1.
Communes of France
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The commune is a level of administrative division in the French Republic. French communes are roughly equivalent to civil townships incorporated municipalities in the United States or Gemeinden in Germany, the United Kingdom has no exact equivalent, as communes resemble districts in urban areas, but are closer to parishes in rural areas where districts are much larger. Communes are based on historical geographic communities or villages and have received significant powers of governance to manage the populations, the communes are the fourth-level administrative divisions of France. A French commune may be a city of 2.2 million inhabitants like Paris, communes typically are based on pre-existing villages and facilitate local governance. All communes have names, but not all named geographic areas or groups of people residing together are communes, a commune is a town, city, or municipality. Use of commune in English is a habit, and one that might be corrected. There is nothing in commune in French that is different from town in English. The French word commune appeared in the 12th century, from Medieval Latin communia, as of January 2015, there were 36,681 communes in France,36,552 of them in metropolitan France and 129 of them overseas. This is a higher total than that of any other European country. The whole territory of the French Republic is divided into communes and this is unlike some other countries, such as the United States, where unincorporated areas directly governed by a county or a higher authority can be found. There are only a few exceptions, COM of Saint-Martin and it was previously a commune inside the Guadeloupe région. The commune structure was abolished when Saint-Martin became an overseas collectivity on 22 February 2007, COM of Wallis and Futuna, which still is divided according to the three traditional chiefdoms. It was previously a commune inside the Guadeloupe region, the commune structure was abolished when Saint-Barthélemy became an overseas collectivity on 22 February 2007.88 square kilometres. The median area of metropolitan Frances communes at the 1999 census was even smaller, the median area is a better measure of the area of a typical French commune. This median area is smaller than that of most European countries. In Italy, the area of communes is 22 km2, in Belgium it is 40 km2, in Spain it is 35 km2, and in Germany. Switzerland and the Länder of Rhineland-Palatinate, Schleswig-Holstein, and Thuringia in Germany were the places in Europe where the communes had a smaller median area than in France. The communes of Frances overseas départements such as Réunion and French Guiana are large by French standards and they usually group into the same commune several villages or towns, often with sizeable distances among them
2.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
3.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
4.
Regions of France
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France is divided into 18 administrative regions, including 13 metropolitan regions and 5 overseas regions. The current legal concept of region was adopted in 1982, the term région was officially created by the Law of Decentralisation, which also gave regions their legal status. The first direct elections for representatives took place on 16 March 1986. In 2016, the number of regions was reduced from 27 to 18 through amalgamation, in 2014, the French parliament passed a law reducing the number of metropolitan regions from 22 to 13 with effect from 1 January 2016. However, the region of Upper and Lower Normandy is simply called Normandy. Permanent names were to be proposed by the new regional councils by 1 July 2016, the legislation defining the new regions also allowed the Centre region to officially change its name to Centre-Val de Loire with effect from January 2015. Two regions, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, opted to retain their interim names, between 1982 and 2015, there were 22 regions in Metropolitan France. Before 2011, there were four regions, in 2011 Mayotte became the fifth. Regions lack separate legislative authority and therefore cannot write their own statutory law and they levy their own taxes and, in return, receive a decreasing part of their budget from the central government, which gives them a portion of the taxes it levies. They also have considerable budgets managed by a council made up of representatives voted into office in regional elections. A regions primary responsibility is to build and furnish high schools, in March 2004, the French central government unveiled a controversial plan to transfer regulation of certain categories of non-teaching school staff to the regional authorities. Critics of this plan contended that tax revenue was insufficient to pay for the costs. In addition, regions have considerable power over infrastructural spending, e. g. education, public transit, universities and research. This has meant that the heads of regions such as Île-de-France or Rhône-Alpes can be high-profile positions. Number of regions controlled by each coalition since 1986, Overseas region is a recent designation, given to the overseas departments that have similar powers to those of the regions of metropolitan France. Radio France Internationale in English Overseas regions Ministère de lOutre-Mer some explanations about the past and current developments of DOMs and TOMs
5.
Normandy
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Normandy is one of the regions of France, roughly corresponding to the historical Duchy of Normandy. Administratively, Normandy is divided into five departments, Calvados, Eure, Manche, Orne and it covers 30,627 km², forming roughly 5% of the territory of France. Its population of 3.37 million accounts for around 5% of the population of France, Normans is the name given to the inhabitants of Normandy, and the region is the homeland of the Norman language. The historical region of Normandy comprised the region of Normandy, as well as small areas now part of the départements, or departments of Mayenne. For a century and a following the Norman conquest of England in 1066, Normandy and England were linked by Norman. Archaeological finds, such as paintings, prove that humans were present in the region in prehistoric times. Celts invaded Normandy in successive waves from the 4th to the 3rd century BC, when Julius Caesar invaded Gaul, there were nine different Celtic tribes living in Normandy. The Romanisation of Normandy was achieved by the methods, Roman roads. Classicists have knowledge of many Gallo-Roman villas in Normandy, in the late 3rd century, barbarian raids devastated Normandy. Coastal settlements were raided by Saxon pirates, Christianity also began to enter the area during this period. In 406, Germanic tribes began invading from the east, while the Saxons subjugated the Norman coast, the Roman Emperor withdrew from most of Normandy. As early as 487, the area between the River Somme and the River Loire came under the control of the Frankish lord Clovis, the Vikings started to raid the Seine Valley during the middle of the 9th century. As early as 841, a Viking fleet appeared at the mouth of the Seine, after attacking and destroying monasteries, including one at Jumièges, they took advantage of the power vacuum created by the disintegration of Charlemagnes empire to take northern France. The fiefdom of Normandy was created for the Norwegian Viking leader Hrólfr Ragnvaldsson, Rollo had besieged Paris but in 911 entered vassalage to the king of the West Franks, Charles the Simple, through the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte. In exchange for his homage and fealty, Rollo legally gained the territory which he, the name Normandy reflects Rollos Viking origins. The descendants of Rollo and his followers adopted the local Gallo-Romance language and they became the Normans – a Norman-speaking mixture of Saxons and indigenous Franks and Celts. Besides the Norman conquest of England and the subsequent conquests of Wales and Ireland, Norman families, such as that of Tancred of Hauteville, Rainulf Drengot and Guimond de Moulins played important parts in the Norman conquest of southern Italy and Crusades. They also carved out a place for themselves and their descendants in the Crusader states of Asia Minor, the 14th century Norman explorer Jean de Béthencourt established a kingdom in the Canary Islands
6.
