1.
Cyprus
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Cyprus, officially the Republic of Cyprus, is an island country in the Eastern Mediterranean and the third largest and third most populous island in the Mediterranean. It is located south of Turkey, west of Syria and Lebanon, northwest of Israel and Palestine, north of Egypt, the earliest known human activity on the island dates to around the 10th millennium BC. Archaeological remains from this include the well-preserved Neolithic village of Khirokitia. Cyprus was settled by Mycenaean Greeks in two waves in the 2nd millennium BC, Cyprus was placed under British administration based on Cyprus Convention in 1878 and formally annexed by Britain in 1914. While Turkish Cypriots made up 18% of the population, the partition of Cyprus and creation of a Turkish state in the north became a policy of Turkish Cypriot leaders, following nationalist violence in the 1950s, Cyprus was granted independence in 1960. On 15 July 1974, a coup détat was staged by Greek Cypriot nationalists and elements of the Greek military junta in an attempt at enosis and these events and the resulting political situation are matters of a continuing dispute. The Cyprus Republic has de jure sovereignty over the island of Cyprus, as well as its territorial sea and exclusive economic area, another nearly 4% of the islands area is covered by the UN buffer zone. The international community considers the part of the island as territory of the Republic of Cyprus occupied by Turkish forces. The occupation is viewed as illegal under law, amounting to illegal occupation of EU territory since Cyprus became a member of the European Union. Cyprus is a major tourist destination in the Mediterranean, on 1 January 2008, the Republic of Cyprus joined the eurozone. The earliest attested reference to Cyprus is the 15th century BC Mycenaean Greek
2.
Limassol District
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Limassol District or Lemesos is one of the six districts of Cyprus. As of 2011, it had a population of 235,330, part of the British Overseas Territory of Akrotiri and Dhekelia forms an enclave on the Akrotiri Peninsula, under the sovereignty of the United Kingdom. The buried ancient city of Amathus is 11 kilometres from Limassol, Archaeological excavations have unearthed ruins of the Byzantine period and a tomb of the 7th century BC. Limassol District forms much of the part of Cyprus. The Kouris River rises in the slopes of Troodos mountains, which lie in the northern part of the district towards the centre of Cyprus. This river has been dammed by the Kouris Dam, which has caused the near drying up of the river in its lower reaches. Limassol, to the northeast of the Akrotiri peninsula lies on Akrotiri Bay, while Pissouri, to the northwest of the peninsula, Episkopi Bay is a nesting ground for green and loggerhead turtles, both of which are on the IUCN list of endangered species. Amathous Beach and the Dassoudi Beach are also situated in the district, Limassol, as the regional capital and a major centre for European tourism, contains many of the administrative and cultural buildings, and a large number of hotels along the seafront. Limassol District Court is located on Lord Byron Avenue near the Limassol city centre and it consists of a court complex with multiple buildings. The city is known for its wineries, and revelry and nightlife, the Limassol District Archaeological Museum, located in Limassol, has historical artefacts from the towns of Kourion and Amathus. The Painted Churches in the Troödos Region is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, researches in Cypriote History and Archaeology, Proceedings of the Meeting Held in Florence, April 29–30th 2009. Weiß, Waldemar, Sabo, Alexander, Peitz-Hlebec, Darja, Schwarz, croatie – Istrie et Dalmatie, un guide de voyage actualisé. Media related to Populated places in Limassol District at Wikimedia Commons
3.
Nicos Nicolaides (politician)
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Nicos Nicolaides is a Greek Cypriot politician. Since May 2011, he is a Member of Parliament in the House of Representatives of Cyprus, Nicolaides was born in Limassol in 1953. He studied electrical engineering at Dartmouth College and the University of Southern California, Nicolaides is married to Elena Ioannou and has two children and a grandson. He speaks English and French fluently, Nicolaides was Minister of Communications and Works in the Christofias cabinet between 2008 and 2010. Previously, he served as chairman of the board of the Licensing Authority, as president of the EDEK Limassol District committee and as a member of the EDEK political bureau and central committee. In parliament, Nicolaides served as a member of the Agriculture and Natural Resources, Communications and Works, Finance and Budget, Nicolaides was elected as the Mayor of Limassol in December 2016. He was supported by the ruling DISY, the Green party, Nicolaides won Limassol with 48, 31% of the vote only marginally ahead of two-term incumbent Andreas Christou on 48, 27%
4.
Movement for Social Democracy
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The Movement for Social Democracy is a Greek Cypriot nationalist and social-democratic political party in Cyprus. The party was founded by Vasos Lyssaridis in 1969 as the United Democratic Union of Centre, since the early 1980s, EDEK has evolved into a European-style social-democratic party. It has however not given up its nationalist orientations, the party changed its name to Movement for Social Democracy in 2000. EDEK is led by Marinos Sizopoulos and is a member of the Party of European Socialists, members were drawn from the committee for re-establishment of democracy in Greece, and fighters from Lyssaridiss group during the 1964 clashes between Greek and Turkish Cypriots. Lyssaridis was the physician of Archbishop Makarios III, the first president of independent Cyprus. The partys name was inspired by Greeks Centre Union of Georgios Papandreou and it positioned itself in the space inbetween. EDEK had links to the international Non-Aligned Movement and was opposed to the right-wing Colonels regime in Greece, many of the partys members were part of the armed resistance to the 15 July 1974 coup against Makarios. The leader of the section of the party, Doros Loizou, was shot. Several members of the youth section with Trotskyist tendencies were expelled between 1979 and 1984 and formed Aristeri Pteryga. During the late 1990s, EDEK negotiated with several minor parties and it merged with two small groups, the Renewal Movement and the Independent Personalities Group, in February 2000. This was marked by its change to Movement for Social Democracy. However, only two months after the merger, the members of the Renewal Movement left, citing a lack of trust vis-à-vis old EDEK members, therefore, basically the new KISOS was the old EDEK. In the 2001 general elections EDEK won 6. 5% of the votes cast and 4 of the 56 seats in the House of Representatives of Cyprus. EDEK was one of the most outspoken opponents of the Annan Plan for the reunification of Cyprus, which was voted on, and ultimately rejected by the Greek Cypriot community in the 2004 referendum. In the elections of 21 May 2006, the first since the referendum, the party increased its share to 8. 9%. EDEK backed Dimitris Christofias of the Progressive Party of Working People in the round of the February 2008 presidential election. On the proposal of EDEKs Political Bureau,109 members of its Central Committee voted in favor of supporting Christofias, five voted against, in February 2010 EDEK quit from the government coalition due to its dispute concerning the decisions of Dimitris Christofias in the Cyprus Problem. In the February 2013 presidential election, EDEK backed the independent candidate Yiorgos Lillikas, the former minister of foreign affairs in Tassos Papadopoulos cabinet
5.
Metropolitan area
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As social, economic and political institutions have changed, metropolitan areas have become key economic and political regions. The Greater São Paulo is a term for one of the multiple definitions the large metropolitan area located in the São Paulo state in Brazil. A metropolitan area combines an urban agglomeration with zones not necessarily urban in character and these outlying zones are sometimes known as a commuter belt, and may extend well beyond the urban zone, to other political entities. For example, El Monte, California is considered part of the Los Angeles metro area in the United States, in practice, the parameters of metropolitan areas, in both official and unofficial usage, are not consistent. Population figures given for one area can vary by millions. A polycentric metropolitan area is one not connected by continuous development or conurbation, in defining a metropolitan area, it is sufficient that a city or cities form a nucleus that other areas have a high degree of integration with. The Australian Bureau of Statistics defines statistical divisions as areas under the influence of one or more major towns or a major city. However, this definition has become obsolete with the conurbation of several statistical divisions into a larger metropolitan areas. In Brazil, metropolitan areas are called metropolitan regions, each State defines its own legislation for the creation, definition and organization of a metropolitan region. The creation of a region is not intended for any statistical purpose, although the Brazilian Institute of Geography. Their main purpose is to allow for a management of public policies of common interest to all cities involved. They dont have political, electoral or jurisdictional power whatsoever, so living in a metropolitan region do not elect representatives for them. Statistics Canada defines a metropolitan area as an area consisting of one or more adjacent municipalities situated around a major urban core. To form a CMA, the area must have a population of at least 100,000. To be included in the CMA, adjacent municipalities must have a degree of integration with the core. As of the Canada 2011 Census, there were 33 CMAs in Canada, including six with a population over one million—Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa, Calgary and Edmonton. In Denmark the only area is Greater Copenhagen, consisting of the Capital Region of Denmark along with the neighboring regions Region Zealand. Greater Copenhagen has an population of 1.25 million people
6.
Eastern European Time
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Eastern European Time is one of the names of UTC+02,00 time zone,2 hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time. The zone uses daylight saving time, so that it uses UTC+03,00 during the summer, a number of African countries use UTC+02,00 all year long, where it is called Central Africa Time, although Egypt and Libya also use the term Eastern European Time. The following countries, parts of countries, and territories use Eastern European Time all year round, Egypt, since 21 April 2015, used EEST from 1988–2010, Kaliningrad Oblast, since 26 October 2014, also used EET in years 1945 and 1991–2011. Libya, since 27 October 2013, switched from Central European Time, used year-round EET from 1980–1981, 1990–1996 and 1998–2012. Belarus, in years 1922–30 and 1990–2011 In Poland this time was used in years 1918–22, in time of World War II, Germany implemented MET in east occupied territories. Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol used EET as part of Ukraine in years 1991-94 and 1996-2014 Turkey, used EET in years 1910-1978, now uses year round DST timezone called Further-eastern European Time or Turkey Time. The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus also uses FET, sometimes, due to its use on Microsoft Windows, FLE Standard Time or GTB Standard Time are used to refer to Eastern European Time. Since political, in addition to geographical, criteria are used in the drawing of time zones. The EET time zone, were it drawn by purely geographical terms, the easternmost part of the Republic of Macedonia, including the city of Strumica. The absolutely easternmost part of Serbia, in the Pirot District, the easternmost town in Norway, Vardø, lies at 30°51 E, which is located east of even of the central meridian of UTC+2, i. e. east of Istanbul and Alexandria. The Norwegian-Russian border is the place where CET borders Moscow time. There is a point at the Norway-Finland-Russia tripoint, near the town of Rayakoski. Belarus is located between 23°11′E and 32°47′E and is fully located with the physical UTC+2 area, but it uses UTC+3 year around. This also includes the city of Anapa, at the westernmost tip of the Krasnodar Krai near the entrance to the Sea of Azov, the Norway–Russia–Finland tri-zone point at Muotkavaara is surrounded by three different times in winter, two in summer. It had three time zones year-around before 2014, two of the four tripoints of Belarus and the tripoint of the Kaliningrad Region are surrounded by three different times in winter
7.
