1.
Christopher Columbus
–
Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer, navigator, colonizer, and citizen of the Republic of Genoa. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean and those voyages and his efforts to establish permanent settlements on the island of Hispaniola initiated the European colonization of the New World. Western imperialism and economic competition were emerging among European kingdoms through the establishment of routes and colonies. During his first voyage in 1492, he reached the New World instead of arriving at Japan as he had intended, landing on an island in the Bahamas archipelago that he named San Salvador. Over the course of three voyages, he visited the Greater and Lesser Antilles, as well as the Caribbean coast of Venezuela and Central America. These voyages had, therefore, an impact in the historical development of the modern Western world. He spearheaded the transatlantic trade and has been accused by several historians of initiating the genocide of the Hispaniola natives. Columbus himself saw his accomplishments primarily in the light of spreading the Christian religion, Columbus never admitted that he had reached a continent previously unknown to Europeans, rather than the East Indies for which he had set course. He called the inhabitants of the lands that he visited indios, the name Christopher Columbus is the Anglicisation of the Latin Christophorus Columbus. His name in Italian is Cristoforo Colombo and, in Spanish and he was born before 31 October 1451 in the territory of the Republic of Genoa, though the exact location remains disputed. His father was Domenico Colombo, a wool weaver who worked both in Genoa and Savona and who also owned a cheese stand at which young Christopher worked as a helper. Bartolomeo, Giovanni Pellegrino, and Giacomo were his brothers, Bartolomeo worked in a cartography workshop in Lisbon for at least part of his adulthood. He also had a sister named Bianchinetta, Columbus never wrote in his native language, which is presumed to have been a Genoese variety of Ligurian. In one of his writings, he says he went to sea at the age of 10, in 1470, the Columbus family moved to Savona, where Domenico took over a tavern. In the same year, Christopher was on a Genoese ship hired in the service of René of Anjou to support his attempt to conquer the Kingdom of Naples. Some modern historians have argued that he was not from Genoa but, instead and these competing hypotheses have generally been discounted by mainstream scholars. In 1473, Columbus began his apprenticeship as business agent for the important Centurione, Di Negro, later, he allegedly made a trip to Chios, an Aegean island then ruled by Genoa. In May 1476, he took part in a convoy sent by Genoa to carry valuable cargo to northern Europe
Christopher Columbus
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Posthumous portrait of Christopher Columbus by
Sebastiano del Piombo, 1519. There are no known authentic portraits of Columbus.
Christopher Columbus
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Christopher Columbus at the gates of the
monastery of Santa María de la Rábida with his son Diego, by
Benet Mercadé
Christopher Columbus
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Columbus' handwritten notes in Latin, on the margins of his copy of
The Travels of Marco Polo
Christopher Columbus
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"Columbus map", drawn c. 1490 in the
Lisbon workshop of Bartolomeo and Christopher Columbus
2.
Indigenous peoples of Costa Rica
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Indigenous peoples of Costa Rica, or Native Costa Ricans, are the peoples who lived in what is now Costa Rica prior to European and African contact and the descendents of those peoples. Approximately 63,976 indigenous people live in the country, comprising 1. 7% of the total population, Indigenous Costa Ricans strive to keep their cultural traditions and language alive. In 1977, the government passed the Indigenous Law, which created reserves, There are a total of 24 indigenous territories located throughout Costa Rica. After only gaining the right to vote in 1994, they are fighting for their rights, particularly regarding the government taking over their land. While indigenous people have struggle for recognition of their rights. Indigenous Costa Ricans belong to eight major ethnic groups, christopher Columbus arrived in Costa Rica in 1502 on his last trip to the Americas. Costa Rica received its name from Gil Gonzalez Davila when he arrived and thought he found the most gold he had ever seen, therefore naming it the Rich Coast. To the Spanish, it was organized from other indigenous groups they had discovered. During the colonization, Costa Rica was very poor, mainly because it was isolated from the majority of the Spanish Empire, natives had lived in Costa Rica for what stretches back to 10,000 years before this, but the cultures were destroyed when the Spanish arrived. Colonies that were set up originally werent successful, because of disease as well as the rain forests. Costa Rica didnt become a province of Spain until the 1560s, by the time that Columbus arrived, there were about 20,000 Costa Rican natives, but this number greatly declined. That was primarily due to disease, particularly smallpox as well as the fact that many indigenous were enslaved to work, Boruca, southern Costa Rica About 2,660 people are in the Boruca tribe. They live in the Puntarenas area of Costa Rica on one of the first reservations that was established for indigenous Costa Ricans. They are popular for their crafts, particularly masks made for the Fiesta de los Diablos which is a festival that stages fights between the Boruca Indians and the Spanish conquistadors. They are a majority in the Puerto Viejo de Talamanca area. The range of the stretches from 11,000 to 35,000. The Bribri have a social structure that is organized in clans. Each clan is composed of an extended family, women have a higher status in this society, because their childrens clans are determined by whichever clan they come from
Indigenous peoples of Costa Rica
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Indigenous territories in Costa Rica
Indigenous peoples of Costa Rica
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Pre-Columbian jade sculpture, collection of
Poás Volcano National Park
3.
Captaincy General of Guatemala
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The governor-captain general was also president of the Royal Audiencia of Guatemala. The colonization of the area became the future Captaincy General began in 1524. In the north, the brothers Gonzalo and Pedro de Alvarado, Hernán Cortés and others headed various expeditions into Guatemala, in the south Francisco Hernández de Córdoba, acting under the auspices of Pedrarias Dávila in Panama, moved into what is today Nicaragua. The capital of Guatemala has moved many times over the centuries, on 27 July 1524, Pedro de Alvarado declared the Kaqchikel city, Iximche, as the first regional capital, styled Santiago de los Caballeros de Guatemala. However, hostilities between the Spaniards and the Kaqchikel soon made the city uninhabitable, in 1526, the Spanish founded a new capital settlement at Tecpán Guatemala, Tecpán being the Nahuatl word for palace. Tecpán is sometimes called the first capital because of its status as the first permanent Spanish military center, the Spaniards soon abandoned Tecpán due to continuous Kaqchikel attacks that made defense of the city untenable. In 1527, the capital was moved yet again to the Almolonga Valley to the east, being refounded on the site of todays San Miguel Escobar district of Ciudad Vieja, near Antigua Guatemala. This settlement was destroyed by a lahar from Volcan de Agua in 1541. In 1543, the capital was again refounded several miles away at Antigua Guatemala, over the next two centuries, this city would become one of the richest of the New World capitals. However, it too was destroyed, this time by a series of earthquakes. The final and current capital is the modern-day Guatemala City, the Church played an important role in the administration of the overseas possessions of the Spanish crown. The first dioceses were established in León, Nicaragua and Guatemala in 1534, another diocese was created in Chiapas in 1539. The dioceses of Guatemala and Chiapas were suffragan to the Archdiocese of Seville, the Diocese of León was made suffragan to Archdiocese of Lima in 1546. Another short-lived diocese was set up in Verapaz, Guatemala in 1559, in 1543 the territory of the kingdom was defined with the establishment of the Audiencia of Guatemala, which took most of Central America as its jurisdiction. This audiencia, along with the one in Lima, took over the territory of the first Audiencia of Panama and it was the first institution to define Central America as a region within the Spanish Empire. Around the same time Habsburg Spain created other captaincies general in Puerto Rico, Cuba, in the 17th century a process of uniting the church hierarchy of Central America also began. The dioceses of Comayagua and León were made suffragan to the Archdiocese of Mexico in 1620 and 1647, as part of the Bourbon Reforms in 1786 the crown established a series of intendancies in the area, which replaced most of the older corregimientos. The intendants were granted broad powers and were charged with promoting the local economy
Captaincy General of Guatemala
–
The Fort of San Fernando
Omoa. Built by the Spaniards to defend against pirates.
Captaincy General of Guatemala
–
The Kingdom of Guatemala within the wider Spanish Americas, c.1600.
4.
New Spain
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New Spain was a colonial territory of the Spanish Empire, in the New World north of the Isthmus of Panama. It was established following the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire in 1521, after 1535 the colony was governed by the Viceroy of New Spain, an appointed minister of the King of Spain, who ruled as monarch over the colony. The capital of New Spain was Mexico City and it developed highly regional divisions, which reflect the impact of climate, topography, the presence or absence of dense indigenous populations, and the presence or absence of mineral resources. The areas of central and southern Mexico had dense indigenous populations with complex social, political, silver mining not only became the engine of the economy of New Spain, but vastly enriched Spain, and transformed the global economy. New Spain was the New World terminus of the Philippine trade, although New Spain was a dependency of Spain, it was a kingdom not a colony, subject to the presiding monarch on the Iberian Peninsula. Every privilege and position, economic political, or religious came from him and it was on this basis that the conquest, occupation, and government of the New World was achieved. The Viceroyalty of New Spain was established in 1535 in the Kingdom of New Spain and it was the first New World viceroyalty and one of only two in the Spanish empire until the 18th century Bourbon Reforms. The Spanish Empire comprised the territories in the north overseas Septentrion, from North America, to the west of the continent, New Spain also included the Spanish East Indies. To the east of the continent, it included the Spanish West Indies and this was not occupied by many Spanish settlers and were considered more marginal to Spanish interests than the most densely populated and lucrative areas of central Mexico. To shore up its claims in North America starting in the late 18th century, Spanish expeditions to the Pacific Northwest explored and claimed the coast of what is now British Columbia and Alaska. The indigenous societies of Mesoamerica brought under Spanish control were of unprecedented complexity, the societies could provide the conquistadors, especially Hernán Cortés, a base from which the conquerors could become autonomous, or even independent, of the Crown. As a result, the Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain, since the time of the Catholic Monarchs, central Iberia was governed through councils appointed by the monarch with particular jurisdictions. Thus, the creation of the Council of the Indies became another, the crown had set up the Casa de Contratación in 1503 to regulate contacts between Spain and its overseas possessions. A key function was to gather information about navigation to make trips less risky and they were accompanied by maps of the area discussed, many of which were drawn by indigenous artists. The Francisco Hernández Expedition, the first scientific expedition to the New World, was sent to gather information medicinal plants, an earlier Audiencia had been established in Santo Domingo in 1526 to deal with the Caribbean settlements. That Audiencia, housed in the Casa Reales in Santo Domingo, was charged with encouraging further exploration, management by the Audiencia, which was expected to make executive decisions as a body, proved unwieldy. Therefore, in 1535, King Charles V named Don Antonio de Mendoza as the first Viceroy of New Spain. After the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire in 1532 opened up the vast territories of South America to further conquests, the Crown established an independent Viceroyalty of Peru there in 1540
New Spain
–
"Vázquez de Coronado Sets Out to the North" (1540) by
Frederic Remington, oil on canvas, 1905
New Spain
–
Flag
New Spain
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Indian Wedding and Flying Pole, circa 1690
New Spain
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Route from Philippines to Acapulco, México
5.
Mexican War of Independence
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The Mexican War of Independence was an armed conflict, and the culmination of a political and social process which ended the rule of Spain in 1821 in the territory of New Spain. September 16 is celebrated as Mexican Independence Day, the movement for independence was inspired by the Age of Enlightenment and the liberal revolutions of the last part of the 18th century. By that time the elite of New Spain had begun to reflect on the relations between Spain and its colonial kingdoms. Changes in the social and political structure occasioned by Bourbon Reforms, political events in Europe had a decisive effect on events in most of Spanish America. In 1808, King Charles IV and Ferdinand VII abdicated in favor of French leader Napoleon Bonaparte, the same year, the ayuntamiento of Mexico City, supported by viceroy José de Iturrigaray, claimed sovereignty in the absence of the legitimate king. That led to a coup against the viceroy, when it was suppressed, despite the defeat in Mexico City, small groups of conspirators met in other cities of New Spain to raise movements against colonial rule. From 1810 the independence movement went through stages, as leaders were imprisoned or executed by forces loyal to Spain. Secular priest José María Morelos called the separatist provinces to form the Congress of Chilpancingo, after the defeat of Morelos, the movement survived as a guerrilla war under the leadership of Vicente Guerrero. By 1820, the few rebel groups survived most notably in the Sierra Madre del Sur, the reinstatement of the liberal Constitution of Cadiz in 1820 caused a change of mind among the elite groups who had supported Spanish rule. Monarchist Creoles affected by the constitution decided to support the independence of New Spain, agustín de Iturbide led the military arm of the conspirators and in early 1821 he met Vicente Guerrero. Both proclaimed the Plan of Iguala, which called for the union of all insurgent factions and was supported by both the aristocracy and clergy of New Spain and it called for monarchy in an independent Mexico. Finally, the independence of Mexico was achieved on September 27,1821, after that, the mainland of New Spain was organized as the Mexican Empire. This ephemeral Catholic monarchy changed to a republic in 1823, due to internal conflicts. After some Spanish reconquest attempts, including the expedition of Isidro Barradas in 1829, after the suppression of that mid-16th-century conspiracy, elites raised no substantial challenge to royal rule until the Hidalgo revolt of 1810. Elites in Mexico City in the century did force the removal of a reformist viceroy. The crowd was reported to shout, Long live the King, the attack was against Gelves as a bad representative of the crown and not against the monarchy or colonial rule itself. There was also a conspiracy in the mid-seventeenth century to unite creole elites, blacks. The man pushing this notion called himself Don Guillén Lampart y Guzmán, lamports conspiracy was discovered, and he was arrested by the Inquisition in 1642, and executed fifteen years later for sedition
Mexican War of Independence
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Clockwise from top left:
Miguel Hidalgo,
José María Morelos, Embrace of Acatempan between
Iturbide and
Guerrero,
Trigarante Army in
Mexico City, Mural of independence by
O'Gorman
Mexican War of Independence
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Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, by
José Clemente Orozco, Jalisco Governmental Palace, Guadalajara.
Mexican War of Independence
–
Father
José María Morelos
6.
First Mexican Empire
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The Mexican Empire was a short-lived monarchy and the first independent post-colonial state in Mexico. It was the former colony of the Spanish Empire to establish a monarchy after independence and for a short time, together with the Empire of Brazil. The First Mexican Empire was short-lived, lasting less than two years, the first and only monarch of the state was Agustín de Iturbide, reigning as Agustín I of Mexico, for less than eight months. The empire was briefly reestablished by the French in 1864, under the 24 February 1821 Plan of Iguala, to which most of the provinces subscribed, the Mexican Congress established a regency council which was headed by Iturbide. If the king refused the position, the law provided for another member of the House of Bourbon to accede to the Mexican throne, however, the goal was merely a political tactic to appease the last royalists, and a full independence was expected. King Ferdinand, however, refused to recognize Mexicos independence and said that Spain would not allow any other European prince to take the throne of Mexico, on 19 May 1822, Mexican Congress named Iturbide as a constitutional emperor. On 21 May it issued a decree confirming this appointment, which was officially a temporary measure until a European monarch could be found to rule Mexico, iturbides official title was, By Divine Providence and the National Congress, First Constitutional Emperor of Mexico. His coronation took place on 21 July 1822 in Mexico City, in August 1822 a plot to overthrow the monarchy was discovered and on August 25, plotters, including 16 members of Congress, were arrested. As factions in the Congress began to sharply criticise Iturbide and his policies, santa Anna and his troops revolted against Iturbide, calling for the restoration of the Congress on 1 December 1822. Santa Anna had secretly persuaded General Echávarri, the commander of the Imperial forces, to switch sides and support the revolution when it was ready to be proclaimed throughout Mexico. The independence heroes Vicente Guerrero, Nicolás Bravo and Guadalupe Victoria soon joined, signing the Plan of Casa Mata on February 1,1823, the insurrectionists sent their proposal to the provincial governments and requested their adherence to the plan. In the course of just six weeks, the Plan of Casa Mata traveled to remote places as Texas. Each provincial government that accepted the plan thereby withdrew its allegiance from the Imperial government and this left Emperor Agustín I isolated with little support outside of Mexico City and a few factions of the Imperial Army. Consequently, he reinstalled the Congress, which he had abolished, abdicated the throne. Santa Anna and the proponents of the Plan of Casa Mata went on to oversee the drafting of a new constitution. The territory of the Mexican Empire corresponded to the borders of Viceroyalty of New Spain, excluding the Captaincies General of Cuba, Santo Domingo, subsequent territorial evolution of Mexico over the next several decades would eventually reduce Mexico to less than half its maximum extent. The first Mexican empire was divided into the following intendances, History of Mexico Second Mexican Empire Federal Republic of Central America Imperial House of Mexico Mexican Empire
First Mexican Empire
–
Flag
7.
