1.
Pentapolis
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A pentapolis, from the Greek words πέντε, five and πόλις, city is a geographic and/or institutional grouping of five cities. Cities in the ancient world probably formed such groups for political, commercial and military reasons, the Philistine Pentapolis, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Ekron, Gath, and Gaza, all combined to make Philistia. The Doric – or Dorian Pentapolis, Kos, on the island of the name in the Aegean Sea, Cnidus, in Caria on the west coast of Asia Minor, Lindus, Ialysus and Camirus. The Pontic Pentapolis, Apollonia, Callatis, Mesembria, Odessos, the Western Pentapolis, five main Greek colonies that came to be in the Roman province of Libya Superior, the western part of Cyrenaica until Diocletians Tetrarchy reform in AD296. The most important was Cyrene and its port Apollonia, Ptolemais, Barca, Balagrae and Berenice and this is the Pentapolis that is referenced in the official title of the Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Alexandria and the Pope of the Coptic Orthodox Church. In Italy there were, an early pentapolis including, Ravenna, Forlì, Forlimpopoli, Classe, Caesarea. A later, medieval Duchy of the Pentapolis on the Adriatic coast east of Tuscany and north of the duchy of Spoleto, including the cities of Rimini, Pesaro, Fano, Sinigaglia. It was part of the core of the Byzantine Exarchate of Ravenna, later, after the fall of the Exarchate, it was transformed into the March of Ancona The Cinque Ports in England – the five being Hastings, New Romney, Hythe, Dover, and Sandwich. The Cinque Terre are five rustic coastal towns in Liguria that are now organized into the Cinque Terre National Park, the National Capital Region consists of five cities, namely, Delhi, Gurgaon, Ghaziabad, Noida and Faridabad. The Five Boroughs of New York City, which were separately governed city-counties until the 1874 and 1898 annexations, the Quad Cities of Iowa and Illinois that share cultural institutions and infrastructure. There are five qsur walled villages located on rocky outcrops along the Wəd Mzab collectively known as the Pentapolis and they are Ghardaïa Tagherdayt, the principal settlement today, Beni Isguen At Isjen, Melika At Mlishet, Bounoura At Bunur, and El Atteuf Tajnint. Adding the more recent settlements of Bérianne and El Guerrara, the Mzab Heptapolis is completed, Pentapolis Monopoli Tripolis Tetrapolis Doric Hexapolis Heptapolis Decapolis many occurrences in the Catholic Encyclopaedia Westermann Großer Atlas zur Weltgeschichte
2.
Autonomous administrative division
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An autonomous administrative division is a subdivision or dependent territory of a country that has a degree of self-governance, or autonomy, from an external authority. Typically, it is geographically distinct from the rest of the country or populated by a national minority. Countries that include autonomous areas may be federacies, federations, or confederations, Autonomous areas can be divided into territorial autonomies, subregional territorial autonomies, and local autonomies. Gibraltar is an overseas territory of the UK. A number of other British Overseas Territories also have autonomy in internal affairs through local legislatures, New Zealand dependent territories New Zealand maintains nominal sovereignty over three Pacific Island nations. The Cook Islands and Niue are self-governing countries in association with New Zealand that maintain some international relationships in their own name. Tokelau remains an autonomous dependency of New Zealand, the Chatham Islands—despite having the designation of Territory—is an integral part of the country, situated within the New Zealand archipelago. The territorys council is not autonomous and has broadly the same powers as other local councils, danish constituent countries The Faroe Islands and Greenland are two autonomous countries within the Kingdom of Denmark. Dutch constituent countries Aruba, Curaçao, and Sint Maarten are autonomous countries within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, in addition they enjoy autonomy in taxation matters as well as having their own currencies. French overseas collectivities, New Caledonia, and Corsica The French constitution recognises 3 autonomous jurisdictions, Corsica, a region of France, enjoys a greater degree of autonomy on matters such as tax and education compared to mainland regions. New Caledonia, a sui generis collectivity, and French Polynesia and they do not, however, have legislative powers for policy areas relating to law and order, defense, border control or university education. Other smaller overseas collectivities have a degree of autonomy through local legislatures. In Ethiopia, special woredas are a subgroup of woredas that are organized around the traditional homelands of an ethnic minority and these woredas have many similarities to autonomous areas in other countries. The five comarcas indígenas of Panama, Autonomous Silesian Voivodeship Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus in Albania. Autonomous republics of the Soviet Union Bantustans of apartheid-era South Africa, subcarpathian Ruthenia and Slovakia within Czechoslovakia. Baltic Provinces of the Russian Empire, grand Duchy of Finland of the Russian Empire. Magyar Autonomous Region of Socialist Republic of Romania Southern Ireland and Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom of Great Britain, weller and S. Wolff, Autonomy, Self-governance and Conflict Resolution, Innovative Approaches to Institutional Design in Divided Societies. Abingdon, Routledge,2005 From Conflict to Autonomy in Nicaragua, Lessons Learnt, olausson, Autonomy and Islands, A Global Study of the Factors that determine Island Autonomy
3.
Libya
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The three traditional parts of the country are Tripolitania, Fezzan and Cyrenaica. With an area of almost 1.8 million square kilometres, Libya is the fourth largest country in Africa, Libya has the 10th-largest proven oil reserves of any country in the world. The largest city and capital, Tripoli, is located in western Libya, the other large city is Benghazi, which is located in eastern Libya. Libya has been inhabited by Berbers since the late Bronze Age, the Phoenicians established trading posts in western Libya, and ancient Greek colonists established city-states in eastern Libya. Libya was variously ruled by Carthaginians, Persians, Egyptians and Greeks before becoming a part of the Roman Empire, Libya was an early center of Christianity. After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the area of Libya was mostly occupied by the Vandals until the 7th century, in the 16th century, the Spanish Empire and the Knights of St John occupied Tripoli, until Ottoman rule began in 1551. Libya was involved in the Barbary Wars of the 18th and 19th centuries, Ottoman rule continued until the Italian occupation of Libya resulted in the temporary Italian Libya colony from 1911 to 1943. During the Second World War Libya was an important area of warfare in the North African Campaign, the Italian population then went into decline. Libya became an independent kingdom in 1951, a military coup in 1969 overthrew King Idris I, beginning a period of sweeping social reform. Since then, Libya has experienced a period of instability, the European Union is involved in an operation to disrupt human trafficking networks exploiting refugees fleeing from wars in Africa for Europe. At least two political bodies claim to be the government of Libya, the Council of Deputies is internationally recognized as the legitimate government, but it does not hold territory in the capital, Tripoli, instead meeting in the Cyrenaica city of Tobruk. Parts of Libya are outside of either governments control, with various Islamist, rebel, the United Nations is sponsoring peace talks between the Tobruk and Tripoli-based factions. An agreement to form an interim government was signed on 17 December 2015. Under the terms of the agreement, a nine-member Presidency Council, the leaders of the new government, called the Government of National Accord, arrived in Tripoli on 5 April 2016. Since then the GNC, one of the two governments, has disbanded to support the new GNA. The name Libya was introduced in 1934 for Italian Libya, reviving the name for Northwest Africa. The name was based on use in 1903 by Italian geographer Federico Minutilli. It was intended to supplant terms applied to Ottoman Tripolitania, the region of what is today Libya having been ruled by the Ottoman Empire from 1551 to 1911
4.
Flag of Libya
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The flag of Libya was originally introduced in 1951, following the creation of the Kingdom of Libya. The flag of the Kingdom of Libya was adopted when Libya gained full independence in 1951 and it consisted of a white star and crescent on a triband red-black-green design, with the central black band being twice the width of the outer bands. The design was based on the banner of the Senussi dynasty from Cyrenaica, which consisted of a field and star and crescent design. According to Pelt, during deliberations of the Libyan National Constitutional Convention, the design was composed of three colors, red, black and green, with a white Crescent and Star centered in the middle black stripe. Mr. Shennib informed the delegates that this design had met the approval of His Highness Emir of Cyrenaica, the assembly subsequently approved that design. This flag represented Libya from its independence in 1951 until the 1969 Libyan coup détat and it brings back to our minds the story of Hijra of our Prophet Mohammed from his home in order to spread Islam and teach the principles of right and virtue. The Star represents our hope, the beauty of aim and object. In 2011, interviews with Ibtisam Shennib and Amal Omar Shennib, the star and crescent were placed within the black central strip of the flag as a reference to the Senussi flag and the role of King Idris in leading the country to independence. The National Transitional Council, formed on 27 February 2011, adopted the previously used in the Kingdom of Libya between 1951 and 1969 as the emblem of the Libyan Republic. On 10 March 2011, France was the first country to recognize the council as the government of Libya. In the following many other Libyan embassies replaced the green flag of Gaddafi with the tricolor flag. All Libyan diplomatic posts, such as embassies and consulates, use the flag of Libya. The flag of Libya is described in Article 7 of the Constitution of 7 October 1951 and it was officially adopted on 24 December 1951. Both the precise shade and legal construction is described in an issued by the Ministry of Information. The passage reads, The exact particulars of the Libyan National Flag prescribed by Article 7 of the Constitution shall be as follows, The red shall be red. The Crescent shall be on the side of the star. The star shall be in the end of the crescent. The maximum width of the 270 crescent shall equal 1⁄6 of its outside diameter which is 1⁄4 of the width of the flag
5.
Italian Cyrenaica
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Italian Cyrenaica was an Italian colony, located in present-day eastern Libya, that existed from 1927 to 1934. It was part of the Italian North African territory conquered from the Ottoman Empire in 1911, Italian Cyrenaica was formed in 1927, after it and Italian Tripolitania became independent colonial entities within Italian North Africa. In 1934, Italian Cyrenaica became part of Italian Libya, in the 1920s, Cyrenaica was the scene of fighting between Italian colonial forces and Libyan rebels who were fighting for independence from colonial rule. In 1931, the independence leader Omar Mukhtar was captured and executed. Cyrenaica was populated by more than 20,000 Italian colonists in the late 1930s, as a consequence there was a large economic development effort in the second half of the 1930s. Italy did massive investment in the infrastructure of Libya but the purpose was to develop the economy for the benefit of Italy. The Italian aim was to drive the population to the marginal land in the interior. The Italians did not provide the Libyans with adequate education, the Italian population had 81 elementary schools in 1939-1940, in Cirenaica were founded -for the Italian colonists- the rural villages of Baracca, Maddalena, Oberdan, D’Annunzio and Battisti in 1938, successively Mameli and Filzi in 1939. For Libyan families were created in Cyrenaica the villages of Gedida-Nuova, Nahida-Risorta, Zahra- Fiorita, fascist Italy maintained several concentration camps in Eastern Libya during the first phase of its occupation of that country. This policy was so successful that in 1940 there were two Italian colonial division made of Libyans, a group of villages with all the needed communications for Italians and Libyans were established in coastal Cyrenaica during the 1930s. 1911, Beginning of the Italo-Turkish War, Italian conquest of Tobruk, Derna, and Benghazi. 1912, Treaty of Lausanne ends the Italo-Turkish war, Ottoman empire ceded Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. 1917-21, Series of agreements between Italians and Senussis, led by Sayyid Idris, resulted in the postponement of conflict, senussi resistance led by Omar Mukhtar begins. 1925, Italo-Egyptian treaty defines the Cyrenaican -Egyptian border,1929, Pietro Badoglio becomes a unique governor of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica. Beginning of Sidi Rhuma talks with Omar Mukhtar, but they failed eventually,1931, Occupying of Kufra Oases, constructing the barbed wire on the Libyan-Egyptian border, the capture, and then the execution of Omar Mukhtar. 1932, Badoglio declares the end of Libyan resistance,1934, Cyrenaica is incorporated in Colony of Libya. Washington, GPO for the Library of Congress,1987, the Ax within, Italian Fascism in Action. List of colonial governors of Italian Cyrenaica Italian Libya Italian Libya Railways Italo-Libyans Italian concentration camps in Libya Jebel Akhdar Mountains Benghazi Province
6.
