1.
Order of the Garter
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The Most Noble Order of the Garter, founded in 1348, is the highest order of chivalry and the third most prestigious honour in England and the United Kingdom. It is dedicated to the image and arms of Saint George and it is awarded at the Sovereigns pleasure as a personal gift on recipients from the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms. Membership of the Order is limited to the Sovereign, the Prince of Wales, the order also includes supernumerary knights and ladies. New appointments to the Order of the Garter are always announced on St Georges Day, the orders emblem is a garter with the motto Honi soit qui mal y pense in gold lettering. Members of the wear it on ceremonial occasions. King Edward III founded the Order of the Garter around the time of his claim to the French throne, the list includes Sir Sanchet DAbrichecourt, who died on 20 October 1345. Other dates from 1344 to 1351 have also been proposed, the Kings wardrobe account shows Garter habits first issued in the autumn of 1348. Also, its original statutes required that member of the Order already be a knight. The earliest written mention of the Order is found in Tirant lo Blanch and it was first published in 1490. This book devotes a chapter to the description of the origin of the Order of the Garter, at the time of its foundation, the Order consisted of King Edward III, together with 25 Founder Knights, listed in ascending order of stall number in St.1431. Various legends account for the origin of the Order, the most popular legend involves the Countess of Salisbury, whose garter is said to have slipped from her leg while she was dancing at a court ball at Calais. When the surrounding courtiers sniggered, the king picked it up and returned it to her, exclaiming, Honi soit qui mal y pense, King Edward supposedly recalled the event in the 14th century when he founded the Order. This story is recounted in a letter to the Annual Register in 1774, The motto in fact refers to Edwards claim to the French throne, the use of the garter as an emblem may have derived from straps used to fasten armour. Medieval scholars have pointed to a connection between the Order of the Garter and the Middle English poem, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, in Gawain, a girdle, very similar in its erotic undertones to the garter, plays a prominent role. A rough version of the Orders motto also appears in the text and it translates from Old French as Accursed be a cowardly and covetous heart. While the author of that poem remains disputed, there seems to be a connection between two of the top candidates and the Order of the Garter. Scholar J. P. Oakden has suggested that it is related to John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, and, more importantly. Another competing theory is that the work was written for Enguerrand de Coucy, the Sire de Coucy was married to King Edward IIIs daughter, Isabella, and was given admittance to the Order of the Garter on their wedding day
2.
Privy Council of the United Kingdom
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Her Majestys Most Honourable Privy Council, usually known simply as the Privy Council, is a formal body of advisers to the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. Its membership mainly comprises senior politicians, who are present or former members of either the House of Commons or the House of Lords, the Council also holds the delegated authority to issue Orders of Council, mostly used to regulate certain public institutions. The Council advises the sovereign on the issuing of Royal Charters, which are used to grant special status to incorporated bodies, otherwise, the Privy Councils powers have now been largely replaced by the Cabinet of the United Kingdom. The Judicial Committee consists of judges appointed as Privy Counsellors, predominantly Justices of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. The Privy Council of the United Kingdom was preceded by the Privy Council of Scotland, the key events in the formation of the modern Privy Council are given below, Witenagemot was an early equivalent to the Privy Council of England. During the reigns of the Norman monarchs, the English Crown was advised by a court or curia regis. The body originally concerned itself with advising the sovereign on legislation, administration, later, different bodies assuming distinct functions evolved from the court. The courts of law took over the business of dispensing justice, nevertheless, the Council retained the power to hear legal disputes, either in the first instance or on appeal. Furthermore, laws made by the sovereign on the advice of the Council, powerful sovereigns often used the body to circumvent the Courts and Parliament. During Henry VIIIs reign, the sovereign, on the advice of the Council, was allowed to enact laws by mere proclamation, the legislative pre-eminence of Parliament was not restored until after Henry VIIIs death. Though the royal Council retained legislative and judicial responsibilities, it became an administrative body. The Council consisted of forty members in 1553, but the sovereign relied on a smaller committee, by the end of the English Civil War, the monarchy, House of Lords, and Privy Council had been abolished. The remaining parliamentary chamber, the House of Commons, instituted a Council of State to execute laws, the forty-one members of the Council were elected by the House of Commons, the body was headed by Oliver Cromwell, de facto military dictator of the nation. In 1653, however, Cromwell became Lord Protector, and the Council was reduced to thirteen and twenty-one members, all elected by the Commons. In 1657, the Commons granted Cromwell even greater powers, some of which were reminiscent of those enjoyed by monarchs, the Council became known as the Protectors Privy Council, its members were appointed by the Lord Protector, subject to Parliaments approval. In 1659, shortly before the restoration of the monarchy, the Protectors Council was abolished, Charles II restored the Royal Privy Council, but he, like previous Stuart monarchs, chose to rely on a small group of advisers. Under George I even more power transferred to this committee and it now began to meet in the absence of the sovereign, communicating its decisions to him after the fact. Thus, the British Privy Council, as a whole, ceased to be a body of important confidential advisers to the sovereign and it is closely related to the word private, and derives from the French word privé
3.
Governor-General of India
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The office was created in 1773, with the title of Governor-General of the Presidency of Fort William. The officer had direct control only over Fort William, but supervised other British East India Company officials in India, complete authority over all of British India was granted in 1833, and the official came to be known as the Governor-General of India. In 1858, the territories of the East India Company came under the control of the British government. The governor-general headed the government of India, which administered the provinces of British India, including the Punjab, Bengal, Bombay, Madras, the United Provinces. To reflect the role as the representative of the monarch to the feudal rulers of the princely states, from 1858 the term Viceroy. Until 1858, the governor-general was selected by the Court of Directors of the East India Company, after 1947, the sovereign continued to appoint the governor-general, but did so on the advice of the Indian government. Governors-General served at the pleasure of the sovereign, though the practice was to have them serve five-year terms, Governors-General could have their commission rescinded and if one were removed or left a provisional governor-general was sometimes appointed until a new holder of the office could be chosen. Provisional governors-general were often chosen from among the provincial governors, many parts of the Indian subcontinent were governed by the East India Company, which nominally acted as the agent of the Mughal Emperor. In 1773, motivated by corruption in the Company, the British government assumed control over the governance of India with the passage of the Regulating Act of 1773. A Governor-General and Supreme Council of Bengal were appointed to rule over the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal, the first Governor-General and Council were named in the Act, their successors were to be elected by the East India Companys Court of Directors. The Act provided for a term for the Governor-General and Council. The Charter Act 1833 replaced the Governor-General and Council of Fort William with the Governor-General, the power to elect the Governor-General was retained by the Court of Directors, but the choice became subject to the Sovereigns approval. After the Indian Rebellion of 1857, the East India Companys territories in India were put under the control of the Sovereign. The Government of India Act 1858 vested the power to appoint the Governor-General in the Sovereign, the Governor-General, in turn, had the power to appoint all lieutenant governors in India, subject to the Sovereigns approval. India and Pakistan acquired independence in 1947, but Governors-General continued to be appointed over each nation until republican constitutions were written, Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma remained Governor-General of India for some time after independence, but the two nations were otherwise headed by native Governors-General. India became a republic in 1950, Pakistan became an Islamic one in 1956. The Governor-General originally had power only over the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal, the Regulating Act, however, granted them additional powers relating to foreign affairs and defence. The powers of the Governor-General in respect of foreign affairs were increased by the India Act 1784, while the Governor-General thus became the controller of foreign policy in India, he was not the explicit head of British India
4.
