1.
Subprefectures in France
–
In France, a subprefecture is the administrative center of a departmental arrondissement that does not contain the prefecture for its department. The term also applies to the building houses the administrative headquarters for an arrondissement. The civil servant in charge of a subprefecture is the subprefect, between May 1982 and February 1988, subprefects were known instead by the title commissaire adjoint de la République. Where the administration of an arrondissement is carried out from a prefecture, the municipal arrondissements of Paris, Lyon, and Marseille) are divisions of the city rather than the prefecture, and so are not arrondissements in the same sense
Subprefectures in France
–
A subprefecture in
Verdun,
Meuse
Subprefectures in France
–
A subprefecture in
Langon,
Gironde
2.
Communes of France
–
The commune is a level of administrative division in the French Republic. French communes are roughly equivalent to civil townships incorporated municipalities in the United States or Gemeinden in Germany, the United Kingdom has no exact equivalent, as communes resemble districts in urban areas, but are closer to parishes in rural areas where districts are much larger. Communes are based on historical geographic communities or villages and have received significant powers of governance to manage the populations, the communes are the fourth-level administrative divisions of France. A French commune may be a city of 2.2 million inhabitants like Paris, communes typically are based on pre-existing villages and facilitate local governance. All communes have names, but not all named geographic areas or groups of people residing together are communes, a commune is a town, city, or municipality. Use of commune in English is a habit, and one that might be corrected. There is nothing in commune in French that is different from town in English. The French word commune appeared in the 12th century, from Medieval Latin communia, as of January 2015, there were 36,681 communes in France,36,552 of them in metropolitan France and 129 of them overseas. This is a higher total than that of any other European country. The whole territory of the French Republic is divided into communes and this is unlike some other countries, such as the United States, where unincorporated areas directly governed by a county or a higher authority can be found. There are only a few exceptions, COM of Saint-Martin and it was previously a commune inside the Guadeloupe région. The commune structure was abolished when Saint-Martin became an overseas collectivity on 22 February 2007, COM of Wallis and Futuna, which still is divided according to the three traditional chiefdoms. It was previously a commune inside the Guadeloupe region, the commune structure was abolished when Saint-Barthélemy became an overseas collectivity on 22 February 2007.88 square kilometres. The median area of metropolitan Frances communes at the 1999 census was even smaller, the median area is a better measure of the area of a typical French commune. This median area is smaller than that of most European countries. In Italy, the area of communes is 22 km2, in Belgium it is 40 km2, in Spain it is 35 km2, and in Germany. Switzerland and the Länder of Rhineland-Palatinate, Schleswig-Holstein, and Thuringia in Germany were the places in Europe where the communes had a smaller median area than in France. The communes of Frances overseas départements such as Réunion and French Guiana are large by French standards and they usually group into the same commune several villages or towns, often with sizeable distances among them
Communes of France
–
Road sign marking the end of the village of
Y in the
Somme department of
Picardy
Communes of France
–
Map of the 36,569 communes of metropolitan France
Communes of France
–
Mittelhausbergen in
Alsace
Communes of France
–
Vacqueyras in
Provence, showing double French/
Provençal name
3.
Geographic coordinate system
–
A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
Geographic coordinate system
–
Longitude lines are perpendicular and latitude lines are parallel to the equator.
4.
France
–
France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
France
–
One of the
Lascaux paintings: a horse –
Dordogne, approximately 18,000 BC
France
–
Flag
France
–
The
Maison Carrée was a temple of the
Gallo-Roman city of Nemausus (present-day
Nîmes) and is one of the best preserved vestiges of the
Roman Empire.
France
–
With
Clovis ' conversion to Catholicism in 498, the
Frankish monarchy,
elective and
secular until then, became
hereditary and of
divine right.
5.