Governorates of Libya
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The governorates of Libya were a tenfold top-level administrative division of Libya from 1963 until 1983. They came into being on 27 April 1963, historically, the three provinces of Libya were sometimes called governorates. The original ten governorates were, Bayda Governorate In 1971 Bayda was renamed Jabal al Akhdar, Al Khums Governorate Awbari Governorate Az Zawiyah Governorate Benghazi Governorate Darnah Governorate Al Jabal al Gharbi Governorate In 1970 Al Jabal al Gharbi was renamed Gharyan. Misrata Governorate Sabha Governorate Tarabulus Governorate, as early as 1973, Libya had been divided into forty-six baladiyat for census purposes. In 1983 Libya replaced the structure with the district one. Districts of Libya Provinces of Libya Map of the ten governorates of Libya, Area Handbook for Libya, United States Library of Congress
7.
Capital city
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A capital city is the municipality exercising primary status in a country, state, province, or other region, usually as its seat of government. A capital is typically a city that encompasses the offices and meeting places of its respective government. In some jurisdictions, including countries, the different branches of government are located in different settlements. In some cases, a distinction is made between the capital and the seat of government, which is in another place. The word capital derives from the Latin caput, meaning head, in several English-speaking states, the terms county town, county seat, and borough seat are also used in lower subdivisions. In unitary states, subnational capitals are known as administrative centres. The capital is often, but not necessarily, the largest city of its constituent, historically, the major economic centre of a state or region often becomes the focal point of political power, and becomes a capital through conquest or federation. Examples are Ancient Babylon, Abbasid Baghdad, Ancient Athens, Rome, Constantinople, Changan, Ancient Cusco, Madrid, Paris, London, Moscow, Beijing, Tokyo, Vienna, and Berlin. Some of these cities are or were also religious centres, e. g. Constantinople, Rome, Jerusalem, Ancient Babylon, Moscow, Belgrade, Paris, and Peking. A capital city that is also the economic, cultural. The convergence of political and economic or cultural power is by no means universal, traditional capitals may be economically eclipsed by provincial rivals, e. g. Nanking by Shanghai, Quebec City by Montreal, and numerous US state capitals. The decline of a dynasty or culture could also mean the extinction of its city, as occurred at Babylon. Although many capitals are defined by constitution or legislation, many long-time capitals have no legal designation as such, for example Bern, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London, Paris, are located in or near them. In Canada, there is a capital, while the ten provinces. The states of such countries as Mexico, Brazil, and Australia all have capital cities, for example, the six state capitals of Australia are Adelaide, Brisbane, Hobart, Melbourne, Perth, and Sydney. In Australia, the capital cities is regularly used, to refer to the aforementioned state capitals plus the federal capital Canberra and Darwin. Abu Dhabi is the city of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. In unitary states which consist of multiple constituent countries, such as the United Kingdom or the Kingdom of Denmark, the national capitals of Germany and Russia, the Stadtstaat of Berlin and the Federal City of Moscow, are also constituent states of both countries in their own right
8.
Benghazi
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Benghazi /bɛnˈɡɑːzi/ is the second most populous city in Libya and the largest in Cyrenaica. The city was also provisional capital of the National Transitional Council and this creates a constant atmosphere of rivalry and sensitivities between Benghazi and Tripoli, and between Cyrenaica and Tripolitania. The population was 670,797 at the 2006 census, on 15 February 2011, an uprising against the government of Muammar Gaddafi occurred in the city. The revolts spread by 17 February to Bayda, Tobruk, Ajdabya, Al Marj in the East and Zintan, Zawiya in the West, Benghazi was taken by Gaddafi opponents on 21 February, who founded the National Transitional Council. The ancient Greek city that existed within the modern day boundaries of Benghazi was founded around 525 BC, at the time, Euesperides was most likely founded by people from Cyrene or Barce, which was located on the edge of a lagoon which opened from the sea. At the time, this area may have been enough to receive small sailing vessels. The oldest coins minted in the city back to 480 BC. One side of coins has an engraving of Delphi. The other side is an engraving of a plant, once the symbol of trade from Cyrenaica because of its use as a rich seasoning. The city was in territory and was surrounded by inhospitable tribes. One of the Cyrenean kings whose fate is connected with the city is Arcesilaus IV and this proved ineffective, since when the king fled to Euesperides during the anticipated revolution, he was assassinated, thus terminating the almost 200-year rule of the Battiad dynasty. After the marriage around the middle of the 3rd century BC of Ptolemy III to Berenice, daughter of the Cyrenean Governor Magas, Euesperides became Berenice and the change of name also involved a relocation. Its desertion was probably due to the silting up of the lagoons, Berenice, the Greek colony had lasted from the 6th to the mid-3rd centuries BC. Modern Benghazi, on the Gulf of Sidra, lies a little southwest of the site of the ancient Greek city of Berenice or Berenicis or Bernici, the new city was later given the name Hesperides, in reference to the Hesperides, the guardians of the mythic western paradise. The name may have referred to green oases in low-lying areas in the nearby coastal plain. Benghazi later became a Roman city and prospered for 600 years, in its more prosperous period, Berenice became a Christian bishopric. The first of its bishops whose name is recorded in extant documents is Ammon, dathes was at the First Council of Nicaea in 325, and Probatius at a synod held in Constantinople in 394. No longer a residential bishopric, Berenice is today listed by the Catholic Church as a titular see, in the 13th century, the small settlement became an important player in the trade growing up between Genoese merchants and the tribes of the hinterland
9.
House of Representatives (Libya)
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The House of Representatives is the legislative body for Libya. It took power on 4 August 2014, following an election on 25 June 2014, turnout at the election was 18%, down from 60% in the first post-Gaddafi election of July 2012. Because of security concerns no voting took place in some locations, the current chairman is Aguila Saleh Issa. The current deputy presidents of the Council of Deputies are Imhemed Shaib, the House of Representatives rejected the ruling, saying it was made at gunpoint. In late 2014, a parliament in Tripoli was proclaimed called the New General National Congress. The House of Representatives did not recognize the new GNC, and voted on 6 October 2015,112 out of 131, to extend its term beyond 20 October, however, the terms of the final proposal were not acceptable to either side, and both rejected it. Nonetheless, the proposal did spark a revised proposal put together by Fayez al-Sarraj and others, under the terms of the agreement, a nine-member Presidency Council and a seventeen-member interim Government of National Accord would be formed, with a view to holding new elections within two years. On 31 December 2015, Chairman of the House of Representatives, as of April 2016, the Libyan National Elections Commission was still considering its recommendations on legislation to implement the next election of the House of Representatives. Following the occupation of Tripoli by armed Islamist groups during the Second Libyan Civil War, since there was not enough housing for them, they initially hired a car ferry from a Greek shipping company, the Elyros of ANEK Lines, for members to live and meet in. Later the House relocated to the Dar al-Salam Hotel in Tobruk, high Council of State Libyan Civil War Libyan Crisis Libyan Council of Deputies election,2014 Official website Official Facebook page
10.
Ancient Greek
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Ancient Greek includes the forms of Greek used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around the 9th century BC to the 6th century AD. It is often divided into the Archaic period, Classical period. It is antedated in the second millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Hellenistic phase is known as Koine. Koine is regarded as a historical stage of its own, although in its earliest form it closely resembled Attic Greek. Prior to the Koine period, Greek of the classic and earlier periods included several regional dialects, Ancient Greek was the language of Homer and of fifth-century Athenian historians, playwrights, and philosophers. It has contributed many words to English vocabulary and has been a subject of study in educational institutions of the Western world since the Renaissance. This article primarily contains information about the Epic and Classical phases of the language, Ancient Greek was a pluricentric language, divided into many dialects. The main dialect groups are Attic and Ionic, Aeolic, Arcadocypriot, some dialects are found in standardized literary forms used in literature, while others are attested only in inscriptions. There are also several historical forms, homeric Greek is a literary form of Archaic Greek used in the epic poems, the Iliad and Odyssey, and in later poems by other authors. Homeric Greek had significant differences in grammar and pronunciation from Classical Attic, the origins, early form and development of the Hellenic language family are not well understood because of a lack of contemporaneous evidence. Several theories exist about what Hellenic dialect groups may have existed between the divergence of early Greek-like speech from the common Proto-Indo-European language and the Classical period and they have the same general outline, but differ in some of the detail. The invasion would not be Dorian unless the invaders had some relationship to the historical Dorians. The invasion is known to have displaced population to the later Attic-Ionic regions, the Greeks of this period believed there were three major divisions of all Greek people—Dorians, Aeolians, and Ionians, each with their own defining and distinctive dialects. Often non-west is called East Greek, Arcadocypriot apparently descended more closely from the Mycenaean Greek of the Bronze Age. Boeotian had come under a strong Northwest Greek influence, and can in some respects be considered a transitional dialect, thessalian likewise had come under Northwest Greek influence, though to a lesser degree. Most of the dialect sub-groups listed above had further subdivisions, generally equivalent to a city-state and its surrounding territory, Doric notably had several intermediate divisions as well, into Island Doric, Southern Peloponnesus Doric, and Northern Peloponnesus Doric. The Lesbian dialect was Aeolic Greek and this dialect slowly replaced most of the older dialects, although Doric dialect has survived in the Tsakonian language, which is spoken in the region of modern Sparta. Doric has also passed down its aorist terminations into most verbs of Demotic Greek, by about the 6th century AD, the Koine had slowly metamorphosized into Medieval Greek
11.
