1.
Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin
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It is situated in Dublin, Ireland, and is the elder of the capital citys two medieval cathedrals, the other being St Patricks Cathedral. Christ Church is officially claimed as the seat of both the Church of Ireland and Roman Catholic archbishops of Dublin, in law, and in fact it has been the cathedral of only the Church of Irelands Archbishop of Dublin, since the English Reformation. Though nominally claimed as his cathedral, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin uses St Marys in Marlborough Street in Dublin as his pro-cathedral, Christ Church Cathedral is located in the former heart of medieval Dublin, next to Wood Quay at the end of Lord Edward Street. As a result, the cathedral now appears dominant in isolation behind new civil offices along the quays, in recent years the Cathedral has offered a great set for Medieval Dramas such as the CWs hit drama Reign. The Main Building of Christchurch Cathedral was used to film pivotal moments in the dramas pilot, Christ Church is the only one of the three cathedrals or acting cathedrals which can be seen clearly from the River Liffey. The cathedral was founded sometime after 1028 when King Sitric Silkenbeard. The church was built on the ground overlooking the Viking settlement at Wood Quay and Sitric gave the lands of Baldoyle, Raheny. The cathedral was staffed by secular clergy. The second Bishop of Dublin introduced the Benedictines, Henry II attended the Christmas service at the cathedral in 1171. According to the cathedral guidebook this was the first time Henry received Holy Communion following the murder of Thomas Beckett by Henrys knights in Canterbury, Edmund and St. Mary and St. Lô. A chapel to St Laurence OToole was added in the 13th century and its design was inspired by the architecture of the English western school of Gothic, and its wrought stones- of a Somersetshire oolite- were sculpted and laid by craftsmen from the same area. In the 1350s a major extension was undertaken by John de St Paul, by 1358, the nave of the cathedral was partly in use for secular purposes and a long quire was added, extending the old choir area by around 10 metres. St Paul also installed an organ and his works were destroyed by the major rebuilding project in the 1870s. In 1480 the wealthy judge William Sutton bequeathed all his lands, the cathedral was the location of the purported coronation, in 1487, of Lambert Simnel, a boy pretender who sought unsuccessfully to depose Henry VII of England, as King Edward VI. In 1493, the school was founded. In 1539, King Henry VIII converted the priory to a cathedral with a dean and chapter and his immediate successor, Edward VI of England, in 1547, provided funds for an increase in cathedral staffing and annual royal funding for the choir school. King Edward VI formally suppressed St Patricks Cathedral and, on 25 April 1547, its silver, jewels and ornaments were transferred to the dean, belonging to that cathedral and which had been in the possession of the dean and chapter of Christ Church. Queen Mary I of England, and later James I of England, meanwhile, in 1551, divine service was sung for the first time in Ireland in English instead of Latin
2.
Dublin
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Dublin is the capital and largest city of Ireland. Dublin is in the province of Leinster on Irelands east coast, the city has an urban area population of 1,345,402. The population of the Greater Dublin Area, as of 2016, was 1,904,806 people, founded as a Viking settlement, the Kingdom of Dublin became Irelands principal city following the Norman invasion. The city expanded rapidly from the 17th century and was briefly the second largest city in the British Empire before the Acts of Union in 1800, following the partition of Ireland in 1922, Dublin became the capital of the Irish Free State, later renamed Ireland. Dublin is administered by a City Council, the city is listed by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network as a global city, with a ranking of Alpha-, which places it amongst the top thirty cities in the world. It is a historical and contemporary centre for education, the arts, administration, economy, the name Dublin comes from the Irish word Dubhlinn, early Classical Irish Dubhlind/Duibhlind, dubh /d̪uβ/, alt. /d̪uw/, alt /d̪u, / meaning black, dark, and lind /lʲiɲ pool and this tidal pool was located where the River Poddle entered the Liffey, on the site of the castle gardens at the rear of Dublin Castle. In Modern Irish the name is Duibhlinn, and Irish rhymes from Dublin County show that in Dublin Leinster Irish it was pronounced Duílinn /d̪ˠi, other localities in Ireland also bear the name Duibhlinn, variously anglicized as Devlin, Divlin and Difflin. Historically, scribes using the Gaelic