Departments of France
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In the administrative divisions of France, the department is one of the three levels of government below the national level, between the administrative regions and the commune. There are 96 departments in metropolitan France and 5 overseas departments, each department is administered by an elected body called a departmental council. From 1800 to April 2015, they were called general councils, the departments were created in 1791 as a rational replacement of Ancien Régime provinces with a view to strengthen national unity, the title department is used to mean a part of a larger whole. Almost all of them were named after geographical features rather than after historical or cultural territories which could have their own loyalties. The earliest known suggestion of it is from 1764 in the writings of dArgenson and they have inspired similar divisions in many countries, some of them former French colonies. Most French departments are assigned a number, the Official Geographical Code. Some overseas departments have a three-digit number, the number is used, for example, in the postal code, and was until recently used for all vehicle registration plates. For example, inhabitants of Loiret might refer to their department as the 45 and this reform project has since been abandoned. The first French territorial departments were proposed in 1665 by Marc-René dArgenson to serve as administrative areas purely for the Ponts et Chaussées infrastructure administration, before the French Revolution, France gained territory gradually through the annexation of a mosaic of independent entities. By the close of the Ancien Régime, it was organised into provinces, during the period of the Revolution, these were dissolved, partly in order to weaken old loyalties. Their boundaries served two purposes, Boundaries were chosen to break up Frances historical regions in an attempt to erase cultural differences, Boundaries were set so that every settlement in the country was within a days ride of the capital of the department. This was a security measure, intended to keep the national territory under close control. This measure was directly inspired by the Great Terror, during which the government had lost control of rural areas far from any centre of government. The old nomenclature was carefully avoided in naming the new departments, most were named after an areas principal river or other physical features. Even Paris was in the department of Seine, the number of departments, initially 83, was increased to 130 by 1809 with the territorial gains of the Republic and of the First French Empire. Following Napoleons defeats in 1814-1815, the Congress of Vienna returned France to its pre-war size, in 1860, France acquired the County of Nice and Savoy, which led to the creation of three new departments. Two were added from the new Savoyard territory, while the department of Alpes-Maritimes was created from Nice, the 89 departments were given numbers based on their alphabetical order. The department of Bas-Rhin and parts of Meurthe, Moselle, Vosges and Haut-Rhin were ceded to the German Empire in 1871, following Frances defeat in the Franco-Prussian War
7.
Calvados (department)
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Calvados is a department in the Normandy region in northwestern France. It takes its name from a cluster of rocks off the English Channel coast, Calvados is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on 4 March 1790. It was created from a part of the province of Normandy. The name Orne inférieure was originally proposed for the department, one popular legend ascribes its etymology to the Salvador, a ship from the Spanish Armada that sank by the rocks near Arromanches-les-bains in 1588. It is more likely, however, that the name Calvados was derived from calva dorsa, meaning bare backs, after the allied victory at Waterloo the department was occupied by Prussian troops between June 1815 and November 1818. On 6 June 1944, the Allied forces landed on the beaches of the Bay of the Seine in what known as the Battle of Normandy. Calvados belongs to the region of Normandy and is surrounded by the departments of Seine-Maritime, Eure, Orne, to the north is the Baie de la Seine, part of the English Channel. On the east, the Seine River forms the boundary with Seine-Maritime, Calvados includes the Bessin area, the Pays dAuge and the area known as the Suisse normande. The most notable places in Calvados include Deauville and the formerly elegant 19th-century casino resorts of the coast, agriculture dominates the economy of Calvados. The area is known for producing butter, cheese, cider and Calvados, the President of the General Council is the centrist Jean-Léonce Dupont, the former dominant figure of the right and centre in the department. The Conseil General of Calvados and Devon County Council signed a Twinning Charter in 1971 to develop links with the English county of Devon, the inhabitants of Calvados are called Calvadosiens and Calvadosiennes. In 1999, Calvados had 648,299 inhabitants, making it the 30th most populated French department, Juno Beach Centre at Courseulles-sur-Mer, Calvados, commemorates the D-Day landing of the Canadian liberation forces at Juno Beach during World War II in 1944. The cult of Saint Thérèse de Lisieux brings large numbers of people on pilgrimage to Lisieux, every September, Deauville hosts the Festival of the American Movie and the beach resort of Cabourg hosts the Festival of the Romantic Movie. Annually, the city of Caen celebrates the festival of the electronical cultures called Nordik Impakt & The festival of Beauregard, the local dialect of the Norman language is known as Augeron. It is spoken by a minority of the population, the culinary specialties from the verdant countryside of Calvados are abundant, cider, calvados, camembert and Pont-lÉvêque cheeses. One of the advantage of Calvados is to be fairly near large urban centers, Calvados is therefore often preferred for holidays and for weekends and sometimes considered as the countryside of Paris. Calvados, via the port of Ouistreham, is an entrance to the continent from Britain, there are two airports, Caen-Carpiquet and Deauville-Saint Gatien. The department of Calvados has several popular tourist areas, the Bessin, the Plain of Caen, the Bocage Virois, the Côte de Nacre, the Côte Fleurie, several beaches of Calvados are popular for water sports, including Cabourg and Merville-Franceville-Plage
8.
Daylight saving time
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Daylight saving time is the practice of advancing clocks during summer months by one hour so that evening daylight lasts an hour longer, while sacrificing normal sunrise times. Typically, regions that use Daylight Savings Time adjust clocks forward one hour close to the start of spring, American inventor and politician Benjamin Franklin proposed a form of daylight time in 1784. New Zealander George Hudson proposed the idea of saving in 1895. The German Empire and Austria-Hungary organized the first nationwide implementation, starting on April 30,1916, many countries have used it at various times since then, particularly since the energy crisis of the 1970s. The practice has both advocates and critics, DST clock shifts sometimes complicate timekeeping and can disrupt travel, billing, record keeping, medical devices, heavy equipment, and sleep patterns. Computer software often adjusts clocks automatically, but policy changes by various jurisdictions of DST dates, industrialized societies generally follow a clock-based schedule for daily activities that do not change throughout the course of the year. The time of day that individuals begin and end work or school, North and south of the tropics daylight lasts longer in summer and shorter in winter, with the effect becoming greater as one moves away from the tropics. However, they will have one hour of daylight at the start of each day. Supporters have also argued that DST decreases energy consumption by reducing the need for lighting and heating, DST is also of little use for locations near the equator, because these regions see only a small variation in daylight in the course of the year. After ancient times, equal-length civil hours eventually supplanted unequal, so civil time no longer varies by season, unequal hours are still used in a few traditional settings, such as some monasteries of Mount Athos and all Jewish ceremonies. This 1784 satire proposed taxing window shutters, rationing candles, and waking the public by ringing church bells, despite common misconception, Franklin did not actually propose DST, 18th-century Europe did not even keep precise schedules. However, this changed as rail transport and communication networks came to require a standardization of time unknown in Franklins day. Modern DST was first proposed by the New Zealand entomologist George Hudson, whose shift work job gave him time to collect insects. An avid golfer, he also disliked cutting short his round at dusk and his solution was to advance the clock during the summer months, a proposal he published two years later. The proposal was taken up by the Liberal Member of Parliament Robert Pearce, a select committee was set up to examine the issue, but Pearces bill did not become law, and several other bills failed in the following years. Willett lobbied for the proposal in the UK until his death in 1915, william Sword Frost, mayor of Orillia, Ontario, introduced daylight saving time in the municipality during his tenure from 1911 to 1912. Starting on April 30,1916, the German Empire and its World War I ally Austria-Hungary were the first to use DST as a way to conserve coal during wartime, Britain, most of its allies, and many European neutrals soon followed suit. Russia and a few other countries waited until the year
9.