Cyrene, Libya
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Cyrene was an ancient Greek and Roman city near present-day Shahhat, Libya. It was the oldest and most important of the five Greek cities in the region and it gave eastern Libya the classical name Cyrenaica that it has retained to modern times. Cyrene lies in a valley in the Jebel Akhdar uplands. The city was named after a spring, Kyre, which the Greeks consecrated to Apollo and it was also the seat of the Cyrenaics, a famous school of philosophy in the 3rd century BC, founded by Aristippus, a disciple of Socrates. It was then nicknamed the Athens of Africa, Grinus, son of Aesanius a descendant of Theras, and king of the island of Thera, had visited the Oracle and offered a hecatomb to the Oracle on sundry matters. The Oracle had offered the advice to found a new city in Libya, many years had passed and the advice was not taken, and Thera had succumbed to a horrific drought and all of the crops and trees had perished. Not knowing how to get to Libya they sent a messenger to Crete to find someone to lead them on their journey and they found a dealer in purple dyes named Corobius. He had once traveled to an island across from Libya called Platea, Grinus and Corobius sailed to Platea, when they reached their destination they left Corobius with months of supplies and Grinus went back to Thera to collect men to settle the newly made colony. After two years of settling the colony they had success and went back to the Oracle to get advice. The Oracle had repeated her advice to move directly to the country of Libya instead of across from Libya, so they moved to a place called Aziris. They settled there for six years, and were successful until the Libyans visited the settlement of Aziris to convince the people to move further inland. They were swayed by the Libyans to move and settled into what is now Cyrene, traditional details concerning the founding of the city are contained in Herodotus Histories IV. Cyrene promptly became the town of ancient Libya and established commercial relations with all the Greek cities. Soon after 460 BC it became a republic, in 413 BC, during the Peloponnesian War, Cyrene supplied Spartan forces with two triremes and pilots. After the death of Alexander the Great of Macedon, the Cyrenian republic became subject to the Ptolemaic dynasty, ophelas, the general who occupied the city in Ptolemy Is name, ruled the city almost independently until his death, when Ptolemys son-in-law Magas received governorship of the territory. In 276 BC Magas crowned himself king and declared de facto independence, the invasion was unsuccessful and in 250 BC, after Magas death, the city was reabsorbed into Ptolemaic Egypt. Cyrenaica became part of the Ptolemaic empire controlled from Alexandria, in 74 BC the territory was formally transformed into a Roman province. The inhabitants of Cyrene at the time of Sulla were divided into four classes, citizens, farmers, resident aliens, the ruler of the town, Ptolemy Apion, bequeathed it to the Romans, but it kept its self-government
12.
Arabic
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Arabic is a Central Semitic language that was first spoken in Iron Age northwestern Arabia and is now the lingua franca of the Arab world. Arabic is also the language of 1.7 billion Muslims. It is one of six languages of the United Nations. The modern written language is derived from the language of the Quran and it is widely taught in schools and universities, and is used to varying degrees in workplaces, government, and the media. The two formal varieties are grouped together as Literary Arabic, which is the language of 26 states. Modern Standard Arabic largely follows the standards of Quranic Arabic. Much of the new vocabulary is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the post-Quranic era, Arabic has influenced many languages around the globe throughout its history. During the Middle Ages, Literary Arabic was a vehicle of culture in Europe, especially in science, mathematics. As a result, many European languages have borrowed many words from it. Many words of Arabic origin are found in ancient languages like Latin. Balkan languages, including Greek, have acquired a significant number of Arabic words through contact with Ottoman Turkish. Arabic has also borrowed words from languages including Greek and Persian in medieval times. Arabic is a Central Semitic language, closely related to the Northwest Semitic languages, the Ancient South Arabian languages, the Semitic languages changed a great deal between Proto-Semitic and the establishment of the Central Semitic languages, particularly in grammar. Innovations of the Central Semitic languages—all maintained in Arabic—include, The conversion of the suffix-conjugated stative formation into a past tense, the conversion of the prefix-conjugated preterite-tense formation into a present tense. The elimination of other prefix-conjugated mood/aspect forms in favor of new moods formed by endings attached to the prefix-conjugation forms, the development of an internal passive. These features are evidence of descent from a hypothetical ancestor. In the southwest, various Central Semitic languages both belonging to and outside of the Ancient South Arabian family were spoken and it is also believed that the ancestors of the Modern South Arabian languages were also spoken in southern Arabia at this time. To the north, in the oases of northern Hijaz, Dadanitic and Taymanitic held some prestige as inscriptional languages, in Najd and parts of western Arabia, a language known to scholars as Thamudic C is attested
13.
Roman province
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In Ancient Rome, a province was the basic, and, until the Tetrarchy, largest territorial and administrative unit of the empires territorial possessions outside of Italy. The word province in modern English has its origins in the used by the Romans. Provinces were generally governed by politicians of senatorial rank, usually former consuls or former praetors and this exception was unique, but not contrary to Roman law, as Egypt was considered Augustus personal property, following the tradition of earlier, Hellenistic kings. The territory of a people who were defeated in war might be brought under various forms of treaty, the formal annexation of a territory created a province in the modern sense of an administrative unit geographically defined. Republican provinces were administered in one-year terms by the consuls and praetors who had held office the previous year, Rome started expanding beyond Italy during the First Punic War. The first permanent provinces to be annexed were Sicily in 241 BC, militarized expansionism kept increasing the number of these administrative provinces, until there were no longer enough qualified individuals to fill the posts. The terms of provincial governors often had to be extended for multiple years,241 BC – Sicilia taken over from the Carthaginians and annexed at the end of the First Punic War. 237 BC – Corsica et Sardinia, these two islands were taken over from the Carthaginians and annexed soon after the Mercenary War, in 238 BC and 237 BC respectively. 197 BC – Hispania Citerior, along the east coast of the,197 BC - Hispania Ulterior, along the southern coast of the, part of the territories taken over from the Carthaginians in the Second Punic War. 147 BC – Macedonia, mainland Greece and it was annexed after a rebellion by the Achaean League. 146 BC – Africa, modern day Tunisia and western Libya, home territory of Carthage and it was annexed following attacks on the allied Greek city of Massalia. 67 BC – Creta et Cyrenae, Cyrenaica was bequeathed to Rome in 78 BC, however, it was not organised as a province. 58 BC – Cilicia et Cyprus, Cilicia was created as a province in the sense of area of command in 102 BC in a campaign against piracy. The Romans controlled only a small area, in 74 BC Lycia and Pamphylia were added to the smal Roman possessions in Cilicia. Cilicia came fully under Roman control towards the end of the Third Mithridatic War - 73-63 BC, the province was reorganised by Pompey in 63 BC. Gallia Cisalpina was a province in the sense of an area of military command, during Romes expansion in Italy the Romans assigned some areas as provinces in the sense of areas of military command assigned to consuls or praetors due to risks of rebellions or invasions. This was applied to Liguria because there was a series of rebellions, Bruttium, in the early days of Roman presence in Gallia Cisalpina the issue was rebellion. Later the issue was risk of invasions by warlike peoples east of Italy, the city of Aquileia was founded to protect northern Italy form invasions
14.
Crete and Cyrenaica
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Crete and Cyrenaica was a senatorial province of the Roman empire, established in 20 BC. It comprised the island of Crete and the region of Cyrenaica in present-day Libya, Ptolemy Apion, the last king of the Hellenistic Kingdom of Cyrenaica left his kingdom to the Roman Republic when he died childless in 96BCE. Rome readily accepted this inheritance from Ptolemy Apion but preferred to leave the administration to local rulers, however, by the 70s BC, civil uprisings by Jewish settlers began to destabilise the province and the Senate was forced to take action. In 74 BC, they sent a low level official, the quaestor Cornelius Lentulus Marcellinus, to officially annex Cyrenaica as a Roman province, marcus Antonius Creticus attacked Crete in 71 BC and was repelled. In 63 BC Crete and Cyrenaica were combined into a province with its capital at Gortyn in Crete. Because this arrangement was geographically inconvenient Diocletian divided the province in 298 AD
15.
Barca (ancient city)
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Barca, also called Barce) is an Ancient city and former bishopric, which survives in both Latin Catholic and Orthodox titular see. Barca was an ancient Greek colony and later a Roman and a Byzantine city in North Africa and it was in the coastal area of what is today Libya. As a Greek city, it was part of the Cyrenaican Pentapolis along with the city of Cyrene itself, achaemenid king Darius I established Barcaean captives in a village in Bactria, which was still flourishing in Herodotus time. According to most archeologists, it was situated at Marj, no remains of the ancient settlement are visible at Marj, but some of the finds made there during the Italian colonial dominance of Libya are on display in the museum at Tolmeita. The citys name, Arabized as Barqah, came to refer to the former state, barce was part of the Exarchate of Africa until it was conquered by the Arabs in 643–644 during the Islamic conquest of North Africa. It originally served as the capital of the Barqah province of the Caliphate, when the Ottoman Turks conquered the region in 1521, they used the Turkish form Barka for the province, but did not retain the citys status as its capital. Early Christianity spread to the Pentapolis of North Africa from Egypt, synesius was raised to the episcopate by Theophilus, patriarch of Alexandria, in 410. In accordance with a ruling of the Council of Nicaea in 325, Pentapolis is therefore included in the titles used both by the The patriarch of the Coptic Church and by the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Alexandria. Although it was destroyed and then restored during the Roman period, becoming a mere borough, Barca was, nevertheless. The bishops who participated in the First Council of Nicaea in 325 included the Arian Zopyros of Barca. Zenobius signed the acts of the Council of Ephesus in 431 and Theodorus took part in the Robber Council of Ephesus in 449, the Metropolitan of Western Pentapolis held the most senior position in the Holy Synod of the Coptic Orthodox Church after that of the Pope of Alexandria. Since the demise of that eparchy as a major Archiepiscopal Metropolis in the days of Pope John VI of Alexandria, also for the Catholic Church, Barca, no longer a residential bishopric, is today listed as a titular see. It has had the following incumbents, apollonia Ptolemais Herbermann, Charles, ed. Barca. Butler, The Arab Conquest of Egypt, p.430 Heinrich Gelzer, Patrum Nicaenorum nomina, p.231 Marquardt, Staatsverwaltung, I, p.459 Westermann, Großer Atlas zur Weltgeschichte
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Italian Libya
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The Adriatic Seas opposite western Balkans shore, with Dalmatia, Montenegro, and Albania, was planned for Italian expansion as the Third Shore, with Libya on the Mediterranean becoming the fourth. Thus the Fourth Shore was the part of Greater Italy. After the Italian Empire conquest of Ottoman Libya in the 1911–1912 Italo-Turkish War and this group, first under the leadership of Omar Al Mukhtar and centered in the Jebel Akhdar Mountains of Cyrenaica, lead the Libyan resistance movement against Italian settlement in Libya. Resistance leaders were executed or escaped into exile, the forced migration of more than 100,000 Cyrenaican people ended in Italian concentration camps. Afterwards Libya was predominantly Italianized, and many Italian colonists moved there to populate Italian North Africa, the Italians in Libya numbered 108,419 at the time of the 1939 census. They were concentrated on the Mediterranean coast around the city of Tripoli, Libya was made an integral part of Italy in 1939 and the local population were granted a form of Italian citizenship. Tunisia was conquered by Italy in November 1942 and was added to the 4th Shore – Quarta Sponda – because of the community of Tunisian Italians living there. Italian colony During less than thirty years in Libya the Kingdom of Italy developed the cities and they built huge public works, such as new town districts with streets and buildings, modern ports, the Italian Libya Railways, and long highways. The Libyan economy and trade flourished very much, similar to what happened during the ancient Roman empire colony era, Italian farmers cultivated lands that had returned to being native desert for many centuries. Even archeology flourished, with ancient city of Leptis Magna rediscovered and used as a symbol of the Italian right to recolonize the region, Libya was considered the new America for Italian emigrants of the 1930s. Indeed in 1938 the governor, Italo Balbo, brought 20,000 Italian farmers to colonize Italian Libya, the 22,000 Libyan Jews were allowed to integrate without problems in the society of the 4th Shore. However after the summer of 1941, with the arrival of the German Nazi Afrika Korps, all these new villages each had a mosque, a school, a social center with sports facilities and a cinema, and a small hospital. Italian state On January 9,1939, the colony of Italian Libya was incorporated into metropolitan Italy, the French, in 1848, had incorporated French Algeria in this manner. By 1939 the Italians had built 400 kilometres of new railroads and 4,000 kilometres of new roads, the most important and largest highway project was the Via Balbo, an east-west coastal route connecting Tripoli in western Italian Tripolitania to Tobruk in eastern Italian Cyrenaica. Most of these projects and achievements were completed between 1934 and 1940 when Italo Balbo was governor of Italian Libya, as it became the Fourth Shore, fezzan, designated as South Tripolitania, remained a military territory. A governor general, called the first consul after 1937, was in direction of the colony, assisted by the General Consultative Council. Traditional tribal councils, formerly sanctioned by the Italian administration, were abolished, administrative posts at all levels were held by Italians. An accord with Britain and Egypt obtained the transfer of a corner of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, known as the Sarra Triangle, in 1939 Libya was incorporated into metropolitan Italy
17.
