1.
Saint symbolism
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Christianity has used symbolism from its very beginnings. Each saint has a story and a reason why he or she led an exemplary life, symbols have been used to tell these stories throughout the history of the Church. A number of Christian saints are traditionally represented by a symbol or iconic motif associated with their life, termed an attribute or emblem, the study of these forms part of iconography in art history. They were particularly used so that the illiterate could recognize a scene and they are often carried in the hand by the Saint. Attributes often vary with time or geography, especially between Eastern Christianity and the West. Orthodox images more often contained inscriptions with the names of saints, many of the most prominent saints, like Saint Peter and Saint John the Evangelist can also be recognised by a distinctive facial type – as can Christ. Some attributes are general, such as the palm frond carried by martyrs, the use of a symbol in a work of art depicting a Saint reminds people who is being shown and of their story. The following is a list of some of these attributes, a New Dictionary of Saints, East and West. Catholic Forum Patron Saints Index Saints Badges or Shields On the Canonizations of John Paul II
2.
Hermit
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A hermit is a person who lives in seclusion from society. In Christianity, the term was applied to a Christian who lives the eremitic life out of a religious conviction. In the Christian tradition the eremitic life is a form of monastic living that preceded the monastic life in the cenobium. The Rule of St Benedict lists hermits among four kinds of monks, other religions, for example, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, and Taoism, also have hermits in the sense of individuals living an ascetic form of life. In modern colloquial usage, hermit denotes anyone living apart from the rest of society, or simply participating in social events. In the common Christian tradition the first known Christian hermit in Egypt was Paul of Thebes, an antecedent for Egyptian eremiticism may have been the Syrian solitary or son of the covenant who undertook special disciplines as a Christian. In the Middle Ages some Carmelite hermits claimed to trace their origin to Jewish hermits organized by Elijah, Christian hermits in the past have often lived in isolated cells or hermitages, whether a natural cave or a constructed dwelling, situated in the desert or the forest. They tended to be out for spiritual advice and counsel. Some eventually acquired so many disciples that they had no physical solitude at all, the early Christian Desert Fathers wove baskets to exchange for bread. In medieval times hermits were also found within or near cities where they earn a living as a gate keeper or ferryman. From the Middle Ages and down to modern times eremitical monasticism has also practiced within the context of religious institutes in the Christian West. This applies to both their monks and their nuns, there have also been many hermits who chose that vocation as an alternative to other forms of monastic life. In the 11th century, the life of the hermit gained recognition as a legitimate independent pathway to salvation, many hermits in that century and the next came to be regarded as saints. The term anchorite is often used as a synonym for hermit, not only in the earliest written sources, yet the anchoritic life, while similar to the eremitic life, can also be distinct from it. Anchorites and anchoresses lived the life in the solitude of an anchorhold, usually a small hut or cell. The door of an anchorage tended to be bricked up in a ceremony conducted by the local bishop after the anchorite had moved in. Another window looked out into the street or cemetery, enabling charitable neighbors to deliver food, clients seeking the anchorites advice might also use this window to consult him or her. There are also lay people who follow an eremitic lifestyle
3.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
4.
Merchant
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A merchant is a person who trades in commodities produced by other people to earn a profit. A merchant historically was anyone involved in business as long as industry, commerce, the status of the merchant has varied during different periods of history and among different societies. There are two types of merchant, A wholesale merchant is a wholesaler who operates in the chain between produce and retail merchant, typically dealing in large quantities of goods, some wholesale merchants only organize the movement of goods rather than move the goods themselves. A retail merchant or retailer, sells merchandise to end-users or consumers, a shop-keeper is a retail merchant. Merchants have existed as long as business, industry, trade, a merchant class characterized many pre-modern societies. Open air, public markets were known in ancient Babylonia and Assyria, China, Egypt, Greece, India, Persia, Phonecia and these markets typically occupied a place in the towns centre. Surrounding the market, skilled artisans, such as metal-workers and leather workers and these artisans may have sold wares directly from their premises, but also prepared goods for sale on market days. In ancient Greece markets operated within the agora, and in ancient Rome the forum, the nature of direct selling centred around transactional exchange, where the goods were on open display, allowing buyers to evaluate quality directly through visual inspection. Relationships between merchant and consumer were minimal, the Phoenicians plied their ships across the Mediterranean, becoming a major trading power by 9th century BCE. The Phoenicians imported and exported wood, textiles, glass and produce such as wine, oil, dried fruit and their trading skills necessitated a network of colonies along the Mediterranean coast, stretching from modern day Crete through to Tangiers and onto Sardinia. The Phoenicians not only traded in goods, but were also instrumental in transporting the trappings of culture. The Phoenicians extensive trade networks necessitated considerable book-keeping and correspondence, in around 1500 BCE, the Phoenicians developed a phonetic alphabet which was much easier to learn that the pictographic scripts used in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. Phoenician traders and merchants were responsible for spreading their alphabet around the region. Phoenician inscriptions have been found in sites at a number of former Phoenician cities and colonies around the Mediterranean, such as Byblos. The Romans defined merchants or traders in a narrow sense. Merchants were those who bought and sold goods while landowners who sold their own produce were not considered to be merchants, being a landowner was a respectable occupation. On the other hand, the trade of merchant was not considered respectable, although they may have lacked high social standing, merchants in ancient Rome often made handsome profits. Umbricius Scauras, for example, was a manufacturer and trader of fish sauce in Pompeii and his villa, situated in one of the wealthier districts of Pompeii, was very large and ornately decorated in a show of substantial personal wealth
5.
