessor for Abstract expressionism with its emphasis on spontaneous, automatic or subconscious creation. Jackson Pollock's dripping paint onto a canvas laid on the floor is a technique that has its roots in the work of André Masson. Another important early manifestation of what came to be abstract expressionism is the work of American Northwest artist Mark Tobey, especially his "white writing" canvases, which, though generally not large in scale, anticipate the "all over" look of Pollock's drip paintings.
Additionally, Abstract expressionism has an image of being rebellious, anarchic, highly idiosyncratic and, some feel, rather nihilistic. In practice, the term is applied to any number of artists working (mostly) in New York who had quite different styles, and even applied to work which is not especially abstract nor expressionist. Pollock's energetic "action paintings", with their "busy" feel, are different both technically and aesthetically, to the violent and grotesque Women series of Willem de Kooning (which are figurative paintings) and to the serenely shimmering blocks of color in Mark Rothko's work (which is not what would usually be called expressionist and which Rothko denied was abstract), yet all three are classified as abstract expressionists.
Abstract Expressionism has many stylistic similarities to the Russian artists of the early twentieth century such as Wassily Kandinsky. Although it is true that spontaneity or of the impression of spontaneity characterized many of the abstract expressionists works, most of these paintings involved careful planning, especially since their large size demanded it. An exception might be the drip paintings of Pollock.
Why this style gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s is a matter of debate. American Social realism had been the mainstream in the 1930s. It had been influenced not only by the Great Depression but also by the Social Realists of Mexico such as David Alfaro Siqueiros and Diego Rivera. The political climate after World War II did not long tolerate the social protests of those painters. Abstract expressionism arose during World War II and began to be showcased during the early 1940s at galleries in New York like The Art of This Century Gallery. The late 1940s through the mid 1950s ushered in the McCarthy era. It was after World War II and a time of political conservatism and extreme artistic censorship in the United States. Some people have conjectured that since the subject matter was often totally abstract, Abstract expressionism became a safe strategy for artists to pursue this style. Abstract art could be seen as apolitical. Or if the art was political, the message was largely for the insiders. However those theorists are in the minority. As the first truly original school of painting in America, Abstract expressionism demonstrated the vitality and creativity of the country in the post-war years, as well as its ability (or need) to develop an aesthetic sense that was not constrained by the European standards of beauty.
Although Abstract expressionism spread quickly throughout the United States, the major centers of this style were New York City and California, especially in the New York School, and the San Francisco Bay area. Abstract expressionist paintings share certain characteristics, including the use of large canvases, an "all-over" approach, in which the whole canvas is treated with equal importance (as opposed to the center being of more interest than the edges. The canvas as the arena became a credo of Action painting, while the integrity of the picture plane became a credo of the Color field painters.
In Europe there was the continuation of Surrealism, Cubism, Dada and the works of Matisse. Also in Europe, Tachisme (the European equivalent to Abstract expressionism) took hold of the newest generation. Serge Poliakoff, Nicolas de Staël, Georges Mathieu, Vieira da Silva, Jean Dubuffet, Yves Klein and Pierre Soulages among others are considered important figures in post-war European painting.
Eventually abstract painting in America evolved into movements such as Neo-Dada, color field painting, Post painterly abstraction, Op Art, hard-edge painting, Minimal art, shaped canvas painting, Lyrical Abstraction, Neo-expressionism and the continuation of Abstract expressionism. As a response to the tendency toward abstraction imagery emerged through various new movements, notably Pop Art.

Towards Mid Century
Jasper Johns 1954-55 pre-Pop Art
Robert Rauschenberg 1963, Neo-Dada
Roy Lichtenstein, 1963 Pop Art
Andy Warhol 1962, Pop Art (repetition)
Alex Katz 1970, Pop Art
David Hockney 1967, English Pop Art
Richard Diebenkorn 1963, Bay Area Figurative Movement
Fairfield Porter 1971-1972, East coast Figurative painting
Pop Art in America was to a large degree initially inspired by the works of Jasper Johns, Larry Rivers, and Robert Rauschenberg. Although the paintings of Gerald Murphy, Stuart Davis and Charles Demuth during the 1920s and 1930s set the table for Pop Art in America. In New York City during the mid 1950s Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns created works of art that at first seemed to be continuations of Abstract expressionist painting. Actually their works and the work of Larry Rivers, were radical departures from abstract expressionism especially in the use of banal and literal imagery and the inclusion and the combining of mundane materials into their work. The innovations of Johns' specific use of various images and objects like chairs, numbers, targets, beer cans and the American Flag; Rivers paintings of subjects drawn from popular culture such as George Washington crossing the Delaware, and his inclusions of images from advertisements like the camel from Camel cigarettes, and Rauschenberg's surprising constructions using inclusions of objects and pictures taken from popular culture, hardware stores, junkyards, the city streets, and taxidermy gave rise to a radical new movement in American art. Eventually by 1963 the movement came to be known worldwide as Pop Art.
Pop-Art is exemplified by artists: Andy Warhol, Claes Oldenburg, Wayne Thiebaud, James Rosenquist, Jim Dine, Tom Wesselmann and Roy Lichtenstein among others. Pop art merges popular and mass culture with fine art, while injecting humor, irony, and recognizable imagery and content into the mix. In October 1962 the Sidney Janis Gallery mounted The New Realists the first major Pop Art group exhibition in an uptown art gallery in New York City. Sidney Janis mounted the exhibition in a 57th Street storefront near his gallery at 15 E. 57th Street. The show sent shockwaves through the New York School and reverberated worldwide. Earlier in the fall of 1962 an historically important and ground-breaking New Painting of Common Objects exhibition of Pop Art, curated by Walter Hopps at the Pasadena Art Museum sent shock waves across the Western United States.
Earlier in England in 1958 the term "Pop Art" was used by Lawrence Alloway to describe paintings that celebrated consumerism of the post World War II era. This movement rejected Abstract expressionism and its focus on the hermeneutic and psychological interior, in favor of art which depicted, and often celebrated material consumer culture, advertising, and iconography of the mass production age.The early works of David Hockney and the works of Richard Hamilton and Eduardo Paolozzi were considered seminal examples in the movement.
While in the downtown scene in New York City's East Village 10th Street galleries artists were formulating an American version of Pop Art. Claes Oldenburg had his storefront, and the Green Gallery on 57th Street began to show Tom Wesselmann and James Rosenquist. Later Leo Castelli exhibited other American artists including the bulk of the careers of Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein and his use of Benday dots, a technique used in commercial reproduction. There is a connection between the radical works of Duchamp, and Man Ray, the rebellious Dadaists - with a sense of humor; and Pop Artists like Alex Katz, Claes Oldenburg, Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein and the others.
While throughout the 20th century many painters continued to practice landscape and figurative painting with contemporary subjects and solid technique, like Milton Avery, John D. Graham, Fairfield Porter, Edward Hopper, Balthus, Francis Bacon, Nicolas de Staël, Andrew Wyeth, Lucian Freud, Frank Auerbach, Philip Pearlstein, David Park, Nathan Oliveira, David Hockney, Chuck Close, Susan Rothenberg, Eric Fischl, Vija Celmins and Richard Diebenkorn.