script wrote bh with a dot over the b and those without knowledge of Irish omitted the dot, spelling the name as Dublin. Variations on the name are found in traditionally Irish-speaking areas of Scotland, such as An Linne Dhubh. It is now thought that the Viking settlement was preceded by a Christian ecclesiastical settlement known as Duibhlinn, beginning in the 9th and 10th century, there were two settlements where the modern city stands. Baile Átha Cliath, meaning town of the ford, is the common name for the city in modern Irish. Áth Cliath is a name referring to a fording point of the River Liffey near Father Mathew Bridge. Baile Átha Cliath was an early Christian monastery, believed to have been in the area of Aungier Street, there are other towns of the same name, such as Àth Cliath in East Ayrshire, Scotland, which is Anglicised as Hurlford. Although the area of Dublin Bay has been inhabited by humans since prehistoric times and he called the settlement Eblana polis. It is now thought that the Viking settlement was preceded by a Christian ecclesiastical settlement known as Duibhlinn, beginning in the 9th and 10th century, there were two settlements where the modern city stands. The subsequent Scandinavian settlement centred on the River Poddle, a tributary of the Liffey in an area now known as Wood Quay, the Dubhlinn was a small lake used to moor ships, the Poddle connected the lake with the Liffey. This lake was covered during the early 18th century as the city grew, the Dubhlinn lay where the Castle Garden is now located, opposite the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin Castle
3.
Kingdom of England
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In the early 11th century the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, united by Æthelstan, became part of the North Sea Empire of Cnut the Great, a personal union between England, Denmark and Norway. The completion of the conquest of Wales by Edward I in 1284 put Wales under the control of the English crown, from the accession of James I in 1603, the Stuart dynasty ruled England in personal union with Scotland and Ireland. Under the Stuarts, the kingdom plunged into war, which culminated in the execution of Charles I in 1649. The monarchy returned in 1660, but the Civil War had established the precedent that an English monarch cannot govern without the consent of Parliament and this concept became legally established as part of the Glorious Revolution of 1688. From this time the kingdom of England, as well as its state the United Kingdom. On 1 May 1707, under the terms of the Acts of Union 1707, the Anglo-Saxons referred to themselves as the Engle or the Angelcynn, originally names of the Angles. They called their land Engla land, meaning land of the English, by Æthelweard Latinized Anglia, from an original Anglia vetus, the name Engla land became England by haplology during the Middle English period. The Latin name was Anglia or Anglorum terra, the Old French, by the 14th century, England was also used in reference to the entire island of Great Britain. The standard title for all monarchs from Æthelstan until the time of King John was Rex Anglorum, Canute the Great, a Dane, was the first king to call himself King of England. In the Norman period Rex Anglorum remained standard, with use of Rex Anglie. The Empress Matilda styled herself Domina Anglorum, from the time of King John onwards all other titles were eschewed in favour of Rex or Regina Anglie. In 1604 James VI and I, who had inherited the English throne the previous year, the English and Scottish parliaments, however, did not recognise this title until the Acts of Union of 1707. The kingdom of England emerged from the unification of the early medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdoms known as the Heptarchy, East Anglia, Mercia, Northumbria, Kent, Essex, Sussex. The Viking invasions of the 9th century upset the balance of power between the English kingdoms, and native Anglo-Saxon life in general, the English lands were unified in the 10th century in a reconquest completed by King Æthelstan in 927 CE. During the Heptarchy, the most powerful king among the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms might become acknowledged as Bretwalda, the decline of Mercia allowed Wessex to become more powerful. It absorbed the kingdoms of Kent and Sussex in 825, the kings of Wessex became increasingly dominant over the other kingdoms of England during the 9th century. In 827, Northumbria submitted to Egbert of Wessex at Dore, in 886, Alfred the Great retook London, which he apparently regarded as a turning point in his reign. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says that all of the English people not subject to the Danes submitted themselves to King Alfred, asser added that Alfred, king of the Anglo-Saxons, restored the city of London splendidly
4.