Federal Republic of Central America
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It existed from September 1821 to 1841, and was a republican democracy. It is also incorrectly referred to in English as the United States of Central America. The republic consisted of the states of Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua. Maps and borders hardly existed at the time so locations are only approximate, from 1838 to 1840 the federation descended into civil war, with conservatives fighting against liberals and separatists fighting to secede. From the 16th century through 1821, Central America, apart from Panama and that date is still marked as independence day by most Central American nations. Independence proved short-lived, as local law-and-order broke down, driven by regional rivalries, many localities refused to accept the newly formed federal powers in Guatemala—San Salvador, Comayagua, León, and Cartago were in open revolt. The ensuing anarchy prompted the land-owning wealthy and conservative class to advocate union with Mexico, on 25 January 1822 the Junta consultiva in Guatemala City voted for annexation. A few weeks later General Vicente Filísola, the envoy of Emperor Agustín de Iturbide of the First Mexican Empire arrived in Guatemala as the new ruler. The annexation was controversial, with some seeing the Mexican constitution with its abolition of slavery, Central American liberals in San Salvador objected to this and refused to accept Filísolas authority. The army was ordered to quell dissent, after Iturbide abdicated, Mexico became a republic and offered to the previously annexed Central American provinces the right to determine their own destiny. Filísola turned over his power to the hastily formed National Constituent Assembly, on July 1,1823 the Congress of Central America declared absolute independence from Spain, Mexico, and any other foreign nation, and established a republican system of government. The liberal-dominated Assembly elected Manuel José Arce as president but he turned against his own faction. San Salvador rose in revolt against federal authority, Honduras and Nicaragua joined the rebellion and Arce was deposed in 1829. The victors led by the Honduran Francisco Morazán took power and Morazán was proclaimed president in 1830, to appease liberal supporters, the capital was relocated from Guatemala City to San Salvador in 1831 but Morazáns hold on power was waning as conservatives regained control in the provinces. The Assembly in 1838 adjourned with the declaration that the provinces were free to rule themselves as the Federal Republic dissolved, in 1839 Morazán was exiled as rebels from Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua entered San Salvador, evicting the governing institutions that held the region together. In practice, the federation faced insurmountable problems, and the union slid into war between 1838 and 1840. Its disintegration began when Nicaragua separated from the federation on November 5,1838, followed by Honduras, in reality, this merely legally acknowledged the process of disintegration that had already begun. The union effectively ended in 1840, by which four of its five states had declared independence
Federal Republic of Central America
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Federal Republic of Central America, 4
Real (1835). Struck in the San Jose, Costa Rica mint (697 were minted).
Federal Republic of Central America
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Flag
8.
Americans
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Americans are citizens of the United States of America. The country is home to people of different national origins. As a result, Americans do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, although citizens make up the majority of Americans, non-citizen residents, dual citizens, and expatriates may also claim an American identity. See Names for United States citizens. S, virgin Islands and Northern Mariana Islands in the 20th century. It also includes influences of African-American culture, westward expansion integrated the Creoles and Cajuns of Louisiana and the Hispanos of the Southwest and brought close contact with the culture of Mexico. Large-scale immigration in the late 19th and early 20th centuries from Southern and Eastern Europe introduced a variety of elements, immigration from Asia, Africa, and Latin America has also had impact. A cultural melting pot, or pluralistic salad bowl, describes the way in which generations of Americans have celebrated and exchanged distinctive cultural characteristics, in addition to the United States, Americans and people of American descent can be found internationally. As many as seven million Americans are estimated to be living abroad, the United States of America is a diverse country, racially, and ethnically. Some other race is also an option in the census and other surveys, people of European descent, or White Americans, constitute the majority of the 308 million people living in the United States, with 72. 4% of the population in the 2010 United States Census. They are considered people who trace their ancestry to the peoples of Europe, the Middle East. Of those reporting to be White American,7,487,133 reported to be Multiracial, with largest combination being white, additionally, there are 29,184,290 White Hispanics or Latinos. Non-Hispanic Whites are the majority in 46 states, there are four minority-majority states, California, Texas, New Mexico, and Hawaii. In addition, the District of Columbia has a non-white majority, the state with the highest percentage of non-Hispanic White Americans is Maine. The largest continental ancestral group of Americans are that of Europeans who have origins in any of the peoples of Europe. This includes people via African, North American, Caribbean, Central American or South American and Oceanian nations that have a large European diaspora, the Spanish were the first Europeans to establish a continuous presence in what is now the United States. Martín de Argüelles born 1566, San Agustín, La Florida, was the first person of European descent born in what is now the United States. Twenty-one years later, Virginia Dare born 1587 Roanoke Island in present-day North Carolina, was the first child born in the Thirteen Colonies to English parents. 8% of the total population, Hispanic or Latino Americans constitute the largest ethnic minority in the United States. They form the second largest group after non-Hispanic Whites in the United States, hispanic/Latino Americans are very racially diverse, and as a result form an ethnic category, rather than a race
Americans
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John F. Kennedy (Irish)
Americans
–
Flag of the United States
Americans
–
George Washington (English)
Americans
–
Frank Sinatra (Italian)
9.
Costa Rican Civil War
–
The Costa Rican Civil War was the bloodiest event in 20th-century Costa Rican history. It lasted for 44 days, during which approximately 2,000 people are believed to have died and this caused a rebel army under commander José Figueres to rise up against the government of President Teodoro Picado, the government was quickly defeated. The junta then stepped down and handed power to Ulate, Costa Rica has not experienced any significant political violence since. In the 1940s, the Costa Rican political scene came to be dominated by Rafael Ángel Calderón, as the violence grew, supporters of the opposition began to carry guns, and the police began to threaten the use of firearms rather than just beating demonstrators. Disgust with the violent reprisals against the opposition led to the Huelga de Brazos Caídos. José Figueres, a Costa Rican businessman, had forced into exile in Mexico on April 12,1942 as a consequence of a radio broadcast in which he strongly criticized the Calderón regime. Figueres had returned to Costa Rica after the election of Picado, before the elections of 1948, Figueres had already been planning for a war. Hoping to use Costa Rica as a base, the Legion planned to move against other authoritarian governments in Middle America, shots rang out, and Valverde fell dead on his doorstep. His hatred for Calderón, combined with his idealism, fueled his desire for war, on March 11, Figueres made the call that brought in the arms and military leaders Figueres needed for a successful campaign. Moras communist militias provided important armed support for the government, both during the years of Picados administration and during the Civil War itself. After their victory this alliance fell apart. The right-wing faction, led by the juntas Minister of Public Safety, Édgar Cardona, Figueres himself became closely identified with the social democrat faction, which later dominated his own National Liberation Party. The economically conservative groups under Ulate ended up allying themselves in the 1950s with Calderóns supporters to form a broad anti-PLN coalition. The National Liberation Army, as the army called itself, slowly worked their way up the Pan American Highway, capturing small but important cities. The official army, which was led by Picados brother, was unable to organize an effective resistance to Figueres National Liberation Army. Figueres also contended against the communist militias commanded by congressman Carlos Luis Fallas, Costa Rican President Picado, realizing that defeat was inevitable, sent notice to Figueres that he was willing to come to a compromise. Picados long-time political ally, Manuel Mora of the communist Popular Vanguard Party, had no intention of negotiating with Figueres, moras forces had sealed themselves up inside the capital of San José, and were determined not to capitulate as quickly as Picado. As the target of many of Figueres criticisms about Costa Rica, Mora, arévalos help proved to be indispensable
Costa Rican Civil War
10.
Constitution
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A constitution is a set of fundamental principles or established precedents according to which a state or other organization is governed. These rules together make up, i. e. constitute, some constitutions are uncodified, but written in numerous fundamental Acts of a legislature, court cases or treaties. Constitutions concern different levels of organizations, from states to companies. A treaty which establishes an international organization is also its constitution, within states, a constitution defines the principles upon which the state is based, the procedure in which laws are made and by whom. Some constitutions, especially codified constitutions, also act as limiters of state power, by establishing lines which a states rulers cannot cross, the term constitution comes through French from the Latin word constitutio, used for regulations and orders, such as the imperial enactments. Later, the term was used in canon law for an important determination, especially a decree issued by the Pope. The Latin term ultra vires describes activities of officials within an organization or polity that fall outside the constitutional or statutory authority of those officials. Ultra vires gives a justification for the forced cessation of such action. A violation of rights by an official would be ultra vires because a right is a restriction on the powers of government, and therefore that official would be exercising powers they do not have. It was never law, even though, if it had been a statute or statutory provision, in such a case, only the application may be ruled unconstitutional. Historically, the remedy for such violations have been petitions for common law writs, excavations in modern-day Iraq by Ernest de Sarzec in 1877 found evidence of the earliest known code of justice, issued by the Sumerian king Urukagina of Lagash ca 2300 BC. Perhaps the earliest prototype for a law of government, this document itself has not yet been discovered, for example, it is known that it relieved tax for widows and orphans, and protected the poor from the usury of the rich. After that, many governments ruled by codes of written laws. The oldest such document still known to exist seems to be the Code of Ur-Nammu of Ur, some of the better-known ancient law codes include the code of Lipit-Ishtar of Isin, the code of Hammurabi of Babylonia, the Hittite code, the Assyrian code and Mosaic law. In 621 BC a scribe named Draco codified the cruel oral laws of the city-state of Athens, in 594 BC Solon, the ruler of Athens, created the new Solonian Constitution. It eased the burden of the workers, and determined that membership of the class was to be based on wealth. Cleisthenes again reformed the Athenian constitution and set it on a footing in 508 BC. The most basic definition he used to describe a constitution in general terms was the arrangement of the offices in a state
Constitution
–
A painting depicting George Washington at the
Constitutional Convention of 1787 signing of the U.S. Constitution
Constitution
–
Detail from
Hammurabi 's
stele shows him receiving the laws of
Babylon from the seated
sun deity.
Constitution
–
The Bendery Constitution by Hetman
Pylyp Orlyk.
Constitution
–
May 3rd Constitution (painting by
Jan Matejko, 1891).
Polish King Stanisław August (left, in regal
ermine -trimmed cloak), enters
St. John's Cathedral, where
Sejm deputies will swear to uphold
the new Constitution; in background,
Warsaw's Royal Castle, where the Constitution has just been adopted.
11.
Technology
–
Technology is the collection of techniques, skills, methods and processes used in the production of goods or services or in the accomplishment of objectives, such as scientific investigation. Technology can be the knowledge of techniques, processes, and the like, the human species use of technology began with the conversion of natural resources into simple tools. The steady progress of technology has brought weapons of ever-increasing destructive power. It has helped develop more advanced economies and has allowed the rise of a leisure class, many technological processes produce unwanted by-products known as pollution and deplete natural resources to the detriment of Earths environment. Various implementations of technology influence the values of a society and raise new questions of the ethics of technology, examples include the rise of the notion of efficiency in terms of human productivity, and the challenges of bioethics. Philosophical debates have arisen over the use of technology, with disagreements over whether technology improves the condition or worsens it. The use of the technology has changed significantly over the last 200 years. Before the 20th century, the term was uncommon in English, the term was often connected to technical education, as in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The term technology rose to prominence in the 20th century in connection with the Second Industrial Revolution, the terms meanings changed in the early 20th century when American social scientists, beginning with Thorstein Veblen, translated ideas from the German concept of Technik into technology. In German and other European languages, a distinction exists between technik and technologie that is absent in English, which translates both terms as technology. By the 1930s, technology referred not only to the study of the industrial arts, dictionaries and scholars have offered a variety of definitions. Ursula Franklin, in her 1989 Real World of Technology lecture, gave another definition of the concept, it is practice, the way we do things around here. The term is used to imply a specific field of technology, or to refer to high technology or just consumer electronics. Bernard Stiegler, in Technics and Time,1, defines technology in two ways, as the pursuit of life by other than life, and as organized inorganic matter. Technology can be most broadly defined as the entities, both material and immaterial, created by the application of mental and physical effort in order to some value. In this usage, technology refers to tools and machines that may be used to solve real-world problems and it is a far-reaching term that may include simple tools, such as a crowbar or wooden spoon, or more complex machines, such as a space station or particle accelerator. Tools and machines need not be material, virtual technology, such as software and business methods. W. Brian Arthur defines technology in a broad way as a means to fulfill a human purpose
Technology
–
A
steam turbine with the case opened. Most electricity is produced by
thermal power stations with turbines like this one. Electricity consumption and living standards are highly correlated.
Electrification was voted the most important engineering achievement of the 20th century.
Technology
–
The spread of paper and printing to the West, exemplified by the
printing press, made it possible for
scientists and
politicians to communicate their ideas with ease, leading to the
Age of Enlightenment; an example of technology as a cultural force.
Technology
–
The invention of integrated circuits and the
microprocessor (here, an
Intel 4004 chip from 1971) led to the modern
computer revolution.
Technology
–
Antoine Lavoisier conducting an experiment with combustion generated by amplified sun light
12.
Eco-tourism
–
It means responsible travel to natural areas conserving the environment and improving the well being of the local people. Since the 1980s, ecotourism has been considered a critical endeavor by environmentalists, several university programs use this description as the working definition of ecotourism. Generally, ecotourism deals with interaction with components of the natural environments. Ecotourism focuses on responsible travel, personal growth, and environmental sustainability. Ecotourism typically involves travel to destinations where flora, fauna, Ecotourism is intended to offer tourists insight into the impact of human beings on the environment, and to foster a greater appreciation of our natural habitats. Responsible ecotourism programs include those that minimize the negative aspects of tourism on the environment. For these reasons, ecotourism often appeals to advocates of environmental and social responsibility, the term ecotourism, like sustainable tourism, is considered by many to be an oxymoron. Like most forms of tourism, ecotourism generally depends on air transportation, additionally, the overall effect of sustainable tourism is negative, where, like ecotourism, philanthropic aspirations mask hard-nosed immediate self-interest. An ecotourist is different from a tourist in the sense that, he or she is mindful of his environment, Ecotourism is a responsible tourism which conserves the environment and sustains the well being of local people. For many countries, ecotourism is not simply a marginal activity to finance protection of the environment, for example, in Costa Rica, Ecuador, Nepal, Kenya, Madagascar and territories such as Antarctica, ecotourism represents a significant portion of the gross domestic product and economic activity. Ecotourism is often misinterpreted as any form of tourism that involves nature, self-proclaimed practitioners and hosts of ecotourism experiences assume it is achieved by simply creating destinations in natural areas. According to critics of this commonplace and assumptive practice, true ecotourism must, above all, sensitize people to the beauty and these critics condemn some operators as greenwashing their operations, using the labels of green and eco-friendly”, while behaving in environmentally irresponsible ways. Currently, there are moves to create national and international ecotourism accreditation programs. National ecotourism certification programs have been put in place in such as Costa Rica, Australia, Kenya, Estonia. Ecotourism is a late 20th-century neologism compounded from eco- and tourism, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, ecotour was first recorded in 1973 and ecotourism, probably after ecotour, in 1982. One source claims the terms were used earlier, claus-Dieter Hetzer, an academic and adventurer from Forum International in Berkeley, CA, supposedly coined ecotourism in 1965 and ran the first ecotours in the Yucatán during the early 1970s. The failure to acknowledge responsible, low-impact ecotourism puts legitimate ecotourism companies at a competitive disadvantage, many environmentalists have argued for a global standard of accreditation, differentiating ecotourism companies based on their level of environmental commitment, creating a standard to follow. The decisions of the board would be sanctioned by governments, so that non-compliant companies would be required to disassociate themselves from the use of the ecotourism brand
Eco-tourism
–
Llano del Muerto waterfall in
El Salvador
Eco-tourism
–
An elephant safari through the
Jaldapara National Park in
West Bengal,
India
Eco-tourism
–
A hanging bridge in Eco-tourism area of
Thenmala,
Kerala in
India - Indias first planned ecotourism destination
13.
