1.
Xare
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Xare is racquet sport, a form of Basque pelota. Equipment includes a racquet and a ball, the ball is not exactly struck, nor is it quite caught—the effect is somewhere in between. The ball is hard, and covered in parchment. The game is played in an indoor court, called a trinquete. For xare, a net is strung across the middle of the trinquete, xare players wear helmets that are similar to those used in cycling
2.
Ustaritz
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Ustaritz is a town in the traditional Basque province of Labourd, now a commune in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department in south-western France. It is located on the river Nive some 13 kilometres inland from Bayonne, Ustaritz was the location of the assembly of local Basque leaders before the French Revolution. The 19th-century French playwright and historian Jean-Joseph Ader was born in Ustaritz, communes of the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department INSEE UZTARITZE in the Bernardo Estornés Lasa - Auñamendi Encyclopedia Information available in Spanish
3.
Olympic Games
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The Olympic Games are considered the worlds foremost sports competition with more than 200 nations participating. The Olympic Games are held four years, with the Summer and Winter Games alternating by occurring every four years. Their creation was inspired by the ancient Olympic Games, which were held in Olympia, Greece, Baron Pierre de Coubertin founded the International Olympic Committee in 1894, leading to the first modern Games in Athens in 1896. The IOC is the body of the Olympic Movement, with the Olympic Charter defining its structure. The evolution of the Olympic Movement during the 20th and 21st centuries has resulted in changes to the Olympic Games. The IOC has had to adapt to a variety of economic, political, as a result, the Olympics has shifted away from pure amateurism, as envisioned by Coubertin, to allowing participation of professional athletes. The growing importance of mass media created the issue of corporate sponsorship, World wars led to the cancellation of the 1916,1940, and 1944 Games. Large boycotts during the Cold War limited participation in the 1980 and 1984 Games, the Olympic Movement consists of international sports federations, National Olympic Committees, and organising committees for each specific Olympic Games. As the decision-making body, the IOC is responsible for choosing the host city for each Games, the IOC also determines the Olympic programme, consisting of the sports to be contested at the Games. There are several Olympic rituals and symbols, such as the Olympic flag and torch, over 13,000 athletes compete at the Summer and Winter Olympic Games in 33 different sports and nearly 400 events. The first, second, and third-place finishers in each event receive Olympic medals, gold, silver, the Games have grown so much that nearly every nation is now represented. This growth has created numerous challenges and controversies, including boycotts, doping, bribery, every two years the Olympics and its media exposure provide unknown athletes with the chance to attain national and sometimes international fame. The Games also constitute an opportunity for the host city and country to themselves to the world. The Ancient Olympic Games were religious and athletic festivals held every four years at the sanctuary of Zeus in Olympia, competition was among representatives of several city-states and kingdoms of Ancient Greece. These Games featured mainly athletic but also combat such as wrestling. It has been written that during the Games, all conflicts among the participating city-states were postponed until the Games were finished. This cessation of hostilities was known as the Olympic peace or truce and this idea is a modern myth because the Greeks never suspended their wars. The truce did allow those religious pilgrims who were travelling to Olympia to pass through warring territories unmolested because they were protected by Zeus
4.
Basque language
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Basque is the language spoken by the Basques. Linguistically, Basque is unrelated to the languages of Europe and indeed, as a language isolate. The Basques are indigenous to, and primarily inhabit, the Basque Country, the Basque language is spoken by 27% of Basques in all territories. Of these, 93% are in the Spanish area of the Basque Country, native speakers live in a contiguous area that includes parts of four Spanish territories and the three ancient provinces in France. However, in those Basque-speaking regions that supported the uprising the Basque language was more than merely tolerated, overall, in the 1960s and later, the trend reversed and education and publishing in Basque began to flourish. As a part of process, a standardized form of the Basque language. Besides its standardised version, the five historic Basque dialects are Biscayan, Gipuzkoan, and Upper Navarrese in Spain and they take their names from the historic Basque provinces, but the dialect boundaries are not congruent with province boundaries. Euskara Batua was created so that Basque language could be easily understood by all Basque speakers—in formal situations. In both Spain and France, the use of Basque for education varies from region to region, a language isolate, Basque is believed to be one of the few surviving pre-Indo-European languages in Europe, and the only one in Western Europe. Basque has adopted a good deal of its vocabulary from the Romance languages, the Basque alphabet uses the Latin script. In Basque, the name of the language is officially Euskara, three etymological theories of the name Euskara are taken seriously by linguists and Vasconists. In French, the language is normally called basque, though in recent times euskara has become common, Spanish has a greater variety of names for the language. Today, it is most commonly referred to as el vasco, la lengua vasca, both terms, vasco and basque, are inherited from Latin ethnonym Vascones, which in turn goes back to the Greek term οὐασκώνους, an ethnonym used by Strabo in his Geographica. The Spanish term Vascuence, derived from Latin vasconĭce, has acquired negative connotations over the centuries and is not well-liked amongst Basque speakers generally, Basque is geographically surrounded by Romance languages but is a language isolate unrelated to them. It is the last remaining descendant of one of the languages of Western Europe. Consequently, its prehistory may not be reconstructible by means of the comparative method except by applying it to differences between dialects within the language. Little is known of its origins, but a form of the Basque language likely was present in Western Europe before the arrival of the Indo-European languages to the area. Others find this unlikely, see the aizkora controversy, Latin inscriptions in Gallia Aquitania preserve a number of words with cognates in the reconstructed proto-Basque language, for instance, the personal names Nescato and Cison
5.
Racket (sports equipment)
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A racket or racquet is a sports implement consisting of a handled frame with an open hoop across which a network of strings or catgut is stretched tightly. It is used for striking a ball or shuttlecock in games such as squash, tennis, racquetball, collectively, these games are known as racket sports. This predecessor to the game of squash, rackets, is played with 30 1⁄2-inch-long wooden rackets. While squash equipment has evolved in the century, rackets equipment has changed little. The frame of rackets for all sports was made of laminated wood. The traditional racket size was limited by the strength and weight of the frame which had to be strong enough to hold the strings. Manufacturers started adding non-wood laminates to wood rackets to improve stiffness, non-wood rackets were made first of steel, then of aluminium, and then carbon fiber composites. Wood is still used for tennis, rackets, and xare. Most rackets are now made of materials including carbon fibre or fiberglass, metals such as titanium alloys. Catgut has partially replaced by synthetic materials including nylon, polyamide. Rackets are restrung when necessary, which may be after every match for a professional, racket is the standard spelling of the word. Racquet is a spelling used more commonly in certain sports. Racket is the spelling in tennis. While some writers, especially those outside North America, prefer the French-influenced racquet, racket is the predominant spelling by a large margin, the origin of the term racket is unclear. According to a belief first published by Malcolm Whitman in 1932. Modern research however reveals this thesis in a questionable light. Instead, the term is likely to be derived from the Flemish word raketsen which is itself derived from Middle French rachasser. Badminton rackets are light, with top quality rackets weighing between about 80 and 100 grams, modern rackets are composed of carbon fibre composite, which may be augmented by a variety of materials
6.
Fronton (court)
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A Fronton is a two-walled or single-walled court used as a playing area for Basque pelota. The front wall of the first frontons in villages was usually the wall of a church, because of the increasing popularity of the game, many churches put up signs forbidding pelota games on their porches. The game were played in town halls, but when the game turned into a highly popular entertainment in the region. A fronton is made up of a floor and three vertical walls, named frontis, the front wall is the main one, where the hits are directed according to the rules. That wall has a line at a determined height named Bajo Chapa, perpendicular to the front wall is attached another longer wall, with marks for the distance to the main wall. The number of marks depends on the type of fronton used, perpendicular to the side wall is the back wall. The height of the three walls must be the same for professional courts, often, in common rural open-air courts, the place where the back wall should be is delimited by a line on the floor. A free wall sideline is delimited to make watching the game easier for an audience or other players, in every kind of fronton, the sidelines are 4.5 m apart. This kind of court is 30 m long and is used only for frontenis. This 36 m court is used professionally for hand-pelota, paleta-leather and this 54 m court is used professionally for long bat, remonte and basket variants. This 28.5 m court has a different shape than the others. It allows the variants of handball, paleta-rubber, paleta-leather and xare and it is used almost exclusively in the Northern Basque Country, but also in some places of León and Castilla. This 100 m open-air court is used for playing Grand Chistera in France and has no side walls and this court is not recognised by the International Federation of Basque Pelota and cannot be used for international competitions. The marks on the fronton must create a notable contrast with the color of the field, to make the difference visible, the marks are often painted. The sideline line is 15 cm wide and parallel to the side wall and this line marks the limit between the playing ground and the exterior. The lower-zone line is 15 cm wide and the height depends on the size of the fronton, the upper-zone is frequently marked at 10 m high on the wall and the line is also 15 cm wide. The squares are the lines painted on the wall and the ground, used to mark the places of service, falta. From square to square the distance is 4 m or 3 m, the falta line is located in the fourth square, while pasa is located in the seventh square, both lines are 15 cm wide
7.
Vulgar Latin
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Vulgar Latin or Sermo Vulgaris is a generic term for the nonstandard sociolects of Latin from which the Romance languages developed. Works written in Latin during classical times used Classical Latin rather than Vulgar Latin, because of its nonstandard nature, Vulgar Latin had no official orthography. Vulgar Latin is sometimes also called colloquial Latin, or Common Romance, in Renaissance Latin, Vulgar Latin was called vulgare Latinum or Latinum vulgare. The term common speech, which later became Vulgar Latin, was used by inhabitants of the Roman Empire, traces of their language appear in some inscriptions, such as graffiti or advertisements. The educated population mainly responsible for Classical Latin might also have spoken Vulgar Latin in certain contexts depending on their socioeconomic background, the term was first used improperly in that sense by the pioneers of Romance-language philology, François Juste Marie Raynouard and Friedrich Christian Diez. These terms, as he points out later in the work, are a translation into German of Dantes vulgare latinum and Latinum vulgare, and these names in turn are at the end of a tradition extending to the Roman republic. Latin could be sermo Latinus, but in addition was a variety known as sermo vulgaris, sermo vulgi, sermo plebeius and these modifiers inform post-classical readers that a conversational Latin existed, which was used by the masses in daily speaking and was perceived as lower-class. These vocabulary items manifest no opposition to the written language, there was an opposition to higher-class, or family Latin in sermo familiaris and very rarely literature might be termed sermo nobilis. The supposed sermo classicus is a scholarly fiction unattested in the dictionary, all kinds of sermo were spoken only, not written. If one wanted to refer to what in post-classical times was called classical Latin one resorted to the concept of latinitas or latine. If one spoke in the lingua or sermo Latinus one merely spoke Latin, but if one spoke latine or latinius one spoke good Latin, and formal Latin had latinitas, the original opposition was between formal or implied good Latin and informal or Vulgar Latin. The spoken/written dichotomy is entirely philological, although making it clear that sermo vulgaris existed, the ancients said very little about it. Because it was not transcribed, it can only be studied indirectly, knowledge comes from these chief sources, Solecisms, especially in Late Latin texts. Mention of it by ancient grammarians, including prescriptive grammar texts from the Late Latin period condemning linguistic errors that represent spoken Latin, the comparative method, which reconstructs Proto-Romance, a hypothetical vernacular proto-language from which the Romance languages descended. The original written Latin language was adapted from the spoken language of the Latins, with some minor modifications. As with many languages, over time the spoken language diverged from the written language with the written language remaining somewhat static. Nevertheless, during the period spoken Latin still remained largely common across the Empire. The collapse of the Western Roman Empire rapidly began to change this, the former western provinces became increasingly isolated from the Eastern Roman Empire leading to a rapid divergence in the Latin spoken on either side
8.
