1.
Distilled beverage
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This process purifies it and removes diluting components like water, for the purpose of increasing its proportion of alcohol content. As distilled beverages contain more alcohol, they are considered harder – in North America, as examples, this term does not include beverages such as beer, wine, sake, and cider, as they are fermented but not distilled. These all have relatively low alcohol content, typically less than 15%, brandy is a spirit produced by the distillation of wine, and has an ABV of over 35%. Other examples of distilled beverages include bourbon, vodka, gin, rum, tequila, mezcal, whisky, scotch, the term spirit refers to a distilled beverage that contains no added sugar and has at least 20% alcohol by volume. Distilled beverages bottled with added sugar and added flavorings, such as Grand Marnier, Frangelico, Distilled beverages generally have an alcohol concentration higher than 30%. The origin of liquor and its close relative liquid was the Latin verb liquere, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, an early use of the word in the English language, meaning simply a liquid, can be dated to 1225. The first use the OED mentions of its meaning a liquid for drinking occurred in the 14th century and its use as a term for an intoxicating alcoholic drink appeared in the 16th century. The term spirit in reference to alcohol stems from Middle Eastern alchemy and these alchemists were more concerned with medical elixirs than with transmuting lead into gold. The vapor given off and collected during a process was called a spirit of the original material. Distilled water was described in the 2nd century AD by Alexander of Aphrodisias, the Alexandrians were using a distillation alembic or still device in the 3rd century AD. The medieval Arabs learned the process from the Alexandrians and used it extensively. Freeze distillation involves freezing the alcoholic beverage and then removing the ice, the freezing technique had limitations in geography and implementation limiting how widely this method was put to use. The earliest evidence of distillation of alcohol comes from the School of Salerno in southern Italy during the 12th century. Again, the Chinese may not have been far behind, with evidence indicating the practice of distillation began during the 12th century Jin or Southern Song dynasties. A still has been found at a site in Qinglong, Hebei. Fractional distillation was developed by Taddeo Alderotti in the 13th century, the production method was written in code, suggesting that it was being kept secret. In 1437, burned water was mentioned in the records of the County of Katzenelnbogen in Germany and it was served in a tall, narrow glass called a Goderulffe. Claims upon the origin of specific beverages are controversial, often invoking national pride, but they are plausible after the 12th century AD and these spirits would have had a much lower alcohol content than the alchemists pure distillations, and they were likely first thought of as medicinal elixirs
2.
Scandinavia
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Scandinavia /ˌskændᵻˈneɪviə/ is a historical and cultural region in Northern Europe characterized by a common ethnocultural North Germanic heritage and mutually intelligible North Germanic languages. The term Scandinavia always includes the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, the remote Norwegian islands of Svalbard and Jan Mayen are usually not seen as a part of Scandinavia, nor is Greenland, an overseas territory of Denmark. This looser definition almost equates to that of the Nordic countries, in Nordic languages, only Denmark, Norway and Sweden are commonly included in the definition of Scandinavia. In English usage, Scandinavia sometimes refers to the geographical area, the name Scandinavia originally referred vaguely to the formerly Danish, now Swedish, region Scania. Icelanders and the Faroese are to a significant extent descended from the Norse, Finland is mainly populated by Finns, with a minority of approximately 5% of Swedish speakers. A small minority of Sami people live in the north of Scandinavia. The Danish, Norwegian and Swedish languages form a continuum and are known as the Scandinavian languages—all of which are considered mutually intelligible with one another. Faroese and Icelandic, sometimes referred to as insular Scandinavian languages, are intelligible in continental Scandinavian languages only to a limited extent, Finnish and Meänkieli are closely related to each other and more distantly to the Sami languages, but are entirely unrelated to the Scandinavian languages. Apart from these, German, Yiddish and Romani are recognized minority languages in Scandinavia, the southern and by far most populous regions of Scandinavia have a temperate climate. Scandinavia extends north of the Arctic Circle, but has mild weather for its latitude due to the Gulf Stream. Much of the Scandinavian mountains have a tundra climate. There are many lakes and moraines, legacies of the last glacial period, Scandinavia usually refers to Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. Some sources argue for the inclusion of the Faroe Islands, Finland and Iceland, though that broader region is known by the countries concerned as Norden. Before this time, the term Scandinavia was familiar mainly to classical scholars through Pliny the Elders writings, and was used vaguely for Scania, as a political term, Scandinavia was first used by students agitating for Pan-Scandinavianism in the 1830s. After a visit to Sweden, Andersen became a supporter of early political Scandinavism, the term is often defined according to the conventions of the cultures that lay claim to the term in their own use. More precisely, and subject to no dispute, is that Finland is included in the broader term Nordic countries, various promotional agencies of the Nordic countries in the United States serve to promote market and tourism interests in the region. The official tourist boards of Scandinavia sometimes cooperate under one umbrella, Norways government entered one year later. All five Nordic governments participate in the joint promotional efforts in the United States through the Scandinavian Tourist Board of North America, Scandinavia can thus be considered a subset of the Nordic countries
3.
