1.
E. M. Forster
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Edward Morgan Forster OM CH, known as E. M. Forster, was an English novelist, short story writer, essayist and librettist. Many of his novels examined class difference and hypocrisy in early 20th-century British society and his novel A Passage to India brought him his greatest success. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 16 different years, Forster was born into an Anglo-Irish and Welsh middle-class family at 6 Melcombe Place, Dorset Square, London NW1, in a building that no longer exists. He was the child of Alice Clara Lily and Edward Morgan Llewellyn Forster. His name was registered as Henry Morgan Forster, but at his baptism he was accidentally named Edward Morgan Forster. To distinguish him from his father, he was always called Morgan and his father died of tuberculosis on 30 October 1880, before Morgans second birthday. In 1883, Forster and his moved to Rooksnest, near Stevenage. This house served as a model for Howards End, because he had fond memories of his childhood there, among Forsters ancestors were members of the Clapham Sect, a social reform group within the Church of England. He inherited £8,000 from his paternal great-aunt Marianne Thornton, the money was enough to live on and enabled him to become a writer. He attended Tonbridge School in Kent, as a day boy, the theatre at the school has been named in his honour. At Kings College, Cambridge, between 1897 and 1901, he became a member of a society known as the Apostles. They met in secret, and discussed their work on, many of its members went on to constitute what came to be known as the Bloomsbury Group, of which Forster was a peripheral member in the 1910s and 1920s. There is a recreation of Forsters Cambridge at the beginning of The Longest Journey. The Schlegel sisters of Howards End are based to some degree on Vanessa, after leaving university, he travelled in continental Europe with his mother. They moved to Weybridge, Surrey where he wrote all six of his novels, in 1914, he visited Egypt, Germany and India with the classicist Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson, by which time he had written all but one of his novels. In the First World War, as an objector, Forster volunteered for the International Red Cross. Forster spent a spell in India in the early 1920s as the private secretary to Tukojirao III. The Hill of Devi is his account of this period
2.
Judi Dench
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Dame Judith Olivia Dench CH DBE FRSA, known as Judi Dench, is an English actress and author. Dench made her debut in 1957 with the Old Vic Company. Over the following few years she performed in several of Shakespeares plays in such roles as Ophelia in Hamlet, Juliet in Romeo and Juliet and Lady Macbeth in Macbeth. Although most of her work during this period was in theatre, she branched into film work. She drew strong reviews for her role in the musical Cabaret in 1968. Over the next two decades, Dench established herself as one of the most significant British theatre performers, working for the National Theatre Company and the Royal Shakespeare Company. She achieved success in television during this period, in the series A Fine Romance from 1981 until 1984 and she has also received the BAFTA Fellowship and the Special Olivier Award. In June 2011, she received a fellowship from the British Film Institute, Dench is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Dench was born in Heworth, North Riding of Yorkshire and her mother, Eleanora Olive, was born in Dublin, Ireland. Her father, Reginald Arthur Dench, a doctor, was born in Dorset, England, and later moved to Dublin and he met Denchs mother while he was studying medicine at Trinity College, Dublin. Dench attended The Mount School, a Quaker independent secondary school in York and her brothers, one of whom was actor Jeffery Dench, were born in Tyldesley, Lancashire. Her niece, Emma Dench, is a Roman historian and professor previously at Birkbeck, University of London, and currently at Harvard University. In Britain, Dench has developed a reputation as one of the greatest actresses of the period, primarily through her work in theatre. She has more than once been named one in polls for Britains best actor. Through her parents, Dench had regular contact with the theatre and her father, a physician, was also the GP for the York theatre, and her mother was its wardrobe mistress. Actors often stayed in the Dench household, during these years, Judi Dench was involved on a non-professional basis in the first three productions of the modern revival of the York Mystery Plays in the 1950s. In 1957, in one of the last productions in which she appeared during this period, she played the role of the Virgin Mary, performed on a fixed stage in the Museum Gardens. Though she initially trained as a set designer, she became interested in school as her brother Jeff attended the Central School of Speech
3.