Sport in Spain
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Sport in Spain in the second half of the 20th century has always been dominated by football. Other popular sport activities include basketball, tennis, cycling, handball, motorcycling, Formula One, water sports, rhythmic gymnastics, golf, Spain has also hosted a number of international events such as the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona and the 1982 FIFA World Cup. Soccer is the most popular sport in Spain, La Liga or Primera División is considered to be one of the worlds best competitions. Successful teams in recent European competitions are Real Madrid, FC Barcelona, Sevilla, Athletic Bilbao, Valencia, Real Madrid and Barcelona have dominated with for much of its history, and created an intimate rivalry. This said, as of 2009, FC Barcelona is both champion of La Liga and the UEFA Champions Leagues victor, also FC Barcelona has won the Copa del Rey championship. Other teams such as Atlético Madrid, Sevilla and Valencia have also gained prominence by winning the UEFA Cup in 2009, 2006–2007 and 2012, the Spanish national football team has been successful and have qualified for the FIFA World Cup tournament thirteen times since 1930. In 2010, Spain defeated the Netherlands in the final to win the tournament for the first time, in the European Championship they were champions in 1964,2008 and 2012 and runners-up in 1984. Spain has won two medals in football Olympic Games tournaments and they have won a silver medal at the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, and won a gold medal during the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. The youth teams have also been successful in the last decade. The U-20 team won the FIFA World Youth Championship in 1999 and were runners-up in 1985 and 2003, the U-17 team was runners-up three times and won third place in 1997 in the FIFA U-17 World Cup. The Spanish ACB is one of the major European basketball leagues, Spanish teams such as Real Madrid Baloncesto, FC Barcelona Bàsquet and Joventut Badalona have won international championships such as the Euroleague or Eurocup. A number of Spanish players such as Pau Gasol and his younger brother Marc Gasol, José Calderón, Ricky Rubio, other Spanish players who have recently played in the league include Rudy Fernández and Sergio Rodríguez. Most recently, they won the medal at EuroBasket 2011, a silver at the 2012 Summer Olympics. The womens national team were medalists at the 2014 FIBA World Championship for Women. Spain has produced a number of champions, excelling in tournaments held on clay courts such as the Roland Garros tournament. Spain has also won the Davis Cup five times and the Fed Cup five other times Rafael Nadal is considered the greatest Spanish tennis player of all time. He has won the French Open for five times. After defeating then world number #1 Roger Federer, Nadal claimed the Wimbledon trophy and he also won the 2009 Australian Open, the first male Spaniard to do so
9.
Sports in France
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Sport in France plays an important role in French society, which is reflected in its popularity among the French people and strong sporting history. Various types of sports are played and followed in France, the most popular of which is association football, association football is the most popular sport in France, with 1,973,270 licensed players in the leagues. The sport was imported from England at the end of the 19th century, in its early days, the sport gained followers mainly in the Paris area and the Northern part of the country - Nord-Pas-de-Calais and Normandy were the first teams that were created outside Paris. In southern France, footballs competitor, rugby football, was favoured at the time. Established in 1919 from competing organizations, the Fédération française de football consists of 18,000 teams and it is also one of only nine teams to have won the UEFA European Championship. France was also the 1984 Olympic Champion and the 1998 World Cup winner, Ligue 1 is the French professional league for association football clubs. It is the primary football competition and serves as the top division of the French football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with Ligue 2, the most successful club in the French first division history is AS Saint-Étienne with 10 championships, followed by Olympique de Marseille with 9 titles and FC Nantes with 8 titles. As of 2016, the current champions are Paris Saint-Germain, the Coupe de France is the premier knock-out cup competition in French football. The Coupe de la Ligue is the major cup competition in France. The Trophée des champions is played each July as a match between the Coupe de France winners and the Ligue 1 champions. Only one French club, Olympique de Marseille, has won the UEFA Champions League in 1993, Stade de Reims, AS Saint-Étienne, and AS Monaco have been runners-up. SC Bastia, FC Girondins de Bordeaux and Olympique de Marseille have also been runners-up in the UEFA Europa League, France womens national football team main international achievement has been fourth place at the 2011 FIFA Womens World Cup. Womens national professional competitions are supervised by the Fédération française de football, the first division is the Championnat de France de football féminin. Olympique Lyonnais is the most successful team in French first division history with 12 titles, in the UEFA Womens Champions League, OL have won twice and have been runners-up twice. Rugby union was first introduced in the early 1870s by British residents, while football is much more popular nationally, rugby union is predominant in the southern half of the country, especially around Toulouse, the French Basque country and Catalonia. Elite French clubs participate in the club competition - the Top 14. Clubs also compete in the European knock-out competitions, the European Rugby Champions Cup and it is the seventh largest French team sport in the terms of licensed players with 457,018 licensed players
10.
Basque Country (greater region)
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The Basque Country is the name given to the home of the Basque people in the western Pyrenees that straddles the border between France and Spain on the Atlantic coast. Euskal Herria is the oldest documented Basque name for the area they inhabit, dating to the 16th century and it comprises the Autonomous Communities of the Basque Country and Navarre in Spain and the Northern Basque Country in France. The region is home to the Basque people, their language, culture, the name in Basque is Euskal Herria. The name is difficult to translate into other languages due to the wide range of meanings of the Basque word herri. It can be translated as nation, country, land, people, population and town, village, the first part, Euskal, is the adjectival form of Euskara the Basque language. Thus a more literal translation would be country/nation/people/settlement of the Basque language, some Basques refer to the seven traditional districts collectively as Zazpiak Bat, meaning The Seven One, a motto coined in the late 19th century. In most contemporary sources it covers the arrondissement of Bayonne and the cantons of Mauléon-Licharre and Tardets-Sorholus, within these conventions, the area of Northern Basque Country is 2,995 square kilometres. As emphasized by Jean Goyhenetche, it would be accurate to depict it as the reunion of five entities, Labourd, Lower Navarre, Soule but also Bayonne. The Southern Basque Country, known in Basque as Hegoalde is the part of the Basque region that lies completely within Spain and it is the largest and most populated part of the Basque Country. It includes two main regions, the Basque Autonomous Community and the Chartered Community of Navarre and its name refers to the charters, the Fueros of Navarre. The Spanish Constitution of 1978 states that Navarre may become a part of the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country if it is so decided by its people, to date, there has been no implementation of this law. The latter has repeatedly asked for an amendment to the Constitution to remove this clause, the Basque Country region is dominated by a warm, humid and wet oceanic climate and the coastal area is part of Green Spain and by extension it affects Bayonne and Biarritz as well. Inland areas in Navarre and the regions of the autonomous community are transitional with continental mediterranean climate with somewhat larger temperature swings between seasons. The list only sources locations in Spain, but Bayonne/Biarritz have a similar climate as nearby Hondarribia on the Spanish side of the border. According to some theories, Basques may be the least assimilated remnant of the Paleolithic inhabitants of Western Europe to the Indo-European migrations, Basque tribes were mentioned by Greek writer Strabo and Roman writer Pliny, including the Vascones, the Aquitani, and others. Geographically, the Basque Country was inhabited in Roman times by several tribes, the Vascones, the Varduli, the Caristi, the Autrigones, the Berones, the Tarbelli, and the Sibulates. Many believe that except for the Berones and Autrigones they were non-Indo-European peoples, some ancient place-names, such as Deba, Butrón, Nervión, Zegama, suggest the presence of non-Basque peoples at some point in protohistory. The Vascones around Pamplona, after fighting against Franks and Visigoths, founded the Kingdom of Pamplona
11.
Argentina
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Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a federal republic in the southern half of South America. With a mainland area of 2,780,400 km2, Argentina is the eighth-largest country in the world, the second largest in Latin America, and the largest Spanish-speaking one. The country is subdivided into provinces and one autonomous city, Buenos Aires. The provinces and the capital have their own constitutions, but exist under a federal system, Argentina claims sovereignty over part of Antarctica, the Falkland Islands, and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. The earliest recorded presence in the area of modern-day Argentina dates back to the Paleolithic period. The country has its roots in Spanish colonization of the region during the 16th century, Argentina rose as the successor state of the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata, a Spanish overseas viceroyalty founded in 1776. The country thereafter enjoyed relative peace and stability, with waves of European immigration radically reshaping its cultural. The almost-unparalleled increase in prosperity led to Argentina becoming the seventh wealthiest developed nation in the world by the early 20th century, Argentina retains its historic status as a middle power in international affairs, and is a prominent regional power in the Southern Cone and Latin America. Argentina has the second largest economy in South America, the third-largest in Latin America and is a member of the G-15 and it is the country with the second highest Human Development Index in Latin America with a rating of very high. Because of its stability, market size and growing high-tech sector, the description of the country by the word Argentina has to be found on a Venice map in 1536. In English the name Argentina probably comes from the Spanish language, however the naming itself is not Spanish, Argentina means in Italian of silver, silver coloured, probably borrowed from the Old French adjective argentine of silver > silver coloured already mentioned in the 12th century. The French word argentine is the form of argentin and derives of argent silver with the suffix -in. The Italian naming Argentina for the country implies Argentina Terra land of silver or Argentina costa coast of silver, in Italian, the adjective or the proper noun is often used in an autonomous way as a substantive and replaces it and it is said lArgentina. The name Argentina was probably first given by the Venitian and Genoese navigators, in Spanish and Portuguese, the words for silver are respectively plata and prata and of silver is said plateado and prateado. Argentina was first associated with the silver mountains legend, widespread among the first European explorers of the La Plata Basin. The first written use of the name in Spanish can be traced to La Argentina, a 1602 poem by Martín del Barco Centenera describing the region, the 1826 constitution included the first use of the name Argentine Republic in legal documents. The name Argentine Confederation was also used and was formalized in the Argentine Constitution of 1853. In 1860 a presidential decree settled the name as Argentine Republic
12.