Daylight saving time
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Daylight saving time is the practice of advancing clocks during summer months by one hour so that evening daylight lasts an hour longer, while sacrificing normal sunrise times. Typically, regions that use Daylight Savings Time adjust clocks forward one hour close to the start of spring, American inventor and politician Benjamin Franklin proposed a form of daylight time in 1784. New Zealander George Hudson proposed the idea of saving in 1895. The German Empire and Austria-Hungary organized the first nationwide implementation, starting on April 30,1916, many countries have used it at various times since then, particularly since the energy crisis of the 1970s. The practice has both advocates and critics, DST clock shifts sometimes complicate timekeeping and can disrupt travel, billing, record keeping, medical devices, heavy equipment, and sleep patterns. Computer software often adjusts clocks automatically, but policy changes by various jurisdictions of DST dates, industrialized societies generally follow a clock-based schedule for daily activities that do not change throughout the course of the year. The time of day that individuals begin and end work or school, North and south of the tropics daylight lasts longer in summer and shorter in winter, with the effect becoming greater as one moves away from the tropics. However, they will have one hour of daylight at the start of each day. Supporters have also argued that DST decreases energy consumption by reducing the need for lighting and heating, DST is also of little use for locations near the equator, because these regions see only a small variation in daylight in the course of the year. After ancient times, equal-length civil hours eventually supplanted unequal, so civil time no longer varies by season, unequal hours are still used in a few traditional settings, such as some monasteries of Mount Athos and all Jewish ceremonies. This 1784 satire proposed taxing window shutters, rationing candles, and waking the public by ringing church bells, despite common misconception, Franklin did not actually propose DST, 18th-century Europe did not even keep precise schedules. However, this changed as rail transport and communication networks came to require a standardization of time unknown in Franklins day. Modern DST was first proposed by the New Zealand entomologist George Hudson, whose shift work job gave him time to collect insects. An avid golfer, he also disliked cutting short his round at dusk and his solution was to advance the clock during the summer months, a proposal he published two years later. The proposal was taken up by the Liberal Member of Parliament Robert Pearce, a select committee was set up to examine the issue, but Pearces bill did not become law, and several other bills failed in the following years. Willett lobbied for the proposal in the UK until his death in 1915, william Sword Frost, mayor of Orillia, Ontario, introduced daylight saving time in the municipality during his tenure from 1911 to 1912. Starting on April 30,1916, the German Empire and its World War I ally Austria-Hungary were the first to use DST as a way to conserve coal during wartime, Britain, most of its allies, and many European neutrals soon followed suit. Russia and a few other countries waited until the year
8.
Eastern European Summer Time
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Eastern European Summer Time is one of the names of UTC+3 time zone,3 hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time. It is used as a daylight saving time in some European and Middle Eastern countries. During the winter periods, Eastern European Time is used, since 1996 European Summer Time has been observed from the last Sunday in March to the last Sunday in October, previously the rules were not uniform across the European Union. Syria, since 1983 Ukraine, Moscow Summer Time in years 1981–89, regular EEST from 1992 In one year 1991 EEST was used also in Moscow, egypt has previously used EEST from 1957–2010 and 2014–2015. Turkey, has previously used EEST from 1970-1978 EEST, Moscow Summer Time from 1979–1983, and EEST from 1985-2016
9.
Greek language
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Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece and other parts of the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any living language, spanning 34 centuries of written records and its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the major part of its history, other systems, such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, were used previously. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic and many other writing systems. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world, during antiquity, Greek was a widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world and many places beyond. It would eventually become the official parlance of the Byzantine Empire, the language is spoken by at least 13.2 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey, and the Greek diaspora. Greek roots are used to coin new words for other languages, Greek. Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around the 3rd millennium BC, the earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the worlds oldest recorded living language. Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now extinct Anatolian languages, the Greek language is conventionally divided into the following periods, Proto-Greek, the unrecorded but assumed last ancestor of all known varieties of Greek. The unity of Proto-Greek would have ended as Hellenic migrants entered the Greek peninsula sometime in the Neolithic era or the Bronze Age, Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Mycenaean civilisation. It is recorded in the Linear B script on tablets dating from the 15th century BC onwards, Ancient Greek, in its various dialects, the language of the Archaic and Classical periods of the ancient Greek civilisation. It was widely known throughout the Roman Empire, after the Roman conquest of Greece, an unofficial bilingualism of Greek and Latin was established in the city of Rome and Koine Greek became a first or second language in the Roman Empire. The origin of Christianity can also be traced through Koine Greek, Medieval Greek, also known as Byzantine Greek, the continuation of Koine Greek in Byzantine Greece, up to the demise of the Byzantine Empire in the 15th century. Much of the written Greek that was used as the language of the Byzantine Empire was an eclectic middle-ground variety based on the tradition of written Koine. Modern Greek, Stemming from Medieval Greek, Modern Greek usages can be traced in the Byzantine period and it is the language used by the modern Greeks, and, apart from Standard Modern Greek, there are several dialects of it. In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia, the historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of the Greek language is often emphasised. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than a foreign language and it is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, Homeric Greek is probably closer to demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English, Greek is spoken by about 13 million people, mainly in Greece, Albania and Cyprus, but also worldwide by the large Greek diaspora. Greek is the language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population
10.
Turkish language
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Outside of Turkey, significant smaller groups of speakers exist in Germany, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Northern Cyprus, Greece, the Caucasus, and other parts of Europe and Central Asia. Cyprus has requested that the European Union add Turkish as an official EU language, in 1928, as one of Atatürks Reforms in the early years of the Republic of Turkey, the Ottoman Turkish alphabet was replaced with a Latin alphabet. The distinctive characteristics of Turkish are vowel harmony and extensive agglutination, the basic word order of Turkish is subject–object–verb. Turkish has no classes or grammatical gender. Turkish has a strong T–V distinction and usage of honorifics, Turkish uses second-person pronouns that distinguish varying levels of politeness, social distance, age, courtesy or familiarity toward the addressee. The plural second-person pronoun and verb forms are used referring to a person out of respect. Turkic languages belong to the Altaic language group, the Turkic family comprises some 30 living languages spoken across Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and Siberia. Turkish is a member of the Oghuz group of languages, a subgroup of the Turkic language family, there is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between Turkish and the other Oghuz Turkic languages, including Azerbaijani, Turkmen, Qashqai, Gagauz, and Balkan Gagauz Turkish. The earliest known Old Turkic inscriptions are the three monumental Orkhon inscriptions found in modern Mongolia, erected in honour of the prince Kul Tigin and his brother Emperor Bilge Khagan, these date back to the second Turk Kaghanate. The Seljuqs of the Oghuz Turks, in particular, brought their language, following the adoption of Islam c. Turkish literature during the Ottoman period, particularly Divan poetry, was influenced by Persian, including the adoption of poetic meters. One of the tasks of the newly established association was to initiate a reform to replace loanwords of Arabic. By banning the usage of imported words in the press, the association succeeded in removing several hundred words from the language. While most of the words introduced to the language by the TDK were newly derived from Turkic roots, owing to this sudden change in the language, older and younger people in Turkey started to differ in their vocabularies. While the generations born before the 1940s tend to use the terms of Arabic or Persian origin. The past few decades have seen the work of the TDK to coin new Turkish words to express new concepts and technologies as they enter the language. Many of these new words, particularly information technology terms, have received widespread acceptance, however, the TDK is occasionally criticized for coining words which sound contrived and artificial. Some earlier changes—such as bölem to replace fırka, political party—also failed to meet with popular approval, some words restored from Old Turkic have taken on specialized meanings, for example betik is now used to mean script in computer science
11.
Nicosia
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Nicosia is the largest city on the island of Cyprus. It is located near the centre of the Mesaoria plain, on the banks of the River Pedieos, Nicosia is the capital and seat of government of the Republic of Cyprus, and as such is the farthest southeast of all EU member states capitals. It has been inhabited for over 4,500 years and has been the capital of Cyprus since the 10th century. The Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot communities of Nicosia segregated into the south and north of the city respectively in 1963, following the intercommunal violence that broke out in the city. Today, the part of the city is the capital of Northern Cyprus. Apart from its legislative and administrative functions, Nicosia has established itself as the financial capital. In 2012, Nicosia was the 5th richest city in the world in purchasing power. Nicosia has been in continuous habitation since the beginning of the Bronze Age 2500 years BC, Nicosia later became a city-state known as Ledra or Ledrae, one of the twelve kingdoms of ancient Cyprus built by Achaeans after the end of the Trojan War. Remains of old Ledra today can be found in the Ayia Paraskevi hill in the south east of the city and we only know about one king of Ledra, Onasagoras. The kingdom of Ledra was destroyed early, under Assyrian rule of Cyprus, Onasagoras was recorded as paying tribute to Esarhaddon of Assyria in 672 BC. By 330 BC, Ledra was recorded to be a small an unimportant town, according to tradition, the city was rebuilt by Leucus, claimed to be the son of Ptolemy I, around 300 BC or 200 BC, and named after him as Leucoton or Lefkotheon. The main activity of the inhabitants was farming. During this era, Ledra did not have the growth that the other Cypriot coastal towns had. In Byzantine times the town was referred to as Λευκωσία or as Καλληνίκησις. In the 4th century AD, the became the seat of bishopric, with bishop Saint Tryphillius. After the destruction of Salamis, the capital of Cyprus, by Arab raids in 647, Nicosia became the capital of the island around 965. The Byzantines moved the islands administration seat to Nicosia primarily for security reasons as coastal towns were often suffering from raids, from that point on it has remained as the capital of Cyprus. On his way to the Holy Land during the Third Crusade in 1187 and he himself stopped first at Crete and then at Rhodes
12.
TripAdvisor
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TripAdvisor, Inc. is an American travel website company providing reviews of travel-related content. It also includes interactive travel forums, TripAdvisor was an early adopter of user-generated content. The website services are free to users, who provide most of the content, and the website is supported by a business model. K. In February 2000, TripAdvisor was founded by Stephen Kaufer, Langley Steinert, Kaufer says the original idea wasnt a user generated social media site to swap reviews. Rather, We started as a site where we were focused more on those official words from guidebooks or newspapers or magazines and we also had a button in the very beginning that said, Visitors add your own review, and boy, did that just take off. Pretty soon the number of average consumer reviews far surpassed the number of professional reviews and that is when the site really turned into this collection of what the normal traveler was saying wherever they were going. Original financing was obtained from Flagship Ventures, the Bollard Group, in 2004, the company was purchased by IAC/InterActiveCorp. In August 2005, IAC spun off its travel group of businesses under the Expedia, in April 2009, TripAdvisor launched its official site in China, www. daodao. com. Since then it has indexed more than 20,000 hotels and restaurants information and customer reviews, in September 2010, SmarterTravel, part of TripAdvisor Media Group, launched SniqueAway, the first members-only site where each travel deal is endorsed by the people. In March 2011, TripAdvisor informed all registered TripAdvisor members that a third party had stolen some of TripAdvisors email list. No passwords or other information was stolen and this happened shortly before many other companies reported similar thefts of the addresses on their email lists. In April 2011, it was announced that Expedia would split into two publicly traded companies by spinning off the TripAdvisor brand of travel sites. According to Expedia CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, the allows the two businesses to be pure plays and to operate with the proper amount of focus to grow respectively. In December 2011, TripAdvisor was spun off from Expedia in a public offering, TripAdvisor states it is the world’s largest travel site, with nearly 280 million unique monthly visitors. In April 2012, the company launched a connection to Facebook that lets users select reviews from people in their social graph, in August 2014, a survey found that TripAdvisor was the most widely recognized, used, and trusted travel website. In October 2014, Trip Advisor released a new feature, Just for you, offering tailored hotel recommendations based on the users preferences and this feature mirrored the Tribes feature launched on competitor site Gogobot in 2013. In 2015, Tripadvisor started letting users not only places but tag them, saying, for example that a place offers brunch, is open on Sunday, or offers delivery, takeout. In May 2007 TripAdvisor acquired Smarter Travel Media operator of SmarterTravel. com and BookingBuddy. com, SeatGuru. com, TravelPod. com, and Travel-Library. com
13.