Joshua Reynolds
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Sir Joshua Reynolds RA FRS FRSA was an influential eighteenth-century English painter, specialising in portraits. He promoted the Grand Style in painting which depended on idealization of the imperfect and he was a founder and first president of the Royal Academy of Arts, and was knighted by George III in 1769. Reynolds was born in Plympton, Devon, on 16 July 1723 the third son of the Rev. Samuel Reynolds and his father had been a fellow of Balliol College, Oxford, but did not send any of his sons to the university. One of his sisters was Mary Palmer, seven years his senior, author of Devonshire Dialogue, in 1740 she provided £60, half of the premium paid to Thomas Hudson the portrait-painter, for Joshuas pupilage, and nine years later advanced money for his expenses in Italy. His other siblings included Frances Reynolds and Elizabeth Johnson, as a boy, he came under the influence of Zachariah Mudge, whose Platonistic philosophy stayed with him all his life. The work that came to have the most influential impact on Reynolds was Jonathan Richardsons An Essay on the Theory of Painting, having shown an early interest in art, Reynolds was apprenticed in 1740 to the fashionable London portrait painter Thomas Hudson, who had been born in Devon. Hudson had a collection of old master drawings, including some by Guercino, although apprenticed to Hudson for four years, Reynolds only remained with him until summer 1743. Having left Hudson, Reynolds worked for some time as a portrait-painter in Plymouth Dock and he returned to London before the end of 1744, but following his fathers death in late 1745 he shared a house in Plymouth Dock with his sisters. In 1749, Reynolds met Commodore Augustus Keppel, who invited him to join HMS Centurion, of which he had command, while with the ship he visited Lisbon, Cadiz, Algiers, and Minorca. From Minorca he travelled to Livorno in Italy, and then to Rome, while in Rome he suffered a severe cold, which left him partially deaf, and, as a result, he began to carry a small ear trumpet with which he is often pictured. Reynolds travelled homeward overland via Florence, Bologna, Venice, and he was accompanied by Giuseppe Marchi, then aged about 17. Apart from a brief interlude in 1770, Marchi remained in Reynolds employment as an assistant for the rest of the artists career. Following his arrival in England in October 1752, Reynolds spent three months in Devon, before establishing himself in London, where he remained for the rest of his life. He took rooms in St Martins Lane, before moving to Great Newport Street and he achieved success rapidly, and was extremely prolific. In 1760 Reynolds moved into a house, with space to show his works and accommodate his assistants. Alongside ambitious full-length portraits, Reynolds painted large numbers of smaller works, in the late 1750s, at the height of the social season, he received five or six sitters a day, each for an hour. By 1761 Reynolds could command a fee of 80 guineas for a full-length portrait, the clothing of Reynolds sitters was usually painted either by one of his pupils, his studio assistant Giuseppe Marchi, or the specialist drapery painter Peter Toms. Lay figures were used to model the clothes and he had an excellent vantage from his house, Wick House, on Richmond Hill, and painted the view in about 1780
5.
George III of the United Kingdom
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He was concurrently Duke and prince-elector of Brunswick-Lüneburg in the Holy Roman Empire until his promotion to King of Hanover on 12 October 1814. He was the third British monarch of the House of Hanover, early in his reign, Great Britain defeated France in the Seven Years War, becoming the dominant European power in North America and India. However, many of Britains American colonies were soon lost in the American War of Independence, further wars against revolutionary and Napoleonic France from 1793 concluded in the defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. In the later part of his life, George III had recurrent, although it has since been suggested that he had the blood disease porphyria, the cause of his illness remains unknown. After a final relapse in 1810, a regency was established, on George IIIs death, the Prince Regent succeeded his father as George IV. Historical analysis of George IIIs life has gone through a kaleidoscope of changing views that have depended heavily on the prejudices of his biographers and the sources available to them. Until it was reassessed in the half of the 20th century, his reputation in the United States was one of a tyrant. George was born in London at Norfolk House and he was the grandson of King George II, and the eldest son of Frederick, Prince of Wales, and Augusta of Saxe-Gotha. As Prince George was born two months prematurely and he was unlikely to survive, he was baptised the same day by Thomas Secker. One month later, he was baptised at Norfolk House. His godparents were the King of Sweden, his uncle the Duke of Saxe-Gotha, George grew into a healthy but reserved and shy child. The family moved to Leicester Square, where George and his younger brother Prince Edward, Duke of York, Family letters show that he could read and write in both English and German, as well as comment on political events of the time, by the age of eight. He was the first British monarch to study science systematically and his religious education was wholly Anglican. At age 10 George took part in a production of Joseph Addisons play Cato and said in the new prologue, What. It may with truth be said, A boy in England born, historian Romney Sedgwick argued that these lines appear to be the source of the only historical phrase with which he is associated. Georges grandfather, King George II, disliked the Prince of Wales, however, in 1751 the Prince of Wales died unexpectedly from a lung injury, and George became heir apparent to the throne. He inherited one of his fathers titles and became the Duke of Edinburgh, now more interested in his grandson, three weeks later the King created George Prince of Wales. Georges mother, now the Dowager Princess of Wales, preferred to keep George at home where she could imbue him with her moral values
6.
