1.
Sacramento, California
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Sacramento is the capital city of the U. S. state of California and the seat of Sacramento County. It is at the confluence of the Sacramento River and the American River in the portion of Californias expansive Central Valley. Its estimated 2014 population of 485,199 made it the sixth-largest city in California, Sacramento is the cultural and economic core of the Sacramento metropolitan area, which includes seven counties with a 2010 population of 2,414,783. In 2002, the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University conducted for Time magazine named Sacramento Americas Most Diverse City, Sacramento became a city through the efforts of the Swiss immigrant John Sutter, Sr. his son John Augustus Sutter, Jr. and James W. Marshall. Sacramento grew quickly thanks to the protection of Sutters Fort, which was established by Sutter in 1839, the city was named after the Sacramento River, which forms its western border. The river was named by Spanish cavalry officer Gabriel Moraga for the Santísimo Sacramento, California State University, Sacramento, is the largest university in the city and one of 23 campuses in the California State University system. University of the Pacific is a university with one of its three campuses in Sacramento. In addition, the University of California, Davis, located in nearby Davis, operates its UC Davis Medical Center, nisenan and Plains Miwok Native Americans had lived in the area for perhaps thousands of years. Unlike the settlers who would eventually make Sacramento their home, these Native Americans left little evidence of their existence. Traditionally, their diet was dominated by acorns taken from the oak trees in the region, and by fruits, bulbs, seeds. In 1808, the Spanish explorer Gabriel Moraga discovered and named the Sacramento Valley, a Spanish writer with the Moraga expedition wrote, Canopies of oaks and cottonwoods, many festooned with grapevines, overhung both sides of the blue current. Birds chattered in the trees and big fish darted through the pellucid depths, the air was like champagne, and drank deep of it, drank in the beauty around them. The valley and the river were then christened after the Most Holy Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ, John Sutter first arrived on August 13,1839 at the divergence of the American and Sacramento Rivers with a Mexican land grant of 50,000 acres. The next year, he and his party established Sutters Fort, representing Mexico, Sutter called his colony New Helvetia, a Swiss inspired name, and was the political authority and dispenser of justice in the new settlement. Soon, the colony began to grow as more and more pioneers headed west, within just a few short years, John Sutter had become a grand success, owning a ten-acre orchard and a herd of thirteen thousand cattle. Fort Sutter became a stop for the increasing number of immigrants coming through the valley. In 1847, Sutter hired James Marshall to build a sawmill so that he could continue to expand his empire, Sutter received 2,000 fruit trees in 1847, which started the agriculture industry in the Sacramento Valley. In 1848, when gold was discovered by James W. Marshall at Sutters Mill in Coloma and he hired topographical engineer William H
2.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
3.
National Register of Historic Places
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The National Register of Historic Places is the United States federal governments official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation. The passage of the National Historic Preservation Act in 1966 established the National Register, of the more than one million properties on the National Register,80,000 are listed individually. The remainder are contributing resources within historic districts, each year approximately 30,000 properties are added to the National Register as part of districts or by individual listings. For most of its history the National Register has been administered by the National Park Service and its goals are to help property owners and interest groups, such as the National Trust for Historic Preservation, coordinate, identify, and protect historic sites in the United States. While National Register listings are mostly symbolic, their recognition of significance provides some financial incentive to owners of listed properties, protection of the property is not guaranteed. During the nomination process, the property is evaluated in terms of the four criteria for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places, the application of those criteria has been the subject of criticism by academics of history and preservation, as well as the public and politicians. Occasionally, historic sites outside the proper, but associated with the United States are also listed. Properties can be nominated in a variety of forms, including individual properties, historic districts, the Register categorizes general listings into one of five types of properties, district, site, structure, building, or object. National Register Historic Districts are defined geographical areas consisting of contributing and non-contributing properties, some properties are added automatically to the National Register when they become administered by the National Park Service. These include National Historic Landmarks, National Historic Sites, National Historical Parks, National Military Parks/Battlefields, National Memorials, on October 15,1966, the Historic Preservation Act created the National Register of Historic Places and the corresponding State Historic Preservation Offices. Initially, the National Register consisted of the National Historic Landmarks designated before the Registers creation, approval of the act, which was amended in 1980 and 1992, represented the first time the United States had a broad-based historic preservation policy. To administer the newly created National Register of Historic Places, the National Park Service of the U. S. Department of the Interior, hartzog, Jr. established an administrative division named the Office of Archeology and Historic Preservation. Hartzog charged OAHP with creating the National Register program mandated by the 1966 law, ernest Connally was the Offices first director. Within OAHP new divisions were created to deal with the National Register, the first official Keeper of the Register was William J. Murtagh, an architectural historian. During the Registers earliest years in the late 1960s and early 1970s, organization was lax and SHPOs were small, understaffed, and underfunded. A few years later in 1979, the NPS history programs affiliated with both the U. S. National Parks system and the National Register were categorized formally into two Assistant Directorates. Established were the Assistant Directorate for Archeology and Historic Preservation and the Assistant Directorate for Park Historic Preservation, from 1978 until 1981, the main agency for the National Register was the Heritage Conservation and Recreation Service of the United States Department of the Interior. In February 1983, the two assistant directorates were merged to promote efficiency and recognize the interdependency of their programs, jerry L. Rogers was selected to direct this newly merged associate directorate
4.
National Historic Landmark
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A National Historic Landmark is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Of over 85,000 places listed on the countrys National Register of Historic Places, a National Historic Landmark District may include contributing properties that are buildings, structures, sites or objects, and it may include non-contributing properties. Contributing properties may or may not also be separately listed, prior to 1935, efforts to preserve cultural heritage of national importance were made by piecemeal efforts of the United States Congress. The first National Historic Site designation was made for the Salem Maritime National Historic Site on March 17,1938. In 1960, the National Park Service took on the administration of the data gathered under this legislation. Because listings often triggered local preservation laws, legislation in 1980 amended the procedures to require owner agreement to the designations. On October 9,1960,92 properties were announced as designated NHLs by Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton, more than 2,500 NHLs have been designated. Most, but not all, are in the United States, there are NHLs in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Three states account for nearly 25 percent of the nations NHLs, three cities within these states all separately have more NHLs than 40 of the 50 states. In fact, New York City alone has more NHLs than all but five states, Virginia, California, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, there are 74 NHLs in the District of Columbia. Some NHLs are in U. S. commonwealths and territories, associated states, and foreign states. There are 15 in Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and other U. S. commonwealths and territories,5 in U. S. -associated states such as Micronesia, over 100 ships or shipwrecks have been designated as NHLs. About half of the National Historic Landmarks are privately owned, the National Historic Landmarks Program relies on suggestions for new designations from the National Park Service, which also assists in maintaining the landmarks. A friends group of owners and managers, the National Historic Landmark Stewards Association, works to preserve, protect, if not already listed on the National Register of Historic Places, an NHL is automatically added to the Register upon designation. About three percent of Register listings are NHLs, american Water Landmark List of U. S
5.
California Historical Landmark
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California Historical Landmarks are buildings, structures, sites, or places in the state of California that have been determined to have statewide historical landmark significance. Historical significance is determined by meeting at least one of the criteria listed below, The first, last, only, associated with an individual or group having a profound influence on the history of California. California Historical Landmarks of #770 and above are listed in the California Register of Historical Resources. By contrast, a site, building, feature, or event that is of local significance may be designated as a California Point of Historical Interest. List of California Historical Landmarks by county National Historic Sites National Register of Historic Places listings in California — with links to list articles by county, los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monuments San Francisco Designated Landmarks Johnson, Marael. A Guide to California Roadside Historical Markers, official OHP—California Office of Historic Preservation website OHP, California Historical Sites searchpage — links to lists by county
6.
Neoclassical architecture
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Neoclassical architecture is an architectural style produced by the neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century. In its purest form, it is a style derived from the architecture of classical antiquity, the Vitruvian principles. In form, Neoclassical architecture emphasizes the wall rather than chiaroscuro, Neoclassical architecture is still designed today, but may be labelled New Classical Architecture for contemporary buildings. In Central and Eastern Europe, the style is referred to as Classicism. Many early 19th-century neoclassical architects were influenced by the drawings and projects of Étienne-Louis Boullée, the many graphite drawings of Boullée and his students depict spare geometrical architecture that emulates the eternality of the universe. There are links between Boullées ideas and Edmund Burkes conception of the sublime, the baroque style had never truly been to the English taste. The most popular was the four-volume Vitruvius Britannicus by Colen Campbell, the book contained architectural prints of famous British buildings that had been inspired by the great architects from Vitruvius to Palladio. At first the book featured the work of Inigo Jones. Palladian architecture became well established in 18th-century Britain, at the forefront of the new school of design was the aristocratic architect earl, Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington, in 1729, he and William Kent, designed Chiswick House. This House was a reinterpretation of Palladios Villa Capra, but purified of 16th century elements and this severe lack of ornamentation was to be a feature of the Palladianism. In 1734 William Kent and Lord Burlington designed one of Englands finest examples of Palladian architecture with Holkham Hall in Norfolk, the main block of this house followed Palladios dictates quite closely, but Palladios low, often detached, wings of farm buildings were elevated in significance. This classicising vein was also detectable, to a degree, in the Late Baroque architecture in Paris. This shift was even visible in Rome at the redesigned façade for S, by the mid 18th century, the movement broadened to incorporate a greater range of Classical influences, including those from Ancient Greece. The shift to neoclassical architecture is conventionally dated to the 1750s, in France, the movement was propelled by a generation of French art students trained in Rome, and was influenced by the writings of Johann Joachim Winckelmann. The style was adopted by progressive circles in other countries such as Sweden. A second neoclassic wave, more severe, more studied and more consciously archaeological, is associated with the height of the Napoleonic Empire, in France, the first phase of neoclassicism was expressed in the Louis XVI style, and the second in the styles called Directoire or Empire. The Scottish architect Charles Cameron created palatial Italianate interiors for the German-born Catherine II the Great in St. Petersburg, indoors, neoclassicism made a discovery of the genuine classic interior, inspired by the rediscoveries at Pompeii and Herculaneum. These had begun in the late 1740s, but only achieved an audience in the 1760s
7.