Poverty
–
Poverty is general scarcity or the state of one who lacks a certain amount of material possessions or money. It is a concept, which includes social, economic. Absolute poverty or destitution refers to the lack of necessary to meet basic needs such as food, clothing. Absolute poverty is meant to be about the independent of location. After the industrial revolution, mass production in factories made producing goods increasingly less expensive, of more importance is the modernization of agriculture, such as fertilizers, to provide enough yield to feed the population. Strategies of increasing income to make basic needs more affordable typically include welfare, economic freedoms, Poverty reduction is a major goal and issue for many international organizations such as the United Nations and the World Bank. The World Bank forecasts that 702.1 million people, down from 1.75 billion in 1990, of these, about 347.1 million people lived in Sub-Saharan Africa and 231.3 million lived in South Asia. According to the World Bank, between 1990 and 2015, the percentage of the population living in extreme poverty fell from 37. 1% to 9. 6%. Nevertheless, given the current economic model, built on GDP, extreme poverty is a global challenge, it is observed in all parts of the world, including developed economies. UNICEF estimates half the children live in poverty. It has been argued by some academics that the policies promoted by global financial institutions such as the IMF. Another estimate places the true scale of poverty much higher than the World Bank, with an estimated 4.3 billion people living with less than $5 a day and unable to meet basic needs adequately. In 2012 it is estimated that, given a poverty line of $1.25 a day 1.2 billion people lived in poverty, the word poverty comes from old French poverté, from Latin paupertās from pauper. The English word poverty via Anglo-Norman povert, there are several definitions of poverty depending on the context of the situation it is placed in, and the views of the person giving the definition. Income Poverty, a familys income fails to meet a federally established threshold that differs across countries, United Nations, Fundamentally, poverty is the inability of having choices and opportunities, a violation of human dignity. It means lack of capacity to participate effectively in society. It means insecurity, powerlessness and exclusion of individuals, households and it means susceptibility to violence, and it often implies living in marginal or fragile environments, without access to clean water or sanitation. World Bank, Poverty is pronounced deprivation in well-being, and comprises many dimensions and it includes low incomes and the inability to acquire the basic goods and services necessary for survival with dignity
Poverty
–
An example of urban poverty in this
slum in
Jakarta,
Indonesia
Poverty
–
Children of the
Depression -era migrant workers, Arizona, 1937
Poverty
–
An early morning outside the Opera Tavern in Stockholm, with a gang of beggars waiting for delivery of the scraps from the previous day.
Sweden, 1868.
Poverty
–
A
Somali boy receiving treatment for malnourishment at a health facility.
14.
Pre-Columbian
–
For this reason the alternative terms of Precontact Americas, Pre-Colonial Americas or Prehistoric Americas are also in use. In areas of Latin America the term used is Pre-Hispanic. Other civilizations were contemporary with the period and were described in European historical accounts of the time. A few, such as the Maya civilization, had their own written records, because many Christian Europeans of the time viewed such texts as heretical, men like Diego de Landa destroyed many texts in pyres, even while seeking to preserve native histories. Only a few documents have survived in their original languages, while others were transcribed or dictated into Spanish, giving modern historians glimpses of ancient culture. Indigenous American cultures continue to evolve after the pre-Columbian era, many of these peoples and their descendants continue traditional practices, while evolving and adapting new cultural practices and technologies into their lives. Now, the study of pre-Columbian cultures is most often based on scientific. Asian nomads are thought to have entered the Americas via the Bering Land Bridge, now the Bering Strait, genetic evidence found in Amerindians maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA supports the theory of multiple genetic populations migrating from Asia. Over the course of millennia, Paleo-Indians spread throughout North and South America, exactly when the first group of people migrated into the Americas is the subject of much debate. One of the earliest identifiable cultures was the Clovis culture, with sites dating from some 13,000 years ago, however, older sites dating back to 20,000 years ago have been claimed. Some genetic studies estimate the colonization of the Americas dates from between 40,000 and 13,000 years ago, the chronology of migration models is currently divided into two general approaches. The first is the short chronology theory with the first movement beyond Alaska into the New World occurring no earlier than 14, 000–17,000 years ago, followed by successive waves of immigrants. The second belief is the long chronology theory, which proposes that the first group of people entered the hemisphere at an earlier date, possibly 50. In that case, the Eskimo peoples would have arrived separately and at a later date, probably no more than 2,000 years ago. The North American climate was unstable as the ice age receded and it finally stabilized by about 10,000 years ago, climatic conditions were then very similar to todays. Within this timeframe, roughly pertaining to the Archaic Period, numerous archaeological cultures have been identified, the unstable climate led to widespread migration, with early Paleo-Indians soon spreading throughout the Americas, diversifying into many hundreds of culturally distinct tribes. The paleo-indians were hunter-gatherers, likely characterized by small, mobile bands consisting of approximately 20 to 50 members of an extended family and these groups moved from place to place as preferred resources were depleted and new supplies were sought. During much of the Paleo-Indian period, bands are thought to have subsisted primarily through hunting now-extinct giant land animals such as mastodon, Paleo-Indian groups carried a variety of tools
Pre-Columbian
–
Hopewell mounds from the
Mound City Group in Ohio
Pre-Columbian
–
hunter-gatherers
Pre-Columbian
–
Mississippian site in Arkansas,
Parkin Site, circa 1539. Illustration by Herb Roe.
Pre-Columbian
–
One of the pyramids in the upper level of
Yaxchilán
15.
Native American (Americas)
–
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian peoples of the Americas and their descendants. The term Amerindian is used in Quebec, the Guianas, Indigenous peoples of the United States are commonly known as Native Americans or American Indians, and Alaska Natives. Application of the term Indian originated with Christopher Columbus, who, in his search for Asia, eventually, the Americas came to be known as the West Indies, a name still used to refer to the islands of the Caribbean Sea. This led to the blanket term Indies and Indians for the indigenous inhabitants, although some indigenous peoples of the Americas were traditionally hunter-gatherers—and many, especially in the Amazon basin, still are—many groups practiced aquaculture and agriculture. The impact of their agricultural endowment to the world is a testament to their time, although some societies depended heavily on agriculture, others practiced a mix of farming, hunting, and gathering. In some regions the indigenous peoples created monumental architecture, large-scale organized cities, chiefdoms, states, and empires. Many parts of the Americas are still populated by peoples, some countries have sizable populations, especially Belize, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Greenland, Guatemala, Mexico. At least a different indigenous languages are spoken in the Americas. Some, such as the Quechuan languages, Aymara, Guaraní, Mayan languages, many also maintain aspects of indigenous cultural practices to varying degrees, including religion, social organization, and subsistence practices. Like most cultures, over time, cultures specific to many indigenous peoples have evolved to incorporate traditional aspects, some indigenous peoples still live in relative isolation from Western culture and a few are still counted as uncontacted peoples. The specifics of Paleo-Indian migration to and throughout the Americas, including the dates and routes traveled, are the subject of ongoing research. According to archaeological and genetic evidence, North and South America were the last continents in the world with human habitation. During the Wisconsin glaciation, 50–17,000 years ago, falling sea levels allowed people to move across the bridge of Beringia that joined Siberia to northwest North America. Alaska was a glacial refugium because it had low snowfall, allowing a small population to exist, the Laurentide Ice Sheet covered most of North America, blocking nomadic inhabitants and confining them to Alaska for thousands of years. Indigenous genetic studies suggest that the first inhabitants of the Americas share a single population, one that developed in isolation. The isolation of these peoples in Beringia might have lasted 10–20,000 years, around 16,500 years ago, the glaciers began melting, allowing people to move south and east into Canada and beyond. These people are believed to have followed herds of now-extinct Pleistocene megafauna along ice-free corridors that stretched between the Laurentide and Cordilleran Ice Sheets. Another route proposed involves migration - either on foot or using primitive boats - along the Pacific Northwest coast to the south, archeological evidence of the latter would have been covered by the sea level rise of more than 120 meters since the last ice age
Native American (Americas)
–
Quechua women in
Peru
Native American (Americas)
–
Pai Tavytera Indians in
Amambay Department,
Paraguay, 2012
Native American (Americas)
–
Paleo-Indians hunting a
glyptodont
Native American (Americas)
–
Drawing accompanying text in Book XII of the 16th-century
Florentine Codex (compiled 1540–1585), showing
Nahuas of conquest-era central Mexico suffering from smallpox
16.
Costa Rica
–
It has a population of around 4.5 million, of whom nearly a quarter live in the metropolitan area of the capital and largest city, San José. Costa Rica was sparsely inhabited by people before coming under Spanish rule in the 16th century. Since then, Costa Rica has remained among the most stable, prosperous, following a brief civil war, it permanently abolished its army in 1949, becoming one of only a few sovereign nations without a standing army. Costa Rica is a member of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie. The country has consistently performed favourably in the Human Development Index, placing 69th in the world as of 2015 and its rapidly developing economy, once heavily dependent on agriculture, has diversified to include sectors such as finance, pharmaceuticals, and ecotourism. Costa Rica is known for its environmental policies, being the only country to meet all five UNDP criteria established to measure environmental sustainability. Costa Rica officially plans to become a country by 2021. In 2012, it became the first country in the Americas to ban recreational hunting, historians have classified the indigenous people of Costa Rica as belonging to the Intermediate Area, where the peripheries of the Mesoamerican and Andean native cultures overlapped. More recently, pre-Columbian Costa Rica has also described as part of the Isthmo-Colombian Area. The oldest evidence of occupation in Costa Rica is associated with the arrival of various groups of hunter-gatherers about 10,000 to 7,000 years BCE in the Turrialba Valley. The presence of Clovis culture type spearheads and arrows from South America opens the possibility that, in this area, agriculture became evident in the populations that lived in Costa Rica about 5,000 years ago. They mainly grew tubers and roots, for the first and second millennia BCE there were already settled farming communities. These were small and scattered, although the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture as the livelihood in the territory is still unknown. The earliest use of pottery appears around 2,000 to 3,000 BCE, shards of pots, cylindrical vases, platters, gourds and other forms of vases decorated with grooves, prints, and some modelled after animals have been found. The impact of indigenous peoples on modern Costa Rican culture has been small compared to other nations. Costa Rica was described as the poorest and most miserable Spanish colony in all America by a Spanish governor in 1719, for all these reasons, Costa Rica was, by and large, unappreciated and overlooked by the Spanish Crown and left to develop on its own. Costa Rica became a democracy with no oppressed mestizo or indigenous class. It was not long before Spanish settlers turned to the hills, where they found rich volcanic soil, like the rest of Central America, Costa Rica never fought for independence from Spain
Costa Rica
–
A stone sphere created by the
Diquis culture at the
National Museum of Costa Rica.
The sphere is the icon of the country's cultural identity.
Costa Rica
–
Flag
Costa Rica
–
The
Ujarrás historical site in the Orosí Valley,
Cartago province. The church was built between 1686 and 1693.
Costa Rica
–
The 1849
national coat of arms was featured in the first postal stamp issued in 1862
17.
Mesoamerican
–
It is one of six areas in the world where ancient civilization arose independently, and the second in the Americas along with Norte Chico in present-day northern coastal Peru. As a cultural area, Mesoamerica is defined by a mosaic of cultural traits developed and shared by its indigenous cultures, while Mesoamerican civilization did know of the wheel and basic metallurgy, neither of these technologies became culturally important. Among the earliest complex civilizations was the Olmec culture, which inhabited the Gulf coast of Mexico and extended inland, frequent contact and cultural interchange between the early Olmec and other cultures in Chiapas, Guatemala and Oaxaca laid the basis for the Mesoamerican cultural area. All this was facilitated by considerable regional communications in ancient Mesoamerica and this Formative period saw the spread of distinct religious and symbolic traditions, as well as artistic and architectural complexes. In the subsequent Preclassic period, complex urban polities began to develop among the Maya, with the rise of such as El Mirador, Calakmul and Tikal. Mesoamerica is one of three regions of the world where writing is known to have independently developed. Upon the collapse of Teotihuacán around AD600, competition between several important political centers in central Mexico, such as Xochicalco and Cholula, ensued. During the early period, Central Mexico was dominated by the Toltec culture, Oaxaca by the Mixtec. Towards the end of the period, the Aztecs of Central Mexico built a tributary empire covering most of central Mesoamerica. The distinct Mesoamerican cultural tradition ended with the Spanish conquest in the 16th century, over the next centuries, Mesoamerican indigenous cultures were gradually subjected to Spanish colonial rule. The exact geographic extent of Mesoamerica has varied through time, as the civilization extended North and South from its heartland in southern Mexico, Mesoamerica is recognized as a near-prototypical cultural area, and the term is now fully integrated in the standard terminology of pre-Columbian anthropological studies. Conversely, the sister terms Aridoamerica and Oasisamerica, which refer to northern Mexico, 10° and 22° northern latitude, Mesoamerica possesses a complex combination of ecological systems, topographic zones, and environmental contexts. A main distinction groups these different niches into two categories, the lowlands and the altiplanos, or highlands. In the low-lying regions, sub-tropical and tropical climates are most common, as is true for most of the coastline along the Pacific and Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. The highlands show much more diversity, ranging from dry tropical to cold mountainous climates. The rainfall varies from the dry Oaxaca and north Yucatan to the humid southern Pacific, several distinct sub-regions within Mesoamerica are defined by a convergence of geographic and cultural attributes. These sub-regions are more conceptual than culturally meaningful, and the demarcation of their limits is not rigid, the Maya area, for example, can be divided into two general groups, the lowlands and highlands. The lowlands are further divided into the southern and northern Maya lowlands, the southern Maya lowlands are generally regarded as encompassing northern Guatemala, southern Campeche and Quintana Roo in Mexico, and Belize
Mesoamerican
–
Maya Ruins of
Tazumal in
Santa Ana, El Salvador
Mesoamerican
–
Mesoamerica and its cultural areas
Mesoamerican
–
Landscape of the Mesoamerican highlands
Mesoamerican
–
Tikal is one of the largest archaeological sites, urban centers, and tourist attractions of the
pre-Columbian Maya civilization. It is located in the archaeological region of the
Petén Basin in what is now northern
Guatemala.
18.
Andean
–
The Andes or Andean Mountains are the longest continental mountain range in the world. They are a range of highlands along the western edge of South America. This range is about 7,000 km long, about 200 to 700 km wide, the Andes extend from north to south through seven South American countries, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Argentina and Chile. Along their length, the Andes are split into several ranges, the Andes are the location of several high plateaus – some of which host major cities, such as Quito, Bogotá, Arequipa, Medellín, Sucre, Mérida and La Paz. The Altiplano plateau is the worlds second-highest after the Tibetan plateau and these ranges are in turn grouped into three major divisions based on climate, the Tropical Andes, the Dry Andes, and the Wet Andes. The Andes are the worlds highest mountain range outside of Asia, the highest mountain outside Asia, Mount Aconcagua, rises to an elevation of about 6,961 m above sea level. The peak of Chimborazo in the Ecuadorean Andes is farther from the Earths center than any other location on the Earths surface, the worlds highest volcanoes are in the Andes, including Ojos del Salado on the Chile-Argentina border, which rises to 6,893 m. The etymology of the word Andes has been debated, the majority consensus is that it derives from the Quechua word anti, which means east as in Antisuyu, one of the four regions of the Inca Empire. In the northern part of the Andes, the isolated Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta range is considered to be part of the Andes. The term cordillera comes from the Spanish word cordel, meaning rope, the Andes range is about 200 km wide throughout its length, except in the Bolivian flexure where it is about 640 kilometres wide. The Andes are the result of plate tectonics processes, caused by the subduction of oceanic crust beneath the South American plate. The main cause of the rise of the Andes is the compression of the rim of the South American Plate due to the subduction of the Nazca Plate. In the south, the Andes share a boundary with the former Patagonia Terrane. To the west, the Andes end at the Pacific Ocean, from a geographical approach, the Andes are considered to have their western boundaries marked by the appearance of coastal lowlands and a less rugged topography. The Andes Mountains also contain large quantities of iron ore located in mountains within the range. The Andean orogen has a series of bends or oroclines, the Bolivian Orocline is a seaward concave bending in the coast of South America and the Andes Mountains at about 18° S. At this point the orientation of the Andes turns from Northwest in Peru to South in Chile, the Andean segment north and south of the orocline have been rotated 15° to 20° counter clockwise and clockwise respectively. The Bolivian Orocline area overlaps with the area of maximum width of the Altiplano Plateau, the specific point at 18° S where the coastline bends is known as the Arica Elbow
Andean
–
Aerial photo of a portion of the Andes between
Argentina and
Chile
Andean
Andean
–
"
Cono de Arita " in the
Puna de Atacama,
Salta (
Argentina).
Andean
–
Aerial view of Aconcagua.
19.