Middle Ages
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In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or Medieval Period lasted from the 5th to the 15th century. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and merged into the Renaissance, the Middle Ages is the middle period of the three traditional divisions of Western history, classical antiquity, the medieval period, and the modern period. The medieval period is subdivided into the Early, High. Population decline, counterurbanisation, invasion, and movement of peoples, the large-scale movements of the Migration Period, including various Germanic peoples, formed new kingdoms in what remained of the Western Roman Empire. In the seventh century, North Africa and the Middle East—once part of the Byzantine Empire—came under the rule of the Umayyad Caliphate, although there were substantial changes in society and political structures, the break with classical antiquity was not complete. The still-sizeable Byzantine Empire survived in the east and remained a major power, the empires law code, the Corpus Juris Civilis or Code of Justinian, was rediscovered in Northern Italy in 1070 and became widely admired later in the Middle Ages. In the West, most kingdoms incorporated the few extant Roman institutions, monasteries were founded as campaigns to Christianise pagan Europe continued. The Franks, under the Carolingian dynasty, briefly established the Carolingian Empire during the later 8th, the Crusades, first preached in 1095, were military attempts by Western European Christians to regain control of the Holy Land from Muslims. Kings became the heads of centralised nation states, reducing crime and violence, intellectual life was marked by scholasticism, a philosophy that emphasised joining faith to reason, and by the founding of universities. Controversy, heresy, and the Western Schism within the Catholic Church paralleled the conflict, civil strife. Cultural and technological developments transformed European society, concluding the Late Middle Ages, the Middle Ages is one of the three major periods in the most enduring scheme for analysing European history, classical civilisation, or Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Modern Period. Medieval writers divided history into periods such as the Six Ages or the Four Empires, when referring to their own times, they spoke of them as being modern. In the 1330s, the humanist and poet Petrarch referred to pre-Christian times as antiqua, leonardo Bruni was the first historian to use tripartite periodisation in his History of the Florentine People. Bruni and later argued that Italy had recovered since Petrarchs time. The Middle Ages first appears in Latin in 1469 as media tempestas or middle season, in early usage, there were many variants, including medium aevum, or middle age, first recorded in 1604, and media saecula, or middle ages, first recorded in 1625. The alternative term medieval derives from medium aevum, tripartite periodisation became standard after the German 17th-century historian Christoph Cellarius divided history into three periods, Ancient, Medieval, and Modern. The most commonly given starting point for the Middle Ages is 476, for Europe as a whole,1500 is often considered to be the end of the Middle Ages, but there is no universally agreed upon end date. English historians often use the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485 to mark the end of the period
6.