George IV of the United Kingdom
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George IV was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of Hanover following the death of his father, George III, on 29 January 1820, until his own death ten years later. From 1811 until his accession, he served as Prince Regent during his fathers mental illness. George IV led an extravagant lifestyle that contributed to the fashions of the Regency era and he was a patron of new forms of leisure, style and taste. He commissioned John Nash to build the Royal Pavilion in Brighton and remodel Buckingham Palace and he even forbade Caroline to attend his coronation and asked the government to introduce the unpopular Pains and Penalties Bill in a desperate, unsuccessful attempt to divorce her. For most of Georges regency and reign, Lord Liverpool controlled the government as Prime Minister and his ministers found his behaviour selfish, unreliable and irresponsible. At all times he was much under the influence of favourites, taxpayers were angry at his wasteful spending at a time when Britons were fighting in the Napoleonic Wars. He did not provide leadership in time of crisis, nor act as a role model for his people. Liverpools government presided over Britains ultimate victory, negotiated the peace settlement, after Liverpools retirement, George was forced to accept Catholic emancipation despite opposing it. His only child, Princess Charlotte, died before him in 1817 and so he was succeeded by his younger brother, George was born at St Jamess Palace, London, on 12 August 1762, the first child of King George III of the United Kingdom and Queen Charlotte. As the eldest son of a British sovereign, he automatically became Duke of Cornwall and Duke of Rothesay at birth, he was created Prince of Wales, on 18 September of the same year, he was baptised by Thomas Secker, Archbishop of Canterbury. His godparents were the Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, the Duke of Cumberland, George was a talented student, and quickly learned to speak French, German and Italian, in addition to his native English. He was a witty conversationalist, drunk or sober, and showed good, the Prince of Wales turned 21 in 1783, and obtained a grant of £60,000 from Parliament and an annual income of £50,000 from his father. It was far too little for his needs – the stables alone cost £31,000 a year and he then established his residence in Carlton House, where he lived a profligate life. Animosity developed between the prince and his father, who desired more frugal behaviour on the part of the heir apparent, the King, a political conservative, was also alienated by the princes adherence to Charles James Fox and other radically inclined politicians. Soon after he reached the age of 21, the prince became infatuated with Maria Fitzherbert and she was a commoner, six years his elder, twice widowed, and a Roman Catholic. Despite her complete unsuitability, the prince was determined to marry her, nevertheless, the couple went through a marriage ceremony on 15 December 1785 at her house in Park Street, Mayfair. Legally the union was void, as the Kings consent was not granted, however, Fitzherbert believed that she was the princes canonical and true wife, holding the law of the Church to be superior to the law of the State. For political reasons, the union remained secret and Fitzherbert promised not to reveal it, the prince was plunged into debt by his exorbitant lifestyle
7.
John Adam (administrator)
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John Adam was a United Kingdom administrator in India, serving as the acting governor-general of the British East India Company in 1823. The eldest son of William Adam of Blair Adam, he was born on 4 May 1779, and was educated at Charterhouse School. He received a writership on the Bengal establishment in 1794, and, after a year at Edinburgh University, most of Adams career was spent in the secretariat. He was private as well as secretary to the Marquess of Hastings. In 1817 he was nominated by the court of directors a member of council, in 1819 he became a member of the Supreme Council of India. As senior member of council, Adam became Governor General of India on Lord Hastingss departure in January 1823 and his rule lasted for seven months, until the arrival of Lord Amherst in August of the same year. It saw the suppression of the freedom of the English press in India, James Silk Buckingham had established the Calcutta Journal, which published severe comments on the government. Adam cancelled Buckinghams license for residence in India, and passed regulations restricting newspaper criticism, Buckingham appealed to the court of proprietors at home, to the House of Commons, and to the Privy Council, but the action of Adam was upheld by each of these three bodies. Another unpopular act of Adams governor-generalship was to withdraw support from the banking firm of Palmer. Adam also appropriated money for the encouragement of Indian education. His health broke down and he left his job and he left in March 1825, after a voyage to Bombay, and a visit to Almorah in the lower Himalayas, he embarked on a ship to return him to his parents in Britain. He died off the coast of Madagascar on 4 June 1825 and he was buried at sea but he is memorialised on his parents tomb in Greyfriars Kirkyard in Edinburgh. The John Adam was an Indian-built ship of about 580 tons burthen, appointed in 1821 for the accommodation of the mission of John Crawfurd to the Courts of Siam, the first edition of this text is available as an article on Wikisource, Cotton, James Sutherland. Attribution This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Cotton
8.
Thomas Maitland (British Army officer)
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Lieutenant General The Right Honourable Sir Thomas Maitland GCB GCH was a British soldier and colonial governor. He also served as a Member of Parliament for Haddington from 1790–96, 1802–06 and he was made a Privy Councillor on 23 November 1803. He was the surviving son of James Maitland, 7th Earl of Lauderdale. Maitland was commissioned into the Edinburgh Light Horse, shortly after his birth and he transferred to the 72nd Foot, and then to the 62nd Foot as a Major in 1790. He was promoted Lieutenant-Colonel in 1794 and Colonel and Brigadier-General in 1798, while serving at St. Domingue, he proactively dealt with Toussaint Louverture, who was then a general in the French colonial force, to disengage Britain. Accordingly he and the black general concluded an agreement on August 31,1798. Maitland served as Governor of Ceylon during 1805 to 1811, in early 1812, Arthur Wellesley, Earl of Wellington began the campaign that resulted in his victory at the Battle of Salamanca on 22 July. At first Bentinck agreed to send 10,000 of his soldiers, after much persuasion, he allowed the operation to go forward and on 7 June he put 8,000 men aboard naval transports under the command of Maitland. The fickle Bentinck changed his mind again on 9 June, stopping the expedition, at last on 28 June Maitland sailed for Minorca. The fleet first picked up 6,000 Spanish troops at Minorca and he wisely decided that Barcelona was too strong to attack, but he also refused to try to capture weakly held Tarragona. Maitland soon received news that Joseph ODonnells Army of Murcia had been routed at the Battle of Castalla on 21 July, without the support of ODonnell, Maitland decided he could not accomplish anything. He re-embarked his expeditionary force and sailed to Alicante instead, joining his troops with the garrison to form an army of 15,000 men, because of the disaster at Salamanca, the French were forced to evacuate both Madrid in central Spain and Andalusia in the south. Their combined forces joined Suchet in the province of Valencia, in close proximity to 80,000 French soldiers, Maitland declined to move from Alicante. Maitland asked to be relieved in September 1812 due to illness, while at Ceylon, Maitland was attracted to a place at Galkissa and decided to construct his palace there. During this time, Maitland fell in love with a half-caste dancing-girl named Lovina, during the construction of the palace, Maitland gave instructions for the construction of a secret tunnel to Lovinas house, which was located close to the governors palace. One end of the tunnel was inside the well of Lovinas house, when the governor came to reside there, he would often use the tunnel to meet Lovina. The Sinhalese village that surrounded the Governor’s mansion developed into a city named Galkissa. Later the city was renamed Mount Lavinia in honour of Lovina, in 1920 the tunnel was sealed up
9.