Government of California
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The government of California is the governmental structure of the state of California as established by the California Constitution. The state also allows participation of the electorate by initiative, referendum, recall. Californias elected executive officers are, All offices are elected separately to concurrent four-year terms, the Lieutenant Governor is the President of the California Senate and acts as the governor when the Governor is unable to execute the office, including whenever the Governor leaves the state. The Governor and Lieutenant Governor also serve as ex officio members of the University of California Board of Regents, Regulatory activity is published in the California Regulatory Notice Register and the general and permanent rules and regulations are codified in the California Code of Regulations. State government is organized into departments, of which most are grouped together into several huge Cabinet-level agencies. These agencies are sometimes referred to as superagencies, especially by government officials. Examples include the, Regents of the University of California California Public Utilities Commission The California State Legislature is the state legislature. It is a body consisting of the California State Assembly, the lower house with 80 members, and the California State Senate. Members of the Assembly serve two-year terms, members of the Senate serve four-year terms, the Speaker of the California State Assembly presides over the State Assembly. The Lieutenant Governor is the ex officio President of the Senate and may break a tied vote, the Legislature meets in the California State Capitol in Sacramento. Its session laws are published in the California Statutes and codified into the 29 California Codes, the state also allows direct participation of the electorate by initiative, referendum, recall and ratification. The Judiciary of California interprets and applies the law, and is defined under the Constitution, law, the judiciary has a hierarchical structure with the Supreme Court at the apex. The Superior Courts are the trial courts, and the Courts of Appeal are the primary appellate courts. The Judicial Council is the arm of the judiciary. The California Supreme Court consists of the Chief Justice of California, the Courts of Appeal are the intermediate appellate courts. The state is divided into six appellate districts. Notably, all published California appellate decisions are binding on all Superior Courts, as mandated by the Constitution, each of the 58 counties has a superior court. It ranked particularly low in public access to information and judicial transparency, in 2005, Pew Research Centers Government Performance Project gave California a grade C-, tied for last with Alabama
8.
Bicameralism
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A bicameral legislature is one in which the legislators are divided into two separate assemblies, chambers or houses. As of 2015, somewhat less than half of the national legislatures are bicameral. Often, the members of the two chambers are elected or selected using different methods, which vary from country to country and this can often lead to the two chambers having very different compositions of members. However, in many Westminster system parliaments, the house to which the executive is responsible can overrule the other house, some legislatures lie in between these two positions, with one house only able to overrule the other under certain circumstances. For example, one house would represent the aristocracy, and the other would represent the commoners as was the case in the Kingdom of England. Others, such as France under the Ancien Régime had a legislature known as the Estates General, which consisted of separate chambers for the clergymen, the nobility. The Founding Fathers of the United States also favoured a bicameral legislature, the idea was to have the Senate be wealthier and wiser. Benjamin Rush saw this though, and noted that, this type of dominion is almost always connected with opulence, the Senate was created to be a stabilising force, elected not by mass electors, but selected by the State legislators. Senators would be more knowledgeable and more sort of republican nobility—and a counter to what Madison saw as the fickleness. He noted further that the use of the Senate is to consist in its proceeding with more coolness, with system and with more wisdom. Madisons argument led the Framers to grant the Senate prerogatives in foreign policy, an area where steadiness, discretion, the Senate was chosen by state legislators, and senators had to possess a significant amount of property in order to be deemed worthy and sensible enough for the position. In fact, it was not until the year 1913 that the 17th Amendment was passed, as part of the Great Compromise, they invented a new rationale for bicameralism in which the Senate would have states represented equally, and the House would have them represented by population. Many nations with parliaments have to some degree emulated the British three-tier model, nevertheless, the older justification for second chambers—providing opportunities for second thoughts about legislation—has survived. An example of controversy regarding a second chamber has been the debate over the powers of the Canadian Senate or the election of the Senate of France. The relationship between the two chambers varies, in cases, they have equal power, while in others. The first tends to be the case in federal systems and those with presidential governments, the latter tends to be the case in unitary states with parliamentary systems. In the United States both houses of the U. S and this is due to their original location in the two-story building that was to house them. In Canada, the country as a whole is divided into a number of Senate Divisions, each with a different number of Senators, Senators in Canada are not elected by the people but are appointed by the Governor General on the advice of the Prime Minister
9.
California State Legislature
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The California State Legislature is the state legislature of the U. S. state of California. It is a body consisting of the lower house, the California State Assembly, with 80 members, and the upper house. New legislators convene each new session, to organize, in the Assembly and Senate Chambers, respectively. Aside from the recess, the legislature is in session year-round, the Democratic Party currently holds supermajorities in both chambers of the California Legislature. The state senate currently consists of 27 Democrats and 13 Republicans, except for the period from 1995 to 1996, the Assembly has been in Democratic hands since the 1970 election. The Senate has been in Democratic hands continuously since 1970, the first Californian State House was originally a hotel in San Jose owned by businessman Pierre Don Pedro Sainsevain and his associates. The State Legislature currently meets in the California State Capitol in Sacramento, members of the Assembly are elected from 80 districts and serve two-year terms. Members of the Senate are elected from forty districts and serve four-year terms, twenty Senate seats are up for election at each two-year election cycle. Term limits were established in 1990 following the passage of Proposition 140. In June 2012, voters approved Proposition 28 which allows legislators to serve a maximum of 12 years without regard to whether the years are served in the State Assembly or the State Senate. The proceedings of the California State Legislature are briefly summarized in regularly published journals, which show votes, reports produced by California executive agencies, as well as the Legislature, were published in the Appendices to the Journals from 1849 to 1970. Since the 1990s, the legislature has provided a video feed for its sessions. Due to the expense and the obvious political downside, California did not keep records of actual speeches made by members of the Assembly. As a result, reconstructing legislative intent outside of an acts preamble is extremely difficult in California for legislation passed before the 1990s. Since 1993, the Legislature has hosted a web/ftp site in one form or another, the most sought-after legislative committee appointments are to banking, agriculture and insurance. A bill is a proposal to change, repeal, or add to existing state law, an Assembly Bill is one introduced in the Assembly, a Senate Bill, in the Senate. Bills are designated by number, in the order of introduction in each house, for example, AB16 refers to the 16th bill introduced in the Assembly. The numbering starts afresh each session, there may be one or more extraordinary sessions
10.
Governor of California
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The position was created in 1849, the year before California became a state. The current governor is Jerry Brown, a Democrat who was inaugurated January 3,2011, in October 2013, Jerry Brown surpassed Earl Warren for the longest cumulative period of time served as governor. Governors are elected by ballot and serve terms of four years. Governors take office on the first Monday after January 1 after their election, there are two methods available to remove a governor before the expiration of the gubernatorial term of office. Impeachment and removal by the legislature The governor can be impeached for misconduct in office by the State Assembly, recall by the voters Petitions signed by California state voters equal in number to 12% of the last vote for the office of governor can launch a gubernatorial recall election. The voters can vote on whether or not to recall the incumbent governor. If a majority of the voters in the vote to recall the governor. The 2003 California recall began with a drive that successfully forced sitting Democratic Governor Gray Davis into a special recall election. It marked the first time in the history of California that a governor faced a recall election and he was subsequently voted out of office, becoming the second governor in the history of the United States to be recalled after Lynn Frazier of North Dakota in 1921. He was replaced by Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Lieutenant Governor of California is separately elected during the same election, not jointly as the running mate of the gubernatorial candidate. California has had a governor and a lieutenant governor of different parties 26 of the past 31 years, the lieutenant governor is also the President of the California State Senate. In practice, there is an agreement for the Lieutenant Governor not to perform more than perfunctory duties while the Governor is away from the state. This agreement was violated when Mike Curb was in office, as he signed several executive orders at odds with the Brown administration when Brown was out of the state. Court rulings have upheld the lieutenant governors right to perform the duties, peter Burnett had the longest post-governorship,44 years. He left office in 1851 and died in 1895, excluding governors who died in office, Robert Waterman had the shortest post-governorship. He died on April 12,1891, a three months and four days after the expiration of his term. Sworn in at the age of 30, J. Neely Johnson was the youngest governor from 1856 to 1858, sworn in at the age of 72, Jerry Brown became the oldest governor in 2011. Earl Warren was the governor to serve more than two consecutive terms in office
11.
United States Capitol
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The United States Capitol, often called the Capitol Building or Capitol Hill, is the home of the United States Congress, and the seat of the legislative branch of the U. S. federal government. It sits atop Capitol Hill at the end of the National Mall in Washington. Though not at the center of the Federal District, the Capitol forms the origin point for the Districts street-numbering system. The original building was completed in 1800 and was subsequently expanded, like the principal buildings of the executive and judicial branches, the Capitol is built in a distinctive neoclassical style and has a white exterior. Both its east and west elevations are referred to as fronts, though only the east front was intended for the reception of visitors. In 2014, scaffolding was erected around the dome for a project scheduled to be completed by early 2017. All exterior scaffolding was removed by the end of summer 2016, prior to establishing the nations capital in Washington, D. C. the United States Congress and its predecessors had met in Philadelphia, New York City, and a number of other locations. In September 1774, the First Continental Congress brought together delegates from the colonies in Philadelphia, followed by the Second Continental Congress, Congress requested that John Dickinson, the Governor of Pennsylvania, call up the militia to defend Congress from attacks by the protesters. In what became known as the Pennsylvania Mutiny of 1783, Dickinson sympathized with the protesters and refused to remove them from Philadelphia. As a result, Congress was forced to flee to Princeton, New Jersey, on June 21,1783, and met in Annapolis, Maryland, the United States Congress was established upon ratification of the United States Constitution and formally began on March 4,1789. New York City remained home to Congress until July 1790, when the Residence Act was passed to pave the way for a permanent capital. As part of the legislation, Philadelphia was chosen as a capital for ten years, until the nations capital in Washington. Pierre Charles LEnfant was given the task of creating the city plan for the new capital city, in reviewing LEnfants plan, Thomas Jefferson insisted the legislative building be called the Capitol rather than Congress House. The word Capitol comes from Latin and is associated with the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus on Capitoline Hill, the connection between the two is not, however, crystal clear. In spring 1792, United States Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson proposed a competition to solicit designs for the Capitol and the Presidents House. The prize for the competition was $500 and a lot in the Federal City, the most promising of the submissions was by Stephen Hallet, a trained French architect. However, Hallets designs were overly fancy, with too much French influence, a late entry by amateur architect William Thornton was submitted on January 31,1793, to much praise for its Grandeur, Simplicity, and Beauty by Washington, along with praise from Thomas Jefferson. Thornton was inspired by the east front of the Louvre, as well as the Paris Pantheon for the portion of the design
12.
Washington, D.C.
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Washington, D. C. formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, the District, or simply D. C. is the capital of the United States. The signing of the Residence Act on July 16,1790, Constitution provided for a federal district under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Congress and the District is therefore not a part of any state. The states of Maryland and Virginia each donated land to form the federal district, named in honor of President George Washington, the City of Washington was founded in 1791 to serve as the new national capital. In 1846, Congress returned the land ceded by Virginia, in 1871. Washington had an population of 681,170 as of July 2016. Commuters from the surrounding Maryland and Virginia suburbs raise the population to more than one million during the workweek. The Washington metropolitan area, of which the District is a part, has a population of over 6 million, the centers of all three branches of the federal government of the United States are in the District, including the Congress, President, and Supreme Court. Washington is home to national monuments and museums, which are primarily situated on or around the National Mall. The city hosts 176 foreign embassies as well as the headquarters of international organizations, trade unions, non-profit organizations, lobbying groups. A locally elected mayor and a 13‑member council have governed the District since 1973, However, the Congress maintains supreme authority over the city and may overturn local laws. D. C. residents elect a non-voting, at-large congressional delegate to the House of Representatives, the District receives three electoral votes in presidential elections as permitted by the Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified in 1961. Various tribes of the Algonquian-speaking Piscataway people inhabited the lands around the Potomac River when Europeans first visited the area in the early 17th century, One group known as the Nacotchtank maintained settlements around the Anacostia River within the present-day District of Columbia. Conflicts with European colonists and neighboring tribes forced the relocation of the Piscataway people, some of whom established a new settlement in 1699 near Point of Rocks, Maryland. 43, published January 23,1788, James Madison argued that the new government would need authority over a national capital to provide for its own maintenance. Five years earlier, a band of unpaid soldiers besieged Congress while its members were meeting in Philadelphia, known as the Pennsylvania Mutiny of 1783, the event emphasized the need for the national government not to rely on any state for its own security. However, the Constitution does not specify a location for the capital, on July 9,1790, Congress passed the Residence Act, which approved the creation of a national capital on the Potomac River. The exact location was to be selected by President George Washington, formed from land donated by the states of Maryland and Virginia, the initial shape of the federal district was a square measuring 10 miles on each side, totaling 100 square miles. Two pre-existing settlements were included in the territory, the port of Georgetown, Maryland, founded in 1751, many of the stones are still standing
13.