Regions of France
–
France is divided into 18 administrative regions, including 13 metropolitan regions and 5 overseas regions. The current legal concept of region was adopted in 1982, the term région was officially created by the Law of Decentralisation, which also gave regions their legal status. The first direct elections for representatives took place on 16 March 1986. In 2016, the number of regions was reduced from 27 to 18 through amalgamation, in 2014, the French parliament passed a law reducing the number of metropolitan regions from 22 to 13 with effect from 1 January 2016. However, the region of Upper and Lower Normandy is simply called Normandy. Permanent names were to be proposed by the new regional councils by 1 July 2016, the legislation defining the new regions also allowed the Centre region to officially change its name to Centre-Val de Loire with effect from January 2015. Two regions, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, opted to retain their interim names, between 1982 and 2015, there were 22 regions in Metropolitan France. Before 2011, there were four regions, in 2011 Mayotte became the fifth. Regions lack separate legislative authority and therefore cannot write their own statutory law and they levy their own taxes and, in return, receive a decreasing part of their budget from the central government, which gives them a portion of the taxes it levies. They also have considerable budgets managed by a council made up of representatives voted into office in regional elections. A regions primary responsibility is to build and furnish high schools, in March 2004, the French central government unveiled a controversial plan to transfer regulation of certain categories of non-teaching school staff to the regional authorities. Critics of this plan contended that tax revenue was insufficient to pay for the costs. In addition, regions have considerable power over infrastructural spending, e. g. education, public transit, universities and research. This has meant that the heads of regions such as Île-de-France or Rhône-Alpes can be high-profile positions. Number of regions controlled by each coalition since 1986, Overseas region is a recent designation, given to the overseas departments that have similar powers to those of the regions of metropolitan France. Radio France Internationale in English Overseas regions Ministère de lOutre-Mer some explanations about the past and current developments of DOMs and TOMs
Regions of France
6.
Departments of France
–
In the administrative divisions of France, the department is one of the three levels of government below the national level, between the administrative regions and the commune. There are 96 departments in metropolitan France and 5 overseas departments, each department is administered by an elected body called a departmental council. From 1800 to April 2015, they were called general councils, the departments were created in 1791 as a rational replacement of Ancien Régime provinces with a view to strengthen national unity, the title department is used to mean a part of a larger whole. Almost all of them were named after geographical features rather than after historical or cultural territories which could have their own loyalties. The earliest known suggestion of it is from 1764 in the writings of dArgenson and they have inspired similar divisions in many countries, some of them former French colonies. Most French departments are assigned a number, the Official Geographical Code. Some overseas departments have a three-digit number, the number is used, for example, in the postal code, and was until recently used for all vehicle registration plates. For example, inhabitants of Loiret might refer to their department as the 45 and this reform project has since been abandoned. The first French territorial departments were proposed in 1665 by Marc-René dArgenson to serve as administrative areas purely for the Ponts et Chaussées infrastructure administration, before the French Revolution, France gained territory gradually through the annexation of a mosaic of independent entities. By the close of the Ancien Régime, it was organised into provinces, during the period of the Revolution, these were dissolved, partly in order to weaken old loyalties. Their boundaries served two purposes, Boundaries were chosen to break up Frances historical regions in an attempt to erase cultural differences, Boundaries were set so that every settlement in the country was within a days ride of the capital of the department. This was a security measure, intended to keep the national territory under close control. This measure was directly inspired by the Great Terror, during which the government had lost control of rural areas far from any centre of government. The old nomenclature was carefully avoided in naming the new departments, most were named after an areas principal river or other physical features. Even Paris was in the department of Seine, the number of departments, initially 83, was increased to 130 by 1809 with the territorial gains of the Republic and of the First French Empire. Following Napoleons defeats in 1814-1815, the Congress of Vienna returned France to its pre-war size, in 1860, France acquired the County of Nice and Savoy, which led to the creation of three new departments. Two were added from the new Savoyard territory, while the department of Alpes-Maritimes was created from Nice, the 89 departments were given numbers based on their alphabetical order. The department of Bas-Rhin and parts of Meurthe, Moselle, Vosges and Haut-Rhin were ceded to the German Empire in 1871, following Frances defeat in the Franco-Prussian War
Departments of France
–
Geometrical proposition rejected
Departments of France
–
The 101 departments of France
Departments of France
–
The three Algerian departments in 1848
7.