Mercer Quality of Living Survey
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The Mercer Quality of Living Survey ranks 221 cities from Vienna to Baghdad on quality of life. Countries with cities commonly ranked in the top 50 include Austria, Switzerland, New Zealand, Germany, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Netherlands, Australia, Sweden, Vienna has been ranked first for eight consecutive years. The quality of living survey is conducted to help governments and major companies place employees on international assignments, the survey also identifies those cities with the highest personal safety ranking based upon internal stability, crime, effectiveness of law enforcement and relationships with other countries. In this case, Luxembourg is top, followed by Bern, Helsinki and Zürich, the cities —230 in total — were evaluated on 39 factors including political, economic, environmental, personal safety, health, education, transportation and other public service factors. Cities were compared to New York City which was given a score of 100. Archived from the original on 28.11.2012,2011 Mercer Quality of Living Interactive World Map 2012 Quality of Living Worldwide Survey – city rankings Full rankings
14.
Global city
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A global city, also called world city or sometimes alpha city or world center, is a city generally considered to be an important node in the global economic system. The most complex of these entities is the city, whereby the linkages binding a city have a direct. Patrick Geddes also used the world city later in 1915. More recently, the term has been described as being synonymous with an influence and financial capital. Global city status is considered to be beneficial and desired, and because of this, many groups have tried to classify, although there is a consensus upon leading world cities, the criteria upon which a classification is made can affect which other cities are included. Smith and Peter J. Taylor established the Globalization and World Cities Research Network, the GaWC inventory identifies three levels of global cities and several sub-ranks. The 2004 rankings acknowledged several new indicators while continuing to rank city economics more heavily than political or cultural factors. The following is a list of the cities in the rankings, as they appear on the GaWC website, Alpha ++ cities are cities most integrated with the economy, London. Alpha + cities are advanced service niches for the economy, Hong Kong, Paris, Singapore, Shanghai, Tokyo, Beijing, Sydney. The Institute for Urban Strategies at The Mori Memorial Foundation in Tokyo issued a study of global cities in 2016. The ranking is based on six categories, Economy, Research & Development, Cultural Interaction, Livability, Environment. This Japanese ranking also breaks down top ten world cities ranked in subjective categories such as manager, researcher, artist, visitor, Global Power City top 10,1. Vienna In 2008, the American journal Foreign Policy, in conjunction with the Chicago-based consulting firm A. T, kearney and the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, published a ranking of global cities, based on consultation with Saskia Sassen, Witold Rybczynski, and others. Foreign Policy noted that the world’s biggest, most interconnected cities help set global agendas, weather transnational dangers and they are the engines of growth for their countries and the gateways to the resources of their regions. The Wealth Report is made by the London-based estate agent Knight Frank LLP together with the Citi Private Bank, the report includes a Global Cities Survey, evaluating which cities are considered the most important to the world’s HNWIs. In 2012, the Economist Intelligence Unit, ranked the competitiveness of cities according to their demonstrated ability to attract capital, businesses, talent. The State of the World’s Cities
15.
Byzantine Empire
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It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until it fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire was the most powerful economic, cultural, several signal events from the 4th to 6th centuries mark the period of transition during which the Roman Empires Greek East and Latin West divided. Constantine I reorganised the empire, made Constantinople the new capital, under Theodosius I, Christianity became the Empires official state religion and other religious practices were proscribed. Finally, under the reign of Heraclius, the Empires military, the borders of the Empire evolved significantly over its existence, as it went through several cycles of decline and recovery. During the reign of Maurice, the Empires eastern frontier was expanded, in a matter of years the Empire lost its richest provinces, Egypt and Syria, to the Arabs. This battle opened the way for the Turks to settle in Anatolia, the Empire recovered again during the Komnenian restoration, such that by the 12th century Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest European city. Despite the eventual recovery of Constantinople in 1261, the Byzantine Empire remained only one of several small states in the area for the final two centuries of its existence. Its remaining territories were annexed by the Ottomans over the 15th century. The Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 finally ended the Byzantine Empire, the term comes from Byzantium, the name of the city of Constantinople before it became Constantines capital. This older name of the city would rarely be used from this point onward except in historical or poetic contexts. The publication in 1648 of the Byzantine du Louvre, and in 1680 of Du Canges Historia Byzantina further popularised the use of Byzantine among French authors, however, it was not until the mid-19th century that the term came into general use in the Western world. The Byzantine Empire was known to its inhabitants as the Roman Empire, the Empire of the Romans, Romania, the Roman Republic, Graikia, and also as Rhōmais. The inhabitants called themselves Romaioi and Graikoi, and even as late as the 19th century Greeks typically referred to modern Greek as Romaika and Graikika. The authority of the Byzantine emperor as the legitimate Roman emperor was challenged by the coronation of Charlemagne as Imperator Augustus by Pope Leo III in the year 800. No such distinction existed in the Islamic and Slavic worlds, where the Empire was more seen as the continuation of the Roman Empire. In the Islamic world, the Roman Empire was known primarily as Rûm, the Roman army succeeded in conquering many territories covering the entire Mediterranean region and coastal regions in southwestern Europe and north Africa. These territories were home to different cultural groups, both urban populations and rural populations. The West also suffered heavily from the instability of the 3rd century AD
16.
Limassol Castle
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The medieval Limassol Castle is situated near the old harbour in the heart of the historical centre of the city of Limassol. The castle as it today is a structure rebuilt circa 1590 under the period of Ottoman rule. Archaeological investigation within the castle revealed that it was built over an Early Christian basilica, other finds beneath the Castle witness the existence of an important church, possibly the citys first cathedral. According to Etienne Lusignan, the castle was erected by Guy de Lusignan in 1193. The first official reference to the dates to 1228, during the involvement of Frederic II of Germany in the affairs of Cyprus. In 1538 the Ottomans captured Limassol and the castle, the Venetian governor of Cyprus, after recapturing the castle, decided to demolish it in order to avoid its possible seizure. This destruction was completed in 1567–68, after the Ottoman acquisition of Cyprus in 1576, the remains or parts of the remains of the castle were incorporated in the new Ottoman fort, completed in 1590, which was considerably strengthened. The underground chamber and the first floor were transformed into prison cells, according to tradition, this is where Richard the Lionheart married Berengaria of Navarre and crowned her Queen of England in 1191
17.
Mediterranean Sea
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The sea is sometimes considered a part of the Atlantic Ocean, although it is usually identified as a separate body of water. The name Mediterranean is derived from the Latin mediterraneus, meaning inland or in the middle of land and it covers an approximate area of 2.5 million km2, but its connection to the Atlantic is only 14 km wide. The Strait of Gibraltar is a strait that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Gibraltar. In oceanography, it is called the Eurafrican Mediterranean Sea or the European Mediterranean Sea to distinguish it from mediterranean seas elsewhere. The Mediterranean Sea has a depth of 1,500 m. The sea is bordered on the north by Europe, the east by Asia and it is located between latitudes 30° and 46° N and longitudes 6° W and 36° E. Its west-east length, from the Strait of Gibraltar to the Gulf of Iskenderun, the seas average north-south length, from Croatia’s southern shore to Libya, is approximately 800 km. The Mediterranean Sea, including the Sea of Marmara, has an area of approximately 2,510,000 square km. The sea was an important route for merchants and travelers of ancient times that allowed for trade, the history of the Mediterranean region is crucial to understanding the origins and development of many modern societies. In addition, the Gaza Strip and the British Overseas Territories of Gibraltar and Akrotiri, the term Mediterranean derives from the Latin word mediterraneus, meaning amid the earth or between land, as it is between the continents of Africa, Asia and Europe. The Ancient Greek name Mesogeios, is similarly from μέσο, between + γη, land, earth) and it can be compared with the Ancient Greek name Mesopotamia, meaning between rivers. The Mediterranean Sea has historically had several names, for example, the Carthaginians called it the Syrian Sea and latter Romans commonly called it Mare Nostrum, and occasionally Mare Internum. Another name was the Sea of the Philistines, from the people inhabiting a large portion of its shores near the Israelites, the sea is also called the Great Sea in the General Prologue by Geoffrey Chaucer. In Ottoman Turkish, it has also been called Bahr-i Sefid, in Modern Hebrew, it has been called HaYam HaTikhon, the Middle Sea, reflecting the Seas name in ancient Greek, Latin, and modern languages in both Europe and the Middle East. Similarly, in Modern Arabic, it is known as al-Baḥr al-Mutawassiṭ, in Turkish, it is known as Akdeniz, the White Sea since among Turks the white colour represents the west. Several ancient civilisations were located around the Mediterranean shores, and were influenced by their proximity to the sea. It provided routes for trade, colonisation, and war, as well as food for numerous communities throughout the ages, due to the shared climate, geology, and access to the sea, cultures centered on the Mediterranean tended to have some extent of intertwined culture and history. Two of the most notable Mediterranean civilisations in classical antiquity were the Greek city states, later, when Augustus founded the Roman Empire, the Romans referred to the Mediterranean as Mare Nostrum
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British Overseas Territories
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The 14 British Overseas Territories are territories under the jurisdiction and sovereignty of the United Kingdom. They are the parts of the British Empire that have not been granted independence or have voted to remain British territories. These territories do not form part of the United Kingdom and, with the exception of Gibraltar, are not part of the European Union, though the Cyprus SBAs are subject to EU law and use the Euro. Most of the territories are internally self-governing, with the UK retaining responsibility for defence. The rest are either uninhabited or have a population of military or scientific personnel. They share the British monarch as head of state, the term British Overseas Territory was introduced by the British Overseas Territories Act 2002, replacing the term British Dependent Territory, introduced by the British Nationality Act 1981. Prior to 1 January 1983, the territories were referred to as British Crown Colonies. With the exceptions of the British Antarctic Territory and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands and the British Indian Ocean Territory, the Territories retain permanent civilian populations. Permanent residency for the 7,000 or so living in the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri. Collectively, the Territories encompass a population of about 250,000 people, the vast majority of this,660,000 square miles, constitutes the British Antarctic Territory. The current minister responsible for the Territories excluding the Falkland Islands, Gibraltar and the Sovereign Base Areas is Baroness Anelay, Minister of State for the Commonwealth, the other three territories are the responsibility of Sir Alan Duncan MP, Minister of State for Europe and the Americas. The first, unofficial, colony was Newfoundland, where English fishermen routinely set up camps in the 16th century. It is now a province of Canada known as Newfoundland and Labrador and it retains strong cultural ties with Britain. English colonisation of North America began officially in 1607 with the settlement of Jamestown, st. Georges town, founded in Bermuda in that year, remains the oldest continuously inhabited British settlement in the New World. Bermuda and Bermudians have played important, sometimes pivotal, but generally underestimated or unacknowledged roles in the shaping of the English and British trans-Atlantic Empires. These include maritime commerce, settlement of the continent and of the West Indies, separate self-governing colonies federated to become Canada, Australia, South Africa, and Rhodesia. These and other large self-governing colonies had become known as Dominions by the 1920s, the Dominions achieved almost full independence with the Statute of Westminster. Through a process of following the Second World War, most of the British colonies in Africa, Asia
19.