House of York
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The House of York was a cadet branch of the English royal House of Plantagenet. Three of its members became Kings of England in the late 15th century and it is based on these descents that they claimed the English crown. Compared with the House of Lancaster, it had a claim to the throne of England according to cognatic primogeniture. The reign of this dynasty ended with the death of Richard III of England in 1485 and it became extinct in the male line with the death of Edward Plantagenet, 17th Earl of Warwick in 1499. Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York, 1st Earl of Cambridge, KG was a son of King Edward III of England and Philippa of Hainault. He was the founder of the House of York, but it was through the marriage of his younger son, Richard to Anne Mortimer that the Yorkist faction in the Wars of the Roses made its claim on the throne. The other party in the Wars of the Roses, the Lancasters, were descendants of Edmunds elder brother, Edmund had two sons, Edward, and Richard of Conisburgh. Edward succeeded to the dukedom in 1402, but was killed at the battle of Agincourt in 1415, Richard married Anne Mortimer, a great-granddaughter of Lionel of Antwerp, the second son of Edward III. Furthermore, Annes son Richard also became heir general to the earldom of March, after her brother, Edmund, 5th Earl. Richard of Conisburgh was executed following his involvement in the Southampton Plot to depose Henry V of England in favour of the Earl of March, the dukedom of York therefore passed to his son, Richard Plantagenet. Through his mother, Richard Plantagenet also inherited the lands of the earldom of March, although he served as Protector of the Realm during Henry VIs period of incapacity in 1453-54, his reforms were reversed by Somersets party once the king had recovered. The Wars of the Roses began the year, with the First Battle of St Albans. Initially, Richard aimed only to purge his Lancastrian political opponents from positions of influence over the king and it was not until October 1460 that he claimed the throne for the House of York. In that year the Yorkists had captured the king at the battle of Northampton, Richard and his second son Edmund were killed at the battle of Wakefield on 30 December. Richards claim to the throne was inherited by his son Edward, with the support of Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick, Edward, already showing great promise as a leader of men, defeated the Lancastrians in a succession of battles. While Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou were campaigning in the north, Edward strengthened his claim with a decisive victory at the Battle of Towton in the same year, in the course of which the Lancastrian army was virtually wiped out. The early reign of Edward IV was marred by Lancastrian plotting, Warwick himself changed sides, and supported Margaret of Anjou and the kings jealous brother George, Duke of Clarence, in briefly restoring Henry in 1470-71. However, Edward regained his throne, and the House of Lancaster was wiped out with the death of Henry VI himself, in the Tower of London in 1471
5.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
6.
Henry VII of England
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Henry VII was King of England from seizing the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death on 21 April 1509, and the first monarch of the House of Tudor. He ruled the Principality of Wales until 29 November 1489 and was Lord of Ireland, Henry won the throne when his forces defeated King Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth Field, the culmination of the Wars of the Roses. Henry was the last king of England to win his throne on the field of battle and he cemented his claim by marrying Elizabeth of York, daughter of Edward IV and niece of Richard III. Henry was successful in restoring the power and stability of the English monarchy after the civil war and his supportive stance of the islands wool industry and stand off with the Low Countries had long lasting benefits to all the British Isles economy. However, the capriciousness and lack of due process that many would tarnish his legacy and were soon ended upon Henry VIIs death. According to the contemporary historian Polydore Vergil, simple greed underscored the means by which royal control was over-asserted in Henrys final years, Henry VII was born at Pembroke Castle on 28 January 1457 to Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond. His father, Edmund Tudor, 1st Earl of Richmond, died three months before his birth, Henrys paternal grandfather, Owen Tudor, originally from the Tudors of Penmynydd, Isle of Anglesey in Wales, had been a page in the court of Henry V. He rose to one of the Squires to the Body to the King after military service at the Battle of Agincourt. Owen is said to have married the widow of Henry V. One of their sons was Edmund Tudor, father of Henry VII, Edmund was created Earl of Richmond in 1452, and formally declared legitimate by Parliament. Henrys main claim to the English throne derived from his mother through the House of Beaufort, Henrys mother, Lady Margaret Beaufort, was a great-granddaughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, fourth son of Edward III, and his third wife Katherine Swynford. Katherine was Gaunts mistress for about 25 years, when married in 1396, they already had four children. Thus Henrys claim was somewhat tenuous, it was from a woman, in theory, the Portuguese and Castilian royal families had a better claim as descendants of Catherine of Lancaster, the daughter of John of Gaunt and his second wife Constance of Castile. Gaunts nephew Richard II legitimised Gaunts children by Katherine Swynford by Letters Patent in 1397, in 1407, Henry IV, who was Gaunts son by his first wife, issued new Letters Patent confirming the legitimacy of his half-siblings, but also declaring them ineligible for the throne. Henry IVs action was of doubtful legality, as the Beauforts were previously legitimised by an Act of Parliament, but it further weakened Henrys claim. Henry also made political capital out of his Welsh ancestry, for example in attracting military support. He came from an old, established Anglesey family that claimed descent from Cadwaladr and he took it, as well as the standard of St George, on his procession through London after the victory at Bosworth. A contemporary writer and Henrys biographer, Bernard André, also much of Henrys Welsh descent
7.