Pop Art, Neo Dada and Realism
Helen Frankenthaler 1952, Color Field painting
Josef Albers 1965, Geometric abstraction
Richard Anuszkiewicz, 1985 Op Art
Morris Louis 1960 Minimalism-Color field
Frank Stella 1967, Shaped Canvas
Gene Davis 1964, Washington Color School
Ronald Davis 1968, Abstract Illusionism
Ronnie Landfield, 1968, Lyrical Abstraction
Color Field painting clearly pointed toward a new direction in American painting, away from abstract expressionism. Color Field painting is related to Post-painterly abstraction, Suprematism, Abstract Expressionism, Hard-edge painting and Lyrical Abstraction.
Color Field painting sought to rid art of superflous rhetoric. Artists like Clyfford Still, Mark Rothko, Hans Hofmann, Morris Louis, Jules Olitski, Kenneth Noland, Helen Frankenthaler, Larry Zox, and others often used greatly reduced references to nature, and they painted with a highly articulated and psychological use of color. In general these artists eliminated recognizable imagery. Certain artists quoted references to past or present art, but in general color field painting presents abstraction as an end in itself. In pursuing this direction of modern art, artists wanted to present each painting as one unified, cohesive, monolithic image.
Frank Stella, Kenneth Noland, Ellsworth Kelly, Barnett Newman, Ronald Davis, Neil Williams, Robert Mangold, Charles Hinman, Richard Tuttle, David Novros, and Al Loving are examples of artists associated with the use of the shaped canvas during the period beginning in the early 1960s. Many Geometric abstract artists, minimalists, and Hard-edge painters elected to use the edges of the image to define the shape of the painting rather than accepting the rectangular format. In fact, the use of the shaped canvas is primarily associated with paintings of the 1960s and 1970s that are coolly abstract, formalistic, geometrical, objective, rationalistic, clean-lined, brashly sharp-edged, or minimalist in character. The Andre Emmerich Gallery, the Leo Castelli Gallery, the Richard Feigen Gallery, and the Park Place Gallery were important showcases for Color Field painting, shaped canvas painting and Lyrical Abstraction in New York City during the 1960s. There is a connection with post-painterly abstraction, which reacted against abstract expressionisms' mysticism, hyper-subjectivity, and emphasis on making the act of painting itself dramatically visible - as well as the solemn acceptance of the flat rectangle as an almost ritual prerequisite for serious painting. During the 1960s Color Field painting and Minimal art were often closely associated with each other. In actuality by the early 1970s both movements became decidedly diverse.
Another related movement of the late 1960s Lyrical Abstraction is a term that was originally coined by Larry Aldrich (the founder of the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield Connecticut) in 1969 to describe what Aldrich said he saw in the studios of many artists at that time. Lyrical Abstraction is a type of freewheeling abstract painting that emerged in the mid-1960s when abstract painters returned to various forms of painterly, pictorial, expressionism with a predominate focus on process, gestalt and repetitive compositional strategies in general.
Lyrical Abstraction shares similarities with Color Field Painting and Abstract Expressionism especially in the freewheeling usage of paint - texture and surface. Direct drawing, calligraphic use of line, the effects of brushed, splattered, stained, squeegeed, poured, and splashed paint superficially resemble the effects seen in Abstract Expressionism and Color Field Painting. However the styles are markedly different. Setting it apart from Abstract Expressionism and Action Painting of the 1940s and 1950s is the approach to composition and drama. As seen in Action Painting there is an emphasis on brushstrokes, high compositional drama, dynamic compositional tension. While in Lyrical Abstraction there is a sense of compositional randomness, all over composition, low key and relaxed compositional drama and an emphasis on process, repetition, and an all over sensibility.
During the 1960s and 1970s artists as powerful and influential as Robert Motherwell, Adolph Gottlieb, Phillip Guston, Lee Krasner, Cy Twombly, Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, Richard Diebenkorn, Josef Albers, Elmer Bischoff, Agnes Martin, Al Held, Sam Francis, Ellsworth Kelly, Morris Louis, Helen Frankenthaler, Gene Davis, Frank Stella, Kenneth Noland, Joan Mitchell, Friedel Dzubas, and younger artists like Brice Marden, Robert Mangold, Sam Gilliam, Sean Scully, Pat Steir, Elizabeth Murray, Larry Poons, Walter Darby Bannard, Larry Zox, Ronnie Landfield, Ronald Davis, Dan Christensen, Joan Snyder, Ross Bleckner, Archie Rand, Susan Crile, and dozens of others produced vital and influential paintings.
During the 1960s and 1970s, there was a reaction against abstract painting. Some critics viewed the work of artists like Ad Reinhardt, and declared the 'death of painting'. Artists began to practice new ways of making art. New movements gained prominence some of which are: Postminimalism, Earth art, Video art, Installation art, arte povera, performance art, body art, fluxus, mail art, the situationists and conceptual art among others.

New abstraction from the 1950s through the 1980s
Philip Guston 1972, pre-Neo-expressionism
Susan Rothenberg 1979, Neo-expressionism
Eric Fischl 1981, Figurative Neo-expressionism
Anselm Kiefer 1983, European Neo-expressionism
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, there was also a return to painting that occurred almost simultaneously in Italy, Germany, France and Britain. These movements were called Transavantguardia, Neue Wilde, Figuration Libre, Neo-expressionism and the School of London respectively. These painting were characterized by large formats, free expressive mark making, figuration, myth and imagination. All work in this genre came to be labeled neo-expressionism. Critical reaction was divided. Some critics regarded it as driven by profit motivations by large commercial galleries. This type of art continues in popularity into the 21st century, even after the art crash of the late 1980s.
Neo-expressionism was a style of modern painting that emerged in the late 1970s and dominated the art market until the mid-1980s. It developed in Europe as a reaction against the conceptual and minimalistic art of the 1970s. Neo-expressionists returned to portraying recognizable objects, such as the human body (although sometimes in a virtually abstract manner), in a rough and violently emotional way using vivid colours and banal colour harmonies.
Painting still holds a respected position in contemporary art. Art is an open field no longer divided by the objective versus non-objective dichotomy. Artists can achieve critical success whether their images are representational or abstract. What has currency is content, exploring the boundaries of the medium, and a refusal to recapitulate the works of the past as an end goal.