Alexander George Woodford
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Field Marshal Sir Alexander George Woodford, GCB, KCMG was a British Army officer. After taking part in the Anglo-Russian invasion of Holland, he served in most of the battles of the Napoleonic Wars, during the Hundred Days he commanded the 2nd battalion of the Coldstream Guards at the Battle of Quatre Bras, the Battle of Waterloo and the storming of Cambrai. Promoted to captain lieutenant on 14 December 1799, he transferred to the Coldstream Guards on 28 December 1799 and he took part in the Battle of Copenhagen in August 1807 before rejoining Lord Forbes staff in Sicily in March 1808. After returning London, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel on 8 March 1810 and he was appointed an aide-de-camp to the Prince Regent with the rank of colonel on 4 June 1814. During the Hundred Days, Woodford commanded the 2nd battalion of the Coldstream Guards at the Battle of Quatre Bras, the Battle of Waterloo and the storming of Cambrai in June 1815. Woodford was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath on 4 June 1815 and he remained in command of his battalion when it formed part of the Army of Occupation of France. Promoted to major general on 27 May 1825, Woodford became lieutenant governor and brigade commander at Malta in 1825 and lieutenant governor and he went on to be Lieutenant-Governor of Gibraltar in February 1835 and Governor and Commander-in-Chief of Gibraltar in September 1836. Promoted to lieutenant general on 28 June 1838, Woodford retired from military service in 1843. Promoted to field marshal on 1 January 1868, he was raised to the office of Governor of the Royal Hospital Chelsea in August 1868 and he also served as colonel of the 40th Regiment of Foot and then as colonel of the Scots Fusilier Guards. He died at the residence at the Royal Chelsea Hospital on 26 August 1870 and was buried at Kensal Green Cemetery. Woodfords father was descended maternally from Ralph Brideoake, a 17th-century clergyman who became Dean of Salisbury, the elder son, the Reverend Adolphus Frederick Alexander Woodford, left the Coldstream Guards for a career in the Anglican Church, later becoming a prominent historian of Freemasonry. Woodford also had a brother, John George Woodford, who enjoyed a similarly respectable military career. He also contributed a part to military reform in the nineteenth-century, particularly such acts as the abolishment of the purchase of commissions. He is also noted for the excavations that he carried out at the supposed battle-field site of Azincourt. His brother died at the age of ninety-four in Keswick in 1879, the British Field Marshals, 1736–1997, A Biographical Dictionary
10.
County Down
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County Down is one of six counties that form Northern Ireland, situated in the northeast of the island of Ireland. Adjoined to the southeast shore of Lough Neagh, the county covers an area of 2,448 km² and has a population of about 531,665 and it is also one of the thirty-two traditional counties of Ireland and is within the province of Ulster. The county was archaically called Downshire and it borders County Antrim to the north, the Irish Sea to the east and south, County Armagh to the west, and County Louth across Carlingford Lough to the southwest. In the east of the county is Strangford Lough and the Ards Peninsula, the largest town is Bangor, on the northeast coast. Three other large towns and cities are on its border, Newry lies on the border with County Armagh, while Lisburn. Down contains both the southernmost point of Northern Ireland and the easternmost point of Ireland and it is currently one of only two counties of Ireland to have a majority of the population from a Protestant background, according to the 2001 census. The other is County Antrim to the north, during the Williamite War in Ireland the county was a centre of Protestant rebellion against the rule of the Catholic James II. After forming a force the Protestants were defeated by the Irish Army at the Break of Dromore and forced to retreat. Later the same year Marshal Schombergs large Williamite expedition arrived in Belfast Lough, after laying siege to Carrickfergus Schomberg marched south to Dundalk Camp, clearing County Down and much of the rest of East Ulster of Jacobite troops. Down contains two significant peninsulas, Ards Peninsula and Lecale peninsula, the county has a coastline along Belfast Lough to the north and Carlingford Lough to the south. Strangford Lough lies between the Ards Peninsula and the mainland, down also contains part of the shore of Lough Neagh. Smaller loughs include Lough Island Reavy, the River Lagan forms most of the border with County Antrim. The River Bann also flows through the areas of the county. Other rivers include the Clanrye and Quoile, there are several islands off the Down coast, Mew Island, Light House Island and the Copeland Islands, all of which lie to the north of the Ards Peninsula. Gunn Island lies off the Lecale coast, in addition there are a large number of small islands in Strangford Lough. County Down is where, in the words of the song by Percy French, The mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea. Slieve Donard, at 849 m, is the highest peak in the Mournes, in Northern Ireland, another important peak is Slieve Croob, at 534 m, the source of the River Lagan. An area of County Down is known as the Brontë Homeland, after Patrick Brontë, father of Anne, Charlotte, Emily, Patrick Brontë was born in this region
11.
Kingdom of Ireland
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The Kingdom of Ireland was a client state of the Kingdom of England that existed on Ireland from 1542 until 1800. It came into being when the Parliament of Ireland passed the Crown of Ireland Act 1542, the territory of the Kingdom had previously had the status of a lordship of the Crown. The Parliament of Ireland passed the Acts of Union 1800 by which it abolished itself, the act was also passed by the Parliament of Great Britain. The act also had the effect of establishing the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland on the first day of 1801 by uniting the Crowns of Ireland, in its early years, the Kingdom of Ireland had limited recognition. While some Protestant powers in Europe recognised Henry and his heir Edward as monarch of Ireland, Henrys daughter, Queen Mary I of England, was recognised as Queen of Ireland by Pope Paul IV in 1555. The papal bull Laudabiliter of Pope Adrian IV was issued in 1155 and it granted the Angevin King Henry II of England the title Dominus Hibernae. Laudabiliter authorised the king to invade Ireland, to bring the country into the European sphere, in return, Henry was required to remit a penny per hearth of the tax roll to the Pope. This was reconfirmed by Adrians successor Pope Alexander III in 1172, when Pope Clement VII excommunicated the king of England, Henry VIII, in 1533, the constitutional position of the lordship in Ireland became uncertain. Henry had broken away from the Holy See and declared himself the head of the Church in England and he had petitioned Rome to procure an annulment of his marriage to Queen Catherine. The Treason Act 1537 was passed to counteract this, following the failed revolt of Silken Thomas in 1534–35, Grey, the lord deputy, had some military successes against several clans in the late 1530s, and took their submissions. By 1540 most of Ireland seemed at peace and under the control of the kings Dublin administration, Henry was proclaimed King of Ireland by the Crown of Ireland Act 1542, an Act of the Irish Parliament. The new kingdom was not recognised by the Catholic monarchies in Europe, after the death of King Edward VI, Henrys son, the papal bull of 1555 recognised the Roman Catholic Queen Mary I as Queen of Ireland. The link of personal union of the Crown of Ireland to the Crown of England became enshrined in Catholic canon law, in this fashion, the Kingdom of Ireland was ruled by the reigning King of England. This placed the new Kingdom of Ireland in personal union with the Kingdom of England, in line with its expanded role and self-image, the administration established the Kings Inns for barristers in 1541, and the Ulster King of Arms to regulate heraldry in 1552. Proposals to establish a university in Dublin were delayed until 1592, in 1603 James VI King of Scots became James I of England, uniting the Kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland in a personal union. The political order of the kingdom was interrupted by the Wars of the Three Kingdoms starting in 1639, during the subsequent interregnum period, England, Scotland and Ireland were ruled as a republic until 1660. This period saw the rise of the loyalist Irish Catholic Confederation within the kingdom and, from 1653, the kingdoms order was restored 1660 with the restoration of Charles II. Without any public dissent, Charless reign was backdated to his fathers execution in 1649, Poynings Law was repealed in 1782 in what came to be known as the Constitution of 1782, granting Ireland legislative independence
12.