Chile
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Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a South American country occupying a long, narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, Chilean territory includes the Pacific islands of Juan Fernández, Salas y Gómez, Desventuradas, and Easter Island in Oceania. Chile also claims about 1,250,000 square kilometres of Antarctica, the arid Atacama Desert in northern Chile contains great mineral wealth, principally copper. Southern Chile is rich in forests and grazing lands, and features a string of volcanoes and lakes, the southern coast is a labyrinth of fjords, inlets, canals, twisting peninsulas, and islands. Spain conquered and colonized Chile in the century, replacing Inca rule in northern and central Chile. After declaring its independence from Spain in 1818, Chile emerged in the 1830s as a relatively stable authoritarian republic, in the 1960s and 1970s the country experienced severe left-right political polarization and turmoil. The regime, headed by Augusto Pinochet, ended in 1990 after it lost a referendum in 1988 and was succeeded by a coalition which ruled through four presidencies until 2010. Chile is today one of South Americas most stable and prosperous nations and it leads Latin American nations in rankings of human development, competitiveness, income per capita, globalization, state of peace, economic freedom, and low perception of corruption. It also ranks high regionally in sustainability of the state, Chile is a founding member of the United Nations, the Union of South American Nations and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States. There are various theories about the origin of the word Chile, another theory points to the similarity of the valley of the Aconcagua with that of the Casma Valley in Peru, where there was a town and valley named Chili. Another origin attributed to chilli is the onomatopoeic cheele-cheele—the Mapuche imitation of the warble of a locally known as trile. The Spanish conquistadors heard about this name from the Incas, ultimately, Almagro is credited with the universalization of the name Chile, after naming the Mapocho valley as such. The older spelling Chili was in use in English until at least 1900 before switching over to Chile, stone tool evidence indicates humans sporadically frequented the Monte Verde valley area as long as 18,500 years ago. About 10,000 years ago, migrating Native Americans settled in fertile valleys, settlement sites from very early human habitation include Monte Verde, Cueva del Milodon and the Pali Aike Craters lava tube. They fought against the Sapa Inca Tupac Yupanqui and his army, the result of the bloody three-day confrontation known as the Battle of the Maule was that the Inca conquest of the territories of Chile ended at the Maule river. The next Europeans to reach Chile were Diego de Almagro and his band of Spanish conquistadors, the Spanish encountered various cultures that supported themselves principally through slash-and-burn agriculture and hunting. The conquest of Chile began in earnest in 1540 and was carried out by Pedro de Valdivia, one of Francisco Pizarros lieutenants, who founded the city of Santiago on 12 February 1541. Although the Spanish did not find the gold and silver they sought, they recognized the agricultural potential of Chiles central valley
13.
Uruguay
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Uruguay, officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, is a country in the southeastern region of South America. It borders Argentina to its west and Brazil to its north and east, with the Río de la Plata to the south and the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast. Uruguay is home to an estimated 3.42 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the area of its capital and largest city. With an area of approximately 176,000 square kilometres, Uruguay is geographically the second-smallest nation in South America, only larger in size than Suriname. Uruguay was inhabited by the Charrúa people for approximately 4000 years before the Portuguese established Colonia del Sacramento, one of the oldest European settlements in the region, in 1680. Montevideo was founded as a stronghold by the Spanish in the early 18th century. Uruguay won its independence between 1811 and 1828, following a struggle between Spain, Portugal, Argentina and Brazil. It remained subject to influence and intervention throughout the 19th century. Modern Uruguay is a constitutional republic, with a president who serves as both head of state and head of government. Uruguay is ranked first in Latin America in democracy, peace, lack of corruption, e-government, on a per-capita basis, Uruguay contributes more troops to United Nations peace-keeping missions than any other country. It ranks second in the region on economic freedom, income equality, per-capita income, Uruguay is the third-best country on the continent in terms of HDI, GDP growth, innovation and infrastructure. It is regarded as a country by the UN. Uruguay is also the third-best ranked in the world in e-Participation, Uruguay is an important global exporter of combed wool, rice, soybeans, frozen beef, malt and milk. Nearly 95% of Uruguays electricity comes from energy, mostly hydroelectric facilities. The Economist named Uruguay country of the year in 2013, acknowledging the innovative policy of legalizing the production, sale, the name of the namesake river comes from the Spanish pronunciation of the regional Guarani word for it. There are several interpretations, including bird-river, the name could also refer to a river snail called uruguá that was plentiful in the water. The only documented inhabitants of Uruguay before European colonization of the area were the Charrúa, the Portuguese discovered the region of present-day Uruguay in 1512. The Spanish arrived in present-day Uruguay in 1516, the indigenous peoples fierce resistance to conquest, combined with the absence of gold and silver, limited their settlement in the region during the 16th and 17th centuries
14.
Cuba
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Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is a country comprising the island of Cuba as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located in the northern Caribbean where the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, and it is south of both the U. S. state of Florida and the Bahamas, west of Haiti, and north of Jamaica. Havana is the largest city and capital, other cities include Santiago de Cuba. Cuba is the largest island in the Caribbean, with an area of 109,884 square kilometres, prior to Spanish colonization in the late 15th century, Cuba was inhabited by Amerindian tribes. It remained a colony of Spain until the Spanish–American War of 1898, as a fragile republic, Cuba attempted to strengthen its democratic system, but mounting political radicalization and social strife culminated in the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in 1952. Further unrest and instability led to Batistas ousting in January 1959 by the July 26 Movement, since 1965, the state has been governed by the Communist Party of Cuba. A point of contention during the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, a nuclear war broke out during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. Culturally, Cuba is considered part of Latin America, Cuba is a Marxist–Leninist one-party republic, where the role of the vanguard Communist Party is enshrined in the Constitution. Independent observers have accused the Cuban government of human rights abuses. It is one of the worlds last planned economies and its economy is dominated by the exports of sugar, tobacco, coffee, according to the Human Development Index, Cuba is described as a country with high human development and is ranked the eighth highest in North America. It also ranks highly in some metrics of national performance, including health care, the name Cuba comes from the Taíno language. The exact meaning of the name is unclear but it may be translated either as where fertile land is abundant, authors who believe that Christopher Columbus was Portuguese state that Cuba was named by Columbus for the town of Cuba in the district of Beja in Portugal. Before the arrival of the Spanish, Cuba was inhabited by three distinct tribes of indigenous peoples of the Americas, the Taíno, the Guanajatabey, and the Ciboney people. The ancestors of the Ciboney migrated from the mainland of South America, the Taíno arrived from Hispanola sometime in the 3rd century A. D. When Columbus arrived they were the dominant culture in Cuba, having a population of 150,000. The name Cuba comes from the native Taíno language and it is derived from either coabana meaning great place, or from cubao meaning where fertile land is abundant. The Taíno were farmers, while the Ciboney were farmers as well as fishers and hunter-gatherers, Columbus claimed the island for the new Kingdom of Spain and named it Isla Juana after Juan, Prince of Asturias. In 1511, the first Spanish settlement was founded by Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar at Baracoa, other towns soon followed, including San Cristobal de la Habana, founded in 1515, which later became the capital
15.
Jai alai
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Jai alai is a sport involving a ball bounced off a walled space by accelerating it to high speeds with a hand-held device. It is a variation of Basque pelota, the term, coined by Serafin Baroja in 1875, is also often loosely applied to the fronton where the sport is played. The game is called zesta-punta in Basque, the Basque Government promotes jai alai as the fastest sport in the world because of the speed of the ball. The court for jai alai consists of walls on the front, back and left, if the ball touches the floor outside these walls, it is considered out of bounds. Similarly, there is also a border on the lower 3 feet of the front wall that is out of bounds. The ceiling on the court is very high, so the ball has a more predictable path. The court is divided by 14 parallel lines going horizontally across the court, with line 1 closest to the front wall, in doubles, each team consists of a frontcourt player and a backcourt player. The game begins when the player of the first team serves the ball to the second team. The winner of each point stays on the court to meet the team in rotation. Losers go to the end of the line to another turn on the court. The first team to score 7 points wins, the next highest scores are awarded place and show positions, respectively. A jai alai game is played in round format, usually between eight teams of two players each or eight single players. The first team to score 7 or 9 points wins the game, two of the eight teams are in the court for each point. The server on one team must bounce the ball behind the serving line, the ball is then in play. The ball used in jai alai consists of metal strands tightly wound together, teams alternate catching the ball in their cesta and throwing it in one fluid motion without holding or juggling it. The ball must be either on the fly or after bouncing once on the floor. A team scores a point if a player, fails to serve the ball directly to the front wall so that upon rebound it will bounce between lines No.4 and 7. If it does not, it is an under or over serve, points usually double after the first round of play, once each team has played at least one point
16.
Florida
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Florida /ˈflɒrᵻdə/ is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, Florida is the 22nd-most extensive, the 3rd-most populous, and the 8th-most densely populated of the U. S. states. Jacksonville is the most populous municipality in the state and is the largest city by area in the contiguous United States, the Miami metropolitan area is Floridas most populous urban area. The city of Tallahassee is the state capital, much of the state is at or near sea level and is characterized by sedimentary soil. The climate varies from subtropical in the north to tropical in the south, the American alligator, American crocodile, Florida panther, and manatee can be found in the Everglades National Park. It was a location of the Seminole Wars against the Native Americans. Today, Florida is distinctive for its large Cuban expatriate community and high population growth, the states economy relies mainly on tourism, agriculture, and transportation, which developed in the late 19th century. Florida is also renowned for amusement parks, orange crops, the Kennedy Space Center, Florida has attracted many writers such as Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, Ernest Hemingway and Tennessee Williams, and continues to attract celebrities and athletes. It is internationally known for golf, tennis, auto racing, by the 16th century, the earliest time for which there is a historical record, major Native American groups included the Apalachee, the Timucua, the Ais, the Tocobaga, the Calusa and the Tequesta. Florida was the first part of the continental United States to be visited and settled by Europeans, the earliest known European explorers came with the Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León. Ponce de León spotted and landed on the peninsula on April 2,1513 and he named the region La Florida. The story that he was searching for the Fountain of Youth is a myth, in May 1539, Conquistador Hernando de Soto skirted the coast of Florida, searching for a deep harbor to land. He described seeing a wall of red mangroves spread mile after mile, some reaching as high as 70 feet. Very soon, many smokes appeared along the whole coast, billowing against the sky, the Spanish introduced Christianity, cattle, horses, sheep, the Spanish language, and more to Florida. Both the Spanish and French established settlements in Florida, with varying degrees of success, in 1559, Don Tristán de Luna y Arellano established a settlement at present-day Pensacola, making it the first attempted settlement in Florida, but it was abandoned by 1561. Spain maintained tenuous control over the region by converting the tribes to Christianity. The area of Spanish Florida diminished with the establishment of English settlements to the north, the English attacked St. Augustine, burning the city and its cathedral to the ground several times. Florida attracted numerous Africans and African-Americans from adjacent British colonies who sought freedom from slavery, in 1738, Governor Manuel de Montiano established Fort Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose near St
17.
Connecticut
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Connecticut is the southernmost state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. Connecticut is also often grouped along with New York and New Jersey as the Tri-State Area and it is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its capital city is Hartford, and its most populous city is Bridgeport, the state is named for the Connecticut River, a major U. S. river that approximately bisects the state. The word Connecticut is derived from various anglicized spellings of an Algonquian word for long tidal river, Connecticut is the third smallest state by area, the 29th most populous, and the fourth most densely populated of the 50 United States. It is known as the Constitution State, the Nutmeg State, the Provisions State, and it was influential in the development of the federal government of the United States. Connecticuts center of population is in Cheshire, New Haven County, Connecticuts first European settlers were Dutch. They established a small, short-lived settlement in present-day Hartford at the confluence of the Park, initially, half of Connecticut was a part of the Dutch colony New Netherland, which included much of the land between the Connecticut and Delaware rivers. The first major settlements were established in the 1630s by England, the Connecticut and New Haven Colonies established documents of Fundamental Orders, considered the first constitutions in North America. In 1662, the three colonies were merged under a charter, making Connecticut a crown colony. This colony was one of the Thirteen Colonies that revolted against British rule in the American Revolution, the Connecticut River, Thames River, and ports along the Long Island Sound have given Connecticut a strong maritime tradition which continues today. The state also has a history of hosting the financial services industry, including insurance companies in Hartford. As of the 2010 Census, Connecticut features the highest per-capita income, Human Development Index, and median household income in the United States. Landmarks and Cities of Connecticut Connecticut is bordered on the south by Long Island Sound, on the west by New York, on the north by Massachusetts, and on the east by Rhode Island. The state capital and third largest city is Hartford, and other cities and towns include Bridgeport, New Haven, Stamford, Waterbury, Norwalk, Danbury, New Britain, Greenwich. Connecticut is slightly larger than the country of Montenegro, there are 169 incorporated towns in Connecticut. The highest peak in Connecticut is Bear Mountain in Salisbury in the northwest corner of the state, the highest point is just east of where Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New York meet, on the southern slope of Mount Frissell, whose peak lies nearby in Massachusetts. At the opposite extreme, many of the towns have areas that are less than 20 feet above sea level. Connecticut has a maritime history and a reputation based on that history—yet the state has no direct oceanfront
18.
