1.
The Cloisters
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The Cloisters is a museum in Upper Manhattan, New York City specializing in European medieval architecture, sculpture and decorative arts. Its early collection was built by the American sculptor, art dealer and collector George Grey Barnard, Rockefeller extended the collection and in 1931 purchased the site at Washington Heights and contracted the design for a new building that was to become the Cloisters. The museum today is part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and its architectural and artistic works are largely from the Romanesque and Gothic periods. Its four cloisters, the Cuxa, Bonnefont, Trie and Saint-Guilhem cloisters, were sourced from French monasteries, between 1934 and 1939 they were excavated and reconstructed in Washington Heights, in a large project overseen by the architect Charles Collens. They are surrounded by a series of chapels and rooms grouped by period and source location. The design, layout and ambiance of the building is intended to evoke in visitors a sense of the Medieval European monastic life through its distinctive architecture, the area around the buildings contains reconstructed early medieval gardens. Barnards collection was purchased along with a pieces from Rockefellers holdings and these became the foundation and core of the Cloisters collection. The Cloisters and the adjacent 4 acres gardens are situated in Fort Tryon Park, construction took place over a five-year period beginning in 1934. He also bought several hundred acres of the New Jersey Palisades and this land is now part of the Palisades Interstate Park. Rockefeller was impacted by the depression of the early 1930s. The Cloisters building was designed by Charles Collens, and incorporated elements from the five cloistered abbeys of Catalan, Occitan, in 1988, the Treasury Gallery within the Cloisters, containing objects used for liturgical celebrations, personal devotions, and secular uses, was renovated. Other galleries were refurbished in 1998 and 1999, the Cloisters is a well-known New York City landmark and has been used as a filming location. In 1948, the filmmaker Maya Deren used its ramparts as a backdrop for her experimental film Meditation on Violence, in the same year, German director William Dieterle used the Cloisters as the location for a convent school in his film Portrait of Jennie. The 1968 film Coogans Bluff used the sites pathways and lanes for a motorcycle chase. The museum contains architecture elements and settings relocated mostly from four French medieval abbeys, between 1934 and 1939 they were transported, reconstructed and integrated with new buildings, in a project overseen by the architect Charles Collens. The exterior building is influenced by and contains elements from the 13th century church at Saint-Geraud at Monsempron, France and it was primarily designed by Collins, who took influence from Bernards original Cloisters Museum. The exterior contains stone from a number of European sources, and was built from 1935, primarily from limestone and it includes four Gothic windows from the refectory at Sens, and nine arcades from a priory at Firiory. The bulbous Fuentidueña Chapel was especially difficult to fit into the area, the Cuxa Cloisters are located on the south side of the building and structurally and thematically are the museums centerpiece
2.
New York City
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The City of New York, often called New York City or simply New York, is the most populous city in the United States. With an estimated 2015 population of 8,550,405 distributed over an area of about 302.6 square miles. Located at the tip of the state of New York. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy and has described as the cultural and financial capital of the world. Situated on one of the worlds largest natural harbors, New York City consists of five boroughs, the five boroughs – Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, The Bronx, and Staten Island – were consolidated into a single city in 1898. In 2013, the MSA produced a gross metropolitan product of nearly US$1.39 trillion, in 2012, the CSA generated a GMP of over US$1.55 trillion. NYCs MSA and CSA GDP are higher than all but 11 and 12 countries, New York City traces its origin to its 1624 founding in Lower Manhattan as a trading post by colonists of the Dutch Republic and was named New Amsterdam in 1626. The city and its surroundings came under English control in 1664 and were renamed New York after King Charles II of England granted the lands to his brother, New York served as the capital of the United States from 1785 until 1790. It has been the countrys largest city since 1790, the Statue of Liberty greeted millions of immigrants as they came to the Americas by ship in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and is a symbol of the United States and its democracy. In the 21st century, New York has emerged as a node of creativity and entrepreneurship, social tolerance. Several sources have ranked New York the most photographed city in the world, the names of many of the citys bridges, tapered skyscrapers, and parks are known around the world. Manhattans real estate market is among the most expensive in the world, Manhattans Chinatown incorporates the highest concentration of Chinese people in the Western Hemisphere, with multiple signature Chinatowns developing across the city. Providing continuous 24/7 service, the New York City Subway is one of the most extensive metro systems worldwide, with 472 stations in operation. Over 120 colleges and universities are located in New York City, including Columbia University, New York University, and Rockefeller University, during the Wisconsinan glaciation, the New York City region was situated at the edge of a large ice sheet over 1,000 feet in depth. The ice sheet scraped away large amounts of soil, leaving the bedrock that serves as the foundation for much of New York City today. Later on, movement of the ice sheet would contribute to the separation of what are now Long Island and Staten Island. The first documented visit by a European was in 1524 by Giovanni da Verrazzano, a Florentine explorer in the service of the French crown and he claimed the area for France and named it Nouvelle Angoulême. Heavy ice kept him from further exploration, and he returned to Spain in August and he proceeded to sail up what the Dutch would name the North River, named first by Hudson as the Mauritius after Maurice, Prince of Orange
3.