Naples
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Naples is the capital of the Italian region Campania and the third-largest municipality in Italy, after Rome and Milan. In 2015, around 975,260 people lived within the administrative limits. The Metropolitan City of Naples had a population of 3,115,320, Naples is the 9th-most populous urban area in the European Union with a population of between 3 million and 3.7 million. About 4.4 million people live in the Naples metropolitan area, Naples is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. Bronze Age Greek settlements were established in the Naples area in the second millennium BC, a larger colony – initially known as Parthenope, Παρθενόπη – developed on the Island of Megaride around the ninth century BC, at the end of the Greek Dark Ages. Naples remained influential after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, thereafter, in union with Sicily, it became the capital of the Two Sicilies until the unification of Italy in 1861. Naples was the most-bombed Italian city during World War II, much of the citys 20th-century periphery was constructed under Benito Mussolinis fascist government, and during reconstruction efforts after World War II. The city has experienced significant economic growth in recent decades, and unemployment levels in the city, however, Naples still suffers from political and economic corruption, and unemployment levels remain high. Naples has the fourth-largest urban economy in Italy, after Milan, Rome and it is the worlds 103rd-richest city by purchasing power, with an estimated 2011 GDP of US$83.6 billion. The port of Naples is one of the most important in Europe, numerous major Italian companies, such as MSC Cruises Italy S. p. A, are headquartered in Naples. The city also hosts NATOs Allied Joint Force Command Naples, the SRM Institution for Economic Research, Naples is a full member of the Eurocities network of European cities. The city was selected to become the headquarters of the European institution ACP/UE and was named a City of Literature by UNESCOs Creative Cities Network, the Villa Rosebery, one of the three official residences of the President of Italy, is located in the citys Posillipo district. Naples historic city centre is the largest in Europe, covering 1,700 hectares and enclosing 27 centuries of history, Naples has long been a major cultural centre with a global sphere of influence, particularly during the Renaissance and Enlightenment eras. In the immediate vicinity of Naples are numerous culturally and historically significant sites, including the Palace of Caserta, culinarily, Naples is synonymous with pizza, which originated in the city. Neapolitan music has furthermore been highly influential, credited with the invention of the romantic guitar, according to CNN, the metro stop Toledo is the most beautiful in Europe and it won also the LEAF Award 2013 as Public building of the year. Naples is the Italian city with the highest number of accredited stars from the Michelin Guide, Naples sports scene is dominated by football and Serie A club S. S. C. Napoli, two-time Italian champions and winner of European trophies, who play at the San Paolo Stadium in the south-west of the city, the Phlegraean Fields around Naples has been inhabited since the Neolithic period. The earliest Greek settlements were established in the Naples area in the second millennium BC, sailors from the Greek island of Rhodes established a small commercial port called Parthenope on the island of Megaride in the ninth century BC
13.
British people
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British people, or Britons, are the citizens of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown dependencies, and their descendants. British nationality law governs modern British citizenship and nationality, which can be acquired, for instance, although early assertions of being British date from the Late Middle Ages, the creation of the united Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707 triggered a sense of British national identity. The notion of Britishness was forged during the Napoleonic Wars between Britain and the First French Empire, and developed further during the Victorian era, because of longstanding ethno-sectarian divisions, British identity in Northern Ireland is controversial, but it is held with strong conviction by unionists. Modern Britons are descended mainly from the ethnic groups that settled in the British Isles in and before the 11th century, Prehistoric, Celtic, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Norse. The British are a diverse, multi-national and multicultural society, with regional accents, expressions. Although none of his own writings remain, writers during the time of the Roman Empire made much reference to them, the group included Ireland, which was referred to as Ierne inhabited by the different race of Hiberni, and Britain as insula Albionum, island of the Albions. The term Pritani may have reached Pytheas from the Gauls, who used it as their term for the inhabitants of the islands. Greek and Roman writers, in the 1st century BC and the 1st century AD, name the inhabitants of Great Britain and Ireland as the Priteni, the origin of the Latin word Britanni. It has been suggested that name derives from a Gaulish description translated as people of the forms. By 50 BC Greek geographers were using equivalents of Prettanikē as a name for the British Isles. However, the term Britannia persisted as the Latin name for the island, during the Middle Ages, and particularly in the Tudor period, the term British was used to refer to the Welsh people and Cornish people. At that time, it was the held belief that these were the remaining descendants of the ancient Britons. This notion was supported by such as the Historia Regum Britanniae. Wales and Cornwall, and north, i. e. Cumbria, Strathclyde and this legendary Celtic history of Great Britain is known as the Matter of Britain. The indigenous people of the British Isles have a combination of Celtic, Norse, Anglo-Saxon, oppenheimer continues that the majority of the people of the British Isles share genetic commonalities with the Basques, ranging from highs of 90% in Wales to lows of 66% in East Anglia. Oppenheimers opinion is that. by far the majority of male gene types in the British Isles derive from Iberia, ranging from a low of 59% in Fakenham, Norfolk to highs of 96% in Llangefni, north Wales. The English had been unified under a single state in 937 by King Athelstan of Wessex after the Battle of Brunanburh. However, historian Simon Schama suggested that it was Edward I of England who was responsible for provoking the peoples of Britain into an awareness of their nationhood in the 13th century
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Kingdom of Great Britain
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The Kingdom of Great Britain, officially Great Britain, was a sovereign state in western Europe from 1 May 1707 to 31 December 1800. It did not include Ireland, which remained a separate realm, the unitary state was governed by a single parliament and government that was based in Westminster. Also after the accession of George I to the throne of Great Britain in 1714, the early years of the unified kingdom were marked by Jacobite risings which ended in defeat for the Stuart cause at Culloden in 1746. On 1 January 1801, the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland were merged to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922, five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the United Kingdom, the name Britain descends from the Latin name for the island of Great Britain, Britannia or Brittānia, the land of the Britons via the Old French Bretaigne and Middle English Bretayne, Breteyne. The term Great Britain was first used officially in 1474, in the instrument drawing up the proposal for a marriage between Edward IV of Englands daughter Cecily and James III of Scotlands son James. The Treaty of Union and the subsequent Acts of Union state that England and Scotland were to be United into one Kingdom by the Name of Great Britain. However, both the Acts and the Treaty also refer numerous times to the United Kingdom and the longer form, other publications refer to the country as the United Kingdom after 1707 as well. The websites of the UK