Akrotiri and Dhekelia
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Akrotiri and Dhekelia, officially the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia, is a British Overseas Territory on the island of Cyprus. The territory is comprised of two Base Areas, one is Akrotiri, or the Western Sovereign Base Area, which includes two main bases at RAF Akrotiri and Episkopi, plus all of Akrotiri Villages district and parts of eleven other village districts. The other area is Dhekelia Cantonment, or the Eastern Sovereign Base Area, the Sovereign Base Areas were created in 1960 by the London and Zurich Agreements, when Cyprus achieved independence from the British Empire. The United Kingdom desired to retain sovereignty over these areas, as this guaranteed the use of UK military bases on Cyprus, including RAF Akrotiri, and this did not affect the status of the bases. The Turkish advance halted when it reached the edge of the Dhekelia Sovereign Base Area to avoid conflict with the United Kingdom. Some Greek Cypriot refugees remain housed on land in the parts of Trachoni, locals claimed the masts would endanger local lives and cause cancer, as well as have a negative impact on wildlife in the area. As of 2010, around 3,000 troops of British Forces Cyprus are based at Akrotiri, Ayios Nikolaos Station, in the ESBA, is an ELINT listening station of the UKUSA Agreement intelligence network. The election of left-wing Demetris Christofias as Cypriot president in February 2008 prompted concern in the United Kingdom, Christofias pledged to remove all foreign military forces from the island as part of a future settlement of the Cyprus dispute, calling the British presence on the island a colonial bloodstain. In some Cypriot media it was stated that the interdiction of the Syrian civil war, utilising Akrotiri and Dhekelia. The Labour government under whom the proposal appeared was replaced by the first Cameron ministry, the SBAs were retained in 1960 to keep military bases in areas under British sovereignty, along with the rights retained to use other sites in what became the territory of the Republic. Not to set up and administer colonies, not to create customs posts or other frontier barriers between the Sovereign Base Areas and the Republic. Not to establish commercial or civilian seaports or airports, not to allow new settlement of people in the Sovereign Base Areas other than for temporary purposes. Not to expropriate private property within the Sovereign Base Areas except for military purposes on payment of fair compensation, the ancient monuments and antiquity will be administered and maintained by the Republic of Cyprus. Licences for antiquity excavation will be issued by the Republic but will be subject to the consent of the authorities of the Sovereign Base Areas, movable antiquities found in excavations or discovered will be the property of the Republic. It has no connection with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office or the British High Commission in Nicosia. The territory is administered by an Administrator who is also the Commander of British Forces Cyprus, the Administrator is officially appointed by the British monarch on the advice of the Ministry of Defence. The Administrator has all the executive and legislative authority of a governor of an overseas territory, no elections are held in the territory, although British citizens are normally entitled to vote in United Kingdom elections. The areas have their own system, distinct from the United Kingdom
20.
Kourion
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Kourion or Latin, Curium, was an ancient city on the southwestern coast of Cyprus, the surrounding Kouris River Valley being occupied from at least the Ceramic Neolithic period to the present. The acropolis of Kourion, located 1.3 km southwest of Episkopi and 13 km west of Limassol, is located atop a limestone promontory nearly one hundred meters in height along the coast of Episkopi Bay. The Kourion archaeological area lies within the Akrotiri West Sovereign Base Area, the Kourion Archaeological Area, and all antiquities within the Akrotiri West Sovereign Base are managed by the Cyprus Department of Antiquity. Kourion is a listed UNESCO World Heritage Site, Kourion was an urban center of considerable importance within Cyprus, reaching the climax of its influence in the Roman and Late Roman periods. The city is mentioned by ancient authors including, Ptolemy, Stephanus of Byzantium, Hierocles. Though Kourion attained its highest prominence under the Romans, the Kouris River Valley has seen occupation from the Ceramic Neolithic period to the present village of Episkopi. Occupation on the acropolis appears to have been from the Late Classical period at latest until the Arab raids of the 7th century CE, the earliest occupation within the Kouris Valley is the hilltop settlement of Sotira-Teppes, located 9 km northwest of Kourion. This settlement dates to the Ceramic Neolithic period, another Ceramic Neolithic hilltop settlement has been excavated at Kandou-Koupovounos, another hilltop situated along the east bank of the Kouris River. In the Chalcolithic period settlement shifted to the site of Erimi-Pamboules, Erimi-Pamboules was occupied from the conclusion of the Ceramic Neolithic through the Chalcolithic period. Occupation of the Early Cypriot period is uninterrupted from the preceding Chalcolithic period, with occupation continuing along the Kouris River Valley, sotira-Kaminoudhia, located to the northwest of Sotira-Teppes, on the lower slope of the hill, was settled. It dates from the Late Chalcolithic to EC I, in the ECIII-LC IA a settlement was established 0.8 km east of Episkopi at Episkopi-Phaneromeni. The Middle Cypriot is a period in the Kouris River Valley. The settlements established during the MC flourished into urban centers in the Late Cypriot II-III, in the MCIII-LC IA a settlement was occupied at Episkopi-Phaneromeni. Episkopi-Bamboula, located on a low hill 0.4 km west of the Kouris, the town flourished in the 13th century BCE before being abandoned c.1050 BCE. In the Cypro-Geometric the Kingdom of Kourion was established, though the center remains unidentified. In the Cypro-Archaic period the Kingdom of Kourion was among the most influential kingdoms of Cyprus, in 672 Damasos, king of Kourion, is recorded as a tributary of Esarhaddon of Assyria as Damasu of Kuri. Between 569 and ca.546 BCE Cyprus was under Egyptian administration, in 546 BCE Cyrus I of Persia extended Persian authority over the Kingdoms of Cyprus, including the Kingdom of Kourion. During the Ionian Revolt, Stasanor, king of Kourion, aligned himself with Onesilos, king of Salamis, in 497 Stasanor betrayed Onesilos in battle against the Persian general Artybius, resulting in a Persian victory over the Cypriot poleis and the consolidation of Persian control of Cyprus
21.
Amathus
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Its ancient cult of Aphrodite was the most important, after Paphos, in Cyprus, her homeland, though the ruins of Amathus are less well-preserved than neighboring Kourion. The pre-history of Amathus mixes myth and archaeology, though there was no Bronze Age city on the site, archaeology has detected human activity that is evident from the earliest Iron Age, c.1100 BC. The citys legendary founder was Cinyras, linked with the birth of Adonis, according to a version of the Ariadne legend noted by Plutarch, Theseus abandoned Ariadne at Amathousa, where she died giving birth to her child and was buried in a sacred tomb. According to Plutarchs source, Amathousians called the grove where her shrine was situated the Wood of Aphrodite Ariadne. More purely Hellenic myth would have Amathus settled instead by one of the sons of Heracles and it was said in antiquity that the people of Amathus were autochthonous, or Pelasgian. Amathus was built on the cliffs with a natural harbor and flourished at an early date. Greeks from Euboea left their pottery at Amathus from the 10th century BC, during the post-Phoenician era of the 8th century BC, a palace was erected and a port was also constructed, which served the trade with the Greeks and the Levantines. A special burial ground for infants, a tophet served the culture of the Phoenicians, the excavators discovered the final stage of the Temple of Aphrodite, also known as Aphrodisias, which dates approximately to the 1st century BC. The earliest remains hitherto found on the site are tombs of the early Iron Age period of Graeco-Phoenician influences, Amathus is identified with Kartihadasti in the Cypriote tribute-list of Esarhaddon of Assyria. Herodotus reports Because he had besieged them, the Amathusians cut off Onesilos’ head and brought it to Amathous, as it hung there empty, a swarm of bees entered it and filled it with honeycomb. The Amathusians did as they were told and still perform these rites in my day and its political importance now ended, but its temple of Adonis and Aphrodite Amathusia remained famous in Roman times. The epithet Amathusia in Roman poetry often means more than Cypriote. The wealth of Amathus was derived partly from its grain partly from its sheep and copper mines, Amathus was a rich and densely populated kingdom with a flourishing agriculture and mines situated very close to the northeast Kalavasos. In the Roman era it became the capital of one of the four regions of Cyprus. Later, in the 4th century AD, Amasus became the see of a Christian bishop, of its bishops, Heliodorus was at the Council of Chalcedon in 451 and Alexander at the Second Council of Nicaea in 787. In the late 6th century, Saint Ioannis Eleimonas, protector of the Knights of St. John, was born in Amathus and after 614 sent Theodorus, bishop of Amathus, anastasius Sinaita, the famous 7th-century prolific monk of Saint Catherines Monastery, was born here. It is thought that he left Cyprus after the 649 Arab conquest of the island, setting out for the Holy Land, anathus declined and was already almost deserted when Richard Plantagenet won Cyprus by a victory there over Isaac Comnenus in 1191. The tombs were plundered and the stones from the beautiful edifices were brought to Limassol to be used for new constructions, much later, in 1869, a great number of blocks of stone from Amathus were used for the construction of the Suez Canal
22.
Ancient history
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Ancient history is the aggregate of past events from the beginning of recorded human history and extending as far as the Early Middle Ages or the Postclassical Era. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with Sumerian Cuneiform script, the term classical antiquity is often used to refer to history in the Old World from the beginning of recorded Greek history in 776 BC. This roughly coincides with the date of the founding of Rome in 753 BC, the beginning of the history of ancient Rome. In India, ancient history includes the period of the Middle Kingdoms, and, in China. Historians have two major avenues which they take to better understand the ancient world, archaeology and the study of source texts, primary sources are those sources closest to the origin of the information or idea under study. Primary sources have been distinguished from secondary sources, which cite, comment on. Archaeology is the excavation and study of artefacts in an effort to interpret, archaeologists excavate the ruins of ancient cities looking for clues as to how the people of the time period lived. The study of the ancient cities of Harappa, Mohenjo-daro, the city of Pompeii, an ancient Roman city preserved by the eruption of a volcano in AD79. Its state of preservation is so great that it is a window into Roman culture and provided insight into the cultures of the Etruscans. The Terracotta Army, the mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor in ancient China, the discovery of Knossos by Minos Kalokairinos and Sir Arthur Evans. The discovery of Troy by Heinrich Schliemann, most of what is known of the ancient world comes from the accounts of antiquitys own historians. Although it is important to take account the bias of each ancient author. Some of the more notable ancient writers include Herodotus, Thucydides, Arrian, Plutarch, Polybius, Sima Qian, Sallust, Livy, Josephus, Suetonius, furthermore, the reliability of the information obtained from these surviving records must be considered. Few people were capable of writing histories, as literacy was not widespread in almost any culture until long after the end of ancient history, the earliest known systematic historical thought emerged in ancient Greece, beginning with Herodotus of Halicarnassus. He was also the first to distinguish between cause and immediate origins of an event, the Roman Empire was one of the ancient worlds most literate cultures, but many works by its most widely read historians are lost. Indeed, only a minority of the work of any major Roman historian has survived, prehistory is the period before written history. The early human migrations in the Lower Paleolithic saw Homo erectus spread across Eurasia 1.8 million years ago, the controlled use of fire occurred 800,000 years ago in the Middle Paleolithic. 250,000 years ago, Homo sapiens emerged in Africa, 60–70,000 years ago, Homo sapiens migrated out of Africa along a coastal route to South and Southeast Asia and reached Australia
23.