Nicoya Peninsula
–
The Nicoya Peninsula is a peninsula on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica. It is divided into two provinces, Guanacaste Province in the north, and the Puntarenas Province in the south and it is located at 10°N85. 4166667°W /10, -85.4166667. It varies from 19 to 37 miles wide and is approximately 75 miles long, forming the largest peninsula in the country and it is known for its beaches and is a popular tourist destination. The main transport and commercial centre in the region is Nicoya, ferries run between the town of Puntarenas on the mainland and the Nicoya Peninsula. There is an airport in Liberia and small domestic airstrips in Nosara, Carrillo. The region was featured in the book Blue Zones, by Dan Buettner. Other notable settlements and places of interest in the include, Tamarindo, Santa Cruz, Nosara, Sámara, Naranjo, Paquera, Curu, Tambor, Montezuma, Santa Teresa. The Nicoya Peninsula is considered by Quest Network one of the Blue Zones in the world, where people commonly live active lives past the age of 100 years
Nicoya Peninsula
–
Nicoya Peninsula seen from space (false color)
Nicoya Peninsula
–
A landscape over the south-east part of the Nicoya Peninsula
Nicoya Peninsula
–
Sunset over the Nicoya Peninsula
20.
Spain
–
By population, Spain is the sixth largest in Europe and the fifth in the European Union. Spains capital and largest city is Madrid, other urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Bilbao. Modern humans first arrived in the Iberian Peninsula around 35,000 years ago, in the Middle Ages, the area was conquered by Germanic tribes and later by the Moors. Spain is a democracy organised in the form of a government under a constitutional monarchy. It is a power and a major developed country with the worlds fourteenth largest economy by nominal GDP. Jesús Luis Cunchillos argues that the root of the span is the Phoenician word spy. Therefore, i-spn-ya would mean the land where metals are forged, two 15th-century Spanish Jewish scholars, Don Isaac Abravanel and Solomon ibn Verga, gave an explanation now considered folkloric. Both men wrote in two different published works that the first Jews to reach Spain were brought by ship by Phiros who was confederate with the king of Babylon when he laid siege to Jerusalem. This man was a Grecian by birth, but who had given a kingdom in Spain. He became related by marriage to Espan, the nephew of king Heracles, Heracles later renounced his throne in preference for his native Greece, leaving his kingdom to his nephew, Espan, from whom the country of España took its name. Based upon their testimonies, this eponym would have already been in use in Spain by c.350 BCE, Iberia enters written records as a land populated largely by the Iberians, Basques and Celts. Early on its coastal areas were settled by Phoenicians who founded Western Europe´s most ancient cities Cadiz, Phoenician influence expanded as much of the Peninsula was eventually incorporated into the Carthaginian Empire, becoming a major theater of the Punic Wars against the expanding Roman Empire. After an arduous conquest, the peninsula came fully under Roman Rule, during the early Middle Ages it came under Germanic rule but later, much of it was conquered by Moorish invaders from North Africa. In a process took centuries, the small Christian kingdoms in the north gradually regained control of the peninsula. The last Moorish kingdom fell in the same year Columbus reached the Americas, a global empire began which saw Spain become the strongest kingdom in Europe, the leading world power for a century and a half, and the largest overseas empire for three centuries. Continued wars and other problems led to a diminished status. The Napoleonic invasions of Spain led to chaos, triggering independence movements that tore apart most of the empire, eventually democracy was peacefully restored in the form of a parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Spain joined the European Union, experiencing a renaissance and steady economic growth
Spain
–
Lady of Elche
Spain
–
Flag
Spain
–
Altamira Cave paintings, in
Cantabria.
Spain
–
Celtic castro in
A Guarda,
Galicia.
21.
Conquistadores
–
Conquistadors /kɒŋˈkɪstəˌdɔːrz/ is a term used to refer to the soldiers and explorers of the Spanish Empire or the Portuguese Empire in a general sense. During the Age of Discovery, conquistadors sailed beyond Europe to the Americas, Oceania, Africa and Asia, conquering territory and they colonized much of the world for Spain and Portugal in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries. Portugal established a route to China in the early 16th century, sending ships via the southern coast of Africa, human infections gained worldwide transmission vectors for the first time, from Africa and Eurasia to the Americas and vice versa. The spread of diseases, including smallpox, flu and typhus. In the 16th century perhaps 240,000 Europeans entered American ports, by the late 16th century silver imports from America provided one-fifth of Spains total budget. The conquistadors were professional warriors, using European tactics, firearms and their units would often specialize in forms of combat that required long periods of training that were too costly for informal groups. Their armies were composed of Iberian and other European soldiers. Native allied troops were largely equipped with armament and armour that varied geographically. Some groups consisted of men without military experience, Catholic clergy which helped with administrative duties. These native forces often included African slaves and Native Americans and they not only fought in the battlefield but served as interpreters, informants, servants, teachers, physicians, and scribes. India Catalina and Malintzin were Native American women slaves who worked for the Spaniards, Castilian law prohibited foreigners and non-Catholics from settling in the New World. However, not all conquistadors were Castilian, many foreigners Hispanicised their names and/or converted to Catholicism to serve the Castilian Crown. For example, Ioánnis Fokás was a Castilian of Greek origin who discovered the strait that bears his name between Vancouver Island and Washington State in 1592, german-born Nikolaus Federmann, Hispanicised as Nicolás de Federmán, was a conquistador in Venezuela and Colombia. The origin of people in mixed expeditions was not always distinguished. Castilian law banned Spanish women from travelling to America unless they were married and accompanied by a husband, women who travelled thus include María de Escobar, María Estrada, Marina Vélez de Ortega, Marina de la Caballería, Francisca de Valenzuela, Catalina de Salazar. Some conquistadors married Native American women or had illegitimate children, European young men enlisted in the army because it was one way out of poverty. Catholic priests instructed the soldiers in mathematics, writing, theology, Latin, Greek, and history, Kings army officers taught military arts. An uneducated young recruit could become a leader, elected by their fellow professional soldiers
Conquistadores
–
Conquistadors and their native
Tlaxcalan allies enter Tenochtitlan
Conquistadores
–
The surrender of
Granada in 1492. The last
Moorish sultan of Granada,
Muhammad XII, before
Ferdinand and Isabella.
Conquistadores
–
Christopher Columbus 's first landing in the Americas in 1492
Conquistadores
–
Hernando De Soto and Spanish Conquistadores seeing the Mississippi River for the first time.
22.
Chibcha
–
The Muisca are the Chibcha-speaking people that formed the Muisca Confederation of the central Andean highlands of present-day Colombias Eastern Range, in particular the Altiplano Cundiboyacense. As one out of four advanced civilizations of the Americas, they were encountered by the Spanish Empire in 1537 and it bordered the territories of the Panche and Pijao tribes. At the time of the conquest, the area had a large population, estimates vary from half a million to up to three million inhabitants. The Muisca spoke muysccubun, a dialect of Chibcha, also called Muysca and Mosca, the economy was based on agriculture, salt mining, metalworking and manufacturing. Today the Muisca population has almost died out, although in the municipalities and districts Cota, Chía, Tenjo, Suba, Engativá, Tocancipá, Gachancipá, a census by the Ministry of Interior Affairs in 2005 provided a total of 14,051 Muisca persons in Colombia. Excavations in the Altiplano Cundiboyacense show evidence of activity since the Archaic stage at the beginning of the Holocene era. Colombia has one of the most ancient archaeological sites of the Americas, El Abra, human skeletons were found that date to 5000 BCE. Analysis demonstrated that the people were members of the El Abra Culture, scholars agree that the group identified as Muisca migrated to the Altiplano Cundiboyacense in the Formative stage, as shown by evidence found at Aguazuque and Soacha. Like the other cultures of America, the Muiscas were in a transition between being hunter-gatherers and becoming sedentary farmers. Around 1500 BCE, groups of agrarians with ceramic traditions came to the region from the lowlands and they had permanent housing and stationary camps, and worked the salty water to extract salt. In Zipacón there is evidence of agriculture and ceramics, the most ancient settlement of the highlands dates to 1270 BCE. Between 500 BCE and 800 BCE, a wave of migrants came to the highlands. Their presence is identified by multicolor ceramics, housing, and farms and these groups were still in residence upon the arrival of the Spanish conquerors. They left abundant traces of their occupation that have been studied since the 16th century and it is possible that the Muisca integrated with more ancient inhabitants, but the Muisca were the ones who molded the cultural profile and the social and political organization. Their language, a dialect of Chibcha, was similar to those peoples of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. Zipa Saguamanchica was in a constant war against aggressive tribes such as the Sutagao, and especially the Panche, the Caribs were also a permanent threat as rivals of the zaque of Hunza, especially for the possession of the salt mines of Zipaquirá, Nemocón and Tausa. The Muisca people were organized in a confederation that was a union of states that each retained sovereignty. The confederation was not a kingdom, as there was no monarch, nor was it an empire
Chibcha
–
Muisca raft (1200–1500 CE), representation of the initiation of the new
Zipa in the
lake of Guatavita
Chibcha
–
Muisca people.
Chibcha
–
Ruins of an ancient Muisca temple at
El Infiernito (the little hell) near
Villa de Leyva
Chibcha
–
Monument to
Bochica in the town of Cuitiva (Boyacá).
23.
Anno Domini
–
The terms anno Domini and before Christ are used to label or number years in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. The term anno Domini is Medieval Latin and means in the year of the Lord, There is no year zero in this scheme, so the year AD1 immediately follows the year 1 BC. This dating system was devised in 525 by Dionysius Exiguus of Scythia Minor, the Gregorian calendar is the most widely used calendar in the world today. Traditionally, English followed Latin usage by placing the AD abbreviation before the year number, however, BC is placed after the year number, which also preserves syntactic order. The abbreviation is widely used after the number of a century or millennium. Because BC is the English abbreviation for Before Christ, it is sometimes concluded that AD means After Death. However, this would mean that the approximate 33 years commonly associated with the life of Jesus would not be included in either of the BC, astronomical year numbering and ISO8601 avoid words or abbreviations related to Christianity, but use the same numbers for AD years. The Anno Domini dating system was devised in 525 by Dionysius Exiguus to enumerate the years in his Easter table. His system was to replace the Diocletian era that had used in an old Easter table because he did not wish to continue the memory of a tyrant who persecuted Christians. The last year of the old table, Diocletian 247, was followed by the first year of his table. Thus Dionysius implied that Jesus Incarnation occurred 525 years earlier, without stating the year during which his birth or conception occurred. Blackburn & Holford-Strevens briefly present arguments for 2 BC,1 BC, There were inaccuracies in the list of consuls There were confused summations of emperors regnal years It is not known how Dionysius established the year of Jesuss birth. It is convenient to initiate a calendar not from the day of an event. For example, the Islamic calendar begins not from the date of the Hegira, at the time, it was believed by some that the Resurrection and end of the world would occur 500 years after the birth of Jesus. The old Anno Mundi calendar theoretically commenced with the creation of the based on information in the Old Testament. It was believed that, based on the Anno Mundi calendar, Anno Mundi 6000 was thus equated with the resurrection and the end of the world but this date had already passed in the time of Dionysius. The Anglo-Saxon historian the Venerable Bede, who was familiar with the work of Dionysius Exiguus, used Anno Domini dating in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, completed in 731. e. On the continent of Europe, Anno Domini was introduced as the era of choice of the Carolingian Renaissance by the English cleric and scholar Alcuin in the late eighth century
Anno Domini
–
Dionysius Exiguus invented Anno Domini years to
date Easter.
Anno Domini
–
Anno Domini inscription at a cathedral in
Carinthia,
Austria.
Anno Domini
–
Statue of
Charlemagne by
Agostino Cornacchini (1725), at
St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican, Italy. Charlemagne promoted the usage of the Anno Domini epoch throughout the
Carolingian Empire
24.
Clovis culture
–
The Clovis culture appears around 11, 500–11,000 uncal RCYBP, at the end of the last glacial period, and is characterized by the manufacture of Clovis points and distinctive bone and ivory tools. Archaeologists most precise determinations at present suggest that this age is equal to roughly 13,200 to 12,900 calendar years ago. Clovis people are considered to be the ancestors of most of the cultures of the Americas. The only human burial that has been associated with tools from the Clovis culture included the remains of an infant boy named Anzick-1. Researchers from the United States and Europe conducted paleogenetic research on Anzick-1s ancient nuclear, mitochondrial, the results of these analyses reveal that Anzick-1 is closely related to modern Native American populations, which lends support to the Beringia hypothesis for the peopling of the Americas. The Clovis culture was replaced by more localized regional cultures from the time of the Younger Dryas cold climate period onward. Post-Clovis cultures include the Folsom tradition, Gainey, Suwannee-Simpson, Plainview-Goshen, Cumberland, each of these is commonly thought to derive directly from Clovis, in some cases apparently differing only in the length of the fluting on their projectile points. Recent preliminary carbon dating shows a culture from around or prior to 13,000 years ago, along with horse, camel, a hallmark of the toolkit associated with the Clovis culture is the distinctively shaped, fluted stone spear point, known as the Clovis point. The Clovis point is bifacial and typically fluted on both sides, the culture was originally named for a small number of artifacts found between 1932 and 1936 at Blackwater Locality No. 1, a site between the towns of Clovis and Portales, New Mexico. These finds were deemed especially important due to their association with mammoth sp. Clovis sites have since been identified throughout much, but not all, of the contiguous United States, as well as Mexico and Central America and it is generally accepted that Clovis people hunted mammoths, as Clovis points have repeatedly been found in sites containing mammoth remains. In total, more than 125 species of plants and animals are known to have used by Clovis people in the portion of the Western Hemisphere they inhabited. The oldest Clovis site in North America is believed to be El Fin del Mundo in northwestern Sonora, Mexico and it features occupation dating around 13,390 calibrated years BP. In 2011, remains of Gomphothere were found, the evidence suggests that humans did in fact two of them here. Theres also the Aubrey site in Denton County, Texas, which produced a date that is almost identical. After this time, Clovis-style fluted points were replaced by other fluted-point traditions with an uninterrupted sequence across North. An effectively continuous cultural adaptation proceeds from the Clovis period through the ensuing Middle, whether the Clovis culture drove the mammoth, and other species, to extinction via overhunting – the so-called Pleistocene overkill hypothesis – is still an open, and controversial, question
Clovis culture
–
A
Clovis projectile point created using bifacial percussion flaking (that is, each face is flaked on both edges alternately with a percussor)
Clovis culture
–
Clovis points from the Rummells-Maske Cache Site,
Iowa.
25.
Arrow
–
An arrow is a shafted projectile that is shot with a bow. It predates recorded history and is common to most cultures, an arrow usually consists of a shaft with an arrowhead attached to the front end, with fletchings and a nock at the other. The oldest evidence of stone-tipped projectiles, which may or may not have been propelled by a bow, dating to c.64,000 years ago, were found in Sibudu Cave, South Africa. The oldest evidence of the use of bows to shoot arrows dates to about 10,000 years ago and they had shallow grooves on the base, indicating that they were shot from a bow. The oldest bow so far recovered is about 8,000 years old, archery seems to have arrived in the Americas with the Arctic small tool tradition, about 4,500 years ago. Arrow sizes vary greatly across cultures, ranging from eighteen inches to five feet, however, most modern arrows are 75 centimetres to 96 centimetres, most war arrows from an English ship sunk in 1545 were 76 centimetres. Very short arrows have been used, shot through a guide attached either to the bow or to the archers wrist and these may fly farther than heavier arrows, and an enemy without suitable equipment may find himself unable to return them. The shaft is the structural element of the arrow, to which the other components are attached. Traditional arrow shafts are made from wood, bamboo or reeds, while modern shafts may be made from aluminium, carbon fibre reinforced plastic. Such shafts are made from an aluminium core wrapped with a carbon fibre outer. The stiffness of the shaft is known as its spine, referring to how little the shaft bends when compressed, hence, an arrow which bends less is said to have more spine. In order to strike consistently, a group of arrows must be similarly spined, center-shot bows, in which the arrow passes through the central vertical axis of the bow riser, may obtain consistent results from arrows with a wide range of spines. Higher draw-weight bows will generally require stiffer arrows, with more spine to give the amount of flex when shot. The weight of a shaft can be expressed in GPI. The length of a shaft in inches multiplied by its GPI rating gives the weight of the shaft in grains, for example, a shaft that is 30 inches long and has a GPI of 9.5 weighs 285 grains, or about 18 grams. This does not include the elements of a finished arrow. Sometimes a shaft will be made of two different types of wood fastened together, resulting in what is known as a footed arrow, known by some as the finest of wood arrows, footed arrows were used both by early Europeans and Native Americans. Footed arrows will typically consist of a length of hardwood near the head of the arrow
Arrow
–
Traditional target arrow (top) and replica medieval arrow.