Facade
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A façade is generally one exterior side of a building, usually, but not always, the front. It is a loan word from the French façade, which means frontage or face. In architecture, the façade of a building is often the most important aspect from a design standpoint, from the engineering perspective of a building, the façade is also of great importance due to its impact on energy efficiency. For historical façades, many local zoning regulations or other laws restrict or even forbid their alteration. The word comes from the French foreign loan word façade, which in turn comes from the Italian facciata, from faccia meaning face, the earliest usage recorded by the Oxford English Dictionary is 1656. It was quite common in the Georgian period for existing houses in English towns to be given a fashionable new façade, in modern highrise building, the exterior walls are often suspended from the concrete floor slabs. Examples include curtain walls and precast concrete walls, the façade can at times be required to have a fire-resistance rating, for instance, if two buildings are very close together, to lower the likelihood of fire spreading from one building to another. In general, the systems that are suspended or attached to the precast concrete slabs will be made from aluminium or stainless steel. In recent years more lavish materials such as titanium have sometimes been used, whether rated or not, fire protection is always a design consideration. The melting point of aluminium,660 °C, is reached within minutes of the start of a fire. Firestops for such building joints can be qualified, too, putting fire sprinkler systems on each floor has a profoundly positive effect on the fire safety of buildings with curtain walls. Some building codes also limit the percentage of area in exterior walls. When the exterior wall is not rated, the slab edge becomes a junction where rated slabs are abutting an unrated wall. For rated walls, one may also choose rated windows and fire doors, on a film set and within most themed attractions, many of the buildings are only façades, which are far cheaper than actual buildings, and not subject to building codes. In film sets, they are held up with supports from behind. Within theme parks, they are usually decoration for the interior ride/attraction/restaurant, by Ulrich Knaack, Tillmann Klein, Marcel Bilow and Thomas Auer. ISBN 978-3-7643-7961-2 ISBN 978-3-7643-7962-9 Giving buildings an illusion of grandeur Poole, the article outlines the development of the façade in ecclesiastical architecture from the early Christian period to the Renaissance
14.
Portico
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A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was used in Ancient Greece and has influenced many cultures. Some noteworthy examples of porticos are the East Portico of the United States Capitol, the portico adorning the Pantheon in Rome, porticos are sometimes topped with pediments. Bologna, Italy, is famous for its porticos, in total, there are over 45 km of arcades, some 38 in the city center. The longest portico in the world, about 3.5 km, in Bologna, Italy, porticos stretch for 18 km. Palladio was a pioneer of using temple-fronts for secular buildings, in the UK, the temple-front applied to The Vyne, Hampshire was the first portico applied to an English country house. A pronaos is the area of the portico of a Greek or Roman temple. Roman temples commonly had an open pronaos, usually with only columns and no walls, the word pronaos is Greek for before a temple. In Latin, a pronaos is also referred to as an anticum or prodomus, the different variants of porticos are named by the number of columns they have. The style suffix comes from the Greek στῦλος, column, the tetrastyle has four columns, it was commonly employed by the Greeks and the Etruscans for small structures such as public buildings and amphiprostyles. Roman provincial capitals also manifested tetrastyle construction, such as the Capitoline Temple in Volubilis, the North Portico of the White House is perhaps the most notable four-columned portico in the United States. Hexastyle buildings had six columns and were the standard façade in canonical Greek Doric architecture between the archaic period 600–550 BC up to the Age of Pericles 450–430 BC. With the colonization by the Greeks of Southern Italy, hexastyle was adopted by the Etruscans, Roman taste favoured narrow pseudoperipteral and amphiprostyle buildings with tall columns, raised on podiums for the added pomp and grandeur conferred by considerable height. The Maison Carrée at Nîmes, France, is the best-preserved Roman hexastyle temple surviving from antiquity, octastyle buildings had eight columns, they were considerably rarer than the hexastyle ones in the classical Greek architectural canon. The best-known octastyle buildings surviving from antiquity are the Parthenon in Athens, built during the Age of Pericles, and the Pantheon in Rome. The destroyed Temple of Divus Augustus in Rome, the centre of the Augustan cult, is shown on Roman coins of the 2nd century AD as having built in octastyle. The decastyle has ten columns, as in the temple of Apollo Didymaeus at Miletus, the temple of Venus and Rome, built by Hadrian in Rome about 130 A. D. was decastyle, the only known example in Roman architecture. Classical architecture List of classical architecture terms Hypostyle Loggia Stoa Greek architecture, Encyclopædia Britannica,1968 Stierlin, Greece, From Mycenae to the Parthenon, TASCHEN,2004, Editor-in-chief Angelika Taschen, Cologne, ISBN 3-8228-1225-0 Stierlin, Henri
15.
Granite
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Granite is a common type of felsic intrusive igneous rock that is granular and phaneritic in texture. Granites can be white, pink, or gray in color. The word granite comes from the Latin granum, a grain, in reference to the structure of such a holocrystalline rock. By definition, granite is a rock with at least 20% quartz. The term granitic means granite-like and is applied to granite and a group of igneous rocks with similar textures and slight variations in composition. Occasionally some individual crystals are larger than the groundmass, in case the texture is known as porphyritic. A granitic rock with a texture is known as a granite porphyry. Granitoid is a general, descriptive field term for lighter-colored, coarse-grained igneous rocks, petrographic examination is required for identification of specific types of granitoids. The extrusive igneous rock equivalent of granite is rhyolite, Granite is nearly always massive, hard and tough, and therefore it has gained widespread use throughout human history, and more recently as a construction stone. The average density of granite is between 2.65 and 2.75 g/cm3, its compressive strength usually lies above 200 MPa, and its viscosity near STP is 3–6 •1019 Pa·s. The melting temperature of dry granite at ambient pressure is 1215–1260 °C, it is reduced in the presence of water. Granite has poor primary permeability, but strong secondary permeability, true granite according to modern petrologic convention contains both plagioclase and alkali feldspars. When a granitoid is devoid or nearly devoid of plagioclase, the rock is referred to as alkali feldspar granite, when a granitoid contains less than 10% orthoclase, it is called tonalite, pyroxene and amphibole are common in tonalite. A granite containing both muscovite and biotite micas is called a binary or two-mica granite, two-mica granites are typically high in potassium and low in plagioclase, and are usually S-type granites or A-type granites. A worldwide average of the composition of granite, by weight percent, based on 2485 analyses. Much of it was intruded during the Precambrian age, it is the most abundant basement rock that underlies the relatively thin veneer of the continents. Outcrops of granite tend to form tors and rounded massifs, granites sometimes occur in circular depressions surrounded by a range of hills, formed by the metamorphic aureole or hornfels. Granite often occurs as small, less than 100 km² stock masses
16.
Corinthian order
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The Corinthian order is the last developed of the three principal classical orders of ancient Greek and Roman architecture. The other two are the Doric order which was the earliest, followed by the Ionic order, when classical architecture was revived during the Renaissance, two more orders were added to the canon, the Tuscan order and the Composite order. The Corinthian, with its offshoot the Composite, is the most ornate of the orders, characterized by slender fluted columns and elaborate capitals decorated with acanthus leaves and it was employed in southern Gaul at the Maison Carrée, Nîmes and at the comparable podium temple at Vienne. Other prime examples noted by Mark Wilson Jones are the order of the Basilica Ulpia and the arch at Ancona the column of Phocas. The Corinthian order is named for the Greek city-state of Corinth, however, according to the architectural historian Vitruvius, the column was created by the sculptor Callimachus, probably an Athenian, who drew acanthus leaves growing around a votive basket. Its earliest use can be traced back to the Late Classical Period, the earliest Corinthian capital was found in Bassae, dated at 427 BC. In its proportions, the Corinthian column is similar to the Ionic column, though it is more slender, the abacus upon the capital has concave sides to conform to the outscrolling corners of the capital, and it may have a rosette at the center of each side. Corinthian columns were erected on the top level of the Roman Colosseum, holding up the least weight and their height to width ratio is about 10,1. One variant is the Tivoli Order, found at the Temple of Vesta, the Tivoli Orders Corintinan Capital has two rows of Acanthus and its abacus is decorated with oversize fleuron in the form of hibiscus flowers with pronounced spiral pistils. The column flutes have flat tops, the frieze exhibits fruit swag suspended between bucrania. Above each swag is a rosette, the cornice does not have modillions. Indo-Corinthian capitals are capitals crowning columns or pilasters, which can be found in the northwestern Indian subcontinent and these capitals are typically dated to the 1st centuries of our era, and constitute important elements of Greco-Buddhist art of Gandhara. The classical design was adapted, usually taking a more elongated form. Indo-Corinthian capitals also incorporated figures of the Buddha or Bodhisattvas, usually as central figures surrounded, the Corinthian architrave is divided in two or three sections, which may be equal, or they may bear interesting proportional relationships, one with another. Above the plain, unadorned architrave lies the frieze, which may be carved with a continuous design or left plain. At the Capitol the proportions of architrave to frieze are exactly 1,1, above that, the profiles of the cornice moldings are like those of the Ionic order. If the cornice is deep, it may be supported by brackets or modillions. The Corinthian column is almost always fluted, if it is not, it is often worth pausing to unravel the reason why
17.