Nevada
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Nevada is a state in the Western, Mountain West, and Southwestern regions of the United States of America. Nevada is the 7th most extensive, the 34th most populous, nearly three-quarters of Nevadas people live in Clark County, which contains the Las Vegas–Paradise metropolitan area where three of the states four largest incorporated cities are located. Nevada is officially known as the Silver State because of the importance of silver to its history and economy. It is also known as the Battle Born State, because it achieved statehood during the Civil War, as the Sage-brush State, for the plant of the same name. Nevada borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, Nevada is largely desert and semi-arid, much of it located within the Great Basin. Areas south of the Great Basin are located within the Mojave Desert, while Lake Tahoe, about 86% of the states land is managed by various jurisdictions of the U. S. federal government, both civilian and military. Before European contact, Native Americans of the Paiute, Shoshone, the first Europeans to explore the region were Spanish. They called the region Nevada because of the snow covered the mountains in winter. The area formed part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain, the United States annexed the area in 1848 after its victory in the Mexican–American War, and it was incorporated as part of Utah Territory in 1850. The discovery of silver at the Comstock Lode in 1859 led to a boom that became an impetus to the creation of Nevada Territory out of western Utah Territory in 1861. Nevada became the 36th state on October 31,1864, as the second of two added to the Union during the Civil War. Nevada has a reputation for its libertarian laws, in 1940, with a population of just over 110,000 people, Nevada was by far the least-populated state, with less than half the population of the next least-populated state. However, legalized gambling and lenient marriage and divorce laws transformed Nevada into a major tourist destination in the 20th century, Nevada is the only U. S. state where prostitution is legal, though it is illegal in Clark County, Washoe County and Carson City. The tourism industry remains Nevadas largest employer, with mining continuing as a sector of the economy. The name Nevada comes from the Spanish nevada, meaning snow-covered, most Nevadans pronounce the second syllable of their state name using the vowel of trap. Many from outside the Western United States pronounce it with the vowel of father, although the latter pronunciation is closer to the Spanish pronunciation, it is not the pronunciation preferred by most Nevadans. State Assemblyman Harry Mortenson proposed a bill to recognize the alternate pronunciation of Nevada, though the bill was not supported by most legislators, the Nevadan pronunciation is the de facto official one, since it is the one used by the state legislature. Nevada is almost entirely within the Basin and Range Province, and is broken up by many mountain ranges
19.
Rhode Island
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Rhode Island, officially the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. Rhode Island is the smallest in area, the eighth least populous, and its official name is also the longest of any state in the Union. Rhode Island is bordered by Connecticut to the west, Massachusetts to the north and east, the state also shares a short maritime border with New York. It boycotted the 1787 convention that drew up the United States Constitution, on May 29,1790, Rhode Island became the 13th and last state to ratify the Constitution. Rhode Islands official nickname is The Ocean State, a reference to the fact that the state has several large bays, Rhode Island covers 1,214 square miles, of which 1,045 square miles are land. Despite its name, most of Rhode Island is located on the mainland of the United States, the official name of the state is State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, which is derived from the merger of four settlements. Rhode Island is now commonly called Aquidneck Island, the largest of several islands in Narragansett Bay, Providence Plantation was the name of the colony founded by Roger Williams in the area now known as the city of Providence. This was adjoined by the settlement of Warwick, hence the plural Providence Plantations and it is unclear how Aquidneck Island came to be known as Rhode Island, although there are two popular theories. Explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano noted the presence of an island near the mouth of Narragansett Bay in 1524, subsequent European explorers were unable to precisely identify the island that Verrazzano had named, but the Pilgrims who later colonized the area assumed that it was Aquidneck. A second theory concerns the fact that Adriaen Block passed by Aquidneck during his expeditions in the 1610s, historians have theorized that this reddish appearance resulted from either red autumn foliage or red clay on portions of the shore. The earliest documented use of the name Rhode Island for Aquidneck was in 1637 by Roger Williams, the name was officially applied to the island in 1644 with these words, Aquethneck shall be henceforth called the Isle of Rodes or Rhode-Island. The name Isle of Rodes is used in a document as late as 1646. Dutch maps as early as 1659 call the island Red Island, Williams was a theologian forced out of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Seeking religious and political tolerance, he and others founded Providence Plantation as a proprietary colony. Providence referred to the concept of providence, and plantation was an English term for a colony. State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations is the longest official name of any state in the Union, advocates for excising plantation asserted that the word specifically referred to the British colonial practice of establishing settlements which disenfranchised native people. Advocates for retaining the name argued that plantation was simply an archaic English synonym for colony, the referendum election was held on November 2,2010, and the people voted overwhelmingly to retain the entire original name. It shares a maritime border with New York State between Block Island and Long Island
20.
Valencian Community
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The Valencian Community, or the Valencian Country, is an autonomous community of Spain. It is the fourth most populousautonomous community after Andalusia, Catalonia and it is often homonymously identified with its capital Valencia, which is Spains third largest city. It is located along the Mediterranean coast to the east of the Iberian peninsula and it borders with Catalonia to the north, Aragon and Castile–La Mancha to the west, and Murcia to the south. The Valencian Community consists of three provinces which are Castellón, Valencia and Alicante, according to its Statute of Autonomy, the Valencian people are a nationality. Their origins date back to the Catalan-Aragonese colonization of the Moorish Taifa of Valencia, the newly founded Kingdom of Valencia was granted wide self-government under the Crown of Aragon with the promulgation of its Furs in 1261. Valencia experienced its golden age in the 15th century, becoming the economic and cultural capital of the Crown, self-government continued after the unification of the Spanish Kingdom, but was eventually suspended in 1707 by Phillip V of Spain as a result of the Spanish War of Succession. Valencian nationalism resurged towards the end of the 19th century, which led to the conception of the Valencian Country. Self-government under the Generalitat Valenciana was finally reestablished in 1982 after Spanish transition to democracy, the Valencian people speak a variety of Catalan called Valencian, accounting for a third of all Catalan speakers. Valencian is a language that has been historically repressed in favour of Spanish. Since it regained status in 1982, Valencian has been implemented in public administration. However, its use continues to be threatened by Spanish due to migration from other parts of Spain, especially in the cities of València. Furthermore, the conflict continues to be pressing, with some groups opposing the official standard based on Catalan orthography. Valencia was founded by the Romans under the name of Valentia Edetanorum, with the establishment of the Taifa of Valencia, the name developed to بلنسية, which eventually became Valencia after the expulsion of the Moors. Valencian Community is the translation of the official name in Valencian recognized by the Statute of Autonomy of 1982. This is the name most used in administration, tourism. On one hand, Valencian Country represented the modern conception of nationality that resurged in the 19th century and it became well-established during the Second Spanish Republic and later on with the works of Joan Fuster in the 1960s, implying the existence of the Catalan Countries. This nationalist subtext was opposed by anti-Catalan blaverists, who proposed Former Kingdom of Valencia instead in order to emphasize Valencian independence from Catalonia, currently, blaverists have accepted the official denomination. The autonomous community can be identified with its capital Valencia
21.
Valencian pilota
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Valencian pilota is a traditional handball sport played in the Valencian Country. Rules variations within the generic Pilota Valenciana category are frequent from area to area but the trait is that the ball is struck with a bare, or almost bare. The general rule involves two teams made from two up to five players each, exceptionally, individual matches are also played between the most renowned players. The second characteristic is that it is not played against a wall, instead, similar to modern tennis, two individuals or teams are placed face to face separated either by a line on the ground or a net in all of modern modalities except for the frontó. A distinctive trait of Valencian pilota is that the spectators are often seated or standing very close to the court means that they may be hit by the ball. The break between indoor and outdoor forms caused many variants to diverge from the original Llargues version, thus Perxa evolved into Galotxa, and which in turn gave rise to Escala i corda, while Raspall was still played in both courtfields. It should be noted that llargues is the variant that uses the original ratlles rule. Nowadays, Valencian pilota is played in the whole Valencian Community, professional players of Escala i corda and Raspall are hired to play at the trinquets or in streets during the towns festivals. There are two versions of the sport depending whether it is played outdoors in a designated street or indoors. Variations of the played in the street are Galotxa, Llargues. The streets must be long and wide, if the streets have some irregularities, such as balconies, lights, sidewalks, traffic signals, etc. they may be used in order to score. Some municipalities have built fake streets which look like real ones but are meant only for pilota games, as for the ones played indoors there are, Frare, Is a short Valencian frontó with bevels on the corners that cause the ball to bounce unexpectedly. Mostly played in the North of the Castelló province, the frontis has a 1-metre high line which marks the lowest point where a bouncing ball may hit. Galotxetes, Played in a 20-by-3. 5-metre space with a 1-metre high net in the middle, on the four corners there are open holes resembling doors where points are scored. Now it is played in the Vinalopó Mitjà comarca. Trinquet, There is a 60-by-10-metre four walled court with stairs on one side for the spectators to sit, There are also two galleries over each of the frontons for people to sit. There is a balcony where reputed people or professional betters may sit. Next to the llotgeta a square is drawn on the ground, the dau, in order to play Escala i corda rules a 2-metre high net must be placed in the middle of the court
22.
Hondarribia
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Hondarribia is a town situated on the west shore of Bidasoa rivers mouth, in Gipuzkoa, in Basque Country, Spain. The border town is sited on a little promontory facing Hendaye over the Txingudi bay, a service boat makes the trip between the two cities. The town holds an ancient old quarter with walls and a castle, in addition, Hondarribia features a beach across the Bidasoa from the touristy housing estate Sokoburu in Hendaye, alongside a mountain called Jaizkibel providing a hilly backdrop to the town. A road leads north-east from the area to the Cape Higuer. The town harbours the San Sebastian Airport, which serves domestic flights, the population as of 2005 is 15,700 inhabitants. The battles fought for possession of this fortified stronghold are generally known by the Spanish name for the place, the city was finally reoccupied by Charles Vs forces in 1524. Siege of Fuenterrabía was the outcome of a siege by the forces of Louis XIII. 27,000 French soldiers besieged the city for two months, firing 16,000 shells into the city, leaving only 300 survivors. The city was destroyed, but nevertheless did not surrender. The Spanish soldiers were successful, and the raising of the siege is celebrated annually on 8 September in a parade, battle of Fuenterrabía, during the War of the Quadruple Alliance. Battle of Fuenterrabía, in which the French Revolutionary Army took the city by breaching the walls, after they took over the city, they blew up with the help of German engineers the section of wall facing France. The signing of the Peace of Basel took place all the wall was destroyed. The womens basketball team Hondarribia-Irun and the rowing club Hondarribia Arraun Elkartea are the two most prestigious clubs in the town. In the last decade, the judo club Ama Guadalupekoa has had a lot of medals in this discipline. The Hondarribia-Irun plays in the Spanish womens basketball league since 2003, Hondarribia has a rowing team called Hondarribia Arraun Elkartea, and its boat is characterized by its green color and its name, “Ama Guadalupekoa”. In 2005 it won “La Bandera de la Concha”, one of the most prestigious competitions for Basque rowers, furthermore, the Vilariño family, which is fully linked to the world of the engine, continues to achieve success at national and European levels. The construction of a jetty and other works by the engineer Iribarren. In the late twentieth century the beach was partially modified, building on its surroundings a recreational port, throughout the year, but especially in the summer months, Arma Plaza Fundazioa organizes guided visits to the old town, the port-quarter of the Marina and the Fort of Guadalupe
23.