Neo Expressionism
Anselm Kiefer, 1990
Ronnie Landfield, 1999
Yan Pei-Ming, 2005 Contemporary painting from China
At the beginning of the 21st century Contemporary painting and Contemporary art in general continues in several contigious modes, characterized by the ideas of pluralism, globalism and International decentralization. Artists from China, and other parts of Asia, as well as Europe and the Americas have produced new and interesting paintings. The "crisis" in painting and current art and current art criticism today is brought about by pluralism. There is no consensus as to a representative style of the age. There is an anything goes attitude that prevails; an "everything going on", and consequently "nothing going on" syndrome; except for an aesthetic traffic jam, with no firm and clear direction, with every lane on the artistic superhighway filled to capacity. Consequently magnificent and important works of art continue to be made albeit in a wide variety of styles.
Hard-edge painting, Geometric abstraction, Hyperrealism, Photorealism, Expressionism, Minimalism, Lyrical Abstraction, Pop Art, Op Art, Abstract Expressionism, Color Field painting, Monochrome painting, Neo-expressionism, Collage, Intermedia painting, Assemblage painting, Computer art painting, Postmodern painting, Neo-Dada painting, Shaped canvas painting, environmental mural painting, traditional figure painting, Landscape painting, Portrait painting, are a few continuing and current directions in painting at the beginning of the 21st century.

Contemporary painting into the 21st Century
Yahyâ ibn Mahmûd al-Wâsitî, Iraq, 1237
Yahyâ ibn Mahmûd al-Wâsitî, Iraq, 1237
Syrischer Maler, 1315 Metropolitan Museum of Art
Ilkhanid Shahnameh, ca. 1330-1340, Smithsonian
Behzād, 1494-45, British Museum
Persian miniature painting, CE 1550
Reza Abbasi, 1609
Razmnama, 1616, British Museum
Two Lovers by Reza Abbasi, 1630
Persian miniature Harun al-Rashid in Thousand and One Nights
Reza Abbasi, 1620
Adam and Eve, Safavid Iran, c. 1550 AD.
A painting depicting Abû Zayd, 1335 AD.
A scene from the book of Ahmad ibn al-Husayn ibn al-Ahnaf, showing two galloping horsemen, 1210 AD.
The angel Isrâfîl, Iraq, 1280 AD.
The Clerk, Iraq, 1287.
An ornamental Quran, by al-Bawwâb, 11th century AD.
Mehmet II, from the Sarai Albums of Istanbul, Turkey, 15th century AD.
Maiden in a fur cap, by Muhammad 'Alî, Isfahan, Iran, mid 17th century.
Youth and Suitors, Mashhad, Iran, 1556-1565 AD.
The depiction of humans, animals or any another figurative subjects is forbidden within Islam to prevent believers from idolatry so there is no religiously motivated painting (or sculpture) tradition within Muslim culture. Pictorial activity was reduced to Arabesque, mainly abstract, with geometrical configuration or floral and plant-like patterns. Strongly connected to architecture and calligraphy, it can be widely seen as used for the painting of tiles in mosques or in illuminations around the text of the holy Koran and other books. In fact abstract art is not an invention of modern art but it is present in pre-classical, barbarian and non-western cultures many centuries before it and is essentially a decorative or applied art. Notable illustrator M.C. Escher was influenced by this geometrical and pattern based art. Art Nouveau (Aubrey Beardsley and the architect Antonio Gaudi) re-introduced abstract floral patterns into western art.
Note that despite the taboo of figurative visualization, some muslim countries did cultivate a rich tradition in painting, though not in its own right, but as a companion to the written word. Iranian or Persian art, widely known as Persian miniature, concentrates on the illustration of epic or romantic works of literature. Persian illustrators deliberately avoided the use of shading and perspective, though familiar with it in their pre-islamic history, in order to abide by the rule of not creating any life-like illusion of the real world. Their aim was not to depict the world as it is, but to create images of an ideal world of timeless beauty and perfect order.
In present days, painting by art students or professional artists in arab and non-arab muslim countries follow the same tendencies of Western culture art.
See also Islamic art. See also Persian miniature. See also Arabesque.

Islamic painting
Oriental historian Basil Gray believes "Iran has offered a particularly unique [sic] art to the world which is excellent in its kind".
Caves in Iran's Lorestan province exhibit painted imagery of animals and hunting scenes. Some such as those in Fars Province and Sialk are at least 5,000 years old.
Painting in Iran is thought to have reached a climax during the Tamerlane era when outstanding masters such as Kamaleddin Behzad gave birth to a new style of painting.
Paintings of the Qajar period, are a combination of European influences and Safavid miniature schools of painting such as those introduced by Reza Abbasi. Masters such as Kamal-ol-molk, further pushed forward the European influence in Iran. It was during the Qajar era when "Coffee House painting" emerged. Subjects of this style were often religious in nature depicting scenes from Shia epics and the like.

Iran

Also see Aboriginal art, Art of Australia Australia
A Kĩkũyũ woman in traditional dress. Ceremonial Face Painting.
Dogon, circumcision cave, with paintings Mali c. contemporary

Main article: African art Africa
At the start of the twentieth century, artists like Picasso, Matisse, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin and Modigliani became aware of, and inspired by, African art. In a situation where the established avant garde was straining against the constraints imposed by serving the world of appearances, African Art demonstrated the power of supremely well organised forms; produced not only by responding to the faculty of sight, but also and often primarily, the faculty of imagination, emotion and mystical and religious experience. These artists saw in African Art a formal perfection and sophistication unified with phenomenal expressive power.

Sources

Outline of painting history
History of art
Western painting
History painting
Art periods
List of painters
Painting
Hierarchy of genres
Self portrait
Annunciation (van Eyck, Washington)

2008-04-15T10:41:00.001-07:00

IX Corps (Ninth Corps) was a corps of the Union Army during the American Civil War that distinguished itself in combat in multiple theaters: the Carolinas, Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi.