Arrow
–
A
Shoshone man using a shaft straightener in traditional arrow construction.
Arrow
–
Modern arrow with plastic
fletchings and nock.
Arrow
–
Obsidian broadhead
26.
Armadillo
–
Armadillos are New World placental mammals in the order Cingulata with a leathery armour shell. The Chlamyphoridae and Dasypodidae are the surviving families in the order. The word armadillo means little armoured one in Spanish, the Aztecs called them āyōtōchtli, Nahuatl for turtle-rabbit, āyōtl and tōchtli. The Portuguese word for armadillo is tatu which derives from the Tupi language, similar names are also found in other, especially European, languages. About nine extant genera and 21 extant species of armadillo have been described and their average length is about 75 cm, including tail. The giant armadillo grows up to 150 cm and weighs up to 54 kg, while the pink fairy armadillo is a diminutive species, all species are native to the Americas, where they inhabit a variety of different environments. Like all of the Xenarthra lineages, armadillos originated in South America, due to the continents former isolation, they were confined there for most of the Cenozoic. The recent formation of the Isthmus of Panama allowed a few members of the family to migrate northward into southern North America by the early Pleistocene, today, all extant armadillo species are still present in South America. They are particularly diverse in Paraguay and surrounding areas, some, including four species of Dasypus, are widely distributed over the Americas, whereas others, such as Yepess mulita, are restricted to small ranges. Their range has expanded in North America over the last century due to a lack of natural predators. Armadillos are small to medium-sized mammals, the smallest species, the pink fairy armadillo, is roughly chipmunk-sized at 85 g and 13–15 cm in total length. The largest species, the giant armadillo, can be the size of a pig and weigh up to 54 kg. Many species use their claws to dig for food, such as grubs. The nine-banded armadillo prefers to build burrows in moist soil near the creeks, streams, the diets of different armadillo species vary, but consist mainly of insects, grubs, and other invertebrates. Some species, however, feed almost entirely on ants and termites, in common with other xenarthrans, armadillos, in general, have low body temperatures of 33–36 °C and low basal metabolic rates. This is particularly true of types that specialize in using termites as their food source. The armour is formed by plates of bone covered in relatively small, overlapping epidermal scales called scutes. Most species have rigid shields over the shoulders and hips, with a number of bands separated by flexible skin covering the back, additional armour covers the top of the head, the upper parts of the limbs, and the tail
Armadillo
Armadillo
–
Nine-banded armadillo skeleton.
Armadillo
–
Pink fairy armadillo
Armadillo
–
1658 woodcut of an armadillo
27.
Sloth
–
Sloths are mammals classified in the families Megalonychidae and Bradypodidae, including six extant species. They are named after the sin of sloth because they seem slow and lazy at first glance, however. Aside from their surprising speed during emergency flights from predators, other traits of sloths include their strong body. They are classified in the order Pilosa because they are related to anteaters, extinct sloth species include many megafaunal ground sloths, some of which attained the size of elephants, as well as a few species of marine sloths. Extant sloths are medium-sized arboreal residents of the jungles of Central, sloths make good habitats for other organisms, and a single sloth may be home to moths, beetles, cockroaches, fungi, ciliates, and algae. The sloths taxonomic suborder is Folivora, sometimes also called Phyllophaga or Tardigrada, the first two names both mean leaf-eaters, derived from Latin and Greek, respectively. Names for the used by tribes in Ecuador include ritto, rit, and ridette, mostly forms of the word sleep, eat. The English word sloth is recorded as meaning laziness, indolence from the century onwards. It was applied to the animal in the early seventeenth-century, as a calque of the Portuguese preguiça, the pronunciation is /ˈsloʊθ/ SLOHTH or /ˈslɒθ/ SLOTH. Sloths are classified as folivores, as the bulk of their diets consist of buds, tender shoots, some two-toed sloths have been documented as eating insects, small reptiles, and birds as a small supplement to their diets. Linnaeuss two-toed sloth has recently been documented eating human faeces from open latrines and they have made extraordinary adaptations to an arboreal browsing lifestyle. Leaves, their food source, provide very little energy or nutrients. Sloths, therefore, have large, specialized, slow-acting stomachs with multiple compartments in which symbiotic bacteria break down the tough leaves. Sloths tongues have the ability to protrude from their mouths 10 to 12 inches. As much as two-thirds of a well-fed sloths body weight consists of the contents of its stomach, although unable to survive outside the tropical rainforests of South and Central America, within that environment sloths are outstandingly successful creatures. On Barro Colorado Island in Panama, sloths have been estimated to comprise 70% of the biomass of arboreal mammals, Sloth fur exhibits specialized functions, the outer hairs grow in a direction opposite from that of other mammals. In most conditions, the fur hosts two species of algae, which provide camouflage. Because of the algae, sloth fur is an ecosystem of its own
Sloth
–
Sloths Temporal range:
Early Oligocene to
Holocene
Sloth
–
Feeding
brown-throated three-toed sloth (Bradypus variegatus),
Cahuita National Park,
Costa Rica
Sloth
–
Hoffman's two-toed sloth (Choloepus hoffmanni) feeding in
Manuel Antonio National Park in
Costa Rica
Sloth
–
Three-toed sloth in the Dallas World Aquarium
28.
Mastodons
–
Mastodons lived in herds and were predominantly forest dwelling animals that fed on a mixed diet obtained by browsing and grazing with a seasonal preference for browsing, similar to living elephants. M. americanum, the American mastodon, is the youngest, the first remnant of Mammut, a tooth some 2.2 kilograms in weight, was discovered in the village of Claverack, New York, in 1705. The mystery animal became known as the incognitum, in 1806 the French anatomist Georges Cuvier named the incognitum mastodon. The name mastodon means breast tooth, and was assigned by the French naturalist Georges Cuvier in 1817, Mastodon as a genus name is obsolete, the valid name is Mammut, a name that preceded Cuviers description, making Mastodon a junior synonym. The change was met with resistance, and authors sometimes applied Mastodon as a name so it became the common term for members of the genus. Species include, M. americanum, the American mastodon, the best known, the American mastodon resembled a woolly mammoth in appearance, with a thick coat of shaggy hair. It had tusks that sometimes exceeded 5 meters in length, they curved upwards and its main habitat was cold spruce woodlands, and it is believed to have browsed in herds. It became extinct at the end of the Pleistocene approximately 11,000 years ago, M. matthewi—found in the Snake Creek Formation of Nebraska, dating from the late Hemphillian. Some authors consider it practically indistinguishable from M. americanum, M. raki—Its remains were found in the Palomas Formation, near Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, dating from the early-middle Pliocene, between 4.5 and 3.6 Ma. However, like M. matthewi, some authors do not consider it distinct from M. americaum to warrant its own species. M. cosoensis—found in the Coso Formation of California, dating from the late Pliocene, originally a species of Pliomastodon, it was later assigned to Mammut. Since a tentative 1977 report of M. matthewi in China, however, the status of Mammut or Zygolophodon borsoni in the literature appears equivocal. Mammut is a genus of the extinct family Mammutidae, related to the proboscidean family Elephantidae, furlongi, named from remains found in the Juntura Formation of Oregon, dating from the late Miocene. However, it is no longer considered valid, leaving only four valid species, a complete mtDNA sequence has been obtained from the tooth of an M. americanum skeleton found in permafrost in northern Alaska. The remains are thought to be 50,000 to 130,000 years old and this sequence has been used as an outgroup to refine divergence dates in the evolution of the Elephantidae. The rate of mtDNA sequence change in proboscideans was found to be lower than in primates. Compared to mammoths, mastodons had shorter legs, a body and were more heavily muscled. The average body size of the species M. americanum was around 2.3 m in height at the shoulders, corresponding to a female or a small male
Mastodons
Mastodons
–
Restoration
Mastodons
–
Comparison of woolly mammoth (L) and American mastodon (R)
Mastodons
–
Excavation of a specimen in a
golf course in
Heath, Ohio, 1989
29.
Voyages of Christopher Columbus
–
For a very long time, it was believed that Columbus and his crew had been the first Europeans to make landfall in the Americas. Columbus was an Italian–born navigator sailing for the Crown of Castile in search of a route to Asia, to access the sources of spices. This led to the discovery of a New World between Europe and Asia, Columbuss voyages led to the widespread knowledge that a new continent existed west of Europe and east of Asia. This breakthrough in science led to the exploration and colonization of the New World by Spain and other European sea powers. The search for a route to Asia continued in 1513 when Vasco Nuñez de Balboa crossed the narrow Isthmus of Panama to become the first European to sight the Pacific Ocean. The search was completed in 1521, when the Castilian Magellan expedition sailed across the Pacific, Portugal had been the main European power interested in pursuing trade routes overseas. Their next-door neighbors, Castile had been slower to begin exploring the Atlantic due to the bigger land area it had to re-conquer from the Moors. In 1492 the joint rulers of the Spanish nation conquered the Moorish kingdom of Granada and he proposed the king equip three sturdy ships and grant Columbus one years time to sail out west into the Atlantic, search for a western route to India, and return. Columbus also requested he be made Great Admiral of the Ocean Sea, appointed governor of any and all lands he discovered, the king submitted the proposal to his experts, who rejected it after several years. It was their opinion that Columbuss estimation of a travel distance of 2,400 miles was, in fact. In 1488 Columbus appealed to the court of Portugal, receiving a new invitation for an audience with King John II and this also proved unsuccessful, in part because not long afterwards Bartolomeu Dias returned to Portugal following a successful rounding of the southern tip of Africa. With an eastern sea route now under its control, Portugal was no longer interested in trailblazing a western route to Asia crossing unknown seas. Columbus traveled from Portugal to Spain to convince the Catholic Monarchs of Spain to finance the expedition, King Ferdinand II of Aragon married Queen Isabella I of Castile in 1469, uniting the two largest kingdoms into what would later be the Spanish Crown. They were known jointly as the Catholic Monarchs, and ruled their kingdoms independently, Columbus was granted an audience with them, on May 1,1489, he presented his plans to Queen Isabella, who referred them to a committee. They pronounced the idea impractical, and advised the monarchs not to support the proposed venture, after continually asking, nagging, begging, and crying for the monarchs to support his plan at the royal court and enduring two years of negotiations, Columbus finally succeeded in January 1492. Queen Isabellas forces had just conquered the Moorish Emirate of Granada, Isabella and Ferdinand received Columbus in the Alcázar in Córdoba to support his plans. The monarchs left it to the treasurer to shift funds among various royal accounts on behalf of the enterprise. Columbus was to be made Admiral of the Seas and would receive a portion of all profits, the terms were unusually generous but, as his son later wrote, the monarchs were not confident of his return
Voyages of Christopher Columbus
–
The Virgin of the Navigators by
Alejo Fernández, the earliest known painting about the discovery of the
Americas, 1531–36.
Voyages of Christopher Columbus
–
The four voyages of Columbus
Voyages of Christopher Columbus
–
Columbus and Queen Isabella. Detail of the Columbus monument in
Madrid (1885).
Voyages of Christopher Columbus
–
The "Columbus map" was drawn circa 1490 in the workshop of Bartolomeo and Christopher Columbus in
Lisbon.
30.
Spanish Empire
–
The Spanish Empire was one of the largest empires in history. The Spanish Empire became the foremost global power of its time and was the first to be called the empire on which the sun never sets, the Spanish Empire originated during the Age of Discovery after the voyages of Christopher Columbus. Following the Spanish–American War of 1898, Spain ceded its last colonies in the Caribbean and its last African colonies were granted independence or abandoned during Decolonisation of Africa finishing in 1976. The unity did not mean uniformity, nevertheless, some historians assert that Portugal was part of the Spanish monarchy at the time, while others draw a clear distinction between the Portuguese and Spanish empires. During the 15th century, Castile and Portugal became territorial and commercial rivals in the western Atlantic. The conquest was completed with the campaigns of the armies of the Crown of Castile between 1478 and 1496, when the islands of Gran Canaria, La Palma, and Tenerife were subjugated. The Portuguese tried in vain to keep secret their discovery of the Gold Coast in the Gulf of Guinea, chronicler Pulgar wrote that the fame of the treasures of Guinea spread around the ports of Andalusia in such way that everybody tried to go there. Worthless trinkets, Moorish textiles, and above all, shells from the Canary and Cape Verde islands were exchanged for gold, slaves, ivory and Guinea pepper. The Crown officially organized this trade with Guinea, every caravel had to get a government license, the treaty delimited the spheres of influence of the two countries, establishing the principle of the Mare clausum. It was confirmed in 1481 by the Pope Sixtus IV, in the papal bull Æterni regis, thus, the limitations imposed by the Alcáçovas treaty were overcome and a new and more balanced worlds division would be reached at Tordesillas between both emerging maritime powers. Seven months before the treaty of Alcaçovas, King John II of Aragon died, Ferdinand and Isabella drove the last Moorish king out of Granada in 1492 after a ten-year war. The Catholic Monarchs then negotiated with Christopher Columbus, a Genoese sailor attempting to reach Cipangu by sailing west, Castile was already engaged in a race of exploration with Portugal to reach the Far East by sea when Columbus made his bold proposal to Isabella. Columbus discoveries inaugurated the Spanish colonization of the Americas and these actions gave Spain exclusive rights to establish colonies in all of the New World from north to south, as well as the easternmost parts of Asia. The treaty of Tordesillas was confirmed by Pope Julius II in the bull Ea quae pro bono pacis on 24 January 1506, Spains expansion and colonization was driven by economic influences, a yearning to improve national prestige, and a desire to spread Catholicism into the New World. The Catholic Monarchs had developed a strategy of marriages for their children in order to isolate their long-time enemy, the Spanish princes married the heirs of Portugal, England and the House of Habsburg. Following the same strategy, the Catholic Monarchs decided to support the Catalan-Aragonese house of Naples against Charles VIII of France in the Italian Wars beginning in 1494. As King of Aragon, Ferdinand had been involved in the struggle against France and Venice for control of Italy, these conflicts became the center of Ferdinands foreign policy as king. Only a year later, Ferdinand became part of the Holy League against France and this war was less of a success than the war against Venice, and in 1516, France agreed to a truce that left Milan in its control and recognized Spanish control of Upper Navarre
Spanish Empire
–
Columbus and the Catholic Monarchs (The return of Columbus to Spain).
Spanish Empire
–
Flag
Spanish Empire
–
The death of French general
Gaston de Foix at the
Battle of Ravenna (1512).
Spanish Empire
–
Upon the death of
Ferdinand the Catholic, the lordship of the Spanish Indies became Kingdoms of the Indies.
31.
Guatemala
–
With an estimated population of around 15.8 million, it is the most populated state in Central America. Guatemala is a democracy, its capital and largest city is Nueva Guatemala de la Asunción. The territory of modern Guatemala once formed the core of the Maya civilization, most of the country was conquered by the Spanish in the 16th century, becoming part of the viceroyalty of New Spain. Guatemala attained independence in 1821 as part of the Federal Republic of Central America, from the mid to late 19th century, Guatemala experienced chronic instability and civil strife. Beginning in the early 20th century, it was ruled by a series of dictators backed by the United Fruit Company, in 1944, authoritarian leader Jorge Ubico was overthrown by a pro-democratic military coup, initiating a decade-long revolution that led to sweeping social and economic reforms. A U. S. -backed military coup in 1954 ended the revolution, from 1960 to 1996, Guatemala endured a bloody civil war fought between the US-backed government and leftist rebels, including genocidal massacres of the Maya population perpetrated by the military. As of 2014, Guatemala ranks 31st of 33 Latin American and Caribbean countries in terms of the Human Development Index, Guatemalas abundance of biologically significant and unique ecosystems includes a large number of endemic species and contributes to Mesoamericas designation as a biodiversity hotspot. The country is known for its rich and distinct culture. The name Guatemala comes from the Nahuatl word Cuauhtēmallān, or place of many trees and this was the name the Tlaxcaltecan soldiers who accompanied Pedro de Alvarado during the Spanish Conquest gave to this territory. The first evidence of habitation in Guatemala dates back to 12,000 BC. Evidence, such as obsidian arrowheads found in parts of the country. There is archaeological proof that early Guatemalan settlers were hunters and gatherers, pollen samples from Petén and the Pacific coast indicate that maize cultivation had been developed by 3500 BC. Sites dating back to 6500 BC have been found in the Quiché region in the Highlands, archaeologists divide the pre-Columbian history of Mesoamerica into the Preclassic period, the Classic period, and the Postclassic period. Until recently, the Preclassic was regarded as a period, with small villages of farmers who lived in huts. This period is characterized by urbanisation, the emergence of independent city-states and this lasted until approximately 900 AD, when the Classic Maya civilization collapsed. The Maya abandoned many of the cities of the lowlands or were killed off by a drought-induced famine. The cause of the collapse is debated, but the Drought Theory is gaining currency, supported by such as lakebeds, ancient pollen. A series of prolonged droughts, among other such as overpopulation, in what is otherwise a seasonal desert is thought to have decimated the Maya
Guatemala
–
Tikal Mayan ruins.