parliament, the Scottish Parliament, the BBC, additionally, the term United Kingdom was found in informal use during the 18th century to describe the state. The new state created in 1707 included the island of Great Britain, the kingdoms of England and Scotland, both in existence from the 9th century, were separate states until 1707. However, they had come into a union in 1603. Each of the three kingdoms maintained its own parliament and laws and this disposition changed dramatically when the Acts of Union 1707 came into force, with a single unified Crown of Great Britain and a single unified parliament. Ireland remained formally separate, with its own parliament, until the Acts of Union 1800, legislative power was vested in the Parliament of Great Britain, which replaced both the Parliament of England and the Parliament of Scotland. In practice it was a continuation of the English parliament, sitting at the location in Westminster. Newly created peers in the Peerage of Great Britain were given the right to sit in the Lords. Despite the end of a parliament for Scotland, it retained its own laws. As a result of Poynings Law of 1495, the Parliament of Ireland was subordinate to the Parliament of England, the Act was repealed by the Repeal of Act for Securing Dependence of Ireland Act 1782. The same year, the Irish constitution of 1782 produced a period of legislative freedom, the 18th century saw England, and after 1707 Great Britain, rise to become the worlds dominant colonial power, with France its main rival on the imperial stage
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British Army
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The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom. As of 2017 the British Army comprises just over 80,000 trained Regular, or full-time, personnel and just over 26,500 trained Reserve, or part-time personnel. Therefore, the UK Parliament approves the continued existence of the Army by passing an Armed Forces Act at least once every five years, day to day the Army comes under administration of the Ministry of Defence and is commanded by the Chief of the General Staff. Repeatedly emerging victorious from these decisive wars allowed Britain to influence world events with its policies and establish itself as one of the leading military. In 1660 the English, Scottish and Irish monarchies were restored under Charles II, Charles favoured the foundation of a new army under royal control and began work towards its establishment by August 1660. The Royal Scots Army and the Irish Army were financed by the Parliament of Scotland, the order of seniority of the most senior line regiments in the British Army is based on the order of seniority in the English army. At that time there was only one English regiment of dragoons, after William and Marys accession to the throne, England involved itself in the War of the Grand Alliance, primarily to prevent a French invasion restoring Marys father, James II. Spain, in the two centuries, had been the dominant global power, and the chief threat to Englands early transatlantic ambitions. The territorial ambitions of the French, however, led to the War of the Spanish Succession and the Napoleonic Wars. From the time of the end of the Seven Years War in 1763, Great Britain was the naval power. As had its predecessor, the English Army, the British Army fought the Kingdoms of Spain, France, and the Netherlands for supremacy in North America and the West Indies. With native and provincial assistance, the Army conquered New France in the North American theatre of the Seven Years War, the British Army suffered defeat in the American War of Independence, losing the Thirteen Colonies but holding on to Canada. The British Army was heavily involved in the Napoleonic Wars and served in campaigns across Europe. The war between the British and the First French Empire of Napoleon Bonaparte stretched around the world and at its peak, in 1813, the regular army contained over 250,000 men. A Coalition of Anglo-Dutch and Prussian Armies under the Duke of Wellington, the English had been involved, both politically and militarily, in Ireland since being given the Lordship of Ireland by the Pope in 1171. The campaign of the English republican Protector, Oliver Cromwell, involved uncompromising treatment of the Irish towns that had supported the Royalists during the English Civil War, the English Army stayed in Ireland primarily to suppress numerous Irish revolts and campaigns for independence. Having learnt from their experience in America, the British government sought a political solution, the British Army found itself fighting Irish rebels, both Protestant and Catholic, primarily in Ulster and Leinster in the 1798 rebellion. The Haldane Reforms of 1907 formally created the Territorial Force as the Armys volunteer reserve component by merging and reorganising the Volunteer Force, Militia, Great Britains dominance of the world had been challenged by numerous other powers, in the 20th century, most notably Germany
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Commander-in-Chief, India
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During the period of the British Raj, the Commander-in-Chief, India was the supreme commander of the British Indian Army. The Commander-in-Chief and most of his staff were based at General Headquarters, India, following the Partition of India in 1947 and the creation of the independent dominions of India and Pakistan, the post was abolished. It was briefly replaced by the position of Supreme Commander of India, prior to independence, the official residence was the Flagstaff House, which later became the residence of the first Prime Minister of India, as Teen Murti House, it is now a museum. This is a list of people who were the military Commander-in-Chief, the rank and title are the final ones for the officers career and not necessarily applicable to his tenure as Commander-in-Chief, India
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American Revolutionary War
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From about 1765 the American Revolution had led to increasing philosophical and political differences between Great Britain and its American colonies. The war represented a culmination of these differences in armed conflict between Patriots and the authority which they increasingly resisted. This resistance became particularly widespread in the New England Colonies, especially in the Province of Massachusetts Bay. On December 16,1773, Massachusetts members of the Patriot group Sons of Liberty destroyed a shipment of tea in Boston Harbor in an event that became known as the Boston Tea Party. Named the Coercive Acts by Parliament, these became known as the Intolerable Acts in America. The Massachusetts colonists responded with the Suffolk Resolves, establishing a government that removed control of the province from the Crown outside of Boston. Twelve colonies formed a Continental Congress to coordinate their resistance, and established committees, British attempts to seize the munitions of Massachusetts colonists in April 1775 led to the first open combat between Crown forces and Massachusetts militia, the Battles of Lexington and Concord. Militia forces proceeded to besiege the British forces in Boston, forcing them to evacuate the city in March 1776, the Continental Congress appointed George Washington to take command of the militia. Concurrent to the Boston campaign, an American attempt to invade Quebec, on July 2,1776, the Continental Congress formally voted for independence, issuing its Declaration on July 4. Sir William Howe began a British counterattack, focussing on recapturing New York City, Howe outmaneuvered and defeated Washington, leaving American confidence at a low ebb. Washington captured a Hessian force at Trenton and drove the British out of New Jersey, in 1777 the British sent a new army under John Burgoyne to move south from Canada and to isolate the New England colonies. However, instead of assisting Burgoyne, Howe took his army on a campaign against the revolutionary capital of Philadelphia. Burgoyne outran his supplies, was surrounded and surrendered at Saratoga in October 1777, the British defeat in the Saratoga Campaign had drastic consequences. Giving up on the North, the British decided to salvage their former colonies in the South, British forces under Lieutenant-General Charles Cornwallis seized Georgia and South Carolina, capturing an American army at Charleston, South Carolina. British strategy depended upon an uprising of large numbers of armed Loyalists, in 1779 Spain joined the war as an ally of France under the Pacte de Famille, intending to capture Gibraltar and British colonies in the Caribbean. Britain declared war on the Dutch Republic in December 1780, in 1781, after the British and their allies had suffered two decisive defeats at Kings Mountain and Cowpens, Cornwallis retreated to Virginia, intending on evacuation. A decisive French naval victory in September deprived the British of an escape route, a joint Franco-American army led by Count Rochambeau and Washington, laid siege to the British forces at Yorktown. With no sign of relief and the situation untenable, Cornwallis surrendered in October 1781, Whigs in Britain had long opposed the pro-war Tory majority in Parliament, but the defeat at Yorktown gave the Whigs the upper hand