Formation, Second Bull Run, and Antietam
On February 5, 1863, Sedgwick was succeeded by Maj. Gen. William F. "Baldy" Smith, and on February 12 the corps was ordered to Newport News, where it encamped for a month. General Smith's stay with the corps was of short duration, for he was succeeded in the following month by Maj. Gen. John G. Parke. While at Newport News, Getty's (3rd) Division was detached and ordered to Suffolk, Virginia, where it was subsequently incorporated into the VII Corps. It never rejoined its old command although, in 1864, one of its regiments, the 4th Rhode Island, was restored to the IX Corps.
In the meantime, General Burnside had been assigned to the command of the Department of Ohio, a district that included Kentucky and eastern Tennessee. He obtained permission for the transfer of his old corps to this field of operations, and on March 19, 1863, General Parke was ordered to proceed there with his two remaining divisions, Willcox's and Sturgis's. Just prior to the departure from Virginia, General Sturgis was relieved, and Maj. Gen. Robert B. Potter was assigned to the command of the 2nd Division. The IX Corps was stationed in Kentucky for two months, during which it served as an army of occupation. In June it was ordered to the support of Ulysses S. Grant, who was then besieging Vicksburg, and proceeding there promptly, it participated in the investment of the city, although not under fire. Upon the surrender of Vicksburg, Parke's two divisions joined the main army in its movement on Jackson, Mississippi, and became engaged in the fighting there, with a loss of 34 killed, 229 wounded, and 28 missing; total, 291. The 1st Division was then under command of Maj. Gen. Thomas Welsh, General Willcox having been assigned to duty in Indiana. The Vicksburg Campaign had been a costly one for the Corps, not due to battle casualties, but to disease. Among those who succumbed to the deadly malaria of the Vicksburg camps was General Welsh, who, soon after, went home to die.
The corps left Mississippi in August, 1863, and returned to Kentucky, where, after a short rest, it joined in Burnside's advance into East Tennessee, a movement that had already commenced. The two divisions were now reduced to about 6,000 men. General Parke having been made chief of staff of the Army of the Ohio, General Potter succeeded to the command of the corps, with Generals John F. Hartranft and Edward Ferrero in command of the two divisions.
Ferrero's Division had a sharp little fight at Blue Springs, Tennessee, October 10, 1863, and the whole corps was engaged, November 16, at Campbell's Station. This was followed by the occupation of Knoxville and the gallant defense against James Longstreet's besieging forces, terminating December 4, in the defeat and withdrawal of the enemy.

Western Theater
General Willcox resumed command of the corps on January 17, 1864, relieving General Potter; on January 26, Parke relieved Willcox, who then took command of the 2nd Division.
General Burnside was again assigned to duty as commander of his old corps, which was ordered to Annapolis, Maryland, for reorganization. In April, the corps was composed of the four divisions of Thomas G. Stevenson, Potter, Willcox, and Ferrero, the latter division being composed wholly of African-American troops. The corps numbered 19,331 present for duty, with 42 pieces of field artillery; but this number was soon increased, the morning reports of May 10 showing a strength of 32,708. In addition to the four divisions, with their two batteries each, there was a brigade of reserve artillery of six batteries and a provisional brigade of heavy artillerymen and dismounted cavalry. In all, there were 42 regiments of infantry, and 14 batteries of light artillery. Ferrero's Colored Division had never been under fire, while many of the white regiments in the corps were newly organized, or had served previously on garrison duty only. In the ranks of the old regiments were many recruits and conscripts.
In the Overland Campaign, Ulysses S. Grant launched a major offensive against Robert E. Lee starting in May, 1864. His command in northern Virginia consisted of the Army of the Potomac, under Maj. Gen. George G. Meade, and the IX Corps operating separately, reporting directly to Grant. Burnside technically outranked Meade and objected to receiving commands from a junior officer. By the time of the Battle of North Anna, however, Grant acknowledged that this arrangement was ineffective and he convinced Burnside, along with General Parke, his chief-of-staff, to waive the question of their superiority of rank over Meade. On May 25, the IX Corps was assigned to the Army of the Potomac.
In the Battle of the Wilderness the corps lost 240 killed, 1,232 wounded, 168 missing; total, 1,640; and, at Spotsylvania, 486 killed, 2,119 wounded, 469 missing; total, 3,146; the heaviest loss at Spotsylvania Court House occurring in the action of May 12. The corps assaulted the right, eastern, flank of the "Mule Shoe" salient. General Stevenson was killed at Spotsylvania on May 10, and Maj. Gen. Thomas L. Crittenden, formerly commander of the XXI Corps, was assigned to the command of Stevenson's (1st) Division.

Overland Campaign
On June 9, at Cold Harbor, General Crittenden was relieved at his own request, and Brig. Gen. James H. Ledlie was placed in command of the 1st Division. In the first assault on Petersburg, June 17, the corps made a brilliant attack, Potter's Division gaining possession of the works; unfortunately, the division was obliged to relinquish its foothold for want of proper support. The corps was engaged in a similar attempt on the following day, the losses in Potter's and Willcox's Divisions being unusually severe in proportion to the number engaged. Losses were 497 killed, 3,232 wounded, and 262 missing; total, 2,991. The dead included Brig. Gen. James St. Clair Morton, chief engineer of the corps.
The enemy's works proving too strong for assault, the army entrenched itself in preparation for the ten-month siege that followed. On June 19, Ferrero's (4th) Division of black troops rejoined the corps, having been absent during the whole of the previous campaign, engaged on duty at the rear. Ferrero's men were now placed in the trenches with the other three divisions. The part of the line occupied by the IX Corps was very near the enemy's works, and an incessant firing was kept up during the siege, resulting in a daily loss of men, killed or wounded. While there was a comparative quiet in front of the other corps positions, the men of the IX Corps were subjected to the terrible strain of a constant watchfulness and deadly exposure. The enemy seemed to be excited to an undue activity by the presence of Ferrero's Colored Division.
The IX Corps was prominently connected with the siege because of its role in the infamous Battle of the Crater, in which a lengthy mine shaft was dug from its line to under the Confederate works. This mine, which was excavated by the coal miners of 48th Pennsylvania, Potter's Division, was successfully exploded with four tons of gunpowder, resulting in an enormous crater, but the assault that followed was a failure. Just before the assault, Grant and Meade directed Burnside to replace Ferrero's black division with Ledlie's white division, fearful of the political consequences of using black troops at the forefront of a major assault. But Ledlie's troops were not trained for the assault and Ledlie himself remained in the rear area, inebriated. The assault was a fiasco, in which Union soldiers charged into the crater, becoming trapped there, easy targets for the Confederates along the crater's rim. Ferrero's black regiments went into action in the rear and fought well, but had no chance for success. The losses in the IX Corps at the crater were 473 killed, 1,646 wounded, 1,356 missing; total, 3,475. Immediately after this engagement, General Ledlie was relieved from command of the 1st Division, and Brig. Gen. Julius White, of the XXIII Corps, was assigned to Ledlie's place.
On August 13, 1864, General Burnside was granted a leave of absence; he never rejoined the corps, but was succeeded by General Parke, who remained in command until the close of the war. At the battle of the Weldon Railroad, August 19–21, 1864, the three divisions of White, Potter, and Willcox were engaged with considerable loss, although the three combined numbered less than 6,000 muskets; casualties were 60 killed and 315 wounded. By this time the divisions had become so reduced in numbers that a reorganization of the corps became necessary, and so the regiments in White's Division were transferred to the divisions of Potter and Willcox. Under this arrangement Willcox's Division was numbered as the 1st; Potter's, as the 2nd; Ferrero's black troops were designated as the 3rd Division. But in December, Ferrero's Division was permanently detached, and most of his regiments were transferred to the newly organized XXV Corps, which was composed entirely of black troops. General Ferrero himself was assigned to a provisional command at Bermuda Hundred.