Baker
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A baker is someone who bakes and sometimes sells breads and other products made using an oven or other concentrated heat source. The place where a baker works is called a bakery, since grains have been a staple food for millennia, the activity of baking is a very old one. Control of yeast, however, is relatively recent, by the fifth and sixth centuries BCE, the ancient Greeks used enclosed ovens heated by wood fires, communities usually baked bread in a large communal oven. Greeks baked dozens and possibly hundreds of types of bread, Athenaeus described seventy-two varieties, in ancient Rome several centuries later, the first mass production of breads occurred, and the baking profession can be said to have started at that time. Ancient Roman bakers used honey and oil in their products, creating pastries rather than breads, in ancient Rome, bakers were sometimes slaves, who were sometimes manumitted. Large households in Rome normally had their own bakers, the Gauls are credited with discovering that the addition of beer froth to bread dough made well-leavened bread, marking the use of controlled yeast for bread dough. In medieval Europe, baking ovens were often separated from buildings to mitigate the risk of fire. Because bread was an important staple food, bakers production factors were heavily regulated, soon after the enactment of the Assize, baking became a very stable industry, and was executed much more professionally than brewing, resulting in towns and villages having fewer bakers than brewers. Because ovens were expensive capital investments and required careful operation, specialized bakeries opened, Bakers were often part of the guild system, which was well-established by the sixteenth century, master bakers instructed apprentices and were assisted by journeymen. In Amsterdam in 1694, for example, the cake-bakers, pie-bakers, a fraternity of bakers in London existed as early as 1155, according to records of payments to the Exchequer, the Worshipful Company of Bakers was formed by charters dated 1486,1569, and 1685. The guild still exists today, with ceremonial and charitable functions. Five bakers have served as mayor of London. The Columbian Exchange, which began in 1492, had a influence on the baking occupation. Access to sugar greatly increased as a result of new cultivation in the Caribbean, in the eighteenth century, processors learned how to refine sugar from sugar beets, allowing Europeans to grow sugar locally. These developments led to an increase in the sophistication of baking and pastries, and this occupation was less common that cloth manufacturer and tavern/public house worker, but more common than cotton spinner, merchant, calico printer, or grocer. The legislation was soon replicated in other states, joseph Lochner, a bakery owner in Utica, New York, was subsequently convicted of violating the law for forcing his employees to work more than sixty hours a week. Frustrated with the deterioration of working conditions, bakery workers in New York went on strike in August 1905. In Roman Catholic tradition, the saint of bakers and pastry chefs is Honoratus of Amiens
8.