Cornice
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A simple cornice may be formed just with a crown molding. The function of the cornice of a building is to throw rainwater free of the building’s walls. In residential building practice, this function is handled by projecting gable ends, roof eaves, however, house eaves may also be called cornices if they are finished with decorative molding. The projecting cornice of a building may appear to be heavy and hence in danger of falling, particularly on commercial buildings, a rake is an architectural term for an eave or cornice which runs along the gable end of the roof of a modern residential structure. It may also be called a sloping cornice, a raking cornice, the trim and rafters at this edge are called rake-, verge-, or barge-board or verge- or barge-rafter. It is a sloped timber on the facing edge of a roof running between the ridge and the eave. On a typical house, any gable will have two rakes, one on each sloped side, the rakes are supported by a series of lookouts and may be enclosed with a rake fascia board on the outside facing edge and a rake soffit along the bottom. The cornices of a residential building will usually be one of three types, a box cornice, a close or closed cornice, or an open cornice. Box cornices enclose the cornice of the building with what is essentially a narrow box. A box cornice may further be divided into either the box cornice or the wide box cornice type. A narrow box cornice is one in which the projection of the rafter serves as a surface for the soffit board as well as the fascia trim. This is possible if the slope of the roof is fairly steep, box cornices often have ventilation screens laid over openings cut in the soffits in order to allow air to circulate within the cornice. A close, closed, or snub cornice is one in there is no projection of the rafters beyond the walls of the building. This type of cornice is easy to construct, but provides little aid in dispersing water away from the building, in an open cornice, the shape of the cornice is similar to that of a wide box cornice except that both the lookouts and the soffit are absent. It is a lower-cost treatment that requires fewer materials, and may not have a fascia board. Ancient Egyptian architectural tradition made special use of large cavetto mouldings as a cornice, with only a short fillet above, inspired by this precedent, it was then revived by Ardashir I, the founder of the Sasanian dynasty. The cavetto took the place of the cymatium in many Etruscan temples, often painted with vertical tongue patterns, additional more-obscure varieties of cornice include the architrave cornice, bracketed cornice, and modillion cornice. A cornice return is a detail that occurs where the horizontal cornice of a roof connects to the rake of a gable
18.
Minerva
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Minerva was the Roman goddess of wisdom and sponsor of arts, trade, and strategy. She was born with weapons from the head of Jupiter, after impregnating the titaness Metis, Jupiter recalled a prophecy that his own child would overthrow him. Fearing that their child would grow stronger than he and rule the Heavens in his place, the titaness forged weapons and armor for her child while within the father-god, and the constant pounding and ringing gave him a headache. To relieve the pain, Vulcan used a hammer to split Jupiters head and, from the cleft, Minerva emerged, whole, adult, from the 2nd century BC onwards, the Romans equated her with the Greek goddess Athena. She was the goddess of music, poetry, medicine, wisdom, commerce, weaving. She is often depicted with her sacred creature, an owl usually named as the owl of Minerva, stemming from an Italic moon goddess *Meneswā, the Etruscans adopted the inherited Old Latin name, *Menerwā, thereby calling her Menrva. It is assumed that her Roman name, Minerva, is based on this Etruscan mythology, Minerva was the goddess of wisdom, war, art, schools and commerce. She was the Etruscan counterpart to Greek Athena, like Athena, Minerva was born from the head of her father, Jupiter. The word mens is built from the Proto-Indo-European root *men- mind, the Etruscan Menrva was part of a holy triad with Tinia and Uni, equivalent to the Roman Capitoline Triad of Jupiter-Juno-Minerva. Minerva was the daughter of Jupiter, as Minerva Medica, she was the goddess of medicine and doctors. As Minerva Achaea, she was worshipped at Lucera in Apulia where votive gifts, in Fasti III, Ovid called her the goddess of a thousand works. Minerva was worshipped throughout Italy, and when she eventually became equated with the Greek goddess Athena, unlike Mars, god of war, she was sometimes portrayed with sword lowered, in sympathy for the recent dead, rather than raised in triumph. In Rome her bellicose nature was emphasized less than elsewhere and her worship was also spread throughout the empire—in Britain, for example, she was syncretized with the local goddess Sulis, who was often invoked for restitution for theft. The Romans celebrated her festival from March 19 to March 23 during the day which is called, in the plural, Quinquatria, the fifth after the Ides of March, the nineteenth. A lesser version, the Minusculae Quinquatria, was held on the Ides of June, June 13, by the flute-players, in 207 BC, a guild of poets and actors was formed to meet and make votive offerings at the temple of Minerva on the Aventine Hill. Among others, its members included Livius Andronicus, the Aventine sanctuary of Minerva continued to be an important center of the arts for much of the middle Roman Republic. When it was founded, the emperor himself was present and was believed to be of divine nature as a result of its construction, Minerva is featured on the coinage of different Roman Emperors. She is often represented on the side of a coin holding an owl
19.
Education
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Education is the process of facilitating learning, or the acquisition of knowledge, skills, values, beliefs, and habits. Educational methods include storytelling, discussion, teaching, training, Education frequently takes place under the guidance of educators, but learners may also educate themselves. Education can take place in formal or informal settings and any experience that has an effect on the way one thinks, feels. The methodology of teaching is called pedagogy, in most regions education is compulsory up to a certain age. Etymologically, the education is derived from the Latin ēducātiō from ēducō which is related to the homonym ēdūcō from ē-. Education began in prehistory, as trained the young in the knowledge. In pre-literate societies this was achieved orally and through imitation, story-telling passed knowledge, values, and skills from one generation to the next. As cultures began to extend their knowledge beyond skills that could be learned through imitation. Schools existed in Egypt at the time of the Middle Kingdom, plato founded the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in Europe. The city of Alexandria in Egypt, established in 330 BCE, there, the great Library of Alexandria was built in the 3rd century BCE. European civilizations suffered a collapse of literacy and organization following the fall of Rome in CE476, after the Fall of Rome, the Catholic Church became the sole preserver of literate scholarship in Western Europe. The church established cathedral schools in the Early Middle Ages as centres of advanced education, some of these establishments ultimately evolved into medieval universities and forebears of many of Europes modern universities. During the High Middle Ages, Chartres Cathedral operated the famous, founded in 1088, the University of Bologne is considered the first, and the oldest continually operating university. The Renaissance in Europe ushered in a new age of scientific and intellectual inquiry and appreciation of ancient Greek, around 1450, Johannes Gutenberg developed a printing press, which allowed works of literature to spread more quickly. The European Age of Empires saw European ideas of education in philosophy, religion, arts, the Enlightenment saw the emergence of a more secular educational outlook in Europe. In most countries today, full-time education, whether at school or otherwise, is compulsory for all children up to a certain age, formal education occurs in a structured environment whose explicit purpose is teaching students. Usually, formal education takes place in a environment with classrooms of multiple students learning together with a trained, certified teacher of the subject. Most school systems are designed around a set of values or ideals that govern all educational choices in that system, such choices include curriculum, organizational models, design of the physical learning spaces, student-teacher interactions, methods of assessment, class size, educational activities, and more
20.
Lady Justice
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Lady Justice is an allegorical personification of the moral force in judicial systems. Her attributes are a blindfold, a balance, and a sword and she often appears as a pair with Prudentia, who holds a mirror and a snake. Lady Justice is also known as Iustitia or Justitia after Latin, Iustitia, the Roman goddess of Justice, the personification of justice balancing the scales dates back to the Goddess Maat, and later Isis, of ancient Egypt. The Hellenic deities Themis and Dike were later goddesses of justice, Themis was the embodiment of divine order, law, and custom, in her aspect as the personification of the divine rightness of law. There are three features of Lady Justice, a set of scales, a blindfold, and a sword. Lady Justice is most often depicted with a set of scales typically suspended from her hand, upon which she measures the strengths of a cases support. The depiction dates back to ancient Egypt, where the God Anubis was frequently depicted with a set of scales on which He weighed a deceaseds heart against the Feather of Truth, since the 16th century, Lady Justice has often been depicted wearing a blindfold. The blindfold represents impartiality, the ideal that justice should be applied without regard to wealth, the earliest Roman coins depicted Justitia with the sword in one hand and the scale in the other, but with her eyes uncovered. Justitia was only represented as blind since about the end of the 15th century. The first known representation of blind Justice is Hans Giengs 1543 statue on the Gerechtigkeitsbrunnen in Berne, instead of using the Janus approach, many sculptures simply leave out the blindfold altogether. Another variation is to depict a blindfolded Lady Justice as a human scale, an example of this can be seen at the Shelby County Courthouse in Memphis, Tennessee. The cover of a 2006 issue of Rolling Stone proclaimed TIME TO GO. focusing on the corruption that dominated Congress. The drawing showed a bunch of figures evoking reactionary politics emerging from the Capitol, one of the figures was Lady Justice lifting her blindfold, implying that the then-composition of Congress had politicized the criminal justice system. The last distinctive feature of Lady Justice is her sword, the sword represented authority in ancient times, and conveys the idea that justice can be swift and final. The Greco-Roman garment symbolizes the status of the attitude that embodies justice. Justice in sculpture Justice in painting Lady Justice and her symbols are used in heraldry, especially in the arms of legal government agencies. com
21.
Industry
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Industry is the production of goods or related services within an economy. The major source of revenue of a group or company is the indicator of its relevant industry, when a large group has multiple sources of revenue generation, it is considered to be working in different industries. Manufacturing industry became a key sector of production and labour in European and North American countries during the Industrial Revolution, upsetting previous mercantile and this came through many successive rapid advances in technology, such as the production of steel and coal. Following the Industrial Revolution, possibly a third of the economic output are derived that is from manufacturing industries. Many developed countries and many developing/semi-developed countries depend significantly on manufacturing industry, Industries, the countries they reside in, and the economies of those countries are interlinked in a complex web of interdependence. Industries can be classified in a variety of ways, at the top level, industry is often classified according to the three-sector theory into sectors, primary, secondary, and tertiary. Some authors add quaternary or even quinary sectors, over time, the fraction of a societys industry within each sector changes. Below the economic sectors there are other more detailed industry classifications. These classification systems commonly divide industries according to functions and markets. Market-based classification systems such as the Global Industry Classification Standard and the Industry Classification Benchmark are used in finance, the International Standard Industrial Classification of all economic activities is the most complete and systematic industrial classification made by the United Nations Statistics Division. ISIC is a classification of economic activities arranged so that entities can be classified according to the activity they carry out. The Industrial Revolution led to the development of factories for large-scale production, originally the factories were steam-powered, but later transitioned to electricity once an electrical grid was developed. The mechanized assembly line was introduced to parts in a repeatable fashion. This led to significant increases in efficiency, lowering the cost of the end process, later automation was increasingly used to replace human operators. This process has accelerated with the development of the computer and the robot, historically certain manufacturing industries have gone into a decline due to various economic factors, including the development of replacement technology or the loss of competitive advantage. An example of the former is the decline in manufacturing when the automobile was mass-produced. A recent trend has been the migration of prosperous, industrialized nations towards a post-industrial society and this is manifested by an increase in the service sector at the expense of manufacturing, and the development of an information-based economy, the so-called informational revolution. In a post-industrial society, manufacturing is relocated to more favourable locations through a process of off-shoring
22.