Central European Summer Time
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It corresponds to UTC + two hours. Other names which have been applied to Central European Summer Time are Middle European Summer Time, Central European Daylight Saving Time, and Bravo Time. Since 1996 European Summer Time has been observed between 1,00 UTC on the last Sunday of March and 1,00 on the last Sunday of October, the following countries and territories use Central European Summer Time. In addition, Libya used CEST during the years 1951–1959, 1982–1989, 1996–1997, European Summer Time Other countries and territories in UTC+2 time zone Other names of UTC+2 time zone
10.
Race track
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A race track is a facility built for racing of vehicles, athletes, or animals. A race track also may feature grandstands or concourses, racetracks are also used in the study of animal locomotion. Some motorsport tracks are called speedways, a racetrack is a permanent facility or building. Racecourse is a term for a horse racing track, found in countries such as the United Kingdom, India, Australia, Hong Kong. Race tracks built for bicycles are known as velodromes, circuit is a common alternate term for racetrack, given the circuit configuration of most race tracks, allowing races to occur over several laps. A race course, as opposed to a racecourse, is a term for non-permanent tracks for sports, particularly running, water sports, road racing. Many sports usually held on racetracks also can occur on temporary tracks, there is some evidence of racetracks being developed in several ancient civilizations. The most developed ancient racetracks were the hippodromes of the Ancient Greeks, both of these structures were designed for horse and chariot racing. The stadium of the Circus Maximus in Ancient Rome could hold 200,000 spectators, racing facilities existed during the Middle Ages, and there are records of a public racecourse being opened at Newmarket in London in 1174. In 1780 the Earl of Derby created a course on his estate at Epsom. Racecourses in the British Isles are based on grass, known as turf tracks, in the United States, the race tracks are dirt. With the advent of the automobile in the late twentieth century. The earliest tracks were modified horse racing courses, racing automobiles in such facilities began in September 1896, at Narragansett Park in Cranston, Rhode Island. The Indianapolis Motor Speedway was opened in August 1909, beginning in the early 1900s, motorcycle races were run on high, banked, wooden race tracks called board tracks. During the 1920s, many of the races on the AAA Championship circuit were run on board tracks. Modern racetracks are designed with safety being paramount, following incidents of spectator. These often involve run off areas, barriers, and high fencing, several racetracks are incorporated into larger venues or complexes, incorporating golf courses, museums, hotels, and conference centres. Some racetracks are small enough to be contained indoors, for such as motocross, cycling
11.
Port
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A port is a location on a coast or shore containing one or more harbors where ships can dock and transfer people or cargo to or from land. Port locations are selected to optimize access to land and navigable water, for commercial demand, Ports with deeper water are rarer, but can handle larger ships. Since ports throughout history handled every kind of traffic, support and storage facilities vary widely, may extend for miles, some ports have an important military role. One of the worlds oldest known artificial harbors is at Wadi al-Jarf on the Red Sea, along with the finding of harbor structures, ancient anchors have also been found. Guangzhou was an important port during the ancient times as far back as the Qin Dynasty, canopus was the principal port in Egypt for Greek trade before the foundation of Alexandria. Athens port of Piraeus was the base for the Athenian fleet, lothal is one of the most prominent cities of the ancient Indus valley civilisation, located in the Bhāl region of the modern state of Gujarāt and dating from 3700 BCE. Ostia Antica was the port of ancient Rome with Portus established by Claudius, Ports often have cargo-handling equipment, such as cranes and forklifts for use in loading ships, which may be provided by private interests or public bodies. Often, canneries or other processing facilities will be located nearby, some ports feature canals, which allow ships further movement inland. Access to intermodal transportation, such as railroads and highways, is critical to a port, so that passengers, Ports with international traffic have customs facilities. Harbor pilots and tugboats may maneuver large ships in tight quarters when near docks, the terms port and seaport are used for different types of port facilities that handle ocean-going vessels, and river port is used for river traffic, such as barges and other shallow-draft vessels. An inland port is a port on a lake, river, or canal with access to a sea or ocean. An example of this is the St. Lawrence Seaway which allows ships to travel from the Atlantic Ocean several thousand kilometers inland to Great Lakes ports like Duluth-Superior, a fishing port is a port or harbor for landing and distributing fish. It may be a facility, but it is usually commercial. A fishing port is the port that depends on an ocean product. In recent decades, regulations to save fishing stock may limit the use of a fishing port, a dry port is an inland intermodal terminal directly connected by road or rail to a seaport and operating as a centre for the transshipment of sea cargo to inland destinations. A warm-water port is one where the water does not freeze in wintertime, because they are available year-round, warm-water ports can be of great geopolitical or economic interest. A seaport is further categorized as a port or a cargo port. Additionally, cruise ports are known as a home port or a port of call
12.
Casino
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A casino is a facility which houses and accommodates certain types of gambling activities. The industry that deals in casinos is called the gaming industry, casinos are most commonly built near or combined with hotels, restaurants, retail shopping, cruise ships or other tourist attractions. There is much debate whether or not the social and economic consequences of casino gambling outweigh the initial revenue that may be generated. Some casinos are also known for hosting live entertainment events, such as comedy, concerts. The term casino is a confusing linguistic false friend for translators, Casino is of Italian origin, the root casa originally meant a small country villa, summerhouse, or social club. In modern-day Italian, the term designates a bordello, while the gambling house is spelled casinò with an accent. Not all casinos were used for gaming, the Copenhagen Casino was a theatre, known for the mass public meetings often held in its hall during the 1848 Revolution, which made Denmark a constitutional monarchy. Until 1937, it was a well-known Danish theatre, the Hanko Casino in Hanko, Finland—one of that towns most conspicuous landmarks—was never used for gambling. Rather, it was a hall for the Russian nobility which frequented this spa resort in the late 19th century and is now used as a restaurant. In military and non-military usage in German and Spanish, a casino or kasino is an officers mess, in Italian—the source-language of the word—a casino is either a brothel, a mess, or a noisy environment, while a gaming house is called a casinò. The precise origin of gambling is unknown and it is generally believed that gambling in some form or another has been seen in almost every society in history. From the Ancient Greeks and Romans to Napoleons France and Elizabethan England and it was closed in 1774 as the city government felt it was impoverishing the local gentry. In American history, early gambling establishments were known as saloons, the creation and importance of saloons was greatly influenced by four major cities, New Orleans, St. Louis, Chicago and San Francisco. It was in the saloons that travelers could find people to talk to, drink with, during the early 20th century in America, gambling became outlawed and banned by state legislation and social reformers of the time. However, in 1931, gambling was legalized throughout the state of Nevada, Americas first legalized casinos were set up in those places. In 1976 New Jersey allowed gambling in Atlantic City, now Americas second largest gambling city, most jurisdictions worldwide have a minimum gambling age. Customers gamble by playing games of chance, in cases with an element of skill, such as craps, roulette, baccarat, blackjack. Most games played have mathematically determined odds that ensure the house has at all times an overall advantage over the players and this can be expressed more precisely by the notion of expected value, which is uniformly negative
13.