Norfolk
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Norfolk /ˈnɔːrfək/ is a county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the west and north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea and, to the north-west, The Wash. With an area of 2,074 square miles and a population of 859,400, of the countys population, 40% live in four major built up areas, Norwich, Great Yarmouth, Kings Lynn and Thetford. The Broads is a network of rivers and lakes in the east of the county, the area is not a National Park although it is marketed as such. It has similar status to a park, and is protected by the Broads Authority. Norfolk was settled in times, with camps along the higher land in the west. A Brythonic tribe, the Iceni, inhabited the county from the 1st century BC to the end of the 1st century AD, the Iceni revolted against the Roman invasion in AD47, and again in 60 led by Boudica. The crushing of the second opened the county to the Romans. During the Roman era roads and ports were constructed throughout the county, situated on the east coast, Norfolk was vulnerable to invasions from Scandinavia and Northern Europe, and forts were built to defend against the Angles and Saxons. Norfolk, Suffolk and several adjacent areas became the kingdom of East Anglia, the influence of the Early English settlers can be seen in the many place names ending in -ton and -ham. Endings such as -by and -thorpe are also common, indicating Danish place names, in the 9th century the region came under attack. In the centuries before the Norman Conquest the wetlands of the east of the county began to be converted to farmland, and settlements grew in these areas. Migration into East Anglia must have high, by the time of the Domesday Book survey it was one of the most densely populated parts of the British Isles. During the high and late Middle Ages the county developed arable agriculture, the economy was in decline by the time of the Black Death, which dramatically reduced the population in 1349. During the English Civil War Norfolk was largely Parliamentarian, the economy and agriculture of the region declined somewhat. During the Industrial Revolution Norfolk developed little industry except in Norwich which was an addition to the railway network. In the 20th century the county developed a role in aviation, during the Second World War agriculture rapidly intensified, and it has remained very intensive since, with the establishment of large fields for growing cereals and oilseed rape. Norfolks low-lying land and easily eroded cliffs, many of which are chalk and clay, make it vulnerable to the sea, the low-lying section of coast between Kelling and Lowestoft Ness in Suffolk is currently managed by the Environment Agency to protect the Broads from sea flooding
7.
County Durham
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County Durham is a county in North East England. The county town is Durham, a cathedral city, the largest settlement is Darlington, closely followed by Hartlepool and Stockton-on-Tees. It borders Tyne and Wear to the north east, Northumberland to the north, Cumbria to the west, historically, the county included southern Tyne and Wear, including Gateshead and Sunderland. The county has a mixture of mining and farming heritage, as well as a railway industry. Its economy was based on coal and iron mining. It is an area of regeneration and promoted as a tourist destination, in the centre of the city of Durham, Durham Castle and Durham Cathedral are a UNESCO-designated World Heritage Site. Many counties are named after their town, and the expected form here would be Durhamshire. Thus County Durham is a form of County of Durham. The situation regarding the name with regards to present-day local government is less clear. The structural change legislation which in 2009 created the present unitary council refers to the county of County Durham, the former postal county was named County Durham to distinguish it from the post town of Durham. The ceremonial county of Durham is administered by four unitary authorities, the ceremonial county has no administrative function, but remains the area to which the Lord Lieutenant of Durham and the High Sheriff of Durham are appointed. The Borough of Hartlepool, until 1 April 1996 the borough was one of four districts in the relatively short-lived county of Cleveland, the part of the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees that is north of the centre of the River Tees. Stockton was also part of Cleveland until that countys abolition in 1996, the remainder of the borough is part of the ceremonial county of North Yorkshire. Durham Constabulary operate in the area of the two districts of County Durham and Darlington. Ron Hogg was first elected the Durham Police and Crime Commissioner for the force on 15 November 2012, the other areas in the ceremonial county fall within the police area of the Cleveland Police. Air Ambulance services are provided by the Great North Air Ambulance, the charity operates 3 helicopters including one at Durham Tees Valley Airport covering the County Durham area. Teesdale and Weardale Search and Mountain Rescue Team, based at the Durham Constabulary base in Barnard Castle, respond to search, Cuthbert between Tyne and Tees or the Liberty of Haliwerfolc. The bishops special jurisdiction rested on claims that King Ecgfrith of Northumbria had granted a substantial territory to St Cuthbert on his election to the see of Lindisfarne in 684
8.