Mining
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Mining is extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth usually from an orebody, lode, vein, seam, reef or placer deposits. These deposits form a mineralized package that is of economic interest to the miner, ores recovered by mining include metals, coal, oil shale, gemstones, limestone, chalk, dimension stone, rock salt, potash, gravel, and clay. Mining is required to obtain any material that cannot be grown through agricultural processes, Mining in a wider sense includes extraction of any non-renewable resource such as petroleum, natural gas, or even water. Mining of stones and metal has been a human activity since pre-historic times, Mining operations usually create a negative environmental impact, both during the mining activity and after the mine has closed. Hence, most of the nations have passed regulations to decrease the impact. Work safety has long been a concern as well, and modern practices have significantly improved safety in mines, levels of metals recycling are generally low. Unless future end-of-life recycling rates are stepped up, some rare metals may become unavailable for use in a variety of consumer products, due to the low recycling rates, some landfills now contain higher concentrations of metal than mines themselves. Since the beginning of civilization, people have used stone, ceramics and, later and these were used to make early tools and weapons, for example, high quality flint found in northern France, southern England and Poland was used to create flint tools. Flint mines have been found in areas where seams of the stone were followed underground by shafts. The mines at Grimes Graves and Krzemionki are especially famous, other hard rocks mined or collected for axes included the greenstone of the Langdale axe industry based in the English Lake District. The oldest-known mine on archaeological record is the Lion Cave in Swaziland, at this site Paleolithic humans mined hematite to make the red pigment ochre. Mines of an age in Hungary are believed to be sites where Neanderthals may have mined flint for weapons. Ancient Egyptians mined malachite at Maadi, at first, Egyptians used the bright green malachite stones for ornamentations and pottery. Later, between 2613 and 2494 BC, large building projects required expeditions abroad to the area of Wadi Maghareh in order to secure minerals and other resources not available in Egypt itself. Quarries for turquoise and copper were found at Wadi Hammamat, Tura, Aswan and various other Nubian sites on the Sinai Peninsula. Mining in Egypt occurred in the earliest dynasties, the gold mines of Nubia were among the largest and most extensive of any in Ancient Egypt. These mines are described by the Greek author Diodorus Siculus, who mentions fire-setting as one used to break down the hard rock holding the gold. One of the complexes is shown in one of the earliest known maps, the miners crushed the ore and ground it to a fine powder before washing the powder for the gold dust
23.
Baluster
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Multiplied in this way, they form a balustrade. Individually, a baluster shaft may describe the form taken by a brass or silver candlestick. According to OED, baluster is derived through the French, balustre, from Italian, balaustro, from balaustra, pomegranate flower, from Latin balaustium, from Greek βαλαύστιον. The earliest examples are shown in the bas-reliefs representing the Assyrian palaces. The application to architecture was a feature of the early Renaissance, late fifteenth-century examples are found in the balconies of palaces at Venice and these quattrocento balustrades are likely to be following yet-unidentified Gothic precedents. They form balustrades of colonnettes as an alternative to miniature arcading, sangallo passed the motif to Bramante and Michelangelo, through whom balustrades gained wide currency in the 16th century. Because of its low center of gravity, this vase-baluster may be given the modern term dropped baluster. The baluster, being a structure, tends to follow design precedents that were set in woodworking and ceramic practices, where the turners lathe. The profile a baluster takes is often diagnostic of a style of architecture or furniture. Some complicated Mannerist baluster forms can be read as a vase set upon another vase, modern baluster design is also in use for example in designs influenced by the Arts and Crafts movement in a 1905 row of houses in Etchingham Park Road Finchley London England. The modern term baluster shaft is applied to the shaft dividing a window in Saxon architecture, in the south transept of the Abbey in St Albans, England, are some of these shafts, supposed to have been taken from the old Saxon church. Norman bases and capitals have been added, together with plain cylindrical Norman shafts, balusters are normally separated by at least the same measurement as the size of the square bottom section. Placing balusters too far apart diminishes their aesthetic appeal, balustrades normally terminate in columns, building walls or more properly in heavy newel posts because otherwise they will not be structurally strong enough. Balusters may be formed in several ways, wood and stone can be shaped on the lathe, wood can be cut from square or rectangular section boards, while concrete, plaster, iron, and plastics are usually formed by molding and casting. Turned patterns or old examples are used for the molds, Cast iron Cast stone Hardwoods and softwoods Plaster Polymer stone Polyurethane/polystyrene Wrought iron The word banister refers to the balusters of a stairway. According to many dictionaries - a, a handrail, especially on a staircase. Such a handrail together with its supporting structures, the Renaissance baluster and Palladio in Palladio and English Palladianism
24.
Gold-leaf
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Gold leaf is gold that has been hammered into thin sheets by goldbeating and is often used for gilding. Gold leaf is available in a variety of karats and shades. The most commonly used gold is 22-karat yellow gold, Gold leaf is a type of metal leaf, but the term is rarely used when referring to gold leaf. The term metal leaf is used for thin sheets of metal of any color that do not contain any real gold. Real yellow gold leaf is about 91. 7% pure gold, silver colored white gold is approximately 50% pure gold. Layering gold leaf over a surface is called gold leafing or gilding, traditional water gilding is the most difficult and highly regarded form of gold leafing. It has remained unchanged for hundreds of years and is still done by hand. Gold leaf is used in art in a raw state. It has been used in jewellery in various periods, often as small pieces hanging freely. Gold glass is gold leaf held between two pieces of glass, and was used for decorated Ancient Roman vessels, where some of the gold was scraped off to form an image, Gold leaf is also used in Buddhist art to decorate statues and symbols. Gold leafing can also be seen on domes in religious and public architecture, from the ancient temples to modern day buildings, gold leaf has been an integral component of architecture to designate important structures since the dawn of humankind. Due to gold’s resilience, golden-domed buildings can stand up to weather, deterioration and even modern pollution, Gold in architecture became an integral component of Byzantine and Roman churches and basilicas in 400 AD, most notably Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. The church was built by Pope Sixtus III and is one of the earliest examples of gold mosaics, the mosaics were made of stone, tile or glass backed on gold leaf walls, giving the church a beautifully intricate backdrop. The 14th century campanile, or bell tower, is the highest in Rome, the apse mosaic, the Coronation of the Virgin, is from 1295, signed by the Franciscan friar, Jacopo Torriti. It is also the location of ceremonial spaces, such as the Hall of Honour, the Memorial Chamber. Capping the room is a ceiling with deep octagonal coffers, each filled with heraldic symbols, including maple leaves, fleur-de-lis, lions rampant, clàrsach, Welsh Dragons. This plane rests on six pairs and four pilasters, each of which is capped by a caryatid. Below the windows is an architrave, broken only by baldachins at the base of each of the above pilasters
25.
Finial
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A finial or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature. Where there are several such elements they may be called pinnacles and these are frequently seen on top of bed posts or clocks. Decorative finials are also used to fasten lampshades, and as an ornamental element at the end of the handles of souvenir spoons. The charm at the end of a chain is also known as a finial. During the various dynasties in China, a finial was worn on the top of the civil or military officials wore during formal court ceremonies. The finial was changed to a knob for other daily usage, in Java and Bali, a rooftop finial is known as mustaka or kemuncak. A ball-style finial is often mounted to the top of a stationary flagpole, the United States Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard employ a variety of different finials depending on the flag in question, the Marines and Coast Guard deferring to the Navys protocols. Bed posts often end in finials, wooden posts tend to have turned wood finials. While the purpose of finials on bed posts is mostly decorative, they serve a purpose on curtain rods, curtain rod finials can be seen to act much like a barometer of public taste. Many designs hark back to the gothic and neo-gothic of architectural finials, while other contemporary finials reflect minimalist, art nouveau, the durability, strength and machinability of modern alloys have lent themselves to increasingly intricate and dazzling designs. Some lampshades or light fittings, especially in glass, typically terminate in a finial which also serves to affix the shade to the lamp or fixture, finials are twisted onto the lamp harp. Typically the finial is externally decorative whilst hiding an internal screw thread, there are several standard thread sizes which are used. Acroterion Alem Crocket Souvenir spoon Word-of-the-day on finial
26.
Red
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Red is the color at the longer-wavelengths end of the spectrum of visible light next to orange, at the opposite end from violet. Red color has a predominant light wavelength of roughly 620–740 nanometers, light with a longer wavelength than red but shorter than terahertz radiation and microwave is called infrared. Red is one of the secondary colors, resulting from the combination of yellow. Traditionally, it was viewed as a primary colour, along with yellow and blue, in the RYB color space and traditional color wheel formerly used by painters. Reds can vary in shade from light pink to very dark maroon or burgundy. Red is the color of cyan. In nature, the red color of blood comes from hemoglobin, the red color of the Grand Canyon and other geological features is caused by hematite or red ochre, both forms of iron oxide. It also causes the red color of the planet Mars, the color of autumn leaves is caused by pigments called anthocyanins, which are produced towards the end of summer, when the green chlorophyll is no longer produced. One to two percent of the population has red hair, the color is produced by high levels of the reddish pigment pheomelanin. Since red is the color of blood, it has historically been associated with sacrifice, danger, modern surveys in the United States and Europe show red is also the color most commonly associated with heat, activity, passion, sexuality, anger, love and joy. In China, India and many other Asian countries it is the color of symbolizing happiness, since the 19th century, red has also been associated with socialism and communism. The word red is derived from the Old English rēad, the word can be further traced to the Proto-Germanic rauthaz and the Proto-Indo European root rewdʰ-. In Sanskrit, the word means red or blood. In the Akkadian language of Ancient Mesopotamia and in the modern Inuit language of Inuit, the words for colored in Latin and Spanish both also mean red. In Portuguese the word for red is vermelho, which comes from Latin vermiculus, in the Russian language, the word for red, Кра́сный, comes from the same old Slavic root as the words for beautiful—красивый and excellent—прекрасный. Thus Red Square in Moscow, named long before the Russian Revolution, in heraldry, the word gules is used for red. Red can vary in hue from orange-red to violet-red, and for each hue there is a variety of shades and tints. Red hematite powder was found scattered around the remains at a grave site in a Zhoukoudian cave complex near Beijing
27.