Seaside resort
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A seaside resort is a resort town or resort hotel, located on the coast. Sometimes it is also an officially accredited title, that is awarded to a town when the requirements are met. Where a beach is the focus for tourists, it may be called a beach resort. The coast has always been a recreational environment, although until the mid-nineteenth century, even in Roman times, the town of Baiae, by the Tyrrhenian Sea in Italy, was a resort for those who were sufficiently prosperous. Mersea Island, in Essex, England was a holiday destination for wealthy Romans living in Colchester. The development of the beach as a leisure resort from the mid-19th century was the first manifestation of what is now the global tourist industry. The first seaside resorts were opened in the 18th century for the aristocracy, the first rolling bathing machines were introduced by 1735. In 1793, Heiligendamm in Mecklenburg, Germany was founded as the first seaside resort of the European continent and this trend was praised and artistically elevated by the new romantic ideal of the picturesque landscape, Jane Austens unfinished novel Sanditon is an example of that. The extension of this form of leisure to the middle and working class began with the development of the railways in the 1840s, in particular, the completion of a branch line to the small seaside town Blackpool from Poulton led to a sustained economic and demographic boom. The growth was intensified by the practice among the Lancashire cotton mill owners of closing the factories for an every year to service. These became known as wakes weeks, each towns mills would close for a different week, allowing Blackpool to manage a steady and reliable stream of visitors over a prolonged period in the summer. A prominent feature of the resort was the promenade and the pleasure piers, in 1863, the North Pier in Blackpool was completed, rapidly becoming a centre of attraction for elite visitors. Central Pier was completed in 1868, with a theatre and a large dance floor. Many popular beach resorts were equipped with bathing machines because even the all-covering beachwear of the period was considered immodest, by the end of the century the English coastline had over 100 large resort towns, some with populations exceeding 50,000. The development of the seaside resort abroad was stimulated by the well developed English love of the beach, the French Riviera alongside the Mediterranean had already become a popular destination for the British upper class by the end of the 18th century. In 1864, the first railway to Nice was completed, making the Riviera accessible to visitors all over Europe. By 1874, residents of foreign enclaves in Nice, most of whom were British, the coastline became renowned for attracting the royalty of Europe, including Queen Victoria and King Edward VII. Continental European attitudes towards gambling and nudity tended to be more lax than in Britain, the place was renamed Monte Carlo
14.
Upper class
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The upper class in modern societies is the social class composed of the wealthiest members of society, who also wield the greatest political power. According to this view, the class is generally distinguished by immense wealth which is passed on from generation to generation. Prior to the 20th century, the aristocracy was widely used. The term is used in conjunction with terms like upper-middle class, middle class. Upper-class status commonly derived from the position of ones family. Much of the population that composed the upper consisted of aristocrats, ruling families, titled people. These people were born into their status and historically there was not much movement across class boundaries. This is to say that it was harder for an individual to move up in class simply because of the structure of society. The Transatlantic Slave Trade also helped create a class of white Europeans while maintaining a lower class of black Europeans, Americans and Africans. This fact is often edited out of academic research both in publications and online ones such as Wikipedia. In many countries, the upper class was intimately associated with hereditary land ownership. Political power was often in the hands of the landowners in many pre-industrial societies despite there being no legal barriers to land ownership for other social classes. Upper-class landowners in Europe were often members of the titled nobility, though not necessarily. Some upper classes were almost entirely untitled, for example, the Szlachta of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, in England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, the upper class traditionally comprised the landed gentry and the aristocracy of noble families with hereditary titles. The vast majority of post-medieval aristocratic families originated in the merchant class and were ennobled between the 14th and 19th centuries while intermarrying with the old nobility and gentry. Since the Second World War, the term has come to encompass rich, members of the English gentry organized the colonization of Virginia and New England and ruled these colonies for generations forming the foundation of the American upper class or East Coast Elite. In this respect, the US differs little from such as the UK where membership of the upper class is also dependent on other factors. The American upper class is estimated to less than 1% of the population
15.
In Search of Lost Time
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In Search of Lost Time – previously also translated as Remembrance of Things Past – is a novel in seven volumes, written by Marcel Proust. The novel began to shape in 1909. Proust continued to work on it until his illness in the autumn of 1922 forced him to break off. Proust established the early on, but even after volumes were initially finished he kept adding new material. The work was published in France between 1913 and 1927, Proust paid for the publication of the first volume after it had been turned down by leading editors who had been offered the manuscript in longhand. The novel had great influence on literature, some writers have sought to emulate it. In the centenary year of Du côté de chez Swann, Edmund White pronounced À la recherche du temps perdu the most respected novel of the twentieth century. The novel was published in seven volumes, Swanns Way was rejected by a number of publishers, including Fasquelle, Ollendorff. Proust eventually arranged with the publisher Grasset to pay the cost of publication himself, when published it was advertised as the first of a three-volume novel. Du côté de chez Swann is divided into four parts, Combray I, Combray II, Un Amour de Swann, a third-person novella within Du côté de chez Swann, Un Amour de Swann is sometimes published as a volume by itself. Combray I is also similarly excerpted, it ends with the famous madeleine cake episode, in early 1914 Gide, who had been involved in NRFs rejection of the book, wrote to Proust to apologize and to offer congratulations on the novel. For several days I have been unable to put your book down, Gallimard offered to publish the remaining volumes, but Proust chose to stay with Grasset. In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower was scheduled to be published in 1914 but was delayed by the onset of World War I, at the same time, Grassets firm was closed down when the publisher went into military service. This freed Proust to move to Gallimard, where all of the subsequent volumes were published, meanwhile, the novel kept growing in length and in conception. When published, the novel was awarded the Prix Goncourt in 1919, the Guermantes Way was originally published in two volumes as Le Côté de Guermantes I and Le Côté de Guermantes II. Sodom and Gomorrah was originally published in two volumes, the first forty pages of Sodome et Gomorrhe initially appeared at the end of Le Côté de Guermantes II, the remainder appearing as Sodome et Gomorrhe I and Sodome et Gomorrhe II. It was the last volume over which Proust supervised publication before his death in November 1922, the publication of the remaining volumes was carried out by his brother, Robert Proust, and Jacques Rivière. The Prisoner is the first volume of the section within In Search of Lost Time known as le Roman dAlbertine, the name Albertine first appears in Prousts notebooks in 1913
16.