Baldwin I of Jerusalem
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Baldwin I of Jerusalem, formerly Baldwin I of Edessa, born Baldwin of Boulogne,1058. –2 April 1118, was one of the leaders of the First Crusade and he was the brother of Godfrey of Bouillon, who was the first ruler of the crusader state of Jerusalem, although Godfrey refused the title of king which Baldwin accepted. Baldwin was a son of Eustace II, Count of Boulogne and Ida of Lorraine, and he became a cleric, it is said, and, because of his illustrious lineage, held benefices commonly called prebends in the churches of Reims, Cambrai, and Liège. Afterwards he lived in Normandy, where he married Godehilde de Toeni and he returned to Lower Lorraine in order to take control of the county of Verdun. In 1096 he joined the First Crusade with his brothers Godfrey and Eustace III of Boulogne and his wife Godehilde also accompanied him. When Godfrey passed through Hungary, King Coloman demanded a hostage to ensure their good conduct, after entering Byzantine territory, there were a few skirmishes with the Greeks, who had also suffered from the Peoples Crusade. Baldwin commanded a detachment of troops captured a bridge in the vicinity of Constantinople. The hostage, his son the future emperor John II Comnenus, was entrusted to the care of Baldwin, according to Anna Comnena, Baldwin reprimanded one of his soldiers who dared to sit on Alexius throne in Constantinople. Baldwin accompanied his brothers as far as Heraclea in Asia Minor, Tancred was surely seeking to capture some land and establish himself as a petty ruler in the east, and Baldwin may have had the same goal. During his absence his wife fell ill and died at Marash, some historians have suggested that his entire strategy changed from that point, others believe that the change happened earlier. In September 1097 he took Tarsus from Tancred, and installed his own garrison in the city, Tancred and Baldwins armies skirmished briefly at Mamistra, but the two never came to open warfare and Tancred marched on towards Antioch. After rejoining the army at Marash, Baldwin received an invitation from an Armenian named Bagrat, and moved eastwards towards the Euphrates. Another invitation came from Thoros of Edessa, where Baldwin was adopted as Thoros son, when Thoros was assassinated in March 1098, Baldwin became the first count of Edessa, although it is unknown if he played any role in the assassination. He ruled the county until 1100, marrying Arda, the daughter of Thoros of Marash, during these two years he captured Samosata and Suruç from the Muslims, and defeated a conspiracy by some of his Armenian subjects in 1098. During the Siege of Antioch he sent money and food to his fellow crusaders, kerbogha, the governor of Mosul, was marching to relieve Antioch but first stopped at Edessa, which he besieged for three weeks, to no avail. Kerbogha was later defeated at Antioch and the established a principality there. Later that year Baldwin had consolidated his power enough that he was able to march out with his brother Godfrey, at the end of 1099 he visited Jerusalem along with Bohemund I of Antioch, but he returned to Edessa in January,1100. After returning to Edessa, Baldwin aided in relieving the siege of Melitene, the Armenian ruler of the city, Gabriel, then recognized Baldwin as overlord of the city
9.
Lindisfarne
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The Holy Island of Lindisfarne is a tidal island off the northeast coast of England. It is also known just as Holy Island and it constitutes the civil parish of Holy Island in Northumberland. Holy Island has a history from the 6th century AD. It was an important centre of Celtic Christianity under Saints Aidan of Lindisfarne, Cuthbert, Eadfrith of Lindisfarne, after the Viking invasions and the Norman conquest of England, a priory was reestablished. A small castle was built on the island in 1550, the island of Lindisfarne appears under the Old Welsh name Medcaut in the 9th century Historia Brittonum. Following up on a suggestion by Richard Coates, Andrew Breeze proposes that the name derives from Latin Medicata. Both the Parker Chronicle and Peterborough Chronicle annals of AD793 record the Old English name, the soubriquet Holy Island was in use by the 11th century when it appears in Latin as Insula Sacra. The reference was to Saints Aidan and Cuthbert, the name Lindisfarne has an uncertain origin. The first part, Lindis-, may refer to people from the Kingdom of Lindsey in modern Lincolnshire, alternatively the name may be Celtic in origin, with the element Lindis- meaning stream or pool. It is not known if this is a reference to the nearby River Low or a lake on the island. The second element, -farne, probably comes from farran, meaning land, There is also a supposition that the nearby Farne Islands are fern like in shape and the name may have come from there. The island measures 3 miles from east to west and 1.5 miles from north to south, the nearest point of the island is about 1 mile from the mainland of England. The island of Lindisfarne is located along the northeast coast of England and it is accessible, most times, at low tide by crossing sand and mud flats which are covered with water at high tides. These sand and mud flats carry an ancient pilgrims path, and in recent times. Lindisfarne is surrounded by the 8, 750-acre Lindisfarne National Nature Reserve, which protects the islands sand dunes, as of 27 March 2011 the island had a population of 180. Warning signs urge visitors walking to the island to keep to the path, check tide times and weather carefully. For drivers, tide tables are prominently displayed at both ends of the causeway and also where the Holy Island road leaves the A1 Great North Road at Beal. The causeway is generally open from about three hours after high tide until two hours before the high tide, but the period of closure may be extended during stormy weather
10.