House of Lords
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The House of Lords of the United Kingdom, referred to ceremonially as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster, officially, the full name of the house is, The Right Honourable the Lords Spiritual and Temporal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. Unlike the elected House of Commons, all members of the House of Lords are appointed, the membership of the House of Lords is drawn from the peerage and is made up of Lords Spiritual and Lords Temporal. The Lords Spiritual are 26 bishops in the established Church of England, of the Lords Temporal, the majority are life peers who are appointed by the monarch on the advice of the Prime Minister, or on the advice of the House of Lords Appointments Commission. However, they include some hereditary peers including four dukes. Very few of these are female since most hereditary peerages can only be inherited by men, while the House of Commons has a defined 650-seat membership, the number of members in the House of Lords is not fixed. There are currently 805 sitting Lords, the House of Lords is the only upper house of any bicameral parliament to be larger than its respective lower house. The House of Lords scrutinises bills that have approved by the House of Commons. It regularly reviews and amends Bills from the Commons, while it is unable to prevent Bills passing into law, except in certain limited circumstances, it can delay Bills and force the Commons to reconsider their decisions. In this capacity, the House of Lords acts as a check on the House of Commons that is independent from the electoral process, Bills can be introduced into either the House of Lords or the House of Commons. Members of the Lords may also take on roles as government ministers, the House of Lords has its own support services, separate from the Commons, including the House of Lords Library. The Queens Speech is delivered in the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament, the House also has a Church of England role, in that Church Measures must be tabled within the House by the Lords Spiritual. This new parliament was, in effect, the continuation of the Parliament of England with the addition of 45 MPs and 16 Peers to represent Scotland, the Parliament of England developed from the Magnum Concilium, the Great Council that advised the King during medieval times. This royal council came to be composed of ecclesiastics, noblemen, the first English Parliament is often considered to be the Model Parliament, which included archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls, barons, and representatives of the shires and boroughs of it. The power of Parliament grew slowly, fluctuating as the strength of the monarchy grew or declined, for example, during much of the reign of Edward II, the nobility was supreme, the Crown weak, and the shire and borough representatives entirely powerless. In 1569, the authority of Parliament was for the first time recognised not simply by custom or royal charter, further developments occurred during the reign of Edward IIs successor, Edward III. It was during this Kings reign that Parliament clearly separated into two chambers, the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The authority of Parliament continued to grow, and, during the fifteenth century
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Upper house
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An upper house, sometimes called a Senate, is one of two chambers of a bicameral legislature, the other chamber being the lower house. The house formally designated as the house is usually smaller. Examples of upper houses in countries include the UKs House of Lords, Canadas Senate, Indias Rajya Sabha, Russias Federation Council, Irelands Seanad, Germanys Bundesrat, a legislature composed of only one house is described as unicameral. An upper house is different from the lower house in at least one of the following respects, Powers, In a parliamentary system. Therefore, in countries the Upper House votes on only limited legislative matters. Cannot vote a motion of no confidence against the government, while the house always can. In a presidential system, It may have equal or nearly equal power with the lower house and it may have specific powers not granted to the lower house. For example, It may give advice and consent to some executive decisions and it may have the sole power to try impeachments against officials of the executive, following enabling resolutions passed by the lower house. Status, In some countries, its members are not popularly elected, membership may be indirect and its members may be elected with a different voting system than that used to elect the lower house. Less populated states, provinces, or administrative divisions may be represented in the upper house than in the lower house. Members terms may be longer than in the house. Members may be elected in portions, for staggered terms, rather than all at one time, in some countries, the upper house cannot be dissolved at all, or can be dissolved only in more limited circumstances than the lower house. It typically has fewer members or seats than the lower house and it has usually a higher age of candidacy than the lower house. In parliamentary systems the upper house is seen as an advisory or revising chamber. Some or all of the restrictions are often placed on upper houses. No absolute veto of proposed legislation, though suspensive vetoes are permitted in some states, in countries where it can veto legislation, it may not be able to amend the proposals. A reduced or even absent role in initiating legislation, additionally, a Government must have the consent of both to remain in office, a position which is known as perfect bicameralism or equal bicameralism. An example is the British House of Lords, bills can only be delayed for up to one year before the Commons can use the Parliament Act, although economic bills can only be delayed for one month
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Gas lighting
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Gas lighting is production of artificial light from combustion of a gaseous fuel, such as hydrogen, methane, carbon monoxide, propane, butane, acetylene, ethylene, or natural gas. Before electricity became widespread and economical to allow for general public use, gas was the most popular method of outdoor and indoor lighting in cities. Early gas lights were ignited manually, but many designs are self-igniting. In addition, some urban historical districts retain gas street lighting, early lighting fuels consisted of olive oil, beeswax, fish oil, whale oil, sesame oil, nut oil, and similar substances. These were the most commonly used fuels until the late 18th century, chinese records dating back 1,700 years note the use of natural gas in the home for light and heat via bamboo pipes to the dwellings. Public illumination preceded the discovery and adoption of gaslight by centuries, in 1417, Sir Henry Barton, Mayor of London, ordained lanterns with lights to be hung out on the winter evenings between Hallowtide and Candlemasse. Paris was first lit by an order issued in 1524, and, in the beginning of the 16th century, in coal mining, accumulating and escaping gases were known originally for their adverse effects rather than their useful qualities. Coal miners described two types of gases, one called the choke damp and the fire damp. In 1667, a paper detailing the effects of gases was entitled, A Description of a Well and Earth in Lancashire taking Fire. Imparted by Thomas Shirley, Esq an eye-witness, stephen Hales was the first person who procured a flammable fluid from the actual distillation of coal. His experiments with this object are related in the first volume of his Vegetable Statics and these results seemed to have passed without notice for several years. This paper contained some striking facts relating to the flammability and other properties of coal-gas, the principal properties of coal-gas were demonstrated to different members of the Royal Society, and showed that after keeping the gas some time, it still retained its flammability. The scientists of the time still saw no purpose for it. John Clayton, in an extract from a letter in the Philosophical Transactions for 1735, calls gas the spirit of coal and this spirit happened to catch fire, by coming in contact with a candle as it escaped from a fracture in one of his distillatory vessels. By preserving the gas in bladders, he entertained his friends, william Murdoch was the first to exploit the flammability of gas for the practical application of lighting. He worked for Matthew Boulton and James Watt at their Soho Foundry steam engine works in Birmingham and he first lit his own house in Redruth, Cornwall in 1792. In 1798, he used gas to light the building of the Soho Foundry and in 1802 lit the outside in a public display of gas lighting. One of the employees at the Soho Foundry, Samuel Clegg, Clegg left his job to set up his own gas lighting business, the Gas Lighting and Coke Company
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Chandelier
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A chandelier /ˌʃæn. dəlˈɪər/ is a decorative ceiling-mounted light fixture, a distinct type of pendant light. Chandeliers are often ornate, and normally use incandescent light bulbs, crystal chandeliers have more or less complex arrays of crystal prisms to illuminate a room with refracted light. Chandeliers are often located in hallways, living rooms, dining rooms, the word chandelier was first known in the English language in the 1736, borrowed from the Old French word chandelier, which comes from the Latin candelabrum. The earliest candle chandeliers were used by the wealthy in medieval times, from the 15th century, more complex forms of chandeliers, based on ring or crown designs, became popular decorative features in palaces and homes of nobility, clergy and merchants. Its high cost made the chandelier a symbol of luxury and status, by the early 18th century, ornate cast ormolu forms with long, curved arms and many candles were in the homes of many in the growing merchant class. Neoclassical motifs became a common element, mostly in cast metals. Chandeliers made in style also drew heavily on the aesthetic of ancient Greece and Rome, incorporating clean lines, classical proportions. During the 18th century glass chandeliers were produced by Bohemiens and Venetian glassmakers who were masters in the art of making chandeliers. Bohemian style was successful across Europe and its biggest draw was the chance to obtain spectacular light refraction due to facets. As a reaction to this new taste Italian glass factories in Murano created new kinds of light sources. Since Murano glass was not suitable for faceting, typical work realized at the time in countries where crystal was used. Typical features of a Murano chandelier are the intricate arabeques of leaves, flowers and fruits that would be enriched by coloured glass, made possible by the specific type of glass used in Murano. This glass they worked with was so unique, as it was glass and was a complete contrast to all different types of glass produced in the world at that time. An incredible amount of skill and time was required to precisely twist and this new type of chandelier was called ciocca literally bouquet of flowers, for the characteristic decorations of glazed polychrome flowers. One of the use of the huge Murano Chandeliers was the interior lighting of theatres. In the mid-19th century, as gas lighting caught on, branched ceiling fixtures called gasoliers were produced, by the 1890s, with the appearance of electric light, some chandeliers used both gas and electricity. As distribution of electricity widened, and supplies became dependable, electric-only chandeliers became standard, Another portmanteau word, electrolier, was formed for these, but nowadays they are most commonly called chandeliers. Some are fitted with bulbs shaped to imitate candle flames, for example those shown below in Epsom and Chatsworth, the worlds largest English Glass chandelier, is located in the Dolmabahçe Palace in Istanbul
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Latin
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Latin is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. The Latin alphabet is derived from the Etruscan and Greek alphabets, Latin was originally spoken in Latium, in the Italian Peninsula. Through the power of the Roman Republic, it became the dominant language, Vulgar Latin developed into the Romance languages, such as Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, French, and Romanian. Latin, Italian and French have contributed many words to the English language, Latin and Ancient Greek roots are used in theology, biology, and medicine. By the late Roman Republic, Old Latin had been standardised into Classical Latin, Vulgar Latin was the colloquial form spoken during the same time and attested in inscriptions and the works of comic playwrights like Plautus and Terence. Late Latin is the language from the 3rd century. Later, Early Modern Latin and Modern Latin evolved, Latin was used as the language of international communication, scholarship, and science until well into the 18th century, when it began to be supplanted by vernaculars. Ecclesiastical Latin remains the language of the Holy See and the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church. Today, many students, scholars and members of the Catholic clergy speak Latin fluently and it is taught in primary, secondary and postsecondary educational institutions around the world. The language has been passed down through various forms, some inscriptions have been published in an internationally agreed, monumental, multivolume series, the Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. Authors and publishers vary, but the format is about the same, volumes detailing inscriptions with a critical apparatus stating the provenance, the reading and interpretation of these inscriptions is the subject matter of the field of epigraphy. The works of several hundred ancient authors who wrote in Latin have survived in whole or in part and they are in part the subject matter of the field of classics. The Cat in the Hat, and a book of fairy tales, additional resources include phrasebooks and resources for rendering everyday phrases and concepts into Latin, such as Meissners Latin Phrasebook. The Latin influence in English has been significant at all stages of its insular development. From the 16th to the 18th centuries, English writers cobbled together huge numbers of new words from Latin and Greek words, dubbed inkhorn terms, as if they had spilled from a pot of ink. Many of these words were used once by the author and then forgotten, many of the most common polysyllabic English words are of Latin origin through the medium of Old French. Romance words make respectively 59%, 20% and 14% of English, German and those figures can rise dramatically when only non-compound and non-derived words are included. Accordingly, Romance words make roughly 35% of the vocabulary of Dutch, Roman engineering had the same effect on scientific terminology as a whole
32.