Helena Bonham Carter
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Helena Bonham Carter, CBE is an English actress. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role as Kate Croy in The Wings of the Dove. For her role as Queen Elizabeth in The Kings Speech, she was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and she also won the 2010 International Emmy Award for Best Actress for her role as British author Enid Blyton in the TV film Enid. Bonham Carter began her career playing the title character in Lady Jane. Her other television films include A Pattern of Roses, Live from Baghdad, Toast, Bonham Carter was born in Islington, London. C. Her mother, Elena, is a psychotherapist who is of mostly Jewish background and her paternal grandmother was politician and feminist icon Violet Asquith, daughter of H. H. Asquith, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom during the first half of World War I. Bonham Carter is the youngest of three children, with two brothers, Edward and Thomas and they were brought up in Golders Green and she was educated at South Hampstead High School, and completed her A-levels at Westminster School. When Bonham Carter was five, her mother had a nervous breakdown. Five years after her mothers recovery, her father was diagnosed with acoustic neuroma and he suffered complications during an operation to remove the tumour which led to a stroke that left him half-paralysed and using a wheelchair. With her brothers at college, Bonham Carter was left to help her mother cope and she later studied her fathers movements and mannerisms for her role in The Theory of Flight. Bonham Carter, who has no formal acting training, entered the field winning a national writing contest and she made her professional acting début at the age of 16 in a television commercial. She also had a part in a minor TV film, A Pattern of Roses and her first lead film role was as Lady Jane Grey in Lady Jane, which was given mixed reviews by critics. Her breakthrough role was Lucy Honeychurch in A Room with a View, the role went to Emily Watson, who was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance. In 1994, Bonham Carter appeared in a sequence during the second series of the British sitcom Absolutely Fabulous, as Edina Monsoons daughter Saffron. Throughout the series, references were made to Saffrons resemblance to Bonham Carter and her early films led to her being typecast as a corset queen, and English rose, playing pre- and early 20th century characters, particularly in Merchant-Ivory films. She played Olivia in Trevor Nunns film version of Twelfth Night in 1996, Bonham Carter speaks French fluently, and starred in a 1996 French film Portraits chinois. In August 2001, she was featured in Maxim, Bonham Carter was a member of the 2006 Cannes Film Festival jury that unanimously selected The Wind That Shakes the Barley as best film. In May 2006, Bonham Carter launched her own line, The Pantaloonies
4.
Daniel Day-Lewis
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Sir Daniel Michael Blake Day-Lewis is an English actor who holds both British and Irish citizenship. Born and raised in London, he excelled on stage at the National Youth Theatre, before being accepted at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, which he attended for three years. Despite his traditional training at the Bristol Old Vic, he is considered to be a method actor, known for his constant devotion to. He often remains completely in character for the duration of the schedules of his films. He is one of the most selective actors in the industry, having starred in only five films since 1998. Protective of his life, he rarely gives interviews and makes very few public appearances. He starred in My Beautiful Laundrette, his first critically acclaimed role and he then assumed leading man status with The Unbearable Lightness of Being. He was also nominated in category for In the Name of the Father. He has also won four BAFTA Awards for Best Actor, three Screen Actors Guild Awards and two Golden Globe Awards, in November 2012, Time named Day-Lewis the Worlds Greatest Actor. In June 2014, he received a knighthood at Buckingham Palace for services to drama, Day-Lewis was born in Kensington, London, the son of poet Cecil Day-Lewis and English actress Jill Balcon. Day-Lewiss mother was Jewish, and his maternal great-grandparents Jewish families emigrated to England from Latvia and his maternal grandfather, Sir Michael Balcon, was the head of Ealing Studios. Living in Greenwich, Day-Lewis found himself among tough South London children and he mastered the local accent and mannerisms and credits that as being his first convincing performance. Later in life, he has known to speak of himself as very much a disorderly character in his younger years, often in trouble for shoplifting. In 1968, Day-Lewiss parents, finding his behaviour to be too wild, at the school, he was introduced to his three most prominent interests, woodworking, acting, and fishing. The transfer led to his debut at the age of 14 in Sunday Bloody Sunday in which he played a vandal in an uncredited role. He described the experience as heaven, for getting paid £2 to vandalise expensive cars parked outside his local church, for a few weeks in 1972, he and his parents and sister lived at Lemmons, the north London home of Kingsley Amis and Elizabeth Jane Howard. Cecil Day-Lewis had cancer and Howard invited the family to Lemmons as a place they could use to rest, Cecil died there in May that year. Leaving Bedales in 1975, Day-Lewiss unruly attitude had diminished and he needed to make a career choice, although he had excelled on stage at the National Youth Theatre in London, he applied for a five-year apprenticeship as a cabinet-maker, but was rejected due to lack of experience
5.