Cuthbert
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Saint Cuthbert was a saint of the early Northumbrian church in the Celtic tradition. He was a monk, bishop and hermit, associated with the monasteries of Melrose, and the South East of Scotland. After his death he became one of the most important medieval saints of Northern England, Cuthbert is regarded as the patron saint of northern England. His feast days are 20 March and 4 September, Cuthbert grew up near Melrose Abbey, a daughter-house of Lindisfarne, today in Scotland. He had decided to become a monk after seeing a vision on the night in 651 that St. Aidan, the founder of Lindisfarne, died, but seems to have seen some military service first. He was quickly made guest-master at the new monastery at Ripon, soon after 655, about 662 he was made prior at Melrose, and around 665 went as prior to Lindisfarne. In 684 he was bishop of Lindisfarne but by late 686 resigned and returned to his hermitage as he felt he was about to die. This was around 635, about the time Cuthbert was born, Cuthbert himself, though educated in the Celtic tradition, followed his mentor Eata in accepting the Roman forms without apparent difficulty after the Synod of Whitby in 664. Unlike Wilfrid, his style of life was austere, and when he was able to he lived the life of a hermit, fostering is possibly a sign of noble birth, as are references to his riding a horse when young. One night while still a boy, employed as a shepherd, he had a vision of the soul of Aidan being carried to heaven by angels, and later found out that Aidan had died that night. Edwin Burton finds a suggestion of lowly parentage in the fact that as a boy he used to tend sheep on the mountain-sides near that monastery and he appears to have had military service but at some point joined the very new monastery at Melrose, under the prior Boisil. Upon Boisils death in 661, Cuthbert succeeded him as prior, Saint Cuthbert was possibly a second cousin of King Aldfrith of Northumbria, which may have been the reason for his later proposal that Aldfrith should be crowned as monarch. Cuthberts fame for piety, diligence, and obedience quickly grew, when Alchfrith, king of Deira, founded a new monastery at Ripon, Cuthbert became its praepositus hospitum or guest master under Eata. When Wilfrid was given the monastery, Eata and Cuthbert returned to Melrose, illness struck the monastery in 664 and while Cuthbert recovered, the prior died and Cuthbert was made prior in his place. He spent much time among the people, ministering to their needs, carrying out missionary journeys, preaching. After the Synod of Whitby, Cuthbert seems to have accepted the Roman customs and he is also said to have founded St Cuthberts Church in Edinburgh. Cuthbert retired in 676, moved by a desire for the contemplative life, shortly afterwards, Cuthbert removed to Inner Farne island off the Northumbrian coast, where he gave himself up to a life of great austerity. At first he received visitors, but later he confined himself to his cell and he could not refuse an interview with the holy abbess and royal virgin Elfleda, the daughter of Oswiu of Northumbria, who succeeded St. Hilda as abbess of Whitby in 680
11.
Pilgrimage
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A pilgrimage is a journey or search of moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a persons beliefs and faith, a person who makes such a journey is called a pilgrim. As a common experience, pilgrimage has been proposed as a Jungian archetype by Wallace Clift. The Holy Land acts as a point for the pilgrimages of the Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity. Baháulláh decreed pilgrimage to two places in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, the House of Baháulláh in Baghdad, Iraq, and the House of the Báb in Shiraz, later, Abdul-Bahá designated the Shrine of Baháulláh at Bahji, Israel as a site of pilgrimage. Other pilgrimage places in India and Nepal connected to the life of Gautama Buddha are, Savatthi, Pataliputta, Nalanda, Gaya, Vesali, Sankasia, Kapilavastu, Kosambi, Rajagaha, Varanasi, other famous places for Buddhist pilgrimage include, India, Sanchi, Ellora, Ajanta. Thailand, Sukhothai, Ayutthaya, Wat Phra Kaew, Wat Doi Suthep, tibet, Lhasa, Mount Kailash, Lake Nam-tso. Sri Lanka, Polonnaruwa, Temple of the Tooth, Anuradhapura, malaysia, Kek Lok Si, Cheng Hoon Teng, Maha Vihara Myanmar, Bagan, Sagaing Hill. The Four Sacred Mountains Japan, Shikoku Pilgrimage,88 Temple pilgrimage in the Shikoku island, Japan 100 Kannon, pilgrimage composed of the Saigoku, Bandō and Chichibu pilgrimages. Saigoku 33 Kannon, pilgrimage in the Kansai region, Bandō33 Kannon, pilgrimage in the Kantō region. Chichibu 34 