Labourd
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Labourd is a former French province and part of the present-day Pyrénées Atlantiques département. It is one of the traditional Basque provinces, and identified as one of the component parts of the Basque Country by many. Labourd extends from the Pyrenees to the river Adour, along the Bay of Biscay, to the south is Gipuzkoa and Navarre in Spain, to the east is Basse-Navarre, to the north are the Landes. It has an area of almost 900 km2 and a population of over 200,000, over 25% of the inhabitants speak Basque. Labourd has also long had a Gascon-speaking tradition, noticeably next to the banks of the river Adour, the main town of Labourd is Bayonne, although the capital up to the French Revolution was Ustaritz,13 km away, where local Basque leaders assembled. Other important towns are Biarritz, Anglet, Hendaye, Ciboure and Saint-Jean-de-Luz along the coast, the area is famous for the five-day Fêtes de Bayonne and the red peppers of Espelette. Many tourists come to the coast, especially to Biarritz, La Rhune, a 900 m high hill, lies south of Saint-Jean-de-Luz on the border with Spain. The hill is a Basque symbol, with views from its peak. The traditional buildings of Labourd have a low roof, half-timbered features, stone lintels and painted in red, white and green. The house of Edmond Rostand, Villa Arnaga at Cambo-les-Bains, is such a house and is now a dedicated to the author of Cyrano de Bergerac. Lapurdian is a dialect of the Basque language spoken in the region, ancient Labourd was inhabited by the Tarbelas, an Aquitanian tribe. They had the town of Lapurdum, that eventually would become modern Bayonne. In the Middle Ages it formed part of the Duchy of Vasconia, in the year 844 Viking raiders conquered the former oppidum of Lapurdum, where they established a base for their incursions. They were only expelled in 986, leaving a legacy of expertise in Labourd. The town came out of this period attested as Bayonne, up to this point the area of the river Adour was referred to as the County of Vasconia after the early 9th century. This Lope was supposedly the kings relative, being a nephew of King Ramiro Garcés of Viguera and this oft-repeated story has no basis in contemporary documents, and there is no evidence that Navarre extended its territory north of the Pyrenees prior to the late 12th century. Around 1125, Bayonne was chartered by Duke William IX of Aquitaine, in 1130–31, King Alfonso the Battler of Aragon and Navarre attacked Bayonne over a dispute on jurisdictions with the Duke of Aquitaine, William X the Saint. Labourd was ruled directly, between 1169 and 1199, by Richard Lionheart, who gave a charter to Bayonne c.1174 and
24.
Brazil
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Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. As the worlds fifth-largest country by area and population, it is the largest country to have Portuguese as an official language. Its Amazon River basin includes a vast tropical forest, home to wildlife, a variety of ecological systems. This unique environmental heritage makes Brazil one of 17 megadiverse countries, Brazil was inhabited by numerous tribal nations prior to the landing in 1500 of explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral, who claimed the area for the Portuguese Empire. Brazil remained a Portuguese colony until 1808, when the capital of the empire was transferred from Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro, in 1815, the colony was elevated to the rank of kingdom upon the formation of the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves. Independence was achieved in 1822 with the creation of the Empire of Brazil, a state governed under a constitutional monarchy. The ratification of the first constitution in 1824 led to the formation of a bicameral legislature, the country became a presidential republic in 1889 following a military coup détat. An authoritarian military junta came to power in 1964 and ruled until 1985, Brazils current constitution, formulated in 1988, defines it as a democratic federal republic. The federation is composed of the union of the Federal District, the 26 states, Brazils economy is the worlds ninth-largest by nominal GDP and seventh-largest by GDP as of 2015. A member of the BRICS group, Brazil until 2010 had one of the worlds fastest growing economies, with its economic reforms giving the country new international recognition. Brazils national development bank plays an important role for the economic growth. Brazil is a member of the United Nations, the G20, BRICS, Unasul, Mercosul, Organization of American States, Organization of Ibero-American States, CPLP. Brazil is a power in Latin America and a middle power in international affairs. One of the worlds major breadbaskets, Brazil has been the largest producer of coffee for the last 150 years and it is likely that the word Brazil comes from the Portuguese word for brazilwood, a tree that once grew plentifully along the Brazilian coast. In Portuguese, brazilwood is called pau-brasil, with the word brasil commonly given the etymology red like an ember, formed from Latin brasa and the suffix -il. As brazilwood produces a red dye, it was highly valued by the European cloth industry and was the earliest commercially exploited product from Brazil. The popular appellation eclipsed and eventually supplanted the official Portuguese name, early sailors sometimes also called it the Land of Parrots. In the Guarani language, a language of Paraguay, Brazil is called Pindorama
25.
Costa Rica
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It has a population of around 4.5 million, of whom nearly a quarter live in the metropolitan area of the capital and largest city, San José. Costa Rica was sparsely inhabited by people before coming under Spanish rule in the 16th century. Since then, Costa Rica has remained among the most stable, prosperous, following a brief civil war, it permanently abolished its army in 1949, becoming one of only a few sovereign nations without a standing army. Costa Rica is a member of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie. The country has consistently performed favourably in the Human Development Index, placing 69th in the world as of 2015 and its rapidly developing economy, once heavily dependent on agriculture, has diversified to include sectors such as finance, pharmaceuticals, and ecotourism. Costa Rica is known for its environmental policies, being the only country to meet all five UNDP criteria established to measure environmental sustainability. Costa Rica officially plans to become a country by 2021. In 2012, it became the first country in the Americas to ban recreational hunting, historians have classified the indigenous people of Costa Rica as belonging to the Intermediate Area, where the peripheries of the Mesoamerican and Andean native cultures overlapped. More recently, pre-Columbian Costa Rica has also described as part of the Isthmo-Colombian Area. The oldest evidence of occupation in Costa Rica is associated with the arrival of various groups of hunter-gatherers about 10,000 to 7,000 years BCE in the Turrialba Valley. The presence of Clovis culture type spearheads and arrows from South America opens the possibility that, in this area, agriculture became evident in the populations that lived in Costa Rica about 5,000 years ago. They mainly grew tubers and roots, for the first and second millennia BCE there were already settled farming communities. These were small and scattered, although the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture as the livelihood in the territory is still unknown. The earliest use of pottery appears around 2,000 to 3,000 BCE, shards of pots, cylindrical vases, platters, gourds and other forms of vases decorated with grooves, prints, and some modelled after animals have been found. The impact of indigenous peoples on modern Costa Rican culture has been small compared to other nations. Costa Rica was described as the poorest and most miserable Spanish colony in all America by a Spanish governor in 1719, for all these reasons, Costa Rica was, by and large, unappreciated and overlooked by the Spanish Crown and left to develop on its own. Costa Rica became a democracy with no oppressed mestizo or indigenous class. It was not long before Spanish settlers turned to the hills, where they found rich volcanic soil, like the rest of Central America, Costa Rica never fought for independence from Spain
26.
Ecuador
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Ecuador also includes the Galápagos Islands in the Pacific, about 1,000 kilometres west of the mainland. What is now Ecuador was home to a variety of Amerindian groups that were incorporated into the Inca Empire during the 15th century. The territory was colonized by Spain during the 16th century, achieving independence in 1820 as part of Gran Colombia, Spanish is the official language and is spoken by a majority of the population, though 13 Amerindian languages are also recognized, including Quichua and Shuar. The capital city is Quito, while the largest city is Guayaquil, in reflection of the countrys rich cultural heritage, the historical center of Quito was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1978. Cuenca, the third-largest city, was declared a World Heritage Site in 1999 as an outstanding example of a planned. Ecuador has an economy that is highly dependent on commodities, namely petroleum. The country is classified as a medium-income country, Ecuador is a democratic presidential republic. The new constitution of 2008 is the first in the world to recognize legally enforceable Rights of Nature, Ecuador is also known for its rich ecology, hosting many endemic plants and animals, such as those of the Galápagos Islands. It is one of 17 megadiverse countries in the world, various peoples had settled in the area of the future Ecuador before the arrival of the Incas. They developed different languages while emerging as unique ethnic groups, even though their languages were unrelated, these groups developed similar groups of cultures, each based in different environments. Over time these groups began to interact and intermingle with each other so that groups of families in one area became one community or tribe, with a similar language and culture. Many civilizations arose in Ecuador, such as the Valdivia Culture and Machalilla Culture on the coast, the Quitus, each civilization developed its own distinctive architecture, pottery, and religious interests. Eventually, through wars and marriage alliances of their leaders, a group of nations formed confederations, one region consolidated under a confederation called the Shyris, which exercised organized trading and bartering between the different regions. Its political and military came under the rule of the Duchicela blood-line. The native confederations that gave them the most problems were deported to distant areas of Peru, Bolivia, similarly, a number of loyal Inca subjects from Peru and Bolivia were brought to Ecuador to prevent rebellion. Thus, the region of highland Ecuador became part of the Inca Empire in 1463 sharing the same language, in contrast, when the Incas made incursions into coastal Ecuador and the eastern Amazon jungles of Ecuador, they found both the environment and indigenous people more hostile. Moreover, when the Incas tried to subdue them, these indigenous people withdrew to the interior, as a result, Inca expansion into the Amazon basin and the Pacific coast of Ecuador was hampered. The indigenous people of the Amazon jungle and coastal Ecuador remained relatively autonomous until the Spanish soldiers, the Amazonian people and the Cayapas of Coastal Ecuador were the only groups to resist Inca and Spanish domination, maintaining their language and culture well into the 21st century
27.