Spice
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A spice is a seed, fruit, root, bark, or other plant substance primarily used for flavoring, coloring or preserving food. Spices are distinguished from herbs, which are the leaves, flowers, sometimes, spices may be ground into a powder for convenience. Spices are sometimes used in medicine, religious rituals, cosmetics or perfume production, the spice trade developed throughout South Asia and Middle East by at least 2000 BCE with cinnamon and black pepper, and in East Asia with herbs and pepper. The Egyptians used herbs for mummification and their demand for exotic spices and herbs helped stimulate world trade. The word spice comes from the Old French word espice, which became epice, and which came from the Latin root spec, by 1000 BCE, medical systems based upon herbs could be found in China, Korea, and India. Early uses were connected with magic, medicine, religion, tradition, archaeological excavations have uncovered clove burnt onto the floor of a kitchen, dated to 1700 BCE, at the Mesopotamian site of Terqa, in modern-day Syria. The ancient Indian epic Ramayana mentions cloves, the Romans had cloves in the 1st century CE, as Pliny the Elder wrote about them. In the story of Genesis, Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers to spice merchants, in the biblical poem Song of Solomon, the male speaker compares his beloved to many forms of spices. The earliest written records of spices come from ancient Egyptian, Chinese, the Ebers Papyrus from Early Egyptians that dates from 1550 B. C. E. Describes some eight hundred different medicinal remedies and numerous medicinal procedures, historians believe that nutmeg, which originates from the Banda Islands in Southeast Asia, was introduced to Europe in the 6th century BCE. Indonesian merchants traveled around China, India, the Middle East, Arab merchants facilitated the routes through the Middle East and India. This resulted in the Egyptian port city of Alexandria being the trading center for spices. The most important discovery prior to the European spice trade were the monsoon winds, sailing from Eastern spice cultivators to Western European consumers gradually replaced the land-locked spice routes once facilitated by the Middle East Arab caravans. Spices were among the most demanded and expensive available in Europe in the Middle Ages. Given medieval medicines main theory of humorism, spices and herbs were indispensable to balance humors in food, in addition to being desired by those using medieval medicine, the European elite also craved spices in the Middle Ages. An example of the European aristocracys demand for spice comes from the King of Aragon and he was specifically looking for spices to put in wine, and was not alone among European monarchs at the time to have such a desire for spice. Spices were all imported from plantations in Asia and Africa, which made them expensive, from the 8th until the 15th century, the Republic of Venice had the monopoly on spice trade with the Middle East, and along with it the neighboring Italian city-states. The trade made the region rich and it has been estimated that around 1,000 tons of pepper and 1,000 tons of the other common spices were imported into Western Europe each year during the Late Middle Ages
4.