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French Revolutionary Wars
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The French Revolutionary Wars were a series of sweeping military conflicts, lasting from 1792 until 1802, resulting from the French Revolution. They pitted the French First Republic against Britain, Austria and several other monarchies and they are divided in two periods, the War of the First Coalition and the War of the Second Coalition. Initially confined to Europe, the fighting gradually assumed a global dimension as the political ambitions of the Revolution expanded, French success in these conflicts ensured the spread of revolutionary principles over much of Europe. The Revolutionary Wars began from increasing political pressure on King Louis XVI of France to prove his loyalty to the new direction France was taking. In the spring of 1792, France declared war on Prussia and Austria, the victory rejuvenated the French nation and emboldened the National Convention to abolish the monarchy. A series of victories by the new French armies abruptly ended with defeat at Neerwinden in the spring of 1793, by 1795, the French had captured the Austrian Netherlands and knocked Spain and Prussia out of the war with the Peace of Basel. A hitherto unknown general called Napoleon Bonaparte began his first campaign in Italy in April 1796, in less than a year, French armies under Napoleon decimated the Habsburg forces and evicted them from the Italian peninsula, winning almost every battle and capturing 150,000 prisoners. With French forces marching towards Vienna, the Austrians sued for peace and agreed to the Treaty of Campo Formio, the War of the Second Coalition began with the French invasion of Egypt, headed by Napoleon, in 1798. The Allies took the opportunity presented by the French strategic effort in the Middle East to regain territories lost from the First Coalition. The war began well for the Allies in Europe, where they pushed the French out of Italy and invaded Switzerland—racking up victories at Magnano, Cassano. However, their efforts largely unraveled with the French victory at Zurich in September 1799, meanwhile, Napoleons forces annihilated a series of Egyptian and Ottoman armies at the battles of the Pyramids, Mount Tabor, and Abukir. These victories and the conquest of Egypt further enhanced Napoleons popularity back in France, however, the Royal Navy had managed to inflict a humiliating defeat on the French fleet at the Battle of the Nile in 1798, further strengthening British control of the Mediterranean. Napoleons arrival from Egypt led to the fall of the Directory in the Coup of 18 Brumaire, Napoleon then reorganized the French army and launched a new assault against the Austrians in Italy during the spring of 1800. This latest effort culminated in a decisive French victory at the Battle of Marengo in June 1800, another crushing French triumph at Hohenlinden in Bavaria forced the Austrians to seek peace for a second time, leading to the Treaty of Lunéville in 1801. With Austria and Russia out of the war, the United Kingdom found itself increasingly isolated and agreed to the Treaty of Amiens with Napoleons government in 1802, concluding the Revolutionary Wars. The lingering tensions proved too difficult to contain, however, in 1789–1792, the entire governmental structure of France was transformed to fall into line with the Revolutionary principles of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. As a result, one of the first major elements of the French state to be restructured was the army, the transformation of the army was best seen in the officer corps. Before the revolution 90% had been nobility, compared to only 3% in 1794, Revolutionary fervour was high, and was closely monitored by the Committee of Public Safety, which assigned Representatives on Mission to keep watch on generals
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Anglo-Irish people
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Many became eminent as administrators in the British Empire and as senior army and naval officers. The term is not usually applied to Presbyterians in the province of Ulster, whose ancestry is mostly Scottish, rather than English or Irish, the Anglo-Irish held a wide range of political views, with many of them being outspoken Irish Nationalists. And while many of the Anglo-Irish were part of the English diaspora in Ireland, in the course of the 17th century, this Anglo-Irish landed class replaced the Gaelic Irish and Old English aristocracies as the ruling class in Ireland. They were also referred to as New English to distinguish them from the Old English who descended from the medieval Hiberno-Norman settlers and those who converted to the Church of Ireland were usually able to keep or regain their lost property, as the issue was primarily one of allegiance. In the late 18th century the Parliament of Ireland in Dublin won legislative independence, the Anglo-Irish social class was usually of mixed English and Irish or Welsh ancestry. Members of this class commonly identified themselves as Irish, while retaining English habits in politics, commerce. They participated in the popular English sports of the day, particularly racing and fox hunting, many of the more successful of them spent much of their careers either in Great Britain or in some part of the British Empire. Many constructed large houses, which became known in Ireland as Big Houses. The Dublin working class playwright Brendan Behan, a staunch Irish Republican, saw the Anglo-Irish as Irelands leisure class, the Anglo-Irish novelist and short story writer Elizabeth Bowen memorably described her experience as feeling English in Ireland, Irish in England and not accepted fully as belonging to either. Due to their prominence in the military and their conservative politics and they also controlled financial companies such as the Bank of Ireland and Goodbody Stockbrokers. Prominent Anglo-Irish poets, writers, and playwrights include Jonathan Swift, George Berkeley, Oliver Goldsmith, Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde, J. M. Synge, W. B. Yeats, Cecil Day-Lewis, Bernard Shaw, Augusta, Lady Gregory, Samuel Beckett, Giles Cooper, C. S. Lewis, Lord Longford, the polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton was also an Anglo-Irishman. Medical experts included Sir William Wilde, Robert Graves, Thomas Wrigley Grimshaw, William Stokes, Robert Collis, Sir John Lumsden, William Desmond Taylor was an early and prolific maker of silent films in Hollywood. Philanthropists included Thomas Barnardo and The 1st Earl of Iveagh, the Anglo-Irish, as a class, were mostly opposed to the notions of Irish independence and Home Rule. Most were supporters of continued political union with Great Britain, which existed between 1800 and 1922, however, Protestants in Ireland, and the Anglo-Irish class in particular, were by no means universally attached to the cause of continued political union with Great Britain. For instance, author Jonathan Swift, a clergyman in the Church of Ireland, the Irish Rebellion of 1798 was led by members of the Anglo-Irish and Ulster Scots class, some of whom feared the political implications of the impending union with Great Britain. By the late 19th and early 20th centuries, however, Irish nationalism became increasingly tied to a Roman Catholic identity, by the beginning of the twentieth century, many Anglo-Irishmen in southern Ireland had become convinced of the need for a political settlement with Irish nationalists. Anglo-Irish politicians such as Sir Horace Plunkett and Lord Monteagle became leading figures in finding a solution to the Irish question