Philippines
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The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is a sovereign island country in Southeast Asia situated in the western Pacific Ocean. It consists of about 7,641 islands that are categorized broadly under three main geographical divisions from north to south, Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao, the capital city of the Philippines is Manila and the most populous city is Quezon City, both part of Metro Manila. The Philippines has an area of 300,000 square kilometers, and it is the eighth-most populated country in Asia and the 12th most populated country in the world. As of 2013, approximately 10 million additional Filipinos lived overseas, multiple ethnicities and cultures are found throughout the islands. In prehistoric times, Negritos were some of the archipelagos earliest inhabitants and they were followed by successive waves of Austronesian peoples. Exchanges with Chinese, Malay, Indian, and Islamic nations occurred, then, various competing maritime states were established under the rule of Datus, Rajahs, Sultans or Lakans. The arrival of Ferdinand Magellan in Homonhon, Eastern Samar in 1521 marked the beginning of Hispanic colonization, in 1543, Spanish explorer Ruy López de Villalobos named the archipelago Las Islas Filipinas in honor of Philip II of Spain. With the arrival of Miguel López de Legazpi from Mexico City, in 1565, the Philippines became part of the Spanish Empire for more than 300 years. This resulted in Roman Catholicism becoming the dominant religion, during this time, Manila became the western hub of the trans-Pacific trade connecting Asia with Acapulco in the Americas using Manila galleons. Aside from the period of Japanese occupation, the United States retained sovereignty over the islands until after World War II, since then, the Philippines has often had a tumultuous experience with democracy, which included the overthrow of a dictatorship by a non-violent revolution. It is a member of the United Nations, World Trade Organization, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. It also hosts the headquarters of the Asian Development Bank, the Philippines was named in honor of King Philip II of Spain. Spanish explorer Ruy López de Villalobos, during his expedition in 1542, named the islands of Leyte, eventually the name Las Islas Filipinas would be used to cover all the islands of the archipelago. Before that became commonplace, other such as Islas del Poniente. The official name of the Philippines has changed several times in the course of its history, during the Philippine Revolution, the Malolos Congress proclaimed the establishment of the República Filipina or the Philippine Republic. From the 1898 Treaty of Paris, the name Philippines began to appear, since the end of World War II, the official name of the country has been the Republic of the Philippines. The metatarsal of the Callao Man, reliably dated by uranium-series dating to 67,000 years ago is the oldest human remnant found in the archipelago to date and this distinction previously belonged to the Tabon Man of Palawan, carbon-dated to around 26,500 years ago. Negritos were also among the archipelagos earliest inhabitants, but their first settlement in the Philippines has not been reliably dated, there are several opposing theories regarding the origins of ancient Filipinos
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Italy
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Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a unitary parliamentary republic in Europe. Located in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, Italy shares open land borders with France, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, San Marino, Italy covers an area of 301,338 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate and Mediterranean climate. Due to its shape, it is referred to in Italy as lo Stivale. With 61 million inhabitants, it is the fourth most populous EU member state, the Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom, which eventually became a republic that conquered and assimilated other nearby civilisations. The legacy of the Roman Empire is widespread and can be observed in the distribution of civilian law, republican governments, Christianity. The Renaissance began in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe, bringing a renewed interest in humanism, science, exploration, Italian culture flourished at this time, producing famous scholars, artists and polymaths such as Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, Michelangelo and Machiavelli. The weakened sovereigns soon fell victim to conquest by European powers such as France, Spain and Austria. Despite being one of the victors in World War I, Italy entered a period of economic crisis and social turmoil. The subsequent participation in World War II on the Axis side ended in defeat, economic destruction. Today, Italy has the third largest economy in the Eurozone and it has a very high level of human development and is ranked sixth in the world for life expectancy. The country plays a prominent role in regional and global economic, military, cultural and diplomatic affairs, as a reflection of its cultural wealth, Italy is home to 51 World Heritage Sites, the most in the world, and is the fifth most visited country. The assumptions on the etymology of the name Italia are very numerous, according to one of the more common explanations, the term Italia, from Latin, Italia, was borrowed through Greek from the Oscan Víteliú, meaning land of young cattle. The bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes and was often depicted goring the Roman wolf as a defiant symbol of free Italy during the Social War. Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus states this account together with the legend that Italy was named after Italus, mentioned also by Aristotle and Thucydides. The name Italia originally applied only to a part of what is now Southern Italy – according to Antiochus of Syracuse, but by his time Oenotria and Italy had become synonymous, and the name also applied to most of Lucania as well. The Greeks gradually came to apply the name Italia to a larger region, excavations throughout Italy revealed a Neanderthal presence dating back to the Palaeolithic period, some 200,000 years ago, modern Humans arrived about 40,000 years ago. Other ancient Italian peoples of undetermined language families but of possible origins include the Rhaetian people and Cammuni. Also the Phoenicians established colonies on the coasts of Sardinia and Sicily, the Roman legacy has deeply influenced the Western civilisation, shaping most of the modern world
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Mexico
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Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a federal republic in the southern half of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States, to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean, to the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea, and to the east by the Gulf of Mexico. Covering almost two million square kilometers, Mexico is the sixth largest country in the Americas by total area, Mexico is a federation comprising 31 states and a federal district that is also its capital and most populous city. Other metropolises include Guadalajara, Monterrey, Puebla, Toluca, Tijuana, pre-Columbian Mexico was home to many advanced Mesoamerican civilizations, such as the Olmec, Toltec, Teotihuacan, Zapotec, Maya and Aztec before first contact with Europeans. In 1521, the Spanish Empire conquered and colonized the territory from its base in Mexico-Tenochtitlan, Three centuries later, this territory became Mexico following recognition in 1821 after the colonys Mexican War of Independence. The tumultuous post-independence period was characterized by instability and many political changes. The Mexican–American War led to the cession of the extensive northern borderlands, one-third of its territory. The Pastry War, the Franco-Mexican War, a civil war, the dictatorship was overthrown in the Mexican Revolution of 1910, which culminated with the promulgation of the 1917 Constitution and the emergence of the countrys current political system. Mexico has the fifteenth largest nominal GDP and the eleventh largest by purchasing power parity, the Mexican economy is strongly linked to those of its North American Free Trade Agreement partners, especially the United States. Mexico was the first Latin American member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and it is classified as an upper-middle income country by the World Bank and a newly industrialized country by several analysts. By 2050, Mexico could become the fifth or seventh largest economy. The country is considered both a power and middle power, and is often identified as an emerging global power. Due to its culture and history, Mexico ranks first in the Americas. Mexico is a country, ranking fourth in the world by biodiversity. In 2015 it was the 9th most visited country in the world, Mexico is a member of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, the G8+5, the G20, the Uniting for Consensus and the Pacific Alliance. Mēxihco is the Nahuatl term for the heartland of the Aztec Empire, namely, the Valley of Mexico, and its people, the Mexica and this became the future State of Mexico as a division of New Spain prior to independence. It is generally considered to be a toponym for the valley became the primary ethnonym for the Aztec Triple Alliance as a result. After New Spain won independence from Spain, representatives decided to name the new country after its capital and this was founded in 1524 on top of the ancient Mexica capital of Mexico-Tenochtitlan
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Paraguay
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Paraguay lies on both banks of the Paraguay River, which runs through the center of the country from north to south. Due to its location in South America, it is sometimes referred to as Corazón de Sudamérica. Paraguay is one of the two landlocked countries that lie outside Afro-Eurasia, Paraguay is the smallest landlocked country in the Americas. The indigenous Guaraní had been living in Paraguay for at least a millennium before the Spanish conquered the territory in the 16th century, Spanish settlers and Jesuit missions introduced Christianity and Spanish culture to the region. Paraguay was a colony of the Spanish Empire, with few urban centers and settlers. Following independence from Spain in 1811, Paraguay was ruled by a series of dictators who generally implemented isolationist and protectionist policies and he was toppled in an internal military coup, and free multi-party elections were organized and held for the first time in 1993. A year later, Paraguay joined Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay to found Mercosur, as of 2009, Paraguays population was estimated to be at around 6.5 million, most of whom are concentrated in the southeast region of the country. The capital and largest city is Asunción, of which the area is home to nearly a third of Paraguays population. In contrast to most Latin American nations, Paraguays indigenous language and culture, Guaraní, in each census, residents predominantly identify as mestizo, reflecting years of intermarriage among the different ethnic groups. Guaraní is recognized as an official language alongside Spanish, and both languages are spoken in the country. There is no consensus for the derivation or meaning of the name Paraguay, the most common interpretations include, Born from water Riverine of many varieties River which originates a sea Fray Antonio Ruiz de Montoya said that it meant river crowned. The Spanish officer and scientist Félix de Azara suggests two derivations, the Payaguas, referring to the tribe who lived along the river. The French-Argentine historian and writer Paul Groussac argued that it meant river that flows through the sea, Paraguayan poet and ex-president Juan Natalicio González said it meant river of the inhabitants of the sea. Indigenous peoples have inhabited this area for thousands of years, pre-Columbian society in the region which is now Paraguay consisted of semi-nomadic tribes that were known for their warrior traditions. These indigenous tribes belonged to five language families, which was the basis of their major divisions. Differing language groups were generally competitive over resources and territories and they were further divided into tribes by speaking languages in branches of these families. Today 17 separate ethnolinguistic groups remain, the first Europeans in the area were Spanish explorers in 1516. The Spanish explorer Juan de Salazar de Espinosa founded the settlement of Asunción on 15 August 1537, the city eventually became the center of a Spanish colonial province of Paraguay
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Puerto Rico
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Puerto Rico, officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and briefly called Porto Rico, is an unincorporated territory of the United States located in the northeast Caribbean Sea. It is an archipelago that includes the island of Puerto Rico and a number of smaller ones such as Mona, Culebra. The capital and most populous city is San Juan and its official languages are Spanish and English, though Spanish predominates. The islands population is approximately 3.4 million, Puerto Ricos rich history, tropical climate, diverse natural scenery, renowned traditional cuisine, and attractive tax incentives make it a popular destination for travelers from around the world. Four centuries of Spanish colonial government transformed the ethnic, cultural and physical landscapes primarily with waves of African captives, and Canarian. In the Spanish imperial imagination, Puerto Rico played a secondary, in 1898, following the Spanish–American War, the United States appropriated Puerto Rico together with most former Spanish colonies under the terms of the Treaty of Paris. Puerto Ricans are natural-born citizens of the United States, however, Puerto Rico does not have a vote in the United States Congress, which governs the territory with full jurisdiction under the Puerto Rico Federal Relations Act of 1950. As a U. S. territory, American citizens residing on the island are disenfranchised at the level and may not vote for president. However, Congress approved a constitution, allowing U. S. citizens on the territory to elect a governor. A fifth referendum will be held in June 2017, with only Statehood, in early 2017, the Puerto Rican government-debt crisis posed serious problems for the government. The outstanding bond debt that had climbed to $70 billion or $12,000 per capita at a time with 12. 4% unemployment, the debt had been increasing during a decade long recession. Puerto Ricans often call the island Borinquen – a derivation of Borikén, its indigenous Taíno name, the terms boricua and borincano derive from Borikén and Borinquen respectively, and are commonly used to identify someone of Puerto Rican heritage. The island is also known in Spanish as la isla del encanto. Columbus named the island San Juan Bautista, in honor of Saint John the Baptist, eventually traders and other maritime visitors came to refer to the entire island as Puerto Rico, while San Juan became the name used for the main trading/shipping port and the capital city. The islands name was changed to Porto Rico by the United States after the Treaty of Paris of 1898, the anglicized name was used by the US government and private enterprises. The name was changed back to Puerto Rico by a joint resolution in Congress introduced by Félix Córdova Dávila in 1931, the ancient history of the archipelago known today as Puerto Rico is not well known. The scarce archaeological findings and early Spanish scholarly accounts from the colonial era constitute the basis of knowledge about them. The first comprehensive book on the history of Puerto Rico was written by Fray Íñigo Abbad y Lasierra in 1786, the first settlers were the Ortoiroid people, an Archaic Period culture of Amerindian hunters and fishermen who migrated from the South American mainland
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Netherlands
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The Netherlands, also informally known as Holland is the main constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is a densely populated country located in Western Europe with three territories in the Caribbean. The European part of the Netherlands borders Germany to the east, Belgium to the south, and the North Sea to the northwest, sharing borders with Belgium, the United Kingdom. The three largest cities in the Netherlands are Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague, Amsterdam is the countrys capital, while The Hague holds the Dutch seat of parliament and government. The port of Rotterdam is the worlds largest port outside East-Asia, the name Holland is used informally to refer to the whole of the country of the Netherlands. Netherlands literally means lower countries, influenced by its low land and flat geography, most of the areas below sea level are artificial. Since the late 16th century, large areas have been reclaimed from the sea and lakes, with a population density of 412 people per km2 –507 if water is excluded – the Netherlands is classified as a very densely populated country. Only Bangladesh, South Korea, and Taiwan have both a population and higher population density. Nevertheless, the Netherlands is the worlds second-largest exporter of food and agricultural products and this is partly due to the fertility of the soil and the mild climate. In 2001, it became the worlds first country to legalise same-sex marriage, the Netherlands is a founding member of the EU, Eurozone, G-10, NATO, OECD and WTO, as well as being a part of the Schengen Area and the trilateral Benelux Union. The first four are situated in The Hague, as is the EUs criminal intelligence agency Europol and this has led to the city being dubbed the worlds legal capital. The country also ranks second highest in the worlds 2016 Press Freedom Index, the Netherlands has a market-based mixed economy, ranking 17th of 177 countries according to the Index of Economic Freedom. It had the thirteenth-highest per capita income in the world in 2013 according to the International Monetary Fund, in 2013, the United Nations World Happiness Report ranked the Netherlands as the seventh-happiest country in the world, reflecting its high quality of life. The Netherlands also ranks joint second highest in the Inequality-adjusted Human Development Index, the region called Low Countries and the country of the Netherlands have the same toponymy. Place names with Neder, Nieder, Nether and Nedre and Bas or Inferior are in use in all over Europe. They are sometimes used in a relation to a higher ground that consecutively is indicated as Upper, Boven, Oben. In the case of the Low Countries / the Netherlands the geographical location of the region has been more or less downstream. The geographical location of the region, however, changed over time tremendously
