Adamantios Korais or Koraïs was a Greek scholar credited with laying the foundations of Modern Greek literature and a major figure in the Greek Enlightenment. His activities paved the way for the Greek War of Independence and the emergence of a purified form of the Greek language, known as Katharevousa. Encyclopædia Britannica asserts that "his influence on the modern Greek language and culture has been compared to that of Dante on Italian and Martin Luther on German". Korais was born in Smyrna, in 1748, his father Ioannis, of Chian descent, was demogérontas in Smyrna. He was exceptionally passionate about philosophy and linguistics and studied throughout his youth, he studied in his home place, where he graduated from the Evangelical Greek School. After his school years, he lived for a while in Amsterdam as a merchant, but soon he decided that he wanted to study in a university, he studied the Jewish, Dutch and English languages, apart from his knowledge of ancient Greek and Latin. Korais studied at the school of medicine of the University of Montpellier from 1782 to 1787.
His 1786 diploma thesis was entitled Pyretologiae Synopsis, while his 1787 doctoral thesis was entitled Medicus Hippocraticus. He traveled to Paris. There he decided to translate ancient Greek authors and produced thirty volumes of those translations, being one of the first modern Greek philologists and publishers of ancient Greek literature. After 1788 he was to spend most of his life as an expatriate in Paris; as classical scholar, Korais was repelled by the Byzantine influence on Greek society and was a fierce critic of the lack of education amongst the clergy and their subservience to the Ottoman Empire, although he conceded it was the Orthodox Church that preserved the national identity of Greeks. Korais believed Western Europe was the heir of the ancient Greek civilization, which had to be transmitted to the modern Greeks through education. Additionally, he advocated the restoration and use of the term "Hellene" or "Graikos" as an ethnonym for the Greeks, in the place of Romiós, sawn negatively by him.
While in Paris, he was witness to the French Revolution. He was influenced by the liberal sentiments of his age, he admired Thomas Jefferson. A typical man of the Enlightenment, Korais encouraged wealthy Greeks to open new libraries and schools throughout Greece. Korais believed that education would ensure not only the achievement of independence but the establishment of a proper constitution for the new liberated Greek state, he envisioned a democratic Greece. Korais died in Paris aged 84 soon after publishing the first volume of his autobiography. In 1877, his remains were sent to Greece. Korais's most lasting contributions were literary; those who were instrumental in publishing, presenting his work to the public were merchants from Chios. He felt eternally grateful to these merchants, since without them, it would have been financially impossible for him to publish his works; these works included Strabo in Greek, another on Marcus Aurelius, his translation of Herodotus, the translation of the Iliad, his main literary work, the seventeen volumes of the "Library of Greek Literature".
His political writing begins with the publication at the opening of the nineteenth century of Asma Polemistirion and Salpisma Polemistirion, celebrating the presence of Greek troops fighting alongside the French in Egypt. Earlier he had confronted with his Adelphiki Didaskalia the Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem for urging the Sultan's Christian subjects to support the Ottomans in the war against the "atheistic" French. On contrary, he made a call to the Greeks to fight beside the French, "who have the military virtue of the ancient Greeks", against the Ottoman tyranny. Korais went on to publish in 1803 his Report on the Present State of Civilization in Greece, based on a series of lectures he had given in Paris, extolling the link between the rise of a new Greek mercantile class and the advance of the Greek Enlightenment or Diafotismos. In What should we Greeks do in the Present Circumstances?, a work of 1805, he tried to win his compatriots over to Napoleon and away from the cause of their Russian co-religionists.
In years, his enthusiasm for the French Emperor diminished, he ended by referring to him as the'tyrant of tyrants.' Away from contemporary politics, Korais did much to revive the idea of Greece with the creation of the Hellenic Library, devoted to new editions of some of the classic texts, starting with Homer in 1805. Over the following twenty years many others appeared, with lengthy prefaces by Korais entitled'Impromptu Reflections', with his views on political and linguistic matters. Although the broad mass of the Greek people was beyond his reach, he played an important part in the shaping of a new consciousness among the intelligentsia, to play a part in the creation of a new national movement. With the breakout of the Greek revolution in 1821, he was too old to join the struggle; however his house in Paris became a centre for informations, meetings among the Parisian Greeks and financial aid. He wrote many letters advising the revolutionaries. A supporter of Kapodistrias he opposed his policies.
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Inishbofin is an island off the coast of Machaire Uí Rabhartaigh, County Donegal, Ireland. It is a 120-hectare land mass long known as a fishing and farming village, a place where generations of inhabitants have spoken Irish; the current population numbers about 36. There are no shops on the island. There is a boat service to and from it but no regular ferry, it is the largest of a small group of islands. Inishbofin's population dropped in 110 years from 150 to 11; the table reports data taken from the Census of Ireland. Census data in Ireland reliable. List of islands of Ireland Inishbofin Island - The Island Website with information on the island and its history. Inis Bó Finne - information from Comhdháil Oileáin na hÉireann Inishbofin, Donegal - a first-hand account – with photographs – of one American's visit Historical Map of Inishbofin
Kvænangen, Návuotna, or Naavuono is a fjord in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. The fjord runs through Kvænangen Municipality; the 72-kilometre long fjord stretches from the Norwegian Sea to the village of Kvænangsbotn. The Reisafjorden is a large fjord which branches off the Kvænangen fjord to the west and the Badderfjorden branches off to the east; the European route E06 highway crosses the fjord on the Sørstraumen Bridge where the fjord is only about 350 metres wide, just west of the village of Sekkemo. There are a number of islands in the fjord. On the west side of the fjord are the islands of Arnøya, Laukøya, Skjervøya, Kågen; the smaller islands of Haukøya, Rødøya, Skorpa, Nøklan, Spildra are located in the middle of the fjord. Although not in large numbers, cetaceans are known to visit the fjord. Harbour porpoises and dolphins are more observed, larger species such as minke whales, sperm whales, beluga whales can be seen. In recent years, humpback whales started making comebacks to local waters to feed, there had been a rare observation of a critically endangered North Atlantic right whale that have become functional extinct in eastern North Atlantic, stayed for several weeks in the fjord, indicating this area was once a part of historical feeding ground for right whales as well.