George Washington
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George Washington was an American politician and soldier who served as the first President of the United States from 1789 to 1797 and was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He served as Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War and he is popularly considered the driving force behind the nations establishment and came to be known as the father of the country, both during his lifetime and to this day. Washington was widely admired for his leadership qualities and was unanimously elected president by the Electoral College in the first two national elections. Washingtons incumbency established many precedents still in use today, such as the system, the inaugural address. His retirement from office two terms established a tradition that lasted until 1940 when Franklin Delano Roosevelt won an unprecedented third term. The 22nd Amendment now limits the president to two elected terms and he was born into the provincial gentry of Colonial Virginia to a family of wealthy planters who owned tobacco plantations and slaves, which he inherited. In his youth, he became an officer in the colonial militia during the first stages of the French. In 1775, the Second Continental Congress commissioned him as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army in the American Revolution, in that command, Washington forced the British out of Boston in 1776 but was defeated and nearly captured later that year when he lost New York City. After crossing the Delaware River in the middle of winter, he defeated the British in two battles, retook New Jersey, and restored momentum to the Patriot cause and his strategy enabled Continental forces to capture two major British armies at Saratoga in 1777 and Yorktown in 1781. In battle, however, Washington was repeatedly outmaneuvered by British generals with larger armies, after victory had been finalized in 1783, Washington resigned as commander-in-chief rather than seize power, proving his opposition to dictatorship and his commitment to American republicanism. Washington presided over the Constitutional Convention in 1787, which devised a new form of government for the United States. Following his election as president in 1789, he worked to unify rival factions in the fledgling nation and he supported Alexander Hamiltons programs to satisfy all debts, federal and state, established a permanent seat of government, implemented an effective tax system, and created a national bank. In avoiding war with Great Britain, he guaranteed a decade of peace and profitable trade by securing the Jay Treaty in 1795 and he remained non-partisan, never joining the Federalist Party, although he largely supported its policies. Washingtons Farewell Address was a primer on civic virtue, warning against partisanship, sectionalism. He retired from the presidency in 1797, returning to his home, upon his death, Washington was eulogized as first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen by Representative Henry Lee III of Virginia. He was revered in life and in death, scholarly and public polling consistently ranks him among the top three presidents in American history and he has been depicted and remembered in monuments, public works, currency, and other dedications to the present day. He was born on February 11,1731, according to the Julian calendar, the Gregorian calendar was adopted within the British Empire in 1752, and it renders a birth date of February 22,1732. Washington was of primarily English gentry descent, especially from Sulgrave and his great-grandfather John Washington emigrated to Virginia in 1656 and began accumulating land and slaves, as did his son Lawrence and his grandson, Georges father Augustine
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Gilbert Stuart
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Gilbert Charles Stuart was an American painter from Rhode Island. Gilbert Stuart is widely considered one of Americas foremost portraitists and his best known work is the unfinished portrait of George Washington that is sometimes referred to as The Athenaeum, begun in 1796 and never finished. Stuart retained the portrait and used it to paint 130 copies which he sold for $100 each, throughout his career, Gilbert Stuart produced portraits of over 1,000 people, including the first six Presidents of the United States. C. The National Portrait Gallery, London, Worcester Art Museum in Massachusetts, Gilbert Stuart was born on December 3,1755 in Saunderstown, Rhode Island, a village of North Kingstown, and baptized at Old Narragansett Church on April 11,1756. Stuarts father worked in the first colonial snuff mill in America, Gilbert Stuart moved to Newport, Rhode Island at the age of six, where his father pursued work in the merchant field. In Newport, Stuart first began to show promise as a painter. In 1770, Stuart made the acquaintance of Scottish artist Cosmo Alexander, a visitor of the colonies who made portraits of local patrons and who became a tutor to Stuart. Under the guidance of Alexander, Stuart painted the famous portrait Dr. Hunters Spaniels when he was fourteen years old, the painting is also referred to as Dr. Hunters Dogs by some accounts. In 1771, Stuart moved to Scotland with Alexander to finish his studies, Stuart tried to maintain a living and pursue his painting career, but to no avail, so he returned to Newport in 1773. Stuarts prospects as a portraitist were jeopardized by the onset of the American Revolution, Stuart departed for England in 1775 following the example set by John Singleton Copley. He was unsuccessful at first in pursuit of his vocation, the relationship was beneficial, with Stuart exhibiting at the Royal Academy as early as 1777. By 1782, Stuart had met with success, largely due to acclaim for The Skater, Stuart said that he was suddenly lifted into fame by a single picture. At one point, the prices for his pictures were exceeded only by those of renowned English artists Joshua Reynolds, despite his many commissions, however, Stuart was habitually neglectful of finances and was in danger of being sent to debtors prison. In 1787, he fled to Dublin, Ireland where he painted and accumulated debt with equal vigor, Stuart ended his 18-year stay in Britain and Ireland in 1793, leaving behind numerous unfinished paintings. He returned to the United States and settled briefly in New York City, in 1795, he moved to Germantown, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia, where he opened a studio. It was here that he gained a foothold in the art world, Stuart painted George Washington in a series of iconic portraits, each of them leading in turn to a demand for copies, and keeping Stuart busy and highly paid for years. The most famous and celebrated of these likenesses is known as The Athenaeum and is portrayed on the United States one dollar bill. Stuart, along with his daughters, painted a total of 130 reproductions of The Athenaeum, however, he never completed the original version, after finishing Washingtons face, he kept the original version to make the copies
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Gilding
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The term gilding covers a number of decorative techniques for applying fine gold leaf or powder to solid surfaces such as wood, stone, or metal to give a thin coating of gold. A gilded object is described as gilt. Where metal is gilded, it was silver in the West, to make silver-gilt objects, but gilt-bronze is commonly used in China. Methods of gilding include hand application and glueing, chemical gilding, and electroplating, parcel-gilt objects are only gilded over part of their surfaces. This may mean that all of the inside, and none of the outside, of a chalice or similar vessel is gilded, herodotus mentions that the Egyptians gilded wood and metals, and many such objects have been excavated. Certain Ancient Greek statues of great prestige were chryselephantine, i. e. made of gold and ivory, extensive ornamental gilding was also used in the ceiling coffers of the Propylaea. But he adds that luxury advanced on them so rapidly that in very little time you see all, even private and poor people, gild the walls, vaults. Owing to the thickness of the gold leaf used in ancient gilding. Fire-gilding of metal goes back at least to the 4th century BC, in Europe, silver-gilt has always been more common than gilt-bronze, but in China the opposite has been the case. The ancient Chinese also developed the gilding of porcelain, which was taken up by the French. Modern gilding is applied to numerous and diverse surfaces and by various processes, mechanical gilding includes all the operations in which gold leaf is prepared, and the processes to mechanically attach the gold onto surfaces. The process is completed by cold burnishing, overlaying or folding or hammering on gold foil or gold leaf is the simplest and most ancient method, and is mentioned in Homers Odyssey and the Old Testament. The Ram in a Thicket of about 2600–2400 BCE from Ur uses this technique on wood, the next advances involved two simple processes. The first involves gold leaf, which is gold that is hammered or cut very thin sheets. If gilding on canvas or on wood, the surface was often first coated with gesso, gesso is a substance made of finely ground gypsum or chalk mixed with glue. Other gilding processes involved using the gold as pigment in paint, then the gold was applied in the same way as with any paint. Sometimes, after either gold-leafing or gold-painting, the artist would heat the piece enough to melt the gold slightly and these techniques remained the only alternatives for materials like wood, leather, and the vellum pages of illuminated manuscripts. Chemical gilding embraces those processes in which the gold is at some stage of chemical combination and these include, In this process the gold is obtained in a state of extremely fine division, and applied by mechanical means
35.
House of Commons of the United Kingdom
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The House of Commons of the United Kingdom is the lower house of the countrys parliament. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster, officially, the full name of the house is, The Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. The House is a body consisting of 650 members known as Members of Parliament. Members are elected to represent constituencies by first-past-the-post and hold their seats until Parliament is dissolved, under the Parliament Act 1911, the Lords power to reject legislation was reduced to a delaying power. The Government is primarily responsible to the House of Commons and the prime minister stays in office only as long as he or she retains the support of a majority of its members. Although it does not formally elect the prime minister, the position of the parties in the House of Commons is of overriding importance, by convention, the prime minister is answerable to, and must maintain the support of, the House of Commons. Since 1963, by convention, the minister is always a member of the House of Commons. The Commons may indicate its lack of support for the Government by rejecting a motion of confidence or by passing a motion of no confidence, confidence and no confidence motions are sometimes phrased explicitly, for instance, That this House has no confidence in Her Majestys Government. Many other motions were considered confidence issues, even though not explicitly phrased as such, in particular, important bills that form a part of the Governments agenda were formerly considered matters of confidence, as is the annual Budget. Parliament normally sits for a term of five years. Subject to that limit, the minister could formerly choose the timing of the dissolution of parliament. By this second mechanism, the government of the United Kingdom can change without a general election. In such circumstances there may not even have been a party leadership election, as the new leader may be chosen by acclaim. A prime minister may resign if he or she is not defeated at the polls. In such a case, the premiership goes to whoever can command a majority in the House of Commons, in practice this is usually the new leader of the outgoing prime ministers party. Until 1965, the Conservative Party had no mechanism for electing a new leader, when Anthony Eden resigned as PM in 1957 without recommending a successor and it fell to the Queen to appoint Harold Macmillan as the new prime minister, after taking the advice of ministers. By convention, all ministers must be members of the House of Commons or of the House of Lords, a handful have been appointed who were outside Parliament, but in most cases they then entered Parliament either in a by-election or by receiving a peerage. Since 1902, all ministers have been members of the Commons
36.
Abraham Lincoln
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Abraham Lincoln was an American politician and lawyer who served as the 16th President of the United States from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. Lincoln led the United States through its Civil War—its bloodiest war and perhaps its greatest moral, constitutional, in doing so, he preserved the Union, abolished slavery, strengthened the federal government, and modernized the economy. Born in Hodgenville, Kentucky, Lincoln grew up on the frontier in Kentucky. Largely self-educated, he became a lawyer in Illinois, a Whig Party leader, elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1846, Lincoln promoted rapid modernization of the economy through banks, tariffs, and railroads. Reentering politics in 1854, he became a leader in building the new Republican Party, in 1860, Lincoln secured the Republican Party presidential nomination as a moderate from a swing state. Though he gained little support in the slaveholding states of the South. Subsequently, on April 12,1861, a Confederate attack on Fort Sumter inspired the North to enthusiastically rally behind the Union. Politically, Lincoln fought back by pitting his opponents against each other, by carefully planned political patronage and his Gettysburg Address became an iconic endorsement of the principles of nationalism, republicanism, equal rights, liberty, and democracy. Lincoln initially concentrated on the military and political dimensions of the war and his primary goal was to reunite the nation. He suspended habeas corpus, leading to the ex parte Merryman decision. Lincoln closely supervised the war effort, especially the selection of top generals, including his most successful general, Lincoln tried repeatedly to capture the Confederate capital at Richmond, each time a general failed, Lincoln substituted another, until finally Grant succeeded. As the war progressed, his moves toward ending slavery included the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. On April 14,1865, five days after the surrender of Confederate commanding general Robert E. Lee, Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth, a Confederate sympathizer. Secretary of War Edwin Stanton launched a manhunt for Booth, and 12 days later on April 26, Lincoln has been consistently ranked both by scholars and the public as among the greatest U. S. presidents. Abraham Lincoln was born February 12,1809, the child of Thomas and Nancy Hanks Lincoln, in a one-room log cabin on the Sinking Spring Farm near Hodgenville. He was a descendant of Samuel Lincoln, an Englishman who migrated from Hingham, Norfolk to its namesake of Hingham, samuels grandson and great-grandson began the familys western migration, which passed through New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. Lincolns paternal grandfather and namesake, Captain Abraham Lincoln, moved the family from Virginia to Jefferson County, Captain Lincoln was killed in an Indian raid in 1786. His children, including eight-year-old Thomas, the presidents father
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History of Sacramento, California
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The city was named after the Sacramento River, which forms its western border. The river was named by Spanish cavalry officer Gabriel Moraga for the Santisimo Sacramento, before the arrival of Europeans, the Nisenan branch of the Native American Maidu inhabited the Sacramento Valley area. The California Gold Rush started when gold was discovered at Sutters Mill, one of Sutter, however, its location caused the city to periodically fill with water. Fires would also sweep through the city, to resolve the problems, the city worked to raise the sidewalks and buildings and began to replace wooden structures with more resilient materials, like brick and stone. The city was selected as the capital in 1854 after Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo failed to convince the state government to remain in the city of his namesake. Indigenous people such as the Miwok and Maidu Indians were the inhabitants of the north Californian Central Valley. However, no explorer had yet discovered the Sacramento Valley region nor the Golden Gate strait, neither did Gabriel Moraga, who was the first European to enter the Sierra in 1808 and was responsible for naming the Sacramento River, although he incorrectly placed the rivers in the region. The Mexicans, who had declared independence in 1821, shared Spanish sentiments, as a result, he granted Sutters request on the condition that Sutter would become a Mexican citizen. Sutter commenced to build a fort of his namesake, Sutters Fort, in 1840, John Sutter employed both white people and Native Americans for many mundane and military tasks regarding New Helvetia. As New Helvetia continued to develop economically, Sutter constructed a ranch at the Nisenan village of Hok and named it Hock Farm, New Helvetia was considered a stable colony by 1844, and was the only foreigner-friendly locale in Alta California at the time. Among other foreigners, the Donner Party had designated Sutters Fort their destination during a journey that placed them across the Sierra mountains in the wintertime. Sutters empire began to disintegrate when he decided to back the unpopular Alta Californian governor Manuel Micheltorena, Sutter was jailed as a result, but not before Micheltorena issued the Sobrante Grant, which added 88,000 acres of land to New Helvetian territory. In 1845, Castro arrived at Sutters Fort and offered a deal to purchase New Helvetia, Sutter declined, agreeing reluctantly, Sutter raised the Bear Flag over his fortification. However, he treated the Vallejos, whom he considered friends, as guests, while the Bear Flaggers under William B. The United States initiated the Mexican-American War in 1846 against Mexico in the wake of the U. S. annexation of the Republic of Texas, whose independence Mexico had not recognized. California, along with Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, most of Arizona and Colorado, and parts of Oklahoma, Kansas, thus, Sutters New Helvetia fell under U. S. control. Continuing business as normal, John Sutter dispatched associate James W. Marshall, in January 1848, Marshall detected a flake of gold on the ground at the site of Sutters new mill, and after conducting tests, determined the minerals authenticity. Word leaked about the discovery nearly immediately, disappointed with what had become of his holdings, Sutter placed his son as head of fort business operations and retired to Hock Farm
38.