Savoie
–
Savoie is a French department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of the French Alps. For history before 1860, details of the annexation, and modern regionalism and it is widely accepted that Savoie takes its name from the Latin Sapaudia or Sabaudia, meaning land covered in fir trees. Savoie was long part of the states of Savoy, though beginning in the 16th century and it was integrated into the Mont-Blanc department from 1792 to 1815. The province was annexed by France in 1860, the former Duchy of Savoy became the two departments of Savoie and Haute-Savoie. Moûtiers, capital of the province of Tarentaise Valley ceased to be the prefecture after a law passed on September 10,1926. Savoie, along with Albertville, hosted the 1992 Winter Olympics, with ski events at Tarentaise and Beaufortain. The other main alpine valley is the Maurienne, connected to the Tarentaise valley by two passes, the col de la Madeleine and the highest pass in Europe, the col de lIseran. The Maurienne valley was through the col du Mont Cenis, the commercial route between France and Italy. It is one of the longest intra-alpine valleys in the Alps, Savoie is part of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes région. It borders the departments of Haute-Savoie, Ain, Isère and Hautes-Alpes in addition to Italy and its two main lakes are Lac du Bourget and Lac dAiguebelette, one of the least polluted in France due to a 1976 law forbidding any use of motorboats on the lake. According to the Chambéry chamber of commerce, close to 50% of the departments wealth comes from tourism, each year, Savoie hosts over 30 million visitor-nights of tourists. Savoie also profits from its resources with particular strengths in ore processing. Savoie had an exceptionally high export/import ratio of 214% in 2005 and its exports rose to €1.768 billion and €825 million in imports. Its leading exports were steel, aluminum, and electric and electronic components, Savoie is famous for its cows, which produce numerous cheeses, some of them are, Beaufort Savoie Gruyère Reblochon Tamié Tome des Bauges Tomme de Savoie Numerous wine grapes are also grown in Savoie. The most famous wines are made of Gamay, Pinot noir, fruit production is the third largest component of agriculture in Savoie. Apples and pears are also produced in the region and are known for their qualities. Residents of Savoie are known as Savoyards, though they can also be called Savoisiens or Savoyens,8,507 The average population density is not a good indicator, the valleys tend to be much more densely populated, whereas the mountains tend to be near-completely uninhabited. The Catholic Church in Savoie is divided into three dioceses, Chambéry, Maurienne, and Tarentaise, together, they form an archdiocese, in which the bishop of Chambéry is the archbishop
Savoie
–
Prefecture building of the Savoie department, in Chambéry
Savoie
–
Logo
Savoie
–
Sign welcoming visitors to the department of Savoie
Savoie
–
Low elevation: The Savoie frontcountry.
8.
Daylight saving time
–
Daylight saving time is the practice of advancing clocks during summer months by one hour so that evening daylight lasts an hour longer, while sacrificing normal sunrise times. Typically, regions that use Daylight Savings Time adjust clocks forward one hour close to the start of spring, American inventor and politician Benjamin Franklin proposed a form of daylight time in 1784. New Zealander George Hudson proposed the idea of saving in 1895. The German Empire and Austria-Hungary organized the first nationwide implementation, starting on April 30,1916, many countries have used it at various times since then, particularly since the energy crisis of the 1970s. The practice has both advocates and critics, DST clock shifts sometimes complicate timekeeping and can disrupt travel, billing, record keeping, medical devices, heavy equipment, and sleep patterns. Computer software often adjusts clocks automatically, but policy changes by various jurisdictions of DST dates, industrialized societies generally follow a clock-based schedule for daily activities that do not change throughout the course of the year. The time of day that individuals begin and end work or school, North and south of the tropics daylight lasts longer in summer and shorter in winter, with the effect becoming greater as one moves away from the tropics. However, they will have one hour of daylight at the start of each day. Supporters have also argued that DST decreases energy consumption by reducing the need for lighting and heating, DST is also of little use for locations near the equator, because these regions see only a small variation in daylight in the course of the year. After ancient times, equal-length civil hours eventually supplanted unequal, so civil time no longer varies by season, unequal hours are still used in a few traditional settings, such as some monasteries of Mount Athos and all Jewish ceremonies. This 1784 satire proposed taxing window shutters, rationing candles, and waking the public by ringing church bells, despite common misconception, Franklin did not actually propose DST, 18th-century Europe did not even keep precise schedules. However, this changed as rail transport and communication networks came to require a standardization of time unknown in Franklins day. Modern DST was first proposed by the New Zealand entomologist George Hudson, whose shift work job gave him time to collect insects. An avid golfer, he also disliked cutting short his round at dusk and his solution was to advance the clock during the summer months, a proposal he published two years later. The proposal was taken up by the Liberal Member of Parliament Robert Pearce, a select committee was set up to examine the issue, but Pearces bill did not become law, and several other bills failed in the following years. Willett lobbied for the proposal in the UK until his death in 1915, william Sword Frost, mayor of Orillia, Ontario, introduced daylight saving time in the municipality during his tenure from 1911 to 1912. Starting on April 30,1916, the German Empire and its World War I ally Austria-Hungary were the first to use DST as a way to conserve coal during wartime, Britain, most of its allies, and many European neutrals soon followed suit. Russia and a few other countries waited until the year
Daylight saving time
–
Ancient
water clock that lets hour lengths vary with season.