Giacomo Puccini
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Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini was an Italian opera composer who has been called the greatest composer of Italian opera after Verdi. Puccinis early work was rooted in traditional late-19th-century romantic Italian opera, later, he successfully developed his work in the realistic verismo style, of which he became one of the leading exponents. Puccinis most renowned works are La bohème, Tosca, and Madama Butterfly, Puccini was born Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini in Lucca in Tuscany, in 1858. He was one of nine children of Michele Puccini and Albina Magi, the Puccini family was established in Lucca as a local musical dynasty by Puccinis great-great grandfather – also named Giacomo. This first Giacomo Puccini was maestro di cappella of the Cattedrale di San Martino in Lucca and he was succeeded in this position by his son, Antonio Puccini, and then by Antonios son Domenico, and Domenicos son Michele. Each of these men studied music at Bologna, and some additional musical studies elsewhere. Domenico Puccini studied for a time under Giovanni Paisiello, each composed music for the church. In addition, Domenico composed several operas, and Michele composed one opera, Puccinis father Michele enjoyed a reputation throughout northern Italy, and his funeral was an occasion of public mourning, at which the then-famed composer Giovanni Pacini conducted a Requiem. However, when Michele Puccini died in 1864, his son Giacomo was only six years old, as a child, he nevertheless participated in the musical life of the Cattedrale di San Martino, as a member of the boys choir and later as a substitute organist. Puccini was given an education at the seminary of San Michele in Lucca. One of Puccinis uncles, Fortunato Magi, supervised his musical education, Puccini got a diploma from the Pacini School of Music in Lucca in 1880, having studied there with his uncle Fortunato, and later with Carlo Angeloni, who had also instructed Alfredo Catalani. Puccini studied at the conservatory for three years, sharing a room with Pietro Mascagni, in 1880, at the age of 21, Puccini composed his Mass, which marks the culmination of his familys long association with church music in his native Lucca. Puccini wrote a piece called the Capriccio sinfonica as a thesis composition for the Milan Conservatory. Puccinis teachers Ponchielli and Bazzini were impressed by the work, and it was performed at a student concert at the conservatory on 14 July 1883, conducted by Franco Faccio. Puccinis work was reviewed in the Milanese publication Perseveranza. After the premiere of the Capriccio sinfonica, Ponchielli and Puccini discussed the possibility that Puccinis next work might be an opera, Ponchielli invited Puccini to stay at his villa, where Puccini was introduced to another young man named Fernando Fontana. Puccini and Fontana agreed to collaborate on an opera, for which Fontana would provide the libretto, the work, Le Villi, was entered into a competition sponsored by the Sozogno music publishing company in 1883. Although it did not win, Le Villi was later staged at the Teatro Dal Verme, G. Ricordi & Co. music publishers assisted with the premier by printing the libretto without charge
6.