William the Conqueror
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William I, usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman King of England, reigning from 1066 until his death in 1087. A descendant of Rollo, he was Duke of Normandy from 1035 onward, after a long struggle to establish his power, by 1060 his hold on Normandy was secure, and he launched the Norman conquest of England six years later. The rest of his life was marked by struggles to consolidate his hold over England and his continental lands, William was the son of the unmarried Robert I, Duke of Normandy, by Roberts mistress Herleva. His illegitimate status and his youth caused some difficulties for him after he succeeded his father, during his childhood and adolescence, members of the Norman aristocracy battled each other, both for control of the child duke and for their own ends. In 1047 William was able to quash a rebellion and begin to establish his authority over the duchy and his marriage in the 1050s to Matilda of Flanders provided him with a powerful ally in the neighbouring county of Flanders. By the time of his marriage, William was able to arrange the appointments of his supporters as bishops and his consolidation of power allowed him to expand his horizons, and by 1062 William was able to secure control of the neighbouring county of Maine. In the 1050s and early 1060s William became a contender for the throne of England, then held by the childless Edward the Confessor, his first cousin once removed. There were other claimants, including the powerful English earl Harold Godwinson. William argued that Edward had previously promised the throne to him, William built a large fleet and invaded England in September 1066, decisively defeating and killing Harold at the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066. After further military efforts William was crowned king on Christmas Day 1066 and he made arrangements for the governance of England in early 1067 before returning to Normandy. Several unsuccessful rebellions followed, but by 1075 Williams hold on England was mostly secure, Williams final years were marked by difficulties in his continental domains, troubles with his eldest son, and threatened invasions of England by the Danes. In 1086 William ordered the compilation of the Domesday Book, a listing all the landholders in England along with their holdings. William died in September 1087 while leading a campaign in northern France and his reign in England was marked by the construction of castles, the settling of a new Norman nobility on the land, and change in the composition of the English clergy. He did not try to integrate his various domains into one empire, Williams lands were divided after his death, Normandy went to his eldest son, Robert Curthose, and his second surviving son, William Rufus, received England. Norsemen first began raiding in what became Normandy in the late 8th century, permanent Scandinavian settlement occurred before 911, when Rollo, one of the Viking leaders, and King Charles the Simple of France reached an agreement surrendering the county of Rouen to Rollo. The lands around Rouen became the core of the duchy of Normandy. Normandy may have used as a base when Scandinavian attacks on England were renewed at the end of the 10th century. In an effort to improve matters, King Æthelred the Unready took Emma of Normandy, sister of Duke Richard II, as his second wife in 1002
17.
Onobrychis
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Onobrychis, the sainfoins, are Eurasian perennial herbs of the legume family. Including doubtfully distinct species and provisionally accepted taxa, about 150 species are presently known. The Flora Europaea lists 23 species of Onobrychis, the centre of diversity extends from Central Asia to Iran. O. viciifolia is naturalized throughout many countries in Europe and North America grasslands on calcareous soils, sainfoins are mostly subtropical plants, but their range extends throughout Europe as far north as southern Sweden. These plants grow on grassland, agricultural land and wasteland, the leaves are pinnate, alternate, with 6 to 14 pairs of oblong to linear leaflets. Sainfoins have pale pink flowers, typically blooming between June and September and pollinated by bees and solitary bees. The rounded single-seeded pods bear prominent spikes or similar protrusions in many species, enabling them to cling to the fur of large mammals and be thus distributed. These highly nutritious plants were an important forage for heavy working horses in agriculture, because sainfoins are rich in tannins which protect proteins from hydrolysis in the rumen, the proteins are instead absorbed in the abomasum. Onobrychis typically have a taproot and so are very drought resistant. Thus they are grown in any significant extent, though O. viciifolia is met with somewhat more regularly. Onobrychis species are used as food plants by the caterpillars of some Lepidoptera species, such as the case-bearer moth Coleophora colutella, Sainfoin provides a superb forage for grazing animals and voluntary intake of sainfoin by cattle and sheep is 20% higher than for grass. Unlike many other legumes, it is non-bloating and is known to have anthelmintic properties, Sainfoin contains condensed tannins, and it is these that protect animals against bloat. Sainfoin has also shown to increase protein absorption. This, combined with its other benefits, mean that animals grazing sainfoin have very rapid liveweight gains, so young stock can be finished sooner. Sainfoin is therefore useful to low input and organic farmers. Yields can be high at around 16t DM per hectare. Methods and research techniques have been studied and developed to specifically at Sainfoin polyphenols which include tannins. There are significant differences between Sainfoin types and this lead to further development of Sainfoin plant breeding
18.
Duke
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A duke or duchess can either be a monarch ruling over a duchy or a member of the nobility, historically of highest rank below the monarch. During the Middle Ages the title signified first among the Germanic monarchies, Dukes were the rulers of the provinces and the superiors of the counts in the cities and later, in the feudal monarchies, the highest-ranking peers of the king. During the 19th century many of the smaller German and Italian states were ruled by Dukes or Grand Dukes, but at present, with the exception of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, there are no dukes ruling as monarchs. Duke remains the highest hereditary title in Portugal, Spain, in Sweden, members of the Royal Family are given a personal dukedom at birth. The Pope, as a sovereign, has also, though rarely. In some realms the relative status of duke and prince, as borne by the nobility rather than by members of reigning dynasties, varied—e. g. in Italy. A woman who holds in her own right the title to such duchy or dukedom, Queen Elizabeth II, however, is known by tradition as Duke of Normandy in the Channel Islands and Duke of Lancaster in Lancashire. A duchy is the territory or geopolitical entity ruled by a duke, a dukedom is the title or status of a duke, a rank in the present or past nobility, and is not necessarily attached to a duchy. A few examples exist today, The Grand Duchy of Luxembourg is a independent state and its head. In Scotland the male heir apparent to the British crown is always the Duke of Rothesay as well, the Channel Islands are two of the three remaining Crown Dependencies, the last vestiges of the lands of the Duchy of Normandy. The Islanders in their loyal toast will say La Reine, notre Duc, however, the Channel Islands, part of the lost Duchy, remained a self-governing possession of the English Crown. While the islands today retain autonomy in government, they owe allegiance to The Queen in her role as Duke of Normandy. During the Middle Ages, after Roman power in Western Europe collapsed, in 1332, Robert of Taranto succeeded his father, Philip. John took the style of Duke of Durazzo, in 1368, Durazzo fell to Karl Thopia, who was recognized by Venice as Prince of Albania. The Visigoths retained the Roman divisions of their kingdom in the Iberian Peninsula and they were the most powerful landowners and, along with the bishops, elected the king, usually from their own midst. They were the commanders and in this capacity often acted independently from the king. The army was structured decimally with the highest unit, the thiufa, the cities were commanded by counts, who were in turn answerable to the dukes, who called up the thiufae when necessary. When the Lombards entered Italy, the Latin chroniclers called their war leaders duces in the old fashion and these leaders eventually became the provincial rulers, each with a recognized seat of government
19.