Daylight saving time
–
G. V. Hudson invented modern DST, proposing it first in 1895.
Daylight saving time
–
Retailers generally favor DST.
United Cigar Stores hailed a 1918 DST bill.
Daylight saving time
–
William Willett independently proposed DST in 1907 and advocated it tirelessly.
9.
Central European Summer Time
–
It corresponds to UTC + two hours. Other names which have been applied to Central European Summer Time are Middle European Summer Time, Central European Daylight Saving Time, and Bravo Time. Since 1996 European Summer Time has been observed between 1,00 UTC on the last Sunday of March and 1,00 on the last Sunday of October, the following countries and territories use Central European Summer Time. In addition, Libya used CEST during the years 1951–1959, 1982–1989, 1996–1997, European Summer Time Other countries and territories in UTC+2 time zone Other names of UTC+2 time zone
Central European Summer Time
–
light blue
10.
Arpitan
–
Franco-Provençal, Arpitan or Romand is a Gallo-Romance language spoken in east-central France, western Switzerland, northwestern Italy, and in enclaves in the Province of Foggia in Apulia, Italy. Franco-Provençal has several dialects and is separate from but closely related to neighboring Romance languages, Oïl languages, Occitan, Gallo-Italian. The name Franco-Provençal was given to the language by G. I, Ascoli in the 19th century because it shared features with French and Provençal without belonging to either. Arpitan, a neologism, is becoming a name for the language. This name was popularized due to the lands where the Arpitan language is spoken or used to be the prevalent idiom, the name for the region comes from the term Arpes, meaning Alps in Arpitan. Today, the largest number of Franco-Provençal speakers reside in the Aosta Valley, the language is also spoken in alpine valleys in the province of Turin, two isolated towns in Foggia, and rural areas of the Romandie region of Switzerland. It is one of the three Gallo-Romance language families of France and is recognized as a regional language of France. Organizations are attempting to preserve it through cultural events, education, scholarly research, aside from regional French dialects, it is the most closely related language to French. The number of speakers of Franco-Provençal has been declining significantly, according to UNESCO, Franco-Provençal is a potentially endangered language in Italy and an endangered language in Switzerland and France. Franco-Provençal emerged as a Gallo-Romance variety of Latin, the linguistic region comprises east-central France, western portions of Switzerland, and the Aosta Valley of Italy with the adjacent alpine valleys of the Piedmont. This area covers territories once occupied by pre-Roman Celts, including the Allobroges, Sequani, Helvetii, Ceutrones, by the 5th century, the region was controlled by the Burgundians. Franco-Provençal is first attested in manuscripts from the 12th century, possibly diverging from the langues doïl as early as the 8th–9th centuries, one writer has detected the influence of Basque by analyzing fossil words from toponymy and the dialect in the Aosta Valley Valdôtain patois. However, Franco-Provençal is consistently typified by a strict, myopic comparison to French, and so is characterized as conservative. Thus, commentators, like Désormaux, consider medieval the terms for many nouns and verbs, including pâta rag, bayâ to give, moussâ to lie down, all of which are conservative only relative to French. As an example, Désormaux, writing on this point in the foreword of his Savoyard dialect dictionary, states, one can note it not only in phonetics and morphology, but also in the vocabulary, where one finds numerous words and directions that clearly disappeared from French. Franco-Provençal failed to garner the prestige of its three more widely spoken neighbors, French, Occitan, and Italian. Communities where speakers lived were generally mountainous and isolated from one another, the internal boundaries of the entire speech area were divided by wars and religious conflicts. France, Switzerland, the Franche-Comté, and the duchy, later kingdom, the edict explicitly replaced Latin with French as the language of law and the courts
Arpitan
–
Graziadio Isaia Ascoli
Arpitan
–
Map of the Franco-Provençal Language Area: Dark Blue: Protected. — Medium Blue: General regions. Light Blue: Historical transition zone.
Arpitan
–
Title page of a Franco-Provençal dictionary from Saint-Étienne, France (1896): "The Key to the Gaga Dialect".
Arpitan
–
Language area map with standard place names and modern political divisions.
11.