1865

2008-04-14T09:31:00.001-07:00

François Quesnay (June 4, 1694 - December 16, 1774) was a French economist of the Physiocratic school. He also practiced surgery.

Works
In 1758 he published the Tableau économique (Economic Table), which provided the foundations of the ideas of the Physiocrats. This was perhaps the first work to attempt to describe the workings of the economy in an analytical way, and as such can be viewed as one of the first important contributions to economic thought.
The publications in which Quesnay expounded his system were the following: two articles, on "Fermiers" and on "Grains", in the Encyclopédie of Diderot and D'Alembert (1756, 1757); a discourse on the law of nature in the Physiocratie of Dupont de Nemours (1768); Maximes générales de gouvernement economique d'un royaume agricole (1758), and the simultaneously published Tableau économique avec son explication, ou extrait des économies royales de Sully (with the celebrated motto, Pauvres paysans, pauvre royaume; pauvre royaume, pauvre roi); Dialogue sur le commerce et les travaux des artisans; and other minor pieces.
The Tableau économique, though on account of its dryness and abstract form it met with little general favor, may be considered the principal manifesto of the school. It was regarded by the followers of Quesnay as entitled to a place amongst the foremost products of human wisdom, and is named by the elder Mirabeau, in a passage quoted by Adam Smith, as one of the three great inventions which have contributed most to the stability of political societies, the other two being those of writing and of money. Its object was to exhibit by means of certain formulas the way in which the products of agriculture, which is the only source of wealth, would in a state of perfect liberty be distributed among the several classes of the community (namely, the productive classes of the proprietors and cultivators of land, and the unproductive class composed of manufacturers and merchants), and to represent by other formulas the modes of distribution which take place under systems of Governmental restraint and regulation, with the evil results arising to the whole society from different degrees of such violations of the natural order. It follows from Quesnay's theoretic views that the one thing deserving the solicitude of the practical economist and the statesman is the increase of the net product; and he infers also what Smith afterwards affirmed, on not quite the same ground, that the interest of the landowner is strictly and indissolubly connected with the general interest of the society. A small edition de luxe of this work, with other pieces, was printed in 1758 in the Palace of Versailles under the king's immediate supervision, some of the sheets, it is said, having been pulled by the royal hand. Already in 1767 the book had disappeared from circulation, and no copy of it is now procurable; but, the substance of it has been preserved in the Ami des hommes of Mirabeau, and the Physiocratie of Dupont de Nemours.
His economic writings are collected in the 2nd vol. of the Principaux économistes, published by Guillaumin, Paris, with preface and notes by Eugène Daire; also his OEuvres économiques et philosophiques were collected with an introduction and note by August Oncken (Frankfort, 1888); a facsimile reprint of the Tableau économique, from the original MS., was published by the British Economic Association (London, 1895). His other writings were the article "Évidence" in the Encyclopédie, and Recherches sur l'évidence des vérites geometriques, with a Projet de nouveaux éléments de géometrie, 1773. Quesnay's Eloge was pronounced in the Academy of Sciences by Grandjean de Fouchy (see the Recueil of that Academy, 1774, p. 134). See also F.J. Marmontel, Mémoires; Mémoires de Mme. du Hausset; H. Higgs, The Physiocrats (London, 1897).
The influence of Chinese ideas and concepts on Quesnay should not be forgotten: in his lifetime he was known as the French Confucius. 1

2008-04-13T08:02:00.001-07:00

Constitution
The Constitution declares the "underlying law" — that is, the separate common law of Papua New Guinea — to consist of the Constitution, "customary law" derived from the "custom" of the various peoples of Papua New Guinea, and the common law of England as it stood at the date of Papua New Guinea's independence on 16 September 1975. That is to say, decisions of the High Court of Australia, the Judicial Committee of the Imperial Privy Council, not being part of the common law of England, and indeed of the pre-independence courts of Papua New Guinea itself are not part of Papua New Guinea law; but decisions of the House of Lords, the English Court of Appeal, the English Queens Bench Division and other English courts up until Papua New Guinea's independence are. This reflected the fact that Papua New Guinea — at least, Papua, the former British New Guinea — was in law a British possession albeit administered by Australia as an External Territory.
The "customary law" portion of the "underlying law" was contemplated by the original framers of the Constitution as deriving from the regional customs of the country in the same way as the common law of England (that law which was "common" to the whole country) had done prior to 1189, deemed to be "time immemorial" in English law. In practice the courts have found great difficulty in applying traditional custom in a modern legal system and the development of the customary law according to indigenous Melanesian conceptions of justice and equity has been less thorough than may have been anticipated in 1975. In 2000 the National Parliament enacted the Underlying Law Act 2000 which purports to mandate greater attention by the courts to custom and the development of customary law as an important component of the underlying law. Thus far the statute appears not to have effected such a result.

"Underlying law"
Statute law is very largely adopted from overseas jurisdictions. For example, the Criminal Code is adopted from Queensland; the Rules of Court are those of New South Wales; the Matrimonial Causes Act is the extremely old English statute of 1857 which had been in force in the Australian States before the federal Divorce Act, 1964; the Companies Act ch 146 was substantially the English Companies Act, 1948; it was replaced by the Companies Act, 1997, adopted from New Zealand.

Statutes
The judicial system consists of village magistrates courts, district courts in urban centres presided over by stipendiary magistrates, the National Court which is the superior trial court and the Supreme Court which is functionally an appellate division of the National Court: it is not separately constituted, its Chief Justice is also the Chief Justice of the National Court and its bench consists of National Court judges sitting as an ad hoc appellate tribunal. The Supreme Court is the final court of appeal: an appeal lay from the pre-independence Supreme Court to the High Court of Australia (but not directly to the Privy Council); this was abolished at independence. The Supreme Court also has jurisdiction under the Constitution to give advisory opinions, called "references," on the constitutionality of legislation. In addition to its function as a trial court, the National Court also functions as a court of disputed returns hearing "Electoral Petitions" by unsuccessful candidates for Parliament; Leadership Tribunals hearing cases of alleged misconduct in office referred by the Ombudsman Commission consist of one National Court judge and two District Court magistrates.
The Supreme Court has a special responsibility for developing the "underlying law," ie the common law of Papua New Guinea, having resort to those rules of local custom in various regions of the country which may be taken to be common to the whole country. The responsibility has been given additional express warrant in the Underlying Law Act, 2000 which purports to mandate greater attention by the courts to custom and the development of customary law as an important component of the underlying law. In practice the courts have found great difficulty in applying the vastly differing custom of the many traditional societies of the country in a modern legal system and the development of the customary law according to indigenous Melanesian conceptions of justice and equity has been less thorough than may have been anticipated in 1975; the Underlying Law Act does not yet appear to have had significant effect.
Advocacy follows the conventions of the English common law world and is adversarial rather than inquisitorial; German law was wholly displaced by Anglo-Australian law in the former German New Guinea after 1914 when Australia seized the Territory and there are no traces of it in modern Papua New Guinea.
The current Chief Justice of Papua New Guinea is the Honourable Sir Mari Kapi.