University of Oxford
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The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university located in Oxford, England. It grew rapidly from 1167 when Henry II banned English students from attending the University of Paris, after disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk in 1209, some academics fled north-east to Cambridge where they established what became the University of Cambridge. The two ancient universities are frequently referred to as Oxbridge. The university is made up of a variety of institutions, including 38 constituent colleges, All the colleges are self-governing institutions within the university, each controlling its own membership and with its own internal structure and activities. Being a city university, it not have a main campus, instead, its buildings. Oxford is the home of the Rhodes Scholarship, one of the worlds oldest and most prestigious scholarships, the university operates the worlds oldest university museum, as well as the largest university press in the world and the largest academic library system in Britain. Oxford has educated many notable alumni, including 28 Nobel laureates,27 Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom, the University of Oxford has no known foundation date. Teaching at Oxford existed in form as early as 1096. It grew quickly in 1167 when English students returned from the University of Paris, the historian Gerald of Wales lectured to such scholars in 1188 and the first known foreign scholar, Emo of Friesland, arrived in 1190. The head of the university had the title of chancellor from at least 1201, the university was granted a royal charter in 1248 during the reign of King Henry III. After disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk in 1209, some academics fled from the violence to Cambridge, the students associated together on the basis of geographical origins, into two nations, representing the North and the South. In later centuries, geographical origins continued to many students affiliations when membership of a college or hall became customary in Oxford. At about the time, private benefactors established colleges as self-contained scholarly communities. Among the earliest such founders were William of Durham, who in 1249 endowed University College, thereafter, an increasing number of students lived in colleges rather than in halls and religious houses. In 1333–34, an attempt by some dissatisfied Oxford scholars to found a new university at Stamford, Lincolnshire was blocked by the universities of Oxford and Cambridge petitioning King Edward III. Thereafter, until the 1820s, no new universities were allowed to be founded in England, even in London, thus, Oxford and Cambridge had a duopoly, the new learning of the Renaissance greatly influenced Oxford from the late 15th century onwards. Among university scholars of the period were William Grocyn, who contributed to the revival of Greek language studies, and John Colet, the noted biblical scholar. With the English Reformation and the breaking of communion with the Roman Catholic Church, recusant scholars from Oxford fled to continental Europe, as a centre of learning and scholarship, Oxfords reputation declined in the Age of Enlightenment, enrolments fell and teaching was neglected
9.
Edward IV of England
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Edward IV was the King of England from 4 March 1461 until 3 October 1470, and again from 11 April 1471 until his death in 1483. He was the first Yorkist King of England, before becoming king, he was 4th Duke of York, 7th Earl of March, 5th Earl of Cambridge and 9th Earl of Ulster. He was also the 65th Knight of the Order of the Golden Fleece, Edward of York was born at Rouen in France, the second son of Richard, 3rd Duke of York, and Cecily Neville. He was the eldest of the four sons who survived to adulthood and he bore the title Earl of March before his fathers death and his accession to the throne. Edwards father Richard, Duke of York, had been heir to King Henry VI until the birth of Henrys son Edward in 1453, Richard carried on a factional struggle with the kings Beaufort relatives. He established a dominant position after his victory at the First Battle of St Albans in 1455, in which his chief rival Edmund Beaufort, however, Henrys Queen, Margaret of Anjou, rebuilt a powerful faction to oppose the Yorkists over the following years. The Yorkist leaders fled from England after the collapse of their army in the confrontation at Ludford Bridge, the Duke of York took refuge in Ireland, while Edward went with the Nevilles to Calais where Warwick was governor. In 1460 Edward landed in Kent with Salisbury, Warwick and Salisburys brother William Neville, Lord Fauconberg, raised an army and this left Edward, now Duke of York, at the head of the Yorkist faction. He defeated a Lancastrian army at Mortimers Cross in Herefordshire on 2–3 February 1461 and he then united his forces with those of Warwick, whom Margarets army had defeated at the Second Battle of St Albans, during which Henry VI had been rescued by his supporters. Edwards father had restricted his ambitions to becoming Henrys heir, and he then advanced against the Lancastrians, having his life saved on the battlefield by the Welsh Knight Sir David Ap Mathew. He defeated the Lancastrian army in the exceptionally bloody Battle of Towton in Yorkshire on 29 March 1461, Edward had effectively broken the military strength of the Lancastrians, and he returned to London for his coronation. King Edward IV named Sir David Ap Mathew Standard Bearer of England, Lancastrian resistance continued in the north, but posed no serious threat to the new regime and was finally extinguished by Warwicks brother John Neville in the Battle of Hexham in 1464. Henry VI had escaped into the Pennines, where he spent a year in hiding, Queen Margaret fled abroad with the young Prince Edward and many of their leading supporters. Even at the age of nineteen, Edward exhibited remarkable military acumen and he also had a notable physique and was described as handsome and affable. His height is estimated at 6 feet 4.5 inches, making him the tallest among all English, Scottish, most of Englands leading families had remained loyal to Henry VI or remained uncommitted in the recent conflict. The new regime, therefore, relied heavily on the support of the Nevilles, however, the king increasingly became estranged from their leader the Earl of Warwick, due primarily to his marriage. Warwick, acting on Edwards behalf, made arrangements with King Louis XI of France for Edward to marry either Louis daughter Anne or his sister-in-law Bona of Savoy. He was humiliated and enraged to discover that, while he was negotiating, Edward had secretly married Elizabeth Woodville, Edwards marriage to Elizabeth Woodville has been criticised as an impulsive action that did not add anything to the security of England or the York dynasty
10.