United States dollar
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The United States dollar is the official currency of the United States and its insular territories per the United States Constitution. It is divided into 100 smaller cent units, the circulating paper money consists of Federal Reserve Notes that are denominated in United States dollars. The U. S. dollar was originally commodity money of silver as enacted by the Coinage Act of 1792 which determined the dollar to be 371 4/16 grain pure or 416 grain standard silver, the currency most used in international transactions, it is the worlds primary reserve currency. Several countries use it as their currency, and in many others it is the de facto currency. Besides the United States, it is used as the sole currency in two British Overseas Territories in the Caribbean, the British Virgin Islands and Turks and Caicos Islands. A few countries use the Federal Reserve Notes for paper money, while the country mints its own coins, or also accepts U. S. coins that can be used as payment in U. S. dollars. After Nixon shock of 1971, USD became fiat currency, Article I, Section 8 of the U. S. Constitution provides that the Congress has the power To coin money, laws implementing this power are currently codified at 31 U. S. C. Section 5112 prescribes the forms in which the United States dollars should be issued and these coins are both designated in Section 5112 as legal tender in payment of debts. The Sacagawea dollar is one example of the copper alloy dollar, the pure silver dollar is known as the American Silver Eagle. Section 5112 also provides for the minting and issuance of other coins and these other coins are more fully described in Coins of the United States dollar. The Constitution provides that a regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and that provision of the Constitution is made specific by Section 331 of Title 31 of the United States Code. The sums of money reported in the Statements are currently being expressed in U. S. dollars, the U. S. dollar may therefore be described as the unit of account of the United States. The word dollar is one of the words in the first paragraph of Section 9 of Article I of the Constitution, there, dollars is a reference to the Spanish milled dollar, a coin that had a monetary value of 8 Spanish units of currency, or reales. In 1792 the U. S. Congress passed a Coinage Act, Section 20 of the act provided, That the money of account of the United States shall be expressed in dollars, or units. And that all accounts in the offices and all proceedings in the courts of the United States shall be kept and had in conformity to this regulation. In other words, this act designated the United States dollar as the unit of currency of the United States, unlike the Spanish milled dollar the U. S. dollar is based upon a decimal system of values. Both one-dollar coins and notes are produced today, although the form is significantly more common
7.
Edwardian era
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The death of Queen Victoria in January 1901 marked the end of the Victorian era. The new king Edward VII was already the leader of an elite that set a style influenced by the art. The Liberals returned to power in 1906 and made significant reforms, below the upper class, the era was marked by significant shifts in politics among sections of society that had been largely excluded from wielding power in the past, such as common labourers. The Edwardian period is sometimes imagined as a golden age of long summer afternoons and garden parties. This perception was created in the 1920s and later by those who remembered the Edwardian age with nostalgia, the Edwardian age was also seen as a mediocre period of pleasure between the great achievements of the preceding Victorian age and the catastrophe of the following war. Recent assessments emphasise the differences between the wealthy and the poor during the Edwardian era and describe the age as heralding great changes in political and social life. Robert Tressells popular novel The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists is an example of the eras social critique. Despite this, this type of perception has been challenged more recently by modern historians, the British historian Lawrence James has argued that, during the early 20th century, the British felt increasingly threatened by rival powers such as Germany, Russia, and the United States. There was a political awareness of the working class, leading to a rise in trade unions. The aristocracy remained in control of top government offices, the Conservatives – at the time called Unionists – were dominant from the 1890s to 1906. The party had many strengths, appealing to voters supportive of imperialism, tariffs, the Church of England, a powerful Royal Navy, and traditional hierarchical society. There was a powerful leadership base in the aristocracy and landed gentry in rural England, plus strong support from the Church of England. Historians have used election returns to demonstrate that Conservatives did surprisingly well in working-class districts and they had an appeal as well to the better-off element of traditional working class Britons in the larger cities. Nevertheless, the weaknesses were accumulating, and proved so overwhelming in 1906 that they did not return to power until 1922. The Conservative Party was losing its drive and enthusiasm, especially after the retirement of the charismatic Joseph Chamberlain, there was a bitter split on tariff reform, that drove many of the free traders over to the Liberal camp. Tariff reform was an issue that the Conservative leadership inexplicably clung to. Support among the top tier of the class, and in lower middle class weakened. The 1906 election was a landslide for the opposition, which saw its total vote jump 25 percent, the Liberal Party lacked a unified ideological base in 1906
8.