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India
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India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and it is bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the southwest, and the Bay of Bengal on the southeast. It shares land borders with Pakistan to the west, China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the northeast, in the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives. Indias Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a border with Thailand. The Indian subcontinent was home to the urban Indus Valley Civilisation of the 3rd millennium BCE, in the following millennium, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism began to be composed. Social stratification, based on caste, emerged in the first millennium BCE, early political consolidations took place under the Maurya and Gupta empires, the later peninsular Middle Kingdoms influenced cultures as far as southeast Asia. In the medieval era, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Christianity, and Islam arrived, much of the north fell to the Delhi sultanate, the south was united under the Vijayanagara Empire. The economy expanded in the 17th century in the Mughal empire, in the mid-18th century, the subcontinent came under British East India Company rule, and in the mid-19th under British crown rule. A nationalist movement emerged in the late 19th century, which later, under Mahatma Gandhi, was noted for nonviolent resistance, in 2015, the Indian economy was the worlds seventh largest by nominal GDP and third largest by purchasing power parity. Following market-based economic reforms in 1991, India became one of the major economies and is considered a newly industrialised country. However, it continues to face the challenges of poverty, corruption, malnutrition, a nuclear weapons state and regional power, it has the third largest standing army in the world and ranks sixth in military expenditure among nations. India is a constitutional republic governed under a parliamentary system. It is a pluralistic, multilingual and multi-ethnic society and is home to a diversity of wildlife in a variety of protected habitats. The name India is derived from Indus, which originates from the Old Persian word Hindu, the latter term stems from the Sanskrit word Sindhu, which was the historical local appellation for the Indus River. The ancient Greeks referred to the Indians as Indoi, which translates as The people of the Indus, the geographical term Bharat, which is recognised by the Constitution of India as an official name for the country, is used by many Indian languages in its variations. Scholars believe it to be named after the Vedic tribe of Bharatas in the second millennium B. C. E and it is also traditionally associated with the rule of the legendary emperor Bharata. Gaṇarājya is the Sanskrit/Hindi term for republic dating back to the ancient times, hindustan is a Persian name for India dating back to the 3rd century B. C. E. It was introduced into India by the Mughals and widely used since then and its meaning varied, referring to a region that encompassed northern India and Pakistan or India in its entirety
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Greece
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Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, historically also known as Hellas, is a country in southeastern Europe, with a population of approximately 11 million as of 2015. Athens is the capital and largest city, followed by Thessaloniki. Greece is strategically located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, situated on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, the Republic of Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to the northeast. Greece consists of nine regions, Macedonia, Central Greece, the Peloponnese, Thessaly, Epirus, the Aegean Islands, Thrace, Crete. The Aegean Sea lies to the east of the mainland, the Ionian Sea to the west, the Cretan Sea and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. Greece has the longest coastline on the Mediterranean Basin and the 11th longest coastline in the world at 13,676 km in length, featuring a vast number of islands, eighty percent of Greece is mountainous, with Mount Olympus being the highest peak at 2,918 metres. From the eighth century BC, the Greeks were organised into various independent city-states, known as polis, which spanned the entire Mediterranean region and the Black Sea. Greece was annexed by Rome in the second century BC, becoming a part of the Roman Empire and its successor. The Greek Orthodox Church also shaped modern Greek identity and transmitted Greek traditions to the wider Orthodox World, falling under Ottoman dominion in the mid-15th century, the modern nation state of Greece emerged in 1830 following a war of independence. Greeces rich historical legacy is reflected by its 18 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, among the most in Europe, Greece is a democratic and developed country with an advanced high-income economy, a high quality of life, and a very high standard of living. A founding member of the United Nations, Greece was the member to join the European Communities and has been part of the Eurozone since 2001. Greeces unique cultural heritage, large industry, prominent shipping sector. It is the largest economy in the Balkans, where it is an important regional investor, the names for the nation of Greece and the Greek people differ from the names used in other languages, locations and cultures. The earliest evidence of the presence of human ancestors in the southern Balkans, dated to 270,000 BC, is to be found in the Petralona cave, all three stages of the stone age are represented in Greece, for example in the Franchthi Cave. Neolithic settlements in Greece, dating from the 7th millennium BC, are the oldest in Europe by several centuries and these civilizations possessed writing, the Minoans writing in an undeciphered script known as Linear A, and the Mycenaeans in Linear B, an early form of Greek. The Mycenaeans gradually absorbed the Minoans, but collapsed violently around 1200 BC and this ushered in a period known as the Greek Dark Ages, from which written records are absent. The end of the Dark Ages is traditionally dated to 776 BC, the Iliad and the Odyssey, the foundational texts of Western literature, are believed to have been composed by Homer in the 7th or 8th centuries BC. With the end of the Dark Ages, there emerged various kingdoms and city-states across the Greek peninsula, in 508 BC, Cleisthenes instituted the worlds first democratic system of government in Athens
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Basques
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The Basques are an indigenous ethnic group characterised by the Basque language, a common Basque culture and shared ancestry to the ancient Vascones and Aquitanians. The Basques are known as, Euskaldunak in Basque Vasco in Spanish Basque in French, the English word Basque may be pronounced /bɑːsk/ or /bæsk/ and derives from the French Basque, which is derived from Gascon Basco, cognate with Spanish Vasco. These, in turn, come from Latin Vasco, plural Vascones, several coins from the 2nd and 1st centuries BC found in the Basque Country bear the inscription barscunes. The place where they were minted is not certain, but is thought to be somewhere near Pamplona, in Basque, the people call themselves the euskaldunak, singular euskaldun, formed from euskal- and -dun, euskaldun literally means a Basque speaker. Therefore, the neologism euskotar, plural euskotarrak, was coined in the 19th century to mean a culturally Basque person, alfonso Irigoyen posits that the word euskara is derived from an ancient Basque verb enautsi to say and the suffix -ara. Thus euskara would literally mean way of saying, way of speaking, one item of evidence in favour of this hypothesis is found in the Spanish book Compendio Historial, written in 1571 by the Basque writer Esteban de Garibay. He records the name of the Basque language as enusquera and it may, however, be a writing mistake. In the 19th century, the Basque nationalist activist Sabino Arana posited an original root euzko which, he thought, on the basis of this putative root, Arana proposed the name Euzkadi for an independent Basque nation, composed of seven Basque historical territories. Aranas neologism Euzkadi is still used in both Basque and Spanish, since it is now the official name of the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country. Since the Basque language is unrelated to Indo-European, it has long thought to represent the people or culture that occupied Europe before the spread of Indo-European languages there. A comprehensive analysis of Basque genetic patterns has shown that Basque genetic uniqueness predates the arrival of agriculture in the Iberian Peninsula and it is thought that Basques are a remnant of the early inhabitants of Western Europe, specifically those of the Franco-Cantabrian region. Basque tribes were mentioned in Roman times by Strabo and Pliny, including the Vascones, the Aquitani. There is enough evidence to support the hypothesis that at that time, castile deprived Navarre of its coastline by conquering key western territories, leaving the kingdom landlocked. The Basques were ravaged by the War of the Bands, bitter partisan wars between local ruling families, weakened by the Navarrese civil war, the bulk of the realm eventually fell before the onslaught of the Spanish armies. However, the Navarrese territory north of the Pyrenees remained beyond the reach of an increasingly powerful Spain, Lower Navarre became a province of France in 1620. Nevertheless, the Basques enjoyed a deal of self-government until the French Revolution and the Carlist Wars. On either side of the Pyrenees, the Basques lost their native institutions, labourd, Lower Navarre, and Soule were integrated into the French department system, with Basque efforts to establish a region-specific political-administrative entity failing to take off to date. The corresponding Basque names of these territories are Araba, Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa, the BAC only includes three of the seven provinces of the currently called historical territories
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Basque diaspora
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The Basque diaspora is the name given to describe people of Basque origin living outside their traditional homeland on the borders between Spain and France. Notably, the Basque diaspora is referred to as the eighth province. People of Basque descent make up 10% of Argentinas population, Basques have left an indelible imprint on Argentine culture and politics, with many place names and surnames, including those of several Presidents. After several generations, a sense of Basque heritage is still strong, Argentine sportspeople with Basque surnames have frequently been nicknamed El Vasco. This union is the basis of the Chilean elite of today, population estimates of Basque-Chileans range from 10% to as high as 27%. Miguel de Unamuno stated that two things could be attributed to the Basques, The Jesuits and the Republic of Chile. Colombia was one of focus of Basque immigration, it is estimated that at least 40% of the Coffee Axis. Between 1640 and 1859,18.9 percent of the residents of Colombia were of Basque origin, Basque influence is evident in words such as ma, coscorria and tap, to name only a few cases. Basques began to regularly and are distributed throughout the country. It is estimated, for example, for the Department of Antioquia some limited aspects of the culture, many point to Basque origins as a way to understand the populations idiosyncrasies. Prominent among these, were two American historians, Everett Hagen and Leonard Kasdan and these ideas were supported by representatives of developmental theories, who sought to justify business growth based on the character of social groups. There also seems to be some Basque gastronomical influence in the Antioquia region and it is said that the arepa might have been influenced by the Basque talo. A notable percentage of Peruvian people have at least one Basque surname and they trace back their presence to colonial times. It is estimated that up to 10% of Uruguays population has at least one parent with a Basque surname, the first wave of Basque immigrants to Uruguay came from the French side of the Basque country beginning about 1824. The first wave of Basque immigration to Venezuela consisted in Conquerors and Missionaries, the second wave of Basque immigration started on 1939, as a result of the Spanish Civil War. See also History of Newfoundland and Labrador, an estimated of 2% of Mexicans have some amount of Basque descent and that community has increased in size from immigration from Spain in the early 20th century. The Spanish Civil War in the 1930s brought over tens of thousands of refugees from the Basque Country to political asylum in Mexico and Latin America. Most Mexicans of Basque descent are concentrated in the cities of Monterrey, Saltillo, Camargo, and the states of Jalisco, Zacatecas, Durango, Nuevo León, Tamaulipas, and Coahuila
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Olympic sports
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Olympic sports are sports contested in the Summer and Winter Olympic Games. The 2016 Summer Olympics included 28 sports, with five additional sports due to be added to the 2020 Summer Olympics, the 2014 Winter Olympics included seven sports. The number and kinds of events may change slightly from one Olympiad to another, each Olympic sport is represented by an international governing body, namely an International Federation. The International Olympic Committee establishes a hierarchy of sports, disciplines, according to this hierarchy, the Olympic sports can be subdivided into multiple disciplines, which are often assumed to be distinct sports. Examples include swimming and water polo, or figure skating and speed skating, in their turn, disciplines can be subdivided into events, for which medals are actually awarded. The IOCs requirements reflect participation in the Olympic Games as well—more stringent toward men, previous Olympic Games included sports which are no longer present on the current program, like polo and tug of war. These sports, known as discontinued sports, were removed either because of lack of interest or absence of an appropriate governing body. Archery and tennis are examples of sports that were competed at the early Games and were dropped by the IOC. Demonstration sports have often included in the Olympic Games, usually to promote a local sport from the host country or to gauge interest. Some such sports, like baseball and curling, were added to the official Olympic program, baseball, however, was discontinued after the 2008 Summer Olympics. The term sport in Olympic terminology refers to all the events that are sanctioned by one international sport federation, one sport, by Olympic definition, may be divided into several disciplines, which are often regarded as separate sports in common language. Skating is a winter Olympic sport represented by the International Skating Union, and includes four disciplines, figure skating, speed skating, short track speed skating, and synchronized skating. The sport with the largest number of Olympic disciplines is skiing, with six, alpine skiing, cross-country skiing, ski jumping, nordic combined, snowboarding, other notable multi-discipline sports are gymnastics, cycling, volleyball, wrestling, canoeing, and bobsleigh. The disciplines listed here are only those contested in the Olympics—gymnastics has two disciplines, while cycling and wrestling have three each. It should also be noted that the IOC definition of a discipline may differ from that used by an international federation, for example, the IOC considers artistic gymnastics a single discipline, but the International Federation of Gymnastics classifies mens and womens artistic gymnastics as separate disciplines. An event, by IOC definition, is a competition that leads to the award of medals. The number of events per sport ranges from a minimum of two to a maximum of 47 in athletics, which despite its number of events and its diversity is not divided into disciplines. The only summer sports that have never been absent from the Olympic program are athletics, aquatics, cycling, fencing, the only winter sports that were included in all Winter Olympic Games are skiing, skating, and ice hockey
38.
