1.
House
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Houses use a range of different roofing systems to keep precipitation such as rain from getting into the dwelling space. Houses may have doors or locks to secure the dwelling space, most conventional modern houses in Western cultures will contain one or more bedrooms and bathrooms, a kitchen or cooking area, and a living room. A house may have a dining room, or the eating area may be integrated into another room. Some large houses in North America have a recreation room, in traditional agriculture-oriented societies, domestic animals such as chickens or larger livestock may share part of the house with humans. The social unit that lives in a house is known as a household, most commonly, a household is a family unit of some kind, although households may also be other social groups, such as roommates or, in a rooming house, unconnected individuals. Some houses only have a space for one family or similar-sized group. A house may be accompanied by outbuildings, such as a garage for vehicles or a shed for gardening equipment, a house may have a backyard or frontyard, which serve as additional areas where inhabitants can relax or eat. The English word house derives directly from the Old English Hus meaning dwelling, shelter, home, house, the house itself gave rise to the letter B through an early Proto-Semitic hieroglyphic symbol depicting a house. The symbol was called bayt, bet or beth in various related languages, and became beta, ideally, architects of houses design rooms to meet the needs of the people who will live in the house. Such designing, known as design, has become a popular subject in universities. Feng shui can also mean the aura in or around a dwelling, making it comparable to the real-estate sales concept of indoor-outdoor flow, the square footage of a house in the United States reports the area of living space, excluding the garage and other non-living spaces. The square metres figure of a house in Europe reports the area of the enclosing the home. The number of floors or levels making up the house can affect the square footage of a home, many houses have several large rooms with specialized functions and several very small rooms for other various reasons. These may include an area, a sleeping area, and separate or combined washing. Some larger properties may also feature such as a spa room, indoor pool, indoor basketball court. In traditional agriculture-oriented societies, domestic animals such as chickens or larger livestock often share part of the house with human beings, most conventional modern houses will at least contain a bedroom, bathroom, kitchen or cooking area, and a living room. Little is known about the earliest origin of the house and its interior, roman architect Vitruvius theories have claimed the first form of architecture as a frame of timber branches finished in mud, also known as the primitive hut. Philip Tabor later states the contribution of 17th century Dutch houses as the foundation of houses today, as far as the idea of the home is concerned, the home of the home is the Netherlands
2.
Habitat
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A habitat is an ecological or environmental area that is inhabited by a particular species of animal, plant, or other type of organism. The term typically refers to the zone in which the organism lives and it is the natural environment in which an organism lives, or the physical environment that surrounds a species population. Every organism has certain habitat needs for the conditions in which it will thrive, habitat types include polar, temperate, subtropical and tropical. The terrestrial vegetation type may be forest, steppe, grassland, the word habitat has been in use since about 1755 and derives from the Latin third-person singular present indicative of habitāre, to inhabit, from habēre, to have or to hold. Habitat can be defined as the environment of an organism. It is similar in meaning to a biotope, an area of environmental conditions associated with a particular community of plants. Generally speaking, animal communities are reliant on specific types of plant communities, some plants and animals are generalists, and their habitat requirements are met in a wide range of locations. The small white butterfly for example is found on all the continents of the world apart from Antarctica and its larvae feed on a wide range of Brassicas and various other plant species, and it thrives in any open location with diverse plant associations. Disturbance is important in the creation of biodiverse habitats, in the absence of disturbance, a climax vegetation cover develops that prevents the establishment of other species. Lightning strikes and toppled trees in tropical forests allow species richness to be maintained as pioneering species move in to fill the gaps created. Similarly coastal habitats can become dominated by kelp until the seabed is disturbed by a storm, another cause of disturbance is when an area may be overwhelmed by an invasive introduced species which is not kept under control by natural enemies in its new habitat. Terrestrial habitat types include forests, grasslands, wetlands and deserts, within these broad biomes are more specific habitats with varying climate types, temperature regimes, soils, altitudes and vegetation types. Many of these habitats grade into each other and each one has its own communities of plants. A habitat may suit a particular species well, but its presence or absence at any particular location depends to some extent on chance, on its dispersal abilities, freshwater habitats include rivers, streams, lakes, ponds, marshes and bogs. Although some organisms are found across most of these habitats, the majority have more specific requirements, similarly, aquatic plants can be floating, semi-submerged, submerged or grow in permanently or temporarily saturated soils besides bodies of water. Marine habitats include brackish water, estuaries, bays, the sea, the intertidal zone. Further variations include rock pools, sand banks, mudflats, brackish lagoons, sandy and pebbly beaches, the benthic zone or seabed provides a home for both static organisms, anchored to the substrate, and for a large range of organisms crawling on or burrowing into the surface. A desert is not the kind of habitat that favours the presence of amphibians, with their requirement for water to keep their skins moist, nevertheless, some frogs live in deserts, creating moist habitats underground and hibernating while conditions are adverse
3.
Family
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In the context of human society, a family is a group of people affiliated either by consanguinity, affinity, or co-residence or some combination of these. Members of the family may include spouses, parents, brothers, sisters, sons. Members of the family may include grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews, nieces. Sometimes these are considered members of the immediate family, depending on an individuals specific relationship with them. In most societies, the family is the institution for the socialization of children. As the basic unit for raising children, anthropologists generally classify most family organizations as matrifocal, conjugal, avuncular, sexual relations among the members are regulated by rules concerning incest such as the incest taboo. The word family can be used metaphorically to create more inclusive categories such as community, nationhood, global village, the field of genealogy aims to trace family lineages through history. Family is also an important economic unit studied in family economics, one of the primary functions of the family involves providing a framework for the production and reproduction of persons, biologically and/or socially. This can occur through the sharing of material substances, the giving and receiving of care and nurture, jural rights and obligations, thus, ones experience of ones family shifts over time. From the perspective of children, the family is a family of orientation, from the point of view of the parent, the family is a family of procreation, the goal of which is to produce and enculturate and socialize children. Christopher Harris notes that the conception of family is ambiguous. Diverse data from ethnography, history, law and social statistics, reveal the human family as a social institution, the different types of families occur in a wide variety of settings, and their specific functions and meanings depend largely on their relationship to other social institutions. Sociologists have a special interest in the function and status of family forms in stratified societies, much sociological, historical and anthropological research dedicates itself to the understanding of this variation, and of changes in the family that form over time. Levitan claims, Times have changed, it is acceptable and encouraged for mothers to work. The way roles are balanced between the parents will help children grow and learn life lessons. There is great importance of communication and equality in families, in order to avoid role strain, the term nuclear family is commonly used, especially in the United States of America, to refer to conjugal families. A conjugal family includes only the husband, the wife, sociologists distinguish between conjugal families and nuclear families. Other family structures, such as blended parents, single parents, a matrifocal family consists of a mother and her children
4.
Longhouse
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A longhouse or long house is a type of long, proportionately narrow, single-room building built by peoples in various parts of the world including Asia, Europe, and North America. Many were built from timber and often represent the earliest form of permanent structure in many cultures, the Neolithic long house type was introduced with the first farmers of central and western Europe around 5000 BCE—7000 years ago. These were farming settlements built in groups of six to twelve and were home to large extended families. The longhouse is a way of shelter. Located along a slope, a single passage gives access to human and animal shelter under a single roof. The old Frisian Langhuis that developed into the Frisian farmhouse which probably influenced the development of the Gulf house, with these house types the wooden posts originally rammed into the ground were replaced by posts supported on a base. The large and well-supported attic enabled large quantities of hay or grain to be stored in dry conditions and this development may have been driven because the weather became wetter over time. Good examples of houses have been preserved, some dating back to the 16th century. The longhouse was 50 to 60 feet long, the longhouse had a 3 metres -wide central aisle and 2 metres -wide compartments, about 6 to 7 metres long, down each side. The end compartments were used for storage. Hearths were spaced about 6 to 7 metres apart down the aisle and it is possible to infer the population of an Iroquois town from the size and number of longhouses it contained. In South America, the Tucano people of Colombia and northwest Brazil traditionally combine a household in a long house. The Xingu peoples of central Brazil build a series of longhouses in circular formations forming round villages, the ancient Tupi people of Brazilian Coast used to do this as well. The Yanomami people of Brazil and Venezuela build a hut with a thatched roof that has a hole in the middle, called shabono. In Daepyeong, a site of the Mumun pottery period in Korea. Their layout seems to be similar to those of the Iroquois, in these, several fireplaces were arranged along the longitudinal axis of the building. Later, the ancient Koreans started raising their buildings on stilts, so that the inner partitions, the size of the buildings and their placement within the settlements may point to buildings for the nobles of their society or some sort of community or religious buildings. In Igeum-dong, a site in South Korea, the large longhouses,29 and 26 meters long, are situated between the megalithic cemetery and the rest of the settlement
5.