Kingdom of Libya
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Under the constitution of October 1951, the federal monarchy of Libya was headed by King Idris as chief of state, with succession to his designated heirs. Substantial political power resided with the king, the Senate, or upper house, consisted of eight representatives from each of the three provinces. Half of the senators were nominated by the king, who also had the right to veto legislation, local autonomy in the provinces was exercised through provincial governments and legislatures. Tripoli and Benghazi served alternately as the national capital, several factors, rooted in Libyas history, affected the political development of the newly independent country. They reflected the differing orientations of the provinces and the ambiguities inherent in Libyas monarchy. First, after the first Libyan general election,1952, which were held on 19 February, the National Congress Party, which had campaigned against a federal form of government, was defeated throughout the country. The party was outlawed, and Bashir es Sadawi was deported, second, provincial ties continued to be more important than national ones, and the federal and provincial governments were constantly in dispute over their respective spheres of authority. A third problem derived from the lack of a heir to the throne. To remedy this situation, Idris in 1953 designated his brother to succeed him. When the original heir apparent died, the king appointed his nephew, Prince Hasan ar Rida, in its foreign policy, the Kingdom of Libya was recognized as belonging to the conservative traditionalist bloc in the League of Arab States, of which it became a member in 1953. The government was in alliance with the United States and United Kingdom. The U. S. supported the United Nations resolution providing for Libyan independence in 1951, Libya opened a legation at Washington, D. C. in 1954. Both countries subsequently raised their missions to the level and exchanged ambassadors. In 1953, Libya concluded a treaty of friendship and alliance with the United Kingdom under which the latter received military bases in exchange for financial. The next year, Libya and the United States signed an agreement under which the United States also obtained military base rights, subject to renewal in 1970, in return for economic aid to Libya. The most important of the United States installations in Libya was Wheelus Air Base, near Tripoli, considered a strategically valuable installation in the 1950s, reservations set aside in the desert were used by British and American military aircraft based in Europe as practice firing ranges. Libya forged close ties with France, Italy, Greece, Turkey, and established full diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union in 1955, but declined a Soviet offer of economic aid. As part of a broad assistance package, the UN Technical Assistance Board agreed to sponsor a technical aid program that emphasized the development of agriculture, the University of Libya was founded in 1955 by royal decree in Benghazi
18.
Kufra District
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Kufra or Kofra, also spelled Cufra, is the largest district of Libya. Its capital is Al Jawf, one of the oases in Kufra basin, there is a very large oil refinery near the capital. In the late 15th century, Leo Africanus reported an oasis in the land of the Berdoa, visited by a caravan coming from Awjila. It is possible that this oasis was identical with either the Al Jawf or the Taiserbo oasis, and on modern maps. The name Kufra itself is a derivation from kafir, the Arabic term for non-Muslims, kufras location in Libyas southeast places it on the countrys border with Egypt, Sudan, and Chad. Domestically, it borders the districts, namely, Murzuq in west, Jufra in northwest. Kufra is a part of Cyrenacian geographical subdivision, the largest region in Libya, the region receives an annual rainfall of 5 in. There are no rivers in the region, but the region is abundant with groundwater aquifers. All three regions of the county have mostly an undulating plain and occasional plateau, with an average elevation of around 423 m. Around 91 per cent of the land is covered by desert and it is desert climate in all other parts of the region. Dust storms lasting four to eight days is fairly common during Spring, per the census estimation of 2012, the total population in the region was 157,747 with 150,353 Libyans. The average size of the household in the country was 6.9, there were totally 22,713 households in the district, with 20,907 Libyan ones. The population density of the district was 1.86 persons per sq. km, per 2006 census, there were totally 13,313 economically active people in the district. There were 6,295 government employees,2,178 employers,6,454 first level workers and 001 second level workers, the total enrollment in schools was 17,364 and the number of people above secondary stage and less than graduation was 875. During 2007, the part of Kufra District was moved to the newly created Al Wahat District. Besides the main Oasis group of the Kufra basin, four more oases belong to the region, the oasis-valleys of Jabal Arkanu and Jebel Uweinat lie southeast of the basin. Libya became independent in 1951 from the empire and generally known for its oil rich resources. As a part of decentralization in 2012, the country is split into 13 regions from the original 25 municipalities
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Tripolitania
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Tripolitania /trᵻpɒlᵻˈteɪniə/ or Tripolitana is a historic region and former province of Libya. Tripolitania was a separate Italian colony from 1927 to 1934, from 1934 to 1963, Tripolitania was one of three administrative divisions within Italian Libya and the Kingdom of Libya, alongside Cyrenaica to the east and Fezzan to the south. Because the city and the shabiyah are nowadays almost coextensive, the term Tripolitania has more historical than contemporary value, the system of administrative divisions that included Tripolitania was abolished in the early 1970s in favor of a system of smaller-size municipalities or baladiyat. The baladiyat system was changed many times and has lately become the Shabiyat system. The region that was Tripolitania is now composed of several smaller baladiyat or shabiyat – see administrative divisions in Libya, the city of Oea, on the site of modern Tripoli, was founded by the Phoenicians in the 7th century BC. It was conquered by the Greek rulers of Cyrenaica, who were in turn displaced by the Carthaginians, the Greek name Τρίπολις three cities referred to Oea, Sabratha and Leptis Magna. The Roman Republic captured Tripolitania in 146 BC, and the area prospered during the Roman Empire period, the Latin name Regio Tripolitania dates to the 3rd century. The Vandals took over in 435, and were in turn supplanted by the offensive of the Eastern Roman Empire in the 530s. In the 7th century, Tripolitania was conquered by the Rashidun Caliphate, and was inherited by its descendants the Umayyads, the Fatimids, established a Caliphate from Tunisia to Syria. In the 1140s, the Normans of Sicily invaded Tripoli, but were ousted by the Almohad Caliphate in 1158, emir Abu Zakariya, an Almohad vassal, established an independent state in Tunisia in 1229 and took control of Tripolitania shortly after. The Hafsids would control the region until the Ottoman conquest of 1553, Ottoman Tripolitania extended beyond the region of Tripolitania proper, also including Cyrenaica. Tripolitania became effectively independent under the rulers of the Karamanli dynasty from 1711 until Ottoman control was re-imposed by Mahmud II in 1835, Ottoman rule persisted until 1911–12, when it was captured by Italy in the Italo-Turkish War. Italy officially granted autonomy after the war, but gradually occupied the region, after World War I, an Arab Republic, Al-Jumhuriya al-Trabulsiya, or Tripolitanian Republic, declared the independence of Tripolitania from Italian Libya. The proclamation of the Tripolitanian Republic in autumn 1918 was followed by a declaration of independence at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. This was the first formally declared republican form of government in the Arab world, but it gained support from international powers. Italy managed to establish control over Libya by 1930. Originally administered as part of a colony, Italian Tripolitania was a separate colony from 26 June 1927 to 3 December 1934. The Italian fascists constructed the Marble Arch as a form of a triumphal arch at the border between Tripolitani and Cyrenaica near the coast
20.
Fezzan
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Fezzan or Phazania is the southwestern region of modern Libya. It is largely desert, but broken by mountains, uplands, and dry valleys in the north. The term originally applied to the land beyond the strip of Africa proconsularis, including the Nafusa and extending west of modern Libya over Ouargla. As these Berber areas came to be associated with the regions of Tripoli, Cirta or Algiers, in Tamazight, Fezzan means rough rocks. Fezzan could also be a derivation from the regions Latin name Phasania or Phazania, Fezzan is crossed in the north by the ash-Shati Valley and in the west by the Wadi Irawan. The large dune seas known as ergs of the Idehan Ubari, paulinus reached Fezzan and went further south. For two–three centuries after this invasion, Fezzan, as part of the Garamantes State, was a client state of the Roman Empire, with the end of the Roman Empire and the following commercial crisis, Fezzan began to lose importance. The population was reduced due to the desertification process of the Sahara during the early Middle Ages. During the 13th and 14th centuries, portions of Fezzan were part of the Kanem Empire, wars against the Kanem Bornu Empire in the early sixteenth century led to the founding of the Awlad Muhammad dynasty, with Murzuk becoming the capital of Fezzan. Around 1565 it was ruled by Muhammad ibn al-Muntasir, the Ottoman rulers of North Africa asserted their control over the region in the 17th century. In the reign of Abdulhamid II Fizan was used as a place of exile for Young Turks because it was the most remote province from Istanbul. Beginning in 1911, Fezzan was occupied by Italy, however, Italys control of the region was precarious until at least 1923, with the rise of the Italian Fascist regime. The Italians were resisted in their attempts at conquest by tribal Arab adherents to the militant Sanusiya Sufi religious order. The Tuareg clans of the region were only pacified by European expansion shortly before the Second World War, and some of them collaborated with the Italian Army in the North African Campaign. Free French troops occupied Murzuk, a town of Fezzan, on 16 January 1943. French administration was exercised through Fezzan notables of the family of Sayf Al Nasr. Disquieting to the tribes in western Fezzan was the attachment of Ghat. However, when the French military control ceased in 1951, all of Fezzan became part of the Kingdom of Libya, the LF country code was reserved on behalf of Libya Fezzan by the International Organization for Standardization
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Districts of Libya
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There are twenty-two districts of Libya, known by the term shabiyah. In the 1990s these replaced the older baladiyat system, historically the area of Libya was considered three provinces, Tripolitania in the northwest, Cyrenaica in the east, and Fezzan in the southwest. It was the conquest by Italy in the Italo-Turkish War that united them in a political unit. Under the Italians Libya was eventually divided into four provinces and one territory, Tripoli, Misrata, Benghazi, Derna, and the Territory of the Libyan Sahara. After the French and British occupied Libya in 1943, it was split into three provinces, Tripolitania in the northwest, Cyrenaica in the east, and Fezzan-Ghadames in the southwest. Article 176 of the 1951 constitution of Libya stated The Kingdom of Libya shall be divided into administrative units in conformity with the law to be promulgated in this connection, local and regional councils may be formed in the Kingdom. The extent of these units shall be determined by law which shall likewise organize these Councils. in exact quote, after independence, Libya was divided into three governorates, matching the three provinces of before, but in 1963 it was divided into ten governorates. In 1983 a new system was introduced dividing the country into forty-six districts, in 1987 this was reduced to twenty-five districts. On 2 August 1995, Libya reorganized into thirteen districts, in 1998 this was increased to 26 shabiyat districts. In 2001 it was increased to thirty-two districts plus three administrative regions, finally in 2007 it was reduced to twenty-two districts. For historical evolution see also, Subdivisions of Libya, Libyan districts are further subdivided into Basic Peoples Congresses which act as townships or boroughs. Shabiyah is an exclusive to Libya under Gaddafi, in line with exclusive terms for republic, ministry. The term basically means a district, that is, a top level administrative division, etymologically, it is an adjective meaning of or pertaining to the people, popular. In 2007 the current twenty-two districts replaced the older thirty-two district system, among them were Butnan, Jabal al Akhdar, Jabal al Gharbi, Zawiya, Benghazi, and Tripoli. However, there is not agreement about the seven names. Baladiyah or baladiyat, are Arabic words used in many Arab countries to denote administrative divisions of the country, in Libya, the baladiyat system of districts was introduced in 1983 to replace the governorate system. Originally there were forty-six baladiyat districts, but in 1988 that number was reduced to twenty-five baladiyat, the table hereunder lists the old twenty-five baladiyat in alphabetical order with a link to each one and numbered to be located on the map. Note that each district linked may be both a baladiyah and a shabiyah, the many changes may not always be reflected in the article
22.