Franks
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Some Franks raided Roman territory, while other Frankish tribes joined the Roman troops of Gaul. In later times, Franks became the rulers of the northern part of Roman Gaul. The Salian Franks lived on Roman-held soil between the Rhine, Scheldt, Meuse, and Somme rivers in what is now Northern France, Belgium, the kingdom was acknowledged by the Romans after 357 CE. Following the collapse of Rome in the West, the Frankish tribes were united under the Merovingians, who succeeded in conquering most of Gaul in the 6th century, which greatly increased their power. The Merovingian dynasty, descendants of the Salians, founded one of the Germanic monarchies that would absorb large parts of the Western Roman Empire, the Frankish state consolidated its hold over the majority of western Europe by the end of the 8th century, developing into the Carolingian Empire. This empire would gradually evolve into the state of France and the Holy Roman Empire, in the Middle Ages, the term Frank was used in the east as a synonym for western European, as the Franks were then rulers of most of Western Europe. The Franks in the east kept their Germanic language and became part of the Germans, Dutch, Flemings, the Franconian languages, which are called Frankisch in Dutch or Fränkisch in German, originated at least partly in the Old Frankish language of the Franks. Nowadays, the German and Dutch names for France are Frankreich and Frankrijk, respectively, the name Franci was originally socio-political. To the Romans, Celts, and Suebi, the Franks must have seemed alike, they looked the same and spoke the same language, so that Franci became the name by which the people were known. Within a few centuries it had eclipsed the names of the tribes, though the older names have survived in some place-names, such as Hesse. Following the precedents of Edward Gibbon and Jacob Grimm, the name of the Franks has been linked with the word frank in English and it has been suggested that the meaning of free was adopted because, after the conquest of Gaul, only Franks were free of taxation. It is traditionally assumed that Frank comes from the Germanic word for javelin, there is also another theory that suggests that Frank comes from the Latin word francisca meaning. Words in other Germanic languages meaning fierce, bold or insolent, eumenius addressed the Franks in the matter of the execution of Frankish prisoners in the circus at Trier by Constantine I in 306 and certain other measures, Ubi nunc est illa ferocia. Feroces was used often to describe the Franks, contemporary definitions of Frankish ethnicity vary both by period and point of view. According to their law and their custom, writing in 2009, Professor Christopher Wickham pointed out that the word Frankish quickly ceased to have an exclusive ethnic connotation. North of the River Loire everyone seems to have considered a Frank by the mid-7th century at the latest. Two early sources describe the origin of the Franks are a 7th-century work known as the Chronicle of Fredegar. Neither of these works are accepted by historians as trustworthy, compared with Gregory of Tourss Historia Francorum, the chronicle describes Priam as a Frankish king whose people migrated to Macedonia after the fall of Troy
4.