Tigranes the Great
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Tigranes II, more commonly known as Tigranes the Great was King of Armenia under whom the country became, for a short time, the strongest state east of the Roman Republic. He was a member of the Artaxiad Royal House, Tigranes had been a hostage until the age of 45 at the court of King Mithridates II of Parthia after the Armenian defeat in 105 BC. Other sources give the date as much earlier, at around 112–111 BC, after the death of King Tigranes I in 95 BC, Tigranes bought his freedom, according to Strabo, by handing over seventy valleys in Atropatene to the Parthians. When he came to power, the foundation upon which Tigranes was to build his Empire was already in place, a legacy of the founder of the Artaxiad Dynasty, Artaxias I and this did not suit Tigranes, who wanted to create a centralist empire. He thus proceeded by consolidating his power within Armenia before embarking on his campaign and he deposed Artanes, the last king of Armenian Sophene and a descendant of Zariadres. During the First Mithridatic War, Tigranes supported Mithridates VI of Pontus and he rapidly built up his power and established an alliance with Mithridates VI, marrying his daughter Cleopatra. Tigranes agreed to extend his influence in the East, while Mithridates set to conquer Roman land in Asia Minor, by creating a stronger Hellenistic state, Mithridates was to contend with the well-established Roman foothold in Europe. The slaughter of 80,000 people in the province of Asia Minor was known as the Asiatic Vespers, the two kings attempts to control Cappadocia and then the massacres resulted in guaranteed Roman intervention. The senate decided that Lucius Cornelius Sulla, who was one of the consuls. Magadates was appointed as his governor in Antioch, the southern border of his domain reached as far as Ptolemais. Many of the inhabitants of conquered cities were sent to his new metropolis of Tigranocerta, at its height, his empire extended from the Pontic Alps to Mesopotamia, and from the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean. A series of victories led him to assume the Achaemenid title of King of Kings and he was called Tigranes the Great by many Western historians and writers, such as Plutarch. The King of Kings never appeared in public without having four kings attending him, cicero, referring to his success in the east, said that he made the Republic of Rome tremble before the prowess of his arms. Tigranes coin consist of tetradrachms and copper coins having on the obverse his portrait wearing a decorated Armenian tiara with ear-flaps, the reverse has a completely original design. There are the seated Tyche of Antioch and the river god Orontes at her feet, Mithridates had found refuge in Armenian land after confronting Rome, considering the fact that Tigranes was his ally and relative. The King of Kings eventually came into contact with Rome. The Roman commander, Lucullus, demanded the expulsion of Mithridates from Armenia – to comply with such a demand would be, in effect, to accept the status of vassal to Rome and this Tigranes refused. Charles Rollin, in his Ancient History, says, Lucullus reaction was an attack that was so precipitate that he took Tigranes by surprise, according to Roman historians Mithrobazanes, one of Tigranes generals, told Tigranes of the Roman approach
24.
Armenian language
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The Armenian language is an Indo-European language spoken by the Armenians. Like Hellenic Greek, it has its own branch in the language tree. It is the language of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh Republic. It has historically been spoken throughout the Armenian Highlands and today is spoken in the Armenian diaspora. Armenian has its own script, the Armenian alphabet, introduced in 405 AD by Mesrop Mashtots. Armenian is an independent branch of the Indo-European languages and it is of interest to linguists for its distinctive phonological developments within that family. Armenian exhibits more satemization than centumization, although it is not classified as belonging to either of these subgroups, Armenia was a monolingual country by the 2nd century BC at the latest. Its language has a literary history, with a 5th-century Bible translation as its oldest surviving text. Its vocabulary has been influenced by Western Middle Iranian languages, particularly Parthian, and to an extent by Greek, Persian. There are two standardized modern literary forms, Eastern Armenian and Western Armenian, with which most contemporary dialects are mutually intelligible and he is also credited by some with the creation of the Caucasian Albanian alphabet. In The Anabasis, Xenophon describes many aspects of Armenian village life and he relates that the Armenian people spoke a language that to his ear sounded like the language of the Persians. W. M. However, unlike shared innovations, the retention of archaisms is not considered conclusive evidence of a period of common isolated development. Some of the terms he gives admittedly have an Akkadian or Sumerian provenance, loan words from Iranian languages, along with the other ancient accounts such as that of Xenophon above, initially led linguists to erroneously classify Armenian as an Iranian language. Scholars such as Paul de Lagarde and F. Müller believed that the similarities between the two meant that Iranian and Armenian were the same language. The distinctness of Armenian was recognized when philologist Heinrich Hübschmann used the method to distinguish two layers of Iranian loans from the older Armenian vocabulary. Meillets hypothesis became popular in the wake of his Esquisse, eric P. Hamp supports the Graeco-Armenian thesis, anticipating even a time when we should speak of Helleno-Armenian. Nevertheless, as Fortson comments, by the time we reach our earliest Armenian records in the 5th century AD, graeco--Aryan is a hypothetical clade within the Indo-European family, ancestral to the Greek language, the Armenian language, and the Indo-Iranian languages. Graeco-Aryan unity would have divided into Proto-Greek and Proto-Indo-Iranian by the mid-third millennium BC
25.
Council of Chalcedon
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The Council of Chalcedon was a church council held from October 8 to November 1, AD451, at Chalcedon. The Council is numbered as the ecumenical council by the Great Church. A minority of Christians do not agree with the councils teachings and its most important achievement was to issue the Chalcedonian Definition. The Councils judgments and definitions regarding the divine marked a significant turning point in the Christological debates, Chalcedon was a city in Bithynia, on the Asian side of the Bosphorus, today the city it is part of the Republic of Turkey and is known as Kadıköy. The Council of Chalcedon issued the Chalcedonian Definition, which repudiated the notion of a nature in Christ. It also insisted on the completeness of his two natures, Godhead and manhood, the council also issued 27 disciplinary canons governing church administration and authority. In a further decree, later known as canon 28, the bishops declared that the See of Constantinople was, in honour, the teachings of the Council are accepted by the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Catholic Church, Old Catholics and various other Western Christian groups. As such, it is recognized as infallible in its dogmatic definitions by the Catholic, most Protestants also agree that the teachings regarding the Trinity and the Incarnation, as defined at Nicaea and Chalcedon, are orthodox doctrine to which they adhere. However, the Council is not accepted by the ancient Oriental Orthodox branch of the Church and this includes the Coptic, Ethiopian, Eritrean, Syriac, Malankara Syrian and Armenian Apostolic churches. They instead teach that The Lord Jesus Christ is God the Incarnate Word and he possesses the perfect Godhead and the perfect manhood. Nevertheless, the Oriental Orthodox churches refuse to accept the decrees of the Council regarding monophysitism, many Anglicans and most Protestants consider it to be the last authoritative ecumenical council. In 325, the first ecumenical council determined that Jesus Christ was God, consubstantial with the Father and this was reaffirmed at the First Council of Constantinople and the Council of Ephesus. After the Council of Ephesus had condemned Nestorianism, there remained a conflict between Patriarchs John of Antioch and Cyril of Alexandria, Cyril claimed that John remained Nestorian in outlook, while John claimed that Cyril held to the Apollinarian heresy. The two settled their differences under the mediation of the Bishop of Beroea, Acacius, on April 12,433, in the following year, Theodoret of Cyrrhus assented to this formula as well. He agreed to anathematize Nestorius as a heretic in 451, during the Council of Chalcedon and he claimed to be a faithful follower of Cyrils teaching, which was declared orthodox in the Union of 433. Cyril had taught that There is only one physis, since it is the Incarnation, Cyril had apparently understood the Greek word physis to mean approximately what the Latin word persona means, while most Greek theologians would have interpreted that word to mean natura. Thus, many understood Eutyches to be advocating Docetism, a sort of reversal of Arianism—where Arius had denied the divinity of Jesus. Cyrils orthodoxy was not called into question, since the Union of 433 had explicitly spoken of two physeis in this context, Leo I wrote that Eutyches error seemed to be more from a lack of skill on the matters than from malice
26.
Third Crusade
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The Third Crusade, also known as The Kings Crusade, was an attempt by European leaders to reconquer the Holy Land from Saladin. After the failure of the Second Crusade, the Zengid dynasty controlled a unified Syria, the Egyptian and Syrian forces were ultimately unified under Saladin, who employed them to reduce the Christian states and recapture Jerusalem in 1187. Spurred by religious zeal, King Henry II of England and King Philip II of France ended their conflict with other to lead a new crusade. The death of Henry in 1189, however, meant the English contingent came under the command of his successor and his death caused tremendous grief among the German Crusaders, and most of his troops returned home. After the Crusaders had driven the Muslims from Acre, Philip in company with Fredericks successor, Leopold V, Duke of Austria, on 2 September 1192, Richard and Saladin finalized a treaty granting Muslim control over Jerusalem but allowing unarmed Christian pilgrims and merchants to visit the city. Richard departed the Holy Land on 2 October, the successes of the Third Crusade allowed the Crusaders to maintain considerable states in Cyprus and on the Syrian coast. However, the failure to recapture Jerusalem would lead to the Fourth Crusade, after the failure of the Second Crusade, Nur ad-Din Zangi had control of Damascus and a unified Syria. Eager to expand his power, Nur ad-Din set his sights on the Fatimid dynasty of Egypt, in 1163, Nur ad-Din sent his most trusted general, Shirkuh, on a military expedition to the Nile. Accompanying the general was his nephew, Saladin. With Shirkuhs troops camped outside of Cairo, Egypts sultan Shawar called on King Amalric I of Jerusalem for assistance, in response, Amalric sent an army into Egypt and attacked Shirkuhs troops at Bilbeis in 1164. Nur ad-Din sent the scalps of the Christian defenders to Egypt for Shirkuh to proudly display at Bilbeis for Amalrics soldiers to see and this action prompted both Amalric and Shirkuh to lead their armies out of Egypt. In 1167, Nur ad-Din again sent Shirkuh to conquer the Fatimids in Egypt, Shawar again opted to call upon Amalric to defend his territory. The combined Egyptian-Christian forces pursued Shirkuh until he retreated to Alexandria, Amalric then breached his alliance with Shawar by turning his forces on Egypt and besieging the city of Bilbeis. Shawar pleaded with his enemy, Nur ad-Din, to save him from Amalrics treachery. Lacking the resources to maintain a siege of Cairo against the combined forces of Nur ad-Din and Shawar. This new alliance gave Nur ad-Din rule over all of Syria. Shawar was executed for his alliances with the Christian forces, in 1169, Shirkuh died unexpectedly after only weeks of rule. Shirkuhs successor was his nephew, Salah ad-Din Yusuf, commonly known as Saladin, Nur ad-Din died in 1174, leaving the new empire to his 11-year-old son, As-Salih
27.