1924 Summer Olympics
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The 1924 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the VIII Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event which was celebrated in 1924 in Paris, France. It was the second time Paris hosted the games, after 1900, the selection process for the 1924 Summer Olympics consisted of six bids, and Paris was selected ahead of Amsterdam, Barcelona, Los Angeles, Prague, and Rome. The selection was made at the 20th IOC Session in Lausanne in 1921, the cost of the Games of the VIII Olympiad was estimated to be 10,000, 000₣. With total receipts at 5,496, 610₣, the Olympics resulted in a hefty loss despite crowds that reached 60,000 people at a time. The opening ceremony and several sporting events took place in the Olympic Stadium of Colombes and this VIII Olympiad was the last one organised under the presidency of Pierre de Coubertin. The Flying Finns dominated the distance running, while the British. Paavo Nurmi won the 1500 m and 5,000 m, ville Ritola won the 10,000 m and the 3,000 m steeplechase, while finishing second to Nurmi on the 5,000 m and cross country. Albin Stenroos won the marathon, while the Finnish team was victorious in the 3,000 m, British runners Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell won the 100 m and 400 m events, respectively. Their stories are depicted in the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire, in addition, Douglas Lowe won the 800 m competition. The marathon distance was fixed at 42.195 km, from the run at the 1908 Summer Olympics in London. The 1924 Olympics were the first to use the standard 50 m pool with marked lanes, swimmer Johnny Weissmuller won three gold medals in swimming and one bronze in water polo. Harold Osborn won gold medals and set Olympic records in both the high jump and the decathlon at the 1924 Olympics, fencer Roger Ducret of France won five medals, of which three were gold. In gymnastics,24 men scored a perfect 10, twenty-three of them scored it in the now-discontinued event of rope climbing. Albert Seguin scored a 10 here and also a perfect 10 on side vault, unexpectedly, the national team of Uruguay won the gold medal in football. The Olympic motto Citius, Altius, Fortius was used for the first time at the Olympics and it had been used before by the Union des Sociétés Françaises de Sports Athlétiques, a French sporting federation whose founding members included Pierre de Coubertin. De Coubertin took the motto from his friend Henri Didon, a Dominican priest who had coined during a speech before a Paris youth gathering of 1891 and these were the first Games to feature an Olympic Village. The Art competitions at the 1924 Summer Olympics were the first time that the Olympic Art competitions were contested seriously, a total of 14 medals were awarded, though none were given in the music category. 126 events in 23 disciplines, comprising 17 sports, were part of the Olympic program in 1924, the number of events in each discipline is noted in parentheses
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1968 Summer Olympics
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The 1968 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XIX Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event held in Mexico City, Mexico, in October 1968. These were the first Olympic Games to be staged in Latin America and they were also the first Games to use an all-weather track for track and field events instead of the traditional cinder track. The 1968 Games were the third to be held in the last quarter of the year, after the 1956 Games in Melbourne, the Mexican Student Movement of 1968 happened concurrently and the Olympic Games were correlated to the governments repression. On October 18,1963, at the 60th IOC Session in Baden-Baden, West Germany, Mexico City finished ahead of bids from Detroit, Buenos Aires and Lyon to host the Games. The 1968 torch relay recreated the route taken by Christopher Columbus to the New World, journeying from Greece through Italy and Spain to San Salvador Island, Bahamas, and then on to Mexico. American sculptor James Metcalf, an expatriate in Mexico, won the commission to forge the Olympic torch for the 1968 Summer Games, the Australian Peter Norman, who had run second, wore an American civil rights badge as support to them on the podium. As punishment, the IOC banned Smith and Carlos from the Olympic Games for life, American George Foreman won the gold medal for boxing by defeating Soviet Ionas Chepulis via a second-round TKO. After the victory, Foreman waved a small American flag as he bowed to the crowd, the high elevation of Mexico City, at 2,240 m above sea level, influenced many of the events, particularly in track and field. No other Summer Olympic Games before or since have been held at high elevation, as a reminder of this fact, one of the promotional articles of these Olympics was a small metallic box labeled Aire de México, that was Especial para batir récords. The tracks at previous Olympics were conventional cinder, for the first time, East and West Germany competed as separate teams, after being forced by the IOC to compete as a combined German team in 1956,1960, and 1964. Beethovens Ode to Joy was played when East and West Germany arrived in the stadium. Al Oerter of the U. S. won his fourth gold medal in the discus to become only the second athlete to achieve this feat in an individual event. Bob Beamon of the U. S. leapt 8.90 m in the long jump and it remained the Olympic record and stood as the world record for 23 years, until broken by American Mike Powell in 1991. American athletes Jim Hines, Tommie Smith and Lee Evans also set long-standing world records in the 100 m,200 m and 400 m, in the triple jump, the previous world record was improved five times by three different athletes. Viktor Saneev won the first of three gold medals in this event. Dick Fosbury of the U. S. won the medal in the high jump using his unconventional Fosbury flop technique. Věra Čáslavská of Czechoslovakia won four medals in gymnastics. Debbie Meyer of the U. S. became the first swimmer to win three gold medals, in the 200,400 and 800 m freestyle events
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1992 Summer Olympics
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The 1992 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXV Olympiad, was an international multi-sport event played in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain in 1992. The games were the first to be unaffected by boycotts since 1972, Barcelona is the second-largest city in Spain, and the birthplace of then-IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch. The city was also a host for the 1982 FIFA World Cup, on October 17,1986, Barcelona was selected to host the 1992 Summer Games over Amsterdam, Belgrade, Birmingham, Brisbane, and Paris, during the 91st IOC Session in Lausanne, Switzerland. Barcelona had previously bid for the 1936 Summer Olympics, but they ultimately lost to Berlin, at the Opening Ceremony Greek mezzo-soprano Agnes Baltsa sang Romiossini as the Olympic flag was paraded around the stadium. Alfredo Kraus later sang the Olympic Hymn in both Catalan and Spanish as the flag was hoisted, the Olympic flame cauldron was lit by a flaming arrow, shot by Paralympic archer Antonio Rebollo. The arrow had been lit by the flame of the Olympic Torch, Rebollo overshot the cauldron as this was the original design of the lighting scheme. South Africa was allowed to compete in the Olympic Games for the first time since the 1960 Summer Olympics, after a long suspension for its apartheid policy. After a close race in the Womens 10,000 metres event, white South African runner Elana Meyer and black Ethiopian runner Derartu Tulu ran a victory lap together, hand-in-hand. Following its reunification in 1990, Germany sent a single, unified Olympic team for the first time since the 1964 Summer Olympics. As the Soviet Union had been dissolved in 1991, the Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania sent their own teams for the first time since 1936, the other Soviet republics competed under the name Unified Team. These nations consisted of present-day Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, the separation of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia led to the Olympic debuts of Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Due to United Nations sanctions, athletes from Federal Republic of Yugoslavia were not allowed to participate with their own team, however, some individual athletes competed under the Olympic flag as Independent Olympic Participants. Fermín Cacho won the 1,500 metres in his home country, chinese diver Fu Mingxia, age 13, became the youngest Olympic gold medalist of all time. In mens artistic gymnastics, Vitaly Scherbo from Belarus, won six gold medals, Scherbo tied Eric Heidens record for individual gold medals at a single Olympics, winning five medals in an individual event. In womens artistic gymnastics, Tatiana Gutsu took gold in the All-Around competition edging the United States Shannon Miller, russian swimmers dominated the freestyle events, with Alexander Popov and Yevgeny Sadovyi each winning two events. Sadovyi also won in the relays, evelyn Ashford won her fourth Olympic gold medal in the 4×100-metre relay, making her one of only four female athletes to have achieved this in history. The young Krisztina Egerszegi of Hungary won three individual swimming gold medals, in womens 200 metre breaststroke, Kyoko Iwasaki of Japan won a gold medal at age of 14 years and six days, making her the youngest-ever gold medalist in swimming competitions at the Olympics. After demonstrated in six previous Summer Olympic Games, baseball became an Olympic sport
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Basque pelota at the 1900 Summer Olympics
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At the 1900 Summer Olympics, a Basque pelota tournament was contested. Only two teams competed, so only one match was played, the competition was held on 14 June. This was the only Olympiad where pelota was an official sport, international Olympic Committee medal winners database De Wael, Herman. The 1900 Olympic Games, Results for All Competitors in All Events, jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland & Company, Inc
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