Kannon, pilgrimage in Saitama Prefecture, Chūgoku 33 Kannon, pilgrimage in the Chūgoku region. Christian pilgrimage was first made to sites connected with the birth, life, pilgrimages were, and are, also made to Rome and other sites associated with the apostles, saints and Christian martyrs, as well as to places where there have been apparitions of the Virgin Mary. A popular pilgrimage journey is along the Way of St. James to the Santiago de Compostela Cathedral, in Galicia, Spain, chaucers The Canterbury Tales recounts tales told by Christian pilgrims on their way to Canterbury Cathedral and the shrine of Thomas Becket. According to Karel Werners Popular Dictionary of Hinduism, most Hindu places of pilgrimage are associated with events from the lives of various gods. Almost any place can become a focus for pilgrimage, but in most cases they are sacred cities, rivers, lakes, Hindus are encouraged to undertake pilgrimages during their lifetime, though this practice is not considered absolutely mandatory. Most Hindus visit sites within their region or locale, Kumbh Mela, Kumbh Mela is one of the largest gatherings of humans in the world. The location is rotated among Allahabad, Haridwar, Nashik, Char Dham, The four holy sites Puri, Rameswaram, Dwarka, and Badrinath compose the Char Dham pilgrimage circuit. Kanwar Pilgrimage, The Kanwar is Indias largest annual religious pilgrimage, as part of this phenomenon, millions of participants gather sacred water from the Ganga and carry it across hundreds of miles to dispense as offerings in Śiva shrines
12.
Mediterranean Sea
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The sea is sometimes considered a part of the Atlantic Ocean, although it is usually identified as a separate body of water. The name Mediterranean is derived from the Latin mediterraneus, meaning inland or in the middle of land and it covers an approximate area of 2.5 million km2, but its connection to the Atlantic is only 14 km wide. The Strait of Gibraltar is a strait that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Gibraltar. In oceanography, it is called the Eurafrican Mediterranean Sea or the European Mediterranean Sea to distinguish it from mediterranean seas elsewhere. The Mediterranean Sea has a depth of 1,500 m. The sea is bordered on the north by Europe, the east by Asia and it is located between latitudes 30° and 46° N and longitudes 6° W and 36° E. Its west-east length, from the Strait of Gibraltar to the Gulf of Iskenderun, the seas average north-south length, from Croatia’s southern shore to Libya, is approximately 800 km. The Mediterranean Sea, including the Sea of Marmara, has an area of approximately 2,510,000 square km. The sea was an important route for merchants and travelers of ancient times that allowed for trade, the history of the Mediterranean region is crucial to understanding the origins and development of many modern societies. In addition, the Gaza Strip and the British Overseas Territories of Gibraltar and Akrotiri, the term Mediterranean derives from the Latin word mediterraneus, meaning amid the earth or between land, as it is between the continents of Africa, Asia and Europe. The Ancient Greek name Mesogeios, is similarly from μέσο, between + γη, land, earth) and it can be compared with the Ancient Greek name Mesopotamia, meaning between rivers. The Mediterranean Sea has historically had several names, for example, the Carthaginians called it the Syrian Sea and latter Romans commonly called it Mare Nostrum, and occasionally Mare Internum. Another name was the Sea of the Philistines, from the people inhabiting a large portion of its shores near the Israelites, the sea is also called the Great Sea in the General Prologue by Geoffrey Chaucer. In Ottoman Turkish, it has also been called Bahr-i Sefid, in Modern Hebrew, it has been called HaYam HaTikhon, the Middle Sea, reflecting the Seas name in ancient Greek, Latin, and modern languages in both Europe and the Middle East. Similarly, in Modern Arabic, it is known as al-Baḥr al-Mutawassiṭ, in Turkish, it is known as Akdeniz, the White Sea since among Turks the white colour represents the west. Several ancient civilisations were located around the Mediterranean shores, and were influenced by their proximity to the sea. It provided routes for trade, colonisation, and war, as well as food for numerous communities throughout the ages, due to the shared climate, geology, and access to the sea, cultures centered on the Mediterranean tended to have some extent of intertwined culture and history. Two of the most notable Mediterranean civilisations in classical antiquity were the Greek city states, later, when Augustus founded the Roman Empire, the Romans referred to the Mediterranean as Mare Nostrum