Libyan Civil War (2011)
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The protests escalated into a rebellion that spread across the country, with the forces opposing Gaddafi establishing an interim governing body, the National Transitional Council. In early March, Gaddafis forces rallied, pushed eastwards and re-took several coastal cities before reaching Benghazi, a further UN resolution authorised member states to establish and enforce a no-fly zone over Libya, and to use all necessary measures to prevent attacks on civilians. The Gaddafi government then announced a ceasefire, but fighting continued, throughout the conflict, rebels rejected government offers of a ceasefire and efforts by the African Union to end the fighting because the plans set forth did not include the removal of Gaddafi. On 16 September 2011, the National Transitional Council was recognised by the United Nations as the representative of Libya. Muammar Gaddafi remained at large until 20 October 2011, when he was captured and killed in Sirte, the National Transitional Council declared the liberation of Libya and the official end of the war on 23 October 2011. In the aftermath of the war, a low-level insurgency by former Gaddafi loyalists continued. A much greater issue has been the role of militias which fought in the civil war and these unresolved issues led directly to a second civil war in Libya. Muammar Gaddafi was the head of the Free Officers, a group of Arab nationalists that deposed King Idris I in 1969 in a bloodless coup and he abolished the Libyan Constitution of 1951, considering it a neocolonial document. From 1969 until 1975 standards of living, life expectancy and literacy grew rapidly, in 1975 he published his manifesto The Green Book. He officially stepped down from power in 1977, and subsequently claimed to be merely a figurehead until 2011. Under Gaddafi, Libya was theoretically a decentralized, direct democracy state run according to the philosophy of Gaddafis The Green Book, according to Freedom House, however, these structures were often manipulated to ensure the dominance of Gaddafi, who reportedly continued to dominate all aspects of government. WikiLeaks disclosure of confidential US diplomatic cables revealed US diplomats there speaking of Gaddafis mastery of tactical maneuvering and this extended even to his own sons, as he repeatedly changed affections to avoid the rise of a clear successor and rival. Both Gaddafi and the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, however, officially denied that he held any power, while he was popularly seen as a demagogue in the West, Gaddafi always portrayed himself as a statesman-philosopher. According to several Western media sources, Gaddafi feared a coup against his government. The Libyan Army consisted of about 50,000 personnel and its most powerful units were four crack brigades of highly equipped and trained soldiers, composed of members of Gaddafis tribe or members of other tribes loyal to him. One, the Khamis Brigade, was led by his son Khamis, local militias and Revolutionary Committees across the country were also kept well-armed. By contrast, regular units were poorly armed and trained. By the end of Gaddafis 42 years rule, Libyas population had a per capita income of $14,000, a broadly secular society was imposed
23.
National Transitional Council
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The formation of the NTC was announced in the city of Benghazi on 27 February 2011 with the purpose to act as the political face of the revolution. On 5 March 2011, the council issued a statement in which it declared itself to be the legitimate body representing the people of Libya. An executive board, chaired by Mahmoud Jibril, was formed by the council on 23 March 2011 after being de facto assembled as a team since 5 March 2011. The NTC issued a Constitutional Declaration in August 2011 in which it set up a road-map for the transition of the country to a democracy with an elected government. The council gained international recognition as the governing authority in Libya. In referring to the Libyan state, the council used simply Libya, the UN formally recognized the country as Libya in September 2011, based on a request from the Permanent Mission of Libya citing the Libyan interim Constitutional Declaration of 3 August 2011. In November 2011, the ISO 3166-1 was altered to reflect the new country name Libya in English, after popular movements overturned the rulers of Tunisia and Egypt, Libyas immediate neighbours to the west and east, Libya experienced a full-scale uprising beginning in February 2011. By 20 February, the unrest had spread to Tripoli, much of Libya had slipped out of Gaddafis control, falling to anti-Gaddafi forces. Eastern Libya, centered around the second largest city and vital port of Benghazi, was firmly under the control of the opposition, the opposition began to organise themselves into a functioning government. Anti-Gaddafi forces marched on Sirte on 28 September 2011, Gaddafi loyalists delayed the attack with the use of their snipers. The fight for Sirte ended on 20 October with the capture of the town, on 24 February 2011, politicians, former military officers, tribal leaders, academics and businessmen held a meeting in the eastern city of Bayda. The meeting was chaired by former justice minister Mustafa Abdul Jalil, the delegates discussed proposals for interim administration with many delegates asking for UN intervention in Libya. The podium at the meeting displayed the pre-Jamahiriya flag, on 25 February, Al Jazeera TV reported that talks were taking place between personalities from eastern and western Libya to form an interim government for the post-Gaddafi era. The following day, former justice minister Mustafa Abdul Jalil was announced to be leading the process of forming an interim body, to be based in Benghazi. Jalil stated that Gaddafi alone bore responsibility for the crimes that have occurred in Libya, he insisted on the unity of Libya. The efforts to form an alternative government have been supported by the Libyan ambassador in the United States, the Libyan deputy ambassador to the United Nations, Ibrahim Omar Al Dabashi, stated that he supported a new alternative government in principle. A National Transitional Council was formed on 27 February to act as the face of the revolution. He later clarified that an airstrike mandated by the United Nations would not be considered a foreign intervention, an Al Jazeera journalist in Benghazi reported that a fully fledged interim government would not be formed until Tripoli was under opposition control
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Miocene
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The Miocene is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about 23.03 to 5.333 million years ago. The Miocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell and its name comes from the Greek words μείων and καινός and means less recent because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene. The Miocene follows the Oligocene Epoch and is followed by the Pliocene Epoch, the earth went from the Oligocene through the Miocene and into the Pliocene, with the climate slowly cooling towards a series of ice ages. The Miocene boundaries are not marked by a single distinct global event, the apes arose and diversified during the Miocene, becoming widespread in the Old World. By the end of this epoch, the ancestors of humans had split away from the ancestors of the chimpanzees to follow their own evolutionary path, as in the Oligocene before it, grasslands continued to expand and forests to dwindle in extent. In the Miocene seas, kelp forests made their first appearance, the plants and animals of the Miocene were fairly modern. The Miocene faunal stages from youngest to oldest are typically named according to the International Commission on Stratigraphy, Two subdivisions each form the lower, middle, continents continued to drift toward their present positions. Mountain building took place in western North America, Europe, both continental and marine Miocene deposits are common worldwide with marine outcrops common near modern shorelines. Well studied continental exposures occur in the North American Great Plains, India continued to collide with Asia, creating dramatic new mountain ranges. The Tethys Seaway continued to shrink and then disappeared as Africa collided with Eurasia in the Turkish–Arabian region between 19 and 12 Ma. The subsequent uplift of mountains in the western Mediterranean region and a fall in sea levels combined to cause a temporary drying up of the Mediterranean Sea near the end of the Miocene. The global trend was towards increasing aridity caused primarily by global cooling reducing the ability of the atmosphere to absorb moisture, climates remained moderately warm, although the slow global cooling that eventually led to the Pleistocene glaciations continued. Although a long-term cooling trend was well underway, there is evidence of a period during the Miocene when the global climate rivalled that of the Oligocene. The Miocene warming began 21 million years ago and continued until 14 million years ago, by 8 million years ago, temperatures dropped sharply once again, and the Antarctic ice sheet was already approaching its present-day size and thickness. Greenland may have begun to have large glaciers as early as 7 to 8 million years ago, life during the Miocene Epoch was mostly supported by the two newly formed biomes, kelp forests and grasslands. This allows for more grazers, such as horses, rhinoceroses, ninety five percent of modern plants existed by the end of this epoch. The higher organic content and water retention of the deeper and richer grassland soils, with long term burial of carbon in sediments, produced a carbon and this, combined with higher surface albedo and lower evapotranspiration of grassland, contributed to a cooler, drier climate. The expansion of grasslands and radiations among terrestrial herbivores correlates to fluctuations in CO2
25.
Limestone
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Limestone is a sedimentary rock, composed mainly of skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral, forams and molluscs. Its major materials are the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate, about 10% of sedimentary rocks are limestones. The solubility of limestone in water and weak acid solutions leads to karst landscapes, most cave systems are through limestone bedrock. The first geologist to distinguish limestone from dolomite was Belsazar Hacquet in 1778, like most other sedimentary rocks, most limestone is composed of grains. Most grains in limestone are skeletal fragments of organisms such as coral or foraminifera. Other carbonate grains comprising limestones are ooids, peloids, intraclasts and these organisms secrete shells made of aragonite or calcite, and leave these shells behind when they die. Limestone often contains variable amounts of silica in the form of chert or siliceous skeletal fragment, some limestones do not consist of grains at all, and are formed completely by the chemical precipitation of calcite or aragonite, i. e. travertine. Secondary calcite may be deposited by supersaturated meteoric waters and this produces speleothems, such as stalagmites and stalactites. Another form taken by calcite is oolitic limestone, which can be recognized by its granular appearance, the primary source of the calcite in limestone is most commonly marine organisms. Some of these organisms can construct mounds of rock known as reefs, below about 3,000 meters, water pressure and temperature conditions cause the dissolution of calcite to increase nonlinearly, so limestone typically does not form in deeper waters. Limestones may also form in lacustrine and evaporite depositional environments, calcite can be dissolved or precipitated by groundwater, depending on several factors, including the water temperature, pH, and dissolved ion concentrations. Calcite exhibits a characteristic called retrograde solubility, in which it becomes less soluble in water as the temperature increases. Impurities will cause limestones to exhibit different colors, especially with weathered surfaces, Limestone may be crystalline, clastic, granular, or massive, depending on the method of formation. Crystals of calcite, quartz, dolomite or barite may line small cavities in the rock, when conditions are right for precipitation, calcite forms mineral coatings that cement the existing rock grains together, or it can fill fractures. Travertine is a banded, compact variety of limestone formed along streams, particularly there are waterfalls. Calcium carbonate is deposited where evaporation of the leaves a solution supersaturated with the chemical constituents of calcite. Tufa, a porous or cellular variety of travertine, is found near waterfalls, coquina is a poorly consolidated limestone composed of pieces of coral or shells. During regional metamorphism that occurs during the building process, limestone recrystallizes into marble
26.