Emporis
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Emporis GmbH is a real estate data mining company with headquarters in Hamburg, Germany. The company collects and publishes data and photographs of buildings worldwide, Emporis offers a variety of information on its public database, Emporis. com, located at www. emporis. com. Emporis is frequently cited by media sources as an authority on building data. Emporis previously focused exclusively on high-rise buildings and skyscrapers, which it defines as buildings between 35 and 100 metres tall and at least 100 metres tall, respectively, today, the database has expanded to include low-rise buildings and other structures. Michael Wutzke started a website about skyscrapers in Frankfurt in 1996, in 2000 he started skyscrapers. com which was folded into Emporis in 2003. In 2004, Stephan R. Boehm assumed the role of Chairman, Wutzke was Chief Technology Officer and managing director until 2010, when he left the company. In 2007 venture capital firm Neuhaus Partners and KfW Bankengruppe invested several million Euro in the company, effective January 1,2009, the company moved its headquarters from Darmstadt to Frankfurt. In 2011, the company moved from Frankfurt to Hamburg, in 2000 a group of Emporis senior editors began presenting the Emporis Skyscraper Award. Eligible buildings are selected from a list of all buildings in the world at least 100 meters tall which were completed that year
39.
SkyscraperPage
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SkyscraperPage is an internet forum for skyscraper hobbyists and enthusiasts that tracks existing and proposed skyscrapers around the world. SkyscraperPage. com drawings have appeared in National Geographics website, Wired, Condé Nast, The Globe and they are based in Victoria, British Columbia. The site has a database of scale-model illustration skyscrapers and other major macro-engineering projects, the scale of the drawings are one pixel per meter. The images are created using pixel art, using these diagrams, skyscrapers and other tall structures from any cities can be compared. General information is given about each structure, such as the location, the year built, if available. In 2008, the site had over 22,000 custom made drawings of skyscrapers, there were 600 artists signed up with the site, about half of whom were active. List of Internet forums List of tallest buildings in the world
40.
Sacramento County, California
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Sacramento County is a county in the U. S. state of California. As of the 2010 census, the population was 1,418,788 and its county seat is Sacramento, which has been the state capital of California since 1854. Sacramento County is included in the Sacramento-Roseville-Arden-Arcade, CA Metropolitan Statistical Area, the county covers about 994 square miles in the northern portion of the Central Valley, on into Gold Country. The southernmost portion of Sacramento County has direct access to San Francisco Bay, Sacramento County was one of the original counties of California, which were created in 1850 at the time of statehood. The county was named after the Sacramento River, which forms its western border, the river was named by Spanish cavalry officer Gabriel Moraga for the Santisimo Sacramento, referring to the Catholic Eucharist. Alexander Hamilton Willard, a member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, is buried in the old Franklin Cemetery. According to the U. S. Census Bureau, the county has an area of 994 square miles. Most of the county is at a close to sea level. The highest point in the county is Carpenter Hill at 828 feet, Carpenter Hill is the lowest high point of any county in California. Major watercourses in the county include the American River, Sacramento River, Cosumnes River, a tributary of the Mokelumne River and Dry Creek, Hispanic or Latino of any race were 306,196 persons. As of the census of 2000, there were 1,223,499 people,453,602 households, the population density was 1,267 people per square mile. There were 474,814 housing units at a density of 492/sq mi. The racial makeup of the county was 64. 0% White,10. 6% Black or African American,1. 09% Native American,13. 5% Asian,0. 6% Pacific Islander,7. 5% from other races, and 5. 8% from two or more races. 19. 3% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race,10. 2% were of German,7. 0% English,6. 7% Irish and 5. 1% American ancestry according to Census 2000. 75. 7% spoke only English at home,10. 0% spoke Spanish,1. 5% Hmong,1. 4% Chinese or Mandarin,1. 3% Vietnamese,1. 2% Tagalog and 1. 2% Russian. 26. 7% of all households were made up of individuals and 8. 0% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older, the average household size was 2.64 and the average family size was 3.24. In the county, the population was out with 27. 6% under the age of 18,9. 5% from 18 to 24,31. 0% from 25 to 44,20. 9% from 45 to 64. The median age was 34 years, for every 100 females there were 95.9 males
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California
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California is the most populous state in the United States and the third most extensive by area. Located on the western coast of the U. S, California is bordered by the other U. S. states of Oregon, Nevada, and Arizona and shares an international border with the Mexican state of Baja California. Los Angeles is Californias most populous city, and the second largest after New York City. The Los Angeles Area and the San Francisco Bay Area are the nations second- and fifth-most populous urban regions, California also has the nations most populous county, Los Angeles County, and its largest county by area, San Bernardino County. The Central Valley, an agricultural area, dominates the states center. What is now California was first settled by various Native American tribes before being explored by a number of European expeditions during the 16th and 17th centuries, the Spanish Empire then claimed it as part of Alta California in their New Spain colony. The area became a part of Mexico in 1821 following its war for independence. The western portion of Alta California then was organized as the State of California, the California Gold Rush starting in 1848 led to dramatic social and demographic changes, with large-scale emigration from the east and abroad with an accompanying economic boom. If it were a country, California would be the 6th largest economy in the world, fifty-eight percent of the states economy is centered on finance, government, real estate services, technology, and professional, scientific and technical business services. Although it accounts for only 1.5 percent of the states economy, the story of Calafia is recorded in a 1510 work The Adventures of Esplandián, written as a sequel to Amadis de Gaula by Spanish adventure writer Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo. The kingdom of Queen Calafia, according to Montalvo, was said to be a land inhabited by griffins and other strange beasts. This conventional wisdom that California was an island, with maps drawn to reflect this belief, shortened forms of the states name include CA, Cal. Calif. and US-CA. Settled by successive waves of arrivals during the last 10,000 years, various estimates of the native population range from 100,000 to 300,000. The Indigenous peoples of California included more than 70 distinct groups of Native Americans, ranging from large, settled populations living on the coast to groups in the interior. California groups also were diverse in their organization with bands, tribes, villages. Trade, intermarriage and military alliances fostered many social and economic relationships among the diverse groups, the first European effort to explore the coast as far north as the Russian River was a Spanish sailing expedition, led by Portuguese captain Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo, in 1542. Some 37 years later English explorer Francis Drake also explored and claimed a portion of the California coast in 1579. Spanish traders made unintended visits with the Manila galleons on their trips from the Philippines beginning in 1565
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Alhambra Theatre (Sacramento)
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The Alhambra Theatre opened in 1927 and was the preeminent movie house in the greater Sacramento area for many years. It was designed in the Moorish style of the great Spanish cities and included a large courtyard, the interior was lavishly appointed with red carpet, gold trim, and large pillars. It was located directly beyond the terminus of K Street at 1025 Thirty-First Street, now Alhambra Boulevard, Sacramento, California 95816. McClatchy High School, and the downtown post office, the theatre was also home to the Alhambra Pipe Organ, an organ of fifteen ranks built by the Robert Morton Organ Company in 1927. After it was removed in 1960, the instrument was used by the First Baptist Church in Stockton and now resides with the Kautz family at Ironstone Vineyards. In 1973, a measure intended to allow the City of Sacramento to purchase the theatre failed to pass. An original fountain is still intact and functioning on the side of the Safeway parking lot. The destruction of the theatre, which was opposed by the public, Alhambra profile and considerable commentary The Alhambra in contemporary Sacramento redevelopment Postcard view of Alhambra archived from the original on Apr 29,2008
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Big Four House
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The Big Four House is a historic 19th-century building in Downtown Sacramento, California. It is now located within Old Sacramento State Historic Park and the Old Sacramento National Historic District, the Big Four House was originally three separate buildings constructed over 1851 to 1852, adjacent to the Sacramento River waterfront. The original three structures included the Stanford Building, the Huntington & Hopkins Building, and the Miller Building, the lower floors were occupied by merchants, three of whom later became The Big Four, hence the buildings name. On the second floor these buildings they organized and ran the Central Pacific Railroad Company of California, to plan, build and they also founded the Southern Pacific Railroad here. Huntington, Hopkins & Co. which imported and sold hardware, iron, steel, the second floor of these structures served as the first offices of the Central Pacific Railroad from 1862 to 1873. By 1878 ownership was consolidated, and the structures were enlarged into one building, over time it has also housed shops, including the Huntington & Hopkins Hardware Store, a bar and cafe, and a hotel on the second floor. The Big Four House was declared a National Historic Landmark on July 4,1961 and it is included within the Old Sacramento Historic District, which also is a National Historic Landmark and on the National Register of Historic Places. It was also formerly a California Historical Landmark of its own, cA-1170, Big Four Building, 220–226 K Street, Sacramento, Sacramento County, CA,11 photos,8 measured drawings,6 data pages
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