European Union
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The European Union is a political and economic union of 28 member states that are located primarily in Europe. It has an area of 4,475,757 km2, the EU has developed an internal single market through a standardised system of laws that apply in all member states. Within the Schengen Area, passport controls have been abolished, a monetary union was established in 1999 and came into full force in 2002, and is composed of 19 EU member states which use the euro currency. The EU operates through a system of supranational and intergovernmental decision-making. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community, the community and its successors have grown in size by the accession of new member states and in power by the addition of policy areas to its remit. While no member state has left the EU or its antecedent organisations, the Maastricht Treaty established the European Union in 1993 and introduced European citizenship. The latest major amendment to the basis of the EU. The EU as a whole is the largest economy in the world, additionally,27 out of 28 EU countries have a very high Human Development Index, according to the United Nations Development Programme. In 2012, the EU was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, through the Common Foreign and Security Policy, the EU has developed a role in external relations and defence. The union maintains permanent diplomatic missions throughout the world and represents itself at the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, the G7, because of its global influence, the European Union has been described as an emerging superpower. After World War II, European integration was seen as an antidote to the nationalism which had devastated the continent. 1952 saw the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community, the supporters of the Community included Alcide De Gasperi, Jean Monnet, Robert Schuman, and Paul-Henri Spaak. These men and others are credited as the Founding fathers of the European Union. In 1957, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and West Germany signed the Treaty of Rome and they also signed another pact creating the European Atomic Energy Community for co-operation in developing nuclear energy. Both treaties came into force in 1958, the EEC and Euratom were created separately from the ECSC, although they shared the same courts and the Common Assembly. The EEC was headed by Walter Hallstein and Euratom was headed by Louis Armand, Euratom was to integrate sectors in nuclear energy while the EEC would develop a customs union among members. During the 1960s, tensions began to show, with France seeking to limit supranational power, Jean Rey presided over the first merged Commission. In 1973, the Communities enlarged to include Denmark, Ireland, Norway had negotiated to join at the same time, but Norwegian voters rejected membership in a referendum
5.
Whisky
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Whisky or whiskey is a type of distilled alcoholic beverage made from fermented grain mash. Various grains are used for different varieties, including barley, corn, rye, Whisky is typically aged in wooden casks, generally made of charred white oak. Whisky is a strictly regulated spirit worldwide with many classes and types, the typical unifying characteristics of the different classes and types are the fermentation of grains, distillation, and aging in wooden barrels. The word whiskey is an anglicisation of the Classical Gaelic word uisce meaning water, distilled alcohol was known in Latin as aqua vitae. This was translated to Classical Gaelic as uisce beatha, which became uisce beatha in Irish, early forms of the word in English included uskebeaghe, usquebaugh, usquebath, and usquebae. Much is made of the two spellings, whiskey and whisky. There are two schools of thought on the issue, there is general agreement that when quoting the proper name printed on a label, the spelling on the label should not be altered. Some writers refer to whisky or whisky/whiskey to acknowledge the variation, the spelling whiskey is common in Ireland and the United States, while whisky is used in all other whisky producing countries. In the US, the usage has not always been consistent, from the late eighteenth century to the mid twentieth century, American writers used both spellings interchangeably until the introduction of newspaper style guides. Since the 1960s, American writers have increasingly used whiskey as the spelling for aged grain spirits made in the US. Scotch is the internationally recognized term for Scotch whisky, the earliest certain chemical distillations were by Greeks in Alexandria in the 1st century AD, but these were not distillations of alcohol. The medieval Arabs adopted the technique of the Alexandrian Greeks, and written records in Arabic begin in the 9th century. Distilling technology passed from the medieval Arabs to the medieval Latins, the earliest records of the distillation of alcohol are in Italy in the 13th century, where alcohol was distilled from wine. An early description of the technique was given by Ramon Llull and its use spread through medieval monasteries, largely for medicinal purposes, such as the treatment of colic and smallpox. The art of distillation spread to Ireland and Scotland no later than the 15th century, the practice of medicinal distillation eventually passed from a monastic setting to the secular via professional medical practitioners of the time, The Guild of Barber Surgeons. The earliest Irish mention of whisky comes from the seventeenth-century Annals of Clonmacnoise, between 1536 and 1541, King Henry VIII of England dissolved the monasteries, sending their monks out into the general public. Whisky production moved out of a setting and into personal homes. The distillation process was still in its infancy, whisky itself was not allowed to age, renaissance-era whisky was also very potent and not diluted
6.