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Francis Hastings, 10th Earl of Huntingdon
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Francis Hastings, 10th Earl of Huntingdon PC was a British peer and politician. He was the eldest of seven children of the 9th Earl of Huntingdon and his wife, Lady Selina, Hastings was eighteen when he succeeded as Earl of Huntingdon and Baron Botreaux on his fathers demise in 1746. In August 1752 Huntingdon left Paris for Spain, where his self-importance irritated the British minister and he visited Gibraltar and Lisbon before returning to England in early July 1753. The following July he left England for a second, two-year tour of the continent, in Italy he studied antiquities with the antiquarian Antonio Cocchi, as well as Joseph Wilton and the Abbé Venuti. He was a Bearer of the Sword of State at George IIIs coronation in 1761, in 1762, he incorrectly announced to the King that his first-born child, by the Queen, was a girl. The error was doubly unfortunate at the time, as the King had hoped for a heir and he also promised £1,000 to the bearer of the news that he had a son. In 1766 he launched a claim to the royal Dukedom of Clarence that preoccupied him for the rest of his life and he died suddenly on 2 October 1789, at the London house of his nephew, Francis Rawdon. On his death in 1789, the earldom became dormant and he was succeeded in the baronies of Hastings, Hungerford, de Moleyns and Botreaux by his sister Lady Elizabeth, wife of John Rawdon, 1st Earl of Moira. Huntingdon was a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1758 and of the Society of Antiquaries in 1768, record for Francis Hastings, 10th Earl of Huntingdon on thepeerage. com Magazine Antiques David, Saul, The Prince of Pleasure ISBN 0-316-64616-4
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Hugh Douglas Hamilton
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Hugh Douglas Hamilton was an Irish portrait-painter. He spent considerable periods in London and Rome before returning to Dublin in the early 1790s, until the mid-1770s he worked mostly in pastel. His style influenced the English painter Lewis Vaslet, Hamilton was born in Crow Street, in Dublin, Ireland, in 1740, the son of a peruke maker. Unfortunately there is little concrete evidence for his earlylife, apart from his own drawings. He studied art under Robert West at the Dublin Society House - and won early success with crayon. He was very adept at building relationships with patrons from the days, taking up with the famous La Touche banking family of Dublin. Very little is known of Hamiltons career between 1756 and 1764, when he moved to London, Hamilton found great success in London through his pastel oval portraits, portraying royalty, politicians and celebrities of the day through this medium. Hamilton was often overwhelmed with orders, including commissions from the British royal family - such as Queen Charlotte and he showed with the Society of Artists and the Free Society of Artists from the mid-1760s to the mid-1770s. From the mid-1770s on, Hamilton became very interested in a softer, more form of pastel fresco, in which he blended crayons. In 1779 he travelled to Italy, where he remained for the twelve years, occasionally visiting Florence but mainly based in Rome. On the advice of artist John Flaxman Hamilton turned to oil painting and his portraits of this period include those of Dean Kirwan, George John, 2nd Earl Spencer, Countess Cowper, and the exiled Charles Edward Stuart. In 1791 Hamilton returned to Dublin, where he died, in 1796 he painted Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the Irish revolutionary. Hamilton was best known for his pastel portraits depicting the head. These pastels were lively and affordable, costing around six guineas a piece and they became very popular throughout Europe. For these oval portraits, Hamilton used handmade cream or off-white paper, usually medium in thickness and this speed and skill was necessary to ensure a steady flow of clientele, as Hamilton was very pressed with commissions for this portraits. While there is no surviving evidence on Hamiltons pastel technique, through close examination of his works. Hamilton most likely applied each tone to the portrait separately before blending to avoid dulling the image, when drawing a face, he first outlined the head and shoulders in a light tone, then added the features of the face in a faint carmine tones. He then blended the tones on the face using his fingers, after this, the background was filled in using the broad side of the pastel, avoiding the outline of the face
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Henry Raeburn
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Sir Henry Raeburn FRSE RA RSA was a Scottish portrait painter and Scotlands first significant portrait painter since the Union to remain based in Scotland. He served as Portrait Painter to King George IV in Scotland, Raeburn was born the son of a manufacturer in Stockbridge, on the Water of Leith, a former village now within the city of Edinburgh. He had a brother, born in 1744, called William Raeburn. His ancestors were believed to have been soldiers, and may have taken the name Raeburn from a farm in Annandale. Orphaned, he was supported by William and placed in Heriots Hospital, soon he took to the production of carefully finished portrait miniatures, meeting with success and patronage, he extended his practice to oil painting, at which he was self-taught. Raeburn was especially aided by the loan of portraits to copy, soon he had gained sufficient skill to make him decide to devote himself exclusively to painting. George Chalmers is his earliest known portrait, in his early twenties, Raeburn was asked to paint the portrait of a young lady he had noticed when he was sketching from nature in the fields. Anne was the daughter of Peter Edgar of Bridgelands, and widow of Count James Leslie of Deanhaugh, fascinated by the handsome and intellectual young artist, she became his wife within a month, bringing him an ample fortune. The acquisition of wealth did not affect his enthusiasm or his industry and it was usual for artists to visit Italy, and Raeburn set off with his wife. After two years of study in Italy he returned to Edinburgh in 1787, and began a career as a portrait painter. In that year he executed a portrait of the second Lord President Dundas. The portraits of John Clerk, Lord Eldin, and of Principal Hill of St Andrews belong to a later period, Raeburn was fortunate in the time in which he practised portraiture. Sir Walter Scott, Hugh Blair, Henry Mackenzie, Lord Woodhouselee, William Robertson, John Home, Robert Fergusson, and Dugald Stewart were resident in Edinburgh, mature works include his own portrait and that of the Rev. Apart from himself, Raeburn painted only two artists, one of whom was Sir Francis Leggatt Chantrey, the most important and famous British sculptor of the first half of the nineteenth century. Raeburn spent his life in Edinburgh, rarely visiting London, and then only for brief periods, so varied were his other interests that sitters used to say of him, You would never take him for a painter till he seizes the brush and palette. In 1812 he was elected president of the Society of Artists in Edinburgh, in 1814 associate, on 29 August 1822 he was knighted by George IV and appointed His Majestys limner for Scotland at the Earl of Hopetoun house. Raeburn had all the qualities of a popular and successful portrait painter. David Wilkie recorded that, while travelling in Spain and studying the works of Diego Velázquez, Scottish physician and writer John Brown wrote that Raeburn never fails in giving a likeness at once vivid, unmistakable and pleasing
Great Britain
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This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Hastings, Francis Rawdon-Hastings, 1st Marquess of". Encyclopædia Britannica. 13 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 53–55.
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