Tower of London
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The Tower of London, officially Her Majestys Royal Palace and Fortress of the Tower of London, is a historic castle located on the north bank of the River Thames in central London. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, separated from the edge of the square mile of the City of London by the open space known as Tower Hill. It was founded towards the end of 1066 as part of the Norman Conquest of England. The White Tower, which gives the castle its name, was built by William the Conqueror in 1078 and was a resented symbol of oppression. The castle was used as a prison from 1100 until 1952, a grand palace early in its history, it served as a royal residence. As a whole, the Tower is a complex of buildings set within two concentric rings of defensive walls and a moat. There were several phases of expansion, mainly under Kings Richard the Lionheart, Henry III, the general layout established by the late 13th century remains despite later activity on the site. The Tower of London has played a prominent role in English history and it was besieged several times, and controlling it has been important to controlling the country. The Tower has served variously as an armoury, a treasury, a menagerie, the home of the Royal Mint, a record office. From the early 14th century until the reign of Charles II, in the absence of the monarch, the Constable of the Tower is in charge of the castle. This was a powerful and trusted position in the medieval period, in the late 15th century, the castle was the prison of the Princes in the Tower. Under the Tudors, the Tower became used less as a royal residence and this use has led to the phrase sent to the Tower. Executions were more commonly held on the notorious Tower Hill to the north of the castle, in the latter half of the 19th century, institutions such as the Royal Mint moved out of the castle to other locations, leaving many buildings empty. Anthony Salvin and John Taylor took the opportunity to restore the Tower to what was felt to be its medieval appearance, in the First and Second World Wars, the Tower was again used as a prison and witnessed the executions of 12 men for espionage. After the Second World War, damage caused during the Blitz was repaired, today, the Tower of London is one of the countrys most popular tourist attractions. Under the ceremonial charge of the Constable of the Tower, it is cared for by the charity Historic Royal Palaces and is protected as a World Heritage Site. The Tower was orientated with its strongest and most impressive defences overlooking Saxon London and it would have visually dominated the surrounding area and stood out to traffic on the River Thames. The castle is made up of three wards, or enclosures, the innermost ward contains the White Tower and is the earliest phase of the castle
11.