Guatemala
–
Flag
Guatemala
–
The Conquistador
Pedro de Alvarado led the initial Spanish efforts to conquer Guatemala.
Guatemala
–
Criollos rejoice upon learning about the declaration of independence from Spain on September 15, 1821.
32.
Panama
–
Panama, officially called the Republic of Panama, is a country usually considered to be entirely in North America or Central America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, the capital and largest city is Panama City, whose metropolitan area is home to nearly half of the countrys 4.1 million people. Panama was inhabited by indigenous tribes prior to settlement by the Spanish in the 16th century. Panama broke away from Spain in 1821 and joined a union of Nueva Granada, Ecuador, when Gran Colombia dissolved in 1831, Panama and Nueva Granada remained joined, eventually becoming the Republic of Colombia. With the backing of the United States, Panama seceded from Colombia in 1903, in 1977 an agreement was signed for the total transfer of the Canal from the United States to Panama by the end of the 20th century, which culminated on 31 December 1999. Revenue from canal tolls continues to represent a significant portion of Panamas GDP, although commerce, banking, in 2015 Panama ranked 60th in the world in terms of the Human Development Index. Since 2010, Panama remains the second most competitive economy in Latin America, covering around 40 percent of its land area, Panamas jungles are home to an abundance of tropical plants and animals – some of them to be found nowhere else on the planet. There are several theories about the origin of the name Panama, some believe that the country was named after a commonly found species of tree. Others believe that the first settlers arrived in Panama in August, when butterflies abound, the best-known version is that a fishing village and its nearby beach bore the name Panamá, which meant an abundance of fish. Captain Antonio Tello de Guzmán, while exploring the Pacific side in 1515, in 1517 Don Gaspar De Espinosa, a Spanish lieutenant, decided to settle a post there. In 1519 Pedrarias Dávila decided to establish the Empires Pacific city in this site, the new settlement replaced Santa María La Antigua del Darién, which had lost its function within the Crowns global plan after the beginning of the Spanish exploitation of the riches in the Pacific. Blending all of the above together, Panamanians believe in general that the word Panama means abundance of fish and this is the official definition given in social studies textbooks approved by the Ministry of Education in Panama. However, others believe the word Panama comes from the Kuna word bannaba which means distant or far away, at the time of the arrival of the Spanish in the 16th century, the known inhabitants of Panama included the Cuevas and the Coclé tribes. These people have disappeared, as they had no immunity from European infectious diseases. The earliest discovered artifacts of indigenous peoples in Panama include Paleo-Indian projectile points, later central Panama was home to some of the first pottery-making in the Americas, for example the cultures at Monagrillo, which date back to 2500–1700 BC. These evolved into significant populations best known through their spectacular burials at the Monagrillo archaeological site, the monumental monolithic sculptures at the Barriles site are also important traces of these ancient isthmian cultures. Before Europeans arrived Panama was widely settled by Chibchan, Chocoan, the largest group were the Cueva. The size of the population of the isthmus at the time of European colonization is uncertain
Panama
–
Vasco Núñez de Balboa, a recognized and popular figure of Panamanian history
Panama
–
Flag
Panama
–
"New Caledonia", the ill-fated Scottish
Darien scheme colony in the Bay of Caledonia, west of the
Gulf of Darien
Panama
–
Santo Domingo Church
33.
Viceroyalty of New Granada
–
The Viceroyalty of New Granada was the name given on 27 May 1717, to the jurisdiction of the Spanish Empire in northern South America, corresponding to modern Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, and Venezuela. The territory corresponding to Panama was incorporated later in 1739, in addition to these core areas, the territory of the Viceroyalty of New Granada included Guyana, southwestern Suriname, parts of northwestern Brazil, and northern Peru. Sporadic attempts at reform were directed at increasing efficiency and centralizing authority, the rough and diverse geography of northern South America and the limited range of proper roads made travel and communications within the viceroyalty difficult. The Wayuu had never subjugated by the Spanish. The two groups were in a more or less permanent state of war, there had been rebellions in 1701,1727,1741,1757,1761 and 1768. In 1718, Governor Soto de Herrera called them barbarians, horse thieves, worthy of death, without God, without law, of all the Indians in the territory of Colombia, the Wayuu were unique in having learned the use of firearms and horses. In 1769 the Spanish took 22 Wayuus captive, in order to put them to work building the fortifications of Cartagena, the reaction of the Wayuus was unexpected. On 2 May 1769, at El Rincón, near Riohacha, they set their village afire, burning the church, the Spanish immediately dispatched an expedition from El Rincón to capture the Wayuus. At the head of this force was José Antonio de Sierra, the Guajiros recognized him and forced his party to take refuge in the house of the curate, which they then set afire. Sierra and eight of his men were killed and this success was soon known in other Guajiro areas, and more men joined the revolt. According to Messía, at the peak there were 20,000 Wayuus under arms, many had firearms acquired from English and Dutch smugglers, sometimes even from the Spanish. This enabled the rebels to take all the settlements of the region. According to the authorities, more than 100 Spaniards were killed, many cattle were also taken by the rebels. The Spaniards took refuge in Riohacha and sent urgent messages to Maracaibo, Valledupar, Santa Marta and Cartagena, the rebels themselves were not unified. Sierras relatives among the Indians took up arms against the rebels to avenge his death, a battle between the two groups of Wayuus was fought at La Soledad. That and the arrival of the Spanish reinforcements caused the rebellion to fade away, New Granada was estimated to have 4,345,000 inhabitants in 1819. With the dissolution of Gran Colombia, the states of Ecuador, Venezuela, the Republic of New Granada, with its capital at Bogotá, lasted from 1831 to 1856. The name Colombia reappeared in the United States of Colombia, the new name for the country having been introduced by a government after a civil war
Viceroyalty of New Granada
–
Pedro Messía de la Cerda, Viceroy of New Granada
Viceroyalty of New Granada
–
Naval flag of Spain since 1785 and of maritime places and coastal forts from 1793
34.
Colombia
–
Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a transcontinental country largely situated in the northwest of South America, with territories in Central America. Colombia shares a border to the northwest with Panama, to the east with Venezuela and Brazil and to the south with Ecuador and it shares its maritime limits with Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Jamaica, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. It is a unitary, constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments, the territory of what is now Colombia was originally inhabited by indigenous peoples including the Muisca, the Quimbaya and the Tairona. The Spanish arrived in 1499 and initiated a period of conquest and colonization ultimately creating the Viceroyalty of New Granada, independence from Spain was won in 1819, but by 1830 the Gran Colombia Federation was dissolved. What is now Colombia and Panama emerged as the Republic of New Granada, the new nation experimented with federalism as the Granadine Confederation, and then the United States of Colombia, before the Republic of Colombia was finally declared in 1886. Since the 1960s the country has suffered from an asymmetric low-intensity armed conflict, Colombia is one of the most ethnically and linguistically diverse countries in the world, and thereby possesses a rich cultural heritage. Cultural diversity has also influenced by Colombias varied geography. The urban centres are located in the highlands of the Andes mountains. Colombian territory also encompasses Amazon rainforest, tropical grassland and both Caribbean and Pacific coastlines, ecologically, it is one of the worlds 17 megadiverse countries, and the most densely biodiverse of these per square kilometer. Colombia is a power and a regional actor with the fourth-largest economy in Latin America, is part of the CIVETS group of six leading emerging markets and is an accessing member to the OECD. Colombia has an economy with macroeconomic stability and favorable growth prospects in the long run. The name Colombia is derived from the last name of Christopher Columbus and it was conceived by the Venezuelan revolutionary Francisco de Miranda as a reference to all the New World, but especially to those portions under Spanish and Portuguese rule. The name was adopted by the Republic of Colombia of 1819. When Venezuela, Ecuador and Cundinamarca came to exist as independent states, New Granada officially changed its name in 1858 to the Granadine Confederation. In 1863 the name was changed, this time to United States of Colombia. To refer to country, the Colombian government uses the terms Colombia. Owing to its location, the present territory of Colombia was a corridor of early human migration from Mesoamerica, the oldest archaeological finds are from the Pubenza and El Totumo sites in the Magdalena Valley 100 km southwest of Bogotá. These sites date from the Paleoindian period, at Puerto Hormiga and other sites, traces from the Archaic Period have been found
Colombia
–
San Agustín Archaeological Park
Colombia
Colombia
–
Lost City
Colombia
–
Muisca raft. The figure refers to the ceremony of the legend of
El Dorado. The legend and the gold would play a pivotal role in luring Europeans to New Granada during the 16th and 17th centuries.
35.
Gold
–
Gold is a chemical element with symbol Au and atomic number 79. In its purest form, it is a bright, slightly yellow, dense, soft, malleable. Chemically, gold is a metal and a group 11 element. It is one of the least reactive chemical elements and is solid under standard conditions, Gold often occurs in free elemental form, as nuggets or grains, in rocks, in veins, and in alluvial deposits. It occurs in a solid solution series with the element silver and also naturally alloyed with copper. Less commonly, it occurs in minerals as gold compounds, often with tellurium, golds atomic number of 79 makes it one of the higher numbered, naturally occurring elements. It is thought to have produced in supernova nucleosynthesis, from the collision of neutron stars. Because the Earth was molten when it was formed, almost all of the present in the early Earth probably sank into the planetary core. Gold is resistant to most acids, though it does dissolve in aqua regia, a mixture of acid and hydrochloric acid. Gold also dissolves in solutions of cyanide, which are used in mining and electroplating. Gold dissolves in mercury, forming amalgam alloys, but this is not a chemical reaction, as a precious metal, gold has been used for coinage, jewelry, and other arts throughout recorded history. A total of 186,700 tonnes of gold is in existence above ground, the world consumption of new gold produced is about 50% in jewelry, 40% in investments, and 10% in industry. Gold is also used in infrared shielding, colored-glass production, gold leafing, certain gold salts are still used as anti-inflammatories in medicine. As of 2014, the worlds largest gold producer by far was China with 450 tonnes, Gold is cognate with similar words in many Germanic languages, deriving via Proto-Germanic *gulþą from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰelh₃-. The symbol Au is from the Latin, aurum, the Latin word for gold, the Proto-Indo-European ancestor of aurum was *h₂é-h₂us-o-, meaning glow. This word is derived from the root as *h₂éu̯sōs, the ancestor of the Latin word Aurora. This etymological relationship is presumably behind the frequent claim in scientific publications that aurum meant shining dawn, Gold is the most malleable of all metals, a single gram can be beaten into a sheet of 1 square meter, and an avoirdupois ounce into 300 square feet. Gold leaf can be thin enough to become semi-transparent
Gold
–
Gold, 79 Au
Gold
–
Moche gold necklace depicting feline heads.
Larco Museum Collection. Lima-Peru
Gold
–
Mirror for the future
James Webb Space Telescope coated in gold to reflect infrared light
Gold
–
The
world's largest gold bar has a mass of 250 kg.
Toi museum,
Japan.
36.
Silver
–
Silver is a metallic element with symbol Ag and atomic number 47. The symbol Ag stems from Latin argentum, derived from the Greek ὰργὀς, a soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. The metal is found in the Earths crust in the pure, free form, as an alloy with gold and other metals. Most silver is produced as a byproduct of copper, gold, lead, Silver is more abundant than gold, but it is much less abundant as a native metal. Its purity is measured on a per mille basis, a 94%-pure alloy is described as 0.940 fine. As one of the seven metals of antiquity, silver has had a role in most human cultures. Silver has long valued as a precious metal. Silver metal is used in many premodern monetary systems in bullion coins, Silver is used in numerous applications other than currency, such as solar panels, water filtration, jewelry, ornaments, high-value tableware and utensils, and as an investment medium. Silver is used industrially in electrical contacts and conductors, in specialized mirrors, window coatings, Silver compounds are used in photographic film and X-rays. Dilute silver nitrate solutions and other compounds are used as disinfectants and microbiocides, added to bandages and wound-dressings, catheters. Silver is similar in its physical and chemical properties to its two neighbours in group 11 of the periodic table, copper and gold. This distinctive electron configuration, with an electron in the highest occupied s subshell over a filled d subshell. Silver is a soft, ductile and malleable transition metal. Silver crystallizes in a cubic lattice with bulk coordination number 12. Unlike metals with incomplete d-shells, metallic bonds in silver are lacking a covalent character and are relatively weak and this observation explains the low hardness and high ductility of single crystals of silver. Silver has a brilliant white metallic luster that can take a polish. Protected silver has greater optical reflectivity than aluminium at all wavelengths longer than ~450 nm, at wavelengths shorter than 450 nm, silvers reflectivity is inferior to that of aluminium and drops to zero near 310 nm. The electrical conductivity of silver is the greatest of all metals, greater even than copper, during World War II in the US,13540 tons of silver were used in electromagnets for enriching uranium, mainly because of the wartime shortage of copper
Silver
–
Electrolytically refined silver
Silver
–
Silver 1000
oz t (~31 kg) bullion bar
Silver
–
Cessna 210 equipped with a silver iodide generator for
cloud seeding
Silver
–
A Canadian 50 cent piece from 1951, with King George the 6th on the obverse and Canada's (now former) coat of arms on the reverse. It is made of 80% silver and 20% copper.
37.
Encomienda
–
The encomienda was a labor system, rewarding conquerors with the labor of particular groups of people. It was first established in Spain during the Roman period, and it was applied on a much larger scale during the Spanish colonization of the Americas and the Philippines. Conquered peoples were considered vassals of the Spanish monarch and the award of an encomienda was a grant from the crown to a particular individual. In the encomienda, the Spanish crown granted a person a specified number of natives from a community, with the indigenous leaders in charge of mobilizing the assessed tribute. In return, the natives would provide tributes in the form of metals, maize, wheat, in the first decade of Spanish presence in the Caribbean, Spaniards divided up the natives, who in some cases were worked relentlessly. With the ouster of Christopher Columbus, the Spanish crown sent a governor, Fray Nicolás de Ovando. In many cases natives were forced to do hard labor and subjected to extreme punishment, however, Queen Isabella of Castile had forbidden Indian slavery and deemed the indigenous free vassals of the crown, allowing many natives and Spaniards to appeal to the Real Audiencias. In the former Inca Empire, for example, the system continued the Incaic traditions of extracting tribute in the form of labor, the heart of encomienda and encomendero lies in the Spanish verb encomendar, to entrust. The encomienda was based on the Reconquista institution in which adelantados were given the right to extract tribute from Muslims or other peasants in areas that they had conquered and resettled. The encomienda system in Spanish America differed from the Peninsular institution in that encomenderos did not own the land on which the natives lived, the system did not entail any direct land tenure by the encomendero, Indian lands were to remain in the possession of their communities. This right was protected by the crown of Castile because the rights of administration in the New World belonged to this crown. The first grantees of the encomienda or encomenderos were usually conquerors who received grants of labor by virtue of participation in a successful conquest. Later, some receiving encomiendas in New Spain were not conquerors themselves but were well connected that they received grants. He designated as pobladores antiguos, a group of undetermined number of encomenderos in New Spain, holders of encomiendas also included women and indigenous notables. The daughter of Doña Marina and conqueror Juan Jaramillo, Doña Maria Jaramillo, two of Moctezumas daughters, Doña Isabel Moctezuma and her younger sister, Doña Leonor Moctezuma, were granted extensive encomiendas in perpetuity by Hernan Cortes. Doña Leonor Moctezuma married in succession two Spaniards, and left the encomiendas to her daughter by her second husband, vassal Inca rulers established after the conquest also sought and were granted encomiendas. Indeed, the settler-conquistadors knew the fury of the aroused Indian lords, voyagers, explorers, initially, the encomienda system was devised to meet the needs of the early agricultural economies in the Caribbean. Later it was adopted to the economy of Peru and Upper Peru
Encomienda
–
Francisco Hernández Giron was a Spanish encomendero in the
Viceroyalty of Peru who protested the
New Laws in 1553. These laws, passed in 1542, gave certain rights to indigenous peoples and protected them against abuses. Drawing by
Felipe Guamán Poma de Ayala.