Mediterranean Sea
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The sea is sometimes considered a part of the Atlantic Ocean, although it is usually identified as a separate body of water. The name Mediterranean is derived from the Latin mediterraneus, meaning inland or in the middle of land and it covers an approximate area of 2.5 million km2, but its connection to the Atlantic is only 14 km wide. The Strait of Gibraltar is a strait that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Gibraltar. In oceanography, it is called the Eurafrican Mediterranean Sea or the European Mediterranean Sea to distinguish it from mediterranean seas elsewhere. The Mediterranean Sea has a depth of 1,500 m. The sea is bordered on the north by Europe, the east by Asia and it is located between latitudes 30° and 46° N and longitudes 6° W and 36° E. Its west-east length, from the Strait of Gibraltar to the Gulf of Iskenderun, the seas average north-south length, from Croatia’s southern shore to Libya, is approximately 800 km. The Mediterranean Sea, including the Sea of Marmara, has an area of approximately 2,510,000 square km. The sea was an important route for merchants and travelers of ancient times that allowed for trade, the history of the Mediterranean region is crucial to understanding the origins and development of many modern societies. In addition, the Gaza Strip and the British Overseas Territories of Gibraltar and Akrotiri, the term Mediterranean derives from the Latin word mediterraneus, meaning amid the earth or between land, as it is between the continents of Africa, Asia and Europe. The Ancient Greek name Mesogeios, is similarly from μέσο, between + γη, land, earth) and it can be compared with the Ancient Greek name Mesopotamia, meaning between rivers. The Mediterranean Sea has historically had several names, for example, the Carthaginians called it the Syrian Sea and latter Romans commonly called it Mare Nostrum, and occasionally Mare Internum. Another name was the Sea of the Philistines, from the people inhabiting a large portion of its shores near the Israelites, the sea is also called the Great Sea in the General Prologue by Geoffrey Chaucer. In Ottoman Turkish, it has also been called Bahr-i Sefid, in Modern Hebrew, it has been called HaYam HaTikhon, the Middle Sea, reflecting the Seas name in ancient Greek, Latin, and modern languages in both Europe and the Middle East. Similarly, in Modern Arabic, it is known as al-Baḥr al-Mutawassiṭ, in Turkish, it is known as Akdeniz, the White Sea since among Turks the white colour represents the west. Several ancient civilisations were located around the Mediterranean shores, and were influenced by their proximity to the sea. It provided routes for trade, colonisation, and war, as well as food for numerous communities throughout the ages, due to the shared climate, geology, and access to the sea, cultures centered on the Mediterranean tended to have some extent of intertwined culture and history. Two of the most notable Mediterranean civilisations in classical antiquity were the Greek city states, later, when Augustus founded the Roman Empire, the Romans referred to the Mediterranean as Mare Nostrum
27.
Sea level
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Mean sea level is an average level of the surface of one or more of Earths oceans from which heights such as elevations may be measured. A common and relatively straightforward mean sea-level standard is the midpoint between a low and mean high tide at a particular location. Sea levels can be affected by factors and are known to have varied greatly over geological time scales. The careful measurement of variations in MSL can offer insights into ongoing climate change, the term above sea level generally refers to above mean sea level. Precise determination of a sea level is a difficult problem because of the many factors that affect sea level. Sea level varies quite a lot on several scales of time and this is because the sea is in constant motion, affected by the tides, wind, atmospheric pressure, local gravitational differences, temperature, salinity and so forth. The easiest way this may be calculated is by selecting a location and calculating the mean sea level at that point, for example, a period of 19 years of hourly level observations may be averaged and used to determine the mean sea level at some measurement point. One measures the values of MSL in respect to the land, hence a change in MSL can result from a real change in sea level, or from a change in the height of the land on which the tide gauge operates. In the UK, the Ordnance Datum is the sea level measured at Newlyn in Cornwall between 1915 and 1921. Prior to 1921, the datum was MSL at the Victoria Dock, in Hong Kong, mPD is a surveying term meaning metres above Principal Datum and refers to height of 1. 230m below the average sea level. In France, the Marégraphe in Marseilles measures continuously the sea level since 1883 and it is used for a part of continental Europe and main part of Africa as official sea level. Elsewhere in Europe vertical elevation references are made to the Amsterdam Peil elevation, satellite altimeters have been making precise measurements of sea level since the launch of TOPEX/Poseidon in 1992. A joint mission of NASA and CNES, TOPEX/Poseidon was followed by Jason-1 in 2001, height above mean sea level is the elevation or altitude of an object, relative to the average sea level datum. It is also used in aviation, where some heights are recorded and reported with respect to sea level, and in the atmospheric sciences. An alternative is to base height measurements on an ellipsoid of the entire Earth, in aviation, the ellipsoid known as World Geodetic System 84 is increasingly used to define heights, however, differences up to 100 metres exist between this ellipsoid height and mean tidal height. The alternative is to use a vertical datum such as NAVD88. When referring to geographic features such as mountains on a topographic map, the elevation of a mountain denotes the highest point or summit and is typically illustrated as a small circle on a topographic map with the AMSL height shown in metres, feet or both. In the rare case that a location is below sea level, for one such case, see Amsterdam Airport Schiphol
28.
Jebel Akhdar, Libya
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The Jebel Akhdar is a heavily forested, fertile upland area in northeastern Libya. It is located in the modern shabiyahs or districts of Derna, Jabal al Akhdar, the Jebel Akhdar consists of a mountainous plateau rising to an altitude of 900 metres, cut by several valleys and wadis. It forms the part of the peninsula that sticks north into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Gulf of Sidra on the west. It runs from Bengazi eastward to just east of Derna, fronting the coast for about 330 kilometres, due to erosion and deposition the plateau is sometimes as much as 16 kilometres from the shore, but it forms cliffs on the headlands. The final uplift and arching of the plateau was completed in the Miocene, the region is one of the very few forested areas of Libya, which taken as a whole is one of the least forested countries on Earth. It is the wettest part of Libya, receiving some 600 millimetres of precipitation annually, the high rainfall contributes to the areas large forests containing Chammari, and enables rich fruit, potato, and cereal agriculture, something of a rarity in an arid country like Libya. Camels, goats and sheep are herded in and around the Jebel Akhdar, documents created during the New Kingdom of Egypt record that to the west there were large populations of metal workers who lived in towns and had plentiful livestock. The only plausible location for these Libyans is the Jebel Akhdar, the ancient Greek colony of Cyrene was located in a lush valley in the Jebel Akhdar, with the ruins remaining. It was the Greeks who introduced farming to the Jebal Akhdar when they colonised its verdant valleys in around 600 BC, during the Italian occupation these mountains were identified as a promising area for agriculture and many Italians moved here in the 1930s. This settlement was interrupted during World War II and the villages, the mountain chain was the site of major battles between the British Commonwealth and the Axis forces during World War II. Mediterranean dry woodlands and steppe – lower elevations Mediterranean woodlands and forests – higher elevations
29.
Gulf of Sirte
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Gulf of Sirte, or Gulf of Sidra after the port of Sidra, is a body of water in the Mediterranean Sea on the northern coast of Libya. Historically it has also known as the Great Sirte or Greater Syrtis. The Gulf of Sirte has been a centre for tuna fishing in the Mediterranean for centuries. It gives its name to the city of Sirte situated on its western side, the gulf measures 439 kilometres from the promontory of Boreum on the East side to the promontory of Cephalae on the West. The greatest extension of the inland is 177 kilometres land inward. Syrtis is referred to in the New Testament of the Bible where the Apostle Paul relates being sent in chains to Rome to stand trial before Caesar Nero, in ancient literature, the Syrtes were notorious sandbanks which sailors always took pains to avoid. The local climate features frequent calms and a more than usually powerful north wind, the shoreline between Cyrene in the east and Carthage in the west featured few ports. Ancient writers frequently mention the sandbanks and their vicinity as dangerous for shipping, the Syrtes maiores are unusually tidal and feature a strong clockwise current, at the rising tide, which then switches when the tide ebbs. This feature may explain the curious corkscrew shape in the area on the Peutinger Table, the landward side was a featureless plain which contrasted with the fertility of the rest of Tripolitania, to the west. Ancient writers mention sandstorms and serpents in this area, furthermore, the ancient textual evidence is not unambiguous in its condemnation of the Syrtes. Plutarch gives a much less melodramatic account of Cato’s march than Strabo’s, saying that it took seven days. As in Cato, they do not avoid the area, and their infamous reputation is, however, found in Roman poetry, from Virgil on. The information in this section is taken from The Syrtes between East and West by Josephine Crawley Quinn. First Battle of Sirte, World War II naval battle between Regia Marina and Royal Navy in December 1941, second Battle of Sirte, World War II naval battle between Regia Marina and Royal Navy in March 1942. The gulf was generally referred to by the US military in those times as Gulf of Sidra, gaddafi declared it The Line of Death, the crossing of which would invite a military response. Gaddafi claimed it to be a sea, not just a coastal area. In response the United States authorized Naval exercises in the Gulf of Sidra to conduct Freedom of Navigation operations, on 21 March 1973, Libyan fighter planes intercepted and fired on a U. S. Air Force C-130 conducting signals intelligence off the Libyan coast. During the encounter, two Libyan Mirage fighters signaled the C-130 to follow them toward Libya and land, prompting the American plane to take evasive action, the C-130 received cannon fire from the Libyan fighters as it fled, but was able to escape by using cloud cover
30.
Susa, Libya
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Susa or Soussa /ˈsuːsə/ is a town and seaside resort in the District of Jabal al Akhdar in north-eastern Libya. Susa stands by the ruins of Apollonia, Cyrenaica, the town contains the Apollonia Museum. It is located about 30 km northeast of Bayda, list of cities in Libya Satellite map at Maplandia. com
31.