Apartment
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An apartment or a flat is a self-contained housing unit that occupies only part of a building, correctly, on a single level without a stair. In Scotland it is called a block of flats or, if its a traditional building, a tenement. Apartments may be owned by an owner/occupier, by leasehold tenure or rented by tenants, the term apartment is favoured in North America. In the UK, the apartment is more usual in professional real estate and architectural circles where otherwise the term flat is commonly. Technically multi-storey apartments are referred to as duplex indicating the number of floors within the property, usage generally follows the British in Ireland, Singapore, Hong Kong and most Commonwealth nations. In Malaysian English, flat often denotes a housing block of lesser quality meant for lower-income groups, while apartment is more generic, in Australian English, the term flat is traditionally used, but the term unit is frequently used. More recently, the apartment is being used. Tenement law refers to the basis of permanent property such as land or rents. It may be combined as in Messuage or Tenement to encompass all the land, buildings. Most apartments are in buildings designed for the purpose, but large older houses are divided into apartments. The word apartment denotes a unit or section in a building. In some locations, particularly the United States, the word connotes a rental unit owned by the building owner, in the England and Wales, some flat owners own shares in the company that owns the freehold of the building as well as holding the flat under a lease. This is commonly known as a share of freehold flat, the freehold company has the right to collect annual ground rents from each of the flat owners in the building. The freeholder can also develop or sell the building, subject to the usual planning and this does not happen in Scotland, where long leasehold of residential property was formerly unusual, and is now not possible. In some countries the word unit is a general term referring to both apartments and rental business suites. The word unit is used only in the context of a specific building. This building has three units or Im going to rent a unit in this building, but not Im going to rent a unit somewhere, in Australia, a unit refers to flats, apartments or even semi-detached houses. An industrial, warehouse, or commercial space converted to an apartment is called a loft
6.
Building
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A building or edifice is a structure with a roof and walls standing more or less permanently in one place, such as a house or factory. To better understand the term building compare the list of nonbuilding structures, Buildings serve several needs of society – primarily as shelter from weather, security, living space, privacy, to store belongings, and to comfortably live and work. A building as a shelter represents a division of the human habitat. Ever since the first cave paintings, buildings have become objects or canvasses of much artistic expression. In recent years, interest in planning and building practices has also become an intentional part of the design process of many new buildings. The word building is both a noun and a verb also an adverb, the structure itself and the act of making it. As a noun, a building is a structure that has a roof and walls and stands more or less permanently in one place, there was a building on the corner. In the broadest interpretation a fence or wall is a building, however, the word structure is used more broadly than building including natural and man-made formations and does not necessarily have walls. Structure is more likely to be used for a fence, as a verb, building is the act of construction. Structural height in technical usage is the height to the highest architectural detail on building from street-level, depending on how they are classified, spires and masts may or may not be included in this height. Spires and masts used as antennas are not generally included, the definition of a low-rise vs. a high-rise building is a matter of debate, but generally three storeys or less is considered low-rise. A report by Shinichi Fujimura of a shelter built 500000 years ago is doubtful since Fujimura was later found to have faked many of his findings. Supposed remains of huts found at the Terra Amata site in Nice purportedly dating from 200000 to 400000 years ago have also called into question. There is clear evidence of homebuilding from around 18000 BC, Buildings became common during the Neolithic. Single-family residential buildings are most often called houses or homes, residential buildings containing more than one dwelling unit are called a duplex, apartment building to differentiate them from individual houses. A condominium is an apartment that the occupant owns rather than rents, houses which were built as a single dwelling may later be divided into apartments or bedsitters, they may also be converted to another use e. g. an office or a shop. Building types may range from huts to multimillion-dollar high-rise apartment blocks able to house thousands of people, increasing settlement density in buildings is usually a response to high ground prices resulting from many people wanting to live close to work or similar attractors. Other common building materials are brick, concrete or combinations of either of these with stone, also if the residents are in need of special care such as a nursing home, orphanage or prison, or in group housing like barracks or dormitories
7.
Mobile home
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A mobile home is a prefabricated structure, built in a factory on a permanently attached chassis before being transported to site. Behind the cosmetic work fitted at installation to hide the base, there are strong trailer frames, axles, wheels, in the United States, this form of housing goes back to the early years of cars and motorized highway travel. It was derived from the trailer, a small unit with wheels attached permanently. The original rationale for this type of housing was its mobility, units were initially marketed primarily to people whose lifestyle required mobility. Previously, units had been eight feet or less in width, but in 1956, the homes were given a rectangular shape, made from pre-painted aluminum panels, rather than the streamlined shape of travel trailers, which were usually painted after assembly. All of this increase the difference between these homes and home/travel trailers. During the late 1960s and early 70s, the homes were even longer and wider. Nowadays, when a home is moved to a location, it is usually kept there permanently. In some states, mobile homes have been taxed as personal property if the wheels remain attached, removal of the tongue and axles may also be a requirement for real estate classification. Mobile homes permanently installed on owned land are rarely mortgageable, whereas FHA code manufactured homes are mortgageable through VA, FHA, the units were often marketed as an alternative to apartment rental. However, the tendency of the units of this era to depreciate rapidly in resale value made using them as collateral for loans much riskier than traditional home loans. Terms were usually limited to less than the thirty-year term typical of the general home-loan market, in this way, mobile home loans resembled motor vehicle loans more than traditional home mortgage loans. Mobile homes come in two sizes, single-wides and double-wides. Single-wides are 18 feet or less in width and 90 feet or less in length, double-wides are 20 feet or more wide and are 90 feet in length or less and are towed to their site in two separate units, which are then joined together. Triple-wides and even homes with four, five, or more units are also built, while site-built homes are rarely moved, single-wide owners often trade or sell their home to a dealer in the form of the reduction of the purchase of a new home. These used homes are either re-sold to new owners or to park owners who use them as rental units. Single-wides are more likely to be traded than double-wides because removing them from the site is easier, in fact, only about 5% of all double-wides will ever be moved. While an EF1 tornado might cause damage to a site-built home, it could do significant damage to a factory-built home
8.
Houseboat
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A houseboat is a boat that has been designed or modified to be used primarily as a home. Some houseboats are not motorized, because they are moored, kept stationary at a fixed point. However, many are capable of operation under their own power, float house is a Canadian and American term for a house on a float, a rough house may be called a shanty boat. In Western countries, houseboats tend to be owned privately or rented out to holiday-goers. Examples of this include, but are not limited to, Amsterdam, London, in Zimbabwe, specifically on Lake Kariba, houseboats have been in use since the creation of the lake in the late 1950s/early 1960s. A houseboat makes it easy to experience the Zambezi basin and all the wildlife, as a lot of game come down to the water for drinking. There is a houseboat and fishing community on the side of Hong Kong Island known as Aberdeen floating village. There was also one such community in the Yau Ma Tei Typhoon Shelter, in India, houseboats as accommodation for tourists are common on the backwaters of Kerala, see below, and on the Dal Lake near Srinagar in Jammu and Kashmir. Houseboats in Kerala, south India, are huge, slow-moving barges used for leisure trips and they are a reworked model of Kettuvallams, which, in earlier times, were used to carry rice and spices from Kuttanad to the Kochi port. Kerala houseboats were considered a convenient means of transportation, the popularity of Kettuvallams has returned in the function as major tourist attractions. Such a houseboat is about 60 to 70 feet long and about 15 feet wide at the middle, the hull is made of wooden planks that are held together by ropes of coconut fiber, the usual wood is Anjali. The roof is made of poles and palm leaves. The exterior of the boat is painted with coats of cashew nut oil. Unlike their counterparts in Kerala, the houseboats in Srinagar, Jammu & Kashmir are usually stationary and they are usually moored at the edges of the Dal Lake and Nageen lakes. Some of the houseboats there were built in the early 1900s and these houseboats are made of wood and usually have intricately carved wood paneling. The houseboats are of different sizes, some having up to three bedrooms apart from a room and kitchen. Srinagars thousand or so houseboats are moored along sections of the Dal and Nagin Lakes, like hotels, houseboats vary in degree of luxury and have been accordingly graded by the Department of Tourism. A luxury houseboat, like a hotel, has fine furniture, good carpets and modern bathroom fittings, while the D category of houseboats
9.
Yurt
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A traditional yurt or ger is a portable, round tent covered with skins or felt and used as a dwelling by nomads in the steppes of Central Asia. The structure comprises an assembly or latticework of pieces of wood or bamboo for walls, a door frame, ribs. The roof structure is often self-supporting, but large yurts may have interior posts supporting the crown, the top of the wall of self-supporting yurts is prevented from spreading by means of a tension band which opposes the force of the roof ribs. Yurt - originally from a Turkic word referring to the imprint left in the ground by a moved yurt, the term came to be used in reference to the physical tent-like dwellings only in other languages. In modern Turkish the word yurt is used as the synonym of homeland or a dormitory, in Russian the structure is called yurta, whence the word came into English. гэр - in Mongolian simply means home, тирмә is the Bashkir term for yurt. киіз үй - the Kazakh word, and means felt house, боз үй - the Kyrgyz term is meaning grey house, because of the color of the felt. Ak öý and gara öý - In Turkmen the term is literally white house and black house, depending on its luxury and elegance. Qara uy or otaw - in Qaraqalpaq the first term means black house, while the second means a newborn family and is used only to name a young familys yurt. Kheymah is the word for a yurt or a tent like dwelling in Pakistan, from the Urdu, خیمه In Persian yurt is called chador, in Tajik the names are yurt, khona-i siyoh, өг is the Tuvan word for yurt. Yurts have been a feature of life in Central Asia for at least three thousand years. The first written description of a used as a dwelling was recorded by the ancient Greek historian Herodotus. He described yurt-like tents as the place of the Scythians. Traditional yurts consist of a wooden circular frame carrying a felt cover. The felt is made from the wool of the flocks of sheep that accompany the pastoralists, the timber to make the external structure is not to be found on the treeless steppes, and must be obtained by trade in the valleys below. The frame consists of one or more expanding lattice wall-sections, a door-frame, bent roof poles, the Mongolian Ger has one or more columns to support the crown and straight roof poles. The wood frame is covered with pieces of felt, depending on availability, felt is additionally covered with canvas and/or sun-covers. The frame is held together with one or more ropes or ribbons, the structure is kept under compression by the weight of the covers, sometimes supplemented by a heavy weight hung from the center of the roof
10.