38.
Habsburg Spain
–
Habsburg Spain refers to the history of Spain over the 16th and 17th centuries, when it was ruled by kings from the House of Habsburg. The Habsburg rulers reached the zenith of their influence and power and this period of Spanish history has also been referred to as the Age of Expansion. The Habsburg years were also a Spanish Golden Age of cultural efflorescence, in some cases, these individual kingdoms themselves were confederations, most notably, the Crown of Aragon. Isabella and Ferdinand were bestowed the title of Most Catholic Monarchs by Pope Alexander VI in 1496, the Habsburg period is formative of the notion of Spain in the sense that was institutionalized in the 18th century. Her husband Philip I was the Habsburg son of the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, shortly thereafter Joanna began to lapse into insanity, though how mentally ill she actually was the topic of some debate. In 1506, Philip I was declared jure uxoris king, but he died later that year under mysterious circumstances, possibly poisoned by his father-in-law, Ferdinand II. Since their oldest son Charles was only six, the Cortes reluctantly allowed Joannas father Ferdinand II to rule the country as the regent of Joanna, Spain was now in personal union under Ferdinand II of Aragon. He also attempted to enlarge Spains sphere of influence in Italy, as ruler of Aragon, Ferdinand had been involved in the struggle against France and the Republic of Venice for control of Italy, these conflicts became the center of Ferdinands foreign policy as king. The war was less of a success than that against Venice, Ferdinand would die later that year. Ferdinands death led to the ascension of young Charles to the throne as Charles I of Castile and Aragon and his Spanish inheritance included all the Spanish possessions in the New World and around the Mediterranean. Upon the death of his Habsburg father in 1506, Charles had inherited the Netherlands and Franche-Comté, in 1519, with the death of his paternal grandfather Maximilian I, Charles inherited the Habsburg territories in Germany, and was duly elected as Holy Roman Emperor that year. At that point, Emperor and King Charles was the most powerful man in Christendom, the accumulation of so much power by one man and one dynasty greatly concerned Francis I of France, who found himself surrounded by Habsburg territories. In 1521 Francis invaded the Spanish possessions in Italy and Navarre, the war was a disaster for France, which suffered defeats at Biccoca, Pavia, and Landriano before Francis relented and abandoned Milan to Spain once more. Charless victory at the Battle of Pavia surprised many Italians and Germans, Pope Clement VII switched sides and now joined forces with France and prominent Italian states against the Habsburg Emperor, in the War of the League of Cognac. Henry VIII of England, who bore a grudge against France than he held against the Emperor for standing in the way of his divorce. Although the Spanish army was defeated at the Battle of Ceresole, in Savoy Henry fared better. The Austrians, led by Charless younger brother Ferdinand, continued to fight the Ottomans in the east, with France defeated, Charles went to take care of an older problem, the Schmalkaldic League. The Protestant Reformation had begun in Germany in 1517, the German Peasants War broke out in Germany in 1524 and ravaged the country until it was brutally put down in 1526, Charles, even as far away from Germany as he was, was committed to keeping order
Habsburg Spain
–
1570 map of the Iberian peninsula
Habsburg Spain
–
Cross of Burgundy Flag
Habsburg Spain
–
Family tree
Habsburg Spain
–
Joanna of Castile
39.
Napoleon I
–
Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led several successful campaigns during the French Revolutionary Wars. As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 until 1814, Napoleon dominated European and global affairs for more than a decade while leading France against a series of coalitions in the Napoleonic Wars. He won most of these wars and the vast majority of his battles, one of the greatest commanders in history, his wars and campaigns are studied at military schools worldwide. Napoleons political and cultural legacy has ensured his status as one of the most celebrated and he was born Napoleone di Buonaparte in Corsica to a relatively modest family from the minor nobility. When the Revolution broke out in 1789, Napoleon was serving as an officer in the French army. Seizing the new opportunities presented by the Revolution, he rose through the ranks of the military. The Directory eventually gave him command of the Army of Italy after he suppressed a revolt against the government from royalist insurgents, in 1798, he led a military expedition to Egypt that served as a springboard to political power. He engineered a coup in November 1799 and became First Consul of the Republic and his ambition and public approval inspired him to go further, and in 1804 he became the first Emperor of the French. Intractable differences with the British meant that the French were facing a Third Coalition by 1805, in 1806, the Fourth Coalition took up arms against him because Prussia became worried about growing French influence on the continent. Napoleon quickly defeated Prussia at the battles of Jena and Auerstedt, then marched the Grand Army deep into Eastern Europe, France then forced the defeated nations of the Fourth Coalition to sign the Treaties of Tilsit in July 1807, bringing an uneasy peace to the continent. Tilsit signified the high watermark of the French Empire, hoping to extend the Continental System and choke off British trade with the European mainland, Napoleon invaded Iberia and declared his brother Joseph the King of Spain in 1808. The Spanish and the Portuguese revolted with British support, the Peninsular War lasted six years, featured extensive guerrilla warfare, and ended in victory for the Allies. The Continental System caused recurring diplomatic conflicts between France and its client states, especially Russia, unwilling to bear the economic consequences of reduced trade, the Russians routinely violated the Continental System and enticed Napoleon into another war. The French launched an invasion of Russia in the summer of 1812. The resulting campaign witnessed the collapse of the Grand Army, the destruction of Russian cities, in 1813, Prussia and Austria joined Russian forces in a Sixth Coalition against France. A lengthy military campaign culminated in a large Allied army defeating Napoleon at the Battle of Leipzig in October 1813, the Allies then invaded France and captured Paris in the spring of 1814, forcing Napoleon to abdicate in April. He was exiled to the island of Elba near Rome and the Bourbons were restored to power, however, Napoleon escaped from Elba in February 1815 and took control of France once again. The Allies responded by forming a Seventh Coalition, which defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in June, the British exiled him to the remote island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic, where he died six years later at the age of 51
Napoleon I
–
The Emperor Napoleon in His Study at the Tuileries, by
Jacques-Louis David, 1812
Napoleon I
–
Napoleon's father
Carlo Buonaparte was
Corsica 's representative to the court of
Louis XVI of France.
Napoleon I
–
Napoleon Bonaparte, aged 23, Lieutenant-Colonel of a battalion of Corsican
Republican volunteers
Napoleon I
–
Bonaparte at the
Siege of Toulon
40.
House of Bourbon
–
The House of Bourbon is a European royal house of French origin, a branch of the Capetian dynasty. Bourbon kings first ruled France and Navarre in the 16th century, by the 18th century, members of the Bourbon dynasty also held thrones in Spain, Naples, Sicily, and Parma. Spain and Luxembourg currently have Bourbon monarchs, the royal Bourbons originated in 1268, when the heiress of the lordship of Bourbon married a younger son of King Louis IX. The house continued for three centuries as a branch, while more senior Capetians ruled France, until Henry IV became the first Bourbon king of France in 1589. Restored briefly in 1814 and definitively in 1815 after the fall of the First French Empire, a cadet Bourbon branch, the House of Orléans, then ruled for 18 years, until it too was overthrown. The Princes de Condé were a branch of the Bourbons descended from an uncle of Henry IV. Both houses were prominent in French affairs, even during exile in the French Revolution, until their respective extinctions in 1830 and 1814. When the Bourbons inherited the strongest claim to the Spanish throne, the claim was passed to a cadet Bourbon prince, a grandson of Louis XIV of France, who became Philip V of Spain. The Spanish House of Bourbon has been overthrown and restored several times, reigning 1700–1808, 1813–1868, 1875–1931, Bourbons ruled in Naples from 1734–1806 and in Sicily from 1734–1816, and in a unified Kingdom of the Two Sicilies from 1816–1860. They also ruled in Parma from 1731–1735, 1748–1802 and 1847–1859, all legitimate, living members of the House of Bourbon, including its cadet branches, are direct agnatic descendants of Henry IV. The term House of Bourbon is sometimes used to refer to this first house and the House of Bourbon-Dampierre, the second family to rule the seigneury. In 1268, Robert, Count of Clermont, sixth son of King Louis IX of France, married Beatrix of Bourbon, heiress to the lordship of Bourbon and their son Louis was made Duke of Bourbon in 1327. His descendant, the Constable of France Charles de Bourbon, was the last of the senior Bourbon line when he died in 1527. Because he chose to fight under the banner of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and lived in exile from France, the remaining line of Bourbons henceforth descended from James I, Count of La Marche, the younger son of Louis I, Duke of Bourbon. With the death of his grandson James II, Count of La Marche in 1438, all future Bourbons would descend from James IIs younger brother, Louis, who became the Count of Vendôme through his mothers inheritance. In 1514, Charles, Count of Vendôme had his title raised to Duke of Vendôme and his son Antoine became King of Navarre, on the northern side of the Pyrenees, by marriage in 1555. Two of Antoines younger brothers were Cardinal Archbishop Charles de Bourbon, Louis male-line, the Princes de Condé, survived until 1830. Finally, in 1589, the House of Valois died out and he was born on 13 December 1553 in the Kingdom of Navarre
House of Bourbon
–
The castle of
Bourbon-l'Archambault
House of Bourbon
–
House of Bourbon
House of Bourbon
–
Henry IV of France, the first Bourbon King of France
House of Bourbon
–
Dynastic group portrait of Louis XIV (seated) with his son
le Grand Dauphin (to the left), his grandson
Louis, Duke of Burgundy (to the right), his great-grandson the duc d'Anjou, later Louis XV, and
Madame de Ventadour, his governess, who commissioned this painting some years later; busts of
Henry IV and
Louis XIII in the background.
41.
United Provinces of Central America
–
It existed from September 1821 to 1841, and was a republican democracy. It is also incorrectly referred to in English as the United States of Central America. The republic consisted of the states of Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua. Maps and borders hardly existed at the time so locations are only approximate, from 1838 to 1840 the federation descended into civil war, with conservatives fighting against liberals and separatists fighting to secede. From the 16th century through 1821, Central America, apart from Panama and that date is still marked as independence day by most Central American nations. Independence proved short-lived, as local law-and-order broke down, driven by regional rivalries, many localities refused to accept the newly formed federal powers in Guatemala—San Salvador, Comayagua, León, and Cartago were in open revolt. The ensuing anarchy prompted the land-owning wealthy and conservative class to advocate union with Mexico, on 25 January 1822 the Junta consultiva in Guatemala City voted for annexation. A few weeks later General Vicente Filísola, the envoy of Emperor Agustín de Iturbide of the First Mexican Empire arrived in Guatemala as the new ruler. The annexation was controversial, with some seeing the Mexican constitution with its abolition of slavery, Central American liberals in San Salvador objected to this and refused to accept Filísolas authority. The army was ordered to quell dissent, after Iturbide abdicated, Mexico became a republic and offered to the previously annexed Central American provinces the right to determine their own destiny. Filísola turned over his power to the hastily formed National Constituent Assembly, on July 1,1823 the Congress of Central America declared absolute independence from Spain, Mexico, and any other foreign nation, and established a republican system of government. The liberal-dominated Assembly elected Manuel José Arce as president but he turned against his own faction. San Salvador rose in revolt against federal authority, Honduras and Nicaragua joined the rebellion and Arce was deposed in 1829. The victors led by the Honduran Francisco Morazán took power and Morazán was proclaimed president in 1830, to appease liberal supporters, the capital was relocated from Guatemala City to San Salvador in 1831 but Morazáns hold on power was waning as conservatives regained control in the provinces. The Assembly in 1838 adjourned with the declaration that the provinces were free to rule themselves as the Federal Republic dissolved, in 1839 Morazán was exiled as rebels from Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua entered San Salvador, evicting the governing institutions that held the region together. In practice, the federation faced insurmountable problems, and the union slid into war between 1838 and 1840. Its disintegration began when Nicaragua separated from the federation on November 5,1838, followed by Honduras, in reality, this merely legally acknowledged the process of disintegration that had already begun. The union effectively ended in 1840, by which four of its five states had declared independence
United Provinces of Central America
–
Federal Republic of Central America, 4
Real (1835). Struck in the San Jose, Costa Rica mint (697 were minted).
United Provinces of Central America
–
Flag
42.
Puntarenas
–
Puntarenas is the capital and largest city in the Province of Puntarenas, on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica. The eponymous and oddly shaped province has its largest section in the South, there are some 100.000 inhabitants in the town and surrounding neighborhoods. With beaches on the Pacific Ocean, it attracts many tourists. It is also a stopover point for the tourist destination Monteverde. Its port, Caldera, is one of the ports. There is a regular scheduled ferries to and from Puntarenas and the Nicoya Peninsula, Puntarenas was discovered by Gil González Dávila in 1522. In 1845 the Congress of the Republic declared Puntarenas a duty-free port, originally, the coffee was brought to port in oxcarts via a trail through the mountains. In 1859, a stretch of track was completed between Puntarenas and the town of Esparza. Eventually, the railway was built all the way through to San José, with the railway connection to the Central Valley, the Pacific ports activities continued to be a major part of the regions economy throughout the 20th century. The site chosen was Caldera, where ships had anchored during colonial times, Caldera was more appropriate site for larger ships, and actually was the first port site used since 1522. The citys major teams are Second Division sides Puntarenas F. C. who have played many season at the highest level. Puntarenas is generally hotter than the Costa Rican Central Valley, with highs ranging from 30 to 35 °C in the coldest/hottest months. Puntarenas travel guide from Wikivoyage Puntarenas Province website Puntarenas commercial website www. radiopuntarenas. net La Radio Digital de Puntarenas
Puntarenas
Puntarenas
Puntarenas
Puntarenas
–
Cathedral of Puntarenas
43.
Panama Canal
–
The Panama Canal is an artificial 48-mile waterway in Panama that connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama and is a key conduit for maritime trade. The original locks are 33.5 metres wide, a third, wider lane of locks was constructed between September 2007 and May 2016. The expanded canal began operation on June 26,2016. The new locks allow transit of larger, Post-Panamax ships, capable of handling more cargo, France began work on the canal in 1881 but stopped due to engineering problems and a high worker mortality rate. The United States took over the project in 1904 and opened the canal on August 15,1914, Colombia, France, and later the United States controlled the territory surrounding the canal during construction. The U. S. continued to control the canal and surrounding Panama Canal Zone until the 1977 Torrijos–Carter Treaties provided for handover to Panama. After a period of joint American–Panamanian control, in 1999 the canal was taken over by the Panamanian government and is now managed and operated by the government-owned Panama Canal Authority. Annual traffic has risen from about 1,000 ships in 1914, by 2012, more than 815,000 vessels had passed through the canal. It takes six to eight hours to pass through the Panama Canal, the American Society of Civil Engineers has called the Panama Canal one of the seven wonders of the modern world. Such a route would have given the Spanish a military advantage over the Portuguese, during an expedition from 1788 to 1793, Alessandro Malaspina outlined plans for its construction. Given the strategic location of Panama and the potential offered by its narrow isthmus separating two great oceans, other links in the area were attempted over the years. The ill-fated Darien scheme was launched by the Kingdom of Scotland in 1698 to set up a trade route. Generally inhospitable conditions thwarted the effort, and it was abandoned in April 1700, another effort was made in 1843. They referred to it as the Atlantic and Pacific Canal and it was a wholly British endeavor and it was expected to be completed in five years, but the plan was never carried out. At nearly the same time, other ideas were floated, including a canal across Mexicos Isthmus of Tehuantepec. Nothing came of that plan either. )In 1846 the Mallarino–Bidlack Treaty, negotiated between the U. S. and New Granada, granted the United States transit rights and the right to intervene militarily in the isthmus. In 1849, the discovery of gold in California created great interest in a crossing between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, the Panama Railway was built by the United States to cross the isthmus and opened in 1855
Panama Canal
–
Satellite image showing location of Panama Canal. Dense jungles are visible in green.
Panama Canal
–
A schematic of the Panama Canal, illustrating the sequence of locks and passages
Panama Canal
–
Ferdinand de Lesseps
Panama Canal
–
Excavator at work, in Bas Obispo, 1886
44.