Cereal
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A cereal is any grass cultivated for the edible components of its grain, composed of the endosperm, germ, and bran. Cereal grains are grown in quantities and provide more food energy worldwide than any other type of crop and are therefore staple crops. Edible grains from plant families, such as buckwheat, quinoa. In their natural form, cereals are a source of vitamins, minerals, carbohydrates, fats, oils. When refined by the removal of the bran and germ, the endosperm is mostly carbohydrate. In some developing nations, grain in the form of rice, wheat, millet, in developed nations, cereal consumption is moderate and varied but still substantial. The word cereal is derived from Ceres, the Roman goddess of harvest, agriculture allowed for the support of an increased population, leading to larger societies and eventually the development of cities. It also created the need for organization of political power, as decisions had to be made regarding labor and harvest allocation and access rights to water. Agriculture bred immobility, as populations settled down for long periods of time, early Neolithic villages show evidence of the development of processing grain. The Levant is the ancient home of the ancestors of wheat, barley and peas, there is evidence of the cultivation of figs in the Jordan Valley as long as 11,300 years ago, and cereal production in Syria approximately 9,000 years ago. During the same period, farmers in China began to farm rice and millet, using man-made floods, fiber crops were domesticated as early as food crops, with China domesticating hemp, cotton being developed independently in Africa and South America, and Western Asia domesticating flax. The first cereal grains were domesticated by early primitive humans, about 8,000 years ago, they were domesticated by ancient farming communities in the Fertile Crescent region. Emmer wheat, einkorn wheat, and barley were three of the so-called Neolithic founder crops in the development of agriculture, around the same time, millets and rices were starting to become domesticated in East Asia. Sorghum and millets were also being domesticated in sub-Saharan West Africa, while each individual species has its own peculiarities, the cultivation of all cereal crops is similar. Most are annual plants, consequently one planting yields one harvest, wheat, rye, triticale, oats, barley, and spelt are the cool-season cereals. These are hardy plants grow well in moderate weather and cease to grow in hot weather. The warm-season cereals are tender and prefer hot weather, barley and rye are the hardiest cereals, able to overwinter in the subarctic and Siberia. Many cool-season cereals are grown in the tropics, however, some are only grown in cooler highlands, where it may be possible to grow multiple crops per year
7.
Potato
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The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop from the perennial nightshade Solanum tuberosum. The word potato may refer either to the plant itself or to the edible tuber, in the Andes, where the species is indigenous, there are some other closely related cultivated potato species. Potatoes were introduced to Europe in the half of the 16th century by the Spanish. It is the worlds fourth-largest food crop, following maize, wheat, the green leaves and green skins of tubers exposed to the light are toxic. Wild potato species can be throughout the Americas from the United States to southern Chile. Following centuries of breeding, there are now over a thousand different types of potatoes. However, the importance of the potato is variable and changing rapidly. As of 2007 China led the world in production, and nearly a third of the worlds potatoes were harvested in China. The English word potato comes from Spanish patata, the Spanish Royal Academy says the Spanish word is a compound of the Taíno batata and the Quechua papa. The 16th-century English herbalist John Gerard used the terms bastard potatoes and Virginia potatoes for this species, potatoes are occasionally referred to as Irish potatoes or white potatoes in the United States, to distinguish them from sweet potatoes. The name spud for a small potato comes from the digging of soil prior to the planting of potatoes, the word spud traces back to the 16th century. It subsequently transferred over to a variety of digging tools, around 1845, the name transferred to the tuber itself. It was Mario Peis 1949 The Story of Language that can be blamed for the false origin. Pei writes, the potato, for its part, was in disrepute some centuries ago, some Englishmen who did not fancy potatoes formed a Society for the Prevention of Unwholesome Diet. The initials of the words in this title gave rise to spud. Like most other pre-20th century acronymic origins, this is false, Potato plants are herbaceous perennials that grow about 60 cm high, depending on variety, with the leaves dying back after flowering, fruiting and tuber formation. They bear white, pink, red, blue, or purple flowers with yellow stamens, in general, the tubers of varieties with white flowers have white skins, while those of varieties with colored flowers tend to have pinkish skins. Potatoes are mostly cross-pollinated by insects such as bumblebees, which carry pollen from other potato plants, tubers form in response to decreasing day length, although this tendency has been minimized in commercial varieties
8.