Richard I of England
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Richard I was King of England from 6 July 1189 until his death. He also ruled as Duke of Normandy, Aquitaine and Gascony, Lord of Cyprus, Count of Poitiers, Anjou, Maine, and Nantes and he was the third of five sons of King Henry II of England and Duchess Eleanor of Aquitaine. He was known as Richard Cœur de Lion or Richard the Lionheart because of his reputation as a military leader. He was also known in Occitan as Oc e No, because of his reputation for terseness, by the age of 16, Richard had taken command of his own army, putting down rebellions in Poitou against his father. Richard spoke both French and Occitan and he was born in England, where he spent his childhood, before becoming king, however, he lived most of his adult life in the Duchy of Aquitaine, in the southwest of France. Following his accession, he spent very little time, perhaps as little as six months, most of his life as king was spent on Crusade, in captivity, or actively defending his lands in France. Rather than regarding his kingdom as a responsibility requiring his presence as ruler, nevertheless, he was seen as a pious hero by his subjects. He remains one of the few kings of England remembered by his epithet, rather than regnal number, Richard was born on 8 September 1157, probably at Beaumont Palace, in Oxford, England, son of King Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. He was a brother of Count William IX of Poitiers, Henry the Young King. As the third son of King Henry II, he was not expected to ascend the throne. He was also a brother of Duke Geoffrey II of Brittany, Queen Eleanor of Castile, Queen Joan of Sicily, and Count John of Mortain. Richard was the younger maternal half-brother of Countess Marie of Champagne, the eldest son of Henry II and Eleanor, William, died in 1156, before Richards birth. Richard is often depicted as having been the son of his mother. His father was Angevin-Norman and great-grandson of William the Conqueror, contemporary historian Ralph of Diceto traced his familys lineage through Matilda of Scotland to the Anglo-Saxon kings of England and Alfred the Great, and from there linked them to Noah and Woden. According to Angevin legend, there was even infernal blood in the family, while his father visited his lands from Scotland to France, Richard probably spent his childhood in England. His first recorded visit to the European continent was in May 1165 and his wet nurse was Hodierna of St Albans, whom he gave a generous pension after he became king. Little is known about Richards education, during his captivity, English prejudice against foreigners was used in a calculated way by his brother John to help destroy the authority of Richards chancellor, William Longchamp, who was a Norman. One of the charges laid against Longchamp, by Johns supporter Hugh
28.
Holy Land
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The Holy Land is an area roughly located between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea that also includes the Eastern Bank of the Jordan River. Traditionally, it is synonymous with both the biblical Land of Israel and historical Palestine, the term usually refers to a territory roughly corresponding to the modern State of Israel, the Palestinian territories, western Jordan, and parts of southern Lebanon and southwestern Syria. It is considered holy by Jews, Christians, and Muslims, many sites in the Holy Land have long been pilgrimage destinations for adherents of the Abrahamic religions, including Jews, Christians, Muslims, and Baháís. Pilgrims visit the Holy Land to touch and see physical manifestations of their faith, confirm their beliefs in the context with collective excitation. Jews do not commonly refer to the Land of Israel as Holy Land, the Tanakh explicitly refers to it as holy land in only one passage, in Zechariah 2,16. The holiness of the Land of Israel is generally implied in the Tanakh by the Land being given to the Israelites by God, that is, it is the promised land, an integral part of Gods covenant. In the Torah many mitzvot commanded to the Israelites can only be performed in the Land of Israel, for example, in the Land of Israel, no land shall be sold permanently. Shmita is only observed with respect to the land of Israel, according to Eliezer Schweid, The uniqueness of the Land of Israel is. geo-theological and not merely climatic. This is the land which faces the entrance of the spiritual world, Jerusalem, as the site of the Temple, is considered especially significant. Sacred burials are still undertaken for diaspora Jews who wish to lie buried in the soil of Israel. According to Jewish tradition, Jerusalem is Mount Moriah, the location of the binding of Isaac, the Hebrew Bible mentions the name Jerusalem 669 times, often because many mitzvot can only be performed within its environs. The name Zion, which refers to Jerusalem, but sometimes the Land of Israel. The Talmud mentions the religious duty of colonising Israel, so significant in Judaism is the act of purchasing land in Israel, the Talmud allows for the lifting of certain religious restrictions of Sabbath observance to further its acquisition and settlement. Rabbi Johanan said that one who walks a distance of 4 cubits in Israel may be confident of a share in the future world, a story says that when R. Eleazar b. Due to the Jewish population being concentrated in Israel, emigration was generally prevented, many Jews wanted Israel to be the place where they died. R. Anan said, To be buried in Israel is like being buried under the altar, the saying His land will absolve His people implies that burial in Israel will cause one to be absolved of all ones sins. Christian books, including editions of the Bible, often had maps of the Holy Land, for instance, the Itinerarium Sacrae Scripturae of Heinrich Bünting, a German Protestant pastor, featured such a map. As a geographic term, the description Holy Land loosely encompasses modern-day Israel, in the Quran, the term الأرض المقدسة is mentioned at least seven times, once when Moses proclaims to the Children of Israel, O my people
29.
Berengaria of Navarre
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Berengaria of Navarre was Queen of England as the wife of Richard I of England. She was the eldest daughter of Sancho VI of Navarre and Sancha of Castile, as is the case with many of the medieval English queens, relatively little is known of her life. In 1185, Berengaria was given the fief of Monreal by her father, Eleanor of Aquitaine promoted the engagement of Berengaria to her son, Richard the Lionheart. Also, Navarre had assimilated the culture of Aquitaine and Berengarias reputation was unbesmirched. It seems that Berengaria and Richard did in fact meet once, years before their marriage, in 1190, Eleanor met Sancho in Pamplona and he hosted a banquet in the Royal Palace of Olite in her honour. The betrothal could not be celebrated openly, for Richard had been betrothed for many years to Alys, Richard terminated his betrothal to Alys in 1190 while at Messina. Richard had Berengaria brought to him by his mother Eleanor of Aquitaine, since Richard was already on the Third Crusade, having wasted no time in setting off after his coronation, the two women had a long and difficult journey to catch up with him. They arrived at Messina in Sicily during Lent in 1191 and were joined by Richards sister Joan, the two women became good friends and Berengaria was left in Joans custody. En route to the Holy Land, the ship carrying Berengaria and Joan ran aground off the coast of Cyprus, Richard came to their rescue, captured the island, and overthrew Comnenus. Whether the marriage was ever even consummated is a matter for conjecture, in any case, Richard certainly took his new wife with him for the first part of the Third Crusade. Berengaria returned well before Richard left the Holy Land, on his return to Europe he was captured and imprisoned, Berengaria remained in Europe, based at Beaufort-en-Vallée, attempting to raise money for his ransom. After his release, Richard returned to England and was not joined by his wife, when Richard returned to England, he had to regain all the territory that had either been lost by his brother John or taken by King Philip of France. His focus was on his kingdom, not his queen, Richard was ordered by Pope Celestine III to reunite with Berengaria and to show fidelity to her in the future. Richard, now mostly spending his time in France, obeyed, when he died in 1199, she was greatly distressed, perhaps more so at being deliberately overlooked as Queen of England and Cyprus. Some historians believe that Berengaria honestly loved her husband, while Richards feelings for her were merely formal, Berengaria never visited England during King Richards lifetime, during the entirety of their marriage, Richard spent less than six months in England. There is evidence, however, that she may have done so in the following his death. The traditional description of her as the only English queen never to set foot in the country would still be literally true, as she did not visit England during the time she was Richards consort. She certainly sent envoys to England several times, mainly to inquire about the pension she was due as dowager queen and Richards widow, which King John failed to pay
30.
Joan of England, Queen of Sicily
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Joan of England was a queen consort of Sicily and countess consort of Toulouse. She was the child of Henry II, King of England and his queen consort. Joan was born at Château dAngers in Anjou, and spent her youth at her mothers courts at Winchester, in 1176, William II of Sicily sent ambassadors to the English court to ask for Joans hand in marriage. The betrothal was confirmed on 20 May and on 27 August Joan set sail for Sicily, escorted by John of Oxford, the bishop of Norwich and her uncle, Hamelin de Warenne, Earl of Surrey. In Saint Gilles, her entourage was met by representatives of the Kingdom of Sicily, Alfano, Archbishop of Capua, and Richard Palmer, Bishop of Syracuse. After a hazardous voyage, Joan arrived safely, and on 13 February 1177, Joan produced no surviving heir, although there were rumours that she had given birth to a boy called Bohemond. Finally, her brother Richard I, King of England arrived in Italy in 1190 and he demanded her return, along with every penny of her dowry. When Tancred balked at these demands, Richard seized a monastery and he decided to spend the winter in Italy and attacked and subdued the city of Messina, Sicily. Finally, Tancred agreed to the terms and sent Joans dowry, in March 1191 Eleanor of Aquitaine arrived in Messina with Richards bride, Berengaria of Navarre. Eleanor returned to England, leaving Berengaria in Joans care, Richard decided to postpone his wedding, put his sister and bride on a ship, and set sail. Two days later the fleet was hit by a storm, destroying several ships and blowing Joan. Richard landed safely in Crete, but they were stranded near Cyprus, the self-appointed despot of Cyprus, Isaac Comnenus was about to capture them when Richards fleet suddenly appeared. The princesses were saved, but the despot made off with Richards treasure, Richard pursued and captured Isaac, threw him into a dungeon, married Berengaria on 12 May 1191 at Limasol, Cyprus and then sent Joan and Berengaria on to Acre. Joan was Richards favourite sister, but he was not above using her as a chip in his political schemes. He even suggested marrying her to Saladins brother, Al-Adil, King Philip II of France also expressed some interest in marrying her, but this scheme, too, failed. Joan was married in October 1196, at Rouen, as his wife, to Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse, with Quercy. She was the mother of his successor Raymond VII of Toulouse, and a daughter, Joan and she therefore took arms against the lords of Saint-Felix, and laid siege to a castrum belonging to them known as Les Cassés. Her efforts were of little avail, some of those with her treacherously and secretly provided arms, greatly aggrieved, she abandoned the siege, and was almost prevented from leaving her camp by a fire started by the traitors
31.
Isaac Komnenos of Cyprus
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Isaac Komnenos or Comnenus, ruled Cyprus from 1184 to 1191, before Richard the Lionheart, King of England conquered the island during the Third Crusade. Isaac nevertheless served amiably as sebastokrator, and his first wife Theodora Kamaterina bore him a daughter, Eirene Komnene, Eirene Komnene married an unnamed Doukas Kamateros and gave birth to Isaac Komnenos, a minor member of the Komnenos family, circa 1155. One should not confuse Isaac with the Byzantine emperor Isaac I Komnenos, Byzantine historian Niketas Choniates provides most of the following account of his life. He was the son of an unnamed Doukas Kamateros who married Eirene Komnene, Isaac Komnenos married an Armenian princess on Cyprus. Emperor Manuel I Komnenos made Isaac governor of Isauria and the town of Tarsus, as Emperor Manuel died in 1180, seemingly nobody greatly cared about the fate of Isaac, whose long imprisonment seemingly failed to improve his general disposition. On account of his Armenian royal wife, he perhaps endured not too harsh terms of captivity, finally his aunt Theodora Komnene, queen consort of Jerusalem, during an affair with the new Byzantine emperor Andronikos I Komnenos, convinced the Emperor to contribute to his ransom. Constantine Makrodoukas, a supporter of the emperor and uncle of Isaac and Andronikos Doukas, a relative, childhood friend, sodomite. These two relatives personally stood surety for the fealty of Isaac Komnenos to the Byzantine emperor, the Knights Templar, whom Niketas Choniates labels the Phreri, strangely enough contributed as well. The Armenians in 1185 released Isaac, clearly tired of the imperial service and he used the rest of the money to hire a troop of mercenaries and sailed to Cyprus. He presented falsified imperial letters that ordered the administration to obey him in everything. When court officials led the prisoners from prison to face the charges, Hagiochristophorites started to stone them, stones impaled both prisoners at the front of the palace of Mangana on 30 May 1185. Meanwhile, Isaac took many other Romans into his service and he created an independent patriarch of Cyprus, who crowned him as emperor in 1185. After a popular uprising at Constantinople led to the death of the Byzantine emperor on 12 September 1185 and he raised a fleet of 70 ships to take back Cyprus. The fleet was under the command of John Kontostephanos and Alexios Komnenos, Andronikos I Komnenos ordered Alexios blinded, neither he nor quite old John seemingly fit the role particularly well. The fleet landed in Cyprus, but after the left the ships, Margaritus of Brindisi. Only much later did return home, if they had not perished altogether. From the time of his coronation, Isaac quickly started to plunder Cyprus, raping women, defiling virgins, imposing overly cruel punishments for crimes, and stealing the possessions of the citizens. Cypriots of high esteem, comparable to Job in riches now were seen begging in the streets, naked and hungry, furthermore, he despicably ordered the foot of Basil Pentakenos, his old teacher, hacked and amputated
32.