Constitutional law
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Constitutional law is the body of law which defines the relationship of different entities within a state, namely, the executive, the legislature, and the judiciary. Not all nation states have codified constitutions, though all such states have a jus commune, or law of the land and these may include customary law, conventions, statutory law, judge-made law, or international rules and norms. Constitutional law deals with the principles by which the government exercises its authority. In some instances, these principles grant specific powers to the government, such as the power to tax, other times, constitutional principles act to place limits on what the government can do, such as prohibiting the arrest of an individual without sufficient cause. In most nations, including the United States, constitutional law is based on the text of a document ratified at the time the nation came into being, Constitutional laws may often be considered second order rule making or rules about making rules to exercise power. It governs the relationships between the judiciary, the legislature and the executive with the bodies under its authority, one of the key tasks of constitutions within this context is to indicate hierarchies and relationships of power. Human rights or civil liberties form a part of a countrys constitution. Most jurisdictions, like the United States and France, have a codified constitution, a recent example is the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union which was intended to be included in the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, that failed to be ratified. Perhaps the most important example is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights under the UN Charter and these are intended to ensure basic political, social and economic standards that a nation state, or intergovernmental body is obliged to provide to its citizens but many do include its governments. Some countries like the United Kingdom have no entrenched document setting out fundamental rights, in those jurisdictions the constitution is composed of statute, case law, a case named Entick v. Carrington is a constitutional principle deriving from the common law. John Enticks house was searched and ransacked by Sherriff Carrington, Carrington argued that a warrant from a Government minister, the Earl of Halifax was valid authority, even though there was no statutory provision or court order for it. The court, led by Lord Camden stated that, The great end and that right is preserved sacred and incommunicable in all instances, where it has not been taken away or abridged by some public law for the good of the whole. By the laws of England, every invasion of private property, if no excuse can be found or produced, the silence of the books is an authority against the defendant, and the plaintiff must have judgment. The commonwealth and the civil law jurisdictions do not share the same constitutional law underpinnings, another main function of constitutions may be to describe the procedure by which parliaments may legislate. For instance, special majorities may be required to alter the constitution, in bicameral legislatures, there may be a process laid out for second or third readings of bills before a new law can enter into force. Alternatively, there may further be requirements for maximum terms that a government can keep power before holding an election, Constitutional law is a major focus of legal studies and research. The doctrine of the rule of law dictates that government must be conducted according to law and this was first established by British legal theorist A. V. Dicey. Dicey’s rule of law formula consists of three classic tenets, the first is that the regular law is supreme over arbitrary and discretionary powers
11.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
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The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a declaration adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 10 December 1948 at the Palais de Chaillot, Paris. The full text is available on the United Nations website, in 1966, the General Assembly adopted the two detailed Covenants, which complete the International Bill of Human Rights. In 1976, after the Covenants had been ratified by a sufficient number of individual nations, during World War II, the Allies adopted the Four Freedoms—freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from fear, and freedom from want—as their basic war aims. A universal declaration that specified the rights of individuals was necessary to effect to the Charters provisions on human rights. In June 1946, the UN Economic and Social Council established the Commission on Human Rights, the Commission on Human Rights, a standing body of the United Nations, was constituted to undertake the work of preparing what was initially conceived as an International Bill of Rights. The commission established a special Universal Declaration of Human Rights Drafting Committee, chaired by Eleanor Roosevelt, the committee met in two sessions over the course of two years. At the time, Humphrey was newly appointed as Director of the Division of Human Rights within the United Nations Secretariat, other well-known members of the drafting committee included René Cassin of France, Charles Malik of Lebanon, P. C. Chang of the Republic of China, Humphrey provided the initial draft which became the working text of the Commission. According to Allan Carlson in Globalizing Family Values, the Declarations pro-family phrases were the result of the Christian Democratic movements influence on Cassin, during these discussions many amendments and propositions were made by UN Member States. British representatives were extremely frustrated that the proposal had moral but no legal obligation, a On 10 December 1948, the Universal Declaration was adopted by the General Assembly by a vote of 48 in favor, none against, and eight abstentions. Honduras and Yemen—both members of UN at the time—failed to vote or abstain, south Africas position can be seen as an attempt to protect its system of apartheid, which clearly violated any number of articles in the Declaration. The six communist nations abstentions centred around the view that the Declaration did not go far enough in condemning fascism and Nazism, Eleanor Roosevelt attributed the abstention of the Soviet bloc nations to Article 13, which provided the right of citizens to leave their countries. 48 countries voted in favour of the Declaration, a.8 countries abstained, Later on, the underlying structure of the Universal Declaration was introduced in its second draft, which was prepared by René Cassin. Cassin worked from a first draft, which was prepared by John Peters Humphrey, the structure was influenced by the Code Napoléon, including a preamble and introductory general principles. Cassin compared the Declaration to the portico of a Greek temple, with a foundation, steps, four columns, articles 1 and 2 are the foundation blocks, with their principles of dignity, liberty, equality, and brotherhood. The seven paragraphs of the out the reasons for the Declaration—represent the steps. The main body of the Declaration forms the four columns, the first column constitutes rights of the individual such as the right to life and the prohibition of slavery. Articles 6 through 11 refer to the legality of human rights with specific remedies cited for their defense when violated
12.
Nursing home care
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A nursing home, convalescent home, skilled nursing facility, care home, rest home or intermediate care provides a type of residential care. It is a place of residence for people who require continual nursing care and have significant difficulty coping with the activities of daily living. Nursing aides and skilled nurses are usually available 24 hours a day, residents include the elderly and younger adults with physical or mental disabilities. Residents in a nursing facility may also receive physical, occupational. Some nursing homes assist people with needs, such as Alzheimer patients. Residents may have legal rights depending on the nation the facility is in. Before the Industrial Revolution, elderly care was largely in the hands of the family who would support elderly relatives who could no longer do so themselves, charitable institutions and parish poor relief were other sources of care. The first government attempts at providing basic care for the elderly, the New Poor Law curbed the cost of poor relief, which had been spiralling throughout the previous decades, and led to the creation of workhouses for those who were unemployed. Most workers in the workhouse were set tasks such as breaking stones, bone crushing to produce fertilizer, by the late 1840s most workhouses outside London and the larger provincial towns housed only the incapable, elderly and sick. By the end of the only about 20 per cent admitted to workhouses were unemployed or destitute. The Local Government Act of 1929 gave local authorities the power to take over workhouse infirmaries as municipal hospitals and elderly care homes, although the Act formally abolished the workhouse system in 1930, many workhouses, renamed Public Assistance Institutions, continued under the control of local county councils. It was not until the National Assistance Act of 1948 that the last vestiges of the Poor Law disappeared, in Britain in the 1950s and 60s, the quality of nursing care steadily improved, with the mandatory introduction of central heating, single rooms and en-suite lavatories. In most jurisdictions, nursing homes are required to provide staff to adequately care for residents. Once a patient has moved into the home, their relatives may not have significant contact with the administration team. Depending on the size of the home, the administration staff may be very small, consisting of only a handful or people. In most countries, nursing home administrators are required to be licensed to run nursing facilities, the direct care staff have direct, daily contact with the patient. This includes registered nurses, licensed practical nurses and nursing assistants, some staff members focus solely on caring for the buildings and grounds. Custodians, maintenance staff, and groundskeepers, for example, keep the inside and outside of the building in clean, additional support personnel also include people who may have some contact with the patient in the nursing home, but it may not be daily or even regularly
13.
Orphanage
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An orphanage is a residential institution devoted to the care of orphans—children whose biological parents are deceased or otherwise unable or unwilling to care for them. It is frequently used to describe institutions abroad, where it is an accurate term. Most children who live in orphanages are not orphans, four out of five children in orphanages having at least one living parent, most orphanages have been closed in Europe and North America. Few large international charities continue to fund orphanages, however, they are still commonly founded by smaller charities, especially in developing countries, orphanages may prey on vulnerable families at risk of breakdown and actively recruit children to ensure continued funding. Orphanages in developing countries are run by the state. Other residential institutions for children can be called group homes, childrens homes, refuges, rehabilitation centers, night shelters, the Romans formed their first orphanages around 400 AD. Jewish law prescribed care for the widow and the orphan, plato says, Orphans should be placed under the care of public guardians. Men should have a fear of the loneliness of orphans and of the souls of their departed parents, a man should love the unfortunate orphan of whom he is guardian as if he were his own child. He should be as careful and as diligent in the management of the property as of his own or even more careful still. The care of orphans was referred to bishops and, during the Middle Ages, as soon as they were old enough, children were often given as apprentices to households to ensure their support and to learn an occupation. In medieval Europe, care for orphans tended to reside with the Church, the Elizabethan Poor Laws were enacted at the time of the Reformation, and placed public responsibility on individual parishes to care for the indigent poor. The growth of sentimental philanthropy in the 18th century, led to the establishment of the first charitable institutions catering for the orphan, the first children were admitted into a temporary house located in Hatton Garden. At first, no questions were asked about child or parent, on reception, children were sent to wet nurses in the countryside, where they stayed until they were about four or five years old. At sixteen, girls were apprenticed as servants for four years, at fourteen, boys were apprenticed into variety of occupations. There was a benevolent fund for adults. A basket was accordingly hung outside the hospital, the age for admission was raised from two months to twelve, and a flood of children poured in from country workhouses. Parliament soon came to the conclusion that the indiscriminate admission should be discontinued, the hospital adopted a system of receiving children only with considerable sums. This practice was stopped in 1801, and it henceforth became a fundamental rule that no money was to be received
14.