The "Rooney Affair": An early crisis in relations between the executive and judiciary
Weisbrot, D., Paliwala, A. and Sawyerr, A. Law and Social Change in Papua New Guinea (Sydney, 1982)

2008-04-12T09:55:00.001-07:00

In topography, a summit is a point on a surface which is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. Mathematically speaking, a summit is a local maximum in elevation.
The term "summit" is generally only used for a mountain peak with some significant amount of topographic prominence or topographic isolation (distance from the nearest point of higher elevation); for example, a boulder next to the main summit of a mountain is not considered a summit. Summits near a higher peak, with some prominence or isolation, but not reaching a certain cutoff value for these quantities, are often considered subsummits (or subpeaks) of the higher peak, and are considered as part of the same mountain.
A pyramidal peak is an exaggerated form produced by ice erosion of a mountain top.

2008-04-11T09:38:00.001-07:00

Mount Stromlo Observatory (MSO) located just outside of Canberra, Australia, is part of the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Australian National University (ANU).

History
Mount Stromlo Observatory has been at the forefront of astrophysical research.
The MACHO project detected gravitational lensing of Magellanic Cloud stars by star mass objects in our Galaxy. This used the Great Melbourne Telescope and a mosaic of 4 2048 by 2048 pixel CCDs. At the time, this was the highest resolution digital camera ever built. THe camera was built by the Centre for Particle Astrophysics in California (CFPA). Observations began in July 1992 and the project concluded in December 1999. It made 200 billion stellar measurements. Data was processed by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
Brian Schmidt, who started work at Mount Stromlo in 1995, organised an international collaboration to study type Ia supernovae. This was called the High-z Supernova Search Team. This found 30 supernovae type Ia in two years. SN1995K had a redshift of +0.478 and SN1997ff had 1.7z. The conclusion was that the Universe expansion is accelerating, contrary to expectations. This discovery was Science Magazine's breakthrough of the year for 1998.

Research
A new rapid survey telescope, SkyMapper, is under construction. SkyMapper will reside at the ANU's other observatory (Siding Spring) and operated remotely from Mount Stromlo.

2008-04-10T09:19:00.001-07:00

The Persian Garden (Persian باغ ایرانی) refers to a tradition and style of garden design which originated in Persia and which influenced the design of gardens throughout the larger region. The Taj Mahal is one of the largest Persian gardens of the world.

History
The origin of Persian gardens may date back as far as 4000 BCE; the decorated pottery of that time displays the typical cross plan of the Persian garden. The outline of Cyrus the Great's garden, built around 500 BCE, is still viewable today.
During the reign of the Sassanids (third to seventh century CE), and under the influence of Zoroastrianism, the presence of water in art grew increasingly important. This trend manifested itself in garden design with greater emphasis placed on fountains and ponds in gardens.
During the Arab occupation the aesthetic aspect of the garden increased in importance, overtaking the utility of the garden. During this time the aesthetic rules by which the garden is governed grew in importance. An example of this is the chahar bagh (چهارباغ), a form of garden which attempts to emulate Eden, having four rivers and four quadrants, representing the world. The design sometimes involves one axis being longer than the other and the creation of water channels running through each of the four gardens to connect to a central pool.
The invasion of Persia by the Mongols in the thirteenth century saw a new emphasis on highly ornate structure within the garden, examples of which include peonies and chrysanthemums. The Mongol empire then carried on a Persian garden tradition in other parts of their empire (notably India).
Babur introduced the Persian garden to India; the now unkempt Aram Bagh garden in Agra was the first of many Persian gardens he created. The Persian concept of an ideal, paradise-like garden is perfectly embodied in the Taj Mahal.
The Safavid Dynasty (seventeenth to eighteenth century) built and developed grand and epic layouts that went beyond being a simple extension to a palace and became an integral aesthetic and functional part of it. In the following centuries European garden design began to influence Persia, particularly the design of France and secondarily that of Russia and the United Kingdom. Western influences led to changes in the use of water and the species used in bedding.
The traditional forms and style are still used among the population of Iran. They are also be found in historic sites, museums and affixed to the houses of the rich.

History
Sunlight and its effects were an important factor of structural design in Persian gardens. Textures and shapes were specifically chosen by architects to harness the light.
Due to the latitudinal position of Iran, shade is also very important in the garden, without which it could not be a usable area. Trees and trellises largely feature as biotic shade; pavilions and walls are also structurally prominent in blocking the sun.
Also related to the heat is the importance of water in the gardens. A form of underground tunnel, below the water table, called a Qanat is used to irrigate the garden and its environs. Well-like structures then connect to the Qanat, enabling the drawing of water.
Alternatively, an animal driven Persian well would be used to draw water to the surface. Such wheel systems could also be used to move water around surface water systems, such as those which exist in the chahar bagh style. Trees were often planted in a ditch called a Jub, which prevented water evaporation and allowed the water to quickly access the tree roots.
The Persian style often attempts to integrate that which is "indoors" with the "outdoors". This is often achieved through the connection of a surrounding garden, with an inner courtyard. Designers often placed architectural elements such as vaulted arches between the outer and interior areas to open up the divide between them.

Elements of the Persian garden
The oldest representational descriptions and illustrations of Iranian gardens come from travelers who reached Iran from lands to the west. These accounts include Ibn Battuta in the fourteenth century, Ruy Gonzáles de Clavijo in the fifteenth century and Engelbert Kaempfer in the seventeenth century. Battuta and Clavijo make only passing references to gardens and do not describe their design.
Kaempfer made careful drawings and converted them into detailed engravings after his return to Europe. They show chahar bagh type gardens with the following features: an enclosing wall, rectangular pools, an internal network of canals, garden pavilions and lush planting. There are surviving examples of this garden type at Yazd (Dowlatabad) and at Kashan (Bagh-e Fin). The location of the gardens Kaempfer illustrated in Isfahan (city) can be identified.