Toulouse
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Toulouse is the capital city of the southwestern French department of Haute-Garonne, as well as of the Occitanie region. The city lies on the banks of the River Garonne,150 kilometres from the Mediterranean Sea,230 km from the Atlantic Ocean and it is the fourth-largest city in France with 466,297 inhabitants in January 2014. The Toulouse Metro area is, with 1312304 inhabitants as of 2014, Frances 4th metropolitan area after Paris, Lyon and Marseille and ahead of Lille and Bordeaux. Toulouse is the centre of the European aerospace industry, with the headquarters of Airbus, the Galileo positioning system, the SPOT satellite system, the Airbus Group, ATR and the Aerospace Valley. The city also hosts the European headquarters of Intel and CNESs Toulouse Space Centre, thales Alenia Space, and Astrium Satellites, Airbus Groups satellite system subsidiary, also have a significant presence in Toulouse. The University of Toulouse is one of the oldest in Europe and, with more than 103,000 students, is the fourth-largest university campus in France, after the Universities of Paris, Lyon and Lille. The air route between Toulouse Blagnac and Paris Orly is the busiest in Europe, transporting 2.4 million passengers in 2014, according to the rankings of LExpress and Challenges, Toulouse is the most dynamic French city. It is now the capital of the Occitanie region, the largest region in metropolitan France, sernin, the largest remaining Romanesque building in Europe, designated in 1998 because of its significance to the Santiago de Compostela pilgrimage route. Toulouse is in the south of France, north of the department of Haute-Garonne, the city is traversed by the Canal de Brienne, the Canal du Midi and the rivers Garonne, Touch and Hers-Mort. Toulouse has a subtropical climate which can be qualified as submediterranean due to its proximity to the Mediterranean climate zone. The Garonne Valley was a point for trade between the Pyrenees, the Mediterranean and the Atlantic since at least the Iron Age. The historical name of the city, Tolosa, it is of unknown meaning or origin, possibly from Aquitanian, or from Iberian, Tolosa enters the historical period in the 2nd century BC, when it became a Roman military outpost. After the conquest of Gaul, it was developed as a Roman city of Gallia Narbonensis. In the 5th century, Tolosa fell to the Visigothic kingdom and became one of its cities, in the early 6th century even serving as its capital. From this time, Toulouse was the capital of Aquitaine within the Frankish realm, in 721, Duke Odo of Aquitaine defeated an invading Umayyad Muslim army at the Battle of Toulouse. Odos victory was an obstacle to Muslim expansion into Christian Europe. Charles Martel, a later, won the Battle of Tours. The Frankish conquest of Septimania followed in the 750s, and a quasi-independent County of Toulouse emerged within the Carolingian sub-kingdom of Aquitaine by the late 8th century
5.
Carolingian Empire
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The Carolingian Empire was a large empire in western and central Europe during the early Middle Ages. It was ruled by the Carolingian dynasty, which had ruled as kings of the Franks since 751 and as kings of the Lombards of Italy from 774. In 800, the Frankish king Charlemagne was crowned emperor in Rome by Pope Leo III in an effort to revive the Roman Empire in the west during a vacancy in the throne of the eastern Roman Empire. The unity of the empire and the right of the Carolingians continued to be acknowledged. In 884, Charles the Fat reunited all the kingdoms for the last time, but he died in 888 and the empire immediately split up. With the only remaining male of the dynasty a child, the nobility elected regional kings from outside the dynasty or, in the case of the eastern kingdom. The size of the empire at its inception was around 1,112,000 square kilometres, in southern Italy, the Carolingians claims to authority were disputed by the Byzantines and the vestiges of the Lombard kingdom in the Principality of Benevento. Use of the term Carolingian Empire is a modern convention, the language of official acts in the empire was Latin. The empire was referred to variously as universum regnum, Romanorum sive Francorum imperium, Romanum imperium or even imperium christianum. Only the remaining Saxon realms, which he conquered, Lombardy. Further, Martel cemented his place in history with his defense of Christian Europe against a Muslim army at the Battle of Tours in 732, the Iberian Saracens had incorporated Berber lighthorse cavalry with the heavy Arab cavalry to create a formidable army that had almost never been defeated. Christian European forces, meanwhile, lacked the powerful tool of the stirrup, in this victory, Charles earned the surname Martel. Edward Gibbon, the historian of Rome and its aftermath, called Charles Martel the paramount prince of his age, Pepin III accepted the nomination as king by Pope Zachary in about 751. Charlemagnes rule began in 768 at Pepins death and he proceeded to take control over the kingdom following his brother Carlomans death, as the two brothers co-inherited their fathers kingdom. Charlemagne was crowned Roman Emperor in the year 800, the Carolingian Empire during the reign of Charlemagne covered most of Western Europe, as the Roman Empire once had. Prior to the death of Charlemagne, the Empire was divided among members of the Carolingian dynasty. These included King Charles the Younger, son of Charlemagne, who received Neustria, King Louis the Pious, who received Aquitaine, and King Pepin, Pepin died with an illegitimate son, Bernard, in 810, and Charles died without heirs in 811. Although Bernard succeeded Pepin as King of Italy, Louis was made co-Emperor in 813, Louis the Pious often had to struggle to maintain control of the Empire
6.