Charles de Morny, Duke of Morny
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Charles Auguste Louis Joseph Demorny/de Morny, 1er Duc de Morny was a French statesman. He was the son of Hortense de Beauharnais and Charles Joseph, Comte de Flahaut, making him half-brother of Emperor Napoleon III. M. Demorny was in fact an officer in the Prussian army and his father was in fact Charles de Flahaut. His mother, Hortense de Beauharnais was the stepdaughter of Napoléon Bonaparte and he was educated by his grandmother, Adelaïde Filleul. After a brilliant school and college career the future duc de Morny received a commission in the army, and the next year he entered the staff college. The comte de Morny, as he was called by a fiction, served in Algeria in 1834–1835 as aide-de-camp to General Camille Alphonse Trezel. In these and other lucrative speculations he was helped by his mistress Françoise Mosselman, eventually there were few great commercial enterprises in Paris in which he did not have an interest. Although he sat as deputy for Clermont-Ferrand from 1842 onwards, he took at first no important part in party politics, but he was heard with respect on industrial and financial questions. His attitude was expressed by the witticism with which he is said to have replied to a lady who asked what he would do if the Chamber were swept out, range myself on the side of the broom handle, was his answer. He then resumed his financial speculations, when in 1854 the Emperor appointed him president of the Corps Législatif, a position which he filled for the rest of his life, he used his official rank to assist his schemes. His wifes connections greatly strengthened his social position, sophie was legally daughter of Prince Sergey Vasilyevich Trubetskoy, but may have been the illegitimate daughter of Nicholas I of Russia. In 1862, Morny was created a Duke and it is said that he aspired to the throne of Mexico, and that the French expedition sent to place Archduke Maximilian on the throne was prompted by Napoleon IIIs desire to thwart this ambition. But while he was laying the foundations of the Liberal Empire his health deteriorated and was injured by quack medicines. The emperor and the empress visited him just before his death in Paris on 10 March 1865, mornys valuable collection of pictures, including Jean-Honoré Fragonards The Swing, was sold after his death. Morny played an important role in the development of the horse racing and breeding industry in France. In 1860, he purchased the English Triple Crown champion West Australian, in 1862 Morny built the Deauville-La Touques Race Course near Deauville. The Prix Morny is named in his honor, in 1832, the Count took the French Romantic painter Eugène Delacroix with him on a diplomatic mission to Tangier, exposing the artist to life outside of cloudy, overcast Paris. He married María de la Purificación Dorticos-Marín y León, Marquesa de Marín, Auguste Charles Louis Valentin de Morny, who succeeded his father as the 2nd Duc de Morny
20.
Napoleon III
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Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte was the only President of the French Second Republic and, as Napoleon III, the Emperor of the Second French Empire. He was the nephew and heir of Napoleon I and he was the first President of France to be elected by a direct popular vote. He remains the longest-serving French head of state since the French Revolution, during the first years of the Empire, Napoleons government imposed censorship and harsh repressive measures against his opponents. Some six thousand were imprisoned or sent to penal colonies until 1859, thousands more went into voluntary exile abroad, including Victor Hugo. From 1862 onwards, he relaxed government censorship, and his came to be known as the Liberal Empire. Many of his opponents returned to France and became members of the National Assembly, Napoleon III is best known today for his grand reconstruction of Paris, carried out by his prefect of the Seine, Baron Haussmann. He launched similar public works projects in Marseille, Lyon, Napoleon III modernized the French banking system, greatly expanded and consolidated the French railway system, and made the French merchant marine the second largest in the world. He promoted the building of the Suez Canal and established modern agriculture, Napoleon III negotiated the 1860 Cobden–Chevalier free trade agreement with Britain and similar agreements with Frances other European trading partners. Social reforms included giving French workers the right to strike and the right to organize, womens education greatly expanded, as did the list of required subjects in public schools. In foreign policy, Napoleon III aimed to reassert French influence in Europe and he was a supporter of popular sovereignty and of nationalism. In Europe, he allied with Britain and defeated Russia in the Crimean War and his regime assisted Italian unification and, in doing so, annexed Savoy and the County of Nice to France, at the same time, his forces defended the Papal States against annexation by Italy. Napoleon doubled the area of the French overseas empire in Asia, the Pacific, on the other hand, his armys intervention in Mexico which aimed to create a Second Mexican Empire under French protection ended in failure. Beginning in 1866, Napoleon had to face the power of Prussia. In July 1870, Napoleon entered the Franco-Prussian War without allies, the French army was rapidly defeated and Napoleon III was captured at the Battle of Sedan. The French Third Republic was proclaimed in Paris, and Napoleon went into exile in England, charles-Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, later known as Louis Napoleon and then Napoleon III, was born in Paris on the night of 20–21 April 1808. His presumed father was Louis Bonaparte, the brother of Napoleon Bonaparte. His mother was Hortense de Beauharnais, the daughter by the first marriage of Napoleons wife Joséphine de Beauharnais, as empress, Joséphine proposed the marriage as a way to produce an heir for the Emperor, who agreed, as Joséphine was by then infertile. Louis married Hortense when he was twenty-four and she was nineteen and they had a difficult relationship, and only lived together for brief periods
21.
Hippodrome
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The hippodrome was an ancient Grecian stadium for horse racing and chariot racing. The name is derived from the Greek words hippos and dromos, the term is used in the modern French language and some others, with the meaning of horse racecourse. Hence, some horse racing tracks also include the word hippodrome in their names, such as the Hippodrome de Vincennes. The Greek hippodrome was similar to the Roman Circus, the hippodrome was not a Roman amphitheatre which was used for spectator sports, games and displays, or a Greek or Roman semi-circular theater used for theatrical performances. The Greek hippodrome was usually set out on the slope of a hill, one end of the hippodrome was semicircular, and the other end square with an extensive portico, in front of which, at a lower level, were the stalls for the horses and chariots. At both ends of the hippodrome there were posts that the turned around. This was the most dangerous part of the track, and the Greeks put an altar to Taraxippus there to show the spot where many chariots wrecked, a large ancient hippodrome was the Hippodrome of Constantinople, built between AD203 and 330. However, since it was built to a Roman design, it was actually a circus
22.
Coco Chanel
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Gabrielle Bonheur Coco Chanel was a French fashion designer and businesswoman. She was the founder and namesake of the Chanel brand, a prolific fashion creator, Chanel extended her influence beyond couture clothing, realising her design aesthetic in jewellery, handbags, and fragrance. 5, has become an iconic product and she is the only fashion designer listed on TIME magazines list of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century. Chanel designed her iconic interlocked-CC monograph, meaning Coco Chanel, using it since the 1920s, Chanel was known for her lifelong determination, ambition, and energy which she applied to her professional and social life. She achieved both financial success as a businesswoman and catapulted to prominence in French high society, thanks to the connections she made through her work. These included many artists and craftspeople to whom she became a patron and her social connections appeared to encourage a highly conservative personal outlook. One of Chanels lovers was a German military officer, Hans Gunther von Dincklage, after the war ended, Chanel was interrogated about her relationship with von Dincklage, but she was not charged as a collaborator. After several years in Switzerland after the war, she returned to Paris, in 2011, Hal Vaughan published a book on Chanel based on newly declassified documents of that era, revealing that she had collaborated with Germans in intelligence activities. One plan in late 1943 was for her to carry an SS separate peace overture to British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to end the war and she was Jeannes second child with Albert Chanel, the first, Julia, was born less than a year earlier. Albert Chanel was an itinerant street vendor who peddled work clothes and undergarments, living a life, traveling to. The family resided in rundown lodgings, in 1884, he married Jeanne Devolle, persuaded to do so by her family who had united, effectively, to pay Albert to marry her. At birth, Chanels name was entered into the registry as Chasnel. Jeanne was too unwell to attend the registration, and Albert was registered as travelling, with both parents absent, the infants last name was misspelled, probably due to a clerical error. The couple had five children who survived—two boys and three girls—who lived crowded into a lodging in the town of Brive-la-Gaillarde. When Gabrielle was 12, her mother died of bronchitis at the age of 32 and her father sent his two sons out to work as farm laborers and sent his three daughters to the Corrèze, in central France, to the convent of Aubazine, which ran an orphanage. Its religious order, the Congregation of the Sacred Heart of Mary, was founded to care for the poor and rejected and it was a stark, frugal life, demanding strict discipline. Despite the tragedy of this, being placed in the orphanage may have been the best thing for Coco’s future because it is where she learned to sew. At age eighteen, Chanel, too old to remain at Aubazine, later in her life, Chanel would retell the story of her childhood somewhat differently, she would often include more glamorous accounts, which were generally untrue
23.