59th Academy Awards
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During the ceremony, AMPAS presented Academy Awards in 23 categories honoring films released in 1986. The ceremony, televised in the United States by ABC, was produced by Samuel Goldwyn, Jr. actors Chevy Chase, Paul Hogan, and Goldie Hawn co-hosted the show. Hawn hosted the gala for the time, having previously been a co-host of the 48th ceremony held in 1976. Meanwhile, this was Chase and Hogans first Oscars hosting stint, eight days earlier, in a ceremony held at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California on March 22, the Academy Awards for Technical Achievement were presented by host Catherine Hicks. Platoon won four awards including Best Picture, platoon and A Room with a View led all nominees with eight each. The winners were announced during the ceremony on March 30,1987. Marlee Matlin was the first deaf performer to win an Oscar, artie Shaw, Time Is All Youve Got and Down and Out in Americas joint win in the Best Documentary Feature category marked the fourth occurrence of a tie in Oscar history. Winners are listed first, highlighted in boldface and indicated with a double dagger, ralph Bellamy Steven Spielberg The following individuals presented awards or performed musical numbers. Determined to revive interest surrounding the awards and reverse declining ratings, actor Robin Williams was initially named a co-host, but he was forced to withdraw from emceeing duties due to his commitment toward his role in the upcoming film Good Morning, Vietnam. One of the biggest priorities for Goldwyn was to shorten the length of the show to at least three hours or less, in view of his goal, he told reporters regarding winners acceptance speeches, We are actually going to give them 45 seconds. The light will start blinking at 45 seconds and go red at 55 seconds, after one minute we will either cut to a commercial or go to something else. Weve also asked multiple winners to flip a coin and pick a spokesman, although Goldwyn attempted to move the Documentary and Short Film Categories to a separate ceremony from the broadcast, the AMPAS Board of Governors refused to do so. Several other people were involved with the production of the ceremony, oscar-winning costume designer Theoni V. Aldredge was hired as fashion consultant for the awards ceremony and supervised a fashion show segment showcasing the five nominees for Best Costume Design. Lionel Newman served as director and conductor for the ceremony. Actors Dom DeLuise, Pat Morita, and Telly Savalas performed the song Fugue for Tinhorns from the musical Guys and Dolls at the start of the ceremony. At the time of the announcement on February 11, the combined gross of the five Best Picture nominees at the US box office was $119 million with an average of $23.9 million. Platoon was the highest earner among the Best Picture nominees with $39.3 million in the box office receipts. The film was followed by Hannah and Her Sisters, Children of a Lesser God, A Room with a View, of the 50 grossing movies of the year,55 nominations went to 18 films on the list
9.