1992 Winter Olympics
–
The 1992 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XVI Olympic Winter Games, were a winter multi-sport event celebrated from 8 to 23 February 1992 in Albertville, France. They were the last Winter Olympics to be held the year as the Summer Olympics. Albertville was selected as host in 1986, beating Sofia, Falun, Lillehammer, Cortina dAmpezzo, Anchorage, the games were the third Winter Olympics held in France, after Chamonix in 1924 and Grenoble in 1968, and the fifth Olympics overall in the country. Sixty-four nations with 1,801 athletes participated in the games, Germany participated as a unified team, while five newly independent European countries debuted, as did six warm-weather countries. Short track speed skating, moguls and womens biathlon made their debut as an Olympic sport, the games were the last Winter Games until 2014 to have demonstration sports, consisting of curling, aerials, ski ballet and speed skiing. It was the last Olympics to have a speed skating rink. The games were succeeded by the 1992 Winter Paralympics from 25 March to 1 April, norwegians won every male cross-country skiing race, with Bjørn Dæhlie and Vegard Ulvang both collecting three gold. Ski jumper Toni Nieminen,16, became the youngest male gold medalist of a Winter Olympic event. Petra Kronberger won both the event and the slalom, while Bonnie Blair won both the 500 m and 1000 m speed skating events and Gunda Niemann took both of the longest races. Kim Kihoon earned gold medals in both short track events. Annelise Coberger of New Zealand won the southern hemispheres first Winter Olympic medal—a silver in the womens slalom, Nicolas Bochatay was killed during a training session. Germany won the most medals and the most gold, the vote to select the host city of the 1992 Winter Olympics was conducted on 17 October 1986, in Lausanne, Switzerland, at the 91st IOC Session. A record of seven different locales bid for these Games, the Oxford Olympics Study established the outturn cost of the Albertville 1992 Winter Olympics at USD2.0 billion in 2015-dollars and cost overrun at 137% in real terms. This includes sports-related costs only, that is, operational costs incurred by the committee for the purpose of staging the Games. The competition venues, the Olympic village, international broadcast center, and media and press center, average cost for Winter Games since 1960 is USD3.1 billion, average cost overrun is 142%. Magique is the Olympic mascot of these Olympics and is a little imp in the shape of a star and it is created by Philippe Mairesse and was presented in 1989. His star shape symbolizes dreams and imagination and his colors come from the French flag, with a red hat and a blue costume. Freestyle skiing event of moguls and short-track speedskating made their debuts as medal disciplines, norwegian skiers won every male cross-country skiing race
1992 Winter Olympics
–
Mexican sculptor
Abel Ramírez Águilar working on his gold medal piece in snow sculpture competition related to the Games
1992 Winter Olympics
–
The emblem is the
flag of Savoy region in the shape of the Olympic flame, dancing above stripes representing the
flag of France.
12.
Mountain
–
A mountain is a large landform that stretches above the surrounding land in a limited area, usually in the form of a peak. A mountain is steeper than a hill. Mountains are formed through tectonic forces or volcanism and these forces can locally raise the surface of the earth. Mountains erode slowly through the action of rivers, weather conditions, a few mountains are isolated summits, but most occur in huge mountain ranges. High elevations on mountains produce colder climates than at sea level and these colder climates strongly affect the ecosystems of mountains, different elevations have different plants and animals. Because of the less hospitable terrain and climate, mountains tend to be used less for agriculture and more for resource extraction and recreation, the highest mountain on Earth is Mount Everest in the Himalayas of Asia, whose summit is 8,850 m above mean sea level. The highest known mountain on any planet in the Solar System is Olympus Mons on Mars at 21,171 m, there is no universally accepted definition of a mountain. Elevation, volume, relief, steepness, spacing and continuity have been used as criteria for defining a mountain, whether a landform is called a mountain may depend on local usage. The highest point in San Francisco, California, is called Mount Davidson, notwithstanding its height of 300 m, similarly, Mount Scott outside Lawton, Oklahoma is only 251 m from its base to its highest point. Whittows Dictionary of Physical Geography states Some authorities regard eminences above 600 metres as mountains, in addition, some definitions also include a topographical prominence requirement, typically 100 or 500 feet. For a while, the US defined a mountain as being 1,000 feet or taller, any similar landform lower than this height was considered a hill. However, today, the United States Geological Survey concludes that these terms do not have technical definitions in the US, using these definitions, mountains cover 33% of Eurasia, 19% of South America, 24% of North America, and 14% of Africa. As a whole, 24% of the Earths land mass is mountainous, there are three main types of mountains, volcanic, fold, and block. All three types are formed from plate tectonics, when portions of the Earths crust move, crumple, compressional forces, isostatic uplift and intrusion of igneous matter forces surface rock upward, creating a landform higher than the surrounding features. The height of the feature makes it either a hill or, if higher and steeper, major mountains tend to occur in long linear arcs, indicating tectonic plate boundaries and activity. Volcanoes are formed when a plate is pushed below another plate, at a depth of around 100 km, melting occurs in rock above the slab, and forms magma that reaches the surface. When the magma reaches the surface, it builds a volcanic mountain. Examples of volcanoes include Mount Fuji in Japan and Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines, the magma does not have to reach the surface in order to create a mountain, magma that solidifies below ground can still form dome mountains, such as Navajo Mountain in the US
Mountain
–
Mount Everest, the highest peak on Earth
Mountain
–
Chimborazo,
Ecuador. The point on Earth's surface farthest from its center.