Convent
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A convent is either a community of priests, religious brothers or religious sisters, or the building used by the community, particularly in the Roman Catholic Church and in the Anglican Communion. The term derives via Old French from Latin conventus, perfect participle of the verb convenio, meaning to convene, the original reference was to the gathering of mendicants who spent much of their time travelling. Technically, a monastery or nunnery is a community of monastics, whereas a friary or convent is a community of mendicants, and a canonry a community of canons regular. The terms abbey and priory can be applied to both monasteries and canonries, an abbey is headed by an Abbot, and a priory is a dependent house headed by a Prior. In English usage since about the 19th century the term convent almost invariably refers to a community of women, in historical usage they are often interchangeable, with convent especially likely to be used for a friary. When applied to houses in Eastern Orthodoxy and Buddhism, English refers to all houses of male religious as monasteries. Christian monasticism Enclosed religious orders Herbermann, Charles, ed. Convent, carmelite Monastery of the Sacred Hearts —- an example of a modern-day convent Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Convent
15.
Domesticated animals
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This includes species which are semi-domesticated, undomesticated but captive-bred on a commercial scale, or commonly wild-caught, at least occasionally captive-bred, and tameable. A number of factors determine how quickly any changes may occur in a species, however, domestication is a gradual process, i. e. there is no precise moment in the history of a given species when it can be considered to have become fully domesticated. Archaeozoology has identified three classes of animal domesticates, commensals, adapted to a niche, prey animals sought for food. To sort the tables chronologically by date of domestication, refresh your browser window, as clicking the Date column heading will mix AD, due to the somewhat unclear outlines of what, precisely, constitutes domestication, there are some species that may or may not be fully domesticated. There are also species that are used or kept as pets by humans. Most animals on this table are at least somewhat altered from wild animals by their extensive interactions with humans. Many could not be released into the wild, or are in some way dependent on humans
16.
Shack
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A shack is a type of small, often primitive shelter or dwelling. In areas of population density and high poverty, shacks are often the most prevalent form of housing. Fire is a significant hazard in tight-knit shack settlements, settlements composed mostly or entirely of shacks are known as slums or shanty towns. In Australian English shack can also refer to a holiday house with limited conveniences. In oilfield drilling a shack can also be the word for a wellsite trailer
17.
Slum
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A slum is a heavily populated urban informal settlement characterized by substandard housing and squalor. While slums differ in size and other characteristics, most lack reliable sanitation services, supply of water, reliable electricity, law enforcement. Slum residences vary from shanty houses to professionally built dwellings that because of poor-quality construction or provision of services have deteriorated into slums, Slums were common in the 18th to early 20th centuries in the United States and Europe. More recently slums have been found in urban regions of developing and undeveloped parts of the world. According to UN-Habitat, around 33% of the population in the developing world in 2012, or about 863 million people. Among individual countries, the proportion of residents living in slum areas in 2009 was highest in the Central African Republic. Between 1990 and 2010 the percentage of people living in slums dropped, the worlds largest slum city is in Mexico City. Slums form and grow in different parts of the world for many different reasons. Some causes include rapid rural-to-urban migration, economic stagnation and depression, high unemployment, poverty, informal economy, poor planning, politics, natural disasters and social conflicts. It is thought that slum is a British slang word from the East End of London meaning room, Slums were common in the United States and Europe before the early 20th century. Slums are now associated with Victorian Britain, particularly in industrial English towns, lowland Scottish towns. Engels described these British neighborhoods as cattle-sheds for human beings and these were generally still inhabited until the 1940s, when the government started slum clearance and built new council houses. There are still many left of former slum housing in the UK. By the 1920s it had become a slang expression in England, meaning either various taverns and eating houses, loose talk or gypsy language. In Life in London Pierce Egan used the word in the context of the slums of Holy Lane or St Giles. A footnote defined slum to mean low, unfrequent parts of the town, charles Dickens used the word slum in a similar way in 1840, writing I mean to take a great, London, back-slum kind walk tonight. Slum began to be used to describe bad housing soon after and was used as alternative expression for rookeries and this passage was widely quoted in the national press, leading to the popularisation of the word slum to describe bad housing. In France as in most industrialised European capitals, slums were widespread in Paris and other areas in the 19th century
18.
Shanty town
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A shanty town or squatter area is a settlement of improvised housing, called shanties or shacks, made of plywood, corrugated metal, sheets of plastic, and cardboard boxes. Such settlements are found on the periphery of cities, in public parks, or near railroad tracks, rivers. Shanty towns are found in developing nations, but also in some parts of developed nations. Shanty is probably from Canadian French chantier, a station established for the organization of lumberjacks. Another possible derivation is from the Irish language sean tí meaning old house, hutment means an encampment of huts. When the term is used by the military, it means temporary living quarters specially built by the army for soldiers, the term is also a synonym for shanty town, particularly in developing countries. Since construction is informal and unguided by urban planning, there is no formal street grid, house numbers. Even if these resources are present, they are likely to be disorganized, unreliable, shanty towns also tend to lack basic services present in more formally organized settlements, including policing, mail delivery, medical services, and fire fighting. A sweeping fire on the hills of Shek Kip Mei, Hong Kong, in late 1953 left 53,000 dwellers homeless, shanty towns have high rates of crime, suicide, drug use, and disease. Stewart Brand has also written, more recently, that cities are Green. They have maximum density—a million people per mile in Mumbai—and minimum energy. People get around by foot, bicycle, rickshaw, or the shared taxi. Not everything is efficient in the slums, though, in the Brazilian favelas where electricity is stolen and therefore free, Jan Chipchase from Nokia found that people leave their lights on all day. In most slums recycling is literally a way of life, shanty towns are present in a number of countries. The largest shanty town in Asia is Orangi in Karachi, Pakistan, in francophone countries, shanty towns are referred to as bidonvilles, such countries include Tunisia and Haiti. Other countries with shanty towns include South Africa or imijondolo, Kenya, the Philippines, Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, West Indies such as Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, and Peru. In Russia, shanty towns - called truščóba - are present in cities as well in Chelobityevo outside Moscow. There is also a major shanty town population in such as Bangladesh
19.
Town
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A town is a human settlement larger than a village but smaller than a city. The size definition for what constitutes a town varies considerably in different parts of the world, the word town shares an origin with the German word Zaun, the Dutch word tuin, and the Old Norse tun. The German word Zaun comes closest to the meaning of the word. An early borrowing from Celtic *dunom, in English and Dutch, the meaning of the word took on the sense of the space which these fences enclosed. In England, a town was a community that could not afford or was not allowed to build walls or other larger fortifications. In the Netherlands, this space was a garden, more specifically those of the wealthy, in Old Norse tun means a place between farmhouses, and is still used in a similar meaning in modern Norwegian. If there was any distinction between toun and burgh as claimed by some, it did not last in practice as burghs, for example, Edina Burgh or Edinburgh was built around a fort and eventually came to have a defensive wall. In some cases, town is a name for city or village. Sometimes, the town is short for township. A places population size is not a determinant of urban character. In many areas of the world, as in India at least until recent times, in the United Kingdom, there are historical cities that are far smaller than the larger towns. Some forms of settlement, such as temporary mining locations, may be clearly non-rural. Towns often exist as governmental units, with legally defined borders. In the United States these are referred to as incorporated towns, in other cases the town lacks its own governance and is said to be unincorporated. Note that the existence of a town may be legally set forth through other means. In the case of planned communities, the town exists legally in the form of covenants on the properties within the town. Australian geographer Thomas Griffith Taylor proposed a classification of towns based on their age, although there is no official use of the term for any settlement. In Albanian qytezë means small city or new city, while in ancient times small residential center within the walls of a castle
20.