Academy Awards
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The various category winners are awarded a copy of a golden statuette, officially called the Academy Award of Merit, which has become commonly known by its nickname Oscar. The awards, first presented in 1929 at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, are overseen by AMPAS, the awards ceremony was first broadcast on radio in 1930 and televised for the first time in 1953. It is now live in more than 200 countries and can be streamed live online. The Academy Awards ceremony is the oldest worldwide entertainment awards ceremony and its equivalents – the Emmy Awards for television, the Tony Awards for theater, and the Grammy Awards for music and recording – are modeled after the Academy Awards. The 89th Academy Awards ceremony, honoring the best films of 2016, were held on February 26,2017, at the Dolby Theatre, in Los Angeles, the ceremony was hosted by Jimmy Kimmel and was broadcast on ABC. A total of 3,048 Oscars have been awarded from the inception of the award through the 88th, the first Academy Awards presentation was held on May 16,1929, at a private dinner function at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel with an audience of about 270 people. The post-awards party was held at the Mayfair Hotel, the cost of guest tickets for that nights ceremony was $5. Fifteen statuettes were awarded, honoring artists, directors and other participants in the industry of the time. The ceremony ran for 15 minutes, winners were announced to media three months earlier, however, that was changed for the second ceremony in 1930. Since then, for the rest of the first decade, the results were given to newspapers for publication at 11,00 pm on the night of the awards. The first Best Actor awarded was Emil Jannings, for his performances in The Last Command and he had to return to Europe before the ceremony, so the Academy agreed to give him the prize earlier, this made him the first Academy Award winner in history. With the fourth ceremony, however, the system changed, for the first six ceremonies, the eligibility period spanned two calendar years. At the 29th ceremony, held on March 27,1957, until then, foreign-language films had been honored with the Special Achievement Award. The 74th Academy Awards, held in 2002, presented the first Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, since 1973, all Academy Awards ceremonies always end with the Academy Award for Best Picture. The Academy also awards Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting, see also § Awards of Merit categories The best known award is the Academy Award of Merit, more popularly known as the Oscar statuette. The five spokes represent the branches of the Academy, Actors, Writers, Directors, Producers. The model for the statuette is said to be Mexican actor Emilio El Indio Fernández, sculptor George Stanley sculpted Cedric Gibbons design. The statuettes presented at the ceremonies were gold-plated solid bronze
10.
Surrey
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Surrey is a county in the south east of England. It shares borders with Kent to the east, East Sussex to the south-east, West Sussex to the south, Hampshire to the west and south-west, Surrey County Council sits extraterritorially at Kingston upon Thames, administered as part of Greater London since 1965. With a resident population of 1.1 million, Surrey is the most densely populated and third most populated county in the South East region, after Kent, the London boroughs of Lambeth, Southwark, Wandsworth, and parts of Lewisham and Bromley were in Surrey until 1889. The boroughs of Croydon, Kingston upon Thames, Merton, Sutton and Richmond upon Thames south of the River Thames were part of Surrey until 1965, when they too were absorbed into Greater London. In the same year, the county was extended north of the Thames by the addition of Spelthorne, due to this expansion, modern Surrey also borders on the London boroughs of Hounslow and Hillingdon. It has the highest GDP per capita of any English county, Surrey is divided in two by the chalk ridge of the North Downs, running east-west. To the north of the Downs the land is mostly flat, the geology of this area is dominated by London Clay in the east, Bagshot Sands in the west and alluvial deposits along the rivers. Much of Surrey is in the Metropolitan Green Belt and it contains a good deal of mature woodland. Among its many notable beauty spots are Box Hill, Leith Hill, Frensham Ponds, Newlands Corner and Puttenham & Crooksbury Commons. Surrey is the most wooded county in England, with 22. 4% coverage compared to an average of 11. 8%. Box Hill has the oldest untouched area of woodland in the UK. Surrey also contains Englands principal concentration of lowland heath, on soils in the west of the county. Agriculture not being intensive, there are many commons and access lands, together with a network of footpaths and bridleways including the North Downs Way. Accordingly, Surrey provides much in the way of leisure activities. The highest elevation in Surrey is Leith Hill near Dorking and it is either 293,294 or 295 metres above sea level and is the second highest point in southeastern England after Walbury Hill 297 metres in West Berkshire. Surrey has a population of approximately 1.1 million people and its largest town is Guildford, with a population of 66,773, Woking comes a close second with 62,796. They are followed by Ewell with 39,994 people and Camberley with 30,155, towns of between 25,000 and 30,000 inhabitants are Ashford, Epsom, Farnham, Staines and Redhill. Guildford is the county town, although the county administration was moved to Newington in 1791
11.