Derna, Libya
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Derna /ˈdɜːrnə/ is a port city in eastern Libya. It has a population of 100, 000–150,000 and it was the seat of one of the wealthiest provinces in the Barbary States, and remains the capital of the Derna District, with a much smaller area. Derna has a unique environment among Libyan cities, as it lies between mountains, the Mediterranean Sea, and the desert. The city is home to people of mixed origins. The city was also the location of the famous Battle of Derna, occurring during the First Barbary War, the battle was fought between a force of roughly 500 US Marines and Mediterranean mercenaries and four or five thousand Barbary troops. Parts of the city were taken over by Islamic State of Iraq, in June 2015 Shura Council of Mujahideen in Derna defeated ISIL and took control over the town. Darnis and Darne were the Greek forms of the name for the city, while the form Dardanis is sometimes found, it is erroneous. Under Rome the city was referred to as Darnis and Derna, under Islam, it was known as Derneh or Terneh. In the Hellenistic period the ancient city of Darnis was part of the Libyan Pentapolis, under Rome, it became a civil and later the religious metropolis of the province of Libya Secunda, or Libya Inferior, that is, the Marmarica region. The names of some of its bishops are found in extant documents. Piso was one of the Eastern bishops who withdrew from the Council of Sardica, early 5th-century Dioscorus is known because of a dispute he had with the bishop of Erythrum. Daniel took part in the Council of Ephesus in 431, in addition, John Moschus speaks of a bishop Thedodorus of Darnis as having had a vision of Saint Leo the Great in the mid-5th century. No longer a residential bishopric, Darnis is today listed by the Catholic Church as a titular see, the city was resettled by the Islamic refugees from Spain in 1493 on the site of the ancient settlement. This in turn, in 1875, became the vilayet of Cyrenaica, in the 1850s it had an estimated 4,500 inhabitants, who lived by agriculture, fishing and the coastal trade. The oldest mosque in Derna is Al-masjeed al-ateeq, or the Old Mosque, restored by wali Mahmoud Karamanli in 1772 and this kind of vault was in use due to lack of some materials, like timber or stone in the region of Cyrenaica. There is another mosque, named Masjeed az-zawiyah, built in 1846, the French admiral Gantheaume landed at Derna in June 1800 in an attempt to reinforce Napoleon in Egypt by bringing troops overland, but was rebuffed by the local garrison. Derna was the location of the 1805 Battle of Derne, in which forces under U. S, lieutenant and former Consul to Tripoli William Eaton—who had marched 500 miles across the Libyan Desert from Alexandria—captured the city as part of the First Barbary War. On 16 October 1911 Italian troops occupied Derna during the Italo-Turkish War, on 30 January 1941, during the Second World War, Australian troops captured Derna from the Italians in the North African Campaign
32.
Ecoregion
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An ecoregion is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a bioregion, which in turn is smaller than an ecozone. All three of these are less or greater than an ecosystem. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of land or water, and contain characteristic, the biodiversity of flora, fauna and ecosystems that characterise an ecoregion tends to be distinct from that of other ecoregions. Three caveats are appropriate for all bio-geographic mapping approaches, firstly, no single bio-geographic framework is optimal for all taxa. Ecoregions reflect the best compromise for as many taxa as possible, secondly, ecoregion boundaries rarely form abrupt edges, rather, ecotones and mosaic habitats bound them. Thirdly, most ecoregions contain habitats that differ from their assigned biome, biogeographic provinces may originate due to various barriers. Some physical, some climatic and some ocean chemical related, the history of the term is somewhat vague as it was used in many contexts, forest classifications, biome classifications, biogeographic classifications, etc. The concept of ecoregion of Bailey gives more importance to ecological criteria, while the WWF concept gives more importance to biogeography, there is significant, but not absolute, spatial correlation among these characteristics, making the delineation of ecoregions an imperfect science. Such transition zones are called ecotones, Ecoregions can be categorized using an algorithmic approach or a holistic, “weight-of-evidence” approach where the importance of various factors may vary. An example of the approach is Robert Bailey’s work for the U. S. The intended purpose of ecoregion delineation may affect the method used, according to WWF, the boundaries of an ecoregion approximate the original extent of the natural communities prior to any major recent disruptions or changes. WWF has identified 867 terrestrial ecoregions, and approximately 450 freshwater ecoregions across the Earth, the use of the term ecoregion is an outgrowth of a surge of interest in ecosystems and their functioning. In particular, there is awareness of issues relating to spatial scale in the study and it is widely recognized that interlinked ecosystems combine to form a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. The Global 200 is the list of ecoregions identified by WWF as priorities for conservation, Terrestrial ecoregions are land ecoregions, as distinct from freshwater and marine ecoregions. In this context, terrestrial is used to mean of land, WWF ecologists currently divide the land surface of the Earth into 8 major ecozones containing 867 smaller terrestrial ecoregions. The WWF effort is a synthesis of previous efforts to define. Many consider this classification to be decisive, and some propose these as stable borders for bioregional democracy initiatives. The eight terrestrial ecozones follow the major floral and faunal boundaries, identified by botanists and zoologists, ecozone boundaries generally follow continental boundaries, or major barriers to plant and animal distribution, like the Himalayas and the Sahara
33.
Mediterranean climate
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A Mediterranean climate /ˌmɛdɪtəˈreɪniən/ or dry summer climate, is the climate typical of the lands in the Mediterranean Basin. The Mediterranean climate is characterised by dry summers and mild, moist winters, Mediterranean climate zones are associated with the four large subtropical high pressure cells of the oceans, the Azores High, South Atlantic High, North Pacific High, and South Pacific High. These climatological high pressure cells migrate by latitude according to the angle of the Sun, shifting north-eastward in the summer. These semi-permanent high pressure systems play a role in the formation of the worlds subtropical and tropical deserts as well as the Mediterranean Basins climate. The Azores High is associated with the Mediterranean climate found in the Mediterranean Basin, the Sahara Desert, the South Atlantic High is similarly associated with the Namib Desert and Kalahari Desert, and the Mediterranean climate of the western part of South Africa. Under the Köppen climate classification, hot climates and cool dry-summer climates are often referred to as mediterranean. Under the Köppen climate system, the first letter indicates the climate group, temperate climates or C zones have an average temperature above 0 °C, but below 18 °C, in their coolest months. The second letter indicates the precipitation pattern, Köppen has defined a dry summer month as a month with less than 30 mm of precipitation and with less than one-third that of the wettest winter month. Some, however, use a 40 mm level, the third letter indicates the degree of summer heat, a represents an average temperature in the warmest month above 22 °C, while b indicates the average temperature in the warmest month below 22 °C. Under the Köppen classification, dry-summer climates usually occur on the sides of continents. Under Trewarthas system, at least eight months must have average temperatures of 10 °C or higher, during summer, regions of mediterranean climate are dominated by subtropical high pressure cells, with dry sinking air capping a surface marine layer of varying humidity and making rainfall unlikely. In many Mediterranean climates there is a strong character to daily temperatures in the warm months. The majority of the regions with mediterranean climates have relatively mild winters, however winter and summer temperatures can vary greatly between different regions with a mediterranean climate. Or to consider summer, Athens experiences rather high temperatures in that season, in contrast, San Francisco has cool summers with daily highs around. In North America, areas with Csc climate can be found in the Olympic, Cascade, Klamath and these locations are found at high altitude nearby lower altitude regions characterized by a warm-summer mediterranean climate or hot-summer mediterranean climate. A rare instance of this occurs in the tropics, on Haleakalā Summit in Hawaii. In South America, Csc regions can be found along the Andes in Chile, the town of Balmaceda is one of the few towns confirmed to have this climate. Small areas with a Csc climate can also be found at elevations in Corsica
34.
Garrigue
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Garrigue or phrygana is a type of low, soft-leaved scrubland ecoregion and plant community in the Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub biome. It is found on soils in southern France and around the Mediterranean Basin. The term has found its way into haute cuisine, suggestive of the resinous flavours of a garrigue shrubland. UNEP World Conservation Monitoring Centre described garrigue as discontinuous bushy associations of the Mediterranean calcareous plateaus and it is often composed of kermes oak, lavender, thyme, and white cistus. There may be a few isolated trees, garrigue is discontinuous with widely spaced bush associations with open spaces, and is often extensive. It is associated with limestone and base rich soils, and calcium associated plants, the fines of periodic brush fires also have had an effect on the patterning and composition of the garrigues. In California a similar Mediterranean climate ecoregion is named chaparral, in Chile its named the Chilean matorral, in South Africa its named fynbos, all are in the Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub biome. Both garrigue and maquis are associated with the Mediterranean climate within the Mediterranean region, however, the distinction is not clear and term use is inconsistent. Maquis shrubland is broadly similar to garrigue, but the vegetation is more dense, Maquis is associated with siliceous soils, unlike the relatively alkaline calcareous soils of the garrigue. Its plant communities are often associated with Holm Oak. Calcifuges such as Erica and Calluna are present in the Maquis ecoregion, the wild garrigue, then, is a man-formed landscape. The intensity of grazing pressure has had a response in the ecotope. First cited in the French language in 1546, the singular word garrigue is borrowed from the Provençal dialect of Occitan garriga, equivalent to old French jarrie. Etymologist Oscar Bloch states that it is most likely related to the Gascon carroc, meaning rock and to the Germanic Swiss Karren and it is thought that Gallic and Latin incorporated these words and then transmitted them in various forms to the Romance languages. The dense, thrifty growth of flora has recommended many of its shrubs and sub-shrubs for uses as ornamental plants in traditional. Grapes that are grown in the region of France are said to produce wines with a barnyard or earthy tone. Some wines bottled in Southern France contain the word Garrigues as part of their appellation or label name
35.
Steppe
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In South Africa they are referred to as Veld. The prairie is an example of a steppe, though it is not usually called such and it may be semi-desert, or covered with grass or shrubs or both, depending on the season and latitude. The term is used to denote the climate encountered in regions too dry to support a forest. The soil is typically of chernozem type, steppes are usually characterized by a semi-arid and continental climate. Extremes can be recorded in the summer of up to 45 °C and in winter, besides this huge difference between summer and winter, the differences between day and night are also very great. In the highlands of Mongolia,30 °C can be reached during the day with sub-zero °C readings at night, the mid-latitude steppes can be summarized by hot summers and cold winters, averaging 250–510 mm of precipitation per year. Precipitation level alone is not what defines a steppe climate, potential evapotranspiration must also be taken into account, the Eurasian Grass-Steppe of the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands had a role in the spread of the horse, the wheel, and the Indo-European languages. The Indo-European expansion and diverse invasions of horse archer civilizations of the steppe eventually led to, the Pannonian Plain is another steppe region in eastern Europe, primarily Hungary. Another large steppe area is located in the central United States, western Canada, the shortgrass prairie steppe is the westernmost part of the Great Plains region. The Channeled Scablands in Southern British Columbia and Washington State is an example of a region in North America outside of the Great Plains. In South America, cold steppe can be found in Patagonia, relatively small steppe areas can be found in the interior of the South Island of New Zealand. In Asia, a subtropical steppe can be found in semi-arid lands that fringe the Thar Desert of the Indian subcontinent, in Australia, subtropical steppe can be found in a belt surrounding the most severe deserts of the continent and around the Musgrave Ranges. Ecology and Conservation of Steppe-land Birds by Manuel B. Morales, Santi Mañosa, Jordi Camprodón, international Symposium on Ecology and Conservation of steppe-land birds
36.
Oak savanna
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An oak savanna is a type of savanna, or lightly forested grassland, where oaks are the dominant trees. These savannas were maintained historically through wildfires set by lightning or humans, grazing, low precipitation, there are also small areas of oak savannas in other parts of the world. The oak savannas of the Midwestern United States form a zone between the arid Great Plains to the west and the moist broadleaf and mixed forests to the east. The bur oak is the dominant species in northern oak savannas, although black oak, white oak, the dominant tree in the south is usually the black oak, although the chinquapin oak, post oak, and black-jack oak are also common. The flora of the herbaceous layer consists of species associated with tallgrass prairies. There are also a few species that are unique to oak savannas, Oak savannas, because of their mixture of grassland, woodland, and unique savanna species, typically have a higher plant diversity than grasslands and woodlands combined. Before European settlement, the oak savanna, a fire ecology, was extensive and was often a dominant part of the ecosystem. Fires, set by lightning or Native Americans, ensured that the savanna areas did not turn into forests, only trees with a high tolerance for fire, principally certain oak species, were able to survive. On sandy soils, black oak predominated, on rich soils bur oak was the major tree in Midwestern North America. European settlers cleared much of the savanna for agricultural use, in addition, they suppressed the fire cycle. Thus surviving pockets of savanna typically became less like savannas and more like forests or thickets, many oak savanna plant and animal species became extinct or rare. With the rise in interest in conservation, restoration and preservation of surviving areas of oak savanna began. Low intensity, spring prescribed burns have been used since 1964 at the Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve in Minnesota in an attempt to restore the area to an oak savanna. Burned areas are now more savanna like than unburned areas but still have higher densities than apparently existed in presettlement times. Restoration work began in the 1970s in Illinois, followed by work in Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, an excellent example of a restored oak savanna is Wisconsins Pleasant Valley Conservancy State Natural Area. Oak Savannas, Characteristics, Restoration, and Long-Term Management Pleasant Valley Conservancy State Natural Area Oak Savannah Documentary produced by Oregon Field Guide
37.