Cardamom
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Cardamom, sometimes Cardamon or Cardamum, is a spice made from the seeds of several plants in the genera Elettaria and Amomum in the family Zingiberaceae. Both genera are native to India, Bhutan, Indonesia and Nepal, some other countries, such as Sri Lanka, have also begun to cultivate it. Cardamom is the worlds third-most expensive spice, surpassed in price per weight only by vanilla, the modern genus name Elettaria is derived from the local name. The root ēlam is attested in all Dravidian languages viz. Kannada elakki, Telugu yelakulu, Tamil elakkai, the second element kai means seed or fruit. The Malabar region had historical connections and was a prominent area of cardamom cultivation. A related root is present in Hindi ilaychi, Bengali ælachi. In Sindhi it is called Photta, in Sanskrit it was known as ela or ellka. In Marathi it is known as velchi or veldoda. In Sri Lanka, the plant is known as Enasal by Sinhala language, there are two main types of cardamom, True or green cardamom comes from the species Elettaria cardamomum and is distributed from India to Malaysia. What is often referred to as white cardamon is actually Siam cardamom, the two types of cardamom, κάρδαμομον and ἄμωμον, were distinguished in the fourth century BCE by the Greek father of botany, Theophrastus. Theophrastus and informants knew that these varieties were originally and solely from India, both forms of cardamom are used as flavorings and cooking spices in both food and drink, and as a medicine. E. cardamomum is used as a spice, a masticatory, Cardamom has a strong, unique taste, with an intensely aromatic, resinous fragrance. Black cardamom has a distinctly more smokey, though not bitter, aroma, green cardamom is one of the more expensive spices by weight, but little is needed to impart flavor. It is best stored in the pod as exposed or ground seeds quickly lose their flavor, grinding the pods and seeds together lowers both the quality and the price. For recipes requiring whole cardamom pods, a generally accepted equivalent is 10 pods equals 1 1⁄2 teaspoons of ground cardamom and it is a common ingredient in Indian cooking. In the Middle East, green cardamom powder is used as a spice for sweet dishes, as well as traditional flavouring in coffee, Cardamom is used to a wide extent in savoury dishes. In Asia both types of cardamom are used in both sweet and savory dishes, particularly in the south. Both are frequent components in spice mixes, such as Indian and Nepali masalas, green cardamom is often used in traditional Indian sweets and in masala chai
9.