World War I
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World War I, also known as the First World War, the Great War, or the War to End All Wars, was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. More than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, were mobilised in one of the largest wars in history and it was one of the deadliest conflicts in history, and paved the way for major political changes, including revolutions in many of the nations involved. The war drew in all the worlds great powers, assembled in two opposing alliances, the Allies versus the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary. These alliances were reorganised and expanded as more nations entered the war, Italy, Japan, the trigger for the war was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, by Yugoslav nationalist Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914. This set off a crisis when Austria-Hungary delivered an ultimatum to the Kingdom of Serbia. Within weeks, the powers were at war and the conflict soon spread around the world. On 25 July Russia began mobilisation and on 28 July, the Austro-Hungarians declared war on Serbia, Germany presented an ultimatum to Russia to demobilise, and when this was refused, declared war on Russia on 1 August. Germany then invaded neutral Belgium and Luxembourg before moving towards France, after the German march on Paris was halted, what became known as the Western Front settled into a battle of attrition, with a trench line that changed little until 1917. On the Eastern Front, the Russian army was successful against the Austro-Hungarians, in November 1914, the Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers, opening fronts in the Caucasus, Mesopotamia and the Sinai. In 1915, Italy joined the Allies and Bulgaria joined the Central Powers, Romania joined the Allies in 1916, after a stunning German offensive along the Western Front in the spring of 1918, the Allies rallied and drove back the Germans in a series of successful offensives. By the end of the war or soon after, the German Empire, Russian Empire, Austro-Hungarian Empire, national borders were redrawn, with several independent nations restored or created, and Germanys colonies were parceled out among the victors. During the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, the Big Four imposed their terms in a series of treaties, the League of Nations was formed with the aim of preventing any repetition of such a conflict. This effort failed, and economic depression, renewed nationalism, weakened successor states, and feelings of humiliation eventually contributed to World War II. From the time of its start until the approach of World War II, at the time, it was also sometimes called the war to end war or the war to end all wars due to its then-unparalleled scale and devastation. In Canada, Macleans magazine in October 1914 wrote, Some wars name themselves, during the interwar period, the war was most often called the World War and the Great War in English-speaking countries. Will become the first world war in the sense of the word. These began in 1815, with the Holy Alliance between Prussia, Russia, and Austria, when Germany was united in 1871, Prussia became part of the new German nation. Soon after, in October 1873, German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck negotiated the League of the Three Emperors between the monarchs of Austria-Hungary, Russia and Germany
24.
World War II
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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the worlds countries—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing alliances, the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust and the bombing of industrial and population centres. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history, from late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European colonies in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific. The Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, in 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy, thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies. World War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world, the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia, most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities, the start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939, the exact date of the wars end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945, rather than the formal surrender of Japan
25.
Normandy landings
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The Normandy landings were the landing operations on Tuesday,6 June 1944 of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during World War II. The largest seaborne invasion in history, the operation began the liberation of German-occupied northwestern Europe from Nazi control, planning for the operation began in 1943. Adolf Hitler placed German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel in command of German forces, the amphibious landings were preceded by extensive aerial and naval bombardment and an airborne assault—the landing of 24,000 American, British, and Canadian airborne troops shortly after midnight. Allied infantry and armoured divisions began landing on the coast of France at 06,30, the target 50-mile stretch of the Normandy coast was divided into five sectors, Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword. Strong winds blew the landing craft east of their positions, particularly at Utah. Casualties were heaviest at Omaha, with its high cliffs, at Gold, Juno, and Sword, several fortified towns were cleared in house-to-house fighting, and two major gun emplacements at Gold were disabled, using specialised tanks. The Allies failed to any of their goals on the first day. Carentan, St. Lô, and Bayeux remained in German hands, and Caen, German casualties on D-Day have been estimated at 4,000 to 9,000 men. Allied casualties were at least 10,000, with 4,414 confirmed dead, museums, memorials, and war cemeteries in the area now host many visitors each year. Between 27 May and 4 June 1940, over 338,000 troops of the British Expeditionary Force, after the German Army invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin began pressing his allies for the creation of a second front in western Europe. In late May 1942 the Soviet Union and the United States made a joint announcement that a. full understanding was reached with regard to the urgent tasks of creating a front in Europe in 1942. Instead of a return to France, the Western Allies staged offensives in the Mediterranean Theatre of Operations. By mid-1943 the campaign in North Africa had been won, the Allies then launched the invasion of Sicily in July 1943, and subsequently invaded Italy in September the same year. By then, Soviet forces were on the offensive and had won a victory at the Battle of Stalingrad. The decision to undertake a cross-channel invasion within the year was taken at the Trident Conference in Washington in May 1943. Initial planning was constrained by the number of landing craft, most of which were already committed in the Mediterranean. At the Tehran Conference in November 1943, Roosevelt and Churchill promised Stalin that they would open the second front in May 1944. Four sites were considered for the landings, Brittany, the Cotentin Peninsula, Normandy, as Brittany and Cotentin are peninsulas, it would have been possible for the Germans to cut off the Allied advance at a relatively narrow isthmus, so these sites were rejected
26.
Claude Lelouch
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Claude Barruck Joseph Lelouch is a French film director, writer, cinematographer, actor and producer. Lelouch was born in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, the son of Charlotte and his father was born to an Algerian Jewish family and his mother was a convert to Judaism. His father gave him a camera to him a fresh start after his failure in the baccalaureat. He started his career with reportage – one of the first to film life in the Soviet Union. He also filmed sporting events like the 24 Hours of Le Mans and his first full-length film as director, Le Propre de lhomme, was decried by the critics – Claude Lelouch, remember this name well, because you will not hear it again – Cahiers du cinéma said. La femme spectacle, following prostitutes, women shopping, going for nose-jobs, was censored for its misogynist tendency, a Man and a Woman changed his fortunes and was met with favour even by the Cahiers group. The 1981 musical epic Les Uns et les Autres is widely considered as his masterpiece and his 1976 film, Cétait un rendez-vous, purportedly features a Ferrari 275 GTB being driven at extreme speed through the streets of Paris at dawn. The entire short is shot from the point of view of the car, legend has it that Lelouch was arrested after it was first shown publicly. In a 2006 interview, Lelouch stated that he drove his own Mercedes-Benz 450SEL6.9 in the film and he has collaborated more than two dozen times with composer Francis Lai. They scored a hit with the piece chabadabada for the film A Man and a Woman sung by Nicole Croisille and Pierre Barouh. He is the father of 7 children, in 1993 he was the President of the Jury at the 18th Moscow International Film Festival. 2016, Commander in the Order of the Crown, lelouchs A Man and a Woman won the Palme dOr at the 1966 Cannes Film Festival, as well as two Oscars including Best Foreign Language Film. His 1967 film, Vivre pour vivre, was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, in 1971, he won the David di Donatello for Best Foreign Directing for Le Voyou. Media related to Claude Lelouch at Wikimedia Commons Claude Lelouch at the Internet Movie Database
27.