Village
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A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town, with a population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Though often located in areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods. Villages are normally permanent, with fixed dwellings, however, transient villages can occur, further, the dwellings of a village are fairly close to one another, not scattered broadly over the landscape, as a dispersed settlement. In the past, villages were a form of community for societies that practise subsistence agriculture. In Great Britain, a hamlet earned the right to be called a village when it built a church, in many cultures, towns and cities were few, with only a small proportion of the population living in them. The Industrial Revolution attracted people in numbers to work in mills and factories. This also enabled specialization of labor and crafts, and development of many trades, the trend of urbanization continues, though not always in connection with industrialization. Although many patterns of life have existed, the typical village was small. Homes were situated together for sociability and defence, and land surrounding the living quarters was farmed, Traditional fishing villages were based on artisan fishing and located adjacent to fishing grounds. The soul of India lives in its villages, declared M. K. Gandhi at the beginning of 20th century, according to the 2011 census of India,68. 84% of Indians live in 640,867 different villages. The size of these villages varies considerably,236,004 Indian villages have a population of fewer than 500, while 3,976 villages have a population of 10, 000+. Most of the villages have their own temple, mosque, or church, auyl is a Kazakh word meaning village in Kazakhstan. According to the 2009 census of Kazakhstan,42. 7% of Kazakhs live in 8172 different villages, to refer to this concept along with the word auyl often used the slavic word selo in Northern Kazakhstan. Peoples Republic of China In mainland China, villages 村 are divisions under township Zh, 乡 or town Zh, Republic of China In the Republic of China, villages are divisions under townships or county-controlled cities. The village is called a tsuen or cūn under a rural township, japan South Korea In Indonesia, depending on the principles they are administered, villages are called Kampung or Desa. A Desa is administered according to traditions and customary law, while a kelurahan is administered along more modern principles, Desa are generally located in rural areas while kelurahan are generally urban subdivisions. A village head is respectively called kepala desa or lurah, both are elected by the local community. A desa or kelurahan is the subdivision of a kecamatan, in turn the subdivision of a kabupaten or kota, the same general concept applies all over Indonesia
21.
Suburb
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A suburb is a residential area or a mixed use area, either existing as part of a city or urban area or as a separate residential community within commuting distance of a city. In some areas, such as Australia, China, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and a few U. S. states, new suburbs are routinely annexed by adjacent cities. In others, such as Arabia, Canada, France, and much of the United States, Suburbs first emerged on a large scale in the 19th and 20th centuries as a result of improved rail and road transport, which led to an increase in commuting. Suburbs tend to proliferate around cities that have an abundance of adjacent flat land, the English word is derived from the Old French subburbe, which is in turn derived from the Latin suburbium, formed from sub and urbs. The first recorded usage of the term in English, was made by John Wycliffe in 1380, in Australia and New Zealand, suburbs have become formalised as geographic subdivisions of a city and are used by postal services in addressing. In rural areas in both countries, their equivalents are called localities, the terms inner suburb and outer suburb are used to differentiate between the higher-density suburbs in proximity to the city center, and the lower-density suburbs on the outskirts of the urban area. The term middle suburbs is also used, Suburbs, in this sense, can range from areas that seem more like residential areas of a city proper to areas separated by open countryside from the city centre. In large cities such as London, suburbs include formerly separate towns and villages that have been gradually absorbed during a growth and expansion. In the United States and Canada, suburb can refer either to an residential area of a city or town or to a separate municipality or unincorporated area outside a town or city. The earliest appearance of suburbs coincided with the spread of the first urban settlements, large walled towns tended to be the focus around which smaller villages grew up in a symbiotic relationship with the market town. The word suburbani was first used by the Roman statesman Cicero in reference to the large villas, as populations grew during the Early Modern Period in Europe, urban towns swelled with a steady influx of people from the countryside. In some places, nearby settlements were swallowed up as the city expanded. The peripheral areas on the outskirts of the city were generally inhabited by the very poorest, by the mid-19th century, the first major suburban areas were springing up around London as the city became more overcrowded and unsanitary. A major catalyst in suburban growth came from the opening of the Metropolitan Railway in the 1860s, the line joined the capitals financial heart in the City to what were to become the suburbs of Middlesex. Harrow was reached in 1880, and the line extended as far as Verney Junction in Buckinghamshire, more than 50 miles from Baker Street. Unlike other railway companies, which were required to dispose of surplus land, in 1912, it was suggested that a specially formed company should take over from the Surplus Lands Committee and develop suburban estates near the railway. However, World War I delayed these plans and it was only in 1919, with expectation of a housing boom. The term Metro-land was coined by the Mets marketing department in 1915 when the Guide to the Extension Line became the Metro-land guide and this promoted the land served by the Met for the walker, visitor and later the house-hunter
22.
City
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A city is a large and permanent human settlement. Cities generally have complex systems for sanitation, utilities, land usage, housing, a big city or metropolis usually has associated suburbs and exurbs. Such cities are associated with metropolitan areas and urban areas. Once a city expands far enough to another city, this region can be deemed a conurbation or megalopolis. Damascus is arguably the oldest city in the world, in terms of population, the largest city proper is Shanghai, while the fastest-growing is Dubai. There is not enough evidence to assert what conditions gave rise to the first cities, some theorists have speculated on what they consider suitable pre-conditions and basic mechanisms that might have been important driving forces. The conventional view holds that cities first formed after the Neolithic revolution, the Neolithic revolution brought agriculture, which made denser human populations possible, thereby supporting city development. The advent of farming encouraged hunter-gatherers to abandon nomadic lifestyles and to settle near others who lived by agricultural production, the increased population density encouraged by farming and the increased output of food per unit of land created conditions that seem more suitable for city-like activities. In his book, Cities and Economic Development, Paul Bairoch takes up position in his argument that agricultural activity appears necessary before true cities can form. According to Vere Gordon Childe, for a settlement to qualify as a city, it must have enough surplus of raw materials to support trade and a relatively large population. To illustrate this point, Bairoch offers an example, Western Europe during the pre-Neolithic, when the cost of transport is taken into account, the figure rises to 200,000 square kilometres. Bairoch noted that this is roughly the size of Great Britain, the urban theorist Jane Jacobs suggests that city formation preceded the birth of agriculture, but this view is not widely accepted. In his book City Economics, Brendan OFlaherty asserts Cities could persist—as they have for thousands of years—only if their advantages offset the disadvantages, OFlaherty illustrates two similar attracting advantages known as increasing returns to scale and economies of scale, which are concepts usually associated with businesses. Their applications are seen in more basic economic systems as well, increasing returns to scale occurs when doubling all inputs more than doubles the output an activity has economies of scale if doubling output less than doubles cost. To offer an example of these concepts, OFlaherty makes use of one of the oldest reasons why cities were built, in this example, the inputs are anything that would be used for protection and the output is the area protected and everything of value contained in it. OFlaherty then asks that we suppose the protected area is square, the advantage is expressed as, O = s 2, where O is the output and s stands for the length of a side. This equation shows that output is proportional to the square of the length of a side, the inputs depend on the length of the perimeter, I =4 s, where I stands for the quantity of inputs. So there are increasing returns to scale, O = I2 /16 and this equation shows that with twice the inputs, you produce quadruple the output
23.
Country
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A country is a region that is identified as a distinct national entity in political geography. Sometimes the word countries is used to both to sovereign states and to other political entities, while other times it refers only to states. The word country comes from Old French contrée, itself derived from Vulgar Latin contrata and it most likely entered the English language after the Franco-Norman invasion during the 11th century. Areas much smaller than a state may be called by names such as the West Country in England, the Black Country, Constable Country. In many European countries the words are used for sub-divisions of the territory, as in the German Bundesländer. The modern Italian contrada is a word with its meaning varying locally, the term country is frequently used to refer to sovereign states. There is no agreement on the number of countries in the world. There are 206 sovereign states, of which 193 states are members of the United Nations, all are defined as states by declarative theory of statehood and constitutive theory of statehood. The latest proclaimed state is South Sudan in 2011, the Kingdom of Denmark, a sovereign state, comprises Metropolitan Denmark and two nominally separate countries—the Faroe Islands, and Greenland—which are almost fully internally self-governing. The Kingdom of the Netherlands, a state, comprises four separate countries, Netherlands, Aruba, Curaçao. The degree of autonomy of non-sovereign countries varies widely, some are possessions of sovereign states, as several states have overseas territories, with citizenry at times identical and at times distinct from their own
24.
Cave
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A cave is a hollow place in the ground, specifically a natural underground space large enough for a human to enter. Caves form naturally by the weathering of rock and often extend deep underground, the word cave can also refer to much smaller openings such as sea caves, rock shelters, and grottos. A cavern is a type of cave, naturally formed in soluble rock with the ability to grow speleothems. Speleology is the science of exploration and study of all aspects of caves, visiting or exploring caves for recreation may be called caving, potholing, or spelunking. The formation and development of caves is known as speleogenesis, which can occur over the course of millions of years, caves are formed by various geologic processes and can be variable sizes. These may involve a combination of processes, erosion from water, tectonic forces, microorganisms, pressure. Isotopic dating techniques can be applied to cave sediments, in order to determine the timescale when geologic events may have occurred to help form and it is estimated that the maximum depth of a cave cannot be more than 3,000 metres due to the pressure of overlying rocks. For karst caves the maximum depth is determined on the basis of the limit of karst forming processes. Most caves are formed in limestone by dissolution, solutional caves or karst caves are the most frequently occurring caves and such caves form in rock that is soluble. Most occur in limestone, but they can form in other rocks including chalk, dolomite, marble, salt. Rock is dissolved by acid in groundwater that seeps through bedding planes, faults, joints. Over geological epochs cracks expand to become caves and cave systems, the largest and most abundant solutional caves are located in limestone. Limestone dissolves under the action of rainwater and groundwater charged with H2CO3, the dissolution process produces a distinctive landform known as karst, characterized by sinkholes and underground drainage. Limestone caves are often adorned with calcium carbonate formations produced through slow precipitation and these include flowstones, stalactites, stalagmites, helictites, soda straws and columns. These secondary mineral deposits in caves are called speleothems, the portions of a solutional cave that are below the water table or the local level of the groundwater will be flooded. Lechuguilla Cave in New Mexico and nearby Carlsbad Cavern are now believed to be examples of type of solutional cave. They were formed by H2S gas rising from below, where reservoirs of oil give off sulfurous fumes and this gas mixes with ground water and forms H2SO4. The acid then dissolves the limestone from below, rather than from above, caves formed at the same time as the surrounding rock are called primary caves
25.