Cumin
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Cumin is a flowering plant in the family Apiaceae, native from the east Mediterranean to South Asia. Its seeds are used in the cuisines of different cultures. It also has uses as a traditional medicinal plant. The English cumin is derived from the Old English via Latin cuminum from the Greek κύμινον, Cumin is the dried seed of the herb Cuminum cyminum, a member of the parsley family. The cumin plant grows to 30–50 cm tall and is harvested by hand and it is an annual herbaceous plant, with a slender, glabrous, branched stem that is 20–30 cm tall and has a diameter of 3–5 cm. Each branch has two to three sub-branches, all the branches attain the same height, therefore the plant has a uniform canopy. The stem is coloured grey or dark green, the leaves are 5–10 cm long, pinnate or bipinnate, with thread-like leaflets. The flowers are small, white or pink, and borne in umbels, each umbel has five to seven umbellts. The fruit is a lateral fusiform or ovoid achene 4–5 mm long, containing two mericarps with a single seed, Cumin seeds have eight ridges with oil canals. They resemble caraway seeds, being oblong in shape, longitudinally ridged, and yellow-brown in colour, like members of the Umbelliferae family such as caraway, parsley. Cumin has been in use since ancient times, seeds excavated at the Syrian site Tell ed-Der have been dated to the second millennium BC. They have also reported from several New Kingdom levels of ancient Egyptian archaeological sites. In the ancient Egyptian civilization, cumin was used as spice, originally cultivated in Iran and the Mediterranean region, cumin is mentioned in the Bible in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. The ancient Greeks kept cumin at the table in its own container. Cumin was also used heavily in ancient Roman cuisine, in India, it has been used for millennia as a traditional ingredient in innumerable recipes, and forms the basis of many other spice blends. Cumin was introduced to the Americas by Spanish and Portuguese colonists, several different types of cumin are known, but the most famous ones are black and green cumin, both of which are used in Persian cuisine. Today, the plant is grown in Pakistan, India, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Iran, Turkey, Morocco, Egypt, Syria, Mexico, Chile. Since cumin is used as part of birdseed and exported to many countries
10.
Fennel
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Fennel is a flowering plant species in the carrot family. It is a hardy, perennial herb with flowers and feathery leaves. It is indigenous to the shores of the Mediterranean but has become naturalized in many parts of the world, especially on dry soils near the sea-coast. It is an aromatic and flavorful herb with culinary and medicinal uses and. Florence fennel or finocchio is a selection with a swollen, bulb-like stem base that is used as a vegetable, fennel is used as a food plant by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species including in its native range the mouse moth and the Old-World swallowtail. Where it has introduced in north America it may be used by the anise swallowtail. The word fennel developed from the Middle English fenel or fenyl and this came from the Old English fenol or finol, which in turn came from the Latin feniculum or foeniculum, the diminutive of fenum or faenum, meaning hay. The Latin word for the plant was ferula, which is now used as the name of a related plant. The Greek name for fennel is marathon or marathos, and the place of the battle of Marathon. The word is first attested in Mycenaean Linear B form as ma-ra-tu-wo, as Old English finule, fennel is one of the nine plants invoked in the pagan Anglo-Saxon Nine Herbs Charm, recorded in the 10th century. In the 15th century, Portuguese settlers on Madeira noticed the abundance of fennel, and used the Portuguese word funcho. Fennel, Foeniculum vulgare, is a perennial herb and it is erect, glaucous green, and grows to heights of up to 2.5 m, with hollow stems. The leaves grow up to 40 cm long, they are finely dissected, with the ultimate segments filiform, the flowers are produced in terminal compound umbels 5–15 cm wide, each umbel section having 20–50 tiny yellow flowers on short pedicels. The fruit is a dry seed from 4–10 mm long, half as wide or less, fennel is widely cultivated, both in its native range and elsewhere, for its edible, strongly flavored leaves and fruits. Its aniseed flavor comes from anethole, a compound also found in anise and star anise. Florence fennel is a group with inflated leaf bases which form a bulb-like structure. It is of cultivated origin, and has a mild anise-like flavor, Florence fennel plants are smaller than the wild type. The inflated leaf bases are eaten as a vegetable, both raw and cooked, several cultivars of Florence fennel are also known by several other names, notably the Italian name finocchio
11.