A Man and a Woman
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A Man and a Woman is a 1966 French film written and directed by Claude Lelouch and starring Anouk Aimée and Jean-Louis Trintignant. The film is notable for its photography, which features frequent segues between full color, black-and-white, and sepia-toned shots, and for its memorable musical score by Francis Lai. A Man and a Woman had a total of 4,272,000 admissions in France and was also the 6th highest-grossing film of the year, in the United States, the film earned $14,000,000. A sequel, A Man and a Woman,20 Years Later was released in 1986. A young widow, Anne Gauthier, is raising her daughter Françoise alone following the death of her husband who worked as a stuntman and who died in a movie set accident that she witnessed. Still working as a script supervisor, Anne divides her time between her home in Paris and Deauville in northern France where her daughter attends boarding school. A young widower, Jean-Louis, is raising his son Antoine alone following the death of his wife Valerie who committed suicide after Jean-Louis was in a fatal crash during the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Still working as a car driver, Jean-Louis divides his time between Paris and Deauville where his son also attends boarding school. One day Anne and Jean-Louis meet at the Deauville boarding school after Anne misses the last train back to Paris, Jean-Louis offers her a lift and the two become acquainted during the drive home, enjoying each others company. When he drops her off, he asks if she would like to drive up together the following weekend, after a busy week at the track preparing for the next race, Jean-Louis calls and they meet early Sunday morning and drive to Deauville in the rain. Clearly attracted to other, they enjoy a pleasant Sunday lunch with their children who get along well. Later that afternoon they go for a boat ride followed by a walk on the beach at sunset, Jean-Louis spends the following week preparing for and driving in the Monte Carlo Rally in southeast France. Every day, Anne closely follows news reports of the race, of the 273 cars that started the race, only 42 were able to finish, including Jean Louiss white Mustang, number 184. Watching the television coverage of the conclusion of the race, Anne sends Jean-Louis a telegram that reads and that night at a dinner for the drivers at the Monte Carlo Casino, Jean-Louis receives the telegram and leaves immediately. He jumps into the car he used during the race and drives through the night to Paris, telling himself that when a woman sends a telegram like that. Along the way he imagines what their reunion will be like, at her Paris apartment, Jean-Louis learns that Anne is in Deauville, so he continues north. Jean-Louis finally arrives in Deauville and finds Anne and the two playing on the beach. When they see other, they run into each others arms
28.
Germanic languages
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It is the third most spoken Indo-European subdivision, behind Italic and Indo-Iranian, and ahead of Balto-Slavic languages. Limburgish varieties have roughly 1.3 million speakers along the Dutch–Belgian–German border, the main North Germanic languages are Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Icelandic, and Faroese, which have a combined total of about 20 million speakers. The East Germanic branch included Gothic, Burgundian, and Vandalic, the last to die off was Crimean Gothic, spoken in the late 18th century in some isolated areas of Crimea. The total number of Germanic languages throughout history is unknown, as some of them—especially East Germanic languages—disappeared during or after the Migration Period. Proto-Germanic, along all of its descendants, is characterized by a number of unique linguistic features. Early varieties of Germanic enter history with the Germanic tribes moving south from Scandinavia in the 2nd century BC, to settle in the area of todays northern Germany, furthermore, it is the de facto language of the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. It is also a language in Nicaragua and Malaysia. German is a language of Austria, Belgium, Germany, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Switzerland and has regional status in Italy, Poland, Namibia. German also continues to be spoken as a minority language by immigrant communities in North America, South America, Central America, Mexico, a German dialect, Pennsylvania Dutch, is still present amongst Anabaptist populations in Pennsylvania in the United States. Dutch is a language of Aruba, Belgium, Curaçao. The Netherlands also colonised Indonesia, but Dutch was scrapped as a language after Indonesian independence. Dutch was until 1925 an official language in South Africa, but evolved in and was replaced by Afrikaans, Afrikaans is one of the 11 official languages in South Africa and is a lingua franca of Namibia. It is used in other Southern African nations as well, low German is a collection of sometimes very diverse dialects spoken in the northeast of the Netherlands and northern Germany. Scots is spoken in Lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster, frisian is spoken among half a million people who live on the southern fringes of the North Sea in the Netherlands, Germany, and Denmark. Luxembourgish is mainly spoken in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, though it extends into small parts of Belgium, France. Limburgish varieties are spoken in the Limburg and Rhineland regions, along the Dutch–Belgian–German border, Swedish is also one of the two official languages in Finland, along with Finnish, and the only official language in the Åland Islands. Danish is also spoken natively by the Danish minority in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein, Norwegian is the official language of Norway. Icelandic is the language of Iceland, and is spoken by a significant minority in the Faroe Islands
29.
Harbor
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A harbor or harbour, or haven, is a body of water where ships, boats and barges seek shelter from stormy weather, or are stored for future use. Ports are often located in harbors, harbors can be natural or artificial. An artificial harbor can have deliberately constructed breakwaters, sea walls, or jettys, or they can be constructed by dredging, in contrast, a natural harbor is surrounded on several sides by prominences of land. Examples of natural harbors include Sydney Harbour, Australia and Trincomalee Harbour in Sri Lanka, artificial harbors are frequently built for use as ports. The oldest artificial harbor known is the Ancient Egyptian site at Wadi al-Jarf, on the Red Sea coast, the largest artificially created harbor is Jebel Ali in Dubai. The Ancient Carthaginians constructed fortified, artificial harbors called cothons, a natural harbor is a landform where a part of a body of water is protected and deep enough to furnish anchorage. Natural harbors have long been of great strategic naval and economic importance, having a protected harbor reduces or eliminates the need for breakwaters as it will result in calmer waves inside the harbor. For harbors near the North and South Poles, being ice-free is an important advantage, the worlds southmost harbor, located at Antarcticas Winter Quarters Bay, is potentially ice-free, depending on the summertime pack ice conditions. Although the worlds busiest port is a hotly contested title, in 2006 the worlds busiest harbor by cargo tonnage was the Port of Shanghai
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Touques (river)
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The Touques is a small 104 km long coastal river in Pays dAuge in Normandy, France. The Touques is officially navigable up to the Pont des Belges,800 m from its estuary and its source is in the Perche hills, south of Gacé. The river runs northwards, and flows into the English Channel between the communes of Deauville and Trouville-sur-Mer in North-Western Calvados, two ports, the Port of Trouville-sur-Mer and Port of Deauville are situated on the river mouth opposite each other. The Touques was diverted and straightened at the end of the 19th century, trouville-Deauville station was built on the rivers former bed. Trouvilles harbour dock wall was rebuilt at the end of the 1990s due to erosion of the stone wall
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Lexington, Kentucky, USA
East Cowes, United Kingdom
Eicklingen, Germany
Kildare, Ireland