Florence
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Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the Metropolitan City of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants, Florence was a centre of medieval European trade and finance and one of the wealthiest cities of the time. It is considered the birthplace of the Renaissance, and has called the Athens of the Middle Ages. A turbulent political history includes periods of rule by the powerful Medici family, from 1865 to 1871 the city was the capital of the recently established Kingdom of Italy. The Historic Centre of Florence attracts 13 million tourists each year and it was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1982. The city is noted for its culture, Renaissance art and architecture, the city also contains numerous museums and art galleries, such as the Uffizi Gallery and the Palazzo Pitti, and still exerts an influence in the fields of art, culture and politics. Due to Florences artistic and architectural heritage, it has been ranked by Forbes as one of the most beautiful cities in the world, in 2008, the city had the 17th highest average income in Italy. Florence originated as a Roman city, and later, after a period as a flourishing trading and banking medieval commune. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, it was politically, economically, and culturally one of the most important cities in Europe, the language spoken in the city during the 14th century was, and still is, accepted as the Italian language. Starting from the late Middle Ages, Florentine money—in the form of the gold florin—financed the development of all over Europe, from Britain to Bruges, to Lyon. Florentine bankers financed the English kings during the Hundred Years War and they similarly financed the papacy, including the construction of their provisional capital of Avignon and, after their return to Rome, the reconstruction and Renaissance embellishment of Rome. Florence was home to the Medici, one of European historys most important noble families, Lorenzo de Medici was considered a political and cultural mastermind of Italy in the late 15th century. Two members of the family were popes in the early 16th century, Leo X, catherine de Medici married king Henry II of France and, after his death in 1559, reigned as regent in France. Marie de Medici married Henry IV of France and gave birth to the future king Louis XIII, the Medici reigned as Grand Dukes of Tuscany, starting with Cosimo I de Medici in 1569 and ending with the death of Gian Gastone de Medici in 1737. The Etruscans initially formed in 200 BC the small settlement of Fiesole and it was built in the style of an army camp with the main streets, the cardo and the decumanus, intersecting at the present Piazza della Repubblica. Situated along the Via Cassia, the route between Rome and the north, and within the fertile valley of the Arno, the settlement quickly became an important commercial centre. Peace returned under Lombard rule in the 6th century, Florence was conquered by Charlemagne in 774 and became part of the Duchy of Tuscany, with Lucca as capital. The population began to again and commerce prospered
12.
Victorian era
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The Victorian era was the period of Queen Victorias reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities. Some scholars date the beginning of the period in terms of sensibilities, the era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwardian period. The later half of the Victorian age roughly coincided with the first part of the Belle Époque era of continental Europe, culturally there was a transition away from the rationalism of the Georgian period and toward romanticism and mysticism with regard to religion, social values, and arts. The end of the saw the Boer War. Domestically, the agenda was increasingly liberal with a number of shifts in the direction of political reform, industrial reform. Two especially important figures in period of British history are the prime ministers Benjamin Disraeli and William Gladstone. Disraeli, favoured by the queen, was a gregarious Conservative and his rival Gladstone, a Liberal distrusted by the Queen, served more terms and oversaw much of the overall legislative development of the era. The population of England and Wales almost doubled from 16.8 million in 1851 to 30.5 million in 1901, Scotlands population also rose rapidly, from 2.8 million in 1851 to 4.4 million in 1901. However, Irelands population decreased sharply, from 8.2 million in 1841 to less than 4.5 million in 1901, mostly due to the Great Famine. Between 1837 and 1901 about 15 million emigrants departed the UK permanently, in search of a life in the United States, Canada, South Africa, New Zealand, Australia. During the early part of the era, politics in the House of Commons involved battles between the two parties, the Whigs/Liberals and the Conservatives. These parties were led by such prominent statesmen as Lord Melbourne, Sir Robert Peel, Lord Derby, Lord Palmerston, Gladstone, Disraeli, Victoria became queen in 1837 at age 18. Her long reign until 1901 was mainly a time of peace, Britain reached the zenith of its economic, political, diplomatic and cultural power. The era saw the expansion of the second British Empire, Historians have characterised the mid-Victorian era as Britains Golden Years. There was prosperity, as the income per person grew by half. There was peace abroad, and social peace at home, opposition to the new order melted away, says Porter. The Chartist movement peaked as a movement among the working class in 1848, its leaders moved to other pursuits, such as trade unions