Descriptions
The six primary styles of the Persian garden may be seen in the following table, which puts them in the context of their function and style. Gardens are not limited to a particular style, but often integrate different styles, or have areas with different functions and styles.

Styles

Main article: Hayat Hayat

Main article: Meidan Meidan

Main article: Charbagh Park
Like the other casual garden, the park, the Bagh emphasises the natural and green aspect of the Garden. Unlike the park it is a private area often affixed to houses and often consisting of lawns, trees, and ground plants. The waterways and pathways stand out less than in the more formal counterparts and are largely functional. The primary function of such areas is familial relaxation.

Bagh

Fin garden
Afif abad garden
Eram garden
Narenjestan-i Qavam garden
Taj Mahal
Shalamar Gardens (in Lahore & Kashmir)
Dowlat abad Garden
Shazdeh Garden See also

2008-04-09T09:37:00.001-07:00

This article concerns auto racing; motorcycles, horses, and dogs also race on dirt tracks.
Australia Canada New Zealand South Africa United Kingdom United States Dirt track racing is a type of auto racing performed on oval tracks. It began in the United States before World War I and became widespread during the 1920s and 30s. Two different types of racecars predominated—open wheel racers in the Northeast and West and stock cars in the South. The open wheel racers were built for racing, and the stock cars were ordinary automobiles modified to varying degrees.
Dirt track racing is the single most common form of auto racing in the United States. There are hundreds of local and regional racetracks throughout the nation: some estimates range as high as 1500. The sport is popular in Australia and Canada also. Many of the cars may also race on asphalt short tracks during the racing season.

The racetrack
Nearly all tracks are oval and less than a mile in length with most being 1/2 mile or less. The most common increments in the U.S. are 1/2 mile, 3/8 mile, 1/3 mile, 1/4 mile, and 1/8 mile. With the longer tracks, the racecars achieve higher speeds and the interval between cars increases. This decreases the chance of crashes but increases the damage and chance of injury when cars do crash.
The track surface may be composed of any soil, but most racers prefer a track with a clay base. The track operators usually try to keep the surface tacky and may sprinkle water on it if it begins to dry. Some operators build flat ovals, but many are highly banked.

North America

Main article: Dirt track racing in the UK. United Kingdom
In mainland Europe Long Tracks can be used on grass, or sand and can be up to 1000m long.

Rest of Europe
Each racetrack or sponsoring organization maintains a rule book outlining each class of racecar; including dimensions, engine size, equipment requirements, prohibitions, etc. The requirements for each class are usually coordinated with other racetracks and associations to allow for the widest available venue for each type of car. This coordination allows the drivers to enter many different racetracks, increasing their chances of winning; allows the racetrack to field as many cars as possible; lets the racing associations develop a series of race events; and promotes fan interest.
Many fans prefer one or the other of the different type cars. Open wheel fans say, "Real racecars don't have fenders." Stock car (shown right and above) fans point out that even minimal contact between open wheel racers usually disables both cars. In reality, both types of vehicles have weak and strong points. Open wheel racers are usually lighter and nimbler. Stock cars can push and shove their way to advancement.
Many tracks support both types of racer in their programs. Both types range from powerful V8 engines to small, still powerful, 4-cylinder engines. Some of the smaller open wheel racers even have classes for single-cylinder powerplants. Depending on the class, the cars may have wings to aid in handling at higher speeds.

The race vehicle
Open wheel cars are generally manufactured with tubular frames and a body purchased for that particular class. Classes include:
The sanctioning bodies include:

Dwarf (5/8 replicas of 1928 to 1948 coupes and sedans)
Kart (Go Kart)
Sprint
Midget (Speedcar)
Quarter Midget
USAC - The United States Automobile Club
World of Outlaws Sprint cars
National Sprint Tour Sprint cars Open wheel cars
Modified cars are a hybrid of open wheel cars and stock cars - this class of car has the racing characteristics of a stock with the rear wheels covered by fenders and the front wheels open. There are sanctioning bodies that control the rules for this class at most tracks. Sanctioning bodies include:

Advance Auto Parts Super Dirt Series
IMCA (International Motor Contest Association)
UMP (United Midwestern Promoters)
USRA (United States Racing Association)
USMTS (United States Modified Touring Series)
WISSOTA (WISSOTA Promoters' Association)
DTRA (Dirt Track Racing Association) Modified cars
Stock cars are generally automobiles manufactured by the major automakers with certain modifications as allowed for each class. There are several general types:

Non-production cars
Today's current dirt super late models feature steel constructed tube frame chassis with aluminum bodies that give them a sleek aerodynamic appearance of a stock appearing race car but there is nothing stock about these 2300 pound machines. The cars are powered by an 800 horsepower motor than can turn in excess of 9,000 RPMs. The engines are based on V-8 Chevrolet, Ford and MOPAR power plants.
Most racing series and special events offer three motor options with the use of weight breaks to create an even playing field:

Open Motor - There is no displacement limit with this type of motor. Most Open motors exceed 400 cubic inches but the 380 small block is a common open motor. These motors utilize aluminum blocks and heads and often have specially welded cams. The cars which run this motor option must weigh at least 2300 lbs.
Spec Motor (Big 10 Motor) - the two most popular are the SAS (Southern All Stars) and SURR (Southern United Professional Racing) Spec motors are built to the series' specifications. The motor can be either all steel all aluminum or a combination of both. Cars using this motor option weigh in at 2200 pounds and run a SAS or SUPR 10 or 12 inch spoiler. Spec Motors CANNOT exceed 358 Cubic Inches.
All Steel Motor - steel block and heads, a maximum of 362 cubic inches, and weigh in at either 2200 or 2150 pounds depending on the series. Cars with an all steel motor must run a 8 or 10 inch spoiler. Super late Model
Late Model Stocks have the same body rules as Super Late Models. The main difference in the two classes is the motor options, especially displacement.
Engine Options: 1. Engines: Chevrolet 350, Chrysler 360, Ford 351 engines. Must be all steel except intake. 2. Engine maximum displacement of 362 cubic inches. 3. Engines cannot be modified in anyway except for aftermarket carburetor, intake manifold and exhaust headers.
These engines are sealed at the intake manifold, cylinder head, front cover, and oil pan with special twist off bolts. Crate engines must not be altered, modified, of changed in any way from factory specification.
Many tracks have variations on these rules in which the standard spec motor is the only option; however, the above rules are becoming more popular with the advent of the crate motor.

Late Model Stock
Use GM or Ford sealed crate motors and have two of there own national touring series: the Stormpay.com Dirt Late Model Series and the Fastrak Crate Late Model Series. Currently, Chrysler has no plans to enter the Stormpay.com or Fastrak Late Model Series.