Amber
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Amber is fossilized tree resin, which has been appreciated for its color and natural beauty since Neolithic times. Much valued from antiquity to the present as a gemstone, amber is made into a variety of decorative objects and it has also been used as a healing agent in folk medicine. There are five classes of amber, defined on the basis of their chemical constituents, because it originates as a soft, sticky tree resin, amber sometimes contains animal and plant material as inclusions. Amber occurring in coal seams is also called resinite, and the term ambrite is applied to that found specifically within New Zealand coal seams, the English word amber derives from Arabic ʿanbar عنبر via Middle Latin ambar and Middle French ambre. The word was adopted in Middle English in the 14th century as referring to what is now known as ambergris, in the Romance languages, the sense of the word had come to be extended to Baltic amber from as early as the late 13th century. At first called white or yellow amber, this meaning was adopted in English by the early 15th century, as the use of ambergris waned, this became the main sense of the word. The two substances conceivably became associated or confused because they both were washed up on beaches. Ambergris is less dense water and floats, whereas amber is too dense to float. The classical names for amber, Latin electrum and Ancient Greek ἤλεκτρον, are connected to a term ἠλέκτωρ meaning beaming Sun, according to myth, when Phaëton son of Helios was killed, his mourning sisters became poplar trees, and their tears became elektron, amber. Earlier Pliny says that an island of three days sail from the Scythian coast called Balcia by Xenophon of Lampsacus, author of a fanciful travel book in Greek, is called Basilia by Pytheas. It is generally understood to be the same as Abalus and it is assumed that there were well-established trade routes for amber connecting the Baltic with the Mediterranean. Pliny states explicitly that the Germans export amber to Pannonia, from where it was traded further abroad by the Veneti, the ancient Italic peoples of southern Italy were working amber, the most important examples are on display at the National Archaeological Museum of Siritide to Matera. Amber used in antiquity as at Mycenae and in the prehistory of the Mediterranean comes from deposits of Sicily. Besides the fanciful explanations according to which amber is produced by the Sun, Pliny cites opinions that are aware of its origin in tree resin. Amber is produced from a marrow discharged by trees belonging to the genus, like gum from the cherry. This is confirmed by the recorded Old High German glas and Old English glær for amber, in Middle Low German, amber was known as berne-, barn-, börnstēn. The Low German term became dominant also in High German by the 18th century, the Baltic Lithuanian term for amber is gintaras and Latvian dzintars. They, and the Slavic jantar or Hungarian gyanta, are thought to originate from Phoenician jainitar, Early in the nineteenth century, the first reports of amber from North America came from discoveries in New Jersey along Crosswicks Creek near Trenton, at Camden, and near Woodbury
12.
Bergenhus Fortress
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Bergenhus fortress is a fortress located in Bergen, Norway. Bergenhus fortress is located in the entrance to the harbour in Bergen and it is one of the oldest and best preserved castles in Norway. The fortress contains buildings dating as far back as the 1240s, the extent of the enclosed area of today dates from the early 19th century. Excavations have revealed foundations of buildings believed to back to before 1100. In the 13th century, until 1299, Bergen was the capital of Norway and it was first enclosed by stone walls in the 1240s. Of the medieval buildings, a hall and a defensive tower remain. The royal hall, today known as Haakons Hall, built around 1260, is the largest medieval building in Norway. The defensive tower, known in the Middle Ages as the keep by the sea, was built around 1270 by King Magnus VI Lagabøte, and contained a royal apartment on the top floor. In the 1560s it was incorporated by the commander of the castle, Erik Rosenkrantz, into a larger structure, in the Middle Ages, several churches, including Christ Church, Bergens cathedral, were situated on the premises. These, however, were torn down between 1526 and 1531, as the area of Holmen was converted into a military fortification under Danish rule. From around this time, the name Bergenhus came into use, building work on Christ Church probably started around 1100. It contained the shrine of Saint Sunniva, the saint of Bergen. In the 12th and 13th centuries it was the site of royal coronations. It was also the site of at least six kings. The site of its altar is marked by a memorial stone. In the 19th century, the fortress lost its function as a defensive fortification, after restoration in the 1890s, and again after destruction sustained during World War II, Bergenhus is today again used as a concert venue and as a feast hall for public events. During World War II, the German navy used several of its buildings for their headquarters, Bergenhus is currently under the command of the Royal Norwegian Navy, which has about 150 military personnel stationed there. The fortifications Sverresborg fortress and Fredriksberg fortress also lie in the centre of Bergen, Haakons Hall and Rosenkrantz Tower are open for visits by the public