Anglo-Normans
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The Anglo-Normans were the medieval ruling class in England, composed mainly of a combination of ethnic Anglo-Saxons and Normans, following the Norman conquest. A small number of Normans had earlier befriended future Anglo-Saxon King of England, Edward the Confessor, when he returned to England some of them went with him, and so there were Normans already settled in England prior to the conquest. Following the death of Edward, the powerful Anglo-Saxon noble, Harold Godwinson, acceded to the English throne until his defeat by William, the invading Normans formed a ruling class in Britain, distinct from the native populations. Over time their language evolved from the continental Old Norman to the distinct Anglo-Norman language, Anglo-Normans quickly established control over all of England, as well as parts of Wales. After 1130, parts of southern and eastern Scotland came under Anglo-Norman rule, the Norman conquest of Ireland in 1169 saw Anglo-Normans settle vast swaths of Ireland, becoming the Hiberno-Normans. The composite expression regno Norman-Anglorum for the Anglo-Norman kingdom that comprises Normandy, the English were Catholic and shared this religion with the Normans and they had already an influence in England, before the conquest. Furthermore, the relationships between the sailors from both sides of the English channel had maintained a common culture. The Normans were not a homogeneous group springing from Scandinavian stock, in terms of culture, they represented the Northern French civilisation, who mostly only spoke Langues doïl as languages. The Norman settlers felt no community with the earlier Danish settlers, however, in their own army, they did not even feel any sense of community with the Poitou, the Bretons, and other groups that had different dialects and traditions. The association between these different troops was only occasional and corresponds to a necessity for the Norman ruler. In fact, the Normans met with the steadiest resistance in a part of England that was the most influenced by the Danish, many of the English nobles lost lands and titles, the lesser thegns and others found themselves dispossessed of lands and titles. A number of free geburs had their rights and court access much decreased, becoming unfree villeins, at the same time, many of the new Anglo-Norman magnates were distributed lands by the King that had been taken from the English nobles. The Norman conquest of England brought the British Isles into the orbit of the European continent, especially what remained of Roman-influenced language and it transmitted itself in the emerging feudal world that took its place. The England that emerged from the Conquest was a different place. The Norman conquest of England also signalled a revolution in military styles, the old Anglo-Saxon military elite began to emigrate, especially the generation next younger to that defeated at Hastings, who had no particular future in a country controlled by the conquerors. William, encouraged them to leave, as a security measure, the first to leave went mostly to Denmark and many of these moved on to join the Varangian Guard in Constantinople. Although the Anglo-Saxons as a whole were not demilitarised, this would have been impractical, instead, William arranged for the Saxon infantry to be trained up by Norman cavalry in anti-cavalry tactics. The younger Norman aristocracy showed a tendency towards Anglicisation, adopting such Saxon styles as long hair and moustaches, (Note that the Anglo-Saxon cniht did not take the sense of the French chevalier before the latest period of Middle English
33.
Bezant
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Bezant is a medieval term for a gold coin. Medievally originally it meant the gold produced by the government of the Byzantine Empire. The word was derived from the Greek Byzantion, later in the medieval era among the Latins the scope of the word was expanded to gold coins produced by Arabic governments. Gold coins were minted in early medieval Western Europe, up until the later 13th century, silver. Gold coins were almost continually produced by the Byzantines and medieval Arabs and these circulated in Western European trade in smallish numbers, originating from the coinage mints of the Eastern Mediterranean. In Western Europe, the coins of Byzantine currency were highly prized. These gold coins were commonly called bezants, the first bezants were the Byzantine solidi coins, later the name was applied to the hyperpyra, which replaced the solidi in Constantinople in the late 11th century. The name hyperpyron was used by the late medieval Greeks, while the name bezant was used by the late medieval Latin merchants for the same coin, the Italians also used the name perpero or pipero for the same coin. Medievally from the 12th century onward, the Western European term bezant also meant the gold coins minted by Islamic governments. The Islamic coins were modelled on the Byzantine solidus during the early years after the onset of Islam. The term bezant was used in the late medieval Republic of Venice to refer to the Egyptian gold dinar, marco Polo used the term bezant in the account of his travels to East Asia when describing the currencies of the Yuan Empire around the year 1300. His descriptions were based on the conversion of 1 bezant =20 groats = 133⅓ tornesel, although usually the medieval bezant was a gold coin, medieval Latin texts have also silver coin bezants. The silver bezants were often called white bezants, occasionally in Latin they were called miliaresion bezants | miliarense bezants. In heraldry, a roundel of a colour is referred to as a bezant. During the Fourth Crusade the city of Constantinople, was sacked by Western forces, during this sacking of the richest city of Europe, the gold bezant would have been very much in evidence, many of the knights no doubt having helped themselves very liberally to the booty. This event took place at the dawn of the widespread adoption of arms by the knightly class. When arms are strewn with bezants, the term bezantée or bezanty is used
34.
Knights Templar
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The order was founded in 1119 and active from about 1129 to 1312. The order, which was among the wealthiest and most powerful, became a favoured charity throughout Christendom and grew rapidly in membership and they were prominent in Christian finance. Templar knights, in their distinctive white mantles with a red cross, were among the most skilled fighting units of the Crusades, the Templars were closely tied to the Crusades, when the Holy Land was lost, support for the order faded. Rumours about the Templars secret initiation ceremony created distrust, and King Philip IV of France – deeply in debt to the order – took advantage of the situation to control over them. In 1307, he had many of the members in France arrested, tortured into giving false confessions. Pope Clement V disbanded the order in 1312 under pressure from King Philip, the abrupt reduction in power of a significant group in European society gave rise to speculation, legend, and legacy through the ages. The re-use of their name for later organizations has kept the name Templar alive to the modern day, after Europeans in the First Crusade recovered Jerusalem in 1099, many Christians made pilgrimages to various sacred sites in the Holy Land. Although the city of Jerusalem was under relatively secure Christian control, in 1119, the French knight Hugues de Payens approached King Baldwin II of Jerusalem and Warmund, Patriarch of Jerusalem, and proposed creating a monastic order for the protection of these pilgrims. The Temple Mount had a mystique because it was above what was believed to be the ruins of the Temple of Solomon. The Crusaders therefore referred to the Al-Aqsa Mosque as Solomons Temple, and from this location the new order took the name of Poor Knights of Christ and the Temple of Solomon, or Templar knights. The order, with about nine knights including Godfrey de Saint-Omer and André de Montbard, had few financial resources and their emblem was of two knights riding on a single horse, emphasising the orders poverty. The impoverished status of the Templars did not last long, another major benefit came in 1139, when Pope Innocent IIs papal bull Omne Datum Optimum exempted the order from obedience to local laws. This ruling meant that the Templars could pass freely through all borders, were not required to pay any taxes, with its clear mission and ample resources, the order grew rapidly. One of their most famous victories was in 1177 during the Battle of Montgisard, although the primary mission of the order was military, relatively few members were combatants. The others acted in support positions to assist the knights and to manage the financial infrastructure, the Templar Order, though its members were sworn to individual poverty, was given control of wealth beyond direct donations. A nobleman who was interested in participating in the Crusades might place all his assets under Templar management while he was away, based on this mix of donations and business dealing, the Templars established financial networks across the whole of Christendom. The Order of the Knights Templar arguably qualifies as the worlds first multinational corporation, in the mid-12th century, the tide began to turn in the Crusades. The Muslim world had become united under effective leaders such as Saladin, and dissension arose amongst Christian factions in, and concerning
35.
Church of the Holy Sepulchre
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The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is a church in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, a few steps away from the Muristan. The tomb is enclosed by the 18th-century shrine, called the Aedicule, within the church proper are the last four Stations of the Via Dolorosa, representing the final episodes of Jesus Passion. The main denominations sharing property over parts of the church are the Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox and Roman Catholic, and to a lesser degree the Egyptian Copts, Syriacs and Ethiopians. According to Eusebius of Caesarea, the Roman emperor Hadrian in the 2nd century AD built a dedicated to the goddess Venus in order to bury the cave in which Jesus had been buried. The first Christian emperor, Constantine the Great, ordered in about 325/326 that the temple be replaced by a church, during the building of the Church, Constantines mother, Helena, is believed to have rediscovered the tomb. Socrates Scholasticus, in his Ecclesiastical History, gives a description of the discovery. The remains are enveloped by a marble sheath placed some 500 years before to protect the ledge from Ottoman attacks. However, there are several thick window wells extending through the marble sheath and they appear to reveal an underlying limestone rock, which may be part of the original living rock of the tomb. The church was starting in 325/326, and was consecrated on 13 September 335. From pilgrim reports it seems that the housing the tomb of Jesus was freestanding at first. Each year, the Eastern Orthodox Church celebrates the anniversary of the consecration of the Church of the Resurrection on 13 September and this building was damaged by fire in May of 614 when the Sassanid Empire, under Khosrau II, invaded Jerusalem and captured the True Cross. In 630, the Emperor Heraclius restored it and rebuilt the church after recapturing the city, after Jerusalem came under Arab rule, it remained a Christian church, with the early Muslim rulers protecting the citys Christian sites. A story reports that the Caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab visited the church and stopped to pray on the balcony and he feared that future generations would misinterpret this gesture, taking it as a pretext to turn the church into a mosque. Eutychius added that Umar wrote a decree prohibiting Muslims from praying at this location, the building suffered severe damage due to an earthquake in 746. Early in the century, another earthquake damaged the dome of the Anastasis. The damage was repaired in 810 by Patriarch Thomas, in the year 841, the church suffered a fire. In 935, the Orthodox Christians prevented the construction of a Muslim mosque adjacent the Church, in 938, a new fire damaged the inside of the basilica and came close to the rotunda. In 966, due to a defeat of Muslim armies in the region of Syria, the doors and roof were burnt, and the Patriarch John VII was murdered
36.