Petroglyph
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Petroglyphs are images created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use such as carving, engraving. Petroglyphs are found world-wide, and are associated with prehistoric peoples. The word comes from the Greek word petro-, theme of the word meaning stone, and glyphein meaning to carve. The term petroglyph should not be confused with petrograph, which is an image drawn or painted on a rock face, both types of image belong to the wider and more general category of rock art or parietal art. Petroforms, or patterns and shapes made by large rocks. Inukshuks are also unique, and found only in the Arctic and they are a category of rock art, and sometimes found in conjunction with rock-cut architecture. However, they tend to be omitted in most works on rock art, a few such works exploit the natural contours of the rock and use them to define an image, but they do not amount to man-made reliefs. Rock reliefs have been made in many cultures, and were important in the art of the Ancient Near East. Rock reliefs are generally large, as they need to be to make an impact in the open air. Most have figures that are over life-size, and in many the figures are multiples of life-size, the vertical relief is most common, but reliefs on essentially horizontal surfaces are also found. The term typically excludes relief carvings inside caves, whether natural or themselves man-made, natural rock formations made into statues or other sculpture in the round, most famously at the Great Sphinx of Giza, are also usually excluded. Reliefs on large boulders left in their location, like the Hittite İmamkullu relief, are likely to be included. Some petroglyphs are dated to approximately the Neolithic and late Upper Paleolithic boundary, about 10,000 to 12,000 years ago, if not earlier. Sites in Australia have petroglyphs that are estimated to be as much as 27,000 years old, around 7,000 to 9,000 years ago, other precursors of writing systems, such as pictographs and ideograms, began to appear. Petroglyphs were still common though, and some cultures continued using them much longer, petroglyphs have been found in all parts of the globe except Antarctica with highest concentrations in parts of Africa, Scandinavia, Siberia, southwestern North America and Australia. There are many theories to explain their purpose, depending on their location, age, some petroglyphs are thought to be astronomical markers, maps, and other forms of symbolic communication, including a form of pre-writing. Petroglyph maps may show trails, symbols communicating time and distances traveled, as well as the terrain in the form of rivers, landforms
26.
Fossil
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Fossils are the preserved remains or traces of animals, plants, and other organisms from the remote past. The totality of fossils, both discovered and undiscovered, and their placement in fossiliferous rock formations and sedimentary layers is known as the fossil record. The study of fossils across geological time, how they were formed, such a preserved specimen is called a fossil if it is older than some minimum age, most often the arbitrary date of 10,000 years. The observation that fossils were associated with certain rock strata led early geologists to recognize a geological timescale in the 19th century. The development of dating techniques in the early 20th century allowed geologists to determine the numerical or absolute age of the various strata. Like extant organisms, fossils vary in size from microscopic, even single bacterial cells one micrometer in diameter, to gigantic, such as dinosaurs, Fossils may also consist of the marks left behind by the organism while it was alive, such as animal tracks or feces. These types of fossil are called trace fossils, as opposed to body fossils, finally, past life leaves some markers that cannot be seen but can be detected in the form of biochemical signals, these are known as chemofossils or biosignatures. The process of fossilization varies according to type and external conditions. Permineralization is a process of fossilization that occurs when an organism is buried, the empty spaces within an organism become filled with mineral-rich groundwater. Minerals precipitate from the groundwater, occupying the empty spaces and this process can occur in very small spaces, such as within the cell wall of a plant cell. Small scale permineralization can produce very detailed fossils, for permineralization to occur, the organism must become covered by sediment soon after death or soon after the initial decay process. The degree to which the remains are decayed when covered determines the later details of the fossil, some fossils consist only of skeletal remains or teeth, other fossils contain traces of skin, feathers or even soft tissues. This is a form of diagenesis, in some cases the original remains of the organism completely dissolve or are otherwise destroyed. The remaining organism-shaped hole in the rock is called an external mold, if this hole is later filled with other minerals, it is a cast. An endocast or internal mold is formed when sediments or minerals fill the cavity of an organism. This is a form of cast and mold formation. If the chemistry is right, the organism can act as a nucleus for the precipitation of minerals such as siderite, if this happens rapidly before significant decay to the organic tissue, very fine three-dimensional morphological detail can be preserved. Nodules from the Carboniferous Mazon Creek fossil beds of Illinois, USA, are among the best documented examples of such mineralization, replacement occurs when the shell, bone or other tissue is replaced with another mineral
27.
Sterkfontein
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The archaeological sites of Swartkrans and Kromdraai are in the same area. Sterkfontein is a South African National Heritage Site and was declared a World Heritage Site in 2000. The Sterkfontein Caves are also home to numerous wild African species including Belonogaster petiolata, numerous early hominin remains have been found at the site over the last few decades. These have been attributed to Australopithecus, early Homo and Paranthropus, modern excavation of the caves began in the late 1890s by limestone miners who noticed the fossils and brought them to the attention of scientists. It was not until 1936 that students of Professor Raymond Dart, in 1936, the Sterkfontein caves yielded the first adult Australopithecine, substantially strengthening Raymond Darts claim that the skull known as the Taung child was a human ancestor. There was a pause in excavation during World War II, in 1947 he found the almost complete skull of an adult female A. africanus. Robert Broom initially named the skull Plesianthropus transvaalensis, but it became known by its nickname. Mrs Ples is now defined as a member of A. africanus, in 1997, a near complete skeleton of a second species of Australopithecus was found in the caves by Ronald J. Clarke, extraction of the remains from the surrounding breccia is ongoing. The skeleton was named Little Foot, since the first parts found were the bones of a foot, excavations continue to this day and finds now total some 500 hominids, making Sterkfontein one of the richest site in the world for early hominids. The Member 4 deposits containing the Australopithecus africanus fossils have been dated to between 2.6 and 2.0 Ma, with the Sts5 Mrs Ples fossil estimated to date to between 2. 05-2. It is estimated to be around 2. 6-2.2 Ma based on a combination of uranium-lead dating and palaeomagnetic analysis and belongs to a species of australopith. In contrast, surface exposure dating of sediments indicate that skeleton StW573 has an age of approximately 4 million years. While the flowstone dated in the dating has been shown to have formed later than the fossil. The palaeomagnetic analysis remains the most credible age estimate based on the current data as it included work on both sediments and speleothem, a slightly younger deposit dated to between 1.8 to 1.5 Mya has revealed the remains of a specimen of early Homo. StW53 has been described as similar to Homo habilis or as a new species Homo gautengensis. No stone tools were associated with the fossil but StW53 itself has evidence for stone tool cut-marks, Member 5 contains Oldowan and Acheulian stone tools as well as specimens of early Homo and Paranthropus and is dated to between 1.6 and 1.1 Mya. Cradle of Humankind List of caves in South Africa Muldersdrift About Sterkfontein Caves
28.
Kromdraai Conservancy
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Kromdraai Conservancy is a protected conservation park located to the south-west of Gauteng province in north-east South Africa. It is in the Muldersdrift area not far from Krugersdorp and its name is derived from Afrikaans meaning Crooked Turn after a kink in the meandering Crocodile River. It was established to protect the caves, old mines, fossil sites, trout farm. The caves in the area, known as the Sterkfontein caves have a number of fossils. A well known site is also named Kromdraai and it, along with such sites as Sterkfontein, Coopers, Swartkrans. Part of the Kromdraai conservancy also falls within the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site, proclaimed by UNESCO in 1998
29.
Malapa
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It is situated within the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site. At the beginning of project, there were approximately 130 known cave sites in the region. Included in this were more than 25 fossil sites that had been unknown to science, Berger brought in geologist Paul Dirks, at that time Head of the School of GeoSciences at the University of the Witwatersrand, to lead the geological aspects of this exploratory project. On 1 August he dropped off Prof. Dirks to map the recognized cave system and proceeded into the area with his dog Tau. Almost immediately he discovered a fossil site that was unknown to science. On 15 August, Prof. Berger returned to the site with his student, Dr. Job Kibii. Within minutes, Matthew had discovered the first remains of human ancestors - a clavicle. On the opposite side of the block Prof. Berger quickly discovered a jawbone with a tooth of a hominid. The find would soon be prepared and identified as part of a skeleton of a juvenile hominid. On 4 September 2008, Berger returned to the site more than a dozen colleagues where Berger discovered a second partial skeleton of an adult female. Over 200 elements have been recovered to date, the partial skeletons are initially described in two papers in the journal Science by Berger and colleagues as a new species of early human ancestor called Australopithecus sediba. The species has long arms, like an ape, short powerful hands, the skeletons are found among the articulated skeletons of a sabre-toothed cat, antelopes and even mice and hares. It is not known how these skeletons came to be in this pool, no carnivores or scavengers reached their bodies. The fossil was dated using a combination of palaeomagnetism and uranium-lead dating by Andy Herries, Robyn Pickering, u-Pb dating of the underlying flowstone indicates that the fossils are not older than 2.0 Ma. The occurrence of species of animal became extinct at ~1.5 Ma indicate the deposit is not younger than 1.5 Ma. In 2011 a more accurate date of the fossils was established when a capping flowstone was too old to enable the normal polarity deposits to date to the Olduvai event. The deposits were instead correlated to a year long period centred at around 1.977 Ma. List of fossil sites Free Images and resources about Australopithecus sediba and Malapa for Educators and Students
30.