Cape Horn
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Cape Horn, named after the city of Hoorn in the Netherlands, is the southernmost headland of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago of southern Chile, and is located on the small Hornos Island. Although not the most southerly point of South America, Cape Horn marks the boundary of the Drake Passage. For decades it was a milestone on the clipper route. The waters around Cape Horn are particularly hazardous, owing to winds, large waves, strong currents and icebergs. The need for ships to round Cape Horn was greatly reduced by the opening of the Panama Canal in 1914, sailing around the Horn is widely regarded as one of the major challenges in yachting. Several prominent ocean yacht races, notably the Volvo Ocean Race, the VELUX5 Oceans, speed records for round-the-world sailing are recognized for following this route. There have been a number of small boat roundings of the Horn but one in particular stands out, Cape Horn is located on Isla Hornos in the Hermite Islands group, at the southern end of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago. It marks the edge of the Drake Passage, the strait between South America and Antarctica. It is located in Cabo de Hornos National Park, the cape lies within what are now Chilean territorial waters, and the Chilean Navy maintains a station on Hoorn Island, consisting of a residence, utility building, chapel, and lighthouse. It was erected in 1992 through the initiative of the Chilean Section of the Cape Horn Captains Brotherhood, the terrain is entirely treeless, although quite lush owing to frequent precipitation. Cape Horn is the limit of the range of the Magellanic penguin. Two lighthouses are located near or in Cape Horn, the one located in the Chilean Navy Station is the more accessible and visited, and is commonly referred to as the Cape Horn lighthouse. However, the Chilean Navy station, including the lighthouse and the memorial, are not located on Cape Horn, on Cape Horn proper is a smaller 4-metre fiberglass light tower, with a focal plane of 40 metres and a range of about 21 kilometres. This is the authentic Cape Horn lighthouse, and as such the worlds southernmost traditional lighthouse, a few minor aids to navigation are located farther south, including one in the Diego Ramírez Islands and several in Antarctica. The climate in the region is cool, owing to the southern latitude. There are no stations in the group of islands including Cape Horn. Winds were reported to average 30 kilometres per hour, with squalls of over 100 kilometres per hour, wind conditions are generally severe, particularly in winter. In summer, the wind at Cape Horn is gale force up to 5% of the time, with good visibility, however, in winter, gale-force winds occur up to 30% of the time
Cape Horn
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Cape Horn
Cape Horn
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Cape Horn, seen from the Chilean Navy station location. The small lighthouse can be seen as a white spot close to the seaside
Cape Horn
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View from an unidentified sailing ship during a storm at Cape Horn, between 1885 and 1954
Cape Horn
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Cape Horn as seen during the
United States Exploring Expedition, depicted in watercolor by
Alfred Thomas Agate
45.
William Le Lacheur
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William Le Lacheur, was a Guernsey sea captain who played an important role in the economic and spiritual development of Costa Rica. William Le Lacheur was born on 15 October 1802 and was baptised Guillaume Le Lacheur in the church of the Forest, Guernsey, on 31 October by his parents Jean Le Lacheur. He was named after his grandfather, Guillaume Allez, who was one of his godparents. Little is known of his education and upbringing, at a young age, he went to sea, working his way up to become the captain of his first ship, St George, in 1827. Le Lacheur married Rachel de Jersey in the church of Forest on 19 May 1828. By 1836, he had formed a company Le Lacheur & Co, over the following years, he continued to add to his fleet, and to seek out new markets. In 1841, Le Lacheur took delivery of the barque Monarch, the Monarch was a much larger vessel and capable of journeys further afield. Since its independence in 1821, Costa Rica had found no regular trade routes for its coffee in European markets and this was compounded by transportation problems. It was much easier to ship the coffee to a Pacific port, Puntarenas and it was before the Caribbean railway from San José to the Caribbean and the Panama Canal were built. William saw an opportunity, and agreed with Costa Rican coffee growers to establish a regular service to carry their coffee to London. In 1843, the Monarch arrived in Puntarenas and loaded the first cargo of nearly 5,000 bags of coffee, the venture was a success, and he began increasing the size of his fleet to accommodate the increasing demand for coffee in London. During the rest of the 1840s, he diverted his other ships from the trade to the coffee trade. Then, starting in 1850, he commissioned the construction of five ships designed especially for the coffee trade, during the 1860s, a further seven ships were added to the fleet. In addition to his contribution to the Costa Rican economy through establishing trade routes, Le Lacheur, a devout Christian, was appalled by what he described the lowest form of the Roman faith being practised, where superstition took precedence over true religion. Through the British and Foreign Bible Society, he obtained and distributed Spanish language Bibles and he distributed 3,500 bibles in Costa Rica, and was presented with an inscribed Imperial Quarto Bible by the Bible Society in recognition of his achievements. In 1864, the year after Le Lacheurs death, it was resolved to build the first Protestant church in Costa Rica. It was made of pre-fabricated iron, was carried to Costa Rica by Le Lacheurs son John and was assembled in San José as the Church of the Good Shepherd and it became unofficially known as the Iron Church. This has been cited as a factor to Costa Ricas economic success
William Le Lacheur
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William Le Lacheur
46.
Guernsey
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Guernsey is a jurisdiction within the Bailiwick of Guernsey, a Crown dependency. The jurisdiction is not part of the United Kingdom, however, defence and most foreign relations are handled by the British Government. Taken together with the jurisdictions of Alderney and Sark it forms the Bailiwick of Guernsey. The two Bailiwicks of Guernsey and Jersey together form the geographical grouping known as the Channel Islands, the name Guernsey, as well as that of neighbouring Jersey, is of Old Norse origin. The second element of word, -ey, is the Old Norse for island, while the original root, guern, is of uncertain origin. Around 6000 BC, rising seas created the English Channel and separated the Norman promontories that became the bailiwicks of Guernsey and Jersey from continental Europe, neolithic farmers then settled on its coast and built the dolmens and menhirs found in the islands today. During their migration to Brittany, Britons occupied the Lenur islands including Sarnia or Lisia and Angia, travelling from the Kingdom of Gwent, Saint Sampson, later the abbot of Dol in Brittany, is credited with the introduction of Christianity to Guernsey. In 933 AD, the Cotentin Peninsula including Avranchin which included the islands, were placed by the French King Ranulf under the control of William I, the island of Guernsey and the other Channel Islands represent the last remnants of the medieval Duchy of Normandy. During the Middle Ages, the island was a haven for pirates that would use the technique to ground ships close to her waters. This intensified during the Hundred Years War, when, starting in 1339, the Guernsey Militia was operational in 1337 and would help defend the island for a further 600 years. In 1372, the island was invaded by Aragonese mercenaries under the command of Owain Lawgoch, Owain and his dark-haired mercenaries were later absorbed into Guernsey legend as invading fairies from across the sea. In the mid-16th century, the island was influenced by Calvinist reformers from Normandy, during the Marian persecutions, three women, the Guernsey Martyrs, were burned at the stake for their Protestant beliefs. During the English Civil War, Guernsey sided with the Parliamentarians, the allegiance was not total, however, there were a few Royalist uprisings in the southwest of the island, while Castle Cornet was occupied by the Governor, Sir Peter Osborne, and Royalist troops. In December 1651, with honours of war, Castle Cornet surrendered. By the beginning of the 18th century, Guernseys residents were starting to settle in North America, the threat of invasion by Napoleon prompted many defensive structures to be built at the end of that century. The 19th century saw an increase in the prosperity of the island, due to its success in the global maritime trade. During the First World War, about 3,000 island men served in the British Expeditionary Force, of these, about 1,000 served in the Royal Guernsey Light Infantry regiment formed from the Royal Guernsey Militia in 1916. For most of the Second World War, the Channel Islands were occupied by German troops, before the occupation, 80% of Guernsey children had been evacuated to England to live with relatives or strangers during the war
Guernsey
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Aerial view
Guernsey
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Flag
Guernsey
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Castle Cornet seen at night over the harbour of
St Peter Port.
Guernsey
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The island of Guernsey seen from 33,000 feet looking North
47.
William Walker (filibuster)
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Walker usurped the presidency of the Republic of Nicaragua in 1856 and ruled until 1857, when he was defeated by a coalition of Central American armies. He was executed by the government of Honduras in 1860, Walker was born in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1824 to James Walker and his wife Mary Norvell. His father was a son of a Scottish immigrant and his mother was a daughter of Lipscomb Norvell, an American Revolutionary War officer from Virginia. One of Walkers maternal uncles was John Norvell, a US Senator from Michigan, William Walker was engaged to Helen Martin, but they never married, and he died without any children. William Walker graduated summa cum laude from the University of Nashville at the age of fourteen and he studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh and University of Heidelberg before receiving his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania at the age of 19. He practiced briefly in Philadelphia before moving to New Orleans to study law and he practiced law for a short time, and then quit to become co-owner and editor of the New Orleans Crescent. In 1849, he moved to San Francisco, where he was a journalist, Walker then conceived the idea of conquering vast regions of Latin America and creating new slave states to join those already part of the United States. These campaigns were known as filibustering or freebooting, William Walker first gained national attention after his duel with William Hicks Graham on January 12,1851 in San Francisco. At that time, Walker was the editor of the San Francisco Herald while Graham was a clerk in the employ of Judge R. N. Morrison. The conflict started after Walker criticized Graham and his colleagues in the newspapers, Graham was a notorious gunman and duellist in his time, having taken part in a number of duels and shootouts in the Old West. Walker on the hand, had experience duelling with single-shot pistols at one time. The combatants met at Mission Dolores and each were given Colt Dragoons with 5 shots and they stood face-to-face at ten paces, and with the signal of a referee, quickly aimed and tried to fire their revolvers. Graham managed to fire two bullets, hitting Walker in his pantaloons and his thigh, seriously wounding him, Walker, though he tried a number of times to shoot his weapon during the duel, failed to fire even a single shot and Graham was left unscathed. The duel ended after the wounded Walker finally conceded, and afterwards Graham was arrested but was quickly released, the duel was recorded in the Alta California. Mexico refused, and Walker returned to San Francisco determined to obtain his colony and he began recruiting from amongst American supporters of slavery and the Manifest Destiny Doctrine, mostly inhabitants of Kentucky and Tennessee. His intentions then changed from forming a colony to establishing an independent Republic of Sonora. He funded his project by selling scrips which were redeemable in lands of Sonora, on October 15,1853, Walker set out with 45 men to conquer the Mexican territories of Baja California Territory and Sonora State. Although he never gained control of Sonora, less than three months later, he pronounced Baja California part of the larger Republic of Sonora, lack of supplies and strong resistance by the Mexican government quickly forced Walker to retreat
William Walker (filibuster)
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William Walker
William Walker (filibuster)
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Walker's Nicaragua map
William Walker (filibuster)
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Walker's house in Granada. On October 12, 1856, during the siege of Granada, Guatemalan officer
José Víctor Zavala ran under heavy fire to capture the flag and bring it back to the Central American coalition Army trenches shouting Filibuster bullets don't kill! Zavala came out unscatched of this adventure.
William Walker (filibuster)
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Walker's grave in the Old Trujillo Cemetery, Colón, Honduras
48.
Filibuster (military)
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A filibuster or freebooter, in the context of foreign policy, is someone who engages in an unauthorized military expedition into a foreign country or territory to foment or support a revolution. The term is used to describe United States citizens who fomented insurrections in Latin America in the mid-19th century. Filibuster expeditions have also occasionally used as cover for government-approved deniable operations. A notable late 20th Century example of this would be the Argentinian scrap metal merchants who landed on South Georgia at the outset of the Falklands War. Filibusters are irregular soldiers who act without official authority from their own government, the freewheeling actions of the filibusters of the 1850s led to the name being applied figuratively to the political act of filibustering in the United States Congress. Unlike a mercenary, a filibuster leader/commander works for himself, whilst a mercenary leader works for others, the English term filibuster derives from the Spanish filibustero, itself deriving originally from the Dutch vrijbuiter, privateer, pirate, robber. The Spanish form entered the English language in the 1850s, as applied to military adventurers from the United States then operating in Central America and the Spanish West Indies. The Spanish term was first applied to persons raiding Spanish colonies and ships in the West Indies, with the end of the era of Caribbean piracy in the early 18th century filibuster fell out of general currency. The term was revived in the century to describe the actions of adventurers who tried to take control of various Caribbean, Mexican. In Sonora, there were the French Marquis Charles de Pindray and Count Gaston de Raousset-Boulbon, the three most prominent filibusters of that era were Narciso López and John Quitman in Cuba and William Walker in Baja California, Sonora, and lastly Nicaragua. The term returned to American parlance to refer to López 1851 Cuban expeditions, gregor MacGregor was a Scottish filibuster in Florida, Central and South America. She has shown that, left to herself, she is incapable of organizing and sustaining any permanent form of government. The Indians on her northern frontier are making continual predatory incursions into her territory and her mixed population has all the vices of civilization, with none of its virtues, all the ignorance of barbarism, with none of its hardihood, enterprise, and self-reliance. It is enervate, effeminate, treacherous, false, and fickle, like the savage and beasts of the forest, its love of liberty is but impatience of control, and hatred of law and government. After effecting so much good, shall we cease from our labors while so much remains to be done, shall we be deterred by the epithet of filibustering, or the cant, fanaticism, and mistaken or pretended philanthropy of a part of the North. …. Unless we can all the convenient transit across the Isthmus to California and Oregon. Filibustering, whether by nations or individuals, is not like avarice—selfish, sordid and it proceeds from ambition, and ambition, rightly directed, is the noblest of human passions. This surely was filibustering, but the most needful of filibustering and it is time to define what we mean by the term filibustering
Filibuster (military)
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Filibuster
William Walker launched several expeditions into Latin America. For a time he ruled
Nicaragua, although he was eventually forced to return to the United States. In 1860, he was captured and executed in
Honduras.
49.
Nicaragua
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Nicaragua, officially the Republic of Nicaragua, is the largest country in the Central American isthmus. Nicaraguas capital, Managua, is the countrys largest city and the third-largest city in Central America, the multi-ethnic population of six million includes indigenous peoples, Europeans, Africans, and Asians. Native tribes on the eastern coast speak their own languages, the Spanish Empire conquered the region in the 16th century. Nicaragua gained independence from Spain in 1821, since its independence, Nicaragua has undergone periods of political unrest, dictatorship, and fiscal crisis—the most notable causes that led to the Nicaraguan Revolution of the 1960s and 1970s. Nicaragua is a democratic republic. The biological diversity, warm climate and active volcanoes make Nicaragua an increasingly popular tourist destination. The name Nicaragua was coined by Spanish colonists based on the name Nicarao, when Spaniard Gil González Dávila came to Nicaragua in 1521 he found in the areas between Rivas and San Jorge the first pre-Columbian natives of Nicaragua. At the time the city was called Quauhcapolca and the cacique leaders name was Macuilmiquiztli. The Pipil migrated to Nicaragua from central Mexico after 500 BC, meanwhile, the Caribbean coast of Nicaragua was inhabited by other peoples, mostly Chibcha language groups. They had coalesced in Central America and migrated also to present-day northern Colombia and they lived a life based primarily on hunting and gathering. In 1502, Christopher Columbus became the first European known to have reached what is now Nicaragua as he sailed southeast toward the Isthmus of Panama, on his fourth voyage, Columbus explored the Miskito Coast on the Atlantic side of Nicaragua. The Spanish attempted to convert all three tribes to Christianity, Nicaragua and Nicarao and their people converted, but Dirangen, however, did not, the first attempt to conquer what is now known as Nicaragua was by Gil González Dávila, who arrived in Panama in January 1520. The first Spanish permanent settlements were founded in 1524, conquistador Francisco Hernández de Córdoba founded two of Nicaraguas principal towns in 1524, Granada on Lake Nicaragua was the first settlement, followed by León at a location west of Lake Managua. Córdoba soon built defenses for the cities and fought against incursions by other conquistadors, Córdoba was later publicly beheaded following a power struggle with Pedro Arias Dávila. His tomb and remains were discovered in 2000 in the ruins of León Viejo, the clashes among Spanish forces did not impede their destruction of the indigenous people and their culture. The series of battles came to be known as the War of the Captains, Pedro Arias Dávila was a winner, although he had lost control of Panama, he moved to Nicaragua and successfully established his base in León. Through adroit diplomatic machinations, he became the first governor of the colony, many indigenous people died as a result of new infectious diseases, compounded by neglect by the Spaniards, who controlled their subsistence. In 1610, the Momotombo volcano erupted, destroying the capital and it was rebuilt northwest of what is now known as the ruins of Old León
Nicaragua
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2,100-year-old human footprints called "huellas de acahualinca" preserved in volcanic mud near
Lake Managua.
Nicaragua
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Flag
Nicaragua
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The Colonial
City of Granada near
Lake Nicaragua, is one of the most visited sites in
Central America.
Nicaragua
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The
Fortress of the Immaculate Conception was constructed in the late 17th century to protect locals in neighboring
Granada from
pirate attacks. Today, it is one of Nicaragua's main tourist attractions.
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