Mountain
–
Aiguille du Dru in the
French Alps
Mountain
–
The
Matterhorn,
Swiss Alps
13.
Mountain ranges
–
A mountain range is a geographic area containing numerous geologically related mountains. A mountain system or system of ranges, sometimes is used to combine several geological features that are geographically related. Mountain ranges are usually segmented by highlands or mountain passes and valleys, individual mountains within the same mountain range do not necessarily have the same geologic structure or petrology. They may be a mix of different orogenic expressions and terranes, for example thrust sheets, uplifted blocks, fold mountains, most geologically young mountain ranges on the Earths land surface are associated with either the Pacific Ring of Fire or the Alpide Belt. The Andes is 7,000 kilometres long and is considered the worlds longest mountain system. The Alpide belt includes Indonesia and southeast Asia, through the Himalaya, the belt also includes other European and Asian mountain ranges. The Himalayas contain the highest mountains in the world, including Mount Everest, mountain ranges outside of these two systems include the Arctic Cordillera, the Urals, the Appalachians, the Scandinavian Mountains, the Altai Mountains and the Hijaz Mountains. If the definition of a range is stretched to include underwater mountains. The mountain systems of the earth are characterized by a tree structure, the sub-range relationship is often expressed as a parent-child relationship. For example, the White Mountains of New Hampshire and the Blue Ridge Mountains are sub-ranges of the Appalachian Mountains, equivalently, the Appalachians are the parent of the White Mountains and Blue Ridge Mountains, and the White Mountains and the Blue Ridge Mountains are children of the Appalachians. The position of mountains influences climate, such as rain or snow, when air masses move up and over mountains, the air cools producing orographic precipitation. As the air descends on the side, it warms again and is drier. Often, a shadow will affect the leeward side of a range. Mountain ranges are constantly subjected to forces which work to tear them down. Erosion is at work while the mountains are being uplifted and long after until the mountains are reduced to low hills, rivers are traditionally believed to be the principle erosive factor on mountain ranges, with their ability of bedrock incision and sediment transport. The rugged topography of a range is the product of erosion. The basins adjacent to a mountain range are filled with sediments which are buried and turned into sedimentary rock. The early Cenozoic uplift of the Rocky Mountains of Colorado provides an example and this mass of rock was removed as the range was actively undergoing uplift
Mountain ranges
–
The
Himalayas, the highest mountain range on Earth, seen from space
Mountain ranges
–
Mountain range of
High Tatras in
Slovakia in 1865
Mountain ranges
–
The
Andes, the world's longest mountain range on the surface of a continent, seen from the air
Mountain ranges
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Hillary and Norgay Montes on Pluto (14 July 2015)
14.
Subprefecture
–
Subprefecture is an administrative division of a country that is below prefecture or province. There are twelve Albanian counties or prefectures, each of which is subdivided into several districts, Examples, District of Korçë, District of Sarandë In Brazil the subprefectures are administrative divisions of some big cities, such as São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. The head of a subprefecture, the subprefeito, is indicated by the municipalitys mayor, in São Paulo there are 32 subprefectures. The largest in area, Parelheiros, covers 353.5 km². Examples, Djibasso Subprefecture Examples, NGouri Subprefecture, Chari-Baguirmi Prefecture and it was used in Qing Dynasty. Called ting in Chinese, it is also on the level as a department. Examples, Aihun Ting in the late-Qing Heilongjiang, a Sous-préfecture is the administrative town of an arrondissement where an arrondissement doesnt contain the préfecture. The civil servant in charge of executive power is the sous-préfet. Examples, Examples, A sous-préfecture is a subdivision of a department in Ivory Coast. See details in Subprefectures of Japan and an example of Kushiro Subprefecture, under Qing Dynasty rule, this was translated from tīng in Chinese Tamsui Subprefecture and Kavalan Subprefecture. Under Japanese rule, 廳 translated to prefecture, so 支廳 translated to subprefecture
Subprefecture
–
'Sous-préfecture' in Verdun, France
15.
Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne
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Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne is a commune in the Savoie department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in south-eastern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department and it lies in the Maurienne, the valley of the River Arc. It was also an Episcopal See of Savoy during the Ancien Régime and its original name was simply Maurienne, or Moriana in Italian and Latin. Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne is located at the confluence of the Arc, a river which has shaped the Maurienne Valley, the neighbouring communes of Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne are Saint-Julien-Mont-Denis, Jarrier, Hermillon, Villargondran, Albiez-le-Jeune, Albiez-Montrond, Saint-Pancrace and Pontamafrey-Montpascal. The climate is the type because of the presence of the Alpine Massif. Route nationale 6 A43 autoroute Col de la Croix de Fer Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne is located on the route of the future new Lyon-Turin rail link, homes, businesses, the SNCF railway station and the rescue centre are fully affected by this project. Responsible for the studies, the Lyon Turin Railway company foresees the installation of a new station in the Sous-le-Bourg quarter, serving the historic line. Geological and topographical investigations are underway and this project promises to be even more complex than that of the Channel Tunnel. The town of Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne is equipped with a network of public transport run by the Communauté de communes Cœur de Maurienne, a heliport is available for the helicopter of the gendarmerie whose base is located in Modane. La Bastille, les Chaudannes and les Clapeys are the three main quarters, the total number of dwellings in the commune is 4,240. Among such housing,87. 9% are principal residences,5. 4% are secondary homes and 6. 7% are vacant dwellings. These accommodations have a share of 17. 5% as individual houses,79. 3% as apartments, the number of residents who own their homes is 37. 9%. This is lower than the average which adds up to nearly 55. 3%. The number of tenants is 56. 7% throughout the housing which is higher than the average of 39. 8%. It may be noted also that 5. 4% of the inhabitants of the commune are people who are housed for free while at the level of the whole of the France the percentage is 4. 9%. Still on all of the municipality housing,3. 5% are studios,11. 5% are two-room housing,28. 4% have three,34. 5% of dwellings have four rooms, and 22. 1% of dwellings have five rooms or more. Locality named after John the Baptist, the precursor, who was born in Ain-Karim, son of Zechariah and Saint Elizabeth, cousin of Jesus, Latin name, Mauriana Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne has been the capital of the Maurienne Valley since the 6th century. The oldest possessions of the Counts of Savoy were the counties of Maurienne, Savoy proper, the Duchy of Savoy, which had been a French-speaking province under the sovereignty of the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont, was invaded by Revolutionary France, but restored to Piedmont in 1815
Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne
–
A view of Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne in the direction of
Modane
Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne
–
The
Maurienne Valley and its main channels of communication to Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne
Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne
–
A general view of Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne
Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne
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Relics of Saint John the Baptist during the festival of bread.
16.
Charles Albert of Sardinia
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Charles Albert, also called The Hesitant for his variable political lines, was the King of Sardinia from 1831 to 1849. His name is bound up with the first Italian constitution, the Albertine Statute, and he abdicated after his forces were defeated by the Imperial Austrian army at the Battle of Novara, and died in exile soon thereafter. He was born in Turin in October 1798, to Charles Emmanuel, Prince of Carignano and he was the third cousin once removed of Victor Amadeus III, and the next male-line heir after the three sons of Victor Amadeus. When Charles Albert was born in 1798, none of his cousins had a son and he was educated in the intellectually liberal atmosphere of Geneva, then in Paris during the First French Empire of Napoleon Bonaparte. Napoleon named him a lieutenant of dragoons in 1814, after the final fall of Napoleon the following year, Charles Albert returned to Turin. Two mentors were entrusted with countering the dangerous ideas about national liberation Charles had learned in France, however, he continued to display some sympathies with the liberals. In 1821, as regent for the Kingdom in the absence of the new king, Charles Felix, Charles Felix sent him to Spain, to serve with the French army that King Louis XVIII of France sent to suppress the liberal revolution there and restore Ferdinand VII. He distinguished himself at the Battle of Trocadero in 1823, which gained him the favour of the leading conservative European power, the Austrian Empire, Charles Albert succeeded his cousin Charles Felix to the throne of Sardinia in 1831. Although an Italian patriot who allegedly was opposed to the Austrian hegemony and domination in Northern Italy and he introduced a series of reforms following the many Revolutions of 1830 that convulsed Europe. He abolished domestic customs and trade barriers within the Kingdom, supported the arts and sciences, and promulgated the Statuto Albertino, during the Revolutions of 1848, he agreed to a constitutional regime which remained in place for the century that the Kingdom of Italy lasted. The same year he declared war on Austria, the small army of Piedmont was supported by volunteers from the whole of Italy. However, after his initial victories lost him the support of the Pope and the other Italian rulers, he was defeated at Custoza, under the increasing influence of the Republicans in Piedmont, he resumed the war the next year. But the Piedmontese were again defeated, at Novara, rather than redrawing the Statute, he abdicated in favor of his son, Victor Emmanuel, and went into exile in Portugal. He died at Porto the same year and his remains were transferred to the Royal Basilica of Superga, outside Turin. Friedrich Engels, Among the indigenous princes, the one enemy of Italian freedom was and is Charles Albert. Italians should bear in mind and repeat every hour the old saying, God watch over my friends, from Ferdinand of the House of Bourbon, there is nothing to fear, he has for a long time been discredited. Charles Albert on the other hand calls himself pompously the liberator of Italy while on the people he is supposed to be liberating he imposes as a condition the yoke of his rule. In 1817, Charles Albert married his cousin once removed, Maria Theresa of Austria, the youngest daughter of Ferdinand III, Grand Duke of Tuscany
Charles Albert of Sardinia
–
Charles Albert
17.