Sarcopoterium
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Sarcopoterium is a genus of flowering plants in the rose family. The genus is synonymous to Poterium, the sole species within this genus, Sarcopoterium spinosum, is common to the southeast Mediterranean region and Middle East. It is a bush with small flowers in inflorescence. Sarcopoterium spinosum flowers in February to April and its fruits mature in autumn, in the summer it is dried and appears dead
38.
Asphodelus ramosus
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Asphodelus ramosus, also known as branched asphodel, is a perennial herb in the Asparagales order. Similar in appearance to Asphodelus albus and particularly Asphodelus cerasiferus, it may be distinguished by its highly branched stem, Asphodelus ramosus is native to the Mediterranean region of southern Europe, northern Africa, and the Middle East. It can also be found in the Canary Islands and it is particularly common on the Catalan coast, where it shows an affinity for acidic soils, mainly schist. It is to be close to the sea on the slopes of the Albères massif. Its very numerous flowers are white with six tepals bearing a central brown streak, the fruits are small round capsules. It has been thought to be Homers asphodel of the underworld, asphodel is known to contain colchicine, a chemical used in the treatment of gout. It was mentioned by Dioscorides, amongst others, for this purpose
39.
Artemisia herba-alba
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Artemisia herba-alba is a perennial shrub in the genus Artemisia that grows commonly on the dry steppes of the Mediterranean regions in Northern Africa, Western Asia and Southwestern Europe. It is used as an antiseptic and antispasmodic in herbal medicine and its specific epithet herba-alba means white herb in Latin, as its stems and leaves are white and woolly. Similarly, it is armoise herbe-blanche or armoise blanche in French, and it is laanah in Old Testament Hebrew. Artemisia herba-alba is a chamaeophyte that grows to 20–40 cm, leaves are strongly aromatic and covered with fine glandular hairs that reflect sunlight giving a grayish aspect to the shrub. The leaves of sterile shoots are grey, petiolate, ovate to orbicular in outline, whereas, the flowering heads are sessile, oblong and tapering at base. The plant flowers from September to December, the receptacle is naked with 2–5 yellowish hermaphrodite flowers per head. Davanone, chrysanthenone and cis-chrysanthenol have been described as major constituents in some populations of A. herba-alba from Morocco, less common non-head-to-tail monoterpene alcohols have been identified in some populations from Negev desert, such as santolina alcohol and yomogi alcohol. Eudesmanolide and germacranolide sesquiterpenes have been detected in the extract of aerial parts. Two bioactive flavonoids, assumed to be hispidulin and cirsiliol, were isolated by chromatography from aerial parts ethyl acetate-extract, Artemisia herba-alba is good fodder for grazing animals, mainly sheep, and in the Algerian steppes cattle. This species of sagebrush is used in herbal medicine for its antiseptic, vermifuge. Artemisia herba-alba was reported as a remedy of enteritis, and various intestinal disturbances. In fact, essential oil showed antibacterial activity, as well as, Artemisia herba-alba based teas were used in Iraqi folk medicine for the treatment of diabetes mellitus. An aqueous extract of aerial parts of the plant has shown a hypoglycemic effect in alloxan-induced diabetic rabbits, Artemisia herba-alba is thought to be the plant translated as wormwood in English-language versions of the Bible. Wormwood is mentioned seven times in the Jewish Bible, always with the implication of bitterness, wormwood is mentioned once in the New Testament, as the name of a star, also with implications of bitterness. Details for, Artemisia herba-alba – The Euro+Med Plantbase, sahara-Nature, Artemisia herba-alba -Retrieved 19 February 2010
40.
Juniperus phoenicea
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It mostly grows at low altitudes close to the coast, but reaches 2,400 metres altitude in the south of its range in the Atlas Mountains. It is the symbol of the island of El Hierro. Juniperus phoenicea is a shrub or small tree reaching 2–12 metres tall, with a trunk up to 1 metre diameter. It is largely monoecious, but some plants are dioecious. The cones are berry-like, 6–14 mm in diameter, orange-brown, occasionally with a waxy bloom. The male cones are 2–4 mm long, and shed their pollen in early spring, there are two varieties, treated as subspecies by some authors, Juniperus phoenicea var. phoenicea. Throughout the range of the species, cones globose, about as wide as long. Confined to coastal dune habitats. The trees essential oil is rich in the tricyclic sesquiterpene thujopsene. The biochemist Jarl Runeburg noted in 1960 that Juniperus phoenicea appears to be the most convenient source of thujopsene so far encountered, List of animals and plants symbols of the Canary Islands Conifer Specialist Group. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, international Union for Conservation of Nature. Adams, R. P. Junipers of the World, The genus Juniperus, ISBN 1-4120-4250-X Gymnosperm Database, Juniperus phoenicea Zsolt Debreczy, Istvan Racz. Kathy Musial, ed. Conifers Around the World
41.
Pistacia lentiscus
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Pistacia lentiscus is a dioecious evergreen shrub or small tree of the pistacio genus growing up to 4 m tall which is cultivated for its aromatic resin, mainly on the Greek island of Chios. It resists heavy frosts and grows on all types of soils and it is also found in woodlands, dehesas, Kermes oak wood, oaks wood, garrigue, maquis, hills, gorges, canyons, and rocky hillsides of the entire Mediterranean area. It is a hardy pioneer species dispersed by birds. When older, it develops some large trunks and numerous thicker and longer branches, in appropriate areas, when allowed to grow freely and age, it often becomes a tree of up to 7 m. However, logging, grazing, and fires often prevent its development, the leaves are alternate, leathery, and compound paripinnate with five or six pairs of deep-green leaflets. It presents very small flowers, the male with five stamens, the fruit is a drupe, first red and then black when ripe, about 4 mm in diameter. In tourist areas, with palmitos or Mediterranean dwarf palm, and exotic plants, it is chosen to repopulate gardens and resorts, because of its strength. Unlike other species of Pistacia, it retains its leaves throughout the year, a related species, P. saportae, has been shown by DNA analysis to be a hybrid between maternal P. lentiscus and paternal P. terebinthus. The hybrid has imparipinnate leaves, with leaflets semipersistent, subsessile terminal, Pistacia lentiscus is native throughout the Mediterranean region, from Morocco and Iberian peninsula in the west through southern France and Turkey to Iraq and Iran in the east. It is also native to the Canary Islands, the word mastic derives from the Latin word Masticare, in Greek, μαστιχάω verb mastichein or massein. Within the European Union, mastic production in Chios is granted protected designation of origin, although the tree is native to all of the Mediterranean region, only on southern Chios is the mastic trees bark scored to weep the masticha resin. The islands mastic production is controlled by a co-operative of medieval villages, collectively known as the Mastichochoria, originally liquid, it is hardened, when the weather turns cold, into drops or patties of hard, brittle, translucent resin. When chewed, the resin softens and becomes a bright white, the resin is collected by bleeding the trees from small cuts made in the bark of the main branches, and allowing the sap to drip onto the specially prepared ground below. The harvesting is done during the summer between June and September, after the mastic is collected, it is washed manually and is set aside to dry, away from the sun, as it will start melting again. Mastic resin is a relatively expensive kind of spice, it has been used principally as a chewing gum for at least 2,400 years, the flavour can be described as a strong, slightly smoky, resiny aroma and can be an acquired taste. Some scholars identify the bakha בכא mentioned in the Bible—as in the Valley of Baca of Psalm 84—with the mastic plant, the Valley of Baca is thought to be a valley near Jerusalem that was covered with low mastic shrubbery, much like some hillsides in northern Israel today. Mastic is known to have been popular in Roman times when children chewed it and it was the Sultans privilege to chew mastic, and it was considered to have healing properties. The spices use was widened when Chios became part of the Ottoman Empire, and it remains popular in North Africa, the Mastichochoria are located in the southern part of Chios
42.
Quercus coccifera
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Quercus coccifera, the kermes oak, is an oak in the Quercus section Cerris. The Kermes Oak was historically important as the plant of the Kermes scale insect. The etymology of the specific name coccifera is related to the production of red dye and derived from Latin coccum which was from Greek κὀκκος. Quercus coccifera is usually a shrub less 2 metres tall, rarely a small tree and it is evergreen, with spiny-serrated coriaceous leaves 1. 5–4 cm long and 1–3 cm broad. The acorns are 2–3 cm long and 1. 5–2 cm diameter when mature about 18 months after pollination and they are held in a cup covered in dense, elongated, reflexed scales. The kermes oak, Quercus coccifera is a scrub oak closely related to the Palestine oak of the eastern Mediterranean, the Palestine oak is distinguished from it by its larger size and larger acorns over 2 cm diameter. The communities receiving several characteristic names and it is indifferent to chemistry of soils, living on calcareous, pebbly, stony and poor soils. A lover of warm weather, it starts to fail from 1000 metres above sea level and it is capable of supporting the continental Mediterranean climate with extreme temperatures and low rainfall, replacing Quercus ilex in drier areas where it excels in drought resistance. It also grows on sea cliffs and in areas where other species of Quercus or Pinus cannot resist the harsh weather conditions. Kermes oak species grow in dry, sunny slopes, Quercus coccifera supports either drought summers and semi-desert climate with rainfall between 400 and 600mm, with a maximum in the fall and spring. In its habitat summers are hot and winters are cold with the dry season with more than 35 °C. In winter the temperatures drop below 0 °C. It lives in areas with moisture produced by condensation fogs, many Ground frost on clear nights, a very hardy species, it grows well in all types of soils as a shrub, withstanding overgrazing. It blooms from March to May in weather still wet and it is easily propagated by seed, an acorn that lies dormant until germinated by wet weather. This might occur anywhere from late summer to late autumn or early winter of the following year, the acorns are very bitter, varying greatly in size and shape from one specimen to another and tasting bad. Acorns can germinate even before falling from the plant, but Quercus coccifera is also multiplied by root suckers, Kermes oaks have become scarce, due to their replacement in wet zones by larger species such as Holm oak. It has also suffered from extensive culling for use as charcoal and it is the only food and shelter for wildlife in some areas, such as the Ebro valley and other dry areas where chaparral replaces oaks due to low rainfall. It is the last Quercus genus species to disappear when rainfall is lacking and their ecological importance is as a habitat and food source in these areas for nesting birds, foxes, rodents and wild boars