La Seu d'Urgell
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La Seu dUrgell is a town located in the Catalan Pyrenees in Spain. La Seu dUrgell is also the capital of the comarca Alt Urgell, head of the district of la Seu dUrgell. It is in the district of Alt Pirineu i Aran, and is the town with the most inhabitants, la Seu dUrgell and Puigcerdà together have 30% of the population of the area. It is located at the confluence of the Segre and the Valira rivers, the city is in the local region of Urgellet, a Pyrenean region formed by 16 municipalities of Alt Urgell. Urgellet and Andorra were the originary County of Urgell with capital in la Seu dUrgell before the county expansion to the south, the towns patron saints are Saint Ot of Urgell, Saint Sebastian, and the Virgin of Urgell. While the Virgin of Núria and Sant Ermengol are the patrons of the diocese of Urgell. Sant Ermengol is the most prominent in the city than other patrons, probably thats why there are various events throughout the year dedicated to Sant Ermengol, such as the Sant Ermengol Fair, one of the oldest in Catalonia, and the altarpiece of Sant Ermengol. The Parc Olímpic del Segre, built in 1992 for the Barcelona Summer Olympic Games, is a pump-driven canoe and kayak sports venue located adjacent to the historical centre of la Seu dUrgell. The name la Seu dUrgell, in Latin Sedes Urgelli, is formed by two different words, Seu from the Latin Sedes, or seat, and Urgell a pre-Roman name, Joan Coromines, a linguist, interprets that the name is related to the presence of water. The Iberian settlement of Arse-durgui was on the hill of Castellciutat, at that time the hill was called Puiolo Urgelli. Where there was the village of Arse-durgui they built the city of Urgell, until the eighteenth century the town was known simply as Ciutat and Castell was added because the existence of an ancient castle that was home of the Counts of Urgell. Over time, Sedes Urgelli took importance and lost the word vicus while civitas Orgellia lost the word Orgellia and becomes simply Civitas until the 18th century. The city is at the confluence of two rivers, the Segre and Gran Valira, located in a plain 7 km long and 691 meters high surrounded by high mountains, the plain is called plana de la Seu and was formed by the Segre river. Because it is located at one of the crossroads of communication in the Catalan Pyrenees, la Seu dUrgell has had a unique. The roads to Andorra, Cerdanya and the low Segre all converge on la Seu dUrgell, parallel to the Valira river rises a mountain range, where stand the remains of two great fortresses, the Ciutadella and Ciutat Castle, both of historic importance in the town. Small banks or open plains around the Segre are separated by gorges, the municipality includes a small exclave to the east. La Seu dUrgell districts, Sant Antoni, despite the low population density of Alt Pirineu i Aran, the area hosts 6. 6% of the exhibitions and other civic activities in Catalonia. In la Seu dUrgell, there are fairs and markets throughout the year
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