Australopithecus africanus
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Australopithecus africanus is an extinct species of the australopithecines, the first of an early -form species to be classified as hominin. Recently it was dated as living between 3.3 and 2.1 million years ago, or in the late Pliocene and early Pleistocene times, it is debated as being a direct ancestor of modern humans. A. africanus was of slender, or gracile, build and has found only in southern Africa at four sites, Taung, Sterkfontein, Makapansgat. Dart assigned the specimen the name Australopithecus africanus, it was dubbed the Taung child. This was the first time the word ape was formally assigned to any hominin, Dart theorized the Taung child skull must represent an intermediate species between apes and humans. And the rejection was buttressed by the widespread belief then, especially in British academia and he dismissed Darts claim, suggesting instead that the Taung child skull belonged to a young ape, most likely an infant gorilla or chimpanzee. Keith immersed himself in defending the Piltdown man and his reputation suffered greatly after the hoax was exposed in 1953, phillip Tobias, in a lengthy essay published in Current Anthropology in 1992, detailed the history of the investigation of the hoax. As part of the essay Tobias debated the inconsistencies in Keiths statements, Darts theory—that the skull known as the Taung child was a human ancestor—was supported by Robert Broom, a paleontologist with the Transvaal Museum of natural history in Pretoria. In 1936, the Sterkfontein caves yielded the first adult australopithecine, later, Broom classified an adult endocranial cast having a brain capacity of 485 cc as Plesianthropus transvaalensis. In April 1947, while blasting at Sterkfontein, he and John T. Robinson discovered a skull belonging to a female which he also classified as Plesianthropus transvaalensis. Both fossils were classified as Australopithecus africanus. Mrs. Ples, whose capacity is only about 485 cubic centimetres, was one of the first fossils to reveal that upright walking had evolved well before any significant growth in brain size. And, in comparison to modern apes, Dart noted as with the Taung child the lack of facial projection and it has slightly human-like, advanced cranial features, but also presents primitive features including ape-like curved fingers adapted to tree climbing. Both P. robustus and A. africanus crania seem very alike despite the heavily built features of P. robustus. A. africanus had a pelvis that would enable more efficient bipedalism than that of A. afarensis, such a morphology would support an earlier time for making and using tools than previously had been thought likely. Evidence of human-like sexual dimorphism in the spine has recently been described in the primate A. africanus. Recent analysis of the Little Foot specimen dated it to about 3, the Makapansgat fossils have been dated to between 3.0 and 2.6 mya. Those at Sterkfontein currently are dated to between 2.6 and 2.0 mya with the Mrs Ples fossil dating to around 2.0 million years, and Gladysvale fossils were dated between about 2.4 and 2.0 mya
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Australopithecus sediba
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Australopithecus sediba is a species of Australopithecus of the early Pleistocene, identified based on fossil remains dated to about 2 million years ago. The fossils were found together at the bottom of the Malapa Cave, where they fell to their death. Over 220 fragments from the species have recovered to date. MH1 is disarticulated and 34% complete if skeletal elements known to be in a block are included while MH2 is 45. 6% complete. Australopithecus sediba may have lived in savannas but ate fruit and other foods from the similar to modern-day savanna chimpanzees. The conditions in which the individuals were buried and fossilized were extraordinary, the first specimen of A. sediba was found by paleoanthropologist Lee Bergers nine-year-old son, Matthew, on August 15,2008. While exploring near his fathers dig site in the hills north of Johannesburg, on the Malapa Nature Reserve. The boy alerted his father to the find, who could not believe what he saw — a hominid clavicle, upon turning the block over, sticking out of the back of the rock was a mandible with a tooth, a canine, sticking out. And I almost died, he later recalled, the fossil turned out to belong to a 4 ft 2 in juvenile male, whose skull was discovered in March 2009 by Bergers team. The find was announced to the public on April 8,2010, also found at the Malapa archeological site were a variety of animal fossils, including saber-toothed cats, mongooses, and antelopes. Berger and geologist Paul Dirks speculated that the animals might have fallen into a deep 100–150-foot death-trap, the bodies may have then been swept into a pool of water with a sandy bottom and rich with lime, allowing the remains to become fossilized. The fossil was dated using a combination of palaeomagnetism and uranium-lead dating which showed that the fossils are no older than ~2.0 Ma, the presence of animal species which became extinct at ~1.5 Ma indicates the deposit is no younger than 1.5 Ma. The sediments have a normal polarity and the only major period between 2.0 and 1.5 Ma when this occurred is the Olduvai sub-Chron between 1.95 and 1.78 Ma. Accordingly, the fossils were dated to ~1.95 Ma. Recent dating of a capping flowstone demonstrated this was not possible, however, the cusp spacing is more like Australopithecus. The femur and tibia are fragmentary, but the foot combines an advanced anklebone combined with a primitive heel and its cranial capacity is estimated at around 420–450 cm3, about one-third that of modern humans. A. sediba had a modern hand, whose precision grip suggests it might have been another tool-making Australopithecus. Evidence of the precision gripping and stone tool production can be seen from Homo-like features such as having a long thumb, the nearly complete wrist and hand of an adult female from Malapa, South Africa presents Australopithecus-like features, such as a strong flexor apparatus associated with arboreal locomotion
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Paranthropus robustus
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Paranthropus robustus is an early hominin, originally discovered in Southern Africa in 1938. Particularly regarding cranial features, the development of P. robustus seemed to be in the direction of a heavy-chewing complex, on account of the definitive traits associated with this robust line of australopithecine, anthropologist Robert Broom established the genus Paranthropus and placed this species in it. Paranthropus robustus is generally dated to have lived between 2.0 and 1.2 million years ago and it had large jaws and jaw muscles with the accompanying sagittal crest, and post-canine teeth that were adapted to serve in the dry environment they lived in. After Raymond Dart’s discovery of Australopithecus africanus, Broom was in favour of Darts claim that Australopithecus africanus was an ancestor of Homo sapiens, however, there was a great deal of skepticism and criticism from the academic community. Many claimed that Dart had been premature in naming the species, as the type specimen and it was thought that such important claims should be based on a full skeleton of an adult. Robert Broom was a Scottish doctor then working in South Africa who began making his own excavations in Southern Africa to find specimens of A. africanus. It was his intent to find complete adult skeletons that would justify the species designation of A. africanus, the fossils included parts of a skull and teeth, all dated to 2 million years old. Sites with fossils of Paranthropus robustus are found only in South Africa, in the cave at Swartkrans, the remains of 130 individuals were discovered. The study made on the dentition of the revealed that the average P. robustus rarely lived past 17 years of age. Paranthropus robustus was the first discovery of a robust species of hominin, it was well before P. boisei. These three species have alternately been in their own or placed within the genus Australopithecus and this is partly because in many small details, the species robustus resembles A. africanus more than it does either of the other robust species, aethiopicus or boisei. Brooms discovery was the second australopithecine after Australopithecus africanus, typical of robust australopithecines, P. robustus had a head shaped a bit like a gorillas with a more massive built jaw and teeth in comparison to hominins within the Homo lineage. The sagittal crest that runs from the top of the acts as an anchor for large chewing muscles. The teeth of these primates were larger and thicker than any gracile australopithecine found, on the skull, a bony ridge is located above from the front to back indicating where the jaw muscles joined. P. robustus males may have stood only 1. 2m tall and weighed 54 kg while females stood just under 1 meter tall and weighed only 40 kg, the teeth found on P. robustus are almost as large as those of P. boisei. Broom analyzed his findings carefully and noted the differences in the molar teeth size which resembled a gorillas a bit more than a humans, other P. robustus remains have been found in Southern Africa. The average brain size of P. robustus measured to only 410 and 530 cc, some have argued that P robustus had a diet of hard gritty foods such as nuts and tubers since they lived in open woodland and savanna
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Taung Child
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The Taung Child is the fossilised skull of a young Australopithecus africanus. It was discovered in 1924 by quarrymen working for the Northern Lime Company in Taung, Raymond Dart described it as a new species in the journal Nature in 1925. The Taung skull is in repository at the University of Witwatersrand, dean Falk, a specialist in brain evolution, has called it the most important anthropological fossil of the twentieth century. In the early 20th century, the workers at quarries in southern Africa routinely uncovered fossils from the tufa formations they mined. Many were of extinct fauna, which included baboons and other primates, the director gave it to his son, Pat Izod, who displayed it on the mantle over the fireplace. Josephine Salmons was the first female student of Dart, an anatomist at the University of Witwatersrand, Salmons was permitted to take the fossilised skull and presented it to Dart, who also recognised it as a significant find. Dart asked the company to any more interesting fossilised skulls that should be unearthed. Young sent some of the back to Dart. The paper appeared in the 7 February 1925 issue of the journal Nature, the fossil was soon nicknamed the Taung Child. Scientists were initially reluctant to accept that the Taung Child and the new genus Australopithecus were ancestral to modern humans, in the issue of Nature immediately following the one in which Darts paper was published, several authorities in British paleoanthropology criticized Darts conclusion. Grafton Elliot Smith stated that he needed more evidence – and a picture of the skull – before he could judge the significance of the new fossil. Arthur Smith Woodward dismissed the Taung Child as having little bearing on the issue of whether the ancestors of man are to be sought in Asia or Africa. These critiques became more fervent a few months later, will satisfy geologists that this claim is preposterous. There were several reasons why it took decades for the field to accept Darts claim that Australopithecus africanus was in the line of descent. For one, the British scientific establishment was at the time enamored with the hoax Piltdown Man, expecting human ancestors to have evolved a large brain very early, they found that the Taung Childs small brain and human-like teeth made it an unlikely ancestor to modern humans. Until the 1940s, most anthropologists also believed that humans had evolved in Asia, and despite accepting that modern humans had emerged through evolution, a large number of anthropologists believed that the genus Homo had split from the great apes as much as 30 million years ago. They therefore felt uneasy about accepting that humans had had a small-brained, solly Zuckerman, who had studied anatomy under Raymond Dart in South Africa, concluded as early as 1928 that Australopithecus was little more than an ape. He and a team carried out further studies of the Australopithecine family in the 1940s and 1950s