Guy of Lusignan
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Guy of Lusignan was a French Poitevin knight, son of Hugh VIII of the Lusignan dynasty. He was king of the state of Jerusalem from 1186 to 1192 by right of marriage to Sibylla of Jerusalem. Having arrived in the Holy Land at a date, Guy was hastily married to Sibylla in 1180 to prevent a political incident within the kingdom. As Baldwins health deteriorated, Guy was appointed regent of Jerusalem, following a year of imprisonment in Damascus, Guy was released by Saladin. After being denied entry to Tyre, one of the last crusader strongholds, by Conrad of Montferrat, the siege developed into a rallying point for the Third Crusade, led by Philip Augustus of France and Sibyllas first cousin once-removed, King Richard the Lionheart. Guy entered a bitter row with Conrad over the kingship of Jerusalem, despite Richards support for Guy, Conrad was assassinated by the Hashshashin days after the election, Richards and Guys involvement in the incident is suspected, but unproven. Nevertheless, Guy was compensated for the dispossession of his crown by being given lordship of Cyprus in 1192, Guy ruled the Kingdom of Cyprus until his death in 1194, when he was succeeded by his brother Amalric. In 1168 Guy and his brothers ambushed and killed Patrick of Salisbury, 1st Earl of Salisbury and they were banished from Poitou by their overlord, Richard I, then Duke of Aquitaine. Guy went to Jerusalem at some date between 1173 and 1180, initially as a pilgrim or Crusader, Bernard Hamilton suggests that he may have arrived with the French Crusaders of 1179. In 1174, his older brother Amalric had married the daughter of Baldwin of Ibelin, Amalric had also obtained the patronage of King Baldwin IV and of his mother Agnes of Courtenay who held the county of Jaffa and Ascalon and was married to Reginald of Sidon. He was appointed Agness Constable in Jaffa, and later Constable of the Kingdom, later, hostile rumours alleged he was Agness lover, but this is questionable. Amalric of Lusignans success is likely to have facilitated Guys social and political advancement whenever he arrived, Guy and Sibylla were hastily married at Eastertide, in April 1180, to prevent this coup. By his marriage Guy also became Count of Jaffa and Ascalon in April 1180 and he and Sibylla had two daughters, Alix and Maria. Sibylla already had one child, a son from her first marriage to William of Montferrat, however, this is improbable, given the speed with which the marriage was arranged, Guy must have already been in the kingdom when the decision was made. With the new King of France, Philip II, a minor, the hope of external aid was Baldwins first cousin Henry II. Guy was a vassal of Richard of Poitou and Henry II, early in 1182, as his health markedly declined, Baldwin IV named Guy regent. However, he and Raynald of Châtillon made provocations against Saladin during a period of truce. But it was his military hesitance at the siege of Kerak which disillusioned the king with him, throughout late 1183 and 1184 Baldwin IV tried to have his sisters marriage to Guy annulled, showing that Baldwin still held his sister with some favour
37.
Poitou
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Poitou was a province of west-central France whose capital city was Poitiers. The region of Poitou was called Thifalia in the sixth century, there is a marshland called the Poitevin Marsh on the Gulf of Poitou, on the west coast of France, just north of La Rochelle and west of Niort. By the Treaty of Paris of 1259, King Henry III of England recognized his loss of continental Plantaganet territory to France. During the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries Poitou was a hotbed of Huguenot activity among the nobility, many of the Acadians who settled in what is now Nova Scotia beginning in 1604, and later in New Brunswick, came from the region of Poitou. After the Acadians were deported by the British beginning in 1755, a large portion of these refugees were also deported to Louisiana in 1785 and eventually became known as Cajuns. The common thread connecting both phenomena is an assertion of a local identity and opposition to the central government in Paris, whatever its composition. Large parts of the Angelique series of novels are set in 17th century Poitou. Count of Poitiers for a list of the Comtes de Poitou, poitou-Charentes for the present-day région including Poitiers. Poitevin, the French regional language spoken in Poitou
38.
House of Lusignan
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It also had great influence in England and France. The family originated in Poitou, near Lusignan in western France, by the end of the 11th century, the family had risen to become the most prominent petty lords in the region from their castle at Lusignan. In the late 12th century, through marriages and inheritance, a branch of the family came to control the kingdoms of Jerusalem. In the early 13th century, the main branch succeeded in the Counties of La Marche, as Crusader kings in the Latin East, they soon had connections with the Hethumid rulers of the Kingdom of Cilicia, which they inherited through marriage in the mid-14th century. The Armenian branch fled to France, and eventually Russia, after the Mamluk conquest of their kingdom, the claim was taken by the Cypriot branch, until their line failed. This kingdom was annexed by the Republic of Venice in the late 15th century, the Château de Lusignan, near Poitiers, was the principal seat of the Lusignans. It was later destroyed during the Wars of Religion, and only its foundations remain in Lusignan, according to legend, the earliest castle was built by the folklore water-spirit Melusine. The lords of the castle at Lusignan were counts of La Marche, Hugh I Hugh II Hugh III Hugh IV Hugh V Hugh VI inherited by collateral succession the County of La Marche as a descendant of Almodis. Hugh VI Hugh VII Hugh VIII Hugh IX Raoul I Raoul II Marie Hugh IXs son, Hugh X, married Isabelle of Angoulême, thus securing Angoulême. Hugh X Hugh XI Hugh XII Hugh XIII Guy Yolande Yolande sold the fiefs of Lusignan, La Marche, Angoulême and they became a part of the French royal demesne and a common appanage of the crown. In the 1170s, Amalric de Lusignan arrived in Jerusalem, having been expelled by Richard Lionheart from his realm, Amalric married Eschiva, the daughter of Baldwin of Ibelin, and entered court circles. He had also obtained the patronage of Agnes of Courtenay, the mother of King Baldwin IV. He was appointed Agnes constable in Jaffa, and later as constable of the kingdom, hostile rumours alleged he was Agnes lover, but this is questionable. Amalrics younger brother, Guy de Lusignan, arrived at some date before Easter 1180, when he arrived is quite unknown, although Ernoul said that he arrived at that time on Amalrics advice. Many modern historians believe that Guy was already established in Jerusalem by 1180. But, Amalric of Lusignans success certainly facilitated the social and political advancement of his brother Guy, Agnes was said to have foiled these plans by advising her son to have Sibylla married to Guy. As the new King of France, Philip II, was still a minor and he owed the Pope a penitential pilgrimage on account of the Thomas Becket affair. Guy was a vassal of Richard of Poitou and Henry II, Guy and Sibylla were hastily married at Eastertide 1180, apparently preventing a coup by Raymonds faction to marry her to Baldwin of Ibelin, the father-in-law of Almaric
39.
Kingdom of Cyprus
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The Kingdom of Cyprus was a Crusader kingdom on the island of Cyprus in the high and late Middle Ages, between 1192 and 1489. It was ruled by the French House of Lusignan and it comprised not only Cyprus, but also some possessions on the Anatolian mainland, Antalya between 1361 and 1373 and Corycus between 1361 and 1448. The island was conquered in 1191 by King Richard I of England during the Third Crusade, from Isaac Komnenos, an upstart local governor and self-proclaimed emperor claiming the Byzantine Empire. There were even rumours that Komnenus was secretly in league with Saladin in order to protect himself from his enemies in the Byzantine capital of Constantinople, the ruling Angelos family. Moreover, control of the island of Cyprus would provide a strategic base of operations from which to launch. The English army disembarked on the shores of Limassol and engaged the Cypriots who proved no match for the English archers, fearing treachery at the hands of the new invaders however, Komnenos fled after making this pledge to Richard and escaped to the stronghold of Kantara. The English king left garrisons in the towns and castles of the island before he departed, a subsequent revolt after Richard left for the Holy Land caused him to doubt the island as a worthwhile gain and eventually prompted him to sell the territory to the Knights Templar. The English invasion of Cyprus marked the beginning of 400 years of Western dominance on the island and it also brought the Latin church to Cyprus, which had hitherto been Orthodox in religion. Richard took them up on the offer and the Templars returned to Syria, retaining, a small minority Roman Catholic population of the island was mainly confined to some coastal cities, such as Famagusta, as well as inland Nicosia, the traditional capital. Roman Catholics kept the reins of power and control, while the Orthodox inhabitants lived in the countryside and it is unclear whether Richard gave him the territory or sold it and it is highly unlikely that Richard was ever paid even if a deal was struck. In 1194, Guy de Lusignan died without any heirs and so his brother, Amalric, became King Amalric I of Cyprus, a crown and title which was approved by Henry VI. After the death of Amalric of Lusignan, the Kingdom continually passed to a series of boys who grew up as king. The Ibelin family, which had much power in Jerusalem prior its downfall. In 1229 one of the Ibelin regents was forced out of power by Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, fredericks supporters were defeated in this struggle by 1233, although it lasted longer in the Kingdom of Jerusalem and in the Holy Roman Empire. The territory in Palestine was finally lost while Henry II was king in 1291, like Jerusalem, Cyprus had a Haute Cour, although it was less powerful than it had been in Jerusalem. The island was richer and more feudal than Jerusalem, so the king had more personal wealth, the most important vassal family was the multi-branch House of Ibelin. However, the king was often in conflict with the Italian merchants, especially because Cyprus had become the centre of European trade with Africa, the kingdom eventually came to be dominated more and more in the 14th century by the Genoese merchants. Cyprus therefore sided with the Avignon Papacy in the Great Schism, House of Brienne and several others
40.
Ottoman Empire
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After 1354, the Ottomans crossed into Europe, and with the conquest of the Balkans the Ottoman Beylik was transformed into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the 1453 conquest of Constantinople by Mehmed the Conqueror, at the beginning of the 17th century the empire contained 32 provinces and numerous vassal states. Some of these were later absorbed into the Ottoman Empire, while others were granted various types of autonomy during the course of centuries. With Constantinople as its capital and control of lands around the Mediterranean basin, while the empire was once thought to have entered a period of decline following the death of Suleiman the Magnificent, this view is no longer supported by the majority of academic historians. The empire continued to maintain a flexible and strong economy, society, however, during a long period of peace from 1740 to 1768, the Ottoman military system fell behind that of their European rivals, the Habsburg and Russian Empires. While the Empire was able to hold its own during the conflict, it was struggling with internal dissent. Starting before World War I, but growing increasingly common and violent during it, major atrocities were committed by the Ottoman government against the Armenians, Assyrians and Pontic Greeks. The word Ottoman is an anglicisation of the name of Osman I. Osmans name in turn was the Turkish form of the Arabic name ʿUthmān, in Ottoman Turkish, the empire was referred to as Devlet-i ʿAlīye-yi ʿOsmānīye, or alternatively ʿOsmānlı Devleti. In Modern Turkish, it is known as Osmanlı İmparatorluğu or Osmanlı Devleti, the Turkish word for Ottoman originally referred to the tribal followers of Osman in the fourteenth century, and subsequently came to be used to refer to the empires military-administrative elite. In contrast, the term Turk was used to refer to the Anatolian peasant and tribal population, the term Rūmī was also used to refer to Turkish-speakers by the other Muslim peoples of the empire and beyond. In Western Europe, the two names Ottoman Empire and Turkey were often used interchangeably, with Turkey being increasingly favored both in formal and informal situations and this dichotomy was officially ended in 1920–23, when the newly established Ankara-based Turkish government chose Turkey as the sole official name. Most scholarly historians avoid the terms Turkey, Turks, and Turkish when referring to the Ottomans, as the power of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum declined in the 13th century, Anatolia was divided into a patchwork of independent Turkish principalities known as the Anatolian Beyliks. One of these beyliks, in the region of Bithynia on the frontier of the Byzantine Empire, was led by the Turkish tribal leader Osman, osmans early followers consisted both of Turkish tribal groups and Byzantine renegades, many but not all converts to Islam. Osman extended the control of his principality by conquering Byzantine towns along the Sakarya River and it is not well understood how the early Ottomans came to dominate their neighbours, due to the scarcity of the sources which survive from this period. One school of thought which was popular during the twentieth century argued that the Ottomans achieved success by rallying religious warriors to fight for them in the name of Islam, in the century after the death of Osman I, Ottoman rule began to extend over Anatolia and the Balkans. Osmans son, Orhan, captured the northwestern Anatolian city of Bursa in 1326 and this conquest meant the loss of Byzantine control over northwestern Anatolia. The important city of Thessaloniki was captured from the Venetians in 1387, the Ottoman victory at Kosovo in 1389 effectively marked the end of Serbian power in the region, paving the way for Ottoman expansion into Europe
Cyprus
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