Paper mills
–
A paper mill is a factory devoted to making paper from vegetable fibres such as wood pulp, old rags and other ingredients. While the use of human and animal powered mills was known to Chinese and Muslim papermakers, the general absence of the use of water-power in Muslim papermaking is suggested by the habit of Muslim authors to call a production center not a mill, but a paper manufactory. Although scholars have identified paper mills in Abbasid-era Baghdad in 794–795, in the Moroccan city of Fez, Ibn Battuta speaks of 400 mill stones for paper. Since Ibn Battuta does not mention the use of water-power and such a number of water-mills would be grotesquely high, the passage is generally taken to refer to human or animal force. An exhaustive survey of milling in Al-Andalus did not uncover a single water-powered paper mill, Burns remains altogether sceptical given the isolated occurrence of the reference and the prevalence of manual labour in Islamic papermaking elsewhere. Likewise, the identification of early hydraulic stamping mills in medieval documents from Fabriano, the earliest certain evidence to a water-powered paper mill dates to 1282 in the Spanish Kingdom of Aragon. A decree by the Christian king Peter III addresses the establishment of a royal molendinum, the first permanent paper mill north of the Alps was established in Nuremberg by Ulman Stromer in 1390, it is later depicted in the lavishly illustrated Nuremberg Chronicle. From the mid-14th century onwards, European paper milling underwent an improvement of many work processes. The size of a paper mill prior to the use of machines was described by counting the number of vats it had. Thus, a one vat paper mill had only one vatman, one coucher, by the early 20th century, paper mills sprang up around New England and the rest of the world, due to the high demand for paper. At this time, there were many leaders of the production of paper, one of such was the Brown Company in Berlin. During the year 1907, the Brown Company cut between 30 and 40 million acres of woodlands on their property, which extended from La Tuque, Quebec, Canada to West Palm, “Log drives” were conducted on local rivers to send the logs to the mills. By the late 20th and early 21st-century, paper began to close. Due to the addition of new machinery, many millworkers were laid off, Paper mills can be fully integrated mills or nonintegrated mills. Integrated mills consist of a mill and a paper mill on the same site. Such mills receive logs or wood chips and produce paper, modern paper machines can be 500 feet in length, produce a sheet 400 inches wide, and operate at speeds of more than 60 miles per hour. The two main suppliers of paper machines are Metso and Voith, Paper pollution Cutting stock problem List of paper mills Burns, Robert I. Paper comes to the West, 800−1400, in Lindgren, Uta, mann Verlag, pp. biz - Paper world directory and search engine for the pulp and paper world List of paper mills on paper and print monthly
Paper mills
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International Paper Company's Kraft pulp and paper mill in
Georgetown, South Carolina. When built, this was the world's largest mill.
Paper mills
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Basement of paper mill in
Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. Pulp and paper manufacture involves a great deal of
humidity, which presents a
preventive maintenance and
corrosion challenge.
Paper mills
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A mid-19th century paper mill, the Forest Fibre Company, in
Berlin, New Hampshire
Paper mills
–
Dutch paper mill from 1654 in the Arnhem open-air museum
.svg)
listen); Arpitan: Arbèrtvile) is a commune in the Savoie department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in south-eastern France.
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Aosta, Italy[1]
Winnenden (Baden-Württemberg)
Sainte-Adèle, Quebec