Ireland
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Ireland is an island in the North Atlantic. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, Ireland is the second-largest island of the British Isles, the third-largest in Europe, and the twentieth-largest on Earth. Politically, Ireland is divided between the Republic of Ireland, which covers five-sixths of the island, and Northern Ireland, in 2011, the population of Ireland was about 6.4 million, ranking it the second-most populous island in Europe after Great Britain. Just under 4.6 million live in the Republic of Ireland, the islands geography comprises relatively low-lying mountains surrounding a central plain, with several navigable rivers extending inland. The island has lush vegetation, a product of its mild, thick woodlands covered the island until the Middle Ages. As of 2013, the amount of land that is wooded in Ireland is about 11% of the total, there are twenty-six extant mammal species native to Ireland. The Irish climate is moderate and classified as oceanic. As a result, winters are milder than expected for such a northerly area, however, summers are cooler than those in Continental Europe. Rainfall and cloud cover are abundant, the earliest evidence of human presence in Ireland is dated at 10,500 BC. Gaelic Ireland had emerged by the 1st century CE, the island was Christianised from the 5th century onward. Following the Norman invasion in the 12th century, England claimed sovereignty over Ireland, however, English rule did not extend over the whole island until the 16th–17th century Tudor conquest, which led to colonisation by settlers from Britain. In the 1690s, a system of Protestant English rule was designed to materially disadvantage the Catholic majority and Protestant dissenters, with the Acts of Union in 1801, Ireland became a part of the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland saw much civil unrest from the late 1960s until the 1990s and this subsided following a political agreement in 1998. In 1973 the Republic of Ireland joined the European Economic Community while the United Kingdom, Irish culture has had a significant influence on other cultures, especially in the fields of literature. Alongside mainstream Western culture, an indigenous culture exists, as expressed through Gaelic games, Irish music. The culture of the island shares many features with that of Great Britain, including the English language, and sports such as association football, rugby, horse racing. The name Ireland derives from Old Irish Eriu and this in turn derives from Proto-Celtic *Iveriu, which is also the source of Latin Hibernia. Iveriu derives from a root meaning fat, prosperous, during the last glacial period, and up until about 9000 years ago, most of Ireland was covered with ice, most of the time
12.
Richard III of England
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Richard III was King of England from 1483 until his death in 1485, at the age of 32, in the Battle of Bosworth Field. He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty and his defeat at Bosworth Field, the last decisive battle of the Wars of the Roses, marked the end of the Middle Ages in England. He is the subject of the historical play Richard III by William Shakespeare, when his brother King Edward IV died in April 1483, Richard was named Lord Protector of the realm for Edwards son and successor, the 12-year-old Edward V. As the young king travelled to London from Ludlow, Richard met and escorted him to lodgings in the Tower of London, on 25 June, an assembly of Lords and commoners endorsed the claims. The following day, Richard III began his reign, and he was crowned on 6 July 1483. The young princes were not seen in public after August, and accusations circulated that the boys had been murdered on Richards orders, there were two major rebellions against Richard. The first, in October 1483, was led by allies of Edward IV and Richards former ally, Henry Stafford, 2nd Duke of Buckingham. In August 1485, Henry Tudor and his uncle, Jasper Tudor, Henry Tudor landed in southern Wales with a small contingent of French troops and marched through his birthplace, Pembrokeshire, recruiting soldiers. Henrys force engaged Richards army and defeated it at the Battle of Bosworth Field in Leicestershire, Richard was struck down in the conflict, making him the last English king to die in battle on home soil and the first since Harold Godwinson. Henry then ascended the throne as Henry VII, after the battle Richards corpse was taken to Leicester and buried without pomp. His original tomb monument is believed to have been removed during the Reformation, in 2012, an archaeological excavation was commissioned by the Richard III Society on a city council car park on the site once occupied by Greyfriars Priory Church. Richards remains were reburied in Leicester Cathedral on 26 March 2015 and they returned to England following the defeat of the Lancastrians at the Battle of Towton and participated in the coronation of Richards eldest brother as King Edward IV in June 1461. At this time Richard was named Duke of Gloucester and made a Knight of the Garter and Knight of the Bath, by the age of seventeen, he had an independent command. With some interruptions, Richard stayed at Middleham either from late 1461 until early 1465, while at Warwicks estate, he probably met Francis Lovell, a strong supporter later in his life, and Warwicks younger daughter, his future wife Anne Neville. As the relationship between the king and Warwick became strained, Edward IV opposed the match, during Warwicks lifetime, George was the only royal brother to marry one of his daughters, the eldest, Isabel, on 12 July 1469, without the kings permission. George joined his father-in-laws revolt against the king, while Richard remained loyal to Edward, in 1468, Richards sister Margaret had married Charles the Bold, the Duke of Burgundy, and the brothers could expect a welcome there. Although only eighteen years old, Richard played crucial roles in the battles of Barnet, during his adolescence, Richard developed idiopathic scoliosis. Following a decisive Yorkist victory over the Lancastrians at the Battle of Tewkesbury, Richard married Anne Neville, by the end of 1470 Anne had previously been wedded to Edward of Westminster, only son of Henry VI, to seal her fathers allegiance to the Lancastrian party