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Tufa
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Tufa is a variety of limestone formed when carbonate minerals precipitate out of ambient temperature water. Geothermally heated hot springs sometimes produce similar carbonate deposits known as travertine, Tufa is sometimes referred to as travertine. It should not be confused with hot spring travertine, however, Mono Lakes tufa is thermogene, according to Pentecost. Tufa, which is calcareous, should not be confused with tuff, modern and fossil tufa deposits abound with wetland plants, as such many tufa deposits are characterised by their large macrobiological component and are highly porous. Tufa forms either in fluvial channels or in lacustrine settings, ford and Pedley provide a review of tufa systems worldwide. Deposits can be classified by their depositional environment, Pedley provides an extensive classification system, which includes the following classes of fluvial tufa, Spring – Deposits form on emergence from a spring/seep. Barrages often contain a significant detrital component, composed of organic material, lacustrine tufas are generally formed at the periphery of lakes and build up phytoherms and stromatolites. Oncoids are also common in these environments, while fluvial and lacustrine systems make up the bulk of tufa systems worldwide, there are several other important tufa environments. Although sometimes regarded as a distinct carbonate deposit, calcareous sinter formed from ambient temperature water can be considered a sub-type of tufa, calcareous speleothems may be regarded as a form of calcareous sinter. They lack any significant macrophyte component due to the absence of light, Tufa columns are an unusual form of tufa typically associated with saline lakes. They are distinct from most tufa deposits in that lack any significant macrophyte component. Some tufa columns may form from hot-springs and therefore actually be a form of travertine. It is generally thought that such features form from CaCO3 precipitated when carbonate rich source waters emerge into alkaline soda lakes and they have also been found in marine settings. Tufa deposits form an important habitat for a diverse flora, bryophytes and diatoms are well represented. The porosity of the deposits creates a wet habitat ideal for these plants, modern tufa is formed from alkaline waters, supersaturated with calcite. On emergence, waters degas CO2 due to the lower atmospheric pCO2, since carbonate solubility decreases with increased pH, precipitation is induced. Supersaturation may be enhanced by leading to a reduction in pCO2, for example increased air-water interactions at waterfalls may be important. Recently it has demonstrated that microbially induced precipitation may be more important than physico-chemical precipitation
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Homo erectus
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Homo erectus is an extinct species of hominid that lived throughout most of the Pleistocene geological epoch. Its earliest fossil evidence dates to 1.9 million years ago and extends to 70,000 years ago, or, possibly, as recently as 35,000 years ago. It is generally thought that H. erectus originated in Africa and spread from there, migrating throughout Eurasia as far as Georgia, India, Sri Lanka, China, a new debate appeared in 2013, with the documentation of the Dmanisi skulls.58 million years ago. From there it migrated, in part, by 2, the fossil record shows that its development from about 1.8 mya to one mya was widely distributed, in Africa, the Transcaucasus, Indonesia, and in Vietnam, China, and India. The second hypothesis is that H. erectus evolved in Eurasia and they occupied the Dmanisi site from 1.85 million to 1.77 million years ago, which was about the same time or slightly before their earliest evidence in Africa. There are several proposed explanations of the dispersal of H. erectus georgicus—including whether or not Africa is the source), the Dutch anatomist Eugène Dubois was fascinated by Darwins theory of evolution especially as it applied to humankind. In 1886, he set out for Asia—which then was the region accepted as the cradle of evolution despite Darwins theory of African origin. In 1891, his team discovered a human fossil on the island of Java, the Java fossil from Indonesia aroused much public interest. It was dubbed by the press as Java Man, but few scientists accepted Dubois argument that his fossil was the transitional form—the so-called missing link—between apes. Java Man is now classified as Homo erectus, most of the spectacular discoveries of H. erectus next took place at the Zhoukoudian Project, now known as the Peking Man Site, in Zhoukoudian, China. This site was first discovered by Johan Gunnar Andersson in 1921 and was first excavated in 1921, canadian anatomist Davidson Blacks initial description of a lower molar as belonging to a previously unknown species prompted widely publicized interest. Extensive excavations followed, which altogether uncovered 200 human fossils from more than 40 individuals including five nearly complete skullcaps, german anatomist Franz Weidenreich provided much of the detailed description of this material in several monographs published in the journal Palaeontologica Sinica. Throughout much of the 20th century, anthropologists debated the role of H. erectus in human evolution, early in the century, due in part to the discoveries at Java and Zhoukoudian, it was widely accepted that modern humans first evolved in Asia. From the 1950s forward, numerous finds in East Africa confirmed the hypothesis of an African genesis and it is now generally accepted that H. erectus descended from either, 1) the earliest hominin genera, or 2) the earliest Homo-species. East Africa provided sympatric coexistence for H. erectus and H, in the 1950s, archaeologists John T. Robinson and Robert Broom named Telanthropus capensis, Robinson had discovered a jaw fragment in 1949 in Swartkrans, South Africa. Later, Simonetta proposed to re-designate it to Homo erectus, in 1961, Yves Coppens discovered a skull of Tchadanthropus uxoris, then the earliest fossil human discovered in north Africa. It was reported that the fossil had been so eroded by sand that it mimicked the appearance of an australopith. Although at first considered to be a specimen of H. habilis, T. uxoris is no longer considered a valid taxon, and has been subsumed into H. erectus
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Zhoukoudian
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Zhoukoudian or Choukoutien is a cave system in Beijing, China. Dates of when Peking Man inhabited this site vary greatly,700, 000-200,000 years ago,670, 000-470,000 years ago and no earlier than 530,000 years ago. The Peking Man Site was first discovered by Johan Gunnar Andersson in 1921 and was first excavated by Otto Zdansky in 1921 and 1923 unearthing two human teeth and these were later identified by Davidson Black as belonging to a previously unknown species and extensive excavations followed. Fissures in the limestone containing middle Pleistocene deposits have yielded the remains of about 45 individuals as well as animal remains and stone flake and chopping tools. The oldest animal remains date from as early as 690,000 years ago, during the Upper Palaeolithic, the site was re-occupied and remains of Homo sapiens and its stone and bone tools have also been recovered from the Upper Cave. The crater Choukoutien on asteroid 243 Ida was named after the location, the caves are located in Fangshan District, southwest of central Beijing. Granger were led to the known as Dragon Bone Hill by local quarry men. Noticing some white quartz that was foreign to the area he immediately realised that this would be a place to search for the remains of primitive man. In 1926 Anderson announced the discovery of two human molars amongst this material and the following year Zdansky published his finding cautiously identifying the teeth as. Homo sp. Canis c. f. variabilis, commonly known as the Zhoukoudian wolf, were found at the Zhoukoudian cave system and archaeological site in 1934 and named by its discoverer, funding was granted and the Zhoukoudian Project commenced excavations in 1927 under the supervision of Chinese archaeologist Li Jie. That fall, a tooth was unearthed by Swedish paleontologist Anders Birger Bohlin for which Black proposed belonged a new species named Sinanthropus pekinensis. The following year Blacks excavations uncovered more fossils of his new species including teeth, a part of a juveniles jaw. These finds allowed Black to secure an extra $80,000 grant from the Foundation which he used to establish a research laboratory, Black stayed on at the Laboratory as honorary director while excavations continued at the site under Chinese paleontologist Yang Zhongjian, anthropologists Pei Wenzhong and Jia Lanpo. Conditions at the site were primitive, with scientists having to ride out to the excavation on mules and staying at caravansaries along the way. When the first skullcap was unearthed at the site in 1929, it was done by Pei, working in a 40-meter crevasse in frigid weather with a hammer in one hand and a candle in the other. A second skullcap is discovered close to the first in 1930, despite the conditions at the site eminent researchers continued to visit. French palaeontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin had been a visitor to the site since 1926. French archaeologist Henri Breuil visited in 1931 and confirmed the presence of stone tools and that same year evidence of the use of fire at the cave was accepted
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