Crate Late Models
There are literally hundreds of additional unsanctioned regional and national special events run through out the year.
Other Major yearly events include:

World of Outlaws
Lucas Oil Late Model Dirt Series
O'Reilly Auto Parts Southern All Stars
World Dirt Racing League
United Midwestern Promoters
Advance Auto Parts Super Dirt Series
Southern Regional Racing Seres
Advanced Auto Parts Thunder Series
O Reilly Auto Parts Southern United Professional Racing
World 100
Ice Bowl (disambiguation)Ice Bowl
Dart Winter Nationals
The Show me 100
The Magnolia State 100
The Dirt Track World Championship
The Topless 100
The Hillbilly 100 (claims to be the longest running event)
Super Dirt Week
Eastern States Weekend Popular Racing Series
These cars are modified manufactured automobiles. There is a high degree of variability between classes of modified cars. The lowest divisions of modified production cars may be completely stock except for having their interior or windshields removed. The highest divisions of modified production cars may have only a few original stock parts, and may be nearly as fast as late model racecars. Most cars have their glass windshields removed and their interiors stripped out. The original seat may be allowed to be used in the lowest classes, but a racing seat and roll cage is required to be installed in higher divisions. Other safety and performance features are added to higher division cars. The engines in lower divisions are completely stock, and higher divisions are highly modified and enhanced. Most modified production cars use full exhaust systems. Engines vary from unmodified 4 cylinders to highly modified V8. Cars in lower divisions use stock tires, and higher division cars use purpose-built specified racing tires.
Common names of modified production car divisions:

Factory Stocks
Mini Stocks
Hornets
Bombers
Cruisers
Hobby Stocks
Stock Cars
Pure Streets
Pure Stocks
Street Stocks
Super Streets
Super Stocks
Pro Stocks Modified production cars
These cars are automobiles just as driven on the street; including the original interiors. The engines may be modified as allowed under different rules:

Saloon

Saloon Unmodified production cars

Main article: Track racing Motorcycles
Many "used up" race vehicles types that were left in barns to rust are being restored to their former glory. The restored race vehicles are being displayed at car shows and sometimes raced. Cars that compete in vintage racing events are from the late 19th century to historic cars from a few years ago. There are more than 170 racing events in North America, and thousands of other vintage events sanctioned by hundreds of clubs.

Vintage Racing
The typical race program usually involves a number of classes, and many tracks offer both open wheel and stock car racing. There is a wide variety of event formats.

The race program
A qualifying session may happen before the start of the event. The session determines either the starting positions in the heat races or the starting positions in the feature event. There are other methods of selecting the starting positions in the heats or feature events, including random drawings and season points standings.

Qualifying
Preliminary races for each class, called heat races, frequently open the schedule. The heat races may determine the starting race position in the main events and usually earn season championship points. The heat races are shorter than the feature races, and not as many cars race in each heat. There are numerous formats for qualifying for the feature event.
In "Progressive racing", the starting lineup for the heat races are randomly selected, and a pre-determined number of drivers qualify for the main event directly from each heat race.
There may be a "trophy dash" during the program to allow the heat winners or the season's top points-getters to compete for a trophy or reward. If the reward is monetary, the race may be called a "dash for the cash" or a "run for the money". Some tracks also use the qualifying dash in place of a heat race to determine where the top cars will start in the A feature.

Heat races
There may be a semi-feature where unqualified racers may race their way into the remaining open starting positions in the feature event. Depending on the number of cars in each class, there may be more than one feature race (C feature; 3rd place heat winners, B feature; 2nd place heat winners, etc.) with the winners moving up through to the main feature (A feature). Other tracks utilize multiple semi-features with a predetermined number of cars from each semi-feature qualifying for the feature. Cars that qualify through the semi-feature usually start in the back of the feature in the order that they finished in the semi-feature.

Semi-Feature/B Main
The A feature or main feature is held for each division. It is usually the longest race in the program. The starting positions may be determined by the season's point standings, or by a combination of the heat/trophy dash/semi-feature finishing positions. Points, a trophy, and frequently a purse are awarded according to finishing position.

Feature/Main
Many tracks have other special events. Occasionally, a track will sponsor a "powder-puff" race to allow women the opportunity to drive the racecars for a few laps of racing. If enough women drivers express an interest in a separate event for themselves, the track operator may put the powder puff into its regular race schedule; otherwise, most serious women racers compete in the same events as the men.
From time to time, the track may have a "bonus points" race to attract racers and fans from competing tracks. Many times the track operators also promise a larger purse for winning these races.
Also, many tracks contract with a touring racing association to schedule an association sanctioned event. The racers in these events earn points for ranking in the association. The associations also usually require a guaranteed purse from the tracks for the winners of sanctioned events.
Many tracks also have a "run-what-you-brung" contest (also "Spectator class/division"). The event features two drivers from the stands who, after signing waivers, can run their personal automobiles against each other in a one-on-one 1 or 2 lap shootout.

Championships

National Dirt Late Model Hall of Fame
Dirt track racing in the United States

2008-04-08T08:30:00.001-07:00

The Richelieu River is a river in Quebec, Canada. It flows from Lake Champlain about 171 km (106 miles) north, ending into the St. Lawrence River at Sorel. It has a drainage basin of 23,400 km² (9035 miles²), of which 19,600 km² (7570 miles²) are in the United States, and a mean discharge of 330 m³/s (430 yd³/s). St. Jean, Chambly, and Sorel are important communities on its route.
The French explorer Samuel de Champlain was the first European to reach the mouth of the river in 1609. Already an important pathway for the Iroquois Indians, it soon became one for French traders as well. They built forts along its length: Fort Richelieu at its mouth, Fort St. Louis (or Chambly), Fort Ste. Thérese and Fort St. Jean on the way, and Fort Ste. Anne on the Isle La Motte in Lake Champlain near its source. Some early journals and maps refer to the lower river as the Sorel River. Formerly also called Iroquois River, its French name comes from Fort Richelieu, which in turn was named in memory of Cardinal Richelieu (1585-1642).
The Chambly Canal (9 locks) permits boats to bypass the rapids at St-Jean-sur-Richelieu and Chambly.The Piste cyclable du Canal-de-Chambly is a 20 km bicycle path that follows the towpath along the canal. The bike path is part of Quebec's Route Verte bicycle path network. The canal is a National Historic Site of Canada and is operated by Parks Canada.
The Champlain Canal and Lake Champlain form the U.S. portion of the Lakes to Locks Passage, linking with the Hudson River and allowing navigation using the Richelieu between the St. Lawrence River and New York City and the Erie Canal.